Civilization Rankings! Part Three: Gods and Kings Civilizations

[Doktor Vic Tim]

I like a lot of the GnK civs. I'll be adding in some quirky nicknames for fun.

7 Austria (Maria the Hungry Theresa):

UA took a hit with World Congress, so you need to be selective what CS's you want to eat into your empire and fatten your amount of cities. Then you wash it down with some Coffee Houses which allow your cities to be built on hills and still get that extra Engineer Specialist slot on top of extra GP generation. Hussars are still good and good late game scouts thanks to extra vision and movement.

7 Byzantium (Theo the Logy Dora):

Early Piety helps them out with getting faster shrines, but everyone wants those awesome reformation beliefs, so she still faces eventual competition in the religious department. Dromon is fun to use, but you give up the ability to sneak steal a coastal city early game. But on the other hand you can provide some ranged sea attacks instead while stealing the city with a Cataphract. Extra belief allows the possibility of getting a lot of religious buildings, which can add up to tourism when spammed en masse with the right reformation.

8 Carthage (Dido the Dodo):
Free Harbours = Free money and with Meritocracy easier expansion. Harbours are available in MEdieval era so Carthage has the upper hand in sea trade route distance. And they also don't have to worry about the 3 gpt maintenance either. Crossing mountains might not seem much, but there are times where that important tactical draw can matter a lot. Quinquereme works better than it looks on paper, making early sea harrassment easier. The African Forest Elephants leaves to be desired, though. Faster generals is a plus, and scary elephant can sometimes help.

7 Ethiopia (Holy Haile Selassie):
The bonus damage is almost obsoleted by the jerk Shoshone, but Ethiopia can still form a tight and tall empire to make as much use of the UA. The Stele is awesome. IT's a building you always build, and that extra 2 faith really speeds up the religion and pantheon in order to pick the better beliefs first. MEhal Sefari is really good and the ability+Defender of Faith makes your units around the capital quite hard to take.

8 Sweden (Gustav II Adolf the Goof):
I'm probably going to be biased towards my own country, but they can be fun to play. Fire up an early fun war to spawn a great general or maybe even two, secure an early CS (90 influence is quite a lot early game, mid and late not too much). He must pick friends wisely without angering other civs, and with the Tundra bias (because tundra is SO COMMON in Sweden....) allows for Dance of the Aurora, but can also ultimately mess you up. Having two UU makes Sweden a bit of an Oxymoron Civ, but the Carolean is fun to use. Kinda wished for a light battle cannon siege unit....

6 The Celts (Boudicca McWitcha):
The UA kind of works at times, but you will have to improve the forests anyway, so you're mostly using it for the fast pantheon and religion, then it's done. An ICS game with them can potentionally work well if planned carefulyl enough, since their UB gives a good amount of happiness. Pictish Warrior is a fun unit, and turning it into a Lancer is not that bad of an idea, since you'll have a fast unit that cost no movememnt to pillage, giving you a Sipahi 0.9.

5 The Huns (Attila Datilla):
It's what many percieve a Barbarian Civ. They have a killer early game.... and that's it. THey may take down a civ or two with those crazy battering rams, but after that the Zulus and Assyrians will eat them faster than Maria Theresa eats city states. Extra production from pastures can be useful, but it's situational.

7 The Mayans (Pacal the Awesome Hat Man):
Long count is still the long count, meaning some free great persons. You'll be rushing Theology anyway, and the Pyramids and a few cities will help quite nicely to that. The science penalty affects them less thanks to the Pyramids, and the Atlatists are only there for saving you the trouble of researching Archery in order to have ranged defence.

8 The Netherlands (William with the Orange Tights):
The UA got a nerf, because it was intended for the early 240 gold trade. Polders can be really good, but they can have the downside of making your lands look VERY attractive and covetable by other people. Who doesn't want that nice city with 7 polders? Sea Beggar is a beast still, and it can really bring in some extra cash attacking cities with that Logistics upgrade.

 

[wigwam]

8 Austria (Maria Theresa): Decent UU, interesting and potentially very powerful UA, great UB. I saw somebody complain that the Coffee House is worse than the Windmill: this is madness. The Coffee House gives you the same +2 the Windmill does. Instead of +10% to buildings, you get +5% to everything (units, Wonders, projects). Plus you get +25% to Great Person generation, and you can build it on hills. It's basically like getting to build a Garden and a Windmill in every city regardless of hills/fresh water, except that you can actually build a Garden there too if you have fresh water. One of the very best UBs in the game.

5 Byzantium (Theodora): Everybody grossly overstates the difficulty of founding a religion. Especially now that the Piety tree is unlocked from the start, there's no reason not to get a religion on any difficulty below Deity, and even on Deity it can be done regularly. You have to make sacrifices, that's all. Throwing all your efforts into building Stonehenge is the best way to get it done.

That said, just founding a religion isn't always enough to get the most out of the Byzantine UA. You can always get one, but you can't always get one early, and you can't always get your pick of the beliefs. It's a very powerful ability on paper, but in practice I often end up using the extra belief on an Enhancer, something to help play catch-up and ensure that my religion actually sticks. The UUs are both very powerful, but Ancient/Classical UUs just don't get much of a workout anymore.

5 Carthage (Dido): The UUs replace the same units as the Byzantine ones, which means they're never going to be super-useful no matter how good they are, and they are both distinctly inferior to the Byzantine versions. Good UA, though.

10 Ethiopia (Haile Selassie): Best UB in the game? Outstanding UA? Perfectly good UU? Ethiopia is a winner.

8 Sweden (Gustavus Adolphus): The UA seems to be poorly-understood. Here's your gameplan: fill out the Patronage tree. Make DoFs with several friendly civs. Go to war with their enemies (the earlier, the better—you just want XP, not actual conquest). Rake in GGs and GAs, plus the occasional GM or whatever from the Patronage finisher. Gift all GGs and GAs after your first (maybe second); gift GPs after you've spread religion three times. Gift GMs unless it's really late in the game and they'll make a lot of money.

The Carolean is the best non-ranged UU in the game, in my opinion. Having March from the start means you can prioritize Cover II over Shock III, and your guys will end up being practically indestructible. The Hakkapeliitta is terrible, of course, even for a Lancer replacement, but you can't win 'em all.

6 The Celts (Boudicca): The components are good, but they never seem to hang together very well. Mustn't underestimate the value of getting the first pantheon, but the UA runs out of steam pretty quickly after that. The Picts would be a lot better if they didn't end up as Lancers. The UB has the best happiness boost in the game, so you'd think we'd all love it, but it just sort of seems weird and unappealing.

4 The Huns (Attila): I may be underrating them because I just don't like them, but god, I just don't like them. They were a bad idea and poorly implemented on top of that. They're not fun to play. Their UA is a hideous mish-mash of random elements. And their UUs, while strong, are now, in BNW, difficult to really take advantage of.

9 The Maya (Pacal): Second-best UB in the game, probably. The UA is overrated but still very good. The UU is fine, saves you a couple turns of research in your Theology beeline.

7 The Netherlands (William): The Polder is very powerful, but you might never get the chance to build one. The UA is still good, not great. The UU is great, but of somewhat limited utility (even compared to, say, the Ship of the Line, which can always provide fire support against land units). Still a solid choice on the whole.

 

[Merciorum]

I think Byzantium is really dice-tier. It can be a 9 or 10, or it can be a 1 or 2, depending upon your luck in civs and start location. They need the ability to always found a religion; with that, they can be lethal, although the lack of your preferred beliefs may require you to adapt your strategy based upon what beliefs are left. I love them, but I tend to play on Prince or King, so it's a little easier to found a religion.

 

[Keirador]

8 Austria (Maria Theresa): Decent UU, interesting and potentially very powerful UA, great UB. I saw somebody complain that the Coffee House is worse than the Windmill: this is madness. The Coffee House gives you the same +2 the Windmill does. Instead of +10% to buildings, you get +5% to everything (units, Wonders, projects). Plus you get +25% to Great Person generation, and you can build it on hills. It's basically like getting to build a Garden and a Windmill in every city regardless of hills/fresh water, except that you can actually build a Garden there too if you have fresh water. One of the very best UBs in the game.

That was me that said they worse than the Windmill. They're worse at building buildings, which is most of the building I do. I typically play tall and have a single city dedicated to training units (wherever my Heroic Epic is, other military Wonders if I can get them), so elsewhere I'm pretty much just building buildings with the occasional Wonder thrown in. I guess the extent to which the Coffee House ultimately produces more hammers would depend on how many of your cities are built on hills, and what it is you spend most of your time constructing. But to call them one of the very best UBs in the game? How many unique buildings are amongst the "very best?" I'd say the Ikanda, the Stele, the Pyramid, the Papermaker, the Floating Gardens, and the Burial Tomb are all better.

Of course, if Austria's UA works you're not playing tall, you're annexing City-States like a madwoman, so this goes back to my original complaint (and apparently I'm alone on this) that the AI just never lets me use Austria's UA and fights me down to the last dollar for every scrap influence with City-States.

5 Byzantium (Theodora): Everybody grossly overstates the difficulty of founding a religion. Especially now that the Piety tree is unlocked from the start, there's no reason not to get a religion on any difficulty below Deity, and even on Deity it can be done regularly. You have to make sacrifices, that's all. Throwing all your efforts into building Stonehenge is the best way to get it done.

That said, just founding a religion isn't always enough to get the most out of the Byzantine UA. You can always get one, but you can't always get one early, and you can't always get your pick of the beliefs. It's a very powerful ability on paper, but in practice I often end up using the extra belief on an Enhancer, something to help play catch-up and ensure that my religion actually sticks. The UUs are both very powerful, but Ancient/Classical UUs just don't get much of a workout anymore.

I don't get the high (well, relatively high) rating here. You basically reinforce my complaint: it's possible to get a religion with Byzantium, but doing so sacrifices building up in other areas, so by the time you get a religion you're playing catch-up. If you're using that bonus belief on an Enhancer belief just to keep your religion viable, what makes Byzantium worth playing at all? Why not just play a Civ that gets to found an early religion, take your pick of the beliefs and not have to worry about needing two Enhancers to stay in the game?

It seems like picking two Enhancers is basically wasting Byzantium's UA, and you agree that it's UUs come too soon, so "5" seems high to me as it basically makes Byzantium a totally vanilla Civ without any usable Uniques.

Or am I misunderstanding your argument here?

 

[wigwam]

No, that's about the size of it. I figure that rates as a slightly sub-average civ. I'm giving the Byzantines a couple points for the UUs—they come too early, but they're certainly not useless. Both are very strong units. And the UA isn't a total waste, either. Picking two Enhancers can mean the difference between having an isolated little religion that you manage to maintain only in your own cities and some nearby city-states and actually spreading it enough to really make Tithe (for example) pay off.

As for Austria, just look at the numbers again: the Coffee House does everything the Windmill does (I'd consider the 5% vs. 10% to buildings thing a wash at worst, but the difference either way is never going to amount to more than like 2-3 hammers even at the end of the game, so who cares?). It also gives you the same effect as a Garden—it's like another entire building for free—and has no terrain requirements. That is huge. It's not as imperative as it used to be to build all your cities on hills, because early war is so rare, but it's still a very attractive choice in the early game. Coffee Houses mean that those cities get their engineer slots etc. in the mid-game. I'd rate it #3 after the Stele and Pyramid, although I'll grant that the Burial Tomb and Paper Maker are close. The Floating Gardens are insanely powerful, but you might never get a chance to build them.

For what it's worth, I haven't ever had any trouble utilizing Austria's UA, although I haven't played Austria since BNW came out (and only once since the UA got nerfed).

 

[Loucypher]

8 - Austria (Maria Theresa):
Since their nerf, they're not AS strong anymore. However, they still boast an impressive UA, a rather powerful UB, and a decent UU. Definitely not a civ to be trifled with, they're just a bit easier to get their wings clipped right now.

6 - Byzantium (Theodora):
Honestly, you can play Byzanthium as if they didn't have any UU's, because the Dromon comes too early to really do anything in the line of battle aside from picking off the odd trireme, and the Cataphract...eh. The UA however is a lot better, and with early-game-piety they're a lot more likely to actually GET that religion, and if they do, odds are it's the strongest religion of the long run.

7 - Carthage (Dido):
Another civ that may as well not have UU's, as they're both just too early to really do anything of huge importance (The elephant's nice, but not gamebreaking). However, free harbors are BIG. The early city connections as well as the insta-longer-trade routes makes Carthage highly interesting for early-game gold gains, and if you manage to nab Messenger of the Gods as well, you're in great shape. Crossing mountains is funny but rarely gamedeciding.

9 - Ethiopia (Haile Selassie):
Hoo boy, this is a juggernaut of a civ. Early game, AI will struggle with your Spirit of Adwa-enhanced units while you're pumping out Steles. Almost guaranteed the first religion, sometimes the second (if Stonehenge/Lucky Celts are in), they can turn a game into easy-mode surprisingly well. And they're not even the best GnK civ...

7 - Sweden (Gustavus Adolphus):
A lot of people just don't know how to play Sweden, it seems. It's quite simple, really. Play nice until the Caroleans hit the fray. Have some DoF's, spam some GP's, gift away those you don't need...and then go to war, spam GG's like no tomorrow, gift them to city states and control aggression against you through the world congress. They require a specific kind of play, but once pulled off right, they're a beast.

4 - The Celts (Boudicca):
While being guaranteed the first pantheon is nice, the Celts really don't have anything else going for them. Both Ethiopia and the Maya are likely to catch up with them soon enough and surpass them, and various other civs can also outpace their faith production. Their UB is bland at best, and their UU, while nice, is generally not going to see that much action.

6 - The Huns (Attila):
Much like the Aztecs, the Huns have recieved a nerf in that early units just aren't as good anymore due to the gold requirement. This doesn't make them piss poor though - an early Ram rush can still severely cripple your neighbors - and their extra Pasture production is nice too. They just don't pack that same punch anymore they did in GnK.

10- The Maya (Pacal):
The Maya are pretty much one of the few god-tier civs, for good reason. Step 1: Build pyramids. Step 2: Beeline Theology. Step 3: Laugh your way to victory. It's that simple with these guys. Strong religious game + Early science advantage + Free GP's = Perfect package. The fact that they don't have to research Archery is nice too, saves them a bit of a headache if faced with early game aggression.

7 - The Netherlands (William):
While they got a slight hit from the DoF requirement for lump sum trades, this does not make the Dutch weak. They're more able to support an early game economy without going in the negative happiness then other civs, helping them set up for later. Polders enable gargantuan cities provided the right sites (and there's always at least 1 or 2 great Polder sites) and the Sea Beggar is, IMO, the best naval UU there is.



... GnK really brought a lot of awesome civs, no?

 

[CraigMak]

I am surprised at how off the G&K rankings are by people. Attila is getting such low ratings and they are quite obviously one of the most overpowered civs in the game. Have you guys even seen horse archers before? Do you know what a ram does? Their hammer ability lasts all game long, the free tech boosts them greatly which has long lasting effects since they can work horse for extra hammers from turn 1 and will be 1 tech ahead all game long. Seriously guys. Attila is like an 11/10. They will decimate Arabia long before they get their OP camels and everyone seems to agree that Arabia is a 10/10.

 

[Keirador]

I am surprised at how off the G&K rankings are by people. Attila is getting such low ratings and they are quite obviously one of the most overpowered civs in the game. Have you guys even seen horse archers before? Do you know what a ram does? Their hammer ability lasts all game long, the free tech boosts them greatly which has long lasting effects since they can work horse for extra hammers from turn 1 and will be 1 tech ahead all game long. Seriously guys. Attila is like an 11/10. They will decimate Arabia long before they get their OP camels and everyone seems to agree that Arabia is a 10/10.

The free tech does not become a game-long tech lead. Babylon, Korea, or any builder-oriented civ will out tech the Huns right quick. And the early game Zerg rush only works as a way of winning the game if you're playing Pangaea on tiny or small. If you're playing a large game with a top tier civ on another continent, Attila is screwed. And since BNW nerfed early warfare (and kinda nerded warfare in general), Attila's even weaker

 

[Keirador]

Wigwam, I grant your points on Austria. If the UA works for other people I'd go ahead and theoretically rate them a 7. IMO they still suffer a problem in that everything Austria can do, Venice can do better, but I'm not sure how popular my perception is that Venice is super OP.