Civilization elimination thread

[Dogmouth]

In the argument for who's better at science, Korea wins the bpt part but Babs wins the timed GS part. you get so many GS that you can settle enough and still not have to save every GS for the final push. Timing certain techs for new buildings and eras is more important to me than raw BPT. both take a great person strategy and korea benefits from all the GPeople they get while babs benefits from being able to generate more total GSs. In a science race the latter is more important, imo. I have to down vote korea as compared to Babs even though it clearly looks like Korea will beat them in this elimination.

it will be a staggering upset if Inca doesnt win this whole thing. They have pretty much been over 30 for the whole thing and led 90% of the time.

All of that is true, but Babs is just so damn dull. A UB wall? Spare me! Bowmen that go obsolete really quickly and don't transfer any special promotions? No thanks! They're a one trick pony, and although it's a great trick, it's still madeningly boring.

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

All of that is true, but Babs is just so damn dull. A UB wall? Spare me! Bowmen that go obsolete really quickly and don't transfer any special promotions? No thanks! They're a one trick pony, and although it's a great trick, it's still madeningly boring.

i agree if the only option is to sci vic. but i love warmongering with them too. while im not using a cool special UU when warmongering im using the tech advantage which means i can get away with fewer but better units like upgraded gatling guns and cannons vs pikemen/trebs/swords (unless im on deity which doesnt happen that soon). and walls help me defend with less units too. i do not love warmongering with Korea but on the converse I actually like culture vics with them. all Gpeople producing beakers is nice. so I play korea for culture/sci vics and I play Babs for sci/dom vics (with the occasional settling for diplo--but only if i dont feel like starting a new game. diplo is that unfun to play, imo.

edit: i forgot that i also like to switch gears and late game warmonger with bombers and nukes. i need to do that more to learn better tactics with units i normally never play with. yeah, doesnt work well for me on deity but emperor and immortal is still quite fun.

 

[Lord Kid]

i agree if the only option is to sci vic. but i love warmongering with them too. while im not using a cool special UU when warmongering im using the tech advantage which means i can get away with fewer but better units like upgraded gatling guns and cannons vs pikemen/trebs/swords (unless im on deity which doesnt happen that soon). and walls help me defend with less units too. i do not love warmongering with Korea but on the converse I actually like culture vics with them. all Gpeople producing beakers is nice. so I play korea for culture/sci vics and I play Babs for sci/dom vics (with the occasional settling for diplo--but only if i dont feel like starting a new game. diplo is that unfun to play, imo.

At least until the bug is fixed with H'wacha, I like playing Dom with Korea. On the right map, turtle ships own until Navigation, and with the tech lead thanks to specialists/settling GS', it's nice having the most advanced military.

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

yeah, the hwacha bug makes it much better for korea but im pretty sure that will get patched out, and hopefully the RA bugs too. when that gets stable new tactics will be used more. i dont like exploiting anything to get advantages.

 

[woodshadows]

it will be a staggering upset if Inca doesnt win this whole thing. They have pretty much been over 30 for the whole thing and led 90% of the time.

I find the Inca love a bit baffling, a well-rounded civ certainly but that is in some ways their failing too because it makes them not particularly good for any one victory condition just kind of middling for every victory condition. Good for replay value, but not a civ I'd choose when going up a difficulty level. A tiny bit of extra gold saved on improvement maintenance, a military advantage which is helpful but doesn't actually provide any intrinsic combat strength modifier, a UU that likewise can be hit or miss but in almost every situation it isn't going to be ultra powerful for you, the UI is nice but a bias for mountains is annoying, it often means I'm stuck behind mountains with a narrow gap to the AI who fails miserably to ever break through, which I guess some people like but I find extremely boring, I want to fight off invaders not sit behind a wall of mountains. I agree with Mesix, the Iroquois are a better version of Inca, the Mohawk warrior is very powerful, the UA is great because though it's only 'in your own territory', at least 3/4 of the game is often spent with your borders shoved up against the ai's with combat crossing back and forth over the borders and the forests are actual roads which you don't need to build, giving extreme mobility and saving your workers for doing other things. Longhouse is comparable to the terrace.

 

[whyidie]

it will be a staggering upset if Inca doesnt win this whole thing. They have pretty much been over 30 for the whole thing and led 90% of the time.

Will be interesting to see how they fare once they're under the microscope.

Korea, Babylon, Siam, have had intense focus on them. Think its just starting for the Maya...

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

ive seen babylon and greece get downvoted like 5 votes in a row. i was actually pleased to see babs still around today. i thought a coalition had developed to get rid of them, haha. based on some randomness i guess it is still anyone's game. arabia will probably take a top 3 spot if not upset inca.

 

[PhilBowles]

Arabia 17
Babylon 20
China 24
Inca 34
Korea 29
Maya 14
Netherlands 5
Persia 20
Siam 10

Ugh, most of us don't believe trading 240g for a lux is an exploit. I also don't believe it's a weakness in programming. And I mean, in order to have the gold to bribe CS with Siam, most of us will be trading g to the AI for the money. Meh, not trying to change any opinions here, but it still kind of stings to say the players are "mistaking" the weakness when it's in all likelihood intentional.

Who ever said bad programming has to be accidental? If it's intentional that an AI is given gold bonuses at higher levels to improve its play, and yet it doesn't spend that gold, that's a definite case of bad programming. If, as was suggested at one point, there's a cap on how much the AI can spend in a turn, and yet its advantages at higher levels include extra gold intended to help it gain an advantage that it then can't spend, that's bad programming. It's been observed by others, and is also my experience, that in G&K the AI has much less spare gold to trade most of the time than in vanilla, and that too suggests that the failure of the AI to spend its gold was a programming issue and the developers have tried to fix it.

Either way, you're still left with Arabia being a civ which:

- doesn't work in multiplayer (humans don't trade luxes for gold)
- doesn't work or is marginal on duel or small maps
- doesn't work at lower difficulty levels where the AI doesn't have substantial gold advantages
- doesn't offer anything to players who - regardless of whether they see gold-for-luxes as an exploit or just lazy - would prefer not to rely on gold-for-lux trades that make the game easier with no effort on their part.
- doesn't work in the common situation where resources are clustered and you only have access to two or three, of which you typically have duplicates.
- doesn't work if other civs have the resources you can offer, or provides a marginal benefit if a civ happens to be missing one.
- is of much less value in G&K with so many other ways to obtain happiness, making it quite feasible to sell off your last copy of a lux early in the game without hampering growth.

 

[woodshadows]

arabia will probably take a top 3 spot if not upset inca.

especially now that the dutch are gone and those who love gold and trade won't be splitting their votes between the two.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

Who ever said bad programming has to be accidental? If it's intentional that an AI is given gold bonuses at higher levels to improve its play, and yet it doesn't spend that gold, that's a definite case of bad programming. If, as was suggested at one point, there's a cap on how much the AI can spend in a turn, and yet its advantages at higher levels include extra gold intended to help it gain an advantage that it then can't spend, that's bad programming. It's been observed by others, and is also my experience, that in G&K the AI has much less spare gold to trade most of the time than in vanilla, and that too suggests that the failure of the AI to spend its gold was a programming issue and the developers have tried to fix it.

Either way, you're still left with Arabia being a civ which:

- doesn't work in multiplayer (humans don't trade luxes for gold)
- doesn't work or is marginal on duel or small maps
- doesn't work at lower difficulty levels where the AI doesn't have substantial gold advantages
- doesn't offer anything to players who - regardless of whether they see gold-for-luxes as an exploit or just lazy - would prefer not to rely on gold-for-lux trades that make the game easier with no effort on their part.
- doesn't work in the common situation where resources are clustered and you only have access to two or three, of which you typically have duplicates.
- doesn't work if other civs have the resources you can offer, or provides a marginal benefit if a civ happens to be missing one.
- is of much less value in G&K with so many other ways to obtain happiness, making it quite feasible to sell off your last copy of a lux early in the game without hampering growth.

Selling happy for gold early does seem too strong now. It's an alarm to me if every single strategy relies on an action like everyone seems to rely on this selling currently. However, I don't know how to tone it down without screwing civs like Dutch and Arabia.

 

[Kwami]

Arabia 16
Babylon 18
China 22
Inca 38
Korea 28
Maya 15
Persia 16
Siam 9

Look, there's nothing wrong with China, but I had to pick one to vote down. Of those civilizations remaining, China is my least favorite. I'm not a very militaristic player, so the Great General bonus isn't all that important to me.

On the other hand, Siam is good all around. The UA works for every victory condition and map type, the UB isn't as situational as most others, and the UU is just fun. Plus, I like their colors.

 

[woodshadows]

Who ever said bad programming has to be accidental? If it's intentional that an AI is given gold bonuses at higher levels to improve its play, and yet it doesn't spend that gold, that's a definite case of bad programming. If, as was suggested at one point, there's a cap on how much the AI can spend in a turn, and yet its advantages at higher levels include extra gold intended to help it gain an advantage that it then can't spend, that's bad programming. It's been observed by others, and is also my experience, that in G&K the AI has much less spare gold to trade most of the time than in vanilla, and that too suggests that the failure of the AI to spend its gold was a programming issue and the developers have tried to fix it.

Either way, you're still left with Arabia being a civ which:

- doesn't work in multiplayer (humans don't trade luxes for gold)
- doesn't work or is marginal on duel or small maps
- doesn't work at lower difficulty levels where the AI doesn't have substantial gold advantages
- doesn't offer anything to players who - regardless of whether they see gold-for-luxes as an exploit or just lazy - would prefer not to rely on gold-for-lux trades that make the game easier with no effort on their part.
- doesn't work in the common situation where resources are clustered and you only have access to two or three, of which you typically have duplicates.
- doesn't work if other civs have the resources you can offer, or provides a marginal benefit if a civ happens to be missing one.
- is of much less value in G&K with so many other ways to obtain happiness, making it quite feasible to sell off your last copy of a lux early in the game without hampering growth.

Wow, I couldn't disagree more with your interpretation of things. I think the civ developers wanted to balance difficulty levels and this is why they intentionally programmed ai's to over-value luxuries they often don't need. I would also hypothesise that the AI is provided such a load of GPT in order to deal with setbacks and quickly get back in the game, while not being overpowering by being allowed to use loads of gold per turn, this is why you'll often see a runaway with 100,000gold by late game and you're thinking "why doesn't genghis just buy a gazillion units and destroy me?"

Making the AI overvalue luxuries is built-in to give the human player a means of surviving on Immortal/Deity, I don't know anyone who doesn't take advantage of this, I also doubt that you don't trade your excess luxuries to the AI for gold on Immortal+, at those difficulty levels it is almost vital that you do if you want any chance of winning. The fact that Arabia is better at it than others is built into how the civ was balanced (or some might say unbalanced - OP), I wouldn't say it's OP though because trade is so determined by AI attitudes towards you and resource distribution that there is a limit and the human incentive to be creative to maintain the right conditions for its maximal use. Though I can often get loads of gold early game to jumpstart my game by late game half the AI are dead or have found copies of the resource themselves. Also, when I play Arabia it's often for the camel archers more than for the bazaar. Saying selling luxuries for gold is an exploit or 'lazy' is like saying playing almost any civ is 'lazy' in that they provide free benefits of some variety - free improvement maintenance Incas, free great people Maya, etc, or rely on 'exploiting' 'bad programming' - janissaries healing on kill the AI is programmed poorly to preserve troops properly to avoid this happening, the AI is programmed poorly in combat dynamics giving <insert every UU in the game> a cheap easy advantage to exploit this weakness. See where I'm going with this?

 

[whyidie]

Either way, you're still left with Arabia being a civ which:

- doesn't work at lower difficulty levels where the AI doesn't have substantial gold advantages
- doesn't offer anything to players who - regardless of whether they see gold-for-luxes as an exploit or just lazy - would prefer not to rely on gold-for-lux trades that make the game easier with no effort on their part.
- doesn't work in the common situation where resources are clustered and you only have access to two or three, of which you typically have duplicates.

Any positive diplomacy modifiers for trade ? I was quite pleased with myself in my first and only game wtih Arabia as it was a diplomatic victory and I did give some of the credit to luxury trading.

 

[Lord Kid]

I find the Inca love a bit baffling, a well-rounded civ certainly but that is in some ways their failing too because it makes them not particularly good for any one victory condition just kind of middling for every victory condition. Good for replay value, but not a civ I'd choose when going up a difficulty level. A tiny bit of extra gold saved on improvement maintenance, a military advantage which is helpful but doesn't actually provide any intrinsic combat strength modifier, a UU that likewise can be hit or miss but in almost every situation it isn't going to be ultra powerful for you, the UI is nice but a bias for mountains is annoying, it often means I'm stuck behind mountains with a narrow gap to the AI who fails miserably to ever break through, which I guess some people like but I find extremely boring, I want to fight off invaders not sit behind a wall of mountains. I agree with Mesix, the Iroquois are a better version of Inca, the Mohawk warrior is very powerful, the UA is great because though it's only 'in your own territory', at least 3/4 of the game is often spent with your borders shoved up against the ai's with combat crossing back and forth over the borders and the forests are actual roads which you don't need to build, giving extreme mobility and saving your workers for doing other things. Longhouse is comparable to the terrace.

I disagree. Their well roundedness makes them ideal for any VC. When you start a game with them, you can simply lay back for a few dozen turns to see who and what is around you before deciding on any specific direction to go. Find a bunch of wonderspamers near you? Go military to take their ripe cities. Warmongers? Go defensive and tech up to the stars, or stay small and go cultural. Most times I don't even build a scout with them, just another warrior and send them out. I like having my core cities protected by terrain, so that I only need a small civil defense force to secure it and then send out my army to lay waste to other civs.

I especially love finding myself in a hilly desert. Build Petra, take Desert Folklore, and spam the hills with terrace farms. And the money you save on improvements means larger military or more buildings in the cities without running into funding issues.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

I think the civ developers wanted to balance difficulty levels and this is why they intentionally programmed ai's to over-value luxuries they often don't need.

Deity should be nearly impossible to win. Right now it isn't. I don't see how this is balancing difficulty levels.

How? A). Get resource tech, B). Develop resource, C). Sell to 240 G. Every Civ, every time.

I don't know anyone who doesn't take advantage of this, I also doubt that you don't trade your excess luxuries to the AI for gold on Immortal+, at those difficulty levels it is almost vital that you do if you want any chance of winning.

That's kind of the point. It shouldn't be vital. It should be a viable plan but not one used in every single strategy. That tells me it's too good the way it stands. The question is how to back that up a little without sticking it to the trading civs.

And how to balance that for playing Diety? Easy. They shouldn't balance it. You should just lose. You should lose on Diety unless you're one of the very very best and get very lucky. A middling part time player like me shouldn't be able to win even on Immortal as often as I do.

 

[woodshadows]

I disagree. Their well roundedness makes them ideal for any VC. When you start a game with them, you can simply lay back for a few dozen turns to see who and what is around you before deciding on any specific direction to go. Find a bunch of wonderspamers near you? Go military to take their ripe cities. Warmongers? Go defensive and tech up to the stars, or stay small and go cultural. Most times I don't even build a scout with them, just another warrior and send them out. I like having my core cities protected by terrain, so that I only need a small civil defense force to secure it and then send out my army to lay waste to other civs.

I especially love finding myself in a hilly desert. Build Petra, take Desert Folklore, and spam the hills with terrace farms. And the money you save on improvements means larger military or more buildings in the cities without running into funding issues.

I wouldn't call well-rounded being 'ideal' for any specific victory condition.

Domination - they can hold their own, but they aren't Bismarck or Genghis, ie, both of those civs and other domination-themed civs will outperform them

Diplomatic - can hold their own, but they aren't Siam or Alexander, both of those civs and diplomacy/trade(gold) themed civs will outperform them.

Science - can hold their own, but they aren't Babylon or Korea, both will do far better.

Cultural - can hold their own.. maybe? actually I don't see them having any particular bonus relevant to this one, so again if I wanted to go for cultural victory I'd choose France, Polynesia, a civ more focused in that direction.

Like I said, Inca are a good civ, but they are well-rounded, meaning they'll do a bit better than average for every victory condition, but aren't going to really shine in any victory condition over civs better suited to those victories.

 

[woodshadows]

Deity should be nearly impossible to win. Right now it isn't. I don't see how this is balancing difficulty levels.

How? A). Get resource tech, B). Develop resource, C). Sell to 240 G. Every Civ, every time.



That's kind of the point. It shouldn't be vital. It should be a viable plan but not one used in every single strategy. That tells me it's too good the way it stands. The question is how to back that up a little without sticking it to the trading civs.

And how to balance that for playing Diety? Easy. They shouldn't balance it. You should just lose. You should lose on Diety unless you're one of the very very best and get very lucky. A middling part time player like me shouldn't be able to win even on Immortal as often as I do.

How many people can win on Deity without gaming the map/opponents/other options? I've never beat Deity playing on a standard Pangea or Continents map, sure I've done it on a tiny duel map or something, but that hardly counts for much. I'd say for probably 99% of players they would consider Deity "nearly impossible to win on" and those who are winning are often doing so off the backs of map-reloaded starting locations and extremely specific planned build/science/policy sequences. I agree that selling a luxury for gold can be 'boring' as Arabia or Netherlands, but no more boring than receiving free great people as the Maya, free gold or happiness or food, or any other free benefit from a UA, UB, or UI. Considering Deity/Immortal means the AI is basically "cheating" with enormous production/gold/science advantages over the human player, it's not really the end of the world if the God of Civ while giving the AI these advantages forced the caveat upon them that they must obligatorily purchase luxuries off the human player when on non-hostile relations.

 

[Buccaneer]

From here on out, I will only downvotes those civs that are best playing wide. That doesn't include Arabia which is best playing with their Camels (and successfully playing with few cities if the you choose the right spots). I have to read back on what others have upvoted for the civ's ability to play wide, which is a play-style I can't imagine doing (i.e., >4 cities under your control).

 

[SammyKhalifa]

How many people can win on Deity without gaming the map/opponents/other options? I've never beat Deity playing on a standard Pangea or Continents map, sure I've done it on a tiny duel map or something, but that hardly counts for much. I'd say for probably 99% of players they would consider Deity "nearly impossible to win on" and those who are winning are often doing so off the backs of map-reloaded starting locations and extremely specific planned build/science/policy sequences. I agree that selling a luxury for gold can be 'boring' as Arabia or Netherlands, but no more boring than receiving free great people as the Maya, free gold or happiness or food, or any other free benefit from a UA, UB, or UI. Considering Deity/Immortal means the AI is basically "cheating" with enormous production/gold/science advantages over the human player, it's not really the end of the world if the God of Civ while giving the AI these advantages forced the caveat upon them that they must obligatorily purchase luxuries off the human player when on non-hostile relations.

I play on random maps, so that's maybe why I can't get there.

I agree with all of that, but every civ should be "boring" in its own way. That's way boring is more interesting.

The resource selling is 2012's "RA Tech Blocking" which eventually got phased out. Though I suppose if it's not this people will just find something else.

 

[Crafty Bison]

Arabia 16
Babylon 18
China 20
Inca 38
Korea 28
Maya 15
Persia 17
Siam 9

I'm gonna be slightly controversial: Persia isn't just a better civ than China, it's a better domination civ than China.
1) the war-mongers best friend is their economy. Persia is the only civ left that can match (and imo surpass) Arabia for the gold civ. It also out produces and generates more culture than China. With the UB, it also wins in the hapiness stakes (potentially meaning even more money and even more economic dominance). China's paper maker is a good UB, but completely overpowered in this department against one of the absolute best UA's.
2) Early rushes are powerful. Persia has a great early rush UU which later ugrades into a great meatbag with an anti mounted bonus. China can't really rush till they get their first GG, which happens quicker than other civs, but not as quick as an early UU. Plus Persia actually likes it when the warrior gets an upgrade ruin.
3) The CKN. If you're warring early then your core units may have or will soon get logistics by the time they reach crossbows. At this point the CKN is just a weak version of a crossbowman. Plus, the distribution of the Persian army is more balanced outside of the UU period (and therefore more effective).
4) The combat bonus (on both sides). OK China wins this round, but only by 5%. I'd much rather have what's coming next......
5) Persias GA movement bonus. GnK cities target siege, so the 1 turn move and shoot is a massive bonus, basically a good UU by itself, and good for all eras. Generally units advance quicker, outmanouvre opponents better, get through more cities and catch more civs off guard with weak defences. The bonus applies to naval and embarked, so it's also half of englands/denmarks UA too. In hills it's most of the Inca's bonus too (aren't they leading this poll atm?), and it's better in forest/jungle.
6) GG tunneling. China gets this round too, though as with round 4, it's not by much. The movement bonuses of Persia mean more turns getting experience, so more GG's. Also the super forts can be v useful for turtle civs, but only in a marginal sense for dom civs.
7) To anyone that says Persia's useless when not in a GA and requires too many wonders to work: turn 130 to EOG is a massive period to have this UA, and most of the turns before this are smoothed over by the UU - It's not half bad as a pikeman either. It does take a couple more WW's than usual, but they're not the ones heavily targeted by the AI (or really by other human civs for the most part), and are mostly while you have all your GA bonuses to help (exception is CI which is not in this period, but worth the chase).

All in all, that's gotta be the man representing Persia in the red corner, surely?