Civ 6 Deity Tier List –– discussing DLC civs now, R&F civs starting 2/19

[Arent11]

Yea. If I can get my recording to work properly, I might post a Korea play. I played a game with them last night and crushed the AI science wise. It's not difficult to take an early lead in science and never look back with Korea, even on deity.

The point is that they are not just "a science civ". If they were just a science civ, their campuses would yield more science & nothing else. But their campuses are also half cost, which means they save production that can be invested in other stuff. Its similar to aztecs, scythia, rome etc., which all save at one point or another production & the question is what production saver is best & most reliable - the free builders of the aztecs, the half cost light cavalry of scythia, the free monuments of rome or the half cost campuses of korea.

 

[vaejovis]

The point is that they are not just "a science civ". If they were just a science civ, their campuses would yield more science & nothing else. But their campuses are also half cost, which means they save production that can be invested in other stuff. Its similar to aztecs, scythia, rome etc., which all save at one point or another production & the question is what production saver is best & most reliable - the free builders of the aztecs, the half cost light cavalry of scythia, the free monuments of rome or the half cost campuses of korea.

Recently played a Korea game on emperor, and noticed a few things:
1. No hills means that Korea’s kind of screwed
2. You have to completely rethink adjacencies - Seowans are best in the second ring and out in the open surrounded by hills
3. I built way more mines than any game before to take advantage of the +1 science to mines (this is just mines, quarries don’t count like with IZ)
4. Because there’s a scientific incentive to build mines, I had the most production as a side-effect. With all the mines, it made building any other district much easier.
5. The feudalism Farm triangle stacks with seowans increased food to adjacent farms - great for mid-late game pop booms

Basically, use the seowans to boost surrounding mines and farms and see epic science as a side effect.

 

[Eliminator_Sr]

Yeah but they don't have a game changing early UU like Rome, Aztecs, Nubia, Sumeria and Macedon nor do they have any immediate tools to go capture a bunch of early cities like Scythia. IME, the best way to keep pace on Deity is to let the AI build campuses and then go capture them. Half price campuses are nice but not enough to put Korea in A tier. I would also argue that it's easier to build campuses in general now with Magnus so I think people are over-rating this ability.

 

[Melchizedek]

2. You have to completely rethink adjacencies - Seowans are best in the second ring and out in the open surrounded by hills.

In evaluating Korea's overall strength, this seems important. Their other districts aren't getting adjacency from Seowans, and they're likely getting a little less use from the GP adjacency bonus, too. Seowans are awesome but they give you strong bonuses in exchange for the normal ones, instead of in addition to them. I've actually seen Seowans that had less science than a normal campus would, although these are rare.

 

[vaejovis]

In evaluating Korea's overall strength, this seems important. Their other districts aren't getting adjacency from Seowans, and they're likely getting a little less use from the GP adjacency bonus, too. Seowans are awesome but they give you strong bonuses in exchange for the normal ones, instead of in addition to them. I've actually seen Seowans that had less science than a normal campus would, although these are rare.

The tradeoff being that a surrounding ring of mines will each produce +1 science, so a well-placed and improved Seowan can result in +10 science total (given 6 pop to work them, and can be from multiple cities).

 

[liv]

The Dutch can have lots of amazing campus' as well. You cannot build them as fast as Korea but you know chop. Are they close to Korea in power if campus are a determing factor?

 

[Arent11]

Recently played a Korea game on emperor, and noticed a few things:
1. No hills means that Korea’s kind of screwed
2. You have to completely rethink adjacencies - Seowans are best in the second ring and out in the open surrounded by hills
3. I built way more mines than any game before to take advantage of the +1 science to mines (this is just mines, quarries don’t count like with IZ)
4. Because there’s a scientific incentive to build mines, I had the most production as a side-effect. With all the mines, it made building any other district much easier.
5. The feudalism Farm triangle stacks with seowans increased food to adjacent farms - great for mid-late game pop booms

Basically, use the seowans to boost surrounding mines and farms and see epic science as a side effect.

Korea has a hills start bias. Which is very good by itself. Of course you need to "waste" a mine location.

 

[Bizrock]

Korea is strong, and a lot, I wouldn't bother if Korea was in the first place. (I know Sumeria is stupid)

And why Japan is in the D tier? Just wondering, I think his bonuses are great, even better now with Government Plaza and Water Park, even Aqueduct is an adjacency bonus.

 

[Softly]

Just the 50% off campuses alone with nothing else would make Korea high B tier at least. Add on the science from mines, +4 default science and the additional science and culture from governors and Korea is clearly the best of the R&F civs.

 

[Arent11]

Korea is strong, and a lot, I wouldn't bother if Korea was in the first place. (I know Sumeria is stupid)

Just the 50% off campuses alone with nothing else would make Korea high B tier at least. Add on the science from mines, +4 default science and the additional science and culture from governors and Korea is clearly the best of the R&F civs.

I would put them either A or B. They have a hills start, which is nice, but you need to turn that science advantage into a military advantage, which might take its time. It's also a difference whether you are talking about fastest win, surest win or single/multiplayer. I would say Korea is very good at making sure that you will eventually win.

 

[Bizrock]

I would put them either A or B. They have a hills start, which is nice, but you need to turn that science advantage into a military advantage, which might take its time. It's also a difference whether you are talking about fastest win, surest win or single/multiplayer. I would say Korea is very good at making sure that you will eventually win.

With science you can rush Knight and crush 10 Warriors with one Knight

 

[Arent11]

With science you can rush Knight and crush 10 Warriors with one Knight

You have to research writing, build a seowon, research the wheel, build some chariots, research maneuver to built them cheaper, find iron & beeline knights. All of that is doable. And that's why I would put them either A or B.

Sumeria doesn't need wheel & doesn't need writing, they can beeline knights directly. On the other hand side this is strongly dependent on whether you even have enemies in the first place. If you are all alone on your continent, you can only use Ziggurats to speed yourself up. In the later game or if isolated, Korea is clearly better. So I'm a bit divided.

 

[Bizrock]

I know Sumeria is this stupid, but if Sumeria doesn't find someone near fast, they will fall pretty hard but korea will still going.
And by the way, you can build knights without Iron with Magnus. one early Seowon can just triple your Science without library.

 

[Eliminator_Sr]

With science you can rush Knight and crush 10 Warriors with one Knight

You still have to survive till you get Knights on Deity and the ancient/classical age is really the only timeframe where the AI can do damage. Yes Korea's bonuses are stupid good once you get to medieval era, but all the civs in A tier right now are equipped to do damage almost immediately and Korea takes longer to get going. I'd still have them in B tier. Korea's bonuses will ensure you outpace the AI to a larger degree but I don't agree that their victory is substantially more 'secure' because a SV is almost assured with any civ if you survive the first few eras with enough cities. With Korea you'll just make it more of a landslide victory. The Mongols are more deserving of A tier IMO, though I 'd have them in B tier as well.

 

[Frostburn]

Single Player

A+ Tier
Aztec
Persia
Macedon
Nubia
Sumeria
Scythia

A Tier
Zulu
Gorgo
Australia
Korea
Mongolia
Rome

B+ Tier
Arabia
Russia
Cree
Dutch
Indonesia
Germany
Scotland
Chandragupta

B Tier
Pericles
Japan
America
China
Kongo

C+ Tier
Georgia
France
Mapuche
Poland
Ghandi
Khmer

C Tier
Egypt
Brazil
England
Norway
Spain

 

[Pietato]

People need to stop saying 'well you can just chop a campus' etc, like that means something. Korea can also chop things, and will use less chop production on a Seowon.

 

[Chibisuke]

I just played a deity game with Korea and seriously, I got like the first 4 great scientists. All in a row. No one else could compete. That won't happen every game but only Korea has that capability. There are so many side benefits to being able to pump out so many cheap campus districts right at the start with such speed. Then if each of those gives +4 or at least +3 science early on, you just tear through the tech tree.

At this point I have played many games with various civs in the expansion. Not all, but many. The "dark age" mechanic is just a devastating concept for many civs. It is easy to get golden/heroic ages, but it is almost certain that most civs will follow that with a dark age. As you get later in the game, dark ages are even more difficult to avoid on deity UNLESS you have certain things that can give you easy era points once you can no longer get points from tech boosts. For example, at one point you can get ppints from building industrial era buildings. But guess what, if your tech isn't high enough, you ain't building those in time. There is also one for trade routes. But if you didn't tech up quick enough, you probably couldn't afford to build enough markets. Likewise, there is one for killing corps/armies. But if you didn't tech up quick enough, you won't be killing a bunch of corps/armies in time.

Even during earlier eras where you can get era points from tech boosts, Korea is a monster. When I was chaining great scientists, I was gaining half a golden age just from that.

I haven't yet mastered the "eras" concept but I think it is still very bad in how it has been implemented. It adds a significant amount of micromanagement to a game that already has plenty enough. And golden/heroic ages don't seem to do much in most games (maybe you get a city flip, but maybe not). But a badly timed dark age can totally wreck you. That being said, Korea is one of the civs where you can get a little ahead of the curve before the era system gets too out of control.

 

[Ever Adrift]

I don't have a completely formed idea of who benefits or losses the most from the era system. I didn't have issues getting and chaining golden ages with China, but I didn't have issue with Rome, Aztecs, or Zulus either.
...
If I had goddess of the harvest, I would sure have liked a classical monumentality but as it was, I didn't feel like I was missing much since despite a few nice Lavra, I wouldn't have had the faith to actually spam much of anything in the classical era.

The era system is a bit hard to completely penetrate - and I've had games where I get irritated because I reach the necessary era points for a Golden Age and still have many turns until the era's end (meaning I end up 'wasting' numerous opportunities to gain era points for the next age) or games where I find myself rushing something stupid - or holding back on something significant,like using a Great Prophet I've earned, - to maximize utility of era points. I feel like a few minor changes would fix this; something really needs to be done about spillover of points. Sometimes I get points for what seems to be completely random, unexpected things, other times it feels slightly random (e.g. getting points for your 3rd theater district but not the second).

As for Monumentality - it is pretty awesome, even without a ton of faith generation. In part, it is because the first few faith purchases are surprisingly cheap - the first settler can cost less than 200 faith on epic speed. Even if you can only buy one or two, it allows you to expand much faster (and can be really useful when combined with Magnus' promotion allowing his city to not lose population when building settlers). It also can help augment your force of builders (also super, super cheap at first) to make your expansion more stable. I find it the only one worth taking...

 

[Ever Adrift]

There's still a few R&F civs I haven't played yet but overall they don't seem to be as powerful as the dlc civs were. Korea is the strongest I've played, but still don't think it's quite A tier, maybe more like high B tier.

Scotland and Cree seemed decent, but not great. Probably C tier for me. Mongols maybe low B. Once they get rolling with cavalry they're definitely strong (had no problems steamrolling the AI with knights and keshigs) , but they're not as strong as sumeria or scythia for domination, they take a bit longer.

Still have to try out Zulu, Mapuche and Netherlands.

I don't play at deity, not that good and I play with 8 Ages of Pace and a few other mods...

That said, I can't sing the praises of the Cree enough. I thought they'd be decent, but I have played a few games as them and had easy wins each time where I would normally struggle. The early trader is surprisingly useful, even without it being a great way to expand borders. Even having the trade route plundered can be good since you can build a new one and send it to a different city expanding more of your borders.

The incentive to build may traders makes the Cree likely to be a gold powerhouse - and it means that you'll have strong culture penetration to other civs, easy expansion along your own trade routes, and makes the somewhat underwhelming initial alliance benefits more useful due to the shear number of trade routes you'll be maintaining. The improved alliances also mean you'll get access to more/all the CS earlier than basically anyone else and you can get a bunch of era points upon reveals of significant chunks of the map and the natural wonders contained therein. The trading even helps keep neighbors happy and allows you to avoid war more easily if you want to.

The UU is the civ's weakest aspect - though if you really work on them and get them 2 more promotions you can make them very fast, powerful units for much of the early game.

And then there is the Mekewap. It is a Kampung but on land - production boosts, food boosts, housing, gold.... it allows massive cities very early on - bringing more era points and providing strong loyalty that allows you to flip cities easily while avoiding the same fate. Not to mention the greater production for wonders, the greater number of districts and associated GP points that come along with it.

I'd say the Cree are A Tier.

 

[Civ_Gumby]

I don't play at deity, not that good and I play with 8 Ages of Pace and a few other mods...
I'd say the Cree are A Tier.

On what tier list? you said it yourself you don't even play deity. The early bonuses of the cree do not compare to civs like persia, sumeria, rome or nubia. Most games are won extremely early on and its just a matter of closing out, the cree don't really have any exceptional advantages early on to help you conquer other civs.