redwings1340
Emperor
When civilizations are revealed, we generally look at the uniques and try to figure out how to play it to the best of our abilities, getting excited about the possibilities this civilization has to offer. That's great, but in this thread, I want to try something a little different, looking at civilizations from a critical light, and try to figure out why they might end up as one of the many civilizations that doesn't end up winning. We will try to find exploits and holes in their uniques, and try to figure out times or situations where a civilization might be vulnerable to either being conquered or falling behind in the game, and how other civilizations can take advantage of this.
I'll start with Rome, since we just got information on it. Rome is very strong in the classical era, but their classical era bonuses pushes them to snowball as much as possible early, leaving them with only a small window to use their UUs and UAs. If they don't get an early huge empire, they're in trouble, and the legion's increased production cost might make a huge empire difficult to defend. Rome's forts are really good at defending choke points, but a wide empire is vulnerable to a multi-front war, and fast units like horsemen can get in to Rome's cities and pillage, forcing them to make more soldiers than they'd like or need. Since legionaries are expensive and Rome wants to go wide, it might be hard to have enough soldiers to guard everywhere in Rome at once, even with their roads.
If Rome is too busy focusing on defense early, they'll be slower at expanding, get fewer districts than they want, and not have a huge lead by the time the midieval era comes along. Eventually, as other civs tech up, Rome can find themselves not having taken full advantage of their bonuses, and start finding themselves falling behind after the classical era. A good medieval or renaissance UU can really hurt Rome and start conquering, and a multi-front war can leave Rome's once formidable defenses broken.
Rome is a great civ early game, but acts like the shoshone in civ V, they need to get an early lead and use that to snowball to victory, but if they can't do that, they're going to get surpassed. Getting to the glory of Rome shouldn't be too difficult, but avoiding the fall or Rome is going to be something all Roman players should fear.
Next up: Greece (make a post showing how Greece might lose, then post another civ for someone else to take down)
I'll start with Rome, since we just got information on it. Rome is very strong in the classical era, but their classical era bonuses pushes them to snowball as much as possible early, leaving them with only a small window to use their UUs and UAs. If they don't get an early huge empire, they're in trouble, and the legion's increased production cost might make a huge empire difficult to defend. Rome's forts are really good at defending choke points, but a wide empire is vulnerable to a multi-front war, and fast units like horsemen can get in to Rome's cities and pillage, forcing them to make more soldiers than they'd like or need. Since legionaries are expensive and Rome wants to go wide, it might be hard to have enough soldiers to guard everywhere in Rome at once, even with their roads.
If Rome is too busy focusing on defense early, they'll be slower at expanding, get fewer districts than they want, and not have a huge lead by the time the midieval era comes along. Eventually, as other civs tech up, Rome can find themselves not having taken full advantage of their bonuses, and start finding themselves falling behind after the classical era. A good medieval or renaissance UU can really hurt Rome and start conquering, and a multi-front war can leave Rome's once formidable defenses broken.
Rome is a great civ early game, but acts like the shoshone in civ V, they need to get an early lead and use that to snowball to victory, but if they can't do that, they're going to get surpassed. Getting to the glory of Rome shouldn't be too difficult, but avoiding the fall or Rome is going to be something all Roman players should fear.
Next up: Greece (make a post showing how Greece might lose, then post another civ for someone else to take down)
