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roquijad
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Santiago
Nov 1999
time: 05:15
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Yellowdaddy: I'm all for it when it comes to aesthetics and flavor. We can easily add races, FE, in order for the game to look different (different faces for characters, for instance), provided race isn't relevant for anything else. IOW, we can add races, but not racism if we don't want to go into more complexity.
If we want the aesthetics, then it's simple and cheap. If we want races/languages as a game factor, then it's more complexity to add.
Different arquitectures of cities was a nice addition to civ2. I liked it because it made a nice visual effect. But arquitecture was irrelevant in game terms. Would you accept that for languages or races?
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There is a problem with your reasoning about languages from a modeling point of view.
Let me be a little bit boring:
What we're doing here is trying to model differences among people. And we're doing that because evidence shows difference has an effect on historic evolution. (I know this sounds very basic, but please follow me). From a modeling view point, the simplest way to account for differences is to put just one variable, labeling each group with a unique identifier. Call it a name. Then you can have, FE, "persians" and "greeks". Voila, you have created difference.
By doing that you can solve some basic problems. The game can compare labels, discover they're different, and do something with it, like increasing unhappiness in persians when greeks invade them. All you need is the label. It's enough to represent in the game that basic evidence that says people is pissed when other people with other ethnicity comes in.
But please note we don't really care why unhappiness increased. It's important to see that it's perfectly possible that the increase of unhappiness is due to differences of language, of race, of clothing style, of religious customs, etc or a combination of all the above.
The sociological explanations for why people is pissed when others come in is totaly irrelevant when modeling. If it's because they talk different, dress different or simply because they call themselves with a different name, we don't care. We have the effect in the game and that's all we needed.
As a corollary, note the ethnic label, by being the only descriptive variable of people differences in our persians vs greeks example, is including every possible human difference. And since it's the only source of difference, it's used for any possible conflict that comes from social differences.
Next step:
A model that uses only one descriptive variable, as in our example above, can represent in the game some evidence we've seen in the world, like the greeks invading the persians, but fails in other cases. Another piece of our evidence shows that persinas who followed ideas of Zoroaster were discriminated when ruled by muslim persians. To represent this, we have two options. First, keep using the labels (stay with our "one-variable handles all differences" strategy): instead of having just "persians", we'll have "muslim persians" and "zoroastrian persians" as new labels. That way the game can compare labels, realize they're different and apply the discrimination. The other option is to add another variable: a second label, used for religions. So you'd have something like:
Ethnicity: persian
Religion: muslim
--and --
Ethnicty: persian
Religion: zoroastrian
Why this second option is better (and therefore used in the model)? Because persians are not the only muslims in the game. We have arab muslims, mongol muslims, etc. If an empire has all those peoples (and others non-muslims) under its control and discriminates all but muslims, then our labeling strategy fails in recognizing where are differences and where are things in common. The game wouldn't be able to effectively apply the discrimination to non-muslims. Therefore we need separeted variables. IOW, we need to model religion.
At this point, having two variables, it's important to note that the first descriptive variable (label) now includes "every possible human difference but religion". Language, race, etc, are there, while religion has its own descriptive variable and is used exclusively for that purpose.
In general, you're gonna have to keep including variables like religion as more evidence you want to incorporate in the game, but only as long as your first descriptive variable (the label), which includes everything that hasn't a specific descriptor, fails to be useful.
So let's see. You say:
quote:
the Japanese during their pre-WW2 occupation of Korea actively tried to delete the Korean language from history, forcing Koreans to adopt Japanese names, and think of themselves as Japanese. |
Do we need a language-specific descriptive variable for this? No. Note that if japanese were having a hostile attitute towards korean for, let's say, they way they dressed, then the effect in game terms is pretty much the same: on screen you'd see complains by the koreans, protests maybe, reduced unhappiness, etc. Even more: if japanese were sucessful, then slowly we'd see koreans transforming an becoming japanese. And again, it didn't really matter if they were changing their language or their clothing.
For the model, it's more than enough to use the label to account for that. The mere fact that there're "koreans" and "japanese" is enough for the game-engine to realize there's a difference and then apply the desired discrimination.
As opposed to the persians example, when I said we needed an extra variable for religion because persians are not the only muslims, in the korean vs japanese case that doesn't happen. The only speakers of korean are koreans. Korean language is so intimately related to the korean people and culture as a whole, that for modeling purposes it makes no sense to add a new variable. The ethnic label by itself and by definition, includes every specific characteristic of koreans as a specific people. And so, we don't need to model language.
Let's see this other example: Chileans and peruvians both speak spanish. You have two different ethnicities but one language. Do we need to define a language-specific variable to account for this? No. Because there's nothing to model really. Who cares if they speak the same language? Since we stated before that we'd only add variables if known evidence is not correctly incorporated in the game, then What evidence are you trying to incorporate in this chileans vs. peruvians case? If you want to speculate that because of the same language they get along better, that's simply false (I'm chilean, BTW).
One last example: During the age when most of modern european nations were born, roughly the 19th century, different languages coexisting within the same "new nation" was an "issue". In order to build a nation, this heterogenity had to be eliminated. But the issue of language was really a simplification. People from different parts of what today is France, FE, not only had different languages, but also different customs. Furthermore, most of them didn't even call themselves "french". They weren't "the same people with different languages". They really were different ethinicities. In the north they had more nordic and english influences, while in the south were influenced by the spanish and "italians" (they didn't exist as "italians" yet, though). Sure they had similarities, but Weren't they equally similar also to spaniards, germans and other peoples near by?. They were different "tribes". Not only spoke different, called themselves different (typically with a local/provincial name). Language again, then, appears as one more difference of different ethnic entities. When it comes to modeling, again, I don't need to individualize language because it's enough to have them labeled as different ethnic groups. The base of France was a set of different ethnic groups, not a set of french peoples with different languages.
If you're still awake at this point, this is what I've been trying to tell you: if you say we need to incorporate language as a specific "thing" (variable), then you have to show me a few examples where the mere use of the ethnic name (label) fails to incorporate some relevant evidence seen in history.
I believe that's a hard task. The problem is, like in the korean vs japanese example, that every time language difference plays a role, different cultural profile in general is really playing a role. And as such, a broader descriptor, the label, is enough because includes language.
Cheers
Rodrigo
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yellowdaddy
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Saoir-Ebhor, Sasainn a tuath, Rialtas Aontach
Apr 2003
time: 05:15
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thanks for taking the time to reply so concisely.
ok
quote:
Different arquitectures of cities was a nice addition to civ2. I liked it because it made a nice visual effect. But arquitecture was irrelevant in game terms. Would you accept that for languages or races? |
well, on one level, sure something is better than nothing.
quote:
Let's see this other example: Chileans and peruvians both speak spanish. You have two different ethnicities but one language. Do we need to define a language-specific variable to account for this? No. Because there's nothing to model really. Who cares if they speak the same language? Since we stated before that we'd only add variables if known evidence is not correctly incorporated in the game, then What evidence are you trying to incorporate in this chileans vs. peruvians case? If you want to speculate that because of the same language they get along better, that's simply false (I'm chilean, BTW). |
well for a start, it must make espionage and war, and depending on the stage of development, some economic effects. almost anyone from a latin, and particularly a spanish-speaking country, could easily merge into another unnoticed - sure latin americans are often of mixed ancestry, but i bet you could pretend to be Nicaraguan or Paraguayan without as much difficulty as a Korean or AustralianAborigine?
i think most people can bgo along with the espionage and pacification effects.
quote:
One last example: During the age when most of modern european nations were born, roughly the 19th century, different languages coexisting within the same "new nation" was an "issue". In order to build a nation, this heterogenity had to be eliminated. But the issue of language was really a simplification. People from different parts of what today is France, FE, not only had different languages, but also different customs. Furthermore, most of them didn't even call themselves "french". They weren't "the same people with different languages". They really were different ethinicities. In the north they had more nordic and english influences, while in the south were influenced by the spanish and "italians" (they didn't exist as "italians" yet, though). Sure they had similarities, but Weren't they equally similar also to spaniards, germans and other peoples near by?. They were different "tribes". Not only spoke different, called themselves different (typically with a local/provincial name). Language again, then, appears as one more difference of different ethnic entities. When it comes to modeling, again, I don't need to individualize language because it's enough to have them labeled as different ethnic groups. The base of France was a set of different ethnic groups, not a set of french peoples with different languages. |
this bit i find some areas whcih don't quite fit together for me. i'm confused - are you talking about the 19th century or the Dark ages... only some nations emerged in the 19th c, and it's not really the point i'm making.
essentially, although you've made good points, you haven;t really addressed what is to me the main concept behind the languages and race idea, IMO [please include a glossary of abbreviations!!!]
the Japs and Koreans in the scenario you discuss, yes by this time they are quite auchthonous ethnic groups. so i can see what you mean about how language isn't such an issue - i pulled that one out as an example of a linguistic equivalent to a jihad.
Peruvians and Chileans are post colonial nations, and on the 3-stage Ethnic Evolution tree i propose, they wuold be categorised as Nations, not Tribes or Peoples.
i think we're possibly talking about two different types of game - the historical scenario - and the - dawn of civilisation - game. historical scenarios may not require a full world map, and may be more to do with military things - like a gulf war scenario which might have a huge middle east map, and not leave you so much control over running a country if you were playing the Allies for instance.
What i mean by the
"3 stage ethnic evolution tree"
is that it provides a structure which more or less simulates the evolution of peoples into tribes and then nations.
go back to 4000 bc or so, there were much less people, much less languages, and much less mixing. a language family, or proto-language defined the early peoples, whether Indoeuro-Hittites or Tibeto-Burmans.
as these people move around, and migrate, due to cenvironment chages, or pressure from other peoples, so they have the potential to split by one grouop going in a differnt direction: as the Tocharians did when they went east and all the other Indo-European tirbes went west. or be isolated by geography - as the Hungarians have following their migration from Western Siberia.
then we have some tribes, who have the same origin [their origin people automatically becoming a tribe as soon as it splits], and some peoples who have not split - and who either splite later or never split and become isolates (in which case their language is likely to be less of a factor in differentiating them, admittedly).
as these tribes bcome more settled they evolve into nations - some based around a location, some around a personality, some around a religion. from an are occupied by a tribe or peopel who become settled, any number of nations i.e.: prinicpalities, duchies kingdoms whatever, cansprnig up, each with the same tribal language - as happened in Germany. through history thesae nations can merge and split.
the next factor not taken into account is the merging.
what happened when rome conquered the mediterranian, and then was overrun by germanic and other tribes?
new merged ethno-linuistic groups emerged - the beginnings of the Frecnh, Spanish, Romanians, Portuguese, Italians, Rhaetians, Catalonians, Istrians, etc...
sure they are a mixture of slightly different things in slightyl different amounts, but for the purposes of a game it needen't be any more than 2 or 3 ethno-linguistic influences.
what happened when the Turks came to Anatolia? when the Hungarians came to Pannonia? when the English came to Britain? they became the overlords of the poeple that lived there, and their language, but not their race, became the dominant feature.
What happened when the Machus conquered China, or when the Ghurids conquered India?
they became the ruling class, but their ethno-linguistic identity was subsumed into the ethnicity of the poepl they ruled. except in the Ghurid's case where they left a muslim aftereffect in northern india.
these are 3 different ways in which tribes and nations can merge.
and thus you can get all your diversity on nations simulated.
if you played the Koreans, and set up colonies in Kamchatka, or elsewhere, a new language could emerge given the right amount of time, there could be any number of Korean languages potentially if you were successful in spreading your Koreans around.
what i'm talking about is at least a reasonably accurate order of and relationship between EG's.
and by using a set list of people, tribe and nation names, plus a way of generating new unique ones to simulate the way naions evlove.
so that you are not sending roman battle tanks against the spanish - which is a bit crappy in terms of realsim.
this is in a nutshell what i'd like to avoid.
i'd like to see nations evolving. language is one of the ways of depiccting and structuring that. i like the idea of race too - if you play the Iroqouis and colonise Francem and you're future generations atart to look a bit mixed as well as having evolved a new Iroqoiis language with a french influence.
what about the ideas of losing data when you destroy a linguistically isolated civilisation? i'd like to see the automaticness of - "i capture your cities so i can automatically get all your technology and map info etc..."
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LDiCesare
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La Ferté sous Jouarre France
Jan 2001
time: 05:15
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Rodrigo's points remain valid. If you consider Romans invading Etruscans, then Iberia, Gaul, Romania, etc. you say that you want to model language so the local celtic (f.e.) language is replaced by a latin language. What Rodrigo says is that what happens is broader than language replacement, in the sense language but also customs, ways of dressing, culture in general, is changed. All these changes can be put together by saying the Gaul ethnic group slowly turns into a Gallo-Roman ethnic group. When Gaul later splinters, each remaining EG can split from the rest (giving rise to Belgians, Lorrains, Provencaux, Catalans...). Each of these has its own language, with its own peculiarites, but the only thing which may be needed IMO is something that says these ethnic labels are "close".
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yellowdaddy
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Saoir-Ebhor, Sasainn a tuath, Rialtas Aontach
Apr 2003
time: 05:15
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yes, i agree with that, culture, dress is all true. they are the other parts of the concept of ethnicity.
i wouldn't say replaced, influences, evolves into, by merger, and then splinters. that's my angle. you get the holy roman empire after.
i don't think that's quite what he was on about.
the problem is when you start treating Gauls as being as different from Britons or Lusitanains as they are from Vikings, Mongolians, or Bantu for that matter.
we know that most groups are affiliated to others, and language is the common thread which makes it possible to measure that. religion can change, as can race to an extent. i think there should be a way of shwong that Gauls are more similar to Britons than they are to Romans or Greeks for example.
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LDiCesare
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La Ferté sous Jouarre France
Jan 2001
time: 05:15
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quote:
i think there should be a way of shwong that Gauls are more similar to Britons than they are to Romans or Greeks for example. |
I agree with that, but what you want looks like "language families" (celtic vs. latin, where Gaul, Kymric, Irish are different languages of celt family) more than languages by themselves. You could thus say an EG is defined by a sort of family tree which can change: Gaul is part of Celt, part of Indo European. Then Gallo Roman is a change of that Celt EG into a Latin EG. These concepts can remain without explicitly modelling language, although language transmission/evolution is what would allow us to model how the changes occur.
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yellowdaddy
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Saoir-Ebhor, Sasainn a tuath, Rialtas Aontach
Apr 2003
time: 05:15
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well, it's sounds like we're coming closer to agreement.
quote:
You could thus say an EG is defined by a sort of family tree which can change: Gaul is part of Celt, part of Indo European. Then Gallo Roman is a change of that Celt EG into a Latin EG. ... although language transmission/evolution is what would allow us to model how the changes occur. |
this is more or less what i've been getting at with the ELG (Ethno-Linguistic Group) tree as opposed to the more ambiguous EG (ethnic Group) distinction.
quote:
These concepts can remain without explicitly modelling language, |
what exactly do you think i mean when you talk about 'modelling language'?
the only idea i had related to that was a way of generating completely new names for places/geographical areas, by having a set of vocabulary for geographical features in each language group... things like "city", "port", Lake", "mountain", "river", "fort" - that would be a way of avoiding generating names of real tribes, cities and countries, but still maintaining the sense of cultural link.
eg when i play as the japanese, i avoid using the set list of names, but make up relevant descrptive city names in japanese, eg: Nishimori - west forest, Kitazaki - north cape. Yamagawa - mountain river. thus these could potentially evolve into the new names of provinces and nations and even new Ethnicities.
i have to admit, envisaging the potential for mutating the vocabs in set ways - like changing vowels to simulate language change:
Kitazaki -> Ketozoke
or consonants as well
Kitazaki - Gedojoge
i think it'd be a novel and interesting feature, i don't know how hard it would be to code in, but it doesn't strike me as being so hard - just a simple command to change letters to the next one along on a universal chart when ELG change occurs.
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LDiCesare
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La Ferté sous Jouarre France
Jan 2001
time: 05:15
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By 'mocelling' I ment mostly adding a languag variable in addition to the ethnic group name.
I like the proposal for city names. This may require a little bit of grammar (limited to object before or after complement), and a set of adjectives/names. Thus Greenland, Colorado, Texas, Dublin could be Pais Verde, Coloured Land, Roseaux, Black(?) hill. City names however often evolved a lot (e.g. Lyons in France is actually Lugdun(um) - Lug's hill).
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yellowdaddy
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Saoir-Ebhor, Sasainn a tuath, Rialtas Aontach
Apr 2003
time: 05:15
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quote:
By 'mocelling' I ment mostly adding a languag variable in addition to the ethnic group name. |
I don't see how this statement fits with this statement:
quote:
You could thus say an EG is defined by a sort of family tree which can change: Gaul is part of Celt, part of Indo European. Then Gallo Roman is a change of that Celt EG into a Latin EG. ... although language transmission/evolution is what would allow us to model how the changes occur. |
Ethnicity and therefore Ethnic groups are defined by the following characteristics:
Race,
Language,
Religion,
Culture/Style,
an EG can made up of any combination of shared or unique nembers of these components.
you can have:
two EG's with only 1 shared component, such as religion only, e.g.:
Russians and Ethiopians
Race: different
Language: different
Religion: same
Style: different
two EGs with 2 shared components, such as Turks and Persians
Race: same
language: different
religion: same
style: different
two EGs with 3 shared components, such as Aztec and Hopi
Race: same
language: same
religion: different
style: same
or 2 EG's who share all 4 components, such as Spanish and Portuguese
Race: same
language: same
religion: same
style: same
..............
it's not completely accurate to say that the Gallo-Romans change from Gaul to Roman, (Celtic to Italic), they merge.
Gallo-Romans are x% Celtic and x% Italic.
the question is what if only some of the Gauls are influenced/integrated by the Romans in an alternative history scenario?
do they lose their entire affinity?
there may be some who adopt Roman style and/or religion, but retain their language - they shouldn't suddenly become a completely different EG? would the same be true for Indonesians arriving in Madagascar and merging with KiSwahili?
two different races - one does not absorb the other - they mix, they merge x% depending on ratio and segregation/integration.
Gaulish and early french languages existed side by side for quite a while before one group superceded the other.
linx:
http://www.sys.uea.ac.uk/~jrk/conlang.html
nb
http://hobbit.griffler.co.nz/introduction.html
http://www.cix.co.uk/~morven/breath.html
http://softrat.home.mindspring.com/germanic.html
the names of tribes should be based at least to an extent on language groups, some tribes in history belong to identical EG's, languages etc...
quote:
Greenland, Colorado, Texas, Dublin could be Pais Verde, Coloured Land, Roseaux, Black(?) hill. |
the city name evolution thing is not quite what you seem to think...
i'm talking about how you start with a PEOPLE, and then it splits and/or merges evolving as a TRIBE, and NATION - which can have identical EG features such as Germany and Austria.
i thought it was best to squeeze them all into the same numbers of potentials - each people can divide into 6 Tribes, each tribe into any (practical) number of Nations.
.quote:
City names however often evolved a lot (e.g. Lyons in France is actually Lugdun(um) - Lug's hill). |
the evolution in names can depict gradual evolution in languae.
you might start with the Nordics,a nd then when the split event occurs, you select which branch you wish to continue playing with, from the chaoice:
Nordics:
Norse (includes vikings)
Svears (includes varangians)
Goths (includes gepids)
Lombards (includes burgundians, vandals)
Alemans (inclusdes franks, sueves)
Ingaevons (includes dutch, saxons, frisians, english)
to depict this, we can see the placenames change:
x
Vitland
Wichtlanda
x
Weissland
Whiteland
Ostbjerg
Ostborg
Ostabaurgs
x
Ostbruck
Oostburg/Eastborough
(i'm not researching them all right now, but you catch my drift)
it needn't be 100% authentic, especially if we're on random worlds, just a sense that a new identity has formed
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Station/6297/index.html
completely new branches could exist, given a sense of prescence by simple alterations to consonants and vowels as in the Jap example above.
from these new names - completely new EGs could evolve.
Wistalendians - from that Whiteland example
or
Ustabrokish - from the other one - just examples
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yellowdaddy
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Saoir-Ebhor, Sasainn a tuath, Rialtas Aontach
Apr 2003
time: 05:15
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another thing i thought about, was culture can be rather like languge - if you look at cambodia. thailand souther vietnam laos, and a bit of burma, there's a cultural homogeneity - more noticable when you travel up to north vietnam where the peopel become colder, and the vibe is more chinese.
i dunno what i'm getting at really
i suppose it's if you are factoring cultural victory things...
it shows that peoples' culture can be pretty similar to other neighbouring peoples without sharing language or even religion completely.
south and north vietnam are really markedly different in their ways. but you don't see the south being controlled in any way by it's neighbours - who are culturally the same essentially.
so a cultural or non-military victory, needs more than culture/style - so i'm referring back the the division of ethnicity into language, religion and style. more same elements are needed for a non-military victory - they need to take on the language, religion AND cultural-style to complete the process and be able to switch loyalty from their own govt to another... but i think their needs to be an economic stimulus - that must be the final and/or biggest stimulus. the poorer they become, the more they revolt - people will put up with a lot of stuff if there's plenty of money about.
but i'm not a prograsmmer, so don't expect fancy logorithms or owt for this!
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yellowdaddy
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Saoir-Ebhor, Sasainn a tuath, Rialtas Aontach
Apr 2003
time: 05:15
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ok,
so what do you propose for how to achieve a cultural victory?
quote:
This just seems needlessly complicated to me. 99% of all players won't care about the distinctions you're making IMO. |
which ones? all of them, or some of them?
the tribe splitting and merging thing doesn't seem to conflict with the game. it's merely adding a structure which allows a dimension of some degree of realism.
i think it's entirely compatible. and it's an idea that i really like. it ties in with the idea of language being as equally important as religion.
quote:
we always need to keep a watch on the game vs world-simulator aspects and ensure that stuff we put in is fun and gives the player bang for the buck. |
does this mean you're opposed the whole concept of world simulation aspects, or that you think that most players aren't likely to be interested in world simulation aspects?
if the latter, then i would say that i can see lots of quite popular sim games (and i don't just means the Sims!).
if the former, then i'm a bit puzzled because there are bits of this game that seem pretty world-simmy to me - the politics and characters elements. I like the ideas in these, but i worry that they will be somehow incomplete without a few other simmy aspects to complement them.
sure i'm presenting some of my ideas in an overly complicated way perhaps. however, i'm really only testing the water, and i don't think they are all especially complicated. i'm sure you don't believe that 99% of civ-type players are just essentially wargamers?
i'd be willing to bet that it's more of a spectrum, with a significant percentage looking for SOME world-simulation aspects, though not necessarily always the same ones.
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yellowdaddy
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Saoir-Ebhor, Sasainn a tuath, Rialtas Aontach
Apr 2003
time: 05:15
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quote:
I'm not sure "cultural victory" has any real meaning. |
well, when i think of cultural victory i'm thinking of ideas related to "finlandisation" and "east germanisation"
as well has the way that the USA and Japan export their culture to an extent where hostile actions from culturally absorbed nations are inconceivable.
also i think of how arab/muslim, roman, greek, chinese, hindu, aztec etc cultures either export aspects of their identity which become a shared identity with other groups whilst retaining the central control of them. Mecca, Rome etc... and also how neighbours are absorbed - conquered by choice - like in the various dynasties of china, the tribes around the Aztecs or Egyptians. it's all in civ 3 - but it's just a bit simplistic.
but the idea is worthwhile - seduce some enemies/rivals, and destroy others.
quote:
Cultural splitting and merging is already planned. |
cool, but what are your thoughts on my attempts at structuring it in language groups?
essentially it's
1. just a way to avoid playing the Italians against the Romans or the Swedish against the Vikings - that kind of thing.
2. a way of generating unique new names for towns and nations etc... with a limited set of placename vocabs.
but coupled with having some racially related faces for characters - as i posted earlier, it could add a sense of authenticity: Malayo-Polynesians (Lapita) splitting into Malays, Madagascans, Filipinos, Maori (polynesians), Paiwans (aboriginal Taiwanese) and maybe Chams of the mekong delta area.
quote:
I like the simulation aspects when they add to the fun and immersion of the game. Simulation that just adds details that most players don't care about is what I am against. We have very few resources to push the project forward, and they need to go to things that are critical for player enjoyment first. After Clash 1.0 is out, then we can afford some nice-to-haves that don't do much for most players. |
i appreciate that.
I'd like/hope to see Clash 1 with
1. some of these racially identifiable faces - as i drew, and
2.the language tree for the tribes to evolve through, including the sets of placename vocabs related to each of the basic 60-70 language groups; and
3. some penalties/advantages for language - if only in espionage, and ability to capture information.
what are your thoughts on the placename generatin idea?
if you imagine 60-70 core ethno-linguistic groups that can be chosen from when playing a "from the dawn of time scenario".
and each with it's own set of placenames eg:
bay
forest
lake
river
hill
mountain
cape
gulf
swamp
desert
plateau/highland
plain
then some colours
then some adjectives:
big
little
long
short
wide
narrow
flat
beautiful
fertile
barren
hot
cold
high
low
valley
coast
that sort of thing.
a. are you into it?
b. how big could thes vocabs be?
c. how easy/hard would it be to make the individual letters of names on the list alter for a given dialect?
e.g.: every "d" becomes a "th" or every "a" becomes an "oi" that sort of thing - to give the illusion of evolution and relationships.
tribe A could have a city called
"Pankod"
and related tribe B using the same name components, but modified as a dialect:
"Poinkoth"
any thoughts?
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Mark_Everson
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Canton, MI
Jan 1970
time: 00:15
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quote:
Originally posted by yellowdaddy
well, when i think of cultural victory i'm thinking of ideas related to "finlandisation" and "east germanisation" (snip)
but the idea is worthwhile - seduce some enemies/rivals, and destroy others. |
Oh, I've got no problem with it if that's your definition.
quote:
cool, but what are your thoughts on my attempts at structuring it in language groups?
essentially it's
1. just a way to avoid playing the Italians against the Romans or the Swedish against the Vikings - that kind of thing. |
There is already a more flexible mechanism for this. Essentially cultures will have a parameter for how much they like another culture. I don't recall exactly where we discussed it, maybe in this same thread. My objection to your approach is sometimes the Latins Could hate the Romans, and your hard-baked language-based approach doesn't seem to be of any help there. If we have languages, and it seems we should, then I have no problem with language families. But tying them too strongly into the game seems premature. Peoples with the same language frequently hate each other. Language closeness is only one of many parameters in how peoples get along.
quote:
2. a way of generating unique new names for towns and nations etc... with a limited set of placename vocabs. |
Sure, seems doable, the short proposals you've made would certainly give some flavor to the game. If you want to make a detailed proposal that's fine. But it is way down on the coding list, which is why I'm not inclined to discuss it at length right now.
quote:
1. some of these racially identifiable faces - as i drew, and
2.the language tree for the tribes to evolve through, including the sets of placename vocabs related to each of the basic 60-70 language groups; and
3. some penalties/advantages for language - if only in espionage, and ability to capture information. |
That sounds fine by me. Does anyone object to my provisionally committing us to this? If so, speak up!
quote:
if you imagine 60-70 core ethno-linguistic groups that can be chosen from when playing a "from the dawn of time scenario".
(snip)
a. are you into it?
b. how big could thes vocabs be?
c. how easy/hard would it be to make the individual letters of names on the list alter for a given dialect?
e.g.: every "d" becomes a "th" or every "a" becomes an "oi" that sort of thing - to give the illusion of evolution and relationships.
tribe A could have a city called
"Pankod"
and related tribe B using the same name components, but modified as a dialect:
"Poinkoth" |
Seems doable, but I'm not sure we'd enough player enthusiasm to justify it in Clash 1.0. I as a player probably wouldn't notice all the clever things you would have happening in the background. Anyone have opinions?
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LDiCesare
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La Ferté sous Jouarre France
Jan 2001
time: 05:15
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I'm not for putting language evolution (gw -> b, etc.) in the game.
I want one of three kinds of names in my game:
- Historical names,
- Names that I can understand ("Big Wood"), be they in English, French, Quenya or a language I made up, but definitely in a language I know or can look up.
- Names I make up myself or picked up somewhere (for instance, 1, 2, 3, etc. are all names I used for cities in ICS civ2 games).
I am not sure seeing a series of names that don't look like anything they know will appeal players. For instance, it's ok if I speak breton to have a city called Gwynned, but to simulate all the language distorsions so it can be called Vannes after being invaded/conquered by French speakers seems pointless. These changes will hurt more than help as I'd rather have the names in my empire stay constant so I can better know what is what and where it is. If names evolve constantly, as they do IRL, it will be harder to fins out where things are. Same for foreign countries. You don't have to know how they call themselves, you just want to give them one name and let it stick.
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yellowdaddy
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Saoir-Ebhor, Sasainn a tuath, Rialtas Aontach
Apr 2003
time: 05:15
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ok
quote:
to simulate all the language distorsions so it can be called Vannes after being invaded/conquered by French speakers seems pointless. These changes will hurt more than help as I'd rather have the names in my empire stay constant so I can better know what is what and where it is. If names evolve constantly, as they do IRL, it will be harder to fins out where things are. Same for foreign countries. You don't have to know how they call themselves, you just want to give them one name and let it stick. |
I wasn't exactly envisaging constant change like that.
Or changes brought about by invasion even.
I was really thinking about a 3 stage evolution process within each people/tribe/nation or EG/ELG.
so city names would only change or evolve within the context of a people or tribe splitting. and then never change unless another split event occured.
Though i suppose, ideally, a complete conquest event perhaps ought to lead to a further name change, as roman placenames have become modified in europe. However, I can see how if names changed every few turns it would be annoying.
I think I already modified the proposal to say that name changes can only occur after a long prescribed length of time. say 300-500 years or perhaps 300 turns (1588-1888 if 1 year is 1 turn during that stage in history). that would mean that Gwened could only change to Vannes if the French maintained their occupation of Brittany for long enough.
This removes the possibiliity of constant annoying changes, and allows some degree of realism. So you might not see so many changes - but do you really want to see the Holy Roman Empire continue to be called that from 4000BC to 3000AD? How do you deal with a break up of an empire like the Autro-Hungarian Empire?
I was really thinking about how many American city names are that of the local tribe that lived there: Miami, Chicago, Kansas,
Though you bring up some points to think about :
a. I didn't know anyone actually ever used the "find city" function!
b. if you're maps aren't going to ever be more than the biggest sizes i managed to squeeze out of Mark, then i can't see it being such a big deal gliding aroung the map with your mouse. Anyway even when you change city names in Civ, they still keep their same position on the list of cities, so i'm surelist based city management features needn't be a big deal either.
but at least you seem to like the idea of a vocab list for each
E(L)G. so putting the other stuff to one side for a moment
It then raises the question, and this relates only to a "from 4000BC" type game (scenarios would have to be different), do you want to have French, Babylonians and Americans playing alongside each other, OR, Italics, Semites, Athabaskans, which then can split into Umbrians, Latins, Faliscans, Oscans, Samnites, etc, and then merge with other tribes to form a new Nation, such as France - a potentially 3 stage process, but not necessarily as in the case of the Basques who you might say don't split, but just move directly from the People to the Tribe to the Nation stage?
If we're talking historical authenticity, then I can't see how playing French against Romans in 3000BC makes any sense at all.
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LDiCesare
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La Ferté sous Jouarre France
Jan 2001
time: 05:15
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I'd like to have no French, English or Americans in 3000BC, but have them evolve from cultures.
Thus this requires people/tribe/nation names, but also adjectives (white russians, wisigoths, etc.).
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LDiCesare
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La Ferté sous Jouarre France
Jan 2001
time: 05:15
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quote:
Originally posted by roquijad
1) There're several comments in earlier posts about independence, what should happen in those cases and things like that. Please just keep in mind that, since social stuff is greatly interrelated with government, revolutions and the like, and since all that is too much to handle it in one model, I originally split it in three models (social, govt, riots). With that framework, the social model is only intended to manage the evolution of Ethnic Groups' characteristics and when and how certain EGs disappear or new ones are created. Nothing more. Anything that happens as a result of cultural stuff must be handled somewhere else (for example in the Govt and Riots models).
2) Be extremely careful with the words "cultures", "ethnicities", "nationalities" and such, for they tend to be used as synonimous in normal language, but in the model we need very specific definitions, for practical reasons and to avoid misleading concepts. I strongly suggest we all use the same terminology. These are the most relevant, as defined in the model:
Ethnic Group: A "unit" of people who have a nationality, a religion and a culture. The EG lives in a geographic location (province, FE).
Nationality: The name of the nation/tribe the EG feels it belongs to.
Culture: A set of variables, such as individualism, asceticism, etc, that describes the attitude of the EG regarding several areas relevant for game.
3) In the past some people have suggested that there should be some sort of "entity" existing "above" EGs describing each "ethnicity". In that way you could guarantee that romans of different parts of the world have in deed similarities, so it makes sense to call them all "romans". Also, to detect when the cultural profile of one EG has departed far enough from its "original culture", in order to change its name and call it something else. I have strongly opposed to that in the past, mainly because I don't see it's needed and I don't find it realistic either. But if you wanna include it, just do. We'll see later. |
quote:
Originally posted by MarkEverson The Ethnicity objects do exist in the current code, and are I think needed. It is the object that all identical EGs (ones that share the same nationality, religion, and culture) in a given province share so that each EG in each square doesn't need a detailed cultural profile. People of the Roman Ethnicity in Gaul and in Latium should have cultures that evolve independently, so IMO it is in the same spirit as your original model. It is mostly in the coding details that it differs. Owen may want to comment on this, since he has presumably worked with that part of the code much more recently than I. |
Okay, so this is a very big bump...
I shook the social model code a bit. There are things I'm not yet happy with, but it runs. I now have to plug things which actually do something with the data... Note that when there are 2 ethnic groups in a square with the same ethnicity name are in theory possible in the code but would cause problems. I didn't check if this had any meaning.
The current code EthnicGroup is a (shared) ethnicity (set of cultural attributes, culture,...), a nationality, the administration of the square (could be province...) it is in. All this I understand, though I wonder whether nationality should be shared as part of Ethnicity?
Now there are these things: tendencies and culturalAttributes. I understand tendencies as it is explained as: "Eventual equilibrium position that CulturalAttributes will evolve to given current environment". But culturalattributes are not clear. It is said also in the code that " Different ethnic groups with the same ethnicity differ ONLY in their opinions." So I suppose that nationality, tendencies and culturalattrbutes are all 'opinions'.
If anyone can clarify these things for me, that would be greatly appreciated. It is normal that the code uses constructs like Ethnicity which allow to factor in certain concepts, so some differences with design documents are inevitable, but there are still things I'm not sure what they're supposed to do.
Anyway, I'm just activating the code that uses the social model to fuel riots. Looks like it's working, but I must tune things so that a riot actually happens and then I'll see if it works or the game crashes. And then I'll have to fix, tune, fix...
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yellowdaddy
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Saoir-Ebhor, Sasainn a tuath, Rialtas Aontach
Apr 2003
time: 05:15
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perhaps culture is quite synonimous with religion (or lack of it).
perhaps it can be defined as in attitudes towards class, women, individual rights v state, democracy, monarchy, violence/pacifism - ie the distinction between pakistanis and indians - their race and language is largely the same, but the pakistanis shook off the caste systme, and now have cultural parity with countrites to their east.
but these things (mentioned above) are quite fluid, and evolve.
going back further
cilmite:foodstuffs,terrain probably ultimately define the nature of the religion - mongols in their tents on the lonely flant plains of northern asia, and polynesians in their tropical atolls. their lifestyle, clothes, art, behaviour is defined by their terrain, climate, flora and fauna.
religions seem to be an early device for educating and controlling a population - what civilisation can evolve from nothing without one?
culture as defined by art, dress, music, food, seems to be entirely down to what's available and the survival needs.
a lot of ancient shamanistic religions from every part of the world seem to be remarkably similar.
are British and Americans, French and Belgians seperate ethnicities or seperate nations?
I think it's clear that they are seperate nations only. (perhaps divided by language?!)
Ethnicity often involves language (including accents) and usually race
so maybe what i'm saying is, that all ethnicities are blank canvasses, defined by their environment.
Stick a Polynesian in the desert and s/he evolves the same kind of culture as an Arab.
Stick an a arab in arctic tundra, s/he evolves Inuit-style culture.
As for whether they're building style goes curvy, square, triangular or pointy - i suppose that's largely to do with environment too - what building materials/climatic concerns.
tendencies - like Greeks and Chinese are more inventive? Apaches and Mongols are more nomadic?
no way, that's almost racist, really.
a nation's definately just a political construct based around economics, and at the early stages with religion as a function of it. unless you define "individualism" as a form of religion?
what do you think?
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LDiCesare
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La Ferté sous Jouarre France
Jan 2001
time: 05:15
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Culture is not synonimous with religion. In the model, they are the 2 components of the ethnicity. In reality, 2 atheists or 2 catholics can have vastly different cultures.
These are well defined in the model (for reference: http://cullivan.com/coc/models/Model-Social.shtml ).
As I see it, there can only be one EthnicGroup of one Ethnicity in a given square, and I don't get the part about opinions in the code comments, unless opinion is about which nationality they should belong to?
Tendencies is supposed to be the way culture is evolving, not whether one is inventive or something. I am not sure where this lies with regards to the model.
The model says:
quote:
The moral codes the EG is exposed to are combined through a weighted sum to form the Tendency Values. Weights, in terms of equations, are created in such way that they ensure:
1) The influence of the religion's moral code over the EG increases with Importance of Religion.
2) The tendency to keep current culture for a longer period increases with Traditionalism.
3) The magnitude with which the govt can influence EG's moral code depends on how "present" the govt is in the province the EG lives in. Here "presence" means govt's capacity of providing an administration the people can "feel" in their daily lives. The Administration Effectiveness Level (AEL) is used for this purpose (see Govt Model).
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This doesn't give me much in terms of equations to fill the tendencies object...
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LDiCesare
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La Ferté sous Jouarre France
Jan 2001
time: 05:15
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Here's some output of the riots produced in-game by some ethnic riotting (figures come from Carthago scenario, which should probably have little of these):
quote:
Ethnic Rioting in [[3, 0]]
by EG Gauls
EDF = 0.5 RDF = 0.0
Probability (before suppression): 0.2
Suppression by troops: 0.0
Severity: 0.03716518
General Infrastructure Destroyed: 0.007433057
Government Infrastructure Destroyed: 0.012388408
Production Reduced: 0.0037165284
Ethnic Rioting in [[11, 8]]
by EG Latins
EDF = 0.5 RDF = 0.0
Probability (before suppression): 0.2
Suppression by troops: 0.0
Severity: 0.038845316
General Infrastructure Destroyed: 0.007769048
Government Infrastructure Destroyed: 0.012948453
Production Reduced: 0.003884554 |
With regards the riots model:
Aggressiveness cultural attribute is not used (yet?) to determine the probability of such an event, and there is nothing yet to repress (suppression by troops or by money spent somewhere).
I think it is important to provide some ways for the player to reduce/prevent/suppress these riots through either spending money or stationning troops. What effect would have troops and money on these riots?
Curent formula is: Probability = 0.8 * ((EDF + RDF)/2), where EDF/RDF are Ethnic/Religious Discrimination Factors. If this leads to 0.4 or more, units can be created, but this is not yet tested (I'll have to devise a scenario for that to happen, where you start with high discrimination factors).
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yellowdaddy
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Saoir-Ebhor, Sasainn a tuath, Rialtas Aontach
Apr 2003
time: 05:15
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quote:
Culture is not synonimous with religion. In the model, they are the 2 components of the ethnicity. In reality, 2 atheists or 2 catholics can have vastly different cultures. |
you mean 1 athiest can have a quite different culture from another?
yes, i think i reached that conclusion when i factored in environment.
what do you mean by culture?
are you planning to make one ethnicity more aggressive (or something) than another as a innate thing that is fixed rather than a cultural thing that can spread or be modified?
if so, what are the pros and cons?
i suppose for your tendencies you might want to have a peek at some social history web pages?!
as far as i know there is a evolution where you start of with a religious state, technology and learning or natural disasters can modify this so it evolves into the the next stage of state where laws and the concept of nationhood evolve.
ancient civilisations won't have much government presence - even ones with good civil services.
it's key inventions/technologies that cause sudden shifts in societal behaviour.
i think it's a shame if you only have one EG per square - if it were set up so that a certain number or population of another ethnicity joined a square's population (EG disbanding a load of foreign military units) there was like an "assimilation threshold"
so you could have a square which was 30% Latin and 70% Gaul, disband loads of roman soldiers and change the balance to the assimilation threshold of say "10% of population" or "10,000 people" and the Gauls would disappear and the population after say 10 years would never be reinstated.
I can see how it'd get annoying having more than four ethnicities in a single square, but two seems a bit tight. you might have a little pie chart! (i'll keep dreaming about a human race simulator...)
but if rival nations are fighting over important border territories with say a port or some resources, then ethnicity could play an important factor in "winning the peace" or "subverting the enemy's military success with insurgency".
opinion might be something like "satisfaction with the quality of life under the current administration"?
(which seems fairly similar to national loyalty, but could include factors like wealth, civil liberties, health, ethno-religious tension?)
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LDiCesare
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La Ferté sous Jouarre France
Jan 2001
time: 05:15
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quote:
what do you mean by culture? |
Check out the url I linked above. Culture is all the traits of the ethnic group (moral code, ...).
There is no innate/fixed trait in the model.
quote:
i suppose for your tendencies you might want to have a peek at some social history web pages?! |
That would be useless. I know the trends, what is supposed to influence what, I just wondered whether someone (Rodrigo) had put equations somewhere which I could reuse directly into the code?
quote:
i think it's a shame if you only have one EG per square |
Argh! I have not been clear. I ment one EG per ethnicity per square. You can have Latins and Romans in one square. You can't have Latin EG1 and Latin EG2 in one square. That doesn't seem to make sense (what would be the difference between these EG1 and EG2?). Actually this is already the case in Demo 7. I once saw a fight where goblins and humans both raised militia in the Siegewars scenario. No, my point was rather to ask what distinguishes 2 EGs of the same Ethnicity. To me it's only the location, but I may be missing something. This is important because in one case I can move the tendencies (better called trends?) into a separate class instead of having one instance of these per EG.
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wombat42
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On the integration of language into Clash:
quote:
Originally posted by Mark_Everson
Seems doable, but I'm not sure we'd enough player enthusiasm to justify it in Clash 1.0. I as a player probably wouldn't notice all the clever things you would have happening in the background. Anyone have opinions? |
Actually, that's exactly the kind of thing I was starting to get excited about with Clash... the exquisite realism even down to the point of having languages that evolve. Of course, I'm a wanna-be linguistic nerd and don't know Java, so I can't really help, but still... I had even started to jot down some non-programming-language based flow-charts in case I did learn it someday, along with all of the different letters/phonic units that I could think of... Anyway, my point is, go for it if you can.
Last edited by wombat42 on 23-11-2003 at 11:00
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wombat42
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quote:
Originally posted by yellowdaddy
if the former, then i'm a bit puzzled because there are bits of this game that seem pretty world-simmy to me - the politics and characters elements. I like the ideas in these, but i worry that they will be somehow incomplete without a few other simmy aspects to complement them.
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By the way, I'm completely with Yellowdaddy on this, though I'm no programmer either... And personally, I would care much more about language trees and what not than characters. Just seems to be a logical extension of the whole ethnic group system, and the only real difference between this and religion trees is in scale - having 2 or 3 languages in a nation vs. 16 ethnic groups of the same religion.
Last edited by wombat42 on 24-11-2003 at 00:07
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yellowdaddy
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Saoir-Ebhor, Sasainn a tuath, Rialtas Aontach
Apr 2003
time: 05:15
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ok, re the thing about 2 EGs of the same Ethnicity, and those Latins 1 and 2...
I think surely the obvious answer is Language - or rather a scale from accent->dialect->language
especially if you're talking about those different branches: the Oscans and Faliscans - sister tribes/dialects of the Latins...
i refer you back to that ethnolinguistic tree i posted...
am i off-target with this point?
as for those equations, yes, i'd like have a peep - i'm no programmer, but i'm ok up to "freshman/sophomore" level
(to use the american).
as for the EG definition, I think missing out race and language is a "missed opportunity".
I think part of the answer behind coming up with those equations ought to be having sets of parameters for religions - i do feel that religion (in it's broadest sense i.e.: philosophy) determines a lot of the othe attributes, and environment, defines the religion.
in my original game idea i wanted to have a "religion designer" and a "political system designer" with rows of parameters and flow charts. ( a bit like in Sim Earth and Sim Life).
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16-04-2003 06:00
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