Civs from easiest to hardest

[Blitzer]

Guess I'll toss in my two cents...


The Civs I have the most success with (standard maps, 8 civs, random terrain) have been the Persians and the Babylonians. My top ten list is a mass of red and green with a splash of yellow for
Egyptians.

I am an early builder/late conquerer, so these infrastructure civs suit my style very well. My first main war is generally not until knights are showing up. For early minor conquests I am on record stating my preference for swordsmen over horsemen. Yes I know I am alone here, but I just don't understand the facination with retreat on 2/1 units... Becomes unbelievably powerful on knights, and it's wonderful on Impi and JW's, but I find I lose almost as many horsemen to 1hp spearmen than I do to a losing 3 or 4 power attacker. As for the non-upgradability of swordsmen, I find they are usually all dead long before they outlive their welcome. The AI makes liberal use of longbowmen late into the game, and a swordsman can take down even a fortified longbowman in mountains with reletive ease.

Since my early game is mostly spent building Pyramids and if possible collosus... I don't find these ancient era UU's to be critical at all in my winning of the game. They are nice, but 4 swordsmen do just as well as three Immortals, and it takes just as long to pop rush a war chariot as it does a horseman.

The traits of Industrious, Religious, and Scientific are exceptional for the hybrid builder/warmonger. I will not build military units if at ALL possible unless I have built all the cultural upgrades I can in that city. All military units are if at all possible built veteran. These three civs are exceptional as they allow me to build my infrastructure to my heart's content while still having time for the excessive wonder building and at times neglect of my military.

I've played all civs now (except the French, pink sucks), and for my playstyle these three are head and shoulders above the rest. For players who can stand passing on early wonders and seek to conquer the contient before 500ad, I can see how UU's can be a great boon... but to the builder they tend to be a nice bonus, but in no way critical to success.

This list from builder perspective only


Top Three

1) Persians
2) Babylonians
3) Egyptians

The Dregs

1) English
2) Zulu
3) Romans

[Nakar Gabab]

Sun Tzu's is so very NOT worthless. Generally, I won't build it myself either (unless it's just going to be TOO easy), but once it's built I *will* capture it. The thing puts a barracks in ANY city, including a just-captured one... huge for keeping cavalry momentum going, and providing a cheap and health-friendly stopover for a leader making his way back to my wonder city/cities. Even for a militaristic civ - and perhaps especially, since those extra promotions mean extra HP to heal.

[Harovan]

Good point for someone who goes for conquest, but not my play style.

If I'm enforced to go to war in the late game (AI's pissed because I'm too strong or similar), I usually don't capture cities, but raze and (if I need the place) rebuild. It's nice to have a free barracks in new cities, but barracks cost me only 40 shields and even if I rush them without having started to build (1:8) they cost me 320 gold. That doesn't really hurt one who makes 1,000/turn and stacked up 20,000.

I would not mind to add a "moral" factor and a larger cultural penalty for city razing. Somebody said, there is a penalty, but I haven't seen it yet. Razing a 35 city should bring your culture to zero! Starving captured cities by making citizens specialists (i.e. not caused by pillaged improvements etc.) should also been punished. Pillaging itself should be punished culturally. As long as I am not penaltized, I'll continue to raze.

[Dimension]

Originally posted by Arrian
UU's are clearly useful and can be quite powerful. I was just saying that I don't consider them as important as the civ traits.

I also think that Religious is by far the best trait. I used to always play the Egyptians, but I'm trying to start playing non-Industrious civs ... which is a little hard to justify, as much as the fast workers help early infrastructure. Playing very aggressively and replacing all my workers with slave labor as early as possible is about the only excuse I can come up with not to play Industrious.

You do certainly have to look at traits before you look at UU's, because the traits are much more important, but often what makes a civ good is the way your strategy adapts to make the best use of their traits and UU.

That gives you a paradox which is the only thing keeping the Egyptians from being hands-down the best civ. Your UU is a Horsemen without Horseback Riding, but if you make use of it, you get a Despotism GA. I don't put much importance on perfectly timed GA's, but getting it under Despotism is a complete waste. There's so much potential science and production that you lose that it cancels out a large part of the benefit of being Religious. That is, you don't have several turns of lost productivity from anarchy, but you also miss out on 20 turns of increased productivity. Really, the only way around this is to not play very aggressively, using your UU as an explorer (and stealing the occasional worker with it) until you can upgrade it.

The Aztecs also have a UU which greatly affects your strategy. If you make proper use of it, you not only have a Religious/Militaristic civ, but a civ with some Expansionist/Industrious benefits as well. The Jaguar Warrior is essentially a scout that can attack. It has the same cost & movement as a scout, but sometimes you get Barbarians from huts. The Jaguar Warrior can retreat, though, and the Barbarians will quickly make him elite. I have found that the best thing to do is not attack with the Jaguar Warriors, but just use them to scout and take workers, which makes them last a lot longer, and doesn't trigger your GA. Just scout around your neighbors for a bit, find a close one with some workers, build Barracks/Archers (which, being militaristic, you have the tech to build immediately), and take their workers with the UU the same turn you attack their cities with Archers. Or, you can spend more time scouting and just wait till you have Horsemen to get mean, but I personally don't like waiting, because you really start to notice how lethargic your non-Industrious workers are. Being extremely aggressive also makes the best use of any Militaristic civ. As the Aztecs, I've gotten enough leaders to build an army, make the Heroic Epic, and rush two wonders while still in BC. I'm not saying the Aztecs are as good as being Religious/Industrious/Militaristic/Expansionist, but they do get most of the benefit of Expansionist, and can more quickly make Industrious obsolete through slave labor.

I don't think UU's are too important, but the really early pre-Horseback Riding ones (Aztecs/Egypt/Greece/Zululand -- Babylonian Bowmen are pretty lame) have potential to significantly change your strategy. If used right, you can get benefits that rival those of the civ traits.

[dadacp]

On Monarch level, I'm a builder. I like the French for the Industrious quick start and the Commercial anti-corruption benefit, plus the nicely timed Golden Age. I wouldn't fight until running out of space, so early military units don't mean much.

On Diety level, I have to fight all the time. I prefer the Germans for the spearman/archer forces right from the start, or the Chinese, because they're Militaristic and Industrious.

[Willem]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph

Starving captured cities by making citizens specialists (i.e. not caused by pillaged improvements etc.) should also been punished. Pillaging itself should be punished culturally. As long as I am not penaltized, I'll continue to raze.

No, no, no, that would make it nearly impossible to get rid of those ridiculous cities the AI builds on useless terrain. In both Civ I & II, I usually ended up starving most of the enemy cities I captured since so often I felt their position to be worthless, or it didn't fit it in with the structure of my main empire. About the only ones I ever kept were those that had Wonders, and even then it had to be a good one. I am extremely fussy about my city locations, and being penalized for getting rid of one would really hamper my style. Frankly, I'm glad to have the Raze option, though I'm thinking it might be to easy doing it that way. However, I am at a loss for ideas as to restrictions.

As for pillaging, that's just a normal part of war, why should a player be penalized? If you're cutting off the road that leads to his only Iron supply, that's just being smart. And there shouldn't be any penalties for that.

[Zaphod]

This is a very interesting thread; kudos to everyone who has contributed.

I agree with the builders that the Egyptians and Bablyonians seem the easiest to play, although I have had some success with the Japanese and Iroquois. I'm playing a game with the Indians at the moment, and am doing pretty well. The non-religious civs are a real trial for me; I hate unhappy people and I change governments quite alot (especially in the modern era, democracy to communism for every war). Spending six turns in anarchy between governments can be a real drag on one's progress!

I was curious, Sir Ralf, about your economic strategy. If you would be willing to divulge some of your secrets, I would be very interested in learning how you generate 1,000 gold/turn. I usually trim my tax rate to the bare minimum to cover expenses, so that I can maximize research. Perhaps there are viable alternatives to this strategy?

[barefootbadass]

Early UUs can make a big difference if you have an aggresive style of play. The biggest benefits are ones that help you with resource problems, and by making a unit that normally isn't very usable much more usable. Some UUs actually really hurt though, because of the upgrade paths they disrupt.

As far as civ traits go my favorites are religious and industrious, I usually play a civ with at least one of these.

Useful UUs-
Jag Warrior very powerful conquering, a major boon if you don't have horses.

Impi- same, but even more powerful in conjuction with horses, no retreat for mobile types.

War chariot-3 for 2 horseman . . . if you don't have jungles and mountains in the way

Immortals- They rock, don't be fooled by the fact that legions slightly beat them one on one.

Legions- A strange beast, good defenders, but not really worth using for that since they are not upgradeable. Attacking they are no better than swordsmen which is why I like Immortals.

[frankdog]

See how the Civs do under AI control

I have noticed that in the few games I have played, whenever the AI has had a French civ, it has done really well. The Industrious and Commercial traits seem to be an excellent combination. Their UU is useless. Perhaps this is to make up for the strong traits.

On the other end of the scale, the English and American Civs rarely make it out to the middle ages in games I've played.

[Lewsir]

New opinions with 29f/PTW?

This is a great thread but I have a feeling it's a bit out of date - maybe opinions would be different now than back in January, after the patches and with PTW? One thing I know has changed is the upgradability of some UUs. I'm not sure what else has changed that would signficiantly alter the ranking of CIVs in terms of "easier/harder" but I'd be interested in hearing about this.

[joncnunn]

For one thing, up until the time that Eqypt gets a GA, they can keep on building War Chariots and upgrading them to the most modern unit in the upgrade path. (This also avoids the early GA problem if they also skip the Pyraimds.)

I also think the orginal poster was a war mongler, I found Babylon to be the easist civ to play. (As a builder)

And the Americans certinately aren't in the hardest category of civs to play if you play them like a builder and not a war mongler.

The Civs that should be played most like a builder during the Ancient Era if possible:

1. England
2. America
3. Ottoman
4. Russia
5. Korea

The Civ that should be played most like a war mongler during the Anicent Era:

1. Aztecs. (Aztec Warrior Rush ASAP before defensive units arrive! Second round of fighting via upgrading them to Swordmen.)

2. Zulus. (Discover Bronze Working ASAP, then use Impi Rush ASAP! Second round fighting using Zulus+ Horsemen.)

3. Irqouis. (Research Horse Back riding ASAP, pre build Mounted Warriors as Chariots, then upgrade and Mounted Warrior Rush.)

4. Romans. (Discover Iron Working ASAP, build lots of warriors and upgrade to Legions, and Legion rush.)

5. Celts. (Same as Romans, except you don't need as many Gallic Warriors which is a good thing because they cost more.)

[GusSmed]

Originally posted by joncnunn
1. Aztecs. (Aztec Warrior Rush ASAP before defensive units arrive! Second round of fighting via upgrading them to Swordmen.)

Don't do such a horrible thing to your wonderful Jaguars. I recently played an Aztec game at Emperor, and I cleaned out my home continent with them. It wouldn't have worked half as well if I'd slowed them down with those expensive iron swords.

Aztecs are great as long as they don't run up against the Zulu.

- Gus

[djafrot]

I have to agree on those Aztecs. Someone earlier said they have the expansionist abilities without the characteristic, and they're dead on. Yeah, you get the occasional barbarian, but they're usually more of a boon (pushing up your experience) than a problem. And the tech's... I swear in one game (on a big map) I got twelve of 'em. Having the huge number of units flying around scares the living crap out of your neighbours, and for some reason they seem to really fight well despite the 1:1 rating.

PLUS with the Azzies you get militaristic bonuses to experiences AND cheap religious stuff.

I used to play with the Persians because of the UU's and the good characteristics, but now those Immortals are slow as mud. Takes WAY too long to get to the front, and for the same cost I can have 3 JW's. No contest!

[Tattila the Hun]

Ever considered creating a real killer civ? By tweaking their abilities, giving them max free tech at the start, giving them a better unit for every age, and perhaps even a unresearchable tech, giving somekind of utopia government, with minimal corruption and loads of free units? For the ultimate challenge!

[Lord Merciless]

I find Romans, Chinese, Persians, Egyptians, and Japanese are the easiest ones to play from the original civs.

Among the new ones, I think Celts and Ottomans are pretty good.