Which civ will claim the 7 seas

[telekinetic136]

I have always loved big ocean worlds and now with brave new world there is 12 civ's with a water related perk so huge maps can be filled with worthwhile civs.

1.) Askia - Songhai
2.) Dido - Carthage
3.) Elizabeth - England
4.) Enrico Dandolo - Venice
5.) Gajah Mada - Indonesia
6.) Harald Bluetooth - Denmark
7.) Kamehameha - Polynesia
8.) Maria I - Portugal
9.) Sejong - Korea
10.) Suleiman - Ottomans
11.) Theodora - Byzantium
12.) William - The Netherlands

Pick your favorite water civ and lets compare notes on which maritime civ dominates the open seas.

 

[FeiLing]

Unquestionable, Liz.

 

[Sam Kwon]

Definitely not Sejong since the whole point of his naval UU is to be defensive and not explore. Um I would say Carthage or England.

 

[ahawk]

My opinion:

#1: Tie - Carthage can be a real monster if you get the right number of Fish, Pearls, Whales, and Crab tiles to utilize their free harbors, and their early naval UU is always nice. But you aren't always guaranteed to get a good start with lots of Fish to improve, so England is always a more reliable choice with their extra movement and nice mid-game UU, though they aren't as powerful as Carthage can be when Carthage gets a good start and picks up Gods of the Sea for pantheon.

#2 The Dutch. Sea-beggars really are overwhelming if you can build enough before your opponents out-tech you. Sea-beggars are basically the Keshiks of the ocean, capable of dominating their era in a way almost no naval UU can. Though the loss of lump-sum trading without DoFs does hurt their UA.

#3 Portugal. The Nau, as well as the UA, make for a great economic strategy.

Runner-up: Ottomans. On Marathon, they can really get up a nice navy via their UA, and from there simply choke out other navies by their sheer numbers.


On a side note, Indonesia actually seems like the worst civ of BNW, and the naval aspect (the UA bonus luxes for settling away from the home continent) comes into play too late, usually, to really help with happiness. By the time I even am considering settling other continents, I usually have happiness in order anyways, as naval technologies usually take a back-seat to other stuff. Even worse, a sword UU and a somewhat uninspiring UB that is a Garden replacement.

 

[Kintara]

Indonesia is obviously playing to a more risk eager crowd. You pop Kris Swordsmen, watch the religion spawn, and pray for a good map roll. The thing is that if those things align, then things should work splendidly. It's meant to be fiddly and high risk. I like it.

So Carthage is great. That said, the production bonus from Harbors have been moved to Lighthouses, so that means it takes a bit longer to get that production going than before. Lighthouses aren't too difficult to put in, and you'll be building them anyway, but it takes a bit of time to tech up to them. Of course, that probably doesn't matter too much on a Tiny Islands map. Those city connections are so worth it, anyway.

 

[The A.K.T]

Denmark. Thier UA is good early game explortaion, mid game conquest. Thier Beserker is strong for Naval maps. And when you get to rifling, they got a new UU to follow up with.

 

[Maledict]

I don't see how it can be anyone but England.

Naval combat is win by who strikes first, and England move faster, see further and have better ships than anyone else. Ship of the Line was the only naval unit in the top 10 units list for a reason - its so absurdly more powerful it feels like cheating once they unlock on a sea based map. Combine that with longbows that makes their cities significantly harder to capture and I struggle to see how they can lose.

 

[RedRover57]

For military domination definitely England, but for trade domination I think Venice will be crazy on an archipelago map. I have played about 150 turns with Venice on a continents map and am making insane gold with ocean trade routes, so I imagine it will be even better on a true water map.

 

[Bakspatel]

Also based on expectation and reading because well, yeah it's not the 12th yet.

1.) England
Obviously. The UA lasts the entire game rather than just one specific good navy unit and from what I understand they also count for navy caravans. Speaking of which, they also have the Ship of the Line.

2.) The Netherlands
Simply because the Sea Beggars are amazing. Build up some barracks and anything else that can promote your Sea Beggars, pick attacking twice per turn and you can commit assaults on cities without having to lose any naval units. A group can heal-attack-heal while Frigates bombard to fasten the progress. Anyone bugging you with their navy? Capture them with ease and use them as meat shields. Unfortunately they quickly lose effectiveness when civs enter the Industrial era but but upgrading them into Destroyers turns them into invincible beasts. The Dutch can be extremely powerful and destructive if in good hands.

3.) Portugal
A good trading UA, the Nau that can explore faster and trade some goodies and there is the Freitoria. Though not necessarily dominating the seas I expect them to be quite powerful. Their main weakness seems to be dependable on preventing warfare as much as possible.

4.) Carthage
Because of the UA they'll be powerful in the beginning. But that doesn't last forever and eventually its effectiveness will be less powerful when other civs get their city connections up and running.

5). Venice
Double trading routes and an improved Galleas, which already is a valuable naval unit. They can dominate but I can see them having some weak points as well. Trade embargo's will be painful for Venice's economy.

6) Byzantium
Because Dromons are awesome and dominating. But that is their only naval strength and the only plus that they maintain is keeping the promotions when upgrading. So powerful in the beginning but becoming less relevant in later eras - depending on how you intent to use your navy

7.) Ottomans
Never really saw their navy as something powerful, you can largely avoid the capture of your ships by targeting the right units and drawing damaged units away. I believe the power of the Ottomans to be lying more in their UU's.

8.) Polynesia
They have a very good trait that can be used for a prosperous empire: meeting civs that others can't and settling on spots that others cannot reach. But they lack the firepower to dominate the seas. With the new culture game they might get their dominance in a different way but still not through cannonballs.

9&10.) Songhai and Denmark
I don't really see the Songhai as a naval civ and never used them for naval warfare. But then again I haven't played them much since the release of G&K. Denmark has a nice trait, but dominating the seas? More like a pain for the opponents but they're not indestructible.

11.) Korea
Pretty much as mentioned before: Turtle ships aren't meant for conquest. And they do not have any other naval treats.

12.) Indonesia
Not sure why it is in the list, their UA promotes settling on different continents but that doesn't make you a dominating power. It actually makes you an interesting target because of the unique luxury resources. I will definitely go to warfare against their colonial settlements.

 

[IkM]

Definitely Ottomans. their UA allows you to build huge navy. you may get many UUs like dromons, sotl, sea beggars etc.

 

[Bas1c]

England.

Apart from what's already been said it's also worth mentioning 2 range Gatling guns which help with defense until flight and let England skip most of the bottom techs and rush straight for nuclear subs, you only have to tech up to metallurgy where others may want/need to get artillery.

Land units also receive the +2 movement when on water tiles so faster worker/settler movement and combined with the other movement points from techs late game units can invade land much faster and are less vulnerable.

 

[SnowKomodo]

It's impossible for me to rank the civs because some are good for conquest, some are good for diplomacy, etc. So I'll just briefly talk about a few of them instead:

Askia - Songhai
War Canoe's extra sight and extra strength is a lot less situational than you would think. But it's still just sauce on the side and you're not going to conquer the high seas with a horsey (Mandekalu Cavalry) so they wouldn't be my choice of civ
Dido - Carthage
I'm on the bandwagon that says free harbors makes them one of the best civs. I've seen around these forums people saying that in BNW the benefits are lessened. To those people, I would rethink those thoughts: http://www.civilopedia.info/civilopedia/BUILDING_HARBOR.aspx I have a BNW game started with them, but I wanted to finish my Indonesia 'learning BNW mechanics' playthrough first
Elizabeth - England
I would have to agree with everyone that England is the best all-around on a water map. But only if you are aggressive. If you want to turtle there are better civs here. Particularly now that the culture and diplomacy game is so deep
Enrico Dandolo - Venice
No idea what to expect. But looking forward to trying out. With my Indonesia playthrough, sea trade routes were very, very lucrative for me (when I wasn't getting my ships plundered all the time...) I was raking in so much cash. Venice + double routes sounds amazing
Gajah Mada - Indonesia
Playing with them right now on small continents. Built 3 cities all on the same continent and spent the entire first part of the game building up my economy and infrastructure. As soon as I could travel across the ocean, I spammed out three settlers and sent them to the nearest separate landmasses - 1. One with a source of iron (which I used for Frigates), 2. One with a whales resource, 3. One with a marble resource. Used my money to buy 3 workshops in each of the new cities, then sent 3 cargo ships to them. The first 2 with food, the other 1 with production since there was enough wheat and food there for the workers to quickly fix up. Then I switched the 2 food cargo ships to production so I had 3 production ships going for a while. I was spamming out all the necessary buildings in the resource cities at a rapid rate and by the time I reached Archaeology I had 6 powerful cities. 4/6 cities were settled on rivers, so I built Candis in them. I only built two Kris Swordsman as support (Ships and Ranged Units were enough), but as it turned out one with the Recruitment promotion assisted me from getting wiped out by the Zulus. I definitely made a lot of mistakes that I won't mention since it's a lot of random minor learning curve stuff which might cost me the victory, but I've had fun nonetheless. Zulu are so annoying though and relentless. Trading all three of my resources (nutmeg, cloves, pepper) for money. Extra gold helping keep my defensive posture against all the aggressive neighbors. The extra happiness is also nice. Exploration tree has helped me immensely.
Harald Bluetooth - Denmark
I've played them only once...I don't know why, but I'm never drawn to picking them. A naval UU in place of the Norwegian Ski Infantry would be nice even though I don't have anything against the NSI (And I don't have anything against it because I never really play it)
Kamehameha - Polynesia
Polynesia gains big time from BNW, and I'm talking about more than just the awesome ability to meet everyone first. Their Moai gain tourism, but I'm talking about more than that as well. I see that as more of a balance issue to keep the Moai from falling behind the curve. Now I don't know for certain since I haven't played them with the new mechanics, but I believe where the Moai truly gains is being able to build your heavy culture chains where the island is shaped favorably. And using your powerhouse cities to send food and production in the case where you sacrifice those in favor of Moai. Nobody seems to mention that, but that's where I anticipate they will get a lot of help
Maria I - Portugal
Really looking forward to playing. No idea what to expect but I believe Ed Beach when he said through his playthrough that he "never had to worry about money or happiness"
Sejong - Korea
Turtle Ships are really great, but with the added incentive in exploring and mapping out your...map (remember, they are the Caravel replacement), they are one of the last civs I would choose on a watery map
Suleiman - Ottomans
They fare better off on domination throughout a Continents map where you can put both the UA and UUs to use, but I could be wrong - you tell me
Theodora - Byzantium
At least after one playthrough, I love the new Piety tree. There is a whole lot for Theodora to work with when she goes Piety + Exploration on a water map. Especially sending those trade routes exerting her religious pressure
William - The Netherlands
Sea Beggars are perhaps my favorite naval unit in the game. UA is often underestimated in my opinion