Should civ7 separate technologies (science) from civics (culture)?

[Krajzen]

I have always assumed everybody except me loves this distinction, because apparently me and civ6 are the worst date ever, so anyway let'a criticize it.

The distinction originally received a lot of praise because
1) It won't create any problems, right?
2) It means more stuff and choices, therefore more depth!
3) It is supposedly realistic - cultural advances are not the same as technical, right?

Well,
1) It does create problems. When every player has two separate progress trees with two currencies, it is much harder to balance pacing of the game and design good AI for it. Especially in. game where a lot of science and culture yields come from random terrain features and are regulated by sheer luck.
2) Both trees combined have more stuff than civ6, but each individual one is much less packed than civ5 tech tree. Individual eras often feel shallow because of that, even if technically you have much stuff to discover. please note that it also has a huge stealthy impact on the eternal complaints on civ6 involving its eras passing too fast. Well, it's no wonder they feel shorter, they do have smaller amount of techs in each tree, which is what matters for that perception of time as you discover both trees in parallel anyway.
3) Now here's where the real fun begins. So my thesis is that the resulting two separate trees are more unrealistic than one big tree governed only by science.
a) Culture - philosophy - society and science - technology are absolutely not two completely disconnected spheres, there are very tightly interconnected both ways through history, and ignoring that seems like some really ancient historical myth or lack of insight, like pre - Marx.
For example, you have no marxism and capitalism before industry, which you don't have without modern physics, which you don't have without two millenias of philosophy going hand in hand with science. You have no literature before writing etc.
b) "Science" yield can be easily renamed to "research" or even "progress", to make unified tree less jarring. But anyway, discovering threatre in civ5 via science yield is not any more unrealistic than discovering government systems in civ6 faster the more operas and paintings you have.


What I'd prefer more than big brain double tech tree, which seems not so big brain when you think about it, would be one big deep tree research system which would require a bit more strategizing than "how to get more blue yield". Because for example you'd have to fund research institutes, finance experiments, have several categories of techs such as 'Biology' 'Engineering' 'Society' each with its own sources of bonuses and a tiny minigame, etc.

 

[Bactrian]

I agree, they should not be separate, for both gameplay reasons (more important, since it's a game) and for better fidelity to fact that science is fundamentally a social process (less important, since it's a game).

 

[criZp]

There certainly should only be one tree both for the sake of connecting nodes that should be connected and for the sake of not looking like a dying tree with only a few leaves remaining.

The thing I think they should do is to have different unlock requirements on different nodes. Building a bunch of libraries to unlock everything doesn't feel very immersive. Neither does keeping track of 150 boosts that often seem way too random and unrelated to their node.

 

[MistroPain]

This is one of those areas where I would like to see Firaxis attempt to innovate or look at other games and draw inspiration from them. However, if we are going to reuse one of the previous systems I would much rather see it become an all science tech tree.

For games worth looking at, I do like the semi-random system Old World implemented, where you can't just beeline certain techs and force strategies (makes for good gameplay, and changes up each game). Someone on the forum also had this nice idea of tech/eras being driven by events that come about from the conditions of your civ:

I'd rather step outside of this discussion:

NO FIXED ERAS

They are artificial, and too often Eurocentric, and almost always utterly unrelated to anything actually happening in the game. When was the last time, in any Civ game, you had any reason for a Rebirth (Renaissance) of any kind?

Instead, 'Eras' should represent Singularities when the very concept, culture and ideals of your Civ change - and they happen based on what is happening in your specific game, and happening to your specific Civilization, not magically all over the world no matter what most of the Civs are doing at the time.

Some examples of Singularity Events:

Agriculture or Animal Domestication - when people first begin to really modify nature to address their specific needs and desires, not just attack it with primitive stone tools and fire. This changes humans' whole relationship with the plants and animals around them, and requires a whole new, settled and more highly organized way of life.
Bronze - the first really useful Artificial Tool Material: bronze saws made real precision carpentry and masonry possible, and therefore the solid and spoked wheel, and bronze weapons transformed warfare and the politics of the warriors.
Iron - the Democratic metal. Available in such near-universal quantities that once you learn how to work it, the tools and weapons are potentially available to everyone, and the old aristocratic Warrior Elite of Bronze has to change: enter Greek Demokratia, 'social contracts', Roman Universal Citizenship, etc. The changes are as much political and cultural as physical
Axial Thinking - the new way of thinking about God, Man, their relationship, and man's relationship to the world. It encompasses Monotheistic Religion, Natural Philosophy, and the codified teachings of Zoroaster, the Hindu Brahmans, Buddha, Lao Tse, and Kon Fu Tse in China. This accelerates Civs and Cultures along very different mental, political and cultural paths.
Printing - specifically, the mass production of written material, the massive expansion of access to Knowledge which in turn requires widespread literacy and formal education beyond anything considered suitable for the mass of people before - and that, in turn, accelerates change in everything.
Steam - artificial Power for everything. This transforms all forms of travel, communication, and view of the world. It also requires a transformation of work, industry, land use to optimize it, and gives rise to the resulting social (dis)orders: Socialism, Communism, Fascism, etc.
Electricity - even more pervasive than Steam in many ways, because its application includes both great changes in communication and private life (artificial lighting) and also more subtle but more incredible expansions of earlier trends like computers, GPS, cell phones, 'interconectivity' undreamed of before
Molecular Chemistry/Physics - when man can modify everything at the most basic physical level, all bets are off: the capability to destroy or create becomes effectively Infinite and so do the political, cultural, and psychological consequences for humanity and the Civilizations.

There are other possibilities, but the point is that when (or even IF) any of these happen is not fixed in time or the game. And in many cases, the Singularity happens somewhere else and is Transmitted to your Civ, with untold consequences (actually, ask the Native Americans, they can tell you about some of the consequences at great length).

Note also that many of these are directly related to Physical changes that could be reflected on the Civ/Map graphics: Agriculture, Bronze, Iron, Steam, Electricity all transform the very appearance of cities and their surrounding landscape: the fact that your neighbor has discovered Iron Working or Steam Power should not come as a surprise to you.

 

[dagriggstar]

I also dislike the double tree setup, primarily because it makes me feel like I am earning science type 1 and science type 2.

I much prefer civ 5 social policies, or civ 4 city flipping, or even at one point I attempted a mod where civilian units could only be earned with culture (the AI didn't understand this, so I had to abandon this project).

Science progression needs a rethink, but I'm yet to make up my mind on what would be best. The three basic ideas I most play around with are
1) Science progression is clustered, sort of like each continent gets its own research group and the civs on that continent sort of unlock tech together
2) The game dictates (for example) only 50 science progress per turn can be given out during the classical era. Civ A produces 30 science (yield), Civ B produces 10 science, Civ C produces 5 science. Civ As science progress is 30 / (30+10+5) = 0.66 * 50 = 33 science progress per turn.
3) As a general principal, the more "open-minded" your civilization (the more migrants/foreigners in your empire) the more science you will generate. Migrants/foreigners living in your city however can cause unrest in your cities, particularly if relations between their parent faction and yourself are bad. The desired result would be that yes you can be science focused but to max out your science you have to play co-operatively with other factions otherwise your empire may collapse on itself.

 

[Amrunril]

I guess I'll be the first person here to say I do enjoy the double tree structure. Having multiple research resources offers interesting possibilities for specialization, either as an in-game strategic choice or as a possibility for unique abilities. And it also makes thematic sense that a focus on "hard science" discoveries won't necessarily help you unlock game elements more related to economics or political science (though I agree there are cases where they should be interconnected).

That said, I do miss the permanent customization element of Civ V's policy trees, and economic practices being unlocked by artistic investments are definitely a thematic disconnect as well. Perhaps the issue is that "culture" in Civ VI represents too many different things, and Civ VII should rethink how to break down social sciences vs. fine arts vs. cultural identity.