The Underrated, Overlooked, Dark Horse Beliefs, Civs, Policies

Cannons- I know they have the "must set up" limitation but other than that they're really powerful. Their base str is higher than Xbows and they have the siege bonus vs. cities. I like to really start my serious campaigning when I get them. Then when I do hit artillery I have some ready to upgrade with some experience.

VicRatlhead5199 said:

Cannons- I know they have the "must set up" limitation but other than that they're really powerful. Their base str is higher than Xbows and they have the siege bonus vs. cities. I like to really start my serious campaigning when I get them. Then when I do hit artillery I have some ready to upgrade with some experience.

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I'll have to give them another shot. I normally steer clear of any "must-set-up" units until artillery, which I imagine is fairly common given a good bow rush can destroy your neighbors.

I'll suggest that the reformation belief policy is underrated, simply because it has two of the best beliefs possible. I've had many games that got a lucky religion start (got a lucky ruin/great pantheon, etc.) where I've decided to go piety... and ridden either glory to god or jesuit education to any victory type i wanted.

Seabastian Civ said:

I'll have to give them another shot. I normally steer clear of any "must-set-up" units until artillery, which I imagine is fairly common given a good bow rush can destroy your neighbors.

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At least they don't get one shot like cats and trebs unless the target has something extra like a coastal city with a galleass/frigate or maybe Oligarchy combined with the goddess of protection pantheon. They'll easily cut city taking time in half since Xbows are pretty sad against cities with castles. Just mix 2 or 3 in with your bows, it speeds things up a lot. I often build a few trebs to have them ready when I hit Chemistry. It's where siege units truly become useful.

Unfortunately still pretty useless in MP where your opponents are smart enough to always target them first...

VicRatlhead5199 said:

Unfortunately still pretty useless in MP where your opponents are smart enough to always target them first...

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Bingo. I've started going cover promos ASAP and they still get ganked in a turn or two.

Seabastian Civ said:

Bingo. I've started going cover promos ASAP and they still get ganked in a turn or two.

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There is an ongoing debate (in a thread that's probably buried a couple pages down by now) as to whether or not ranged siege units (or any ranged units for that matter) gain the benefits from the Cover promotions.

There are a lot of reasons cannons are neglected. There's no good cost-benefit. They are a relatively expensive unit that can easily die before getting off a shot. If you tech in a balanced way (obviously no one does) they wouldn't get to the field before cities are strength 50.

To make them more useful you need to tech for Chemistry before the Scientific Theory branch, at which point, it makes a lot more sense to just keep going 20 more turns, Oxford for Dynamite and have a unit that is 4 times as useful.

It never makes sense to beeline for bottom/military techs because you fall behind on science and end up weaker, unfortunately. Only dynamite stays relevant long enough to let you recoup your invested tech loss.

In G&K there used to be so much advantage to stopping a runaway that it would be worth it to start invasion earlier with cannons to get satellite cities, sometimes. In BNW the AI isn't really going anywhere anyway. Siege units including cannons are neglected for a reason.

India - Dutch - Roman.
Commerce and Exploration.
Big Ben (I underrated it a long time).
Fertility Rites - Religious art.

I like America's UA. For the buying tiles, I learned it's better not to try too hard to find reasons to buy tiles; it works better if you relax about it and only buy when there's a big advantage in doing so. This might sound like it's making less use of the UA, but this approach actually lets it shine since it keeps prices low for when the tiles are badly needed (sooner or later, you will almost always have a reason to buy tiles).

The sight is also a big stress reducer; I find it helps with virtually everything in the early game. I think that it's not only decently powerful, but also fun and differentiating.

Big Ben is good on its own, but combined with the commerce and autocracy policies that cut unit costs, it's ridiculous (73% off units IIRC).

I won't pretend that it's in any way likely for a game to be decided by one air force against another, but when this is the case, the Zero is actually fairly good for what it's meant to do. When the bombers are up, and it's up to Fighters to block them, having Fighters that can beat other Fighters is very useful. Again, in practice this situation doesn't happen.

GhostSalsa said:

There are a lot of reasons cannons are neglected. There's no good cost-benefit. They are a relatively expensive unit that can easily die before getting off a shot. If you tech in a balanced way (obviously no one does) they wouldn't get to the field before cities are strength 50.

To make them more useful you need to tech for Chemistry before the Scientific Theory branch, at which point, it makes a lot more sense to just keep going 20 more turns, Oxford for Dynamite and have a unit that is 4 times as useful.

It never makes sense to beeline for bottom/military techs because you fall behind on science and end up weaker, unfortunately. Only dynamite stays relevant long enough to let you recoup your invested tech loss.

In G&K there used to be so much advantage to stopping a runaway that it would be worth it to start invasion earlier with cannons to get satellite cities, sometimes. In BNW the AI isn't really going anywhere anyway. Siege units including cannons are neglected for a reason.

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Posts like this are why it's a dark horse.

You will build them anyway so they'll be ready when you hit dynamite, that makes the expense a non-issue.

They won't be attacked by the AI if you give them a better target. A few wounded muskets do the trick. They're the first siege unit to surpass the ranged line in base str. so the weakness isn't an issue. They also come when the stronger melee line drops its strategic req. and can be used as a meatshield in ways pikes couldn't in the medieval.

If you're going domination you are going to tech to dynamite after education, before Scientific Theory. Chemistry is right on the way. So I'm not even sure where the tech path comes into the discussion at all.

Waiting for dynamite is not necessary. That idea is why people think domination is so hard on larger maps. It puts you in a time crunch and happiness, gold and infrastructure become an issue while you race to finish in time. Ranged line in classical and medieval, siege in Renaissance and Industrial, air units after that. There is absolutely no reason to wait to start after dynamite. Use those "20 turns" and start/continue the rampage.

Might be my preference but I like to get as much done as possible before air units come into play and ruin the fun strategic play V added with 1upt. It's also a very good idea to set yourself up as a global superpower before the WC comes into play since it can cause problems for warmongers. The bigger you are the easier it is to win the culture and faith quests.

I've heard a lot of hate for Pacal and the Maya. Mostly saying their UU and UA are worthless. I wouldn't say they're the strongest, but I had no idea that the shrine replacement (pyramids) was so powerful. For the same maintenance cost and just a little more production I can get 2 faith AND 2 science immediately on a new city. And you can rush buy it for only 250. I was just playing them because I hadn't before and accidentally discovered that they can be a sleeper tech civilization. Ridiculously easy to get a good religion with them too due to the +2 faith on pyramids. I got the 2nd faith on deity with pretty much no extra bonuses and was riding the extra gold, happiness, culture, and faith ever since. I thought they were only a faith civ but I was wrong.

Originally I thought their little javelin guys were stupid, but then I realized how cheap they are--cheaper than archers. Most cities can crank them out in 1-2 turns and then it's only 100 gold to get a full-fledged bowman. Much more desirable than hard-building them, which is nice because it's the main defense and offense unit through a lot of early game. Pleasantly surprised by these guys.

Their UA isn't bad either, got a ton of free great people from rushing theology in the early BC's, but I did not realize you couldn't repeat units. I don't care about many of the greats, only a few in the beginning so the ability is kinda limited. Gave me a free wonder, early religious expansion, and tech though, so there's that. Could be critical if you play it right.

danaphanous said:

I've heard a lot of hate for Pacal and the Maya. Mostly saying their UU and UA are worthless. I wouldn't say they're the strongest, but I had no idea that the shrine replacement (pyramids) was so powerful. For the same maintenance cost and just a little more production I can get 2 faith AND 2 science immediately on a new city. And you can rush buy it for only 250. I was just playing them because I hadn't before and accidentally discovered that they can be a sleeper tech civilization. Ridiculously easy to get a good religion with them too due to the +2 faith on pyramids. I got the 2nd faith on deity with pretty much no extra bonuses and was riding the extra gold, happiness, culture, and faith ever since. I thought they were only a faith civ but I was wrong.

Originally I thought their little javelin guys were stupid, but then I realized how cheap they are--cheaper than archers. Most cities can crank them out in 1-2 turns and then it's only 100 gold to get a full-fledged bowman. Much more desirable than hard-building them, which is nice because it's the main defense and offense unit through a lot of early game. Pleasantly surprised by these guys.

Their UA isn't bad either, got a ton of free great people from rushing theology in the early BC's, but I did not realize you couldn't repeat units. I don't care about many of the greats, only a few in the beginning so the ability is kinda limited. Gave me a free wonder, early religious expansion, and tech though, so there's that. Could be critical if you play it right.

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Maya are pretty good. Atlatlists have the additional advantage that you can build them without having to research Archery, which saves you a tech in the rush to Theocracy. For the Great People, if you are a map with ocean, the Great Admiral gives you the ability to cross the ocean and contact other civs and city states before Astronomy. And the other GP, a Great Artist gives you a free Golden Age, a Great Writer half a policy, and of course you want to keep an eye on what Great People the city states are requesting, you get 40 or 50 influence for fulfilling their quest.

GKShaman said:

Hello All,

So often we talk about the best strategies and make lists and I feel that most of the beliefs in the game have a "optimal situation/use"

So this thread is for a belief or strategy that surprisingly turned out great but didnt look good at first/on paper.

Religion

Choral Music - Looks a little underwhelming at first but with a wide empire with Liberty Opener, Monument, Amphitheater and Temple is providing 2+1+1+2 culture a turn. Works really nicely even just with monument and temple since shrine is a easy thing to build.

Goddess of the Hunt - Makes making money and growing a city the SAME end goal. A deer w/forest becomes 4 food 2 production! A camp on grassland is 3 food 3 production! Often I find in golden ages I work the money tiles and my city stops growing. Not the case here! Also mosts camps provide some points of production so yippy kay yae!

Cathedrals - Built that new city and need some tiles?
Well save some of that gold - buy a cathedral and move a great work to the new cathedral! Grows the borders naturally and citizens can work the best tile!

Civs

Indonesia- Your UA works GREATLY when ideologies come a knocking - thats when ppl need happiness and magically the world gets new luxuries. Also on most maps its easy to find a place to settle. In addition CSs and other civs WANT these luxuries!

Policies

Their Finest Hour (Cities combat strength improved by 33% Freedom) -
I agree not the sexiest but stacked with Traditions oligarchy - WOW does a city become a soldier. Really crushes most units and if the city has fort and arsenal/garrison - sweet stuff. Really good choice if surprise invaded or sudden attack on a city.

Feel free to add your experience!

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None of these really look like Dark Horses:
Cathedral is a stable for Cultural victories on a high enough difficulty level to where you can't reliably build any of the early midevil world wonders and so spots for works of art are a long ways away. And so too good to be a dark horse.

Chorus Music: Even if you have a wide empire and are enable to fight off AI missionary spam; just about every pantheon still better, making it an handicap.

Goddess of the Hunt: On some starts it's too good to be a dark horse. But on most of them not good enough to qualify.

Indonesia is a great civ on most maps it's only Pangaea that it suffers from, making it too good to be a dark horse.

Finest Hour: Not in the top 4 of Freedom level 2 tenents making the problem being what you're skipping. Also, why are you fighting that close to your core cities in end game??? The fighting should be well away from there by then.

For Dark Horses, I would go with:

Civ: Byzantines; tend to be really hated by Civ Fanatics but if you are early to found your religion you get an extra belief of your choice of any category when founding. (Most popular being one half of the RT - IP combo or a second follower belief at time of founding for a third follower later)

Pantheon: Aurora. This also tends to be hated by civ fanatics since it doesn't work on forest. With the right start it's a decent pantheon; but you could argue your start was pretty bad.

Follower: The one granting happiness bonus to the boring Temple. It's the essayist to use for happiness (this is 2 in every city as no faith is required to use and growing a city large enough to have 5 followers is easy) but doesn't get much respect at Civ Fanatics. This also stacks really well with Feed the World.