Which Civilization is the best for land expansion?

M

macyc

Chieftain
Joined
Mar 20, 2015
Messages
1
Hi guys, I had a question about Civ 5,
What civilization is best for land expansion? I normally play as Rome, or the Ottomans, and they seem to expand much slower than other civilizations, I make up for it by making tons of cities, but I was wondering if some civilizations expand faster than others?
Thanks!
I'm sure everyone can tell I'm very new to the game, so if this is a dumb question I really apologize
 
Border expansion speed, which is what I assume you're asking about here, is based on city's cultural output. In every new city, you should focus on food and cultural buildings first. Some civilizations have bonuses for the expansion-few have unique buildings that add more culture, Russians have unique building that reduces cost of expansion by 25%, Americans have 50% discount, and Shoshone gain extra tiles when founding a new city.

By the way...this isn't CivIV, paving the continent with many cities isn't always the best path to victory. You can win easily with 3-4 cities...in fact that's probably easiest strategy.
 
In civ 5, civilizations are no long unique in building cities quickly like they used to in civilization 4. Social policies now benefit civilizations in different ways that you could choose a social policy that will get you to expand quick.
 
Sarin said:
By the way...this isn't CivIV, paving the continent with many cities isn't always the best path to victory. You can win easily with 3-4 cities...in fact that's probably easiest strategy.
Click to expand...

It was not necessarily the best path in Civ4 either... maintenance costs were tied to total population and number of cities - each new city was a burden on your empire until you developed it enough... although unlike Civ 5, there were fewer "hard caps" (i.e. Global Happiness) to spamming cities.
 
ThorHammerz said:
It was not necessarily the best path in Civ4 either... maintenance costs were tied to total population and number of cities - each new city was a burden on your empire until you developed it enough... although unlike Civ 5, there were fewer "hard caps" (i.e. Global Happiness) to spamming cities.
Click to expand...

Well, in Civ4, "tall" meant what, 6-8 cities? Something like that. And I kinda feel that in CiV, AI was too annoying in stuffing its cities wherever it could, especially next to or between yours. It happens in CivV too, but now as soon...generally, I can pop two or three solid cities before borders with AI become a problem...
 
Well, going tradition will expand your borders faster than the other social policies. Also there's the Shoshone who get massive borders instantly and America who can buy tiles at a reduced cost.
 
And there's Russia with the Krepost which speeds up border expansion. And the religion belief "Religious Settlements"
 
Assuming you mean tile growth the best would be Shoshone, America or Russia.

Also take note of your terrain - some maps you may have a tonne of pastures around your start zone and nearby spots that would make good city placements. From there you can take God of the Open Sky pantheon. Oral Tradition or Sacred Path are alternative means that can work quite well in some situations.

But really any civ can have fast border growth. I presume you are probably playing Liberty with Rome or Ottomons.
Try opening Tradition first (from a culture ruin is best) and then go into Liberty. You'll find your borders will grow very fast then on for all your cities and that really takes some of the heat of playing wide.
This is discussed in another thread but take a look at the numbers below - this shows the difference that the Tradition opener makes...

Browd said:
As Horseshoe Hermi notes, the Tradition opener has a far more dramatic effect than many folks may realize.

To put some meat on the formula bones, at Standard speed, the culture cost of acquiring tile t+1 is FLOOR(15+(10*(t-1))^1.1,5) (note: the Floor function just rounds the plot cost down to the nearest 5 culture). So, the first tile (after the initial 6 free tiles) costs 15 culture, the second plot costs 25 culture, etc.

With the Tradition opener, the exponent does drop to .825 (75% of 1.1). As a result, plot costs behave as shown in the following table:

Tile|Base Culture Cost|Tradition Culture Cost
1|15|15
2|25|20
3|40|25
4|55|30
5|70|35
6|85|40
7|105|40
8|120|45
9|135|50
10|155|55
11|170|55
12|190|60

By the fifth tile, the Tradition culture cost per tile is half the base cost and by the eleventh tile, the Tradition cost is less than one-third the base cost.
Click to expand...
 
gotta get me some angkor wat

if you want fast land expansion I suggest playing shoshone, most obvious choice. after that maybe america

but in terms of tile expansion it's mainly like what others have described before, mostly about your buildings and social policies.
 
Shoshone are the best at flat-out tile expansion, because they start with a lot for free, but I have a feeling the OP is talking about Vanilla Civ V. In which case there are no simple answers, but the best choice might be France, just because they're the Vanilla civ with the from-turn-0 culture bonus which both helps their base tile expansion and let's them rip through Tradition.
 
Primacide said:
Gots to love Browd. Wow.

This explains why good players take the tradition opener even when going full liberty.
Click to expand...

Yes, opening tradition is usually a very good idea. The only time it's not is when you need that settler ASAP.
 
Just going to tack this on...

Anyone else notice that as your city gets really large, the expansion speeds up? They expand quickly at first, then there is a slow lag of growth, then at around 25-30 citizens the cities start to expand rapidly again.
 
Tradition + Religious Settlements (15% faster border growth) as Pantheon Beliefs.

Also, Shoshone starts with additional territory.
 
The angkor wat wonder would also be good for land expansion for any civilization. It would be like having a krepost in every city since costs of acquiring new tiles in every city is reduced.
 
If you're talking expansion through conquest then Germany. With their reduced military unit cost and barbs joining them they can get powerful fast and just roll over over civs.
 
Misac said:
Tradition + Religious Settlements (15% faster border growth) as Pantheon Beliefs.

Also, Shoshone starts with additional territory.
Click to expand...

I tend to think that Religious Settlements is a pretty bad choice. I guess if you had no other decent pantheons available it might be an ok option but I'd rather a faith pantheon that lets me found a religion more quickly and then I can use all that faith to buy Pagoda's for my cities and get the extra culture that way.
It might be a little slower initially but I tend to think that is a stronger approach overall.
 
@Redaxe

Yea, I'm not fun of that either. Never used actually. But OP wants to know how he can expand his borders fast, so, that pantheon is one of the way to do it :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

The_J
Can you make an anti-imperial empire game? The 4Xperts behind Civilization, Syphilisation and Victoria 3 discuss eXperimental 4X design
Replies
5
Views
2K
martindo
M
Hickman888
Dynamic Modifiers
Replies
2
Views
402
Hickman888
Hickman888
Ita Bear
Could the player start with a semi-developed empire like the AI?
Replies
2
Views
385
Solver
Solver
rsc2a
(7a) VP Events Overhaul (Expansion Pack system)
2
Replies
27
Views
3K
APLion
A
C
[BNW] Unlock existing UU & UB for an existing civ ( especially shoshone pathfinder )
Replies
4
Views
287
Caocao84
C
Top Bottom