[NFP] City-States Elimination Thread

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In evaluating Zanzibar (as well as Cahokia), it might be helpful to think about what amenities mean in terms of other yields. Adding 2 amenities to city will almost always push it up a happiness threshold (2 thresholds if it happens to be sitting at -1), so Zanzibar's amenities roughly equate to a 5% boost to all yields (10% to growth) in 6 cities. 5% may not sound like much, but if 30% of one yield is a strong bonus, then 5% of every yield seems like it should be comparably strong. This is limited to 6ish cities, but it applies from the start of the game. whereas it may be 100 turns before Antananarivo reaches a 5% boost to a single yield.

Antananarivo [2] (5-3)
Auckland [10]
Bologna [19]
Cahokia [5]
Yerevan [10]
Zanzibar [4] (3+1)
 
Adjusting time zone vote; voted too late yesterday I usually vote around this timing. Not going to downvote Yerevan again, I think she is at the right place.

Antananarivo [3] (2+1)

Antananarivo is sensitive to civs you play, works better for civs that generate many great people. (Common suspects, Russia, Kongo, Scotland, Sweden, Brazil)
It works well for some civs and less so for other civs.
To a lesser extent, Antananarivo is also sensitive to govenor/build order (obviously, oracle + pingala + grants takes the cake for generating a tonne of GP).
Nonetheless, still very potent for most victory types, maybe less relevant for religious victory types.
Auckland [7] (10 - 3)
Right, + 2 cogs for shallow water only in industrial era is too slow for my liking.
Perhaps if they tie it to the tech tree, + 2 cogs to shallow water when unlocked industrialisation, it would have been much better.

Bologna [19]
Cahokia [5]
Yerevan [10]
Zanzibar [4]
 
Antananarivo [0] (3-3 eliminated). While a powerful bonus, it’s benefits are minor in the early game, and as stated, scale to be more of a win more late game where you’re already getting good income. Certainly good, but 6th is a good showing here.
Auckland [8] (7+1) If we’re simply talking about city viability, then additional production on the coast opens up additional city locations which would be otherwise harder to settle. Yes coastal cities are still not as strong as inland cities, but Auckland certainly helps make them better.

Bologna [19]
Cahokia [5]
Yerevan [10]
Zanzibar [4]

(Edited for cross post, but didn’t really change results)
 
Auckland [8]
Bologna [18] (19-1) One of my favorite city states, and I think it should finish in the top 3, but it's not right for it to have nearly twice as many points as the second one in this game. Extra GPP is always welcome, but if you're not suzerain, it's not going to cost you a scientific or cultural game.
Cahokia [5]
Yerevan [11] (10+1) My vote for the best city state in the game. It's really on a whole other level than other city-states. Everything the other city-states provide is nice. It's nice to have extra GPP, or a bunch of free amenities, or extra production with a coastal civ, but those city-states themselves don't have the level of impact that Yerevan can provide. Yerevan literally wins games. As some others have pointed out, it doesn't merely just give extra things that you're making anyways - it gives you abilities that you won't have anywhere else in the game. You can have several Debator apostles on the map, wiping out enemy apostles like a super-charged wolfpack. Every apostle you make can have triple the spread or just annihilate enemy religion influence. And you can have multiples of these types. Even if you just rely on RNG, once all your good promotions are used, all your new apostles are stuck with pointless, weak ones like 100 gold on conversion, or converting barbarian units. It gives you the best bang-for-the-buck with your apostles.

No, it doesn't have much use for say a scientific game, maybe not much for diplomatic, but as others have pointed out, it has great uses for relic-based cultural wins and domination-via-Grandmaster's-Chapel. But, I would argue that just because it's not important in every game, that it does not mean that it doesn't hold amazing value. It does what it does and makes certain victories a walk in the park.

Here's a thought experiment: Assume we had a brand-new city-state in the game. And once you get suzerain of it, a little button pops up that says "Win Cultural Victory". And when you click it, in one turn, you suddenly have more tourism than anyone else and win a cultural victory instantly. Pretty amazing right? But, it only works for 1 of 5 victory types. So, maybe it's not so great. I don't know. Would this hypothetical city-state be the best in the game? That's kind of what we're debating now. I'm not saying Yerevan is an "instant win button", but out of all the city-states here, it's the closest to that.


Zanzibar [4]
 
Corrected Kmart_Elvis' downvote to 16 (=19-3).

Auckland [8]
Bologna [13] (16-3)
Cahokia [5]
Yerevan [12] (11+1) Was planning to keep Antananarivo in for a bit longer, but with them gone it's back to Yerevan. Everyone knows my feelings on this by now; and since I think they're the best, the downvote goes by necessity to Bologna.
Zanzibar [4]
 
Auckland [5] 8-3 I used to love finding Auckland but coastal cities are just poor and I was never happy with the results. Maybe a top 5 finish is a fair result but it should go next.
Bologna [13]
Cahokia [5]
Yerevan [12]
Zanzibar [5] 4+1 To me this is a top 2 CS, it gives you an amazing flexible bonus just for the envoys.
 
Auckland [2] (5-3) flipflopped between downvoting Cahokia or Auckland, but eventually settled on the latter. +1 production on a tile is always a good bonus; but I reckon the opportunity to build another district is more impactful and more flexible, hence Cahokia.
Bologna [13]
Cahokia [5]
Yerevan [13] (12+1) to bring it equal to Bologna, where it should be. Happy with either of those two winning.
Zanzibar [5]
 
Auckland [2]
Bologna [13]
Cahokia [5]
Yerevan [14] (13+1) - I did want to vote differently as I have upvoted Yerevan a few times now, but I actually found it difficult to decide my other vote. Cahokia and Auckland are so neck and neck in my perception I found it very difficult to vote between them. Bologna is better than Auckland and Cahokia, but is also worse than Yerevan, so if I upvote it, I put it ahead of Yerevan. So this was the only way I could vote. Apologies for the repeat vote!
Zanzibar [2] (5-3) - Nobody responded to my Zanzibar points, so I remain unpersuaded.
 
Like @TCBB, I was also hoping that I‘d get to vote for Antananarivo one last time. I’ve always found it powerful, no matter what type of game I’m doing. And if someone had put me on the spot at the very start of this thread, I’d have given my top 3 as Yerevan, Bologna, and Antananarivo. So from my perspective, it’s a shame that it’s gone.

My upvote therefore transfers to Yerevan, which I do think is more “powerful” than Bologna. As the name suggests, it’s great to have great people. But great people by themselves do not necessarily win you games: they can certainly make your victories faster, but there’s always an inherent will-they-won’t-they with great people that comes from the randomised nature of the pool. Yerevan, on the other hand, has a qualitative and easily observable effect on your victory, and you get to control the parameters at all times. It is direct, it is active, and it is very powerful. In addition, there inevitably reaches a point in most games where you’re so far ahead of the AI that your great people points completely dwarf theirs, at which point Bologna ceases to be particularly relevant: you’d still earn all the good ones anyway. But Yerevan continues to be relevant up until the last, by virtue of the fact that the AI is so goddam obsessed by religion: you need all the help you can get in defeating them, even when it seems you’re already way ahead.

I‘d also finish with @Bengalryan9’s words, which I think encapsulate the essence of what makes Yerevan so uniquely powerful:

There is literally no way I can do what Yerevan can do without Yerevan. It's the *only* way you can choose which apostle promotions you take in the entire game. That's HUGE,

Auckland [2]
Bologna [10] (13-3)
Cahokia [5]
Yerevan [15] (14+1)
Zanzibar [2]
 
Auckland [2]
Bologna [10]
Cahokia [2] (5 - 3) I find it difficult to choose between Cahokia and Auckland. Great bonuses, but I prefer passively boosting tiles (Auckland) rather than having to spend a builder charge with Cahokia. But Cahokian Mounds are a great improvement, certainly deserving of a top 5 spot.
Yerevan [16] (15 + 1) Hard to upvote anyone else at this point because it'd be a major injustice in my opinion if another CS comes in first. Yerevan's bonus is impossible to obtain by any other means, and the bonus is what wins games. Playing for a religious victory even once should highlight just how much better the right promotions are. Proselytizers are amazing at removing foreign religion, and Debaters at actual religious combat. A Chaplain isn't much good. Yerevan will dramatically decrease the amount of Apostles you need. I don't even know what could be comparably powerful for other victory conditions. It's as if you had a CS that lets you start the space race in Renaissance.
Zanzibar [2]
 
Auckland [3] (2+1) Still holding out on this one. It's situational yes, but very strong and vital in those situations.
Bologna [10]
Cahokia [Eliminated] (2-3) It's a great city state, but compared to the remaining city states amenities and housing are easy enough to get without dedicating extra builder charges and tile space.
Yerevan [16]
Zanzibar [2]
 
Auckland [3]
Bologna [11] +1 Useful in all games
Yerevan [13] - 3 Only useful for religous victories

Zanzibar [2]
 
Can we double check the bologna votes? I think it should be at 13. It received some mystery down votes around Kmart Elvis and TCBB
 
No, it has not.

It was last upvoted at post #317, which took it to 19 points. Kmart Elvis downvoted it to 16, which he incorrectly labelled as 18; I corrected his score, then downvoted it myself to 13; then Drivingrevilo downvoted it to 10.

Villus has now taken it to 11.
 
Auckland [3]
Bologna [11]
Yerevan [14] (13+1) It's transformative for the games where it's relevant
Zanzibar [0 - Eliminated] (2-3) I feel that the +Amenity CS were really overrated through the whole thread.
 
Auckland [4] (3+1) - this one of the few City States I will go to war over. The passive bonus to production is awsome, and the coastal city hate is so last year.
Bologna [11]
Yerevan [11] (14-3) - don't get me wrong, I love Yerevan in my games, but I only take full advantage of it IF and only IF I am considering going for a religious victory, which is almost never - I think I won two or three religious victories over 1600+ hours of Civ VI since 2016. If I just want to defend my religion at home from conversion, a single +20 strength Apostle is usually enough with an entourage of other units, and I can reliably get one without Yerevan. Is what Yerevan provides unique? Yes. Is it very strong? Yes. Do I take advantage of it? No, because religious victory is a tedious, micromanagement-dependant slog.

Moderator Action: Removed your edit, please do not troll. Saying you ignore someone is considered trolling. leif
 
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Auckland [1] (4-3) Edit: Ok so NOT Eliminated yet. I've upticked it twice, but 3rd place is already very good. The other two are better
Bologna [11]
Yerevan [12] (11+1) better than Bologna... a lot in my mind

Moderator Action: Changed number to reflect accurate totals with post deletions
 
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Moderator Action: Have deleted three posts and warned several members. If you think someone violated thread rules, report the post. Trolling each other does not help the issue. If you want these types of threads to continue, please be civil.

Thread reopened.

Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889
 
At this point it's like an election where candidates are not the ones I want.

Auckland [1]
Bologna [12] (11 + 1) Don't just look at the Great Scientists and Engineers it brings you. Great Admirals and Merchants can be sweet too. Maybe people don't get how great it is because the effect is not so immediate, but if you evaluate carefully it's really good. (The same applies to some culture CS - not only it generates culture it also saves you tile purchasing costs.)
Yerevan [9] (12 - 3) I expressed my reasons in previous post so won't repeat here. It's interesting how it always get upvoted during a certain time of the day (roughly 7am - 2pm GMT) and then downvoted. I'm curious if this tells something about how people in different parts of the world play the game.
 
Auckland Eliminated - just not as strong as the other two. A little surprised it got this far tbh.
Bologna [12]
Yerevan [10] (9 + 1) - I've just used Yerevan to get a handful of Relics in a Culture game where I wasn't even thinking of Religion. It is obviously game-winning for RV but can also be game-changing in for other VCs. Bologna I think similarly, but less so.
 
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