Future Civics

[Plankhead]

If we're looking to add a future age to the game, we might as well start thinking about new civics for them. Here are my suggestions:

Government: Robotocracy
Upkeep: None
Effects: +25% health and research
Governed by artificial intelligence. Whee!

Legal: Utopia
Upkeep: High
Effects: +10 Happiness, -75% Culture
Make everything really really perfect. Of course, this kind of defeats the purpose of art, so there's a culture hit.

Labor: Hivemind
Upkeep: High
Effects: 33% faster improvements, research, production
Telepathic thingies make everyone behave almost as one organism.

Economic: Data Currency
Upkeep: None
Effects: -50% research costs, +1 gold per turn per tech nobody else has researched
Information is the only form of currency.

Not sure about one for religious.

 

[WildWeazel]

From the way religion and government are heading (nobody start a flamewar over this), it looks like a future civic might be one that allows all religions but discourages public promotion of it. So maybe happy faces for each religion, but no spread of religion? So it would be good for civs that already have religious diversity.

 

[ConnorstheGreat]

I would like to see Data Currency have a negative effect as well, maybe a culture hit?

 

[tdb]

Robotocracy seems rather overpowered with the 25% research bonus and no upkeep. Maybe it could have a chance of randomly losing control of the AI, inducing one turn of anarchy?

 

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Why not change it to the old Tecnocracy of CivII?

 

[Spatzimaus]

My future mod already has 6; I'm going for 10, with 2 in each category. I drew them from Alpha Centauri, so off the top of my head:

Green (Government): +1 food per Town, +2 health per specialist
Knowledge (Legal): adds to research, and all civs without Knowledge get a commerce penalty
Thought Control (Legal): can rush with people, and I forget what else I gave it
Cybernetic (Labor): +1 production per specialist, can rush with money
Planned (Economy): +2 gp per trade route, no maintenance cost due to number of cities
Eudaimonia (Religion): adds to culture and happiness

Still working on it.

 

[Colonel Kraken]

Why not change it to the old Tecnocracy of CivII?

Read my mind.

 

[Kissamies]

Downside of Robotocracy should be decreaced happiness or culture. Some people are bound not to like being governed by machines. Calling it Cybercracy or Technocracy would make it sound less silly. It could alternatively be a Legal civic, in which case it represents administration and legistration controlled by a computer system.

One Goverment civic I can think of is Democracy enchanced with technology so that every citizen can discuss and vote on day to day matters if he or she chooses to. Could be called Cybernetic or Net Democracy. Should be like Universal Suffrage on stereoids or perhaps just US with some Representation characteristics added, but the upkeep should be pretty high.

 

[Steenreem]

Right em, ideas. I don't know how much is possible so most of the effects are pretty simple and regular:
Religion: (how the state handles ppl's believes)
- Manipulation (medium upkeep, +production -war weariness/hapiness) (government sends in ppl to lie about religion and change the founding ideas of the religion. the new ideas say you have to work hard etc. (+production, -war weariness). old ppl do not like the new ideas (-hapiness).
- Persecution (high upkeep)
should over time remove all non-state religions from your cities. I suppose ppl will be mad but the state-religion ppl will be happy so maybe.. it evens up?

Also: there could be a new religion: Destination. People believe that there is no chance or choice: everything is set. (-production/war weariness)

Government: (how decisions are made)
- Internet Voting (low upkeep, +happiness/health -production/commerce) (people can now vote for everything since it's so easy with the internet! (+happiness) less politicians required (low upkeep). less time for people to work (-production). O and ofcourse they are not smart enough to make good decision all they care about is health(-production/commerce))
- Machine Ruling(no/low upkeep, no maintenance costs) (no more politicians!)
- Totalitarian(high upkeep, -war weariness) (camera's watching everyone)

Economics: (how work is organised)
- Collective: (high upkeep, +production, -culture) (work is organised through a collective mind. you can let others read your thoughts.)
- Moblization (no upkeep, +big production, -big health) (something big is happening. we've got to produce as much as we can, even if we bring waste and trash to our land! ) (will cause cities to shrink)
- Megapolics (+production, -culture) (man decides to build infrastructure etc. in 3d. Cities and roads are built over each other. The whole earth is covered in city and factory.)

Legal: (what laws there are)
- Cloning (medium upkeep, +birth rate bonus, -happiness)
- Natureneering (low upkeep, +production/health, -happiness) (engineering own plants/animals etc.)
- Artificial Selection (high upkeep, +production/birthrate, -big hapiness) (ppl who are not smart enough or work less are sentenced to death while smart/hardworking people are bred. More great ppl are born (+birthrate).

Labor: (how work is done)
- Cybernetics(low/medium upkeep, +production, -health)
- Robot Labor(high upkeep, workers build improvements faster, +production)
- De-emotion Drugs (low upkeep, +happiness, -culture)

 

[AgnosticMonk]

A robotacracy (I do prefer cybercracy, but technocracy is a government run by technical elites, not by machines) would be a rather far future Civic, but I could forsee a computerized bureacracy (not sure what it should be named though, perhaps cybercracy should fit that better) as a Legal Civic.

Virtual Democracy can be also be taken from Civ 3, but should have the fault of being vulnerable to manipulation and spies. Technocracy is a good old favorite, but I'm not sure it should be completely a governmental Civic, as they'd still need a systemic justification for thier power. In terms of mining Civ 3 for ideas I think there should be corporate "democracy" in another, less ridiculously utopian form, Syndaclism would provide a good Governmental Civic, neutral enough where it could be for the common good, realistic enough where it can make a balance with its cyberpunk dystopian
counterpart.

Utopia is rather.....loaded. If you read most dystopian novels, it contains a large amount of people who believe they are living in paradise while the rest feel they live in hell. Perhaps instead, Social Order or Social Engineering as Labor or Legal Civics? It suggests the attempt at creating a utopia, without neccesarily suggest its so as well as the idea that they are ordering society around scientific principles to create "harmony".

Ecology itself is already a future Civic really, but Green as government doesn't quite work, because it isn't a system, its more of a goal. Eudomonia I think would work better as a Labor, Legal Civic or Economic Civic given its a government that tries best to give people the freedom to live their lives and improve themselves to their fullest potential.

State Atheism isn't really a future Civ per se, but should have been included, and might fit more or less into the future. I like the idea of Cybernetics as labor. Not as people being modified by machines, but labor itself being organized by computers, if thats what you meant. Artificial Selection should be a Labor Civic as well I'd think, because its like a techonological Caste System. Breeding the best people to do their jobs the best, but its a great idea (well, for a game anyway ). Instead of robot labor, Mechanized Labor might be better. It'd work as a very modern idea and expand well into the future too. Instead of de-emotion drugs perhaps just something like Chemical Control or something along those lines.

I really do want to add more future Civics and technologies to the game, as that was the ONLY good thing about Civ 2. Though, I think there is still some editting need for past and present.

 

[maxpublic]

Utopia is rather.....loaded. If you read most dystopian novels, it contains a large amount of people who believe they are living in paradise while the rest feel they live in hell. Perhaps instead, Social Order or Social Engineering as Labor or Legal Civics? It suggests the attempt at creating a utopia, without neccesarily suggest its so as well as the idea that they are ordering society around scientific principles to create "harmony".

I'll second that. Most ideas of "Utopia" I've heard of always involve forcing person X's views of The Way Things Should Be(TM) on everyone else, at gunpoint if they aren't 'enlightened' enough to adopt it voluntarily. I don't see how you can have any sort of utopia that didn't include as its core tenet "piss off and mind your own business".

Ecology itself is already a future Civic really, but Green as government doesn't quite work, because it isn't a system, its more of a goal. Eudomonia I think would work better as a Labor, Legal Civic or Economic Civic given its a government that tries best to give people the freedom to live their lives and improve themselves to their fullest potential.

On this I think you're wrong. Extremist environmentalists would be quite happy seizing government and forcing their policies on everyone else - at gunpoint, like I mentioned above. Their utopia, everyone else's Ninth Circle of Hell. Imagine the human misery that would result from an extremist environmentalist government....

Max

 

[Reveilled]

I'll second that. Most ideas of "Utopia" I've heard of always involve forcing person X's views of The Way Things Should Be(TM) on everyone else, at gunpoint if they aren't 'enlightened' enough to adopt it voluntarily. I don't see how you can have any sort of utopia that didn't include as its core tenet "piss off and mind your own business".



On this I think you're wrong. Extremist environmentalists would be quite happy seizing government and forcing their policies on everyone else - at gunpoint, like I mentioned above. Their utopia, everyone else's Ninth Circle of Hell. Imagine the human misery that would result from an extremist environmentalist government....

Max

But wouldn't that just be a police state government with environmentalism as the economy civic?

The way I see it, the Government civic only deals with how the leaders of the country are chosen. The policies of those leaders once in power are determined by the other civics.

EDIT: Ooo, hey! Post 100!

 

[AgnosticMonk]

But wouldn't that just be a police state government with environmentalism as the economy civic?

The way I see it, the Government civic only deals with how the leaders of the country are chosen. The policies of those leaders once in power are determined by the other civics.

Yeah, exactly how I see it. Which is part of my problem with figuring out if Technocracy or Syndaclism should be government civics. Syndaclism suggests that the government is run as a corporate entity, where all labor (whatever rights it may or may not have) is organized and paid by said entity which functions as a profit seeking organization. At the same time you could have such a nation be run as a police state, or even maintain some forms of democracy (or heck, even heriditary rule), yet it might also be easily describe as a government that takes the form of a corporation as well, and could even concievably allow internal competition (either free market or mercantilism) or be like the aforementioned governmental entity and have the state property civic.

The same can be said of Technocracy, as a Legal Civic vs. a Government Civic. It could easily be chosen by representitve leaders, come about somewhat democratically, or be absolutist. At the same time, it can easily be beaucratic, or potentially even value free speech.

The determinant I suppose will be a legitmacy test. That is, which one legitimates its rule, as democracys, monarchies and all other governments do. Corporate governments don't, in and of themselves, legitimate their rule. They'd need a seperate system for that, whichever it may be. Technocracy on the other hand is the concept that people with scientific knowledge should run society, which could be forseen as a secular Confucianism on a scientific level, with knowledge proving ones role in society and granting people access to administrative power. Yet, even that definition as much makes it a valid Legal Civic so I am not yet sure on that one. I think I lean towards Legal Civic though, because its more an establishment of who the elites of society are, more then what system they operate under.

 

[maxpublic]

But wouldn't that just be a police state government with environmentalism as the economy civic?

The way I see it, the Government civic only deals with how the leaders of the country are chosen. The policies of those leaders once in power are determined by the other civics.

In Civ terms I think the form of government - other than how efficient it is - isn't that important. It's the policies it implements that determine how it's going to shape the society it rules. So whether it's a representative government (democracy, republic) or a non-representative government (dictatorship, oligarchy) really doesn't mean a great deal. For example, both Nazi Germany and the Stalin-era Soviet Union were garden-variety dictatorships, yet the policies they imposed on their people were very different, and had different consequences. Nazi Germany wasn't any less efficient than the United States nor did it lag behind in research capability, yet the Soviet Union was grossly inefficient in both areas by comparsion.

But in order to get an Ecotopia you either have to have an incredibly brutal dictatorship directed by fanatical environmentalists, or a state composed entirely of Borg drones, except for those at the top. I don't see how you could get an Ecotopia-like entity without one of these conditions. Such a government by it's very nature would be anti-rights, anti-individualist, and generally anti-human.

Max

 

[Reveilled]

In Civ terms I think the form of government - other than how efficient it is - isn't that important. It's the policies it implements that determine how it's going to shape the society it rules. So whether it's a representative government (democracy, republic) or a non-representative government (dictatorship, oligarchy) really doesn't mean a great deal. For example, both Nazi Germany and the Stalin-era Soviet Union were garden-variety dictatorships, yet the policies they imposed on their people were very different, and had different consequences. Nazi Germany wasn't any less efficient than the United States nor did it lag behind in research capability, yet the Soviet Union was grossly inefficient in both areas by comparsion.

But in order to get an Ecotopia you either have to have an incredibly brutal dictatorship directed by fanatical environmentalists, or a state composed entirely of Borg drones, except for those at the top. I don't see how you could get an Ecotopia-like entity without one of these conditions. Such a government by it's very nature would be anti-rights, anti-individualist, and generally anti-human.

Max

Nevertheless, wouldn't this be represented by a police state with an environmentalist economy? Nazi Germany and the USSR were different, yet one would be a Police State with (probably) Mercantilism, and the other a Police State with State Property. Both would still have a police state government civic.

 

[AgnosticMonk]

I think the forms of representation, or non-representation depending, really matter more then the politics in my opinion. As far as I'm concerned ANY political group would sooner establish their own ideals over consent and democracy given a choice between the two, but they'd all rather have both. Its more a matter of the reality of the system they operate through. Its both a matter of their legitimation and the social tools that it grants them. Democracy merely needs the consent of the people, and given that the Nazis were voted into power, its not hard to imagine that a desperate society could give itself over to ANY form of extremism, and most power groups would generally prefer consent and would build off of it. They'd rather have the hearts and minds of the people then not. Fundamentalist governments have operated through democracy, so why not those you despise? As for the system your imagining, it could simply be a Police State, with Social Engineering, any sort of labor, Ecological Economy and State Atheism or Paganism, whichever you imagine they go for.

Oh, also Plankhead, I do like the idea of alternate currency, but instead of data currency, it'd be nice if there is some way you could switch to an energy based economy like in Alpha Centari after discovering a tech, but I have no idea how'd that be implemented. Perhaps just have power sources and the like start developing currency, or something. Probably not that, but its an idea worth sorting around in my head for a while.

For ideas like Hive Mind or other things quite beyond human limits there can be a "Transhuman" Era, where people start adapting technology to the human body and techonolgy replaces ideology sort of like Schismatrix. There could be evolutionary psychics or similar mutations, those who believe in cybernetic modification, others who side with genetic engineering, and those who believe in the purity of human form. That would be of course if it were to be made for the VERY far future though.

 

[Kissamies]

Utopia is more like a perfect society that can't be reached, but should be strived for. Don't think it should exist as a civic. Some ruler might declare his combination of civics an utopia, but it's likely to be a dystopia.

One possible not-so-future civic is Meritocracy. Could be goverment, possibly legal civic, or perhaps even Caste System-like labor civic if taken to extreme.

 

[Tahuti]

Religion: Neo-Paganism/Atheism
20% Science - No (Organized) State Religion - No spread of (Organized) Religion
Requires: Cloning (Kinda Contra-Conservative, so is this civic)

Government: Technocratic Representation
Only the intellectuals may vote
20% Gold
Requires: Technocracy