Governments in civ4 ?

No specific governments in this iteration. This time we have civics instead, which consists of 5 categories (Government, Labour, Legal, Religion and Economics), with each having 5 options. The last we heard, the options for government were Despotism, Hereditary Rule, Police State, Representative and Universal Sufferage.
Hope this helps.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.
 
Yep, there are no specific govs as such, you make choices based on various options which then forms your governmental style, each choice brings bonuses/problems. For instance no slavery may boost population happiness but prevent rushing to complete builds
 
Yea, the new system is like SMAC, except with 5 choices for each instead of four.

They are listed here, what we know so far -
http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/info/#Control

Though now that I look over the table, questions arise. Why is there both a Despotism and Police State under government? Under Legal, none of those choices make sense. Can you not have both freedom of speech AND buerocracy? And how did "Nationhood" and "Vassalage" make it under Legal? That really needs to be cleared up. What about the Economy also? What is the difference between State Property and Communism? Perhaps State property is like under Feudalism, where the king and nobles owned all the land, whereas Communism is where the Party/People own the land communally? And how does Pacifism make it under religion? Damn I've confused myself again. As I said, many questions. Perhaps the great Soren Johnson would see fit to shed more light on this in a future info release? :mischief:
 
That's funny. I never remember seeing full list of civics mentioned anywhere until now.

Certain options certainly make no sense, but I assume there's some dim logic behind them. I hope we'll find it out before consulting civilopedia.
But hey! There's environmentalism. That'll score Civ IV one extra point if I ever have to review it.
 
Trajan13 said:
Yea, the new system is like SMAC, except with 5 choices for each instead of four.

They are listed here, what we know so far -
http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/info/#Control

Though now that I look over the table, questions arise. Why is there both a Despotism and Police State under government? Under Legal, none of those choices make sense. Can you not have both freedom of speech AND buerocracy? And how did "Nationhood" and "Vassalage" make it under Legal? That really needs to be cleared up. What about the Economy also? What is the difference between State Property and Communism? Perhaps State property is like under Feudalism, where the king and nobles owned all the land, whereas Communism is where the Party/People own the land communally? And how does Pacifism make it under religion? Damn I've confused myself again. As I said, many questions. Perhaps the great Soren Johnson would see fit to shed more light on this in a future info release? :mischief:

I know it is confusing. To get the answer as from the game, you are going to need the information from the person who designed it figure this out.
But I will try to give ideas from my knowledge as a historian. I might not hurt to pull out a Dictionary now. I will now show my ideas and opinions on what these things could possibly mean:

Q: Why is there both a Despotism and Police State under government?
My Opinion:
Definition of Despotism: a state or a system of government in which the ruler (the "despot") has unlimited power

Now, a Police State sound to me more like a Fascists or Communist state, due to this government required Fascism to be used. The police in reality would be like secret police, or Hitler's S.S. the Police State still sound like to me that the people are trying to be protected against something and trying to convince the people that is for their good and to their advantage to have this much protection. Despotism sounds more like a tight military control, and that the people have no rights (period), and that everything is for the good of the ruler, more like a Monarchy.

Q: Under Legal, none of those choices make sense. Can you not have both freedom of speech AND buerocracy? And how did "Nationhood" and "Vassalage" make it under Legal? That really needs to be cleared up.
My Opinion:
Definition of Bureaucracy: A system of managing an organization (as a government or business) by strictly following a fixed procedure that often results in delay.

I think that legal represents what kind of laws they are, and how loose they are. In a plain Bureaucracy, I would think that the laws would be much stricter than with laws that allow freedom of speech. Doesn't make MUCH sence, but we don't have much to work off of. As for the other Nationhood, and Vassalage, I think with Vassalage, that it represents laws that severely restrict the lower class. Meanwhile, Nationhood is probably more like a Nation-State, where the lower class is slightly "looser" in freedoms, but not much.

Q: What about the Economy also? What is the difference between State Property and Communism? Perhaps State property is like under Feudalism, where the king and nobles owned all the land, whereas Communism is where the Party/People own the land communally?
My Opinion: I think the idea above might be the answer, but I think another idea is that State property means the type of communism/feudalism where none of the lower class owns anything and the upper class or government owns everything. And when they say Communism, they mean the real type where everyone shares us, but there is less strict government control than the modern comunism. I got a feeling that that isn't as close as the guess in the question, but it might be.

Q:And how does Pacifism make it under religion?
My Opinion: Maybe the options for this kind of religion means how exceptant or how powerful a religion is in your country? If it is pacifist, maybe your people's opinion is that war is bad, and they use religion to explain this. Freedom of Religion means that the people are exceptant of other religions and people, and are against war for reasons people are different (the religious wars). Organized religion is preobably something like that the religion dictates several government moves, but not all.
and Theocracy...
Definition of Theocracy: government of a country by officials believe to have divine guidance
...sounds like a part of Fascism and the "master race." It probably has a play in religion by that that country's religion is the ultamite religion and that all others should be destroyed (religious wars).

I hope this helps ;)
 
I have to say that I have not seen the video or screenshot where we see communism as a Civics option-whether as Government or Economy.
In my opinion, though, it should be State Property and Planned Economy-as these two are very different ideas, but both of which were-oddly enough-found to some degree in the 'Communist' regimes of the early to mid 20th century.
I can understand the distinction between Police State and Despotism-given that a Despot can occur as a result of a General (like Julius Caesar) or a Monarch (such as Louis XVI) or any other kind of leader taking absolute control of all apsects of power. A Police State OTOH, as Gun powder Man suggests, often occurs at the peoples consent-to some degree-because they want protection, even at the expense of their freedom. The historical examples of police states given by GPM are valid, but IngSoc-from 1984-is another good example of the Dictatorship by consent.
I should say, though, that I deseperately hope that civics will be the most moddable part of the game, because I have a whole host of ideas of how I want to re-organise the entire Civic system.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.
 
Aussie_Lurker said:
The last we heard, the options for government were Despotism, Hereditary Rule, Police State, Representative and Universal Sufferage.
Hope this helps.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

In other words, Despotism, Monarchy, Fascism, Republic and Democracy, respectively. What's up with name-game?

P.S.: If religion is going to be part of the game, shouldn't there be a Theocratic ideology as well?
 
You misunderstand desertsnow. With the Civics options, the Form your government takes-in terms of how representative it is-is just one area that you can select. Now though, you can also select what type of economy you have, how your labour-force is organised, how you treat religion and what kind of legal freedoms your people enjoy. Truth is, if all combinations of the 5 categories is possible, then a player can effectively have 5 to the power of 4 government types (I think it was over 3000 specific types of government), including Theocracy (which is dealt with under Religion).
Oh and, just a word of advice, try reading the other posts first, because it is all explained there.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.
 
I think Fascism is a tech advance.
 
Aussie_Lurker said:
You misunderstand desertsnow. With the Civics options, the Form your government takes-in terms of how representative it is-is just one area that you can select. Now though, you can also select what type of economy you have, how your labour-force is organised, how you treat religion and what kind of legal freedoms your people enjoy. Truth is, if all combinations of the 5 categories is possible, then a player can effectively have 5 to the power of 4 government types (I think it was over 3000 specific types of government), including Theocracy (which is dealt with under Religion).
Oh and, just a word of advice, try reading the other posts first, because it is all explained there.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

Doh. Excuse my carelessness, I was in a bit of a rush to read through the forums last night. Anyway, 5^4=625, which still makes a lot of specific government styles. Five to the power of five comes to over 3000 (3125 specifically).
 
I never played Civ 1 or 2 but i playe Call to power. And the one thing that i thought was missing fromit and Civ 3 is customizable govs. So I think it is a great idea that belonged in the game. But i am a little confused on when certain options come into game play EXE. When are you able to emancipate? and what happens if you choose not to have slavery but you arnt advanced enough to have serfs?

Just some questions.
 
The way I would define them

Despotism: Government by strongman, with minimal order/organization
Police state: Government by strongman, through well organized police apparatus (basically a 'modern' despotism)

For Legal..I see this more as the 'purpose' (or rather the overall effect) of society's means of making laws

Vassalage: Laws are made for the political benefits of powerful leaders.. Military bonus
Bureacracy: Laws are made for the purpose of social stability..Corruption bonus
Freedom of Speech: Laws are made for the purpose of personal liberty..Happiness bonus
Nationhood: Laws are made for the purpose of improving the national culture..Cultural bonus
Barbarism: Laws are made based on no particular overarching purpose..unit support bonus


As for what if you don't want slavery but aren't advanced enough to have Emancipation or Serfs...well either a Caste System or old Tribalism
Caste System I'd imagine would have a production bonus of some kind (but no rush)


What I'm really confused about is Pacifism under religion..Freeedom of religion makes sense...I'm not sure of the distinction between Organized religion and Theocracy...possibly Theocracy is a stronger effect of the state religion... I'm thinking that Primitivism and Pacifism are the two 'non religious' choices one focusing on national Identity rather than religious, the other attempting to mute all cultural identities

For Economics, I think State Property and Decentralization are probably the only choices until near the end of the Middle Ages.

Decentralization-Corruption bonus
State Property-Worker bonus
Free Market-Trade Bonus
Communism-Production Bonus
Environmentalism-Health Bonus
 
In my opinion, only if some civics unlet other (for example, if you have Emancipation you cannot have vassalage) there is no sense in the "Legal" part. The Government is well done, I think, because Despotism and Police State are similar, basically the Despot may be a good leader, and use the power to develop the culture or an moral idea, but the Police State searchs specifically the restriction of people. Also, a Despot doesn't have the level of organization than Polices.
But Religion is a total mess, dont you think?
 
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