Civilization VII Ages

Author: thecrazyscot

Ages represent a significant gameplay evolution for Civilization – one as big as when we moved from squares to hexes. Fundamentally, Ages divides a single game of Civilization into distinct playable chapters. Every Age is designed to capture the essence of a specific period of human advancement, achieved by filling the Age with historically-relevant elements. – Ed Beach

Overview
A “full” game of Civilization VII is divided into three ages:

Antiquity Age
Exploration Age
Modern Age

Each age can be played as its own “game” of approximately 150-200 turns, with unique civilizations, units, buildings, tech and civic trees, and implementations of core gameplay systems. Ages also have their own gameplay and narrative arcs. These consists of events triggered by accumulating Age Progress, culminating in a Crisis. A Crisis is a multi-stage challenge which steadily gets more difficult, impacting all players in the game.

If you play multiple ages sequentially, your choices and development from each age will carry over to the next via Age Transitions. During an Age Transition, you’ll choose a new civilization to play as during the next age, and unlock Legacy bonuses to carry over into the new age, positioning yourself more advantageously for what is to come.

Antiquity Age	Age Transition	Exploration Age	Age Transition	Modern Age	Game End
Play as you would a normal game. Age Progress accumulates every turn, and fills faster based on actions taken by all players. The Crisis is unlocked once Age Progress reaches a certain threshold. Once the age ends an Age Transition begins.	Pick a new civilization to play in the next age. Spend Legacy Points to purchase Legacies to be active during the next age. Optionally, choose new Capital. The game world evolves, with game systems updating for the next age.	Play as you would a normal game. Age Progress accumulates every turn, and fills faster based on actions taken by all players. The Crisis is unlocked once Age Progress reaches a certain threshold. Once the age ends an Age Transition begins.	Pick a new civilization to play in the next age. Spend Legacy Points to purchase Legacies to be active during the next age. Optionally, choose new Capital. The game world evolves, with game systems updating for the next age.	Play as you would a normal game. Age Progress accumulates every turn, and fills faster based on actions taken by all players. The Crisis is unlocked once Age Progress reaches a certain threshold. The game ends once a player is victorious or the last turn is played.	Winner is determined via victory conditions: – Cultural – Economic – Military – Scientific – Score Victory condition specifics are not confirmed yet.

Unique Ages
Each age is now self-contained, with multiple elements unique to that age:

Civilizations: each civilization is now unique to a specific age, with all its unique attributes specific to its age and thus immediately relevant.
Resources: some resources are exclusive to a single age, while others are available across multiple ages.
Civics and Technologies: each age has unique and standalone Tech and Civic research trees.
Buildings: most buildings are now age-specific, which has several downstream effects:
- A building can only be built during a specific age.
- Obsolete buildings from previous ages have reduced yields in later ages.
- Obsolete buildings from previous ages can be “overbuilt” (or replaced) by buildings from later ages.
- As always, there are exceptions. Ageless buildings are not age-specific and do not have the same restrictions on when they can be built or penalty to yields.
Units: most military units (with the exception of Commanders) are age-specific and not buildable in later ages.
Game Systems: certain game systems will change or unlock entirely when moving to a new age. Some known examples:
- Pantheons are available in the Antiquity Age, while the full-blown Religion mechanic unlocks in the Exploration Age.
- Trade Route mechanics change from era to era.
Playable Map Area: as ages progress, the playable map area expands. Specifically, the Exploration Age unlocks the ability (via research) to traverse oceans, unlocking access to other continents populated with other players and Independent Powers.

Progressing through an Age
Each age has its own progression meter, which must be filled in order for the age to conclude. Progress is fundamentally added in a small increment every turn, but additional progress is added when other actions are taken (like eliminating another civ).

Once a certain threshold has been met, the Crisis begins. Each age has a set of unique crises, each of which presents a different challenge to the players. However, even if the specific challenges are unique, the general structure of the crises follow this pattern:

Narrative events are triggered at certain progression thresholds. These narrative events unlock Crisis Policy Slots for the player.
Crisis Policy Slots must be filled from a selection of negative Crisis Policies unique to that specific crisis.
The crisis culminates in a significant scripted event. An example from the Antiquity Age would be a massive barbarian assault.

An example narrative event during a crisis:

An example of Crisis Policies a player must choose from for a specific crisis:

Legacy Paths
Each age has a specific set of Legacy Paths which can be intentionally pursued or passively progressed. There are four paths:

Science
Culture
Military
Economic

Each path measures a different concrete metric, like wonders built or cities in your empire, and the specifics of each path are unique to each age.

Gaining more of that metric progresses along the Legacy Path, and up to 3 milestones can be unlocked including a potential Golden Age.

Milestones add Age Progress and provide several bonuses, such as:

Legacy Points
- These are spent during an Age Transition to purchase Legacy Options
Legacy Options
- These are purchased during an Age Transition to provide a one-time or persistent benefit during the upcoming age
Attribute Points
- These are used to upgrade your Leader bonuses (see this thread for more discussion)
An immediate gameplay benefit

Some examples:

Completing a path unlocks a Golden Age option for the next age:

If you fail to make any progress on a Legacy Path, you will unlock a Dark Age Legacy Option.

Age Transitions
When an age’s progress meter is completely filled, the age concludes and an Age Transition occurs. This is an intermission of sorts which prepares the map and players for the next age, and is considered a climactic moment during a game. It also represents a time jump between ages.

What happens and what will you do?

You will pick new civilization to play in the next age.

You will have multiple civilizations to choose from, each unlocked by:
- …your previous civilization choices. Each civilization unlocks a guaranteed historical or geographical path for later choices. For example, choosing Maurya India in the Antiquity Age guarantees the ability to choose Chola India in the Exploration Age.
- …your leader choice. Each leader also guarantees certain civilization choices. For example, if Napoleon is your leader you will always be able to choose the French Empire in the Modern Age.
- …your gameplay choices. Certain civilization choices can be unlocked by in-game decisions. For example, if you obtain enough Horse resources in the Antiquity Age, you will unlock the Mongols as an Exploration Age choice.

Note that the AI players will prioritize following one of the “historical” paths available to them via their leader or previous civilization choices.

Spend Legacy Points to purchase Legacy Options to be active during the next age. Optionally, choose new Capital.

Legacy Points have a specific type, and can be used to purchase Legacy Options of the matching type.
Wildcard Legacy Points can be used to purchase Legacy Options of any type, and some options require Wildcard Points.
You may pick at most 1 Golden Age Legacy Option.

Some potential options for Military, Cultural, Economic, Scientific, and Wildcard Legacy Options.

You’ll see a nice summary for what choices you’ve made:

If you choose to place a City, the city you place will be pre-populated with buildings and districts from the previous age. You can opt not to place Town and City Legacy Options to gain Settlers instead.

The game world evolves, with game systems updating for the next age.

New Tech and Civic Trees unlock, with each player’s progress on the trees reset.
New Legacy Paths unlock, with each player’s Legacy progress reset.
Some new resources are spawned, while other resources might be removed.
New discoverables are spawned.
Obsolete building yields are reduced.
Obsolete policy cards are removed.
Some cities may be reduced to towns. Unconfirmed, but theorized based upon some seen gameplay effects.
Units may be removed. Unconfirmed, but theorized based upon some seen gameplay effects.
Certain game systems may no longer be available, or new/expanded game systems may become available.
- Examples:
  - Pantheons are available in the Antiquity Age while Religion becomes available in the Exploration Age.
  - Naval warfare is greatly expanded upon in the Exploration Age.

However, there are some things which which are persistent across ages.

Your leader is the same for all three ages, and their innate bonuses will be enhanced throughout the game as you unlock Attribute Points and progress along multiple Leader Attribute Trees.
Ageless buildings, wonders and unique quarters are not impacted by Age Transitions.
Commander units maintain their experience and promotions across Age Transitions.
Traditions (unique policy cards) that you’ve unlocked via Civic Tree research are always available to fill social policy slots regardless of age.

Sources
Ages gameplay explained
Civilization VII Dev Diary #1: Ages