Is Germany a powerhouse now?

[HerrDoktor]

I tried two still unfinished games with Germany post-patch - a civilization I had quite abandoned since G&K.

It seems to me they're quite powerful right now, and not tied to a single victory condition - after all, your permanent production bonus means more wonders, science buildings, spaceship parts, units, whatever suits you. They also have all the bases covered: early game, you get free units to protect you (or, god forbid, early conquering); at medieval, Hanse starts playing, getting progressively higher bonuses; Late game, you have panzers as the icing on the cake.

The downside which perhaps prevents them from becoming top tier, is the bias against trade routes to other civilizations, meaning less tourism and science. Less unit maintenance more or less compensates for the money losses though. All in all, at least they're fun to play now.

I've only played on King, so maybe Germany is less viable on higher difficulties. What are your experiences?

 

[Securion]

Germany is still not very "historically correct" imho, and have quite "weird" bonuses... but yes; Its a real powerhouse now if in the hands of someone who knows what their doing.

 

[HerrDoktor]

Germany is still not very "historically correct" imho, and have quite "weird" bonuses... but yes; Its a real powerhouse now if in the hands of someone who knows what their doing.

Well, if they would be historically accurate, what bonuses Germany wouldn't have? They're known for science (way more than Korea and Babylon), wealth, production, culture (musicians and writers) and military (maybe a bit overrated on that part - they had a militaristic culture, but lost both World Wars, after all). Even for religion, Martin Luther was German.

Still, the same can be said of England, USA and France (which, contrary to popular belief and internet jokes, was a military superpower for most of its history).

 

[Matthew.]

I have a feeling Hanse looks better on paper than actually plays out in the game. Realistically, you won't be getting them up and running until after Public Schools unless you are purposely delaying Scientific Theory. Which means the production bonus is only in effect for the last round of buildings (Labs, Broadcast Towers, etc.) Even though it maxes out at 40% (50% with wonders), it will probably be closer to 25-30% for most of the time you use it.

I suppose one way to look at it is it gives German cities the ability to build a late-game building for free due to all the saved hammers. So Germany can build things like Hospitals/Stadiums, which are nice buildings but can be difficult to fit into a build order, all without falling behind of where one would normally be. Or, build a couple extra Bombers for free

I would have rated Germany as a lower mid-tier Civ in G&K, but with all the changes, both directly and indirectly, I think they are a solid mid-tier Civ now. They are still a war-monger Civ at heart, so peaceful players won't see a lot of their benefits in a game. Lower unit maintenance doesn't account for much if all you have are a few machine guns in Oligarchy cities

Although I think they could make a solid Diplo Civ now, too Granted, Diplo wins are usually the easiest and don't require any special tactics, but if Germany rushes Freedom and starts getting 4 reputation per turn from city-states, they also get a massive 40% hammer bonus on top of that.

 

[Matthew.]

they had a militaristic culture, but lost both World Wars, after all

Although up against the massive superpowers at that time, completely surrounded, and still managed to break all three. Not to go off-topic, but if we are looking at the wars as a win or lose scenario and Germany "lost", then who won? The intention was to keep Germany from becoming a dominant player in Europe, that is the whole reason Europe was gunning for war long before WWI even broke out, and yet today they are a dominant player. A lot of blood was shed and it is too bad that whole Hitler thing near the end had to leave a black mark, but Germany got what it wanted, which is a place among the world powers. I'd say that is a win in the end.

 

[Smokeybear]

Well, if they would be historically accurate, what bonuses Germany wouldn't have? They're known for science (way more than Korea and Babylon), wealth, production, culture (musicians and writers) and military (maybe a bit overrated on that part - they had a militaristic culture, but lost both World Wars, after all).

Overrated? I don't think so. Yes, their top (non-military) leadership did make some bad strategic decisions during those two world wars which in greatest part led to their downfall (to most of humanity's immense relief), but the German military itself was one of the most brilliant, disciplined, well trained and successful in history during that period. If Germany had had the population and resources of a nation like Russia or the US, the world would have been at great risk of becoming a German-speaking empire.

Sorry to get sidetracked, but that comment needed addressing

 

[KrikkitTwo]

I tried two still unfinished games with Germany post-patch - a civilization I had quite abandoned since G&K.

It seems to me they're quite powerful right now, and not tied to a single victory condition - after all, your permanent production bonus means more wonders, science buildings, spaceship parts, units, whatever suits you. They also have all the bases covered: early game, you get free units to protect you (or, god forbid, early conquering); at medieval, Hanse starts playing, getting progressively higher bonuses; Late game, you have panzers as the icing on the cake.

The downside which perhaps prevents them from becoming top tier, is the bias against trade routes to other civilizations, meaning less tourism and science. Less unit maintenance more or less compensates for the money losses though. All in all, at least they're fun to play now.

I've only played on King, so maybe Germany is less viable on higher difficulties. What are your experiences?

Hanse comes up in Renaissance not Mideval (otherwise basically correct.. they sort of take a dip in the mideval era.)

 

[HerrDoktor]

Hanse comes up in Renaissance not Mideval (otherwise basically correct.. they sort of take a dip in the mideval era.)

Yes, Renaissance. They have a brief weak period in Medieval, when there aren't barbarians anymore. Still cheaper unit maintenance, but that doesn't seem to account for much when AI can stay in the red while popping up units like a rabbit plague.

About the military comment, it was a very mild affirmation of skepticism, let's just discuss Germany in the game. I don't get you guys saying you'll only build Hanse by industrial. I didn't plan my games perfectly with Germany, as I could certainly use the Colossus and Petra for the extra trade routes, but didn't even try for them. Still, I got my Hanses up and running by the Renaissance, rushing banking, giving a 10% bonus immediately, which would be 20% if I had the wonders.

 

[leadtothehead]

I don't have the beta patch so I don't know about in game, but on paper the Hanse is a very nice building but probably not overpowered unless you intentionally set your empire up specifically for building a core of friendly city states, by that I mean normally I have between 2-5 allied CSs playing normally often with only 1-2 with shared borders, meaning maintaining 5 or 6 CS within trade route range and not allied to a opposing Civ that goes to war with you is kind of difficult to do.

One thing I do know is when you see Greece, Venice, Siam, or Austria they will become your hated rivals.

 

[bonafide11]

Isn't Germany's new bonus pretty much worthless if you embargo trade with city-states? Just a simple WC resolution can significantly hurt their new late game bonus.

 

[Gamewizard]

Isn't Germany's new bonus pretty much worthless if you embargo trade with city-states? Just a simple WC resolution can significantly hurt their new late game bonus.

So then they lose out on production, but make up for it in more gold and possibly science from trading with other civs instead. Obviously a German player doesn't want a CS embargo to happen, but it is far from crippling them.

And the panzer is still one of the best units in the game, especially combined with Autocracy's lightning warfare tenant (7 movement unit that ignores zone of control). Sure it comes late, but if you prioritize the bottom half of the tech tree instead of the top half, you can steamroll the world in 15-20 turns. Your massive economy allows you to spam railroads and they can literally teleport anywhere on the map.

 

[tat501]

I think they're incredibly powerful now. You have possibly the strongest UU - the Panzer which cuts swathes through late game armies and a bank that can give you huge production boosts.

Essentially you set your cities up to be Panzer factories using the Hanse.

You should have lots of money and lots of city state allies because of the trade routes plus the fact your unit maintenance is low - so an embargo of city states is unlikely because you can veto it with a bit of work thanks to your cs allies even if the world hates you.

EDIT -

The difficulty I have playing Germany now is social policy choice -

I used to go Honor and tradition followed by Commerce and Rationalism.

Now I want to squeeze Patronage in as well - and still take commerce so I can get mercenary armies and field cheap Landsknechts to defend myself whilst I tech to Panzers.

 

[Martinus]

Isn't Germany's new bonus pretty much worthless if you embargo trade with city-states? Just a simple WC resolution can significantly hurt their new late game bonus.

I think Germany should pursue diplomatic dominance to make sure this never happens. But you could just as easily say this WC resolution disables Freedom tier 3 tenet - if you have it you should just do everything to prevent it.

Btw, by the same token any embargo civ resolution disables the UA of any civ with trade route bonuses, no?

 

[Martinus]

I don't have the beta patch so I don't know about in game, but on paper the Hanse is a very nice building but probably not overpowered unless you intentionally set your empire up specifically for building a core of friendly city states, by that I mean normally I have between 2-5 allied CSs playing normally often with only 1-2 with shared borders, meaning maintaining 5 or 6 CS within trade route range and not allied to a opposing Civ that goes to war with you is kind of difficult to do.

One thing I do know is when you see Greece, Venice, Siam, or Austria they will become your hated rivals.

Agreed about Venice or Austria but why would Greece or Siam prevent Germany from utilizing its trade route UA?

 

[leadtothehead]

Agreed about Venice or Austria but why would Greece or Siam prevent Germany from utilizing its trade route UA?

Only from the stand point of those two Civs being big on city state relations, so you will be need to stay on top of them in influence for event that a war breaks out you don't lose the trade routes.

 

[leadtothehead]

I think they're incredibly powerful now. You have possibly the strongest UU - the Panzer which cuts swathes through late game armies and a bank that can give you huge production boosts.

Essentially you set your cities up to be Panzer factories using the Hanse.

You should have lots of money and lots of city state allies because of the trade routes plus the fact your unit maintenance is low - so an embargo of city states is unlikely because you can veto it with a bit of work thanks to your cs allies even if the world hates you.

EDIT -

The difficulty I have playing Germany now is social policy choice -

I used to go Honor and tradition followed by Commerce and Rationalism.

Now I want to squeeze Patronage in as well - and still take commerce so I can get mercenary armies and field cheap Landsknechts to defend myself whilst I tech to Panzers.

Yeah I normally went Tradition, part of Honor, then Commerce and then jump to ideology policies when able, like you Patronage seems like a real good fit but where to fit it in!, might make building the Oracle a priority.

 

[bonafide11]

So then they lose out on production, but make up for it in more gold and possibly science from trading with other civs instead. Obviously a German player doesn't want a CS embargo to happen, but it is far from crippling them.

I'm not saying it's crippling of them, but what the buzz for new Germany is about is not any of their other unique bonuses, and the Hanse itself without the city-state trade relations is simply a bank, so an embargo on city-state trades is a big blow to Germany. Of course a good German player would do everything in his/her power to prevent that from happening, but it's a good strategy for dealing with Germany nonetheless. Either way, Germany is strong, but the Hanse has some drawbacks to it.

Honestly, I think new Japan is now underrated. The Zero still kind of sucks, but the samurai is a beast, and building all of those culture producing fishing boats fast (it only takes one turn!) can be a big boost to Japan's growth in the medieval era.

 

[Matthew.]

I think the Zero is good enough. If you play high level AI's, they will get to flight and you will want to prevent them from spamming their own bombers. The new cap on planes per city isn't a big deal, there are ways around it. Carriers, multiple cities on a war front.

Not only does it allow you to build bombers and fighters, but if you have no oil it gives you the option to spam anti-air while your heavily upgraded samurai-now-infantry and artillery spam march across the land unchecked.

I'll put it this way: I'd take the new Zero over America's B17. Such a simple change, but gives a lot of flexibility that other Civs have no access to.

 

[Matthew.]

1) Early war to get good land (say with catapults and pikes)
2) Focus on science to go through medieval-renaissance as quickly as possible
3) Build Hanse and factories in the industrial era to get your production up. Get autocracy up for the bonuses on military production
4) Build panzers. Lots of them. Use autocracy to build up a healthy happiness surplus, and make your panzers even better.
5) Conquer the world.

Good on paper, but Autocracy will throw you into massive unhappiness, unless by some random fluke the current culture/tourist dominant Civ picks it up first.

I'd say better off focusing on a heavy culture (and tourism as a by-product) game with heavy city-state alliance play. Use converted barbs to boost up military without needing to use hammers of your own, so you can focus on infrastructure instead. Ally culture city-states for future ideology protection and so when you do start dominating, the alliances don't turn on you and prevent you from using Hanse.

Science is always important, but less so for war-mongers. You only need to make it to artillery/bombers/Panzer--the rest of the techs are not all that important (although rocket artillery is nice).

NOW you can go Autocracy, convert your empire over to a war machine, and dominate.

Keep in mind this is theory, too. I tried one game so far with your strategy (and it would have worked in Gods and Kings), but the new Ideology system completely wrecked my empire since I ignored the culture/tourism aspect.

 

[Aaron90495]

Good on paper, but Autocracy will throw you into massive unhappiness, unless by some random fluke the current culture/tourist dominant Civ picks it up first. I'd say better off focusing on a heavy culture (and tourism as a by-product) game with heavy city-state alliance play. Use converted barbs to boost up military without needing to use hammers of your own, so you can focus on infrastructure instead. Ally culture city-states for future ideology protection and so when you do start dominating, the alliances don't turn on you and prevent you from using Hanse. Science is always important, but less so for war-mongers. You only need to make it to artillery/bombers/Panzer--the rest of the techs are not all that important (although rocket artillery is nice). NOW you can go Autocracy, convert your empire over to a war machine, and dominate. Keep in mind this is theory, too. I tried one game so far with your strategy (and it would have worked in Gods and Kings), but the new Ideology system completely wrecked my empire since I ignored the culture/tourism aspect.

Yep, the key is to go heavy culture first, so that going Autocracy doesn't wreck you. Then, pick up Lightning Warfare and destroy everyone in the late game.