Assyria or Carthage?

[slyone14]

Hey everyone, I need some advice. I'm an experienced civ 5 player and have played most of the civs. I have always played cubs that were strong later on. I have yet to try a classical and ancient era civ. I am deciding between Assyria and Carthage. In everyone's opinion, which is the stronger all around civ? For those that played both, which did you enjoy more and why?

I don't really choose a civ by what win type they are best at, I adapt my play style on what's happening. Anyway, I will be playing on emperor, 22 civs and earth map.

Thank you, any advice is appreciated.

 

[KingKong76]

Assyria with no doubt!
Really more enjoyable to play!
Incredibly strong warmongers especialy early on! Siege towers are simply crazy horsehockys... UB is ok, but its their UA that makes them very strong! Epecialy on Immortal-Deity where you are most likely to be behind in science in the first tier of the game! (still very usefull on emperor)

If you manage to take 5-6 cities before you take tech lead, its 6 FREE TECHS!
Its more than what Korea can get in the whole game!! (well you cant calculate like that, but still)

Carthatge... Hate them... depiste the fact that UU trireme is way more powerfull that reg trireme, far to be a game changer. Same for Affrican Elephant. I like the free harbor, its useful, but again not a game changer. And you can cross Montain if you are most likely willing to take 50pts Hit!! Soooo WOW!

someone will probably make a point to prouve me wrong, but for me Carthage is in the bottom 2 tier in every type of map or conditions.

 

[budweiser]

I like Carthage. They are super rich all game long and later they are militarily strong. But they don't play the same as other civs. Its best to go wide with them and get as many coastal cities hooked up as possible.

 

[Redaxe]

They are two very different civs; Assyria is a pure domination civ, Carthage is more flexible; it favors some early war but its main strength is economic.
For Carthage you need a large coastal map, lots of cities and it is by far the best civ to take advantage of Liberty and Exploration. It looks a little bland but it does make for a fun game as you can get a strong seafaring empire.

 

[ThorHammerz]

For Assyria:

- Do you enjoy taking cities more efficiently than the Huns could ever dream of?

- Do you enjoy taking cities with classical era units during the industrial period (provided you kept some alive/in reserve)?

- Do you enjoy neglecting science production, yet staying on-par with everyone else's tech level because your UA gives you all the science you'll ever need (provided you are at war)?

- Do you like training level 2-3 units right out of the gate before reaching renaissance/industrial era?

For Carthage:

- Do you enjoy slightly-stronger triremes, that can beat up other triremes, but are pretty worthless in the same scope as regular triremes (i.e. unable to take cities without suiciding like 10 of them on their bloody (btw, the blood is yours) walls?)

- Does the prospect of free harbours (read: automatic and maintenance free city connection for any and all coastal cities, bonus naval trade route range) lighten your eyes?

- Does the prospect of being able to cross mountains (after you get your Great General from Honor or manually racking up the GG points) seem fun to you?

- Do you like elephants? .

 

[slyone14]

They are two very different civs; Assyria is a pure domination civ, Carthage is more flexible; it favors some early war but its main strength is economic.
For Carthage you need a large coastal map, lots of cities and it is by far the best civ to take advantage of Liberty and Exploration. It looks a little bland but it does make for a fun game as you can get a strong seafaring empire.

See this is my fear of Assyria, i play using 22 civs, so domination victory is often very challenging and i dont want to limit my play style. I keep reading that while they are an enjoyable civ, that are really limited towards dom.

As far as Carthage I keep reading that they are a fun civilization, but seem boring. But thats the purpose of doing something new. I think using a earth map with them would be fun. The biggest reason ive never tried a classical civ, is it seems once you hit medieval and your UU and UA go away, things would be boring. But I dont get that vibe with this civ. What is your experience with classical civs, does it get boring after your UU and UB go away?

 

[slyone14]

For Assyria:

- Do you enjoy taking cities more efficiently than the Huns could ever dream of?

- Do you enjoy taking cities with classical era units during the industrial period (provided you kept some alive/in reserve)?

- Do you enjoy neglecting science production, yet staying on-par with everyone else's tech level because your UA gives you all the science you'll ever need (provided you are at war)?

- Do you like training level 2-3 units right out of the gate before reaching renaissance/industrial era?

For Carthage:



- Do you enjoy slightly-stronger triremes, that can beat up other triremes, but are pretty worthless in the same scope as regular triremes (i.e. unable to take cities without suiciding like 10 of them on their bloody (btw, the blood is yours) walls?)

- Does the prospect of free harbours (read: automatic and maintenance free city connection for any and all coastal cities, bonus naval trade route range) lighten your eyes?

- Does the prospect of being able to cross mountains (after you get your Great General from Honor or manually racking up the GG points) seem fun to you?

- Do you like elephants? .

This is a great anylsis of both civs, thank you. So if you had to choose one, whom would you choose and why?

 

[Lexicus]

I would play Assyria, Carthage is more of a "flavor" civ while Assyria is one of the most powerful Civs in the game.

If you don't like domination, that's no big deal. Particularly if you're playing with 22 Civs, you can conquer a bit in the early game and then with the massive lead you get just go for whatever victory type you want.

I've never played Carthage but they don't appeal to me much. If you like the idea of having a Phoenician-style trading empire with lots of coastal cities Carthage might be for you.

Carthage is also significantly more powerful if you play on an Archipelago map. The free harbors will be a massive bonus when most cities are connected with harbors and roads are rare.

 

[ThorHammerz]

This is a great anylsis of both civs, thank you. So if you had to choose one, whom would you choose and why?

Depends entirely on the map and playstyle you wish to go for.

Assyria for warmongering (heading towards either cultural or domination) -if you just want to have fun and roll the colours of the map .

Carthage on naval maps (i.e. small continents, archipelago, tiny islands), or on larger continental maps (with decent coastline exposure) with plenty of mountains (i.e. turn world age to 3 billion years old).

Spoiler :

If it is an MP game with England on the map, you are in for a slow, long, and painful death (read: your Quinquereme's slight combat bonus, 13 vs 10 against triremes isn't going to do jack s*** when English triremes can outrun you into the FoW or to a city's ranged protection). You have dominance up until compass with naval trade route control, but once compass is researched, a squadron of Galleass will overpower them with ease. I don't have to explain what happens to any Civ on the coasts against England once Frigates/Ships of the Line come into play, do I?

 

[joncnunn]

Hey everyone, I need some advice. I'm an experienced civ 5 player and have played most of the civs. I have always played cubs that were strong later on. I have yet to try a classical and ancient era civ. I am deciding between Assyria and Carthage. In everyone's opinion, which is the stronger all around civ? For those that played both, which did you enjoy more and why?

I don't really choose a civ by what win type they are best at, I adapt my play style on what's happening. Anyway, I will be playing on emperor, 22 civs and earth map.

On the normal Earth map that comes with the game this will be up to the RNG because it will disable the starting bias. (You could have an inland start with Carthage such as starting in the middle of Siberia which would be like having no UA.)

Now if this was a normal script, Carthage has a huge edge due to the free Harbors + ease of getting 3 food cargo ship routes running to Carthage + a naval UU.

 

[Abraxis]

Carthage is and has been my most favorite civ in the game since its release with G&K, not because I think they're the best (though I do think they're severely under-rated) but because I think they have one of the widest range of opening strategies available to them. They don't have to abide by the same restrictions as everyone else when it comes to expansion in the early game. As a result, it really gives you a sense of freedom to just do whatever you need to to suit your situation.

Many of their bonuses have secondary and tertiary side-effects that really aren't clear unless you've played them a bunch, such as their strong Quinqueremes giving you a quick means of inflating your nation's military strength beyond that of a normal civ. Thereby setting you up nicely for a diplomatic as well as domination game, and offsetting any AI aggression incurred from your quick expansion. Civs will be more friendly toward you because of your fleet (which will allow you to shape the diplomatic climate of the rest of the game). The high military strength value for the Quinquereme perceived by the AI also makes it easy to float around the coast in small packs extorting gold from city states if you choose to be aggressive. The Quinquereme's ability to deter warmongers also allows you to safely ignore the bottom half of the tech tree while you b-line something on the top half (particularly useful to get the Galleass to defend your cities, supplementing not having a land army). Alternately you can raid Civs' trade lanes you figure they will be a threat later. There's very little they can do about it. There are no tactics available for naval warfare that early. Everyone is engaging each-other 1:1 along a straight band of coast. Always having the stronger ships, means you always win. Period.

The freedom of being able to place your cities anywhere on a coast without having to worry about connections allows you to pick out all the best city locations/trading spots, and gives you access to a much wider range of luxury resources than any other civ would nomraly have available to them without trading -as they're forced to stay relatively close to their capital. It also makes it reasonable to settle near far-away natural wonders.
Having your cities so spread out also means more of your cities will be within early trading range of more civs. Which means more trade routes giving you more science and indirect diplomacy gains. Come archeology, you also have quick access to more artifacts.

Their starting bias also usually makes for high production capitals, which you can leverage for early wonders even on higher difficulties. You could also leverage that to easily get a religion. Religion also can go quite well with Carthage's spread-out style as you have more wide-spread nodes from which to project influence over a wider area. Also that Messenger of the Gods pantheon goes great with the free city connections.

There's a ton of other stuff, I could go on all night. Their abilities can be leveraged toward just about any direction you could want to go, and that's half the fun of Carthage, trying to work their abilities in new and creative ways. They're very similar to Polynesia or The Shoshone in that regard, which are conveniently my second and third favorites.

Sorry I have nothing to say about Assyria. They've always seemed pretty one-dimensional to me, I've never been interested in playing them, hopefully this helps regardless.

P.S. It may seem a small thing, but Carthage's colours are also great. The white background is easy on the eyes and doesn't clash with or obscure anything else on the map, while the lilac borders are nice and soft.

 

[TheologiaCrucis]

Carthage's Quinquerme is actually really strong. If you have a fleet of say, 5 of them, and if the city your are attacking is exposed to the coast on more than one side, you can capture coastal cities early on with JUST triemes.

 

[ThorHammerz]

Carthage's Quinquerme is actually really strong. If you have a fleet of say, 5 of them, and if the city your are attacking is exposed to the coast on more than one side, you can capture coastal cities early on with JUST triemes.

If it's a city that has 3 coastal tiles bordering it (i.e. the 1-tile-islands that the AIs seem to be crazy for), is a <4 population city with no garrison or additional support archers in adjacent tiles, and/or a trireme or 2 to stall, then yes, you could do it very easily. You could probably even do it with just regular triremes if that was the case.

 

[GCavalry]

For Carthage:

- Do you enjoy slightly-stronger triremes, that can beat up other triremes, but are pretty worthless in the same scope as regular triremes (i.e. unable to take cities without suiciding like 10 of them on their bloody (btw, the blood is yours) walls?)

- Does the prospect of free harbours (read: automatic and maintenance free city connection for any and all coastal cities, bonus naval trade route range) lighten your eyes?

- Does the prospect of being able to cross mountains (after you get your Great General from Honor or manually racking up the GG points) seem fun to you?

- Do you like elephants? .

This. Carthage for early elephant defense and gold. No need to build road. And coastal start means 2 food cargo ship to the capital and has super research, and build lost of wonder!

 

[WarpCircuits]

Assyria is pretty good for Diety when the AI is poppin out cities faster than the mind can comprehend, and they almost always have the tech lead on you...

Carthage is better for King and lower when the AI will not have much of an advantage over you and you wish to strike early.

 

[DocRock]

Do you really rate Assyria that high? Playing them on Immortal at the moment and I am bit disappointed, especially if I compare them to other warmonger civs like the Zulu or the Mongols.

- the UB is kind of useless. How am I supposed to get a GW of writing early on, when it matters? The Zulu barracks are sooo much better.

- the UU is good but it's not superb in my oppinion. It cannot attack anything but cities, so it struggles to get XP. Against a hill based capital, it struggles to do enough damage. At least if you consider the hordes of melee units on Immortal / Diety that counterattack. For example, an Impi with all the Bull upgrades (that are easy to get) can defend so much better while fighting next to a city. Furthermore, an Ancient unit is obsolete pretty fast. I know that it's good eben latter on in thr second row but you just son't need anything after you got to Dynamite.

Don't get me wrong, it is a good unit. But it's not the superb weapon like the Keshik, Impi, Ram, Longbow, Chinese Xbow etc.

- Finally the UA. It's good and fun to play with, but you cannot choose the techs. So I ended with getting Sailing and other stuff, I really had no use for.

So overall, Assyria is an okay Civ to me. But there other Domination-focused Civs that are so much better.

 

[ThorHammerz]

It cannot attack anything but cities, so it struggles to get XP. Against a hill based capital, it struggles to do enough damage.

- Finally the UA. It's good and fun to play with, but you cannot choose the techs. So I ended with getting Sailing and other stuff, I really had no use for.

DocRock,

The whole point of a siege tower is not necessarily to use the siege tower itself to attack (although it is still good at doing so early in the game). You must support it with additional combat units in order to take advantage of it's sapper ability (+50% city attack to all units within 2 tiles range).

As with all conditional bonuses, you cannot simply expect to "brute force" (i.e. building nothing but the unit) your way in like the Keshik/Battering Ram/Longbows - you need to plan ahead not only on a tactical level, but also on a strategic level.

You must recognize that it can become obsolete (i.e. cannot train more) after a while.... BUT, it's sapper bonus persists throughout the entire game. You do not necessarily need to to go on the offensive as soon as you can build Siege towers, so long as you train enough to take 2-3 with you on each offensive (give them the Cover promotions for extra survivability) throughout the rest of the game.

You need only 1-2 Great Works of Writing to make full use of Assyia's UB, as you are allowed to bounce the works around (make sure they are in the city the turn before a unit is completed or bought with gold).

The randomness of the UA is indeed a little.... random however. But being able to choose your stolen techs would give the Assyrian player too huge of an advantage.

 

[DocRock]

And how do you get those GW in the beginning of the game, where the buildings can be build? I still rate the Zulu barracks way higher than the Assyria one.

So far I build 5 Composite Bows and 2 Towers in my current game. It works.. But not really well. Actually I think 2 Catas + Bows wouldn't perform that much worse. I have no iron for Swordsmen so some spears would be an option. I am only saying that instead of the Towers I would gladly take aome Impis as I think they are way better. I am swarmed by units, i.e. sweden counterattacked with ~12 units (mainly Bows + Spears) and my Towers are useless against that. While Impis, on the other hand, would be devastating. Switch in Chinas Xbows or English Longbows uf you wish. The all arrive neRly at the same time especially if beelined. And they all work wonders against units and cities. The tower only helps against cities.

I understand the idea of keeping them for later warfare, but later on you don't need any help with cities. Artillery, Bombers, Battleships.. They all make city defense kind of irrelevant.

In my oppinion, a UU that helps you with enemy units early on is just way better. Futhermore, Assyria adds nothing to help with Happiness or Money, making it hard to keep conquering. There are many Civs more suited for Domination. Well, in my oppinion at least...

 

[KingKong76]

Do you really rate Assyria that high? Playing them on Immortal at the moment and I am bit disappointed, especially if I compare them to other warmonger civs like the Zulu or the Mongols.

- the UB is kind of useless. How am I supposed to get a GW of writing early on, when it matters? The Zulu barracks are sooo much better.

- the UU is good but it's not superb in my oppinion. It cannot attack anything but cities, so it struggles to get XP. Against a hill based capital, it struggles to do enough damage. At least if you consider the hordes of melee units on Immortal / Diety that counterattack. For example, an Impi with all the Bull upgrades (that are easy to get) can defend so much better while fighting next to a city. Furthermore, an Ancient unit is obsolete pretty fast. I know that it's good eben latter on in thr second row but you just son't need anything after you got to Dynamite.

Don't get me wrong, it is a good unit. But it's not the superb weapon like the Keshik, Impi, Ram, Longbow, Chinese Xbow etc.

- Finally the UA. It's good and fun to play with, but you cannot choose the techs. So I ended with getting Sailing and other stuff, I really had no use for.

So overall, Assyria is an okay Civ to me. But there other Domination-focused Civs that are so much better.

Well, you are in fact supposed to use those for their 50% general type bonus on cities... I actuly dont even bring them to the city wall... I protect them behind M.Units and just make sure all of my range units are affected by a siege tower. Combined tht with a general, and you can actualy take some cities so fast that AI sometime dont even have time to react.

1st time I played Assyria I was so supprised... I way overreacted in building/units that much other units.... that said I passe throug Napoleon 4 cities in like 12 tuens I think.

Then took 2 more from Elisabeth... and offer me another one to make peace...
I was stunned by the speed of all this.

Then I open demography, and I was 1st in tech!! Woooooo!

ANy whole point is that I dont think you are supposed to attack cities with them... MAYBE very early in the game.

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

22 civs and earth map.

definitely makes the debate interesting. ive never played against more than 12 civs. i'd guess Carthage has the greater advantage for more settling opportunities (island locations) as 22 civs will be a hugely crowded place on an Earth map. and it is continents, which will help encourage a water-based approach for anything other than tall/science. but Assyria will turtle better for a tall science game. pick on a strategic neighbor or two and steal some techs during some windows of opportunity.

if going domination, then either will work, whether by siege/artillery or by frigates and mix of land invasion. 22 civs is quite a lot to deal with. no one capital will be a huge wonder spot either, im guessing.