What are your experiences with new BWN civs now?

[Chiatroll]

I haven't played them all so I'll mention the ones I played. I want to hear other people's experiences with the new civilizations also.

I won't do anyone 1-5 rating or anything because if I don't like a civ I might just be doing it wrong or they might suck. Time will tell as BWN is played further and people analyze the tactics further.

My experience is on the king difficulty so it is far far from the highest level of play.

Assyria -----------------

I played them in a marathon game on a huge map on a pangea with increased city states to max and I was going for domination. I like them a lot. I was able to beeline military ignoring other sciences without falling apart. I rushed my siege towers out and started taking neighbors. As soon as I could and managed to get all the techs I needed from my UA.

I did get a bit lucky this game though and my first city was close enough for me to see Uluru and toss my second city next to it. So I got a religion with deserts and desert folklore. I went tradition then some honor into Economics and and then autocracy and I should of gone liberty instead of tradition for my large puppet empire.

The UA is by far the best thing about Assyria. Normally it's hard to ignore parts of the tech tree but I got all those free techs from people who found it for me. The UU and UB seem to just exist to support your UA. Even before I had the military structure to support the UU on it's dangerous walk to the town the UU can easily give those city attacking archers that 50% siege while the tower itself gets into a protected by melee position.

I basically just walked through all my neighbors taking them over one by one. The max cities states hurt me because Siam bought them all and embargoed me. I made enough cash with trading posts and city connections to keep a good sized war machine going to finish by the modern era.

Happiness was my biggest worry even with a strong religion and lots of buildings giving me happiness it's just not as easy to come by as it used to be.




Brazil -----------------
I played them on a marathon game large map with normal cities and city states and continents. Brazil has an amazing tourism game.

The game was trickier because I was on an island alone with china who kept attacking me even though my capital was in a pretty defensible position. I went piety/tradition obtained mosques and pagodas and they both gave me +2 tourism for my reformation.

Brazil wood camps are amazing I snagged a religion thanks to piety and had +1 culture from jungles as a pantheon so after universities I was getting +2 food +2 gold +3 culture +2 science from each jungle I had. It was a rough start but when I started getting those camps and universities I was shooting ahead of everyone.

They start rougher then other civs because they can't do much until late game. I tried to keep my happiness and zero to control my golden ages earlier so they would be quick and cheap late game when I had the tourism for my golden ages to make a difference. With freedom and the Chichen Itza it was 32 turns of carnival after 32 turns of carnival once beginning I took hotels and everyone just fell down from the party bomb power of carnival

I finished before airports and after hotels and I was pumping out almost a thousand tourism during my carnival which when you add in the 100% spread rate and how long my carnivals lasted no one stood a chance against them. I'm not sure any civilization can complete with a Brazilian culture game as long as you watch your golden ages.

I never really used the UU to have much to say about it. I had a war with china since day one since we shared a relatively small island and never got over it but I beat them back using frigates and artillery. Since then, even though Austria was mad at me and bigger then me, the defensive pacts I had and the embargo I bought on Austria made her threat minimized so I could take everyone with culture during peace.




Indonesia -----------------
I played a quick game standard map archipelago. It was fun. I liked having the extra resources for my trade town and the extra happiness. Suleiman went to war with me though and he destroyed all my trade boats and beat me up. It ended around the renaissance.

I made some early mistakes that were my fault so I didn't get full feel of them. I wasn't that into the kriss warriors but I do like the religion boost of from kandi.

They definitively feel like they work best as a somewhat wide trade empire in a map that is not Pangaea. If they get a religion they will be pumping out the faith buildings too thanks to the power of kandi.




Morocco -
I haven't played them yet.

Poland -
I haven't played them yet.

Portugal -----------------
I had a standard game standard size continent game I was testing things with. You will be able to go somewhat wide because of the feitorias but those are really limited because of their positioning rules. It's the gold modifier Portugal is best at. Your trade city will feel like Venice with all the cash it rolls in for you.

I made the Big Ben and I sent a thousand or so nau's on trade missions then deleted them to make a profit for a long time and that's 1 per city. They have such a low cost and make such a nice profit they are very spammable.

It's definitely a diplomatic victory civ. If you go to war people might plunder your trade routes and you need those but you can buy all the city states and do whatever you want with world congress and everyone else can just back off.




Shoshone -
I haven't played them yet.

Venice -----------------
I have an unfinished team game with them where I'm Venice and the other player is Poland. I have all the money. I can just throw money at my teammate whenever I want. We are in the modern era and I'm covered in money. I own most of the city states so when it comes to a vote I can do whatever I want whenever I want for whatever reason I want.

I need to keep up with my navy though because I have almost all my trade routes coming from my capital which means it wouldn't take a lot of work for someone who declares war on me to wipe out all my income.




Zulus -
I haven't played them yet.

New France -
I haven't played them yet.

 

[Teholb]

I've only been able to seriously give a go with one of the new civs, Morroco.

Large, 8Civ/20CS, Standard, Emperor, Communitas map script (based on PerfectWorld3)

The game started out well, with Siam to the north and Carthage to the west. Being Morroco, and positioned just so between two empires would later prove to be the winning circumstance. Carthage was wrapped around the western end of a large inland sea (technically a vast bay with a single coast tile serving as entry point inside Carthage's borders- it was strangely reminiscent of the Straits of Gibraltar. Dido ran trade routes across this ocean to the only city I had located on the coast, at the far western reaches of my empire: Fes.

As my science, gold, and culture grew exponentially over the years, a global web of influence began to form. I was more or less at the heart of the continent, and being an enterprising Trade Prince (I guess I RP a little, not intentionally . . . it just comes out ), I had created roads that would reach to the heart of every nation on my continent, which was 7/8. Literally, my roads touched the capital of seven civilizations. The amount of land and sea trade was dramatic, to say the least. My influence over every one of the civs on that continent grew to such dominance that a single denouncement on my part was the equivalent of an economic embargo. And when I made such a move in the late Renaissance in order to shut down an upstart Denmark, everything went according to plan. Six other civilizations denounced him, signaling their consent for a bit of war action. No sooner than I had produced a small army, Denmark was on my borders with a DoW.

My scientifically enabled military might was disgusting. I tore through his ranks like a plague, took a city he had been using as a trade hub far from his main empire, and proceeded to march across the continent on the roads I had conveniently placed. Denmark became terrified and offered a ripe 10Pop city, some GPT, and a luxury to assuage my wrath. I accepted and thus was Denmark put down.

Nothing happened for a while, the crippled and shunned Denmark sadly retreating to his lonesome northwestern corner. It wouldn't be until a couple hundred years after the first Ideology was adopted that trouble would once again rear it's ugly head for my great empire. It's worth noting at this point that, while I was DoF'd with all civs on my continent, and they generally DoF'd eachother, they did have separate wars, and frequently exchanged lands. I believe this was because the AI was always assured a trade partner with high gold output, namely, myself.

A good while after I acquired nuclear weaponry, Siam let their true colors show. They denounced me . . . and the world denounced them back. The war didn't break out until 20 odd turns before I could complete my spacecraft. Siam possessed nuclear arms of it's own at this point, and decided to threaten me. I'm fairly certain this was the AI reacting to my imminent Science victory. Now, this was a very, very serious problem. Siam's capital was a mere 19 tiles from my capital, Marrakech (I love that name, btw). We were linked by roads, and this guy has nuclear missiles stationed in his capital. It was his mistake not to make the first strike. Two missiles were allocated to complete crippling of his capital. One more was sent to destroy a cadre of three Bombers stationed in a nearby city. From that point on, all hell broke loose as Siam made a desperate bid for my destruction. And that's basically the end. I launched my spacecraft after our short battle, and that was it.



I believe this SS sums up the story rather well . . .
Notice India, completely isolated from the rest of the world. Nobody seriously bothered leaving the main continent because the trade was so good. Haha. I never even saw how large his empire was.

 

[PhilBowles]

Assyria -----------------

Played Assyria on both Immortal and Emperor. Happiness from captured cities was a crippling factor, given the way happiness now affects military performance and production, and while gold for maintenance wasn't an issue, I couldn't afford to rush-buy courthouses or more units.

I didn't find I could advance quickly enough to make up for the tech deficit I experienced rushing to key warmongering techs. This was on a mostly forest map, so it's quite possible Assyria will prove to be heavily-terrain dependent, though less so than the Huns.

The siege tower is good, but compared with the Huns the Assyrians are limited by the fact that their siege unit replaces another. The lack of a ranged siege unit before Physics does hurt, when approaches to the city itself can be blocked by enemy units.

The Royal Library seems mediocre, and tailored for a period in the game much later than the siege tower - it basically turns the Military Academy experience into a third free promotion. I learned to my cost that, as Assyria, you do not want to rush Drama & Poetry and fill up a Writers' Guild at the first opportunity.

Overall the civ's probably the weakest BNW civ I've played, but that may be (a) bad map luck, (b) my own limited experience warmongering, and (c) BNW changes that make warmongering generally more difficult, especially the hit to production and combat strength from unhappiness.

I've run into AI Assyria once - Ashurbipanal was disliked but rather passive, with one of the smallest militaries and low tech.

Brazil -----------------

Haven't played them. They've turned up only once, in an Assyrian game I didn't finish, so didn't see enough of them to get an impression.

Indonesia -----------------
I played a quick game standard map archipelago. It was fun. I liked having the extra resources for my trade town and the extra happiness. Suleiman went to war with me though and destroyed he all my trade boats and beat me up. It ended around the renaissance.

I made some early mistakes that were my fault so I didn't get full feel of them. I wasn't that into the kriss warriors but I do like the religion boost of from kandi.

They definitively feel like they work best as a somewhat wide trade empire in a map that is not Pangaea. If they get a religion they will be pumping out the faith buildings too thanks to the power of kandi.

I've played Indonesia most (once on a Pangea to prove a point, and won diplo victory), all on Emperor. The supreme importance of religion in BNW, particularly as an income-earner, makes the candi extremely valuable. Like you, people are learning that a UA that says "each of the first three continents..." does not mean "you should have a 4-city empire". I've usually gone for 3-4 cities on my mainland, as space allows, and settle islands later. The game where I settled all three raked in large amounts of cash and happiness (although it was also the game I didn't win, as I was beaten to a science victory).

Morocco -
I haven't played them yet.

I've tried them a couple of times, but been unfortunate in not getting a desert start. I drifted away from both games without completing them. As characterful as the UA is, it turns out not to seem particularly strong. It's quite dependent on who's setting up trade routes with you, as well as vice versa, but at best I've still managed only 6 different civs/CSes at a time (i.e. +18 gpt and +6 cpt). The culture boost doesn't seem that substantial in practice, probably less so than it would have pre-G&K now culture from art and artifacts is everywhere. It's a fair bit of work to arrange trade routes so that they don't overlap between civs to maximise the bonus, and not always worth it - I tended to try that way to maximise the culture gain, but that often meant taking suboptimal trade routes.

I didn't get to the stage with Berber Cavalry, and due to the lack of desert had little opportunity to use kasbahs - I did get a couple on desert hills, though, and the yield for doing that is nice.

Mansour has shown up twice as an AI, and was destroyed both times - once by the Zulu before I encountered him, and once by Songhai.

Poland -
I haven't played them yet.

Me neither. Saw them once as an AI, but that was in one of the unfinished Moroccan games. They seemed to do well.

Portugal -----------------

I haven't played them yet - they showed up as a rival in a duel game and did fairly well, but that was another unfinished Moroccan game.

The UA looks rather weak given the experience I now have with the bonuses from resources, and will probably net less money than Morocco - let alone than Venice, or than Indonesia can get from selling surplus luxuries - but the Nau and Freitoria look as though they should make up for it.

Shoshone -
I haven't played them yet.

Haven't played or seen them in action.

Venice -----------------

I rolled a random civ when starting my latest game and got Venice. I got ahead so quickly it got old fast, and that's before I started using my surplus trade routes. Just started a war at Napoleon's urging and I can buy all the units I want. I'll probably carry it on to get the achievement, but Venice is far from interesting to play at least up to Emperor. I may try on Immortal, where the greater difficulty of securing Wonders should pose an actual challenge, but a civ that's apparently drastically overpowered (saying this as someone who once argued that pre-nerf Austria was probably ok rather than too strong) on all but the highest difficulties is not fun to play.

Zulus -
I haven't played them yet.

Me neither, but I lost an Assyria game to him - he invaded Nineveh while I was in Austria. In that, though, AI Shaka didn't seem any better set-up than any other AI, and didn't bring more units - he just had the element of surprise.

New France -
I haven't played them yet.

Me neither, nor New Arabia. AI Napoleon seems to play much as he always did.