Introduction

Here's the section for Civilizations, dealing with all the data about how Tribes, Civilizations, Special Rulers and Special Bonuses and options for civilizations.
Thanks for reading,
-List Administrator DarkCloud

Summary

Basically, most of the discussion centered around civ-customizability, civil war nation-splitting and, minor civs.

There was a large debate on the merits of the inclusion of Israel as a major civilization with some people citing Israel's contributions to civilization and linking it with the ancient Judea of the past, and some people arguing that since Israel has not been around very long contiguously that it is different from Judea, and cannot stand as an empire of its own.

However trivial that debate seems, it did open discussion about what constitutes a Major Tribe (a Civilization). Some suggested that only "Imperial" empires could be considered Civilizations. Others suggested that a Civilization was only game worthy if it had "expanded and controlled an extended area of land and exerted its culture and influence upon disparate groups." Nowadays, of course, with today's faster communication and globalization, communications are affected faster and culture is spread over a more varied region, therefore this debate is close to becoming moot- however, personally, I support this definition of a Civilization.

Nevertheless, as you will read below and in the conclusion, there were several suggestion to the relative proliferations of civilizations, ranging from people's suggestions of a "Create-A-Civ" Machine, to Extensive Minor Tribes, to "Dynamic Civilizations" as well as tangentially related suggestions such as Civil-War Empire splitting.

Related Threads

{The List} Civilization traits, Nuclear Master
{The List}Civilizations, civilleader
{The List}Civilizations, DarkCloud
{The List}Civilizations Version II , DarkCloud
Barbarians become civilized? , Mojotronica
Civilization specific golden ages, Tripledoc
{The List} Nomads and Chiefdoms, Spiffor
Civ IV fit for minors, Fosse
Barbarians, Master Zen
Civil Wars, Metaliturtle

Index

1.0.0 Types of Civs
2.0.0 Rulers
3.0.0 Colonies
4.0.0 Immigration
5.0.0 Nations' Compositions
6.0.0 Proposed Civ Lists
7.0.0 Civ Traits
8.0.0 Civ Placement
9.0.0 Unique Units
10.0.0 Other
Conclusion

The Ideas

----
1.0.0 Types of Civs
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1.1.0 Barbarian Civs

*Barbarians, through capturing cities, could become civilizations themselves, over time. Thus we start with 8-10 civs on the map at the beginning and can end with 16 simultaneous civilizations.
-narmox

*Barbarians should be able to capture cities like they did in Civ II and start churning out their own units.
-Rasputin

*Barbarians should be able to trade
-Azazel

*Barbarians can be hired as mercenaries (Perhaps without a nationality [Like Privateers])
*Barbarians can rent/loan/sell units
*And if they are mercs there should be a chance (perhaps modified by your cultural strength and/or how much you paid for them (minimum, moderate, or high)or somethn) that they go independent or even turn against you since they are mercs after all (such as what german mercs did to the Romans occasionally)
-Kramerman

*If Barbarian civs don't generate Culture, then perhaps they could gain special Generals (Like Attila the Hun) or a "golden age" which will give them some culture. If they then conquer enough cities they can become a powerful military civ. Then again, if their golden age ends, or the leader dies this empire will likely fall apart.
-ixnay

*Instead of giving the Barbarians no culture, don't give them any Civ Attributes... Therefore they'd be weeded out through normal attrition after a short time
*And if that wasn't enough of a handicap and barbs started overrunning actual Civ's you could give them a slight production handicap.
-wrylachlan

*New civs (like nomadic barbarians with strong armies) should appear at times to destroy weak civs because not only the Mongols, but a great variety of civs came out of nowhere. Those civs could be allowed to receive techs when conquering cities, so they can soon cope with their foes and not continue to live in the Stone Age...
-Wernazuma III

*I think that Barbarian 'civs' entering the industrial age should be given status as a regular civilization.
-Panzeh

*What if the barbs had their own research pool, a small number added to it each turn per settlement on the map.

When the number adds up to a certain amount (average approx every 40 or 50 turns) one barbarian settlement somewhere in the world (determined at random) becomes a full-fledged Civ (using one of the unused Civs -- if all are used, it doesn't happen.) (Thanks to player's use of Barbarian settlements as Worker farms using Conquest's enslavement rules, this would be much more likely to occur.) Then the barb research pool drops back to zero again.

The new civ starts at a tech level determined by the units the barbs are using at the time (Warriors, Horsemen etc...)
-Mojotronica

1.2.0 Civil Wars

*In addition, some civilizations (ex: USSR) can split apart (like in Civ II), through a peaceful coup, or a civil war.
-narmox

*Which Civs are prone to splitting should be balanced with other characteristics.
-Brent

*Could be triggered with a certain chance by certain tech advances like Monotheism, Printing Press, Democracy or Abolishment etc. or by changing government.
-Wernazuma III

*During a Civil war two halves of the civ would be generated and split. They'd have to be in a locked war until one half again controls 2/3rds and then reunite. This would better reflect the temporary nature of most civil wars.

With one or two exceptions: All cities separated from the capital by ocean or a certain (large) amount of tiles should be considered "colonies". When a Civil War should be triggered, the colonies would revolt and split permanently from the civ. The same goes for cities which once were conquered and are not completely assimilated.
-Wernazuma III

*All civs should have a chance of revolt if their capital is taken (as per civ2.)
For example: The USA could split into Yankees and Confederates, etc...
-Rasputin

*There should be at least two rebel groups for every civilization
-Stefu

*It would be good if it were possible for a far-flung outpost of your empire to "declare independence". If the player agrees to this, they get serious diplomatic kudos; if they disagree, it's a war of independence. This would be a nice variation to the "civil war" idea.
-Plotinus

*Any civilization could split by adding North, South, East, West, New, Upper, Lower, Nieder, Occidental, Australis, Borealis before or after the original name for one or both civs. Some of these could depend on the civ, like Nieder for the Germans. North, South, East, West, Upper, Lower, and Nieder would be most likely when the breakoffs are still adjacent. New, Australis, and Borealis would be most likely for overseas breakoffs. A breakoff civ could use the name of its new capital.

Preference would be given to historically appropriate, completely different names, such as the Afrikaners for the Dutch, Catalonia for Spain, or the Faroese for the Vikings.

The game could begin with a civ already split into North and South, East or West, or Upper and Lower.

A pregame setting could affect the frequency of breakoffs. A large map with few civs could spawn a lot of breakoffs. Breakoffs could be automatically disallowed for for a small map already basically full of civs.

A breakoff could incorporate the name of the continent it is on, such as West Australia, West Antarctica, Central Africa, Central Asia, Central Europe, or North Greenland, whether you're playing on a real world map, or if the game assigns its own names to randomly generated continents (based on the presence of multiple civs of the same Culture Group?), or if the human player names continents.

A breakoff could combine the original name with the name of a body of water it is on, such as Pacific America or Atlantic America.

A breakoff could be named for a physical feature like The Andes, The Amazon, or Sahara, most likely randomly assigned based on terrain and/ or the original civ and/ or neighboring civs. For example, a new civ broken off from the Incas or near both the Incas and the Guarani could be called The Andes.

If a particular game involves many different breakoffs from different civs, two adjacent breakoffs from different civs could merge.
Any new civ either in the southern hemisphere or to the south of the civ it breaks from could be called Australia.

A new civ's primary designation could be an acronym based on things like the name of the original civ, the government type, North, South, East, West, Upper, Lower, New, Monotheist, Pagan, or words that have no specific relation to game circumstances. If a government type becomes part of an acronym used as a civ's name, maybe that civ would tend to stick with that government type more than it otherwise would.
-Brent

1.2.1 Micro-Macro Cultural Groups and Civil Wars

*Some major civs would have associated minor civs which make up a microculturegroup, you choose either the major civ, the microculturegroup, some but not all of the minor civs, or none of the above. Some major civs do not have associated microculturegroups, some mcgs do not have associated major civs, and some minor civs stand alone outside of any mcg. There can be overlap, for instance maybe you can't have both Germany and Prussia. Maybe Karelia will be part of the Slavic mcg one game and the Nordic one the next.

*The player can create his or her own major or minor civs, micro or macro culture groups, and internal provinces. The player can reassign relationships between civs, groups.
-Brent

1.2.2 Different ways to trigger a Civil War

*For example, say you are a Republic and you start a war with someone, fine, but after 50 turns you're still at war, the people nearest that civ dislike being at war with them and revolt en masse.

Similarly, Crazy Communist man keeps sacrificing his citizens to the Gods of production, resulting in a lower class uprising and a very interesting split.

These could even be turned into a "revolutionary" game, where factors such as being across an ocean too early could lead to a revolution by colonists who are sick of getting ruled by a King on another land thousands of miles away.

Revolutions and Civil wars could be turned on and off at the player's discretion.
-Metaliturtle
Tie happiness to it, and then make the happiness model more complex. As it is now, only gross negligence will lead to a city rioting for more than a single turn (if that), but in reality large populations are much harder to control

Enough unhappiness (which can be seen specifically in game terms as dislike for the controlling regime) and you run the risk of parts of the empire fragmenting off.

Making civil wars like this would only work if happiness is harder to control (ie, based on other factors than city size and city improvements).
-Fosse

1.2.3 Specific Civ-Splits (Culture Groups)

*Civs that can split apart include Spain, England, France, Celts, Romans, Arabs, Germany, Scandinavia.
Spain can split into Portugal, Mexico, Peru, Argentina, etc.
England can split into America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa.
Celts can split into Brittany, Ireland, Wales, Cornwall, Scotland.
Rome can split into Spain, Italy, France, Romania.
Arabs can split into Egypt, Iraq.
Scandinavia can split into Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Faroes, Jutes, Vinland.
USSR can split into Ukraine, Belarus, Siberia, Kamchatka.
America can split into Texas, California, Union, Confederacy.
Germany can split into Austria, Switzerland, Bavaria, Saxony, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, West Germany, East Germany.
-Brent

Minor civs associated with America: Confederacy, Yankees, Texans, California, Alaska, Canada (maybe), Deseret (fits as well as CA and TX I think).

Minor civs associated with Germany: Bavaria, Saxony, Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Liechtenstean. Maybe instead of Switzerland: Zurich, Berne, Thurgau, etc.

Minor civs associated with Scandinavia: Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, Finland, Faroes, Jutes, Karelians, Gotland, Sami

You could choose between a Pacific Islands microculture group or a Polynesian major civ. the minor civs would be Aborigines, Maori, Fiji, Tahiti, Hawaii, Tonga, Samoa.
-Brent

Aztecs-Teotihuacans-Olmec
Inca-Tiahuacanos-Moche
English-Americans-Canadians
Russians-Polish-Mongols
Greeks-Romans-Minoans
Egyptians-Assyrians-Babylonians
French-German-Spanish
Sioux-Iroqoius-Navaho
Chinese-Japanese-Korean
Indians-Siamese-Khmer
-The List for Civ III

1.3.0 Combo-Civs

*Close allies should be able to join each others civilization if the civs are much alike (examples: the member-nations of the USSR, or the EU)
-DarkCloud

1.4.0 Civ-Creation

*If we could customize our own civs, then we wouldn't need more civs. The player should be able to add traits, give civs abilities, etc. from the New Game setup screen... Not just from the editor.
-Rasputin

*You should be able to choose attributes, your cultural group (asian, european, arab, mediteranian, african, american), your Unique Units (im hoping there are at least one more UU per civ, if not a UU for each civ for each age), etc.
And all this should be possible because this game is about building a civilization form the ground up, right?
-Kramerman

*Why don't we do it RPG style ? Give us a hell load of points to start with, distribute them over various characteristics (like: agricultural: 1000, militaristic: 2000, scientific: 1500, environment-conscious, religious etc....) which will give you certain advantages and you can improve these characteristics throughout the game (like if you build lots of farms you get more experience in agriculture; if you conquered two continents in less than half a century, you get to a militaristic level when all new units are produced with a +5 morale; etc.). And that will be your own civilization.

And if you're like me and can't make up your mind as how to distribute the damn points, you could choose a 'real world' civ with an all-made-up-just-for-you distribution exactly the way it's done in Empire Earth.
-Kirastos

1.5.0 Renaming Civs

**Give civilizations the option to rename themselves when they advance to a new era. Each civ can have suggested names to switch to for each era. For example:

Babylon -> Iraq
Persia -> Iran
Gaul -> Franks -> France
-ixnay

1.6.0 Voluntarily Splitting Civs

*I'd like to have the option to create civs out of your own civ. So if your nation becomes too rowdy, you can seperate a part of civ and rebuild your nation.
If your Civ is on the verge of revolting against you, you can just cut off the rowdy cities so you can work on making the ones you have better.
-Frozzy

1.7.0 Hardcoded Numbers of Civs

*There shouldn't be a hardcoded max number of civs - just say "over this number, we don't support whatever happens".
-skywalker

1.8.0 Minor Civs/New Tribes

*I think that the reason people started asking for the was that we all want a world full of many, many civilizations, but we realize that our computers would choke on the AI required to run that many civilizations. Plus, it's easier to keep track of trade, diploacy, aliances and other things with only a handful of civs than with dozens.

So giving us 8 to 16 major civilizations keeps AI turn lenght down and makes keeping track of diplomacy and war manageable (though not with the Civ III diplomacy screen). Then, throw a dozen or so "minor" civilizations into the mix to fill in the cracks and make for a more interesting, dynamic, and realistic world.
-Fosse

*I want minor civs to have a completely different set of paramaters for their own goals and abilities, and for our interactions with them:

1) A Minor Civ is a Tribe from the available civs, that can be set as minor by the player or at random. The Player is always a Major Civ. Minor Civs start with one city and a handful of defenders (same as majors).

2) A Minor Civ's cities will work the best food tile in their radius to determine city size growth. They recieive gold from the land they work (or whatever system Civ 4 uses), but no shields

The Reason: Represents agrarian and simple cultures focus of food rather than production. They can use the gold later.

3) Minor Civs do not build units, but instead have them appear in their cities (1 unit each city) every X number of turns. These units will either be military or settlers (much less often)

The Reason: No build orders for the AI to think about, production queues, etc. Settler production won't reduce city size.

4) Minor Civs want two things: Cash and Survival. They get gold from cities they conquer, plus more units per X turns (more cities to get them at).

DIPLOMACY

1) Minor Civs are either at peace or war with everyone else, major or minor.
The Reason: This keeps them out of diploatic relations, and keeps things simple.

2) Majors can demand tribute from Minors. If they Minor can afford to pay and has a weak military, they will pay. If not, they will eithe refuse or declare war.

3) Majors can pay Minors to start a war with a 3rd party, or to end a war.

4) Minors can only be at war if it is declared upon them, if they are paid, or after a tribute demand.

TRADE

1) Any resources in a Minor's land can be traded to another civ for money.

CULTURE

1) Each Minor city generates a small amount of culture per turn (to prevent wholesale absorbtion).

SCIENCE

1) Each minor civ absorbs techs known to majors it has DIRECT CONTACT with (has met their units, are within so many tiles of their border) after that tech has been discovered by 50% of the major Civs. This determines what kind of units they can get.
The Reason: They are always backwards, but will be close to their neighbors. So a minor Civ might be more advanced than an isolated major.

TRAITS

1) Each minor civ has the traits of its Tribe. These traits influence the types of units they generate, the amount of gold they make from land, and their disposition

PROMOTIONS

1) If a major slot opens up, then the most poweful Minor becomes a major. This opens full diplomatic relations (maintaining current war and peace status), and automatically builds several key city improvments in the minor's cities (depending on era, in early game, no improvments, in modern perhaps marketplace, temple). These buildings can be influenced by traits.
-Fosse

*I want minor civs to behave normally regarding building improvements and units, technology, culture, and diplomacy. I favor the disadvantage of no Traits, subordinate characters, or unique units. Minor civs could share culturegroupspecific units with their entire culturegroup. There would be no civspecific graphics. If major civs have more than one available ruler, minors have one or none if none makes sense.
-Brent

*New tribes should probably appear periodically
-Mercator

*The more I think of it, the more "minor civs" seem to be a good idea. Imagine having them start with two settlers, but without the possibility to build new ones. They still could conquer foreign ones however. Thus most of them would die over time, but in some occasions they might develop into good foes.

*Those minor civs, as I said, would require little work, as there'd be no UUs and no need for time-robbing leader graphics.
-Wernazuma III

*In reality, many civs arose in the passage of time- therefore, should not some Minor civs start later than the major ones with already established cities- or in breaking off from an already-existing empire and establishing their own suzeraniety much like the Barbarian takeovers in Civ I,II?
-polypheus/DarkCloud

*I do like the idea of minor civs. These would be 1 city civilizations randomly scattered about the map, having 1 or 2 military units. I think you should be able to convince them you join you via diplomacy, though conquest could always happen too.
-Drachasor

*Let the normal gameplay decide what is a major and what is a minor civ. A tribe is stuck on a small island? -- Likely to become a "minor civ". I don't like the designation of a civ being "minor" because of the earth history.
-Shogun Gunner

*Minor Civs are good an all, but let's get our priorities in order here- the AI programming is going to have to be much better before the number of civs is increased significantly.
-Shogun Gunner

*If a major civilization is destroyed, then a minor civilization that is well-located (not near anyone else) becomes major. It gets a technology boost, and it's accumulated culture is no longer invisible (this will mean that it will quickly convert surrounding minor civs to it).
-Drachasor

*Birth of the Federation implemented Minor civs in a good way. They never expanded but you could engage in diplomacy and trade with them. You could conquere them, ally with them or get them to join your empire. If you did conquer them or get them to peacefully join, you would get access to special buildings that could enhance your empire.

Something similar could be done with civ4. Make minor civs such that they never expand, but can provide bonuses to you if you conquer or make them join you.
-The diplomat

*Perhaps minor civs could be only created by Barbarians who capture cities of other nations? In this way barbarians could become minor civs and minor civs could become major civs (if they expand to 3+ cities.)
-MORON

*There are no "minor" civs. Every civilization that is up to city level is perfectly capable of developing new technology and expansionism. All the civilizations that are considered "failures to adopt" never had the time to do so. For a fundamental technological revolution it takes around a century of trade and war before the infanstructure and culture attitudes match up and many civs are wipe out as a dozen kights and musketeers march into their cities.

Even the American natives, not really a major civ, have changed their lifestyle completely in two generations, from static agrian culture to normanic ones with horseback riding and guns before being wiped out. Normadic lifestyle is adopted for military reasons, just in case you are wondering.

As for the lack of technology for some civilizations, it is simply the result of bad starting location and latter starting times. (some civs only had cities since say 1000AD) Consider the polynesians with nothing but sea and very little trade with the asians, or the Aztecs that have no negibours within reach to trade whatsoever. While this is happening, the largest landmass of euro-asia has lots of tech trade and huge population, it is not surprising that the europeans managed to expand while Aztecs did not.
-MORON

*Nomadic settlers produce higher food/shields in certain squares(tundra, steppe, etc) than cities but need to move around constantly so not to deplete renewable resources(like how nomads stayed in different places in each season). ideally you want nomads lasting a long time(just like in real life) in steppe areas while cities would spring up in fertile areas. so on the map of earth civs would do best to go straight to sedentary cities in areas like the indus valley while others areas would stay nomad cities longer(iran, germany, etc?), and places like siberia would have nomads for a very long time. nomads should definately be a more powerful civ type in certain environments especially if they are located next to a sedentary civ they can raid
-pg

*Each nomadic settler acts as a cityworker and you can stack them for increased production. that would make it easier since a settler with 3 population points would be confusing. Instead, just have 3 settlers walking together, producing together and feeding eachother. Then you just cap the number of nomadic settlers you can have in one square. If there are 4 nomadic settlers in an area and they reach the max food no new settler is made until the group splits. nomads wont grow over a certain point.
-LzPrst

*I assume nomads wouldnt need to support their units since they are hunter/gatherers...

this would be good for the warmongers as they could stay nomadic in nomansland a long time and then suddenly explode and conquer enemy cities with their vast, but horse-smelling troops
-LzPrst

*If nomads conquer a city and do not raze it to the ground- then they immediately become sedentary and lose nomadic bonuses, but gain bonuses that regular civilizations posess.
-DarkCloud

1.10.0 Civ Break-Offs

*When you start a new game of Civilization IV; only a few large, major civs are available to start with, such as Chinese, Semites, and Indoeuropeans.

To keep from having the same exact group of civs for the whole game, there would be breakoffs. Indoeuropeans can split into Romans, Celts, Germans, Slavs, Indians, etc.
-Brent

1.11.0 Proto-Civs (Relates to Minor Civs)

*The Civilizations should start as tribes, and aren't really considered civs before they complete their palace. This would allow the game to start earlier.
Before the palace is built, the tribes won't create any culture, though they would be able to create warriors, archers, and such. However, they will also have no scientific advancement since they are little more than nomadic herdsmen who have finally settled down and are just starting to adjust to the rigors of civilization and farming.

Once palaces are built, the civilizations will overtake the near tribes rapidly, with the villages and encampments turning into small cities
-Azazel

1.12.0 Evolving Civilizations

In Civilization, civilizations are in one block. I mean you pick the French, you pick the French, and you will continue all the way with them. You may change your governement, your strategies but never your nationality and what you are in substance. You will always have the same center, the same identity, the same power.

I think that a civilization evolves. Even if it is represented in Civilization, because it can't be avoided, I think it is the most interesting and fascinating feature of a civilization that a civilization can become another civilization. Not only, it is the most interesting feature in term of gameplay in Civilization: to see your civilization change and grow.

This is why i would want to see a system in Civilization 4 that allows an evolution of a civilization culture, power, identity. The better would be an evolution in relation with the other civilizations. It could be done through culture, appartenance feeling, revolutions, events, trade, spreading...

The other things i would want to see for a good civilization evolving is technology diversity, with large tech trees, very specific, inventive and optional technologies.

Some other things already influences this civilization evolving and specificities, like military leaders that give a civilization a good military past and present.

For sure, a Civilization game with such specifities would be a revolution: civilizations would be highly customizable and would be very realistic and generally, i think, very "civilizationish".
-Naokaukodem

*I also agree with Peter that the context in which your civ evolves should make a difference, and that civ bonuses should come more out of your civ's history than your starting pick.
-Mark_Everson

*I would assume all tribes start from the same point. No advantages, no tendencies, etc. A civ near the ocean or with a lot of cities on the coast would start to get advantages in reduced costs in building ship related units, improvements. Perhaps after building your third harbor, the cost starts to come down.

To take that another step, if you conqured a number of cities from a neighboring nation, the traits of the foreign nationals in your new cities would have a different character. Over time, this would influence your nation's values, traits, etc.
-Shogun Gunner

2.0.0 Rulers

2.1.0 Choosing Rulers

*Every civ could have two different rulers available for being chosen as the civ's leader.
(Example: Americans - George Washington and Woodrow Wilson.)
-Rasbelin

*There should be (Like Civ II) both a Male and a Female Leader for each nation
-POTUS

2.2.0 Ruler Traits

*Each ruler should have his or her own traits which affect the way they play the game.
-Brent

*Each ruler's traits should effect a civilization's traits. For example:
Stalin could have an Authoritarian trait to add to Russia's hypothetical Merchant/Green traits.
-DarkCloud

2.3.0 Changing Rulers

*Like in the game Europa Universalis, the Leaders for each civilization should change after x amount of years (to be randomly determined).

*The names for these rulers could be randomly generated.

*Each ruler would have traits like civilisations do in Civ III. For example: one ruler could be conservative and pressing (ala Margaret Thatcher), or changing and friendly (ala Mikhail Gorbachev), or militaristic and fascist (ala Adolf Hitler).
-Fozzy, DarkCloud

2.4.0 Ruler Graphic Design

*If animated leaders are used, add support for static leaderheads in picture format, as opposed to the still-flcs necessary to make static leaderheads in civ3.

2.5.0 Different Civ Rulers for Different Governments

*I want some different rulers available to represent some different governments.
-Brent

2.6.0 List of Rulers

America: Washington, Lincoln, Kennedy

England: Coel, Brutus, Henry I, Mary, Victoria

France: Charlemagne, Hugh Capet, Napoleon, Joan of Arc

Israel: Moses, Joshua, Saul, David, Solomon, Zedekiah, Ben-Gurian, Golda Meir

Egypt: Seti, Rameses, Tutankhamen, Cleopatra

Polynesia: Kamehameha, Hawaii-Loa, Queen Lilliolikauna

Rome: Romulus, Julius Caesar, Caesar Augustus, Vespasian, Christantine

2.7.0 A Way to Maximize Use of Rulers/Assigning Culture Group Rulers

*This could particularly be useful when an obscure Civ has no usable historical ruler of its own. Such a Civ could either use a historical ruler of a related Civ, or a ficticious person assigned to the Culture Group.

*Be able to use the same ruler for more than one available Civ. Possibly each culture group would have a pool of rulers that you choose from separately from your civ. Some of these rulers could be actual rulers from history, some could be other famous members of that culture group from history, and some could be ficticious. If you really want to any ruler could rule any civ. The rulers could have their own traits, completely separate from the civ traits or the same sorts of traits and you could choose which civ and ruler you want by their Traits. The ficticious rulers could be designed to cover Traits that you couldn't reasonably assign to one of the historical persons for that culture group. You could have more limited options for ruler/ civ combinations. Benito Juarez could be available only for the Zapotecs or the Mexicans. Margaret for Norway, Sweden, or Denmark. Charlemagne for Rome, France, or Germany.
-Brent

Civilizations page 2