Leaders that you would not want to have in civ 7 (until you think about it and they are strangely appealing)

Okay, sticking to 'sort of historical' rather than Follywood or completely legendary, in extremely roughly chronological order:

Ja-im-hatap (Imhotep) for Egypt.
Ptahhatp for Egypt
En-hedu-ana (Enheduanna) for Akkad
Thales of Miletus for Greece
Brasidas for Greece
Wei Yang (Shang Yang) for (Qin) China
Hasdai ibn Shaprut for Al-Andulus
Nizam al-Mulk for the Seljuq Turks
Rodrigo Diaz de Vivar (El Cid) for Castile
Hassan i-Sabbah for Abbasid Caliphate
Aleksandr Yaroslavich Nevskii for Novgorod (Russia)
Ise Nogai (Nogai Khan) for Mongolia
Jan Zizka for Bohemia
Tlacaelel for the Aztecs
Jakob Fugger for Germany/Holy Roman Empire
Yuanjing (Qi Jiquang) for Ming China
Guido Fawkes (Guy Fawkes) for England
Axel Oxenstierna for Sweden
Armand Jean du Plessis (Richelieu) for France
Gaspar de Guzman y Pimental (Olivares) for Spain
James Graham (Great Montrose) for Scotland
Shih Yang (Ching Shih) for China
John Law for France
Mikhal Aleksandrovich Bakunin for Russia
Oscar Wilde for Britain
George Marshall for the United States
 
Zaarin said:
I am tired and at a glance read this as Wallace Shawn. I'm not opposed. :mischief:
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You declare war on him as he’s leading any Asian or Italian civ:

“You fell victim to one of the classic blunders! The most famous of which is, ‘never get involved in a land war in Asia,’ but only slightly less well-known is this: ‘Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line!’”
 
Zaarin said:
She'd make an awesome civ leader
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In my database, which was started under Civ VI with Civ VI definitions, I have her listed as either a Great Prophet OR a Great Writer with the following Great Works:
Exaltation of Inanna (Nin-me-sara) - poem/song
Hymn to Inanna (In-nin sa-gur-ra) - poem/song
Inanna the Warrior (In-nin me-hus-a) - poem/song

But of course, since both her literary and religious work was in support of daddy Sargon's political purposes, she fits as a potential Leader in Civ VII . . .
 
can't keep him out forever...
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He definitely fits the "big personality" bill.
 
Ricimer.

He was a good political operator.

That isn't why he's strangely appealing, though.

Roman admirers would have a Chernobyl moment. You wanted Julius, and woulda been intrigued by either of the Gracchi brothers. That'd have been different. They're strangely appealing too. But no. What you're gonna get is an infamous puppetmaster who disposed of the gallant Majorian without any ceremony.

A totally unsubtle troll that would ruffle feathers in a way only a real history nerd could enjoy.
 
Here's one: Louis Napoleon.

He was King of Holland as an effective vassal of the French Empire led by his brother (the Napoleon), and reigned for only four years. In those four years, he did his best to learn Dutch, immerse himself in Dutch culture, prioritize the lives of his subjects, and he even sought to protect the interests of the Netherlands over the wishes of his brother - which is also what cost him the job eventually. He was so popular, in fact, that when he returned to the Netherlands thirty years (!) later under a false name, people figured out who he was and formed a crowd to cheer for him outside the window of his hotel room.

He's absolutely perfect for a game that decouples leaders and civilizations.

Probably the main issue with his inclusion is that he's the brother of the most famous Napoleon and the father of Napoleon III.
 
Zaarin said:
I'd love to hear a leader speaking Avestan. :D But he'd be difficult to connect to a civ even obliquely since the civilization connected to the Avesta is still uncertain, though they were probably located in Afghanistan.
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Avestans were an Iranian people though, no, and one that semi-predates the Achaemenid and subsequent Persian empires? Wouldn't that make Zarathustra a really good "start" to the Iranian legacy in the same way we probably aren't getting a Zhou civ for Confucius and a Yamatai civ for Himiko?

I also think it may be the best chance at nodding at all to Sogdia and that general region, at least until the day that Sogdia is actually included in an expansion. Which I suspect, if we get a Sogdian civ, won't happen until our second round of "Middle East"/Pashtun DLC civs. Mostly because I think there is more important "connective tissue" being released in our very first wave of DLC to connect the Middle East to the rest of the Eurasian continent as a matter of opening up pathways (Timurids, probably Georgia/Hittites, possibly Phoenicia/Scythia) that Sogdia doesn't function very well as in a first round. I could see it fitting well alongside a number of civs in a follow-up DLC that focused mostly on flavor, maybe alongside Scythia/Durrani/Tibet region, or maybe Babylon or even the Safavids if they aren't in the game at launch.

Voidwalkin said:
Just dropping by to say that if you want a leader who transcends, who could plausibly have adapted to and successfully led any people at any time in history, there is one clearly outstanding candidate...

Timur! Cuddly Eurasian horseman!
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I was going back and forth for a bit as to whether we wanted Timurids alongside Mongolia in the same era, or if it would be better to skip them and just have Tamerlane act as nominal representation. But I think the Timurids are extremely likely to appear in "Crossroads of the World," if not base game, simply because of how well they act as glue for that region. But I think they will be representing the "Iranian" legacy that will be led by a Zarathustra or Nader Shah type leader thankfully, and we won't have to fret about the devs devoting resources to Tamerlane. One could argue that leaders in VII being divorced means we can have supervillain leaders (and just look, we have Napoleon), but I think that will be pretty rare, and in fact leaders are even more likely to be positive portrayals of cultural legacies than they even were in VI, because now they are even moreso being used as ideological throughlines than simply fun caricatures, and it would just seem horribly cynical to string together a three civ historical line under tyranny.
 
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RedCourtJester said:
Avestans were an Iranian people though, no, and one that semi-predates the Achaemenid and subsequent Persian empires? Wouldn't that make Zarathustra a really good "start" to the Iranian legacy in the same way we probably aren't getting a Zhou civ for Confucius and a Yamatai civ for Himiko?
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Fair. I think we will see a handful of "leaders without civs" in Civ7. Zenobia and Charlemagne are prime candidates.
 
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