I'm in complete agreement with the name changes. I think they make perfect sense.
These are peoples that have been misrepresented in stories, media, and games basically from the moment they came into contact with Europeans. Their cultures have undergone many attempts at cultural genocide and assimilation--or even actual genocide--and discrimination remains a huge issue for Native Americans to this day. So I think that changing the names is a good way to give a nod to these cultures in a positive way without undermining gameplay.
WORLD’S EDGE: Based on the feedback we got from you and other consultants, we changed the Fire Pit to the Community Plaza (a building where Villagers work together to create benefits for your civilization) and went through the same beta process to balance this.
I'm fine with this as well. The firepit was understandably very offensive, and this seems like a more appropriate way to implement the same mechanic into the game.
The removal of Nature Friendship is understandable for the same reasons as the firepit, though I am a bit sad about this one when it comes to gameplay. Conversion was one of the more fun mechanics with these civs and even in the entire game, and I think removing it has pretty huge implications for early game balance as well. Less army military strength and less scouting ability being the major downsides here. I guess we'll have to wait and see what they replaced it with. I can live with this one, I think. The first 3-4 minutes of the game are not really that important and should be balance-able over time.
The mining change does worry me though. While I understand the reasoning for the change, I feel that there is probably no good alternative to mining for gameplay. I guess we'll have to wait and see.
