wow, I didn't know it.
Really makes sense
Really makes sense
Policies revision
- Thread starter Rhye
- Start date
Skojardu
Warlord
- Joined
- Feb 19, 2014
- Messages
- 121
I like the idea from a Civ 6 sort of card perspective, if you can mimic that. Such as, say you are in a level 2 policy framework; if you have a crisis, you go to the level 0 policy (1 military, 1 economic), until you fix the stability which returns you to a level 1 one. Hmm...
dissatisfieduser
Chieftain
- Joined
- Mar 4, 2021
- Messages
- 33
I came across an interesting article that posits that beyond the three archetypes of government described by Polybius, there is a fourth form called Bureaucracy. You can read it for yourself here: https://www.benlandautaylor.com/p/the-fourth-form-of-government.
The author of the article has also written several articles highly influenced by Caroll Quigley's theory on the evolution of civilizations which he terms the Four Instruments of Expansion. Again, you can read it for yourself here: https://www.benlandautaylor.com/p/the-four-instruments-of-expansion
To summarise the theory, civilizations expand via a class of people who acquire and accumulate surplus capital to then reinvest in acquiring more capital. This logic can appear in various (four identified) forms. For example Manorialism is when a class of people who own land extract the surplus of, usually farmers, to acquire more land or new methods to increase the yields of their land. Like Polybius' theory, these instruments of expansion have functional and dysfunctional forms: in Manorialism's case, an example is the early medieval age in Europe where a military class of landowners acquired more instruments (land) by conquest to fuel more conquest while the dysfunctional form, that as the theory describes happens when the instrument slows down, is the late medieval age in Europe where the descendants of the aforementioned military class for political or religious reasons use the surplus gained from taxation to fund diversions like tournaments, in essence less productive reinvestments. Some civilizations like The West from the medieval period successively moved on from one instrument of expansion to another while others like China for socio-political reasons were not able to move to another instrument and hence stagnated.
In terms of gameplay, I would imagine that the instruments of expansion can work as social policies that are strongly tied to the stability mechanic, particularly economic and social stability. Each instrument of expansion (and I'd add a fifth on top of Landau-Taylor's four in the form of Collectivism) is represented as mutually exclusive trees, some are locked behind technologies or ages if we keep an eye for future implementation in civ7. It is possible to switch to another tree given you've reached the end of your currently selected tree and you match the tech/age requirement. Picking a policy in your tree gives a temporary (5-10 turns?) boost in stability on top of regular policy bonus. Each successive policy returns a shorter stability boost than the last and the last policy (maybe) fives no stability bonus and (maybe) negates half or eliminates the policy bonuses of previously selected policies. Switching to another instrument tree gives a big decaying stability boost but since the trees are mutually exclusive, depending on how the base game is coded if the final policy doesn't negate the bonuses of the of policy tree, then switching to another instrument policy tree deactivates the previously active policy tree. In terms of implementation in civ5, I think the ideologies policy system could be repurposed for this system, if implemented. For clarity's sake, I'll state each instrument of expansion below:
Manorialism (Land Rentism)
Commercial Capitalism (Commerce/Mercantilism)
National Bureaucracy (State Direction/Palace Economy)
Industrial Capitalism (Capitalism)
Collectivism
I think this system can coexist with Polybius' model from PiR's post given how both together can describe the cyclical nature of civilisational rise and fall.
The author of the article has also written several articles highly influenced by Caroll Quigley's theory on the evolution of civilizations which he terms the Four Instruments of Expansion. Again, you can read it for yourself here: https://www.benlandautaylor.com/p/the-four-instruments-of-expansion
To summarise the theory, civilizations expand via a class of people who acquire and accumulate surplus capital to then reinvest in acquiring more capital. This logic can appear in various (four identified) forms. For example Manorialism is when a class of people who own land extract the surplus of, usually farmers, to acquire more land or new methods to increase the yields of their land. Like Polybius' theory, these instruments of expansion have functional and dysfunctional forms: in Manorialism's case, an example is the early medieval age in Europe where a military class of landowners acquired more instruments (land) by conquest to fuel more conquest while the dysfunctional form, that as the theory describes happens when the instrument slows down, is the late medieval age in Europe where the descendants of the aforementioned military class for political or religious reasons use the surplus gained from taxation to fund diversions like tournaments, in essence less productive reinvestments. Some civilizations like The West from the medieval period successively moved on from one instrument of expansion to another while others like China for socio-political reasons were not able to move to another instrument and hence stagnated.
In terms of gameplay, I would imagine that the instruments of expansion can work as social policies that are strongly tied to the stability mechanic, particularly economic and social stability. Each instrument of expansion (and I'd add a fifth on top of Landau-Taylor's four in the form of Collectivism) is represented as mutually exclusive trees, some are locked behind technologies or ages if we keep an eye for future implementation in civ7. It is possible to switch to another tree given you've reached the end of your currently selected tree and you match the tech/age requirement. Picking a policy in your tree gives a temporary (5-10 turns?) boost in stability on top of regular policy bonus. Each successive policy returns a shorter stability boost than the last and the last policy (maybe) fives no stability bonus and (maybe) negates half or eliminates the policy bonuses of previously selected policies. Switching to another instrument tree gives a big decaying stability boost but since the trees are mutually exclusive, depending on how the base game is coded if the final policy doesn't negate the bonuses of the of policy tree, then switching to another instrument policy tree deactivates the previously active policy tree. In terms of implementation in civ5, I think the ideologies policy system could be repurposed for this system, if implemented. For clarity's sake, I'll state each instrument of expansion below:
Manorialism (Land Rentism)
Commercial Capitalism (Commerce/Mercantilism)
National Bureaucracy (State Direction/Palace Economy)
Industrial Capitalism (Capitalism)
Collectivism
I think this system can coexist with Polybius' model from PiR's post given how both together can describe the cyclical nature of civilisational rise and fall.
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