PCGamer: The best culture to choose in Humankind

[EscapedGoat]

I've never been able to pick Harrapans - spending too much time in Neolithic!

oh I fully agree and it's the only real dilemma you have in the start, staying in neolithic for as long as you can is the best strategy and that's usually not compatible with getting the best culture which IMO is the Harrapans. However, I still think their bonuses are the overall best ancient age bonuses.

While it is true you can settle scouts to "make up" for pop, you still face the problem if you are not Harrapans that you want to grow your city beyond ~6 population. Since each pop eats approximately 8 food, you're looking at a huge investment in food related infrastructure, which the Harrapans get more or less "for free" by the nature of their bonuses and their unique district.

In "in game" terms, you could make the argument that the Harrapans roughly "+2 FIMS per tile" base bonus (under ideal circumstances) is somewhat comparable to the Egyptian "+1 FIMS per tile" but Harrapans will usually lose out on the neolithic legacy trait which is "+1 FIMS per pop" because they need to be the first to pick (most of the times). If you pick Egypt a little later and immediately settle ~6 scouts in the capital, you will have achieved a FIMS bonus which is roughly comparable to what the Harrapan has, and you also have the 10% discount on districts. Given the stronger neolithic, it might be a stronger or at least equal position for the first city. The "+2 FIMS per tile" is also somewhat theoretical, usually you don't have all rivers, and the FIMS distribution for the best available city site might include tiles that are pure production and will not give a FIMS bonus for Harappans.

 

[Victoria]

Another nice thing about Egyptians is their legacy trait is a % so stays relevant all game.
It also allows you to put your specialists as scientists early and the pyramids +1 influence is a nice touch as is the Markabata.

 

[fortydayweekend]

Another nice thing about Egyptians is their legacy trait is a % so stays relevant all game.
It also allows you to put your specialists as scientists early and the pyramids +1 influence is a nice touch as is the Markabata.

I also like the adjacency bonuses that make building more makers quarters useful into the next couple of eras. You can really get a good industry going which frees up workers for food, money, or research as you say.

I don't think any of the other ancient EQs give an MQ bonus? So building up industry feels very slow unless you have a great map for it or enough river forest to rely on hydrology/carpentry.

 

[Forster]

I don't seem to ever get the early ai picks and usually end up Egyptian, athough Zhao is fun. I also like the Romans. That extra unit early is very useful when fighting, and you can still add another through the tech tree. There is a lot of staying power in Roman units.

 

[Cherenkov]

I'm almost at 400 hours played and most of that is at HK difficulty. I've played and won on normal, large, huge maps. My ratings on Ancient era civs.

A: Egypt, Harappan(just hard to get especially on a Huge map but I've done it), Mycenaean
B: Nubia, Zhou(with the right map, A with a perfect map), Babylon
C: Everyone else

Harappan growth means you can put workers into science for an early science boost and/or production. You can also produce armies and repopulate the losses quickly. But yea the odds of getting them are pretty low and means you go into classical at T6-8 with maybe 2-3 tribes. I'm not a fan of the EU especially compared to Egypt. That being said my best game is still with the Harappans.
Egypt is better than the Harappans and has the much better EU and almost guaranteed to get on a normal size map and usually large maps. The EU Move->shoot->move available early in the game is deadly. Awesome trio of an incredible LT, EU, EQ.
Mycenaean EQ is like having a mini Egypt EQ without placement restrictions and has the added benefit of more stability than a garrison. Their LT is better than Hittites. Military stars are easiest to earn and so having a bonus to that is perfect for the warmonger inside me. Really fun warring civ to play at that stage of the game.

Nubia is very close given a resource rich start and can even exceed the others. Archers are already one of the best units in the game and their EU is even better. I just find earning merchant stars a lot harder early in the game compared to military, builder, agrarian.
Babylon LT lets you get through the early science fast and you'll easily be first to writing for some extra fame, but doesn't scale well in the later eras. The EU is a really good early anti-cav unit. Their EQ is good not great like Egypt's, gets more benefit from nearby farmer's quarters but I'm too busy building maker's quarters in the early game.
Zhou can be A tier on a perfectly mountainous map and it is a shame they are not considered a science civ. Like merchants I find aestheste stars hard to get that early in the game especially as Zhou which has no influence from their LT/EQ. The EU is really nice but requires horse and copper. If you get lucky you can go into classical era with 200+ science while other civs are struggling to make 20-30. That is huge for getting through the classical tech tree quickly.

Just want to make a quick classical comment about Huns. Don't do it. You are 100x better off with Persia or Greece. One one the biggest drawbacks with Huns is that because hordes are generated at outposts it means your outposts cannot be attached to a city until you get out of the era. You want archers + immortals or hoplites over hun hordes any day of the week. Hunnic hordes might look cool and are extremely annoying when the AI is a hun neighbor but you will severely limit your city growth during your time with them.

 

[Taefin]

My ancient picks (HK, I don’t loiter Neolithic and skip 5 turns, almost always conquer a city in Ancient).

A - Egyptians
B - Harappans, Mycenaeans, Hittites, Nubians, Babylonians
C - Phoenicians
D - Olmecs, Zhou
Never tried - Assyrians

Egyptians just have such a strong early production queue of EQx3 -> EUx4 that no other culture can outpace, and a better unit than anyone can get by then.

Harappans are fine, my games with them have involved an immediate runner conquest as the extra CS helps even the odds on HK. However the districts are slow and it’s tough to compete with AI who have boosted EU. I don’t know about them being hard to get. Skipping 5 turns I get to ancient by T9-10 most of the time, often with legacy.

Mycenaeans also fine, and the EQ stellar, but situational since you really do want those 15+ spots to get them up fast enough for their expensive EU to be relevant. Maybe it’s my 5 turn delay, but it’s hard for me to get 4 EU before the AI gets organized warfare. Very good but not as clean as Egypt.

Hittites make the conquest easy but the start is slow building regular MK and needing copper adds 2 techs to the path. They play as late ancient conquest for me where you punch through the first few swordsmen to end the war.

Nubians archer is amazing and the gold is more helpful to me that others I guess, I buyout tons. I only tried them 1-2 times on bad starts and they really made up for that.

Babylonians are all about rushing swordsmen for me. The EU is way too expensive for what you get. I like to build a bunch of their EQ, after a few MQ and make a late switch to Rome, which almost always clinches the game.

Phoenicians, I don’t know how, but I always clinch the game early with them. It’s a slow methodical start that usually has more outposts than administrative centers, but the EQ’s gold and food set up for Carthage very well. Major strength of gold is just getting gold era stars I’d otherwise miss.

Zhou I have never had a good game with. Even with tons of mountains, the EQ takes too long to build and so the science edge is not as meaningful. Takes me forever to get their EU online and limits me to very few districts to keep the strength bonus. Also doesn’t help with capturing cities and Zhou make it much harder for me to get adequate infantry built.

Olmecs, hmm I must not value early influence as much as others, perhaps because of early conquest making it less vital. The EU is worthless and the EQ is good enough but not exceptional. My not liking being restricted to defensive gameplay is probably the biggest factor.

Assyrians, for whatever reason the EU didn’t interest me and the EQ seems useless (it’s a garrison right?). Maybe I’m discounted the advantage in early open warfare but it seems they’d get outclassed when infantry come online. I wish they got a siege tower that let infantry move freely over enemy walls and/or removed defender fortification bonus. I mean, why does the narrator comment on their siege weapons? Just to rub it in?

Overall hats off to Amplitude for at least getting us all to have such different experience of ancient cultures, even if Egypt and Harappans are pretty widely popular.

 

[Siptah]

The Assyrian EQ is a garrison that gives influence and can be purchased with influence in outposts. That was quite good, actually (but I fear with the now higher influence cost, ROI might be too slow). The EU is quite good for the price and, together with the +1 on all units LT, feels so incredibly fast at that point of the game.

 

[PSG]

Egyptians are hands down the best. All other things being equal starting with the Egyptians will reduce the time to finish the tech tree by 40 to 50 turns out of 600.

I like the Olmec better than the Harrapans, but I stack the heads up partially built while I concentrate on building MQs and my first wonder (Pyramids preferred for non-Egyptian starts) and finish them after switching to the Persians. Speaking of which my game will blow up if I don't pick the Persians. 2 extra city slots is all too valuable.

 

[Cherenkov]

Assyrians are a mixed bag for me. Their LT speed along with their EU is great for snagging 0 pop independent cities if you time it right. Their EU quickly becomes quickly obsolete as spearmen will take them out easily. The EQ is too defensive for my tastes and +2 influence is ok but the Mycenaean EQ is so much better with near Egypt like production bonus.

OTOH, trespassing is awesome allowing you to play dirty tricks with either ransacking or using the AA to annex attached territory. But in my experience the AI reacts quickly and you'd better have the units to run interference while others are ransacking/annexing else you'll get interrupted.