Civilization elimination thread

[woodshadows]

America 13
Arabia 24
Aztecs 21
Babylon 26
Byzantium 21
Carthage 22
Celts 10
China 24
Denmark 7
Egypt 12
England 16
Ethiopia 21
France 18
Greece 22
Huns 6
Inca 26
Iroquois 17
Japan 18
Korea 20
Maya 26
Mongolia 12
Netherlands 18
Ottoman Empire 20
Persia 19
Roman Empire 19
Russia 19
Siam 21
Songhai 12
Sweden 16

Spain is out of there - bad civ, melee knights are weak in this game, I dont like how overpowering pikes are against them, knights should get some huge flanking bonus against pikes to even things out a bit and make knights relevant again, right now I might have one horseman just to take a city but it's never used to engage in much fighting. UA is pretty boring, tercio is cool tho.

Ethiopia gets my up vote today, I've reconsidered them, a UA that provides an enormous military advantage when you need it; ie, when you are fighting offensively against someone bigger than you, or defensively against someone bigger than you. Almost a nice thing it doesn't stick around versus smaller civs, I mean do you really need a military advantage against someone smaller? would probably take all the fun out of war. The UU is pretty nice, cheaper to build, free rough terrain promo and that capital bonus which I don't think much of but might come in useful one day. UB is great and guarantees you get a nice pantheon and religion.

 

[blackcatatonic]

edit: someone beat me to eliminating Spain, so I'm downvoting Songhai instead.

America 13
Arabia 24
Aztecs 21
Babylon 26
Byzantium 21
Carthage 22
Celts 10
China 24
Denmark 7
Egypt 12
England 17 (+1)
Ethiopia 20
France 18
Greece 22
Huns 6
Inca 26
Iroquois 17
Japan 18
Korea 20
Maya 26
Mongolia 12
Netherlands 18
Ottoman Empire 20
Persia 19
Roman Empire 19
Russia 19
Siam 21
Songhai 10 (-2)
Sweden 16

I haven't played as England since the expansion, but I'm currently witnessing an awesome game in which Longbowmen and Ships of the Line are making mincemeant of... well, just about everyone. Toss in a free extra Spy, and the hands-down best war music of the game, and it's a no-brainer.

Songhai are boring, and less cool post G&K.

The other day I took two points off Spain because the UA is cheap, gimmicky and situational. Guess what? It's still cheap, gimmicky and situational. Bye Spain.

 

[woodshadows]

blackcatatonic, i think you may have to recast your negative vote, i dont know the rules for this thing, but i eliminated spain a couple minutes before you.. also be sure to include the updated positives i added to ethiopia

 

[Rooftrellen]

Rome: The civ I'm currently playing. Somehow Rome always ends up on islands, and without iron, when I play... The civ seems to lack focus; its dual UU is good for early domination (assuming iron and enemies), but burns out fairly quickly and the UA doesn't have any obvious synergy with it. The UA by itself is a lot less impressive than many, and doesn't promote any particularly interesting play style. So, it's a civ that's reliant on a somewhat situational domination approach at a very specific game stage, it's a warmonger civ that offers no particular advantages when warmongering for most of the game (read: Huns), and combines these with an uninspired and relatively weak UA.

Rome works better the wider you go with that UA. Both UU's allow you to take early cities or at least secure land for later settlement, but the gem is the UA.

Last I checked, the UA works on puppets, which will always build a thousand different things. The faster they do it, the better they provide resources and/or are ready to be annexed without needing to sink tons of money into them.

Thus, the UA benefits large empires that need to build up captured cities after a war, either those that are annexed or puppets.

 

[DGDobrev]

I just wanted to share that I really like how this voting is going. In my opinion, the best way to judge a civilization is how it performs on the highest difficulties like Immortal and Deity. So far all of the dropped out civs certainly did not do so well on these levels:

- India is poorly thought out without specific advantages (although it is nice to grow in OCC without having to worry about happiness for a while)
- Austria has a broken UA (I like playing vs them though, makes it more interesting)
- Polynesia needs a lot of luck to get a decent start and has to use those Moai's very strategically to get them to produce something significant - although the early-game culture boost is kinda nice
- Germany is kinda cool to play after a point - but most of the time you are not allowed to get to that point, be it by the AI on Deity, or a warmongering human player.
- Spain, as said by many, including myself, is too situational for its own good. On lower difficulties it is overpowering - getting a 2nd and a 3rd city very early on surely shifts the balance of power in your favor. However, on higher difficulties if you spawn next to a warmonger, you should simply quit, and I hate to have such a worry every time I start a game.

For the same reason, I really like seeing Babylon up there. Their UU and UB lets you be creative and go for any victory. The Walls of Babylon is sorely underestimated - build it and you can have your city tank for you, while your archers in and behind it pick their targets off one by one. See that you are next to a warmonger? Tech up and get some military yourself. See that the neighbor is peaceful? Go for the RA's. Want culture? Tech up quickly and get the + culture wonders and buildings. I love stuff that lets the player adjust his tactics, strategies and allows him/her to be creative.

 

[Mesix]

I have always favored playing civs with cool UB over civs which have two UU. I am interested to see which flavor is favored by the community.

 

[Lord Kid]

America 13
Arabia 24
Aztecs 21
Babylon 26
Byzantium 21
Carthage 22
Celts 8
China 24
Denmark 7
Egypt 12
England 17
Ethiopia 20
France 18
Greece 22
Huns 6
Inca 26
Iroquois 17
Japan 18
Korea 21
Maya 26
Mongolia 12
Netherlands 18
Ottoman Empire 20
Persia 19
Roman Empire 19
Russia 19
Siam 21
Songhai 10
Sweden 16

The Inca are still my absolute favorite, but I've got to throw Korea a little love. Their UU's are great for turtling up and building, plus their UA is fantastic if playing GP factories.

Celts are entirely too boring for my taste. And I'm not a fan of a UA that requires me to leave my tiles unimproved.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

America 11 (-2)
Arabia 24
Aztecs 21
Babylon 26
Byzantium 21
Carthage 22
Celts 8
China 24
Denmark 8 (+1)
Egypt 12
England 17
Ethiopia 20
France 18
Greece 22
Huns 6
Inca 26
Iroquois 17
Japan 18
Korea 21
Maya 26
Mongolia 12
Netherlands 18
Ottoman Empire 20
Persia 19
Roman Empire 19
Russia 19
Siam 21
Songhai 10
Sweden 16

America got downvoted it's UA is lame as is the minuteman. The bomber is OK but not enough for me to care.

I upvoted Denmark because I really like polders.

I almost downvoted England. Not because I dislike England, but because I really dislike the embarkation bug that hits them especially hard. I've told units to land on an island several turns away only to have them arrive at the island and spend 10+ turns pacing back and forth in front of the beaches before I've noticed. Argh

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Celts are entirely too boring for my taste. And I'm not a fan of a UA that requires me to leave my tiles unimproved.

Yeah their UA is reliable for snatching a Pantheon, and not much beyond that. I know it was done this way (can't improve the tiles) for balance issues, but I don't think that allowing improvements would have made it OP, just more attractive.

I played as them a couple of times and was entirely unimpressed.

 

[black_kitten]

America 11
Arabia 24
Aztecs 21
Babylon 26
Byzantium 21
Carthage 23
Celts 8
China 24
Denmark 8
Egypt 12
England 17 (+1)
Ethiopia 20
France 18
Greece 22
Huns 4
Inca 26
Iroquois 17
Japan 18
Korea 21
Maya 26
Mongolia 12
Netherlands 18
Ottoman Empire 20
Persia 19
Roman Empire 19
Russia 19
Siam 21
Songhai 10 (-2)
Sweden 16

Carthage: free harbors are great for immediate trade routes without maintenance and for more profit from sea resources, plus the quinquereme as an early ranged naval unit is one of the few UUs that is really unique (and not only: as unit x, but stronger).

Huns: If they miss the opportunity for an early rush with rams, they become nearly useless. Also, razing cities more quickly seems to be a strange ability for my taste - why conquer cities only to destroy them if puppets are almost always better?

 

[Lord Kid]

Yeah their UA is reliable for snatching a Pantheon, and not much beyond that. I know it was done this way (can't improve the tiles) for balance issues, but I don't think that allowing improvements would have made it OP, just more attractive.

I played as them a couple of times and was entirely unimpressed.

I hosed myself the first time I played as them because I was so excited about grabbing a quick pantheon I didn't pay attention to the fact that even placing a camp on the forest tile negated the Faith bonus. I did have one game where I combined their UA with the non-forested Tundra pantheon and it worked out fairly well. Honestly they're completely underwhelming.

 

[GreekIrish]

Great start huh? NOT!!! Cause Atilla was my neighbor. His early DoW on T40, followed by a swarm of Rams and Horse Archers waltzing over my sorry army of 7 archers I will remember for a long time to come. With any other civ I would at least have CB's... Freaking first ever loss on Deity

7 archers

That's your problem right there. You need spear-men to fight Attila. I played on Immortal, and Attila attacked me early into the game, but I was able to hold him off because spearmen are effective to both horse archers and battering rams. I was able to come back and take his capital as Korea.

 

[Light Cleric]

I think he still could have survived as long as he focus-fired the Horse Archers; remember Battering Rams are harmless as long as they can't get to the city and the AI is bad at using Horse Archers. And if you settled on a hill you should have been fine.

Of course I would never ever use Spain for an OCC so meh

 

[bcaiko]

America 11
Arabia 24
Aztecs 21
Babylon 26
Byzantium 21
Carthage 23
Celts 9 (+1)
China 24
Denmark 8
Egypt 10 (-2)
England 17
Ethiopia 20
France 18
Greece 22
Huns 4
Inca 26
Iroquois 17
Japan 18
Korea 21
Maya 26
Mongolia 12
Netherlands 18
Ottoman Empire 20
Persia 19
Roman Empire 19
Russia 19
Siam 21
Songhai 10
Sweden 16

Boosting The Celts, who don't deserve to go down this early. A very strong, early UU and a guarantee to found a religion are nothing to scoff at.

Egypt still gets my downvote. A lackluster early UU only compounds their problem; they lack focus.

 

[Mesix]

America 11 (-2)
America got downvoted it's UA is lame as is the minuteman. The bomber is OK but not enough for me to care.

I upvoted Denmark because I really like polders.

Try upgrading the minutemen. Mechanized Infantry which ignore terrain movement penalties are one of the most powerful units in the game! America can steamroll a Modern/Atomic era war on large maps unlike any other civilization.

FYI, the Netherlands builds polders, not Denmark.

 

[GAGA Extrem]

America 11
Arabia 24
Aztecs 21
Babylon 26
Byzantium 21
Carthage 23
Celts 9
China 24
Denmark 8
Egypt 10
England 17
Ethiopia 20
France 18
Greece 20
Huns 4
Inca 26
Iroquois 17
Japan 18
Korea 22
Maya 26
Mongolia 12
Netherlands 18
Ottoman Empire 20
Persia 19
Roman Empire 19
Russia 19
Siam 21
Songhai 10
Sweden 16

Korea: I like specialists.
Greece: Can't see where all the love is coming from.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

Yeah their UA is reliable for snatching a Pantheon, and not much beyond that. I know it was done this way (can't improve the tiles) for balance issues, but I don't think that allowing improvements would have made it OP, just more attractive.

I played as them a couple of times and was entirely unimpressed.

While I'm not the world's biggest fan of the Celts, when I played them I found that not getting to improve those 1-3 forest tiles in the beginning of the game just wasn't that big of a deal. You don't have to WORK those tiles, just have them next to your city. Hopefully you'd have other (better) tiles from which to choose.

 

[DGDobrev]

That's your problem right there. You need spear-men to fight Attila. I played on Immortal, and Attila attacked me early into the game, but I was able to hold him off because spearmen are effective to both horse archers and battering rams. I was able to come back and take his capital as Korea.

Are you sure you can get enough Spearmen with Spain around T40 and still manage to get the tech to build a Library and work your luxuries? On Deity, it is critically important to buy your Library, as you save on the average over 12 turns of building with boosted research. It is also critical to buy a worker and get the techs needed to work your luxuries asap. Ok, if you had gold or silver it is awesome, mining is all you need, but if you have plantations or pearls/crab (as in this game), then you need to lose even more turns worth of research.

Yeah, ok, I got 7 archers, but with Spearmen you need to push - and that in my game meant going into tiles controlled by 2 Hun cities of pop 7+ - you can imagine the damage they would do. Atilla plays very aggressively on Deity, mind you... He settled 2 cities right on my borders, effectively forcing me to buy tiles, which is even bigger setback as Spain in the early game.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Try upgrading the minutemen. Mechanized Infantry which ignore terrain movement penalties are one of the most powerful units in the game! America can steamroll a Modern/Atomic era war on large maps unlike any other civilization.

FYI, the Netherlands builds polders, not Denmark.

Facepalm! Jeeze I make a fool of myself pretty regularly here. (Not changing my vote though because I don't want to screw the system up)

About the Minuteman upgrades, yeah that's cool and all but Mech Infs are only around for such a very small slice of the game. It's essentially the same with the B-17's. They're cool but show up so late that the game is usually decided by then and they don't have a huge impact.

Now, I understand that all of the minuteman upgrades inbetween them and Mech Infs will have the movement penalties removed as well. But it's still kind of a weak bonus when considering the weakness of the American UA and the short period of time that the other UU is in the game. The minutemen should have been stronger to compensate for the otherwise lackluster factors of the American civ - or other units (like Settlers) should have also gotten the sight bonus to make them more useful (you wouldn't have to escort them).

Also, in my games, minutemen/muskets are just not around for a very long time. So you would have to really redirect a lot of your production in a short period of time to be able to pump out enough minutemen to have a decent sized army with their bonuses in later eras.

While I'm not the world's biggest fan of the Celts, when I played them I found that not getting to improve those 1-3 forest tiles in the beginning of the game just wasn't that big of a deal. You don't have to WORK those tiles, just have them next to your city. Hopefully you'd have other (better) tiles from which to choose.

It's still meh. Especially with a northern or southern start with lots of tundra where you need the camp improvements ASAP to make your city really viable. And it's a +1 to +3(I think) bonus per tile, which is great to get a pantheon, but not much else.

Especially when you consider that by the time you get close to founding or enhancing a religion you are really going to need to improve those tiles to keep your cities momentum up. After that, the bonus goes away almost entirely as you improve tiles or is so small it doesn't contribute much.

 

[Monthar]

America 11
Arabia 24
Aztecs 21
Babylon 26
Byzantium 21
Carthage 23
Celts 9
China 24
Denmark 8
Egypt 10
England 17
Ethiopia 20
France 18
Greece 20
Huns 2 -2
Inca 26
Iroquois 17
Japan 18
Korea 25 +1 from me and a +2 correction of post 244
Maya 26
Mongolia 12
Netherlands 18
Ottoman Empire 20
Persia 19
Roman Empire 19
Russia 19
Siam 21
Songhai 10
Sweden 16

Post 244 had down votes for both Korea and France, but the write-up indicated France. It seems this posted had copied post 241's list before the poster of 241 edited their vote to change from down voting Korea to down voting Songhai.

I am also voting Korea up by 1. Since this post is both a correction of Korea and a vote for Korea, I used purple as the color. I feel Korea is the strongest science civ, because with 4 cities running just 1 specialist each can match the science output of Babylon's early academy. Once universities are up, running just the 2 scientists for both civs, Korea's bpt would be the same as Babylon with 2 academies. This trend continues to build, so even though Korea will produce fewer GS's, with the much higher BPT, those few late game bulbs will easily match or even exceed what Babylon can pull off.

The Huns get my down vote this time. With a good map for an early battering ram/horse archer rush they can be very over powered. However, if you can't pull off a good early rush with them, their power quickly drops to subpar.