Diplomatic Victory Elimination Thread

[Hogimus]

15. Gorgo/Greece [14]
21. Kristina/Sweden [50]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [46]
30. Pericles/Greece [30] (33-3) @bengalryan9 makes a good point. You need space to get all the envoys this could give you, and Pericles has no great way to do.
40. Tamar/Georgia [26]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [45]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [20] (19+1) If all of this comes down to who can generate the most DF, why would we eliminate a civ that has two extra sources of DF over three that whose DF generation is less reliable? For Gorgo and Pericles's bonus you need at least three acropolises (?) to get 1 extra DF a turn, and that's only if you have no competition.

 

[Weraptor]

15. Gorgo/Greece [14]
21. Kristina/Sweden [51] (50+1) Will be interesting to see who wins, Kristina or Teddy?
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [46]
30. Pericles/Greece [30]
40. Tamar/Georgia [26]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [45]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [17] (20-3) Not reliable enough and rather wins a cv.

 

[Kwami]

15. Gorgo/Greece [14]
21. Kristina/Sweden [52] (51 + 1) I voted for Teddy last time, so I'll go with Kristina this time.
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [46]
30. Pericles/Greece [30]
40. Tamar/Georgia [26]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [45]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [14] (17 - 3) One source of Favor (from Tourism) is essentially zero. The other (emergencies) is highly variable and usually doesn't provide much. Much worse than the other options here.

Some quick numbers on Teddy. In addition to the passive Favor granted by each government, Teddy also gets:

Classical Republic: 2 DF per turn from the Classical Era
Merchant Republic: 3 DF per turn from the Renaissance Era
Democracy: 4 DF per turn from the Modern Era
Digital Democracy: 8 DF per turn from the Information Era

+1 DF per turn if you can build Forbidden City and +1 DF per turn if you can build Potala Palace, too.

Teddy gets this Favor just for existing. He doesn't need to devote Gold or production or Envoys or other resources to get it. He doesn't need a religion. He just needs to exist.

So, maybe in a lucky Canada game where you get an emergency that you're eligible to join every 30 turns or so, you can get an average of 3 DF per turn over the course of the game, but Teddy is clearly getting more than that. And besides, Canada has to spend Gold or Production to get that Favor. And, in my experience, I've never had a game with so many emergencies that I could join and win. There's no way that Wilfrid beats Teddy on DF in the vast majority of games.

 

[TeddyMain]

15. Gorgo/Greece [14]
21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [46]
30. Pericles/Greece [30]
40. Tamar/Georgia [26]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [46] [45+1] Kristina is the definite winner of this thread, but also I highly doubt Matthias can beat Teddy in terms of favor production.
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [11] [14-3] I've voted for them many times in the past, but at this point they're the weakest of the bunch.

 

[enKage]

I would not be able to vote later possibly, so forgive me slightly earlier hour

I just finished Canada game to check why it is still here and some thoughts.
1) Emergencies / competitions are roughly every 30 turns
2) For winning competition you get 100 DF, 200 DF if you are a target. Canada doubles it, so it is respectively 200/400 DF
3) 200DF / 30 turns is slightly over 6DF per turn. This is like suzereinity over 6 city states. Common civ gets 3, but don't focus on emergencies, right? Of course you cannot enter / enforce each emergency, but most of them you can.
Anyway, let's say Wilfried gets 3 more DF over regular civ per turn. This is more than Teddy before level 3 gov. But can easily get even more, just by being emergency target! Take one city in war not to geneate greviances, enjoy.
4) Tourism as Canada is easy to get: hockey/mounties, so few more DF per turn
5) Lategame Canada is strong culture civ. Not as strong as Greek and Sweden, but better then the rest on the list.And this means earlier DF from finishing civic tree

I have to strongly revise my previous thoughts and for now I think Canada > USA, even if DF may be sth equal, culture makes the difference.

And would Georgia get those 3 more suzereinities? Depends on map. Neighbours - no problem. Further CS - problematic.
Someone said there is nothing stopping me from converting distant city state. Probably someone forgot waves of apostles and missionaries of Peter, Mansa, Gandhi, Poland Khmer.... a lot with deity AI faith bonus.
And Georgia has ZERO culture bonus, and focusing on faith means theatres come later


15. Gorgo/Greece [14]
21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [46]
30. Pericles/Greece [30]
40. Tamar/Georgia [23] 26-3 Please, be gone
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [46]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [12] 11+1 Not yet. not before Georgia.

 

[Leucarum]

15. Gorgo/Greece [11] (13-3)
21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [46]
30. Pericles/Greece [30]
40. Tamar/Georgia [23]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [46]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [13] 12+1

Wow! That changed fast. I think the CS folk should really go next. It really usually isn't that hard to control most of the city states regardless of who you play so like the gold generators they don't bring as much new to the table... Matthias has got to be the best of Greece/Georgia/Hungary

Then between the tree DF gatherers, Kristina is in a class of her own.

Out of the other two, Teddy is completely passive, but if you don't play 100% passively - Wilfrid can usually trigger an emergency or two against himself early in the game. In that case he dwarfs the favour Teddy can generate. Each of those emergencies is the equivalent of 60 turns of teddy at tier 3 govt. You can also get it early enough that you can dominate early congresses where you arent 100% sure of the result.

Some of the disagreement appears to be about how easy emergencies are to trigger... Does difficulty play a role in people's assessment here? On lower levels where most of the AI loves you it can be harder to trigger an energency so there is that.

 

[kryat]

15. Gorgo/Greece [11]
21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [47] (46+1)
30. Pericles/Greece [30]
40. Tamar/Georgia [23]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [46]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [10] (13-3)

Hungary is amazing for this victory type. The best ability for envoy bonuses, great gold and culture generation (from being able to build CH and TS across rivers quickly), and UUs that encourage diplomatic play (are fast enough to field quickly). He’s just a lot of fun to play.

In my last Canada game, I was generating a staggering +16 raw diplomatic favor per turn from tourism alone. No one else can touch that. The problem is that 1600 tourism per turn will get you to a culture victory very quickly. This is not a fake problem. I suppose one could moderate the amount of tourism per turn, but that seems to be more hassle than it’s worth.

 

[leandrombraz]

15. Gorgo/Greece [8] (11-3)
21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [47]
30. Pericles/Greece [30]
40. Tamar/Georgia [23]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [47] (46+1)
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [10]

Getting and keeping your religion as the majority in a city state is pretty difficult without eliminating the religion in the region altogether

You don't need to keep, it's a matter of timing and of using your envoys wisely. I usually save envoys because it isn't worth sending them unless they give me something, like leaving a CS with 1~3~6 envoys to get some yields or get their suzerainty. If I have only enough envoys to get a CS to 5, for example or I don't have enough to be their suzerain, I'll save the envoys for later since they won't do anything now. I also keep an eye on when I'll unlock more envoys. Point is, I'll convert a city when I have envoys to send and I'll have envoys to send because I didn't waste them or/and because I synced the conversion with the time I unlocked more envoys. I won't convert and then try to keep the city converted into I get envoys. After the deed is done, the AI can flip it back to their religion, I already got my envoys.

 

[bengalryan9]

15. Gorgo/Greece [8]
21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [47]
30. Pericles/Greece [27] (30-3) How much extra favor is a peaceful Pericles really going to turn those 10-12 extra envoys in to?
40. Tamar/Georgia [23]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [47]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [11] (10+1) Oh Canada...

One source of Favor (from Tourism) is essentially zero.

In my last Canada game, I was generating a staggering +16 raw diplomatic favor per turn from tourism alone. No one else can touch that. The problem is that 1600 tourism per turn will get you to a culture victory very quickly.

Well which is it? If they're on the route to getting a culture victory, they're probably getting at least 700-1000 tourism which is an extra +7-10 favor per turn. That's not nothing, and even Teddy has a tough time matching that without going to a Tier 4 government. On the flip side, if Wilfred's getting essentially zero from this bonus as you say, he has no chance at winning a CV. So there are a lot of mixed messages regarding Canada here, which is a real shame that's going to knock Canada out too early (the same thing happened with the Mountie, so no shock there). If Canada's getting attacked from two completely opposite sides of an argument, maybe it's not such a good argument on either side? The truth lies somewhere in the middle in most games: +5 favor or so per turn with no real shot at winning a CV. That seems pretty good for DV to me.

Teddy gets this Favor just for existing. He doesn't need to devote Gold or production or Envoys or other resources to get it. He doesn't need a religion. He just needs to exist.

So, maybe in a lucky Canada game where you get an emergency that you're eligible to join every 30 turns or so, you can get an average of 3 DF per turn over the course of the game, but Teddy is clearly getting more than that. And besides, Canada has to spend Gold or Production to get that Favor. And, in my experience, I've never had a game with so many emergencies that I could join and win. There's no way that Wilfrid beats Teddy on DF in the vast majority of games.

Who here is saying Wilfred is better than Teddy at favor generation? *I* sure didn't, and in the top 5 I just posted I had Teddy ahead of Canada, because yeah, it's obvious. What Canada *is* is better at generating favor than Gorgo, Pericles, and Tamar, all of whom you chose not to downvote because you wanted to assert that Canada's not top 2 when there are 7 civs left on the list, I guess?

I have to strongly revise my previous thoughts and for now I think Canada > USA, even if DF may be sth equal, culture makes the difference.

Kudos to you for actually trying them out and realizing the error of your ways. Now if only Canada could get those points you took away back.

For winning competition you get 100 DF, 200 DF if you are a target. Canada doubles it, so it is respectively 200/400 DF

Guys, seriously, look at those numbers and calculate how much favor per turn you'd have to generate to get that much favor over 30 turns, then ask how many civs can actually do that. If it happens once, that's a huge boon. These can and will happen multiple times in a game.

 

[Kwami]

15. Gorgo/Greece [8]
21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [47]
30. Pericles/Greece [27]
40. Tamar/Georgia [23]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [48] (47 + 1) I voted for Kristina last time, so it's Teddy this time. See previous post for Teddy numbers. In short, way more DF per turn than Canada.
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [8] (11 - 3) Canada isn't getting 6 DF per turn more than other leaders from emergencies. Half of that DF is available to anyone. At best, you're looking at 3 DF per turn. More likely, it'll be less than that. Emergencies aren't guaranteed and Canada isn't always eligible to join them. Also, if you're making any significant DF per turn from the Tourism->DF ability, then you'll probably just win a Cultural Victory before you win a Diplomatic Victory. So, it's a non-factor.

And no, Canada isn't top 2. The top 2 are probably Teddy and Kristina. Frankly, Canada's not even top 5. They should have been eliminated a while ago.

 

[KnightModern]

15. Gorgo/Greece [5] (8 - 3) time for her to go, Wilfrid is more suited for DV than her
21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [47]
30. Pericles/Greece [27]
40. Tamar/Georgia [23]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [49] (48 + 1) top 2, that's for sure
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [8]

 

[Weraptor]

15. Gorgo/Greece [2] (5-3) Ending her suffering.
21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [47]
30. Pericles/Greece [27]
40. Tamar/Georgia [24] (23+1) Better than Pericles.
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [49]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [8]

 

[Hogimus]

"Canada isn't getting 6 DF per turn more than other leaders from emergencies. Half of that DF is available to anyone. At best, you're looking at 3 DF per turn. More likely, it'll be less than that. Emergencies aren't guaranteed and Canada isn't always eligible to join them. Also, if you're making any significant DF per turn from the Tourism->DF ability, then you'll probably just win a Cultural Victory before you win a Diplomatic Victory. So, it's a non-factor."

Nearby city-states are not guaranteed either. Tamar needs to already have invested envoys in a city-state and then keep them her religion to get any kind of bonus over anyone else. Yah, you can go out and convert them, but to keep them you need to keep up your faith game, so why aren't you just winning a religious victory? City-state access in the early game is random, but creating an emergency and generating tourism are directly in your control.

15. Gorgo/Greece [Eliminated] (2-3) Only has one non-guaranteed form of DF generation
21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [47]
30. Pericles/Greece [27]
40. Tamar/Georgia [23]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [48]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [9] (8+1) Has two methods of DF generation

 

[lotrmith]

21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [47]
30. Pericles/Greece [27]
40. Tamar/Georgia [25] 24 + 1 We get it, a lot of you hate religion, but the advantage here is real.
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [46] 49 - 3 Getting my votes in now, don't take it personal we're nearly at top 5. Per era, someone with an envoy advantage is likely out-earn Teddy in DF. Plus this ability is the *most* boring.
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [9]

It appears to me that Gorgo is eliminated due to muliple votes? @Hogimus totals seem very off.

We are rating civs mainly regarding power but flavour is also taken into account.

 

[BenitoChavez]

21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [47]
30. Pericles/Greece [27]
40. Tamar/Georgia [22] = 25 - 3. See below
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [47] = 46 + 1. Consistent and powerful. I'd rather have Teddy than Matthias for pure diplo.
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [9]

You don't need to keep, it's a matter of timing and of using your envoys wisely. I usually save envoys because it isn't worth sending them unless they give me something, like leaving a CS with 1~3~6 envoys to get some yields or get their suzerainty. If I have only enough envoys to get a CS to 5, for example or I don't have enough to be their suzerain, I'll save the envoys for later since they won't do anything now. I also keep an eye on when I'll unlock more envoys. Point is, I'll convert a city when I have envoys to send and I'll have envoys to send because I didn't waste them or/and because I synced the conversion with the time I unlocked more envoys. I won't convert and then try to keep the city converted into I get envoys. After the deed is done, the AI can flip it back to their religion, I already got my envoys.

Sure you could do that. But to do that you have to wait until you want to use your envoys, march your religious units across the map, keep them alive vs the swarms of AI religious units, convert the city, send your envoys, then march your religious units away. If you lose suzerainty, you need to repeat the process to get the bonus envoys. Point being, its a work intensive, convoluted process. Everyone else, other than maybe Wilfrid has equally powerful but simpler mechanics.

 

[TeddyMain]

21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [44] [47-3] City-state suzerainty now can only get you so far, since each city-state you have suzerainty over gives 1 DF per turn. It actually is pretty map-dependent if you think about it, as for Tamar, Pericles, and Matthias, larger maps=more city-states=more favor, and smaller maps=less city-states=less favor. Kristina and Teddy don't have to worry about this issue.
30. Pericles/Greece [27]
40. Tamar/Georgia [22]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [48] [47+1] This thread prioritizes efficiency in achieving a diplomatic victory, not how much fun achieving a diplo victory is. Yeah I agree, Teddy's is by far the most boring, but that's because it is so much easier to get a good amount of diplo favor compared to fighting for city-state suzerainty.
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [9]

Also I believe Gandhi has vanished from the finishing scores list.

 

[Flaxton]

21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [44]
30. Pericles/Greece [24] 27-3, How many Acro can you actually build? Compared with Matt and Tamar they will control CS better
40. Tamar/Georgia [22]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [49] 48+1, simply because I believe Sweden will win by culture first.
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [9]

 

[Kmart_Elvis]

21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [44]
30. Pericles/Greece [21] (24-3) I agree that the limited amount of envoys you earn with him hurts him. You just get 1 Envoy per Acropolis. With Matthias, you can just keep buying 2 envoys for some gold. With Tamar, you get an extra envoy each time you earn one, provided the city state is your religion. Both of those civs have the ability to overtake all City states with envoys, something Pericles lacks.
40. Tamar/Georgia [23] (22+1) As I stated above, I rank her higher than Pericles in ultimate envoy generation, although she's still not as good as Matthias. Still she brings unique religious/city state playstyle that's quite fun. Deserves the top 5.
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [49]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [9]

 

[enKage]

Tamar vs Kristina: map dependent suzerein of few neighbouring city states vs massive DF and culture
Tamar vs Mathias: map dependent suzerein of few neighbouring city states vs unlimited envoys and neverending suzerein over every CS in a game
Tamar vs Pericles: map dependent suzerein of few neighbouring city states vs massive culture and strong number of envoys depending on number of cities
Tamar vs Teddy: map dependent suzerein of few neighbouring city states vs passive DF, higher and earlier than suzerein status over few neighbouring cities
Tamar vs Wilfried: map dependent suzerein of few neighbouring city states vs strong culture and 2 sources of additional DF, both higher than suzerein status over neighboring cities

Really? Georgia in top5? The world collapses.....


21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [44]
30. Pericles/Greece [21]
40. Tamar/Georgia [20] 23-3 It is weaker than many eliminated, including Mali, Persia, Cree, Egypt, who can directly buy 4-8 diplo victory points without hurting economy. Should not be in top10, but somehow knocking to top5
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [49]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [10] 9+1 up up up! After my last game I give it a place in top3

 

[bengalryan9]

21. Kristina/Sweden [52]
25. Matthias Corvinus/Hungary [44]
30. Pericles/Greece [18] (21-3) Unlike Matthias or Tamar, he has a hard cap on the number of extra envoys he can produce. Do you really think those 8-12 extra envoys are going to let him keep up with anyone else on this list in favor? If so, you're fooling yourself. If you want to get more than that and go on the offensive, you're going to build up grievances that cancel out any extra favor you get altogether.
40. Tamar/Georgia [20]
41. Teddy Roosevelt/America [49]
45. Wilfrid Laurier/Canada [11] (10+1)

First off, emergencies aren't reliable? CITY STATES aren't reliable! Nobody wants to hold that against Greece, Georgia, or Hungary though. The last game I finished had 2 city states standing at the end, and usually it's not much better than that.

Second, even if he's only (lol) averaging +3 extra DF per turn, how many extra envoys do Gorgo, Pericles, and Tamar actually need to generate to compensate for that? Quite a few. Favor > Envoys, because all those envoys *might* get you (after you've spent a few of them on the same city state) is 1 extra favor per turn... if that city state survives.

Re: Wilfrid's tourism bonus, let's be realistic here. There exists this mythical place called a "middle ground" where Wilfrid is most likely to find himself as far as tourism is concerned. There may be a few times where he's pulling in 1600 tourism and getting +16 favor per turn while heading towards a culture victory, and there may a few times where he has little-to-no tourism and gets nothing from the bonus, but the overwhelming majority of games are going to find him somewhere in the middle. If Wilfred's got 400-500 tourism (not too difficult) he's almost assuredly not getting a CV, but that +4 to +5 extra favor (on top of the extra he already gets from emergencies and competitions!) is huge, particularly in the late game when (especially on higher difficulties) there may be less than a handful of city states even left and everyone else on this list (except Teddy and Kristina) are losing their main sources of extra favor.

There are two people on this list that I would say could reliably produce more favor than Canada. Period.