Civilizations identity / nationality evolution system

[realpolitic]

I think some traits could be good. To counteract a civ that's all war for a hundred turns, it could become brutish: science goes down even further. A civ that bulds culture suddenly gets a discount in the cost of building cultural improvements, does it continue into an "overkill" of culture just because it's cheap? Learning institutions beome cheaper when you build plenty: Should you build cheap Universities or go to war. Most civ were easier to win at high levels with lots of war, let's keep some incentive for war, but also add these incentives for peace.

[Max Sinister]

A Civ "too cultural" becomes too sophisticated: People don't care for problems of economy or military because that's under their dignity; they prefer to write poems about chrysanthemums (like some Chinese mandarins, I imagine. Don't want to offend anyone).

[realpolitic]

I'll agree on them not liking the military, but I certainly see plenty of "social justice" art.

[GAZ082]

All this can be programmed in Python, i think. Is just a mix of
"if".

For example, if 50% of your land is dessert, and has been that way for, 100 turns, you will get a food bonus:

"if DessertLandPer >= 50 AND Turns >= 100 then
FoodinDessertTiles = FoodinDessertitles+1"

That is the basic logic, the pseudocode.

If Soren releases the AI and game mechanics code, im sure you will be able to define custom variables to represent that.

For example, you count how many dessert tiles you have in your territory, this should be given by a function, taking in consideration what land you have in your borders. Perhaps, you will be able to access the data in a list like...

Terrains = [Tundra, Dessert, Forest]

Now, the data in the list, would be like:
Terrains = [10, 50, 20]
So, within your borders you got 10 tundra, 50 dessert and 20 forest. Python does not know that the first number is Tundra, but you do and you can call it like:
terrains[1]...
****, ill put the friggin code like in Python, dudes, this is Python, ill copy and paste:

Python 2.4.1 (#65, Mar 30 2005, 09:13:57) [MSC v.1310 32 bit (Intel)] on win32
Type "copyright", "credits" or "license()" for more information.

************************************************** **************
Personal firewall software may warn about the connection IDLE
makes to its subprocess using this computer's internal loopback
interface. This connection is not visible on any external
interface and no data is sent to or received from the Internet.
************************************************** **************

IDLE 1.1.1
>>> terrains = [10, 50, 20]
>>> terrains[1]
50
>>> desert= terrains[1]
>>> desert
50
>>> PerofDesert = (desert*100)/(terrains[0]+terrains[1]+terrains[2])
>>> PerofDesert
62
>>> if PerOfDesert >= 50 and Turns >= 100:
' Change the property "food" to every desert in your empire.'

There, you have.

Imagine the map like points. Every point is a tile, and has coordinates, like (12,54) or perhaps, just a number to 65000, numbering every tile of a map since 0 (upper left) to the max, lower right. So, im pretty sure, you will be able to know all the properties of a tile checking a nested table:

>>> world = [1,2,3,4] 'Until the last one, perhaps 65000 in a huge map.
>>> world[0] = ["Yo! Im a hot desert!", "Food = 2"]
>>> world[0]
['Yo! Im a hot desert!', 'Food = 2']
>>> world[0][1]
'Food = 2'
>>> world[0][0]
'Yo! Im a hot desert!'

There is a nested table. world[0] calls the first item of the table world, and the secon [] calls the first or second value within the first item in world.

I dont know how they are gonna use XML to put the data, but they are no different to Python's tables.

Hope i made my point, is 2 am here and ive been busy all day...

[Addled Platypus]

Just a thought of a PBEM game where two gamers a playing alike?

I would think there should be small difference between the two


Great Idea by the way

[realpolitic]

Re: Re: Re: Civilizations identity / nationality evolution system

Originally posted by Naokaukodem


In Civilization you can't change the label during the game, it remains the very same during all the game. But i don't think that the label is very important here. The more important is the identity of the civilization: it would have to change with the time, with culture meltings, trade, events like revolutions or conquests, spreading and migrations. This is what i try to say by "civilization in one block": instead of being managed like one entity, in one block, our civilization could be manage like several unified entities, in several blocks.

Are yo refering to nations with several cultural identities like America's Bible belt, Left Coast, Heartland ,and the east Coast, and
Iraqs Sunnis Kurds and Shiia?

[Naokaukodem]

I guess that the system mentionned above would take care of such cultural identities. But there I don't know if they are geographical. They may be more historic, and in such case it would be quite difficult to simulate them. But the spirit of the idea is effectively to dissociate the culture from the frontiers, so there could be several cultures in a same country, indeed. But i guess that with time, those cultures would melt and form a new one.
Well in fact I think that the culture identities you mention are more religious identities than truly culture ones. This system works with totally different cultures, not with only religious schisms.

[ghen]

Are you thinking along the lines of a nationality tree, like the tech tree is now? Start with maybe 5-10 base nationalities from the stone age (nation used loosely here) and have them evolve into their respective geographical nations later, like have the Saxons evolve into british and irish nations and you have to choose which you want to become with varying differences. (don't quote my history)

Thats alot more static than having bonuses based on gameplay, but I think more fun since you have a bit more control.

[Naokaukodem]

Well in fact I don't know how irish separated from british in reality, it would be a good information to see. But I'm thinking more like those would have been separated from the start and have been formed in one country. I mean the irish and british would have been separated before even the hypothetic formation of a saxon state. Then the saxon state take form, then the local cultures are too strong and reinforce themselve and separate the country in several other nations. There, if you were at the head of the saxon state, you'll have to choose which new country to manage. The only thing is that I don't know if a united country can separate itself with time in more little ones, and how to translate this in Civ if this is true. Idea maybe?

[Jonah5]

Wow I had almost the same ideas that you...Naokaukodem....had. When i first heard they were making civ4 the first thing i did was fill about 20 pages of paper up with things i would like to see in civ4, but my hopes for the game are, i think, years ahead of our current technology. I think I only put one of my ideas on the forums but that was so long ago I can't remember it. But I completely agree with you. Maybe soon your ideas can come to pass, oh and mine too!

[NanoDingo]

Like the Demographics in Civ II, only they actually affect game-play? Like if a Civilization has the longest Military Service for, say, 50 turns, it gains free promotions on units produced, for example; highest Literacy Rate might grant free Libraries. Although, these examples both tend towards positive feedback loops, so it might unbalance the game...

[Bobby Chicken]

over complexity is never good...

[Naokaukodem]

Don't say foolish things please. Where did you see overcomplexity? Because you don't understand a concept does not mean it is complex.

[Naokaukodem]

Originally posted by Shogun Gunner
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.

That's exactly the idea! If you conquer a city, you will want to improve the culture. Then your culture will start to mix with the foreign culture already present. At a point, this could form a third culture that could rebel if you don't take care enough, like the fall of the Roman Empire. If fact, each time a foreign culture will break the 1/3 of the local culture of a city, a third culture will take form and begin to "vampirize" the two fighting cultures, taking culture points from them to add to it. If the third culture reach a point when it dominate the other cultures within the city, then there is a chance for a rebellion and a civil war, this city revendicating independance.