Ranking and Rating UHV Requirements (and suggested improvements)

[BaneFire]

Like most people here I enjoy playing for the UHVs. They make for unique and interesting gameplay that is not found in any other Civ game or any other strategy game in general. Nonetheless, out of the many varied UHV types there are some that are more appealing and interesting... and some that are less appealing and interesting.

I've decided to create a "tier list" of the different types of UHVs, and following on from the lower rated UHV types, suggest replacements for them. I'll list as many as possible, but some are relatively generic (eg, the vast majority of "conquest" UHVs can simply go under a single header).

S Tier
These are unique and interesting UHV goals that combine unique gameplay, strategic interests and well, fun.

• Infrastructure goals: Inca (Build a road along the Andes), Canada (Build a railroad from Atlantic to Pacific), Russia (Trans-Siberian railroad)

These two infrastructure based goals are my favourite. Infrastructure is generally something good and useful, and making a goal out of it, especially with a tight deadline that requires proactive play (in the Inca case, raising an army to conquer the native cities, in the Canada case, rushing cities to the Pacific and prairie oil).

• Puzzles: Polynesia (settle certain islands), Vikings (colonise North America early)

These are their own weird category and could probably go under the Settlement Rush, but they're reliant on unique, almost "gimmicky" gameplay. The difference here is that the gimmick is often pretty fun, allowing you to use all the strategies you know to push the game to its limits.

• Certain Uniques: Mali (great merchant in Mecca), Maya (contact with Europe), Harappa (foreign trade)

These aren't really groupable but are highly unique goals which require out-there gameplay and strong planning and strategy. Often they are more based around a "side goal" rather than your all-out goal, but in my opinion these are super fun and unique.

A Tier
These are fun and good goals that are perhaps a bit more generic preventing them from being S Tier, but still make for good gameplay. Often they combine the interests and strengths of your civilisation so you aren't being too gimmicky.

• Great Person Settling: Moors (Settle 4 great people in Cordoba), Ethiopia (Settle 2 Great Prophets in Orthodox cities), Tibet (5 Great Prophets), etc

Settling Great Prophets is rarely a bad thing, although I'd probably prefer if the requirement changed to something like "create x great people", so that you can use them for bulbs or otherwise. Nonetheless micromanaging for GPs and specialising cities to get them makes for somewhat "standard" gameplay, but is just good Civ 4 play.

• Settlement Rush: Portugal (Colonise 15 cities in Brazil/Africa/Asia), Spain (First to colonise America),

Expanding your empire is also pretty essential gameplay and it's nice to be rewarded for going wide rather than tall. Often these UHV goals synchronise very well with the civ bonus, eg English maintenance bonus.

• Conquer: The vast majority of civs!

Conquer-based UHV goals are pretty damn common, whether it's Rome taking the Mediterranean, Mongolia building the Silk Road or Japan's long-term goal, but they're still often fun. They work best when they synchronise with other UHVs allowing for warlike gameplay, they are worse when they conflict with your UHVs, eg, Greece having to build wonders and do conquests.

B Tier
These goals are generic, with the fun coming more from planning and executing them rather than the goal itself. Sometimes they can be really crap if they conflict internally with other UHVs, other times they can be pretty good if they go hand-in-hand with another.

• Secure Resources: America (oil), Ethiopia (incense), etc

These can be a weird bunch, sometimes being very fun, eg Ethiopia having the choice between conquering Egypt or Yemen, other times they can be a bit too dependent on random factors. Nonetheless they allow for more proactive gameplay so are the better half of the B Tier.

• Have at least "X": France (Parisian culture), Egypt (500+ culture)

Note this is different from the other category I've made below. In general this is simply a binary yes/no check to see if you've reached a certain goal and it's merely a matter of achieving it. Somewhat passive gameplay but at least you're generally in control of what's going on so it can't be too faulted.

• Build a specific wonder: Maya (Temple of Kulkan), Polynesia (Maoi)

Often based around a specific wonder that's especially useful and realistic for you, I think these are good goals because said wonder is often powerful and useful. Note again this is different from another similar category. Getting one wonder is fine, it's adequate, not that exciting but not a pain either.

C Tier
Contrary to your gameplay style, unintuitive and badly explained or generally boring to achieve, these are uninteresting goals which by themselves could be interesting but are often let down due to something like stringent requirements (eg having to control totally an area, rather than vassalise it, eg way too early/late date checks).

• Don't let X settle: Ethiopia (No Europeans in Africa), America/Colombia (No Europeans in Americas)

While they're somewhat interesting goals, they are unfortunately all let down due to weirdly specific requirements. For example America has to do naval landings in the Caribbean and Ethiopia must send massive elephant stacks wandering round Africa. They could easily move to A-Tier if they were modified to be a bit more realistic and accepting.

• Discover X techs/Build X wonders: Romans, Chinese, Babylon, etc etc etc

A very common one and frankly a really boring one. Often a run can be ruined because the AI randomly rushed a tech that was part of your UHV meaning you either have to save-scum it or abandon the UHV strat. Doubly frustrating due to the fact that techs and wonders can't easily be prevented. Sure, it's neat when you save up Great People to rush them, but it's an otherwise unreliable and random strat which simply isn't a fun mechanic.

• Anything that requires you to penalise yourself to achieve it: eg, Japan and 6000 average culture

Any UHV where you must deliberately limit your gameplay to achieve the goal is abhorrent and should be changed. Prime example is the Japanese one requiring you to only found your capital for the first hundred turns or so. I'd rather be making Samurai and conquering Korea, not sitting making culture buildings!

• Population requirement: India, Byzantium, Thailand, etc

Some population requirement goals are more realistic and fair than others, eg, the Byzantine and Aztec high population capitals are reasonable. However some are simply too reliant on the AI fudging up, eg Indonesia's population goal. As population is something you can't really affect too much if there's a runaway China or Japan or India, it can be a really frustrating goal.

F Tier
These are actively BAD UHV goals and should be immediately scrapped.

• Have X: Byzantium (5000 gold in 1000 AD), Mali (5000 gold/15000 gold)

Way to turn the game into a boring bean counter. Requiring you to *have* the gold rather than *earn* it is terrible, forcing you to sit on a stack of money rather than actually use it. Doubly frustrating for civs who have money based abilities: eg, Byzantium has the power to bribe barbarians... except, you won't be bribing them since you need to save up for the 5000 gold!
Doubly insulting because some UHV goals do it perfectly: the Tamil trade one and the Moor piracy ones are both great because you don't have to sit on a stack of gold, you can actively spend and use it while you achieve your goals.

• Slave-based: Brazil, Congo

Slavery as it stands is simply too unreliable. Sometimes mega-Ethiopia has been killing Impis all game, meaning you just need to save up 1k gold, buy 10 slaves and achieve the goals. Other times, Ethiopia, Mali and the Congo collapse meaning you simply can't achieve the goal. Coinflip based and utterly undynamic.

• AI-reliant: Canada diplomacy goal, Portugal open borders

Similarly to the slavery category, some UHV goals simply rely on the AI doing stuff, which again is a coinflip. Sometimes they can be A Tier - playing as Portugal and sending carracks to the Orient to secure new trade routes is great. Playing as Portugal and reaching the Orient to find that there are 50 independent cities and no open borders to secure is terrible.

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As such, here are some of my suggestions for replacements for certain UHV goals which I consider grossly unfun, and the reasoning behind them.

America 1 - Remove the Caribbean requirement. (Too stringent, and IRL the Monroe Doctrine never even concerned the Caribbean too much)
Aztecs 3 - Control the IRL Mexican borders. (The goal here is simply to survive and thrive the European invasion. Conquering the Maya and potentially any European colonies is good enough imo.)
Brazil 1 - Have over 50 gold-per-turn from selling sugar to other civilisations and harvesting the plots. (Still based around sugar. Slave plantations would make it easier by having additional gold on the plots.)
Byzantine 1 - Settle a Great General in Rome by 900 AD. (Changes it from sitting around making wealth and Great Merchants to actively halting the barbarian conquests. Also might prompt more action with European civs.)
Canada 3 - Have defensive pacts with 8 other nations with Multilateralism. (Might not be perfect, but a bit more proactive than current imo.)
China 2 - Discover a New World civ before any European civilisation. (Still based around the Song dynasty prosperity and tech-rushing, with a more proactive bent this time.)
Congo 2 - Sell slaves to 8 different civilisations. (Slaves in general sell for 100 gold, but this time you're less reliant on civs having enough money to buy them, and more reliant on finding new slave markets.)
Ethiopia 3 - Build a Orthodox Cathedral and send a Great Merchant to the Orthodox Holy City. (Puts more focus on Ethiopia's religious goals and having a robust economy, rather than just waiting the entire game out.)
Greece 1 - Be the most advanced civ in XXX BC. (Allows a little more diversity in play with still a tech focus.)
Inca 3 - Control 5 silver resources. (Encourages slightly more intelligent play than just city-spamming.)
Indonesia 1 - Have at least XX population in 4 biggest cities. (Less reliant on hoping a plague hits Japan/China/India.)
Japan 1 - Have at least 6000 culture in your capital. (You can found other cities! Wow!)
Mali 3 - Control 4 gold and 2 gems, and have at least 100 gold per turn in XXXX AD. (Allows you to focus on gaining wealth, and means you can turn down science just on the goal-check, rather than for 50 turns.)
Carthage 3 - Have at least 12 trade routes. (Focuses more on contacting new civilisations and setting up trade routes, rather than just sitting on money.)
Tamil 1 - Have at least 15 gold-per-turn in trades with European civilisations. (There's already a gold-check in Tamil 3, so no need for another one. Instead focuses on setting up new trades.)

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Anyway I hope this was coherent and sparks some discussion. In general:
Any UHV that encourages proactive play is good. Any that encourages counter-productive, stupid or passive play is bad.

 

[1SDANi]

If you changed Japan's Culture UHV you'd have to also change accordingly its Tech UHV and possibly also its UP.

 

[Orbii]

If you changed Japan's Culture UHV you'd have to also change accordingly its Tech UHV and possibly also its UP.

I also personally find the gameplay pattern for the UHV interesting due to the restriction. Usually I do it with 4 cities -- Kyoto, Tokyo, Nagasaki, and Seoul. That's generate 24000 culture, which is equivalent in difficulty to the French and Italian culture UHVs, give or take.


As for the main post, I think there's a lot of great suggestions, but I think you may be referring to an older DoC version? Some of the UHVs have been changed, after all.

 

[BaneFire]

@Orbii yeah the 1.16 version, not the development version. I think some things are different but in general the tiers still are relevant.

 

[cmakk1012]

I really like most of your suggestions. Any UHV goal that is overly dependent on AI behavior is terrible and really ought to be changed. A few thoughts:

Byzantine 1 - Settle a Great General in Rome by 900 AD. (Changes it from sitting around making wealth and Great Merchants to actively halting the barbarian conquests. Also might prompt more action with European civs.)

You could make this one more ambitious, even. Similar to RFCE, UHV1 could simulate Justinian’s goals, with a bit of wiggle room for the Arab spawn. Control Italy, Carthage, and southern Spain(?) in 750 AD, and the GG in Rome requirement. Maybe multiple GGs.

Tamil 1 - Have at least 15 gold-per-turn in trades with European civilisations. (There's already a gold-check in Tamil 3, so no need for another one. Instead focuses on setting up new trades.)

Definitely a bit dependent on how much GPT the Euro civs have at that point in time. It could work, but maybe it could be GPT with all civs, not just Euros? Tamil trade with Southeast Asia and China was also significant.

Ethiopia 3 - Build a Orthodox Cathedral and send a Great Merchant to the Orthodox Holy City. (Puts more focus on Ethiopia's religious goals and having a robust economy, rather than just waiting the entire game out.)

Eh, not that difficult IMO. What about a Coptic UHV: control Egypt in 1000 AD? Or even more ambitious, include Armenia as well?

 

[1SDANi]

Or even more ambitious, include Armenia as well?

Conquest UHVs that encourage Open Borders with neighbors are really cool. I always love moving troops through Byzantium to conquer Jerusalem for the Holy Romans.

 

[JHLee]

For me Aztec 3 is one of the most fun goals in DoC, it reminds me of Sunset Invasion in CK2.
It's not like there is a time limit so you can build up as much as you like before invading Europe.

Your Byz1 suggestion could easily be done by playing as Rome and switching to Byz.

The current Eth 3 was interesting and challenging enough for me.

I like your Greece 1, Inca 3, and Jap 1 suggestions.

Mali 3 - I dunno, I tried Mali a few weeks ago and it wasn't too ridiculous.
I mean, for Byz UHV in 600AD, you have to stay at 0 tech for 40 turns
since you can't reliably get 2 Great Merchants in time due to the wonders in Constantinople and Athens.
Mali is definitely more sensible than that.

I'd like to make a suggestion myself:

The current Korean UHV is quite a minor-copy of the Chinese UHV.
I would suggest changing it into something more interesting:

 

[TJDowling]

I really like infrastructure goals too. I kind of wish there were more but I can't think of too many other ways to do infrastructure that wouldn't become tedious. If we add HSR as a route type that could be a goal for Japan but then there would be two late game UHVs.

Now that I think about it there could be goals like build X number of [type of improvement]. Like Russia, perhaps X number of farms. Which would encourage colonizing Siberia to get more arable land without explicitly stating it.

 

[Enyavar]

Now that I think about it there could be goals like build X number of [type of improvement]

Like Brazil's slave plantations.

Like Russia, perhaps X number of farms. Which would encourage colonizing Siberia to get more arable land without explicitly stating it.

Russia has the Trans-Siberean Railway to encourage that, which is a great goal I think.
But farming in Siberia is a strange idea: Russia could build all those farms in Poland's core rather than in Siberia. And farming up the own core is a good idea anyways, only cottaging the core can compete with the strategy.

What I'd like is to swap Indonesian population goals with something like "have 10 town improvements that are built in your core/historical area"

 

[TJDowling]

Like Brazil's slave plantations.


Russia has the Trans-Siberean Railway to encourage that, which is a great goal I think.
But farming in Siberia is a strange idea: Russia could build all those farms in Poland's core rather than in Siberia. And farming up the own core is a good idea anyways, only cottaging the core can compete with the strategy.

What I'd like is to swap Indonesian population goals with something like "have 10 town improvements that are built in your core/historical area"

I dunno, there's plains in Siberia and definitely a need of extra food which would be wasted on already food rich Poland. Anyway, that was less a suggestion than trying to give a quick example of how an infastructure goal that isn't routes could be implemented.