So, No Britain?

[Zaarin]

Jose Rizal is actually not in any middle school textbooks

The philippines does not have middle schools :^)

He's not in American textbooks either; he's probably the most novel leader in our roster.

 

[Archanist]

He's not in American textbooks either; he's probably the most novel leader in our roster.

Considering the Philippine-American war was a single line of text when I studied in the states, compared to it being a whole chapter and exam when I moved to the Philippines, I'm not surprised by this.

Though for me, Batutta would be the most novel

 

[Zaarin]

Though for me, Batutta would be the most novel

I was more previously familiar with Ibn Battuta and had considered him as a possible leader before so I found his inclusion less surprising, but he's probably my favorite addition to Civ7's roster.

 

[Siptah]

Jokes aside, I think they went with relatively safer choices for leaders because of three major things:
1. Leaders and Civs are divorced
2. Leaders lead 3 different civs in a game
3. Leaders are not strictly heads of state anymore (ok there were exceptions before but now it's not as rare)

Going with more well known leaders softens the blow of these three things to casual civ players since it's a large departure from the original leader civ formula

I think the divorce between leaders and civs is very important here. If your civ is France or Japan, you can easily have an associated leader of lesser fame, and still benefit from the famous civ - or the other way round (see Alexander). If the leader (and to lesser extent the civ) have to stand on their own, they either need to be famous or have interesting bonuses or a cool story that can be expressed in three lines of text to be attractive.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

He's not in American textbooks either; he's probably the most novel leader in our roster.

Well, he was a novelist, so that checks out.
I would have said Trung Trac, if I hadn't been exposed to her on these forums when speculating for potential Vietnam leaders for Civ 6.

 

[Arcaian]

(I actually like the inclusion of Tecumseh, too, but he's an extremely, extremely obvious choice so no credit given.)

It's definitely geographically dependent too - I wasn't raised in the US education system, but I'm very interested in the indigenous history of the americas, so I'm obviously going to be aware of Tecumseh. But I have quite a few civ-playing friends, including ones who have some historical knowledge, and I think only one of them knew of Tecumseh. I don't think he's the most out-of-nowhere choice, but I think for people who weren't raised on the American education system, he's less well known than one might expect. If it weren't for Hamilton, I'd probably put Lafayette into that category as well

 

[Zaarin]

It's definitely geographically dependent too - I wasn't raised in the US education system, but I'm very interested in the indigenous history of the americas, so I'm obviously going to be aware of Tecumseh. But I have quite a few civ-playing friends, including ones who have some historical knowledge, and I think only one of them knew of Tecumseh. I don't think he's the most out-of-nowhere choice, but I think for people who weren't raised on the American education system, he's less well known than one might expect. If it weren't for Hamilton, I'd probably put Lafayette into that category as well

Yes, I'm definitely taking into account that the game was made by Americans. I think it's less the case now, but there was definitely a period of American historiography when Tecumseh was "the most famous Indian" and "the Indian Alexander" (because he conveniently demonstrated that defying American expansion was futile). But even so he's still a very big name in American history.

 

[Krikkit1]

Eh, Civ7 has overwhelmingly leaned towards "big names" like Augustus, Xerxes, Charlemagne, Ben Franklin, Hatshepsut, Tecumseh, Napoleon, Isabella, Catherine the Great, Harriet Tubman...Most of the remainder have big pop culture presence like Machiavelli, Himiko, Confucius...I think Ibn Battuta and Amina were the only real surprises, and neither was new to me. I miss leader choices like CdM, Hojo Tokimune, Jadwiga, Tomyris...For all the doors non-leader leaders opened, Firaxis has played it very safe with the leader choices. And I get it: they're trying to balance out other big changes for the general audience. But it's disappointing.

Hatshepsut is the “probably in the books but most people forget about them”

Tubman+Tecumseh would probably only be in US ones

Himiko wouldn’t count as pop culture outside of specific areas

As for Ibn Battuta and Amina…honestly being new to most civ fanatics is probably impossible.

Honestly at least 1/2 of them should be in the people who sort of liked history remembered them from their grade school books and you want some that everyone knows (Napoleon, Confucius …Alexander, Genghis when we get them)

 

[Gen.Washington]

as much as I like the age system, the heart of the issue is that there are only 10 civs per era and launch. That automatically means some civs like India and China get multiple slots off the bat and some civs get none. Past games could have up to 12 players so having 10 civs per age feels very limiting at first.

 

[Siptah]

Well, he was a novelist, so that checks out.
I would have said Trung Trac, if I hadn't been exposed to her on these forums when speculating for potential Vietnam leaders for Civ 6.

I really like the inclusion of Ibn Battuta, but he is fairly unavoidable if you ever read something about African, Near or Middle Eastern history of the Middle Ages. I was surprised he was so unfamiliar with many here, despite the Kilwa Wonder in civ VI.

I think Trung Trac refreshing, and also Amina and Machiavelli, despite being well-familiar with them. Having Friedrich and Machiavelli in the same game is probably my favorite inclusion though. I‘m less thrilled by Lafayette, but maybe that is more about the context of too many leaders from the age, France, and the US. I‘m disappointed by Tubman because of the abilities. What was the topic of the thread again?

 

[Xandinho]

I'd have included the British in place of Prussia and the HRE in place of Normandy to be the Germanic representation of Exploration. That way, we'd have had the major European powers represented in some way, and the dissatisfaction would be less.

Personally, I don't like the inclusion of the Normans the way they were done, and the worst thing is that they could prevent a possible inclusion of England in the future.

 

[Arcaian]

That automatically means some civs like India and China get multiple slots off the bat and some civs get none.

I still find this framing strange - there are three civs from the Indian subcontinent, but why the framing of "India gets three and some people gets none" implies a much greater level of connection and/or continuity between these civs than there was historically. They're different cultures, they're different language groups, they're different in a huge number of ways. Why does "India get multiple slots" but Europe isn't treated the same? What connection do the Chola, an empire from the far south of India, have to the Mughals, an empire with a Turkic/Mongol ruling class based out of far-north India have that France and Spain do not? For comparison, the capital cities of these two states were about 2,000 km apart - would including Rome and Russia count as 'multiple slots for Europe' on that basis? There are three civs that predominantly held territory in modern-day India, but if that's the only connection, it's a pretty flimsy one in my opinion.

 

[Zaarin]

I still find this framing strange

I think it was the framing intended by the devs, but it's not a framing that holds up to close scrutiny.

 

[agamemnon_of_the-bronze_]

I still find this framing strange - there are three civs from the Indian subcontinent, but why the framing of "India gets three and some people gets none" implies a much greater level of connection and/or continuity between these civs than there was historically. They're different cultures, they're different language groups, they're different in a huge number of ways. Why does "India get multiple slots" but Europe isn't treated the same? What connection do the Chola, an empire from the far south of India, have to the Mughals, an empire with a Turkic/Mongol ruling class based out of far-north India have that France and Spain do not? For comparison, the capital cities of these two states were about 2,000 km apart - would including Rome and Russia count as 'multiple slots for Europe' on that basis? There are three civs that predominantly held territory in modern-day India, but if that's the only connection, it's a pretty flimsy one in my opinion.

this game is still way too eurocentric. India in particular has been egregiously neglected for a long time in representation.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

I think it was the framing intended by the devs, but it's not a framing that holds up to close scrutiny.

Yeah, it's quite clear they were selling this as the "India" pathway, considering they had that on a slide at one of their presentations.
That being said I doubt we'd get separate Maurya, Chola, and Mughal civs if it wasn't for ages, and the India split. They were all, essentially more or less, part of the India civ of past games.

I'd have included the British in place of Prussia and the HRE in place of Normandy to be the Germanic representation of Exploration. That way, we'd have had the major European powers represented in some way, and the dissatisfaction would be less.

Personally, I don't like the inclusion of the Normans the way they were done, and the worst thing is that they could prevent a possible inclusion of England in the future.

Better yet, is it could have just been England over Normandy in the first place. If they wanted to blob civs together I'd rather a French/Germanic blob of the Franks/Carolingians in Exploration before Normans.

 

[queenpea]

Yeah, it's quite clear they were selling this as the "India" pathway, considering they had that on a slide at one of their presentations.
That being said I doubt we'd get separate Maurya, Chola, and Mughal civs if it wasn't for ages, and the India split. They were all, essentially more or less, part of the India civ of past games.

Better yet, is it could have just been England over Normandy in the first place. If they wanted to blob civs together I'd rather a French/Germanic blob of the Franks/Carolingians in Exploration before Normans.

"The Normans," still, to me, feel like a fifth-wave DLC civilization. Ironic as their inclusion is essentially crucial to the introduction of the Ages system. I guess I was disappointed by their design, which seems like Civ 6 Japan (bonuses on coastal tiles) + Georgia (we love walls).

 

[thecrazyscot]

By my count we have Ibn Battuta, Jose Rizal, and Harriet Tubman. (I actually like the inclusion of Tecumseh, too, but he's an extremely, extremely obvious choice so no credit given.)

Heh, I'm sure we could go around in circles for a while 'cause it's fundamentally subjective , but for my part I'd tack at least Amina and Trung Trac on the "novel" list as well. And as this is the first time we are removing the requirement for leaders to be heads of state we are getting a whole slate of brand new leaders.

Out of 21 unique leaders at launch, by my count 11 have never been in a mainline Civ game before.

 

[Zaarin]

but for my part I'd tack at least Amina and Trung Trac on the "novel" list as well.

Fair. I kind of glossed over Trung because she's been requested so many times and Amina because her agenda transgresses my agenda of not connecting agendas to terrain. But you're right; I'd include them as well.

And as this is the first time we are removing the requirement for leaders to be heads of state

I made a list somewhere of over a dozen non-heads-of-state leaders in prior Civ games. They're only explicitly highlighting it now, but it never was a rule, at best a guideline.

 

[agamemnon_of_the-bronze_]

at the very least, if they were not going to include britain they could have added a british leader. Wellington, Nelson, Edmund Burke... any of these would have been an interesting inclusion (more interesting than lafayette AND napoleon) and would have increased representation.

 

[Zaarin]

at the very least, if they were not going to include britain they could have added a british leader. Wellington, Nelson, Edmund Burke... any of these would have been an interesting inclusion (more interesting than lafayette AND napoleon) and would have increased representation.

We'll almost certainly get an English leader in the DLC that introduces Britain. I'll be curious to see if it's Elizabeth I again or someone new. Or maybe it will be Henry II because we do not have enough French leaders.