What are the top 3 worst/weakest civs in your opinion?

For arguments sake lets say on standard/fractal or standard continent maps.

I'm sure this topic has been done to death previously, but not since the patch. And I haven't really had a chance to play all Civs post-patch-but I'd say:

1. Egypt- The War Chariot is a joke, and the UA forces you into spamming for wonders as a play tactic.
2. Iroquois- Forests as roads is neat, but it won't take you far later in the game. Same for the longhouse. t's all too conditional.
3. England- The Longbowman is devastating, granted, but the naval bonuses really just do it for me-unless explicitly playing on Archipelago.

1. Ottomans - barb navy? really?
2. Egypt - Weak UU and the wonder bonus is useless on high dificulties (The AI will build faster anyway).
3. America - Mediocre UU and UA. They are not terrible, but just arent special enough.

1. England. Naval bonuses need a specific map to function and I'm not ok with playing a civ which only ability is +1 range for a single unit.

2. Rome. I hate how this civ forces you to beeline to iron working before you even know if you have the timing window to use it's UUs. It takes a great deal of willpower to continue playing if you find you don't have iron near your lands.

3. Russia. UU and UB give small bonuses to unit/building I never really use. Siberian riches can be nice but usually extra resources are kinda useless as you don't need a big army against an AI.

1. The Ottomans. Trait even post-patch is really lame, naval units doesn't matter at all in civ V. The Janissary is good on the offensive but useless on the defensive and against larger forces. The Sipahi is a dumb joke that acts as a suicide bomber against a unit with more than 15-20 strength.

2. Rome. Trait is OK but UUs are screaming for iron, and if you don't have iron you're kind of screwed.

3. Spain. Trait is excellent, but UUs are pretty standard.

Worst:

1. Aztec. At least the Ottomans have the awesome Janissary and there have been some decent published strats on how to use the UA to your advantage in spots. The Aztec just suck. I never do early wars and seldom can use their UB anyway.

2. America. I really wish they were better. I want to like my home Civ. But they do pretty much stink. I would change their UA to make them some type of super nation - something like +1 from all cultural buildings.

3. Mongolia. Yes, they probably are not bottom 3, but I just don't like playing as them. I love CS allies so a UA that encourages me to kill them doesn't work for me. Keshiks are only useful for a while and I can get a Khan as any Civ with the right policies and CS allies.

All I can say is the commenters above seem to have no knowledge what so ever on the subject, based on their rationale. Not to be rude.
For example:
The Aztec UB is one of the best UBs in the game, if not the best.
Mongolia is one of the best warmongering civs in the game.
Introducing a whole new style of play does not make a civ bad...
And the list goes on.

Or then the above opinions intendedly have no factual bases and are just chosen by gut feeling.
Moderator Action: Please don't troll your fellow posters.

aatami said:

All I can say is the commenters above seem to have no knowledge what so ever on the subject, based on their rationale. Not to be rude.
For example:
The Aztec UB is one of the best UBs in the game, if not the best.
Mongolia is one of the best warmongering civs in the game.
Introducing a whole new style of play does not make a civ bad...
And the list goes on.

Or then the above opinions intendedly have no factual bases and are just chosen by gut feeling.

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OP states 'in your opinion' - not 'by the games math'. That being said, just picking apart other peoples choices and not placing your own is a little counter productive to the thread...no?

The only Civ I would constitute 'bad' really is England as they are entirely situational and getting them on a map with minimal water is just painful; longbowman can almost claim redemption for other shortcomings - but not enough for me personally. When things are slightly situational, that's fine as it 'defines' a Civ; luckily random maps don't give you random settings(such as no barbs) or I would have to add a few more civs to that.

I stand by my assertion that Mongolia stinks. Unless you war extensively against city states (few players do) they are no better than the Ottomans.

If you don't attack City States you are left with +1 horse movements, a nice but less effective and long-term useful UU than the Janissary, and a special great person I can get as ANY civ - just enact the free Great People policy, watch and wait for your Khan. 1000 says you get one before Mech Infantry, when you finally need its speed.

Disagree on the Mongols. Keshik are possibly the best UU in the entire game; they're much stronger than the Janissary in the short term and come sooner. A handful of Keshiks can roll almost any empire on any difficulty.

Janissaries have a lot going for them, but if I just want to win a warmongering game, the Mongols are high on my list of civ choices (though behind the Songhai and situationally the Danes).

My worst 3 are probably:
1. America - Useless UA, one strong UU (Minutemen) which aren't as strong as Janissaries, another UU that's pretty bad, adds up to a weak overall civ. I would play the Ottomans over them every time, and the Ottomans are still a consensus bottom tier civ.
2. Japan - UA is pretty bad (not useless, but bad), and both UUs are underwhelming.
3. Germany - UA is still underwhelming, one UU is relatively poor and the other comes much too late. There are some interesting Germany strategies, but this is still overall a weak civ. If the game wasn't normally pretty much decided by the time Panzers enter the field, it'd be a different story, but as strong as they are, they're not usually going to make a big difference.
Honorable mention: Egypt

starrywisdom said:

The only Civ I would constitute 'bad' really is England as they are entirely situational and getting them on a map with minimal water is just painful; longbowman can almost claim redemption for other shortcomings - but not enough for me personally.

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I agree that England's big bonus is situational, but personally I love Sun Never Sets. It stacks with the Great Lighthouse and Commerce's Naval Tradition. So even triremes have 8 moves per turn, with a +2 sight.

It's be even more fun if the danged AI would build up decent navies by the time you got Ship of the Line ..

fmlizard2 said:

I stand by my assertion that Mongolia stinks. Unless you war extensively against city states (few players do) they are no better than the Ottomans.

If you don't attack City States you are left with +1 horse movements, a nice but less effective and long-term useful UU than the Janissary, and a special great person I can get as ANY civ - just enact the free Great People policy, watch and wait for your Khan. 1000 says you get one before Mech Infantry, when you finally need its speed.

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Wait ! You are really under estimating the power of Great KHAN.
Lets discuss the Mongol civ.
UA : CS bonus is average since you rarely fight CS. However it can be helpful when one CS ask you to kill another CS. Horse movement bonus however is awesome !
Keshlik : It is clearly the best UU in Civ V. It can kill tons of units without even taking slight damage.
Khan : Again one of best UU in the game. It gets extra moves + boosted healing to nearby units which in my games has save the day many times.

fmlizard2 said:

I stand by my assertion that Mongolia stinks. Unless you war extensively against city states (few players do) they are no better than the Ottomans.

If you don't attack City States you are left with +1 horse movements, a nice but less effective and long-term useful UU than the Janissary, and a special great person I can get as ANY civ - just enact the free Great People policy, watch and wait for your Khan. 1000 says you get one before Mech Infantry, when you finally need its speed.

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The Keshik may not be the best long term UU but few are? Even the UU's with bonuses that transfer when upgraded generally don't have super good bonuses (exceptions are the Jannissary for one, though). The Keshik, for the entirey of the medieval era, is an absolute beast and arguably one of the best medieval UU's, and best UU's in the game overall. It's even useful well into the renaissance era as Lancers are usually pretty uncommon unless the Ottomans and go Sipahi for whatever reason.

The Khan is fantastic and complements the Keshik perfectly, as does the +1 mounted movement - the City State bonus is just gravy, man.

Not to mention the Medieval Era is when most people start really rolling with the wars. (Which imo needs to be fixed so that the Ancient Era is longer and there is more chance to have wars in the ancient/classical eras) - I mean look at Rome and Persia and early China - HUGE ancient/classical empires, not just one or two cities.

Overall Mongolia is one of the strongest civs militarily. Definately top 5 or top 3 military civs - they're just focused more on pre-industrial war is all (which is pretty historically accurate as well).

1. Spain sucks, every time I have played them I usually find one wonder at the other side of the map (I play standard fractal).

Spain is 9 times out of 10 like playing a civ with no UA. Then that one time you have a good start (I am still waiting) I'm sure it's like hitting the lottery (a gimick). I havent had one good start with them ever. I seriously dislike them.

Now I am sure there are players that play spain and every time you get killer wonders right at your doorstep, but I can only go by my experience. I NEVER EVER get anything with them (like playing a civ with no ua).

2. Never bothered to play America (seems weak).

3. Ottomans have a sucky UA they are a joke. (unless playing island map which I dont ever play)

4. England sucks too for having a crap UA.

5. Russia sucks because who needs all those resources? maybe in MP you would but I do SP. Russia could be a mid tier civ for mp but I think they really are low tier for sp games.

Those 5 civs really stand out as being very weak and bad.

I am going to say there are 2 civs that seem really OP. France and Persia for building (I dont have the xp pac with babylon so cant comment on them).

Siam and Greece are good I suppose but I dont like messing with city states all the time. Thats just a playstyle thing for me.

For warmonger I would say Mongal, China, Japan.

When looking at this game there seems to be a few very powerful elite civs, a bunch that are medicore in the middle, and then a few that reallys stink.

Sadly the civs are not well balanced in my opinion. I would hazard a guess that the majority of civ players only play a small percentage of the "popular" civs since many of the lesser civs are a total joke.

Best Civ?

Arabia. You can shake whatever kind of empire you want to be given any situations. Money rule, after all. Bazaar doubles every luxury to trades and to keep civs calm. And when Oil started showing up, you know Arabia will steamroll everything if you haven't killed it already.

Hiawatha. AI is abusing this dude left, right, and center. All those forests-related thing boost their efficiencies. And since Mohawk dudes need no Irons now, it gets beter. Have you ever seen an AI Hiawatha that is not on the roll if you didn't kill it outright?

Nebuchadnezzar. The lord of knowledge. And since knowledge is totally power in Civ V, you know you're screwed in long term if you don't kill him outright.

Artifex1 said:

Sadly the civs are not well balanced in my opinion. I would hazard a guess that the majority of civ players only play a small percentage of the "popular" civs since many of the lesser civs are a total joke.

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I agree that the Civs aren't terribly well balanced, but I think that the majority of them are fairly comparable.

Personally I always play a new Civ every time I play. Variety is the spice of life. But yeah, I see a lot of people posting that they "always play X". Seems like a loss to me.

I find it very rewarding to play each game according to a Civ's strength, even if they are "weak".

I think America isn't quite as bad as everyone claims. It doesn't have a concrete advantage with the +1 sight but +1 sight can be very advantageous never-the-less.
I used America for the first time last week and was surprised at how different warfare was with that sight bonus. Much easier.

That said, America and Germany are two civilizations that don't play like they should in Civilization V. Neither Civilization feels like they're represented. Germany doesn't feel like Germany and America doesn't feel like America.

I think America receiving a gold bonus and Germany receiving a production bonus would be much more fitting.

I play the game on Marathon speed so Germany can be made into a powerhouse. I generally focus my production on buildings while gaining my military for free. Once the brutes are gone and you start gaining archers and spearman it isn't so bad....

But it still doesn't feel like Germany. Germany should be a feared Civilization.

Germany should get a beerhouse special building and a bonus to great people I think.
Keep the Panzer as their unique unit.

Artifex1 said:

5. Russia sucks because who needs all those resources? maybe in MP you would but I do SP. Russia could be a mid tier civ for mp but I think they really are low tier for sp games.

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I'll have to disagree with that number five. The fact that strategic resources gain an extra hammer as the UA easily makes up for too much iron and horses. And more Uranium means more Nukes. That extra hammer can be exceptionally useful

fmlizard2 said:

I stand by my assertion that Mongolia stinks. Unless you war extensively against city states (few players do) they are no better than the Ottomans.

If you don't attack City States you are left with +1 horse movements, a nice but less effective and long-term useful UU than the Janissary, and a special great person I can get as ANY civ - just enact the free Great People policy, watch and wait for your Khan. 1000 says you get one before Mech Infantry, when you finally need its speed.

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I'm trying to figure out if you're just messing with us.