suggestions for civ 7

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

You know what ? I don't care those steeple quarrels. Your most iconic example would be "native americans", but even there, that's just because some of them were specifically named in Westerns movies. I'm not shocked by celts or even less by Polynesia. They are all "civilizations", which we could defined as "a more or less wide group of people".

To counter that argument it would be the same thing as making a "Mesoamerican" civ combining the Aztecs, Maya, Zapotecs, Toltecs, Olmecs etc. because they are also a wide group of similar people.

 

[Naokaukodem]

To counter that argument it would be the same thing as making a "Mesoamerican" civ combining the Aztecs, Maya, Zapotecs, Toltecs, Olmecs etc. because they are also a wide group of similar people.

Wasn't it the point of "Native Americans" in Civ4 ?

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Wasn't it the point of "Native Americans" in Civ4 ?

Well it turned out to be a design failure, as you can see by many people still pointing it out to this day, especially after we already had the Iroquois and the Sioux in previous games.

I can somewhat forgive Polynesia though as it only appeared once. Civ 5 Celts though falls into the same category as above.

The Vikings are fine except for the name. They should have just been called the Norse to begin with from their introduction until we got Denmark.

 

[Naokaukodem]

It all depends on the knowledge of anyone and the importance we want to give to it. The civilization concept is fractal. You can do barely anything you want with it. That's not a failure. Which Aztecs, Maya, Zapotecs, Toltecs, Olmecs are you talking about heh ?

 

[Zaarin]

@Naokaukodem I wanted to apologize for my tone earlier. I was frustrated at our miscommunications, and I apologize. I do feel we're talking in circles, though, and it's probably best not to resume the topic.

 

[Naokaukodem]

np, I'm accustomated to those kinds of querrels. I was just preoccupied that you seemed to shut the door for an earlier start.

 

[Zaarin]

I was just preoccupied that you seemed to shut the door for an earlier start.

I do like the idea; I'm just not convinced that Firaxis is up to the challenge of making it interesting. E.g., I rush through the Neolithic period in Humankind because it's just not that interesting. I think it could be made interesting, but a lot of the good ideas in Civ6 were badly implemented so I prefer to be cautious.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

I do like the idea; I'm just not convinced that Firaxis is up to the challenge of making it interesting. E.g., I rush through the Neolithic period in Humankind because it's just not that interesting. I think it could be made interesting, but a lot of the good ideas in Civ6 were badly implemented so I prefer to be cautious.

I see it similar to going back to Civ 4 where the "barbarians" would start out as wild animals. At the very least it will gives scouts a chance to win in combat, depending on the animal.

Another alternative is you can set up a campsite which would be your base with your first settler. You always have the option to move again until you learn agriculture and finally choose a permanent spot for your first city.

 

[Zaarin]

Another alternative is you can set up a campsite which would be your base with your first settler. You always have the option to move again until you learn agriculture and finally choose a permanent spot for your first city.

A (semi-)mobile home city is a good thought, actually, and something civs like the Scythians and Mongols could re-adopt after settling.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

A (semi-)mobile home city is a good thought, actually, and something civs like the Scythians and Mongols could re-adopt after settling.

Could even be used for some Native American civs, and I'm talking about the ones who didn't even live on the plains. Bands setting up camps and moving with the animals to hunt.

 

[Ranger0001]

I see it similar to going back to Civ 4 where the "barbarians" would start out as wild animals. At the very least it will gives scouts a chance to win in combat, depending on the animal.

This could work in some very interesting ways where the neutral threat changes but it does seem like the way that neutral pieces attack randomly in Conquest of Elysium(which is a game worth checking out) being initially animals.

To counter that argument it would be the same thing as making a "Mesoamerican" civ combining the Aztecs, Maya, Zapotecs, Toltecs, Olmecs etc. because they are also a wide group of similar people.

Which this really just depends on how we define civilization in this game which could be done in a couple ways. But if United States is consitered a civ then each of those are separate ones and should be even if something like Polynesia is one wide group of people, overall people in common law countries also are to the same extent.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

A (semi-)mobile home city is a good thought, actually, and something civs like the Scythians and Mongols could re-adopt after settling.

This fits neatly with the apparent (current theory) start of 'pastoralism', which occurred when groups got domesticated cattle (draft animal - oxen) and horses and could move their formerly-static settlements with their herds, which had formerly been tied to riverine sites where the settlements were. That allowed them to exploit much wider areas, grow bigger herds, and exploit the wide plains between the river valleys that had previously been out of reach.

In game terms, you establish a permanent settlement or many during the 9 - 4000 BCE "Neolithic" and at the point you get Animal Domestication - Cattle and Horses (Horses being the last major animal domesticated - now placed at 4500 - 4200 BCE) you can choose to make your settlement(s) Mobile and 'diverge' from the Settlement - Agriculture - City route.

- And get a choice of pastoral Civs to play: Scythian, Mongol, Comanche, etc

There could even be a mechanic in-game to allow you to switch back and forth: technically, the "Greeks" became pastoral with the rest of the "Indo-Europeans" (Yamnaya) and stayed pastoral until around 1800 - 1600 BCE when they conquered the Boetian and Attic plains and Peloponesias and took over existing cities and settlements like Athens, Argos, etc. In other words, chose Pastoral but also chose to be Greeks without getting any of the usual "Greek" Uniques because they weren't building Greek Cities yet, but were, apparently, already establishing some of the cultural characteristics of the (Mycenean) Greek Civilization: Heroic Warriors, Epic Poetry, an apparently coherent language and religious tenets for the entire group, etc.

Something like this also has the advantage (IMHO) of making the first period of the game: Neolithic and Ancient - more eclectic, with some Civs starting cities early and hoping they can make them work (like, if the river doesn't dry up or the smoking mountain over there doesn't blow it's top), others adopting the pastoral path on suitably wide open terrain and still others delaying a final decision until they find a really good Spot.

The 4000 BCE Magic Starting Date has always been a Fantasy: the number of later Civs recognizable in 4000 BCE can be counted on the fingers of one hand with enough fingers left over to hold a drink, so perhaps it's time we Opened Up the starting date possibilties to the entire period 9000 - 2000 BCE with a trade off between Starting Early and chancing a disastrous City Collapse or wandering more, settling down later but being sure you can stay settled when you do . . .

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Which this really just depends on how we define civilization in this game which could be done in a couple ways. But if United States is consitered a civ then each of those are separate ones and should be even if something like Polynesia is one wide group of people, overall people in common law countries also are to the same extent.

It's also a reason that I don't necessarily consider India a blob civ, because there is a current unified Republic of India. That being said I wouldn't mind for more representation from the Indian subcontinent like the Mughals as an entirely different civ, separated from India.

 

[Zaarin]

There could even be a mechanic in-game to allow you to switch back and forth: technically, the "Greeks" became pastoral with the rest of the "Indo-Europeans" (Yamnaya) and stayed pastoral until around 1800 - 1600 BCE when they conquered the Boetian and Attic plains and Peloponesias and took over existing cities and settlements like Athens, Argos, etc. In other words, chose Pastoral but also chose to be Greeks without getting any of the usual "Greek" Uniques because they weren't building Greek Cities yet, but were, apparently, already establishing some of the cultural characteristics of the (Mycenean) Greek Civilization: Heroic Warriors, Epic Poetry, an apparently coherent language and religious tenets for the entire group, etc.

If we treat every Indo-European civ as Proto-Indo-Europeans in the Neolithic, the Pontic Steppe is going to be even more crowded on TSL maps than the Balkans are in Civ6...as every European civ + Persia + India (+ Hittites, if they're included) starts there.

It's also a reason that I don't necessarily consider India a blob civ, because there is a current unified Republic of India. That being said I wouldn't mind for more representation from the Indian subcontinent like the Mughals as an entirely different civ, separated from India.

I agree that India isn't a blob per se, just a very poor representation of the civilization it's trying to represent. India, Aztecs, and Zulu are all relics of Civ's inception in the 90s: India in being stuck as the modern nation-state, Aztecs in being prioritized over the Maya (though I will say I very much enjoyed Civ6's more nuanced portrayal of the Mexica; I'm not even a warmonger and I love to play the Aztec), and the Zulu in being the staple African civ (in Civ1, one might even say "token African civ") based sheerly on their pop culture presence.

 

[BuchiTaton]

To counter that argument it would be the same thing as making a "Mesoamerican" civ combining the Aztecs, Maya, Zapotecs, Toltecs, Olmecs etc. because they are also a wide group of similar people.

By the way Cetls, Polynesians and Maya were at their "steam common group" phase around 3.5K years ago, so put together Mesoamerica is more like all Mesopotamia (in their greater form).

Also to be honest in the traditional sense CIVILIZATION is for broad pluri-cultural and multi-national entities, so we should talk about European civilization and not about Scotish civilization.

 

[Zaarin]

Also to be honest in the traditional sense CIVILIZATION is for broad pluri-cultural and multi-national entities, so we should talk about European civilization and not about Scotish civilization.

I agree about multinational but not multicultural. To me, civilization in the Civilization sense means culture, not civilization, and when in doubt it should err in favor of the granular and specific, not the broad and nonspecific. As of yet, there is no European language (L. L. Zamenhof tried his best, but interlangs will never work--or, as he might say, "L. L. Zamenhof provis sian eblon, sed interlangoj neniam funkcios."), and honestly with the demise of Christendom Europe is further from being a united culture than it was 500 or even 1000 years ago.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

and the Zulu in being the staple African civ (in Civ1, one might even say "token African civ") based sheerly on their pop culture presence.

I guess Egypt doesn't count?
I only say that because Zulu weren't even in the SNES version of the game, being replaced by Japan for obvious reasons.

I agree that India isn't a blob per se, just a very poor representation of the civilization it's trying to represent.

I mean I think this iteration is the best that they've done. Surely it will only get better in the future, and not turn into another Iroquois to Native Americans?

Civ 4 gets an honorable mention for having Ashoka as well, but they also had a Fast Worker UU.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

If we treat every Indo-European civ as Proto-Indo-Europeans in the Neolithic, the Pontic Steppe is going to be even more crowded on TSL maps than the Balkans are in Civ6...as every European civ + Persia + India (+ Hittites, if they're included) starts there.

I think it's obvious that no group prior to 4000 BCE is playable in Civilization: we have only traces of languages, and most of those reconstructs from later iterations, no native site names, let alone cities, and the only thing for 'Leaders' would be the occasional, usually much later, Mythologcal Founders.

So, my concept (at the moment, I ma post something more evolved tomorrow) is that you start as a random 'tribe' and this being Civ and not That Other Game, you personalize it by making up a name or selecting from a list. Quite possibly do the selection of a name after you see your starting Position, so if you are near a large river in a grassy plain you might pick:
Yamnaya
Botai
Repin
Usatova
Khvalyna
Shulaveri
Or you could set up the game as "I want to (eventually) play China" and choose from:
Daxi
Majiabang
Xinle
Houle
Cisha
Peilagang

All of these are simply names of early cultures given from archeological sites, which is why the option to name your own should be included: in no case do we know what these people were actually called or called themselves.

Now, you could immediately settle down if you've got a good site: domesticatable plants, like Korn (any of the grass grains like Wheat, Millet, Barley, etc), Rice, or Potato, a river or coast teeming with fish, a marshland teeming with waterfowl, a plains covered with huntable deer/gazelle/antelope or domesticable Sheep, Goats, Cattle (Goats and Sheep would actually be on Hills) - in other words, enough food to support a larger population than Wandering Extended Family. In that case, you get to choose a Civ to play right away (because, yeah, we'll stick with City = Civilization for most playable Civs) - but, since every decision you make in the game should be a Trade Off, you lose the opportunity to Scout Around first - because until you've got a Hunter working one of the tiles with animals, you cannot form a Scout to continue exploring.

You could also settle down without choosing a Civ, but in that case your 'settlement' will not grow into a City, it will simply spawn a new Wandering Group whenever its population grows to 2. This gives you the chance to keep exploring and settling new territory, but no chance to build up the Culture/Social points that the specialization in an urban setting would get you - again, always a Trade Off of some kind. But even the non-Civ group can (slowly in the early period) get Science progression, and so reach Domestication of Cattle and/or Horses so that they can choose a Pastoral Civ to 'play' towards the end of the Early Period (4500 - 3000 BCE). Because, of course, we have historical pastorals that can be made into Civs for the game: Scythians, Xiong-nu, Mongols, Lakotah, Comanche,, Huns, etc.

Basically, I want that Early Period to be much more full of Meaningful Decisions about when and where to settle down, and how you want to progress and even what to Research compared to the rally Bare Bones Neolithic that HK gave us.

 

[Zaarin]

I guess Egypt doesn't count?

While technically in Africa, usually when one says "Africa" without qualification they mean "Subsaharan Africa"--just like "Asia" without qualification usually implies East Asia. Plus culturally Egypt was more Near Eastern than African.

I mean I think this iteration is the best that they've done.

Which is kind of sad because Civ6 India is...not great.

Basically, I want that Early Period to be much more full of Meaningful Decisions about when and where to settle down, and how you want to progress and even what to Research compared to the rally Bare Bones Neolithic that HK gave us.

I do like your ideas (and I agree on being able to choose your tribe's name--on which note, kind of baffling that the ability to rename your civ went away in Civ6).

 

[Eddie Verdde]

I would like to have spherical maps in Civ7.