Civs included. Just the facts madam 2.

[Gramphos]

As nobody has looked into it I decided to look up that page on Iroquois that Locutus found earlier (proofing that they were in). And after searched the page for "Salamanca" I found this:

http://www.tolatsga.org/iro.html
The Seneca were once the largest tribe of the Iroquois League - the number of their warriors equal to the other four tribes combined.
...
The Seneca, however, are the only Native American tribe to own an American city - Salamanca, New York.

This should take the Spanish out of the list for good. (Or at least move them down to the clue section)

As we are running out of facts that will add Civs to the list, we have to search for evidence against the one on there way to the list.

[Locutus]

Sorry for not posting earlier: I had some problems with my Internet connection so I haven't been online since my previous post (but if it's any comfort, this thread is the first one I checked out as soon as I could go online again )

Gramphos,
Fantastic research man! I thoroughly investigated the existance of a link between the name Salamanca and Iroquois civilization back then but couldn't find anything. Don't know how I managed to overlook that but all the more respect to you for finding it after all! This moves the Spanish to the 'suggestions based on clues' list.

Though nothing is certain yet, I think this means we figured out all the civs! All that's left to do is finding some harder evidence on Babylonians, Aztec and Persians and resolve the Mongol-Japan issue, which interestingly enough seems to be shifting more and more towards Japan (I wouldn't like this personally but unfortunately Firaxis is calling the shots, not me). Thanks to Kenobi and Phutnote for their useful info. You both make good points. I have one point of criticism though:

I think Firaxis has been pretty good with its research, so there's no way it's a representation of good old Genghis.

This is not true, I and others have noted many small or larger historic accuracies already (one example being Alexander the Great not having long hair, but there are many others). For this reason I'm going to leave this issue open (at 50/50) for now. Unless very strong evidence or an overwelming amount of clues comes along for one of the nations I'm gonna keep this as it is. I'll move the Japanese civ up to the '100% certain' list to indicate one of the civs is certainly in but we don't know which one yet and that the issue is completely open and could go either way.

Edit: typos and stuff...


So far, based on our evidence, we know that:

100% CONFIRMED. These civs ARE in CIV 3:

1. AMERICANS - Leader (Abraham Lincoln; 100% confirmed), city names (capital), Unique Unit (F15)
2. GERMANS - Unique Unit (Panzer), city names (capital), multiple text references, video reference
3. CHINESE - Leader (Mao Zedong; 100% confirmed), city names
4. ROMANS - Leader (C. Julius Ceasar), city name (capital), Unique Unit (Legion), video reference
5. FRENCH - Leader (Joan of Arc(?); 100% confirmed), city names (capital), dialogue window of the French (Unique Unit: Musketeer?)
6. RUSSIANS - Unique Unit (MiG), city names
7. ZULUS - Unique Unit (Impi), city names
8. ENGLISH - Leader (Elisabeth I; 100% confirmed), (Unique Unit: Man-at-Arms?)
9. EGYPTIANS - Leader (100% pharaoh, does anyone know who this is?), definite text reference, city names (capital)
10. INDIANS - Leader (Mahatma Ghandi; 100% confirmed)
11. MONGOLS (50%) or JAPANESE (50%) - one of these two is certainly in but which one is still open for debate, evidence consists of a Leader (Genghis Kahn or not?) and possibly a Japanese Unique Unit (Samurai(?))
12. IROQUOIS - Leader (Hiawatha; 100% confirmed), city names, text references, Unique Unit (75% Unique Unit - 25% Military Leader)
13. GREEKS - Leader (Alexander the Great, city names (capital), possible Unique Unit (Hoplite(?)), text reference, video reference.


EVIDENCE ABOUT OTHER CIVS (which means they could be in or not):

14. PERSIANS - City names (capital)
15. BABYLONIANS - City name
16. AZTECS - City names


SUGGESTIONS BASED ON CLUES (weak clues but we report them):

17. SPANISH - City name: Salamanca, but it was once a Roman city and there's also an Iroquois city with that name.
18. VIKINGS (?) Very weak clues. See above mention URL for the boat: Viking Longboat?
19. ISRAELIS. Apolytoner Eli has pointed out that according to a israeli site, Israel is in.
20. CANADIANS. City name (Montreal). The city name is NOT on the map, but on a civ 3 window.
21. CONFEDERATES. As refered to in a swedish article, a Great Military Leader in Civ 3 could be Stonewell Jackson. Apolytoner Arator argued that this leader is impossible to be in the same civ as Lincoln (=100% confirmed leader of the Americans). Many other Apolytoners disagree though, arguing that he's more likely to be an American, among other reasons because (as joseph1944 pointed out) he served for the American Army before joinging the Confederates.
22. PHOENICIANS. Based on a single text reference in a preview.


--------------------------------------------------------
The evidence is categorized as such:

Leader= We have a picture of the leader of the corresponting civ.
Unique Unit= We know that the particular unique unit belongs to the corresponding civ
Text reference= The civ has been mentioned by Firaxis in their web site or in interviews by their CEO
Video reference= The civ was seen in Firaxis demo movie from E3.
City names= The names of cities that clearly belong to the corresponding civ are included in scrrenshots of the game
All other clues= All other clues are reported next to the civ name.

-------------------------CIV FACTS-----------------------

+ Firaxis said the made NO official announcement regarding the number of civs that may or may not be included in the game.
+ In a Gamespot article its says that civs will be 16.
+ An israeli site says that civs will be 16
+ In an IGN preview it says that there will be 16 civs.
+ By now, many other sources have also claimed that the total number of civs in Civ3 will be 16.

--------------------------POINTERS-------------------------

* The city names in the screen shots can be from an extra city names list or could have been arbitrarily written be members of Firaxis. So city names in screenshots doesn't guarantee that a civ will be in. Examples: Kerplakistan & Huntsville, possibly others.
* Another problem could be scenarios. Though city names alone are not enough evidence to include a civ on the 100% certain list and scenario-specific graphics are not likely to be made public until the game is in late beta (if they even exist at all), it's quite possible that some of the evidence we used in this list is based on scenario specific information and not be valid for the regular game.

[Eli]

[Immortal Wombat]

Couldn't the game have both mongols and japanese? did I miss something that said there was definatly only one of them?

If Bactra in fact was part of Babylonia rather than Persia, then that would make the 14 top civilizations (mongols + japanese) with the Aztecs and Babylonians the 16 civs included.

[death_head]

I don't see the point of these self-imposed Civ limitations...

[Zealot]

Why aren't the portuguese a civ in the game? They could be a unique civ too! We had a huge empire on the XVI century! The trade ability could be exploited!

[Locutus]

IW,
You disappoint me You played Harlan's Alexander scenario (CtP2), you ought to know that Babylon and Bactra are about 1000 miles apart. Bactra lies near the present day Afghanistan-Uzbekistan border while the Babylonians never came much further east than the Iran-Iraq border. Also, Persepolis as anything else than a Persian capitol seems unlikely to me. OTOH, it would be possible for that Babylonian city we saw in a screenshot (Nippur IIRC) to be a Persian city, though that still seems far-fetched.

As I said in my previous post, nothing is certain yet. We only have 13 civs confirmed (and one only half: Japan or Mongol, we don't know which one), which still leaves three positions open. In theory even the Arabs could still be in, though that's not very likely of course. It's possible that the Babylonians are Persians are in fact one civ and that the Mongol and Japanese are both in but the evidence we currently have suggests otherwise.

death_head,
What do you mean by 'self-imposed Civ limitations'?

Zealot,
Yeah well, I'd like to see the Arabs, Spanish, Dutch, Khmer and a whole bunch of other civs as well but it ain't gonna happen. Firaxis only wants 16 civs (most likely), so they have to make some choices that many people won't like. I'm sure there will be mods and expansion packs and stuff though with all these civs included...

[Zealot]

It still isn't fair, Locutus! It was bad enough that the portuguese weren't on Colonization! And on Civ 2 we weren't present again, but the carthaginians and the vikings were! I'm sorry, but these civs didn't have the historical impact that the portuguese have.

And another thing that pisses me off is that Macau was founded in 1557 by the portuguese, and the city of Macau is already on Civ3 and is part of the chinese empire!! The nerve!!

http://viewer.fgnonline.com/fgn_media.jsp?media=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fgnonline.com%2Fmedia%2Fpc%2Fnews%2Fbusy.jpg

[TechWins]

The reason why Firaxis has included so little amount of civs is because they wanted to make each and every civ unique. They stated that they would rather have less unique civs than have a lot of bland civs.

[me_irate]

All i can say is that at least one civ from mesopotamia should be in there. These were the first civs and IMO the most important. I believe Babylonians are the most likely simply because they were in civ 1. The babylonians, assirians, persians, pretty much covered the same land. While each had its own land the others didn't the main part Babylon, Ur, Akkad Ashur and many of those cities were owned by all three (not to mention other civs) Even if one sees babylon in a screen shot it does not make the babylonians a sure thing simply because for a time i believe babylon was even the capital of persia. As well as persepolis Akkad and about 5 other cities.

[joseph1944]

Originally posted by Locutus
As I said in my previous post, nothing is certain yet. We only have 13 Civs confirmed (and one only half: Japan or Mongol, we don't know which one), which still leaves three positions open. In theory even the Arabs could still be in, though that's not very likely of course. It's possible that the Babylonians are Persians are in fact one civ and that the Mongol and Japanese are both in but the evidence we currently have suggests otherwise.

Locutus good job. Just a thought. If you wanted to make money and you are Firaxis, would you not include the Japanese and not the Mongol. Also include Israel. I was thinking about how many computer there is in Israel and Japan compare to Mongolia. Or for that matter how many computer in the Arab world. And before someone jump all over this I mean computer that people can play games on and not (be killed for doing so) the Gov. or Business computer.

[Locutus]

Zealot,
I beg to differ. The Carthagians and Vikings had a very big impact on history. The Portuguese were important too but they certainly weren't more important than the other two. Whether or not certain civs were in previous games shouldn't have any impact on which civs are in Civ3. I mean, that would almost force Firaxis to leave the Romans, Greek and Chinese out and certainly you'll agree that that wouldn't be a very good idea?

I agree the Portuguese are a major civ, but I'm not sure if they're in the top 16 (then again, I could say the same of the Iroquois and French).

I certainly agree that it's ridiculous that Macao is a Chinese city, I sure hope that will be fixed before the game hit's the stores.

Techwing,
I know, but that doesn't mean I (or anyon else) have to agree. Personally I think it's quite possible to have 32 civs and still make them all unique. You just shouldn't include too many similar civs (FE Assyrian, Babylonian, Sumerian, Persian, etc), but more not-so-obvious but still very important civs like the Ethiopians, Hebrew, Khmer, Bantu, Polish, Arabs, Polynesians, etc.

Me_irate,
I agree, there is indeed a lot of overlap between various ME civs. That's exactly why city-names alone aren't sufficient as evidence for a civ's inclusion. But Persepolis in particular was a very Persian city. The only other civs that ruled over it AFAIK are the Greeks (very briefly, during the reign of Alexander the Great) and the Romans. IMHO seeing Persepolis in a screenshot is a strong clue that the Persians are included, though it's still no certainty. For Babylon and Nippur and other cities that are actually located in Mesopotamia (Persepolis lies well outside it as you no doubt know), I agree that this is by no means a guarantee that the founder-civ is included, though the possibility exists and shouldn't be ignored.

Joseph,
Thanks. I don't think money should be too much of a concern for Firaxis. If it was, then the Koreans, Canadians and Dutch (among others) would also 'have to' be included. Besides, Civ3 is even among non-TBS players one of the most anticipated games of the year (or next year ), Firaxis will have to try very hard to not make Civ3 a big hit (see Diablo 2: it s*cked yet it sold). So it's not really necessary for Firaxis to let Marketing pick the civs.

But even if I'm all wrong, your reasoning still can't be used in this thread as an argument to include the Japanese rather than the Mongols. It's by no means hard evidence and IMHO hardly counts as a clue either; it's mere speculation.

[me_irate]

I don't believe that the carthagains should be in the game. I believe the phoenecians should be. Carthage was but a colony that took over the remaining Phoenecian empire after they fell to alexander. Phoenecians were probley the greatest seafarers of ancient time and clearly controlled the seas.

another note i believe the japenese deserve a place far more than the mongols. They are better represented as barbarians that roam in hoards not a civilization.

[me_irate]

Originally posted by Locutus
The only other civs that ruled over it AFAIK are the Greeks (very briefly, during the reign of Alexander the Great) and the Romans.

Also didn't the Selucid greeks controll Persepolis for a time after alexanders death? Or did they lose it right afterward to rebellion? And i also had it in my mind that one of the Arab nations controlled it in ancient times as well this might not be correct though, i cant rember for sure.

[TechWins]

I know, but that doesn't mean I (or anyon else) have to agree. Personally I think it's quite possible to have 32 civs and still make them all unique. You just shouldn't include too many similar civs (FE Assyrian, Babylonian, Sumerian, Persian, etc), but more not-so-obvious but still very important civs like the Ethiopians, Hebrew, Khmer, Bantu, Polish, Arabs, Polynesians, etc.

No, of course you don't have to agree with it. I was just simply explaining the fact why there are so little amount of civs. I would like to have 32 civs as well. With the Brazil, Incas, Aztecs (not suer if they're in the selected 16), either Turkey or the Ottoman Empire (whatever you want to call them), and many others. I want to have more western hemisphere civs because there is a lack of them. Not that I neccesarily would like to play with them it's just that they should try to balance out the civs for each continent. Obviously the European area should have the most because there are many civs in that area that deserve to be in (i.e. English, French, Germans, Spanish, Vikings, Polish, Romans, Greek, and many others).