What civ's/leader's uniques do you think have the best/worst synergy?

iammaxhailme

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Not necessarily "whose uniques are best", but "whose uniques complement each other". Byzantium is probably the easy answer for best synergy; their religious and war games are so tightly intertwined by their uniques that it makes for a very interesting playstyle. IMO an example of bad synergy are the Dutch, whose things are kinda random. Sure, you could make an argument like "Use De Zeven Provincien to conquer cities, then make Polders to block them up so they're hard to take back" but that'll rarely work out in practice.

Another example of great synergy is the Inca. Working mountains combining with Terrace Farms, Aqueducts being buildable on mountains, etc is great. Another bad one, imo, is rough rider Teddy. He's very strong in general, but I feel like a diplo/domination civ has no real reason to have the Film Studio, which works way better with Bull Moose or regular Teddy.
 
Another bad one, imo, is rough rider Teddy. He's very strong in general, but I feel like a diplo/domination civ has no real reason to have the Film Studio, which works way better with Bull Moose or regular Teddy.
To be fair at least the Rough Rider unit does get culture for kills, so that's one cultural thing going for them along with the Film Studio. Plus, most of the Rough Rider abilities were already with regular Teddy so...

I think a bad synergy is Peter of Russia. You most likely are never going to be behind on culture and there's no real reason for you to try to gain the upper hand in science if most of the time you are going for either a cultural or religious victory.
Also I'd have to go with Black Queen Catherine. The spy ability is interesting but has nothing to do with the rest of cultural France at all, unless you want to use them to just steal great works.

I was tempted to say Scotland but it's hard to synergize his ability with anything. :mischief:

As for great synergy I'd definitely have to go with Vietnam. You know when choosing the civ you are going to be a strong guerilla warfare civ building and defending your cities in rainforest, marsh, and forests.
 
there are a few I like:

-Phoenicia: having 100% loyalty in your coastal cities on the same continent is a great help when playing with Dramatic Ages;

-Japan: being able to build Holy Sites, Theater squares and encampments in 50% of normal time helps to boost the Civ quickly.

note I have not played all the Civs yet.
 
Favorite Synergistic Civs:
  • Victoria (I love her playstyle)
  • Dido (Also love her playstyle and the subtle touches that enhance Phoenicia's colonialist gameplan)
  • Suleiman (One of my favorite approaches to Domination, even if I can almost never pull it off :cry:)
Atrocities of design that should be deleted forever/could have more synergy:
  • Harald, exclusively for the Stave Church. They are just not the Faith dom civ...
  • I have to put Jadwiga here out of necessity.
  • English Eleanor :(
  • As much as I love him, I have to put Lautaro here because 3 pieces of his kit are all pointing in slightly different (and as mentioned above, sometimes contradictory) Domination directions, and then the Chemamulls just kind of exist (don't try to one-up Gorgo- she will always be best at Culture+Dom)
  • Robert in practice, not in theory (I see what they were trying to do with the Golf Course). Scotland's only usable strength is positive amenities, but that's basically the only strength they have (everything else is too situational and late) and even then it's an if.
 
Favorite Synergistic Civs:
  • Victoria (I love her playstyle)
  • Dido (Also love her playstyle and the subtle touches that enhance Phoenicia's colonialist gameplan)
  • Suleiman (One of my favorite approaches to Domination, even if I can almost never pull it off :cry:)
Atrocities of design that should be deleted forever/could have more synergy:
  • Harald, exclusively for the Stave Church. They are just not the Faith dom civ...
  • I have to put Jadwiga here out of necessity.
  • English Eleanor :(
  • As much as I love him, I have to put Lautaro here because 3 pieces of his kit are all pointing in slightly different (and as mentioned above, sometimes contradictory) Domination directions, and then the Chemamulls just kind of exist (don't try to one-up Gorgo- she will always be best at Culture+Dom)
  • Robert in practice, not in theory (I see what they were trying to do with the Golf Course). Scotland's only usable strength is positive amenities, but that's basically the only strength they have (everything else is too situational and late) and even then it's an if.

I would give the stave church a pass since it boosts sea resource's production which fits the viking + militaristic theme. I think it's problem is that you just don't have many reasons to build a lot of holy sites/temples.
 
Lots of money covers a multitude of sins... I did think the same as you at first, but was convinced to give her a try and I don't think she's as anti-synergistic as a lot of people think at first glance. Money > Great work slots is a pretty easy deal...

I agree: English abilities kick earlier and are more powerful overall. A unique classical Harbor at half price has, weirdly, more influence into having more Culture and Great Work with the economy boost than a unique renaissance Château that could give more Culture but comes later and do not really help at Great Works generation.
The French better wonder generation is not negligible (yet, kind of weak), but does not apply to every slot Wonders like the Apadana, Great Library, Broadway and the Sydney Opera House, while English's Workshop allows to stockpile more Iron / Coal that can be sold for money, give a slight Production boost to Industrial Zone and better yield to powered building. In the end, it helps more at producing wonders and buying building. But it comes even later (Industrialization) and England suffers a lot from "not enough district slot".

In the end, France has a better Culture and Tourism generation, yet does not really have more tools toward acquiring Great Works. English has no incentive toward going into a Cultural Victory, yet if it does, has way more tools into acquiring Great Works, making better use of Eleanor's ability.
So we end up in an odd case where Eleanor has better synergy with France, yet has more potential with England.
 
Kongo is by far the worst offender for me.

They get bonuses towards playing a cultural game with extra GPP generation and increased relic yields.
However, they have horrendously bad faith generation in that they cant build holy sites, and faith is extremely important for a cultural victory as the main tourism behemoths (national parks and rock bands) require lots of faith to fuel.
Simularly increased relic yields, while nice for Kongo, are possibly the hardest civ to make use of consistently in that Kongo cannot build apostles of their own (instead relying on them proccing through district construction), which then also rely on even getting the martyr promotion to begin with.
Yes you can build Mont St. Michel as Kongo to guarantee martyrdom, but why would you go through all that hassle for a few extra yields at most? And you dont even get control over whether or not you can get the Reliquaries belief, which would actually synergize well for Kongo.

Terribly designed civ, made worse in GS when culture started relying even more on faith, which Kongo is inherently bad at.

Oh, and Kongo becomes almost brokenly strong when they get a turn 5 relic through sheer RNG hut luck.
RNG is never good design for a civ.
 
English Eleanor :(
If you picture her as a culture leader, sure. Though England feels primarily a domination focused civ and Eleanor lets you do domination through loyalty flipping instead of relying on a big navy.
 
I would give the stave church a pass since it boosts sea resource's production which fits the viking + militaristic theme. I think it's problem is that you just don't have many reasons to build a lot of holy sites/temples.

Yeah, that's Harald's issue - you need harbors as you're settling coastal, but then you need holy sites for the UB. But then you want to chop woods to build those boats, but you don't want to chop woods to keep those adjacencies. And you still need all the base districts otherwise, and religion basically does nothing for them otherwise. If they had some good use - either faith buying boats, or even if you went crazier and did something like give them -50% faith yields but gave that other stuff as science and culture or something, that would have done a lot more to tie in.

If you picture her as a culture leader, sure. Though England feels primarily a domination focused civ and Eleanor lets you do domination through loyalty flipping instead of relying on a big navy.

Yeah, Eleanor's issue is more that you need to build so many districts. You need Theatres to generate the great works, but you also need everything else, not to mention a focus on harbors and coastal cities. So Eleanor is just hard to manage to use her to her fullest.
 
there are a few I like:

-Phoenicia: having 100% loyalty in your coastal cities on the same continent is a great help when playing with Dramatic Ages;

-Japan: being able to build Holy Sites, Theater squares and encampments in 50% of normal time helps to boost the Civ quickly.

note I have not played all the Civs yet.

Phoenicia doesn't get immune from Dramatic Ages, cites will still flip, though it doesn't make sense, it would've made more sense to gain Foreign Continent Loyalty instead, given she should be settling other continents and will pretty much exert enough loyalty to maintain for herself.
 
I have struggle with the thin line between good synergy and bad dependency.
  • Aztecs have a good synergy with their Eagle Warrior that generates Builders, and its ability that makes use of Builders. Both abilities work on their own, but you can combine them to achieve something greater.
  • France have a bad dependency on Wonders. The game expects you to build them for double Tourism, and milk them with Château that would generate further Tourism at Flight. Yet, if you cannot secure a few Wonders, you end up with a non existant ability (wasted production, extremely low Tourism output) and weak unique tile improvement.
Thankfully, France is getting stronger with the updates since they add more Wonders ending with more leftovers to pick and make use of the ability and the infrastructure, while the Château was made a little less tedious to use (but still tedious). In the end, I play France as a warmonger in order to secure those Wonders to make use at least some of the ability (except the Production part). and the Garde Impériale became a nice unit to do it (why build wonders when you can steal them?).

[Kongo is a] terribly designed civ, made worse in GS when culture started relying even more on faith, which Kongo is inherently bad at.

Even if I agree, Kongo wasn't designed that bad. In Vanilla, the Cultural Victory was more a Great Work victory (Wonders were and are not significant) even if Seaside Resort and the few lucky Civilizations that enjoyed Tourism at Flight could diversify their Tourism output. It was the accumulation of small updates that drove Kongo from powerful to meh:

  • The Amphitheater used to have 1 slot only, instead of 2. Enjoying 4 additional slots in the Palace was a greater bonus.
  • The Great Works of Writing (GWoW) were twice as powerful: 4 Culture and Tourism , increased to 8 Tourism with the Printing Press.
  • The stack of Tourism modifiers were far more beneficial. For example, a GWoW (4) gave 16 Tourism with Printing Press (double) and Reyna’s Curator (double). Nowadays, a GWoW (2) gives 6 Tourism with Printing Press (+100%) and Pingala’s Curator (+100%).
  • The “Nkisi” ability used to give +100% Great Artist, Musician and Merchant points and applied to Great Writer points.
  • The “Rock Band” unit that needs Faith didn’t exist. It was created as a way to reduce the domestic Tourism of an opponent Cultural civilization and to prevent the Cultural Victory to drag on when two civilizations were aiming for the same Victory condition.
  • The Naturalists' costs were twice as pricey in a game where Faith outputs were lower (Great Prophets point didn’t generate Faith, weaker pillage…). Even the Civilizations that were able to swim in Faith bought them moderately.
  • Having enough Housing for cities to grow was harder to achieve. The early Neighborhood is less useful due to Coastal city suffers less from Housing problem (Lighthouse update), the creation of Monumentality (more Builders → more tile improvements → more Housing), the addition of new policy cards or government like Civil Prestige, Classical Republic’s legacy or Monarchy’s legacy, or the addition of new districts like the Dam or Preserve. Furthermore, the Mbanza could be targeted by Spy that now pillage it (reduce Housing) and generate Rebels.
  • Probably many more I forgot.

I believe Kongo should:
  • Be allowed to build and keep Holy Sites.
    • Kongo suffered too much from not being able to build them. They couldn't enjoy many beliefs (Feed the World, Choral Music, Warrior Monks...), couldn't build any Worship buildings, and couldn't enjoy the Faith applied to Holy Site's building from City-State.
    • Conquered cities with Holy Sites would keep them. It means the Relics and the religious Great Works of Art inside of Temples and Cathedrals would not be deleted anymore.
    • Kongo would be still unable to get a Great Prophet.
  • Keep the Faithless Populous Civilization and update the "Religious Convert" ability accordingly.
    • Holy Site's adjacency bonuses, Shrines and Temples would not generate Faith, but other yields instead. I am going for Food and Gold, because it synergies well with Kongo gameplay but this could change.
      • All bonuses from "outside influence" like the Faith from Envoys of religious City-States or the Worship buildings would keep their Faith bonuses, and not changed into Food and Gold. It is thematic with the Religious Convert idea.
    • I believe the mechanic around the free Apostle on Mbanza / Theater Square construction was a way to circumvent the problem of being unable to buy. Kongo needed to generate some religious units to spread the religion in his empire. If Kongo is able to build Holy Site, that mechanic is no longer needed. Meanwhile, Kongo still struggle to generate Faith and, therefore, would struggle to buy Religious unit. Maybe it needs to be able to buy them with Gold.
    • Other players should have an incentive into converting Mvemba A Nzina. He could be the Gilgabro of Religion.
In the end, I would like to see the ability updated like that:
« Holy Sites' adjacency bonus, Shrines and Temples give Food and Gold instead of Faith. Enjoys the founder and the enhancer beliefs of any religion when that religion has established itself in a majority of his cities. Can buy Missionaries, Apostles and Gurus with Gold at discounted price. When sharing the same religion, Mvemba A Nzinga and the founder share a +2 Movement to religious units. Great Prophets cannot be earned. »

Sure, it will still not be a good ability, but at least it is not detrimental anymore. The additional Movement is free, and allows Kongo to more effectively sacrifice his Apostle if they enjoy from Martyr.
 
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Some of not mentioned yet:

Best:
Kongo (!!!)
Free apostle + cheap early neighbourhood = dozens of units for free via conversion

Cree
Added trader + food and gold from trade routes + Mekewap to remove housing limits. IMO 3/4 uniques of Cree are the best synergies ever made

Worst:
Mali
lack of production encourages internal trade, while additional food from internal trade can be used to work ines to even more hammers and huge cold. At the same time other ability wants a player to specialise in international trade for pure gold
 
Some of not mentioned yet:
Worst:
Mali
lack of production encourages internal trade, while additional food from internal trade can be used to work ines to even more hammers and huge cold. At the same time other ability wants a player to specialise in international trade for pure gold
The point of Mali is that you don't really use production, and therefore internal trade routes, to build. You're discouraged from using production and have buckets of gold so you buy the buildings and units rather than build them. The super quick construction of buildings and units are partially counterbalanced by districts (if you don't have that governor yet or your empire is too big for them to effectively cover), wonders and projects taking longer.

It's not supposed to be synergistic. The lower production is intended to counterbalance and encourage the use of your other abilities.
 
It's not supposed to be synergistic.
Blasphemy?!
intended to counterbalance and encourage the use of your other abilities.
It is such a great thing, when you realize, you still have the ability to surprise yourself - makes you wonder, what else you can do, that you've forgotten about ...

 
Best:
Kongo (!!!)
Free apostle + cheap early neighbourhood = dozens of units for free via conversion

Not sure if you understand the ability here.
You get one apostle upon completion of a TS or Mbanza, and that apostle may or may not have any value to you.
Usually, they don't.

There is nothing synergistic at play here.
 
Favorite Synergistic Civs:
  • Victoria (I love her playstyle)
  • Dido (Also love her playstyle and the subtle touches that enhance Phoenicia's colonialist gameplan)
  • Suleiman (One of my favorite approaches to Domination, even if I can almost never pull it off :cry:)
Atrocities of design that should be deleted forever/could have more synergy:
  • Harald, exclusively for the Stave Church. They are just not the Faith dom civ...
  • I have to put Jadwiga here out of necessity.
  • English Eleanor :(
  • As much as I love him, I have to put Lautaro here because 3 pieces of his kit are all pointing in slightly different (and as mentioned above, sometimes contradictory) Domination directions, and then the Chemamulls just kind of exist (don't try to one-up Gorgo- she will always be best at Culture+Dom)
  • Robert in practice, not in theory (I see what they were trying to do with the Golf Course). Scotland's only usable strength is positive amenities, but that's basically the only strength they have (everything else is too situational and late) and even then it's an if.
I agree with Jadwiga, Harald and Suleiman.
- I couldn't do much with Jad and Har for religion but I was able to do conquest with Suleiman. I recall conquering and conquering with a few catapults and then upgrading them for future eras. :)
 
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