Historians discuss... with the Firaxis historian!

[The_J]

Civ6 streamer and history PhD student @Paisley_Trees has together with a colleague interviewed @Andrew Johnson [FXS] during the CivGive charity stream last Sunday.
They discuss how they pick the civs in combination with making an interesting and balanced game, that they read the forums here (although that we need to discuss things earlier; although we had the right timing with Georgia), they discuss other leader possibilites in Civ7, and a lot more.
If you are really curious, you have to watch the video .

 

[local_hero]

Andrew teaches at Stockholm University?? That's so cool! I'll have to check what courses they offer lol.

 

[Andrew Johnson [FXS]]

Mostly I teach in the core anthropology courses - Environment and Society, Gender and Sexuality, Medical Anthropology.

When I’ve got space to teach close to my research interests I’ve taught “Power and Politics in Southeast Asia”, “Magic, Science and Religion”, “Ruin,” and urban anthropology. But I don’t think I’ve had a chance to teach them at Stockholm yet!

 

[Hellenism Salesman]

although we had the right timing with Georgia

Which, as a reminder everyone, means we still have a chance this time round!

Tamar for Civ VII!

I enjoyed the stream. Was a highlight of the CivGive! Made me smile when Andrew highlighted CivFanatics by name The organizers did a pretty good job with their historical objectives, too.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

Which, as a reminder everyone, means we still have a chance this time round!

Tamar for Civ VII!

I enjoyed the stream. Was a highlight of the CivGive! Made me smile when Andrew highlighted CivFanatics by name The organizers did a pretty good job with their historical objectives, too.

Tamar would be a good fit for Civ 7. There's some many opportunities for building walls, since you can do it in multiple districts now. And she can take on Han and Ming and build Great Walls. She would be in heaven!

But realistically, it would be good to have her with Golden Age mechanics and sans the less interesting trappings of Georgia.

 

[ezzlar]

Andrew Johnson - Stockholms universitet

Andrew Johnson - Stockholms universitet

www.su.se

Well, that could be worth dropping by a seminar!

 

[Andrew Johnson [FXS]]

There’s a lot of cool stuff coming down the pipeline! Just be patient - and if you want to annoy the devs see your favorite stuff, just make a lot of noise in as many channels as you can! Things move slowly but the team is responsive!

Ezzlar - I didn't even know about this profile! I need to update it. Thanks!

 

[UWHabs]

Was a nice watch. A good reminder that civ having a historian in the company is just great. Even if I'm sure Andrew gets out-voted for gameplay or legacy reasons, having someone push is a great step. It was sort of glossed in the interview, but when the interviewer was mentioning the difference between, say, Mansa Musa's agenda vs Sundiata Keita's, you could see Andrew just being like "yeah, that was me" while also being patient to not throw his teammates under the bus with the stuff that wasn't his

 

[shaglio]

I know this is a Civilization forum, but I couldn't help the big smile spreading across my face when @Andrew Johnson [FXS] was talking about his younger self enjoying flipping through his brother's D&D books. My two passions were coming together and I couldn't stop grinning like the Cheshire Cat.

 

[SnowKomodo]

Pretty sick that he's a Southeast Asian expert

 

[Andrew Johnson [FXS]]

I was a perennial DM, though. I’m now happily a player in two games full of writers (both from Firaxis and other studios) and it’s fantastic.

SnowKomodo: ใช่แล้ว! My PhD is in anthropology but I have a concentration in Southeast Asian history from Cornell, the center of SEA studies in the USA. I also lived and taught in Singapore for four years (at NUS and Yale-NUS) and Mahidol (กรุงเทพ) for one.

 

[Zaarin]

I was a perennial DM, though. I’m now happily a player in two games full of writers (both from Firaxis and other studios) and it’s fantastic.

I was a perennial GM. Then one of my players asked to run a game, and while he did a good job, I found I liked GM'ing better. (I'm back in the GM's chair now.)

 

[stealth_nsk]

I was a perennial GM. Then one of my players asked to run a game, and while he did a good job, I found I liked GM'ing better. (I'm back in the GM's chair now.)

I like both roles, that's so cool.

 

[Andrew Johnson [FXS]]

Don’t get me wrong! It’s my favorite thing to GM. But I’m just overloaded now between keeping up academic work and Firaxis stuff. Working in games has meant that my groups are just fantastic, too - one game I've got a former producer for WoC (and Riot) running it, and there's the narrative director at Firaxis in there. The other one has two writers for Elder Scrolls Online and the lead writer for Midnight Suns. Both of them are absolute blasts.

 

[shaglio]

I was a perennial DM, though. I’m now happily a player in two games full of writers (both from Firaxis and other studios) and it’s fantastic.

I've become a perennial DM only because I play with my daughter and her 2 best friends (12-13yo). But recently my daughter told me she wants to try DMing and has been working on making her own campaign with the help of the 2024 DMG (which is more new-DM friendly than the 2014 one).

On a slight tangent, sadly for my daughter, the lack of Hotseat Multiplayer in Civ 7 means we will no longer be able to play against each other like we did in Civ 6

 

[Zaarin]

Don’t get me wrong! It’s my favorite thing to GM. But I’m just overloaded now between keeping up academic work and Firaxis stuff.

I hear that. I ran a procedurally generated game (Mutant Year Zero) while I was working on my master's. It's partially my own fault that I'm perennial GM; if I want to play the indie games I enjoy, I have to run them myself.

 

[tedhebert]

Been playing and GMing for the last 30 years with the same group, which now contains some of our kids who are now adults. We've played D&D from 2nd to 5th Ed, Rolemaster and Spacemaster and are now playing Pathfinder 2 campaigns. I enjoy being GM as much as playing, especially when
I bend the rules to accommodate a loved gameplay setting from favorite books, like GOT or The Steven Erikson Malazan decalogy...

 

[B0RDERL1NE]

I might as well get on this bandwagon! I GM more than I play. Long time D&D fan, but I recently became a Pathfinder 2E convert. Other favorite systems include 7th Sea, Fate, Epyllion, Shadowrun, Call of Cthulu, and the Alien RPG.

Curse of Strahd is my favorite campaign, I've run it 6 times. Recently I made a fantasy campaign set in Egypt that I was running for 2 groups, all custom setting work. I've also published 2 books for a table top RPG of my own design, and was working on developing a cyberpunk system that I intended to try to publish until I became a dad and my free time disappeared.

 

[Zaarin]

Alien RPG

Free League is the best RPG company in the market by a country mile, both for the Year Zero Engine and the production values of their books. I rarely run anything except their games and Son of Oak's games (City of Mist, Legend in the Mist) anymore. (Also, not a historical RPG, but I think quite a few people here might be interested in a game called Nibiru, which is a sci-fi game with a rich Mesopotamian flavor.)

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

Curse of Strahd is my favorite campaign, I've run it 6 times.

I still aspire to find the right group to run it once!