[R&F] Civ of the Week: Bully for You! (America)

[acluewithout]

• Leader: Teddy Roosevelt

• Leader Ability: Roosevelt Corollary Units on your own continent receive +5 Combat Strength. Cities with a National Park receive +1 Appeal to all Tiles. Gain Rough Rider Unique Unit at Rifiling.

• Civ Ability: Founding Fathers. All Diplomatic Policy Slots are converted to Wild Card Policy Slots.
  
  
• Unique Unit (Leader): Rough Rider. [Stats to come].

• Unique Unit (Civilization): P-51 Mustang. [Stats to come].

• Unique Infrastructure: Film Studio. Unique Building that replaces the Broadcast Centre (unlocks at Radio). Costs 525. Provides +100% Tourism from this City starting from the Modern Era. Provides +4 Culture, +1 Citizen Slots, +1 Great Artist Point, +2 Great Musician Points and +1 Great Work of Music Slot.

• Leader Agenda: Big Stick. Likes peaceful Civilizations that have a City on America's Continent; Dislikes Civilizations that start wars on America's Continent.

• Suggested Reading List: None.

Notes:

• Previous CotW: Ancient: The Full Monty, Cree, Gilgabro, Greece, Hiccup Horrendous Haddock (Harold) the Third, Nubia, Egypt Classical: Kongo, Point Break, Price of Persia, Rome, Sythia, Medieval: China, Georgia, India, Japan, Khmer, Mongolia, Poland, Zulu; Renaissance: Indonesia, Netherlands, Spain, Mapuche, Korea; Industrial & Modern: Germany, Scotland

 

[Disgustipated]

They are just so boring to play. That about sums up America. I just finished a game with them last night. And it was still a boring civ. I will post screenshots when I get home. I did manage my 3rd earliest cultural victory after Kongo and Pericles Greece. Pericles is still King of cultural victory in my book. But my America game was only a few turns slower than my Kongo game, but not even close to Pericles. Much of that was due to early theater squares. My victory came soon after radio and computers, so film studios weren't a huge impact. Early theater squares were more of an impact for me along with increased great writer points from my Pantheon. I even had Pericles in the game, but strangely he was never much competition for great writers/artists. I'll have to check the map when I get home, maybe he didn't have many hills.

I won so quickly I never even built rough rider and p-51. Both are kind of useless to me.

I did early conquest of Egypt and Arabia and stopped after that. While extra population from conquest is helpful in generating more culture, that's time I couldn't spend getting theater squares up. It took a while to get those conquered cities productive. That's why its a strange civ to me. A weird conquer neighbors/culture civ. They really only excel at one victory type, and you have 2 useless uu's that do nothing to help that.

 

[local_hero]

I like America, but sure they are unspectacular. But the diplo card to wild card is good aswell as the +5 combat strength.

I enjoy playing them if I have good faith generation to afford the naturalists. Build a natural park or two and then making the resorts. It's less fun if you can't get your own religion and have to settle for the AI religion. Persia makes better resorts so much better and easier than America though. A few builder chargers compared to thousands of faith. And their national parks are probably better too with a few Paira-thingies.

The UU's are kinda cool. The Mustang might be a good unit, it's not Teddy's fault that the AI don't build air units. And can't use them.

@acluewithout I have deciphered which poll option is Brazil. 50/50 on which one is Australia. Still don't get the Captain Hook one. Would you please mind explaining the poll options so I can vote?

 

[Naeshar]

"America" is a staple civ that must be in every Civ incarnation.
Here, it looks good on paper, however the impression in game is disappointing. Teddy is either a nasty warmonger where he is strong or quite pointless. As a player, the only good point is defensive +5 strength home. Units meh. Founding Fathers (in RnF) convert diplo to wildcard policies, which is kind of fine, however if playing culture you will want them filled by green cards anyway. You forgot to add the vanilla ability, gaining gov legacy bonuses faster, which is kind of good, but of little effect. The film studio is fine for shortening the culture drag to victory.
The big stick is pretty pointless (pun intended).

I voted for ... France I guess? please add descriptions. (Captain Hook is Petah the great, because of the looks)

 

[acluewithout]

I like America, but sure they are unspectacular. But the diplo card to wild card is good aswell as the +5 combat strength.

I enjoy playing them if I have good faith generation to afford the naturalists. Build a natural park or two and then making the resorts. It's less fun if you can't get your own religion and have to settle for the AI religion. Persia makes better resorts so much better and easier than America though. A few builder chargers compared to thousands of faith. And their national parks are probably better too with a few Paira-thingies.

The UU's are kinda cool. The Mustang might be a good unit, it's not Teddy's fault that the AI don't build air units. And can't use them.

@acluewithout I have deciphered which poll option is Brazil. 50/50 on which one is Australia. Still don't get the Captain Hook one. Would you please mind explaining the poll options so I can vote?

Options for next week are:

• Brazil
• France
• Russia
• Australia

 

[AmazonQueen]

Options for next week are:

• Brazil
• France
• Russia
• Australia

Took me a while to work them out. I'm not a football fan.

America rank up with Korea in the boring stakes. I've managed 1 complete game with them but too much of the game they are virtually featureless. I do like Teddy as an opponent, always amusing.

 

[Disgustipated]

Oh America, how I wish you could be great again. Why must you suck so?

Granted the +5 combat bonus is nothing to sneeze at. But I held back my conquest knowing this wouldn't be enough to take on Alexander's 2 UU's. And I didn't want to do that much conquering either. Though I was able to liberate Kumasi from Macedon before he got his uu's out. I then surrounded all 6 tiles of Kumasi for much of the game to prevent him from conquering it. I mainly wanted the extra culture for my theater squares. Eventually someone else got Suzerain of it, and I was booted out. But Alexander lost interest by then.

My start, I settled in place.

Spoiler :

This ended up being more of an artistic win than I was planning. I was pulling in so many great writers and artists, I just went with it. I went with Divine Spark for more great writer points, and Lay Ministry for more culture. I wasn't planning for religion, but other AI's didn't push hard for it, and the conquered holy sites from Egypt and Arabia pushed it through. Despite 2 conquered (and 1 later city flip) holy sites, my faith production sucked big time this game. Perhaps I could have not built wonders, and built holy sites instead. But for the most part I concentrated on theater squares and wonders. Had to get some commercial hubs going because my economy was suffering early on. So I only got 1 national park in. and a few seaside resorts. I often don't have a lot of places for seaside resorts until I build Eiffel tower. But I never finished it before the game was won. I usually pull up mines and harvest things like stone near the coast to improve appeal after Eiffel tower is built, and just spam seaside resorts everywhere. But it wasn't necessary this game since this is mostly a Great person cultural victory.

Pericles had 7 Acropolis, but for whatever reason he could not compete with me for great writers and artists. Final score 19 Great Writers/Artists/Musicians to his 10 Great writers/artists/musicians. He got more than I thought he did. We were the only 2 getting them from what it looks like on the report screen.

My grade is a B-. They are a solid civ. Just not a very interesting one. A little help conquering your early neighbors helps their early game, so at least not all their bonuses are late game. I just wish there was more to do with them. I honestly don't like playing them. I like him as an opponent in the game as AmazonQueen above mentioned. Bully for him. Keep in mind I took a significant diplomatic hit eliminating 2 opponents from the game. Even after all my warmongering penalties died off. Something to keep in mind if you want to take advantage of that +5 combat strength. Jadwiga really hated me, even though I did have a friendship with her before I started conquering. Though I did manage 3 alliances with the other continent. As I got close to winning, China would not renew friendship.

• Leader Ability: Roosevelt Corollary Units on your own continent receive +5 Combat Strength. Cities with a National Park receive +1 Appeal to all Tiles. Gain Rough Rider Unique Unit at Rifiling.
• combat strength is pretty awesome, if a little boring. Don't think I've ever used the rough rider much in combat, not much to say about him. the National Park appeal isn't that great. A city with a National Park probably has good appeal anyways. But it will help the tourism yields of the National Park I suppose.

• Civ Ability: Founding Fathers. All Diplomatic Policy Slots are converted to Wild Card Policy Slots.
• I didn't use Charismatic leader much if at all because of this. I'm really not sure how much this helped me. I'd rather build Forbidden City which I did. I'd rather have a free Diplo slot.
  
  
• Unique Unit (Leader): Rough Rider. [Stats to come].
• My game ended shortly after this was available. I did not build one. I don't recall ever using these in my games, aside from an occasional barbarian or two.

• Unique Unit (Civilization): P-51 Mustang. [Stats to come].
• Never got to Advanced Flight in my game. Not a useful uu if you are going cultural victory. If the AI attacked your cities with bombers, then this UU would be useful I suppose. Until air combat is fixed, this has no use. Perhaps in multiplayer it can be of some use.

• Unique Infrastructure: Film Studio. Unique Building that replaces the Broadcast Centre (unlocks at Radio). Costs 525. Provides +100% Tourism from this City starting from the Modern Era. Provides +4 Culture, +1 Citizen Slots, +1 Great Artist Point, +2 Great Musician Points and +1 Great Work of Music Slot.
• A pretty good building, but takes forever to build. I cash bought several of mine. Otherwise the build times would have taken forever. I'm not sure how much this lowered my cultural victory time. I was well on my way to cultural victory when this became available. Honestly I think Computers is the tech which always gives me the final push towards cultural victory. That tech is so important.

• Leader Agenda: Big Stick. Likes peaceful Civilizations that have a City on America's Continent; Dislikes Civilizations that start wars on America's Continent.
• Satisfying his agenda is hit or miss, it all depends on where you land on the map. It's one of the lesser aggravating agendas to satisfy, so he has that going for him.

From my final Save. I won the game before I became a nation. You will have to hit end turn before the cultural victory happens the following turn. Many unimproved tiles. I seemed to be lagging in production all game (only reason I built industrial zones), and had trouble getting improvements up, and my cities built up. I know I should have harvested most of that stone, I meant to, but never got around to it.

Spoiler :

 

[MaryKB]

I don't like Civ 6 America as much as I enjoyed Civ 5 America, but I still enjoy playing. I feel that +5 is very useful for me, not just for fighting early Barbarians but also if I have someone starting right on top of me, I can often conquer with just my Warriors very quickly, so I sort of start with two capital cities. I pretty much never build his unique units, I really preferred Minutemen and B-17s, so I feel that's sort of wasted to me. I love culture victory, and I've found you can win really quickly once you start building your Film Studios, it's like your tourism just starts rising exponentially, lol.

Oh but I do play America a lot simply because of color. I love, love, love his shade of blue, I think it's very pretty and I enjoy seeing that pattern for my cities.

 

[Midgardsormr]

I like America with later era starts. Force the game into the Industrial or Modern era in order to get the chance to use the unique features, which all too often come into play just as the game is ending.

 

[Icicle]

+5 combat strength on home continent can be game-breaking if you start in the middle of a big continent. All of that is going to be yours no matter who else settles there and you can just laugh off early barbarians.

The movie studio can spare a lot of 'end turn' actions on your way to cultural victory for which we must all be thankful.

I wish you could upgrade Knights to Rough Riders, they'd be really good then.

Founding Fathers is crazy good early game when diplo slots are very poor. It becomes less useful late game when you actually want to run diplo policies.

I've never built a P-51.

Overall I must agree that America is just kind of dull. But I do recommend them for new players who have issues with barbarians, that +5 bonus makes them so easy to deal with and then once you've easily controlled your home continent (which hopefully is a good one) you've got a great base for building up culture and catching up with Film Studios. They're a pretty solid mid-tier civ to me.

Also, America is direly in need of a new leader. There are so many good ones to choose from and hopefully we can get one that gives a more fun playstyle.

 

[Bechhold]

America is a prime example of why the game elements that were in IV need to be reintroduced and always be in Civ games. Their leader attributes were amazing.

 

[Sostratus]

I agree with other posters that america doesn't really have a punchy aspect to their play style that you really feel as a bonus when playing them.
I really miss the minuteman from civ5 for this reason. Imagine having a fast moving musketeer- either through no terrain cost or something like 3 movement. It would really make them more exciting when playing.
P-51 mustangs are actually incredible UUs, just no one needs fighters. Have you seen those things? They can beat jet fighters. Nuts!

Founding Fathers is crazy good early game when diplo slots are very poor. It becomes less useful late game when you actually want to run diplo policies.

I also think GS would offer a great opportunity for a pivot on what the civ ability can do. A lot of the new infrastructure and tweaks would mesh well with the industrial and expansion legacy of the USA. Founding fathers isn't bad, but it's worthless until you get to political philosophy; unlike Greece or Poland or Germany, whose bonuses kick in with chiefdom. I kinda wish it actually gave you something more substantive than swapping slots around. The old "double legacy bonus" was nice. Heck, at the risk of being OP, having founding fathers grant you the legacy card bonuses for free without requiring a slot once you unlock them would be very cool...

 

[Leathaface]

I think America is a fun civ to play as. I like to play peaceful so that +5 combat strength on your home continent comes in handy in holding off barbs and early enemy Civs.

Culture victory is my favourite type, so the Film Studio is a very good building in my eyes. I am not a skilled player so I finish my Cutlure victory with the Film Studio helping, I stay in the game long enough for them to have an effect. Plus with an extra era being added in GS, the Film Studio has gotten stronger. The +1 appeal to National Parks is a nice bonus too.

BTW I simply love America's music in Civ VI, their music is easily top 3 for sure.

 

[Human Crouton]

I really like the +5 bonus on my continent. It's true that most of America's bonuses end up with them playing pretty vanilla, but I do enjoy planning on taking over my entire continent because of the + 5 bonus.

If tourism acted more like it did in V, with some game play bonuses besides just a victory, then America's film studio would be really fun. That's just me dreaming though.

 

[acluewithout]

America are terribly boring.

The +5 is tactical inert. It applies to all units, and pretty much in all useful situations given most of your battles will be on your own continent. It’s weirdly also a negative incentive to expand overseas (spoiler - the US has been pretty keen on expanding overseas).

The unique building is very powerful. But much like England’s Museum, you don’t really do anything with it. You just build it an win. Still, I like it. Emphasising America’s cultural aspects is also clever.

I think the policy card thing is the most interesting bit, because it changes what governments mean for you. I love how it turns Oligarchy into a second Autocracy. But I don’t like how it sort of suggests America eschews diplomacy and is somehow inward looking. I think that particular perspective of America is wrong.

The national park thing is also maybe interesting, because you can then use national Parks to boost seaside resorts and Neighbourhoods. But how often does that come up?

The units are terribly, but that’s more a problem with the underlying mechanics for aircraft and how fast the game is. The p51 is also such a ... specific UU. For it to really shine, you’d want America to have some more general bonuses for aircraft.

I think America should be reworked. Their power level is fine, but they are dull as dishwater. I’d like the Civ ability to give a diplomatic card slot and then +% bonuses to building Harbours, Aerodromes and Indistrial Zones (or maybe a bonus to building those on foreign continents, which would then be a nice juxtaposition with Teddy’s abilities). I’d keep the Broadcast Centre and UUs (given the p51 will be boosted by the Civ ability) but rework Teddy’s abilities. I don’t really have many suggestions for Teddy’s ability, but as a start maybe limit the combat bonus to certain units, just so you had to think more about how you use it.

You could also then make thendiplomatic card into a wild card either a bonus for a different Civ, or perhaps a benefit for having a particular wonder. The later would be very cool.

 

[Luddify]

Never nuts about them, but I must say they're super fun with the giant Earth TSL map and all civs turned on. Nice nasty battle with the Cree and the Aztecs for control of NA.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

Never nuts about them, but I must say they're super fun with the giant Earth TSL map and all civs turned on. Nice nasty battle with the Cree and the Aztecs for control of NA.

How is the fight with the Cree a nasty battle? America is the Cree's Kryptonite if they start on the same continent. Unique Scout gets trounced in the early eras by an enemy sporting a +5 combat bonus.

 

[BarbarianHunter]

America are terribly boring.
The unique building is very powerful. But much like England’s Museum, you don’t really do anything with it. You just build it an win. Still, I like it. Emphasising America’s cultural aspects is also clever.

I disagree to one degree or the next. Those film studios lessen the boring part of the game by speeding the victory along.

The units are terribly, but that’s more a problem with the underlying mechanics for aircraft and how fast the game is. The p51 is also such a ... specific UU. For it to really shine, you’d want America to have some more general bonuses for aircraft.

Rough Riders are niche. I don't have to go to combustion and can devote my relatively meager science on flight and computers for the win. I suppose I could even skip steel, although I usually don't but still never complete the Eifel Tower before a CV. I really should stop that. Anyway, they're a tough unit that avoids unnecessary science expenditures so you can concentrate on a CV.

 

[Mr. Shadows]

The +5 continental bonus probably makes the best at surviving dangerous starts on Deity. The converted card slot makes Oligarchy very attractive. How is the Film Studio working these days? Iirc there was something wonky about its era requirements. Teddy would be a lot more fun if the game stayed interesting into the modern era. I cautiously hope that GS will do that. As it is neither unique unit is particularly meaningful.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Yea, America's not bad, but just rather passive.

Leader Ability: Roosevelt Corollary Units on your own continent receive +5 Combat Strength. Cities with a National Park receive +1 Appeal to all Tiles. Gain Rough Rider Unique Unit at Rifiling.

The combat strength bonus is basically the bulk of what makes America good and allows for strong defense and early conquest all of which is critical to Civ 6. It also makes perfect sense since the doctrine basically is not about non-interference, but that only America was supposed to do the intervening.

The National Park bonus is pretty lame. It translates to 4 tourism, so it may be a 33-50% increase if all tiles in the park is charming, but much less if it's actually a decent park. This basically ensures consistency, but since Naturalists are so expensive, it's not like park spam is even possible most of the time.

Finally the Rough Rider has to be hard built, and thus that probably won't see much use.

Civ Ability: Founding Fathers. All Diplomatic Policy Slots are converted to Wild Card Policy Slots.

Transforms a useless policy slot into a better one. Though it has no effect on Autocracy. As Diplomatic cards get better late game, this policy becomes much less useful.

Unique Unit (Civilization): P-51 Mustang. [Stats: Nobody Cares].

Really nothing to talk about, since fighters have no use currently.

Unique Infrastructure: Film Studio. Unique Building that replaces the Broadcast Centre (unlocks at Radio). Costs 525. Provides +100% Tourism from this City starting from the Modern Era. Provides +4 Culture, +1 Citizen Slots, +1 Great Artist Point, +2 Great Musician Points and +1 Great Work of Music Slot.

As with all t3 buildings, the base building is too expensive and terrible to really consider in the first place. Great Musicians also take forever to get and aren't that great. The Film Studio is better but requires an annoying conditional since not all civs will be in the modern era+ especially if you went to war and crippled some. And then America's abilities favor war too.... This might speed up some wins, but in a lot of cases you might as well just skip it.

Still quite strong at times, and recommended for beginners due to the solid early game. Unless you roll a dumb map where the continents split at your capital (yes that happens), it should be pretty easygoing.

Well, anyhow, fired up some starts and rolled a good one as America (Emperor/Fractal/Normal/Yadadada)



The game can't be bothered to give me a legit luxury most of the time so I just settle on the olives. Gorgo is just next door and attacks with everything, but since I'm America, all it ends up doing is giving my slingers experience. America should probably be more likely to open with early slingers since it's easy to boost archery with them.

Spoiler :

I have to take Gorgo's capital because all this fighting sent me into a Dark Age... and then an emergency gets declared on me (But, she started it!) Her last city is a small one and succumbs to loyalty, giving me 400 free gold which is nice though not necessarily as game ending if you succeeded against a target early. I revive Gorgo to stop Khmer from taking the city, and to give tourism but I have to get rid of the Khmer's influence, so more war...

Spoiler :

If I was still in a Dark Age, could have stacked with Twilight Valor. Even warriors would be decent.

I turn my attention to the Netherlands but I notice something is creeping up to my capital. It turns out Montezuma was acutally next door but he somehow hid himself until like turn 140 and since I was too involved in wars, didn't notice. Though it seems like Barbs crippled him so he's an easy target. Would have been bad if he showed up early, so thank the barbs.

Spoiler :

This spot is great National Park bait. I even built a neighborhood. But they just cost too much faith and I only got 1 park.

Spoiler :

And the game ended before any of the uniques came into play.

Capital @ end

Spoiler :

Sparta

Spoiler :

Also built the normally useless Potala Palace at the end which is basically a wildcard slot for America. I put... a diplomatic card in. It might have been more useful if I didn't waste the GE on the always useless Ruhr Valley, but hey, for the sake of completion!