Who is the best?

[hellwitch]

Well It Rome which is the best civ it no matter who of the 2 leaders you pick. This is for human player. For AI Asoka is the best from what i've seen overall but Shaka is the best warmonger AI.

About HC - it is usefull only in single player because in multi human player didn't build so many archers but mix of units. Thats why HC UU is useless in multi player games!
Again all "super" economy leader are not so good in multi because there the military is most important(as you will fight vs clever human player just from the begining).

 

[Ekulyen]

I'm partial to Pacal II myself. Financial and Expansive are my favourite traits, heheh. Cheap granaries are always lovely, and the Ball Court has synergy with Expansive's health boost for your larger cities... Holkans are pretty interesting. I like the resourceless UUs; I like the concept of building your army up even as you're connecting copper. You start with Mysticism/Mining, which isn't terrible.

 

[Fei Kelei]

Re Zara Yaqob: I'm surprised that his UU would ever turn out to be irrelevant. It's good enough to be worth a beeline towards gunpowder. Even if we forgo that, a mass upgrade of Oromos leads to a highly-promoted Rifle army that would make Tokugawa and Churchill green with envy.
Apart from his UU, he screams 'solid but thoroughly unexciting' to me.

I just finished a Prince game with Zara and was well pleased with him. His traits give you four cheap buildings (most importantly courthouses), and while his UB is pretty boring, it should at least mean that you can worry a little less about someone crowding your borders. Oromos are just great fun, though. A unit I can promote to Drill IV with just Barracks and Theology/Vassalage or a settled GG? Yes, please. And the fun really starts once you upgrade them all to Riflemen.

Also, for some reason the AI always does really great with this guy. When you see him you know you're going to have to kill him or at least disrupt him or he's going to be a major problem.

 

[ASIMOV123]

I like incan fin/ind and Ramesses ind/spi, I love when I can switch government with no anarchy, just have to wait 5 turn to re-change it. It is cool to immediately get to change when war comes when you least expect it. And those HC terraces OWN.

 

[Joshua368]

I just finished a Prince game with Zara and was well pleased with him. His traits give you four cheap buildings (most importantly courthouses), and while his UB is pretty boring, it should at least mean that you can worry a little less about someone crowding your borders.

Four? He has six cheap buildings: Libraries, Theatres, Colloseums, Lighthouses, Courthouses, Factories. It's the most of any trait combination!

 

[Fei Kelei]

My bad. I was using the BtS leader picker for quick reference when I wrote that post, and it leaves out Libraries for the Creative trait and Factories for Organized. But yeah, the fact that you get so many cheap buildings is a major plus for Zara.

 

[bippukt]

I personally like Charlemagne a lot, although I won't claim that he is the best. Faster settlers and free CG promotion combine nicely for faster expansion. However, the crucial phase for establishing your supremacy is during the middle age - The UU with +100% against both melee and mounted units (along with all the defensive bonuses) means that you will absolutely rule the battlefields. I have had just 2 units wipe out almost all the attacking army of the enemy. Just a few trebs will make sure that it's curtains for the enemy. Then -75% maintainance courthouses will make sure that your vast empire doesn't slow down your research too much. Not a bad combo, but he could have done better with better traits.

 

[Chose]

Question: Who is the best

Answer: Me

 

[Da_V_Man]

Personally, I like Hannibal for his traits. The best of the peace and wartime at the same time. It makes him flexible for that, and I like to warmonger a bit, but not total conquest.

 

[TheEnforcer]

The vast majority of responses here favors a warmonger approach and doesn't really address isolationist builder types.

 

[Supr49er]

Welcome to the Forums ASIMOV123.

 

[Eddogegr3]

I am a warmonger that likes to expand. I prefer to expand peacefully first so I can build a good economy and not focus on military because I lay the law down.

1. Mehmed; While Janisary's are weak, the Hamm is awesome. I love his traits as well.
2. Julius
3. Qin Shi Huang - I love the Chinese UU and UB. I prefer Qin over Mao slightly. Being a Warmonger, a Protective trait is a bonus because I will be attacked as I am attacking.

And as far as my Cyrus Avatar, well he is my favorite leader in real life, not Civ 4. Darius is actually pretty good for an economy.

 

[DrewTate]

Augustus. And I always pwn the Ottomans in my games. They're lame.

 

[dragodon64]

I am a builder turned world dominator, starting in the late middle ages. Anything with financial is awesome, but Philosophical (not fan of Lizzy, tho), Organized and Creative are all great treats and most of the good leaders have at least one of them. Protective on the other hand is a like not having a trait at all.

Well, I'm kinda dodging the question, so I'll just spit it out. My favorite is probably Huayna Capac if I'm not going for Conquest/Domination and Hannibal if I am. Other awesome leaders include Darius, Mansa Musa, Pericles, Frederick and Zara Yaqob are others I've had amazing games with. And the game with Pericles was stunning despite what was probably the worst starting location I got since Civ3 (no resource except fish and banana, hemmed in by Shaka and Tokugawa, room for capital and 1 crappy city with pig and 1 flood plain, total homeland area was 1/3 jungle or mountain).

 

[star15389]

I find Victoria and Julius Caesar to be the best leaders. Since I'm not good at early expansion, Imperialistic is a big help in getting good land before the AI (in my last game with Vicky, I got Marble within seven tiles of Napoleon's capital and a tile with four Gold in its BFC ten tiles from Hannibal's capital), while Organized and Financial help, in conjunction with their UBs, to get a mid-game tech lead. Both of their UUs are good, too (or, in Julius' case, extremely OP.)

Not to mention Vicky starts next to Stone fairly often, and if you build the Great Wall you get 300% Great General points for battles within your borders. Very useful when Monty decides to impale a huge stack of obsolete mounted units onto your Riflemen!

But of course their is no best leader; it all depends on your style of play and the particular map.

 

[havuoksa]

I would have to say DE GAULLE,
since I won the Emperor level with it, and am quite near of winning the Immortal-level now, with following strategy:

Build Stonehenge ASAP, you get the extra happiness for over half of the game as he's a Charismatic leader. Also, as he's industrious, it's easy to do it even without access to stone. Again, as he's industrious, try building Great Lighthouse and Temple of Artemis (especially if you got marble near), IF you're not alone in the start, then choose your friend, for example the one with the lowest score and who's not aggressive, and not expansive is a bonus. Then maintain this and hurry for what France has to offer at its best: Astronomy with The Salon as replacement for observatory with the free artist. Try to build as many wonders as you can without the loss of NOT building the essential buildings: libraries, markets, courthouses. Your military will suffer but you'll get the "reward", since if you're the first on astronomy, you got the huge advantage of spreading those Galleons w/settlers to the necessary resources. Also, with a big Galleon-fleet, you can devastate the whole fishing/crabbin'/clammin'-fleet of your "worst enemy".

And as an another bonus, with astronomy, you can now trade with ocean to the newly found civs, with tremendous bonuses with the Great Lighthouse/artemis-combo! Just remember to keep this bonus as long as possible, you don't need that Scientific Method that soon. And now is the time to even up with the military.

Also, Engineering and Castles are a must asap, for that one more trade route.

Recommend to try this one for all, even though I know it's very hard to get those early three wonders so early on, and it costs you some techs etc to keep up w/others.

Best luck!

 

[dragodon64]

Castles are horrible buildings, barely giving you what you paid for in the first place with the trade route and EP bonus and requiring you build another useless building, walls, first. Also I'm not really sure what fishing fleet you're talking about- would you go to war just to pillage the enemy's seafood? That said De Gaulle is another great leader and I should have mentioned him above. The only bad thing about his traits is to get his special building, you have to obsolete Stonehenge.

 

[oyzar]

The best leader really depend on what game you play. For example in largish mp pitboss games without tech trading i would like to play willem or viccy or pacal if we have plenty of space however if it is more cramped julius, pacal, mansa and darius get a lot better. With tech trading non-cramped Joao, justian and sulleiman get a lot better. If you are cramped Shaka, hamurabi, sitting bull gets way better. In small mp games i would want to play sitting bull or mansa musa or hatty. Against the AI with land access early huyana, julius, augustus, darius and cyrus are definatly the best(though hatty and ramsess are still decent). If you play an occ Ghandi, Ramsess, Peter or Bismark is the way to go. Playing largish games against the AI without early access i would definatly want viccy or willem or pacal(or maybe something like justian or sulleiman).

 

[havuoksa]

@dragodon64:
I agree on castles being...maybe not "horrible" but "not so good" buildings I'd say. The time-span on their use is very short. If you don't make that Engineering your top priority tech to grab (and who would?!). But, on my strategy that I described, they do work, because of the Gr.Lighthouse/Artemis that one extra trade-route to every city is a must. And castles don't even stop working with Astronomy, so those inter-continental trades far away, are good, no question about that.

Of my Galleon-fleet pillaging the sea-industries, most of the time I play high sea level-maps, where that really is something to do, I know the opponent's health has serious problems after I've done it. I haven't declared war, but others have, and that's when the Galleons rock! With high-sea-level-maps, I don't see much of the negative consequences of declaring war either, nobody can do anything to me when I'm the first with Galleons, and as at that point of came, you usually have Hereditary Rule, so the negative happiness is not an issue either...

And yeah, Stonehenge goes by Astronomy, but that's half-way of the game already, so don't mind.

 

[bippukt]

@dragodon64:
I agree on castles being...maybe not "horrible" but "not so good" buildings I'd say. The time-span on their use is very short. If you don't make that Engineering your top priority tech to grab (and who would?!).

Charlemagne!!!