[R&F] Is England the worst Naval Civ?

[acluewithout]

Or even more narrowly, who's best suited to "rule the waves", i.e. who has the best advantages in naval combat.

Probably Monty, right?

Attack bonus for luxuries, and luxes give you a reason to have cities on other continents, and their builders let you get harbours faster. Monty rules the waves.

...hang on... maybe Monty is a Naval Civ! Just got to teach those Eagle Warriors to Swim...

 

[KayAU]

@KayAU I'm shocked you'd say Spain are only a "bit" Naval. I mean, I think I get your logic, but please no!

To be honest, I was surprised by this myself. But when I started to consider which of their abilities are oriented towards naval gameplay, it really only comes down to the earlier fleets and armadas, as well as some incentive to cross the ocean to find a new continent. I think Spain is a religious civ, first and foremost.

I did put them at the top of the "a bit naval" civs, though.

 

[Archon_Wing]

A naval civ i think is a civ that explicitly has bonus to something in the water. But yes, it's kinda silly that some civs are great at everything and just spills over. For example, Mongolia could be considered a religious civ because their diplo combat bonus applies to religious units. The result is that poor Spain can't even keep up with the Mongols or Aztec in something they're supposed to excel at!

And you'll notice this with the too-strong civs like Sumeria/Scythia/Rome/Aztec/w.e. They're not just one-trick ponies. They're basically good at everything and then you have civs that are good at nothing as a result.

Though to be fair there are probably more strong choices than in many games where only 2-3 are truly viable choices.

 

[Scaramanga]

To add to this naval-gazing I would say that England is great because they get three uniques to earn era points. If they don't start near a continental border they can boost Cartography easier and sail into the map's main ocean to the other side of the world. Speaking from experience on pangea maps there is usually some settling room there and you get circumnavigation points. Responding to Emergencies on the home continent is all they need to interfere with and then England can shine when colonising other areas of the map.

 

[liv]

To add to this naval-gazing I would say that England is great because they get three uniques to earn era points. If they don't start near a continental border they can boost Cartography easier and sail into the map's main ocean to the other side of the world. Speaking from experience on pangea maps there is usually some settling room there and you get circumnavigation points. Responding to Emergencies on the home continent is all they need to interfere with and then England can shine when colonising other areas of the map.

I think England only has two uniques. The British Museum is an ability and you do not get era score from that.
They can sail but settling there is not easy due to everything already being gobbled up or loyalty issues.

 

[Tech Osen]

Are we sure Zulu's early corp/armies spill over onto fleet/armadas? I mean Spain doesn't get earlier corp/armies, does it?

 

[liv]

I seem to remember trying that with the Zulus and it did not work. boats needed to wait

eta
I checked. Zulus cannot make fleets when they get mercenary

 

[kryat]

I think England only has two uniques. The British Museum is an ability and you do not get era score from that.
They can sail but settling there is not easy due to everything already being gobbled up or loyalty issues.

Redcoat, Seadog, and RND

 

[Scaramanga]

I think England only has two uniques. The British Museum is an ability and you do not get era score from that.
They can sail but settling there is not easy due to everything already being gobbled up or loyalty issues.

Three: two units and a district.
Very often I find acres of space on the other side of the world. But even one city in a prime location is foothold.

 

[acluewithout]

Well, one thing that’s come out of this thread is how many Civs are good at Naval stuff, which I’d never really thought about. I mean, none of them are England of course, which is rubbish (as is Spain apparently), but there are quite a few good explicitly Naval Civs, and quite a few which are sort of secretly good at Naval stuff ("submarines" if you will).

This thread may have motivated me enough to try Netherlands some more. I think the only reason I’ve avoided them is that I don’t like the leader. I mean, I do like her. I’d never really heard about Steam Boat Willy before Civ VI. She’s a very cool person, and I generally like how FXS have been pulling in a more diverse set of great people for leaders. So, good work FXS... but, yeah, I just can’t get into playing her as a leader. Maybe that’s a bit daft on my part.

What’s a bit annoying is that there are so many good Naval civs, and Naval / Coastal stuff generally, but then the Naval and Colonial game is so lacking generally. I can’t see the next expansion actually doing much about that - I’m expecting it will be heavily focused on governments and ideology and maybe industrialisation. Naval and Colonies seems like something that would need more a chunky dlc. Here’s hoping FXS are open to something like some cool dlc after the next expansion (a bit like how EU4 does it), because there a lots of (small-ish) areas the game could use some filling out.

 

[KayAU]

The Netherlands are very good, in my opinion. I played as them in my previous game, and those river adjacency bonuses made for some pretty amazing districts. I had very few Campuses, Industrial Zones or Theatre Squares with less than +4.

Currently, I'm playing as the Shoshone. That's right, I've gone back to Civ 5 for a while. At first it was a bit daunting, as I had forgotten how to play it properly, but it is coming back to me now.

 

[UWHabs]

Well, one thing that’s come out of this thread is how many Civs are good at Naval stuff, which I’d never really thought about. I mean, none of them are England of course, which is rubbish (as is Spain apparently), but there are quite a few good explicitly Naval Civs, and quite a few which are sort of secretly good at Naval stuff ("submarines" if you will).

This thread may have motivated me enough to try Netherlands some more. I think the only reason I’ve avoided them is that I don’t like the leader. I mean, I do like her. I’d never really heard about Steam Boat Willy before Civ VI. She’s a very cool person, and I generally like how FXS have been pulling in a more diverse set of great people for leaders. So, good work FXS... but, yeah, I just can’t get into playing her as a leader. Maybe that’s a bit daft on my part.

What’s a bit annoying is that there are so many good Naval civs, and Naval / Coastal stuff generally, but then the Naval and Colonial game is so lacking generally. I can’t see the next expansion actually doing much about that - I’m expecting it will be heavily focused on governments and ideology and maybe industrialisation. Naval and Colonies seems like something that would need more a chunky dlc. Here’s hoping FXS are open to something like some cool dlc after the next expansion (a bit like how EU4 does it), because there a lots of (small-ish) areas the game could use some filling out.

It's also a bit weird that there are so many civs with a bonus to the naval game, but none of them are truly dominant at it, like other civs are at other things. Norway I guess is the most truly naval power (Indonesia is more of a coastal power), but as mentioned, they have less combat bonuses than civs that get explicit or implicit bonuses (Japan or Aztecs/Mongols). And in many ways, as mentioned before, the civs with arguably the best naval bonuses are there more or less due to lazy game mechanics (Aztecs).

 

[Archon_Wing]

Speaking of Aztec, IMO their luxury bonus should behave like Oligarchy and only apply to melee units. Aztecs getting a bonus to horse riding is sort of silly anyways.

(But then again Oligarchy applies to ships too...)

 

[acluewithout]

Speaking of Aztec, IMO their luxury bonus should behave like Oligarchy and only apply to melee units. Aztecs getting a bonus to horse riding is sort of silly anyways.

(But then again Oligarchy applies to ships too...)

Agree Aztec and Melee. But I'm okay with Melee Ships getting Oligarchy - that's a good synergy for Norway. Now, Rams working with Melee Ships... that's a problem...

 

[Archon_Wing]

Yea ram ships are pretty funny; not really sure what to do about them.