Traits - best to worste

[Diamondeye]

First of all, hats off to Rusten for some very nice statements and posts. And I can definately see what you mean by the Fin comment. I am, at the moment, only playing on prince, so I wouldn't know how Immo/Dei is.

Most of the time human players don't focus on building defensive units or just have units sit in a city while the AI attacks. Crossbows are about the only archery unit I build in general (unless I need some archers for early barb defense).

True. However, it isn't a counterargument to my statement. Archery units are definately useful even on the offensive. Crossbows especially. A mach->Engi beeline can make an army of trebs/xbows/pikes which can effectively walk over any medieval defence as long as you get there quick and supply with LOTS of trebs. I think, perhaps, that the reason Pro is underrated is that Drill is underrated. I personally find Drill IV better than Combat IV under most circumstances. Also, with only one promotion available (barracks or theo or vassalage), the drill I out of the box allows special promotions like Cover and Pinch.

Sure your city with 10 CG III/drill longbows may be almost invulnerable but if all your tiles get pillaged your economy is seriously damaged. Bring those longbows out into flat territory and see how long they will last. Even if they are drill 4 a horse archer or knight can ignore first strike.

Completely agree. But if you have drill IV units, be sure to guard them well against mounted units. Leaving them out in the open is idiotic. As is leaving CR units without protection. As long as you think about what you do, Protective is a fine trait.

For similar reasons most people don't build a lot of walls or castles maybe in a couple cities but compared to courthouses which are built in essentially every city they aren't that useful. Gunpowder units also get drill I so the trait does have some use but compared to others it is weak for most play styles.

Agree, walls doesnt match Courthouses in priority (then again, what does?). But, as Sun Tzu said, knowing your enemy is half the victory. Knowing that an AI won't attack until the cultural defenses are 0% or it's siege weapons are destroyed is a huge bonus when defending a city. 4 turns of building a wall can win you 13 turns of bombardment. Also, if you play by your strengths and the AIs weaknesses, flanking horse archers can easily ruin the AIs siege units - and the AI stack will then attack asap. Here, CG promotions and walls/castles help alot.

Keep in mind these are just opinions and the best or worst trait for someone depends on how well or poorly they utilize the trait. Ind isn't a favorite trait of mine but cheap forges can be powerful and the bonus to that wonder you want can help as well.

Agree. But in general, Ind isn't worth it.

Of course best trait for the AI depends on who he is against. If everyone is peaceful then def is useless but creative or defensive can save an AI for an early rush.

I always like to learn so tell us how you leverage defensive and maybe you can win some people over. Just stating what is or isn't the worst trait doesn't convince anyone.

Well, first of all I war alot. I need to keep my border cities safe with as few units as possible, to minimize unit upkeep. Protective helps here. Second, I often build walls and castles in border cities. Third, I am against the traditional "A good army is a melee army". If I feel like taking out Tokugawa with Crossbows and trebs, I will. And I have done so, on Prince.
Fourth, I often win a city with the width of a hair, and a CG promotion or a quick wall can help lots there aswell. Fifth, I am a great fan of the Drill line and nearly always promote archery down that line, Gunpowder aswell if I'm Pro, some of them even if I'm not.

Industrious is useless on higher levels... you'll never get the wonders anyway.
(snip)
11) Creative

Agree on IND. How come you rate Cre last? It is huge most games, imho.

Well, seeing as how I'm too busy making Swordsmen to build a couple Archers. Also, the best defence, I think, it's a good offence. Not only that, but I always use melee units in my city to attack incoming stacks before they reach my city. Sure, I'll have one or two archers in my cities, but they're really a last ditch effort.
It might be a holdover from CivII days, where I would garrison cities with a pikeman and two knights. Or from even Age of Empires II, when I played Goths all the time.

As explained above, I tend to use alot more kinds of units than just meleespam. Agree, there are no archery "axe" for the rush (unless playing Mali), but both Longbows and Crossbows can serve well. Plus, I find Drill more combineable with the huge amounts of siege the game requires that you bring in order to crack the AIs cities (as these always seem to build walls... ).

 

[troytheface]

The best trait combination is Protective/Organized and the designers knew this and left it out as an option.

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

Traits are perhaps more defining of a leader even more so than UU or UB, both of which might not ever come into play. However simply placing ranks like this won't be useful for comparison purposes.

I don't know how to do it technically, but is it possible to create a form where you can log in and put your ranking in, and then scores are automatically added to the large poll?

For example, if I place trait A first, it would add 1 point to the overall total. Every member votes once, and during the vote must give a rank to all traits. Eventually, the traits with lower points will be considered stronger, and vice versa.

I haven't thought of the traits in isolation yet, because some weak traits are really powerful when handed together. All I would say at this point is that imperialistic should be ranked dead last.

 

[AfterShafter]

The best trait combination is Protective/Organized and the designers knew this and left it out as an option.

Though I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic or not, I actually really want to play that... I hope they give it to... Pontiac of the Natives. That'd work for me

 

[Refar]

I play random leaders, so i dont really need to think about my 'favourites' - makes the choice easier.
And there are many things besides traits, playing into liking or disliking certain leaders: UU, UB, Ugly Artwork, ...
That said, i am allways happy to draw a Charismatic leader. It does help early economy a liiiiittle bit (Happy cap) and it's just great for warmongering.
Spiritual is nice to have too - perhaps not that big in net benefit, but makes for fun games - one less thing to worry about.
Industious on the other hand is a bit dangerous, as i am a former Wonder-addict.

The rest is quite fuzzy, as all traits can be used to some benefit, if you take a moment to think about what this benefit actually could be in your game. Just for example - CRE - But its not just the negligible +2 . Its also half price Library, Theater and Colosseum. Meaning faster specialists early and easy access to from midgame.

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ORG+PRO might make for quite some spying fun.

 

[helemaalnicks]

Ugly Artwork

I like the red houses from Carthage (and probably some other civs too).

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

Okay so I read the thread more carefully, and realised that there's a lot of argument here because the topic of debate is ill-defined. Everyone's talking past each other.

Obviously financial is weaker the higher you go, because warmongering is pretty much your only way out in higher difficulties in vanilla and warlords, while in BTS it's mad lightbulbing. Financial doesn't help.

However,
a) not everyone plays high levels. Some like to play lower levels with other role-playing or thematic restrictions
b) In MULTIPLAYER, financial is kind of powerful, as people usually play in teams and one player is usually the tech-propeller in the back, and may even give gold to teammates to upkeep the massive stacks.

Individually, from best to worse, using BTS, assuming non-archipelago, monarch/emperor difficulty:

organised
philosophical
aggressive
financial
expensive
creative
charismatic
industrious
spritual
protective
imperialistic

 

[Monkeyfinger]

b) In MULTIPLAYER, financial is kind of powerful, as people usually play in teams and one player is usually the tech-propeller in the back, and may even give gold to teammates to upkeep the massive stacks.

Oh god, you've opened pandora's box with this one.

 

[mentork]

Well, i for one, don't think there is a "best one", you have to see the synergy with the UU, the UB, and the other trait.

Take my guy for example (sitting bull), I know you might think protective is weak, but what about the totem pole? If you build that and a barracks, you can get city garrison 3 right off the bat on a basic archer. (all your archers could have City garrison 3, even the Inca can't rush that) Or if you want to send your archers into unfriendly territory you could start them out with drill 3.

 

[DigitalBoy]

The best trait combination is Protective/Organized and the designers knew this and left it out as an option.

But we do have Gilgamesh, and he's even better.

 

[one2tieyourshoe]

My all time favorite leader is Zara, but I always pretend he is Ras Tafari and that pot-smoking Jamaicans worship me.

 

[SenhorDaGuerra]

all traits are situationally useful, and each can be leveraged differently and so are better to have in certain situations. even protective. though i dont like to use it cos i prefer to go to war.

 

[shawy89]

Im starting to disagree with own list! Charismatic is higher, maybe no. 4 for me now. I played with Hannible and got a conquest win on a standard size contintents map, epic speed, noble. Scored about 36,000 or so, 2nd best score!!

Also, i just found out u can win conquest with vassals, coz in the F8 screen it still says 5 rivals remaining!? they were all my vassal though.

 

[Ekmek]

good thread and decent arguments. I'm going to have try out some leaders I never considered before...

 

[paydro]

Industrious is useless on higher levels... you'll never get the wonders anyway.

I respectfully disagree here. Here's a nice post from Snaaty that (in part) refutes that a little: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=6564508&postcount=178

Plus there's always Obsolete out there doing his thing, though I suppose it's always on Immortal and not Deity.

Personally, I think it's very difficult to actually "rank" the traits.... it's basically impossible to say for sure which is better between Philosphical and Financial, for instance, because they are suited to opposite economies.

Top: Philosophical, Financial
Second: Industrious, Spiritual, Organized
Third: Expansive, Charismatic, Creative, Aggressive
Bottom: Protective, Imperialistic

I know there are loads of protective fans out there, and there are always threads going on about how great/terrible a trait it is. I am in the latter camp, simply because if I am going to make a war, I'd rather have aggressive, and if I'm not going to make a war, other traits offer me better benefits.

For the record, I play on Emperor.

 

[Bleys]

I agree with Hammurbabbles point here:

There are no best and worst traits unless you are rut-locked into a single strategy. There are better and worse traits for particular strategies, but the better way to put that is that there are better and worse strategies for particular traits.

But that response is incomplete. There must be an additional consideration for "preferred level of difficulty". I have said many times that True Difficulty is NOT just the game setting played, but is also influenced by map and speed preferences.

So I would combine Hammurs thoughts with Rustens (and a few others, including the author he quoted from another thread)

. . . (the) best traits aren't the ones who are the easiest to use, but the ones who are the most effective on higher difficulty levels with optimal play.

He takes that point to the extreme, but in essence, he is correct. "Best" is probably not the correct word for this topic, because its just too general.

Now, taking those 2 points into consideration, I think those who reply to this thread should qualify there responses with their preferences.

My favorite (best?) traits are IND, ORG, CRE, and SPI. Why?

Because I play Monarch, Continents, like to take over my own continent with early Wars, then build peacefully to a tech lead and take the rest in the Industrial+ Eras. I am also a wonder addict, and at Monarch, I most certainly can make the most of the IND trait.

I also like to jump civics a lot, especially late in the game, so thats why SPI gets a nod, to jump in and out of Nationalism/Slavery/Theocray and back to FS - Bur/Caste/SP - FM/FR.

I hate having to make something to "create culture", especially in newly conquered cities, which is why CRE is among my fav's.

I also like lots of cities, and ORG is a great trait for REXing.

Middle tier traits, again, for me, and the levels and maps I play, are FIN, CHA, PHI, and EXP.

Lower tier traits, again because my style and my chosen "difficulties" dont take make as much use of their synergy are: IMP, PRO, AGG.

I have played some Emp games though, won perhaps 5%, tops, and I am 100% agreed that at that level, the traits that are "best" on Prince/Monarch are absolutely NOT the best on Emp/Immortal. IND and FIN are not nearly as powerful at those levels, for reasons that have been pointed out already.

CRE and SPI are still very strong, however, mostly because of the speed advantages they offer. CRE means faster border pops early, and faster key buildings like Theaters later, both of which are pretty strong at higher levels. SPI gets a nod because Golden Ages can be hard to come by, and even harder on the higher levels when you may not get the Taj, or may be using those GP for bulbs or settling instead of GAs Later in the game, when changing even 1 civic can cost as many as 3 turns of Anarchy, thats when the SPI trait really shines. IMHO. At Monarch and below, I am usually so far ahead when the Anarchy turns become more of a penalty that it doesnt matter much.

So in summary, I guess my point is that there is no easy way to define "Best". Its all a matter of the many variables that come into play every time we see those magic words, "Initializing . . . Set up players . . . Set up map . . . Finishing".

 

[TheWilltoAct]

Jerry, goths are the ones that get Huskarls right? If so those were some crazy fast lil dudes lol... man I loved AOE2, too bad it's so outdated

I'm seeing a lot of poo pooing of industrious but as paydro mentions above obsolete seems to find it quite useful