The Civ V Expansion Wishlist v2.0

[dagriggstar]

On spain - I think they should represent when they were at their "highest" point in their history. It's pretty hard to argue that medieval Spain was more influential/important than colonial Spain...

Malinese
Special ability -Golden caravansarai. Every gold, silver, copper and salt resource tile generates an aditional gold and culture point for the city that works them.

Nitpick - Caravansarai's were buildings built along the silk road...Last time I checked Mali wasn't in central asia

 

[Caeserportugal]

Where is Portugal?

Come on you are forgetting the nation that started the Descobertas

Leader: Afonso Henriques (Was the first King of Portugal. Obtained independence from Leon and Castille. Managed to beat Five Muslim Kings in Just 1 battle.)

UU1 : I Know r_rolo doesn´t like this but I can't see a better UU The Nau replacing the Caravel. Has +2 movement and +3 extra LOS

UB : Casa da India: +2 extra gold from trade routes from all intercontinental Cities.

 

[Calouste]

Siglo de Oro alternative version: Units gain a +25% combat bonus during golden ages, each 5 turns of golden age your civilization generates a great artist. That way:
1- You have a civ which relies heavily in golden eras without following the Persian model, adding variety and flavour
2- Spain has still to favours the piety social policies, which help to create golden eras
3- Its decadence / golden periods gets more crucial since they also affects their military outcomes.
4- It reflects Spain's literary output very well and encourage the players to prolongate the lenght of their golden eras rather than their number... say, mandate of heaven over reformation, not to mention that it makes Spain + Louvre / Hermitage a really poweful combo

Sorry to bring this to you, but for the rest of the world Spain's literary output == Don Quichote.

 

[Louis XXIV]

On spain - I think they should represent when they were at their "highest" point in their history. It's pretty hard to argue that medieval Spain was more influential/important than colonial Spain...

Well, some Civs represent their high point (Rome, Egypt, Persia). Other represent quite a bit of their history (Germany for example, also England). It depends on many factors, often relating both to game balance and audience recognition.

Nitpick - Caravansarai's were buildings built along the silk road...Last time I checked Mali wasn't in central asia

Would the word "Caravan" be different? I obviously connect caravans with camels and the sahara as much as I would the silk road. The Sahara trade was clearly a crucial part of the Mali's power.

 

[cybrxkhan]

Would the word "Caravan" be different? I obviously connect caravans with camels and the sahara as much as I would the silk road. The Sahara trade was clearly a crucial part of the Mali's power.

Yeah. Caravan and Caravanserai are two different things. A Caravanserai was a kind of inn-like place (I think) where merchants could stop by along the Silk Road, so most of them were in Persia or Central Asia.

 

[Xen]

I have a very hard time thinking that it would be anything other then a game of semantics - because as harsh as central Asia is, there little doubt that the Sahara is just as if not more harsh, and that the need (and the existence) of rest stops such as the Caravanserai were in existence there as well, even if only in form and function, but not in the specific name.

 

[Ikael]

have to say I like what you've done here! I prefer Siglo de Oro as a special power and I think your idea for it is better than mine. Though I don't see a way to extend golden ages in the piety tree... do we know anything about the length of golden ages beyond the fact that Reformation grants you an instant 6-year golden age? I may feel the same way about your statistics for the unique units as well.

Yay! Glad that you liked my Siglo de Oro Version! thing is, we know little about how golden eras works exactly, but for what I know, they tend to last less the more you use them. A good way to compensate it could be that any time you enter into an era you gain a great artist?

However don't you think a knight that does not require horses might be a little too powerful? maybe the conquistador should have some other ability? Maybe something like the ability to embark to an overseas transport before the technology that enables it globally does. Thus making it ideal for overseas expeditionary forces, and potentially able to conquer city states. Though the embarking ability wouldn't be useful on all maps.

Thing is, the conquistadores were way more about being able to fight with little or no support from the metropoli rather than being elite units per se, for example, the Peru conquest was made with just 180 men, 27 horses and 1 cannon. I don't think that it is too much overpowered since a) it is a UU that recieves no combat bonus or whatsoever b) you still need iron in order to build them.

About the Tercio, thing is, they were way more than a formation (its formation was the "Spanish square"), they were a distinct military elite force that combined both pikes and arquebus, thus being a little hard to decide which unit it should replace: it was used extensively during city siegues since it defended cannons from both calvary (pikes) and infantry (arquebus). Another alternative version of the Tercios could be the following one:

Tercio - Replaces Pikemen. It has a +75% bonus fighting against infantry units, thus being an ideal unit to pity against city garrisoned units and providing cover for artillery.

Sorry to bring this to you, but for the rest of the world Spain's literary output == Don Quichote.

That's a reductionist as to say that England's literary output = Shakespeare

Nitpick - Caravansarai's were buildings built along the silk road...Last time I checked Mali wasn't in central asia

I must admit that I was being lazy when it came to Mali's SA's name. Thing is, these 3 resources (salt, copper, gold and silver) were rigurously controlled by the state in order to avoid inflaction since it was their main export.

 

[Calouste]

That's a reductionist as to say that England's literary output = Shakespeare

It's the only Spanish book that is really famous.

 

[Louis XXIV]

I feel that English humanists add Moore's Utopia to internationally known English works. I can't say if Chaucer or Milton are necessarily well-known inside Spain, but I can at least say that one (which is more than I can say for Spain). That being said, I'd argue neither side can lay claim to the most influential writers (or artists in general, we're talking about Great Artists). I'd argue France or Italy (mostly Florence, actually) would win there.

BTW, can anyone help me think of a non-naval UU for Venice? I realize many people might not immediately think Venice should be in the game or would think that their navy is their only respectable contribution to warfare (which isn't terribly far from the truth). I'm trying to reconcile all the UU contributions and am coming up with way too many bottlenecks. Plus, it seems against Firaxis' design philosophy to focus strongly on one area at the neglect of all others (there's a cool idea for a reevaluated Portugal with Fuzieleros as their UU).

I'm also trying to think of a UA for Korea.

Here's what I have for them so far:

Spoiler Korea :

Korea
Leader: Sejong the Great
As I understand it, he accomplished more than Wang Kon. Wang just founded a dynasty.

Unique Unit:
Hwach'a - replaces cannon, ranged attack of 20, but can fire twice. Requires no iron.
I hate to repeat China, but I'm at a loss for any other way to represent it considering that a Cannon is already at 26 and Artillery is only 32 (an increase similar to the one the ballista had would just make it absurdly powerful).

Turtle - replaced Caravel, strength 20, ranged attack 7, speed 6
Turtles were shielded against cannonfire (I'm hoping the mechanics would work to reduce the effect of enemy bombarding ships) and often employed a tactic of ramming a ship before releasing their broadside. The idea is to encourage direct combat between vessels instead of relying on bombardment.

Unique Ability: I have nothing. Something to represent the influence of Confuscianism? Something to represent the modern economic strength of Korea? If someone has an idea, let me know.

 

[Niptium]

For the Dutch, the leader shouldn't be Whilelmina but Johan de Witt.

 

[Lyoncet]

England only produced Shakespeare, Spain only produced Cervantes, and France only produced Hugo (who nobody would know about if it weren't for Boublil, Schonberg, and Disney). Oh and some other guy from some other place in Europe wrote Beowulf too in some language that nobody understands. Well that pretty much wraps up European literature!



(As an afterthought, I'm probably really going to regret having posted this in about 2 hours, but I just couldn't pass up a chance to say "Boublil, Schonberg, and Disney." Come on!)

 

[Louis XXIV]

Italians have Dante (even if Petrarch and Boccaccio don't stick in people's minds as much, Dante is kickass. He even has a video game based on his work ).

Niptium, very cool figure. Didn't really know of him before. He strikes me as a leader of the Dutch in a similar way as Pericles was leader of Athens.

 

[dagriggstar]

On the Malinese (expanded)

Agree they were probably called something else. Since its a UA you can call it almost anything that is related to the Malinese (Golden pilgrimage for example). You might also note that I picked up on it since I suggested using the Caravanserai as a UB for the Uzbeks earlier in this topic

 

[Ikael]

Introducing: Trade routes

It always baffled me how trade routes were represented on Civilization games. They were crucial to the development of cities, their strategic placement of trade routes being always way more important that which special resource was around them. The introduction of a proper, deep trade route system will allow to:

1- Add another option for axphisiating and subjugating a civilization other than open war
2- Add historical realism
3- Make sea relevant again
4- Make trading cities a viable strategy
5- Add flavour to diplomacy, with acess to sea and the opening of trade routes being major causes of diplomacy and war, not because of an artificial parameter but rather due to

Stablishing trade routes:

Trade routes are stablished ona similar fashion to roads in Civ Rev: enter in one city, then choose to which foreign city do you want to stablish the trade route. A line will appear on the map, representing said trade route between two cities. Looks easy, but there are some limitations:

LIMITATIONS:

- Cost: In order to stablish trade routes, you will need to spend culture points, a way to represent the entrepenurial spirit of your civ. Also, it will force you to choose between your society having an inward vs outward focus. That being said, if the mechanic is introduced there will probably be a need to calibrate (and probably augment) the quantity of culture that cities provide.

- Manteinance: In the ancient era, one city can only support one single trade route. Economic buildings like marketplaces, banks and stock exchanges and certain social policies will help to amplify the number of possible trade routes per city. Still, the number is limited in order to avoid imbalance (trade route benefits can be HUGE), so choose your trading partners wisely... and break the economic ties whenever a better opportunity arrives... or mantain them in order to prevent war with certain civs.

- Defense: Yup, trade routes can be pillaged and intercepted. Pillaging sea routes tends to yield more gold than land ones, so be careful of pirates!

TRADE ROUTE MECHANICS:

- Radious of trade routes: simply put, trade routes have an initial radious of 4 hexes, meaning that you WILL need roads between cities in order to stablish them, or resort to river / sea communication. Think of trade route radious as the distance that a unit that have a maximum of 4 moves. Said imaginary unit would have to be able to travel in these 4 movements from your city to the desired trading partner, thus . Also the cost of stablishing a trade route gets determined not exactly by the distance per se, but rather by how fast you would arrive from city A to B, meaning the infrastructure and buildings that boost trade route radious like Harbours or airports will be of extreme importance if you want to have something that resembles an economy.

- Intermediaries: Since trade routes are initially very limit in radious, lots of them will have to restort to intermediaries: Say you want to stablish a trade route from city A to city B, but they are too far appart. You can make its traderoute a stop on city C between the two, even if it is not the final destination. The trick? If that city belongs to another empire said city will "suck" an amount of the gold, science, food and production that this traderoute will provide, since it is an intermediary. Which will in turn make commercial wars something way, way more common: tired of pesky Arabs being between the silk route from Europe to China? Let's wage war agains them!

BONUSES:

- Sea routes: Also trade routes would have a very crucial fuction: to make sea stop sucking. Sea trade routes have unlimited radious unlike land ones, as long as it connect two maritime cities, with the only limitation of transatlantic trade (you will need a harbour in order to stablish transoceanic trade routes) with other cities.

- One - sided benefits of trade routes. Its main benefit is the gold that they generate, shared equally between the two trading cities, the biggest the cities and the more far away they are, the biggest will be the gold that the traderoute yields. Thing is, there are special bonuses that only benefit one of the two trading cities (or the intermediary city in the case that there's one). That could very well mean that you can axphisiate a civilization by monopolizing its trade routes, or by simply having the "bigger end" of the stick. The one sided benefit of trade routes are:

- Science: The city with the highest culture yield will recieve a science bonus, in order to represent the influx of the brightest minds (hint:
- Food: The city with the highest happiness will recieve a food bonus in order to reflect the inmigration processes
- Production: The city with the highest specialist population will recieve a production bonus in order to reflect the importance of trade routes for the different industries (hint: use liberty social policies in order to get the best from trade routes!)

 

[Xen]

RE: Venice-
They should have an infantryman who has ranged bombardment- all the city troops/homeguards of the major Italian city-states multi rolled between heavy infantry and crossbowmen (such as the infamous Genoese) but Venice was regarded as having the most professional and motivated army amongst the Italian city states because by and large, the other major cities that comprised the venetian possessions in mainland Italy felt as a part of the state - not subject territories - and unlike many situations in Italy, would willingly fight to remain a part of Venice.

Added to this was its corps of Marines, and enforced training in the crossbow - and one can see how and why Venice was the major native power of Italy.

 

[Niptium]

Italians have Dante (even if Petrarch and Boccaccio don't stick in people's minds as much, Dante is kickass. He even has a video game based on his work ).

Niptium, very cool figure. Didn't really know of him before. He strikes me as a leader of the Dutch in a similar way as Pericles was leader of Athens.

Yes. Johan de Witt can be labeled as Holland's Pericles. The thread starter should add him in the Dutch list. Whilelmina didn't do much as she didn't control much...

 

[Zhahz]

It always baffled me how trade routes were represented on Civilization games. They were crucial to the development of cities, their strategic placement of trade routes being always way more important that which special resource was around them.

Easy. Everything in civ is heavily abstracted and represents thousands of years of history. Micromanaging trade serves zero purpose since trade is but a small part of the extensive big picutre. If you're designing a game, you weigh which elements players will be most interested in, and apparently micromanaging trade is low on the list for Civ and high on the list for trade-oriented games like Anno, which are lighter on other elements Civ is heavy with.

Players often have some pet concept, leader, civ, whatever that they feel is underrepresented, improperly represented, or whatever in Civ but the bottom line is that the game is made for everyone, not just individual tastes, and they have to design and impliment something that works for 100's of thousands of players, not just certain individuals or small pockets of players.

 

[Louis XXIV]

Yes. Johan de Witt can be labeled as Holland's Pericles. The thread starter should add him in the Dutch list. Whilelmina didn't do much as she didn't control much...

Maybe because she's a female leader? I've never even heard of her (I would think William of Orange would win out over her). The list up top isn't entirely updated (which is forgivable, people can spam out ideas faster than someone can copy them).

RE: Venice-
They should have an infantryman who has ranged bombardment- all the city troops/homeguards of the major Italian city-states multi rolled between heavy infantry and crossbowmen (such as the infamous Genoese) but Venice was regarded as having the most professional and motivated army amongst the Italian city states because by and large, the other major cities that comprised the venetian possessions in mainland Italy felt as a part of the state - not subject territories - and unlike many situations in Italy, would willingly fight to remain a part of Venice.

Added to this was its corps of Marines, and enforced training in the crossbow - and one can see how and why Venice was the major native power of Italy.

Venice's accomplishments really were quite amazing. In some ways, their biggest weakness is that they didn't care enough about Italy. Florence and Milan could fight amongst themselves for the peninsula (and France and Germany would do so as well, along with Spain), but Venice had colonial possessions so they weren't overly ambitious to get more territory in Italy.

I was just having trouble thinking of an actual unit (that's why I picked Galleas earlier, which isn't a bad choice, just even more naval than necessary). Something either as a Longswordsman or Crossbow could work (I was considering ripping off Medieval Total War with Pavise Crossbowmen). I was also thinking of making the unit the Condotierri (Italian mercenary soldiers used by every state). Of course, they could be seen as the downfall of the City-state system, but I feel it was more just the constant warfare that was responsible for that.

EDIT: Another unit idea interesting me would be the Stradioti, which were light cavalry of Albanian and Greek origin that were mercenaries for Venice to fight the Ottomans. They definitely seem like something that stood out as Venetian. The only problem is, when facing off with Ottoman Sipahi's, I'm not sure they stand out.

 

[Ikael]

Easy. Everything in civ is heavily abstracted and represents thousands of years of history. Micromanaging trade serves zero purpose since trade is but a small part of the extensive big picutre. If you're designing a game, you weigh which elements players will be most interested in, and apparently micromanaging trade is low on the list for Civ and high on the list for trade-oriented games like Anno, which are lighter on other elements Civ is heavy with.

Players often have some pet concept, leader, civ, whatever that they feel is underrepresented, improperly represented, or whatever in Civ but the bottom line is that the game is made for everyone, not just individual tastes, and they have to design and impliment something that works for 100's of thousands of players, not just certain individuals or small pockets of players.

Thing is, this is a tread precisely about which of our pet peeves we would like to see included in a future expansion in the same way that spyonage or corporations were added to Civ IV.

Still, my game design philosophy pretty much mirror's your signature's. I do not seek to have an historic simulator, that's what Hearts of Iron or Europa Universalis is for. However, I like to see that the logic of the game mirror's the logic of history. A good example of that "abstracted logic" would be the penalty of global empire happiness due to the conquering new cities or overexpansion: while not realistic per se, it reflects very well the need for a period of "assimiliation" of anexed territories, even if things like guerrillas, or rebuilding of damaged infrastructure are not directly represented.

My problem with the traditional trade route system is precisely that it is not too much logic (connecting cities to capital? so the more cities you build in your own empire, the more trade routes you get), nor does it seem simplified.

 

[Louis XXIV]

It does well of reflecting the wealth of a capital in an empire. It's the all roads lead to Rome effect.

It doesn't do well to represent merchant trade abroad, though. They've tried a little bit through diplomacy, but it's a separate situation (official negotiations between Empires).