Willem van Oranje?

[Ai Shizuka]

First off, a disclaimer: I'm a Prince player, so this thread may be utterly wrong, by some experts' point of view.
But I'm about to finish my first game with this guy and, well, it's not even funny. I mean, he's simply so overpowered from Renaissance and beyond. Financial is a strong trait by itself, not mentioning Creative for super-easy early land claiming.
And then the East Indiaman comes into play. Modern era cargo space with +2 ? Frigates? These guys barely need any escort until Ships of the Line. And then Dikes? Turning any half-decent coastal burg into a production powerhouse? Once again, I'm playing at Prince, but I never had this feeling of total domination with any other leader. I'm attacking with tanks vs cities defended by rifles right now. The last war was infantry vs longbows and some rifles. The map is Big and Small, so I don't know if the AI's are simply unable to play this format but hey, it feels like playing at Warlord all over again. And I missed the Great Lighthouse by 3 turns.

So, I'm kind of puzzled about this guy. I usually see the same people mentioned as "owerpowered": Huayna Capac, the Romans, Lizzy, maybe the Persians or Joao. But what about Willem?

 

[6K Man]

Willem can be totally overpowered on water maps. The mitigating factor is that he's not especially good early - the UU and UB don't come along until the midgame at best. But, yeah, if playing a map with lots of water and that isn't too crowded, you just need to get the GLH, spam coastal cities, and sit tight until Astro.

 

[Joshua368]

I'd have to agree, a while ago played an archipelago map on monarch with the guy. With the already overpowering great lighthouse/financial collosus combo shooting me ahead in the early game. Got to use the liberalism to assembly line slingshot. And just as that happened, dikes came online turning me into a production powerhouse and my east indiaman-carried infantry marched right over the longbows of my enemies.

He is insanely powerful on water maps, though in the usually game I'd just say he's a good leader. I suppose part of the ballance is that the creative trait isn't that great on the island maps on which he thrives, since border wars are rare. Not much of a weakness though.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Indeed, he's a strong leader. His opening with financial and cheap libraries is set to vault you forward, and if you get a lead the UB does help you keep it.

I wouldn't use the UU against frigates (as a correction, ships of the line get +50% vs frigates...iirc nothing special vs galleons so you shouldn't see any difference in fighting one or the other with the dutch UU). Actually, the stronger thing about it is that it holds more troops - making intercontinental attacks much easier. You still need cover though, especially if someone has airships but even if they don't, 6 + 10% coastal D isn't going to cut it vs a lot of 8 str units, even if they're unpromoted.

IMO the dike and the portugese UB's are both overrated. The dike can be helpful on archipelago maps, where you're forced to work a LOT of water tiles. However, on continents maps their margin of usefulness is good but hardly spectacular. A water tile is worth 2F 1H 3C with the dike. This is a marginal tile, not a great one (only great water tiles are seafood). So other than 1-3 hammers for seafood, the dike is only going to help a typical city minimally. If you want hammers, a workshop or a farm for whipping are both MUCH higher yields. If you want commerce, you have financial cottages to lean on and that late in the game with emancipation it takes very little time for a cottage to overtake 2f 1h 3c.

I'm not saying it isn't useful, because it is. A couple hammers from excess tiles going into water or at least seafood is better than nothing on a building that's inherently worthwhile to begin with. It's no sacrificial alter though .

 

[Joshua368]

The inevitable dike + maoi city is pretty awesome though.

In the game I mentioned early I put the Maoi on a one-tile island with nothing surrounding it but water and two or three seafood. Ended up being on of my top production cities. 40 production from water tiles ain't bad. Also during the Maoi's construction it proved to be one of the very rare occassions where the boring ol' 1 hammer specialists were actually useful.

 

[Dirk1302]

Willem's very strong, he's almost never mentioned as the strongest leader in the game which he can easiliy be. Levee (dike) in all coastal cities and also financial on these squares, you just have so much more to work with.

To give a direct reaction on the op, it's a matter of playing style of course but i far prefer Willem to HC. If i play HC i never rush with the quecha's as this is just too cheesy. In other departments Willem fits my playing style much more with his mid/late game strengths.

 

[Bleys]

I think William is the strongest Island-map leader. For mostly-land maps, like Pangaea, Continents, Hemispheres, HC is hard to top, but William comes close, IMHO, especially at higher levels when IND loses some of its luster and the speed of the AI makes CRE a killer bonus.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Willem's very strong, he's almost never mentioned as the strongest leader in the game which he can easiliy be. Levee (dike) in all coastal cities and also financial on these squares, you just have so much more to work with.

To give a direct reaction on the op, it's a matter of playing style of course but i far prefer Willem to HC. If i play HC i never rush with the quecha's as this is just too cheesy. In other departments Willem fits my playing style much more with his mid/late game strengths.

It's really, really hard to quecha rush on immortal + anyway if you play normal speed. Only time I saw something like that was DaveMCW choking in his 8 city "CE" space win off one of obsolete's WE/SSE threads. Actually, the images for obsolete's game were lost, but dave's are still there...

 

[sinergistic]

It's really, really hard to quecha rush on immortal + anyway if you play normal speed. Only time I saw something like that was DaveMCW choking in his 8 city "CE" space win off one of obsolete's WE/SSE threads. Actually, the images for obsolete's game were lost, but dave's are still there...

So, what you're saying is that Obsolete's images are Obsolete?

Ok, right. Not funny.

 

[Gliese 581]

Agreed, Willem is one of the best, especially on high levels where the creative trait is very powerful.

 

[Ai Shizuka]

Alright, so Willie has his fair share of supporters, after all.
Now I just need to keep playing random leaders and not picking him again

 

[DMOC]

It's really, really hard to quecha rush on immortal + anyway if you play normal speed. Only time I saw something like that was DaveMCW choking in his 8 city "CE" space win off one of obsolete's WE/SSE threads. Actually, the images for obsolete's game were lost, but dave's are still there...

I replayed the game on a new patch and choking Hammurabi did not work.
-------
And Willem is also great on land...dikes can help out ANY city (well with a few exceptions...)

 

[Sian]

DMOC ... in cities without any water titles Dikes is no better than Levees

 

[6K Man]

It's true that a Dike just makes below-average tiles (coast, ocean) into marginal ones. But if you're like me and end up settling a few crummy sites to grab silver, fur, or that one crab tile in the godforsaken north, the ability to add a Dike can make that semiuseless city into a so-so one. Water tiles with lighthouse are self supporting, at least, and with a Dike and even one seafood resource, it's not hard to get a city with 16 base hammers or so. Suddenly, that's not quite so crummy.

It's the same deal if you feel the need to grab those 1 and 2 tile island cities from, or ahead of, the AIs. A little seafood for whipping, and suddenly, it's an advanced base.

 

[madscientist]

I think Willem is one of the top 5 leaders, although behind HC.

Some comments

1) He is the best on an island board, or one where you have a very high percentage of coastal cities such as Fractal.

2) The UB is one of the best providing you go into the games late. If your one to have the game won by Cavalry/rifling then it's weak.

3) The UU is pretty stronge and last until the end, having the same unit capacity as transports.

4) A financial leader with fast libraries means real fast early teching!

 

[dankok8]

Certainly a top 5 leader, especially on water map. imo the UU is the worst of all since it's still weaker than a frigate and so should be escorted. The good thing is that it can enter foreign cultural zone without open borders and can carry as many units as a transport. The UB and traits are good as pointed out by previous posters, but so are the starting techs. Agri + Fishing is pretty dang good.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I replayed the game on a new patch and choking Hammurabi did not work.
-------
And Willem is also great on land...dikes can help out ANY city (well with a few exceptions...)

Hmmm, I'd noted problems choking in recent patches. Maybe it's not a coincidence.

 

[Iranon]

He's about as good as a leader can be without munching archers for breakfast. Pretty much no later bonus competes with 3 capitals in the early Classical age.

 

[Gocho]

I win regularly at Monarch and am currently getting trounced in my attempts to move up to Emperor. All my Emperor wins are with HC or Willem so he must be doing something right!

 

[Bleys]

I win regularly at Monarch and am currently getting trounced in my attempts to move up to Emperor. All my Emperor wins are with HC or Willem so he must be doing something right!

Very common, thats exactly my situation with Immortal.

Try Hannibal too, he is easier to win with. The Romans or Egyptians are also very solid AIs whose traits and Uniques are nice for the new Emperor player.