Some Ideas for Additional Civilizations

Veebs

Chieftain
Joined
Jun 14, 2021
Messages
6
Hi all! I have greatly enjoyed the WtP mod and appreciate all of the work everyone has put into it. While playing, I came up with some ideas for some new civilizations. I imagine that adding additional civs is not top of mind for the community, but I thought I might share my thoughts nonetheless.

German Colonies
(based on the Klein-Venedig project, or possibly other short-lived/failed efforts)

Spoiler New Germany :

Name: German Colonies
King: Holy Roman Emperor
Leaders: A couple of choices here, but perhaps one reflecting an Austrian/Hapsburg project and one reflecting a Prussian or Bavarian project
Common Leader Trait: Something involving tool/blade or guns/cannon production. Maybe a free blacksmith house in every colony
Starting Units: Master Blacksmith, Veteran Dragoon
Unique Units: Evangelist (Jesuit Missionary)
First City Name: Neu-Augsburg


East Asian Colony Civs
(These would definitely stretch into the realm of alternate or speculative history. It might also call for some variation in artwork for units, buildings, and interface. I imagine it is impossible to have the Crosses symbol or Europe button change based on the civ, but it might be possible to introduce a more universal symbol/button)

Spoiler New China :

Name: Chinese Colonies or Ming Colonies
King: Chinese Emperor or Ming Emperor
Leaders: Zheng He
Common Leader Trait: Confucian (Educating colonists does not require teachers)
Starting Units: Expert Native Trader, Renowned Medic, (maybe a non-settleable military unit as well)
Unique Units: Treasure Ship (Galleon), Junk (Caravel), Buddhist Monk (Jesuit Missionary)
Unique Buildings: Buddhist replacements for Chapel/Church/etc.


Spoiler New Japan :

Name: Japanese Colonies
King: Japanese Emperor
Common Trait: Collectivist Ethic (Less unhappiness from Tax increases or war with other nations)
Starting Units: Expert Fisherman, Veteran Town Guard
Unique Units: Treasure Ship (Galleon), Junk (Caravel), Buddhist Monk (Jesuit Missionary)
Unique Buildings: Buddhist replacements for Chapel/Church/etc.


Islamic World Civs
(These would completely enter the world of speculative history, but might be interesting for those who enjoy that)

Spoiler New Turkey :

Name: Ottoman Colonies
King: Ottoman Sultan/Caliph
Common Trait: Something reflecting the devşirme/janissary system (enslaved units can be armed or occupy statesman positions without penalty -OR- has access to enslaved european units)
Starting Units: Expert Native Trader, Expert Miner, (maybe a non-settleable military unit as well)
Unique Units: Small/Large Galleys (Small/Large Coastal Ships), Imam (Firebrand Preacher), Da'i (Jesuit Missionary)
Unique Buildings: Prayer House/Mosque/Grand Mosque (Chapel/Church/Cathedral)


Spoiler New Iran/Persia :

Name: Persian/Iranian Colonies
King: Safavid Shah
Common Trait: Bureaucratic (Healers and Preachers also produce liberty bells)
Starting Units: Elder Statesman, Free Colonist
Unique Units: Imam (Firebrand Preacher), Da'i (Jesuit Missionary)
Unique Buildings: Prayer House/Mosque/Grand Mosque (Chapel/Church/Cathedral)


Spoiler New India :

Name: Mughal/Indian Colonies
King: Mughal Emperor
Common Trait: Artistic (Every 3 citizens produces +1 culture)
Starting Units: Hardy Pioneer, Expert Cotton Planter
Unique Units: Imam (Firebrand Preacher), Da'i (Jesuit Missionary)
Unique Buildings: Prayer House/Mosque/Grand Mosque (Chapel/Church/Cathedral)


Again, these are just random ideas. I thought someone might find them interesting!
 
Hi guys,

1. Creating a Civ and all needed UnitArtStyles is massive effort.
2. We wanted to stay at least a bit "historically correct" / "immersiv" and not do "too extreme fiction".
3. We will stay in the "New World" and not become "Global"

So while this here existed in the New World (but only very shortly) and could have been discussed:
  • Little Venice (definitely though not "Holy Roman Empire of German Nations")
These here definitely did not:
  • China, Japan, Turkey, India ...
------

Summary:

Chances are low that we will add any new Colonial Powers to WTP due to the effort considering graphics.
And if we do we will definitely not add fictional new Colonial Powers (meaning those had no role in History for Colonization of New World).
 
...
German Colonies
(based on the Klein-Venedig project, or possibly other short-lived/failed efforts)

Spoiler New Germany :

Name: German Colonies
King: Holy Roman Emperor
Leaders: A couple of choices here, but perhaps one reflecting an Austrian/Hapsburg project and one reflecting a Prussian or Bavarian project
Common Leader Trait: Something involving tool/blade or guns/cannon production. Maybe a free blacksmith house in every colony
Starting Units: Master Blacksmith, Veteran Dragoon
Unique Units: Evangelist (Jesuit Missionary)
First City Name: Neu-Augsburg

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_colonization_of_the_Americas
While even the WIKI article calls that "german colonization", that is historically nonsense. The Welsers may have been a trading family from Augsburg, similar to the better known Fuggers, and they may have got the right to exploit "Klein-Venedig" (or rather Venezuela) as a colony, they did not do so as represantants of any kind of Germany. It was the King of Spain - who coincidentally was the Emperor of the HRE too - who granted them the right to explore and exploit Venezuela but he did so in his function as the King of Spain to whose realm the whole coast of South America in the Carribean at that time belonged. In other words - it was a spanish colony that would have had a german governour if it had succeeded and not went down in history and the Welsers practically in a situation like Pizarro or Cortez.

Please remember too, that in 1492 and for a long time there is no prussia with a colonial interest. In 1492 "Prussia" was still in the possession of the Teutonic Order and stayed there until the reformation. What you refer to as Prussia was back then called "Brandenburg" and later became "Brandenburg-Prussia" and only after 1701 the Kingdom of Prussia.

If you want to play Bavaria you could use a bit of phantasy and play the Netherlands. That is because in Bavaria was divided in up to 4 duchys at times, one of them being "Bavaria-Straubing" which included rule of Holland, Zeeland, Hainault/Hennegau and part of Frisia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bavaria-Straubing

East Asian Colony Civs
(These would definitely stretch into the realm of alternate or speculative history. It might also call for some variation in artwork for units, buildings, and interface. I imagine it is impossible to have the Crosses symbol or Europe button change based on the civ, but it might be possible to introduce a more universal symbol/button)

Spoiler New China :

Name: Chinese Colonies or Ming Colonies
King: Chinese Emperor or Ming Emperor
Leaders: Zheng He
Common Leader Trait: Confucian (Educating colonists does not require teachers)
Starting Units: Expert Native Trader, Renowned Medic, (maybe a non-settleable military unit as well)
Unique Units: Treasure Ship (Galleon), Junk (Caravel), Buddhist Monk (Jesuit Missionary)
Unique Buildings: Buddhist replacements for Chapel/Church/etc.

The extent of chinese/han colonization at that time was to establish their rule over Formosa and Manchuria and "Inner" Mongolia. Beyond that there were no official attempts of establishing colonies, especially not in the Americas. The huge influx of chinese workers /kulis after the Californian Gold Rush and the building of railways would be far too late for the game.

Spoiler New Japan :

Name: Japanese Colonies
King: Japanese Emperor
Spoiler New Japan :

Spoiler New Japan :
.


At the start of the game in 1492 Japan had just had the Onin War which showed that the Ashikaga Shogunate was just an empty shell that could not control the vassals anymore and lead to the Sengoku Jidai. Noone would colonize anything outside Japan until Japan would be united again
 
I have a concept for "Minor Civs" - similar to City States in other CivGames.
(So nations that can not be played by yourself, do not even have a real leader, just a few basic Units but the Player can trade and interact with.)

I was thinking about using Civs like "Klein Venedig", "Scottland", "Courland", ... as "Minor Civs".
(One reason why I have not publihsed it yet is that I had found too few suitable Civs I could have used for it.)
 
The danish and the swedish are already in the game. :viking: And the norwegians during their history belonged to either the one or the other in the time after 1492...
Norway was under Denmark 1388-1814 and then under Sweden 1814-1905.

I just noticed that the 1814 event on Wikipedia is fairly short and not that accurate. What happened is that the UK asked Denmark in 1801 to join them against France. Denmark refused and stated the policy of neutrality. The UK attacked Denmark and fired upon Copenhagen even after Denmark surrendered (Lord Nelson's decision). In 1805 the UK asked Sweden to join forces against France. Sweden agreed in exchange of getting Norway. The UK agreed while completely ignoring that it belonged to neutral Denmark. In 1807 members of parliament in London started receiving information that Denmark planned to attack England, all from anonymous sources. Other sources claimed that the Danish king planned to donate the entire Danish fleet to France (no evidence then or since backs up either claim). While a big minority objected in parliament, the majority decided that Denmark should pay compensation for this hostile act, which would be to hand over the entire fleet. They attacked Copenhagen again and again ignored surrender. This time they landed troops, which fired newly developed rockets in what is known as the first bombardment of civilians in history. Those rockets were shooting out flames to set the city a blaze and they kept burning even if they were put into buckets of water. The UK then left with the entire Danish fleet.

In 1814 the Danish king was asked to sign a treaty to hand over Norway. If he refused, then the UK would ensure that both Norway and Denmark came under Swedish rule. He signed and then Norway declared independent, claiming that since they were not part of Denmark, the king of Denmark had no jurisdiction over Norway, hence the signature was worthless. The UK and Russia (at the time an ally of the UK) blocked Norwegian ports and the Swedish army started running around in Norway. That lasted for 5 months until Norway voluntarily agreed to a mutually beneficial union. At least that's what Sweden calls it. Norway refers to it as an occupation. Once Norway declared independent in 1905, Sweden kept part of what was Norway and it just happened to be the area with the best farmland. Sweden still isn't popular in Norway.

Wikipedia mainly sums this up as "As the Danish kingdom found itself on the losing side in 1814". Denmark did contact France in 1807 stating that the UK has promised Danish land to Sweden and they keep attacking Denmark, completely ignoring neutrality. The UK never declared war. They just attacked and took ships as they pleased. However Denmark never helped France, but France did send troops to Denmark to fight off Swedish attacks as it was in both Danish and French interest that Sweden (an ally of the UK) didn't gain control of Denmark, hence control of the ship traffic between the Atlantic and the Baltic. Denmark was never offensive in the Napoleon wars.
 
I have a concept for "Minor Civs" - similar to City States in other CivGames.
(So nations that can not be played by yourself, do not even have a real leader, just a few basic Units but the Player can trade and interact with.)

I was thinking about using Civs like "Klein Venedig", "Scottland", "Courland", ... as "Minor Civs".
(One reason why I have not publihsed it yet is that I had found too few suitable Civs I could have used for it.)

I thought that you mentioned some time ago that the number of civilizations is limited too? So that no new ones could be added in a game without removing natives or wild animals or other european colonizers?

Would those then just be alternative colonizers that would take the place of someone else instead of being additional colonizers?
 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_colonization_of_the_Americas
While even the WIKI article calls that "german colonization", that is historically nonsense. The Welsers may have been a trading family from Augsburg, similar to the better known Fuggers, and they may have got the right to exploit "Klein-Venedig" (or rather Venezuela) as a colony, they did not do so as represantants of any kind of Germany. It was the King of Spain - who coincidentally was the Emperor of the HRE too - who granted them the right to explore and exploit Venezuela but he did so in his function as the King of Spain to whose realm the whole coast of South America in the Carribean at that time belonged. In other words - it was a spanish colony that would have had a german governour if it had succeeded and not went down in history and the Welsers practically in a situation like Pizarro or Cortez.

Yeah, it is quite a stretch at best. Nobody looking to recreate/reenact the colonial history of the western hemisphere within the timeline of the game would ever use any of these civilizations.

However, I do enjoy the varied experience of having alternative options for civ bonuses that lend themselves to different playstyles. I do think the idea of having a native trader or an elder statesman as starting units would lend itself to an interesting experience. I also think my idea for an Ottoman unique ability of allowing enslaved units to function as soldiers or statesmen would present some interesting strategies. As for China though, not requiring teachers might be way too big an advantage.
 
I thought that you mentioned some time ago that the number of civilizations is limited too?
That information is long outdated we now know that it is possible to add many more.
(In these old days we simply did not know but Civ4BTS modders found out that there is no such hard limit.)

Would those then just be alternative colonizers that would take the place of someone else instead of being additional colonizers?
They would be additional and as I said, take the role of "Minor Civs" / "City States".
(Basically being similar to Natives in gameplay - trade partners, having DLL Diplo Events, ... - but just as Europeans.)
 
Norway was under Denmark 1388-1814 and then under Sweden 1814-1905.

I just noticed that the 1814 event on Wikipedia is fairly short and not that accurate. What happened is that the UK asked Denmark in 1801 to join them against France.

Which would have been suicide as France on land was still winning and even on sea still had an operable fleet before Trafalgar.

Denmark refused and stated the policy of neutrality.

Not quite. They joined the "League of armed neutrality"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_League_of_Armed_Neutrality
because they knew that simply declaring neutrality would be empty words that noone cared about. And they, as the other members of that league wanted to protect neutral shipping and trading with both sides. That worked during the 1st League while the UK was fighting the American Revolutioneers but was largely unsuccessful for the 2nd league.

The UK attacked Denmark and fired upon Copenhagen even after Denmark surrendered (Lord Nelson's decision).

to "copenhagen" something after that became an idiom meaning to totally destroy something in a pre-emptive strike
I would not blame Nelson - any other british admiral would have done the same because 1801, 1807 Copenhagen or in WW2 Mers-el-Kebir. The fear that the fleet of Denmark or in WW2 France could be joined to that of the enemy and so enable the enemy to invade the UK always brought up the fiercer attitudes of the UK.

In 1805 the UK asked Sweden to join forces against France. Sweden agreed in exchange of getting Norway. The UK agreed while completely ignoring that it belonged to neutral Denmark. In 1807 members of parliament in London started receiving information that Denmark planned to attack England, all from anonymous sources. Other sources claimed that the Danish king planned to donate the entire Danish fleet to France (no evidence then or since backs up either claim). While a big minority objected in parliament, the majority decided that Denmark should pay compensation for this hostile act, which would be to hand over the entire fleet. They attacked Copenhagen again and again ignored surrender. This time they landed troops, which fired newly developed rockets in what is known as the first bombardment of civilians in history. Those rockets were shooting out flames to set the city a blaze and they kept burning even if they were put into buckets of water. The UK then left with the entire Danish fleet.

In 1814 the Danish king was asked to sign a treaty to hand over Norway. If he refused, then the UK would ensure that both Norway and Denmark came under Swedish rule. He signed and then Norway declared independent, claiming that since they were not part of Denmark, the king of Denmark had no jurisdiction over Norway, hence the signature was worthless. The UK and Russia (at the time an ally of the UK) blocked Norwegian ports and the Swedish army started running around in Norway. That lasted for 5 months until Norway voluntarily agreed to a mutually beneficial union. At least that's what Sweden calls it. Norway refers to it as an occupation. Once Norway declared independent in 1905, Sweden kept part of what was Norway and it just happened to be the area with the best farmland. Sweden still isn't popular in Norway.

Wikipedia mainly sums this up as "As the Danish kingdom found itself on the losing side in 1814". Denmark did contact France in 1807 stating that the UK has promised Danish land to Sweden and they keep attacking Denmark, completely ignoring neutrality. The UK never declared war. They just attacked and took ships as they pleased. However Denmark never helped France, but France did send troops to Denmark to fight off Swedish attacks as it was in both Danish and French interest that Sweden (an ally of the UK) didn't gain control of Denmark, hence control of the ship traffic between the Atlantic and the Baltic. Denmark was never offensive in the Napoleon wars.

Melos. In the peleponesian war Athens annihilated the island city of Melos. Melos was neutral but Athens forced them to chose - either join Athens or fight. There is a nice discussion recorded about the right of might in the Melosian dialogue
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Melos#The_Melian_Dialogue

The danish were just in the same position - their navy was not strong enough to challenge the UK. But the navies of France, Spain and Denmark combined could have become a threat - so the UK acted on a neutral nation.
 
We already have more than enough (European) nations in the game.
Totally agree. :thumbsup:

There is no need for a new (playable) European Civ.
(There is no good candidate for one either.)
 
There should not be implemented new Civs. We already have more than enough (European) nations in the game. More nations would ruin it...just my 2 cents

I fully agree because I see Colonization as a game to colonize the New World / America.
For people who want to create maps of other areas of the world, say Africa or Asia, or who want to expand the usual timeline to before 1492 or after 1792 - for those it might make sense to add others, but IMO that would not be the "New World" but the old world.
 
I'd love to see small playable civilizations that don't can't get immigrants from Europe, akin to how Port Royal behaves. I know it is probably a lot of work - but these would be fantastic for a self-imposed one-city challenge or piracy gameplay.

Additionally, I don't understand why different civilizations need to have different ship models for exact same ship type. I believe these better be used for additional ship variations instead.
 
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I don't understand why different civilizations need to have different ship models for exact same ship type.
It is small graphical details like "flags", "paintings" on the shiphull, different Uniforms, ... that are part of the NationSpecific UnitArtStyles.
It is a level of professional quality that most "single hobby modders" simply can not achieve but in those days we had people skilled enough to do it.

In those "golden days of modding" when we still had a large team we said:
"We are not going to be one of these low quality fast assembled patchwork mods, but a quality mod that pays attention to details."

In those days we had 4 top tier graphical modders in the team.
@Willi_Tell , @Fankman, @melcher kürzer , @Schmiddie

It is a "high standard" that was set, but it is what made this mod special.
It is hard to keep up today - with much less graphical modders - but at least we still try.

Summary:
It was a quality decision we made that I am not willing to revert or sacrifice anymore.
Such details make the difference in quality between low quality mods and high quality mods.

----

Does that answer your question?
 
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