[NFP] Maya First Look

[The Civs 6]

Played the Mayans a few more times and I still think it's an F-tier civ unless you're willing to restart repeatedly in order to get the right kind of land. And you could do that with any civ and frankly get a better end product. It's not hard to get the mountains/fissures/reefs for +4ish campuses in most of your cities if you restart a few times. It's certainly easier than getting clusters of plantations in multiple cities for observatory adjacencies. I feel like people are cheesing the map generator to get unusually good plantation configurations and then calling the civ good at science when you could easily do the same (and better) with civs like Australia and the Netherlands, or in literally every game with Korea. The Mayans don't even get anything that helps a science victory beyond their unique campus. I wouldn't place them in the top four of science civs, there's a lot more to science victories than campus adjacency--and doubly so if you're playing with a limited number of cities.

But the housing issue is just too much. Every city has to have a builder or granary instantly in order to function. This is such a huge disadvantage that it completely erases everything else this civ has to offer. If their farms got +1 production or something so that you actually want to work those farms you have to build, that would be one thing; but they don't, you're forced to build useless trash farms that basically mean those builder charges are wasted until Feudalism because non-Feudalism farms are some of the worst improvements you can work. So every settler effectively comes with the additional cost of a builder or granary in order for the city to not be garbage for the longest time. It's a bit like having -50% production toward settlers. And you cannot settle anywhere that doesn't have farmable land.

How big of a deal is it really to be able to settle in places without water? There's water everywhere. This ability barely changes anything about city placement. The map generator is specifically designed to provide sources of water in such a spatial configuration that it matches how one might settle, at least in 90% of cases. You will almost never start in an area whose land grants you more cities by settling without water than another civ could get when tied to water sources. And since you're severely discouraged from expanding far away, you can't even take advantage of those far-flung stretches of land far away from start locations where there isn't water. The game literally makes you start near water sources, and you're still encouraged to settle near them (or at least mountains) in order to get aqueducts, so there's very little to be gained for the Mayans. This so-called bonus does not amount to any meaningful advantage.

The unique archer is very good for early defense, but an ancient era unit doesn't carry that much weight for a civ whose only valid victory approach is science. You're strongly encouraged to rush aqueducts anyway, so you'll arrive at crossbowmen quickly enough that a strong archer replacement is not some kind of godsend.

I think that's overstating the case just a little. They have the potential to get a sizable scientific lead early in the game, by building cheap observatories in their first cities that receive the 10% buff, and building a lot of farms around them. You use your special archers to defend against early aggressors, and once you get into feudalism it's all a very powerful combination. that kind of thing itself makes them better than a civ like the Khmer in my opinion. they have a gameplan that allows them to excel in the late mid game and early late game.

 

[Karmah]

My experience is on only one immortal game. I will never pretend to have the objective truth. Maya is too dependable on builder charges *early*. I might have overdone trying to play the strength of the civ, but investing so much on builders to get the civ rolling, I ended up late on everything compared to other games. Sure at the end with a land covered of farms I had very big cities, capital at 45, four to five cities around 30+, science was ok but I was late in turns. I'm not even the kind that reached anywhere close to sub 200 victory (nor do I have the expertise to chase it).
To be honest, I feel that Maya is equipped to try to catch up with a maimed start specific to being Maya... So not really impressed.
They do bring the potential for chasing the highest pop at the end of the game. If that is your thing, this civ is for you.

 

[lotrmith]

If you're playing the Maya, you want farms - you want cities to be large, you want housing, and the gold is useful. Again people keep making the mistake of looking at a civ that by design plays differently from others and saying "this is bad because the usual way I play isn't as effective with it". If you want to play a civ that plays identically to any other that has free upside, you have Nubia. Again, "how is this good for the Maya?" is a more relevant question than "how is this good generically?"

Rephrased: You don't *want* housing so much as you *need* housing to make up for a lack fresh water bonus.

You don't need, nay you don't even *want* mega cities. Population has significant diminishing returns.

 

[PhilBowles]

Rephrased: You don't *want* housing so much as you *need* housing to make up for a lack fresh water bonus.

True for the first two farms (technically just over one farm, since the first farm produces 1.5 housing). Anything past that is all upside. I think it's fair to say that we're all in agreement that the Maya start slowly whatever people's perspective on how well they compensate that over the course of a game.

You don't need, nay you don't even *want* mega cities. Population has significant diminishing returns.

Again, mitigated by context. If your civ bonus is a flat +10% to all yields, then you benefit most from having cities with large yields - which equates to large populations. My point is that it's all part of a single synergistic design, and so treating each piece in isolation isn't very productive. You can still argue, as indeed some have, that the synergy taken as a whole isn't where it might be (and personally, while I enjoyed the gameplay of playing around the early housing restriction I was doing so precisely because I initially saw them as "a handicap civ" in a game that's too easy for my liking. I don't see any real necessity in game terms to remove their access to freshwater while keeping everything else the same - civs like India get housing improvements comparable to Maya farms with no downside).

 

[Kmart_Elvis]

Played the Mayans a few more times and I still think it's an F-tier civ unless you're willing to restart repeatedly in order to get the right kind of land. And you could do that with any civ and frankly get a better end product. It's not hard to get the mountains/fissures/reefs for +4ish campuses in most of your cities if you restart a few times. It's certainly easier than getting clusters of plantations in multiple cities for observatory adjacencies. I feel like people are cheesing the map generator to get unusually good plantation configurations and then calling the civ good at science when you could easily do the same (and better) with civs like Australia and the Netherlands, or in literally every game with Korea.

I'm not going to defend the Maya as OP or anything, and I think there's several valid points you bring up in your post, but I think it's unfair to put them as F Tier. It's simply easier to get at least +3 adjacency (which let's you use Rationalism) from finding plantations, and surrounding them with farms or districts. You don't even need plantations to get the +3. As for Netherlands and Australia, they are the kings of science adjacency, and I don't think anyone on this thread has argued they can go toe-to-toe with them in that regard. But Maya has a definite advantage over vanilla campuses with it being half-priced and the ability to increase adjacency via farms.

I also didn't cheese the start when I played them. I took the first map that came up. I don't feel it was anything special...I managed to get two Observatories next to two plantations each, but that was it.

The Mayans don't even get anything that helps a science victory beyond their unique campus. I wouldn't place them in the top four of science civs, there's a lot more to science victories than campus adjacency--and doubly so if you're playing with a limited number of cities.

Um, what about 10% science, production, gold, and food in all your cities within the radius? And since you're growing super tall, you're working more tiles and even have room to throw some specialists in there?

But I agree about the top 4, there's certainly some competition. I also agree that there's more than campus adjacency... Which is kind of the point I'm making with the Maya. They're still a strong science civ even if they can't get the sexy campuses like Netherlands or Australia.

But the housing issue is just too much. Every city has to have a builder or granary instantly in order to function. This is such a huge disadvantage that it completely erases everything else this civ has to offer. If their farms got +1 production or something so that you actually want to work those farms you have to build, that would be one thing; but they don't, you're forced to build useless trash farms that basically mean those builder charges are wasted until Feudalism because non-Feudalism farms are some of the worst improvements you can work. So every settler effectively comes with the additional cost of a builder or granary in order for the city to not be garbage for the longest time. It's a bit like having -50% production toward settlers. And you cannot settle anywhere that doesn't have farmable land.

I've found the housing issue is tough at first and yours is a valid complaint. But that it "completely erases everything else this civ has to offer" is absolutely ridiculous hyperbole. It gives them a slower start, but Ancestral Hall or purchasing builders will alleviate that problem.

How big of a deal is it really to be able to settle in places without water? There's water everywhere. This ability barely changes anything about city placement. The map generator is specifically designed to provide sources of water in such a spatial configuration that it matches how one might settle, at least in 90% of cases. You will almost never start in an area whose land grants you more cities by settling without water than another civ could get when tied to water sources. And since you're severely discouraged from expanding far away, you can't even take advantage of those far-flung stretches of land far away from start locations where there isn't water. The game literally makes you start near water sources, and you're still encouraged to settle near them (or at least mountains) in order to get aqueducts, so there's very little to be gained for the Mayans. This so-called bonus does not amount to any meaningful advantage.

Well there's not water everywhere. But it gives them the flexibility to settle within 6 tiles or near plantations without having to rely on fresh water. You have to understand the ability in the context of the civ.

The unique archer is very good for early defense, but an ancient era unit doesn't carry that much weight for a civ whose only valid victory approach is science. You're strongly encouraged to rush aqueducts anyway, so you'll arrive at crossbowmen quickly enough that a strong archer replacement is not some kind of godsend.

Well they're not strictly geared for science. First you argue that all they have going for them for science victory is just a campus, now you're arguing they're a science civ. You're trying to have it both ways.

Their Archer is great because it comes at a time when you're probably going to be rushed by a more aggressive neighbor. And because they're so tough, you don't have to upgrade them to crossbows right away since they can still hold their own for a while. I'd say that fits in well with the civ design.

 

[The Civs 6]

Their Archer is great because it comes at a time when you're probably going to be rushed by a more aggressive neighbor. And because they're so tough, you don't have to upgrade them to crossbows right away since they can still hold their own for a while. I'd say that fits in well with the civ design.

Yeah having played them the special archer is pretty incredible for defense of your little turtle empire. Plus they are strong enough to allow you to go down factories rather than having to go down for crossbowman, which I find to be good.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

Well my second try as them not going as swimmingly as the first. I can see what people are saying about map and such. Perhaps just up the odds so that they almost always have plantations? That's the main part that makes them fun for me anyhow.

 

[kb27787]

My experience is on only one immortal game. I will never pretend to have the objective truth. Maya is too dependable on builder charges *early*. I might have overdone trying to play the strength of the civ, but investing so much on builders to get the civ rolling, I ended up late on everything compared to other games. Sure at the end with a land covered of farms I had very big cities, capital at 45, four to five cities around 30+, science was ok but I was late in turns. I'm not even the kind that reached anywhere close to sub 200 victory (nor do I have the expertise to chase it).
To be honest, I feel that Maya is equipped to try to catch up with a maimed start specific to being Maya... So not really impressed.
They do bring the potential for chasing the highest pop at the end of the game. If that is your thing, this civ is for you.

Kongo will beat Maya hands down--I can tell you that Give them a try and you will see. Moreover Kongo is actually better for their specialized victory type (culture) and their "malus" is actually a plus in certain circumstances.
Extra housing from farms does nothing if your city does not have some reliable way of food income. (Kongo gets food added to their city center whenever they build their UD, while Maya has to actually make farm triangles and work such crappy tiles!) Builders get more expensive as the games go on for one, and secondly Maya doesn't have the culture focus Kongo has so eventually you don't have tiles to work with your extra pop because your borders expand too slowly (otherwise you need to buy tiles which kinda kills the purpose of the extra gold from farms)!

Rephrased: You don't *want* housing so much as you *need* housing to make up for a lack fresh water bonus.

You don't need, nay you don't even *want* mega cities. Population has significant diminishing returns.

Mega cities are OK but they need to be well-developed (such that you have many districts and specialist slots to work with all that pop, and food to feed them all). This is probably the only time one would want to work the building slots (15+ or so pop). Of course, this means mega cities that simply have a lot of flatland farms are useless (since you have no production). So yes, you can make huge Mayan cities with swaths of farms but overall unless you have enough production the extra size of those cities are worthless.

Anyhow, any empire would want at least ONE mega city (for Pingala to reside in).

 

[Zaarin]

Kongo will beat Maya hands down--I can tell you that Give them a try and you will see. Moreover Kongo is actually better for their specialized victory type (culture) and their "malus" is actually a plus in certain circumstances.

Kongo's chief malus is that their music will make you want to smash your headphones or speakers within the first two minutes of the game.

 

[PhilBowles]

Mega cities are OK but they need to be well-developed (such that you have many districts and specialist slots to work with all that pop, and food to feed them all). This is probably the only time one would want to work the building slots (15+ or so pop). Of course, this means mega cities that simply have a lot of flatland farms are useless (since you have no production). So yes, you can make huge Mayan cities with swaths of farms but overall unless you have enough production the extra size of those cities are worthless.

Anyhow, any empire would want at least ONE mega city (for Pingala to reside in).

The main trick there is trade routes, with the various cards that boost production particularly (and secondarily food to support specialists and workers on production-heavy tiles), since the Maya multiplier is calculated from total yields including trade values.

 

[Leucarum]

Kongo's chief malus is that their music will make you want to smash your headphones or speakers within the first two minutes of the game.

They were the first Civ I played, hence their music is (in my head) the tune I always most associate with Civ6... Hence while it is definitely overly jaunty I cut it a little nostalgia slack.

 

[kb27787]

The main trick there is trade routes, with the various cards that boost production particularly (and secondarily food to support specialists and workers on production-heavy tiles), since the Maya multiplier is calculated from total yields including trade values.

Aye... if only Maya got the Suguba instead of Mali... the half cost would've helped. Mali can somewhat overcome the production malus by those trade routes.
As is, Maya can hardly afford the production to build and develop 4 districts/city in any timely manner (actually for most civs this is not realistic... at most you go for 2 well-developed districts + 1 extra district later in the game; cities that are settled later should only go for 1 district first).

So you have: observatory, industrial zone, and what I presume shall be theatre squares. Of all 3 you need at least tier 2-3 buildings (theatres in particular are useless without their buildings). A 4th CH with a market AND route on top of that is far more than one can afford. (And you might need some entertainment districts, and if you want faith, you'd have to go holy sites).

 

[KayAU]

I really like Kongo, although I fail to see how their main malus (not being able to found a religion or build Holy Sites) is anything but a malus. I mean, it's something other civs can do just as well, only they would do it by choice. What I really like about Kongo is their high population and great passive yields from Theatre Squares and M'banzas. I know you're not supposed to build Neighborhoods, but as Kongo, I am building M'banzas everywhere. Kongo has always been one of my favorites, now challenged by both the Inca and the Maya.

They all suffer from a common problem, though: huge cities are just not good enough in Civ 6. I just wish the developers would address this. I have seen different opinions on whether expansion/warmongering/ICS needs to be limited somehow, but I don't think I have seen anyone argue against giving large cities a bit of a boost. As it stands, you are only getting good value from having 1 large city: your Pingala city.

Anyways, back to the Maya: I do strongly agree with @PhilBowles that they need to be considered as a full package and in the context of their favoured playstyle, as their bonuses are very interconnected. This is a big part of why I like them so much. Playing the Maya feels different from other civs, planning things out feels rewarding, and they favour a playstyle I personally enjoy. I understand the dissent about their power level, and some of it is probably due to differing playstyles, speed and map settings, and so on. I will say this though: under the right condiditons, they can be really strong. This is true for all civs to some degree, but the Maya are among the ones where getting the right features can really get you a big boost. On the other hand, under bad conditions, they do have some abilities to help them tough it out (a hard shell and the ability to make your own adjacencies and housing). Both these characteristics are appealing to me.

 

[kb27787]

I really like Kongo, although I fail to see how their main malus (not being able to found a religion or build Holy Sites) is anything but a malus.

Ever faced barb invasions on deity?
Esp. with the latest patch they have become utterly ruthless.

Kongo gets free apostles while other people still only have missionaries early game (I've had this regularly). Two words: heathen conversion (has saved my back many a time). They basically are guaranteed a free army with the latest tech as the game goes on. (If Yerevan is in the game, I've gone to highest military score on deity without producing any military units aside from 1 archer, simply by converting barbarians across the map)

Also, if the stars align: free +2 gold/city (church property) or +2 faith/city (pilgrimage) with ZERO investment if the right religion becomes your majority religion. Moreover, let's say the majority religion is missionary zeal (all religious units ignore movement penalties) then ALL your apostles (including those of a different religion) gain this ability. The leader UA is very misleading--you don't simply gain the founder belief (the one on the topmost) you actually gain ALL the beliefs of the majority religion (including crusade and defender of the faith when applicable).

I will say Kongo's bonuses get stronger and stronger as difficulty level increases (on prince they would actually suck since AIs are so slow to spread religion, and the barbs are not so aggressive).

 

[KayAU]

Oh, the free Apostles are obviously a bonus. If you are talking about the whole Leader Ability, then yes, it is a bonus/malus affair. I thought you were only referring to the malus part.

I don't actually mind Kongo's malus much, as I don't enjoy religion much in Civ VI.

 

[AntSou]

Played the Mayans a few more times and I still think it's an F-tier

I think it's a "3 to the 3 to the 6 to the 9 D. O. double Gizzle representing the ABQ waddup" tier.

Since we're on the subject of random letters and/or numericals.

 

[PhilBowles]

Aye... if only Maya got the Suguba instead of Mali... the half cost would've helped. Mali can somewhat overcome the production malus by those trade routes.
As is, Maya can hardly afford the production to build and develop 4 districts/city in any timely manner (actually for most civs this is not realistic... at most you go for 2 well-developed districts + 1 extra district later in the game; cities that are settled later should only go for 1 district first).

So you have: observatory, industrial zone, and what I presume shall be theatre squares. Of all 3 you need at least tier 2-3 buildings (theatres in particular are useless without their buildings). A 4th CH with a market AND route on top of that is far more than one can afford. (And you might need some entertainment districts, and if you want faith, you'd have to go holy sites).

I think people are strongly overstating the low productivity of Maya cities. Most of mine had the usual mix of hills and floodplains - you don't need to spam farms in every city any more than India needs to spam stepwells. The couple of early farms that give you good early housing as well as observatory adjacency are fine for much of the early game.

My cities were all roughly comparable with 60+ base production by the time they were fully developed (with four districts each) - thanks to that and trade routes (which by this point were +10 production each), by the time I was building spaceport projects I was completing the main launches in 15 turns without boosts, and La Grange stations in 3 despite being so late for a tier 3 government that I didn't get the National Museum online in time for it to be useful for more than a couple of laser station launches.. That's without Ruhr Valley of Stephanie Kwolek boosting the spaceport, both of which I missed. Coba in that game was one of if not the best space production city I've ever had in Civ VI.

I've gone back into my old saves to get a screenshot of my civ after I'd founded all of my cities (so not counting the ones I later captured). This, as I've said before, is I think a pretty average start in everything but access to strategic resources (which was well above average) - a single plantation and a bunch of flat land and hills.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

Kongo's chief malus is that their music will make you want to smash your headphones or speakers within the first two minutes of the game.

I never understood that, it seems I am one of the few players who don't listen to the ingame music at all. Honestly, it just too often sounds like some leftover "world music" CDs you find at some oddly-smelling record store. I pretty much always put my own music on when playing Civ. Not saying Civ doesn't have some fantastic music, but dude.. I don't want to reroll every game with Scotland in it

 

[The Highwayman]

I never understood that, it seems I am one of the few players who don't listen to the ingame music at all. Honestly, it just too often sounds like some leftover "world music" CDs you find at some oddly-smelling record store. I pretty much always put my own music on when playing Civ. Not saying Civ doesn't have some fantastic music, but dude.. I don't want to reroll every game with Scotland in it

I know right. I love the music of Civ VI...but Scotland....uggh. Even after they're wiped off the map. I guess that's the trade off for selling luxes at an inflated rate in the early turns.

 

[PhilBowles]

I know right. I love the music of Civ VI...but Scotland....uggh. Even after they're wiped off the map. I guess that's the trade off for selling luxes at an inflated rate in the early turns.

That's actually one of my favourites. I've always liked Scotland the Brave, and I'm a fan of the arrangements in Civ VI.