We Know There Will Be 39 Civs for the Founders Edition, And My Guess: Mainly About Non-linear Civ Choices

[untitledjuan]

Rome into Spain makes sense, though

Maya into Inca, Rome into Spain into France, Mongolia into Russia ... man, I don't care what people say, if this is how it's playing out, this game is going to be a real cluster.... in my view.

 

[TheGhostEnthusiast]

I'm not a base game Russia believer and Spain's probably going to have Mexico or some other Latin American civ to go to, so I'm not really worried there. Maya -> Inca is baffling, and, while I'm not generally too pressed about picking "historical paths," not even having that as an option for them is going to make me wary to pick them until the inevitable Aztec DLC.

 

[Xandinho]

The problem is that having only 10 civs per era will make things very narrow, without much flexibility in terms of choice. Another problem is that they chose unrelated civs to represent entire continents (Aksum, Songhai, and Buganda for Africa; Maya, Inca, and Mexico for "South America"). I think people would be more at ease if we had Ghana, Songhai, and Hausa for Africa, and had two different history paths for Latin America, one for Mesoamerica and one for South America. So until we get additional content that fixes many of these gaps, things in the base game are going to be pretty crazy.

 

[RedCourtJester]

The problem is that having only 10 civs per era will make things very narrow, without much flexibility in terms of choice. Another problem is that they chose unrelated civs to represent entire continents (Aksum, Songhai, and Buganda for Africa; Maya, Inca, and Mexico for "South America"). I think people would be more at ease if we had Ghana, Songhai, and Hausa for Africa, and had two different history paths for Latin America, one for Mesoamerica and one for South America. So until we get additional content that fixes many of these gaps, things in the base game are going to be pretty crazy.

Precisely what I've been thinking.

Half the expected staple 14 (Egermerichirusispandiazil) won't have leaders at launch with only 30 civs. AND the paths we do have won't be as satisfying as, what I've been saying, could easily have been "Wagadu -> Songhai -> Hausa" under Amina which people totally would have bought. Just do that ten times, and players would buy into it much more from either angle (freedom of choice versus historical consistency).

 

[Xandinho]

Precisely what I've been thinking.

Half the expected staple 14 (Egermerichirusispandiazil) won't have leaders at launch with only 30 civs. AND the paths we do have won't be as satisfying as, what I've been saying, could easily have been "Wagadu -> Songhai -> Hausa" under Amina which people totally would have bought. Just do that ten times, and players would buy into it much more from either angle (freedom of choice versus historical consistency).

Here’s how I would have done it:

• Western European path: Rome > England, HRE > America (from England), France (from HRE)
• Eastern European path: Greece > Byzantines (would also come from Rome) > Russia
• Middle Eastern path: Egypt, Assyria > Abbasids > Ottomans (would also come from Byzantines)
• Far East Asian path: Han > Ming > Qing, Meiji Japan
• South/Southeast Asian path: Maurya > Chola > Siam
• African path: Ghana > Songhai > Hausa
• North American/Mesoamerican path: Maya, Mississippian > Aztec, Shawnee > Mexico (crazy, but I still think Mexico is better to succeed the native Americans than America, until we have one)
• South American path: Tiwanaku > Inca > Aymara

I know some transitions are still crazy, but it's the best I can do with only 10 civs per era, while trying to fit all the staple civs in somehow and make everything make some sense (and this would unfortunately mean merging South and Southeast Asia into a single historical path, but again, having only 10 civs per era is quite limiting). The next 9 civs would be meant to fill in some gaps and make the transitions less chaotic.

 

[TheSpaceCowboy]

Here's how I'd have handled ten civilizations per Age at launch:

1. Britons -> Anglo-Saxons -> English
2. Celts -> Spain -> Argentina
3. China -> feudal Japan -> South Korea
4. Egypt -> Ethiopia -> Boers
5. Gauls -> Franks -> France
6. Goths -> Holy Roman Empire -> Germany
7. Greece -> Byzantium -> Russia
8. Hebrews -> Outremer -> Israel
9. Mississippi -> Sioux -> America
10. Rome -> Papal States -> Italy

Pre-order bonus: Norse (Exploration Age)

 

[gdr_willter]

I told it again and again, my essential idea is there will not be a concept like "PATH". Routes will be structured with zigzag forks and junctions.

If you want to talk about civs guess with strict paths, I think there are more fitting threads than this.

 

[kaspergm]

1. Celts -> Spain -> Argentina
2. China -> feudal Japan -> South Korea
3. Mississippi -> Sioux -> America

Suggestions like these show exactly why the system they have implemented is doomed to fail, no matter how hard one tries to make it work, if one wants to have all the "major" staples included in the game.

I don't care if Rome > Spain or Spain > France makes sense from some marginal historical pov. From a cultural pov., I find these paths pretty immersion breaking and sometimes even offensive to the involved cultures, not to mention the absurdity of something like Maya > Inca which is just plain nonsensical. The same goes for suggested upgrades like China > Japan (sorry, but WTH?) or Sioux > America.

The way I see it, they simply tried to include too many mutually exclusive interests at the same time. They want to include the major historical civs and they want to cover geography as broadly as possible and they want to have a historical path for each civilization. That's simply trying to bend too many diverging branches against each other.

The only way I can see the system with three tiers working if they kill some of their darlings. They should probably have tried to select 8-10 major ANCIENT ERA civilizations and then focus on making meaningful evolution paths for them (without trying to force all kinds of other civs into those). That would be civs like:

• Rome
• Greece
• Egypt
• China
• India
• Japan
• Something meso-American (Olmec?)
• Something north-American
• Something south-American
• Something sub-Saharan
• Something Mesopotamian

These should have actual meaningful evolution lines, like Rome > Papal States > Italy, China dynasties, etc.

ADDITIONALLY they should select 5-10 emergent civs that come to the power in Exploration/Modern era and add these as alternative lines. That would include civs like:

• Spain
• France
• England
• Germany
• USA
• Mongols
• Russia
• Portugal
• Brazil
• Arabia

And then have these come into play as possible evolutions off the core ancient civs.

 

[TheSpaceCowboy]

I told it again and again, my essential idea is there will not be a concept like "PATH". Routes will be structured with zigzag forks and junctions.

If you want to talk about civs guess with strict paths, I think there are more fitting threads than this.

There will absolutely be alternative routes that the AI will resort to if the player selects what would have been the default choice for the AI civ.

However, I imagine that if you were to create a game with ten AI civs in the Antiquity Age, none of them would share the same default first choice for an Exploration Age civ. And each of those Exploration Age civs would likewise have a different default choice for the Modern Age.

 

[gdr_willter]

There will absolutely be alternative routes that the AI will resort to if the player selects what would have been the default choice for the AI civ.

It only means "AI do not follow in-game unlocks like horses for Mongolia, they will follow one of the historical routes ulocked by civ and leader".

We don't need any strict 1-2-3 path for it.

 

[uppi]

There will absolutely be alternative routes that the AI will resort to if the player selects what would have been the default choice for the AI civ.

However, I imagine that if you were to create a game with ten AI civs in the Antiquity Age, none of them would share the same default first choice for an Exploration Age civ. And each of those Exploration Age civs would likewise have a different default choice for the Modern Age.

We have not seen any indication of "backup" choices. Every indication points to leaders (not Civs!) having two preferences from which they will presumably choose at random when both are available.

So constructing a singular path for each civ is folly and the OP had the right idea with displaying it as a sort of web. We can speculate how many distinct paths there are for each leader, but I am guessing at least two.

 

[Siptah]

@kaspergm I‘d argue that Rome > Spain is not a marginal historical pov, but the best possible culturally. And for sure one that has a lot of sense to it, probably one of the best transitions from a cultural pov in the base game but also many suggestions (I mean Maurya > Chola? How is Rome > Spain not much better in a cultural pov). Of course, given enough ages, you could do Phoenicians/Celtiberians/El-Agar > Rome > Visigoths > Umayyads > Castile/Aragon > Spain to represent the culturally diverse and many-influenced country that Spain is today (and not just in regions with a non-castilian official language). But if you have to choose one of them, Rome and Visigoths seem the most fitting options to me - and tbf, I can‘t comprehend how someone could argue against that progression specifically.

More to the OP, I hope for a lot of civs that allow forking in a good way. Such as the Goths and Rome that can realistically have 5+ unlocks in the next age without too many DLCs necessary. Similarly, Mongols could be unlocked by many civs already. But I’m especially interested in civs that are „in between“ the common regions, the gameplay „crossroads of the world,“ civs that get you out/into China, MENA, India, Europe, SEA.

 

[Evolena]

We have not seen any indication of "backup" choices. Every indication points to leaders (not Civs!) having two preferences from which they will presumably choose at random when both are available.

So constructing a singular path for each civ is folly and the OP had the right idea with displaying it as a sort of web. We can speculate how many distinct paths there are for each leader, but I am guessing at least two.

We've seen Egypt unlocking Songhai and Abbasid, and Norman unlocking French Empire and a HIDDEN one.

 

[uppi]

We've seen Egypt unlocking Songhai and Abbasid, and Norman unlocking French Empire and a HIDDEN one.

Yes. My point is, that there is no indication that either of these has any preference over the other.

 

[TreVor_ish]

I wonder how many games will be abandoned, because player could not get the desired transition.
With 39 this still makes it only 13 players on the map, and that's months after initial release, which is still the smallest vanilla Civilization game.
Number of additional civs mods will explode. I just hope map size wont be a hindrance. (or graphical asset array size)

 

[gdr_willter]

I wonder how many games will be abandoned, because player could not get the desired transition.

I consider that the human player will be a first one to choose their next civ.

 

[TreVor_ish]

I consider that the human player will be a first one to choose their next civ.

Makes it fun in multiplayer.

 

[Uberfrog]

Makes it fun in multiplayer.

We don’t actually know that only one player can pick each civ per age.

There is nothing stopping you from playing the same civ in Civ 6’s multiplayer.

 

[Siptah]

From what I know about civ 7, my guess would be that the standard option for MP (and potentially also SP) is: leaders have to be unique, but civs can be duplicated.

 

[Zaarin]

From what I know about civ 7, my guess would be that the standard option for MP (and potentially also SP) is: leaders have to be unique, but civs can be duplicated.

Given how long it took to get a toggle to turn off duplicate leaders in Civ6, I wouldn't be surprised even duplicate leaders are permitted.