What do you think of the Leaders?

[Boris Gudenuf]

Interesting to know! I'm mostly familiar with North American pigments, which were largely mineral-based (red from ochre or galena; yellow from ochre; black from soot; white from chalk, calcium carbonate, or clay; occasionally blue or blue-green from copper oxides), usually with bear grease as a mordent/medium.

Ironically, I'm most familiar with European Medieval and post-Medieval 'natural' pigments and dyes because of my research into Uniform colors in 17th - 18th century armies, which I painted in miniature for over 10 years. I found out about the Mesoamerican purples entirely by accident because the logwood 'purple' was tried in Europe as a substitute to Medieval purple dyes and pigments, which were mixtures of various natural vegetation like raspberries and blueberries. Unfortunately, it turned out that all of them were just as tremporary: one light rainfall or an hour in the sun and they all became various shades of red, gray, or black!

 

[Jeppetto]

We've discussed default personas in another thread and specifically in relation to Napoleon and given that he would fit nicely as base game leader but technically isnt one as he's bonus content, I had insane thought about there actually being default non-revealed Napoleon for base game and both revealed personas being additional personas. Napoleon the Corsican, I dunno

 

[Zaarin]

We've discussed default personas in another thread and specifically in relation to Napoleon and given that he would fit nicely as base game leader but technically isnt one as he's bonus content, I had insane thought about there actually being default non-revealed Napoleon for base game and both revealed personas being additional personas. Napoleon the Corsican, I dunno

Baal of Heaven, if two Napoleons is four too many, then three Napoleons is nine too many. Wait...three Napoleons...I'll trade in all three for Napoleon III.

 

[Jeppetto]

50 shades of Napoleon I want a mod that changes every leader's face to Napoleon... Wait scratch that we wait with that for Alexander the Great, that one gonna release with three personas

 

[TheGhostEnthusiast]

Wait scratch that we wait with that for Alexander the Great, that one gonna release with three personas

Alexander will have 4 personas, two each in a series of two DLC packs: The first will contain Antiquity Macedon, Antiquity Sparta, Exploration Byzantium, and Modern Hellenes (along with Alexander, Short Life of Glory and Alexander of Alexandria) and the second will contain Antiquity Minoans, Antiquity Troy, Exploration Nicaea, and Modern North Macedonia (along with Alexander, Long Afterlife of Glory and Alexander, But Actually Just Diogenes Wearing His Clothes)

 

[gdr_willter]

I'm completely okay with the historically inaccurate colors of the leaders' outfits. Because their colors are not only the reflections of the leaders themselves, but also the visual signs of the faction they lead. If we strictly try to pick the historical palettes, we'll get the 25+ leaders and personas with only red, blue, black, and white except a single purple for Augustus.

 

[Zaarin]

except a single purple for Augustus.

sad whoever leads Phoenicia and Byzantium noises

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

I'm completely okay with the historically inaccurate colors of the leaders' outfits. Because their colors are not only the reflections of the leaders themselves, but also the visual signs of the faction they lead. If we strictly try to pick the historical palettes, we'll get the 25+ leaders and personas with only red, blue, black, and white except a single purple for Augustus.

This isn't that much of a limitation. When I was busily painting up 18th century military miniatures, I stopped long enough to count my acrylic paints and discovered that I had 16 different shades of red, ranging from dark red-brown to bright crimson, and 22 shades of blue ranging from dull blue-gray to bright light, medium, or dark blue to turquoise. Aside from white and gray, red and blue were by far the most common colors for 'elite' regiments' coats and everybody's cuffs, vests, and coat linings ("distinctives' in the language of the time).

 

[gdr_willter]

This isn't that much of a limitation. When I was busily painting up 18th century military miniatures, I stopped long enough to count my acrylic paints and discovered that I had 16 different shades of red, ranging from dark red-brown to bright crimson, and 22 shades of blue ranging from dull blue-gray to bright light, medium, or dark blue to turquoise. Aside from white and gray, red and blue were by far the most common colors for 'elite' regiments' coats and everybody's cuffs, vests, and coat linings ("distinctives' in the language of the time).

No, no, I'm the one who felt the hard problem to find differences between a lot of reds in Civ series. And I'm not even a CVD, then how much harder for them?

Civ franchise is the video game, not a miniature game. Those colors have to be more distinguishable for everyone on every device. Giving up to use various colors like purple or green and deciding to use a lot of various reds and blues... is historically accurate of course, but also a bad game design decision.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

No, no, I'm the one who felt the hard problem to find differences between a lot of reds in Civ series. And I'm not even a CVD, then how much harder for them?

Civ franchise is the video game, not a miniature game. Those colors have to be more distinguishable for everyone on every device. Giving up to use various colors like purple and green is historically accurate of course, but also a bad game design decision.

Limitations are what you make of them. Believe me, on 15mm figures distinctions of coat colors get very important to keep from getting confused - especially in the early 18th century when, for instance, the Dutch and French armies both had troops wearing coats colored red, blue, white and gray and they were the primciple opponents for most of the wars of the early 18th century!

That, in fact, is how I ended up with so many different shades of red and blue: looking for distinctions among them.

Purple is perfectly useable, as long as you dont't use 'true' purple until after 1860. Purple was used to describe mixtures of blue and red that we would call Maroon or Dull Red, and the fact that most of them would wash right out of the fabric in a light rain we can ignore in the game. Similarly, green was used by a few armies in Europe, but they quickly made it a very dark green, because all the green pigments would fade and 'gray out' in sunlight - none were 'light fast' and in modern museums in France and Russia they are kept behind glass cases in rooms with no access to direct sunlight at all.

And among the most common fabric dyes before modern chemical pigments, 'Red' can be anything from a dull brick red to a bright crimson, but the latter is for Royalty (or at least, Army Commanders) and other 'special' types. Blue can be blue-gray, dark blue, medium blue, light blue, and even shades of blue-green depending on which of several different vegetable dyes or combinations are being used. One advantage of Indigo (native to India, introduced to Europe in the mid-17th century, so Exploration Age) is that the fabric gets darker the more times you dip it in a vat of Indigo dye, so that everything from a very light, 'sky' blue to a very dark 'royal' blue can be obtained from the same plant and dye.

By my count, just among red, blue and mixtures of the two that gives us a minimum of 8 distinct colors without even considering less-common shades like orange and yellow, which were possible but, like green, transient in 'real life' but useable in-game without completely divorcing the graphic from any reality.

 

[gdr_willter]

Limitations are what you make of them. Believe me, on 15mm figures distinctions of coat colors get very important to keep from getting confused - especially in the early 18th century when, for instance, the Dutch and French armies both had troops wearing coats colored red, blue, white and gray and they were the primciple opponents for most of the wars of the early 18th century!

That, in fact, is how I ended up with so many different shades of red and blue: looking for distinctions among them.

Purple is perfectly useable, as long as you dont't use 'true' purple until after 1860. Purple was used to describe mixtures of blue and red that we would call Maroon or Dull Red, and the fact that most of them would wash right out of the fabric in a light rain we can ignore in the game. Similarly, green was used by a few armies in Europe, but they quickly made it a very dark green, because all the green pigments would fade and 'gray out' in sunlight - none were 'light fast' and in modern museums in France and Russia they are kept behind glass cases in rooms with no access to direct sunlight at all.

And among the most common fabric dyes before modern chemical pigments, 'Red' can be anything from a dull brick red to a bright crimson, but the latter is for Royalty (or at least, Army Commanders) and other 'special' types. Blue can be blue-gray, dark blue, medium blue, light blue, and even shades of blue-green depending on which of several different vegetable dyes or combinations are being used. One advantage of Indigo (native to India, introduced to Europe in the mid-17th century, so Exploration Age) is that the fabric gets darker the more times you dip it in a vat of Indigo dye, so that everything from a very light, 'sky' blue to a very dark 'royal' blue can be obtained from the same plant and dye.

By my count, just among red, blue and mixtures of the two that gives us a minimum of 8 distinct colors without even considering less-common shades like orange and yellow, which were possible but, like green, transient in 'real life' but useable in-game without completely divorcing the graphic from any reality.

No. You have to believe me in this problem. I also have quite a long experience on the visual design for digital media, and the minor differences in same color ONLY work when you need them as the combination for a single entity. Not as the distinguishable two entities. Of course you can break the rule for a purpose, but then you'll lose the function we really need.

 

[j51]

No. You have to believe me in this problem. I also have quite a long experience on the visual design for digital media, and the minor differences in same color ONLY work when you need them as the combination for a single entity. Not as the distinguishable two entities. Of course you can break the rule for a purpose, but then you'll lose the function we really need.

In terms of User Design for screens this is correct.

Luckily uniform color doesn’t have to match the color of the badges. So certain civs can have specific uniform colors for the 18th-19th century while their faction color will be whatever the leader has associated with them.

 

[j51]

Civ 6 used way too many blues and reds before the “jersey system” btw

 

[AriochIV]

The Leader Attribute bonuses seem rather tepid: +1 this and +10% that. I suppose they might add up if you can accumulate a lot of them, but judging by the Exploration stream it doesn't seem like you can get very many.

 

[gdr_willter]

In terms of User Design for screens this is correct.

Luckily uniform color doesn’t have to match the color of the badges. So certain civs can have specific uniform colors for the 18th-19th century while their faction color will be whatever the leader has associated with them.

Sure, but I think we have seen it before that FXS decided to paint the unit uniforms with the leader's color set. However, the red/blue uniforms of the line infantry IRL are very noticeable, so I also hope they use those famous style and add some decorations with the leader color.

Anyway my main point is the leader color itself, not the unit outfits, so I'm still very sure about that we need the leaders who are wearing the historically wrong colors for the design purpose.

 

[Baudshaw]

Thanks. Taking all that into account, could this look like a plausible roster for the remaining leader reveals:

Confirmed:
Amina [Songhai]
Benjamin Franklin [America]
Himiko [Meiji Japan]
Napoleon (two personas) [France]

Speculated based on ESRB:
Catherine the Great [Russia]
Frederick the Great [Prussia]

Additional:
Polynesian leader (Lili'uokalani or Kamehameha) [Hawaii]
Victoria [Britain]
1x new, curveball leader along the lines of Machiavelli. Possibly a Mexican leader [I posted a separate thread on Frida Kahlo as a potential curveball], or a cultural leader not linked to any of the launch civs.
1x series favourite, revealed as a standalone or alongside a civ with a tenuous connection: Genghis Khan (alongside Qing?), Gandhi (alongside Mughals?) or Shaka (alongside Buganda?).

Personally I think that Frederick the Great might not be in at launch, because I think Prussia/Germany is going to be in Right to Rule DLC. I have a feeling that that the ESRB leak might have been based on both the game at launch and the already announced DLC. I could be completely mistaken.

Gandhi would be stupid, in my opinion. I think the last one will be a massive wildcard, similar to Tomyris

 

[Lord Lakely]

Charlemagne - S
I'm just going to give him a Totally Not Biased s-tier rank, and refrain from further comment.

 

[Voidwalkin]

Baal of Heaven, if two Napoleons is four too many, then three Napoleons is nine too many. Wait...three Napoleons...I'll trade in all three for Napoleon III.

Why do you hate Napoleon?

He's perfect for civ. No matter the installment, conquer a continent and dominate in all categories is the most common strategy. He's representative, baby.

 

[Zaarin]

Why do you hate Napoleon?

He's probably the most appallingly boring person in history, and he's a poor avatar for France.

 

[stealth_nsk]

He's probably the most appallingly boring person in history, and he's a poor avatar for France.

Well, with Charles de Gaulle being too recent, I'd say Napoleon is a very good representation of modern age France, swinging between monarchy and republic through revolutions and wars.