I played the [pick 30+1 civs mindgame] ... and it made me forgive the developers a bit for some of their choices

[Evie]

If we look at unlocks, yes. But in terms of paths, it's more complicated.

Right now (using three paths per), I have Gaul, Goth and Carthage as the pathways into Spain, but if I added Portugal, it would bE...Gual, Goth and Carthage.

 

[Siptah]

If we look at unlocks, yes. But in terms of paths, it's more complicated.

Right now (using three paths per), I have Gaul, Goth and Carthage as the pathways into Spain, but if I added Portugal, it would bE...Gual, Goth and Carthage.

I‘ve stopped thinking about paths. I don‘t think it‘s that important and will become less and less important with every new civ added. And in many parts of the world, there are bottlenecks in certain ages, which makes restrictions not worth it imho. In Europe, you can have 5-6 good antiquity civs, but easily 10 exploration ones, for example. In MENA, antiquity will have more civs than modern. It will always be uneven in a way. And I don‘t care much about what the AI does if their choice doesn‘t interfere with mine (as I‘m first to choose).

 

[Xandinho]

A single civ can lead to several other civs in the next era. Rome can easily lead to a dozen civs. I don't see any problem with Spain or Portugal coming from Phoenicia. We already know that Spain will also come from Rome and perhaps, in the future, Goths.

 

[Evie]

Paths are an integral of the game design; designing a civ in Civ VII without figUring then out is like imagining civs in civ VI without making sure they have an actual still-existing language they can use. The fact that players can work around them by using.

This means that some regions will have more obscure choices in some eras, and be missing some less obscure ones, or that we will have cross-region paths. That's part of the design,

I don't buy one civ leading to a dozen as something that will happen. I'm fairly sure I heard the devs make reference to not wanting to overload new/casual players with evolution paths, so I think we can firmly put 12-path scenario out of our heads.

And yeah, Goth and Phoenicia/Carthage leading to Spain works, and so does Rome (but as above, I don't see Rome getting a dozen path so it may well lose some of its current ones as new civs get introduced that need Rome more). The problem isn't lack of good path into Spain. It's that anything that's good for spain is equally good for portugal, anything that is good for Portugal is equally good for Spain, and anything that's good for both is equally good for Franks, Normans, Italians, Dutch and half a dozen other equally important places.

Makes it hard to come up with spearate portuguese and Spanish lists without blocking other civs, while still keeping the number of path reasonable (again: sorry not sorry, I don't believe the devs would do 12 path civs).

My current thinking is to move the Franks back to ancient and make the proto-HRE civ the Carolingians instead of the Frankish Empire. Then the Goths can cover Mediterannean Germanic people (Iberia, Italy) and the Franks more the France-Low Countries-Germany centered germanic roots. And the Norse can still norse it up of course.

 

[seasnake]

I've come around a bit on the unmooring leaders from civs. By decoupling them, you can put in civs that would otherwise be impossible, like the Nazca, Chavin, Moche where we have images, art and settlements, and descendant cultures, but no written accounts of specific leaders. Basically the conceit of the game is that a group of historical figures are sitting down at a table to play a game, and they will play by choosing and using three different civs acosss three different eras, with the victor being decided at the end of the last era.

 

[BackseatTyrant]

I've come around a bit on the unmooring leaders from civs. By decoupling them, you can put in civs that would otherwise be impossible, like the Nazca, Chavin, Moche where we have images, art and settlements, and descendant cultures, but no written accounts of specific leaders. Basically the conceit of the game is that a group of historical figures are sitting down at a table to play a game, and they will play by choosing and using three different civs acosss three different eras, with the victor being decided at the end of the last era.

Yeah, that's a good way of putting it.

One thing that does bug me about this change though, is how they're attaching faction colours to the leader rather than to the civ. Then again, I'm speaking as someone whose most cherished mod is the one that overhauls the jersey system to give everyone "better" colours (I'm sorry, but baby blue Sweden, *anything* blue Greece and whatever the hell they were thinking with Korea, just didn't sit right with me)

 

[gdr_willter]

Yeah, that's a good way of putting it.

One thing that does bug me about this change though, is how they're attaching faction colours to the leader rather than to the civ. Then again, I'm speaking as someone whose most cherished mod is the one that overhauls the jersey system to give everyone "better" colours (I'm sorry, but baby blue Sweden, *anything* blue Greece and whatever the hell they were thinking with Korea, just didn't sit right with me)

I'm considering the leaders now represent the nations/people/identities in Civ 7, so attachinf faction colors for them fairly make sense for me. The civilizations now represent the systems and forms of the countries based on limited time.

 

[pokiehl]

Having everyone's faction colors change every age would be really confusing and unimmersive. Attaching colors to the permanent leader was definitely the right call.

 

[j51]

Thinking about it, I don't think it's absurd for Brazil to come from Spain too, until Portugal is included. Dutch also make some sense.

Or an Italian city state or the HRE or frankly a Japanese shogunate. I think post colonial civs can coming from their major immigrant groups is cool.

 

[Evie]

And if all else fails (ie, there aren't enough connection otherwise) I'm even willing to have those connections happen at the wrong time (Antiquity Japan into Inca instead of Peru, sure, go for it!) or in reverse (Hawaii into Meiji Japan, sure, why not), because at least it's still refering to a more real connection than "they both live in Africa"

There's better, and I'd prefer better, but I'll take the althistorical in-joke before I take "it's all Africa".

 

[Xandinho]

Or an Italian city state or the HRE or frankly a Japanese shogunate. I think post colonial civs can coming from their major immigrant groups is cool.

Considering that Brazil has huge communities of Italians and Japanese, then it could work.

And if all else fails (ie, there aren't enough connection otherwise) I'm even willing to have those connections happen at the wrong time (Antiquity Japan into Inca instead of Peru, sure, go for it!) or in reverse (Hawaii into Meiji Japan, sure, why not), because at least it's still refering to a more real connection than "they both live in Africa"

There's better, and I'd prefer better, but I'll take the althistorical in-joke before I take "it's all Africa".

I think they wanted to represent different regions of Africa, but making cultural leaps that don’t make much sense (since there’s no real connection between Aksum, Songhai, and Buganda other than “they’re all in Africa”).

I'd much prefer if they did something like 'Ghana > Songhai > Hausa' or 'Aksum > Somali > Ethiopia'.

 

[Evie]

Or just go straight for Aksum-Solomonic-Ethiopia becsuse, frankly, if there's one country outside Asia that deserves the China treatment, it's Ethiopia, but yes, I fully agree.

 

[Krikkit1]

Considering that Brazil has huge communities of Italians and Japanese, then it could work.


I think they wanted to represent different regions of Africa, but making cultural leaps that don’t make much sense (since there’s no real connection between Aksum, Songhai, and Buganda other than “they’re all in Africa”).

I'd much prefer if they did something like 'Ghana > Songhai > Hausa' or 'Aksum > Somali > Ethiopia'.

I think the "representing multiple regions in Africa" makes sense becase now they can add DLCs for individual African Civs that Don't have weird connections. Antiquity/Modern Western Africa, Exploration East/South Africa now all have at least one good connection, even if they are a single civ DLC.

 

[uppi]

Paths are an integral of the game design; designing a civ in Civ VII without figUring then out is like imagining civs in civ VI without making sure they have an actual still-existing language they can use. The fact that players can work around them by using.

This means that some regions will have more obscure choices in some eras, and be missing some less obscure ones, or that we will have cross-region paths. That's part of the design,

I don't buy one civ leading to a dozen as something that will happen. I'm fairly sure I heard the devs make reference to not wanting to overload new/casual players with evolution paths, so I think we can firmly put 12-path scenario out of our heads.

And yeah, Goth and Phoenicia/Carthage leading to Spain works, and so does Rome (but as above, I don't see Rome getting a dozen path so it may well lose some of its current ones as new civs get introduced that need Rome more). The problem isn't lack of good path into Spain. It's that anything that's good for spain is equally good for portugal, anything that is good for Portugal is equally good for Spain, and anything that's good for both is equally good for Franks, Normans, Italians, Dutch and half a dozen other equally important places.

Makes it hard to come up with spearate portuguese and Spanish lists without blocking other civs, while still keeping the number of path reasonable (again: sorry not sorry, I don't believe the devs would do 12 path civs).

My current thinking is to move the Franks back to ancient and make the proto-HRE civ the Carolingians instead of the Frankish Empire. Then the Goths can cover Mediterannean Germanic people (Iberia, Italy) and the Franks more the France-Low Countries-Germany centered germanic roots. And the Norse can still norse it up of course.

I think that if the game gets content long enough, the dozen Rome unlocks scenario is eventually going to happen. Having DLC dependencies (like if you want the Portugal DLC, you must have the Carthage DLC) would be a bad idea, because that will soon degenerate into dependency hell. So most DLCs will need to somehow tie in to the base game civs. Removing civ unlocks would also be a dependency nightmare (the HRE DLC removes the Rome unlock for Spain, but only if you have the Carthage DLC unless you also own the Portugal DLC...). So the endgame of this is that pretty much every European exploration era civ is going to be unlocked by Rome.

 

[Krikkit1]

I think that if the game gets content long enough, the dozen Rome unlocks scenario is eventually going to happen. Having DLC dependencies (like if you want the Portugal DLC, you must have the Carthage DLC) would be a bad idea, because that will soon degenerate into dependency hell. So most DLCs will need to somehow tie in to the base game civs. Removing civ unlocks would also be a dependency nightmare (the HRE DLC removes the Rome unlock for Spain, but only if you have the Carthage DLC unless you also own the Portugal DLC...). So the endgame of this is that pretty much every European exploration era civ is going to be unlocked by Rome.

Some might be unlocked by Greece only, or they will be in a pack with the antiquity civ that unlocks them.

 

[Cuauhtémoc's Rage]

I think that if the game gets content long enough, the dozen Rome unlocks scenario is eventually going to happen. Having DLC dependencies (like if you want the Portugal DLC, you must have the Carthage DLC) would be a bad idea, because that will soon degenerate into dependency hell. So most DLCs will need to somehow tie in to the base game civs. Removing civ unlocks would also be a dependency nightmare (the HRE DLC removes the Rome unlock for Spain, but only if you have the Carthage DLC unless you also own the Portugal DLC...). So the endgame of this is that pretty much every European exploration era civ is going to be unlocked by Rome.

I mean, given the medium we're working with (civ switching and all) this is probably the best option we can go with. Too many is better than too few, right? Although I think DLC dependency can be done right if all the associated civs are just in the same pack, i.e., Portugal and Carthage as only one DLC.

 

[Siptah]

I think that if the game gets content long enough, the dozen Rome unlocks scenario is eventually going to happen. Having DLC dependencies (like if you want the Portugal DLC, you must have the Carthage DLC) would be a bad idea, because that will soon degenerate into dependency hell. So most DLCs will need to somehow tie in to the base game civs. Removing civ unlocks would also be a dependency nightmare (the HRE DLC removes the Rome unlock for Spain, but only if you have the Carthage DLC unless you also own the Portugal DLC...). So the endgame of this is that pretty much every European exploration era civ is going to be unlocked by Rome.

Exactly. Limiting paths to a specific number is tackling a minor problem, but it‘s a „fix“ that creates so many major problems that I can’t see it is part of the design post release. But I personally believe all the things about unlocks are still somewhat WIP, otherwise we would have more info on this.

 

[Evie]

This would be a compelling argument if not for the fact that coding features and factions from one DLC to work differently depending on what combination of other DLCs are available is commonplace industry practice. Civ has already experimented with it with some of the latter NFP/leader passes leaders and civ.

As is, it’s elementary coding to have the Portuguese evolve from the Greek if you don’t have the Carthage DLC, and evolve from Carthage (but not Greece) if you have the Carthage DLC. So assuming we MUST end up with civs with twelve outlets because everyone needs a base game connection? Is a profoundly unsafe assumption.

I think it far more likely the devs will continue with their vision of limited outlets, perhaps somewhat higher number over time (like 3 or 4 instead of 2), and use simple coding to address people who don’t have particular DLCs.