Confederate States of America

Age of Empires III: DE III - Discussion
23

If you want to get technical, the inclusion of a weirdly specific Lakota card puts the chronologically latest reference in the game (not counting skins or cheats) at 1970ish.

The artwork of the card “Heyoka” references a style of Heyoka paint that didn’t occur among the Lakota until the 70’s. My grandma gave me a firsthand account of watching the style migrate north from the Navajo.

ADDED: The artwork in question. This was traditionally a Navajo clown style, not Lakota. Our Heyoka were known as contrarians and did things backwards, like ride their horse backwards or wear many layers in the summer and declare it’s cold, or wear nothing in the dead of winter and complain about the heat.

image

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24

Guys, the general rule is that if the thread has to do with AoE3 and its historical period, it’s all good to discuss. :+1:

However, any comment that seeks to create controversy will be immediately deleted. Thank you.

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25

That was probably unintemtional, but interesting that we could make the argument for jets being in the timeline

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26

USA civ must have revolution options just like Mexicans civ has- they should have revolutions because the lack of them is controversial. Did the USA never have them? A unanimous and indivisible country XDDD

Boredom

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I definitely think the CSA should just be a revolution. However, I think Texas should be introduced as a separate civ. It could be interesting.

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28

Just keep them as a revolt for Mexico. They weren’t independent long enough to warrant being a civ.

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29

Roughly 1492 to 1876 if you follow ensembles portrayal, give or take a few years in either end.

As for the overall thread, the CSA existed for around 1% of the games time period, it was never a great power and wasn’t even recognized as independent by any such power. Why should such a small part of history fill so much in a global spawning game? Why do we need a revolution of a revolution in the game? I already find USA somewhat problematic to have in the game but now we will literally get the 3rd English speaking civ like this is some stacking doll.

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30

If we get Texas then also add Centroamerica.

Imo neither of those should be added but its a fair comparison imo

And either way theres a lot to add across the world to get to add Texas.

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Since this thread is allowed to continue, I guess it’s worth responding to.

First, I think a lot of people didn’t get past this line:

Yeah a full civ sounds a bit much for something so short lived, but later you mention a revolt or revolt card.

I agree with this. One of the ways I like to play is to create historic matchups, Spain vs Aztecs, USA vs Britain, etc. Having a matchup of USA vs CSA, at least in some capacity, would cover one of the biggest, or at least well known, events to occur during this time period.

In a way, the game seems to climax right around the American Civil War, including some iconic units from the war like ironclads and gatling guns, but still sidestepping the conflict.

One thing you left out is a historical battle or historical map. Would all the people opposed to CSA as a civ also oppose a Gettysburg Historical Battle?

If I had to do it (and I probably will at some point), I would be torn between a couple ideas. On the one hand I might just make it a full civ similar to the USA since I would want to start the game as CSA vs USA, but like people have mentioned it runs into issues with how short lived they were. That isn’t a huge issue for me thematically, though, since I don’t view each skirmish game starting in 1500 and ending in 1970, I view a skirmish taking place over a relatively short time and the “ages” as a representation of your town’s development.

The other idea would be to rework USA, implementing the civil war and the compromises leading up to it as a crucial part of the civ’s mechanics. Basically, if you don’t take steps to avoid it and keep both sides placated, your imperial age up will be blocked and you will be forced to either “revolt” into the Union or Confederacy. You could unrevolt (maybe just as the Union) but it could still come at a cost.

Some of the things that could trigger the “civil war” revolt:

  • Selecting an unbalanced amount of free/slave states
  • Creating an unbalanced eco that favors one side over the other
  • Creating an unbalanced military that favors one side over the other

Maybe I could also shoehorn the civ a bit to make it feel like you’re a town on a border state or something.

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33

my thought is let make it a dlc which unlock civil war in age3 to 4 similar to revolt

edit 1 actually, make revolt options dlc is profitable

edit 2 actually, make card exclusive to dlc is profitable

edit 3 actually, make units exclusive to dlc is profitable

edit 4 actually, make card exclusive to time limited card pool slot machines, with waifus card icon is profitable

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35

Age of Empires 3 has a civilization called the Lakota that the American Civil War definitely did affect due to the growth of the Lakota during the 1860s while American military presence waned in the region. That’s part of “global impact”, unless you’re considering the Lakota as part of the US?

Also, foreign volunteers in one major war almost always affect every subsequent war involving troops from the home country. For example, Irish veterans of the Civil War on both Confederate and Union sides took part in the Fenian Uprising of 1867 in both Ireland and Canada (in some cases wearing their respective old uniforms alongside each other in battle). The Prussians benefitted immensely from studying the American Civil War to prepare for their war with France in 1870 which they won. American ex-Confederates took part in fighting alongside the Jamaicans against the Cruzob Maya in Belize. Several American Civil War veterans later became Cuban Generals (2 of which, one Union and one Confederate, eventually gained the rank of Commander-in-Chief in Cuba) and fought in their rebellion against Spain. American Civil War veterans also influenced the Japanese Civil War of the late 1860s (typically as advisors) which also featured an ex-Confederate ironclad in battle.

Speaking of weaponry, any massive modern war inevitably leads to arms sales around the world when that conflict concludes. Weapons used or made for the American Civil War were sold all over the place, especially Latin America for their wars with each other and with Spain.

Tens of thousands of Americans emigrated to other countries during and after the war, especially from the most war-torn parts of the nation.

So yeah the American Civil War had global impact. Again, I’m not saying I personally want it in AoE3, just helping y’all understand why someone might want it represented so people don’t go around with false assumptions.

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36

Well, it’s not that I’m actively opposed but it’s more that I don’t see the point. Not in the civ, and even in the historical battle I’m massively eh on it. There’s no grand story to tell other than “slavery bad, innit?” and off the top of my head I can easily name 5 more important and more interesting scenarios contemporary to it that’d make better historical battles.

You know what unironically could be fun?

English civil war.

Yeah, Cromwell and friends.

Sits a lot more comfortably on what this game is actually suited for mechanically being set in the 17th century and all. Hell, thanks to the New Model Army even a unit roster for Revolutionary English would be a lot more reasonable to come up with and justify compared to the straw grasping one must do to come up with unique confederate stuff.

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37

From a business standpoint, there’s zero reason to make any CSA stuff. The game’s most notable times in the news up to now has been its botched attempt to make the Native Americans less racist, which was called out when the game released.

If 3DE makes the news again, but this time for the implementation of a country that literally only existed because they wanted slaves… I can’t imagine it would go well to the higher-ups.

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38

avoiding the history is racist.
but yes, i agree with all these come down to business decisions.
and we all know WE suck at making good one

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How is it racist to avoid the US civil war? this isn’t a US civil war simulator?

Frankly can people even come up with mechanics or units that wouldn’t either make everyone mad or look like the USA we have in game already?

The confederate army was in large parts similar to the US, other than unlike the north they had relatively few innovations during the war, most southern soldiers used front-loaders the entirety of the war while the North increasingly started introducing things like Gatling-guns and breech-loaders, and even repeating rifles, into their armies.

The only reason i can see for adding the CSA is for “larping”, and in a game where we could have dosens of other factions with their own unique ideas, techs and languages i just don’t value the larping aspect.

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40

I honestly don’t know how someone just waves away a battle like Gettysburg as if it doesn’t matter.

If you told me you wanted to include the most important battle in the English civil war I would say yes, that does sound like a worthwhile event to include.

Just because you don’t have any ideas doesn’t mean the rest of us don’t. Besides, in-game mechanics are subtle, extremely easy to fudge, and only loosely based on history. Take the US roster: cut gats, banks, and second factories, nerf regulars, buff cav, and you’re already at a completely different civ in-game.

As far as I’m concerned this is a much better argument to stop adding european civs into the game. We’re already scraping the bottom of the barrel with countries similar in size to individual US states. Just make Ohio it’s own civ, it’s bigger than Denmark.

You are describing the in-game revolution mechanic.

I think most of us agree it isn’t going to happen for basically this reason.

What other reasons do you have to include civs in a video game?

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41

There’s some bizarre American exceptionalism thing going on if you think Gettysburg is some must have battle that changed the destiny of the world or something.

Again, like, the Crimean War already involved trains and telegraphs and innovation in field hospitals if you want to tackle the angle of “it’s a war that brought a lot of innovation to the battlefield.”

The French Intervention in Mexico which is, well, literally contemporary saw just about everyone trying their luck at invading Mexico, French troops with Austrian auxiliaries, mercenaries from Egypt, troops from Belgium and Poland, you can’t tell me that wouldn’t make a more interesting historical mission…

Scale? The War of the Triple Alliance had about as many people involved way down in South America. Hell, the Taiping Rebellion saw an order of magnitude more people fighting.

You could say the war was of global importance but, like, in the same decade Japan’s transition from Shogunate to Empire was going on, the Italian unification, the Austro-Prussian war and German unification in general, so… eh?

An United States mirror match feels massively underwhelming if you weren’t raised with the mythology of the United States Civil War being the most important event of the century I guess.

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42

It’s not bizarre American exceptionalism, if anything it’s quite the inverse. You’re bringing up battles and conflicts that are either already in-game or no more important. You don’t have to like America but you also don’t need to pretend the world wouldn’t look any different if the CSA had won at Gettysburg and marched on Washington.

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43

FE says they will finally give in an add CSA in come capacity
a collection of history nerds to uhh…edgelords throw their hands in celebration
as the day dawns closer to the dlc release, forums fill with unironic dixieland song posts
they all dress their army of North Virginia cosplay and gather round their computers
the same two people who did our dlc announcement appear on screen with tepid enthusiasm
"here it is folks, to show we aint gonna sidestep things here is a historical CSA simulator
across the screen the words come:
“Time to make Georgia howl in the new march to the sea campaign!”
DLC to come late 2030

NGL i would love to see the reactions to this.

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Sherman’s March, a new tutorial to practice raiding.

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