Siam was nice before spies and on lower difficulty levels. No fun to throw 1000gold at a city state only to have it coup'd on you, I was once so determined to hold onto a citystate and had extra gold, so I invested gold into a city state 4 times in a row, only for each time the next turn Austria to coup them until I was out of gold. Also, a good Arabia player would have fun picking apart those slow elephants with the amazing camel archer
You no longer need to throw gold at CSes, and spies only make them easier to control if you select your targets effectively - there's nothing like gaining free influence every 15 turns. Plus the resting influence system really benefits Siam who, I'll stress again, only need to be friends (not allies) with a city-state to start farming UA benefits - and anyone can obtain 30 influence permanently with any CS they aren't at war with. Last time I faced a successful coup against one of my CSes (an Immortal game, as Sweden rather than Siam) was two turns before a diplo vote, and it was the only successful coup out of three launched that turn (plus several earlier efforts against my CSes).
Incas are perfectly suited for going tall or wide. Free/cheap rail/roads allows you to expand horizontally to your hearts content, while Terrace Farms with their start bias makes those core cities food and production powerhouses. They are great for any map type, and hills can't be destroyed like other terrain.
The trouble is, terrace farms don't scale well - they get mediocre bonuses in later eras compared with farms or mines, and you never get more than 2 hammers from them. Making them great for early growth and cheap early buildings, but bad for long-term development.
Perhaps it's my play style, but whenever I've played Bab I never felt like I had much choice but to for the stars. I've taken Korea both tall and wide, and they felt right doing it.
Oh, I agree there. I played Babylon once, won, didn't go back to them - they're not an interesting civ by any means. As much as Mesix likes to praise Babylon's purported flexibility, his testimony also suggests he has limited experience playing civs other than Babylon to compare. And yes, I love playing Korea - the UUs genuinely feel unique (and which other civ can boast of having two UUs,
both of which are very strong, on top of a very strong UA?), and while it's certainly best-suited for going for science victory, the UA is effectively free beakers for stuff you'll normally be doing anyway.
Beaker for beaker, Korea simply outproduces Babylon, at least in my experience. Getting BPT bonus for every specialist AND settled GP's more than makes up for Babylon's early GS. The Academy starts at +10 BPT, and goes up from there. Sure, Korea does require some more aggressive play at the start to catch Babylon, but once they do it's over. Babylon simply cannot keep up after that.
Babylon's early advantage isn't the Academy - it's the Academy + National College, which is +12 bpt before anyone else will get it. This is a genuine edge this civ has over Korea or the Maya, who are forced to go wider to maximise their UA benefits (or in the case of Korea, delay their benefit by waiting to tech to tier 2/3 specialist buildings - which appears to be how Mesix has played them and why his experience is that they are slow to tech), and so will rarely get an early College. Then of course their GS bonus means more academies, which means more from the NC if the academies are placed around the capital. Korea will take the lead in science, but just as Mesix is comparing the two and finding Korea can't compete because he's using a suboptimal Korean strategy, it seems that you're not taking full advantage of what Babylon can do and finding them lacking as a result.
I'll always favour Korea - as others have said, Babylon is about rushing to the finish line. This may well be essential on Deity (indeed probably is), but personally I prefer playing longer games, and with Korea I'll get a more interesting game out of it. Maybe people just want to rush Babylon because it's so boring to play they don't want to spend too much time on each game...?
i guess for some it's a 1-trick pony because its hard to NOT play to a civs strengths in the same way every time. i dont go for cultural vics with babylon, but every other vc is a lot of fun with them (well, diplo isnt fun with anyone, but that's another topic), and they all hinge on decent beakers. for me there is no "1-trick" other than beelining writing to settle the GS. after that it is up to you whether you turtle up and tech race or warmonger or spread out with 6-8 cities or whatever.
That's less a case of not playing to the civ's strengths in the same way, and more a case of ignoring its strengths altogether. The Writing academy is not Babylon's selling point and it won't keep them ahead of a fast-expanding Maya player or a Korean with amphitheaters and an early Cathedral belief. Babylon's strength is faster GS production, which means more academies. But to utilise it you have to play very specifically to maximise your GSes, and play tall to concentrate your academies where you can maximise their bonuses.
also on deity, you dont get a "commanding tech lead" until the atomic/information age which is much more challenging and the UU/UBs are surprisingly necessary to weather the first 80-100 turns.
I've yet to face an early rush in Deity - I can readily survive past the period when Bowmen and Walls are much use.
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city which can support a lot of specialists. Babylon on the other hand can do just about anything they want. Hit the Renaissance shortly after turn 100 and the Industrial era 50 turns later. Crank out units to dominate your opponents...or build all the wonders before they research the necessary techs...or shoot for the stars! You can really attempt any victory condition and go either tall or wide with Babylon. The key is
and with Babylon you are practically guaranteed to out tech all other civs even on the highest difficulty settings.
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