Possible Future Direction (personal view)

[strategyonly]

Edit: I'll probably mull over this as I walk the dog... cold air is good that way. The freezing rain though I could do without. XD

I hear you have the same "crappy" weather we are having down here in Minnesota, HUH?

 

[Acularius]

I hear you have the same "crappy" weather we are having down here in Minnesota, HUH?

The joys of 'Lake effect'. It was generally a like mist throughout the day, and I choose luckily, that is, it had stopped and I walked the dog without it falling upon my head.

 

[rightfuture]

Back On Topic-
In Dallas I woke to a once in a 7+ yr onslaught of Mountain Cedar, which welcomed me with wheezing, and compelling skin awareness, (to the very skin under my eyebrows), thanks to our friend the countrywide sweeping front o' fun and tornadoes!
This inspires me to pursue the freedom of our favorite exploration of personal near utopia and history of our making, and ongoing unbound future of CIV, C2C.
(...hits download of V28 SVN...)
whether (weather) or not!

 

[rightfuture]

I love the random events part of this mod. It adds a "lack of control" element that forces you to differentiate your strategy from time to time. However, I find that such differences are almost irrelevant, other than the vitally important element of "flavor".

Is there anyone else here that would support a new version of random events that could completely alter the gameworld irrevocably (as an optional feature of course)? Events in human history that occur to me are the massive volcanic eruption that created "the year without a summer", the Indian tsunami of 2004, etc.... I consider these only mid-level catastrophes.

I would also be in favor of truly EPIC catastrophes like meteor strikes that alter the look of an entire continent, potentially wiping out entire nations. A superflu virus that wipes 50% population of a city, region, or even the entire world. The eruption of a Yellowstone-style supervolcano that alters or destroys everything within a 15-square radius. Something fun veering towards fantasy might be a monstrous genetic mutation (probably in prehistoric or ancient times) resulting in a nearly unkillable "barbarian" animal with 50 hitpoints (like the mbwun from The Relic (kothoga from the movie version).

These are just off the top of my head....

I know that the fun of this game for many people is the total, complete control that one can have building their civ. Hence the reason that there is a mod-mod that eliminates some more "annoying" (negative) features in C2C. Personally, I find the potential for nation or potential world ending catastrophes as a really cool add-on that would add to the overall tension. It would be a random element that could change the entire nature of your current game. Awesome! It might even end it, if you were very unlucky (hence the reason God invented reloads for those party poopers). If I am in the extreme minority here, can someone at least point me in the right direction to a tutorial on how to create my own random events as a mod-mod? The possibilities are endless and captivating....

A static boardgame of reproducible certainty, or an immersive, adaptive, and 'Living' world full of flavorful strategies? To be able to overcome potential challenges, where you can navigate, intuit, and strategize your way past changing expectations and potential risks. Excitement, not simply the most agreeable denominator, SPICE full of LIFE! Adaptive (not fixed) Control and Consequences in your hands; breathing, changing history around you, and the ability to change/play the one you know or expect, as well as the one you don't, and see where it could go! Ongoing escalation and exploration of improvement, so you can discover what could be over that next hill and in that next turn!
To see it, we need your voices to breathe life into possibility, to explore what can happen.

The future of Caveman2Cosmos can be as limitless as the possibilities written into it! Adaptive risk, and unbound variations, with exciting and comfortable control! From the wonder of a caveman first leaving his fixed home to explore an unknown prehistoric world, through a vibrant history(remixed and/or revisited), to the cosmos of possibility and endless variations of potential futures (unbound, unlimited, and open to different paths), to beyond; not just an expected outcome.
(Can there be, only 1 techtree? Only 1 histree?) Please set us free!

I couldn't agree with you more.

 

[rightfuture]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flge_rw6RG0

"Roads, Where We're going we don't need roads!" - Doc Brown - Back to the Future!!

Let's dream and create it together!
Face it, We ALL want to see that one more improved turn/version!
Now we just got to figure out how to do that together!
Become the inspiration, and the solution.

 

[xanhou]

Hello everyone,

Sorry to disrupt all the day-dreaming of awsome games, but I see a problem here.
The project Koshling want(s/ed) to start is massive. Basically, re-create an entire game. If you want to start from scratch, this is as much work as creating a new game. Since it took an experienced coordinated group of proffesionals several year to build Civ IV, I believe that if you guys ever want to even think about starting the project, you HAVE to shrink the goals down to a minimum. For example: First try to re-create Civ IV vanilla that misses half of it's features. This is already so much work that completing it will be an achievement for the world-wide modding community in its whole!

A second problem is that for such a project you need good programmers. Not code monkeys, but designers, people who have had training or experience in the mathematical aspects and code design aspects of the project.
You need engineers.
I cannot judge all of you based on what I read on the forums, but I get the feeling Koshling is the main programmer for this mod. The others know their way around the code and XML's, but seeing their reaction of Koshlings blog I doubt they know how to approach such a project. I may be (and hope that I'm) wrong here though.
In any case, I may be able to help solve this second problem, given that you guys can accept that we first implement a numbed down version of vanilla Civ IV*.
I'm a computer science student, with sufficient experience in java, but I actually want to learn C#, so that will be no problem. I do understand everything Koshling talks about on his blog, kind of usefull. What I do not have, is experience in is modding Civ, or python.

One technical note: My fear for this project is not the game engine, not the graphics engine or GUI, nor the multiplayer. I fear the AI part of the project. Making a good AI sounds to me a lot harder than anything else. The main game engine is just a lot of work that should be organized as good as possible (something I do not underestimate though), but the AI is a whole different level of complexity.
Im pretty sure that I we start this project, its popularity will stand or fall based on the AI. 99% of all CIV games are single player games.

*Some features that can be left out in the initial goal:
- Culture (we all know it useless in vanilla BtS anyway)
- Anything beyond the Classical era, having two full era's shows the engine is ready.
- Giving independance to some of your cities (and other barely ever used features).
- Espionage. I believe even vanilla Civ IV without BtS had no espionage, but I may remember this the wrong way.
- Religion.
- tribal villages
- etc.

 

[RidetheSpiral23]

Hey everyone!

I know i haven't been around in a while and I'm just now trying to catch up on all these new threads/features/discussions. I apologize for that but I would like to explain. Not because I feel I need to (let's be honest this is the internet) but because I think it pertains to this thread rather nicely.

I was enjoying working on maps and putting me two cents into discussions here. A lot actually. Everyone has great ideas, some of them very different than others, but I just felt like C2C was just turning into a mutant of CIV with no real defining goal or end product. I understand everyone wants to do their own thing but it just felt like it was collapsing slowly.

I personally got frustrated as soon as I tried to make the Iron Age scenario. To put it bluntly it is literally hell trying to make a scenario when buildings/game mechanics/cultures/everything is constantly changing. It just doesn't work.

I miss playing CIV, a lot. C2C started frustrating me, but you know what, I can't play vanilla anymore. Honestly, I hate playing vanilla now and don't get me started on CIV 5. I don't like the way the CIV franchise is going and I'm frustrated with the every changing C2C.

I agree with xanhou. It would be ridiculously hard to make an entirely new game. Harder than I even understand I think but I have seen some awesome work from the modders here. But I would rather see that then the mod C2C just rolling along with no end goal or cohesion. What do I know though.

Have a discussion on the features that have worked/not worked and focus on making it a balanced and enjoyable new game. Start with one age even. Build it slowly and jointly from the ground up. Civ players would flock to it if it was good. I dont know where I'm going with this so I'm done...

 

[xanhou]

Hey everyone!

I agree with xanhou. It would be ridiculously hard to make an entirely new game. Harder than I even understand I think but I have seen some awesome work from the modders here. But I would rather see that then the mod C2C just rolling along with no end goal or cohesion. What do I know though.

Ofcourse a revised version of C2C is the final goal, but I think we have to split things up into two projects.
One for building the engine/base game, and one for the actual game for which the entire engine was build (C2C).
Basically: seperate the technical problems from the gameplay issues.

 

[strategyonly]

IF "we" has access to the Main game engine, there would NOT be a problem, but since Firaxsis is an engine hog, it will never happen

 

[ls612]

Have a discussion on the features that have worked/not worked and focus on making it a balanced and enjoyable new game. Start with one age even. Build it slowly and jointly from the ground up. Civ players would flock to it if it was good. I dont know where I'm going with this so I'm done...

I think that part of the problem is that sometimes you just need to make certain design decisions and continue from there. If we decide to support X or Y, and how much of those to support, we need to stick with it. Otherwise we will get bogged down in some of these things and never go anywhere. We are planning on making this open source last I checked so if someone has a problem with something we do they can change it.

 

[RidetheSpiral23]

Open source is a good idea and you bring up some great points. Is there any plans on using a free game engine?

 

[ls612]

Open source is a good idea and you bring up some great points. Is there any plans on using a free game engine?

I'm not certain, I tried using a couple but ran into some issues compiling them for x64. That probably though is a function of me not being the best at this.

 

[Acularius]

Personally, I like tossing out ideas and building upon them. Even if it amounts to nothing it feels like I get something out of my head for a while.

That and I like to get a feel for what everyone else is thinking... its pretty interesting.

 

[rightfuture]

Here are a few tips that will help everyone eventually get there:

1. Like C2C, AND, ROM, and modding in general, this will be an ongoing work in progress, things will take time to work out. You have to keep the goal of making the best game possible, in sight.
If I learned one lesson here it was the power of collaborative and individual focus behind a ongoing common dream: Just make CIV better.

-If you love CIVILIZATION, you probably should invest yourself here over a long time. Whether you are a player or a modder, it is your desire to see things made better, that encourages you to talk, discuss, learn to edit things, and then learn to mod. It can be anything we want it to be. With our help it can get even better.

-No matter who you are, If you like (or dislike -try to make things productively positive) what you see (or don't see) then you can help make things better but bringing attention to it, by just sharing your opinion, and helping in the discussion to work out solving the problem.

-Some things take time and may have to be the best right-now solution so keep on caring about it, and share your thoughts. Anyone can potentially help find a solution or a better idea, even if they don't program.


2. It's all a learning and experimentation process.
Everything here is going to be using the horizon effect.
You are only going to be able to see so far ahead at any given time.
Like seeing a hill in the distance, you won't know what the next valley is like until you can get in a better place to see it.

You have to hang in there until you work it out, some things just take time.
That is why it is good to have 2 alternate focuses, when one is slowing you down you have something to shift to that keeps things moving.

-Sometimes it is a good thing to shift between experimentation (building things) and theory(developing ideas). This keeps both the work and the ideas flowing.

-It is also a good idea to alternate between individual work and cooperative work (every so often), so that you can vary up the focus and get perspective, as well as help or new insight.

- Developing a coordinated pattern between the team can multiply the power of focus, especially on working important things out.

3. Another big factor that businesses tend to overlook is timing.
Effective organization and planning solve a lot of problems that are caused by a diversity of people, ideas, and goals.

The first thing I would do to get things moving

-is to define the best common ground and ambitious goal, so that people have something to aim for and then

-start a collaborative outline to start fleshing out with ideas.

-I would also organize and prioritize the ideas, and set aside (instead of discard) any rejected ones(to keep going through) so they can help inspire better material. (Sometimes an old idea turns up as better, sometimes it ends up inspiring solutions.)

Remember that your experimentation process and your peers is what you learn from. You never learn from doing things the right way, so embrace mistakes. They are the routes to insight and perspective. You never become experienced all at once. It is just through trying and taking steps that you end up there. Sometimes obstacles just end up presenting an easier solution.
It's a journey, you just need the right vantage point.

So I recommend that C2C(practice) and C2C 2.0(theory right now) continue to be works-in-progress.
There is much that can be developed and used both ways.
This way you can pursue ideas and rely on a good foundation freely.
I think the best way is go back and forth in your own productive way, and try to coordinate and organize your efforts with others so that the results are multiplied.

In my senior level technology management class(engineering and management) at my Alma Mater,
we used a textbook that dived specifically and deep into the science behind technology and development,
Strategic Management of Technology and Innovation
http://www.amazon.com/Strategic-Management-Technology-Innovation-Burgelman/dp/0073381543

and one of the most important lessons I learned from it was how to determine when to commit to a prototype and when to keep on developing a product to better it's ideas. This book was the most inspiring and complicated textbook I ever went through(and I've probably been through way more than most). It took the product design process (any project really) from the specifics to the overall project management to a degree a scientist looks at it.
(I also think the example of Apple teaches this well, right and wrong.)

The reality is that the more you invest in projects, the more you want to organize them so that they can keep moving and fresh with ideas.
'Failure to plan, is planning to fail.' ~Winston Churchill
'If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will get you there. - Lewis Carroll
but sometimes you won't see your road, unless your change your perspective, or be willing to embrace some new ideas(as mentioned before - The Horizon effect).
You can only see what is in your current field of view. Sometimes you are too close to a problem to see it clearly.
You want to reach your goal, but sometimes the journey is just as valuable.

Like C2C versions, you want to eventually commit to a version (to keep things moving), but you also need to keep an ongoing flow of ideas and have a design process.
Each version can help you keep moving and inspire you to the next.
Old ideas and versions also have foundational and inspirational value, to throw them completely away is to keep starting from scratch and wasting your experience.
Some of these things you just have to figure out, because you can't force it.

That is why we need each other, because even though we can do a lot alone, we can do a lot more together. We can complement and supplement the best of each other, and mitigate our shortcomings.

C2C tends to progress the best when people coordinate their efforts and focus on their strengths. Our goal is ongoing improvement, and to see that best (not most common) game we all would love CIV to be. We all want to see it happen.
Let's do what we can to see it eventually get there.

 

[strategyonly]

@rightfuture

WOW i knew there was a reason i made you the Official PR person.

 

[Acularius]

Dynamic Demographics​

Concepts:
State: What the State owns.

Private: What the Citizens own.

Capitol: Where the ‘Ruler’ is located.

Community: Aside from the ‘Ruler’ being represented by the ‘Ruling Class’, the Community is similar to the Capitol in that it acts as a Population Centre and Collection Node.

Tile: Where the population unit works.

Population Chit: ≥100 represent by an outline of a person and a Dot. =500 by a Chevron. =1000 by a triangle. =10000 by a Square. Providing varying amounts of ‘work’ to be assigned.
Each Population chit grouping is represented by 3 traits, Culture (How easy to administer), Religion (Culture) and Education (Providing efficiency bonus, as the civilization learns MORE, Education becomes more expensive).
A Population chit also has an advanced form, which forms the Ruling Class which will allow the player to govern more areas depending on the level of infrastructure, technology, education and civics.

Civics: Modifiers and options on how one manages their civilization.

=Tier 0= ‘Gaia Seed’ stage
Ruler: In the beginning, they can only control ‘1’ population unit, as a nomad tribe whereas the excess population breaks off to form a new tribe. *After a set amount of ‘tribes’ fill the game, ‘AI’ and ‘Independent’, the tribe the player controls learns to manage bigger populations.

Citizen: The Base Unit. Early game, when the population exceeds 100, it breaks off forming a new tribe. They can Hunt (better than they can forage), Gather (Forage/stone/wood), Defend, and change careers.

Soldiers: Initially they will resemble nothing like our modern day soldiers but this will largely be dependent on how you manage your civilization (Civics). They can Hunt (≥Citizens), Gather (≤Citizens), Defend (>>Citizens), Police, Reinforce, and form Military Units. Initially the early military unit of the game is the ‘Scout’ so one can scout around an area and not have to move from a good spot unless one sees a better one. Later on, one can begin to form actual military units. Rulers now provide leadership points, while soldiers provide troop quality and manpower points.

=Tier 1= ‘Fire, Tool-making, Early Domestication, and Society’
Artisans: Pre-Industrially, this class will serve as the only means to manufacture and prototype a LOT of products. Initially they will only breed dogs (no bonus, while dogs provide a hunting bonus to units that use it) and produce tools (out of stone and wood initially, which provides a bonus to hunting and gathering). With the advent of tools, this will unlock the ‘Labourer’ class. Artisans employ other classes as Raw Material gatherers.

Labourer: Initially, gathers simple Raw Materials for the artisans, with the use of tools they can begin to Harvest/Mine/Quarry for Raw Materials. Furthermore they will eventually begin to build and maintain infrastructure such as buildings, roads, forts and ports.

Merchants: Once this class is unlocked, Rulers can act as a Trade Node. Merchants act as links between cities (Domestic and Foreign) and are unlocked by ‘Private Ownership’, initiating the beginning of the ‘Private Market’. Merchants lubricate the markets by facilitating trade by moving to Communities, Capitols and Ports acting as trade nodes and their limits are based on volume of trade (technology, infrastructure and efficiency). They can employ any of the ‘employable classes ‘such as but not limited to ‘Artisans’ and ‘Slaves’.

Sailor: With the advent of tool-making and fishing, the sailor class forms and can initially only fish in rivers or on coasts. With ‘boats’ rivers and coasts are fished more efficiently and the Sailor can fish further out depending on the boat. Furthermore with the use of boats, , Merchants and Rulers can employ Sailors to form trade links through waterways. Fish (>> Citizen), Defend (Citizen ≤Sailor≤ Soldier) and can operate naval vessels.

Priest: Spreads religion (Depending on civics) and gathers offerings from followers. Depending on the civics of a civilization will affect how much ‘tithes’ a priest may gain and what he can employ. Moving the Priest to another city will cause him to spread the religion there.

Slave: Can only be employed and depending on civics may never own anything, freed slaves that are not employed are governed by civics (such as selling them, or they becoming a free ‘citizen’). Only upkeep is their demand for food, excess food garners population growth. Depending on their tasks the employers must supply the necessary tools and good to increase the efficiency of the slave, which is always better than a citizen but less effective than the population that does it. They also have a HARD time being educated in any form or degree, basic literacy is the best they can achieve.


=Tier 2= ‘Further Domestication and Agriculture’
Farmer: Grower of food and provider of most natural goods summarize the Farmer quite well. With the discovery of a cereal/fruit/vegetable/fauna (other than dogs) the Farmer class may be unlocked. Initially they will harvest the resource at the same efficiency as the citizen (Base, but not as forage. Wheat will provide wheat), but with tools they may begin to domesticate the crop/animal and eventually begin to spread it to other farming areas. To domesticate animals they must initially hunt them (=Soldiers) but with a chance to domesticate the animal, growing with each turn. With the presence of ‘tools’, ‘dogs’ and ‘building materials’ these chances increase geometrically. Already knowing how to domesticate an animal or plant increases the chances of domesticating others.

Scholar: The Engineers/Scientists who can be employed and employ others while providing various bonuses depending on the civics of a civilization. Furthermore, civics and technology allow for a greater variety of tasks and bonuses.

Bureaucrat: The Administrative class which can only be employed under a ‘Ruler/Ruling Class’. From that they can then employ various other classes to work under the ‘State’. Ruling classes in other communities can also be taxed, instead of being limited to the tax provided by the Capitol. Again, like all classes, what tasks they can perform and bonuses they provide will be dictated by their Education, Technology and Civics.

Officers: Rulers provide more leadership points. Officers may only be employed by the ‘State’ (Ruler) and subsequently the respective ‘Ruling classes’. They provide additional leadership points which is largely governed by Education, Technology, and Civics. They preform best under a system that employs a Professional Army. They in turn, may employ Soldiers to better maintain them and grant varying bonuses.

=Tier 3= ‘The beginnings of Industry’
Employees (Urbanites): Can only be employed. Initially will only be found in the early workshops, but as the game progresses they will man the factories and provide many services. As a service, they may also act like a bureaucrat for other classes.

=Ruler and Ruling Classes=
A ruler initially will have no demands and depending on choices will come from various classes. Furthermore, different combinations of classes will result in different structures. If the Ruler is from the ‘Officer’ class, this will provide increased bonuses from other officers and will probably be consider a Despot. If the Ruling Classes are drawn from the ‘Officer’ pool as well, then these will form the ‘Junta’ and they tend to employ as many soldiers as they can from the resources they get from their communities. They can employ other classes for varying effects and abilities, a priestly class under the employ of a despot may prefer a more ‘aggressive’ religion. A bureaucrat under that priest may force this opinion on the other priests in the civilization.

=Combinations=
Various combinations in employment will result in different things. A priest employing the farmer will gain access to his crop, that farmer will be provided from the priest overall, and will tend to follow his culture and religion. A merchant may employ people in the community his is presently in (foreign or domestic) once he is able to afford it.
A priest employing a bureaucrat may create a more centralized religion outside the control of the ‘State’.

I like tossing out ideas...

Edit: Afterthought, forgot to make mention of an 'entertainer' (artist) class that essentially produces 'entertainment', such as dancing and singing to goods like 'frescoes' and 'mosaics'... sole purpose is to provide these things in service of another class.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Slave: Can only be employed and depending on civics may never own anything, freed slaves that are not employed are governed by civics (such as selling them, or they becoming a free ‘citizen’). Only upkeep is their demand for food, excess food garners population growth. Depending on their tasks the employers must supply the necessary tools and good to increase the efficiency of the slave, which is always better than a citizen but less effective than the population that does it. They also have a HARD time being educated in any form or degree, basic literacy is the best they can achieve.

Except of course during the classic period when slaves could be well educated to be employed as tutors for the wealthy and manage the books of the merchants. In this case it is the well educated that became slaves, usually via conquest, not the other way round.

 

[Acularius]

Except of course during the classic period when slaves could be well educated to be employed as tutors for the wealthy and manage the books of the merchants. In this case it is the well educated that became slaves, usually via conquest, not the other way round.

Slaves come from somewhere, correct... therefore they would adopt have the 'Education value' of where they came from. Enslave a foreign priest or scholar would definitely be a plus.
Furthermore, it is easier to teach a smaller group of slaves, a population chit of less than/or equal to 100. So long as there is a scholar in the stack teaching, then the slaves will learn (increase in EV).
Civics can also be modified to represent this part of history... it will be expensive to maintain educated slaves.
By basic literacy, I mean like speaking the language and maybe writing their name. Depending on what a civilization knows, this will probably rate somewhere around 5-10% EV by the time the Industrial Era roles around.

Hence why every population chit, or grouping thereof will have the 3 values.
Culture and Religion can be left to the wayside initially and expanded upon later.

You can also expand it later, like adding 'nobles' as a Ruling Class...

 

[Laskaris]

Good, interesting ideas. Some remarks of mine on them:

Capitol: Where the ‘Ruler’ is located.

A capitol is a building where a legislature meets. A capital is an area of a country, usually a city, where the seat of government is located. You probably mean "capital", right?

I apologise for being a semantics fascist, but the "capitol" / "capital" confusion always irritates me.

*After a set amount of ‘tribes’ fill the game, ‘AI’ and ‘Independent’, the tribe the player controls learns to manage bigger populations.

Why? That strikes me as rather artificial. I would prefer a system where hunter-gatherer tribes develop into more advanced societies because it makes sense in terms of their surroundings, not because some are "player controlled" and others "AI" and the game decrees that the player controlled tribe develop simply because it should.

In the game I envision, the possibility to develop into an early agrarian society, and from there into an early civilization, would depend mostly on geographical location and the availability of resources (domesticable crops and animals). To make sure that the player has that possibility if he so desires, we could make sure that player starting locations are within regions with good resource "packages" (think the Fertile Crescent, the Indus river valley or the North Chinese Plain in the real world).

Or, if he so desires, a player could choose to be placed in a less favourable area at game start. Maybe he will eventually develop his hunter-gatherer tribe into a society of nomadic pastoralists, who raid the mighty early civilizations and eventually bring one such civilization down and become civilized themselves? That would also be an interesting game.

Artisans: Pre-Industrially, this class will serve as the only means to manufacture and prototype a LOT of products. Initially they will only breed dogs (no bonus, while dogs provide a hunting bonus to units that use it) and produce tools (out of stone and wood initially, which provides a bonus to hunting and gathering).

This assumes that wolves which can be domesticated into dogs exist everywhere in the world. Which, if we are thinking realistically, might or might not be the case, depending on where in the world wolves evolved first, and where they were able to migrate from there.

Again, I would prefer a game that is not deterministic ("wolves are everywhere"), but dynamic ("some areas of the planet have wolves, others don't"). We could always make sure, through placement of starting locations, that players have access to good domesticable animals early on.

Sailor: With the advent of tool-making and fishing, the sailor class forms and can initially only fish in rivers or on coasts. With ‘boats’ rivers and coasts are fished more efficiently and the Sailor can fish further out depending on the boat. Furthermore with the use of boats, , Merchants and Rulers can employ Sailors to form trade links through waterways. Fish (>> Citizen), Defend (Citizen ≤Sailor≤ Soldier) and can operate naval vessels.

I don't think a separate "sailor" type of population is necessary. Depending on what, exactly, they do, sailors are labourers (the unskilled ones), artisans (skilled sailors, like navigators or sailing masters) or soldiers (naval soldiers) by another name. So we could simply require a bunch of labourers and a handful of artisans to man a ship.

Employees (Urbanites): Can only be employed. Initially will only be found in the early workshops, but as the game progresses they will man the factories and provide many services. As a service, they may also act like a bureaucrat for other classes.

Again, these are just modern versions of the labourer (unskilled labour), the artisan (skilled labour) and the clerk or bureaucrat ("desk jobs"). I don't see a need for a new, separate population type.

Generally speaking, I would try to make do with as few population types as possible, and give them the ability to do all kinds of different things. Fewer population types, more choice of jobs which each of them can do. You get the idea.

 

[Laskaris]

@ Acularius: I'm going to add my ideas to the ones you posted.

The game I envision would model the progress of human societies from the dawn of mankind to the modern age and beyond. In my design, I am staying fairly close to the types of societies as defined in contemporary academia.

As a starting point, let's have a look at the society types as defined by British sociologist Anthony Giddens, one of the most prominent modern sociologists (Anthony Giddens, Sociology (6th edition), Polity Press 2009). They are:

Hunter-gatherer societies (from 50.000 BCE). Consist of small numbers of people gaining their livelihood from hunting, fishing and the gathering of edible plants. Few inequalities. Differences of rank limited by age and gender.

Agrarian societies (from 12.000 BCE). Based on small rural communities without towns or cities. Livelihood gained through agriculture, often supplemented by hunting and gathering. Stronger inequalities than among hunters and gatherers. Ruled by chiefs.

Pastoral societies (from 12.000 BCE). Size ranges from a few hundred people to many thousands. Depending on the tending of domesticated animals for their subsistence. Marked by distinct inequalities. Ruled by chiefs or warrior kings.

Traditional societies or civilizations (from 6.000 BCE). Very large in size, some numbering millions of people (though small compared with larger industrialised societies). Some cities exist, in which trade and manufacture are concentrated. Based largely on agriculture. Major inequalities exist among different classes. Distinct apparatus of government headed by a king or emperor.

Beyond these pre-modern societies, there are the modern industrial societies, which Giddens subdivides into First World societies, Second World societies and Third World societies. But let's not go there for the time being and instead look at the pre-modern societies.

In the beginning, all societies are hunter-gatherer societies. Depending on geographic location and available resources (domesticable crops and / or animals), some develop into agrarian societies, others into nomadic pastoralists. What Giddens terms agrarian societies here are early agrarian societies, based on villages, no cities or towns, no writing system, no formal institutionalised government. Think of "barbarian" tribes like the ancient Celts or Germans (the Celts were on the verge of becoming a civilization, but did not quite make it before Rome crushed them). Some of these early agrarian societies then develop into what Giddens calls traditional societies or civilizations. They differ from earlier agrarian societies in that they have cities, a centralized government with formal institutions, bureaucrats and the like, and a writing system that also leads to a flowering of the arts and sciences.

One more type of pre-modern society which is not found in Giddens, but which some scholars postulate and which I would like to add is an "early modern" or "early capitalist" society. This describes the societies that developed in Europe from the late middle ages until the industrial revolution, forming the basis for that revolution. They are traditional civilizations, but differ from earlier such civilizations in developing an early capitalist economic system like mercantilism, and as a result having an increasingly powerful middle class of merchants and craftsmen who rival and later surpass the old land-holding elite. Another example of such an early modern society would be the Song Dynasty in China.

Different types of societies would differ in game terms in having different limts on the population sizes, the agricultural production and goods production they can handle, and in having different possible population unit types with different class values assigned to them. For instance, soldiers might enjoy a very high social status in some societies (they usually do in pastoral societies), but not in others.

How would the progression work? If the right resource "package" of domesticable plants and / or animals is available, a hunter-gatherer society can develop into an (early) agrarian society or a pastoral society. Some of the early agrarian societies will develop into traditional civilizations. Pastoral nomads will be raiding the early agrarian societies and the civilizations, and the "barbarian" early agrarian societies will sometimes be raiding their neighbouring civilizations as well. Interesting interaction all around!

It will be possible for early agrarian societies and pastoral societies to "civilize" by learning from neighbouring civilizations and / or conquering and usurping them. Think about the Germanic tribes (an example of early agrarian societies) which brought down the Roman Empire and founded the Germanic kingdoms, or the Mongol or Turkic tribes (pastoral societies) who conquered various other, older civilizations, founding the Yuan Dynasty and later the Qing Dynasty in China, the Mughal Empire in India, the Ottoman Empire on the Bosporus, and so forth.

I think that's enough brainstorming for now, so I will leave out the modern societies for a future discussion.