Civ Discussion - Han

[bengalryan9]

The next civ up for a discussion is the Han. The Han are a scientific and diplomatic civ with a grassland starting bias. They unlock the Ming and Mongolia in the Exploration age, and the Qing in the Modern Age, and their associate wonder is Weiyang Palace (+6 influence).

Their unique ability is Nine Provinces, which gives the capital and any new towns an additional population with their first growth event.
Their unique military unit is the Chu-Ko-Nu, an archer replacement that has exerts zone of control, has higher combat strength, and gets +5 ranged strength when attacking adjacent units.
Their unique civilian unit is the Shi Dafu, a great person that can only be trained in cities with at least 10 population. Once again I’m not going to list every single one here but they tend to give free codices, bonus science, a free tech/celebration/promotion/population, or extra influence.
Their unique infrastructure is the Han Great Wall, which gives a flat +2 culture plus +1 happiness for each adjacent great wall segment. It also counts as a fortification and grants defending units on the tile +6 combat strength. It can only be built in a straight line and cannot branch or fork.

Their unique civics are:
Zhi – Unlocks the Great Wall, gives +1 science to science buildings per adjacent quarter, and +1 settlement limit.
Li – Unlocks the Guanxi tradition and gives +2 influence on the palace.
Yi – Unlocks the Jiu Qing tradition and gives Chu-Ko-Nu +5 combat strength when defending.
Junzi – Unlocks Weiyang Palace, the Tianxia tradition, and gives +10% science in the capital.
They do not appear to have any masteries in their civic tree.

Their traditions:
Guanxi - +1 influence on science buildings
Jiu Qing - +1 influence on happiness buildings
Tianxia - +1 science on specialists

What do people think of the Han? What is your preferred playstyle with them? Do they have any weaknesses or areas that could use a rebalance? Which leaders fit well with them, and who do you look to transition to in future ages?

 

[bengalryan9]

I only played as the Han once and it was pretty early on (maybe my 4th game?). TBH they are a civ that I kind of forget about it when I'm deciding who to play as, but that doesn't mean they're bad and, in fact, now that I look at their entire kit again it makes me want to take them for a spin again. Might start as them when I start my next game after the next patch drops.

The Han are one of many examples in that the civ description on the civ select screen doesn't really tell you everything you need to know about them... if you just went off that description you'd have no idea of the science abilities they have going for them. Outside of the Maya they may be one of the strongest science civs in antiquity, and they'll generate more influence than probably anyone but Greece. Both of those are strong advantages! I argued that a lot of Greece's extra influence could go to waste but the Han don't have all the discounts on spending it that the Greeks do so I think it's very helpful here.

Extra population is always nice and allows you to get your settlements up and running that much faster. Chu-Ko-Nus are stronger ranged units (which I love) that can stand up better on defense (also a plus for me!). Shi Dafu suffer the same issues that all great people do, but there *are* some pretty nice ones in there and at least these don't require multiple buildings to train. Their civics have some nice effects and their traditions do as well (especially Tianxia, which should see use throughout the game, especially right after age transitions).

The Great Wall drives me nuts. It pretty much always has. This is very much a me problem, though - I want my cities to look nice, and having all these short chunks of wall going every which direction really irks me lol. All I want are long stretches along the outside of my border but good luck with that - you first have to work tiles outward from the city center to be able to build on those tiles in the first place, any resource will get in the way, and since they can never fork or branch you can have a tough time adjusting to changes in your borders, so it's never going to look how it's *supposed* to, lol. It's a nice improvement, though, so it is worth placing and it definitely helps a science focused Han keep up in culture as well. Does the fortification bonus on these tiles apply to enemy troops as well? I think I remember seeing that it does in an earlier game I played where I was attacking a city surrounded by them, and if so that's a pretty serious drawback.

As for leaders, obviously Confucious, Himiko, and Trung Trac fit with Han's science focus well. For less obvious picks consider Achaemenid Xerxes to buff their UI and improve their economy, or Ibn Battuta, whose two attribute points can allow you to start settlements with *3* population, or to discount befriending city states, or to go even stronger into your science game.

Ming China is an obvious and natural followup in Exploration as you can just plop their UI right on top of Han's. I could see Abbasid and Majapahit also being good followups, if you can unlock them.

 

[sixty4half]

They push the snowball early and they push it hard. Their bonuses are very good early game and the traditions keep you in the lead through out all 3 ages.

You'll have a huge amount of science, culture, influence and happiness that is all completely unaffected by the age changing so you'll always have a head start if you played Antiquities well.

 

[Sagax]

I’ll admit, the Great Library is my least successful legacy path in the entire game - mainly because my Antiquity strategy is weak on science. My beakers come in late, and it usually boils down to me frantically trying to complete tech masteries that grant codices, but will often be 1-2 short before the age ends.

To that end, the Shi Dafu are a godsend, amplified by the fact that Han’s abilities naturally nudge you towards city conversion - so you are more likely to have a spare city to produce them, while others are busy with wonders and army. Of all unique GPs, I find them most useful.

The Great Walls should be spammable, but their placement requirements make it tricky. You want to prioritize improving resources, but UIs cannot be built on them, so you are forced to make a choice of improving a bunch of “blank” tiles - which is not ideal.

That being said, there is a “secret”: last time I checked, the Han Great Wall has a bug where it removes your population by 1 each time it’s built, without affecting the food output. So you can essentially lock in your settlement’s growth pace as along as you spam the Great Wall in it. I don’t think this has been fixed yet.

100% agree that they’re the prime example of why we need to be able to see civ civic trees upfront during selection.

 

[Navelgazer]

I'm largely with bengalryan9 here, in that I tend to forget about Han despite how strong they are, in part because I simply don't have the patience to deal with building a pretty Great Wall and I'm not sure how anyone actually does that. But whatever, the Wall is kinda the meme part of their kit (though I'm sure Xerxes-A loves it), while everything else they've got works fine enough without it.

Maybe I've just had good luck with Shi Dafu, but I've found them more reliably impactful than most random UUs. They just each give you a nice bonus that you probably aren't desperately in need of, but which will help with your overall snowball (some of which even stick around past the era!)

Cho-Ko-Nu are great (any unique ranged unit is going to make me pretty happy, but these are particularly good for their time) and the UA is basically like Carthage's Colonist but without restrictions. But those Traditions are key - small numbers that start to add up very nicely.

Confucius is the obvious pairing for several reasons, and it's tough to have a bad game there, but you may also try Ada Lovelace, to use your science production to yank along your culture, Trung Trac to really double down on the science and build up a militaristic beast for later, or Lafayette, who fits beautifully with Ming but doesn't unlock them himself (not that Ming is that tough to unlock through gameplay, though.) Since Han's traditions are worth keeping around at least through Exploration (where they do very nice things to aid in the Science path.), Lafayette ends up pairing nicely with them.