Hi all,
I see the next expansion pack is already on the way, but an idea occured to me whilst playing "Warlords", so I thought I would sketch it out here in the hopes that something similar may come to us in a later patch or expansion. And this is it; As well as the Demographics graphs, and the Territory map over time at the end, give us a true written History as the game plays, so a sense of a living, breathing world develops... In other words, give us a narrated version of events too.
Let me explain how I invision it working; Let us say that the AI is playing as the Romans, and attacks the French in 1500 AD. The game notes this as an event trigger, and adds to the "History" Page a title of "The Romano-French War of 1500 to..."
Now,the AI already has detailed diplomacy values which defines how and why it takes the actions that it does, so these could be added in a more literary form into the "History" for the first part of the narrative;
"Declaring the constant refusals of the French to "donate" tribute an insult to his Imperial honor, Julius Casaer declared war in 1500"
Obviously script a few different responses to each possible stimulus for each diplomatic causus belli, just as we have different in-character chat styles already for diplomatic converstions.
But what if it's a human who declares war? Give them the same options when declaring war, and allow them to write their own history....! "You have refused to give us what we want. Prepare to die!" which in turn forms the first lines of the History.
And let's say it also records that the unit whose action starts the war is near Paris and started on a Forest square. Thus it adds to the narrative
"Roman Praetorians marched from out of the woods around Paris to go collect what they felt they rightfully deserved."
The next part would be a little trickier... how to get the game to tell the story of how the War progressed? A verbal intepretation of the Power graph might suffice, or a retelling of the major city exchanges or a unit loss to unit loss comparison perhaps. But either way, fill out the story, give us something to look at later and be reminded we've an actual History behind our actions too.
Then, report the events which end the war in a similar manner; If it's ended by a treaty, once more record the diplomatic modifiers etc that justified it, and also what conditions were signed. If it's a total victory, state which city was the last to fall. And add the final date of combat to the title, "The Romano-French War of 1500 to 1515 AD"
Et voila, one potted History!
Also, those new world events mentioned for Beyond the Sword? Add them in to the "History" too.
Birth of Great People, they can go in as well too... but also how they are used. "In XXXX Isaac Newton was born; He became most famous for (Building Thing in City X) / working with (Great Person Y) for rapidly advancing the knowledge and public moral of his civilization / dying during the Siege of Paris within the Romano-French War" etc
Cities flipping to other civilizations; add them too, suitably fleshed out a little... "Impressed by the (highest cultural modifer) of Titlertown, eventually the people of Paris just couldn't resist any longer, and in 1970 ran to embrace the same way of life of the lucky Titlerians and their (quality of that modifier)".
Record the writings of the historians when they say their occasional "Richest 7 Civilizations", but flesh that out a bit, and possibly exagerate more and more the further back in History they made their observations; Think of the reports about "How Many People Were Needed To Build The Pyramids?", say... in antiquity the answer being "hundreds of thousands, for every hour of every day, over hundreds of years" but slowly getting more and more accurate (or just less outlandish) the closer we get to modern research. Don't change the order of the 7 of course, but just have the ancient historians being much more poetic than the purer modern numbers
And what shall we do with this written history? Perhaps you don't hear about events until you have true contact with the Civilization who was involved with them... Perhaps then have a "Share History" option under diplomacy, which not only fills in the World History that the other Civ knows about into your own record, but maybe should give a small positive diplomatic bonus when exchanged with the AI because sharing history fleshes out your awareness of what everyone else is thinking and doing. Although whether the AI could actually use that information in game play terms as well as the player, I do not know. It might thus be more desirable to just leave it as player-pleasing fluff, instead of gameplay mechanic effecting then.
But no matter what, what we want most of all is for the whole world to know of and remember our actions... so record our mighty (and not so mighty deeds) in true flowery historical style! Let us share and tell the stories of the world, rather than just read cold demographic numbers and charts!
So that's my idea. Do people like the sound of it? And have they any further thoughts if they do?
I see the next expansion pack is already on the way, but an idea occured to me whilst playing "Warlords", so I thought I would sketch it out here in the hopes that something similar may come to us in a later patch or expansion. And this is it; As well as the Demographics graphs, and the Territory map over time at the end, give us a true written History as the game plays, so a sense of a living, breathing world develops... In other words, give us a narrated version of events too.
Let me explain how I invision it working; Let us say that the AI is playing as the Romans, and attacks the French in 1500 AD. The game notes this as an event trigger, and adds to the "History" Page a title of "The Romano-French War of 1500 to..."
Now,the AI already has detailed diplomacy values which defines how and why it takes the actions that it does, so these could be added in a more literary form into the "History" for the first part of the narrative;
"Declaring the constant refusals of the French to "donate" tribute an insult to his Imperial honor, Julius Casaer declared war in 1500"
Obviously script a few different responses to each possible stimulus for each diplomatic causus belli, just as we have different in-character chat styles already for diplomatic converstions.
But what if it's a human who declares war? Give them the same options when declaring war, and allow them to write their own history....! "You have refused to give us what we want. Prepare to die!" which in turn forms the first lines of the History.
And let's say it also records that the unit whose action starts the war is near Paris and started on a Forest square. Thus it adds to the narrative
"Roman Praetorians marched from out of the woods around Paris to go collect what they felt they rightfully deserved."
The next part would be a little trickier... how to get the game to tell the story of how the War progressed? A verbal intepretation of the Power graph might suffice, or a retelling of the major city exchanges or a unit loss to unit loss comparison perhaps. But either way, fill out the story, give us something to look at later and be reminded we've an actual History behind our actions too.
Then, report the events which end the war in a similar manner; If it's ended by a treaty, once more record the diplomatic modifiers etc that justified it, and also what conditions were signed. If it's a total victory, state which city was the last to fall. And add the final date of combat to the title, "The Romano-French War of 1500 to 1515 AD"
Et voila, one potted History!
Also, those new world events mentioned for Beyond the Sword? Add them in to the "History" too.
Birth of Great People, they can go in as well too... but also how they are used. "In XXXX Isaac Newton was born; He became most famous for (Building Thing in City X) / working with (Great Person Y) for rapidly advancing the knowledge and public moral of his civilization / dying during the Siege of Paris within the Romano-French War" etc
Cities flipping to other civilizations; add them too, suitably fleshed out a little... "Impressed by the (highest cultural modifer) of Titlertown, eventually the people of Paris just couldn't resist any longer, and in 1970 ran to embrace the same way of life of the lucky Titlerians and their (quality of that modifier)".
Record the writings of the historians when they say their occasional "Richest 7 Civilizations", but flesh that out a bit, and possibly exagerate more and more the further back in History they made their observations; Think of the reports about "How Many People Were Needed To Build The Pyramids?", say... in antiquity the answer being "hundreds of thousands, for every hour of every day, over hundreds of years" but slowly getting more and more accurate (or just less outlandish) the closer we get to modern research. Don't change the order of the 7 of course, but just have the ancient historians being much more poetic than the purer modern numbers
And what shall we do with this written history? Perhaps you don't hear about events until you have true contact with the Civilization who was involved with them... Perhaps then have a "Share History" option under diplomacy, which not only fills in the World History that the other Civ knows about into your own record, but maybe should give a small positive diplomatic bonus when exchanged with the AI because sharing history fleshes out your awareness of what everyone else is thinking and doing. Although whether the AI could actually use that information in game play terms as well as the player, I do not know. It might thus be more desirable to just leave it as player-pleasing fluff, instead of gameplay mechanic effecting then.
But no matter what, what we want most of all is for the whole world to know of and remember our actions... so record our mighty (and not so mighty deeds) in true flowery historical style! Let us share and tell the stories of the world, rather than just read cold demographic numbers and charts!
So that's my idea. Do people like the sound of it? And have they any further thoughts if they do?
But it doesn't change gameplay at all and adds a lot of flavor to the game.
