Humankind - Aztecs Discussion thread

[grug]

I'm more surprised that the Franks are expansionist than that the Aztecs are militarist. I think one of the earliest articles mentioned building cathedrals as the French, and the Capetian Knight unit from the tech tree in one of the dev videos really suggested a Capetian dynasty France, which made me think they would be aesthete. Definitely an interesting design choice not to have any medieval aesthetes.

As far as the ball court, I think it would be cool if they had it as a generic building available to all players, given that it can be used by three different cultures. Maybe it could give stability and military xp or something, and come with an in-game event for the Aztecs and Mayans. It's odd to me in Civ that the amphitheater is one of the generic buildings when its more of a Mediterranean specific building, although I understand the need for a culture generating building in the classical era, and they can't really have all of the generic buildings tailored to be region specific. I think that Humankind is having a slightly different approach to buildings than civ based on what they've shown in videos (like the tannery, pottery workshop, alchemist's workshop and apothecary) which seems to offer a bit more universal, more numerous, and cheaper buildings. But if they do have some region specific buildings passed off as a generic baseline, I hope its not just European-specific buildings.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

I'm more surprised that the Franks are expansionist than that the Aztecs are militarist. I think one of the earliest articles mentioned building cathedrals as the French, and the Capetian Knight unit from the tech tree in one of the dev videos really suggested a Capetian dynasty France, which made me think they would be aesthete. Definitely an interesting design choice not to have any medieval aesthetes.

As far as the ball court, I think it would be cool if they had it as a generic building available to all players, given that it can be used by three different cultures. Maybe it could give stability and military xp or something, and come with an in-game event for the Aztecs and Mayans. It's odd to me in Civ that the amphitheater is one of the generic buildings when its more of a Mediterranean specific building, although I understand the need for a culture generating building in the classical era, and they can't really have all of the generic buildings tailored to be region specific. I think that Humankind is having a slightly different approach to buildings than civ based on what they've shown in videos (like the tannery, pottery workshop, alchemist's workshop and apothecary) which seems to offer a bit more universal, more numerous, and cheaper buildings. But if they do have some region specific buildings passed off as a generic baseline, I hope its not just European-specific buildings.

The "Mesoamerican Ball Game", which, at least from courts discovered in archeological sites, seems to have been nearly universal from central Mexico to near-Panama, is peculiar to that region, but it's actual significance is hotly debated: cultural? Religious? Military? All Of The Above? My suspicion is that the actual rules of the game may have varied from culture to culture and even city to city, and the major significance may also vary. Consider some archeologist from, say, 1500 years in the future trying to discern the significance of the ball games played in the various stadiums throughout the Americas, Asia and Europe, and trying to figure out the differences among US and Canadian 'Football', Rugby or Soccer. My suspicion is that we are in the same position in regards to the Mesoamerican game or games.

The problems with a 'cultural building' or structure in the Classical Era are two:
1. Most of them have a religious connection, as in the Greek theatre, which started as Religious events and only later evolved into the dramatic and comedic plays. That begs the question then: does the 'building' go in a Cultural or Religious District/Quarter?
2. I can't think of any of them that aren't cultural/Civ-specific: the Amphitheatres, Hippodromes, Circuses, Paradizia, etc. A 'general' cultural-only construction is probably going to be somewhat fictional if it is to be Universal among all the available Civs.
The Mesoamerican Ball Court is a good example, in fact: probably had a strong religious component, even if we aren't sure what it was, and was a competitive event like the Greek (religious) Olympic Games, but like the Olympics was limited to a single culture-group.

 

[ost]

For anyone curious, one of the Devs (wilbefast) posted this on a Games2Gether thread about a lack of Medieval Aesthetes:

Hi folks,

I'm really sorry to hear people are disappointed by this. The simple truth is that ensuring every affinity is available in every era wasn't a golden rule we kept ourselves to when choosing the cultures: the objective was for each era to have different gameplay "colour", and for balance to exist across all the era but not necessarily within any given era. Cultures were chosen for a variety of reasons, and while balancing out the available affinities was a factor we had in mind it was only one among many: we needed also to balance out available unit types, legacy trait types and emblematic districts, cover important historical actors, have some amount of name recongition but also a few surprises, avoid anachronisms, try to create lineages, try not to be too Europe-centric, try to distinguish ourselves, etc. The choices were never simple and involved a lot of fiery debate and biting of nails.

I would stress that the affinities, legacy traits, buildings and units were determined in close collaboration with our historians - as a result I think the associations between affinity and culture are at least "defensible", from a historical standpoint - though obviously no culture is ever so simple in reality as its representation might be in a game. Constantinople derived its wealth from trade though, that much is difficult to deny. Franks as aesthetes might be more appropriate - we will reconsider the question, but I can make no promises as a lot of content has already been produced.

I'm sorry once again that we didn't give affinity "coverage" more weight in our decision-making process, but I am hopeful that you'll always find something in and amongst the available cultures that makes you say "that's totally me, that's what I want". And if all else fails, transcending should always be viable choice: there's no sense including the option if it isn't.

It's nice to get some insight into their culture selection philosophy - not an enviable job in my opinion. Everyone has their favourite niche culture or civilization. As the old saying goes "You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time". Anyways, it seems that they are going to give the issue of Aesthete Franks a bit more consideration.

 

[CivLuvah]

For anyone curious, one of the Devs (wilbefast) posted this on a Games2Gether thread about a lack of Medieval Aesthetes:



It's nice to get some insight into their culture selection philosophy - not an enviable job in my opinion. Everyone has their favourite niche culture or civilization. As the old saying goes "You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time". Anyways, it seems that they are going to give the issue of Aesthete Franks a bit more consideration.

It's good that they clarified their decisions on the lack of affinities in some eras.

 

[mitsho]

Interesting, and such an honest and refreshing take. I don‘t really mind either way for their decision, but I am glad that they ponder.

I do think, people overestimate the affinity as well. The Legendary (?) bonus of each culture seems to have more of an impact, no?

 

[Gwydden]

Interesting, and such an honest and refreshing take. I don‘t really mind either way for their decision, but I am glad that they ponder.

I do think, people overestimate the affinity as well. The Legendary (?) bonus of each culture seems to have more of an impact, no?

The legacy trait does seem like the most distinct feature of each civilization, and possibly the most impactful as well, but it's also the only one they haven't bothered to advertise with this culture reveals. I think I understand why: revealing legacy traits would involve gameplay information that no doubt is still subject to change. But I cannot blame people for forgetting about the one thing absent from the culture cards and focusing on the generic archetype signposted right below the name.

 

[mitsho]

Completely agree, and thanks for correcting me botching up legacy with legendary. This is not a RPG after all (or is it? Only on a higher level?).

 

[CivLuvah]

This is not a RPG after all (or is it? Only on a higher level?).

You get to customize your avatar as well as your faction, so a bit?

 

[ehecatzin]

I guess a very cultural focused playstyle will include trascending your classical civ to medieval. Then again the whole point of the game seems to be to adapt and score the most point per era, maybe you simply go Agrarian for extra population or builder for the wonders during medieval?.

Tho it would be very funny to play pacifist turtle, then go Mongol wreck everybody, then back to turtle again.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

I guess a very cultural focused playstyle will include trascending your classical civ to medieval. Then again the whole point of the game seems to be to adapt and score the most point per era, maybe you simply go Agrarian for extra population or builder for the wonders during medieval?.

Tho it would be very funny to play pacifist turtle, then go Mongol wreck everybody, then back to turtle again.

Mutant Mongol Ninja Turtles?

 

[Catoninetales_Amplitude]

The legacy trait does seem like the most distinct feature of each civilization, and possibly the most impactful as well, but it's also the only one they haven't bothered to advertise with this culture reveals. I think I understand why: revealing legacy traits would involve gameplay information that no doubt is still subject to change. But I cannot blame people for forgetting about the one thing absent from the culture cards and focusing on the generic archetype signposted right below the name.

I have certainly picked cultures for their Legacy Traits, for their Emblematic Quarter, or even Emblematic Unit at times in my own games.
You're pretty spot on with your guess on why we did not include the Legacy traits: Names and gameplay effects might still be subject to change, and some of them even interact with gameplay systems we have not revealed yet (take for example the classical cultures PartyElite showed in his video: Some of them interact with Trade Routes or with Patronage, neither of which we have discussed yet.)

But while we are omitting the Legacy Trait entirely from the culture cards for these reasons, I am not sure why some people are saying that our Culture reveals "focused on the Affinity" or was even the core of how we described the cultures in some way, when the Affinity is presented by a single word and an icon, as opposed to the EQ and EU both getting art and a full paragraph of text about the historical context. For a long time, people even treated the Gameplay Orientation as just an indicator of what the EQ and EU would be good at, so I was surprised how many people suddenly spoke of the affinities as the defining trait of the cultures.

 

[Elhoim]

But while we are omitting the Legacy Trait entirely from the culture cards for these reasons, I am not sure why some people are saying that our Culture reveals "focused on the Affinity" or was even the core of how we described the cultures in some way, when the Affinity is presented by a single word and an icon, as opposed to the EQ and EU both getting art and a full paragraph of text about the historical context. For a long time, people even treated the Gameplay Orientation as just an indicator of what the EQ and EU would be good at, so I was surprised how many people suddenly spoke of the affinities as the defining trait of the cultures.

I guess we people like things fit neatly into preconceived boxes. This is the science civ! This is the culture civ! This is the money civ! So when you see the affinity, you think that's what the civ is about. So when one was "missing", it was a assumed that you couldn't play a cultural/influential civ in the medieval. I guess thatCiv VI further reinforced this with some of the extreme focus on some civs, or even EL with some factions being about a very particular thing.

 

[Catoninetales_Amplitude]

Yeah, the human need to categorize and compartmentalize is strong. But I can already tell you that with many of these cultures, there's more to them than the label, as seen in the Greeks with their "aesthete" Quarter and a strong military unit.

 

[Elhoim]

Yeah, the human need to categorize and compartmentalize is strong. But I can already tell you that with many of these cultures, there's more to them than the label, as seen in the Greeks with their "aesthete" Quarter and a strong military unit.

Definitely, that's what I love about the game, how the design of the civs cover many bases to give a better representation of their strengths.

 

[Stringer1313]

Well, some people are screaming "bad design" in Discord, due to lack of freedom of choices. I just feel they equate symmetry to good design, kinda like an OCD thing.

Agreed. The game is not automatically more enjoyable just b/c you have more freedom of choices, especially when the choices are frequent (micromanagement), have minimal impact, or are not interesting (i.e., have no tradeoffs)