aieeegrunt
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Razing has been a thing in just about every civ game
suggestions for civ 7
- Thread starter luca 83
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Razing has been a thing in just about every civ game
SupremacyKing2
Deity
True. Also, plagues can hit "randomly" which adds another negative. If the plague happens to decimate the AI, it gives the human player an unfair boost. If the plague hits the player, it gives the player an unfair penalty.
The only way plagues could work is if they were tied to a health mechanic so that it was less random. If players neglected to build health buildings they would be more likely to get disease in that city. That disease could spread to nearby cities that are connected by roads or trade routes. Also, plagues would need to be nerfed so that they were not debilitating. Maybe you just lose 1-2 population for 1 turn in the affected city. I think that would hurt but not be crippling.
Henri Christophe
L'empereur
Better than raze a city, a mechanic I was thinking is possible to have in this game is slavery.
Despite your raze the city, you may sell the population for luxury resources. That is not hard to inplement and it show how slavery works.
The citzen enslaved don't lose their faith, to represent how religions was spreads in Americas.
Maybe it can be an hability of certain Civ as Dahoemy.
As what @SupremacyKing2 said, I'd like it to be part of a bigger health mechanic that either replaces housing, or combines aspects of housing. Buildings such as aqueducts and sewers would also help to reduce the potential spread of disease along with other buildings such as hospitals.
Plus what other way to get the world together in diplomacy than to deal with a pandemic?
SupremacyKing2
Deity
Yeah. I think the health mechanic could work something like this:
Pop requires health points. Buildings like sewers, aqueducts, hospitals, would add health points. Lack of housing would lower health points since we know that overpopulation tends to facilitate the spread of diseases. You take the health points from buildings minus the health points needed from pop to see if you have enough health to meet your population's needs. Based on if you have a surplus or deficit of health points, you would get a ranking:
- Excellent health: + pop growth, + amenity
- Good health: + pop growth
- Average health: no bonus
- Poor health: - pop growth
- Terrible health: - pop growth, Chance of plague outbreak
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Boris Gudenuf
Deity
They have now tracked Plague (Bubonic) back to the first "Indo-European" (pastoral) migrations into Europe, people who brought that and other animal-sourced epidemics with them and devastated the existing agricultural communities who had no immunities built up. That makes "Epidemic" or Pandemic an historical fact going back to nominal Start of Game in 4000 BCE.
The trick is to have such a thing but not have it dominate your progress through the game.
As long as Civ persists in its Unrelenting Progress model of Civilization, that's going to be very tricky. "Rise and Fall' or even real "Dark Ages" have never worked in Civ because any set-back to the progress of your Civilization is seen as crippling given the unrelenting, constant pressure to stay even r ahead of all the other human or AI 'players'.
But I think you've touched on the answer, which is:
1. Have something the Player can do to alleviate the effects of Plague - as stated, a set of 'Health' structures that can be built: Sewer Systems (Cloaca Maxima as a National Wonder?), Water Systems (charcoal was being used as a water purifying agent as far back as the early Classical Era in the Phoenician cities), even primitive medicine is better than no medicine at all, and herbal medicine compendiums were being written in China prior to 1000 BCE - add in the teaching and writing of Hippocrates, Galen, Dioscorides, and there are ample examples of Classical Medicine that could be used as a mechanic to alleviate the worst effects of an Epidemic.
2. "Tone Down" the worst effects of Pre-Germ-Theory Pandemics. Instead of losing up to 1/3 - 1/2 your population in a turn or two, limit the Worst Cases and perhaps make the effects only apply to individual cities instead of spreading within a single turn from one end of the continent to the other (Plague of Justinian seems to have spread from the British Isles to India within 5 years, which in game terms means Instant Catastrophic Population Loss, which would usually also equal Rage Quit And Stuff This %$#@& Game)
By making the effects at least start in individual cities, that would also allow the effects to be directly related to Events - have a lot of long-distance Trade Routes = More Risk of Plague, but also More Gold coming in: you takes the good with the bad in the game. IF the epidemic spreads more slowly than IRL, as in a city at a time over several turns, that allows some Player Intervention which alone makes the mechanic easier to live with.
Formal Quarantine wasn't "invented" until around 1600 CE by Venice, but people stopping traveling to infected cities or cutting off trade with a city to avoid the Plague on an individual basis was much older, so you could, basically, trade a temporary Economic Hit to avoid a Population Hit - again, giving the gamer some means of dealing with the epidemic event, even if only partially.
Other potentially interesting effects of Plague might be to have epidemics at random strike down Great People (short of the Civ Leader, of course) or even Governors - you'd lose the Governor's effects for X turns until a 'new' one is trained.
Losing a Great Person completely could be balanced by the better chance (maybe the Only Chance in the game) of getting Great People generated by the Plague Conditions - that might be how you get, for instance, a Boccaccio's Decameron or Camus' The Plague Great Works, or a Florence Nightingale or Alexander Fleming Great Person . . .
Missed chance in Civ 6 with Kristina as a leader.
The 2010 boardgame had a Great Humanitarian category and Florence Nightingale was one of them along with Mother Theresa. It's certainly not an accurate description of all of them, considering Alexander Fleming would be considered a Great Scientist, but I wonder what other kind of category them, as well as Clara Barton, could fit under?
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Saxo Grammaticus
Clerk
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My main issue here is that tying health back to buildings (like Civ IV) risks reducing it to factor of maintenance. In a way, Civ VI at least condensed most passive maintenance into housing and amenities!
I certainly like the idea of epidemics counterbalancing the profitability of trade, or even having a risk associated with certain advances, but I think trade would need to be reworked, possibly to be more profitable. Another possibility would be spreading along rivers and coasts outside of mapped trade routes.
This could also be interesting. Having epidemics neutralize governors or their unknown successors could be chaotic, especially for tall states. As for great people, would be practically lethal to Peter's Russia...
Plus what other way to get the world together in diplomacy than to deal with a pandemic?
Although our world may not make the best case on this point, I am certainly in favor of diversifying diplomacy in general. The International Sanitary Conferences from 1851 to 1938, if not earlier with other precursors, suggest a framework for industrial era, international cooperation on global health crises.
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I am against adding epidemics to the gamę because for 97% of game's timespan, before mass vaccinations and modern medicine and microbiology, there was very little to do much against them and preindustrial civilizations didnt even have the knowledge and paradigms required to solve the issue.
What am I trying to say, when you try to invent "rational and scientifically sound" for our modern perspective ways to overwhelmingly win with epidemics in the medieval age (while not having vaccine tech) , you already go meta and break game's immersion and realism anyway, because before microbiology people just... Didn't think that way.
Also, even besides vaccines, pre modern hospitals, medicine and border control were absolutely not on the logistical level to do much against mass scale epidemics.
So one way or another you always end up with either something ahistorical or something incredibly frustrating (your people die randomly and you cant do much).
What am I trying to say, when you try to invent "rational and scientifically sound" for our modern perspective ways to overwhelmingly win with epidemics in the medieval age (while not having vaccine tech) , you already go meta and break game's immersion and realism anyway, because before microbiology people just... Didn't think that way.
Also, even besides vaccines, pre modern hospitals, medicine and border control were absolutely not on the logistical level to do much against mass scale epidemics.
So one way or another you always end up with either something ahistorical or something incredibly frustrating (your people die randomly and you cant do much).
The epidemics are historically the Justinian plague brought from the east and brought about consequences in the barbarian invasions and in the barbarian invasions. The black plague killed 1% of the population but led to a boom thanks to the subpolation caused by the plague that led to the renaissance are part of history
https://www.worldhistory.org/article/782/justinians-plague-541-542-ce/
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Henri Christophe
L'empereur
Malaria was used in favor of Haitian troops during the Slave revolt, it should be fine to the game have some mechanic to play with plagues and disease, even militaristic.
it was not malaria but dengue carried by mosquitoes
BuchiTaton
Emperor
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Lets remember that CIV's Industrial Era is middle game, so vaccination could be used almost half the turns anyway.
It is way more ahistorical and frustrating to not have even the more basic representation of one of the most important factors on human history.
Like was said Health could be abstracted like everything else on game, or should we ignore that armies on early eras take decades to move between neighboring cities?
Water reservoir, Hospital, Sewer, Urban Parks, etc. gives better Health that mean population growth and other bonus, for example Water Reservoirs gives a defensive bonus to last longer againts sieges, Hospitals yield science and Urban Parks reduce pollution.
About disease being an "annoying random punishment", actually it could be more controlable than complety random disasters like meteors or unrelated to player actions in early game like floods and droughts (that only are manageable in late game). They could add some interesting mechanics:
- Immunity: Once one city suffers a pandemy their population develops inmmunity (in some %), even the Settlers from that city would inherit the inmmunity for the new city.
- Tropical Diseases: If your first City is founded in Jungle or Savannah your population would gain resistence to tropical disease (before vaccines and antibiotics).
- Livestock: Most pandemic diseases are related to domesticated animals like cows, pigs, chickens, etc. So if your neglected city that yield X or Y animal resource it has a high chance to produce a pandemic.
- Trade routes: Obviously pandemics would spread faster through bussy trade networks, so isolation is a way to reduce damage.
- Population Density: Big cities would fall faster and harder victim to pandemics.
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Ok I admit all your points were good 
And you made me realize that subtly calibrated diseases could act as a natural balance for runaway empires
- Big cities suffer from pandemic faster and this has more brutal effects, this risk should rise exponentially especially if you don't care about infrastructure, water, slums which are also exponentially bigger problems...
- Trade routes carry diseases, so the more trade you have with more diverse and faraway partners, the more risk there is - exponentially once again (poorer and more isolated countries benefit greatly)
- Jungles generally make development harder in civ games but good luck conquering them now
- Religious power (pilgrims) attracts diseases
- Armies returning from conquest may bring diseases
- Diseases spread much faster within bordera than outside, so an empire is ravaged way before disease arrives to smaller civs lying somewhat nearby
With those inferences, I think I am on board with diseases.
Also, a global pandemic in late game shutting down a lot of things ESPECIALLY in rich and powerful countries may be an interesting disturbance to the endgame order, obviously alone not being enough to make endgame fun. Also, it depends for whan iteration of civ devs would feel comfortablr adding this sort of thing, certainly not in civ7...
And you made me realize that subtly calibrated diseases could act as a natural balance for runaway empires
- Big cities suffer from pandemic faster and this has more brutal effects, this risk should rise exponentially especially if you don't care about infrastructure, water, slums which are also exponentially bigger problems...
- Trade routes carry diseases, so the more trade you have with more diverse and faraway partners, the more risk there is - exponentially once again (poorer and more isolated countries benefit greatly)
- Jungles generally make development harder in civ games but good luck conquering them now
- Religious power (pilgrims) attracts diseases
- Armies returning from conquest may bring diseases
- Diseases spread much faster within bordera than outside, so an empire is ravaged way before disease arrives to smaller civs lying somewhat nearby
With those inferences, I think I am on board with diseases.
Also, a global pandemic in late game shutting down a lot of things ESPECIALLY in rich and powerful countries may be an interesting disturbance to the endgame order, obviously alone not being enough to make endgame fun. Also, it depends for whan iteration of civ devs would feel comfortablr adding this sort of thing, certainly not in civ7...
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Boris Gudenuf
Deity
Ok I admit all your points were good
And you made me realize that subtly calibrated diseases could act as a natural balance for runaway empires
- Big cities suffer from pandemic faster and this has more brutal effects, this risk should rise exponentially especially if you don't care about infrastructure, water, slums which are also exponentially bigger problems...
- Trade routes carry diseases, so the more trade you have with more diverse and faraway partners, the more risk there is - exponentially once again (poorer and more isolated countries benefit greatly)
- Jungles generally make development harder in civ games but good luck conquering them now
- Religious power (pilgrims) attracts diseases
- Armies returning from conquest may bring diseases
- Diseases spread much faster within bordera than outside, so an empire is ravaged way before disease arrives to smaller civs lying somewhat nearby
With those inferences, I think I am on board with diseases.
Also, a global pandemic in late game shutting down a lot of things ESPECIALLY in rich and powerful countries may be an interesting disturbance to the endgame order, obviously alone not being enough to make endgame fun. Also, it depends for whan iteration of civ devs would feel comfortablr adding this sort of thing, certainly not in civ7...
Nice summary of the reasons why a Plague or Epidemic mechanic would be useful in the game.
Another point is that the near-continuous (in game time frames) presence of epidemics in, as far as we can tell, all urban areas from the first concentrations of people acted as a steady 'brake' on population growth. To the point where some archeologists/ancient historians have characterized cities as having generally 0 population growth from the birth/death ratio, but all population increase coming from people moving to the city from the countryside.
And once Germ Theory and decent general medical care removed the Epidemic Brake, population in the Industrial Era soared in Europe and the USA and other areas that could adopt the new medical realities. That dramatic population increase had huge political, economic, and other consequences, and really hasn't been modeled in the game up to now: an Epidemic mechanic could naturally include it in the game in the future, and give the gamer another set of Late Game Problems to solve in a Late Game that is pretty bland now . . .
Saxo Grammaticus
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If I recall correctly, probably from Death in Hamburg, this applied to many 19th-century European cities as well.
Saxo Grammaticus
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I still remember the first time I triggered the inspiration for Reformed Church and kept a wary eye open for any schismatic activity... While I recall a lot of desire for schism and reform mechanics, the following from Zaarin provides a fairly simple and concrete suggestion:
Furthermore, many have expressed a desire for a more decentralized approach to religion that does not specifically rely on states. I would suggest, for instance, that pantheons be more local. Perhaps Desert Folklore brings a lot of faith in for the capital and first expansion, but for those cities without desert, it would be natural for more appropriate pantheons to develop. Maybe those deserts were sacred to the elders, but the Great Prophet may come from those who believe in Religious Idols instead. The player could promote certain sects, but not without risk of alienating other believers.
This would work quite well within the current constraints of Civ VI, where coreligionist states could determine differences in belief through ecumenical councils. There could be many ways to implement this. For instance, we could revive the Apostolic Palace from Civ IV so all coreligionist states would regularly convene to vote on beliefs. I am also open to another of Zaarin's ideas that adopting a Theocracy could trigger a schism on its own, modeling the seizure of religious authority. I will point out, though, many terms including "schism," "ecumenical council," and "reformation" are specific to Christianity and thus not necessarily applicable to other contexts.
Furthermore, many have expressed a desire for a more decentralized approach to religion that does not specifically rely on states. I would suggest, for instance, that pantheons be more local. Perhaps Desert Folklore brings a lot of faith in for the capital and first expansion, but for those cities without desert, it would be natural for more appropriate pantheons to develop. Maybe those deserts were sacred to the elders, but the Great Prophet may come from those who believe in Religious Idols instead. The player could promote certain sects, but not without risk of alienating other believers.
i would suggest a multi-layered development of theology where councils not the apostolic palace creates schisms also the grip of religion on countries could create schisms like a martin luther, or new and old believers in russia or monosiphists or arians in constantinople. for other religions, confucians have influenced taoism. buddhism shintoism, even there are doctrinal differences, shia and sunni in islam and the various sects should be kept in mind
GeneralZift
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I don't mind a pandemic mechanic, but somehow I don't trust Firaxis not to implement it in the most frustrating way possible. (See: Civ 6)
