How to repair the Age transition system -not a civ game- opinions and suggestions

[stealth_nsk]

Animated leaders are kind of problem of marketing. Civilization franchise is the leader of 4X strategy games, the only AAA game among them. It gives some advantages - when new people come to the genre, Civilization games are always first in the recommendation list. But it has it costs and animated voiced leaders are part of the things you need to have to keep this position. For the same reason Civilization uses real instruments (and Civ7 even orchestral recording), that's just part of the package.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

Well, as a general rule, most people don't contribute to science or culture. Very few have achieved this after facing the conservatism of the masses. I believe that if an empire grows too large, it stagnates, or if it achieves a golden age, it stagnates, because the population doesn't contribute, and that would be a race between the leader who seeks to civilize and the very human nature that is being shaped.

It's a secondary problem. The Hellenes was never an Empire, but an Alliance of city states. Civ has always been about building empires, imagine running ten cities each one with a different government. Old world has gone maybe too far with the leaders and specialist concept, whilst in Civ 6 the choice was always the same 6 governors. It's not easy peasy for sure. It's only a ruff guideline.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

In many cases, cities don't have the same type of terrain or provide the same types of yields (except, of course, when at a high level it doesn't matter as much), nor do they have the same needs or strategic value, and it would be the same with a different type of government in each city. Like a religion that gives more or less yields to something.

The problem with a City State type of unit such as the Hellenic in game terms is not the variation in resources artificial and physical amongst the various cities, but their utter lack of cooperation except in extreme circumstances and their constant internecine warfare amongst themselves. Only when, in Hellenistic times (post-Alexander) did the Greek cities begin forming Leagues among themselves and their cities actually start cooperating in a political or military sense that the game more or less requires as the standard Civ action.

Prior to that, the idea of an Athens and a Sparta being part of the same political unit would be considered nonsense by most Greeks. Even when faced with an existential threat, like the Persian invasions, half the Greek cities joined the Persian side or sat out the entire affair as neutrals. And when any Greek city wanted to attack a non-Greek group, they were on their own: to model a Greek city-state Civ with any accuracy, if they declared war on any non-Greek IP or Civ only one Greek city should be able to build military units or send them against the enemy - every other city would be neutral. Even the most cosmopolitan and well-educated Greek simply could not conceive of anyone, Greek or non, not born in his own city as being his equal or having any civic rights, so they were quite incapable of making the intellectual leap required to form any larger political unit than their own city and the immediate countryside: everyone else were foreigners to be conquered or ignored.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

Exactly. That would mean that at the beginning of the game, you're just another city in the crowd until you develop your civilization further (like the game I believe was called Spore) and its many layers that hold it together, not an empire that's always the same and becomes tiresome by the end of the game. Just because someone shares your culture, territory, nation, or religion doesn't mean they're part of your civilization, and in the same way, they can be part of your civilization without having much in common. For example, what held the Arabs together was their religion, and for the Americans, it was their system of government, but they could vary in everything else.

Not exactly. When you form an Alliance in Civ you don't take control over the other civs. The same way you didn't in the Vassalage system in C5. What I was trying to say is that there should be a revised multi-civ government system for the latter argument to work.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Exactly. That would mean that at the beginning of the game, you're just another city in the crowd until you develop your civilization further (like the game I believe was called Spore) and its many layers that hold it together, not an empire that's always the same and becomes tiresome by the end of the game.

Civ VII is especially limited in the way it handles governments and government-types: all they are is some minor bonuses during Celebraions, with no other meaningful effect in the game.

In reality, there is strong evidence that some of the earliest cities were only physically cities. That is, there is no archeological evidence in the sites of any heirarchy - nobody was in charge - so that as soon as even a minor crisis came along, the city simply disintegrated back into family/clan groups.

There is other evidence from somewhat later that many, if not all, of the early cities in Mesopotamia were all city-states. That is, there is no really early evidence that there was any political unity above the city, even though they shared many aspects of culture and language: they might all be Sumerians (just as later the Greeks were all Greeks) but politically, they were Lagashians, Urukians, - no loyalty beyond the city.

IF all of this was to be included in the game, it would require a distinct 'Trigger' for a Civ/group to advance beyond the individual city to 'empire' in any form at all. The problem then is that every player will beeline for the trigger, because remaining a single city is not likely to be any more optimal than it was in real life. That makes it a waste of game design, since there is no real gamer decision involved.