Design your own Civ VI civ

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

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Here's an old list of Civ ideas I made in 2018. I never really elaborated or expanded on most of these, but if anyone here wants to use these as a building block, be my guest.

Also, disclaimer: These ideas were made when I was 12, so I obviously wasn't comprehending the controversiality of some of these people, lol.

Lol. At first I thought you found a possible leak for Civ 7 base game and my first instinct was well they are going even bolder now.

 

[Problemedical]

Greetings! I have an addition to my Ukrainian civ concept and I'd love to share it with you guys.
Enter Daniel I (of Galicia), the first King of Rus'/Ruthenia and an alternative leader for both my Ukrainian civ (#971) and my upcoming Kievan Rus/Ruthenia civ.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_of_Galicia
Daniels' Leader Ability: "The Second Solomon"
+50% Production towards Walls. Each level of Walls provides +1 Amenity, +20 Loyalty and +20% towards constructon of Holy Site, Commercial Hub, Sich and Industrial Zone districts. +50% border growth in city with Walls.
Daniel's Unique Unit: Oruzhnick
A powerful Man-at-Arms replacement. Cheaper to build, +5 Combat Strength, can move after promoting. Gets a free Promotion if built in a city with Walls.
Please let me know what you think about this, and hope you all having a great day (evening if you're in my time zone )

 

[Zaarin]

Lol. At first I thought you found a possible leak for Civ 7 base game and my first instinct was well they are going even bolder now.

They took to heart the advice that the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.

 

[Birch617]

So here is my idea for another Indigenous Mesoamerican civ that i feel is missing from the game, the Purepecha (Tarascan is offensive to em btw), which not only has its unique culture that separated em from other Mesoamerican people as they also were a rival state to the Aztecs, stopping their northern expansion.
I tried to make em Religion Focus with a maybe more generalist ability that could allow them to pursue any victory.


Purepecha:

Civ Ability: Fabled City of Hummingbirds

Encampments, Industrial Zones, Mines and Quarries don’t lower the appeal of tiles, Land and Religious unit get +7 combat strength when produced on cities with at least 9 Breathtaking Tiles, additional +4 combat strength if more than 12 tiles have that same level of appeal.

Strategic Resources on High Appeal tiles are revealed without the need to research their technologies.

Civ Leader: Taríacuri

Leader Ability: Will of Curicaueri

Before founding a Religion, all Purepecha Units get +10 combat strength against City State units and killing them grants a small amount of Great Prophet points. After getting a Religion the combat strength is reduced to +5 combat strength but killing City State units now spread the Purepecha Religion to all nearby City States.

Conquering a City State grants +1 appeal to every tile on that City; for every City State and conquered City State that follows the Purepecha Religion, the cost of purchasing units with Faith is reduced by a very small percent.

Unique Unit: Quangariecha (Swordman Replacement)

o Only requires 10 Iron.

o +5 Combat Strength against units that don't use Strategic Resources, double while inside of Purepecha Territory

o While inside of Purepecha Territory, heals a small amount of health at the end of every turn, adjacent units that also use strategic heal a small amount as well

Unique District: Yacata (Holy Site Replacement)

o Cheaper to build.

o Grants +1 appeal to all tiles in the City.

o Can be placed on top of Strategic Resources, allowing the player to buy units that use that Strategic Resource with Faith; all improved copies of that strategic resources get +1 Faith from the Yacata and every building the district has.

 

[Birch617]

Another Mesoamerican Civ idea i got cuz yeah idk i just feel like writing em and sharing ;D

Mixtec:

Civ Ability: Ñuu Dzahui

Civics that grant Envoys are researched a 50% faster and getting their Inspirations gives an additional +1 Envoy.

Cities that aren’t settled on freshwater give +1 production to Plantations and +1 food to tiles adjacent to improved hills.

+2 housing for every City state that you are a Suzerain on Cities not settled on freshwater.

Civ Leader: Eigth Deer

Leader Ability: Legacy at the hand of the Chaa Chii

Increase Great People Generation from Districts and buildings on the Mixtec Capital and conquered Capitals, retiring a Great Person of a specific type grant a small burst of Great People points of another type, the amount increase during a Golden Age.

o Great Generals grant Great Writer Points

o Great Writers grant Great Artist Points

o Great Artist grant Great Scientist Points

o Great Scientist grant Great Merchant points

Great Works of Writing grant +2 Loyalty on Conquered Cities


Unique Unit: Zandaru (Spearman Replacement)

o Appears on a later technology that the unit it replaces.

o Same combat strength as a Swordman

o Gains additional experience when fighting a melee unit.

o Promoting fully heals if adjacent to a Great Person

Unique Improvement: Coo Yuu

o Can be unlocked by researching Masonry or Irrigation.

o Can only be build on hills

o +1 Food +1 Production +0.5 Housing

o Gives + 1 Housing on cities not settled on Freshwaters instead of +0.5 Housing

o +1 Food per adjacent Plantation.

o +1 Production when adjacent to at least 2 other Coo Yuu

o Cities with at least 5 or more Coo Yuu get and small boost of production towards Ancient and Medieval Walls.

 

[Birch617]

More Civs designs Cuz yeah why not ;p
Lakota:

Civ Ability: Great Mystery

After fully evangelizing your religion, you can use another Apostle to evangelize an additional Non-Worship Belief or Pantheon to your religion (Pretty Much Theodora Ability in Civ 5).

Holy Wars have the Grievances halved and during the first 10 turns of a Holy War, Faith purchasing units is cheaper.

Stealing Tiles with Culture bomb deal damage to City centers, its defenses and adjacent unit if the Lakota are at war with that Civilization (or City-State)

Civ Leader: Sitting Bull

Leader Ability: Mission from the Great Spirit

Pillaging tiles always give a small amount of faith, increase faith yields if the pillage is performed by a calvary unit, the Depredation promotion becomes a Tier I promotion for all Calvary units.

Can buy Light Calvary units with faith.


Unique Unit: Sunka Wakan (Renaissance Era Light Calvary)

o Requires 10 Horses to Train

o 210 Production cost

o 1 Gold maintenance

o Suffers no penalties against Anti-Calvary

o 52 Combat Strength

o +1 Movement when starting a turn on Plains

o 1 build charge to make a Tipi

Unique Improvement: Tipi

o Unlocked at Animal Husbandry; Built by Builders and Sunka Wakan

o Always Culture Bomb when place adjacent to a border (except if there another Tipi adjacent to it

o +0.5 Housing +1 Gold

o Doubles the terrain yields if placed on Plains and Plains Hills

o +0.5 Housing per 2 adjacent Tipi; with later technologies turn into +0.5 per adjacent Tipi

o +1 Food per adjacent camp and pastures

 

[Zaarin]

Civ Ability: Ghost Dance

After fully evangelizing your religion, you can use another Apostle to evangelize an additional Non-Worship Belief or Pantheon to your religion (Pretty Much Theodora Ability in Civ 5).

Given how the Lakhota distorted the Ghost Dance, I'd much rather see a Wovoka-led Paiute with a Ghost Dance ability.

 

[Birch617]

Given how the Lakhota distorted the Ghost Dance, I'd much rather see a Wovoka-led Paiute with a Ghost Dance ability.

True, do you have a suggestion for a different name for the ability?

Another Civ design cuz i'm bored and somewhat feeling very creative lately idk, so i choose to do an Ojibwe Civ design, originally was planning to do an Anishinaabe civ design but i ended up splitting into an Ojibwe civ and an Odawa one (i'm having trouble in choosing leaders cuz Pontiac comes to mind but maybe there a better choice like Andrew Blackbird but idk)

Ojibwe

Civ Ability: Wiigwaasabak

Campus and Theather Squares get +1 Great Writer Points for every two adjacent Lumbermills, gets a free Builder after researching the Construction Technology if the city has one of these districts.

Lumbermills get +1 Culture for every two adjacent Districts.

Every time a Great Work of Writing is created in a city get a burst of production equal as chopping a Woods feature.

Civ Leader: Hanging Cloud

Leader Ability: Full Warrior of the Bear Clan

Gets access to an additional Unique Building and Unit.

Gains a free Military Policy slot after building 5 Doodems

Unique Leader Building: Doodem (Monument Replacement)

o Double the loyalty as the Monument

o +1 Slot for Great Work of Writing

o Grants a Ogichidaakwe once the technology for its reached

Unique Leader Unit: Ogichidaakwe (Replaces the Musketman)

o Can only be gained from building a Doodem

o Starts with an amount of initial experience for every era since its Doodem was built

o No Maintenance cost

o Lower Combat Strength than the unit it replaces

o No movement penalties on Woods

Unique Unit: Jiimaan (Replaces the Galley)

o Lower production cost

o 26 Combat strength

o +3 Combat strength for each adjacent land tile with a Woods; increase into +5 if the Woods tiles is improved

o Gains Great Writer points from Kills

Unique Buildings: Tribal College (Replaces the Research Lab) (In-Game look would look like the Red Lake Nation College, an Ojibwe Tribal College)

o Cheaper to build; Same Base Effects

o +1 slot for a Great Work of Writing

o +1 Amenity

o For every Two Great Works of Writing on the City, all District get +1 Adjacent bonus from the Campus

 

[Zaarin]

True, do you have a suggestion for a different name for the ability?

Wakan Tanka or its translation Great Mystery.

Pontiac

I wouldn't go with Pontiac myself. Scholarly consensus is that he was not as influential as white people thought he was, and his fellow rebels generally regarded him as reckless and irresponsible, causing him to lose most of the influence he had by the end of the uprising that bears his name. I don't necessarily have a better suggestion for the Odawa, though.

 

[Birch617]

Wakan Tanka or its translation Great Mystery.


I wouldn't go with Pontiac myself. Scholarly consensus is that he was not as influential as white people thought he was, and his fellow rebels generally regarded him as reckless and irresponsible, causing him to lose most of the influence he had by the end of the uprising that bears his name. I don't necessarily have a better suggestion for the Odawa, though.

Thanks for your suggestions, alredy change the name
Also yeah i had heard something similar about Pontiac, so i guess Andrew Blakcbird would be better

 

[Birch617]

Finally finish this one, i'm a bit iffy about the Lake dependent design cuz in my experience i kinda don't see that much lakes in my games or if they are a lot on a map they tend to be kinda small sometimes so idk, i still like the idea
Odawa

Civ Ability: Traders of the Great Lakes

Lake tiles get +1 Culture and Mines on cities with at least one Lake tile get +1 Production, this bonuses double if the City Center is adjacent to a Lake tile.

After Foreign Trade is unlocked, all Cities settle adjacent to a Lake get +1 Trade Route capacity and a free Trader, Internal Trade get +2 Culture for each Lake tile in the destination, International Trade routes get +2 Gold for each Lake tile at destination, additional +1 Faith for each Lake tile if the city follows the Odawa Religion.

Traders can be bought with Faith.

Civ Leader: Andrew Blackbird

Leader Ability: Historian of the Anishinaabe

The Diplomatic Quarter and its building increase Trade Route capacity if adjacent to Coastal City or a City center adjacent to a Lake tile.

The Palace get +2 Slots for Artifacts, Archeological Museums are cheaper to build and training an Archeologist always grants a Eureka or Inspiration.

Artifacts of Odawa origin give +4 Loyalty and increase religious pressure by +3% when placed on a city. Excavating Artifacts on the Capital’s continent always grant a small burst culture.

Unique Unit: Gunstock War Club (Pike and Shot Replacement)

o Lower Production cost

o +12 combat strength against units that use Niter

o Gains the Promotion tree of Melee units.

o Unlocked early at Cartography

Unique Building: Midewigamig (Temple Replacement).

o Cheaper to Build

o Its Relic slot can also hold Great Works of Writing and Artifacts

o All Religious Units start with Chaplain promotion

o Gurus created on this City can use their healing charges as religion spreads

 

[TyrannusRex]

Don't really have much of an idea for how he'd work at the moment, but what would you all think maybe about Ptolemy I dual-leading Egypt and Macedon?
(And before anyone complains about Cleopatra, yes. We all know. Sit down.)

 

[Zaarin]

Don't really have much of an idea for how he'd work at the moment, but what would you all think maybe about Ptolemy I dual-leading Egypt and Macedon?
(And before anyone complains about Cleopatra, yes. We all know. Sit down.)

Although he was Macedonian, Ptolemy I never led Macedon in any fashion. I'm also personally not a fan of the "one leader, two civs" gimmick; it cheapens leaders as the face of their civ. When it was just an excuse to include Eleanor, it was annoying but tolerable--but I'm even less fond of the gimmick since it ceased to be the one-off "Eleanor gimmick." As for Ptolemy himself, I'd be more interested in seeing Seleucus I Nicator than Ptolemy I Soter--but the game is so drenched in Hellenes I'm not too sure I need a Seleucid civ, either. Maybe Civ7 could roll all its Classical Hellenes into one Hellenistic civ covering the Greeks, Macedonians, and Diadochi successor states?

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Thanks for your suggestions, alredy change the name
Also yeah i had heard something similar about Pontiac, so i guess Andrew Blakcbird would be better

For an Odawa leader, how about Egushawa (or Agushaway, Agashawa, Gushgushagwa, or Negushwa - the man's name could be spelled almost as many different ways as Billy Shakspeers!). He was an Ottawa (one of several variants of 'Odawa') chief, supported the French in the French & Indian War, then the British in the Revolutionary War, led a large contingent of Ojibwa, Ottawa, and Potawatomi at St Clair's Defeat (1791 - the worst defeat ever suffered by US forces at the hands of the Native Americans, so bad they never even gave it a formal name!) and helped the British recruit native allies during the Revolutionary War. Was one of the last Native chiefs to sign a treaty with the US after the war.

Although he was Macedonian, Ptolemy I never led Macedon in any fashion. I'm also personally not a fan of the "one leader, two civs" gimmick; it cheapens leaders as the face of their civ. When it was just an excuse to include Eleanor, it was annoying but tolerable--but I'm even less fond of the gimmick since it ceased to be the one-off "Eleanor gimmick." As for Ptolemy himself, I'd be more interested in seeing Seleucus I Nicator than Ptolemy I Soter--but the game is so drenched in Hellenes I'm not too sure I need a Seleucid civ, either. Maybe Civ7 could roll all its Classical Hellenes into one Hellenistic civ covering the Greeks, Macedonians, and Diadochi successor states?

Ptolemy Soter is strictly an Egyptian leader: there's no evidence that his family had even regional leadership in Macedonia. On the other hand, of all the Successors (Diadochii) he managed to found a dynasty in Egypt that outlasted all the other Successor Kingdoms by 35 - 250 years, making him by far the most successful of the Hellenistic rulers, including Alexander, at least in terms of longevity.

On the other hand, there's something to be said for a Leader called Demetrios Poliorcetes: "Demetrios Beseiger of Cities": talk about advertising your playstyle . . .

 

[Zaarin]

Ptolemy Soter is strictly an Egyptian leader: there's no evidence that his family had even regional leadership in Macedonia. On the other hand, of all the Successors (Diadochii) he managed to found a dynasty in Egypt that outlasted all the other Successor Kingdoms by 35 - 250 years, making him by far the most successful of the Hellenistic rulers, including Alexander, at least in terms of longevity.

He did, but the Seleucids were much more successful at integrating themselves into the local politics, whereas the Ptolemies stayed aloof from the Egyptians, whom they looked down upon. The Seleucids intermarried with Persian and Babylonian noble families, maintained the old temples, and pretty much adopted the Perso-Babylonian bureaucracy wholesale (which, TBH, is the same as to say they maintained the old temples).

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

He did, but the Seleucids were much more successful at integrating themselves into the local politics, whereas the Ptolemies stayed aloof from the Egyptians, whom they looked down upon. The Seleucids intermarried with Persian and Babylonian noble families, maintained the old temples, and pretty much adopted the Perso-Babylonian bureaucracy wholesale (which, TBH, is the same as to say they maintained the old temples).

Not to start a purely historical discussion here, but the Seleucids were building on a structure set up by the Persians in their Empire in which local, non-Persian (or Macedonian) administration remained fundamentally important in running things, and the Persian Satraps regularly intermarried with the local nobility - Mazaevashta (Mazaeus) , the Persian Satrap of Babylon for 20 years before Alexander conquered it, had a Babylonian wife and apparently was fluent in both court and local languages. In Egypt, by contrast, there was no 'local administration' - everything centered on the Pharaoh's Central Administration (and, like any Central Administration, they generated a huge mass of 'papyruswork' - a large percentage of the papyrus documents that have survived are basically, Ancient Egyptian Red Tape!). That meant that the Ptolemy's and Seleucids had to use different techniques to make their empires work, because the underlying administrative/political structure was different and encouraged the differing techniques that each wound up using.
On the other hand, it was Ptolemaic Egypt that managed the most lucrative fusion of Greek and Middle Eastern science in the faculty and facilities of the Mouseion (Great Library) at Alexandria: Galen, Euclid, Ptolemy, Dioscorides, Theon - only Euclid was a native of Alexandria, the rest 'migrated' there from other Greek or Hellenistic cities, because That was the place to do 'scientific' work, and their resulting compendiums and synthesis of Greek natural philosophy and middle eastern observation and experimentation was the basis for the later Arabic and European Medieval scientific advances, an influence that, I would argue, lasted much longer than any political or even cultural influences the Seleucids left behind in Mesopotamia and its surroundings.

 

[TyrannusRex]

I mean... Gandhi never led India in any fashion, nor really Pericles with Greece, either.

 

[Zaarin]

I mean... Gandhi never led India in any fashion, nor really Pericles with Greece, either.

You'll note Gandhi is also an unpopular choice with the more historically minded CivFanatics, too. He's also rather alone on that front; every other civ leader had some leadership role in their civ, including Pericles.

 

[TyrannusRex]

You'll note Gandhi is also an unpopular choice with the more historically minded CivFanatics, too. He's also rather alone on that front; every other civ leader had some leadership role in their civ, including Pericles.

To play devil's advocate, while he didn't hold a proper political office, he was at the head of the Indian National Congress, I do believe. Similarly, Pericles headed the democratic faction of Athenian politics, he just also happened to be a strategos (general) which apparently was an elected position back then.

Personally, I don't mind the choice of Gandhi because I know that Civ is basically one big summary of history and culture, and the individual factions are meant to only hit the broad strokes.

(I don't see anyone complain about Gilgamesh or Kupe that much, and they probably didn't exist.)

 

[Zaarin]

To play devil's advocate, while he didn't hold a proper political office, he was at the head of the Indian National Congress, I do believe. Similarly, Pericles headed the democratic faction of Athenian politics, he just also happened to be a strategos (general) which apparently was an elected position back then.

Personally, I don't mind the choice of Gandhi because I know that Civ is basically one big summary of history and culture, and the individual factions are meant to only hit the broad strokes.

I was critiquing him by the standards you presented, not my own; my personal complaint against Gandhi is that he's not really representative of India's history, which is far from pacific. Plus the "Nuclear Gandhi" joke has gotten very stale.

I don't see anyone complain about Gilgamesh or Kupe that much, and they probably didn't exist.

1) Most scholars agree Gilgamesh existed; several contemporary-ish (we don't know exactly when he lived) mention him. It's harder to say whether Kupe existed; oral history is often remarkably accurate, but there's no way to independently verify it in this case. IMO the Civ6 leader least likely to have existed is Tomyris. 2) I've complained about Gilgamesh a lot, particularly his (visual) design and the design of the Sumer civ on his account. People also complained about the choice of Kupe over historical Maori chiefs when the civ was announced, but I think a lot of people have come to accept him because he's such a fun character, a lot like CdM.