Assyria underpowered?

[FECAL_URGENCY]

When I play as Assyria, I beeline science as usual. What several people here are forgetting is that if you deliberately go deep in the tech tree, you can be way ahead in total science and yet still be missing many more primitive technologies. I just go straight through the top of the tree, and use conquests to fill out the bottom (military) techs. If you're playing at any respectable difficulty, there's no way you're going to totally eclipse all your neighbours until you're well into the game, and if you reach that point, you're already winning anyway.

 

[MarshalN]

Spoiler :

So, my first and current Assyria game. I thought it was pretty funny Shaka stole CALENDAR. The three crosses is India being dead and so our trade deal got canceled. I got pretty lucky with Assur's placement - the dye and cotton were totally not expected.

Not doing that well science wise since I chose to tech the bottom half and steal/take the top half. I think the above poster's approach will probably work better. Sejeong is running away with the science but his military is crap, so I will probably keep stealing techs from him until I can't steal anymore, then I'll kill him.

 

[El Caballerion]

Assyria strategy:

1) Build a couple siege towers
2) Victory

 

[Strategist83]

You can't make a UA like that because on any of the higher difficulties the human player will never be the most advanced Civ in the world in the first few eras.

Difficulty is irrelevant, the game isn't and shouldn't be balanced around the AI's cheat bonuses on high difficulties. Other civs aren't balanced around this, either. The bonus I suggest for Assyria will be mostly theoretical since you're unlikely to be the tech leader when playing as a warmonger, but it still needs to be there so that having a good science rate doesn't penalize Assyria like it currently does, which makes no sense for a civ with a leader interested in scholary pursuits. It doesn't have to be a large bonus, it just has to be there.

 

[FECAL_URGENCY]

Difficulty is irrelevant, the game isn't and shouldn't be balanced around the AI's cheat bonuses on high difficulties. Other civs aren't balanced around this, either. The bonus I suggest for Assyria will be mostly theoretical since you're unlikely to be the tech leader when playing as a warmonger, but it still needs to be there so that having a good science rate doesn't penalize Assyria like it currently does, which makes no sense for a civ with a leader interested in scholary pursuits. It doesn't have to be a large bonus, it just has to be there.

Eh, I disagree with all of your arguments for why the UA is "poor design".

First off, half of your argument is based on the UA not being faithful to history, and I don't think I need to explain how game balance and historical accuracy are entirely unrelated.

The rest is based on an unjustified assumption that a catch-up ability is poor design. Why? It's only bad if the player can always count on being the furthest ahead, but if that's the case then the difficulty just needs to be increased. It has nothing to do with balancing the UA specifically for high difficulties.

It makes things much more interesting when there are UAs with strong effects but balancing drawbacks, and I think this one is a good example. India's would be another one, love it or hate it.

 

[civ54lyfe]

A desert capitol isn't bad when you do the Desert Folklore / Petra strat.

right ofc. but the starts i tried w/Assyria only had Desert tiles as a background (not good desert tiles e.g. Oases, Flood Plains, mining lux) kind of "backyard" in the terrain, while it was a rivered Plains that was the main feature.

 

[Wodan]

there is only 1 useful promotion they can get (cover 2) that carries with upgrades to trebs

It sounds like you're operating under the belief that Shock and Drill aren't useful and don't carry when upgraded to trebs/cannon/artillery. My experience is that they are and do. Not only do they help you in defensive fights, but they also add to your ranged combat strength.

 

[Johnpecan]

The main weakness with Assyria is that their UU and UA help almost exclusively if you're going to war. If you're in a situation where you want to be peaceful, you really gain nothing from choosing Assyria.

With that said, if you are planning on at least waging some war (which I do 90% of my games at Immortal), they're quite nice.

 

[Seabastian Civ]

Those extra writing slots seem useless. I never use artists or writers on tourism unless I'm going for a tourism win. I'd rather get a free-ish policy or a golden age than 2 tourism. Musicians might as well go into tourism since you can't use them for anything anyway. Regardless...

I struggle using siege towers and keeping my budget above water. In the future I will probably adopt a more balanced approach with Assyria- take some CBs and a ST or two out right before XBs rather than rushing to war like I used to.

 

[Wodan]

Really? Are you sure they add to range combat?

Yep. Do a quick test for yourself; load an old save or something.

Either way, they can't be used to unlock range or logistics....

That's a good point.

Those extra writing slots seem useless. I never use artists or writers on tourism unless I'm going for a tourism win.

I find that the ability to shuffle Works to my outer cities helps pop borders faster.

 

[Arkangelus]

They definitely do upgrade; not only do the terrain bonuses work for both defence and offence, but so does Siege against Cities (and stacks if you take Volley later), and if you've gone Honor you can even upgrade the adjacent unit bonus onto your cannons. It can be ridiculously beneficial switching from melee to ranged, just not the other way around.

They seem extremely strong in the players hands, but I've always found the AI really struggles. They seem to stay small a bit too long before trying to war, and are very very easily hurt by terrain.

 

[NukeAJS]

What's not to get? You bee-line mathematics, make 4 siege towers, and then attack the most technologically advanced civ. The UA makes it so that you aren't penalized for bee-line -- you just pick up all those little techs as you keep stomping cities.

 

[Seabastian Civ]

What's not to get? You bee-line mathematics, make 4 siege towers, and then attack the most technologically advanced civ. The UA makes it so that you aren't penalized for bee-line -- you just pick up all those little techs as you keep stomping cities.

Uh, no. Maybe on Prince. On Emperor + you need CBs to escort, maybe a pike or two. Suddenly your budget is in the red since you're supporting 8 units that are slowly traipsing through the wilderness at one tile per turn. And the first city you take better have some unique luxuries or else you're unhappy as hell, and your military has a -% modifier.

Read the previous posts and they all agree: Assyria isn't immune to the woes of early war and acting like they aren't doesn't help anyone.

 

[Wodan]

Uh, no. Maybe on Prince. On Emperor + you need CBs to escort, maybe a pike or two. Suddenly your budget is in the red since you're supporting 8 units that are slowly traipsing through the wilderness at one tile per turn. And the first city you take better have some unique luxuries or else you're unhappy as hell, and your military has a -% modifier.

Read the previous posts and they all agree: Assyria isn't immune to the woes of early war and acting like they aren't doesn't help anyone.

You've got a point but you're overstating the situation a bit. Assyria should only keep some cities just like any civ conquering in the early game. Others should be razed, and given that in the early game those cities will be smallish, they'll only take a couple of turns to burn down. Meanwhile your troops can be on their way to the next city. (At 1-2 tiles per turn, not strictly 1.)

There's also nothing stopping you from founding a religion so your midgame has plenty of happiness cap.

 

[Gort]

I basically burn anything that doesn't give me a new luxury.

I can't imagine attacking with just four siege towers, though. That sounds like asking for trouble. I go with two siege towers and some archer-type units to escort.

 

[Seabastian Civ]

You've got a point but you're overstating the situation a bit. Assyria should only keep some cities just like any civ conquering in the early game. Others should be razed, and given that in the early game those cities will be smallish, they'll only take a couple of turns to burn down. Meanwhile your troops can be on their way to the next city. (At 1-2 tiles per turn, not strictly 1.)

There's also nothing stopping you from founding a religion so your midgame has plenty of happiness cap.

Very good points. But we both agree that simply spamming siege towers doesn't work.

 

[NinjaGnat]

I'm having good success with my current game as Assyria on Emperor, with the caveat that I went tradition and managed to chop the great library thanks to starting in a massive forest.

I went great library -> national college right off the bat, founded 2 more cities while researching Drama and then used the resulting writers to quickly finish tradition and start training cover II siege towers. 3 Towers with composite bow support can take out your nearest neighbor, after which I was leading in tech.

Of course, this all assumes you somehow get the great library and don't have aggressive neighbors. A clear formula for winning as basically anyone.

 

[Wodan]

Very good points. But we both agree that simply spamming siege towers doesn't work.

Well, sure. You can't "simply" anything in CiV, and Assyria is no exception. I don't think that should be a criticism of Assyria's uniques. That said, maybe they could be improved or made more realistic... but again, that could probably be said about most of the civs/leaders.

 

[Gabriel Pyyrhic]

Also don't forget that it is giving you a great work of writing slot that does not require amphitheatres, which gives you advantages.

The benefits of the RL as I see them are :

1. You do not have to expend hammers on ampitheatres until you need to build OPERA HOUSES. Allowing you to focus your production elsewhere. This allows you to focus on your science/military.

2. If you are favouring a small civilization it allows you to have more slots for great works of writing.

3. POSSIBLY : Not sure if PUPPETS favour science over culture, but if they do then they may build ROYAL LIBRARIES before CULTURE buildings thus enabling you to pop in a great work and improve their cultural output (for example for border growth et al). As PUPPETS do not increase SP costs, this could possibly provide a culture boost for a small empire.

4. You can easily expand a new settlements borders without investing in monuments or amphitheatres. Similar to using a faith purchased cathedral (with a GW).

5. You can obtain extra XP for your units allowing them to gain Level 1, 2 or 3 quicker then they normally would.

6. If you go wide, the extra GWW slots can be filled through great works that you capture. Allowing you to pursue a CV aggressively.

The Royal Library is more about flavouring the CIV to encourage a scientific focus. Assyria is all about SCIENCE through war, with a small cultural bonus for those that choose to exploit it.

In summary ASSYRIA allows you to further your SCIENTIFC goals through warfare (UA) and your cultural goals through warfare (UB - GWW capture after sacking a city), whilst providing you with a strong military advantage in the early ages (UU + UB (Extra XP)).

 

[Maxym]

On difficulties above Emperor, you'll always be behind in tech at the start, when you want to be attacking with Assyria, and as anyone you always want libraries.

It's also a misconception that you want to be behind with Assyria - in fact you want to be close to tech leader,

The siege tower is powerful out of context, but it is not sufficient compensation for having no ranged siege units. You need several, or a couple of supporting melee units, to get the most from it, and you still can't skimp on ranged units. Unlike the Hun battering ram, the siege tower costs you the catapult, a long-lived unit at a critical game stage, and having no ranged siege before Physics is tough. Especially as the siege tower's effectiveness as a direct siege unit (rather than to support other units) tails off before the catapult's.

The Royal Library has very little synergy with the civ's approach. It requires a Great Work of Writing, and you don't want to be devoting effort to teching to Drama and Poetry and then building a Writers' Guild early, plus the experience boost is less than you get from a barracks. So either you use it late, or you try to rely on looting a Great Work from a captured city. In either case, it's a somewhat pointless bonus since by that time you've built the units you need (particularly if you're successfully capturing cities).

You make several good points, but are way off on catapults. Siege towers more than compensate. Cats are some of the most useless units in the game. Calling it long lived is a joke, it is the most one shotted unit of the game. CBs and later XB supported by siege towers make a short work of any city under 35 strength. At this time cats have been obsolete for thousands of years.