Need for Diversity

[Grit]

I know this has been talked about a lot but I think that with all their resources Firaxis could add alot more Civs. Its not fair that you only get 2-however many civs deepending on the game. Give me some more Easter Euro, Far East, African, Middle East, Ocieanic, and North American civs for pete Sake

 

[smjjames]

theres MANY civs out there, but they can only put so many in the game.

if you want different civs, theres plenty of mods in the creation and customization section that you can use.

 

[Sohan]

For the Middle East, some popular civs not in the standard game are the Babylonians, Assyrians, Hittites, Phoenicians, Israelites, etc. I suppose the best we can hope for right now is for mods for them, which I'm sure there are somewhere.

For Africa, the best I can think of is adding Ethiopia, Zulu, Songhay, and Carthage. Maybe Ghana too, and aside from that no major civs really pop into mind. Problem with all these is coming up with famous leaders, city names, and unique units. Carthage is the one that stands out the most.

For the Far East, there are plenty of options. I'm sure there are some mods for new Far East civs by now. Korea, Siam, and Dai-Viet(Vietnam) are some fairly big names that come to mind. I'm sure someone feels the urge to inject Tibet in there for some reason.

For Oceania, pretty obvious, just mod in Australia, New Zealand, and/or the Polynesians, etc. Then again, why would you want any of them and what kind of unique units would they get? And is there really a leader for any of them that has stood out in history?

For North America, I guess you can throw in the Mayan civ, the Sioux civ, and a couple other Native American civs to boot. Canada is a viable option too.

 

[acidsatyr]

lol canada

 

[Underdawg]

Yeah... Canada.... *Laughs out Loud* And I live in Canada.

 

[Technocactus]

I know this has been talked about a lot but I think that with all their resources Firaxis could add alot more Civs. Its not fair that you only get 2-however many civs deepending on the game. Give me some more Easter Euro, Far East, African, Middle East, Ocieanic, and North American civs for pete Sake

It should be about the world's best civs, not the best civs that happen to have been in a region.

 

[Antiochus]

Indeed...as i have said before, this is Civilisation 4, not Barbarian 4. It would be ridiculous to include masses of mediocre "civilisations" (many of the suggestions are for peoples like the Zulu, who fit the definition of barbarian far better) just for the sake of it.

 

[armchairknight]

Well, I'm with Grit: I'd like many more civs. That's one of the reasons I like Sevomod. But if we're keeping the list short, how about Babylonia, Canada, Ojibwa, Siam, Syria, and Zaire? IMO that's diversity!

 

[armchairknight]

It should be about the world's best civs, not the best civs that happen to have been in a region.

How would anyone judge the quality of an entire civilization? Is anyone actually qualified to do so? I wonder....

 

[Antiochus]

Pretty easy i would have thought. Look at their size, their accomplishments, their cultural impact, their longevity, and their impact on history and world affairs. Also, being an actual civilisation rather than a bunch of nomadic barbarians is a great help.

 

[armchairknight]

Pretty easy i would have thought. Look at their size, their accomplishments, their cultural impact, their longevity, and their impact on history and world affairs. Also, being an actual civilisation rather than a bunch of nomadic barbarians is a great help.

Yeah, but if they exist today, when will they fall? What would you consider an accomplishment? How much you affect your neighbors is a measure of your quality? How much of a measure? Barbarians? What makes one a barbarian? That their values vary greatly from ones own? Or is the nomadic qualifier the important thing? The better civs stayed put? These seem pretty subjective, to me. Hard to judge something fairly without objective tools to measure with, wouldn't you agree? Your list of features seems decent enough, really, but how do you apply it?

 

[Antiochus]

If you really wanted you could apply criteria like settlement in cities vs tribal encampments, whether they had stone buildings, whether they had written language etc (for ancient civs at least). For civs that currently exist in the real world, since we do not know the future, we must combine those criteria with things like length of existence, power, size and influence in the modern age...even though in 500 years we may look back and say other civs (less well-known now) should be civilisations in the game.

In any case, the whole issue is subjective, and it's probably best to apply common sense. People are going to want the more well-known and historically influential civs in the game, and i am no exception to that. Thus the decisions on who to include will reflect the general wishes of the target market to an extent. There are a few grey areas when it comes to deciding who should be in or out - and yes it is a subjective decision. The more civs that are in the game, the harder it is to balance. However, i do think they ship too few civs and leaders in the original game in order to sell x-packs. I think the number of civs in Civilisation III, including all x-packs, is an appropriate number.

 

[JustAnotherUser]

The only things different between civs are

the name
two traits
one UU
starting techs

And the name, UUs and starting techs are mostly for flavour

What is exactly the big deal?
Why play a civ (or against one) called Babylonians would be so different than playing a civ called Persians?

 

[armchairknight]

The only things different between civs are

the name
two traits
one UU
starting techs

And the name, UUs and starting techs are mostly for flavour

What is exactly the big deal?
Why play a civ (or against one) called Babylonians would be so different than playing a civ called Persians?

Not a big deal, really. Just a fun conversation. But consider this: you're playing a basketball video game...would it be more fun to play as your team or the 'blue team'? I know which one I'd rather play. Go Pistons!

I like flavor. Don't you?

 

[armchairknight]

If you really wanted you could apply criteria like settlement in cities vs tribal encampments, whether they had stone buildings, whether they had written language etc (for ancient civs at least). For civs that currently exist in the real world, since we do not know the future, we must combine those criteria with things like length of existence, power, size and influence in the modern age...even though in 500 years we may look back and say other civs (less well-known now) should be civilisations in the game.

In any case, the whole issue is subjective, and it's probably best to apply common sense. People are going to want the more well-known and historically influential civs in the game, and i am no exception to that. Thus the decisions on who to include will reflect the general wishes of the target market to an extent. There are a few grey areas when it comes to deciding who should be in or out - and yes it is a subjective decision. The more civs that are in the game, the harder it is to balance. However, i do think they ship too few civs and leaders in the original game in order to sell x-packs. I think the number of civs in Civilisation III, including all x-packs, is an appropriate number.

Yeah, good points. In other words it's like a beauty pagent. Another possible problem with including the number of civs that I would like to see would be the decreasing distinctiveness of any given civ. Not that I think this an unsurmountable obstacle, just a possible issue that might have to be dealt with. I would love to see, oh, 187 civs in the game myself. But that's just me. I'm greedy like that.

 

[JustAnotherUser]

I like flavor. Don't you?

Not when it is too artificial.

 

[armchairknight]

Not when it is too artificial.

What's too artificial? Sometimes you just can't get too artificial.

 

[naterator]

would it be more fun to play as your team or the 'blue team'? I know which one I'd rather play.

hey! i used to have a blast playing as the boston frogs! double dribble rules!
back to the subject though... i think more cive are fun, but without more traits, it's just so much fluff. i liked having 2 choices for some trait combos sometimes in civIII, but if there were 30 civs with only the traits we already have, there'd be a bunch of threads complaining that the civs are too alike.

 

[Truronian]

I would love to have 100s of civilization choices (a la Call to Power) but I think there are things that should be and were much higher on Firaxis's to do list.

 

[JustAnotherUser]

What's too artificial? Sometimes you just can't get too artificial.

With artificial I mean, using your example, if the only difference between the Blue team and the Pistons is the name and nothing else then this is "artificial flavour", and that would be the case with more civs in Civilization. I rather modifiy the XML if I really want different civs or just immagine that were it say "Aztec" it actually say "zulu" and where it show "persians" is actually "babilonians", et voilà instant new civs.