.

[MiniPatton]

I have to admit I'm a little disappointed with the England Civ.

The Royal Dockyard - I mean it would be good if harbours didn't establish a trade route already. Sure an additional trade route is good however I'm not sure to how much of a bonus that will be considering China/Germany have huge perks.

Would have been good for them to get a better navy related bonus like having a Venetian Arsenal 'ask' perk in one city etc. Maybe even have the Sherman tank as well for example. Just appears to me they have been short changed in comparison to the others.

IF you gain an additional trade route PER Royal Dockyard, I think that can escalate to generating wealth or inner empire growth substantially. Not to mention money can be used to buy great people now.

This could be Hutama levels of absurdity in BE, or perhaps Venice with the capability to settle more cities.

 

[footslogger]

I love the releases so far the civs look to actually be different this time around. Before there was just this hint of power here and there, but this game it feels like they gave everyone some OPness. So vying for power will be so much more dynamic.

I agree about the first part. Really imaginative, bold, distinctive civs this time, which makes me want to try many of them. That never happened before. My one concern is that the OP element to many of them will work too much to the human player's advantage. He will be able to exploit his civ's bonuses to the max but will the AI civs be capable of doing the same? I doubt it. That could make the game a bit unbalanced and easier than it should be. Can only wait and see.

 

[CaiusDrewart]

I agree about the first part. Really imaginative, bold, distinctive civs this time, which makes me want to try many of them. That never happened before. My one concern is that the OP element to many of them will work too much to the human player's advantage. He will be able to exploit his civ's bonuses to the max but will the AI civs be capable of doing the same? I doubt it. That could make the game a bit unbalanced and easier than it should be. Can only wait and see.

I agree. I think Civ V UAs were mostly not really strong enough, and the Civs felt too similar as a result. For instance, the entirety of Civ V Egypt's UA is a 20% wonder construction boost. That's fine, and perfectly flavorful for Egypt, but is that really powerful enough to make Egypt feel that special? I'd say no. (Compare Civ IV Egypt, which got a 50% boost to wonder construction, among many other things. There you could really feel the difference!)

Civ VI UAs, in addition to being more complex and multifaceted, also seem to be much stronger on average. That should make the game more interesting.

 

[Cyon]

I think Japan both looks like tkr strongest and most fun to play with.

Adjacency bonus will make all district bonuses better, faster cheaper holy sites, theater districts and encampment is always helpful and helps with early religion.

A defensive bonus that habe Large reach if you settle your cities on the coast and a late production and culture boost with the electronic factory.

With some extra samurai topping.

Yummy!

 

[dturtle1]

...Germany looks like a top tier. They have 1 additional military policy through to WHOLE game, which means that unlike any other civ, you can use both military policies from the beginning...

Yeah, This is a really good boost that is at its most powerful in the early game. The flexibility it will provide will be pretty amazing later on as well.

I particular like the idea of running double wildcard Slot Governments whilst still getting an extra military policy. Allowing you to be able to still go military heavy if required

Democracy as Germany allows up to 4 Military Slots and 3 economic OR 2 Military and 5 economic OR somewhere in between. (assuming you use both wild card slots) If you consider Military and Economic being the primary policies, this is a lot of flexibility.

Germany is not weak by any means

 

[Brutus2]

Brazil is the only one so far where I couldn't help but think "wow, this is going to be top tier". It isn't only for their bonuses, but they presumably have jungle start bias, which seems to be great for setting up early science adjacency bonuses.

No doubt that Brazil has great potential but I wonder about the start bias and availability of rainforests beyond your capital. Each city that you build or conquer after you capital will be less and less likely to have rainforest as you move farther away from that start bias. It's not like all of your districts will be surrounded by rainforests.

 

[isau]

This is so hard to answer without seeing a final build and the numbers involved. Any of them could be incredible, but it depends on what the numbers look like.

That said, just based on what we can see, Egypt seems like it could be the weakest, or at least the most vulnerable to bad starts. Egypt explicitly needs rivers to get its Wonder bonus, its UU needs a specific terrain type, its Sphinxes need to be built next to a wonder to get adjacency bonuses. It seems to me it could easily add to a rocky start that is highly dependent on the RNG.

Strongest is an even bigger guess, but IMO Germany is a contender. Germany's unique ability that lets you build a district with 3 less population than other civs seems astoundingly powerful. Other civs can get bonuses for adjacency and so on, but Germany can actually build districts, early and wide.

 

[indradiva]

Egypt is by no means weak even without rivers that, by the way, aren't hard to find. It still keeps its trade route bonus and bonus gold is always good. Also, the Sphinx, AFAIK, gets only bonus Faith from being adjacent to a Wonder, and while Faith is good, it's not so important as Culture. That's the main strength of the Sphinx: to provide free Culture way before Theatre Square. Last but not least, the Maryannu Chariot Archer is already very fast compared to Heavy Chariot and it's ranged, so it's pretty good for hit-and-run tactics and raids at enemy cities, very strong early game unit. Egypt is a fairly balanced civ, not weak in any terrain.

 

[Verified_Confection_Being]

No doubt that Brazil has great potential but I wonder about the start bias and availability of rainforests beyond your capital. Each city that you build or conquer after you capital will be less and less likely to have rainforest as you move farther away from that start bias. It's not like all of your districts will be surrounded by rainforests.

But what if Brazil starts on that well known continent playfully known as the 'worm of the equator'?

 

[Matthew.]

No doubt that Brazil has great potential but I wonder about the start bias and availability of rainforests beyond your capital. Each city that you build or conquer after you capital will be less and less likely to have rainforest as you move farther away from that start bias. It's not like all of your districts will be surrounded by rainforests.

True, but presumably by then you will have profited from your good start. I gave the example of Civ 5's desert bias with desert folklore and petra. If you got those in your capital, it didn't matter if your secondary cities were on desert.

We will need to wait and see just how good jungle starts will be, but my impression so far is that Brazil will rarely end up in a "low science" start, both because of their starting bias and their bonus to adjacency.

 

[CaiusDrewart]

I can't get over how strong unimproved rainforest tiles look. They offer production in addition to good food! Traditionally a jungle start means a stunted early game, but I don't think that will be the case in Civ VI at all.

 

[tedhebert]

I still think that Aztecs have one of the strongest UU with the eagle Warrior, turning defeated enemies into builders, which can then be used with the CIV ability to speed up district construction.

Ever since it was announced that there would be no warmongering penalties for early war in the ancient Era, and will remain very low until renaissance, it means that Aztec are in a position to make early city acquisition, and in my mind, getting a great start has been a key element in all CIV versions

I've always been a Wide type of guy, so

 

[Civbra]

Brazil, germany and China I think are the good ones. Japan with that bonus by close districts and Monty with eagle warriors seem to be pretty good, tho

I don't know about you folks, but for me, all civis so far in Civ VI in general seems pretty good!

At Civ V there is 4 or 5 civs with real fun, but here, by what I have seen so far, I probably go random for my first games

 

[JimmyBanks]

Strongest Civ so far? That would be Greece... it has double the leaders of all the other civs.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Strongest Civ so far? That would be Greece... it has double the leaders of all the other civs.

Georgia is stronger. Tamar is so powerful, even developers didn't dare including her in the game.

 

[Miravlix]

True, but presumably by then you will have profited from your good start. I gave the example of Civ 5's desert bias with desert folklore and petra. If you got those in your capital, it didn't matter if your secondary cities were on desert.

We will need to wait and see just how good jungle starts will be, but my impression so far is that Brazil will rarely end up in a "low science" start, both because of their starting bias and their bonus to adjacency.

Having +6 science is rather problematic if someone has +2 science 20 turns before that.

Brasil's problem is that it can't get it's bonuses fast due to low production.

 

[Martinus]

A lot of civs have really situational bonuses, depending on geography. I think one of the strongest "universal" civs is Germany - the production bonus from the Hansa district AND the ability to build one more district than determined by the population cap can make them outproduce its rivals in all the relevant resources, especially in the early game when the population is low so +1 district per city can be big.

 

[Liex]

Brasil's problem is that it can't get it's bonuses fast due to low production.

Not really, apparently unimproved jungles don't hinder your production anymore. And I suppose it's easier to remove them if you need to improve a resource or something.

Towards mid-game, Brazil may want to improve its adjacency bonuses through polices. For instance, Natural Philosophy, a classical era policy, doubles the campus adjacency bonus. And there's is always the Chichen Itza, a medieval era wonder that grants +2 Culture and +1 Production in every jungle tile. And the Sacred Path pantheon, giving +1 Faith.

Welcome to the Jungle, friends.

 

[Ikael]

I love how this time there are a lot of powerful, tier 1 civs with many flexible possible strategies for them ^^ Ed Beach is doing a superb game design job, as usual!

As for the civs:

God tier: China, Scythia, Brazil
Potential God tier: Germany, Aztecs
Awesome tier: Spain, Japan, England, Egypt
Good enough tier: America, France

We're having a very good civ tier distribution so far ^^

Also, I would like to point out that people are really underselling America, me thinks. Have you looked at goverment legacy bonuses? They are really, really powerful, and America's UA downright DOUBLES them since the very beggining of the game (X2 to their adquisition speed).

 

[Shafi-is-back]

I think it's Brazil for me. Assuming the jungle start bias is going to get them a decent amount of jungle nearby, the bonus seem insane.