After playing the Testament RPG, I became interested in trying out the Babylonians. I enjoyed them in all other incarnations of Civ, particularly Civ3 where the bowman rush was amazingly powerful.

However, I played two games last night on Prince difficulty (large/marathon/fractal) and got absolutely banjoed both times by the AI civs. Hamu's traits are relatively weak, and the bowman isn't much of an improvment on the regular archer - they certainly can't be used to assault enemy cities, although I guess they could accompany your swordsmen for extra protection.
I found that I was outmatched in culture and tech, and couldn't even resort to DoW on my neighbours as I was weaker militarily.
In both instances I had decent starts (although I had no copper, iron or horses in the last game, but this was offset by plenty of gold etc...)

In Civ3 I always tried to achieve the same thing as the Civ I was playing, so as the Babs, I would try to get a decent level of culture going by 2000BC and have the Hanging gardens built before 500BC. I know this is a lame builder-trap to fall into for Civ4, but I can't even get close to having an anywhere decent level of culture before 800AD.

Any thought on what seems to be a dissapointing Civ?

I like Hammy.

Traits are a matter of opinion and playing style but AGG + ORG is most certainly not "weak" - Helps with war and with economy. I am not in love with Bowmen, but the UB is fine - Colosseum with extra health.

Overall he's good to run a decent size empire, having the edge in research and production mid-to-late game - this is where ORG and also the extra health will kick in most noticeable.

I find his UU and UB lame, no synergy between traits and Uniques, and relatviely weak traits. Org is okay mid-tier, and Agg is just below that. T's just his uniques that really does it. Plus, Agg with an archer UU makes for a very weak combo. Pro/archer UU or Agg/melee UU would be better, imho. Babylonia is one of the teams I hate the most, and the AI seems to be bad aswell. He's been vassalized in all games I've played with him.

Bowmen are intended to protect you in multiplayer, but the Gardens are quite useful in either type of game. Hammurabi is nice because he has some good economic support (gardens and organized) to go along with one solid warmongering trait. Hammurabi works best when using short spurts of territory grabbing war followed by economic consolidation, and then repeating the cycle.

I would say he is roughly equal to Gilgamesh, Joao II or Suryavarman in overall power. He isn't top tier, but he is in no way terrible.

I find his UU and UB lame, no synergy between traits and Uniques, and relatviely weak traits. Org is okay mid-tier, and Agg is just below that. T's just his uniques that really does it. Plus, Agg with an archer UU makes for a very weak combo. Pro/archer UU or Agg/melee UU would be better, imho. Babylonia is one of the teams I hate the most, and the AI seems to be bad aswell. He's been vassalized in all games I've played with him.

As far as Hammurabi's AI goes, he has a bit of a disadvantage as most of the other AIs really hate him. He has quite a high peaceweight, meaning warlike civs will dislike him, and there's a definite bias in the game towards warlike civs. He's been a pariah in most of the games I've played recently, much like Gandhi usually is. This probably makes things slightly difficult for Hammurbai's AI. That said, it shouldn't be any worse for him than for Hatshepsut, Elizabeth, Frederick, etc. For some reason though, he just never seems to have any friends in my games.

I pulled off a bowman rush on prince fairly easily.

Took the Ethopian capital that was garrisoned with 3 warriors (what??). I was prepared to take down 3 archers, so it didn't matter. I finished them off early enough that I was able to use my bowmen in my second war against the Maya. They weren't front line troops, but they did their part.

I still have 2 bowmen garrisoned in some of my internal cities because they are so far inland (or on an inland sea that I completely control) that it doesn't really matter. They are a living monument to the glories of Babylonian history.

As a side note, the agg trait is helping my get my Medic 3 Woodsman 3 unit. Don't underestimate the help that the free combat 1 promotion - it unlocks many other promotion paths.

I recently had a successful conquest game playing Hammurabi on noble level. I didn't really think much of him, though. Bowmen seem weak, and tech and culture are difficult for him. The main reason I won, I think, was that I had a great strategic starting position that allowed me to pen in the other two civs on my continent. I had to steal techs in order to even keep up with the other civs. All in all, I'd rate him in the lowest 25% of leaders.

I've won with him, but for me, he's in the lower third of leaders.

He sounds pretty good to me, in principle. I'm no good at the game and can't manage war at all, but I thought Organised was supposed to be good for domination? You can use Aggressive to conquor lots of cities and Organised to afford to keep them. He's a bit like Napoleon, except with a slightly less crap UU and UB.

He's not exactly Boudica or Darius, but he doesn't sound bad at all to me.

i appreciate the op's comment.

In Civ3 Bowmen were 2/2, and Blue- a poor man's Legionaire-
now, they are good against Melee and Pink.

A leader with the Protective trait can produce similiar archer troops.

Maybe in a game where there are alot of early uu civs involved ol Babylon would be a better than average choice.

I think he's one of the best. His UU is a resourceless counter to to all but mounted troops, his Agg gives his early axemen some teeth, the Org is nice for non-crippling expansion, and the Garden is the only building outside Aqueduct to give an early health bonus. Plus a quick Barracks is always nice.

I've had some impressive wins with him.

In my current game he has a tech lead and is prepping to launch spaceship o.o

I like Hammy but his traits sometimes seem to outdo his UU. I like the idea of the UU but 50% of 3 means nothing really in the early game. Even at 5 exp to make them Combat I and Shock you are only a 5.55 - not exactly anti-sword unit. (Meaning being able to attack an invading sword.) Now with defense bonuses yeah, they are ok but they don't really stand up to the benefit that crossbows get mainly due to their str value being so low for their times. Whereas the crossbow is at roughly equal strength to the melee units of its time.

I would say the best use of the Bowman is to use it as defense soley. But at least it is good defense vs. the melee invaders of its time if accompanied by defensive bonuses and requires no resource.
The UB I am fond of since I have found Colosseums much more useful providing an automatic :) before their cultural benefits. If you are capped out on both health and happiness, the Colloseum will provide 1 more population ability by itself.

I must say his strongest attributes though are the traits. Agg to build the barracks fast enough for an axe/sword rush, then Org to maintain a decent economy and recover from an early rush without missing too much of a beat. (Of course any organized leader can do that.)
I am a little more fond of Agg though because I modded the commando promotion to unlock at compass and become available after Combat I. So aggressive actually helps alot in the medieval period. Quick barracks, Free Combat I, means most units start with Combat I, I give them commando, and with Theocracy or Vassalage, I can also step into City Raider fresh out of the gate.

But even the standard Agg trait is pretty solid. Now when comparing it to the rediculously powered Cha, sure it falls short. But I wouldn't rank Agg towards the bottom. IMO Protective, Expansive, Creative, Industrious,and Imperialistic fall below it.

I must admit, I don't like Hammurabi much either. He strikes me as one of those "Jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none" kind of leaders. He can warmonger, or build peacefully, but is not exceptional at either.

I do think the bowmen would be good for multiplayer (haven't tried it yet though). I always use archers a lot in multiplayer, and having an archer that eats melee would make your cities a lot less inviting to attack.

I've yet to be successful with Hammu, but I started my first campaign with him yesterday. Prince, Epic, normal "Big n small" map. Still to early to say how it'll go, but so far so good.

The thing is to fully use his powers is to rex early, with organised I seem to be able to expand quite alot quicker and still got a good enough economy to keep a techlead. This time I had plenty of space to expand on without needing an early rush, but I figure an "very" early rush would've been quite possible with the Bowman. Else the bowman is excellent for defense and taking care of barbs. But the disadvantage is that the UU is obsolete fairly quickly.

The UB on the other hand seems pretty good to me, you get both +1 happy and +2 health from one building for a little less than what an aqueduct costs, so you could say that you'll likely not need to build any aqueducts early on and you can save the theatre for later as well.

My plan is domination and I think hammu is up to the task nicely.

As some posters said, every trait and unique stuff he has is not bad, but they just don't work well in a package. He's given aggressive and organized so he should be a warmonger, but his UU is an archer, while his UB provides extra health instead of the much needed happiness (in comparison, hippodomes are godsent for a warmonger running SE).

The only way I could think of using him is with metals, pull for an axe or sword rush, put in a couple of bowmen to pick out the isolated axes or spears. Defeat the cloest neighbour and expand the empire. Use the bows to defend. Then target for big cities using the extra health.

As an AI, he's one of the worst to be your closest neighbour, though. Basically impossible to rush. Like to expand. Forcing you to beeline to construction or horse riding to get rid of him. And he just looks too unpleasant IMHO. No wonder other AIs don't like him :cry:

I played one game with him, knocked out a lot of the continent early with bowmen. I haven't had the urge to play him ever again. I didn't find him very interesting I guess.

Expand. His traits rock. I missed the Vanilla Tokugawa when WL came out. His UU/UB aren't even important because his traits have killer synergy (much like either Celtic leader).

Having said that, bowmen are not gallic warriors (which to be clear, I don't think are that bad because of the lack of iron requirement). Two bowmen with Garrison should stop three swordsmen, which is a pretty sweet hammer ratio. If you're on a hill, no contest, if there are walls and a hill, make that four swordsmen, maybe five.

I would say he is roughly equal to Gilgamesh, Joao II or Suryavarman in overall power. He isn't top tier, but he is in no way terrible.

... You mention two of the best AIs/civs and call the roughly mid-tier :eek:
Joao is definately awesome, and Gilgamesh is a ridiculously perfect early warmonger. Suryavarman does ok, but traits and UU is nothing special. UB is nice, though. His AI is ok, but so annoying I have to kill him.

As far as Hammurabi's AI goes, he has a bit of a disadvantage as most of the other AIs really hate him. He has quite a high peaceweight, meaning warlike civs will dislike him, and there's a definite bias in the game towards warlike civs. He's been a pariah in most of the games I've played recently, much like Gandhi usually is. This probably makes things slightly difficult for Hammurbai's AI. That said, it shouldn't be any worse for him than for Hatshepsut, Elizabeth, Frederick, etc. For some reason though, he just never seems to have any friends in my games.

cities

After playing the Testament RPG, I became interested in trying out the Babylonians. I enjoyed them in all other incarnations of Civ, particularly Civ3 where the bowman rush was amazingly powerful.

However, I played two games last night on Prince difficulty (large/marathon/fractal) and got absolutely banjoed both times by the AI civs. Hamu's traits are relatively weak, and the bowman isn't much of an improvment on the regular archer - they certainly can't be used to assault enemy cities, although I guess they could accompany your swordsmen for extra protection.
I found that I was outmatched in culture and tech, and couldn't even resort to DoW on my neighbours as I was weaker militarily.
In both instances I had decent starts (although I had no copper, iron or horses in the last game, but this was offset by plenty of gold etc...)

In Civ3 I always tried to achieve the same thing as the Civ I was playing, so as the Babs, I would try to get a decent level of culture going by 2000BC and have the Hanging gardens built before 500BC. I know this is a lame builder-trap to fall into for Civ4, but I can't even get close to having an anywhere decent level of culture before 800AD.

Any thought on what seems to be a dissapointing Civ?

I find Hammurabi to be a solid leader and his traits/uu/ub make a lot of sense.

- If you have copper: Cheap barracks, free combatI axes & cheap courts = early rush.
- No copper but Iron: You attack later, beeline construction for his ub. Go to war with cats+axes/swords.

But you can play peaceful as well. You can rex with cheap courts+org and focus on development/economic techs. The UU is a great early unit to keep your land safe from barbs or an early AI rush. I think he's a versatile leader, though warmongering would be the most obvious option.

Late game you get cheap factories which goes great with the +2 health from the UB. Just so happens to be I got an immortal game going with him, if you'd be interested the link is in my siggy. ;) I don't think he's disappointing so far.

I love him , close to my fave leader.

A really slow starter but once he gets going his traits are fantastic , the thing I love about organised is it pays off no matter what type of economy you run...just let the money come to you

Often when I play him I start with a worker and delay bronze working a little while my worker does stuff.....its this period where the bowman shines , he lasts for ages against any mellee unit till maces and its so cheap and easy to get two into each border city.(three bowman=two axes shield wise)...Its benefit from an attacking point of view is that it frees up other troops for offence

I dont mind the fact that the bowman does not get the aggressive melee bonus....I figure half priced barracks still gives me an edge.

As for the UB I really like it cause I struggle to fight pre catapults with Hammurabai......so once I get to construction its time to start rolling

... You mention two of the best AIs/civs and call the roughly mid-tier :eek:
Joao is definately awesome, and Gilgamesh is a ridiculously perfect early warmonger. Suryavarman does ok, but traits and UU is nothing special. UB is nice, though. His AI is ok, but so annoying I have to kill him.


The key there being "AI" leaders. The AI gets more mileage out of creative than financial. Pretty much any creative civ will do well, as will any AI designed for rapid expansion. (Like Joao.)

The key there being "AI" leaders. The AI gets more mileage out of creative than financial. Pretty much any creative civ will do well, as will any AI designed for rapid expansion. (Like Joao.)

The key is not only AI. It has a big impact, sure, but as player civs, Portugal and Sumeria are still far top tier.

Hammurabi is terrific in multiplayer for the reasons mentioned.

I think the general tone of players at CFC is a little down on Hammurabi because his traits seem fairly vanilla.

He's excellent at a textbook military rush/expand/recover cycle, but a lot of us have done that a number of times already.

He's also very land and resource dependant. You can survive without metal early on thanks to the bowman, but not having Iron or at least Copper is crippling as the game goes on. Any Aggressive leader without metal is going to feel neutered. And Organized is a trait that requires a large empire (lots of land) before it starts to feel like it's pulling its weight as well.

So there's essentially one fairly obvious path for Hammurabi to follow. When you roll a good start, terrific, He can be a real powerhouse. But if you get thrown a mediocre or poor start, he doesn't have a lot that can pull you out of a rut the way that Financial, Philosophical, or Industrious can.

So the traits are good, but fairly vanilla and suggest one fairly linear path, and the UU and UB are good but kind of vanilla as well. We also tend to overemphasize happiness over health because (I suspect) many of spend the bulk of our time playing the early portion of games where happiness is the biggest limit on growth. Health only starts to matter much later on.

It's also kind of frustrating to imagine swapping him with Gilgamesh. Babylon has an archer UU and Colosseum UB. Gilgamesh is Protective and Creative, which boosts archery units and cheap Colosseums. Sumeria has an Axeman UU and Courthouse UB - which would in turn get boosted by Aggressive and Organized. I try to not let it bug me but it still irks me from time to time. :)

My beef with Hammurabi is that any strategy you can name as being effective with him, Ragnar can do better. Comparing the two:

Both are Aggressive
Ragnar's second trait is basically organized on steroids
Ragnar gets a beefed up replacement of the bread and butter medieval fighting unit, Hammurabi doesn't
Ragnar gets a really speedy navy, Hammurabi doesn't

What does Hammurabi get in return? A couple health attached to a crummy midgame building, and a measure of defense against rushes that almost never come.

Since most leaders have SOMETHING unique to bring to the table, obsolescence is the best way to make me look down on a leader, and Hammurabi is one of the big two sufferers of that (the other is Roosevelt. Poor bastard.)

I'd say that Hammer Time is better for a specialist economy, Monkey, since organized is actually pretty good for it... And I don't consider financial "organized on steroids" - organized gives you benefit no matter what you're doing, financial only if you're cottage spamming (or heavily coastal). Not to mention organized has some of the best fast buildings in the game!

And I don't mind the health from Hammer's building - if you aren't playing a naval game, Ragnar's building is pretty meh, but a bonus to health can be of notable benefit. Then again, I'm a proponent of expansive...

Also, you say "Ragnar gets a beefed up replacement of the bread and butter medieval fighting unit, Hammurabi doesn't" - Hammer Time gets a replacement of the bread and butter early defense unit. If those rushes almost never come for you, well, you and I play very different games ;) And bowmen actually do have some leongevity to them - they make any non-chariot rush prior to macemen (see: a long time period) a heck of a lot harder. Granted, I'd rather have berserkers, but bowmen really are not bad at all, and fill a very different role.

Hammer Time isn't my favorite leader - heck, I don't even play him, one of my friends does... But I think he's a pretty darned good one, and org/agg is a powerful combo.

On a side note... Is it just me, or do we disagree a lot? You seem like an intelligent guy and a good player, but I totally don't see eye to eye with you on a lot of stuff ;)

I've noticed that our anectodal evidence which supports our playstyles seems to, quite often, be very different.

You see early rushes, I don't.
AIs attack your heavily defended cities, they pillage my countryside if I try to make them do that.
They've been going around my units if I try to choke them with a "stasis rush" since Warlords, but that strategy still works for you.
There's more but I can't remember it.

Good players will play quite differently if they face different things to adapt to, y'know?

I agree with alot of that Aftershaver especially the benefits of organised...I hate locking into a playing style before I start.

Also the thing about the UB is the time it arrives.....since Ham offers little for early offence (despite being agg.) , construction is very important.....and along comes your UB.

The strength of the bowman is that it frees up all your other units for attack....two bowmans behind walls on a hill can take alot of heat even from swordsman

great starting techs too , just require patience cause your UU and bronze working are two techs away

They've been going around my units if I try to choke them with a "stasis rush" since Warlords, but that strategy still works for you.


Wow, really? I have a stupidly high success rate with this, and I am playing on Emperor most of the time. I was really thinking it was just the way the game is programmed, but I just must have a lot of luck with it. You're keeping your units in a square directly beside the city, right? If you move them, the CPU usually does make a break for it another way.

You mean completely surrounding the inner ring, like so?

x . x
. c .
x . x

Never tried that. But, uh. That takes what, 4 units per city at the very least? Probably more in practice because you likely won't have the luck to have that many forests to park your chokers in, and the AI can and does swat my single units like gnats if they lack good defensive terrain.

Why not simply fight the old fashioned way if you're going to devote that many resources to an early war?

I did just realize, though, that I haven't actually USED this in a long time. I tried it in warlords, watched my small choking forces get used as floor paint, and decided it wasn't worth it anymore. Maybe if I went back to it, it would work.

No, no... When I do it, it's on one one square with one stack, and that has, dozens of times for me, locked the enemy settlers in their capital. I need to stop endorsing this thing if it is just my being lucky that has it working.

If your units are being turned into a fine puree (in the one stack), you don't have enough. I have *never* needed more than five units (4 archers/spearmen at least) to keep a copperless enemy Civ from wiping out my stack before they hit longbowmen (happened once - kept Isabella at one city with five archers until she got longbowmen!). Even if they have 15 archers in their city, they don't (for me) attack with more than one or two at a time unless they get one or two really lucky wins in a row - which is why you need a few extra archers or spearmen in your stack. I'd say five archers is the sweet spot. Start with two or three warriors, but get archers/spearmen out there as fast as possible to prevent the CPU from wiping out your stack.

I'm trying to remember if I was using it in Warlords... I really don't know - it's been a while now. In any case, if you do give this another try, let me know - it works for me very consistently for me.

The key is not only AI. It has a big impact, sure, but as player civs, Portugal and Sumeria are still far top tier.

You have the right to your opinion, but I do not think Joao or Gilgamesh compare well with Huayna Capac, Elizabeth or Darius. The Hall of Fame gives anecdotal evidence that this view is correct.

I dunno if you're lucky or I'm unlucky, we can't base that on just you and me when there are hundreds of board users.

Molybdeus, you should know better than to try to make someone look bad by comparing them to a group that's quite possibly the top 3 of a group of 52.

You know, I think I'll make a "stasis rush" thread with a poll and see what kind of results I get.. I'm really curious now whether it really is just my lucky going crazy on me. I'll do it tomorrow in any case - don't have the energy to do a new thread tonight.

I recently wrapped up a Domination win with Hammy, it turned out to be easier than I expected. I used the Bowmen as barb counters (I play with raging barbs normally), and the UB helped a ton with health problems (I had more than enough happy, but very little health). Organized helped keep the economy flowing, especially as I used fairly expensive civics during much of the game. One of my easiest dominations actually. It also helped that I got the Colosseum quest as I was building Gardens everywhere for the health, that Golden Age gave me a tech lead that I used to build hordes of Cavalry, and after that it was a done deal, just the mopping up.

Molybdeus, you should know better than to try to make someone look bad by comparing them to a group that's quite possibly the top 3 of a group of 52.

I did not say they were bad. I said they weren't top tier. In my opinion . . .

The top tier of leaders is Darius, Hannibal, Elizabeth, Huayna Capac, etc.
The second tier of leaders is Mehmed, Frederick, Lincoln, etc.
The third tier of leaders includes Joao, Hammurabi and Gilgamesh.
The fourth tier of leaders is Bismarck, Genghis Khan, etc.
The fifth tier of leaders is Sitting Bull, Saladin, etc.

Joao is not bad. He is average for a human player. (And above average for an AI player, but that isn't the point of this thread.)

Discussions about "best leaders" seem to come down to one fundamental difference of style:

- Some players have a favourite strategy, and THEN they look for a leader that works best with that strategy. These players may not like Hammy, because he is an "all-rounder" type of leader.

- Other players like to pick a leader (or get a random one), then look at the starting location, and THEN work out a strategy that works in that situation and with that leader. These players will probably love Hammy because he is flexible and good at many things. He has Org for expansion and good economy; Agg for warring; a good defensive early UU; and a UB that addresses his two remaining weak spots - heath and happiness. He rocks.

Another note - this ^^ explains why the AI often does well with Hammy - because he adapts to many situations.

It may also explain why Hammy is under-represented in the HOF - because if you ALREADY have your strategy, you will choose someone who synergizes exactly with that strategy, rather than picking an all-rounder.

I don't know if many people start a HOF bid by rolling random leader, random map! But for a non-HOF game, random leader is challenging and fun - and Hammy is a good outcome if you get him.

I found a handy use for the Bowman last night.....I dont know the maths but if I brought one or two with an offensive stack and parked on a hill outside the target city (or forest if not possible) , when the AI had a go at the stack before my turn , the Bowmen took on the axes and my axes were untouched when it came to my turn.

But this may be the case with normal archers cant remember....but even so they mop up damaged melee units with ease

And two Bowman plus a spear will do a good job defending a city for a very long time and both units can pick off barbs

^^

plus they look neat :)

My beef with Hammurabi is that any strategy you can name as being effective with him, Ragnar can do better. Comparing the two:

Both are Aggressive
Ragnar's second trait is basically organized on steroids
Ragnar gets a beefed up replacement of the bread and butter medieval fighting unit, Hammurabi doesn't
Ragnar gets a really speedy navy, Hammurabi doesn't

What does Hammurabi get in return? A couple health attached to a crummy midgame building, and a measure of defense against rushes that almost never come.

Since most leaders have SOMETHING unique to bring to the table, obsolescence is the best way to make me look down on a leader, and Hammurabi is one of the big two sufferers of that (the other is Roosevelt. Poor bastard.)

If you spam cottages yes. :rolleyes: Fin vs org? Been there, done that. Play a SE and show me how fin beats org. And if you don't rush as agg/org, somethings wrong with you. Wasting those cheap courts.

As other people said Hamm is a solid, all round leader. Comparing leaders is just ridiculous, as each leader asks for another strategy ..

I don't know if many people start a HOF bid by rolling random leader, random map! But for a non-HOF game, random leader is challenging and fun - and Hammy is a good outcome if you get him.

I play HOF games with random leaders (and barbs on always), haven't played as Hammy yet though.

Everyone should read BurN's Code of Hammurabi thread, it is very amusing and entertaining and ends with a spectacular win.