Only 30 Civs in base game (+ Shawnee)

[RedCourtJester]

It's looking to me like they're going to do the thing where the "Space Race Victory" is a Moon mission rather than an interstellar mission, so I think they've definitely left themselves room to add a fourth Age if they choose to do so.

It's true that the near-future gameplay does not have a good track record in Civilization, but there are a few reasons why this might be different in Civ7. One is the length of Ages: interstellar travel is really NOT a near-future thing, so interstellar missions have always felt rushed and completely implausible; the length of Civ7 Ages does potentially allow enough time to reach a tech level where such a thing could feel plausible. Another is the rubber-banding of Civ7 Ages, that could focus the gameplay of a Future Age instead of it being the usual strung-out endgame of a contest that was already over several hundred turns earlier.

But anyhow, we're getting way ahead of ourselves.

I think pairing "modern technology" with "speculative technology" will probably work out better in a hypothetical fourth age than simply speculative tech. Especially if it serves as a "jumping off point" for some crazy sci-fi nonsense ala Beyond Earth.

Jules Verne leads SPACEFRANCE.

 

[AriochIV]

Again, if they sell such a thing, I hope it's not a traditional expansion but an entirely self-contained DLC. If it's an expansion, it might come with other things I want, which would make it difficult to disable, and would probably be built upon in future expansion(s).

I think something that large would most likely be part of a formal expansion, but it still could (and should) be an option that can be disabled.

 

[Voidwalkin]

Source (at 44'15, the video should start there) :

I think Augustus' appearance would be made a bit more dignified by a little MPB. Man would benefit from a little old hairline recession.

 

[Zaarin]

I think Augustus' appearance would be made a bit more dignified by a little MPB. Man would benefit from a little old hairline recession.

I think his appearance could benefit from darker skin, gaining weight, and a curly beard. Wait, I'm describing Septimius Severus.

 

[Mudokon Pop]

No Britain seems an odd choice, but they're not technically confirmed. I originally had Normans - Britain as the default here, but there's no great alternative option for France who are confirmed. Maya into Spain as the default pathway also feels horrible but none of the other revealed Antiquity era civs make sense as the default other than Rome, who have already been assigned the Normans. Mississippi is also difficult to place here, because the Shawnee make the most sense but that doesn't work for players who don't get the DLC.

I honestly don't believe that Britain will be excluded from the base game. I also assume the paths are not as linear (stacked) as we are percieving them to be - there could be two equally likely unlocked paths for any civ (ie we saw Egypt unlocks both Abbasids & Songhai) and so I see no problem with the Normans unlocking both Britain & France.

 

[RedCourtJester]

I think his appearance could benefit from darker skin, gaining weight, and a curly beard. Wait, I'm describing Septimius Severus.

Rome -> Almoravids/whatever -> Italy path. Great second Roman leader choice actually, if we ever get one.

 

[Zaarin]

Rome -> Almoravids/whatever -> Italy path. Great second Roman leader choice actually, if we ever get one.

TBH I just enjoy the irony of a Carthaginian leading Rome.

 

[AriochIV]

I think Augustus' appearance would be made a bit more dignified by a little MPB. Man would benefit from a little old hairline recession.

A balding teenager just looks even weirder.

 

[Zaarin]

A balding teenager just looks even weirder.

I knew a guy in high school who was balding. TBH he looked considerably older at 17 than I do now at 35.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Rome -> Almoravids/whatever -> Italy path. Great second Roman leader choice actually, if we ever get one.

Severus could even be given a 'special' Leader Bonus: under him the Legion was re-organized to include lanciarii - spearmen - to better counter heavy enemy cavalry like the Sarmatian and Persian Cataphracts.
Would make a loverly modification of any Legion graphics, replacing a couple of the figures in trhe group with men carrying spears . . .

He also started the construction of what was later called the "Baths of Caracalla", the most ornately decorated public baths in Rome. It was referred to as one of the Wonders of Rome, and would make a nice candidate for a Leader-related Wonder.

 

[RedCourtJester]

Severus could even be given a 'special' Leader Bonus: under him the Legion was re-organized to include lanciarii - spearmen - to better counter heavy enemy cavalry like the Sarmatian and Persian Cataphracts.
Would make a loverly modification of any Legion graphics, replacing a couple of fteh fogures in trhe group with men carrying spears . . .

He also started the construction of what was later called the "Baths of Caracalla", the most ornately decorated public baths in Rome. It was referred to as one of the Wonders of Rome, and would make a nice candidate for a Leader-related Wonder.

Probably not too hard either since spearmen models are already in the game and likely use the same universal bones/animations.

I was considering the idea of leader-related wonders. They might happen, however I think they are less likely to happen in antiquity than other eras, given that they would materially affect the "wonder" win-con. Maybe one exclusive wonder will be too much of a swing toward imbalance, remains to be seen how they would feasibly balance around that.

 

[chaosprophet]

This is partly why I'm not holding myself to 10 civs per era. The game's design naturally suggests there will be more modern civs than antiquity or exploration civs. I think antiquity will always be locked at 5 based on the 7 wonders win-con (8-ish universal wonders plus 5 civ-specific wonders each game), but if there aren't any restrictions as harsh as that in exploration/modern, I could maybe see the game opening those eras up later. Maybe 8-10 in exploration, 12-15 modern?

With already 9 in ancient, at best I could see a 9/9/12. But then there is strong evidence for one more ancient civ at least, so 10/10/10 is the most likely at the moment.

But as they said that the civs in the "new world" are very well into existence and can steal a wonder from you even if you can't reach them, I bet you can only play a 5-player multiplayer game from Antiquity, but that in single player this is still you + 7 civs in each age.

I also though the increase meant those others civs in the other side of the world, but then it would make sense for the civs increase to happen on the exploration age and not modern, so that is what is confusing me now. Do we even now if those 5 mean all at the same side of the world or the 5 limit would mean 3 in one part 2 on the other or 4 in the initial and one on the other? The Antiquity stream had 4 on a continent at the end of the age with that continent fully explored. Tecumseh from the later save seems like the initial continent had 3 civs, with 2 on the other parts of the map. Albeit that doesn't tell us much as we don't know the world setting they used for those games.

AI have to agree with Zaarin. I’d find such an era very boring and offputting. I don’t want sea cities and other sci fi stuff in the game.

I for one hope for space exploration in such a potential future setting.

I would love for an eventual 4th age, but as a pretty much futuristic / sci-fi ish one, and think the whole changes between ages system would fit something like that well. But having some different type of choice for civs or completely futuristics ones. And not just to have a recent age instead, if the game really ends tech wise as early as some think it will, albeit we don't really know it yet. I could see it going as far as Information Era level of units (excluding the GDR).

But I think chances of then adding a future age are small, as people in general don't tend to like it much, so too much effort for likely not enough gain even if on a separated dlc package. Maybe they could try a small version as a free scenario and then see if people have interest on a full age.

 

[Zaarin]

Severus could even be given a 'special' Leader Bonus: under him the Legion was re-organized to include lanciarii - spearmen - to better counter heavy enemy cavalry like the Sarmatian and Persian Cataphracts.
Would make a loverly modification of any Legion graphics, replacing a couple of the figures in trhe group with men carrying spears . . .

He also started the construction of what was later called the "Baths of Caracalla", the most ornately decorated public baths in Rome. It was referred to as one of the Wonders of Rome, and would make a nice candidate for a Leader-related Wonder.

He also sponsored the cult of Sol Invictus as an organized pagan alternative to the growing popularity of Christianity, Gnosticism, and Neoplatonism...and Sol Invictus was basically Latinized Bel (the Aramaic god, a sun god, not to be confused with Canaanite Baal, a storm god--the Canaanite equivalent would be the goddess Shamsh/Shemesh/Shapash).

 

[Leucarum]

I hope no future age. The civ lineup per age is already too limited.

it could just be that if more civs are added in exploration/antiquity you can't go above 5 civs, but by modern all the civs are on the map so starting with 8 is fine.

Or who knows, maybe we're in bizzaro world and say civs in modern have revolutionary versions of themselves or something, so you could have either on the map?

 

[RedCourtJester]

He also sponsored the cult of Sol Invictus as an organized pagan alternative to the growing popularity of Christianity, Gnosticism, and Neoplatonism...and Sol Invictus was basically Latinized Bel (the Aramaic god, a sun god, not to be confused with Canaanite Baal, a storm god--the Canaanite equivalent would be the goddess Shamsh/Shemesh/Shapash).

Although it does seem that Bel was Ba'al through a later culture. Kind of like how Jupiter (and arguably Devas) was just Dyeus Phater from older PIE mythologies.

I would love it if there were a way to translate pantheon gods that way, maybe an antiquity mini-game of god-expies.

 

[Zaarin]

Although it does seem that Bel was Ba'al through a later culture.

No, "Baal" is just a Semitic word that means "lord, master" and was a very common epithet for many deities. Marduk was called Belu in late Akkadian. Even YHWH is called Baal a few times. It's not the name of a specific god except in Phoenician where in the case of Baal Hadad "Baal" slowly became the god's name and "Hadad," "thunderer," became the epithet. Biblical Hebrew also uses "baal" to mean any pagan tutelary god, and to some extent this usage actually matches Phoenician as well, funny enough.

 

[chaosprophet]

it could just be that if more civs are added in exploration/antiquity you can't go above 5 civs, but by modern all the civs are on the map so starting with 8 is fine.

You actually made me think of what is likely the more obvious explanation: If you start at exploration age, they want you to still have the exploration age experience, which means, the players can only be the ones from the initial part of the world map, and the other civs on the rest of the map aren't options. So it isn't that new civs appear from the exploration to modern transition, just that the game don't want to give the player control over those other civs until modern age where things may be better equalized. As the number suggests a smaller number of civs in the other part of the world than in the main, likely so when you get to exploration you don't find just a full filled landmass like the initial one, but also a lot of space to explore and grab. So it would make sense to not let the player pick those civs at the first two ages as they would have a lot more of space to play with and/or less opponents for a while giving them an advantage that the game can just automatically cap on the AI civs / or alternatively have a smaller part of the world available, and another without anyone. (like, about half of the map for the 5 civs on your side, a smaller, about 30% of the map for the 3 civs, and another 20% dvided in another part of the map that is also divded by ocean from all players so will have at most independent power for whoever gets there first during exploration).

EDIT: As an example, it if you have an europe+asia+africa landmass available for 5 players, with an Americas for 3 other players that you can't start with on the first two ages, and a third continent of australia without players and that everyone else can only access when they gett ocean crossing during exploration.

 

[RedCourtJester]

No, "Baal" is just a Semitic word that means "lord, master" and was a very common epithet for many deities. Marduk was called Belu in late Akkadian. Even YHWH is called Baal a few times. It's not the name of a specific god except in Phoenician where in the case of Baal Hadad "Baal" slowly became the god's name and "Hadad," "thunderer," became the epithet. Biblical Hebrew also uses "baal" to mean any pagan tutelary god, and to some extent this usage actually matches Phoenician as well, funny enough.

Ah, I apologize, I think I was confusing the Aramaic Bel with the Palmyrene Bel.

 

[Leucarum]

You actually made me think of what is likely the more obvious explanation: If you start at exploration age, they want you to still have the exploration age experience, which means, the players can only be the ones from the initial part of the world map, and the other civs on the rest of the map aren't options. So it isn't that new civs appear from the exploration to modern transition, just that the game don't want to give the player control over those other civs until modern age where things may be better equalized. As the number suggests a smaller number of civs in the other part of the world than in the main, likely so when you get to exploration you don't find just a full filled landmass like the initial one, but also a lot of space to explore and grab. So it would make sense to not let the player pick those civs at the first two ages as they would have a lot more of space to play with and/or less opponents for a while giving them an advantage that the game can just automatically cap on the AI civs / or alternatively have a smaller part of the world available, and another without anyone. (like, about half of the map for the 5 civs on your side, a smaller, about 30% of the map for the 3 civs, and another 20% dvided in another part of the map that is also divded by ocean from all players so will have at most independent power for whoever gets there first during exploration).

EDIT: As an example, it if you have an europe+asia+africa landmass available for 5 players, with an Americas for 3 other players that you can't start with on the first two ages, and a third continent of australia without players and that everyone else can only access when they gett ocean crossing during exploration.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking but clearly didn't articulate very well.

Essentially after exploration all the civs are on the map at the start so you can go higher

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

I was considering the idea of leader-related wonders. They might happen, however I think they are less likely to happen in antiquity than other eras, given that they would materially affect the "wonder" win-con. Maybe one exclusive wonder will be too much of a swing toward imbalance, remains to be seen how they would feasibly balance around that.

The way Civ VII handles "Civ Unique" wonders makes Leader Specific Wonders more likely, I think: they aren't really Exclusive, you just get a substantial bonus to build them. That still makes it possible to, for instance, build the Baths of Hatshepsut if Septimus is busy with something else.