New Museum Type

[Boris Gudenuf]

We have currently Archeological and Art Museums in Civ VI, but it occurred to me while reading Smithsonian magazine that the game is missing another important type of museum and museum-artifact: A museum of Science and Technology, or Science and Industry. As technology has advanced since the 19th century (in game terms, Modern Era and later) more and more 'out-dated' technology becomes a source of Museum Exhibits.
Specifically, I'm familiar with the Smithsonian collection, the Deutsche Museum in Munich, and the military collections at the Museum d' la Armee in Paris, Aberdeen in the USA, Ingolstadt, Vienna, Copenhagen and London in Europe, so those are the examples I'll draw from.

The basic idea is, as you discover a new technology that changes the Units, Buildings, or other technology your Civilization is using, the older technology becomes available as an Artifact in a Museum of Science and Technology.
That Museum becomes available a little later than the current Art and Archeology Museums, at about the Civic: Mass Media. (Modern Era)

Samples of Artifacts that could be placed in such a museum:
1. When you enter the Atomic Era, your (invisible in the game) Railroads convert to electric or diesel-electric locomotives, so older Steam Locomotives become available as Artifacts. A any time after that turn, depending on the number of cities in the Civ (OR the number of railroads/routes between cities)a Locomotive artifact may be generated.
- These could even be specifically labeled according to civilization, like the Flying Scotsman for Britain or the UP "Big Boy" for the USA.
2. As soon as you discover Advanced Flight or Rocketry, an obsolete aircraft may become available as an Artifact. These, again, could be labeled by Civ: Spirit of Saint Louis for the USA, the Sopwith Camel for Britain, etc.
3. As soon as you enter the Modern Era, every Factory you have in the Civ increases the chance that you will produce an Artifact: Obsolete Machinery (Jacquard Loom, Steam Pile Driver, etc)
4. Every time after the start of the Modern Era that a new Technology or Civic allows you to Upgrade a unit, you may instead Disband one such unit to produce an Obsolete Military Uniforms/Equipment artifact
- These could even be specific to the unit, so a Bombard, Field Cannon or Artillery Unit produces a Bronze Cannon, Railway Gun, or Howitzer Artifact, an Antitank Crew produces an '88' or Bazooka Artifact, a Musketman produces a Stand of Muskets artifact, etc.

All of these Artifacts have a small chance of being produced in each turn after the first Museum of Science and Industry is built, but they cannot be Stockpiled: if there is no room to display them, they are stashed away in a warehouse and crumble away to nothing.

 

[Guandao]

This sounds like a great idea.
How about a museum which focuses on paleontology as well? I hate it when people confuse archeology and paleontology.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

How about a museum which focuses on paleontology as well? I hate it when people confuse archeology and paleontology.

Agree completely - my sister has her Doctorate in Archeology, and when people say "Oh, you dig up Dinosaurs" you can hear her teeth grinding from across the room! Unfortunately for a quick explanation, her speciality is bones, but from middens/garbage/kitchens, to identify the diet of the natives (mostly American Southwest and Pacific Northwest)

The problem is, the process of obtaining paleontological and archeological 'artifacts' is broadly similar: you dig them up. That means you either have to differentiate the diggers in the game, or randomly select what they dig up, which is not precisely accurate - it's very rare that an expedition looking for Tlingit artifacts comes up wth a T-Rex tooth 'by mistake'! Differentiation means the already-overworked Cities in the Modern and later Eras have to build yet another type of 'Unit' to generate culture.

What I am looking for is a Third alternative (to the current Great Art People and 'Archeological' digs) for obtaining culture, by allowing the conversion, so to speak, of Technology and even (obsolete) military units into Museum Artifacts. By keeping the Building to a single extra Museum type and letting the artifacts 'come to you' as you pursue the usual Technology and Military paths, it should make the 'extra' culture relatively painless to acquire.

Of course, we can also add a new Wonder to build on this:
Smithsonian Institution.
Since the actual Smithsonian includes the National Art Gallery, National Portrait Gallery, Natural History Museum, Air and Space Museum, and so on, it is a Museum that can be built at the same time as the Archeological Museum or Art Museum, but it has 4 slots for Great Works -
Which can be filled with any combination of Great Art, Great Music (The Smith holds the second largest collection of recordings after the Library of Congress), Artifacts OR Science/Technology/Military Artifacts.
In addition to the slots, I'd give it +2 Great Scientist points per turn, + 3 Science, +4 Culture in the city.

 

[Xandinho]

Great idea, I think any idea that makes the end of the game more interesting is welcome.

This sounds like a great idea.
How about a museum which focuses on paleontology as well? I hate it when people confuse archeology and paleontology.

I agree, paleontology could come to provide science bonus to civ. The palentologists could be used to discover fossils of beings from past periods. For example, on discovering the fossil of a new type of dinosaur, civ would gain a great scientific boost. Or each fossil could provide different bonuses, including tourist. It's something that needs to be worked on, but it's an interesting end-of-game improvement.

 

[Siptah]

Honestly, I'd rather see some brand new mechanics than a paleontology museum or paleontologists running around and digging stuff up. The tech museum that gets filled in a different way could work though.

 

[God of Kings]

It should be possible to have both a paleontology museum and an archaeology museum. Note the American Museum of Natural History and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, respectively, both sandwiched by Central Park in New York City.

Some museums house both, such as the Smithsonian Institution in Washington and the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto.

Yes, there should be science museums as well.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

It should be possible to have both a paleontology museum and an archaeology museum. Note the American Museum of Natural History and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, respectively, both sandwiched by Central Park in New York City.

Some museums house both, such as the Smithsonian Institution in Washington and the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto.

Yes, there should be science museums as well.

New York City, as you mentioned, and Washington, DC are both modern examples of cities with 'Theater Square - Museum Districts'!

There are 'specialized' museums, most notably the art museums like the Louvre. New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Hermitage, 'Technology' museums like the Deutsche Museum in Munich. We could proliferate Specialty Museums to add to the game Paleontology ('Natural History') and Military (Museum de l'Armee in Paris, Aberdeen or Kubinka military collections, etc) on top of the current Art and Archeology and my originally proposed Technology Museums.
I would suggest instead we provide a 'generalized' museum to supplement the specialized types.

Here's the proposal:
Specialized Museums:
Art Museum - Great Works of Art
Archeology Museum - results from Sea Wrecks, Archeology Sites clearly labeled as 'Human'
Natural History Museum - results from Archeology Sites labeled 'Pre-Human'
Technology Museum - results from sources as I outlined in the original Post for this thread.

Generalized Museums:
These would be Wonders or National Wonders (which should be brought back to CivVI!) - such as:
Smithsonian Institute
Royal Ontario Museum
Dahlem Museum
British Museum & Library

Each of these would have 4 slots for 'Works', but they could be filled with Anything that could go in a specialized museum. And if the four slots are filled with Great Work of Art, Human Archeology Find, Natural History Archeological Find, and Technology Artifact, they should get a Boost to the Culture and Great Person points (Theming?)

These could be built in addition to or instead of any other Museum in a District.

Another, simplifying possibility, would be to combine Archeology and Natural History into the current Archeology Museum, but allow a Bonus (+1 Culture, +1 Great Person Points per turn) if both Human and Natural History Archeological finds are included.

 

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

Samples of Artifacts that could be placed in such a museum:
1. When you enter the Atomic Era, your (invisible in the game) Railroads convert to electric or diesel-electric locomotives, so older Steam Locomotives become available as Artifacts. A any time after that turn, depending on the number of cities in the Civ (OR the number of railroads/routes between cities)a Locomotive artifact may be generated.
- These could even be specifically labeled according to civilization, like the Flying Scotsman for Britain or the UP "Big Boy" for the USA.
.

Or iconic JNR C62 'The Galaxy Express 999'

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Love the idea of a Science/Technology Museum.
That being said why not just give certain Great Scientists or Great Engineers a great work associated with them (inventions) that could be placed in the museum?
I also do like the idea of choosing to retire an obsolete unit as well. It would be even more interesting if you could only do it if you were the first, or only one such as your UU, to build them.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Love the idea of a Science/Technology Museum.
That being said why not just give certain Great Scientists or Great Engineers a great work associated with them (inventions) that could be placed in the museum?
I also do like the idea of choosing to retire an obsolete unit as well. It would be even more interesting if you could only do it if you were the first, or only one such as your UU, to build them.

In a Gaming World long ago and far away . . .
Specifically, in Alpha Centauri, the first of any unit that you built cost much more than later ones, because it was a Prototype that required more work to 'get the bugs out'.

Bring that to Civ, and Prototype Units would be candidates for a Museum when they became obsolete - your first Biplane, Frigate, Bombard, etc could be re-graphiced as an outdoor museum exhibit, your first Pikeman, Musketman, or Great Swordsman would provide a collection of antique weaponry to go inside the museum.

This could apply to 'civilian' constructions as well: add a Tech later on to show the transition from the first steam locomotives on railroads to diesels and electric motors or the 'Fast Trains" in service now, and that would automatically create an exhibit(s) of older Locomotives. Same with Older transport/cargo ships, and older transport/passenger aircraft.

 

[BuchiTaton]

Since the CIV series works with Culture and Sciene is easier if CIV7 (I dont see changes to CIV6) have a "museum" for each one:
- GALLERY= Traditional, historical and modern art (for culture).
- MUSEUM= Natural science and technology (for science).

The element of national history could work the same with a MEMORIAL building (bonus to loyalty), there are a lot of historical memorials that have museums with national "relics" inside. All of these would be for the Industrial era.

I think short and specific names for infracture is better and easier to associate with their on-game effects.

By the way can somebody said me why we have Water Parks but dont have Hospitals?

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

The element of national history could work the same with a MEMORIAL building (bonus to loyalty), there are a lot of historical memorials that have museums with national "relics" inside. All of these would be for the Industrial era.

That sounds a little similar to the National History Museum in the Govt. Plaza already.

By the way can somebody said me why we have Water Parks but dont have Hospitals?

Because there is no health mechanic?
Currently right now the only bonuses they would probably give is maybe late game food, housing, or amenities? Maybe units could heal faster on a tile with a hospital building and could be where medics spawn too?

Don't get me wrong I like the idea of the Water Park but I would have never thought to include it in the game. I do wish it was a little bit more distinguished from the EC and focus it more on late game tourism than amenities.
Plus the name Water Park has always bugged me. A water park is an amusement park with water rides, which that district isn't. It should be called Amusement Pier.

 

[God of Kings]

Don't get me wrong I like the idea of the Water Park but I would have never thought to include it in the game. I do wish it was a little bit more distinguished from the EC and focus it more on late game tourism than amenities.
Plus the name Water Park has always bugged me. A water park is an amusement park with water rides, which that district isn't. It should be called Amusement Pier.

Firaxis probably thought of this:

It's a water park next to the beach

Apparently, this is a water park ride according to Firaxis:

It's located next to the beach

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Firaxis probably thought of this:

It's a water park next to the beach

Apparently, this is a water park ride according to Firaxis:

It's located next to the beach

Yes Water Parks usually don't have Ferris Wheels or Aquariums though. For all intents and purposes it's a pleasure pier/boardwalk district though not in name.