[R&F] Civ of the Week: Sythia

Who should be next weeks Civ? (Medieval)


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I hadn't played Scythia in a long time but they are just as powerful as I remember. I cranked up a game and got quite a good start with a few stone in range of the capital and some early horses in the second city. Basically went straight for bronze working then horseback riding. Even without any direct neighbors here it was pretty easy to just steamroll through city states and I managed to acquire 12 cities, the pyrarmids, and colesseum before turn 90. With a direct neighbor or two this would have been even more lopsided. Stone circles and Kurgan really helped with faith output and was able to use in conjunction with monumentality for 3 extra settlers. I built encampments first and used the GG point card to add extra power but it's not necessary given the healing and combat boost against wounded units.

Emperor/Standard/Fractal

Spoiler :
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Strong civ... Perhaps the best at early conquest... But war weariness is quite a pain (made worse by happiness affecting loyalty issues). I liked Macedon better but Scythia gets their rush faster and much more efficiently. The main problem is that you cannot quite suicide your horse horde into cities as war weariness from losing units is severe. This makes me win slower with them.
 
Well gave them another go.
Good start, moved 2 tiles to start on a plains hill next to a river and have 2 horses within 2 tiles
Found Cyrus, beelined horsemen, conquered Cyrus

Sadly turns out we were alone on a large island. My economy tanked with just 6 horsemen and 2 horse archers but I've pulled it around and I'm up to about 10 cities, reckon I'll manage about 15 on the island.

2 problems I see with Scythia:
1) Its early rush isn't fast if you don't have easy access to horses. This seems to be the case more often than not in my games.
2) It doesn't have much to help it if their aren't any foes around. No bonuses to production except military. No bonuses to culture or science. The kurgan helps found a pantheon but their bonus to religious conflict is also useless if theres nobody else around.

Its a very one trick pony civ, as much as Macedon.
 
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The tier 3 government building War Department's bonus 'units heal for 20 after killing a unit' replaces Scythia's 'units heal for 30 after killing a unit' UA
 
The tier 3 government building War Department's bonus 'units heal for 20 after killing a unit' replaces Scythia's 'units heal for 30 after killing a unit' UA

I just tested in game- these abilities do stack. I was able to get units healing over 30 points after kill upon completing the war department. So presumably, you can get up to 50 points of healing.
 
Finished my game started on post #4. Religious victory. Ranking Louis the 16th (who is actually 15th place). A bit low, but because my victory was so early. 1340 AD. This is my earliest victory yet (setting aside achievement victories on duel maps and whatnot). I am pretty much forced to give them an A grade at this point. I still like Macedon and Pericles better, but technically I got a victory earlier with Tomyris than either one of those. I just don't consider religious victories all that fun. It almost doesn't seem like a victory. I take that back, my Macedon victory was actually turn 273, this is turn 289, so Macedon is actually faster. Keep in mind I don't play for fast victories, this is casual play that does focus on civ abilities.

I didn't even need a fully promoted Moksha. The 3 promotion apostles never made it to their destination before the game ended. My horsies religion is the one true religion. I didn't even need a religious city-state. I didn't find one until very late in the game, and didn't have any envoys to send them.

To finish this game out convert Shahr-I-Qumis with the apostle next to the city. Here's a screenshot of my 3 city setup. My third city ended up being a pile of crap (that failed Petra), I don't know what I was thinking settling that city. Borders expanded too slowly and I had to buy out to the fish. 2nd city was good, but again borders were slow to expand. Low culture didn't help. I didn't build a single theater square.

It's hard to really say how I feel about this civ. I always hated this civ, yet I did the 2nd fastest victory I've had with this civ, so I can't exactly discount them. They are still at a disadvantage if they start alone or with only 1 other civ. And getting a religion isn't easy. I had to spend every single last gold to buy a great prophet to get one in time. Earth Goddess certainly helped my early religious victory, so there is a luck factor. But with Simultaneum it was going to happen regardless. I'm pulling over 300 faith per turn this final turn. Final grade. A grade (middle), I can't rank them higher because the fun factor isn't there for me. I would say you really have to focus on her abilities to get the most out of her. If you try to play her like any other civ, it won't be pleasant.

Spoiler :
 

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I ended up finishing a domination just before turn 160 which is close to my best. Scythia are definitely top of the pack for early wins right up there with Macedon. I just skipped Knights altogether and beelined straight for cavalry for mass upgrades, but they were really just for mop up. I did most of the damage with horsemen. This might not work quite as well on Deity but I still think you can easily overwhelm close neighbors with horsemen as long as you secure horses.

I think I easily could have finished faster but got too bogged down with districts rather than just chopping out non-stop horsemen. I also pursued the naval route when I didn't really need it because I thought it was a continents map when it was a snaky pangaea. Turn 125 Dom wins seem easily doable with the right map.

General strategy was:

1) Beeline Bronze Working then Horseback Riding
2) Build some encampments + stables
3) Stone Circles/harvest + Kurgan for accumulating faith (went Liang first then double promoted Magnus)
4) Beeline Maneuver for horsemen boost
5) Save trees and chop out as many horsemen as possible
6) Get Great General (faith buy if you need to)
7) Get Golden Age (quite easy with classical UU and early UI)
7) Split your army early and keep horsemen in groups to leverage healing - just alternate attacks and have the lower health units get the kill
8) Add Raid policy to support economy and stronger heal
9) Declare on anyone in your path
10) Beeline military tradition and upgrade to cavalry for mop up and blitz straight through to the final capitals

Spoiler :
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How about build a slinger as first unit to try to get the eureka for archery to make horseback riding faster as part of the strategy?
 
The health-on-kills alone makes them premium war-mongers. When added to the bonus against wounded units the result is that ALL of Tomy's units are superior. Only the very best UUs are as good as Scythia's base-line units. Double light cav means that you have quantity and quality. I would expect Scythia to produce some of the fastest Dom wins in the game.
 
So. Playing around with a game. Immortal. Large Continents. Playing Germany. Got into a nasty scuffle with Sythia.

...can I just say, that combat bonus when injured is a real pain when fighting Sythia. Ouch.

And you really need to be careful to not lose a unit or one of Tom’s cheeky monkeys heals. I’d forgotten about that and was doing so fighting with a melee, two archers and a very plucky scout. Scouty McScouty Face got killed (he often does), and suddenly some promoted Sythia unit healed and everything (briefly) went out the window.
 
For whatever worth, for those interested in Scythian history, here is a link to my in-development post on Tomyris and Scythia's historicity vis-a-vis their in-game portrayal, and which cites the Rejected Princesses as well as a podcast episode with the creator of that entry on Tomyris where they discuss Tomyris' appearance in Civ VI as well.

Scythia itself is certainly a fun civ for military and religious victories (though one has to ask why religious victories; they were more known for their wondrous gold cultural artifacts than their religion).
 
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