Civilization (1980 board game)

This article is about the original Civilization board game designed by Francis Tresham. For other board games named Civilization, see Civilization (disambiguation) § Games.

Not to be confused with Civilization (video game).

Civilization

Civilization box cover Civilization 2nd Edition cover image
Players	2–7
Setup time	15 minutes
Playing time	3–12 hours
Chance	Low
Skills	Strategy, tactics

Civilization is a board game designed by Francis Tresham, published in the United Kingdom in 1980 by Hartland Trefoil and in the United States in 1981 by Avalon Hill. The Civilization brand is now owned by Hasbro. It was out of print for many years, before it saw republication in 2018, by Gibsons Games. The game typically takes eight or more hours to play and is for two to seven players.

Civilization is widely considered to be one of the most influential games in the strategy genre, cited as foundational to both the grand strategy and 4X subgenres.

The game is also first in incorporating a technology tree (or "tech tree"), a common feature in subsequent board and video games, which allows players to gain certain items and abilities only after particular other items are obtained.

Overview

The Civilization board depicts areas around the Mediterranean Sea. The board is divided into many regions. Each player plays a historic civilization and starts in the area where appropriate for that civilization, and attempts to grow and expand their empire over successive turns, trying to build the greatest civilization while minimizing the effects of calamities and war.

The goal of Civilization is to be first to advance to the final space on a table called the Archaeological Succession Table (AST). The AST starts at 8,000 B.C. and ends at 250 B.C. The AST contains fifteen spaces, and players are advanced on the AST each turn. At several points, however, certain conditions must be met (such as, the civilization must have a certain number of cities) in order to advance. Since any given civilization is unlikely to meet the advancement criteria at every stage of the AST, games usually last more than fifteen turns.

Civilization is unusual in that it does not focus on war and combat, as many games of its genre do. Instead, players are encouraged to trade and cooperate in order to advance. However, war and combat are entirely permissible, and are sometimes inevitable. In fact, the game is designed to limit players' geographical expansion possibilities, forcing them to deal with other civilizations militarily, diplomatically, or otherwise if they wish their own civilization to reach its full potential.

Gameplay

A game starts with each player having a single population token in the area based on the specific civilization represented (e.g. on the island of Crete for the Cretans or in Africa for the Egyptians). As the first few turns progress, the population expands exponentially. Since any given area only supports so many population tokens, players need to spread out, eventually meeting the civilizations of other players.

Trade is the most important activity in Civilization. Trade cards give a player's civilization wealth, which ultimately helps their civilization advance on the AST. As each civilization grows, adding more and more population to the board, players can convert excess population into cities by gathering six population tokens in an area favoring settlement (or twelve in other areas). Each city grants a trade card to the owner, one of eleven commodities, such as iron, salt and grain. Having more cities gives access to more valuable commodities, such as bronze, spice and gold. Each such commodity has a value equal to the number of cities required, so for example once your civilization grows its third city, you can gain a salt card, valued 3, and you need eight cities to have a chance at a gems card, valued 8. However, collecting more cards in a set gives an exponentially larger payout (number of cards squared times the commodity value). For example, as mentioned one salt is worth 3 points. Two salt, however, is worth (2^2x3=)12 points, and three are worth (3^2x3=)27 points.

The total number of cards in each set differs. There are nine salt cards but only four gems cards, for instance. While collecting all four gems cards pays (4^2x8=)128 points collecting all nine salt cards pay (9^2x3=)243 points, so every commodity remains relevant. Thus, players are encouraged to trade with each other to collect sets of the same commodity. You trade by selecting some of your cards to offer another player, truthfully stating one of them, as well as the total points value of the proposed trade. If that player agrees, you swap cards.

The quirk is that along with trade cards come eight calamity cards such as volcano eruptions, famine and civil war, which destroy population and cities. The player that is stuck with a particular calamity card at the end of trading suffers that calamity. Since players are only required to tell the truth about one of the cards and the total points value they are trading, calamity cards can be slipped into a trade to avoid their effects. Many "trade sessions" can become quite vocal and exuberant as players try to out-trade one another.

After trading is complete and calamities are resolved, players can cash in their sets of commodity cards. Gains from trade are used to purchase civilization cards, such as agriculture, coinage, philosophy and medicine, which grant special abilities and give bonuses toward future civilization card purchases. The goal of the game is to advance (on the AST) through the Late Iron Age and become the most advanced civilization on the map board. This is accomplished through clever game play and purchase of several high-value civilization cards, while trying not to antagonize your neighbors.

Editions

Civilization by Hartland Trefoil (1980).

Civilization by Avalon Hill (1982):

The 1st edition has a cover depicting an antique Greek temple, an Egyptian fresco and some baskets; the board with the map is a one-piece multifold.

The 2nd edition has a board consisting of two separate pieces and has a cover showing the faces of three figures from ancient history above a collage of the Pyramids, the Parthenon, the Nile, and an erupting Mount Vesuvius. These three people are: a general of the Roman Legion (using the likeness of actor Stephen Boyd from the 1964 film The Fall of the Roman Empire); a Greek or Roman statesman or philosopher (using the likeness of Alec Guinness also from The Fall of the Roman Empire); and a Judaean or Minoan noblewoman (using the likeness of actress Rita Gam from the 1961 movie King of Kings).

Civilization by Gibsons Games/Welt der Spiele/Piatnik (1988): English and German version. The cover shows six members from people around the Mediterranean Sea.

Civilisation by Descartes (1989): French version. The cover shows a grayhaired male, a Roman temple and the Pyramids in the background.

Civilisation by Gibsons (2018): UK version. The cover shows a Roman officer and an Egyptian noblewoman.

Expansions

Advanced Civilization (1991)

Main article: Advanced Civilization

The Advanced Civilization expansion contains simplified trading rules and gives every civilization the possibility to buy all civilization advances. It also adds more trading cards, civilization advances, calamities and rules for up to eight players. It contains all the cards available in the Trade Card Set (below).

Other expansions

• Trade Card Set (1982): Usable with the Avalon Hill version. Adds additional commodities such as timber, silver and ivory to reduce the frequency of calamities, reduce the risk for a shortage in low value trade cards (which disproportionately hurts the players with the most cities), and increase the challenge of making large sets. Advanced Civilization includes this expansion.
• Western Extension Map (1988): Usable with the Hartland/Trefoil and the Avalon Hill version. Extends the game board west of Italy to cover Gaul, parts of the Iberian peninsula, the British Isles and northwest Africa. (Note that a version of this expansion was also available for the original Hartland Trefoil version of the game)
• Eastern Expansion Map (1995): Usable with the Hartland/Trefoil and the Avalon Hill version. Adds Persia, Sumer, Samita and Indus people and covers the areas of Persia, the westernmost parts of the Indian subcontinent and Arabia. The map has the imprint "Civilisation Eastern Extension Unofficial Version". It was published in Alea Magazine #21 (Spain). In addition there are five new civilization cards.

Adaptations

Incunabula was the first computer emulation of the board game by Avalon Hill (1984, for MS-DOS). Besides the main game, it included two shorter variants, one eliminating trade and one that includes only trade.

Avalon Hill's Advanced Civilization was a 1995 MS-DOS computer version of the board game, incorporating the Advanced Civilization expansion. The rules were slightly modified from the board game for computer play.

A projected sequel of the Civilization board game in the ages after antiquity drove the development of Age of Renaissance, published by Avalon Hill in 1996. This game, designed for 3 to 6 players, has kept only a few features of 'Civilization, such as commodities (no longer collectible cards but territories) and the civilization advances (no longer cards but ticks in a check list).

Civilization is also well-known as the core inspiration behind Sid Meier's computer game of the same name, which would itself act as the progenitor of the wider 4X genre.

Reception

In the February 1983 edition of Dragon magazine (Issue #70), Tony Watson thought the game was ground-breaking, saying, "Once in a while, a new game comes out that proves that there is still plenty of virgin territory out there for game designers to explore and plenty of room for innovative and imaginative approaches to those subjects. Avalon Hill's release, Civilization, is just such a game." He concluded, "Civilization is a game that defies comparison with others [...] It's a fine value and is highly recommended."

In the January 1990 edition of Games International (Issue 12), Steve Jones examined the game at length and concluded, "Civilization is an excellent multi-player game for those who like long games which require considerable thought, concentration and decision making."

Civilization was chosen for inclusion in the 2007 book Hobby Games: The 100 Best. Steven Savile commented that designer Francis Tresham "created a thinking gamer's game, one that deserves to be played around a table with friends — especially the cheerfully scheming sort".

Reviews

• Casus Belli #44 (April 1988)
• Games (Vol 6, No 4, issue #30, July/August 1982, review by R. Wayne Schmittberger)
• 1982 Games 100 in Games
• Jeux & Stratégie #17

Awards

At the 1983 Origins Awards, Civilization was awarded the Charles S. Roberts Award for "Best Pre-20th Century Boardgame of 1982".

Legacy

The game shares the name and the basic broad themes of expansion, development and conflict with the MicroProse computer game Civilization by Sid Meier that came out a decade later. While the gameplay of the computer game is unrelated to Civilization, MicroProse did pay Avalon a licensing fee for the name. Later in 1998 MicroProse filed a lawsuit against Activision (who licensed the rights to the board game) and Avalon Hill to secure the rights for using the name. The lawsuit was settled amicably in 2000, with Avalon Hill selling all rights to the Civilization franchise to MicroProse.

Although the success of the Civilization computer games series has led to multiple board games, starting with Sid Meier's Civilization: The Boardgame in 2002, none of these games has any direct relation to the Civilization board game discussed here.

See also

• Dawn of the Ancients – play-by-mail game sharing similar aspects as noted in a 1985 gaming magazine.

External links

• Product page at Gibsons Games
• Civilization at BoardGameGeek