A speculation thread: special abilities

Alright, we already know
Glory of Rome : Buildings that are already in the capital build 20% faster
and
The Great Warpath: Military units move faster through forest.
Now both these abilities are very diferent, and so far I think the roman one is much more useful. I generally like economic/industrial advantages more than military boni because they are more flexible. They are useful for builders and in wartime for having larger armies. But hey, the Romans have no unique building and maybe the longhouse is much better than the name suggests....
What I want to do in this thread is to speculate about the other abilites although we only know their names and still don't know exactly how the economy (cottages? trade routes? great people?) in Civ5 works. Nevertheless I'll hazard some guesses for fun and glory should some predictions turn out to be correct.

Arabia - Trade Caravans
More trade routes? Bonus to trade income ? Sounds boring since it would be a generic bonus that doesn't change the way you play the game. Maybe some "inofficial" trade that gives you access to a small fraction of a neutral players/city state's resources ? That would be cool. Maybe overpowered and infuriating for strategic resources, especially when you're the other guy and lose some of your horses for example, but if it's just health and happiness ressources it might be OK.

Aztecs - Sacrificial Captives
The first thing that comes to mind is a culture bonus for defeated enemies. Maybe you a gain small amount of every time you completely destroy an opposing unit. Culture bonus for Aztecs looks weird for people who are familiar with Civ4 Monty, but it would give the Aztecs more incentive to constantly wage war.

China - The Art of War
Most classical chinese military works stress the importance of logistics, deception, psychological warfare and positioning. My guess is that chinese units will receive larger boni for flanking and/or nearby friendly units. In the screenshots both are 15% each, for China they might be 25% or 30%, meaning china would profit much more from larger armies and good use of terrain than other civs. It would also mean that you'd have to properly plan and prepare your wars to make use of this ability.

Egypt - Monument Builders
Faster wonder construction ? Boring, but useful and appropriate for Egyt.

Greece - Hellenic League
Easier to befriend city states ? No idea what it could mean otherwise.

India - Population Growth
Self-explanatory and booooring....

Ottoman - Barbary Corsairs
Weird choice, sounds like something only useful on certain map types. Auomatically blocks some naval trade routes of your enemies when you're at war ?

Russia - Siberian Riches
Extra resources? Like +7 iron from a single mine instead of +5 ? Another hypothesis I read on this forum was a yield bonus for tundra tiles which would totally suck.

Songhai - River Warlord
Troops move along rivers as if they were roads like in SMAC (and older civ titles?). Could be useful in certain situations, but underwhelming compared to Rome's abilty and many of my guesses.

I'll play.

Aztecs: sacrificial captives-- a significantly lower unhappiness penalty in a captured city.
United States: manifest destiny-- either faster tile expansion, cheaper to buy tiles, or significantly faster settler production.
England: sun never sets-- Maybe cheaper maintenance costs for cities.
Japan: Bushido-- starts with some of the honor tree already filled in.
Egypt: monument builders-- I agree, faster wonder construction. 20-25%.
Russia: Siberian riches-- maybe they can make better use of tundra tiles? It'd have to be a petty good boost to be effective though.
Babylon-- I predict the ability will be called "whores of Babylon." Massive happiness boost >.>

Manifest Destiny: faster tile expansion, bonus creating settlers are obvious ones. But maybe more probability to get settlers from goodie huts.
Trade Caravans: trade bonus or extra trade route. But i guess extra trade route will be domestic only.
Sacrificial Captives: happines bonus as you "liberate" cities.
Art of War: experience bonus??
Monument Builders: Can it be more obvious.
Sun Never Sets: Less colonial expenses.
Ancien Regime: Some bonus under aristocracy
Hellenic League: more benefits from city states or diplomacy bonuses.
Population Growth: it is what it is.
Bushido: Less war weariness
Barbary Corsairs: get some money in blockades with all units like you do with privateers.
Archaemenid Legacy: can't think of anything maybe some culture bonus????
Siberian Riches: more probability to find a resource in your territory when you unlock one.
Father Governs Children: have no idea can't even speculate
River Warlord bonnus attackingand/or defending on river tiles and/or crossing rivers.

Well, seeing as resources are spread out when the map is created, your Siberian Riches idea doesn't, can't, and won't work in the way you described it.

with a mine you can find a resource normally wouln't appear.

Want to add-- I doubt that River Warlord is going to be a river version of the Great Warpath, or a simple combat boost on rivers. River tiles aren't nearly as plentiful, so the boost would have to be massive for this ability to be any good. Songai units would have to be damn near invincible by rivers to make up for the fact that it's the only situation in which they get any advantage.

Also, I really hope they figure out a better name for the Indian ability.

The Art of Kama Sutra.
I think "monument" builders would work too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furor_Teutonicus

It refers here to the berserk fury of the Teutonic Tribes in battle-so I'm guessing yet *another* combat related Special Ability. This would bother me because, with 2UU's, I feel that the Germans are already far too oriented towards combat-which makes them extremely *inflexible* as a Civilization. At least Rome has a pro-builder Special Ability, & it sounds like Japan does too-which would balance out their 2UU's. Hope I'm wrong about Furor Teutonicus!

Aussie.

The was a scenario in BTS where you played in mesoamerica, and when you defeated an enemy you had a chance to capture them as slaves, bring them to your city, then sacrifice them for happiness or culture. I never got into it, so I don't know how long the happiness stayed around, if perminant or temporary. So on this idea....

Sacrifical Captives- A chance to capture defeated enemy an return them to a city for sacrifice, either Happiness or culture. (I'd think the happiness may have to be temporary, otherwise you could just exploit this, so it could last for x turns, but you'd be able to keep it up in wartime).

muhtesem insan said:

with a mine you can find a resource normally wouln't appear.

Click to expand...

Yeah, your right. But it would be a bit useless abillity in my opinion.

muhtesem insan said:

with a mine you can find a resource normally wouln't appear.

Click to expand...

Oh, goody! My mine just produced Cows!

siberian riches could perhaps mean that you would get one more horse-unit per horse resource (or some other resource), would be a bit russian (larger armies) and fit the name. However I wouldnt mind the abilty to use snow tiles for food or production, I think that could be very useful.

CTH said:

siberian riches could perhaps mean that you would get one more horse-unit per horse resource (or some other resource), would be a bit russian (larger armies) and fit the name. However I wouldnt mind the abilty to use snow tiles for food or production, I think that could be very useful.

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If it was for some sort of production boost on tundra it would be a crappy skill. Unless Russia is allways placed in a spot always located near tundra, you'd be down and out with that ability. So I can't see it being that, unless like I said Russia is always near/around tundra. If your in all grassland you have no ability. While Romes sitting there with it's 20% production boost, your sitting there with your useless ability.

Tylerryan79 said:

If it was for some sort of production boost on tundra it would be a crappy skill. Unless Russia is allways placed in a spot always located near tundra, you'd be down and out with that ability. So I can't see it being that, unless like I said Russia is always near/around tundra. If your in all grassland you have no ability. While Romes sitting there with it's 20% production boost, your sitting there with your useless ability.

Click to expand...

I think it's possible. the Great Warpath requires forests, and while you're not going to be on a continent without any, some starting positions will make it more useful than others. Same could be said for Russia's ability. And besides, even if they don't start by tundra, chances are they'd be the only civ with the ability to settle in tundra effectively (especially if it's food to get the boost), which would be useful when they expand their empire/colonize, no matter where they start.

Well...

America - As everyone has been speculating it will be expansion related. Personally I'd just say that they just expand faster (not cheaper to "rush" expansion with gold/culture - just that assuming that all civs aren't "rushing" expansion of their hexes that the Americans will claim hexes faster).

Arabia - More gold (or atleast commerce) from trade routes. I'd imagine with the UB the Arabs will be the economic powerhouses of civ this time around. All the extra gold you'll be generating should allow the Arabs to be highly flexible strategy wise. The Arabs will be the new Mali, the Mali will be the old Arabs

Aztecs - It's pretty obvious that it'll be something to make sacrificing pop for production (ie slavery) more effective. If the UB gives a food bonus we could be looking at a potential better rusher then the Iroquois, or atleast after an initial Iroquois rush an Aztec rush

China - Some sort of espionage bonus seems about right, but possibly could be diplomatic (easier to induce other civs into wars ? other civs "forget" past indescretions faster ?)

Egypt - I really have no idea on this one Will be interesting to see how it works with the Burial tomb. If the burial tomb UB gives a culture advantage at the start of the game, you could use that culture to claim important tiles (eg stone/marble) which would give a huge advantage for early wonders.

England - They've probably slashed distance maintainence.

France - Really dunno...Given the two UU's I'd say its related to military though...

Germany - See above, same logic

Greece - Yea as others have said, better relations with city-states / more bonuses from city states. Will make for highly variable gameplay though (since different city-states would have different bonuses so each game you have different bonuses to utilise)

India - Yea well...I know that Ghandi won't do it, but a war elephant rush with a faster recovering population could potentialy be a good tactic. Why, why couldn't they choose Asoka/Akbar as the leader...

Iroquois - well we know this one...While we're on it though I'd add that I suspect the UB will make forests more productive somehow for them. That'd make the Iroquois very dangerous early on...

Japan - Will be interesting with whether its early part of the civic thing available or military based (or both - militaristic civics could be more effective).

Ottomans - Perhaps something specific to privateers/naval warfare would be abit too ineffective. All ships made out of wood gain promotions faster ?. Otherwise yea you're looking at alot higher yields from blockades.

Persia - Given the fact that Persia/Iran has a very distinct culture even today, and we know that cities take quite some time to be fully destroyed - could it be that Persian cities "rebel" longer / take longer to raze to the ground. I'd imagine whatever the ability is, that it would likely compliment the UB. But I don't have any ideas on that either...

Rome - Known

Russia - The map is divided into regions, so I'd suggest it isn't out of the question say - that the English will be more likely to be placed in a coastal location. Using the same logic - the Russians could be more likely placed in a cold tundra heavy location. Either way I'd expect higher yields from tundra tiles - to the point where they're atleast level with grasslands. Don't underestimate the ability to build large effective cities in parts of the map that other civs cannot really utilise...

Siam - I just ah dunno. If the Wat acts as some sort of food/health bonus and the ability gives more happyness then you get larger cities but then that's really quite similar to India...

Songhai - The Mud Pyramids could give a bonus to river tiles, not the ability. I would guess the map tries to place them near rivers, then they have some sort of combat bonus. The problem with that is the fact that it seems too specific to be effective. River could simply be there to throw us off something more obvious (warlord). Maybe the ability sucks though because the UU and UB are so good though

Maybe River Warlord is just additional economic bonuses on river tiles. I am most interested in Arabia's ability, hope it is really something that could let peacemongers keep up.

Btw. if Russia had ability to uncover additional resources, would it be not potential ability of everyone else? I mean, wouldn't it be pretty common tactic to let them reveal it and take over? And with limited resources that would probably be worthwile. So that really would be a weakness not an advantage.

I'm not sure if pop rushing is even in Civ5. This pic is from the early game and there's only the option to buy with money which now either has no prerequsites or it's available very early.

Rushing with population could be a potential special ability, maybe for Egypt but we know that their monument builders were (at least in the case of the pyramids) paid workers and not slaves.

Some ideas for France: We know that happiness is now empire-wide and not city by city, but maybe there's still a police mechanic that makes a city "less unhappy" if it has a military unit stationed inside. Maybe for the French this bonus is larger, after all the term ancien regime is associated with absolutism.
Another possibility would be that France can assign more citizens to specialist buildings (+1 free specialst per city in Civ4 terms) to reflect France's role in culture and science. In this case ancien regime would refer to the king's/state's patronage of arts and philosophy.

The "Pop rushing" button could easily be made invisible when not in a civic(tree) which disallows is or when lacking a building to do so.
Russia: if it's tundra-specific, it's the dumbest and most un-Civ-like move ever.

Maybe the Aztec ability gets them a bonus for razing cities. It might return additional culture, or hammers to a nearby city for each population removed from the enemy city.

maybe the songhai don't get any penalties for attacking across rivers?