Government civics
Legal civics
Labor civics
Economy civics
Religion civics
Terrain improvements
Wonders
Leader traits
Military units
Civ diaries
The Dutch Republic. A playtest of the conventional “cottage economy” metagame for Civ IV; thoughts on the vanilla game as a morality play for liberal triumphalism.
Portugal Pluricontinental. A less jaundiced, and much more critical retelling of the story of capitalism, foregrounding plunder, plantations, and corporate plutocracy.
Turtle Island Confederacy. A playtest of new game mechanics involving labor autonomy, environmentalism, and forest preserves. The first real exercise in political imagination, of thinking about other, very possible worlds.
Zulu Peoples’ Union. An exercise in exporting revolutions, featuring great propagandists, peoples’ revolts, and small, self-sufficient communes.
Holy Theban Empire. An extrapolation of what a temple economy and hydraulic despotism, and a world shaped by religion, might look like into the 21st century.
Machinery from Oracle – Monotheism from India – Compass – Optics – Literature – Currency from India – Calendar form Mali – monarchy from Portugal – Music – Code of Laws from China – Civil Service – Drama from Mali – Feudalism – Construction from Greece – Theology from Portugal – Guilds – Horseback Riding from China – Banking – Paper – Education
Cities
6th: Hamburg joins the Dutch Republic from Germany 640 BCE (286)
7th: Cuman captured from Barbarians 610 BCE (289)
8th: Rotterdam founded 20 (352)
9th: Aachen captured from Holy Roman Empire 260 (376)
10th: Augsburg joins the Dutch Republic from Germany, after previously being conquered from Holy Roman Empire 585 (417)
11th: Mainz captured from Holy Roman Empire, 830 (466)
Wonders
The Colossus built in Amsterdam, 480 BCE (302)
The Pyramids built in Amsterdam, 110 BCE (339)
Hanging Gardens built in Amsterdam, 380 (388) with 8 cities
Shwedagon Paya built in Amsterdam, 625 (425)
Great Library built in Amsterdam, 765 (453)
Great People
1st GP: Great Scientist; Academy of Amsterdam established 730 BCE (277)
2nd GP: Great Engineer; Pyramids built 110 BCE (339)
3rd GP: Great Scientist 390 (389)
4th GP: Great Artist from Music 540 (408); 1st Golden Age 570 (414)
5th GP: Great Scientist 665 (433); Academy of Visigoth built 675 (435)
Wars
War on Holy Roman Empire, at the request of Germany: 80 (358) – HRE destroyed at the Battle of Mainz 830 (466)
War on France, to win support of New World civs: 515 (403) – peace from random event 765 (453)
War on Ottomans, at the request of England: 760 (452) – peace from random event 880 (472)
Golden Age
1st Golden Age: 570 (414), from Great Artist granted by Music
Revolutions
Revolution of 570 (414): Universal Suffrage, Organized Religion, Judaism
Revolution of 640 (428): Bureaucracy and Free Religion
Other key events
First circumnavigation by the Dutch: 500 (400)
Apostolic Palace established by Jewish civs at 930 (486); Portugal wins residency
Metal Casting – Mysticism – Meditation – Priesthood – Masonry – Sailing – Mathematics – Alphabet from Portugal – Animal Husbandry from Holy Roman Empire – Hunting and Iron Working from Mali – Aesthetics – Polytheism and Archery from Greece – Machinery from Oracle
Cities
3rd: The Hague founded
4th: Visigoth captured from Barbarians 1130 BCE (237)
5th: Phrygian captured 960 BCE (254)
Trade-based thalassocracy - plantations and the origin of capitalism - privateering and primitive accumulation - colonies as markets - corporations as a weapon - structural adjustment
Capital that generates lots of great persons and commerce through a combination of environmentalism and the bonuses it confers on old-growth forest preserves, and the national park national wonder
Priestly caste Lots of priest specialists can be assigned because of shrines that are concentrated in one city
Palace economy. Angkor Wat means Priests are productive, there is a mutually-reinforcing reliance on assigning Priests...but Priests eventually become obsolete
Hydraulic despotism
Great priests direct research - found all religions - go on religious wars -
Cottage economy as the safe conventional play - trade-offs introduced in the Political Imagination mod - lower production from autonomy, lower experience for units... etc.
Playing the game as it was meant to be played. That is, as a parable for Western liberal triumphalism. Two components to this:
1.) That wealth and well-being is best achieved through the guarantee of personal rights and freedoms---to participate in politics and express oneself, to practice one’s religion (or irreligion) without prejudice, to own and improve personal property, and to make decisions about one’s own life.
2.) Value of science and experts.
In political thought, this could be expressed as Isaiah Berlin’s Two Concepts of Freedom.
Playtest whether the vanilla play is still viable.
Rely on technological edge in warfare rather than numbers or promotions
Low Upkeep.
-10% Production in all Cities.
+25% Great Person birth rate.
-3 XP for new units.
-25% Worker improvement build speed.
Cottages and Preserves grow at normal speed.
Prerequisite: none.
Synergies, anti-synergies, and trade-offs
-10% Production in all Cities.
Autonomy with Organized Religion
Autonomy with State Property
Spiritual Civs.
-3 XP for new units.
For instance,
A unit built in a city with a Barracks (+3 XP) would begin with 0 XP.
A mounted unit built in a city with a Stable (+2 XP) would begin with 0 XP.
A mounted unit built in a city with both a Barracks and a Stable would begin with (3+2) - 3 XP, or 2 XP.
A unit built in a city with a settled Great General (+2 XP) without a Barracks would begin with 0 XP.
For these reasons, it makes sense for early-game militaristic civs to switch away from Autonomy to Slavery. This makes more storytelling sense to me:
However...
Cottages and Preserves grow at a normal rate.
In the Political Imagination Mod, Cottages and Preserves do not grow under Slavery, Serfdom, and Caste System.
To my mind, Cottages and Preserves represent landscapes that are created by free people.
The most obvious historical basis is the “freedom of the city” of medieval Europe: that town-dwellers are free to own and trade property.
But this mechanic is also meant as an in-game abstraction of other places and periods of the pre-modern world that were shaped not by rigidly hierarchical societies, nor by centralized authorities.
Are there examples of this?
Rice terraces! Oak savannah! Terra preta!
For civs whose economies are based on Cottages and Preserves, it might make sense to eventually transition to Emancipation.
+25% Great Person birth rate.
The point I wish to make here is that the Western Enlightenment is not the only conception of human freedom in human history. There are notions of freedom that arose , and from very different traditions of thought.
Secondly, that there is an “epistemic violence” in the Western Enlightenment. An erasure of the diversity of forms of human organization, and a consequent denial of the diversity of forms that imagination can take. At the heart of both is the insistence of the Western Enlightenment on its own self-image as the only legitimate way to see human nature and human society, on the basis that it is the only way that is based on science and reason.
The other implication: in as much as there are other bases of human liberty and potential in the past, there are also other bases for human liberty and potential into the future.
Further reading and related concepts
Graeber and Wengrow on the myth of the stupid savage
Despotism
Low Upkeep.
+20% Food in Capital.
-10% Food in all Cities.
Hereditary Rule – no change
Low Upkeep.
+1 Happiness per Unit stationed in a City.
Representation
High Upkeep, from Medium.
+2 Science per Specialist, down from +3.
+5 Happiness in largest Cities, up from +3.
Police State
High Upkeep.
+50% Great General emergence.
-50% War Weariness.
+25% Unit Production.
-50% Great People emergence.
-50% Culture in all Cities.
Universal Suffrage
Medium Upkeep.
Can spend Gold to hurry production in a City.
+1 Production from Town.
Democracy now requires Liberalism.
Barbarism
Low Upkeep.
+10% Production and Commerce in Capital.
+1 Gold per Specialist.
Vassalage
High Upkeep.
+2 XP for Units built in all Cities.
Free units, scaled with number of Cities.
-25% Great Person birth rate.
Bureaucracy
High Upkeep.
+50% Production and Commerce in Capital.
-25% Great Person birth rate.
Nationhood
No Upkeep.
+25% Espionage in all Cities
+4 Happiness from Barracks, up from +2.
Can Draft a number of Units per turn, scaled with size of map.
To do: move non-national culture anger from globaldefines to civicinfos, and then have a higher value for Nationhood.
Free Speech
Low Upkeep.
+100% Culture in all Cities.
+2 Commerce from Towns.
+25% War Weariness, up from 0.
-2 Happiness from Jail, Intelligence Agency, Security Bureau, and Scotland Yard.
One of the things I had found the most bothersome about vanilla Beyond the Sword is how the AI civs automatically shift to Slave societies as soon as they research Bronze Working.
There is an implied teleology here: that there is a direction to human history, that this direction is one of convergence.
Societies progress along a line,
Social evolutionism, a sense of inevitability, that things are always getting better, and the implicit point that our society here and now is thus better than all other societies in the past.
The concept of “metanarrative” should help clarify this.
The game does provide a disclaimer that new civics are not necessarily better than the old civics. But for this to be true, the game mechanics need to reflect the point.
1. There has to be some trade-off: both choices should present both pros and cons.
Evidently, with Bronze Working and Slavery, the game seems to be saying that this isn’t the case: retaining Tribalism confers no advantage over Slavery.
2. And, for the sake of storytelling and imagination, the choice should correspond to very different ways of organizing human life, and approximate societies that did exist,
Not only does this make for repetitive, uninteresting gameplay. It is also, according to recent archeological and anthropological evidence, wrong.
One of the aims of the Political Imagination Mod is to present interesting, generative dilemmas.
to the limited extent that Civ 4 could do so---that is, as imperfect abstractions that enhance gameplay, and prompt further curiosity and imagination.
Autonomy – formerly Tribalism
Low Upkeep.
-10% Production in all Cities.
+25% Great Person birth rate.
-3 XP for new units.
-25% Worker improvement build speed.
Slavery
Medium Upkeep.
Can sacrifice Population to hurry production in a City.
-2 Happiness from Barracks, Stable, and Granary.
Cottages and Preserves do not grow.
Serfdom
Medium Upkeep, from Low.
+50% Worker improvement build speed.
+2 Food, -2 Commerce from Farms.
+1 Food and +1 Commerce from Wineries.
+1 Food from Windmills.
-2 Food and +4 Commerce from Plantations.
-1 Food from Cottages, Lumbermills, Mines, Preserves, Quarries, Watermills, Wells, and Workshops.
-1 Happiness from Castle, Courthouse, Granary, Grocer, and Market.
Cottages and Preserves do not grow.
Caste System
Medium Upkeep.
Unlimited Artists, Merchants, and Scientists.
+1 Production from Workshop.
-1 Happiness from Library, University, and Observatory.
-2 Happiness from Academy and Oxford University.
-2 Production under Environmentalism.
Cottages and Preserves do not grow.
Emancipation
Low Upkeep.
+25% War Weariness.
-4 Happiness from Barracks.
-1 Happiness penalty for Civs that do not adopt Emancipation.
+100% Growth for Cottages and preserves.
Low Upkeep
No State Religion.
+2 Happiness per Religion in a City; up from +1 in vanilla game.
+50% Science in all Cities; up from +10% in vanilla game.
Prerequisite: Liberalism, or control over Shwedagon Paya.
In the Political Imagination Mod, Free Religion is a facet of a morally ambiguous dilemma involving Liberalism.
Free Religion now confers a 50% research bonus on all cities. At the same time, all technologies from Liberalism onward also cost 50% more. Therefore, to research Industrial, Modern, and Future era techs at a normal pace, you must adopt Free Religion.
However, Free Religion can only be adopted either by owning the Shwedagon Paya, or by researching Liberalism.
Once your civ researches Liberalism, the following are obsoleted:
each religion’s Shrine,
the Spiral Minaret,
the University of Sankore,
the Apostolic Palace,
the Sistine Chapel,
the (modified) Kremlin,
the Pentagon,
Mount Rushmore,
Castles.
This means you can either have research at a normal pace, or have shrine income/strong espionage/additional XP and reduced war weariness—not both.
In other words, you are now forced to choose between a late-game strategy involving Liberalism, and therefore freedom of belief, and scientific rationalism at the heart of society—or illiberal strategies centred on late-game religion, espionage, and militarism.
The only way to adopt Free Religion without researching Liberalism is to own the Shwedagon Paya.
Synergies and anti-synergies
Cottage societies. Universal Suffrage, Free Speech, and Emancipation also now require Liberalism to be researched.
These civics are complementary:
Emancipation doubles the rate at which Cottages grow,
Universal Suffrage grants +1 Production from Towns,
Free Speech gives +2 Commerce from Towns and doubles Culture output for all cities.
Towns become efficient engines for producing Culture, Research, and Gold, if running Free Market, and its +10% Gold bonus.
This is the “cottage economy” of the vanilla game.
There is also a path-dependence here:
Espionage buildings (Jails, Intelligence Agencies, Security Bureaus, and Scotland Yards) generate Anger under Free Speech.
Barracks generate Anger under Emancipation.
Both civics have a +25% War Weariness penalty.
A civ running both Free Speech and Emancipation would thus have high baseline anger in cities with military and espionage infrastructure, and run a +50% War Weariness penalty.
Furthermore, Liberalism also obsoletes some wonders associated with Espionage and warmongering.
This is the morally-ambiguous dilemma: would you play a Liberal civ and have rapid late-game research? Or would you forego Liberalism, and craft a late-game strategy based on religion, or espionage, or warfare?
Played games. Religion in the Dutch Republic.
Specialist-based societies based on Representation, Caste System, and Mercantilism. it is possible to use Free Religion in conjunction with gain a benefit from the specialist-based bonuses of the following civics:
Representation (+2 Research/specialist),
Caste System (unlimited Scientist specialists per city), and
However, Liberalism also obsoletes the specialist-based bonuses conferred by the Sistine Chapel and the Kremlin.
Further reading and related concepts
Ulrich Beck on the Risk Society
We Have Never Been Modern
A key anti-modernist tract? Sayyad Qutb. But you’ll also need to talk about how Qutbism and Deobandism etc are also very modern ideologies, with roots in the Enlightenment...
Enlightenment mythology (the idea that we owe the modern world to reason?)...enlightenment trauma (the denial of other realms of possibility / enlightenment is about reason, criticism, and public debate---but the “public” has never been universal, and often denies the worlds of othered peoples)...
Paganism
Low Upkeep.
+1 Happiness from each Forest, Jungle, and Oasis tile.
Organized Religion – no change
High Upkeep.
Can build Missionaries without Monastery.
+25% Production bonus for Buildings in Cities with State Religion.
Theocracy
Medium Upkeep.
+4 Happiness in Cities with State Religion.
+2 XP for Units built in Cities with State Religion.
-2 Happiness in Cities for each Religion other than the State Religion.
Religions other than State Religion cannot spread.
Pacifism – no change
No Upkeep.
+100% Great Person birth rate in Cities with State Religion.
+1 Gold Support Cost per Military Unit.
Free Religion
Low Upkeep
No State Religion.
+2 Happiness per Religion in a City.
+50% Science in all Cities.
Decentralization
Low Upkeep.
+100% city maintenance costs from distance to Capital.
+50% city maintenance costs from number of cities.
+1 Happiness from Granary, Aqueduct, Lighthouse, Harbor, Forge, Library, Market, and Courthouse.
Mercantilism
Medium Upkeep.
+1 free Specialist per City.
-1 Gold, +1 Science, and +1 Espionage per Specialist.
-1 Trade Routes per City.
No foreign Trade Routes, except with Vassals.
Foreign Corporations have no effect.
+10% Food in all Cities.
Free Market
Medium Upkeep.
-25% Maintenance for Corporations.
+10% Gold in all Cities.
+1 Trade Routes per City.
-2 Happiness from Customs House, Market, Grocer, Bank, Wall Street, and Corporation Headquarters.
-2 Health from Harbor, Airport, Factory, and Industrial Park.
State Property
Low Upkeep.
No Maintenance Costs from distance to Capital.
Corporations have no effect.
+10% Production in all Cities.
-8 Happiness in 6 largest cities.
-2 Health from Barracks, Drydock, Forge, and Factory.
Communism no longer requires Liberalism.
Environmentalism
Medium Upkeep.
+40% Maintenance for Corporations.
+6 Health in all Cities.
+2 Health from Public Transportation.
+1 Food, +1 Commerce from Forest Preserve.
+1 Food, +1 Production, +1 Commerce from Established Forest Preserve.
+1 Food, +2 Production, +1 Commerce from Mature Forest Preserve.
+2 Food, +2 Production, +1 Commerce from Old-Growth Forest Preserve.
-1 Food from Farm, Fishing Boats, Cottage, and Hamlet.
-2 Food from Village and Town.
-1 Food, -1 Production from Pasture.
-2 Production from Mine, Quarry, Offshore Platform, and Well.
+2 Commerce from Windmill.
Religion in the Dutch Republic Religion as a cultural tool.
Ancient era: 4000 - 1530 BCE
Dutch society was irreligious. No state religion, Paganism.
To the north, Aquigranan Meditation.
Indian Monotheism to the distant southwest
Classical era: 1530 - 740 BCE
1530 BCE (turn 197): began researching Mysticism, then Meditation, and then Priesthood
Mysticism was bound up with the Oracle race, which it lost.
Medieval era: 740 BCE - 1050
570 (turn 414): Organized Religion, Judaism
By the middle of the 4th century Aquisgranan Meditation had spread to four Dutch cities, and was the most widely-practiced belief in the Republic. Since 260 CE, the Dutch had also held control over Aachen, the Aquisgranan holy city, and the former capital of the Holy Roman Empire.
However, the Dutch Republic’s most important trade partners, most notably the Roman Empire, had adopted Indian Monotheism—as had its more belligerent neighbours, like the Russians and Zulu to the northeast. The only Aquigranan polity was the belligerent Holy Roman Empire to the north. In the interest of maintaining harmonious foreign relations, Indian Monotheism was adopted as the official religion during the Revolution of 570.
Despite the official adoption of Indian Monotheism, Aquigranan Meditation had a deeper influence on Dutch public life. As a compromise to Aquigranans, official support for its practice was one of the rights guaranteed in the Revolution of 570. This guarantee became the basis for official support of all religions, beliefs, and practices. Monastic missions of all faiths were officially sponsored, and religious buildings were also built at public expense. Eventually, these practices grew into secular cultural promotion policies that were adopted 800 years later, in the Liberal Revolution of 1370.
640 (turn 428): Free Religion, no state religion
A community of Aquigranans that had settled in Amsterdam also shaped public and official attitudes to the state, religion, science, and economics. In 625, they completed a major temple, Shwedagon Paya, in Amsterdam. Official Monotheism was abandoned in 640, in favour of an irreligious state. Along with the implementation of a civil service, the construction of the Great Library of Amsterdam in 765, and the long-standing Academy of Amsterdam (established in 730 BCE by a Great Scientist), this attitude of tolerance led to a flowering of Dutch science in Amsterdam that lasted until the Scientific Revolution of 1794.
Renaissance era: 1050 - 1542
Industrial era: 1542 - 1869
Modern era: 1869 -
1872 (turn 891): Mahabodhi built in Buddhist holy city
Finally, Aquigranans also laid the foundations for Dutch environmental management. The former Holy Roman capital, Aachen, became a second center for learning with the establishment of the Academy of Aachen in 1265. The northern region, comprising former Holy Roman lands, remained heavily-forested and sparsely-populated; Aachen became the centre of the Carolignian Forest National Park established in 1800, which drew scientists and leading practitioners of Aquigranan Meditation to the city. The Aquigranan Mahabodhi was established in 1872, and became a centre for redistributive ecological thought.
