InsidiousMage
Emperor
- Joined
- Jan 3, 2021
- Messages
- 1,165
I was going to put in the issue in the title but that would make it unnecessarily long. In another thread some suggested Muhammad Ali Pasha a leader for Egypt, who would be a perfectly fine leader, but he's ethnically Albanian which got me thinking about how long Egypt was ruled by non-Egyptian dynasties. You start with Pharaonic dynasties, which still included some non-Egyptian dynasties, then you have Persian domination, the Ptolemies (Greco-Macedonian), Roman domination, Arab domination under the Caliphate, the Tulunids (a Mamluk dynasty), the Ikhshidids (Mamluks ruling in the name of the Abbasids), the Fatimids, then Saladin and the Ayyubids (Kurdish in origin), The Mamluks, then Ottoman and finally British domination until independence in the 1920s. Outside of the Pharaohs, you don't get a native Egyptian ruler until the modern period which means that any native Egyptian ruler in the game is going to have to be a Pharaoh, given Firaxis's preference against using modern leaders. Obviously, the Pharaohs ruled for a long time, almost 3,000 years, but they feel of a kind in way that, say, the Achaemenids, Parthians, and Sasanids don't feel. I can't really think of any other possible Civ that would have a similar dynamic but I'll admit to my own limited knowledge in the matter.
As a bit of a side note, although Firaxis prefers the obvious, well-known choices for civs and leaders, I wonder how much the lack of post-Pharaonic "native" rulers would be a limiting factor for them if they wanted to do someone other than a Pharaoh.
As a bit of a side note, although Firaxis prefers the obvious, well-known choices for civs and leaders, I wonder how much the lack of post-Pharaonic "native" rulers would be a limiting factor for them if they wanted to do someone other than a Pharaoh.