Civ Tiers

infidel88

Prince
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Jul 29, 2013
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So I was wondering what are your opinions on particular civs in order to check which could need a buff or nerf. I believe there are some very strong civs and some laughable and it should be balanced a bit. Of course we're talking about civs in the hand of human player.

What should be taken into account in my opinion is flexibility and being decent no matter conditions or RNG and strength of UA (15 points), UI/UB (10 points) and UU (5 points). Extra 2 points can be added if certain thing about them is truly exceptional. If you think this scoring is not balanced well, let me know, general idea was - UA is for whole game, therefore worth most, UI/UB stays with you after you discover, but sometimes comes late, UU is only for one era, max two.

Top tier:
Aztecs (13+10+4) = 27/30
Egypt (12+10+5) = 27/30
Poland (15+6+3) +2 solidarity = 26/30
Mongolia (9+10+5) +2 ger = 26/30
Indonesia (11+9+4) = 24/30
Carthage (13+7+4) = 24/30
Netherlands (12+9+3) = 24/30
Korea (12+8+4) = 24/30
Inca (12+7+5) +2 slinger = 24/30

Good:
Ottomans (9+10+4) = 23/30
Polynesia (9+10+2) +2 for moai = 23/30 and Im aware that moai should get far more points :)
Shoshone (12+7+4) = 23/30
Denmark (9+10+3) = 22/30
Greece (11+8+3) = 22/30
Babylon (11+8+3) = 22/30
Maya (12+8+2) = 22/30
Austria (10+9+2) = 21/30
Zulu (10+8+3) = 21/30

Average:
Ethiopia (8+10+2) = 20/30
Rome (8+8+4) = 20/30
Celts (11+5+4) = 20/30
Persia (9+7+4) = 20/30
Spain (8+8+4) = 20/30
Venice (12+5+3unique) = 20/30 MoV is too unique to rate it, gave it average.
Songhai (7+9+3) = 19/30

Below Average
Huns (7+7+3) = 17/30
Byzantium (8+6+3) = 17/30
America (5+8+4) = 17/30
China (7+6+4) = 17/30
Germany (8+7+2) = 17/30
England (9+4+4) = 17/30
Portugal (4+8+5) = 17/30
Arabia (5+7+4) = 16/30
France (6+7+3) = 16/30
Japan (8+5+3) = 16/30
Russia (11+2+3) = 16/30

Poor:
Assyria (7+5+3) = 15/30
Siam (6+6+3) = 15/30
Sweden (8+5+2) = 15/30
India (2+8+3) = 13/30
Morocco (4+5+2) = 11/30
Brazil (5+4+1) = 10/30


Any opinions? Is topic like that even necessary or are we happy with general balance?
 
There is an extra subforum dedicated to leader balance, lots of conversation over there.
 
What map script is this on? Naval UUs and some abilities like Polynesia's aren't too hot if you're playing on Pangea but are better on Continents and great on Archipelago.

I used Mongolia in a game awhile back and wasn't too impressed with Khans, definitely not on par with the top tier UUs. The extra movement was almost never helpful and extra healing was nice but it doesn't work unless your units are stopped to heal in the first place so it's slightly more useful than a Medic promotion.

As far as UUs go, Camel Archers are pretty crap (their total benefits are +2 melee CS and the withdraw promotion iirc), I'd put them at +1 probably, definitely not +4. Conquistador, War Chariot, Quinquireme, and Pictish Warrior don't really seem worth the scores they're given either.

India's ability is worth much more than +2, I don't know how the extra growth works exactly (and their UB contributes to growth too) but the one game I played with them I ended up with cities that probably had 20-40% higher population than I would've otherwise. No Missionaries limits the religious game you can play but the increased pressure and earlier start mean you can probably convert one or two neighboring AIs in most cases.

There's another topic that's being sort of used for tier lists here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/general-leader-discussion.541829/page-3
 
This is for average continent map. Of course you can make a case of map like Amazon that will Irq or Brazil move up couple of tiers, but I was talking about average map. Some water, some islands, some mountains, some forests.

For me extra movement is awesome, as khan can give bonus to whole front and it's fast to get him there from capital when he is born.

Yeah, I confused Camel Archer with vanilla. It's crap in VP.

India - choosing pantheon on 1st turn is - depending on RNGesus - a gift or a curse. Usually the latter. And lets say you start next to a lake, choose goddess of purity and border growth will skip lake tiles anyway :D So you either make a random selection or hope for uncovered luxuries. And lack of missionaries/inq means if you get early visit from neighborhood friendly prophet, you become religion carrying zombie. Not cool.

I would love to see bottom tier civs buffed, hence the post. Playing with them feels like a punishment.
 
I honestly don't see why Askia is so low on your list. It's literally a roflstompkthxbye with him right now. But yea, there's already a thread as galbias linked to discuss leaders and their rankings.

Songhai has a river bias and allowing bonus movement on rivers, and since every civ likes to settle on a river, there's little doubt that the rivers will hurt them more than it hurts you in combat, and funnily enough, it's in their territory. And I'd like to question the unique unit rating...it's an ANCIENT era unit with 18 combat strength. That's almost twice the power of it's "counter" unit, which is the spearmen...with 10 combat strength. There are NO units coming even close to that in ancient era. And in classical, only the berserker has more CS than it, but it comes at one of the very last techs. I have to also mention that the mandeluke has no penalties attacking a city. I honestly don't see why Askia's at the bottom of "average."
 
Askia lacks flexibility. If you don't get horses early on (and if you don't play on communitas it's totally possible) and only small rivers on start, you are very limited regarding your UU and UA becomes somewhat crappy.
 
Arabia got a lot stronger in the recent version because of the tourism-changes (both tourism-types that got buffed are further strengthened by his uniques, his ancient era tree of choice also got buffed), yeah the camel archers aren't that impressive (not the worst UU in the game, but it is on the list) but both the other parts are really solid. I mean I won a cultural victory at the dawn of industrial era(as early as is possible) with Harun on immortal just recently, and that was with a pretty horrible start.

Yeah when it comes to flexibility he really isn't all that, and the AI still plays him like a wide warmonger for some reason (I absolutely can't find any synergy for that), but his tourism-power is no joke.
 
Askia is top tier for me. No question. Also, the best performing AI in my test games.

You could remove the UU entirely, and I'd still feel they are top tier.
 
I haven't played several of them though, so will play some others on your bottom tier for fun. I've never played as Morocco so will give them a go.
 
Just won a culture victory with Morocco. Spawned near tundra, and mountains so lots of barbarians, more than usual. Wasn't too bad though, just made units and dealt with them. Morocco seemed quite good for a culture victory, but the whole game was peaceful (likely in part due to barbs) and just made my way through it until done.
 
I don't know why UU scores so low. This implies that any civ that has a crap UA and an excellent UU is a worthless civ. I disagree with the argument that it only works for an era, it is usually two eras and some of the promotions carry on. But more importantly, a good UU is the difference between succesfully conquer half world or just tire yourself trying.

I'm fine with the flexibility scoring though. So, a unit that relies on iron, being iron available only 80% of the time and limited, has to be weighted accordingly.

@notque, Have you played that Morocco game in just 5 hours? O_O
 
Just won a culture victory with Morocco. Spawned near tundra, and mountains so lots of barbarians, more than usual. Wasn't too bad though, just made units and dealt with them. Morocco seemed quite good for a culture victory, but the whole game was peaceful (likely in part due to barbs) and just made my way through it until done.
Sure, but wouldn't the same victory come faster with other civs of similar profile? Dutch? Probably so. Morocco has no bonuses towards war (lack of flexibility) and in fact, if you're in a war with neigbour and you're isolated - you're screwed out of your UA completely. They are only designed for very peaceful game. So while their AU is not that bad on paper, it is very one dimensional.

I don't know why UU scores so low. This implies that any civ that has a crap UA and an excellent UU is a worthless civ. I disagree with the argument that it only works for an era, it is usually two eras and some of the promotions carry on. But more importantly, a good UU is the difference between succesfully conquer half world or just tire yourself trying.

I'm fine with the flexibility scoring though. So, a unit that relies on iron, being iron available only 80% of the time and limited, has to be weighted accordingly.
That's why I've added 2 bonus points possible. For those really outstanding things. UA is the best in my opinion, as it's with you for the whole game. From the very start. It can cause early snowballing (hello Huns) and we know from economy that dollar today is worth way more than 2 dollars in a year.

Sure we can discuss over weight of UA/UB-I/UU 3/2/1, maybe 2/1/1 would be more like it, but Id rather get general agreement that certain civs need buffs in some areas. And it's far easier to achieve that by comparison instead of simply pointing out arguments. If CivA is much better than CivB in eyes of 9of10 players, I think some adjustment is needed.
 
Sure, but wouldn't the same victory come faster with other civs of similar profile? Dutch? Probably so. Morocco has no bonuses towards war (lack of flexibility) and in fact, if you're in a war with neigbour and you're isolated - you're screwed out of your UA completely. They are only designed for very peaceful game. So while their AU is not that bad on paper, it is very one dimensional.


That's why I've added 2 bonus points possible. For those really outstanding things. UA is the best in my opinion, as it's with you for the whole game. From the very start. It can cause early snowballing (hello Huns) and we know from economy that dollar today is worth way more than 2 dollars in a year.

Sure we can discuss over weight of UA/UB-I/UU 3/2/1, maybe 2/1/1 would be more like it, but Id rather get general agreement that certain civs need buffs in some areas. And it's far easier to achieve that by comparison instead of simply pointing out arguments. If CivA is much better than CivB in eyes of 9of10 players, I think some adjustment is needed.
It's quite difficult to compare civs just by playing them. In one game you get lucky and suddenly that civs seems overpowered. Play several times with that unique civ and you will be missing some play time with other civs. For example, I never played Egypt or Assyria, and this time I'm trying to play Persia for the first time. I wouldn't believe what an Immortal is capable of, if I hadn't play it myself; they don't hit too hard, but they are resilient, thus perfect for a 'tank' role.
 
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