Method and Limits

The Rulebook works upward from evidence. First, it identifies a game rule and paraphrases it. Second, it describes inputs, conversion, outputs, conditions, and feedback. Third, it asks what general analytical question that structure suggests. Only later can an independently researched historical case test the claim.

This order prevents an attractive aphorism from searching backward for a convenient game analogy. It also gives a future case permission to reject the rule.

Every analogy is constrained by at least four distortions: the player has centralized objectives; information is unusually broad; time is compressed into turns and thresholds; and game entities obey stable quantified rules. Historical actors have conflicting purposes, incomplete knowledge, unequal power, and the ability to reinterpret or change institutions.

Numerical balance never establishes historical magnitude. Civilopedia historical context never substitutes for scholarship. Civilization and leader bonuses are game variants, not claims about represented peoples. The analytical rules are therefore hypotheses with scope, countervailing mechanisms, falsification conditions, and explicit evidence needs.