An alternative Deity Tier List (a.k.a. 'Don't Forget About Conquest')

The problem with egypt is that there is little synergy between the UA and the UU + UB. Both the UB and UU favor a wide empire with 1-2 conquered capitals and maybe getting a religion that further buffs the temples (DF is definitely a strong pantheon with the start bias and if you can get culture from temples and a religious building it can be a very strong religion). But the UA doesn't work quite well with this startegy because there is little time for wonders. And playing wide you won't build many national wonders either.

On the other hand the UA works well with a tradition tall empire: you stack the bonus with aristocracy and get a science lead faster, letting you build more wonders. But the UB is not that great if you only get 4-5 of them. In this case you want to avoid early wars in order to focus on science and growth so the UU is useless. But going tradition let's you get ahead in science faster for any civ so really what the UA gives is just a reduction in hammers.

Egypt can be quite strong with the right combination of terrain and religion, but all this is situational so they can't be put in the first two tiers on any list.
 
Regarding burial tombs:
Assuming 5 cities, 10 smilies and 10 gpt is quite good, besides the normal temple benefits
 
But the UA doesn't work quite well with this startegy because there is little time for wonders. And playing wide you won't build many national wonders either.
Yes, but at Deity one doesn’t get the early era wonders in any case. In my experience, self-founding 6-8 cities, there is a delay to National Wonders, but not more than one or two that I give up on. It is just a turn or two extra for the cap, so the delay really comes from the prerequisite buildings in the expos.

But the UB is not that great if you only get 4-5 of them.
It is a decent buff on an okay building. Many civs do not even have a UB.

In this case you want to avoid early wars in order to focus on science and growth so the UU is useless.
I disagree here, as early war almost always seems to be a factor, even if one does not take cities. The CA is an okay unit on its own for barb hunting, so having a buffed unit is significant positive.

Egypt can be quite strong with the right combination of terrain and religion, but all this is situational so they can't be put in the first two tiers on any list.
This tier list has them right in the middle, so maybe we can all agree about that?
 
I'm honestly baffled by how poorly rated is Assyria's UA, especially by the OP, given the premise of the list that emphasizes warmongering on Deity. I'm not even an expert Deity player (I probably lose more often than I win), but I found their UA strong enough to put them into Tier 2, close to Tier 1 for Deity warmongering.

1. UA: Obviously at Deity you're going to be behind in science. Even still, if you're warmongering (successfully) you'll be able to catch up with hardly any science infrastructure. You can beeline military techs instead of the standard (boring) Philosophy -> Education -> Scientific Theory -> Plastics.

I happened to spawn next to Hiawatha, who in most games is the most annoying city-spammer. In this case, his city-spamming meant that by the time I was through, my 10 tech deficit had vanished. Of course you can't rely on spawning next to Hiawatha, but as you know, every civ city spams on Deity. The OP called the UA just "hit and miss" but at Deity it was almost always hit for me. Even after I had the tech lead, as I continued my warmongering it was still worth free techs here and there, as there was always some part of the tech tree that I'd ignored (e.g., Steel, Navigation, Refrigeration). This is so much better than the Songhai's extra gold from city capture, which the OP rated 4/5. It's not as good as Poland/Korea/Babylon UA's, but for the parameters listed (Deity warmongering), I think it was worth dozens of turns of research. I'd rate it a 6, personally.

2. UU: Siege Towers are not as good as Battering Rams only because they're later in the tech tree. But others have already argued for them here. The OP keeps replying that he doesn't like to warmonger during this period anyway, because it comes during that in-between period, since he prefers UUs in Ancient or Medieval. But Siege Towers make it feasible to attack during that in-between period, with just composites for support.

And as others have noted, they are useful well past their era just for the buff to other units. (Their defense doesn't scale with era, but you can take advantage of AI tendencies to first attack weakened units. They'd rather attack a 90 HP musketman, who can survive a few hits, than a 100 HP siege tower.) They don't really become obsolete until artillery. How many UUs have that kind of staying power? Only the ones with upgradable abilities. I'd rate it 3.5/5.

3. UB: Royal Libraries are pretty useful, mainly for the production saved. You'll build libraries anyway, and it saves you from having to build early amphitheaters and barracks (or it stacks with barracks if you want to build it anyway). The OP says that warmongers want to use their GWs for political treatises for faster SPs, but you only need one. The first GW's great work will pay itself off culture-wise in the long run. And then you can go back to political treatises after that because you can just rotate that single great work between your royal libraries when a city is one turn from building a unit. (Yes, some micromanagement needed.) I'd rate it 2.5/5, mainly for the production saved in not building amphitheaters and barracks.

My ratings would put Assyria firmly into Tier 2 with Alex and Lizzy, and ahead of Askia. I honestly do not get how you rated extra gold from city capture 4/5 but extra science from city capture 2/5. Science beats gold every day of the week.
 
Yes, but at Deity one doesn’t get the early era wonders in any case. In my experience, self-founding 6-8 cities, there is a delay to National Wonders, but not more than one or two that I give up on. It is just a turn or two extra for the cap, so the delay really comes from the prerequisite buildings in the expos.

You can get some early wonders if you beeline them: Oracle, HG and Piramids are fairly doable on deity. But they are not worth it always, especially if you plan to attack early.

When playing wide many NWs are a tough choice. If you have 10 cities (including captured with War Chariots) each NW costs 425 hammers, not to mention the prerequisite buildings. You might want to skip some that you usually have in a 4-6 city tradition game (Hermitage is first on the list).

It is a decent buff on an okay building. Many civs do not even have a UB.
Yes but it's not game changing for 4 cities, the temple is not a prioritised building,and this just makes it a lot more attractive. This has a nice synergy with piety and if you have 3 policies to invest going left side to Theocracy can give a good bonus, but this again is stronger for wide play and not as strong for tall (I'm sure there are better ways to spend 3 policies in that case).

I disagree here, as early war almost always seems to be a factor, even if one does not take cities. The CA is an okay unit on its own for barb hunting, so having a buffed unit is significant positive.

By wars I meant offensive wars where you want to at least get a capital. Sometimes war is inevitable, and you might do well to prepare, especially if you are next to a warmonger. But the Chariot Archers and War Chariots are not really good units for this type of war. Not even for barb hunting, since they cost more than archers and they have a strange upgrade path. Unless you are making good use of them, like city taking there is no point in training those units. You are much better with archers: they require less tech are cheaper and upgrade to something useful all game long.

This tier list has them right in the middle, so maybe we can all agree about that?

Yes they are in the middle in most tier lists so that is the general consensus. Sometimes people tend to remember that time when everything went well and they steamrolled the map with civ X and then tend to overrate them, but Egypt is middle tier no matter how you look at it.
 
I'm honestly baffled by how poorly rated is Assyria's UA, especially by the OP, given the premise of the list that emphasizes warmongering on Deity. I'm not even an expert Deity player (I probably lose more often than I win), but I found their UA strong enough to put them into Tier 2, close to Tier 1 for Deity warmongering.

1. UA: Obviously at Deity you're going to be behind in science. Even still, if you're warmongering (successfully) you'll be able to catch up with hardly any science infrastructure. You can beeline military techs instead of the standard (boring) Philosophy -> Education -> Scientific Theory -> Plastics.

"Random" civ has given me a lot of Assyria lately (like 4-5 of my last 20 games have been Assyria), and I'm pretty stoked about it. You get so many techs if you're warmongering that it's honestly easy to forget you got them. I've also had the flattest tech trees I've ever had as Assyria...it is not uncommon to completely fill out an era before moving on to the next, while beelining whatever it is you would normally beeline. This works extremely well with a military push for reasons you said. It works even better with a typical Honor/Commerce strategy because you end up swimming in gold and the purchase discount allows you to just straight up build the science buildings you didn't bother teching for.

Honestly, I'm pretty impressed with them after a few runs of using them. Yes, Seige towers are at an awkward tech spot, but if you remember that you're playing Assyria and adjust accordingly, you can do some serious damage with just seige towers and a complement of Cbows.
 
I honestly do not get how you rated extra gold from city capture 4/5 but extra science from city capture 2/5. Science beats gold every day of the week.

My guess would be that they thought gold is more important as you can use it whnever
you like and gives you units. I agree the UA is better than rated, though.
 
I honestly do not get how you rated extra gold from city capture 4/5 but extra science from city capture 2/5. Science beats gold every day of the week.
I like this list and the methodology very much, but consentient is also prejudiced by his personal experience. But what else is there? He had a great DCL game with Askia and buffed the numbers up. AFAIK, he never personally had a strong run with Assyria.

But this is what I like about the methodology: even if there is bias, the numbers are close to exactly right!

For the sake of argument, flip those scores or give both 3/5. Forget about the tiers. The relative strength rating from civ to civ is just about perfect. Even with the changes you want. It is a very robust approach to ranking the civs.
 
beetle, I never said I had any problem with the methodology. But the difference I'm talking about for Assyria was two whole tiers. It was the difference between being ranked closer to Byzantium or to Korea.

I'm sure there are civs which I've rated not as high as they should be, because I failed to consider the strategic principles which would make them so good (e.g., maybe the Songhai, which I would actually flip with Assyria in the OP's rankings). I'm just saying maybe the OP should consider as much also with Assyria.
 
But the difference I'm talking about for Assyria was two whole tiers.
That is more about how close the tiers are numerically. Consentient would disagree, but in the end, the tiers turn out to be pretty arbitrary. Look at the numbers: in every case there is only a single point difference between the bottom of one tier and the top of the tier below it.

The numbers roughly work, no matter what few or several things one might pick at.

People are understandably concerned with whom their favorite civ is grouped, but on the scale provided, there is nothing like a statistical difference between tiers.

That said, IMHO, you are being quite liberal with rating Assyria’s uniques -- especially compare to uniques with the same values. Plus you want to give Assyria the benefit of fractional value assignments when really (to be consistent with what is already in place) you should be rounding down.

The methodology (and the resultant ranking) is not perfect, but it is better than anything anyone else anyone has come up with.
 
That is more about how close the tiers are numerically. Consentient would disagree, but in the end, the tiers turn out to be pretty arbitrary. Look at the numbers: in every case there is only a single point difference between the bottom of one tier and the top of the tier below it.

The numbers roughly work, no matter what few or several things one might pick at.

People are understandably concerned with whom their favorite civ is grouped, but on the scale provided, there is nothing like a statistical difference between tiers.

That said, IMHO, you are being quite liberal with rating Assyria’s uniques -- especially compare to uniques with the same values. Plus you want to give Assyria the benefit of fractional value assignments when really (to be consistent with what is already in place) you should be rounding down.

The methodology (and the resultant ranking) is not perfect, but it is better than anything anyone else anyone has come up with.

I agree that the tiers boundaries are arbitrary, but the differences between Consentients rating of Assyria and mine are not arbitrary. Our differences in opinion are pretty significant. As I said, it's the difference between being closer to Korea or Byzantium. I'm not sure what you mean by "the numbers roughly work", because I argue that they didn't work for Assyria.

Assyria isn't even my favorite civ, so I wouldn't say at all that I'm "concerned" about it. This is hardly a life-or-death matter.

But I do contest statements like "Assyria's UA is hit-or-miss" since, on Deity, it's almost ALWAYS a hit during the eras that siege towers are in play. You'll certainly be behind in tech before the Renaissance, so there's always a tech to steal.
 
I agree Assyria's UA is pretty much always hit especially if you war during all era starting with ancient or classical. Siege towers can actually be used well into Renaissance since AI usually don't target a full hp unit that has double cover promotion if there are other bait units. They start being weaker during industrial era but then you should have cannons or even artillery by then. They're pretty much underrated by this list but that might be his personal experience with this civ being limited.
 
I can never get Assyria to work for me. Maybe I delay building the siege towers too long, but once I finally get a couple of them and go after a city, they just get wrecked.
 
I can never get Assyria to work for me. Maybe I delay building the siege towers too long, but once I finally get a couple of them and go after a city, they just get wrecked.

They're a complement to other units, not the backbone of your army. (I don't rate them like Keshiks, Chu-Ko-Nus, Impis, or Camels for that reason.) You need to clear out the enemy units with composites first. The problem with composites is that they're slow to take down the city, and by the time they bring it down, the enemy might have reinforcements to bring in. Siege towers speed up that process significantly, can withstand a few city bombardments due to their immediate cover upgrades, and replace the need for a melee unit (which doesn't have cover).
 
I am not sure I ever have taken a cap with them, but if you make them a priority you should be able to get a couple cities. I am pretty terrible with early warmongering, but I can get that far.

It is very disconcerting using siege to screen your archers! I hold off until I have three towers and three CBs. I want three because, even after Cover 2, I might need to rotate one out.

I have not been able to keep them alive much after that, and I have not been able to translate that early success into a sweep.
 
Three CBs doesn't seem like enough. At least not at Deity. I probably wouldn't attack until I've got 5 CBs and 2 towers. Having the 3rd to rotate out for the reason you stated isn't a bad idea. Using your towers to screen for archers is disconcerting, as you say. They hold up well against ranged units, but not that well against melee. It wouldn't hurt to have a pike around for that purpose.
 
I'm just playing here with Byz on Immortal... and I think the Dromons are getting a raw deal. to wit: "-1/5, since Triremes are actually better for scouting and surviving numerous encounters with barb galleys and enemy units."

1. They are criticized because they can't take cities. But when do you ever go after cities with a purely naval force that early in the game? I never do. My navy is to break down the walls, if I use a navy at all, and I use land units to capture the city. Once in a while I'll use a melee naval unit to take a city, but never in the ancient or classical eras, I wait for Privateers for that. If you really had to use an ancient era unit attacking from the sea, just put a swordsman into a boat. If the walls are gone, he'll take it as well as a Trireme would.

2. We all know the reason people tend to not like melee units, especially UU's: They take damage every time they attack. That's another thing that makes the Dromon a good unit: It doesn't take damage on the attack. Not a good unit for scouting? It's great for scouting. They can attack barb naval units with relative impunity, and also let's not forget they can attack units on land. This all adds up to faster experience. They'll probably take some damage from barb naval units, but less than a trireme would. How many times have you been far from home and found a barb naval unit with a trireme and thought "I can't attack that thing, I'm too far from home and my health is low." Not a problem for a Dromon.

So anyway... they're still not a great civ, but at least I like the Dromon.
 
The rating given to Dromons is biggest flaw in the whole works. Everything else anyone might argue about is off by one or two points at most, but the Dromon should be 2/5, so a three point difference. But even with three extra points Byzantium is in the lowest tier. The system is very robust!

For the earlier Dromon discussion, see p. 9, starting with post #170.
 
The rating given to Dromons is biggest flaw in the whole works. Everything else anyone might argue about is off by one or two points at most, but the Dromon should be 2/5, so a three point difference. But even with three extra points Byzantium is in the lowest tier. The system is very robust!

For the earlier Dromon discussion, see p. 9, starting with post #170.

India gets a bit of a raw deal too IMO, their UA turns out to be pretty good for happiness (even more so if lifting higher pop cities off the AI to shorten the growing time curve/cost), but that was touched on. The elephant archers getting a 0/5 I can't agree with though. You are scratching a resource-based unit (which you can now sell) for 3 move composite bows that are a bit less expensive and buildable earlier than composite bows.

Consentient himself wrote about the T85 (deity) and t100 (immortal) viability of composite bows. How is a faster comp bow that is available sooner getting a zero in valuation? If anything, 3 moves should extend their relative viability timeframe compared to normal comps (though they will need that since they don't upgrade). They're like a poor man's horse archer, so should be rated weaker...but hell those were 5/5.

I'd take a resourceless 3 move composite bow vs the neutrals' chariots needing horse any day.
 
Couldn't agree more. They are actually tougher than comp bows -- 9 combat strength vs. 7 for the Comp Bow (same ranged combat strength - 11) -- and they do come much earlier in the tech tree than Comp Bows, and without requiring a digression from the path to Civil Service, Education, etc.). Their only downsides are no defensive terrain bonuses and loss of range promotions if you choose to upgrade upgrade them to knights. Everything else is :goodjob:
 
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