Poll: Southeast Asia and the Fundamental Unfairness of It All

Okay, I need to quiet my brain and commiserate about how/why we are two expacks in and have precisely one Civ and no City-States covering an extremely dense region of long-standing, influential empires. If we only got one civ, I think Khmer is the right choice, but it seems such a waste to the exclusion of several diverse, distinct cultures.

We probably won't see Burmese, Siamese, and Vietnamese representation in expack 3, given that out of eight civs they usually seem to assign only one slot to Asia and CSs tend to be added approximately one per continent. However, in a perfect world, all three would be in the game somehow. So the question I pose to you is, which would be the minimum you would accept as "complete?"

I'll give three votes, in case answers have dimensions. And I'm leaving out Kuala Lumpur because I get the impression most people would neither be elated nor unhappy if it were included or excluded as a city-state.

 

Why no inclusion of Champa, Lan Sang, the smaller Indonesian states, Brunei, and the small Malay and Filipino states? They ARE in Southeast Asia.

 

Any choice that at least had Vietnam I chose and the region would definitely feel complete with them.
If I had to choose another one I think I would pick Siam over Burma just for the sole purpose of possibly taking a different approach such as having a more Renaissance/Industrial Era Southeast Asian Civ than another Medieval to Renaissance Era civ in terms of Burma which reached their peak in the Pagan Kingdom. Also Siam/Thailand has a much stronger market/ pop culture/ and modern day regional power to go off.
Of course in a perfect world it would be cool to get all of them.
Plus we already have Indonesia too as part of Southeast Asia so we already have more than 1 Civ from that region.

 

It's not a region I have strong feelings about, but Vietnam would be my top choice as maximally distinct from Khmer and Indonesia. I'd have no objection to Burma or the return of Siam, however. I'm a little surprised to see Siam leading the poll, given how popular Vietnam is on these boards.

 

Siam has a lot of design space in terms of gameplay; it has some cultural overlap with the Khmer, but not nearly enough to make it a problem in terms of distinguishing them in the game. Siam and Vietnam also are the two civs in the region with the most potential for colonial- or modern-era uniques, which would distinguish them further from Khmer or Indonesia.

Vietnam is the most distinct culturally, and you could definitely make it work in Civ VI, but I actually think the between the Mapuche, Khmer, and a third SEA civ, its gameplay niche would be satisfactorily occupied. Cultural distinction isn't enough to carry it without distinct gameplay to back it up, and I would much rather have a Vietnam that feels like Vietnam to play rather than a hodgepodge of esoteric uniques.

As for Burma, it definitely deserves some form of representation as a bastion of Buddhism and formidable military power in its prime. My only hesitation for wanting it as a full civ is that I don't exactly want another Faith/Military hybrid civ, but I think Firaxis would be able to work.

As a side-note, I think Singapore is a likely candidate SEA city-state representation, considering that it was in Civ V and is an actual city-state. Luang Prabang another choice; in an ideal world where all 4 aforementioned civs were in the game, it would be a shoe-in: historical significant for being capital of the largest empire in SEA, regionally fills the only empty area of the peninsula, and still modernly recognizable as one of the main cities of Laos.

 

Siam and Viets are fundamentally different, while both shares the use of War Elephants with different weapons loadout (Elephant Lancers Before 1600, Gun Elephants with some variants by the time first cannons came to use). Siamese are more or less Khmer successors (Many words in modern Thais took the roots in old Khmers, including those in royal households) and could use Khmer archetects. Viets are extremely sinic and should belongs to 'Asian' rather than 'Southeast Asian' culture groups.


And who came up with BKK being City States? And reasons why Siam never deserves a full fledge playable CIV status beyond that of city states?
My idea about Southeast Asia is that.. either Singapore, Luang Prabang, Vientiane or Champa are preferred City States lists. Also what about Chiangmai or Chiangrai? the two are CS choices aren't they?

 

I would also think some of the pre-Colonial Filipino states, which I notice are not on the poll, are NEVER on "what new civ would like to see" polls, and are never suggested at all. The Kingdom of Maynila, the Rajahnate of Cebu, the Kedatuan of Madja-as, the Sultanate of Temate (the old Moro civ in the south), or Tondo might all make interesting, but always overlooked, civ choices, in my opinion.

 

Of course I would want all 4 of them as civs, but I will say that Siam is the most superfluous. I barely prefer Vietnam to Burma/Myanmar, but think Bagan would be a superb city state choice.

 

Where is option without Khmer ?!

 

There is no option without Khmer because they are already in the game.

 

How distinct though?

Even enthusiastic requests for specific civ's aren't necessarily accompanied by any practical considerations. I mean, I've spent time brainstorming ideas for Vietnam in both the Civ V and VI forums (feel free to search for them) and it's really a stretch in terms of identifying potential ideas for unique buildings, districts, units, etc. Or, for that matter, victory conditions to steer them towards (culture seems to win only because it's the one you go to when all others wash out). We are talking about a nation that has spent most of its existence subjugated. I mean, we're talking about roughly a millennia of Chinese rule.

That's sort of the snag with the "fairness" argument, as if every region of the world should have more-or-less comparably strong representation. I don't see a "band camp" approach as particularly fair. And again, I spent time cogitating on both Vietnam and Khmer. On top of that, the ultimate execution for a Civ VI civ doesn't really convey any personality anyway. Look at what we got for Khmer. My idea was essentially to have the baray act as an aqueduct with a radius effect (like factories) so that you could build civ's in inhospitable places. The actual implemented design was just find rivers and build vanilla aqueducts and holy sites next to rivers for some extra food.

 

Well there is the Nhà_thờ_họ that could replace the shrine and provide culture as well. Vietnamese folk religion is the dominant religion worshiped in Vietnam.

There is also the Water_puppetry theater that could be built along a river and add more culture every time the tile is flooded.

My favorite would be a làng (village) improvement that would get bonuses based off of the adjacency of other improvements. Plus having them surrounded by bamboo to get bamboo in the game would be a plus.

For the UU I would like them to get a Mông_Đồng. I think it would be a nice early Ironclad replacement that would feel the void of no Korean Turtle Ship. It would also be better in coastal waters. I wanted to avoid another elephant UU this time.

I've done my research on the Civs I want.

 

Ineresting. In my latest write-up for Vietnam, which was some months ago, I did go with the craft village, which at one point I conceived as an alternate market but then I may have gotten swept up into the ubiquity of unique improvements and thought it could be a UI built next to a luxury resource that gave a benefit depending on the resource's yield bonus type.

The unique ability revolved around receiving a series of unique GG's. Way too ambitious for Civ VI I suppose.

 

I would go with the water theatre personally. For one, it's a lot more unique than another temple or housing complex. For two, the idea seems to have a slightly more global impact than other Vietnamese structures, which seems to be to the benefit of adding some flavor to other civs (see, Scotland, Canada, and Sweden and their global contributions). And for three, the Water Park has no unique UBs and there are so few options; it would very comfortably replace the aquarium.

 

Man, someone threw out the water puppetry back in Civ days, and it hasn't been let go since. To me, it's a pretty tenuous thing to latch onto for purposes of trying to find something that represents core Vietnamese identity. But I must agree it's more interesting than another holy site building replacement. They're always easy bait, because any civilization of any duration has some kind of faith, and those buildings tend to be nicer and more enduring than regular structures, so the idea gets floated that the civ is another faith-monger. I would say Vietnamese folk religion is not many notches higher than a pantheon.

In terms of being more constructive, I would submit that water parks come too late in the game for the puppets to replace an aquarium, so what could be done instead is have it as an arena replacement in an entertainment center. Like Alexander's suggested, it could benefit from floods and protect the district from flood damage.

I think it's unnecessarily self-conscious to regard elements of the Viet Cong as taboo, or Vietnam's long history of guerrilla warfare preceding it. For instance, I think a nice unique for Vietnam would be tunnel entrances that would let Vietnamese move from one jungle space to another. Something an early airport or paradrop ability. Or give builders the ability to trap tiles.

 

I think if it were to replace a building an Aquarium would make the most since granting both culture and amenities.
Then again, when I originally suggested it, I thought it would make a better unique improvement built on flood plains that would grant more culture after the tile floods. This would represent how when the rivers flooded the rice farms, starting in about the 11th century, the villagers created the puppet shows when they could not work on their farms.

 

I voted mainly for the options that have Vietnam and Siam. Burma would be interesting, but I don't see this as a priority above those two.

 

And that made Viets differed to anyone else in the ASEAN. They should be categorized as 'Asian' culture groups (Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Mongolian... Everyone in this cultural groups are Sinic, heavily influenced by Chinese cultures and Confucianism philosophy (One might say Confucianism is philosophy and not quite religion since the lack of afterlife beliefs and less emphasis on otherworldly mattters and much more and sociopolitics). While anyone else in the same subcontinents followed Hindic cultures.

 

Like I said, you'd want such a thing to available before water parks actually become available, which is too late.

 

Distinct because Vietnam has chiefly been influenced by China, whereas most of Southeast Asia (including Khmer and Indonesia) has been mostly influenced by India.

If this is directed at me, I certainly never made such an argument. I think the "TSL" arguments or the arguments that "another civ exists nearby" are extremely weak.