Please elaborate. India (tighter Happiness cap, less restrictive food boxes) and Siam (Maritime bonus, Wat) look like the big winners to me. I don't see how a +2H/+2C building is all that great unless you plan to spam units from size 2 cities. Even so, you need to win the research war to get quality units.
You're right in that India got stronger, but I disagree with your other points.
Egypt definitely got stronger. There's at least 5 National Wonders that every empire is going to want now which benefit from the +20% wonder production speed. Secondly they usually went for Tradition, which received a minor buff. (Slowpoke has shown why this isn't a major buff - 1 gold per 2 population is laughable and nobody in their right mind would grab this bonus. Should have been +1 gold per 1 population at least). Just think of how crazy large their capitol would be with the change to food requirements and the +50% food growth, and now imagine that with the National Library and a bunch of the other national wonders. Compare this to civs that normally went for Liberty and are now feeling a nerf (ie France, China, etc).
Secondly, their UB isn't meant for spamming size 2 cities. Instead they can go down the culture track for science and still grab a happiness bonus. Most civs need to grab colosseums to go beyond a certain size. I think this is especially true now that it will be easier to get to your happiness cap (less food requirements, less happiness bonuses).
Siam got *weaker*. They are still a good civ, but their 50% bonus won't yield as much food now. This nerf was probably needed for them though, as they were getting pretty obscene amounts of food already. I don't think their Wat is all that special given how much later it comes out. This could play out different though, since everyone's going to want universities for scientists.
Martin Altivo said:
Don't see it. They'll be a warmonger civ now. A 400
advantage in reaching Steel is massive now that Libraries are so bad.
Babylon was a warmonger pre-patch too. They were tier 1 due to easy easy Steel slingshots (or in some cases riflemen slingshots). The thing is they could get 3 Great Scientists very early, and are now limited to 1. If you go for war as Babylon, you're basically sacrificing half your UA for the majority of the game as you won't be able to produce a lot of scientists. I think Babylon's going to be forced to go for universities.
Imagine how much a scientist meant for a different civ. Now nearly double that bonus, and that's how much a scientist means to Babylon. The library nerf hurt everyone, but Babylon moreso, not less. I'd place Babylon at one tier above Germany / Ottomans now.
to +1
