[R&F] Civ of the Week: Netherlands

[Disgustipated]

Where do the Dutch rank do you guys think? I think Indonesia is better due to their early faith and their UI is really easier to deal with than the Dutch, maybe. I am not sure if the super districts save the Dutch?

I gave my score above. I actually played a second game of them because I had some free time and I like them so much. They are one of my favorite civs. My score still stands at A+. They are in my top 5 civs in terms of power ranking and also my top 5 for fun factor.

My second game was only 7 slower turns on science victory than my first (in post #3). And this is with only 2 campus districts for a good portion of the game because I really couldn't get good adjacencies. +2 for the river was all those 2 got. Only after I conquered a whole bunch with my UU did I get more. Now Indonesia may be able to beat Dutch in culture victory time. Maybe I should have went culture this game to compare. But Netherlands is still the stronger civ by far in my opinion. And obviously Indonesia is better suited for religious victory. For the fun factor, both are pretty fun, but Netherlands still edges Indonesia out.

 

[Sostratus]

Just in general, I'd prefer that lakes not be treated like sea coast tiles, but it's not a big issue for me

My limited experience with firetuner has suggested that there is no mechanical difference between coast and lake except that lakes have to be 6 tiles or smaller.
It may be a deeply buried and unavoidable behavior. I agree that It feels like lakes should be doing something different from coast.

As I understand it, the recovery of land technique is primarily about keeping the sea from rushing in. Eliminating an inland lake would require diverting the fresh water inflow to another location, causing the lake to dry up. Kind of a different technology.

*This is all based on the dutch experience. Remember, most of the country is within a meter of sea level, which is way different than what we see in the US and canada.
Coming from a more agrarian land recovery background, drainage technology is all essentially the same: get the water somewhere else. The netherlands' polders were started by the introduction of the windmill powered water pump. All they needed to do was create a good level of control around low lying areas (dikes), and pump the excess water out. (On the map I pasted, those thin lines are dikes that do as you noted- block more water from coming in uncontrollably.) Once those industrious dutch got ahold of steam powered pumps, they went bonkers. Of course, draining a lake is no different than draining low lying "sea:" block the water inlet and start pumping. (lakes are mostly already sealed!) In fact, a lot of what the dutch have built on wasn't really sea at all- it was more swampy lake chains. In fact, schiphol airport (one of the busiest in europe!) is built on polder land that used to be a lake. So there's a pretty big case for lakes if we use history, which is one of my least favorite justifications for Civ6. Of course, a lot of the polder efforts on the coastal side of things are less around land drainage and more about flood protection. With so much of the country near or below sea level, just controlling the flooding was huge. When you look at a project like the Zuiderzee, it was indeed a saltwater bay; but extensive dam work and the fact that it is fed by many fresh water rivers is what makes it productive for agriculture. Oh, and as far as diverting water flow: all these polders still have to deal with the water flowing into them from various rivieren; that's why the pumping stations, sluice networks, and water boards still exist. Otherwise it would just fill up again. See: Wartime antics.

Everywhere else in the world, farmers have mostly stuck to draining marshes and such via ditches or dumping soils in. The Dutch decided to earn the polder UI by being absolutely berserk about it.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Where do the Dutch rank do you guys think? I think Indonesia is better due to their early faith and their UI is really easier to deal with than the Dutch, maybe. I am not sure if the super districts save the Dutch?

Hard to say. They're solid with the river ability but are crap without rivers; but riverless starts suck anyways with any civ. However you usually can find rivers somewhere. Even if it's the tundra, an extra good adjanency campus or theater can be chopped out. Polders just can't be relied upon. The 1 culture to foreign routes is great early game.

So they usually have a bit going for them most games, more so on water maps because Frigates are always good, but can be shut down very hard in difficult scenarios. They're the only civ besides Indonesia that really wants lakes and that's gotta count for something.

I'd put them as average, with a high level of variance.

 

[Wyvern_Parade]

Hope I'm not hopping into this thread too late, but I just had time to finish up my game as the Netherlands.

Settings: Deity, Online Speed, Fractal

Screenshot (309)

• Wyvern_Parade
• Oct 13, 2018

Not a great start, but I've got a river and some nice campus spots so I roll with it.

Not the best start, but easy to defend and has some nice campus spots.

Screenshot (315)

• Wyvern_Parade
• Oct 13, 2018

+6 Campus

I guess I'll take a +6 Campus...

Screenshot (317)

• Wyvern_Parade
• Oct 13, 2018

Got some nice gold from winning a city state emergency against Germany. This put us on the path...

Easily grabbing some gold by liberating a cs from Germany.

Screenshot (325)

• Wyvern_Parade
• Oct 13, 2018

I finally eliminate Germany. Took me ages since I had to wait for muskets.

Frederick wasn't too happy with me after that, and decided to attack me in the Medieval era. It didn't work out so well for him. But it did take me a while to completely wipe him out.

Screenshot (327)

• Wyvern_Parade
• Oct 13, 2018

All the space project great people.

Nothing exciting really happened after that, so here's all my Space Race great people.

Screenshot (329)

• Wyvern_Parade
• Oct 13, 2018

Khmer declares a sad war against me.

The Khmer make a sad attempt to stop me.

Screenshot (332)

• Wyvern_Parade
• Oct 13, 2018

Brazil, their ally makes a slightly less pathetic effort.

Their ally Brazil makes a slightly less pathetic attack.

Screenshot (335)

• Wyvern_Parade
• Oct 13, 2018

Khmer were the closest to me in completing a science victory in the end, but they still had a...

The Khmer were closest to me in the Space Race, but still quite a long way off.

Screenshot (339)

• Wyvern_Parade
• Oct 13, 2018

We have lift-off!

Lift-off!

Screenshot (341)

• Wyvern_Parade
• Oct 13, 2018

Overall it was a pretty easy game despite an average start location. I was able to make some early gold by completing a cs emergency against Germany, which helped me buy out some useful early buildings. Unfortunately I didn't have any iron so I had to wait until muskets to take out the Germans. But after that it was smooth sailing all the way to space.

I wasn't really pushing for speed, and could have certainly min-maxed a bit more to speed up my victory. But sub-160 on Online speed is going to give you the win 100% of the time in my experience. I actually went a little too hard on culture and had tons of excess Great Writers running around my empire by the industrial era.

I think the Netherlands are a slightly above average civ with well-rounded abilities. They obviously depend a lot on rivers to take advantage of their strongest bonus, but I've never rolled a non-river start with them so that's rarely a problem. Having a few +5 or +6 campuses early this game really helped me catch up in science and be able to fend off Germany's knight/warrior monk push. Those adjacencies also come in handy for using Rationalism, as others have noted. It's nice that the Netherlands are one of the easiest civs to get high Theater Square adjacency bonuses with too.

I feel all their other abilities are middling or situational at best. The culture from trade routes is OK early. Their UU is useful, but not game-changing. Polders are great if you get a nice map for them, but despite tons of coastline I only had a few spots to build 2 adjacent Polders in this game. In any case, I like civs with flexibility and playing the adjacency bonus mini-game so the Dutch suit my play style just fine.

 

[DWilson]

I'm glad for this thread. I gave the Netherlands another try, and I'm super happy with how the game has gone. It's been an unexpectedly pleasant, peaceful game. (I didn't get many warmongers, and this biggest warmonger, the Zulu, we're contained early on in a small peninsula behind England, who likes me due to our shared starting continent).

 

[Kwami]

@Wyvern_Parade : Your images aren't showing for me. If I click on a link for one, then I get this error: "You do not have permission to view media within this album.".

 

[Wyvern_Parade]

@Wyvern_Parade : Your images aren't showing for me. If I click on a link for one, then I get this error: "You do not have permission to view media within this album.".

Sorry, I think I had the album set to private. I set all the images to public so hopefully they're visible now.

 

[DWilson]

Does anyone else think their Renaissance music reminds them of Harry Potter? Maybe I'm just uncultured and don't recognize a famous composition outright, but I definitely recall the music playing in the in game Renaissance era (Industrial tech, but I presume it goes by in game era since R&F) playing in at least one, if not multiple, Harry Potter movies.

 

[Disgustipated]

As Archon Wing found out in his game, you can get +3 diplomatic modifier with Wilhelmina for each trade route you send her. Here's the relevant thread. I'm just putting it here to keep Netherlands info in one spot for anyone still learning the game.

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/apparently-wilhelminas-agenda-scales.638240/

I'm not exactly sure when you start getting that. It may be after she comes up to you and thanks you for sending her trade routes, though in my game I was a few turns into the modern age before I got it (I started in the industrial age). So it may take a little bit of time before the modifier starts showing up.

You could probably burn down 5 of her cities, but you send her enough trade routes to her remaining cities and she will love you. Kind of funny. Bug or or not, it's what's in the game.

 

[acluewithout]

So, waiting for GS, I’ve been playing around with the Netherlands.

They’re... well. They’re quite good, aren’t they? A good power level - nothing OP. All fairly useable. Just a good, solid Civ to play with.

It’s fun leaning into early theatre squares and adding in some culture from extra adjacency (bit like Greece or Japan, although TS are full price) and then also add culture from trade routes. You can then come back for science later.

The Harbour thing is interesting too - I find I’m not building Commercial Hubs because I don’t want to lose river adjacencies for other districts, so Harbours become a bit more attractive anyway plus help with the slight Naval focus because of the UU. The culture bomb then just makes coastal cities a bit more functional. I guess FXS could have given Netherlands some other yield bonus for Harbours, but the culture bomb is different and is, well, interesting. In principle, it should also synergise with Polders, giving you potentially more tiles to, er, polder-ise.

The UU is good. Frigates are already powerful. The UU does a good job of slightly buffing Frigates but not actually making them OP.

But. Netherlands. Sigh. They’re a little ... bland?

Polders are fab. But it would be more fun if you could build them more readily on proper coastal tiles, because then you’d really feel like you’re reclaiming land. Building them in lakes feels silly and is underwhelming.

IZ are still terrible. God, I hope IZs get better in GS.

And the trade bonuses just don’t scratch the “Dutch Trading” itch. The loyalty bonus seems, well, not weak so much as just irrelevant because I don’t often bother with domestic routes. But getting extra culture from trade routes is very good, and I don’t want to undersell that. It’s just that the trade bonuses overall just... well. They’re just not exciting.

I’m not sure the Netherlands need much to be really really fun. IZ being better in general would help. Slightly, just slightly, easier placement rules for Polders. And something a bit sexier with trade. No idea what. Maybe a discount building Traders? Or Traders can travel further? Or an extra trade route a Mercantilsim? Or Harbours give Great Merchant points too?

Well. As they are, they’re quite fun. Hopefully they’ll be even more fun after GS.

(BTW Dutch are Civ of the Week on reddit this week. Someone there suggesting making the loyalty trade route thing a policy card. I really like that idea given how slight this bonus is anyway and that it would synergise well with other Civs’ abilities. Making it a more general ability would also free up room to give the Netherlands a different power.)

 

[steveg700]

The three land-tile requirement wouldn't be so onerous if it polders themselves could count for adjancency. Ideally, you should at least be able to plug a gap between two polders with polders.

Of course, polders are still water tiles--you can sail boats around in those lovely fields (must be rough on the flowerbeds)--so that's not currently how it works. Maybe Gathering Storm will change that, since the code for transitioning tiles between land and water will exist.

As I understand it, the recovery of land technique is primarily about keeping the sea from rushing in. Eliminating an inland lake would require diverting the fresh water inflow to another location, causing the lake to dry up. Kind of a different technology.

True. Most lakes in Civ are closed, so damming the lake is a non sequitor. If it's supplied water from an underground source, that is indeed a separate feat of engineering from what the Dutch were dong historically.

Another thematic deficit is that the emphasis on building districts on rivers is that those rivers should be where Dutch sawmills are, the backbone of Dutch productivity during their period of global supremacy with their massive fleets. Then again, they were importing that wood, which is not reflected by how sawmills work in Civ games. I guess one could argue that an industrial zone is an abstracted representation.

 

[steveg700]

So, waiting for GS, I’ve been playing around with the Netherlands.

They’re... well. They’re quite good, aren’t they? A good power level - nothing OP. All fairly useable. Just a good, solid Civ to play with.)

Their trade route bonuses are what trade route bonuses tend to be in Civ VI: a real nothingburger, watered-down hopelessly due to balance concerns over having no hard cap on how many trade routes a player can have.

Any assessment rests entirely on the river bonuses and the highly situational polder availability.

 

[Sagax]

I swear, every game I play feels like this:

Play as the Netherlands: my lands can only accommodate a few scattered unimpressive polders.

Play as any other civ: Poldergasm everywhere!

And this is on Fractal/Shuffle maps, mind you. The Netherlands is one of the only two civs that I always want to try again and again, looking for those godlike locations and yields. That’s more than many other civs in the roster can hope for, seeing how many of them are “play once and forget”.

 

[Sostratus]

I swear, every game I play feels like this:

Play as the Netherlands: my lands can only accommodate a few scattered unimpressive polders.

Play as any other civ: Poldergasm everywhere!

The Path of the Polder is not an easy road, my son. I feel this too all the time.

Their trade route bonuses are what trade route bonuses tend to be in Civ VI: a real nothingburger, watered-down hopelessly due to balance concerns over having no hard cap on how many trade routes a player can have.

It's funny- per trade route bonuses are heavily limited but direct per city bonuses are thrown out left and right: every UD, kongo's artifact bonus, Heck even Arabia's science per foreign city following, are per city boosts. But trade route capacity is also per city save 2-3 routes. So it's kind of silly they do it that way.

The three land-tile requirement wouldn't be so onerous if it polders themselves could count for adjancency.

As long as they required 2 land tiles plus [one land tile or one polder] then you could build lines of polders along some straight coastlines until you hit a bend, but you could never actually fill in an entire sea with them. I think it would be a good change; they could just reduce the +4 gold bonus to like, +2 and drop the adjacency at replaceable parts from 2 food/1prod to 1/1. I rage quit more netherlands games due to lack of polder than anything, which is exactly what you want to avoid: a shiny toy no one can use. I give them huge huge props for quickly changing the flatland requirement to regular land too, although i think mountains still don't count.

 

[steveg700]

It's funny- per trade route bonuses are heavily limited but direct per city bonuses are thrown out left and right: every UD, kongo's artifact bonus, Heck even Arabia's science per foreign city following, are per city boosts. But trade route capacity is also per city save 2-3 routes. So it's kind of silly they do it that way.

It's stuff like this and the kind of sweeping, stacking combat bonuses some civ's get (America, Mongolia, Mapuche) that give me the impression there's no central authority at Firaxis acting as a continuity cop, making everything fits together as a whole.

Played Cree over the weekend. Barely could perceive the whole business with camps and pastures giving more food and gold.

As long as they required 2 land tiles plus [one land tile or one polder] then you could build lines of polders along some straight coastlines until you hit a bend, but you could never actually fill in an entire sea with them. I think it would be a good change; they could just reduce the +4 gold bonus to like, +2 and drop the adjacency at replaceable parts from 2 food/1prod to 1/1. I rage quit more netherlands games due to lack of polder than anything, which is exactly what you want to avoid: a shiny toy no one can use. I give them huge huge props for quickly changing the flatland requirement to regular land too, although i think mountains still don't count.

Good points. There is of course a distinction between shallow and ocean water tiles. As long as shallow water was amongst the restrictions, they could ease up on the three adjacent land tiles and still not have to worry about outrageous abuses.

 

[acluewithout]

Polders should be a spammable as Kampungs (albeit with different placement rules). They look cool. Are cool. And the game needs as much flavour and uniqueness as it can get.

Are trade bonuses generally weak? They easily stack with other trade route yield bonuses. So, even if a bit weak by themselves, I’m not sure they’re weak overall. But agree they can be a little bland.

Anywho. Just wanted to say I’d played the Dutch and liked them. I’ll add them to my list of Civs I play when I’m not playing England (joining Norway, Japan and Khmer). Hopefully GS will update them a little (even just indirectly) just to make them a little more fun.

 

[Ferocitus]

I have had great fun playing them, even though it can take time to find good river systems to exploit.
Definitely worth playing several times in succession to get a feel for their weaknesses and strengths.

I also like having them as one of my 5 European opponents (out of 20+ total civs) every few games.
If they don't have enough rivers nearby, they really push out to settle other continents where there are. I like that kind of behaviour from AI civs.