Leader / Civ Picking Thread

For me, one of the most fun aspects of big games like this is all the analysis and scrutiny that takes place. Because of this, I really enjoyed all the discussion over our own leader/civ picks. Over the past couple days, I’ve jotted down my thoughts on the other teams’ leader/civ picks, trying to determine who I think will do well and who will do poorly. So without further ado, here is my completely biased and uneducated list of rankings, from worst to best, of the other teams’ picks and outlook for this game:

Worst Picks:

Team Spanish Apolyton (Boadicea of Zulu) 9

The Spanish team is definitely going for early warfare. They have two warring traits, an early uu with two movement points, and a barracks ub. We should try to avoid early friction with them when they have all the military advantages, but I do think we could hold out with superior tactics if attacked. As has been suggested, they might be resentful that some teams seemed to dismiss their mod as being untested. Maybe we can use this to our advantage, by directing them towards other teams. At least we shouldn’t be their first natural targets if we keep good diplomacy.

Beyond the early game, the Spanish won’t be able to keep up against better economic traits and builds. Unless they quickly conquer an easy foe (unlikely), they are not in the running to win this game.

Team WePlayCiv (Ragnar of Native America) 8

WPC wasted their first pick with Ragnar, and Native America seems pretty unorthodox as well. Dog soldiers are barely stronger than regular axemen vs. melee (8 vs 7.5), but are significantly weaker against non-melee. I doubt the mapmaker would leave one team without copper/iron, so I don’t see the point. I guess the Totem Pole’s exp is nice, but there were much better ub’s left to choose from, and it doesn’t pair well with Agg trait.

Attacking in the ancient era against competent opponents is hard, and rarely benefits either side unless one wins quickly and decisively. Grabbing financial will help, but it’ll be tough for WPC to catch up if they fall behind from early war. Combined with their small team size and technical difficulties, I don’t see this team contending for the win.

Team UniversCivilization (Mehmed of Holy Rome) 7

Mehmed is a good leader on this map. Org will keep costs down from early expansion, and it has good synergy with the ub. Without Fin, they will have a hard time keeping up in techs even with lowered civics and maintenance costs. HRE seems like a bad pick to me. Their uu is nothing special, and the starting techs are horrible. They will have a slow start, and no early-game advantages, so they will probably seek peace with their neighbors while trying to REX to take advantage of their Org trait and ub. If they get attacked early, they will be in trouble.

UniversCiv has decent, all-around picks, but it’ll be hard for them to pull away from the pack.
 
So-so picks:

Team Civfr (Willem of Maya) 6
The French got a good leader with Willem. They are the only creative team, which gives them a definite culture edge when borders get tight. They will be able to get double-speed ballcourts to deal with happiness issues, but there are other ways to deal with happiness. The holkan isn’t too special since the mapmaker won’t be denying copper/iron to one team (if the map is at all balanced). We share the same starting techs, which are ok. I could see them doing decently in this game.

Team CivPlayers (Darius of Aztec) 5
CivPlayers have one of only two Org leaders, which will be good on this map. They also nabbed Fin, so Darius is pretty good all-around. Half-speed sacrificial alters that double the power of their whip should be useful indeed. Their starting techs are pretty bad and don’t leave anything for a worker to do, so their start will be slow. The uu is weaker than a swordsman, and shouldn’t be scary as long as we chop our forests fast enough.

They could use their traits and ub to quickly catch up after a slower start. With no real early advantages, expect them to want peace with their neighbors while they pursue a REX strategy, and watch out for a come-from-behind run.

Team Civforum.de (Isabella of Inca) 4
Inca was a pretty decent pick, giving a third trait with the Terrace, and the expansive trait pairs well with that. Spiritual seems anti-synergetic, though, since you don’t need a religion so badly with Terraces producing culture. I don’t remember the timeline exactly, but I wonder if they chose their civ before the final settings were decided, and then felt they needed Spiritual to counter or use espy. Their early UU is great for choking, so we should watch out for that.

The Germans are fielding the biggest team according to the official rosters thread, so they will probably be playing close attention to this game. I could see them doing well (and would have ranked them higher, but am dinging them for combining Spi, which encourages early religion, with terraces, which make early religion unnecessary).
 
Best picks:

Team Apolyton (Elizabeth of Ottoman) 3

Elizabeth is a very strong economic leader. While the traits might not have a lot of synergy, it does give a lot of economic options. Ottoman is a pretty good civ, with the extra happiness from the Hammam being nice. The uu is only good if they get gunpowder with a big tech lead, but with Elizabeth, they just might. The starting techs are probably the best two for a faster start and earlier financial cottages.

Apolyton might be a team to watch out for. If they can avoid early war and hit their stride, they’re going to be hard to keep up with economically.

Team Realms Beyond (Pacal of Egypt) 2

I’m sure RB is very happy with their picks. They consider Fin and Exp to be the top two traits, and having an economic trait and expansive trait balance nicely. RB will build 1.5-2 workers per city and whip a granary as the first build in most cities, so they’ll get their money’s worth from Exp. Our test saves showed the power of Egypt’s starting techs letting them go straight to pottery for very early riverside cottages. War Chariots seem to scream “rush”, but they’ll probably use them instead to discourage others from rushing them so they can tech in peace. Of course, any under-defended neighboring cities will quickly see swarms of WC’s.

RB will commit many man-hours to this game, reading demos (cloak & dagger), conducting diplo, maxing mm efficiency, running sims, etc. They could be strong contenders for the win.

Team Civfanatics (Mansa of India) 1

So we all know that we’re the favorites to win this thing. India is the best civ by far, and opens up a lot of options with our fast worker. Mansa gives us a Financial leader to keep up in tech, and the Spiritual trait that we can have lots of fun with. Our start might not be the fastest, but we have a solid team that will make sure that our mm, tactics and diplo will let us keep up at the start, and surge ahead in the mid-game. If we avoid early war, maintain strong alliances, and use the most of our strong advantages, the win should be all ours!



So, those are my thoughts. If anyone wants to give their own opinions, or critique any of mine, I’d love to hear it. Plus, this little exercise should get us that much more prepared to face our foes!
 
Very nice, Yossarian! Thank you for taking the time to write that :D

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2
 
I agree, that RB has a strong pick, probably the strongest combo of our opponents and definitely are a team everybody needs to watch out for.

I am not sure, whether I'd really rank the pick below ours, but I definitely agree, that our pick is really good and will not be a reason for not winning...
 
What you think about civ after seeing the starts?:mad:

my personal opinion on the picks:

1.RB
2.the Darius guys.
3.Elizabeth(but just becasue of the start pozition)
4.Us(very antiIndia start)
 
Just that you don't feel like I would have been favoring anyone. The 1st version of the map having the basic idea of starting locations was ready way before leader/nation picks were started. I sent 1st draft to r_rolo1 5th of June.
 
I asumed were simetrical, but lools like are not.So instead pf starts we can replace with start.

And no , there is no place to see other strats altough i would enjoy that:mischief:
 
While the map is not mirrored, what I have seen at RB in the past is at least the initial bfc being identical (or at least the same tiles with comparable resources), but surrounding areas being different for each player. So I think it is safe to assume that all the teams are looking at very similar screenshots, if not identical.

This start isn't as pro-India as I would like, but it does give us lots of options, so at least it's interesting!

I would still consider us as favorites to win this thing. Home team advantage and everything, right? I do agree that this start makes Darius of Aztecs stronger than I gave them credit for, with FP's for Fin cottages, and lots of food for those half-anger whips. RB and Elizabeth will also do well with this start.
 
If I would try to summarize picks

1) RB.. biggest favorites right now based on the pick if the starts are somewhat the same. They can start snowball from T11 if they settle on bananas, no one can catch their early game expansion pace and super awesome UU if there are horses on hand (as they should be)
From my experience WC's can hold their own even against spears on defense.

2) Darius of Aztec is go to guy with 5 turns unhappy and 2-pop Sac Altars. They need to Oracle Col though
Don't underestimated jaguar - they are resourceless AND have easy access to W2.

if the starts are mirrored, they will have troubles to reach CoL AND IW in reasonable timeframe to milk their early game power.
will really depend how they analyze start and how much effort they put into testing the paths towards these 2 clear targets to get

3) Willem of Maya - resourceless holkan will offer choking strength and early game defense which is hardly matched by any other team here.
Creative gets them edge on libraries AND city settling patterns (5 turns for border pop into resources is very strong option).
Very good all around leader with enough defense for early game that will allow safe expansion.
Don't forget we play with barbs on and holkans are good match against barb archers.

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Hard to slot in our team ;-) since the opinion is biased. I say we have good pick and from tests it seems we will have enough early game power to compete, but we will be in catch up from start especially compared to RB, unless they do some dumb decisions at start which is hard to imagine.

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When I started to talk about barbarians... I am sure some of you know how it goes, but for refreshing memories.

once the average number of cities on continent is 2, the barb switch into pillage mode and can enter borders of cities if there is worker/unit/improvement.
once the average number of cities is 3, they will actively try to attack cities.

So we have some 40-50 turns to prepare some defenses against them.

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@Yossarian
you have there mistake with DS x Axeman scenario... the combat system doesn't work this way. the +100% DS strength is actually subtracted from Axeman bonuses so the unpromoted DS is always str 4, but the axeman strength lowers, for example on open terrain it would be
DS 4, Axe 5 * (1+0.5-1) = 2.5
The only bonus that is added directly to strength of unit is combat promotion, any other percentages are subtracted from defender's bonuses.
 
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