Top 5 City States Opinion

[UWHabs]

Auckland is nice because it can turn horrible cities into decent cities, or good cities into great cities. That being said, it's still situational, in that if you don't have a lot of coast, it's not very useful. And to maximize it, yes, you need to run Liang+Fisheries, which can take some effort. But other than maybe Nazca, no city-state does more for "bad" tiles.

I do like the city-states whose bonuses are good, but still more or less passive. Babylon, Bologna, Anatanrivo, Buenos Aires, Zanzibar, Geneva, Nan Madol, etc.. are all great because you essentially don't change your play, you just accept the bonus. They can still be annoying when you lose suzerain, but not to the level when you lose Auckland or Kumasi, where now I either need to suffer through horrible cities, or start re-routing my traders if I don't think I can get it back soon enough.

 

[Deadly Dog]

I find it really hard to make a "top 5" list as I've gotten fantastic results, situationally, from almost a dozen of the city states. Bologna has given me a GP factory with a 7-city Sweden, Zanzibar and Auckland are a welcome sight at any point in the game; Kumasi, Tana, Nan Madol are usually welcome in my games. Kabul once gave me battlefield domination in the classical era with two level 4 Okitchitaw (I ran Survey card exclusively, got ~30exp when my Okie captured a city).

Apart from the usual suspects, I think Buenos Aires needs to be rated higher, certainly higher than Zanzibar, because it's not hard to have 3+ different bonus resources if you put some energy into it.

Also Hattusa was indispensable in my last 2 victories, first with Kristina and a small empire on 1 continent, then with Suleiman. I'm liking this one a lot more now, it seems its always useful to have a resource stockpiling as soon as you unlock it. Takes the urgency out of getting the resources hooked up even when a strat shows up nearby.

 

[CoconutTank]

Have been playing a session with Valletta and paid much more attention to the faith-buying for walls and flood harbors, and holy heck, yes it is great. I always prioritize walls whenever I capture or start a city, and Valletta definitely speeds up that process. It helped that I could find a friendly faith CS to boost my faith income as well, so I had a lot of extra faith lying around. Each Ancient Wall costs 80 faith, which is sort of cheap relative to other items, and the city only needs Ancient Walls to at least attack. The other walls are definitely pricey, but getting Walls out of city's build queues feels awesome.

 

[Victoria]

I think Buenos Aires needs to be rated higher, certainly higher than Zanzibar, because it's not hard to have 3+ different bonus resources if you put some energy into it.

I think you mistake the amenity value a touch.Buenos Aires provides 10 Amenities at best while Zanzibar provides 12 guaranteed without any work or requirement to avoid chopping.
Each bonus resource provides +1 amenity rather than the same as a lux.

 

[Troy Bruckner]

But other than maybe Nazca, no city-state does more for "bad" tiles.

The most productive tiles I have ever had in game are from stacked Nazca lines. Once oil pops up those tiles are 20+ in total output even without Petra. It's downside is the loss of usable tiles.

 

[Sostratus]

The most productive tiles I have ever had in game are from stacked Nazca lines. Once oil pops up those tiles are 20+ in total output even without Petra. It's downside is the loss of usable tiles.

I feel like the game doesn't highlight the lack of usability of the lines enough. I wish they could come up with a more balanced yield that allowed you to work the nazca lines. It's a really really cool improvement!