Good/Evil/Neutral change

[Ravenshroud]

While most certainly leaders affect your "alignment", when society grows it tends to effect the landscape as much as its leaders. If it differs greatly from its leaders, it overthrows them.

I personally like the shifting alignment complexity. What I don't like is the lack of influence alignment has on your decisions.

What if you got MORE complex. What if each city in your empire had an alignment rating and your civic and religious choices had an alignment rating?

Then your ability to manage cities, keep the people happy, improve culture, and even build buildings would be affected.

----- FOR EXAMPLE

I start the game with a leader that has a rating of 90. Meaning 90% good. My first city starts with a rating of 90 as well. As does my "society" rating.

I capture a city and decide to raze it. My society rating drops to 80, just an example. Now the first city is 10 points of of my current society rating. Because they are not pleased they decide to provie 1 less research per turn until they are back within 5 points.

Every turn they move x points toward 80.

Now later I discover The Veil. I make it my state religion. Dropping my society rating to 50. My initial city was at 85. They are pissed. Instead of moving toward 50, they wove slowly away until they defect.

This is truly a complex system. But would simulate how we react when our government/leaders do things we like vs things we don't like. I think it would take a full-time developer to implement and woud rework much of the current system.

 

[mindlar]

All of this sounds interesting, but doesn't sound fun.

Cities that defect because I take a good civ and switch to the veil is not fun. Likewise playing as the Calabim and having them have an "awakening" and convert to good by following the Order religeon is a choice that you don't have as a player if your cities are going to defect.

 

[Ravenshroud]

Welcome to Civilization...

It shouldn't be fun to lose your towns and people. Ask England what they thought about us leaving. Or the French about Marie Antoinette. Decisions leaders make should have negative consequences if they go against the people's desires.

In strong rule, or dictatorships, you might get away with that stuff. But happy, good people, don't like you starting wars in small countries and spending all their tax money there.

Oops I digress...

The fun in the game is in managing an empire of people. If you don't care what the people want, you are probebly going to have a hard time as leader and it should be reflected as such. And consequently if you do a good job, you should be rewarded.

 

[Kael]

The trap you may get caught in is that the game may be playing you instead of you playing the game. In real life leaders guide within the will of the people (some with more success than other). But the abstraction in civ is that you are the empire. There are a few minor examples of unrest but in large "you" (ie: the player) are a civilization, not a leader.

A change to move you out of the godseat of immortal embodiment of the cizilization and into a lesser role of mere political leader could make for an interesting mod, but wouldnt be desired in FfH.

The player builds his civ the way he wants to, we would prefer to present challenges from other civs. Test the machine he built against other entities, not have the challenge come from within. To do so takes away the players control and limits his sphere of influence in a medium where we want to give the player the most control possible while still being able to provide resonable challenges and decisions.