Civs of the Fourth Age

Lengthy preamble cut short: We are getting new Civs for the Age, so let's talk:

**Implementation**

They'll likely follow the Test of Time design and have scaling bonuses and re-worked Traditions when not in their Apex Age. Much of this appears to be a given.

However, an interesting discussion does exist on how to handle Atomic Civs because Modern Civs already had an issue with questionable pivoting away to their cultural civics and actually using their toolkit to their full advantage since Victory is a few turns away.

As I had issue with non-Apex Civs being too much on par with Apex Civs, I think Atomic Age Civs should have shorter cultural civic trees. If your Apex was Ages ago and you're not ahead of an Atomic Age Apex Civ, then tough luck!

**Shake-Ups**

I think some shake ups are in order for Modern Civs because they can relinquish aspects of the Atomic Age. So, Russia would be shifted into Imperial Russia and drop the Soviet Rocket Launcher, probably.

**Concerns**

Before I get to my Civ list that I think are somewhat likely, I should still remark on that we are at a Civ imbalance with Exploration having two more Civs than the other Ages. It's less an issue now, but perhaps this might mean less expectation of parity, especially for the Atomic Age.

Civ for a while also appeared to not touch too much modern stuff, so I'm unsure about some aspects of my list and I don't really have any leaders (but I'll mention some later on in the comments) as the closer you get to present day, they come with baggage.

The naming scheme will be a clear problem when you get to my list and you can obviously guess it.

**Atomic Age Civilizations likely to come**

Based on Civs in game and those with particular naming schemes:

(1) Modern America (America changes to Colonial America)

(2) Modern France (French Empire remains the same or is also considered Imperial France)

(3) Modern Egypt (Egypt is renamed to...???)

(4) Modern Japan

(5) Korea

(6) Modern India

(7) Turkey

(8) Germany

(9) Modern Iran (Qajar is considered Qajar Iran)

(10) Modern China

(11) Modern Russia

Honorable mentions: United Kingdom (which I didn't include because it's a rather presumptuous name as though there are no other united kingdoms)

The clear and obvious issue is that I use the term "modern" in each of them despite this not being the Modern Age. Of course, these will be sub-heading the names, so you'd get Han, Ming, Qing, and China even if some parts mention the dynasty or time period name. Luckily, this is fine for Civs like Korea and Germany and even India.

This list is based on Civ with alternate names in their Game Guides and stuff as well as having some tie in to movies and the space race.

Africa isn't tricky with South Africa probably a given and the Americas isn't either, but its hard to pick based on likelihood. I'd say Colombia.

Part of the controversy (such as it is) is what would be determined "Atomic" and how they'll convey it. Like, is Russo just instead going to be Soviet Russia? How would you depict Iran?

I stealth included Egypt as a Modern Civ because it's time to finally escape the Pyramid version of the Civ and it's unlikely we'll get anything that's not already included within a dynasty like the Abbasids. I would include Senegal for the statue alone, but I'd have to consider how I'd split it for a civ stack but I could see Niger into Senegal.

**What are your thoughts and your predictions?**