Greek strategies.

[ProphetofProfit]

I need some ideas for when I debut in Civ V on Thursday. And other civs have their own threads while the Greeks do not.

UA
Hellenic League: City-State influence degrades half as slowly as normal, and it recovers at twice the speed as for other civilizations.

UU
Companion Cavalry: Strength 14. Movement 5. Cost 80. More likely to spawn great generals. Requires horseback riding.

+2 strength compared to Horseman and +1 movement. Cost is reasonable and should dominate all earlier units bar spearmen.

UU
Hoplite: Strength 9. Movement 2 Cost 60 Requires bronze working. +100% vs mounted units.

+2 strength compared to the Spearman. Can be unlocked via agriculture and mining, making it a useful early unit. Greater strength than all units up to Horseman, Catapults and Swordsmen.

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How do people see their early game progressing with the Greeks? It will perhaps be useful to meet as many City-States as possible to gain gold, and then to become friendly with them by completing their requests. One of the requests is to defeat nearby barbarians, which the Greeks should be well equipped to do with their early UUs. As Companions are more likely to spawn GG's, destroying a few dozen Barbarian units as soon as possible could be useful. So in order to expand and discover CSs, a scout could be the first unit to build.

I don't really feel qualified to write a long post so I'll leave it to the rest of you to fill in the blanks.

 

[cracked]

Hard to say until I've played as them. I'd be inclined to build an army to take on other civs early, as that's when you're uu's will give you an advantage.

Befriending city states should be easy. To levarge the advantage I'd try to develop the patronage sp.

Go for a diplomatic victory long term.

and avoid destroying city states if I could help it.

 

[muxec]

Destroying one city state if it makes you friend of another is well worth it. Especially if your new ally has many horses.
I played demo a little and I must say companion cavalry is very powerful. Extremely fast so you can attack the city, take heavy damage and run away from city shooting range. And it gives more great generals.
Hoplites are fine. If you are lucky to get your initial warrior upgraded by goodie hut you'll have easy barbarian farming.

 

[King Jason]

Destroying one city state if it makes you friend of another is well worth it.

Not really, with such a low rate of decay, I've found that if a city-state asks for another one to be wiped out, I usually just bribe it with gold for my influence instead.

Pay the highest amount for an instant ally for a large amount of turns and you can dump the gold when their about to become friendly again.

I had 2 cultural city-states near me and I befriended one with a little gold + many missions to maintain the alliance, and the other one wanted that ally dead... so instead I just bribed it with gold, netting me two cultural allies and plenty of resources.

 

[happyturtle]

The easiest way to make friends is the 'destroy this barb encampment' quest, which is a good incentive not to destroy encampments until they've had a chance to make trouble for someone.

After trying my hand at city conquest (demo, warlord level), I think I'll probably avoid the 'destroy our neighbor' quests unless I have a reason to want the city for myself. It's a lot of work taking a city-state, and the rewards for liberating it again are so high that you'd have to be guarding it closely the whole rest of the game.

 

[bjbrains]

The easiest way to make friends is the 'destroy this barb encampment' quest, which is a good incentive not to destroy encampments until they've had a chance to make trouble for someone.

After trying my hand at city conquest (demo, warlord level), I think I'll probably avoid the 'destroy our neighbor' quests unless I have a reason to want the city for myself. It's a lot of work taking a city-state, and the rewards for liberating it again are so high that you'd have to be guarding it closely the whole rest of the game.

I've found that conquering city states is almost always more trouble than its worth until medieval times really. City states all seem to grab walls early and even get a passive strength boost, so they often have 18-19 strength by the classical period. It can still be worth it to deny your opponents a city-state that you can't support, but as Greece you shouldn't have this problem. It also pisses off the peaceful leaders like nothing else. Be wary.

 

[12agnar0k]

Companion Cavalry make mincemeat of Spearmen too, just have them properly uprgraded and maybe have a great general backign them.
Using Companion Cavalry is a good way to break cities down early on, 14 strength is powerful!

 

[King Jason]

Companion Cavalry make mincemeat of Spearmen too, just have them properly uprgraded and maybe have a great general backign them.
Using Companion Cavalry is a good way to break cities down early on, 14 strength is powerful!

Not to mention, they can attack cities without risk of bombard if it's surrounded by at least one strip of flatland. Move 2 in, attack, move 2 out.

All in all... Companions are phenomenal. They have virtually no weakness in their era.

A roman ballista might hurt a bit, but Companions could mop up or outrun a roman military, making those pretty ineffective too..

Suffice it to say, I am quite pleased with the Greeks.

City states are awesome, by the way.

 

[Le Roi Soleil]

I have found making an enemy of the nearest city state to my borders to be quite profitable. Stealing workers is quite valuable early on, as is the presence of a sparring partner for XPs for my units when they don't have anyone better to fight. I've found that eventual conquest (early classical era) is pretty easy if you've kept the city state weak through constant harassment.

By doing this with the one closest to your borders you have a much easier time logistically during the harassment and war, and avoid getting territorially overextended once you conquer it. I also haven't noticed any deterioration in my relations with other civs or city states if I keep this treatment to a single neighbor. The message "The City States are getting nervous" (paraphrased) seems to pop up as soon as you decide to screw with a second one, but one victim seems to be considered acceptable.

 

[Cyberian]

What I found to be effective was trading excess resources (even horses) to the other civs. They are quite willing to pay a lot for that, sums of 100++ and even per turn gold.
Of course you should pick those civs that won't be dangerous to you, so not a bordering warmonger or the top tier civ but even that can work when you go to war with them they lose the ressources anyway but you got the gold.

With the extra gold I gained more city states and ultimately more resources and happy to annex one enemy capital and one city state for a mission.
I am also not building any courthouses early it is just not required with all the ressources. When Civil Service and massive growth is happening the courthouse will be built faster in a better developed city.

 

[ProphetofProfit]

I just played the demo on emperor and destroyed the Germans, Egyptians and Romans by turn 95. Here's how:

a. Go straight for Stonehendge.
b. Save up some money to get bonus culture from a city state.
c. Beeline to CC.
d. Spam CC.
e. Get the Honor SP for the GG and flanking bonus.
f. Profit.

I didn't build any more cities, just went Worker>Stonehendge>CC. This saved me a ton of culture so that I could get the GG, flanking and a golden age. I already had a GG running around, so when I popped another I started another golden age. CC are indeed brutal.

 

[Ahriman]

Well, at least no-one can say the Greeks aren't historically accurate....conquering the world in the classical era.
Though the Companion cavalry:hoplite ratio seems to go the wrong way.

 

[ProphetofProfit]

The AI was too passive in my game. All three civs had access to horses but had no Horseman at all, even with them being a big improvement on warriors. Without the threat of horseman, building Hoplites is a waste of time, since CC have 5 vs 2 movement and 14 vs 9 strength and their counter, spearmen, aren't difficult to defeat with a promotion or two and a general nearby.

 

[Larsenex]

I do get the Kill my neighbor quest along with Killing the Barbarian encampment. How do you accept the quest or do you just go over there and kill them? How can I tell if I get any kind of reward such as more influence if I do what they ask?

Thanks

 

[King Jason]

I do get the Kill my neighbor quest along with Killing the Barbarian encampment. How do you accept the quest or do you just go over there and kill them? How can I tell if I get any kind of reward such as more influence if I do what they ask?

Thanks

Click on the city-state to check if there's any active goal for them. There's no "accepting" ~ if you're the civ that completes the task then you get a boatload of influence with them.

Kinda like random event quests from CIV4, they're open to everyone until someone completes it first.

In time, after a task is done, the city-state will usually come up with another task such as generating a GP, connecting a resource to your trade network, or finding a natural wonder.

 

[Ahriman]

How do you accept the quest or do you just go over there and kill them

You just go fulfill the conditions, no acceptance needed. They're more like bounties than quests.

How can I tell if I get any kind of reward such as more influence if I do what they ask?

More influence is the reward. There is a notification any time you fulfill a quest.

 

[Ahriman]

How do you accept the quest or do you just go over there and kill them

You just go fulfill the conditions, no acceptance needed. They're more like bounties than quests.

How can I tell if I get any kind of reward such as more influence if I do what they ask?

More influence is the reward. There is a notification any time you fulfill a quest.

 

[Alexfrog]

My greek strategy:

Dont spend your initial policy picks on the first three, terrible trees. Save them up.

Get Civil Service via Great Library slingshot to get into Medieval Ages faster. Once there, spend those picks you've saved up on the patronage tree. (If you got stonehenge as well, you should have 3 picks by now).

Sell resources to the AI player to get lots of gold, as you get them. Horses, extra happy resources, etc.

Spend all that gold once you hit Medieval age on getting city state alliances. (Quests are good too if you can do them of course). Now, youll have a number of alliances, and they'll all give you extra bonuses, degrade very slowly, and give you science and great people if you get those policies!

 

[Cronos]

@ ProphetofProfit. I have had nearly the identical experience as you. The AI, in the demo anyway, just didnt build enough units, esp spearmen. They just seem to have loads of scouts and warriors running around the place in a disorganised rabble.

Just spamming CC is probably the most viable strategy for the Greeks at this point in time.

 

[King Jason]

I'm doing this in a game right now and for ease of use I'm playing Pangea and it seems as you topple civs one after the other, the other ones get a feel for your method.

Of 8 civs, the last 3 civs I encountered had literally nothing but spears in their borders.

... not that that stopped me.

Oh and I never expanded beyond Athens and my puppet-conquests, of which I only kept capitals and 2 city-states. I was lucky enough to have 2 horses in my border to start with but after a couple of alliances I had more horse than I knew what to do with, I only built 5 Companions ~ 2-3 are enough take any undefended city.

Difficulty ~ King