Is there enough content for a Dark Ages era?

[OldIowaTiger]

Watching all of the plays and streams it feels like the science/civic trees have a huge jump from Classical to Medieval. It seems like things feel like they are paced pretty well and then things can get 200-400 years ahead of "real-time" pace in this time. Would there be enough content in terms of civics and techs to add an entire era to slow things down?

I'm just brainstorming but you could even do fun things with monasteries, for example. Thoughts?

P.S. I put this in the discussion and not suggestions board because I thought it provided an answer for the pacing which has been a point of discussion.

 

[ExemplarVoss]

Not really. I mean, sure there are places you can randomly slot in techs, but... 'dark ages' isn't really a place I'd put them. There are all sorts of issues with it, for one thing.
One, it is a debateable era in the first place,
two, it only applies to a corner of the world (which is kinda important for civ)
three, it was more a matter of recorded knowledge (and hasn't turned out to be as 'dark' in that regard as earlier historians thought, they were just looking the wrong places for texts)
four... I'm not really sure what you'd slot in.

Monasteries (and various equivalents) are pretty well covered already by religious buildings.

Slowing things down is a problem with the eureka system (it probably shouldn't be half), and the overall science 'value' of each tech. If you want to slow things down, change eurekas to 1/3 and/or make techs cost more. Just jamming things in is pretty much the worst way to deal with a systemic problem.
The other possibility is making specific eras longer by making a third tier of techs for some or all eras, rather than just two. (And adding more prerequisites so you can't just bee-line through multiple eras with 2 or 3 techs.)

 

[Bad Wolf]

Civ gameplay doesn't really lend itself to a dark age.

That is, unless you do like Civ 1 and halve the tech generation at 0 AD...

 

[OldIowaTiger]

Well I understand that the Dark Ages were not necessarily a lack of learning and recorded texts. I don't mean to imply that it would be a way to literally slow down the learning but rather as another era to close the gap between Classical and Medieval. A period that is not Classical but not yet Medieval.

I am not tied into using the term Dark Ages but perhaps something else that signifies the time between these two periods. I like the Eureka/Inspiration system but it probably does need to be cut down from 50%.

 

[Bad Wolf]

Well, there was a noticeable slowdown in both learning and recorded texts, that's why it's called a dark age (because it kind of "goes dark" so to speak). As far as gameplay goes, I don't think the early middle ages were distinctive enough from the high middle ages to really warrant a different gameplay era in a game like Civ (though I certainly wouldn't complain if they added one!)

 

[CaiusDrewart]

There wasn't ever a complete cessation of learning or literacy, but in roughly the 6th-8th centuries there was radical political and economic simplification in Western Europe (that is to say, a lot of the things that had been holding society together disappeared), and along with that came declines in thing like population, long-distance trade, literacy, and production of texts.

Of course, the Eastern Roman Empire flourished during the first half of this period, the Abbasid Caliphate during the second half--to say nothing of China.

 

[Verified_Confection_Being]

The very concept of historical ages is both irrelevant and stupid. We can't say the dark age is the one that doesn't fit if we're prepared to accept the medieval and all the rest.

But from a gameplay perspective, why do we need it? The dark ages are usually seen as part of the medieval era anyway

 

[Browd]

Although perhaps more ancient-era (and pre-ancient) focused than Dark Ages per se, you might take a look at Rob (R8XFT)'s Anno Domini mod for Civ VI: http://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/anno-domini-civ-6-version-available-now.600320

 

[Ever Adrift]

The 'Dark Ages' is really just a reference to the Medieval Period of European history, more specifically, the early Medieval period. Civilization 6 is about the entire history of global civilization; there was never a global 'dark ages.'

 

[Bodin]

I like the potential of the idea. In Western Europe, the "Dark Ages" were characterized by the rise of 'barbaric nations' and mass destruction (pillaging) of civilizations. It gave rise to monastic orders prioritizing the preservation of knowledge (through manuscript copying, both religious and classical works [such as preserving the writings of Aristotle and the annuls of Julius Caesar], which later developed into the art of illumination during the Medieval period). What if science tech not only had to be discovered, but kept (maintained)? Copies of one's tech (like blueprints, recipes, and so forth) had to be stored in science districts. If a player lost "all" his/her science districts, some of the tech could be lost (the player would suffer a setback) and had to re-discover some lost tech (perhaps at an accelerated rate)? It would also explain why spies had to infiltrate science campuses - that's where copies of the tech is stored.

During the Dark Ages, it was also a time in which barbarians were much more frequent and preserved knowledge was lost (or scarce) just as we also saw the rise of heresy and divergent religious movements ("cults"). There have been great "Revolution" mods done for previous Civ games, but those focused on just political division. During the Dark Ages, Western Europe also saw the rise in these new religious teachings - not from a foreign religion, but from a 'new teaching' or 'new interpretation' within an established religion.

So how could something like this be implemented in the Civ 6 game? Illumination could be a tech discovered (with faith and culture bonuses). It could be the 'technology' for making copies of tech for multiple campuses. Create a Scribe who makes copies of tech for all science campuses. Create a Monk who makes copies of religious scrolls for all holy sites (protection against heresy). I'm not sure about what the best method for the game mechanic would be, but that's just one way it could be done.

And just as we see empires rise and split (ie. revolution and/or civil war), the same can happen in a religion (the rise of a religion and then a "new teaching" comes on the scene to split the religion and give rise to cult followers (every world religion has cults where its believers claim to follow the 'true' and/or 'improved' way). Just as we see "barbarians" arise and we see 'barbarian units' show up when there is unhappiness, so too, could 'heretics' show up who try to 're-invent' an established religion. Maybe it could also make a 'religion' available during those Dark Ages to the player who hasn't started a religion yet (being formally adopted by a civilization) and who would be, in games terms, the sworn enemy of the civilization with the 'founding' religion.

So a DLC could further develop the religious aspects of Civ 6 for a type of "civil war" within religious systems and further tweak the barbarians into a real, nation-conquering (or at least, pillaging) threat. Illumination being used to preserve tech and a religion's 'true' teachings during a time of barbarian invasion and lost knowledge.