More Alternate Leaders?

[Phrozen]

But Spain as a civ has exploration/colonization abilities, and, funding Columbus aside, I'd personally associate Isabella, Defender of the Faith, with religion more than exploration. She didn't conquer Grenada because she was curious about its library or fund the Inquisition out of curiosity. Also recall that the ostensible purpose of Columbus' voyage was to fund a crusade...

But I agree: I'd be astonished to see Isabella at this point. She overlaps too heavily with Philip, there are too many other civilizations that could better use an alternate leader, and the likelihood of Portugal's return makes her that much less relevant.

I think Alfonso X would be a better choice for Spain. He could focus on culture and/or science.

 

[Zaarin]

I think Alfonso X would be a better choice for Spain. He could focus on culture and/or science.

Eh, Spain is very low on the list of civs that need alternate leaders. In-game Philip II may bear little resemblance, either in appearance or personality, to the historical Philip II, but it's not like he was a poor choice or his LUA is horrible. And I suspect we'll see Izzy back next time around, hopefully with her iconic strawberry blonde locks.

 

[Lord Lakely]

How about we have no more alt leaders and just have more Civs instead? ^__^

 

[Zaarin]

How about we have no more alt leaders and just have more Civs instead? ^__^

Because Cleopatra.

 

[Lord Lakely]

Make Ptolemaic Egypt its own Civ.

 

[Zaarin]

Make Ptolemaic Egypt its own Civ.

An acceptable compromise.

 

[Phrozen]

An acceptable compromise.

If we can have 50 versions of Greece we can have two versions of Egypt.

 

[Zaarin]

If we can have 50 versions of Greece we can have two versions of Egypt.

Especially since one of them is Greek?

 

[Lord Lakely]

Plot twist for Civ 7: every Civ is Greek.

 

[AmazonQueen]

I wouldn't mind a Greek city-states scenario, possibly competing for trade and colonies across the Med.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

But Spain as a civ has exploration/colonization abilities, and, funding Columbus aside, I'd personally associate Isabella, Defender of the Faith, with religion more than exploration. She didn't conquer Grenada because she was curious about its library or fund the Inquisition out of curiosity. Also recall that the ostensible purpose of Columbus' voyage was to fund a crusade...

But I agree: I'd be astonished to see Isabella at this point. She overlaps too heavily with Philip, there are too many other civilizations that could better use an alternate leader, and the likelihood of Portugal's return makes her that much less relevant.

This is all true that Spain's ability is exploration focused, but considering Phillip has the whole inquisition and faith thing going, the exploration focused ability would have made her somewhat different. But, in my opinion, Spain is already very accurately portrayed already, and at this point it probably is better to scrap her if she would be too much like Phillip.

 

[Zaarin]

Plot twist for Civ 7: every Civ is Greek.

I thought that was Civ6.

This is all true that Spain's ability is exploration focused, but considering Phillip has the whole inquisition and faith thing going, the exploration focused ability would have made her somewhat different. But, in my opinion, Spain is already very accurately portrayed already, and at this point it probably is better to scrap her if she would be too much like Phillip.

There's always Joanna of Castile.

 

[Stomper66]

America - Abraham Lincoln
Lincoln could make America a production powerhouse. Union's industry overwhelmed Confederacy in US Civil War.
Could have a Monitor UU replacing ironclad.

Yes Abraham Lincoln would be a good fit for America and make US more industry and science focused rather than nature and culture. If you played Civ6 there was a great US Civ war scenario so it would be great if they brought that back in another expansion.

England - Henry V
Big personalitty, great briton, pops in a lot in discussions for new English leader.
Longbowmen a natural UU for him.

Yes definitely but maybe keep the sea dog and redcoat as well as having the Longbowman, or if that was OP maybe drop the sea dog for the new unit. The MOAR units mod already includes the Longbowman and the design is perfect anyway. Like Philip I could just imagine Henry being very passionate and theatrical as well.

Phillip doesn't cover exploration at all in his leader ability, so I think Isabella would be a great leader if they wanted to make Spain more exploration focused. Of course I'm also under the impression that the true exploration civ we get will be Portugal.

But I agree: I'd be astonished to see Isabella at this point. She overlaps too heavily with Philip, there are too many other civilizations that could better use an alternate leader, and the likelihood of Portugal's return makes her that much less relevant.

Eh, Spain is very low on the list of civs that need alternate leaders. In-game Philip II may bear little resemblance, either in appearance or personality, to the historical Philip II, but it's not like he was a poor choice or his LUA is horrible. And I suspect we'll see Izzy back next time around, hopefully with her iconic strawberry blonde locks.

This is all true that Spain's ability is exploration focused, but considering Phillip has the whole inquisition and faith thing going, the exploration focused ability would have made her somewhat different. But, in my opinion, Spain is already very accurately portrayed already, and at this point it probably is better to scrap her if she would be too much like Phillip.

Yeah I think that even though I would want to see Isabella in game it would be for all the wrong reasons (or right reasons) Philip is great already and Spain is one of the best designed and accurately portrayed civs in the game already so if it aint broke don't try and fix it. I agree that they would be very low down on the list of civs that could do with alternate leaders.

Speaking of lists of things low down on lists I wouldn't want to see Portugal included until I see 5 or 6 new civs included beforehand. I say this because there are too many European civs in the game already, and besides Austria/Hungary I'm not keen on Firaxis including anymore. Civs like Mali/ Songhai, Shoshone/ Apache, Iroquois, Ottomans, Byzantines, Cathage, Inca, Morocco and Maya are more essential at this point.

I also think that Brazil are kind of like Portugal in Civ6 anyway. Brazil was a Portuguese colony, Pedro and all of Brazils rulers are probably Portuguese heritage, Brazilians speak Portuguese, The Portuguese Royal family moved their court to Brazil permanently in 1808. I really can't see many differences between these two civs. But who knows you could say the same for Britain and Australia and these civs seem to distinguish themselves from each other easily enough.

 

[Phrozen]

I could see something like this for Egypt:

Djoser
LUA: Imhotep. Djoser has access to the unique governor Imhotep.
Or
LUA: Pyramid Builder. All wonders grant +1 culture to tiles around them. +2 culture after The Enlightenment. Gets a free Great Engineer at Masonry.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Speaking of lists of things low down on lists I wouldn't want to see Portugal included until I see 5 or 6 new civs included beforehand. I say this because there are too many European civs in the game already, and besides Austria/Hungary I'm not keen on Firaxis including anymore. Civs like Mali/ Songhai, Shoshone/ Apache, Iroquois, Ottomans, Byzantines, Cathage, Inca, Morocco and Maya are more essential at this point.

I also think that Brazil are kind of like Portugal in Civ6 anyway. Brazil was a Portuguese colony, Pedro and all of Brazils rulers are probably Portuguese heritage, Brazilians speak Portuguese, The Portuguese Royal family moved their court to Brazil permanently in 1808. I really can't see many differences between these two civs. But who knows you could say the same for Britain and Australia and these civs seem to distinguish themselves from each other easily enough.

I don't really associate Brazil at all with Portugal, other than they acquired their language. Brazil has a very distinct culture from the rest of the world and, if anything, Portugal is more closer to Spain in their culture. Portugal is probably the only civ left from Europe that is probably guaranteed to get in, even though they are low on my list as well. They helped started the Age of Discovery and was the first, and biggest maritime colonial empire in the world during the Renaissance. So for those reasons I don't see why they shouldn't be included. By the way the Byzantines are also European.

 

[Xandinho]

Yes Abraham Lincoln would be a good fit for America and make US more industry and science focused rather than nature and culture. If you played Civ6 there was a great US Civ war scenario so it would be great if they brought that back in another expansion.



Yes definitely but maybe keep the sea dog and redcoat as well as having the Longbowman, or if that was OP maybe drop the sea dog for the new unit. The MOAR units mod already includes the Longbowman and the design is perfect anyway. Like Philip I could just imagine Henry being very passionate and theatrical as well.









Yeah I think that even though I would want to see Isabella in game it would be for all the wrong reasons (or right reasons) Philip is great already and Spain is one of the best designed and accurately portrayed civs in the game already so if it aint broke don't try and fix it. I agree that they would be very low down on the list of civs that could do with alternate leaders.

Speaking of lists of things low down on lists I wouldn't want to see Portugal included until I see 5 or 6 new civs included beforehand. I say this because there are too many European civs in the game already, and besides Austria/Hungary I'm not keen on Firaxis including anymore. Civs like Mali/ Songhai, Shoshone/ Apache, Iroquois, Ottomans, Byzantines, Cathage, Inca, Morocco and Maya are more essential at this point.

I also think that Brazil are kind of like Portugal in Civ6 anyway. Brazil was a Portuguese colony, Pedro and all of Brazils rulers are probably Portuguese heritage, Brazilians speak Portuguese, The Portuguese Royal family moved their court to Brazil permanently in 1808. I really can't see many differences between these two civs. But who knows you could say the same for Britain and Australia and these civs seem to distinguish themselves from each other easily enough.

As already sayd in the post above, Portugal is much more similar with Spain than with Brazil, and if there is a European that we can expect to be included with almost 100% certainty, this European is Portugal. There is no reason for a civ that has been in the game since civ3 be overlooked in civ6. If we have 3 European civs in the next expansion, given that 1 slot will be filled by Portgual, the other two will be filled with probably an eastern European civ with another random European

 

[Stomper66]

Byzantines are also European.

Since their capital was Constantinople (modern day Istanbul) and most of their empire at its height was over countries like Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Palestine and Egypt I don't really consider the Byzantines European. I suppose it's down to interpretation where Europe begins and ends and some might consider these countries European but I certainly don't.

I'm not saying Portugal are not important or worthy enough of being in the game they are especially with all their trade and exploration accomplishments. But there are over 30 civs in the game right now and around a third of these are all Europeans. Let's have some more diversity and get a chance to play some civs from other parts of the world. They've gone in the right direction with the inclusion of the Cree, Indonesia and Khmer.

 

[Zaarin]

Since their capital was Constantinople (modern day Istanbul) and most of their empire at its height was over countries like Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Palestine and Egypt I don't really consider the Byzantines European. I suppose it's down to interpretation where Europe begins and ends and some might consider these countries European but I certainly don't.

Constantinople is physically in Greece, not Anatolia (though modern Istanbul is located on both sides of the Bosphorus; if I'm not mistaken the Anatolian portion of the city was historically regarded as a separate city). The core of Byzantine territory was in the Balkans and Eastern Europe, though they also sometimes controlled Roman Asia (what wasn't taken by Persia) until the Islamic Conquest. The Byzantine leadership was also almost entirely Greek (I think there might have been a couple Syrian emperors? But Rome proper also had a couple Syrians and a Carthaginian). I'd call Byzantium unequivocally a European empire with some Asiatic holdings. Contrast their successors, the Ottomans, whose core holdings were in Anatolia and the Middle East and whose ruling class originated in Central Asia, who I'd therefore call a Middle Eastern civilization with European holdings. Also worth pointing out that religiously the Byzantines were Christians and Ottomans were Muslims. This was irrelevant to culturally placing Byzantium when Byzantium was young--Christianity spread rapidly and widely from its birthplace in Judea west and south into Africa and east at least as far as China and perhaps as far as Japan*--but after the Islamic Conquest Christians became decidedly marginalized in Asia and strongly associated with Europe. Even before Islam, however, Byzantium could be religiously pegged as European in that the Asiatic churches were non-Chalcedonian (whether Oriental Orthodox or Nestorian, i.e. the Church of the East) whereas the Byzantines were Chalcedonian (Eastern Orthodox).Note also that they considered themselves both Roman and Greek, and that Western Europe regarded the Byzantines as the height of European culture. So I think there are a lot of grounds for calling Byzantium, especially Medieval Byzantium, European.

*I understand there is some evidence of a native Syriac church in Japan predating the introduction of Catholicism by the Portuguese.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Since their capital was Constantinople (modern day Istanbul) and most of their empire at its height was over countries like Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Palestine and Egypt I don't really consider the Byzantines European. I suppose it's down to interpretation where Europe begins and ends and some might consider these countries European but I certainly don't.

I agree that none of those countries are considered European, although that small portion of Turkey where Constantinople is debatable like above post said. Even so it was pegged as a continuation of the Roman Empire which was already in all those countries you mentioned, which, of course Rome is indeed considered European.

 

[Stomper66]

Note also that they considered themselves both Roman and Greek, and that Western Europe regarded the Byzantines as the height of European culture. So I think there are a lot of grounds for calling Byzantium, especially Medieval Byzantium, European.

With medieval Europe I consider the medieval European countries to be those under the control of the Roman Church and being part of Christendom. I always thought that the Byzantine empire was a rival to the western church with its own Orthodox Church, beliefs, culture, and heads of authority. And with their geographical location (of the empire overall) they seem to not be completely European and not completely middle eastern but something in between. This is why I think the inclusion of the Byzantines could be really cool as the civ would be a hybrid of European and Asian influences. This could be shown in the leaders clothing, the music and the unit and city design. It would also be really interesting to have them on the real world map as their location would allow them to benefit from several trade routes and militarily control access between the two continents.