What's your least favorite Civ and why?

[Republic of San Montuoso]

The Khmers are the civ that have two major victory paths: Culture and Religion. And the fact is, if you try to defend yourself from one, you help them get the other. That's a very nice mechanic I think.

 

[Leucarum]

The Khmers are the civ that have two major victory paths: Culture and Religion. And the fact is, if you try to defend yourself from one, you help them get the other. That's a very nice mechanic I think.

I think there was another thread on here asking about which civs people thought should be changed, where quite a few people named Khmer. Despite the fact that I don't enjoy Khmer's mechanic I didn't think it needed change, since it seems fun to a lot of people. It is also one of the fastest culture victory civs with its relic strategy so it's good for that playstyle to be supported.

I think it's good for there to be civs which appeal to specific playstyles given that there's enough civs to appeal to everyone. But I'd guess those will be the most polarizing civs at the same time. I think we're seeing that in this thread.

What I'd love to try and get data to look at is how correlated people's opinions on civs are? Does liking Georgia mean you'll probably like Hungary for example?

 

[Patine]

For me it has to be Canada. The tundra start is bad, the inability to declare early war hinders me in many situations, the unique unit is unexciting and cannot be used for efficient combat, and the unique improvement comes too late to make a difference. On top of it all, the leader annoys me for some unexplicable reason - not the historical figure obviously, but how he is depicted on the leader screen. He seems like somebody I would never get along with IRL, with his pompous dress and mannerisms.

I have to agree Korea is very unexciting. You just plop down your seowons and wait for the game to end. Yeah, wow, that really gets my adrenalin going. Sigh.

I only played one game with Khmer, but I disliked it so much I have never tried to give the civ another chance. The suiciding of missionaries is such a silly mechanic, and the fact you boost your civ by actually losing religious combat and thus religious pressure in foreign civs is counterintuitive and counterproductive. How exactly should it work? Do I zerg the other civ with my missionaries, suicide them all and increase the power of the foreign religions, only to later convert those cities by other means? Or do I simply ignore religious victory? If it is the latter, it seems like a weird choice for a civ centered around faith.

Norway is strange - the naval pillaging is nice, but the AI settles so few cities by the sea and improves so few tiles there usually is very little to actually pillage. My dominating feeling in my Norway game was frustration at that fact. I WANNA PILLAGE BUT I CAN'T!

My least favorite is Canada. It feels like almost all of their abilities are useless or detrimental.

The lack of having the AI declare a surprise war on you is not terribly beneficial because it takes away your ability to get free cities from the AI when they try to warrior rush you. On deity, this is a great way to get cities without many grievances in the right circumstance. The other problem with this ability is that the lack of surprise wars doesn’t obviate the need to build at least some military because you need units to clear out barb camps. If you could totally avoid military at the beginning of the game, that would be beneficial because you could just focus on infrastructure but as it stands, you still need at least a skeletal army in the ancient era.

Canada’s tundra bonuses are useless. You don’t want to build farms on tundra, double extraction doesn’t do much particularly combined with the disincentive to war, and the bonuses to certain improvements isn’t meaningful.

The hockey ring is also useless. First, you have to build it with a lot of tundra around just to have it be okay. Second, you get a bonus to having a stadium next to it. I’m not going to spam the worst district type in the worst terrain and then fully upgrade those districts just to get a measly four culture. At professional sports, four culture makes no difference at all.

The double diplo favor from tourism is not impactful. In the early game, you don’t have sufficient tourism to generate a meaningful amount of favor for this ability. Late game, if I’m going for a diplomatic victory, having 5 to 10 more fever per turn just doesn’t matter. The way you win World Congress votes isn’t by raw diplo favor, but rather by making smart votes and timing in the Statue of Liberty.

The only two abilities that are actually okay are the double diplo favor from winning scored competitions and the Mountie. The double favor from winning competitions is totally fine. It gives you a nice little gold boost that you wouldn’t otherwise have, but it really doesn’t change how you play. I like the Mountie in theory and I used it to spam about 10 national parks in my last Canada game, but I don’t think this helped me win much faster. When I checked the tourism map at the end of the game, the national parks were generating about 10% of my total tourists. I think the issue is that national parks don’t have anything that can further boost their tourism like policy cards or wonders. Seaside resorts can be boosted by Cristo Redentor. Great works can be boosted by policy cards. National parks don’t have anything. Maybe if one of Canada‘s bonuses included double tourism for national parks, that might make the Mountie better but as it stands, the Mountie was only okay.

In short, most of Canada‘s abilities are either not impactful or detrimental. The Mountie is fine, but it comes relatively late and it didn’t seem to help me win faster. When I’ve played Canada, it feels like you’re just playing a generic civ without any real bonuses for 75% of the game until you get Mounties. This really stinks because I want to like Canada and they fit my play style because I don’t like warmongering except to occasionally kill a neighbor, but I find playing Canada games to be a pain.

Canada is all about city planning. Both hockey rinks and the entertainment complexes you'd want to build next to them increase the appeal of their surrounding tiles (and tundra tiles tend to already have decent appeal to begin with), which pairs well with Canada's position as the only civ in the game that can convert production, gold, AND faith into national parks. Personally I really enjoy making the plans necessary to take advantage of this as much as possible, but that's just personal preference.

I do wish national parks were more impactful than they actually are considering how much work and planning goes into creating them, but that's more a problem with game balance than Canada IMO. Having the mountie and hockey rinks come so late wouldn't be as big of a deal if national parks were more powerful, but as it is currently stands they do feel like they come a little late.

As a Canadian, myself, I want to say the portrayal of this civ is ridiculously and badly stereotyped. I have lived in Canada all my life - 44 years - and I have never set foot in, or seen in person (as opposed to drawing, paintings, and other art, photos or video footage) actual land that qualifies as "tundra." The great majority of Canadians have not - within Canada, going "north of 60," is somewhat of an achievement. Only three municipalities of Canada that have been chartered for local government purposes as "cities," (out of over, like, 300-400 in the country) are in "tundra," terrain - Yellowknife, Inuvik, and Iqaluit - and they're very small and very dependent on external supply, as cities go. In other words, next to no one in Canada lives on "tundra," and the foundational areas of Upper and Lower Canada, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and the capital, Ottawa (formerly Bytown) are no more "tundra," than the U.S. Rust Belt and New England - so logical "tundra start." Also, Canada's response to the Northwest Rebellion led by Louis Riel shows Canada WILL engage in wars (and even be nasty) without allies inviting them to.

 

[Navelgazer]

And few Russians live in Siberia. Tundra sucks, but Canada is the second largest country by landmass and it's because they claimed a ton of it. Yes, 90% of Canadians live within a hundred miles of the U.S. border. That's not something to design a civ around.

 

[criZp]

I don't think so, and I don't think they should. Unbalanced civs that have different advantages and disadvantages allow you to pick different playstiles and challenges. Balanced civs would only bring less options to play with.

I think what they did to Norway proves that unique playstyle and balance can go together just fine. Especially the later balance buffs to pillage yields has taken them from bad to decent, while their playstyle has stayed the exact same.

 

[RealHuhn]

The Khmers are the civ that have two major victory paths: Culture and Religion. And the fact is, if you try to defend yourself from one, you help them get the other. That's a very nice mechanic I think.

Khmer is just awesome in general, if you like different play styles. The civ buffs underused mechanics like aqueducts, relics, farms and early siege units in a meaningful way. Tall cities benefit from the culture bomb and additional amenities. Also incredibly strong at faith focused strategies like holy wars, buying settlers/districts/units/great people with faith etc.
I'd say they are even slightly too good at winning early culture victories. The introduction of flood plains definitely nerfed them though. It's very annoying to lose all your awesome farms in a single turn.

 

[oSiyeza]

I think what they did to Norway proves that unique playstyle and balance can go together just fine. Especially the later balance buffs to pillage yields has taken them from bad to decent, while their playstyle has stayed the exact same.

I agree, but we are using balance in a different way. If you mean balance like no civ is significantly better than other to achieve victory. I don't think that is even posible, the moment you have different victory conditions and some conditions are more difficult than others, that balance goes off the window by design. And that is not a bad thing necessarily.

The balance objective should be to be able to have fun with different civs and different playstile, while keeping victory reasonably posible for all of them. In that sense I agree Norway is a well balanced civ. But if we compare it with other civs, and look how easy is to win with them compared to others then is not, and I think that is ok.

A deeper conversation can be had about multiplayer. But I also dont think it requires to be symmetrical either.

 

[ADHansa]

Maori. Can't stand the start at the ocean gimmick. Never play them, any time i see they are in the game is a immediate restart.

 

[criZp]

any time i see they are in the game is a immediate restart.

Why?

 

[Francel]

As an AI opponent, I often see Maori get rolled. When they settle allover the place or in bad locations, they often don’t seem to be able to mount much opposition.

 

[oSiyeza]

As an AI opponent, I often see Maori get rolled. When they settle allover the place or in bad locations, they often don’t seem to be able to mount much opposition.

Maori is an example of a civ that the AI doesn't know how to handle, but that can be very cool if you play as them. This dichotomy is all over the place with the civilizations. Some terribly uninspired, but very capable in hands of the AI, some are the exact opposite. Is good we have both.

 

[Dantesedge]

I really enjoy the Maori... once I've settled my first city and have gotten through Kupe's leader ability. I hate it. I give that their start is the most unique in the game, but I don't enjoy sailing around looking for a good spot which is usually taken already.

The only civ (that I've played so far) that I just don't enjoy that much is India. Ghandi's leader ability just doesn't do much for me (the other leader's is better) and Dharma is a GREAT idea that doesn't seem to do much - at least it comes with amenities. In the end, it's the Stepwell that kills it for me... I just don't get how to place them without ruining triangle farms. I enjoy city planning in this game but I have never understood how to do India productively. That's clearly more my fault than India's but with that said I just don't enjoy playing them.

 

[Patine]

I really enjoy the Maori... once I've settled my first city and have gotten through Kupe's leader ability. I hate it. I give that their start is the most unique in the game, but I don't enjoy sailing around looking for a good spot which is usually taken already.

The only civ (that I've played so far) that I just don't enjoy that much is India. Ghandi's leader ability just doesn't do much for me (the other leader's is better) and Dharma is a GREAT idea that doesn't seem to do much - at least it comes with amenities. In the end, it's the Stepwell that kills it for me... I just don't get how to place them without ruining triangle farms. I enjoy city planning in this game but I have never understood how to do India productively. That's clearly more my fault than India's but with that said I just don't enjoy playing them.

See, imagine having an Aleut civ, with both oceanside and tundra starting bonuses...

 

[FedorWin]

Any civ with a bonus that lasts for 10 turns after using certain casus belli. Specifically, even though I really like their inclusion in the game as well as their music, none of Georgia’s bonuses are appealing to me.

Also shoutout to America when Civ VI was first released (i.e. before they got a diplomatic card slot upgraded to wild, and before they got extra diplomatic favor). USA is a big market for videogames, and yet their bonuses in the game are so boring. At least Teddy’s got a big personality.

 

[Navelgazer]

Having made fun of them a lot at first, and then played with them a lot, I'm definitely in the Georgia Fan Club now. Since we're unlikely to ever get a Papal States/Holy See civ, Georgia instead reflects almost exactly what the design of such a civ would look like, and it's crazy fun.

 

[Leucarum]

I like that America got a set of bonuses which feel relevant throughout the game and yet are still available early. They mignt not be the most asymmetric abilities every but for a stereotypically late blooming civ that's a nice achievement.

 

[bengalryan9]

I like that America got a set of bonuses which feel relevant throughout the game and yet are still available early. They mignt not be the most asymmetric abilities every but for a stereotypically late blooming civ that's a nice achievement.

They're just so passive, though, and that's what makes America dull to play. Nothing they have is going to make you rethink how you build up your cities, where you settle, what troops you produce, how you deal with city states, etc... they're not the only civ that has that problem, but I think they're one of the worst about it. So bland.

 

[tedhebert]

Only time I enjoyed playing America was with an Industrial Era start... And even then ;-)

 

[Leucarum]

They're just so passive, though, and that's what makes America dull to play. Nothing they have is going to make you rethink how you build up your cities, where you settle, what troops you produce, how you deal with city states, etc... they're not the only civ that has that problem, but I think they're one of the worst about it. So bland.

Yeah, you're right and they're one of the civs I have only ever played once or twice as there's nothing that dramatically changes how you play.

But I think there's still a design lesson in there for other late blooming civs. Canada and Spain for example could do with having a few more bonuses front-loaded. America has a passive design but it's quite elegant and I find it difficult to dislike that.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

I just can't get into either version of India.