Poll: Best Colonists

Criteria: Maximize chance of winning on higher levels on standard maps (whatever they are)

 

Scientists are really powerfull because:
- u get 5 science instead of 3 science from the very beginning in ur capital --> Techs are going way faster than ur competition if u can keep ur city growing early game.

- When u settle and the outpost becomes a city the tech penalty's are reduced if not gone + u get another science boost.

I'm going after these colonists to powerhouse in science .

 

Potentially 6 science if you also start w/ the clinic. Research ALL the things!

 

I think they seem to be really balanced. Artists and Aristocrats of course work best with wide empires.

 

It's all about the synergy. I'm reluctant to pick any one best trait unless I know what the other traits I'm picking are, and the victory condition I'm going for...

 

Scientist or artists for wide.

 

I am torn between Aristocrats and Artists as both have +1 Health/City. My divide is over how powerful +3 Energy/City will be compared to +2 Culture/City. For example, if I am going Supremacy-Wide then Energy looks more tempting. I think if I go Harmony-Wide or Purity-Wide that Energy could be better.

 

I think it is more or less impossible to answer that question without having played the game. My choise would (probably) be Artists or Refugees, depending on how easy it is to managed health early on.

 

Artists let me take more virtues in the early game and help exanding in the mid game, both of that can be converted into a nice snowballing effect. Also my city borders expand more quickly early game probably offsetting the opportunity cost of not having the second best option imho (engineers) by being able to work better tiles in the early years of each city.

Please don't nerf artists (but they are OP imho)! I mean really this is not realistic, artists should not be better at settling a wild planet than engineers or scientists (and don't get me started about aristocrats, they should give malus instead of bonus, because inequality in a society hampers its economical growth and damages the quality of available healthcare. Name them entrepreneurs and i'm fine with it).

 

When I think of Aristocrats in BE terms I think of "Bill Gates goes to Space".

 

Refugees look very strong. They can be Engineers if you need them to be. Just work more Mines and less Farms. They can be a poor-man's Aristocrat. If you have Science/Culture terrain they allow you to work it over Farms too.

Going the other way is possible in good terrain, but won't work in low Food terrain. So Refugees will protect you against bad starts better than the others, and allow you more flexibility in city placement.

Aristocrats are the sleeper here. Energy buying looks like it could be very strong. There's no pop rushing from the looks of it. Forest chops are powerful, but limited more by number of Forests than how fast you can chop them. An Aristocrat ARC stealing Energy and Energy rushing with a few Forest chops thrown in might be a very bad neighbor to have ...

 

thats an interesting point. From what we have seen the city tile does not yield flat 2 food (supporting 1 pop from the start), but just works the tile thats underneath the city (plains and Marshes only give 1 food, deserts zero and founding a city in a hill tile when landing could be interesting (stnting growth until that worker or vivarium comes around. So a city on plains has 3 food instead of 1 food with refugees, which could make it easier to start fast. I'll be taking a worker with me though so early improving of tiles should offset that possible disadvantage. Also culture is a limited ressource in the early game and health in the mid game, so i think even with a tall strategy i will prefer artist over refugees. But i recon that refugees might indeed be better than engineers. You won't win me over on aristocrats though, not unless they change the name ;-)

 

Aristocrats: people with white, powdered wigs. How else are they going to move upwards in society?

 

The tendency to look for synergies (locking one in a specific corner) and the two approaches of rush OR preparation for a strong middle game will make for "interesting" multiplayer almost akin to SMAC: I never played that in MP though. But i can imagine.

 

I think they all look very good. It would be difficult to say which is best.

 

While I seem to be in the minority I'll probably go Engineers first (with PAC) for the fast early production. Refugees gives you higher population but that also gives you worse health, and with the way the tech-web is set up and how powerfull stealing tech and beakers with spies seems in the last video maxing science output might not be as overwhelmingly important as in previous games. Artists are obviously interesting but the increasing cost for every new virtue means you wont get that far ahead in virtues, still almost certainly worth it especially for Franco-Iberia obviously.

 

They all look good so far. Here are my current thoughts

Artists: The +1 health on top of the culture looks strong and I can see +2 being a seizable portion of your total culture per turn boosting your virtue acquisition a lot. I would definitely recommend artist if you want to go prosperity since this seems to be the tree with the most bonuses to grab early to be interesting (free settler, free worker, +2 pop per new cities etc).

Engineers: From what we've seen, hammers seem to be a more scarce ressource in civbe than in civ5, hills being only 1 hammer base for example. Also the trees seems to have less free hammers than early civ5. You can still grab free settler and free worker but that's it compared to civ5's +1 hammer, free monuments, free aqueducts, free worker, free settler. And that's only if you go prosperity early in which case artist seems like a better option. Getting +2 hammer makes your capital on flat go from 4hammer to 6 and outpost on grass go from 1 to 3 (before tiles). That is a tremendous difference if we have to bring up a lot of infrastructure. It will also be very good, as liberty republic was, for people wanting early military. Since you make the gambit to raise your food through terrain then, these colonists should in my opinion take the free worker to catch up in food and just build a soldier if necessary (which production is hastened up to 50% thanks to engineers). Or maybe take the lab to have the free tech in order to have more options for production if it appears teching is too slow and you'd finish all your early choices.

Refugees: Very good if food is as important in this game. It's somewhat the other side of engineers, allowing you to raise your food rather than your hammers so you'll have to rely on hills for hammers, sadly base hills seems to be only 1 hammer in this game.

Scientists: Will depend on how important it is to tech fast in this game compared to being able to have a strong infrastructure. Also it will depend on whether or not +2 per city is strong compared to your base bpt. It will definetely boost your early bpt so maybe scientists are a definite very good option if there are early techs that you want fast for some reason.

Aristocrats: +1 health is good like for artists. We'll have to see what kind of ratio the game use for gold per hammer to really see how good this is.

 

I think I've been underestimating Aristocrats. That +3 energy per city can pay the maintenance for an extra terrascape, and you get +1 health per city too.

 

I may have been persuaded by the existence of all these high yield, but maintenance requiring tile improvements that perhaps aristocrats may be the way to go, as the health bomus makes going wide easier and the energy gets you what is essentially a free one of the improvements.

However, I think the difference between all the colonist choices power-wise is minimal, and really comes down to personal preference.