Now with charismatic and Imperialistic...

[die_by_thesword]

What do you think are the best and worst traits?

Aggressive 9/10 Great-- free promotion are fantastic and a welcome boost to any civ both for peace and war.
Creative 8/10 Good-- Free culture boost is great.
Expansive 7/10-- Decent, helps out but an aqueduct gets the job done as well without occupying a trait. Granieries never really needed more speed in production.
Financial 8/10 Good-- Definatly helps with the cash flow, in the long run really helps.
Industrious 9/10 Great-- A personal favorite, the boost helps with pumping out that stonehenge oe pyramids and gives you a strong early advantage. Double production of the forge is also very nice to have
Organized 4/10 Poor-- Who cares? less money from upkeep that was never too expensive.
Philosophical 10/10-- A fantastic trait that was reduced because of it's difficulty to effectively balance.
Spiritual 3/10-- Crap.
Charismatic 9/10-- Excellent, makes leveling those troops quick and painless. The boost to happiness is also not bad.
Imperialistic 9/10-- Also excellent, those great generals make or break wars. Settler boost helps expansion.

 

[Quotey]

You're forgetting Protective.

Spiritual 3/10-- Crap.

Yes, because needing to change several civicsfor a war in late game, you are FINE with 5 turns of anarchy.

Organized 4/10 Poor-- Who cares? less money from upkeep that was never too expensive.

Admittedly, I don't use Organized, but do yuo play tiny maps, OCCs, or do you stick with few cities?

Also, rating Creative the same as Financial is iffy. Rating Creative 8/10 for that reason is fairly questionable.

 

[Perfxion]

In order of usefullness

Philosophical
Imperialistic
Aggressive
Charismatic
Industrious
Creative
Spiritual
Financial
Expansive
Organized

 

[mbye]

My ratings (warmonger SP emporer):

1. Financial - An army needs to get paid
2. Charismatic - Two more early happiness on high levels is just what I usually need before getting calender
3. Aggressive - Makes it easy to get better promotions, also helps with early medics
4. Imperialistic - With a lot of warfare, great generals are quite helpful. I could always use more war production or promotions
5. Creative - Sometimes it helps secure resources, other times it is not that useful, it also matters a lot less in the late game, a monument (obelisk) is not that expensive as a replacement (especially useful for charismatic leaders)
6. Organized - It helps to keep others capitals early in the game while still trying to keep ahead in some techs
7. Philosophical - I am too busy trying to get production cities building units to worry about using citizens to get great people, plus I rarely build my own wonders
8. Industrious - Wonders are too risky to build on emporer or higher, only helpful for cheap forges, which I build for the happiness (gold, silver, gems)
9. Expansive - I always seem to have happiness problems before health because of war weariness, only useful deep inside the flood plains
?. Protective - I have not experienced this yet, my instincts tell me that it will not suit my game very well

 

[Brancaleone]

My opinion oooh lets hear it:

Philosophical - 6 not many people like to focus on specialists. I like this trait; when i focus on it, i can have several cities sneezing great people left and right, very cool But i only play when i feel like doing something different; i dont think its that good.

Imperialistic - 7 Great expansion bonus is cool, you can take the sweetest spots and care about gpt later, but of all the trait bonuses, this is the only that kinda of get obsolete... And extra generals, i still dont know if you can settle more than 1 general great people in one city, but if you can, with heroic epic here, you can produce some evil killing machines .

Aggressive - 8 Its good, nuff said.

Charismatic - 7 Instead of giving you war advantages faster like agressive, this trait works better in the long run. I imagine changing to a non-charismatic leader will make you feel promotions take forever to come The happynes bonus is cool earlier, but i never have problems with it later. A good trait, still.

Industrious - 5 I dont build many wonders (i tend to fall behind in techs because of over expansion, so the only wonders i get are usually stoneh or pyramids). A trait for two wonders.. no, thx.

Creative - 9 My favourite. Playing without this seems like playing handcapped. I always play epic speed, and making your cities starting to produce any culture is painfull. Ive had so many cities flip to the enemy, that now, i play creative and every conquered city gets a cheap threatre whipped in the first turn the uprsing ends, and with +5 culture quickly like that i can trully enjoy the game . By far, my favourite; usefull during the entire game also.

Spiritual - 7 You can change religions to trade techs, then change again to not piss off your neighbohods (sp), change civics before war for fast production and +4 xp, then change everything back when it ends; really versatile. I dont use this trait (feels like playing withou traits at all), but i can understand how some people cant play without it. Its also the most unrealistic trait IMO

Financial - 10 . I played my half dozen first games in Civ IV with financial leaders (extra gold sounded atractive back then), and later, i had to relearn how to play the game. Now i dont play this trait at all, or Prince gets too easy (and monarch is still difficult). This trait is too good.

Expansive - 4 It dosent suits my playing style. I whip so much, my population is always low and i never have health problems. Cheaper granaries are very good, but i usually end whipping the granary and leaving the city at 1 turn of growing, so i hold the growlth to finish the granary and one turn later i get half of the food from growing. I cant see how this trait can win a game; maybe if youre playing philosofical / expansive with caste system, then every food counts, and for huge cities, the health bonus can be usefull, but honestly, all it gives is the opportunity for you to trade away the health resources that you dont need (and only have 1 of) for happy res. or gpt, or just trade them away for other health resources or give them away and get some positive diplomatic modifier.. This trait needs something else.

Organized - 8 I love to overexpand, and this trait works wonders. Cheaper courthouses are almost a cheat.

And protective - 5 to 7 I dont know. Id rather be attacking than defending my cities. And when i get invaded, i fortify my hills and forests to protect my precious cottages. Once you get gunpownder, then defending newly acquired cities is much easier, and everywhere, 1 first strike is usefull. But i dont know. I can see how i could play an entire game and all it gives me is 1 first strike (when i conquer other nations too quickly, or when i stop them from landing on my island), and id rather play agressive if i want a free promotion. Double speed of castles is good for commerce, Imperialistic and Expansive needs something like that IMO. An ok trait.

 

[yavoon]

dont have warlords

financial 11/10
aggressive 9/10
organized 7/10
industrious 6/10
philosophical 5/10
spiritual 5/10
expansive 3/10
creative 2/10

I think thats all of em.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Sorry, but I would definitely rate Spiritual at either 6 to 8 out of 10. Why? Well those 1-2 turns of anarchy REALLY add up, especially if you are in a tech or Wonder race with another civ. Spiritual allows you to chop and change religion and civics at will, without harming your economic, industrial or scientific progress one jot!
Now, if we were talking Civ3, then I would rate Spiritual closer to a 3-4, simply because there were fewer government changes.

Aussie_Lurker.

 

[Tarkhan]

Spiritual is great if you're aiming for cultural victory. and no anarchy, and the freedom to change to fit your needs.

See Sullla's Civ4 walkthrough, or RB1: Cuban Isolationists to see how awesome it really is.

HinBudJewIsm the Magnificent shall rule you all!

 

[meatwad4289]

I'm gonna go ahead and say, It's not really about the traits you pick being the best, its which everones correspond to your personality.. If you pick agressive and imperalistic, and you sit at home waving your hands i nthe air breathing i nthe smoke, belieaving in love and peace and happyness, and don't think you should interferre with the way things are... Your gonna be screwed over, because You're not effectivly using your traits, and if you can use them effectivly you'll be unstoppable... I mean in Civ4 Vanilla I played as PResident Davis of the Confederacy in a mod, My country fell apart to many times to count, I tried three times and each time failure, and he had that Forbidden combo with the philosical and industrial(fairly sure it was that but it was that too powerful one) anyway, I played as General Lee Spiritual and Creative I believe it was, either way I kicked ass everytime.. Spirtual eliminated the Anarchy I had when turning communist... lol not sure what creative did but oh well...

Anyways now I'm Roosevelt, whos industrious and organized...I don't know what the traits do, but it I can go from peace time production to war time production like No other, which is ironic because thats what roosevelt did lol. Some how, I've never been as powerful as I am now with any other civ, or trait. I mean my last game of civ vanilla, I had 150 nukes, 200 Modern Armors and atleast 3 mechs on each city, and it would take me right up until the end of the game to take over the world... In this, I control 5 vassals 60k in Gold, and only have alittle over 100 infantry.. Few other unit types 20 diffrent max lol.. When I start playing again in a few minutes I will begin preparing for My D-Day inwhich I plan to construct 10 new transports and fill it completely with infantry, Depending on the speed I get the ships filled, I may add an extra 5 or 10 ships. I'll have anywhere from 40 to 80 Infantry ready to take hit the Japanese Beaches, whiel they have at most musketmen lol.. But theres another thing, I have 15 infantry there Already waiting in a coastal city on the other side of the continent, close to my Russian Vassals(made it to enslave them lol) I'm going to send my D-Day troops to the city, with a Warlord and once I reach the City I'm going to use the Warlord to give them All 20 xp, So about 55 to 95 Infantry plus 10 to 20 Transports will Recieve a huge bonus... The entire continent will be mine.. When Russia demands independence(only peacetime vassal I've had) I'll reenslave them... Japan tho, I will crush... Then I'll let the cities grow back and then take my super soldiers and Send them to Germany for D-Day 2.. lol

What I'm saying is, sometimes you'll luck out and the game goes your way, sometimes you pic kthe right leader and the game goes your way, sometimes both... inmy case its not traits as those are last i look at its the luck of the draw...

 

[aggri1]

Hi.

I'm posting here because this is the old Civ IV thread with "imperialistic" and "charismatic" in the title...

What I want to know is under which circumstances is CHA better than IMP, purely in terms of unit promotions. We have EITHER CHA or IMP, here. I am basically trying to compare the cheaper CHA promotions against the increased numbers of IMP Great Generals. Assume we settle all the Great Generals we get.

Say we get X GGs as CHA, then we'd have 2X as IMP.
But our units need more points as IMP.

At 13XP, CHA gets to promotion level five. IMP gets this level at 17XP. So we need four more XP, which is 2GGs. So... IMP is better if we can get FOUR GGs, as CHA would then have only two.

For level six, CHA is at 20XP, IMP at 27XP. So we need FOUR MORE GGs as IMP to make up those seven XP. That means we'd have a total of eight GGs as IMP (or four as CHA) in order to "be better" as IMP. If we have fewer than eight settled GGs, then CHA is better.

Is this accurate?

Also, of course, the GG-assisted IMP units are all made in the one city in which the GGs reside. Not always likely, is it? So when we build units in a few places, CHA looks better again.

If we have the Great Wall, and are fighting on home soil, than IMP looks good, as we'll get even more GG points.

Thoughts?

Cheers, A.

 

[JujuLautre]

You left two important parameters out of your reasoning:
- using charismatic, you will also get great generals
- using charismatic, all units benefit while with great generals only the units built in the city they are settled in benefit.

 

[lymond]

The OPs breakdown of the traits is hilarious in how wrong he is about many of the traits - like way off. Not sure if he is referring to BTS or vanilla/warlords. He loves Aggressive and hates Organized. Must have been playing on settler level.

Anyway, not sure of the math but Charismatic seems to be the better option to me. It's a better trait for one, but I guess it depends how much you will be fighting. Once you get that first GG will get you a lot more out of Charismatic than IMP. IMO the benefits of Char outweigh that of IMP since it affects all your units and units coming out of the city that settles GGs will get more promos. In fact, you can spread your settled GGs around as 3 promos are more than enough out of the gate.

 

[Windsor]

He's referring to Warlords. Vanilla didn't have charismatic and imperialistic while BTS wasn't released yet.

On promotions: You don't get 2x GGs as imperialistic. the cost for each additional GG goes up just like other GPs. Having other multipliers such as fighting at home or the wall is also a bigger bonus for non-imp. Going from 100% to 200% bonus is "only" a 50% increase.

And I'm usually happy with 3 promos out the gate too. In fact, often I find it best to be 1 fight away from the 3rd promo. 7XP troops as cha is nice, then your going to heal at both 8 and 13.

 

[aggri1]

Oh yeah. Some good points there; in particular I overlooked the increasing cost of the GGs, which means that to reach equivalent promotion levels one would really need a lot more total XP gained (for more GGs) with IMP, making it unlikely. Then there's the 'only-from-one-city' thing (which I did mention).

Therefore, I think I'm convinced that, as far as unit promotions go, CHA is better than IMP.

Cheers, A.

 

[Iranon]

Organized: 10/10. A powerful economic boost that's largely independent of economy type and in full effect when I'm abusing my economy for more production. Useful building discounts, cheap lighthouses can make a huge difference for getting filler cities off the ground.
Financial: 9/10. Rivaling ORG in overall economic power and easily leveraged, it makes commerce as a production replacement (rushbuy, large-scale upgrading) worth considering. Bit of a one-trick pony though.
Industrious: 9/10. Powerful and surprisingly flexible if you get comfortable with managing failure cash. Production first is attractive because it speeds up everything else , but forges are rather expensive without the trait. Some very useful wonders require problematic concessions without the trait.
Philosophical: 8/10. It may be less powerful than the other economy traits, but gains points for flexibility. It can get good use out of a full-fat wonderspam or keep an ultra-sparse expansionist economy afloat, and you have the choice between steady and immediate returns.


Expansive: 7/10. A no-nonsense hammer saver that will give new cities a considerable head start, the health benefits are less important but a nice bonus later on.
Spiritual: 7/10. Saves a few turns at least and allows a slightly more efficient economy when you have the patience for tweaking, but won't rival a dedicated economy trait. As a diplomatic tool, it's second to none - very useful on Deity where a sugar daddy/mommy is often worth the indignity.
Imperialistic: 6/10. shines in sticky situations, like settler first on resource-poor starts or requiring blocking cities without regard for the economy. Most of the time, expanding at a brisk but sane pace favours EXP.
Charismatic: 5/10. Economic and military benefits, but neither are terribly impressive or effective straight away.

Creative: 4/10. It makes things easier rather than adding much substance, with careful city placement culture is often not necessary. Still: simplifying my game, aiding fringe cities in the culture struggle and getting conquests online without additional investment is hardly a total waste.
Protective: 2/10. Dependable and useful for phony wars (to choke, simplify diplomacy or make high-level AIs waste their production bonuses). Even less good economically than it used to be (wall overflow) but you're thrown a bone if you can make castles useful.
Aggressive: 1/10. is mostly wasted outside of a good, hard melee rush... and on high levels, those are often not worth attempting even if they're possible (nobody to leech from when you're semi-isolated, chances are someone else will benefit more from unclaimed land if not). To add insult to the injury, none of the AGG leaders rank among the best early warmongers. 1/10.

***

Note that my scale is off if you think 7/10 should be average (as modern reviewing practice suggests) or 5.5/10 is average (sensible if you try to use the full scale); it's somewhere in between.

Also, I care more about the total package... on the whole, I'm content even with irrelevant Uniques if I have at least of the first group and none of the third.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Lol, I was reading the OP and was like lol wut, until I realized it was so old.

Organized is great, it's the gift that keeps giving as you expand. Cheap courthouses are so awesome too.

Philosophical is great too; those GPs pop out so fast. It's easy to get great people going as long as you build a library somewhere. Great people are most valuable early on, and so this helps when it matters the most.

I like to whore wonders, so industrious is awesome. Cheap forges seal the deal.

Of course, it sometimes has to do with how well it synergizes. I don't mind Sitting Bull's protective, because it's matched with a resourceless UU and philosophical. The combo of UU,UB and traits allows me to get great people without any risk of dying whatsoever, practically.

On the other hand, Toku is poop to me. AGG is nice for rushing, but protective doesn't help me if I want to axe rush; I don't want to build archers! What exactly can I get from him that I can't get from another AGG leader? Superpower gun units? That's a long way off.

Then you have leaders like Charlemagne who have not so great traits and poor starting techs and soso UU.

 

[theskibum]

Organized: 10/10. A powerful economic boost that's largely independent of economy type and in full effect when I'm abusing my economy for more production. Useful building discounts, cheap lighthouses can make a huge difference for getting filler cities off the ground.
Financial: 9/10. Rivaling ORG in overall economic power and easily leveraged, it makes commerce as a production replacement (rushbuy, large-scale upgrading) worth considering. Bit of a one-trick pony though.
Industrious: 9/10. Powerful and surprisingly flexible if you get comfortable with managing failure cash. Production first is attractive because it speeds up everything else , but forges are rather expensive without the trait. Some very useful wonders require problematic concessions without the trait.
Philosophical: 8/10. It may be less powerful than the other economy traits, but gains points for flexibility. It can get good use out of a full-fat wonderspam or keep an ultra-sparse expansionist economy afloat, and you have the choice between steady and immediate returns.


Expansive: 7/10. A no-nonsense hammer saver that will give new cities a considerable head start, the health benefits are less important but a nice bonus later on.
Spiritual: 7/10. Saves a few turns at least and allows a slightly more efficient economy when you have the patience for tweaking, but won't rival a dedicated economy trait. As a diplomatic tool, it's second to none - very useful on Deity where a sugar daddy/mommy is often worth the indignity.
Imperialistic: 6/10. shines in sticky situations, like settler first on resource-poor starts or requiring blocking cities without regard for the economy. Most of the time, expanding at a brisk but sane pace favours EXP.
Charismatic: 5/10. Economic and military benefits, but neither are terribly impressive or effective straight away.

Creative: 4/10. It makes things easier rather than adding much substance, with careful city placement culture is often not necessary. Still: simplifying my game, aiding fringe cities in the culture struggle and getting conquests online without additional investment is hardly a total waste.
Protective: 2/10. Dependable and useful for phony wars (to choke, simplify diplomacy or make high-level AIs waste their production bonuses). Even less good economically than it used to be (wall overflow) but you're thrown a bone if you can make castles useful.
Aggressive: 1/10. is mostly wasted outside of a good, hard melee rush... and on high levels, those are often not worth attempting even if they're possible (nobody to leech from when you're semi-isolated, chances are someone else will benefit more from unclaimed land if not). To add insult to the injury, none of the AGG leaders rank among the best early warmongers. 1/10.

***

Note that my scale is off if you think 7/10 should be average (as modern reviewing practice suggests) or 5.5/10 is average (sensible if you try to use the full scale); it's somewhere in between.

Also, I care more about the total package... on the whole, I'm content even with irrelevant Uniques if I have at least of the first group and none of the third.

Your rankings of the traits are almost flawless. I would swap IND and SPI places simply because I very, very rarely try for wonders and forges are typically whipped or chopped in my games. Additionally I prefer to be in control of the diplo scene as best as possible and SPI abuse certainly allows that as well as the switching in and out of war buildup/economy civics at will.

Lol, I was reading the OP and was like lol wut, until I realized it was so old.

Me too...took me a little while to notice this thread is 5 years old.

 

[Turquoiside]

So on that note (because I was ing too...) was Organized boosted somewhere along the line? I can't imagine why it was so disliked - It's easily one of my favorites. The only trait I really would dislike having is Aggresive.

 

[Iranon]

@ thebiskum: Thanks for the compliment. Amusingly enough, I almost agree... in some other trait ranking thread I gave the same ranking (I think) but noted that the value of IND and SPI could vary a lot. If I'm very uncomfortable with the diplomatic situation, they could even trade places.

@ NarutoAvatarDBZ: Overall level of play may have increased (ORG scales with difficulty level and its benefits aren't as in-your-face as those of other economic traits). I've also been shoving numerical analysis down the throat of anyone who would listen until some people gave in

 

[Ataxerxes]

So on that note (because I was ing too...) was Organized boosted somewhere along the line? I can't imagine why it was so disliked - It's easily one of my favorites. The only trait I really would dislike having is Aggresive.

I don't think Organized was boosted. The OP didn't like it, but most people agree Organized is very strong. And the higher the difficulty level, the better Organized is. At very high levels, it's considered the best trait by many.

Aggressive is a weak trait, but I'd put Protective behind Aggressive. I think they are the two weakest, but Aggressive is better. However, on crowded maps Aggressive is good for rushing so can be a very good trait in certain situations.