Guide To Policy And Crisis Cards In Civilization 7

Policy cards make a return in Civilization 7, and they work similarly to those in Civilization 6. However, the new ages system means that there are some changes to how policy cards change between age transitions. Civ 7 also introduces Crisis Cards which are a new feature for the end-of-age crises that will plague your empire regardless of how successful your age has been.

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Civilization 7 Review – Classic Civilization With A Few New Twists

An excellent art style, fantastic sound track, and great leaps forwards for replayability, Civilization 7 is a great game. But it will prove divisive.

These new changes bring about some new strategies and ways to think about policy cards, and we’ll cover some of these below to give you a better idea of how to make the most of your civic tree.

How Do Policy Cards Work?

You will start the game with two policy cards available, which you can slot into your empire when you complete your first civic research.

These early game choices are huge in Civilization 7. Will it be extra culture? Or extra science and production? You are basically choosing the future of your age within the first few turns.

Policy cards can be unlocked via the technology or civic tree. Typically, they provide global buffs to your empire, whether that be extra production for infantry units, extra happiness, influence, and so on.

Crisis Cards

When you reach the end of an Age – whether that be Antiquity or Exploration – a crisis will be triggered at 70 percent age completion.

You will be prompted to select a Crisis Card. This will start out with just one card, and as the age progresses and the crisis worsens, you will need to select extra cards. You must slot the crisis cards. There’s no avoiding the chaos about to head your way.

The crisis may be a plague infecting your cities, in which case you can choose cards that actually can provide some benefit – like extra culture when a town is infected that has an Altar, for example.

Understanding when your empire is about to be thrown into chaos is very important. For example, you may be involved in a drawn-out war against a neighbor. If the plague crisis hits then your opponent’s cities will slowly kill any troops it has stationed there.

However, it may be that an aggressive city state power has spawned next to your capital and is throwing units at it. Knowing which crisis cards to take in these events can be the make or break of your empire.

Tradition And Policy Cards

There are two types of policy card available in Civilization 7: Tradition and Policy Cards.

Tradition cards are earned via your civilization’s civic tree. Tradition cards are retained between ages, whereas regular policy cards are reset and changed for the new era.

Again, this is where some strategic thinking needs to come into play – is there a speciifc tradition card from your current civilization that will be useful in future ages? You can only choose to research one new civic at a time, therefore potentially restricting your access to your civ’s unique civics.

Culture Generation

Many of the policy cards are accessed via the civic tree, which is essentially a scientific technology tree but for culture generation.

Much of Civilization 7 is trying to find a balance between all the victory milestones – economic, cultural, scientific, and military, while attempting to hit a golden age in at least one of them.

There have been plenty of games where we’ve neglected culture entirely and come to regret it later, when we have no Tradition cards to slot at the beginning of the next age.

Even very basic culture generation – like monuments in your cities – should be enough to secure some decent generation to unlock your civilization’s tradition cards.

Grand Strategy

Turn-Based Strategy

4X

Released

February 11, 2025

ESRB

t

Genres