Does Sumeria need a rework?

[DogeEnricoDandolo]

Recently I found a mod by Sukritact that reworks Sumeria's civ ability that actually makes this civ fun to play. The related achievement of winning with Sumeria is "Cradle of Civilization", yet playing this civ is so dull and boring it feels more like a warring tribe than the first ever civilization. Not to mention, additional Tribal village reward on top of gold when clearing Barb camps and 50% discount when levying are just borderline useless when the game gets past Classical. The civ always feels like it boils down to spam War-carts and win within the first 20 mins of the game, since there is literally next to zero counterplay to this UU that it doesn't really matter what Gilgamesh's leader ability and Sumeria's civ ability are. In terms of "dull gameplay", Sumeria is only rivaled by Korea.

Firaxis, if you still are working on updating Gathering Storm, please take a look.

What do you guys think?

(The mod that inspires this post for anyone who needs it: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1763144075)

 

[acluewithout]

Yes, they do.

I’d seen the same Mod and it had got me thinking along the same lines.

Sumeria is a funny case. The main features of Sumer are the Warcart and UI, which I think are both fine. Yeah, Gilgabro has a strong early game, but that’s his schtick and that’s fine. The Civ ability is also fine. Not really game changing, but fine. And overall, I think Sumer’s power level is fine.

But the leader ability is a hot mess. It’s just confusing and seems directed at multiplayer in a way that makes zero sense given basically no other Civs are directed a MP specifically.

I think LA just needs to be simplified. The question then becomes, depending on what you do with the LA, do you tweak any other abilities.

All that said. Sukritact’s Mod, while a more extensive rework, is a very cool take on the Civ. The extra pop for starting cities and adjacency for the UI are awesome. And I agree that making Sumer feel more like a builder Civ would be cool.

 

[The googles do nothing]

If it make the game more fun to play for you and others it's a good mod. I think that Sumeria's UA and LA are fine but the problem is you don't need to use them to win because of the great early game advantages. There's enough civ's now that have a few be one trick and easy mode is ok.

 

[DogeEnricoDandolo]

I think LA needs some tweaks so it can work in multiplayer without getting easily abused. However, I do think the Civ ability needs to be changed, like completely. As I said earlier, this ability does not make it feel like the first ever civilization, more like a warring tribe. The barb camp part can be kept, but I want to see something like the mod suggests, to make them feel like actually builders, and not just warmongers.

If it make the game more fun to play for you and others it's a good mod. I think that Sumeria's UA and LA are fine but the problem is you don't need to use them to win because of the great early game advantages. There's enough civ's now that have a few be one trick and easy mode is ok.

My point is not to make the civ more complicated, but that you have to use at least 3 out of 4 bonuses to win. There are a lot of single minded civs (especially those cultural and domination ones) where their gameplay is super straightforward regarding what they want to do, but they are still a treat to play, not like "I'm just gonna win 1 game, unlock their achievement, fill the Hall of Fame and forget about them forever". There are 3 civs in the game where I think only one of 4 bonus works, which are Korea (Seowon), Scotland (civ ability) and Sumeria (War-Cart), where all other 3 bonuses either are too weak and inconsequential, or only weakly complimentary and directly dependent upon the strongest bonus. Scotland is clearly the least dull in all 3, but still. These civs are not weak by any means, but a little balance by spreading the strength to all 4 bonuses instead of heaping all in 1 definitely helps the game, since you actually feel like you are making decisions on when to focus on what, not tunnel-visioning the entire game.

 

[Haig]

I would make war chariots less strong or cost more production.

 

[Bibor]

Here's how I play Gilgamesh currently.
I conquer my closest neighbor with warcarts and starting warrior, because why not. The second neighbor might or might not be doable with warcarts. It's not a guaranteed success. With extra benefits from camps, you are incentivized to divert warcarts from your war effort. In any case, you can now block off a sizeable amount of land for quite a while, which makes barbarian spawns a thing through classical era and perhaps beyond.

This is pretty much how first ancient civilizations were built. They didn't start with Ziggurats or Pyramids, they started with conquests. If anything, I'd say Gilgamesh is the best of early conquerors, because Ziggurats can really help prop up this style of gameplay. This isn't unique. Aztecs have a very similar playstyle and, arguably Scyhtia has the same, just slightly later.

Sumeria is one of those civs that make much more sense on a huge map or with many AIs, where their playstyle fits the historical narrative. With 16 civs, Sumeria gobbles up 2 and then someone gobbles up Sumeria. That's pretty much how it went anyway.

 

[jozef57]

i not agre that korea is dull it is maybe the strongest civ in the game

 

[Bibor]

i not agre that korea is dull it is maybe the strongest civ in the game

Doubt it. Korea is has a very slow start in anything but tech. As such, it's early game is really rather dull.

 

[DogeEnricoDandolo]

i not agre that korea is dull it is maybe the strongest civ in the game

"Dull" and "weak" are not synonymous, it has nothing to do with being strong or not.

 

[Pietato]

You should be clearing barb camps all game long.

 

[Gloompy]

I have no idea. First off, the guy is way too ugly to play. Secondly, im only on my 4th game so I have no experience with him other than using my Viking Longboats to pillage his idiot southern shores. I really like this Harald Haradr--whatever dude im playing as. Sumeria seems a little to compliant on others though, so I kind of agree.

 

[gozpel]

No one mention Nubia, I take out two civs way before Classical era on Deity, every time. Well that said, if they are close enough.

Build order: scout, slinger x 3, builder in between maybe, warrior and slinger. Research archery, upgrade 4 slingers to Pitati archers and your neighbour is doomed.
Now you have 4 archers and 2 warriors, you can kill anything with that.

Haha, just reroll like me, so you get good tiles in your first city.

 

[kaspergm]

I would make war chariots less strong or cost more production.

I agree, there's a mod that makes War Carts and actual Chariot replacement, and I think that's fine.

 

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

I would make war chariots less strong or cost more production.

Yes. War Cart should be their replacemnt of heavy chariots ('heavy' prefix comes here... did 'light chariots' exists and what consitiutes 'ligth' and 'heavy' variants of the two ancient mounted units? since both are manned by warrior castes of each respective empires (and thus were trained from early childhood, existence of these reflexts that an empire with this has develop a complex and systematic society where one person sticked to one profession is more efficient than one person to do many jobs when needed).

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

Yes. War Cart should be their replacemnt of heavy chariots ('heavy' prefix comes here... did 'light chariots' exists and what consitiutes 'ligth' and 'heavy' variants of the two ancient mounted units? since both are manned by warrior castes of each respective empires (and thus were trained from early childhood, existence of these reflexts that an empire with this has develop a complex and systematic society where one person sticked to one profession is more efficient than one person to do many jobs when needed).

Old wargames typically depicted "light" chariots as two men on the chariot performing a skirmishing function with javelins or bows while "heavy" chariots held three to four men, also with javelins or bows but sometimes a spear as well, performing a shock function through a willingness to charge enemy formation and close to melee range.

How well old wargames captured the historical use of chariots, I don't know, but I suspect there's some validity to describing a precursor to Knights as a "heavy chariot" unit.

And, like Knights, in my opinion they should be expensive to maintain and you should be limited in how many of them an empire can field.

 

[Victoria]

and 50% discount when levying are just borderline useless when the game gets past Classical

I completely disagree, for a start few levy when they should, the discount is great and combined with no maintenance on the donkey carts, it is great.

ability that actually makes this civ fun to play

They are fun, they are OP fun but more importantly they are one of the civs best aligned to their abilities.
If you do not want to play them, then don’t, there are a zillion others. I mostly play England and only want her changed to get rid of ahistorical stuff like free units. Sumeria’s ally ability and friends abilities also make them one of the few civs out there that are different to play with, ally with them all game and see the benefits.

You don’t like them fair enough, maybe they are a bit OP but Nubia is more OP as is Genghis and possibly Incan.

Their ziggurats feel right, their donkey carts feel right, their alliance stuff fits in with them too as does their ally stuff. You say they are boring I say they are not, certainly not as boring as Korea.

 

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

And, like Knights, in my opinion they (Charoits) should be expensive to maintain and you should be limited in how many of them an empire can field.

There comes a problem of criterion to use the limit numbers of these early heavy cavs (and codes. since these will limit tanks as well). Anything that comes before tanks are strictly associated with social strata. from chariots of antiquity, through cataphracts, kights, and cuirassiers (many Cuirassiers are Elite Guards, like Prussian Gardes du Corps). Since before the proliferations of repeating firearms, warfare (and combat) is/are a matter of personal skills and proficiency (that so often requires a decade or two of training and perfections).

 

[acluewithout]

I agree levying CA is really strong and synergises well with their UU. Sumer build the Heavyweight Chariot. Fez (or whoever) builds everything else. The levy ability also ratchets well with difficulty, because CS get more units with higher difficulties.

The barb camp thing is completely and utterly random. But fun.

War Donkeys are awesome. They’re meant to be OP and fun. They wouldn’t be anywhere near as fun if you couldn’t build them right away. And there’s a subtle nerf, because if you are building them right away you’ll have to do that without a Policy Card...

Ziggurat is good, but it’s maybe showing it’s age compared to newer Civs. It could probably use a tweak - not to make it more powerful, but to make it more interesting to place.

I don’t get the Leader Ability. It just sounds convoluted and hard to leverage. I like the focus on allies, but the whole sharing xp and get ally points by getting into wars sounds messy.

I also agree there could have been more of a nod to great buildings etc.

Sumeria are a cool design. Could they use a bit of a tweak? Yeah. Do they need a tweak for game balance? Probably Nah.

What Sumeria really need is a worth challenge...

 

[MonkeyPaw]

Gathering Storm was a bit of a buff for Ziggurats, they can get some really nice yields on floodplains after a flood or two. And it's very appropriate for Sumeria that you want to settle near fertile rivers.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

There comes a problem of criterion to use the limit numbers of these early heavy cavs (and codes. since these will limit tanks as well). Anything that comes before tanks are strictly associated with social strata. from chariots of antiquity, through cataphracts, kights, and cuirassiers (many Cuirassiers are Elite Guards, like Prussian Gardes du Corps). Since before the proliferations of repeating firearms, warfare (and combat) is/are a matter of personal skills and proficiency (that so often requires a decade or two of training and perfections).

Agreed. I've personally argued that elite/professional unit limits should be based on your military infrastructure / social policy cards to reflect these considerations, while grunt troops should be limited by your overall population size (and easily replaced after a couple of turns).