TheSpaceCowboy
The Gangster of Love
- Joined
- Jul 14, 2013
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I’ve shared some of these ideas in the past, and have been meaning to get this post made since Civilization VII was announced, but want to at the very least publish them before the official reveal event in a few hours, so as not to be influenced by it in any way.
Civilization V had Hexes and One Unit Per Tile. Civilization VI had Districts. My proposal for the Big Idea to innovate Civilization VII is Cultures, Citizens, and Counsels. This would expand the scope of the game at levels both above and below that of your civilization.
Culture
Just as cities belong to civilizations, civilizations belong to Cultures. You’re still playing as a civilization, not a Culture. You share a Culture with several other civilizations in the game.
At their heart, Cultures are all about asymmetry and flavor. Playing two different civilizations from the same Culture would be about as different as playing two different civilizations from Civ VI. But playing as civilizations from different Cultures would almost be like playing two different 4X strategy games altogether. The goal is much more varied gameplay.
Each Culture will have a unique:
These are all in addition to the unique Leader Abilities, Civilization Abilities, Units, and Buildings/Districts/Improvements of each civilization.
With respect to the singular Hero and Wonder, civilizations of the same Culture would be competing to produce each. They’d also be competing to assimilate Tribes and Nations (replacing Barbarians and City-States, respectively) that belong to the same Culture. Tribes that belong to the same Culture as the player would act like Barbarians in New Frontier, in that they can be dealt with diplomatically. Tribes from a different Culture will always be hostile to the player.
Sharing a Culture benefits relations between groups. Envoys sent to Nations of the same Culture are more effective than to ones of a foreign Culture. After conquering a city of a different civilization or Nation, it is easier to assimilate the Citizens of the same Culture than a different one. Loyalty pressure is greater on cities whose Citizens belong to your Culture and lesser on those of different ones.
Each Culture has a defining idea that radically differentiates them from other Cultures. For example, Amerindians start on the New World continent(s) isolated from the other Cultures, while
Colonial civilizations cannot be chosen at the start of a Standard game. Only once an Old World Culture has three cities on the New World continent(s) can they choose to abandon their original civilization and play as a Colonial. The Cultures would be:
Citizens
Each and every Citizen is an individual. Your population, instead of being a mere quantity, is all of these individuals, each with their own beliefs, strengths, and weaknesses.
Every time a City, Nation, or Tribe gains a population point, a new Citizen is randomly generated. This individual will have a numeric value for skills in the following categories:
These relate to the Citizen’s aptitude at Culture, Money Making, Scientific Research, Warfare, Building, and Faith, respectively. Each time a Citizen is produced, they can do one of four things:
Improve a Tile - Good for Citizens with low skills, building Farms, Pastures, etc.
Construct a Building/District/Wonder - The Citizen will work in the Building once it's constructed. A Citizen with high Productivity but low Zeal will take fewer turns to build a Temple, but that Temple will produce less Faith or Great Prophet points. A Citizen with low Productivity but high Zeal will take longer to construct a Temple, but it will produce more Faith and Great Prophet points.
Military Duty - Good for Citizens with high Fitness. You select a specialization such as Warrior or Archer, and the Citizen becomes that unit after several turns of training. More advanced military specializations require resources such as Iron or Oil, in addition to the Citizen
Specialize - Becomes a Trader, Missionary, Rock Band, etc. Restrictions apply to some specializations.
The Cities themselves no longer have production queues. Each Citizen takes a number of turns to build his Building or learn his specialization, and this can happen simultaneously if the Citizens have generally low Production skills and the City is growing quickly in population.
Citizens can also be born with rare traits. One with a Green Thumb might produce more food on a farm, while one that’s a Tactician might have a greater combat buff on advantageous terrain.
Certain buildings can make Citizens born in that city have better skills in a certain category. A campus with a Liberal Arts College would give all new Citizens of the city a higher Creativity, whereas a Military Academy would improve Fitness. T
When a civilization has acquired enough Great Person points, the next city to increase in population will not receive a random Citizen, but rather a predetermined Great Person from their Culture’s list. Even after retiring a Great Person remains a part of the city’s population.
Though Citizens cannot be moved around, in addition to their job, they can also be appointed to a position in their government’s Counsel.
Counsel
Instead of filling policy cards, Governments are now differentiated by how many members of their ruling Counsels there are and what job functions they have. These Counsels are very similar to those found in Crusader Kings III, except for the fact that everyone is more or less immortal.
For the earliest government of Chiefdom, the only Counsel member is the Leader. Early governments like an Ancient Republic or a Monarchy might only have one spot on their Counsel. A late game government like a Democratic Republic would have the Leader, Vice President, Speaker of the House, Chief Justice, and a whole slew of Cabinet Secretaries. A retired Great General would have stats that make him a particularly good choice for Secretary of Defense, whereas a Great Engineer would make a better Secretary of Labor, but either could fill any position.
There is now a new currency called Political Capital that is used to purchase Policies. Depending on the Government, some policies cost more Political Capital than others. In a Democratic Republic, it costs more Political Capital to enact Censorship than Free Speech. Governments also have different means of generating Political Capital. In a Democratic Republic, every Citizen with a positive approval rating of the Leader generates Political Capital. For a Fascist government, Political Capital might be gained by a combination of Soldiers’ approval and through conquest.
Tribes & Nations
Tribes and Nations would replace Barbarians and City-States, respectively. Unlike Barbarians and City-States, Nations can potentially become Civilizations, and Tribes could likewise become Nations, and in turn, Civilizations.
Moreover, each and every Tribe would be unique. Those with a unique unit would start the game with such, though unique abilities and improvements would only be available once a Tribe became a Nation. Tribes would start off in Outposts, similar to the former Barbarians. However, a Tribe’s goal is explicitly to capture a Settler from a Civilization and return it to its Outpost. If a Settler founds a City on an Outpost, that City becomes permanently associated with the Tribe’s unique attributes. The same is true if a Civilization’s Settler captures the Outpost, albeit the Civilization would own that City instead of the Tribe becoming a Nation. Were that to happen, the Tribal units would attack that City without halt until they captured it or all died. This is the only scenario in which Tribes can capture a City.
If the Tribe either uses a captured Settler at its Outpost or captures the City founded there, it succeeds in becoming a Nation. Every Nation has a single unique element, usually consisting a unit or an improvement, but sometimes an ability. Additionally, each Nation has a typing and Suzerain bonus. The typing is the same as with City-States, but with the addition of Naval-type Nations that give bonuses to harbors and Naval unit production. Suzerain bonuses benefit whatever Civilization has sent the Nation the most envoys. Were the Nation to become a Civilization, it would no longer generate a Suzerain bonus, but the envoys sent would still continue to confer type bonuses.
Nations have no Leader, Leader Ability, or Civilization Ability, nor do they acquire any should they become Civilizations. All of their abilities always and only apply within the borders of the original City. This is true even if that City is captured by another Nation or Civilization. All Nations share the same Agenda: Become a Civilization. They do so by expanding to a second City. Because Nations cannot directly produce or purchase Settlers, they must Capture cities or Settlers. This is the major differentiating factor between the new Nations and the former City-States mechanic.
If a Nation captures a Settler, the City it founds will be pulled from the list of names from the Settler’s Civilization. The new City would not have any of the uniques associated either with the Nation or the Settler’s Civilization. However, if the Nation conquers another Nation, the conquered City remains named after the conquered Nation and retains all of its uniques, including improvements already constructed and the ability to build new unique units and improvements associated with the conquered Nation. Likewise if a Nation (or Civilization) conquers a City belonging to a Civilization, all of the unique improvements and districts of the original Civilization are preserved.
Nations that become Civilizations are able to adopt a government, participate in trade deals, generate envoys, earn era score, and achieve victory conditions. They can form Alliances, albeit their Alliance-types are always the same as their Nation-typing, and former Nations alone can have multiple Alliances of the same type (including a new Naval-type Alliance).
A former Nation turned Civilization will have an Agenda to pursue whatever victory condition is associated with its original typing (Domination for both Military and Naval types, Diplomatic for Industrial types, and a new Economic victory for Economic types).
Not all Nations will begin as Tribes. Some will be Nations from the start, with the density of such equivalent to the number of City-States per map size currently. In general, ancient peoples would be designated Tribes and modern nation-states would start as full Nations.
While Civilizations that start as either Tribes or Nations are at a distinct disadvantage compared to actual Civilizations, those fortunate few that manage form a broad coalition by conquering numerous other Nations and having access to their various uniques may achieve some semblance of a competitive edge. However, given that Civilizations can likewise conquer Nations, with those Cities being able to generate both the uniques of the Civilization and that particular Nation, as well as accessing the Leader Ability and Unique Ability of the Nation, the original Civilization will usually retain an advantage.
Science
Instead of only Science and Eurekas, there will be multiple means of researching Techs on the Tech Tree, with each Culture strong in one and weak in another. These include:
Discovery: Some Techs cannot be unlocked without first satisfying a certain condition. For example, an early naval Tech such as Sailing might require construction of either a City on a coast or a Harbor.
Eurekas: These apply to all Techs, even those that are unlocked by a Discovery. For those that require multiple items, sometimes each item contributes to the research. For example, Sailing might require two Fishing Boats, but each Boat built would advance the Research 20% or so. Even after completing the Research for Sailing via Eurekas and other means it would still need to be Discovered to be unlocked.
Great Scientists: Same as in Civ VI, but now retired Scientists can join your Council
Research: Initially, research along the Tech Tree would be limited to one Tech at a time, and throttled by a trickle of Science, requiring Eurekas and Great Scientists to speed up advances. However, once the Research Center district comes online (much later than Civ VI’s Campus), each Research Center can be dedicated to its own Tech, greatly speeding this process.
Contact: Each time a Civilization sees another using a Technology it has not yet Discovered (e.g. Spanish musketmen being in sight range of Azteks who had not yet discovered Gunpowder), the first Civilization has a chance to automatically Discover the Tech. The chance percentage would depend in large part as to what Era the Tech is from.
Trade: Anytime two Civilizations share a trade route, a very small percent of progress will be made each turn toward every Tech that one has Researched but the other has not yet.
Era: The Science put towards a Tech via Eurekas, Great Scientists, Research, or Trade would be the standard amount for Techs of the current Era, but about +25% greater per era for Techs from earlier Eras, and about -25% less per ara for Techs from future Eras.
Moreover, each Culture would get a unique Tech Tree. While most of the Techs are shared, some would be unique to certain Cultures, others would come later or earlier on the tree, some would have different conditions to Discover or gain a Eureka, and some would cost more or less Science.
Campus District & Science Victory
Replacing the University is are a selection of new tier two buildings, each of which confer bonuses to certain skills for Citizens born in that city:
A&M - Farming and Mining traits
Business School - Enterprising
Institute of Technology - Intelligence
Liberal Arts College - Creativity
Military Academy - Fitness
Seminary - Zeal
Vocational - Productivity
Replacing the Research Lab are a selection of new tier three buildings, all of which are necessary to complete for the new Science victory (in addition to a Moon Landing via the Spaceport).
All of these projects potentially must be completed a number of times before they achieve their goals, so having multiple Campuses with the same Tier 3 building would allow the same project to be pursued multiple times simultaneously, increasing chances of success.
For example, the location of extraterrestrial radio signals will be set at the outset of the game. The S.E.T.I. project only scans a fraction of the sky each time the project is run. It may happen to be pointed at the right part of the sky the very first time, or it might take a dozen attempts.
Moreover, these projects can be run at an accelerated rate in order to obtain victory faster (potentially necessary when competing with other civilizations), but such acceleration risks catastrophic failure. These disasters include:
This would result in a much more dynamic endgame. It would force players to diversify their cities and offer major risks and rewards in racing to complete these projects
Civilization V had Hexes and One Unit Per Tile. Civilization VI had Districts. My proposal for the Big Idea to innovate Civilization VII is Cultures, Citizens, and Counsels. This would expand the scope of the game at levels both above and below that of your civilization.
Culture
Just as cities belong to civilizations, civilizations belong to Cultures. You’re still playing as a civilization, not a Culture. You share a Culture with several other civilizations in the game.
At their heart, Cultures are all about asymmetry and flavor. Playing two different civilizations from the same Culture would be about as different as playing two different civilizations from Civ VI. But playing as civilizations from different Cultures would almost be like playing two different 4X strategy games altogether. The goal is much more varied gameplay.
Each Culture will have a unique:
- Ability
- Unit
- Building/District/Improvement
- Great Persons list
- Wonder
- Hero
- Spy
- Tech Tree
- And means of making technological progress
These are all in addition to the unique Leader Abilities, Civilization Abilities, Units, and Buildings/Districts/Improvements of each civilization.
With respect to the singular Hero and Wonder, civilizations of the same Culture would be competing to produce each. They’d also be competing to assimilate Tribes and Nations (replacing Barbarians and City-States, respectively) that belong to the same Culture. Tribes that belong to the same Culture as the player would act like Barbarians in New Frontier, in that they can be dealt with diplomatically. Tribes from a different Culture will always be hostile to the player.
Sharing a Culture benefits relations between groups. Envoys sent to Nations of the same Culture are more effective than to ones of a foreign Culture. After conquering a city of a different civilization or Nation, it is easier to assimilate the Citizens of the same Culture than a different one. Loyalty pressure is greater on cities whose Citizens belong to your Culture and lesser on those of different ones.
Each Culture has a defining idea that radically differentiates them from other Cultures. For example, Amerindians start on the New World continent(s) isolated from the other Cultures, while
Colonial civilizations cannot be chosen at the start of a Standard game. Only once an Old World Culture has three cities on the New World continent(s) can they choose to abandon their original civilization and play as a Colonial. The Cultures would be:
- African
- Amerindian
- Colonial
- Eastern
- Far East Asian
- Mediterranean
- Middle-eastern
- Northern
- South East Asian
- Western European
Citizens
Each and every Citizen is an individual. Your population, instead of being a mere quantity, is all of these individuals, each with their own beliefs, strengths, and weaknesses.
Every time a City, Nation, or Tribe gains a population point, a new Citizen is randomly generated. This individual will have a numeric value for skills in the following categories:
- Creativity
- Enterprising
- Intelligence
- Fitness
- Productivity
- Zeal
These relate to the Citizen’s aptitude at Culture, Money Making, Scientific Research, Warfare, Building, and Faith, respectively. Each time a Citizen is produced, they can do one of four things:
Improve a Tile - Good for Citizens with low skills, building Farms, Pastures, etc.
Construct a Building/District/Wonder - The Citizen will work in the Building once it's constructed. A Citizen with high Productivity but low Zeal will take fewer turns to build a Temple, but that Temple will produce less Faith or Great Prophet points. A Citizen with low Productivity but high Zeal will take longer to construct a Temple, but it will produce more Faith and Great Prophet points.
Military Duty - Good for Citizens with high Fitness. You select a specialization such as Warrior or Archer, and the Citizen becomes that unit after several turns of training. More advanced military specializations require resources such as Iron or Oil, in addition to the Citizen
Specialize - Becomes a Trader, Missionary, Rock Band, etc. Restrictions apply to some specializations.
The Cities themselves no longer have production queues. Each Citizen takes a number of turns to build his Building or learn his specialization, and this can happen simultaneously if the Citizens have generally low Production skills and the City is growing quickly in population.
Citizens can also be born with rare traits. One with a Green Thumb might produce more food on a farm, while one that’s a Tactician might have a greater combat buff on advantageous terrain.
Certain buildings can make Citizens born in that city have better skills in a certain category. A campus with a Liberal Arts College would give all new Citizens of the city a higher Creativity, whereas a Military Academy would improve Fitness. T
When a civilization has acquired enough Great Person points, the next city to increase in population will not receive a random Citizen, but rather a predetermined Great Person from their Culture’s list. Even after retiring a Great Person remains a part of the city’s population.
Though Citizens cannot be moved around, in addition to their job, they can also be appointed to a position in their government’s Counsel.
Counsel
Instead of filling policy cards, Governments are now differentiated by how many members of their ruling Counsels there are and what job functions they have. These Counsels are very similar to those found in Crusader Kings III, except for the fact that everyone is more or less immortal.
For the earliest government of Chiefdom, the only Counsel member is the Leader. Early governments like an Ancient Republic or a Monarchy might only have one spot on their Counsel. A late game government like a Democratic Republic would have the Leader, Vice President, Speaker of the House, Chief Justice, and a whole slew of Cabinet Secretaries. A retired Great General would have stats that make him a particularly good choice for Secretary of Defense, whereas a Great Engineer would make a better Secretary of Labor, but either could fill any position.
There is now a new currency called Political Capital that is used to purchase Policies. Depending on the Government, some policies cost more Political Capital than others. In a Democratic Republic, it costs more Political Capital to enact Censorship than Free Speech. Governments also have different means of generating Political Capital. In a Democratic Republic, every Citizen with a positive approval rating of the Leader generates Political Capital. For a Fascist government, Political Capital might be gained by a combination of Soldiers’ approval and through conquest.
Tribes & Nations
Tribes and Nations would replace Barbarians and City-States, respectively. Unlike Barbarians and City-States, Nations can potentially become Civilizations, and Tribes could likewise become Nations, and in turn, Civilizations.
Moreover, each and every Tribe would be unique. Those with a unique unit would start the game with such, though unique abilities and improvements would only be available once a Tribe became a Nation. Tribes would start off in Outposts, similar to the former Barbarians. However, a Tribe’s goal is explicitly to capture a Settler from a Civilization and return it to its Outpost. If a Settler founds a City on an Outpost, that City becomes permanently associated with the Tribe’s unique attributes. The same is true if a Civilization’s Settler captures the Outpost, albeit the Civilization would own that City instead of the Tribe becoming a Nation. Were that to happen, the Tribal units would attack that City without halt until they captured it or all died. This is the only scenario in which Tribes can capture a City.
If the Tribe either uses a captured Settler at its Outpost or captures the City founded there, it succeeds in becoming a Nation. Every Nation has a single unique element, usually consisting a unit or an improvement, but sometimes an ability. Additionally, each Nation has a typing and Suzerain bonus. The typing is the same as with City-States, but with the addition of Naval-type Nations that give bonuses to harbors and Naval unit production. Suzerain bonuses benefit whatever Civilization has sent the Nation the most envoys. Were the Nation to become a Civilization, it would no longer generate a Suzerain bonus, but the envoys sent would still continue to confer type bonuses.
Nations have no Leader, Leader Ability, or Civilization Ability, nor do they acquire any should they become Civilizations. All of their abilities always and only apply within the borders of the original City. This is true even if that City is captured by another Nation or Civilization. All Nations share the same Agenda: Become a Civilization. They do so by expanding to a second City. Because Nations cannot directly produce or purchase Settlers, they must Capture cities or Settlers. This is the major differentiating factor between the new Nations and the former City-States mechanic.
If a Nation captures a Settler, the City it founds will be pulled from the list of names from the Settler’s Civilization. The new City would not have any of the uniques associated either with the Nation or the Settler’s Civilization. However, if the Nation conquers another Nation, the conquered City remains named after the conquered Nation and retains all of its uniques, including improvements already constructed and the ability to build new unique units and improvements associated with the conquered Nation. Likewise if a Nation (or Civilization) conquers a City belonging to a Civilization, all of the unique improvements and districts of the original Civilization are preserved.
Nations that become Civilizations are able to adopt a government, participate in trade deals, generate envoys, earn era score, and achieve victory conditions. They can form Alliances, albeit their Alliance-types are always the same as their Nation-typing, and former Nations alone can have multiple Alliances of the same type (including a new Naval-type Alliance).
A former Nation turned Civilization will have an Agenda to pursue whatever victory condition is associated with its original typing (Domination for both Military and Naval types, Diplomatic for Industrial types, and a new Economic victory for Economic types).
Not all Nations will begin as Tribes. Some will be Nations from the start, with the density of such equivalent to the number of City-States per map size currently. In general, ancient peoples would be designated Tribes and modern nation-states would start as full Nations.
While Civilizations that start as either Tribes or Nations are at a distinct disadvantage compared to actual Civilizations, those fortunate few that manage form a broad coalition by conquering numerous other Nations and having access to their various uniques may achieve some semblance of a competitive edge. However, given that Civilizations can likewise conquer Nations, with those Cities being able to generate both the uniques of the Civilization and that particular Nation, as well as accessing the Leader Ability and Unique Ability of the Nation, the original Civilization will usually retain an advantage.
Science
Instead of only Science and Eurekas, there will be multiple means of researching Techs on the Tech Tree, with each Culture strong in one and weak in another. These include:
Discovery: Some Techs cannot be unlocked without first satisfying a certain condition. For example, an early naval Tech such as Sailing might require construction of either a City on a coast or a Harbor.
Eurekas: These apply to all Techs, even those that are unlocked by a Discovery. For those that require multiple items, sometimes each item contributes to the research. For example, Sailing might require two Fishing Boats, but each Boat built would advance the Research 20% or so. Even after completing the Research for Sailing via Eurekas and other means it would still need to be Discovered to be unlocked.
Great Scientists: Same as in Civ VI, but now retired Scientists can join your Council
Research: Initially, research along the Tech Tree would be limited to one Tech at a time, and throttled by a trickle of Science, requiring Eurekas and Great Scientists to speed up advances. However, once the Research Center district comes online (much later than Civ VI’s Campus), each Research Center can be dedicated to its own Tech, greatly speeding this process.
Contact: Each time a Civilization sees another using a Technology it has not yet Discovered (e.g. Spanish musketmen being in sight range of Azteks who had not yet discovered Gunpowder), the first Civilization has a chance to automatically Discover the Tech. The chance percentage would depend in large part as to what Era the Tech is from.
Trade: Anytime two Civilizations share a trade route, a very small percent of progress will be made each turn toward every Tech that one has Researched but the other has not yet.
Era: The Science put towards a Tech via Eurekas, Great Scientists, Research, or Trade would be the standard amount for Techs of the current Era, but about +25% greater per era for Techs from earlier Eras, and about -25% less per ara for Techs from future Eras.
Moreover, each Culture would get a unique Tech Tree. While most of the Techs are shared, some would be unique to certain Cultures, others would come later or earlier on the tree, some would have different conditions to Discover or gain a Eureka, and some would cost more or less Science.
Campus District & Science Victory
Replacing the University is are a selection of new tier two buildings, each of which confer bonuses to certain skills for Citizens born in that city:
A&M - Farming and Mining traits
Business School - Enterprising
Institute of Technology - Intelligence
Liberal Arts College - Creativity
Military Academy - Fitness
Seminary - Zeal
Vocational - Productivity
Replacing the Research Lab are a selection of new tier three buildings, all of which are necessary to complete for the new Science victory (in addition to a Moon Landing via the Spaceport).
- The Medical Laboratory has the "Human Genome Project"
- The Particle Accelerator has the Project "Detect the Higgs Boson"
- The Robotics Lab has the project "Develop Artificial Intelligence"
- The Satellite Array has the project "Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence"
All of these projects potentially must be completed a number of times before they achieve their goals, so having multiple Campuses with the same Tier 3 building would allow the same project to be pursued multiple times simultaneously, increasing chances of success.
For example, the location of extraterrestrial radio signals will be set at the outset of the game. The S.E.T.I. project only scans a fraction of the sky each time the project is run. It may happen to be pointed at the right part of the sky the very first time, or it might take a dozen attempts.
Moreover, these projects can be run at an accelerated rate in order to obtain victory faster (potentially necessary when competing with other civilizations), but such acceleration risks catastrophic failure. These disasters include:
- Medical Laboratory - Lab Leak (a pandemic, operating similar to the Black Death scenario)
- Particle Accelerator - Miniature Black Hole (grows one hex in radius per turn for three turns, destroying everything and leaving that section of the map impassable ever after)
- Robotics Lab - Spawns barbarian Giant Death Robots and hijacks all nuclear missiles worldwide, launching them at as many cities as possible, a la Terminator: Judgment Day
- Satellite Array - A hostile Flying Saucer appears and begins systematically destroying World Wonders and their surroundings in a one hex radius, a la Independence Day
This would result in a much more dynamic endgame. It would force players to diversify their cities and offer major risks and rewards in racing to complete these projects
