Technically this is a Part Two (if you've seen my Navajo post, also linked), but this will be Part 1 to that "part zero" until I can flesh out some additional details I have for a full complementary set of Native North American civilizations.
The reason why I am doing this is that I felt that there were some under-represented parts of the world (particularly in the modern age), so I wanted to make some designs to show both the flexibility of the current Ages system, as well as to bring attention to some good candidates for players and the dev team that they may not be considering (or may very well be, and in that case I am joining the chorus for their inclusion!). I know that through the lifecycle of the game we will get a greatly expanded set of civilizations, and while this game has managed to do something past Civ games did not (i.e. look at how focused Civ 7 is at the start on Asia as compared to Europe regarding the Civ selection, and I absolutely laud the choices and continued attempt to move away from a Western focus), it is still missing a lot of choices in certain regions. In particular, the areas I wanted to create a series on were Sub-Saharan Africa (how this project started), North America (particularly the Native Americans/First Nations), South America, and (oddly) the Middle East. While I know that the Middle East will get fleshed out quickly, I may produce a set for some civs I'd like to see there, but I certainly would like to see the often-ignored Central Asia finally get its due, so that will probably be the fourth post in my series. So that will be probably five sets of three civilizations each, but I may add more if I feel inspired.
So, what is the current state of African representation in game?
We have a total of five civilizations that can meet this standard in my eyes: in Antiquity we have Aksum, Carthage (DLC), and Egypt, which is a pretty fair selection for the first era. The problem becomes the Exploration and Modern ages each having one choice for Africa in total (Songhai and Buganda respectively), which simply feels like not enough for such a large continent. So, I set to work these past couple of weeks on-and-off developing some choices. This set managed to produce two rough lines, one on the western side of Africa, and one on the eastern, though I focused less on lineage and cultures/states/empires that I thought were interesting and new, precisely because a newer culture has a bit more room for free design space (and I like learning about new places). With that preface, I'll stop blabbering about my intent and get started.
The Antiquity Age - Wagadu (ancient Ghana)
Why this civ? Trying to find details on older African civilizations can be difficult due to a reliance on oral tradition over a lack of contemporary writing sources, but Wagadu was the first true regional power and Empire in Sub-Saharan Western Africa with the revolution of the Camel being introduced to the region allowing them to dominate trade. It also segues into the Songhai civilization geographically and helps the player roleplay that particular lineage a bit better. I opted for the traditional name Wagadu instead of the name "Ghana" because the "Ghana" is the ruler of the civilization and Wagadu is the proper name (it also opened up a bit more design space you will see below). Their theme is about expansion and trade networks, with a secondary Influence theme.
Design note: why Antiquity? The time period is imperfect, but a rough estimate of Wagadu's existence is from 100 CE to a bit past the 13th century CE. In Humankind, Wagadu/Ghana is Medieval, which is appropriate, but I didn't find Wagadu appropriate for the mechanics of the Exploration age in Civ 7. So, I decided to put them here analogous to how Khmer are in Antiquity, though I feel this is even more appropriate of a fudging of the timeline. It also gives us a nice West African lineage (well, two parts of it) to have something here. It could also nicely lead into Mali if that ever happens in Civ 7 (unlikely) or other West African cultures.
Disclaimer: None of my numbers are based on calculating anything RE: the current game state, they are intended merely to present the civ as a complete package and are not always used consistently.
Capital: Koumbi Saleh
Attributes: Economic, Expansionist (design note: I picked the latter trait due to the large empire/vassals it had, but toyed with Diplo and scrapped it in favor of making my Modern choice Economic/Diplo)
Ability: Kings of Gold - Trade routes to City States provide +1 Influence in Cities. Trade routes to other Civilizations provide +1 Resource Capacity in Cities.
Start Bias: Desert, Plains, Salt, Camels (design note: might be too many)
Unique Civics:
Salt Trade: Tier 1 - +1 Gold on Mines, increased to +2 Gold if it has a resource. Unlocks the Merchant’s Quarters unique building. Unlocks the Camel Caravans tradition, providing +5 Trade Route Range over land and +1 Resource Capacity in Settlements. Tier 2: Adds 100% Production or Gold towards producing Merchant units. Adds +1 Happiness on City and Bonus resource tiles in Settlements. Unlocks the Sahelian Trade Dominance tradition, adding +1 influence on all road connections, increased to +2 in Hub Towns.
Ownership of All Gold: Requires Salt Trade. Unlocks the Nyamakala unique building. Adds gold for every filled resource slot in a Settlement. Adds 50 gold and 25 influence per age every time another player starts a trade route to your civilization. Unlocks the Gold Tax tradition adding +100% Gold yields from trade routes.
Kafu: Requires Salt Trade. Adds influence on the Capital for every resource slot filled. Adds extra gold, culture, and influence on the palace. Unlocks the El-Ghaba wonder. Unlocks the Vassal Kings tradition, giving +50% Influence towards actions started on City States you are suzerain of.
Unique Units:
Horon: (Tier 2 Cavalry replacement) - Bonus Combat Strength fighting on Desert or Plains tiles. Adjacent enemy Cavalry units suffer a Combat Strength penalty. (Design note: the name of the unit is taken from the Mande/Soninke language word for Freeman, of which West African militaries were made up of, and the unit is a Camel Warrior and reference to the impact of camelry; I would love a better word).
Ghana (Great Person) Can only be built in the Capital once it has reached a set Population, and the specific Ghana received is random. List of Ghana units:
Unique Infrastructure:
Suguba: Wagadu quarter created by putting the Nyamakala and Merchant's Quarters in the same tile. Adds Gold and Culture for every filled Resource slot in the city. (design note: yes, I am stealing this word/district name based on language and needing a word for this):
Nyamakala: Adds Gold. Adds production for each adjacent quarter and resource. (Design note: this is a type of community of craftspeople, trying to find lots of terms was difficult for me; I also added the production bonus as a reference to the craftspeople doing their hard labor and to vary up the Civ a tiny bit).
Merchant's Quarters: Adds Gold. Adds Influence for each adjacent quarter and wonder. (Design note: again, terms are hard, and "Foreign Merchant's Quarters" was even longer).
(Design note: This was a tough one to do, but I didn't want to do an improvement since Songhai already has a trade improvement. Originally El-Ghaba was the Quarter, but instead I based this off of the other half of Koumbi Saleh being a "large business district". The Nyamakala came about entirely by accident, but I was glad to find something in all of my reading that I could use, and I liken using this term to how Ulema is the district for the Abbasids).
Associated wonder:
El-Ghaba: Receives all of the yields of the Palace. Adds a large amount of gold, and a small amount of influence on the palace per turn (and therefore, itself) and adds 100 influence when built.
Other Antiquity African civs I toyed with: the Urewe culture in the Great Lakes region (the Kitara Empire is too legendary I decided), Nubia (because they're cool, and I also toyed with an Exploration age Nilotic civilization), and the Bantu (which would be a very broad blob, but would fit with lots of Central and Southern African cultures for lineage purposes).
The reason why I am doing this is that I felt that there were some under-represented parts of the world (particularly in the modern age), so I wanted to make some designs to show both the flexibility of the current Ages system, as well as to bring attention to some good candidates for players and the dev team that they may not be considering (or may very well be, and in that case I am joining the chorus for their inclusion!). I know that through the lifecycle of the game we will get a greatly expanded set of civilizations, and while this game has managed to do something past Civ games did not (i.e. look at how focused Civ 7 is at the start on Asia as compared to Europe regarding the Civ selection, and I absolutely laud the choices and continued attempt to move away from a Western focus), it is still missing a lot of choices in certain regions. In particular, the areas I wanted to create a series on were Sub-Saharan Africa (how this project started), North America (particularly the Native Americans/First Nations), South America, and (oddly) the Middle East. While I know that the Middle East will get fleshed out quickly, I may produce a set for some civs I'd like to see there, but I certainly would like to see the often-ignored Central Asia finally get its due, so that will probably be the fourth post in my series. So that will be probably five sets of three civilizations each, but I may add more if I feel inspired.
So, what is the current state of African representation in game?
We have a total of five civilizations that can meet this standard in my eyes: in Antiquity we have Aksum, Carthage (DLC), and Egypt, which is a pretty fair selection for the first era. The problem becomes the Exploration and Modern ages each having one choice for Africa in total (Songhai and Buganda respectively), which simply feels like not enough for such a large continent. So, I set to work these past couple of weeks on-and-off developing some choices. This set managed to produce two rough lines, one on the western side of Africa, and one on the eastern, though I focused less on lineage and cultures/states/empires that I thought were interesting and new, precisely because a newer culture has a bit more room for free design space (and I like learning about new places). With that preface, I'll stop blabbering about my intent and get started.
The Antiquity Age - Wagadu (ancient Ghana)
Why this civ? Trying to find details on older African civilizations can be difficult due to a reliance on oral tradition over a lack of contemporary writing sources, but Wagadu was the first true regional power and Empire in Sub-Saharan Western Africa with the revolution of the Camel being introduced to the region allowing them to dominate trade. It also segues into the Songhai civilization geographically and helps the player roleplay that particular lineage a bit better. I opted for the traditional name Wagadu instead of the name "Ghana" because the "Ghana" is the ruler of the civilization and Wagadu is the proper name (it also opened up a bit more design space you will see below). Their theme is about expansion and trade networks, with a secondary Influence theme.
Design note: why Antiquity? The time period is imperfect, but a rough estimate of Wagadu's existence is from 100 CE to a bit past the 13th century CE. In Humankind, Wagadu/Ghana is Medieval, which is appropriate, but I didn't find Wagadu appropriate for the mechanics of the Exploration age in Civ 7. So, I decided to put them here analogous to how Khmer are in Antiquity, though I feel this is even more appropriate of a fudging of the timeline. It also gives us a nice West African lineage (well, two parts of it) to have something here. It could also nicely lead into Mali if that ever happens in Civ 7 (unlikely) or other West African cultures.
Disclaimer: None of my numbers are based on calculating anything RE: the current game state, they are intended merely to present the civ as a complete package and are not always used consistently.
Capital: Koumbi Saleh
Attributes: Economic, Expansionist (design note: I picked the latter trait due to the large empire/vassals it had, but toyed with Diplo and scrapped it in favor of making my Modern choice Economic/Diplo)
Ability: Kings of Gold - Trade routes to City States provide +1 Influence in Cities. Trade routes to other Civilizations provide +1 Resource Capacity in Cities.
Start Bias: Desert, Plains, Salt, Camels (design note: might be too many)
Unique Civics:
Salt Trade: Tier 1 - +1 Gold on Mines, increased to +2 Gold if it has a resource. Unlocks the Merchant’s Quarters unique building. Unlocks the Camel Caravans tradition, providing +5 Trade Route Range over land and +1 Resource Capacity in Settlements. Tier 2: Adds 100% Production or Gold towards producing Merchant units. Adds +1 Happiness on City and Bonus resource tiles in Settlements. Unlocks the Sahelian Trade Dominance tradition, adding +1 influence on all road connections, increased to +2 in Hub Towns.
Ownership of All Gold: Requires Salt Trade. Unlocks the Nyamakala unique building. Adds gold for every filled resource slot in a Settlement. Adds 50 gold and 25 influence per age every time another player starts a trade route to your civilization. Unlocks the Gold Tax tradition adding +100% Gold yields from trade routes.
Kafu: Requires Salt Trade. Adds influence on the Capital for every resource slot filled. Adds extra gold, culture, and influence on the palace. Unlocks the El-Ghaba wonder. Unlocks the Vassal Kings tradition, giving +50% Influence towards actions started on City States you are suzerain of.
Unique Units:
Horon: (Tier 2 Cavalry replacement) - Bonus Combat Strength fighting on Desert or Plains tiles. Adjacent enemy Cavalry units suffer a Combat Strength penalty. (Design note: the name of the unit is taken from the Mande/Soninke language word for Freeman, of which West African militaries were made up of, and the unit is a Camel Warrior and reference to the impact of camelry; I would love a better word).
Ghana (Great Person) Can only be built in the Capital once it has reached a set Population, and the specific Ghana received is random. List of Ghana units:
- Kaya Magan Cisse: Activated on the Palace to add Gold to the Building.
- Bassi: Activated on an altar to begin a Celebration.
- Tunka Manin: Activated on a Gold building to receive a large amount of Gold.
- Dyabe Cisse: Activated on an Independent People's tile to immediately make it into your Suzerain City State and starts a trade route to your Capital, if able.
- Soumaba Cisse: Activated on an Independent People's tile to immediately make it into your Suzerain City State and start a Celebration.
- Diara Kante: Activated on the Palace to begin a celebration.
- Kambine Diaresso: Activated on a Gold building to add Happiness to the settlement.
- Bannu Bubu: Activated on the Palace to add Happiness to the building.
- Magan Wagadou: Activated on an Altar to receive a large amount of Gold.
- Birana: Activated on an Independent People's tile to immediately make it into your Suzerain City State and add a large amount of Influence.
Unique Infrastructure:
Suguba: Wagadu quarter created by putting the Nyamakala and Merchant's Quarters in the same tile. Adds Gold and Culture for every filled Resource slot in the city. (design note: yes, I am stealing this word/district name based on language and needing a word for this):
Nyamakala: Adds Gold. Adds production for each adjacent quarter and resource. (Design note: this is a type of community of craftspeople, trying to find lots of terms was difficult for me; I also added the production bonus as a reference to the craftspeople doing their hard labor and to vary up the Civ a tiny bit).
Merchant's Quarters: Adds Gold. Adds Influence for each adjacent quarter and wonder. (Design note: again, terms are hard, and "Foreign Merchant's Quarters" was even longer).
(Design note: This was a tough one to do, but I didn't want to do an improvement since Songhai already has a trade improvement. Originally El-Ghaba was the Quarter, but instead I based this off of the other half of Koumbi Saleh being a "large business district". The Nyamakala came about entirely by accident, but I was glad to find something in all of my reading that I could use, and I liken using this term to how Ulema is the district for the Abbasids).
Associated wonder:
El-Ghaba: Receives all of the yields of the Palace. Adds a large amount of gold, and a small amount of influence on the palace per turn (and therefore, itself) and adds 100 influence when built.
Other Antiquity African civs I toyed with: the Urewe culture in the Great Lakes region (the Kitara Empire is too legendary I decided), Nubia (because they're cool, and I also toyed with an Exploration age Nilotic civilization), and the Bantu (which would be a very broad blob, but would fit with lots of Central and Southern African cultures for lineage purposes).
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