Playing One civ through the Ages

[Evolena]

We already were upgrading our Civilizations before, by adding stuff to them. Social policies were one example. Governors were another, Great People, etc

I didn't saw that as upgrading the civ I was playing, only the playthrough I was in. And honestly, it was often the same choices regardless of the Civ, maybe more regarding the targeted victory.

 

[Krajzen]

Honestly the best solution for me would be if we went back to the persistent civs but leaders could change across eras, representing cultural and dynastic change. Certainly not "appropriate leader in the appropriate era" (enormous headache to forcibly fit civs into this scheme) instead you just take France and in the first era play as Napoleon, in the second as Joan of Arc and in the third as Louis XIV. The obvious inequality between civs in terms of the amount of historical leaders could be alleviated by either giving some civs "generic" fictional leaders or retaining civ7 idea of dissociating leaders from civs completely. Alternately you could simply make so some civs have multiple leaders and others only one, because after all you don't need to change leader bonus every era if you already like your one leader's strong bonus, since unlike unique units etc it doesn't get outdated, so you solve that balance problem of squaring civ retention into civ7.

You could even combine leader change with slight modification to the civ itself in terms of mechanics and cosmetics (city lists etc) to have more of that vibe of transformation. So your England under Alfred the Great has Anglo-Saxon city names, but modern ones under Victoria etc. Hell even the very name of the civ could change - you have macro civ of "India" but under Ashoka its "Maurya" (or "Maurya India"), otherwise it's "Chola" or "Maratha" etc.

With this system you can have "macro-civilizations" such as China without weird divide into completely different peoples but while retaining their great internal diversity, you can have fairly dramatic evolutions such as Zoroastrian to Islamic Iran, you can split separate civs however much you want (nothing stopping you from the separate Mughal civ after all) and you can still play as Babylon from 3000 BC to 2100 AD.

There is however one crucial meta problem with this solution: leaders demand a lot of effort to be made compared to the gameplay you get out of them. Unless Firaxis went back to some lower effort leader portrayals (no way lol) or some tech (AI?) was used to greatly ease the process at some point - it's probably too labor heavy solution.

Well that and also the obvious fact that Firaxis can't apply it in civ7 at this point.

 

[Siptah]

Honestly the best solution for me would be if we went back to the persistent civs but leaders could change across eras, representing cultural and dynastic change. Certainly not "appropriate leader in the appropriate era", just so you take France and in one era play as Napoleon, in the other as Joan of Arc and in yet another as Louis XIV. The obvious inequality between civs in terms of the amount of historical leaders could be alleviated by either giving some civs "generic" fictional leaders or retaining civ7 idea of dissociating leaders from civs completely. Alternately you could simply make so some civs have multiple leaders and others only one, because after all you don't need to change leader bonus every era if you already like your one leader's strong bonus, since unlike unique units etc it doesn't get outdated, so you solve that balance problem of squaring civ retention into civ7.

You could even combine leader change with slight modification to the civ itself in terms of mechanics and cosmetics (city lists etc) to have more of that vibe of transformation. So your England under Alfred the Great has Anglo-Saxon city names, but modern ones under Victoria etc. Hell even the very name of the civ could change - you have macro civ of "India" but under Ashoka its "Maurya" (or "Maurya India"), otherwise it's "Chola" or "Maratha" etc.

There is however one crucial meta problem with this solution: leaders demand a lot of effort to be made compared to the gameplay you get out of them. Unless Firaxis went back to some lower effort leader portrayals (no way lol) or some tech (AI?) was used to greatly ease the process at some point - it's probably too labor heavy solution.

Well that and also the obvious fact that Firaxis can't apply it in civ7 at this point.

That and the fact that it doesn't seem to have any advantage over switching civs if it is implemented the way you are suggesting it.

Mix-matching leaders is a ton of fun! As it can probably be disabled by the player soon (when keeping civs is allowed) for the minimal cost of losing around 1/3 of all civs that are currently in the game, it loses its downsides. Bad luck for people that want to play as Greece or Ottomans, because they won't be available for players that want to stick to this option. But you can't please everybody, and I think the gameplay advantage of mixing and matching is so huge (it's one of the best features the series has produced imho), that I'd personally take a lot of disadvantages in exchange for it.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Honestly the best solution for me would be if we went back to the persistent civs but leaders could change across eras, representing cultural and dynastic change. Certainly not "appropriate leader in the appropriate era" (enormous headache to forcibly fit civs into this scheme) instead you just take France and in the first era play as Napoleon, in the second as Joan of Arc and in the third as Louis XIV. The obvious inequality between civs in terms of the amount of historical leaders could be alleviated by either giving some civs "generic" fictional leaders or retaining civ7 idea of dissociating leaders from civs completely. Alternately you could simply make so some civs have multiple leaders and others only one, because after all you don't need to change leader bonus every era if you already like your one leader's strong bonus, since unlike unique units etc it doesn't get outdated, so you solve that balance problem of squaring civ retention into civ7.

Developers directly stated what they tested leader switching and it didn't work well. While they didn't specify, why, I could make some guesses. The most obvious one is that ageless entity should provide bonuses which apply to all ages, while changing entity should provide age-specific bonuses. And the problem here is that things which are normally age-specific, like unique units or unique buildings are much harder to attribute to leaders than to civilizations.

BTW, we already had some form of leader change and I should say, this form was awesome

P.S. Additional point to discussion about civilization always having leaders which lead anything.

Also, 4 ages of Civ3 seem to match Civ7 with its potential 4th age. Would love to see mod, which changes leader outfit like that.

 

[Lebo44]

And the problem here is that things which are normally age-specific, like unique units or unique buildings are much harder to attribute to leaders than to civilizations.

I cannot agree with that. It depends on what leaders. If you think about these 'less popular ones' like Ada Lovelace or Rizal - that might be true. But in case of these most serious leaders in the history they certainly could be attributed to most effective units of the nation they ruled up.

Caesar - Legions
Victoria - Redcoats
Washington - Minutemen
Francis Drake - Privateer
etc.

It does appear that the issues with Civ 7 largely originate from its other controversial choices. In this case to include of lesser-known leaders and detaching them from civs.

 

[stealth_nsk]

I cannot agree with that. It depends on what leaders. If you think about these 'less popular ones' like Ada Lovelace or Rizal - that might be true. But in case of these most serious leaders in the history they certainly could be attributed to most effective units of the nation they ruled up.

Caesar - Legions
Victoria - Redcoats
Washington - Minutemen
Francis Drake - Privateer
etc.

I'm not saying it's impossible, but it's much less natural than applying them to civilization. And if you decide to add second Roman leader for example, or just leader not known for warfare, that would be much bigger problem.

It does appear that the issues with Civ 7 largely originate from its other controversial choices. In this case to include lesser-known leaders.

I'm totally sure that decisions about leader roster were done much later than decisions about core mechanics.

 

[Lebo44]

I still disagree. Truly iconic leaders, who should be prioritized in the game, have had cities, nations, even entire eras named after them. Think of Elizabeth, Victoria, Napoleon, Stalin, Genghis-Khan etc. Their names alone evoke the full sweep buildings, technologies, government types, values or political events that defined their time.

To me, leaders are what give a single civilization its internal diversity. Take Peter the Great and Stalin. Both could represent Russia, yet they relates to vastly different eras, ideologies, and leadership styles. Same civilization, but radically different vibe.

 

[ColtSeavers]

I think the enhanced flavor for leaders and especially civs is a real strong point for civ 7. I don't consider it non-important, it's one of the things that drives the game for me and makes me to want to play another one. Yes, there are many modifiers to keep track of – more than in civ 6 for sure, but both leaders and civs are also much more thematic and deeper, which is a positive exchange in my opinion. But I think civ and leaders are the easier ones to remember and consider – at least if you play like me and do one age in one session if possible. A quick reminder before you start the session and you're good to go. And most of them feel natural or thematic, so there's only a few ones I keep forgetting. And some are really just passive things that you'd usually not play for, such as Ashokas production from happiness – it's a nice passive bonus, but eventually, you'll eat that happiness with more settlements anyway and won't try to optimize that bonus (at least that's how I play).

But I also grow up with and still play games where modifiers and bonuses are crucial to keep in mind and much more plentiful than in civ 7. E.g., playing Age of Empires 2 and Age of Mythology competitively when I was younger, which basically required to know all bonuses and tech tress by heart to find the optimal strategy against your opponent(s). Or nowadays EU4 or Anno 1800, where constant and temporary, local and global bonuses often surpass the 100 active ones threshold. It's probably some sort of training or getting used to that's involved. And seeing modifiers as something that's worth chasing, optimizing, and adapting to – which probably isn't for everyone. I wouldn't describe me as a min-maxer though.

I still enjoy playing AoE 2 a lot. While AoE 2 is far more focused on multiplayer, making the balance of all respective bonuses a higher priority, I understand that this is ultimately a matter of taste. All I'm saying is that Civ 7 still seems to have a lot of mechanics that need fixing. I would rather see the developers focus on improving the religious gameplay or the victory conditions than spend too much time and energy on inventing new Civ bonuses, Agendas, and so on!

 

[stealth_nsk]

I still disagree. Truly iconic leaders, who should be prioritized in the game, have had cities, nations, even entire eras named after them. Think of Elizabeth, Victoria, Napoleon, Stalin, Genghis-Khan etc. Their names alone evoke the full sweep buildings, technologies, government types, values or political events that defined their time.

To me, leaders are what give a single civilization its internal diversity. Take Peter the Great and Stalin. Both could represent Russia, yet they relates to vastly different eras, ideologies, and leadership styles. Same civilization, but radically different vibe.

Conceptually I agree. And yes, it's possible to do the game this way, but there are still pretty big issues. What I could see now:

1. From psychologic standpoint, the game produces much more emotions when playing against personalized opponent
2. Since it's impossible to find matching leaders for each era for each civilization (few civilizations keep any direct descendants throughout the whole history), this picture of Peter vs. Stalin leading Russia doesn't look that good. It's more about Hatshepsut vs. Charlemagne leading Russia. Mechanically the same, but from immersion it's different

And once again, I didn't test how this option could work, Firaxis did. It would be cool if game designers would talk about it at some game conference eventually so we know the details, currently it's just theoretical game design excersice.

 

[Crashdummy]

IMHO a lot of the problems that Civ 7 has are a cascade effect produced from the early design decision to have Ages resets and Civ switching

Civ 7 cant change everything, i think Leaders being detached from Civ is something that cant be undone, even in the new mode, so that will stay

For future Civilization games, in my opinion civ switching and ages resets should go away, Firaxis should get the Civ V and Civ VI foundation, add several of the Civ VII changes (towns/cities, /navigable rivers/etc) and build over that

 

[Leucarum]

For future Civilization games, in my opinion civ switching and ages resets should go away, Firaxis should get the Civ V and Civ VI foundation, add several of the Civ VII changes (towns/cities, /navigable rivers/etc) and build over that

Civ games are built in layers. And districts were a huge deal for 6 but got more or less dropped for 7 so it wouldn't be a first

 

[stealth_nsk]

IMHO a lot of the problems that Civ 7 has are a cascade effect produced from the early design decision to have Ages resets and Civ switching

Civ 7 cant change everything, i think Leaders being detached from Civ is something that cant be undone, even in the new mode, so that will stay

For future Civilization games, in my opinion civ switching and ages resets should go away, Firaxis should get the Civ V and Civ VI foundation, add several of the Civ VII changes (towns/cities, /navigable rivers/etc) and build over that

I'm leaning more towards "the best of both worlds" approach, ages could work in more limited fashion. For example, I want to be able to finish all I started, so there should be no removal of things from the game. If you start building something, you could continue building it. On the other hand, separate science/culture trees per age and simultaneous access to next age trees is cool anti-snowball mechanics. Also, it provides more leafy trees with masteries (as you need to beeline less) and allows cleaner trees fitting on one screen. Probably that part of ages could stay.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Civ games are built in layers. And districts were a huge deal for 6 but got more or less dropped for 7 so it wouldn't be a first

I disagree, districts just got transformed. Instead of adding buildings to it, you overbuild, but you usually still dedicate some district as commercial, science etc. and keep it through ages.

 

[UWHabs]

I disagree, districts just got transformed. Instead of adding buildings to it, you overbuild, but you usually still dedicate some district as commercial, science etc. and keep it through ages.

Districts were basically eased up. Instead of building a science district, where only science buildings go, you build an urban district, and then have flexibility in what goes there.

But on the other points, I think the problem with any sort of leader switching is that as mentioned above, it's hard enough to get one leader for each civ, never mind having 3 of them. You'd end up with more Shakala options, which I think would be received even worse (especially if they have to really cut down the animation of the leaders to pump out more of them).

I could see in a civ-8 game, maybe you get a little of both. You could go back to civs and leaders being global, but perhaps each era (or appropriate), you choose an advisor. So your high level leaders would be your Napoleon, Charlemagne types, and your advisors are maybe Gandhi, Lovelace, Ibn Battuta, etc..

I do think there's some good in the age resets - if it actually works to prevent some of the crazy snowballing of the past, it gives you a bigger chance to fully reset some of the game functions, and so on. But you do have to solve some of the problems we get right now, where you are in those last few turns of the era and you get this weird case where I don't want to build anything because I know it's going away. Or worse, your science is running away, and you have to somehow stop it because if it does that too much it kills the rest of the age for you too quickly.

 

[Leucarum]

I disagree, districts just got transformed. Instead of adding buildings to it, you overbuild, but you usually still dedicate some district as commercial, science etc. and keep it through ages.

"More or less dropped" I agree with you

 

[stealth_nsk]

Districts were basically eased up. Instead of building a science district, where only science buildings go, you build an urban district, and then have flexibility in what goes there.

Yes, they are more flexible, but due to adjacency bonuses, you usually still specialize them exactly like in Civ6 (other than need sometimes to build "bridges" to reach desired tile).

"More or less dropped" I agree with you

More like evolution and adoption for age change than "dropping" to me.

 

[Leucarum]

More like evolution and adoption for age change than "dropping" to me.

Po-tay-to, po-tah-to? I think we're both talking about the same thing and disagreeing on terminology.

 

[Siptah]

I still enjoy playing AoE 2 a lot. While AoE 2 is far more focused on multiplayer, making the balance of all respective bonuses a higher priority, I understand that this is ultimately a matter of taste. All I'm saying is that Civ 7 still seems to have a lot of mechanics that need fixing. I would rather see the developers focus on improving the religious gameplay or the victory conditions than spend too much time and energy on inventing new Civ bonuses, Agendas, and so on!

I agree that mechanics should come first currently (aside from new civs, that obviously need flavor and well thought out bonuses). But I'm not of the opinion that civ 7 should focus much on civ or leader balance anyway. They need to create kits that are first and foremost fun to play and feel full of flavor, and then look that no kit by itself stands out as too OP or UP in a consecutive step. I don't think that they should tweak for specific combinations at all, except for in very special circumstances. Similarly, I think the devs should not spent too much time to make all civs equally strong in the one-civ-through-all-ages option. Just keep them as they currently are, and wait for fan feedback that points at the greatest outliers – such as was done for Hawaii and Maya for example after release. The competitive MP crowd is relatively small, and for the others, it might be fun to go full game Siam with Tecumseh (with everything being as it is currently) if they think that this is the most fun way to play the game.

 

[IntelligentDisk]

BTW, we already had some form of leader change and I should say, this form was awesome

View attachment 746210

P.S. Additional point to discussion about civilization always having leaders which lead anything.

Also, 4 ages of Civ3 seem to match Civ7 with its potential 4th age. Would love to see mod, which changes leader outfit like that.

I feel like if this was introduced now it would be ridiculed immensely. Although maybe me saying that is just a reflection of my own feelings on that.

 

[Siptah]

I feel like if this was introduced now it would be ridiculed immensely. Although maybe me saying that is just a reflection of my own feelings on that.

It was also ridiculed immensely when it was in civ 3, afaik. Besides most people not taking the game so seriously back then as people are since civ V onwards.