The Swahili city states were a group of city states along a 1500 mile stretch of East African coast united by tradition, language, trade, and religion. They began as Bantu villages and through the Indian Ocean trade grew to be wealthy and prosperous, transporting raw materials, including spices, metals, and over a ton of gold per year, from the African interior to places like Arabia, Persia, the Mediterranean, India, and China. They were heavily influenced by trade and cultural fusion with Arabia and Persia but maintained their unique culture and tradition. They minted their own currency, built great mosques and monumental tombs, and recieved visitors like Ibn Batutta and Zheng He.

They went into a decline after a series of Portuguese invasions in the 1500's and changes to the Indian Ocean trade, but from the 11th to 15th centuries they were very wealthy and powerful, impressing even the Portuguese with their riches and their tools for navigation. I think the use of the fame mechanic to show the value of their legacy even after some of the great cities have been virtually abandoned makes the Swahili a good fit for a medieval culture for Humankind.

This is getting pretty far into speculation on unreleased game mechanics, but here are some bonuses (assuming those will even be part of the game), EU's and EQ's I thought could work for the Swahili. 

Focus: Diplomatic

Bonus: African Spice Islands: +x influence for every luxury resource, +3 money for sea trade routes. The city state of Zanzibar was known as Africa's spice islands, and the Swahili city states often leveraged resources and trade for power.

EU: Dhow: Swahili ship that can expend itself to build an outpost (or trading post?) in the territory of a minor faction and claim the region. Dhows were Arab merchant vessels used along the Swahili coast which encouraged the development of Bantu villages into full fledged city states through trade. Allows the player to peacefully expand along the coast even as land becomes more scarce in the medieval era.

EQ: Stepped Courtyard: Functions as a market (assuming those will exist), also gives +1 influence for every trade route with an ally from that city, +1 science for every ally with active trade routes. Stepped Courtyards were unique features of Swahili merchant houses that allowed foreign traders to live and trade with them while waiting for trade winds to change, which brought foreign ideas into the home and encouraged cultural fusion through trade. Gives the player extra benefits from trading with allies.

Focus: Industrious/ City-Building

Bonus: Coral and Stone: -x% construction cost of buildings adjacent to sea tiles, +2 industry from land trade routes, +2 money from sea trade routes. The construction bonus represents how Swahili elite built houses and monuments using coral harvested from the sea as a building material, while the trade bonus represents their vital role in exporting raw materials from the African interior and importing manufactured goods from across the Indian Ocean. 

EU: Jahazi: +x movement, +x combat strength on tiles with a trade route. Jahazis were Swahili merchant vessels which took advantage of the monsoon season and trade winds to travel long distances, and were remarkably good navigators. Lets the player have a unit that can quickly respond to threats to sea trade routes.

EQ: Maritime Causeways: Functions as (or a building in) a harbor, +1 industry and +1 food from sea resources in this region, +x% trade route range. Maritime Causeways were part of the city infrastructue of the city states of Kilwa and Songo Mnaro, serving as a warning of underwater reefs, aiding the docking of ships, and allowing fish, shellfish, and coral to be harvested at low tide. Allows cities on shore regions to be more prosperous for the player.

Those bonuses are of course speculative but represent the potential of the Swahili for the game.

I like it, although I suspect they would call it navel focused, which is already covered by the Norse.

Since we don't know yet what exactly makes each civ unique, I'm not too sure about those civ bonus that look a lot like Civ5 design (and are honestly quite boring).

But yeah Swahili is a great idea for a medieval civ.

I'm all for more african civilization because africa is not just egypt

Dinode wrote:

I like it, although I suspect they would call it navel focused, which is already covered by the Norse.

I agree that the most obvious would be either naval focus (Norse) or trade focus (Arabia or Mali), which is why I gave suggestions for other focuses. It could still work to have a naval-centric culture with a focus that isn't naval, such as in the Renaissance Era where I can only assume they would have England, Spain, Netherlands, and Portugal, which would all technically be naval focused, just in different ways. And I wouldn't expect a relatively obscure culture in popular media to make it into the first edition of the game, but it could still work for a DLC or something.

Ezumiyr wrote:

Since we don't know yet what exactly makes each civ unique, I'm not too sure about those civ bonus that look a lot like Civ5 design (and are honestly quite boring).

But yeah Swahili is a great idea for a medieval civ.

I agree, I tried to keep it fairly generic and based it off of Civ because its a little early for speculation like this without more knowledge of the game's mechanics. I just wanted to give suggestions for bonuses based off of elements of Swahili culture.

Airwane wrote:

I'm all for more african civilization because africa is not just egypt

I'm trying to think of which African cultures would be best for the game. We already have Egypt and Nubia basically confirmed, and there are others that were in the Civ games like Mali/ Songhai, the Zulu, Kongo, Carthage, Morroco, and Abyssinia/ Ethiopia. I think good ones not found in the Civ games would be the Swahili for the Medieval Era, for reasons I stated above, the Ashanti for the Rennaisance Era, maybe South Africa for Modern Era, and maybe Ghana for the Classical Era. I'm also wondering what era a culture like the Zulu would go in, would it be based on tech level, time period, or social and government structure?

grug wrote:

Airwane wrote:

I'm all for more african civilization because africa is not just egypt

I'm trying to think of which African cultures would be best for the game. We already have Egypt and Nubia basically confirmed, and there are others that were in the Civ games like Mali/ Songhai, the Zulu, Kongo, Carthage, Morroco, and Abyssinia/ Ethiopia. I think good ones not found in the Civ games would be the Swahili for the Medieval Era, for reasons I stated above, the Ashanti for the Rennaisance Era, maybe South Africa for Modern Era, and maybe Ghana for the Classical Era. I'm also wondering what era a culture like the Zulu would go in, would it be based on tech level, time period, or social and government structure?

I like your suggestion. From Mali (Mansa Musa ) to the Kingdom of Kongo and the Zulu (chaka Zulu). there is a lot of interesting things to have. granted they didn't really big world wonder but I think cultural, economy and politics element of it will be very interesting.

I hope they will make it a big map.

ps: I'm from D R congo so any game that get my culture as a playable faction has my gratitude lol 

I think the Swahili weren't big on naval but more of merchant people. 

While I can't talk about the inclusion of Swahili culture, I can at least assure you that our design team has seen your pitch and we appreciate all suggestions for cultures to be included. You have clearly put some effort into putting together your pitch.

The-Cat-o-Nine-Tales wrote:

While I can't talk about the inclusion of Swahili culture, I can at least assure you that our design team has seen your pitch and we appreciate all suggestions for cultures to be included. You have clearly put some effort into putting together your pitch.

Thanks for reading!

Glad to see that the Swahili will soon be in the game! I made this idea a while ago before there was much info out on the game mechanics so I would expect the actual design to be pretty different from what I thought up, but it's really cool that they're continuing to add to the game and including new cultures. I love the other cultures they are adding too. Much appreciation to the dev team!

FullScreenLurking wrote:

How did you get the devs to see your culture suggestion when most of these have been languishing in obscurity for months?

I'm pretty sure the devs still look at community suggestions, they just haven't interacted as much since the game was released and the amount of feedback picked up. Just because more recent suggestions haven't received a response doesn't mean the devs haven't seen it, or at least not necessarily, and I've still seen them respond sporadically.