What is the most versatile civilization?
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clapyourhands
Prince
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Rome. You can do almost anything with many cities with good infrastructure, and Rome is good at building many cities with good infrastructure.
They have a strong unit for military and cheap movement through their own cities, a small headstart on culture in monuments, ease of trade through trading posts, housing and amenities through their UD, etc. Solid all around.
They have a strong unit for military and cheap movement through their own cities, a small headstart on culture in monuments, ease of trade through trading posts, housing and amenities through their UD, etc. Solid all around.
Eliminator_Sr
Prince
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Aztecs - faster districts and more workers equals better overall productivity all game long. Combat bonuses and improved luxuries and an early UU that can conquer from turn 1 make them extremely well suited for domination as well. They aren't quite as flexible on religion and culture but you can still rush the appropriate districts.
Going to go with Freddy Barbarossa. His extra district means you can basically go in any direction and the Hansa makes sure you have the production to build anything. The extra military policy spot while not the most versatile card certainly doesn't hurt.
clapyourhands
Prince
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Aztec religious units get a combat bonus through Monty's ability so you can hoard luxuries and absolutely destroy enemy religious units to spread your religion that way. Don't even need to declare war since religious combat is separate and religious units have open borders with everyone. Take a belief having to do with spread through religious combat or a religious combat bonus itself and you're good to go.
isau
Deity
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I can't believe I'm saying this, but as of R&F I think France might qualify as one of the more versatile. They can grab Wonders during the leg of the game they are fairly accessible. The changes to Diplomatic Visibility in R&F means Catherine gets +3 combat in all situations, right from turn 1. The unique unit comes at a good time and has strong bonuses on the home continent (stacking with the diplo bonus). Spies are generally useful toward any victory condition. The Chateau isn't great, but it's a Culture improvement in a game where Culture adjacency is hard to come by, so I'll take it.
Alexander's Hetaroi
Deity
Australia is my choice for being the most versatile.
They can settle in places where others really wouldn't, on coast with no rivers and in the middle of the desert, while getting good adjacency bonuses for districts pushing them toward any kind of victory.
They can settle in places where others really wouldn't, on coast with no rivers and in the middle of the desert, while getting good adjacency bonuses for districts pushing them toward any kind of victory.
iammaxhailme
Emperor
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Brazil is pretty good at everything if you get a good rainforest start. They can get lots of science, faith, or culture from adjacency. And if you want to dominate, chop lots and get a huge army early.
Brutus2
Prince
I just want to acknowledge that every post had named a different civ as most versatile. You have to give the devs some credit for some really well designed civs.
unpossible251
Warlord
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I feel an elimination game coming on... gosh, I hope we don't go back to that.
I was almost gonna go for Australia, but I've found theyre great for everything except culture victory. Districts will sit on the hexes that you'd have otherwise needed for resorts or national parks.
So I call Japan. Half price districts for war, faith and culture, which should set you off on one of three paths. Uniques for a bit of culture late game and early medieval war, plus bonuses on land and sea. To be fair, no real bonuses for production or science, which hinders space race somewhat... but i got socialised into planning out industrial zone overlap righ from the opening turns, which was how it went for release version.
I was almost gonna go for Australia, but I've found theyre great for everything except culture victory. Districts will sit on the hexes that you'd have otherwise needed for resorts or national parks.
So I call Japan. Half price districts for war, faith and culture, which should set you off on one of three paths. Uniques for a bit of culture late game and early medieval war, plus bonuses on land and sea. To be fair, no real bonuses for production or science, which hinders space race somewhat... but i got socialised into planning out industrial zone overlap righ from the opening turns, which was how it went for release version.
Ornen
Warlord
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No love for Arabs? One of the stronger civs for scientific, religious, and conquest victory.
Australia's a big one, great bonuses to science and production plus way more options in terms of where to settle.
You can make a case for Nubia –– early archer rush is still very powerful, and no one does it better than the Nubians. If the archer rush remains as the best opener, there's a good case to be made for Nubia.
I find amenities far more limiting than housing, making any amenity bonus very useful if you want to grow, which will help with every victory type. On that note, Aztec and Scotland have some nice bonuses.
Whether you're pushing science or culture, you'll always need production. Which creates a case for Germany, although production is feeling much less needed in R&F than it did in vanilla.
Australia's a big one, great bonuses to science and production plus way more options in terms of where to settle.
You can make a case for Nubia –– early archer rush is still very powerful, and no one does it better than the Nubians. If the archer rush remains as the best opener, there's a good case to be made for Nubia.
I find amenities far more limiting than housing, making any amenity bonus very useful if you want to grow, which will help with every victory type. On that note, Aztec and Scotland have some nice bonuses.
Whether you're pushing science or culture, you'll always need production. Which creates a case for Germany, although production is feeling much less needed in R&F than it did in vanilla.
halfhalfharp
Prince
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Agree with Germany. The extra productivity pushes towards anything. They can build wonders much faster than France after they've got Hansa. While production problem is faced by every civs, Germany certainly stands out in every aspects.
Jewelrunna
Prince
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I’m going to say Australia, their bonuses are just well-suited for literally any victory type; even domination is strong on them if you decide to be the most passive-aggressive player imaginable. 
Runner ups to Rome, Germany, Cree, Aztec, and Brazil.
Runner ups to Rome, Germany, Cree, Aztec, and Brazil.
Japper007
Prince
Japan, they always have good adjacency for every District type without relying on any particular terrain (like Dutch or Germany with rivers, Russia on Tundra or everyone else on mountains and hills). They also get discounts to districts that help with every victory apart from maybe Science (though the discounted ones go a long way towards helping that as well)
Sostratus
Deity
Going to assume the map is something that isn't island plates.
With R&F... Korea is just so good because of the Seowon in conjunction with the mines and farms boost it gives. +1 food from farms, guys. In the ancient era. WHAT. So it's really just how well you can exploit that science lead. I also think Zulu is blisteringly OP the moment they get the Corps civic, cause you can turn military power into anything if you have neighbors. But anyways...
Rome is very well rounded. Great infrastructure boosts and the best unique swordsman, which itself is the probably the highest impact unit in most games.
That said, Aussie has 3 huge advantages: production from getting dow'd, since you will get dow'd; boosted districts from appeal, very good but not reliable; outback stations. I would wager Outbacks are the best UI in the game. But they do need some swaths of flat space to really get things going.
Aztec district rush is better than Rome's bonus for infrastructure, and they have those crazy boosts to amenities and combat. Talk about having it all. You do need a lot of luxuries in your turf though, which means you need to get a foothold on other continents. Not as easy with loyalty unless you start near a boundary. So they lose generalist points there.
I think Germany is best in ICS though, because if you use the Hansa well, and I mean really exploit those suckers, and you can absolutely explode in production over everyone. Truly efficient Germans can get a Hansa up to 30 production with the right layout. Hansa+CH produces independent of terrain, so you don't even need hills; you can monopolize the engineers and merchants with all those IZ/CHs you have; and in R&F, you can leverage several government and legacy bonuses better than anyone to fuel your district-based rampage. Classical Rep, Merchant Rep, & Democracy (this last one makes your carpet of districts absurd.) Plus you get the extra military policy from Fred the Red, so you can keep up a military production card + limitanei or retainers in those governments too. Not that you even needed the extra district slot, but it guarantees even a size 1 city can get it's CH+Hansa laid down turn 1 (for locking in cost.)
The 4 civs I mentioned are all very strong generally because production is power; but I'd cast my vote for Germany having the "most general power" because it's truly terrain independent and can out-produce pretty much everyone.
With R&F... Korea is just so good because of the Seowon in conjunction with the mines and farms boost it gives. +1 food from farms, guys. In the ancient era. WHAT. So it's really just how well you can exploit that science lead. I also think Zulu is blisteringly OP the moment they get the Corps civic, cause you can turn military power into anything if you have neighbors. But anyways...
Rome is very well rounded. Great infrastructure boosts and the best unique swordsman, which itself is the probably the highest impact unit in most games.
That said, Aussie has 3 huge advantages: production from getting dow'd, since you will get dow'd; boosted districts from appeal, very good but not reliable; outback stations. I would wager Outbacks are the best UI in the game. But they do need some swaths of flat space to really get things going.
Aztec district rush is better than Rome's bonus for infrastructure, and they have those crazy boosts to amenities and combat. Talk about having it all. You do need a lot of luxuries in your turf though, which means you need to get a foothold on other continents. Not as easy with loyalty unless you start near a boundary. So they lose generalist points there.
I think Germany is best in ICS though, because if you use the Hansa well, and I mean really exploit those suckers, and you can absolutely explode in production over everyone. Truly efficient Germans can get a Hansa up to 30 production with the right layout. Hansa+CH produces independent of terrain, so you don't even need hills; you can monopolize the engineers and merchants with all those IZ/CHs you have; and in R&F, you can leverage several government and legacy bonuses better than anyone to fuel your district-based rampage. Classical Rep, Merchant Rep, & Democracy (this last one makes your carpet of districts absurd.) Plus you get the extra military policy from Fred the Red, so you can keep up a military production card + limitanei or retainers in those governments too. Not that you even needed the extra district slot, but it guarantees even a size 1 city can get it's CH+Hansa laid down turn 1 (for locking in cost.)
The 4 civs I mentioned are all very strong generally because production is power; but I'd cast my vote for Germany having the "most general power" because it's truly terrain independent and can out-produce pretty much everyone.
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