Civilizations

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

Internal politics should definitely be represented. Not by GLs though.

Speaking of GLs, I'm having a hard time getting a single dang SGL in any given Epic game, and I'm almost always in the lead, tech wise... never have lost the race for Philosophy for example.

Internal politics should be complex... the "monied classes" should object to certain expenditures, for example... certain elements have finally been added (ethnic tensions, for example) that are great, but there should be more.

Someday...

[jkelly]

YS,

Why would the Celts be "hard"? There are existing Celtic nation-states in the modern world. De Valera would make more sense as a modern Celtic leaderhead than having Abe Lincoln in furs at 4000 BCE does now.

Plotinus,

I don't know that Civ3 'civilizations' are really trying to represent "political continuity". I wouldn't want to try to pin down what they *do* represent, but I don't think that's it. Then again, the Byzantines are now a seperate civ from the Greeks (pet peeve), which is clearly a political distinction as opposed to a language or ethnic one, so...

[Plotinus]

[jkelly] You're probably right. Certainly the Celts were never a discrete political unit. The problem is that, in this game, "civilisation" is often equated with "nation" (so placing units within another civ's cultural territory is described as trespassing on their national borders), which is why we have all those European civs such as the French, Germans, English, Spanish etc. Yet at other times, "civilisation" seems to mean something more amorphous, referring to a cultural grouping - hence the presence of the Celts, the Arabs, etc. By that definition, the French and Germans would probably be considered a single "civilisation": after all, both developed from the Holy Roman Empire and therefore have a common cultural outlook and shared history. Only rarely do we have a civ that is really a distinct civilisation in both senses - and I think ironically the Byzantines are the prime example of that, historically - even if you think they should be the same as the Greeks, and personally I think they should be the same as the Romans.

[Hagbart]

Nah, France and Germany (by that definition) shouldn't be considered as one civ. France is a latin civ while Germany is a germanic civ. England and Germany a far closer than France and Germany, you know the saxons are original from Germany.

Have you never seen the movie 'Gladiator' where the romans are fighting the germanic tribes (a totally different branch of civ).

What really splits or holds a civ together is the language... (so for ex. the German speaking states (Germany, Austria and others ) could be considered one civ.
Scandinavia is already ONE civ in the game, altho it is separate states in real life. One of the reasons of this is ofcourse that the languages in Scandinavia originates from the same old-nordic language.

[Brundlefly]

Originally posted by Yahweh Sabaoth
Internal politics should definitely be represented. Not by GLs though.

Internal politics should be complex... the "monied classes" should object to certain expenditures, for example... certain elements have finally been added (ethnic tensions, for example) that are great, but there should be more.

Someday...

Perhaps GL's shouldn't be used for politics, but it would be neat to add options for leadership change at various intervals within the game. It would be possible to change the characteristics of your civilization over time based upon your leader selections.

For instance, Ancient Rome may have been Militaristic/ Commercial early on, but an argument could be made that during the latter stages of the empire it became Religious...

[gmt]

Why is Austria not playable w/o editing?

[gmt]

Just figured it out.

[Zero]

can anyone tell me what the trait/UU ae for the new civs are and what are the new traits for existing civs.

Obviously i dont have C3C yet. I'd like to know.

[vmxa1]

I posted this before, so pardon me for being too lazy to do it again. Here is a start

Mayan Ag/Ind Jav Thrower
Byzantines Sea/Sci Dromon (Greek fire for a Galley)
Hittites Comm/Exp 3 man chariot
Incans Ag/Exp Chasqui Scout
Netherlands Sea/Ag Swiss Merc (Pike)
Portugal Sea/Exp Carrack (caravel)
Sumeria Ag/Sci Enkidu Warrior

[Plotinus]

[Hagbart] Were the Saxons from Germany? I thought they were more from where the Netherlands are now. In any case, we English are just as much Jutes, who were from Denmark. I think that while the German and French languages have different roots, the cultures have the same background, since they are essentially two divisions of the Holy Roman Empire (founded by Charlemagne, a Frank, and which later morphed into Austria). French and Germans alike are all descended from barbarians of the kind that General Maximus saw off with such aplomb - Goths, Ostrogoths, Franks, etc - as are the Spanish (Visigoths) and the Italians (Lombards). We Europeans are just a bunch of howling barbarians, you know.

You're right that language is important. But that would make the English the same civ as the Americans! Well, sort of the same. What a thought.

[Tripledoc]

I miss the Assyrians, the Scythians and the Seljuks.

The Assyrians discovered the almost precise distance to the moon 3000 BC.

The Scythians had some fantastic four horse chariots plated with gold.

And the Seljuks built some magnifiscient mosques in what is today Eastern turkey.

With the Seljuks and Scythians the Eurasian heartland would be a bit more crowded than it is now with only the Mongols and Russians there now. Arguably the Assyrians would be hard to place between the Babylonians and Hittites.

Two civs for north America is too little. There needs to be at least two more, however since I am not well versed in North American cultures and there seems to be so many to choose from I don't know who those should be. I am thinking that one could be the Inuit to fill out the arctic circle.

One more for South America would be nice, maybe the Olmecs.

And finally a Polynesian civ to flesh out the pacific expanses.

I think these civs would add further playability to the world map.

[Aqualung71]

There definitely should be an Australian civilisation - not that I'm biased or anything, but we have one of the largest landmasses in the world.

The unique unit could be the Yobbo, whose choice of weaponry (a pool cue, cricket bat or beer bottle) would render him largely useless against Tanks or MA, but I'm sure someone could provide an interesting enough graphic to make building him worthwhile. Unfortunately, stationing a Yobbo in a city causes disorder. All in all, the Yobbo is a pretty pointless unit, but it exists. The Aussie Civ continent could also have its own special resource - kangaroos. But these would not be like any other resources - they would be hard to connect roads to because they would be hopping around the map every few turns. Since kangaroos are actually a pest, they would in fact reduce the food and production on the tile by 1, and could be "pillaged" by a worker unit with a shotgun to return the tile to normal.

The Aussies would also have their very own unique worker unit, called the Convict. The Convict would travel a little slower than a normal worker on account of the ball and chain around his leg, but would work at the same rate as a normal worker. In an ironic historical twist however, the Convict may be shipped to England and repopulated into any English city without protest from England, which will increase corruption and unhappiness in that city.

Australia's unique artillery unit, the Barbecue, cannot be captured and would require any passing enemy units to halt and remain stationary for 2 turns. After the 2 turns, the enemy unit would return in a zig-zag direction to it's home city where it would recover.

Some special buildings only available to Aussies would also be necessary. The Brewery would increase commerce in its city while the Pub would provide increased happiness. However, the Pub would also result in slightly lower worker productivity in the city, and would also require one citizen to be converted to a policeman. It may also cause random accidents such as Aussie military units actually attacking each other.

Australia would start with a disadvantage diplomatically, as everyone in its region will be furious upon meeting, regardless of difficulty level...and the only nation to be gracious will be the US.....but that will come at the cost of very expensive and unfair trade deals. Oh, and Australia will have a one-sided MPP with the US: Australia must declare war on US's enemies, but the US doesn't need to declare war on Australia's enemies.

The Ayers Rock great wonder would strangely be available to all civ's, however if Australia built it, it would automatically lose 25% of it's land area to a barbarian tribe (that tribe, strangely, would automatically be given Pubs and Breweries in all its cities). The barbarian tribe would then try to sell the land back to Australia. Every 10 turns thereafter there would be a chance of the process repeating. Oh, and the more courthouses present in Australian cities, the higher the chance of reoccurrence.

Australia would have its own government type which would be similar to democracy, but would generally involve cruder diplomatic language in dealing with regional neighbours.

Best of all though would be the Sportsman unit. Armed only with a peak of physical fitness and a charming smile, the Sportsman would be able to enter any rival civ's city on the map and create unhappiness, while at the same time generating an improved attitude from the rival civ. Of course, Sportsmen stationed in Australian cities would also increase happiness.

There's a few other things that could be done, but I won't bore you with them!!!!

Cheers!

[Tripledoc]

So who should the leader of the Australian civilization be? I suggest either Mel Gibson or Kylie Minogue as runners up. However my favourite would be Dame Edna.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
I'm thoroughly impressed with Civ3's roster, but I see some omissions still, such as Assyria, the Marmeluks, the Sassanids, Mali, Poland-Lithuania, the Slavs, etc.

They've got the Mamelukes. It's called Egypt. They've got the Sassanids, it's called Persia. The Slavs are represented by Russia, but Poland-Lithuania might be interesting.

[Calgacus II]

Originally posted by Alexander01
Call to Power, eat your heart out!

They thought they were better with all of their extra civilizations and moving units.

But really, who could take seriously any civ game with things like a Jamaica civilization and Plasmatica units?

Now, with fully upgraded Civilization3, what we knew all the long has been proved again:

SID MEIER'S CIVILIZATION SERIES IS THE BEST CIVILIZATION GAMING SERIES!

Civ has the Zulu and the Iroquois. DOn't slander the superior CTP games just because Conquests has improved somewhat on the shockingly disappointing civ3 vanilla

Incidentally. I've played the a few of the "conquests" . The ones I've played are rottern. Particularly the Mesopotmia one. CTP2's Alexander the Great scenario remains the best "conquest" ever