What civilization do you think will be the most powerful?

[JonoLith]

The more I think about the Iraquois and the 1upt, the better I think they are - IF they fight in forested areas. They can simply envelop the enemy units, and because of 1upt envelopment plays a bigger role.

If you play Civ 4 as Aztecs, and do a rush to Iron Working, and just start sending Jaguars into enemy territory with Woodsmen 2 on them, you'll start to get a feel for what I expect the Iroquois to be capable of.

You can literally shut them down to having one city for the duration of the game. It's super awesome.

 

[Dragonflow]

The Iroquois might be good at an early game rush or harassment, but we have yet to see how useful they turn out to be during the later stages.

 

[rh1n0man]

I suspect that the Iroquois will be very powerful when used by humans. They will initially be given some awesome scouting which will allow the player to find other civilizations and city states very fast. With the speed bonus and UU there can possibly be even more than one warrior rush giving a early advantage in city's. Then the real advantage begins, Exploitation of what I imagine will be an initially poor combat AI. Something like this will probably happen. Find enemy civ with large forest in between. Then start abusing the civ with demands. If they initially give in to the demands due to inflated city count, great but eventually they will attack. station some archers in the large forest and wait for their army to show. Bombard the enemy army with arrows focusing on the spears once they come. The enemy AI will see the exposed archers and try to rush them because it thinks it has an advantage. The archers being in the woods can outrun even their cavalry. Then your cavalry completely envelop them and use the support advantage to finish off a mostly immobile army. With no enemy army, and lots of XP and upgrades, the cites will only pose a minor challenge. This exploitation can be repeated until the late medieval when most of the forests are chopped. By then, with most maps, you will have a good part continent. The big challenge for a player will be expanding past the initial continent especially if the Songhai, English or Ottomans are over there with their navy advantages. This is all assuming the enemy AIs don't know to ignore the Iroquois army in the field and just avoid being in range of forest when battling them.Although the Iroquois will be very powerful under humans, I don't expect that the Iroquois will ever last past the Renaissance when used by the AI as they cant properly exploit the ability.

 

[Calouste]

India seems like they would be screwed if there aren't good food resources around. I think they are too map dependent.

I don't think the map dependency is that bad. Food resources don't seem to give as large bonusses as they did in Civ4 (+1, maybe +2), and the Granary now gives +2 food while the amount of food needed to grow to the next level is lower (at least early on) than in Civ4.

 

[Crazy George]

The counter to the Iroquois' forest walk ability is chopping down forests. Don't know how this will play out in neutral territory. But you can bet if the Iroquois are my neighbors, I'm going to clear cut everything in sight. One can only hope the AI will be smart enough to do the same.

 

[PinkHammurabi]

The more I think about it, the more inclined I am to see Romes power as quite valuable - barracks + happiness buildings all in half the time speak in my mind of pumping out legions and productive cities for the empire; Rome probably wont be an ancient blitz civ, as I think it requires a little too much initial building and investment- but it will be one that once the ball gets rolling its going to be very hard to stop, even if you factor out Legions and Ballistas.

First off, I definitely think you're overstating this. Secondly, where are you getting "half the time"?

 

[Caeserportugal]

The counter to the Iroquois' forest walk ability is chopping down forests. Don't know how this will play out in neutral territory. But you can bet if the Iroquois are my neighbors, I'm going to clear cut everything in sight. One can only hope the AI will be smart enough to do the same.

Yeah but then you won't be able to use the forests for youre own defense

 

[Sonereal]

The counter to the Iroquois' forest walk ability is chopping down forests. Don't know how this will play out in neutral territory. But you can bet if the Iroquois are my neighbors, I'm going to clear cut everything in sight. One can only hope the AI will be smart enough to do the same.

That seems like a pretty poor idea. You pretty much are destroying your defenses doing that meaning that if the Iroquois invaded (which is the only time where your idea makes sense), you're going to be forced to fall further back because you denied yourself forests and I doubt you're building forts to replace the forests you tear down.

 

[Caeserportugal]

By the way why isn't Babylon included on this list I know it's not one of the 18 civs but it will be available to the people buying the Special edition.

 

[stealth_nsk]

By the way why isn't Babylon included on this list I know it's not one of the 18 civs but it will be available to the people buying the Special edition.

We don't know anything about it

 

[Bobbtjoe]

By the way why isn't Babylon included on this list I know it's not one of the 18 civs but it will be available to the people buying the Special edition.

We don't know anything about it

He pretty much awnsered your question. Since we don't know a thing about Babylon, anyone who votes for it would be completely guessing, and I didn't want that.

 

[AriochIV]

If you start next to Rome, better Warrior/Archer rush that bad boy pronto, 'cause otherwise you're toast once he reaches the Classical period.

If you start next to Greece -- good luck.

By the way why isn't Babylon included on this list

We do not speak of that civilization here.

 

[PinkHammurabi]

We do not speak of that civilization here.

I heard that! You can't censor me! I'll never be quiet!

 

[Dodge_272]

India seems like they would be screwed if there aren't good food resources around. I think they are too map dependent.

Nice avatar.

 

[Feyd Rautha]

I voted for Egypt because I think wonder rushing will be strong even at high diffs in this version AND because the War Chariot not requiring horse is a big deal in my book with the change to domination victory (only have to hit the capital)means a decent group of war chariots that can break through the front lines could make for an early and devastating rush. Finally, with one unit per hex being implemented, manuverability is VERY powerful when it comes to attack and defense.

Another thing to consider is that since those War Chariots don't require a horse resource they can serve as highly mobile ranged support for your later horsemen and knights that WILL use up those resources, but would normally be limited in terms of impact because of a lack of ranged support being able to keep up with them.

 

[bhavv]

I don't think the map dependency is that bad. Food resources don't seem to give as large bonusses as they did in Civ4 (+1, maybe +2), and the Granary now gives +2 food while the amount of food needed to grow to the next level is lower (at least early on) than in Civ4.

With fewer cities though, you have less opportunity to claim important strategic resources. If you play as India and start out near very few strategic resources, place around 6 cities down and then locate lots of vital resources (E.G. Elephants) far outside of your initial city ranges, you are going to be very disadvantaged. Either you miss those resources, or you need to build more cities and end up with unhappiness.

 

[Mustakrakish]

I don't know which one will be the most powerful in my hands, but as AI I think I will probably be the most afraid of those with the double sized army compared to my, hence Russia and Arabia. Especially if Catherine's back stubbing nature will transfer from civ4. Arabia seems peaceful though, but looks can be deceptive.
Oh and the most feared/hated will probably be Songhai. If just because from Azazell's screen shots they seemed to own people badly. It seems to me that Askia will be something like Zara with Shaka tendensies, my worst nightmare.

 

[generalwar]

I think that we have forgotten 1 civ -Persia. You built mausoleum+ special ability-Achaemenid Legacy=100% extended Golden age. So, if golden age lasts as in civ 4(5 turns?? not sure) then with this it will last 10 turns. In those 10 turns units receive +1 Movement and a +10% Combat Strength bonus. If you got a big army and composed from various units, you could kick some ass real hard. So Persia is a perfect backstabber, like Cathy in civ4.
(Thanks Arioch for sorting this datas on his analayses on his civ 5 page)

What do you think about that that? About Persia as a backstabber?

 

[Calouste]

With fewer cities though, you have less opportunity to claim important strategic resources. If you play as India and start out near very few strategic resources, place around 6 cities down and then locate lots of vital resources (E.G. Elephants) far outside of your initial city ranges, you are going to be very disadvantaged. Either you miss those resources, or you need to build more cities and end up with unhappiness.

As far as we know, you don't need an Ivory resource to build the Indian UU. And of course you will have access to less strategic resources, but a smaller empire will be easier to defend, so you'll need fewer of them.

 

[Dragonflow]

As far as we know, you don't need an Ivory resource to build the Indian UU. And of course you will have access to less strategic resources, but a smaller empire will be easier to defend, so you'll need fewer of them.

A small empire might be easier to defend but it can also be a great disadvantage. Imagine this Situation:
You're playing as India, your empire consists of about six cities. You get attacked and your army is to small to hold the enemy back. Unlike other civs with big empires you can't take the loss of even one city and you can't try falling back into the heart of your empire in order to gather more troops. Other civs could just sacrifice some border cities in order to protect their more important core cities,India on the other side doesn't have this option.