Gengis Khan.

[Skwink]

To me, he is the best aggressive leader. He is the only leader I have ever met who will move a HUGE stack all the way across the map to attack me. Who is most impressive to you?

 

[[username]]

I'm quite a noob and haven't played that many games yet, but the last game I had Genghis in (NC Monty), he was terrible. He quickly expanded to 9 or 10 cities by abusing both of his traits pretty well, but this crashed his economy (he had a huge power drop at some point, which I at first supposed to have been caused by Sitting Bull's defensive overkill, it might have been a Strike as well though - if AIs can get strikes, that is) and he ended up getting techs like Agriculture, Pottery and Sailing in 1000-something AD.

I find Ragnar far worse. He is good in tech, and always seems to be one of the top dogs in my games, even with terrible land.

 

[bitplayer]

The khan can be trouble I agree but shaka is worse imo. That cat definately doesn't like me.

 

[Paw]

Alexander seems pretty good. Seems to have a decent tech rate, empire, etc and seems pretty good at war (against other AIs).

That said, I always love (hate) when Monty's in my games.

 

[bestbrian]

Shaka is pretty potent, and he has the potential to snowball and become a runaway AI.

Napolean never seems to amount to much, but in the games where I've seen him competitive he's been highly effective.

 

[The7Sins]

In my games the best of the aggressive AIs is usually either Shaka or Alex.

Genghis however in every game of mine without fail will have one or more of his cities taken by barbs and a third of the time be eliminated by the barbs. He is the only AI I've seen that happen to. He is by far the worst leader of the entire game when used by the AI in my games for some reason.

 

[plasmacannon]

Mehmed tends to expand all over the place.
Gilgamesh is usually a pain to attack. Who wants to attack cities with PRO LBs and Vultures? ug.

Genghis can be stubborn.
I've had a game where I took his only horse resourse.
We both had elephants and was almost to gunpowder, but, he was behind in other techs.
He attacked that city, just so, he could build his UU.
Then, only built one.

I have seen HC lose his capitol and thus be eliminated, by Barbs.

 

[Retrograde]

In all of my games, Alexander expands slow as molasses, techs hella slow, and gets vassal'ed pretty fast. Never seen him beat anyone.

 

[Ataxerxes]

In all of my games, Alexander expands slow as molasses, techs hella slow, and gets vassal'ed pretty fast. Never seen him beat anyone.

I've had the same experience with Alex. Genghis can get going but he usually techs pretty poorly in my experience.

I go with the majority, Shaka is the most dangerous. For some reason, he doesn't tech as poorly as the other Aggressive leaders and seems to make better decisions regarding who to attack.

 

[Skwink]

I've had the same experience with Alex. Genghis can get going but he usually techs pretty poorly in my experience.

I go with the majority, Shaka is the most dangerous. For some reason, he doesn't tech as poorly as the other Aggressive leaders and seems to make better decisions regarding who to attack.

Monty often techs and all that very well in my time.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Shaka is the most dangerous. For some reason, he doesn't tech as poorly as the other Aggressive leaders

Could it be that most Aggressive Leaders will build plenty of Barracks, while Shaka's Barracks (the Ikhanda) directly reduces his City Maintenance costs and thus indirectly increases his tech rate?

 

[Gamer999]

What I have experienced is that Suruavaman seems to be the runaway guy in every game I have played he within, second strongest AI is Mehmed I think, they both expand really fast and usually grow to be the strongest. But for aggressive leaders I think Montezuma is the most dangerous one.

 

[Ataxerxes]

What I have experienced is that Suruavaman seems to be the runaway guy in every game I have played he within, second strongest AI is Mehmed I think, they both expand really fast and usually grow to be the strongest. But for aggressive leaders I think Montezuma is the most dangerous one.

Monty is definitely the most psychotic one. It's been said, "He just wants to see blood. He doesn't care if it's yours of his". One thing that can hurt him is his extreme courage. He'll attack someone he has no hope of beating. I think most people share my experience about Monty, but mileage does vary. I think Monty is even more likely to attack than Shaka, but doesn't have any judgement.

Sury and Mehmed are very good. I find the rexers to be my biggest problem - unless I'm playing OCC.

 

[Vonreuter]

I've never had any trouble with Greece either. Alexander seems to lead the Greek empire to its death in every game. At times he attacks me and loses, at other times he attacks another AI and loses. The worst I've had with him is losing a frontier city perhaps and ending up in a long war that hinders the start of my game.

Montezuma seems to end up in a similar situation than Alex, although at times he may actually win a war. He's also pretty often at my throat, which is not nice.

Shaka is a different matter, however. His civ snowballs in just about every game and expands very quickly as soon as he gets some ships over those oceans.

Tokugawa is no threat, neither has Genghis been to me.

Well, I've grown bored of seeing all the same leaders taking the lead or lagging behind so nowadays I play with mixed leaders (e.g. "Elizabeth of the Mongolians"). That's the only way to make sure Tokugawa isn't an isolationist bastard with no chances of winning, that Mansa Musa isn't always one of the top techies, that Suryavarman doesn't expand all over the place and that Asoka doesn't broker the secrets of the Indian empire to everybody who is willing to trade them for anything.

Mixed leaders seem to work pretty well. I'm seeing more interesting games nowadays, even though they are exceedingly ahistorical, but such is Civ.

 

[hotrodlincoln]

I seem to get Zara Yaqob on almost every map I play, and he always goes completely nuts and settles half the map. He's not super aggressive most of the time, but he's incredibly expansionist and eventually when he's got rifles on his enemies swordsmen he's going to stop playing nice.

One thing I frequently see is Zara settling so many cities the generator runs out of names and just calls them barbarian city names.

 

[Racsoviale]

honestly a civ game is never good without a warmonger(shaka/monty/gengis) of the three I prefer gengis the least since he is horrible at teching and always falls behind and ends up being a pushover.

 

[theskibum]

I seem to get Zara Yaqob on almost every map I play, and he always goes completely nuts and settles half the map. He's not super aggressive most of the time, but he's incredibly expansionist and eventually when he's got rifles on his enemies swordsmen he's going to stop playing nice.

One thing I frequently see is Zara settling so many cities the generator runs out of names and just calls them barbarian city names.

Zara is always well handled by the AI in my games too. Always painfull starting near him unless you get horses or copper. Then its early rush time and he has a bullseye on the back of his track suit.

 

[s.bernbaum]

I never knew Zara was such a powerhouse. I am playing as Zara in my current game. (I use random civ starts.) I have never played as him before and only had him as an AI once before. As you all mention, I am walking all over all of the AIs in production, expansion, culture, income, and expansion.

 

[Ataxerxes]

I never knew Zara was such a powerhouse. I am playing as Zara in my current game. (I use random civ starts.) I have never played as him before and only had him as an AI once before. As you all mention, I am walking all over all of the AIs in production, expansion, culture, income, and expansion.

That's been my experience with Zara as well. He has two very good traits. His UB doesn't suit me but his UU is very good. He's one of the few leaders who I make it a priority to get gunpowder with. I don't know if it's a good idea or not, but I usually upgrade my Oromos instead of building new riflemen or infantry if I can help it. I'm a sucker for two promotions free. Drill I and II aren't great, but now Drill IV is there for the taking.

 

[s.bernbaum]

That's been my experience with Zara as well. He has two very good traits. His UB doesn't suit me but his UU is very good. He's one of the few leaders who I make it a priority to get gunpowder with. I don't know if it's a good idea or not, but I usually upgrade my Oromos instead of building new riflemen or infantry if I can help it. I'm a sucker for two promotions free. Drill I and II aren't great, but now Drill IV is there for the taking.

That's exactly what I have done. After gunpowder, I avoided riflery so I could build loads of Drill IV oromos. Then I researched assemblyline. I'm two turns away from it now and one of the AIs offered to trade riflery to me last turn. So, I will be doing lots of upgrading shortly for those Drill IV infantry.