Are any civs or leaders by themselves weak? Are some too good?

I've played two full playthroughs and a couple more to midgame.

First game was just exploring the game with Trung Trac on Maya/Inca/Mexico (played on governor here by accident, all other games on immortal) - Maya was great, but Inca and Mexico not quite as good as expected. Inca because it was so terrain dependent to find rough next to mountains, and Mexico because the celebration effects didn't feel super impactful. Trung Trac's science paired well with Maya as expected and her Commander abilities were nice but not especially synergistic with these civs.

Second game was only through exploration - Ibn Battuta with Egypt/Shawnee. Both Civs were great* but Shawnee really shined. Battuta was about as good as expected - those extra attribute points were fantastic, but the share map was meh. (Caveat: manually exploring the map is one of my favorite parts of civ so this ability is rather anti-fun for me ;))
*I think some of Shawnee's abilities are potentially bugged? But I was running an early version of Ynamp so that may have been part of the issue, will need to test again later.

Third game was Xerxes Archemenid as Mississippi/Ming/America for a trade focused game - ended up with a fair amount of combat though. Most surprising was how great Ming was, those Great Wall sections were 8 Culture/Gold each and incredibly strong, and their UU was fantastic: a strong front line unit that can range attack (at two tiles! I was expecting one), and it gets +4 in featureless terrain. Xerxes A, Mississippi, and America were good but not mindblowing.

Current game, midway through exploration, is Confucius on Khmer/Abbasid for a specialist run. It's going ok - it takes quite a while to get specialists up and going during Antiquity. Confucius seems weaker than expected, but I want to try this combo again after I get some more experience.
 
I like how we're all finding different things to appreciate in the various civs/leaders. For me...

Potent
Ibn Battuta - being able to race to your chosen repeatable +X% attribute is really good. Pushing culture in a game with him and Hawai'i was eye watering.
Xerxes KoK - The combat strength bonus. Yikes.
Harriet Tubman - +5 war support is really good. If you get her and gate of all nations... She's a great pick for higher difficulties where the AI is more likely to attack you. I really misjudged her abilities.

Maya, Abassids - Ageless science buildings are amazing. And they both get other solid abilities. One following the other seems really nice.
Hawai'i - Needs to be toned down I think. The amount of culture is bonkers.
Persia - Hits like a truck and you get to settle the entire map.
Songhai - Treasure fleet points the slowest to come by? Not any more...

Interesting
Xerxes Achaemenid - His abilities are solid but not flashy
Tecumseh - He takes a bit of work to get set up, once he does though... Kiskopo Nena'to and him with a few city states on side are like space marines.
Shawnee - They need setup, but they can hit hard.
Mississipians - The best trade civ in antiquity. The burning arrows are pretty good.

Underwhelming
Isabella - Wonder yields aren't as good as I'd hoped. I overestimated her I think.
Greece - A bit of a one-trick pony. You can make it work though.
Aksum - I am enjoying them even though they are weaker than I'd hoped. For me they are saved by their traditions giving bonuses for resources/coast which are solid for antiquity, and give you a nice head start in exploration.

I haven't really rated the modern civs. The victory conditions force you to push fast down very generic paths and I don't think I've been able to see what the modern civs can really do as the game ends too quick. I can't wait for the ability to turn off victory conditions. Score victory only is my bet for the most interesting way to play.
 
I have only played 3 games: Catherine of Han => Ming => Russia, Hatshepsut of Egypt => Abbasid => Prussia, and Trung Trac of Persia => Mongolia => Qing, all on Immortal.
- Catherine: amazing leader, very strong in Culture, match perfectly with Russia. Russia's ability seems small but it gives Culture on every urban district, not quarter, so it is actually a lot.
- Han is disappointing, the Shi Dafu isn't that impressive to me. I hate unique improvements, their Great Walls didn't change my mind.
- Ming: strong in science, but extremely boring, very defensive. +50% science for doing nothing, slots in as many traditions as you can, avoid regular policies unless those policies are really strong. And again, Great Walls.
- Hatshepsut + Egypt: Chef's kiss, 10/10
- Abbasid: Incredible Science and Culture output. I actually love their Alim a lot.
- Prussia: Unique railroad is pretty good, civics 10/10, insane level of production especially if fascism is picked. Suitable for late game domination cuz everyone hates you for no reason.
- Trung Trac + Persia is straight up busted. A commander with a commendation straight out the gate? Immortal with First Strike + Order commendation hits for +15 over their regular counterpart. Kind of nuts.
- Mongolia is boring. I am still learning how flanking works so not sure if their unique commander is good or not, but I don't feel it is that impressive. Strong, but very one-dimensional, kind of expected from Mongolia.
- Qing can win an economic victory really fast, but because I had such a large empire from the previous 2 ages already. Otherwise, Qing feels really mid. Both UUs are non-factors. Influence from UQ is acceptable.
 
my ratings so far:

OP:
Maya, Hawaii, Abbasid. all 3 have bonkers science or culture generation. Hawaii & Abbasid can generate 500+ science/culture fairly early in Exploration, enabling you to research pretty much any tech or civic on the tree in 1 turn.
Maya also very strong, their kit is all around very nice. All 3 of these made my life easy.

Strong:
Spain: massive bonuses to building and using fleets, fighting in distant lands. conquistadors rock
Greece: I used their befriend CS bonus from beginning to end. especially impactful in the modern era when you can befriend all city states turn 1.

Fine:
Mississippi: I'm sure their growth bonus helped, it just didn't feel impactful compared to the above civs
Rome: I like their kit a lot, just not blowing me away like the above.

I've only played one game through to the modern era, but America felt fine to me.

currently playing as Rome. I don't want to play Spain again, but I'm slightly dreading switching to Normans... wall-themed civs have never been the strongest, and I'd much rather have Spain's broad bonuses to fleet building & distant lands conquest than playing a military civ that seems more squarely focused on fortifications for some reason. we shall see
 
I'm no expert and I haven't even finished a game yet, since I've mostly been playing around with different stuff in the Antiquity and Exploration age so far to get a hang of everything.

Aksum: My early go-to civ so far, and I wouldn't mind a buff, but I still enjoy them. The biggest issue with them is that they're the only real naval Antiquity civ, so their bonuses at sea don't mean much of anything. The Dhow's trade route charge can be nice, and synergises well with the rest of their kit. The Tankwa's extra range is fantastic considering how limiting trade route range is in antiquity, but the "can't be plundered" ability feels kinda useless (Maybe I've just been lucky but I don't believe I've had a trade route plundered once on land or at sea yet - maybe that's a higher difficulties thing?) But the Tankwa feels like an example of a thing I'm noticing in a number of civ designs, where a UU feels like a CUA that was stapled onto a Unit so as to give the civ a UU. In other words, Aksum could have easily had the CUA of "Sea trade routes have extra range and cannot be plundered," but instead it's strapped onto one of their Uniques, and Aksum already has fewer of those than most. I need to play around more with the Hawilt to see if it's actually worthwhile, but what keeps me coming back to Aksum (aside from Cultural/Economic/Naval being a good fit for how I like to play) is that their extra gold on resources adds up fast, their traditions are fantastic for setting up an Exploration Age run, and the Great Stele is a perfect first wonder, which gets a bit competitive, so having an edge to securing it is nice.

Amina: Her extra resource slots are wonderful, and a great fit for Aksum. Her +5 combat strength on desert and plains is in effect more of a defensive than offensive ability, but that's fine if you're trying to play for an economic victory anyway. I don't think I'd try to use her for a Military victory, though.

Greece: So good! Influence is coming out early as a very important currency and one of the toughest ones to get, so already Greece has a lot going for it there. Hoplites being available from the start is nice. Weirdly, as much as I've played around with this one, I don't think I've built a single Logos yet. Oracle is pretty mid but I build it every time anyway because it's cheap and I'm still in the habit of rushing for it from Civ6.

Himiko, Queen of Wa: OMG I love her. Friend of Wei is nice, and will pay off when you get a chance to use it, but the real gem here is the free support for proposed endeavors. In my experience, the AI is just constantly proposing endeavors, and paying zero influence to stack up those extra yeilds, freeing you up to gobble up suzerainities, is just incredibly powerful. Particularly strong with Greece, as one might expesct.

Machiavelli: Also great with Greece, and probably better on higher difficulties than I'm currently playing on. Right now, my proposed endeavors are almost always supported, which doesn't give you any gold, but isn't bad in any case.

Ibn Battuta: All-arounder for sure, kind of the Mario of the available leaders from what I can tell, but that's not a bad thing. Customizability feels very powerful in this game. Hard to say whether he'll seem better or worse as I get more experienced with the game, because that could easily go either way.

Khmer: I've started up a couple of games with them and can't seem to make anything happen with them, at least yet. I understand that their traditions (particularly w/r/t specialists) can make them very powerful, so I need to give them another shot.

Abbasid: I had great success with them coming out of an Economic golden age with Aksum, in which I'd converted all but one of my settlements into cities, and was able to keep them as such at the start of the Exploration Age. I didn't really understand the current religion mechanics in that run-through and mostly ignored it, so I probably could have done more with them, but I was focusing on science and econ anyway, and it did wonders in both cases there,

I'm currently playing Ahsoka, World Renouncer through the India path (Maurya in Antiquity, now Chola) and that combo seems pretty fantastic as well. Managed to get golden ages in Economic, Cultural and Scientific in Antiquity. I haven't tried Maya yet, but it sounds like they need to be my next game. Especially since they unlock Mexico, who is very tricky to unlock through gameplay, and who is the Modern-age civ I'm most excited to try out.
 
Really Good:

Oblique Frederick and Maya: Start is really good IMO, getting the free units from making its unique science building and taking advantage of the extra combat range on commanders can lead you to have several lvl 10-15 commanders by the end of the modern age... I haven't tried baroque yet, I think the same logic applies for a maya start with him as well.

Ibn Battuta and Han: it helps if you have the memento for a bonus expansion point, but you don't inherently need it for this strat, but you can get +3 pop in every settlement if you bline for the expansion attribute that gives you the extra pop, and coupled with han's ability of an extra one for each settlement you can claim most of the map/resources quite quickly.

Probably good, but cant seem to get it to work:

Charlemagne and Maurya: I haven't figured out how to maximize happiness and also prevent economic collapse from the free elephants you do get...

Machiavelli and Greece: limited success, very weak military game and highly depend on being surrounded by ungrabbed Independent peoples, the free money is nice but its kinda a huge trade off sometimes cause you spend the influence and once you get declared war on, it would be nice to have a stockpile for such emergency / the hoplite doesn't seem that strong
 
I'll also second the strength of Hawaii. I wasn't entirely sure if their tradition that adds culture to marine tiles was so strong because I was playing on archipelago but judging by these comments it's just generically powerful.

Mongolia feels strong (I had them paired with KoK Xerxes) but more importantly they're incredibly fun. While you get points from Homeland conquests unlike everyone else, you don't get the extra bonuses from religious conversion so need to conquer a lot - feeling like a true menace to your continent. Leading into them from Persia means you get a lot of commanders that have a head start on promotions (Trung Trac could possibly make this setup even better) so I had half a dozen with Initiative (unpacked units can move that turn), the extra slots unlocked, and the radius commendation before the end of Exploration.
 
Black Gate said:
I'll also second the strength of Hawaii. I wasn't entirely sure if their tradition that adds culture to marine tiles was so strong because I was playing on archipelago but judging by these comments it's just generically powerful.

Mongolia feels strong (I had them paired with KoK Xerxes) but more importantly they're incredibly fun. While you get points from Homeland conquests unlike everyone else, you don't get the extra bonuses from religious conversion so need to conquer a lot - feeling like a true menace to your continent. Leading into them from Persia means you get a lot of commanders that have a head start on promotions (Trung Trac could possibly make this setup even better) so I had half a dozen with Initiative (unpacked units can move that turn), the extra slots unlocked, and the radius commendation before the end of Exploration.
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Yep, my Mongolia game was with Trung Trac, albeit with a Maurya start. Very strong and, as you said, even more fun. Augustus paid no heed to the settlement camp which gave me a lot of real estate to work with for the legacy path :cooool:
 
Hellenism Salesman said:
I think Askum could use a tiny buff, probably to the Dhow. I think letting it enter into Friendly players' territory without Open Borders would be good.
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The +2 gold to resources buff for Aksum is quite good. All of the other stuff they have is lacking, but the gold is so powerful in Civ 7 that Aksum's advantage there honestly feels good enough to compensate for their other garbage abilities and make them at least decent imo, though I wouldn't mind if they got buffs.

Egypt and Persia stand out to me as the weaker antiquity civs. All of the other ones have more things going for them. Navigable rivers are not common enough for Egypt's bonus to matter as much as it should, and Persia's combat buff is nice, but it's all they have. On the other hand of antiquity, Maya and Rome are just OP I'm pretty sure.
 
ZeroSuitSenpai said:
Egypt and Persia stand out to me as the weaker antiquity civs. All of the other ones have more things going for them. Navigable rivers are not common enough for Egypt's bonus to matter as much as it should, and Persia's combat buff is nice, but it's all they have. On the other hand of antiquity, Maya and Rome are just OP I'm pretty sure.
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Haven't played Egypt yet, but Persia has at least decent units and CS bonuses. And a fun quest to kill all kinds of unit types with immortals - and if an immortal dies during the quest, you just get a new one for free... On the other hand, I think Rome is the better warmongering civ.
 
Maya: Unique quarter is so good, could finish science victory projects with low production city.

Ming: UU has same ranged attack strength with ranged unit and has 2 range. It basically replaces ranged unit, and it can benefit from +5 strength when full health promotion. Extremely strong.
Ming great wall is busted. It's probably game system problem though - if you replace an improvement to a Ming UI, the settlement loses a pop and you need same small amount of food to re-grow it. You can quickly spam walls in every town and you'll be swimming in culture and gold.
 
I kinda found Trung Trac/Rome meh, great on paper, less good in practice. I think both are definitely above average tier on their own, but there are a couple of issues that it has going against them. Trung Trac wants cities (in tropical terrain), Rome wants towns, that's the main thing that makes this combo less powerful and makes it very awkward. You also cannot get terracotta army because you need to start in grassland, unless you reroll until you start in grassland, build terracotta army, and make the towns into cities moving onto the exploration era and moving of corona civic. I feel trung trac + Persia is probably a better combo since Persia has the more useful unique army commander, with a free promotion in a very powerful category. With trung trac you can immediately get to the bottom of assault and like Rome you get a powerful unique infantry unit. Rome has very legions which is good with the traditions slot in, but that's a bonus they have where they don't necessarily need Trung Trac except for her wanting to be at war all the time, but it renders it void because she wants cities and Rome doesn't want that. Still a good combination because both are good, but not that amazing as some have said or make it seem like, great on paper, bad in practice.

Trung Trac + Maya is probably very powerful tho.
 
Augustus & Rome just fit like a glove. after playing that combo, I don’t have any plans to mess with what works, as far as Rome pairings go
 
So I've written above about Himiko-Wa + Greece (which is incredibly good for what it does.) Now I've tried transitioning from that combo into Shawnee, which gets hilarious in its synergy. I'm psyched to transition into Modern, immediately stack up traditions that reduce the Befriend Independent cost, and gobble up as many City States as possible.
 
Navelgazer said:
So I've written above about Himiko-Wa + Greece (which is incredibly good for what it does.) Now I've tried transitioning from that combo into Shawnee, which gets hilarious in its synergy. I'm psyched to transition into Modern, immediately stack up traditions that reduce the Befriend Independent cost, and gobble up as many City States as possible.
Click to expand...
yeah Greece is easy to sleep on, their city state traditions are extremely powerful across all eras and will synergize well with many exploration/modern civs
 
Giskler said:
Seemed meh:
Buganda
Click to expand...
I found them to be great for military victory. Unique policies that give +50% health from pillaging tiles and policy where rivers do not stop movement allows for really fast and dynamic conquests. With that +50% pillaging health you can come back much easier from city assaults off to a bad start because you pretty much never need to pull back and wait multiple terms to fully heal up. I was able to roll across the map with them no problem.
 
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