Civilization Tiers for Fall From Heaven 2

[Bill Bisco]

When deciding to create a Fall From Heaven game with challenge or balance, it's helpful to know the tier of power each civ is in. With this thread, you will:

1. Know which civs are the most powerful
2. Know what the differences in tiers mean


Civilization Tiers

Tier 1: Hippus, Kuriorates
Tier 2: Amurites, Calabim, Luchiurp, Illians, Infernal
Tier 3: Lanun, Ljosalfar, Khazad, Mercurian, Shieam, Svartalfar
Tier 4: Balseraphs, Bannor, Clan of Embers, Elohim, Malakim
Tier 5: Grigori, Sidar
Tier 6: Doviello

Tier Descriptions


Tier 1
These civs have the best early and lategame competitiveness. Able to conquer opponents rapidly and build successive conquests from earlier successes. They have highly effective mobile armies. Hippus get horses from their Palace, while Kuriorates do not need horses at all. As such, both civs are able to build tier 2 and 3 units independently from terrain.

Tier 2
These civs have a secret weapon that can be devastating if released. Whether its the Amurite Firebows, the Calabim Vampires, or the Luchiurp Fireball Golems, a civilization can be swiftly defeated if the plan is completed or enough of these units are made. Their strategy takes time however, and if interrupted, their years of planning may come to naught. They lack the speed of initiation and mobility of tier 1.

Tier 3
These civs have a few tricks that help them such as Khazad production, Lanun commerce, or cottage forests. However, their tricks cannot compare with Tier 2's power and plan.

Tier 4
These civs have a couple of niceties such as Elohim's Sanctuary, Bannor's Crusade, and Clan of Embers's warrens. However, the tricks of this tier lack the robustness of Tier 3.

Tier 5
Tier 5's strategies require too much luck, and have nothing to fall back on should their various gambits fail. Waning is inadvisable most of the time, the hidden power of Ghosts is less powerful than promised, and Adventurers cannot make up for a zerg rush

Tier 6
This tier tries to emulate abilities from other tiers but fails at them and lacks a longterm strategy that is more competitive than other tiers. Wild Hunt is worse than Warcry. Lucian is inferior to Adventurers.


Questions, comments disagreements, arguments?

 

[Senethro]

Firstly, put Flauros in Tier 1 on his own.
Remove the Infernal/Mercurian as they don't play the same game as everyone else.
Lanun and Khazad are probably Tier 2. Amurites are probably Tier 3 - yes, they're powerful, but everyone knows it and will kill them early.
Finally, the Doviello are difficult to play with, not bad. A good player can easily drag them up to Tier 4. Theres a few others who fall into this category, especially warmongery ones, but its awfully subjective.

 

[Tasunke]

While I agree that Infernal and Mercurian play their own game, I think the current placement is a fair assesment of average effectiveness. With that said, removing those two is fine by me because either can become unbeatable if they play their games right.

I do not, however, agree with your devotion to Flauros. In a sandbox game, the Vampires win, this is because of their synergy with Aristograrianism + Governors Mansions. Flauros is only slightly better than the other two leaders. They are all still tier 2, although I suppose u could consider Flauros 2.5, also a Vampire armada* can eventually become a highly effective fighting force, although a tier 1 can bring some quite respectable force of arms against Flauros before he gets a force of vampires. I do not understand your reasoning that everyone is going to target the Amurites first ... because by that logic they would actually target Flauros first.

armada sounds cool. And it would require buying mobility 1 on all vampires (and logically death 2 as well)

 

[Monkeyfinger]

Lanun, Khazad: Up 2 tiers
Doviello, Balseraphs, Malakim: Up 1 tier
Hippus, Kuriotates, Svartalfar: Down 1 tier
Amurites: Down 4 tiers

Lanun commerce and Khazad happiness/aggressiveness apply from the very start and give them a really strong start. Lanun are a bit vulnerable to a an ultra fast warrior rush but the speed with which they hit tier 2 and upgrade units means the window to rush them is really short, and you can't really pillage them out because they work water and forests mainly. Nerfed versions of midgame units? No problem! Follow a religion to conpensate. OO for good melee units, Empyrean for good mounted ones and an uber caster... best 2 options. Khazad have an incredibly tough early defense, a good but not top-tier early rush, and a much stronger economy than other good rushers which makes it more profitable for them to do. As the size of the happiness bonus starts to fade, their production advantage gets rolling, and they're still financial. In the somewhat common event of a big dog gobbling up other civs and ignoring you, Dwarven Druids are the ultimate trump card in the late game barnburner that results.

Balseraphs have revelry to speed them through the last leg of the journey to sorcery, or to give them some desperately needed extra production and tech in a brutal earlygame war. It's not the most reliable move but it helps. Malakim lightbringers are great for a diverse midgame army, and if you can find some floodplains their earlygame goes pretty fast, but that's too unreliable for tier 2. Doviello are bad but not that bad, Raider and quick, cheap upgrades can make for some brutal surprise attacks.

Hippus and Kuriotates are great but not quite top of the heap. You're overstating their resource related advantages because spawning without any sort of strategic resource is very rare. Kiss of death when it happens to any other civ, sure, but one that almost never matters in my experience. Tasunke burns himself out after a couple conquests unless you have an awesome start/killer economy managment skills/no more opponents, Rhoanna can only simulate aggressive once and isn't quite as mobile, Cardith has to be very careful on defense because the loss of one city is really horrible for him, while other civs can generally afford it. Svartalfar just feel below average. Pigeonholed into one religion if they want an economy that's not horrible and their hero's only good in SP and sinister is only good in MP.

Amurites.... hahahahaha. Your description of tier 6 is SO perfect for them. Philosophical and organized are the redheaded stepchild economic traits, and while firebows have some mobility-related perks compared to other mass-summon units, their frailty and cost makes them quite the inferior option overall. Even if they can score a quick knockout or two with them, their anemic economy means they have a much harder time driving the game home than other civs with a breakout midgame move unless they're involved in a really small game (which I believe you play a disproportionally large number of.)

EDIT: I agree that the infernals and mercurians aren't really rankable. So much of their performance depends on 100-150 turns (normal speed) which they have no control over, where only other civs are doing stuff. Whether they do well or do crap, it's really easy to point the finger at events that happened BEFORE they hit the world.

And no, Flauros isn't the top Calabim leader. He has the same "kick me" sign as the amurites which humans and AIs alike can read. He's better than them because he techs a lot faster and Moroi are better than axemen and Vampries are better than.... most things... but these can be small comfort. Alexis can take most comers in the warrior age. Alexis can beat the crap out of you with Moroi, not vampires. Alexis has better vampires. Economy's a lot weaker than Flauros's, but the ability to focus on commerce/food tiles and rely on manors for hammers makes it at least respectable, and she's a lot hardier and more reliable than her bro. Flauros makes for flashier wins, but they're more prone to being stopped.

 

[Bootsiuv]

All of the civs with financial leaders are pretty much catapulted to tier 1 IMO.

Calabim, Khazad, and Lanun are all extremely powerful.

Amurites are strong, but their early game sort of sucks. They don't really get good until they get mages IMO....mid-game, and they get even better once Govannon and Firebows hit the scene.

That's an awful lot of beakers though.

The larger the map, the further down in tier the Kuriotate fall IMO. Kuriotate on duel/tiny/small are easily tier 1. They go down to tier 2 on the larger maps, and would even consider giving them tier 3 on the largest maps.

Balseraph and Clan could probably be tier 3 at least.

Illians should drop a tier or two. Lack of religion and extremely late game heroes makes their early game more difficult. They also lose the river commerce bonus if they're played the way their meant to be.

 

[Monkeyfinger]

Stasis is an incredibly flexible and powerful tool and the 3 priests are like lesser heroes which are available at philosophy. Also, +2 happiness per city from turn 1. Illians're fine at tier 2.

 

[Emptiness]

How powerful a civ is in any given game depends in large part upon map, map settings, game settings and starting position. Any tier classification needs to either address all those variables or else come with a huge "ymmv".

 

[cabbagemeister]

I agree with Monkeyfinger's post for the most part. In addition, I'd argue that:

Sheaim probably belong in T2. First, they have Pyre Zombies, which are the most fearsome UU in the game. Nothing is scarier than seeing a stack of PZs bearing down on you, and a city stocked with PZs is very difficult to take without some very unusual tricks. Second, they have the second-best mages in the game (behind Keelyn's) and a headstart towards stacking Death mana. That's a huge military advantage in both the early-mid and late-mid games, which is usually enough to secure a game.

Elohim probably belong in T5. They just have very little going for them IMO. Even their few advantages are very difficult to bring to bear.

 

[Goodgimp]

Grigori Tier5, really? Wow, I always felt they were almost overpowered and cheap when I play them

 

[Breunor]

Hmm, I usually find that the Kurio's aren't that good, but I guess I'm outvoted here. I do best with the Clan and the Khazad. I also think the Amurites are a little weaker. I've also had trouble with the Illians.

Obviously settings matter. On archipelago, the Lanun all the way ...

I'm not as strong as some of the other players here though, these are just my experiences.

Best wishes,

Breunor

 

[Demus]

the grigori are among the best semi-early rushers (a grig rush usually happens around turn 40-50, when their first adventurer hits shock 1 and a few combat promo's), and with cassiel have the potential for an economical strong midgame.
For flauros, the real advantage isn't even the vampires: it's the manors. +10-20 production per city? yes please! And he builds them twice as fast as Alexis afaik.

 

[Tasunke]

if building Governor Manors is all about being Organized, then Decius would be able to build Governor Manors with Equal speed.

I could see the Lanun as a possible tier 1 from an economic perspective, but they will hardly ever have the productive capabilities to be militariliy competitive, unless you rely on Tsunamis from OO, which can be countered with rival tsunamis or Pillar of Fire, or Fireballs ....

Khazad, however, due to their lack of speed, I don't see as going farther than Tier 2 at the max.
I hardly think that the Hippus can be considered a "permanent best civ" but when the big guns are brought to bear, thats the civ I know I can count on.

Amurites and Vampires both have long-term strategies, which makes them safe in Tier 2. Beelining for Firebows is a viable strategy, you just need a large stack of them at one time. A stack of 20 firebows can defeat 20 vampires with Death 2. Its in smaller conflicts that vampires shine. Vampires also have the advantage of extra production from governor's mansions. However its the lack of Seige (other than dragging catapults along) as well as lack of collateral, for the same reason (no easily accesible fireballs) which makes the Amurites able to crush vampire armies if given the chance. Of course you need enough of them ... I would say at least 10 firebows for starters, but even 40 firebows can probably defeat 60 vampires ... and it also depends on how much death mana the vampires have access to. You need several death mana nodes to compare spectres to fireballs in any meaningful way.

Another Vampiric advantage is the ability to gain near-infinite levels, but thats a glass-ceiling effect. Only truly reliable in extremely long SP games. In the end I would say they (Amurites and Vampires) are roughly equal, and the strongest nations in the Mid-Late era. The nations most likely to survive an early appocalypse as well, if they have decent numbers of summoning units.

Kurios simply get to the top of the food-chain the fastest. If all civs have an equal start, the Kurios can get to higher tiers with speed competitive with lanun if not faster (by faster I mean also able to grab lots of good land quickly ... with expansive + the legends worldspell). The trick with Kurios is to get to the top of the Food Chain first and keep the others beneath you.

There are alot of things such an early Hegemony can bring you ... wether its a Hyborem rush, a Basium rush, an attempted religious victory, or an attempted conquest/domination victory. If you want to play a defensive long-game, its the easiest civ (probably) to win a cultural victory, due to having 3 potentially ultra-high productive cities. Best way to acheive this is probably some combination of FOL and/or Order religions. of course, if you can simply rush for Chalid this is not needed, and you can support him with your ultra-mobile and !!Defensible!! Centaur Archers.

 

[Bill Bisco]

How powerful a civ is in any given game depends in large part upon map, map settings, game settings and starting position. Any tier classification needs to either address all those variables or else come with a huge "ymmv".

The tiers assume a Pangea-like map. Going Islands or Archipelago can easily propel Lanun to tier 1 and everyone else down.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. Some of these of classifications are in the air and require more testing. To address speicific points.

1. Regarding Flauros. He is good I'm not doubting you as I've seen it myself. But from our tests he gets soundly defeated by Horse Archers and Centaur Archers.

2. Regarding Doviello. I somewhat agree with you. However, I think Bannor, Elohim, etc. can resist Lucian and the wolves early attack, while longterm every other Tier4 civ is just flatout better. I consider Grigori and Sidar better than Doviello so my opinions are in somewhat of a bind

3. Regarding Lanun, having extra food from the sea and extra commerce there too is a good thing and no arguments there. The problem more lies in that Lanun cannot use water tiles until they acquire fishing putting them behind other civs, and that Lanun must start near enough ocean to get the most out of their civ benefit, meaning that the Lanun rely on a fair amount of luck to be competitive.

4. Regarding Khazad, they are indeed a competitive and good civ. However they get utterly thrashed against Illians and humiliated by the Hippus. There is some argument about Khazad rushes against the Amurites. My guess is that the Amurites although lacking Aggressive can hold out long enough from the Khazad to get Firebows and turn the tide. This should be tested though.

5. Regarding Balseraphs, I'm discinclined to say that they're as good as the Ljos or the Lanun But we could organize a test.

6. Regarding the tier 1 civilizations. I'm happy to defend their use against any other civ in a pangea-like map.

7. Regarding Shieam. I think a test is in order to see how they compare to Calabim, Luchiurp and Amurites.

Peace,
Bill

 

[Tasunke]

I will also state that Alazkan is quite effective in MP ... although not-so-much his HN, just the mirror that he brings with him ... and I usually find that for much of the mid-game it is most capable remaining in his hands.

 

[Lone Wolf]

Hippus, Kuriotates, Svartalfar: Down 1 tier

Why are the Svartalfar lower then the Ljosalfar? Hell terrain destroying Faeryl's precious forests?

 

[Monkeyfinger]

The Lanun can work mines and (lumbermilled) forests just as well as anyone else. Hell, they can actually draw food from those coastal forest starts that every civ has to occasionally put up with, so in that situation their production's actually really good.

How are the Khazad "slow"?

Vampires vs. firebows in a direct battle comes down to "who strikes with their summons first." That's a test of timing and scouting in SP and reaction speed in simturns MP. I consider vampires better because they're a lot less likely to die if someone drops a stack of hasted and/or road-using axemen on their heads before they can cast.

Lone Wolf: That and Arendel having much better traits than any of the other elves, including her sister.

 

[Tasunke]

only levelled vampires are alot less likely to die to more mundane means. Firebows are fairly strong in their own right. Both are likely to have copper, although Firebows also have defensive strikes and first strikes (free). So while Vampires have one point of higher defense, they are otherwise more defensive.

Khazad armies aren't usually mobile enough to be competitive unless they already have a comfortable empire with at least 3 cities (and enough culture to give them breathing room). Hawks plus mobility allows for more agile opponents to potentially run circles around the khazad. Of course ... raiders makes a large advantage.

 

[Monkeyfinger]

Hawks and mobility are available to the Khazad, so's Haste. They also get chariots, a perfectly servicable mounted unit. Trebs waste the latter three but every civ's siege has that problem. You aren't compelled to use trebs, they're just a nice little bonus if you're using a strat that already incorporates siege.

Vampires have 2 points of defensive strength over firebows, assuming equal metals. They also need not spend their apprenticeship/titan/whatever promo on fire2, and start with C1 if they're Alexis's.

 

[Ekolite]

You put the Clan of Embers in tier 4? Seriously? In my honest opinion the Clan are one of the most powerful civs in the game, especially as Jonas. The barbarian trait is a huge advantage in the early game, and even better if you can make it last until the Horsemen are terrorising your enemies for you. Then you have the Spiritual trait, a strong contender for the most powerful leader trait in the game, and expansive which combines with Warrens to allow you to build Setlers FOUR times as fast as everyone else. Tier 4?

Then you have Ogres. Yes they're more expensive then champions iirc, but Warrens counter this perfectly. If you ever get to Ogres of course, once you get Warrens you can spam warriors and outnumber your enemies by about 4 to 1.

Of course, ultimately this comes down to the player. Any single civ can be propelled to tier 1 by the right player, and that is what makes FFH such a fantastic game. Trying to rank them like this is utterly futile. Everyone has a different play style, and different preferences, so everyone has different ''tier 1'' civs. There was the thread in the strategy forum a little while ago complaining that the Khazad are underpowed and too hard to play, but many players consider them to be strong enough to be perhaps one of the top 3 civs in terms of power.

If I was ranking these, the Amurites would be in the lowest tier because my play style is very much un-magical. I rarely even research knowledge of the ether unless I have good starting mana. Similarly, never been a fan of the Illians so they'd drop a few tiers. My top tier would consist of the Lanun (Tier three, really?), the Clan, the Kuriotates and the Khazad.

 

[Ekolite]

Really, for this to be of any use or value you should attempt to rank individual leaders, leading their standard civ, on specific factors such as ''Early Rush'' (Tasunke, Alexis, etc), ''Specialist Economy'' (Sandalphon etc), ''Late game strength'' (Illians etc), ''Aristograrian Synergy'' (Flauros, Varn Gosam etc) and so on.

I think this would make for a much more interesting debate.