[NFP] You Rank the New Frontier Pass Civs (and Leaders)

[Hellenism Salesman]

Okay, so ranking Civilzations is difficult, due to the insane amount of factors you can take into account. Attempting to rank them based on general quality is even more difficult, as it's a combination of all those factors. And, depending on person to person, not only does subjectivity take place in what elements they prefer, but also in how much emphasis they place on the indidivudal elements, and how important they think each of those are.

But screw it! We're gonna do it anyway!

I'm asking you to rank the NFP Civs (and soon to be leaders, if our suspicions for the next pack are to be believed), on a 1-10/10 scale based on these general factors:

• Gameplay
  • Is the Civ fun to play? Do they make you think? Is there a lot of strategy in their playstyle? Do you enjoy playing as them?
• Balance
  • Closely related to gameplay, balance can easily determine your experience with a Civ. Is the Civ too strong? Are they too weak? Do you care?
• Aesthetics
  • The art part. Do you like the visual and musical aspects of the Civ? Do they have good themes and ambients? Is their icon a good choice? Does the leader's design look good to you?
• Historical Aspects
  • This can either be very minor or very major depending on how much you care about history, but is the Civ historically accurate? Do you think they made good choices for what aspects of them to represent and what leader they have?

And then, just take those four factors, and depending on how important they are to you, give them a general score that encapsulates all of these.

Current New Frontier Pass Civs and Leaders (I will update this as new ones are revealed):

• Maya, led by Lady Six Sky
• Gran Columbia, led by Simón Bolívar
• Ethiopia, led by Menelik II
• Gaul, led by Ambriorix
• Byzantium, led by Basil II
• Babylon, led by Hammurabi

Personally, I can't speak here, since I haven't gotten the chance to play as them all yet, but, I'm curious to hear what others say, and like most of these threads, I start this for civil discussion.

 

[Duke William of Normandy]

This isn't for everyone here, considering I have Civilizations Expanded, but here are my thoughts:

1: Music
10/10 for each of them, I love every single one, you cannot change my mind. Gran Colombia, Ethiopia, and Byzantium especially.

2: Balance
With the Civilizations Expanded mod, once again, not for everyone, it really balances out the Civ and Leaders... and by that I mean it makes them all OP, but in a fun way.
Without the mod... Not that much balance.

3: Gameplay
Look at no. 2 for reference.

4: Historical Aspects

4a: Leaders
I like the Leader choices so far, especially Basil II. Lady Six Sky I have my gripes with, but not too many.

4b: Abilities
They are all pretty historically accurate and fun to play with, excluding Hammurabi's and Babylon's in a historical sense. I dislike, though, that Byzantiums is solely focused on Domination and doesn't have any bonuses towards Infrastructure.

5: Art
Not the best I've seen but could be worse. I dislike Ambiorix's background art, it's just a bit too bland. Same with Basil II's.

Final Score:
Gran Colombia: 8/10 Could have used more creativity, in my opinion, but overall pretty fun way to win Domination Victories and losing friends.
Maya 9/10 Unique playstyle, bonuses, and penalties. Tall Civilization as well, which gives another point as well.
Ethiopia 10/10 A versatile Civilization that can focus on Religion while also being good at attaining a Scientific or Cultural Victory.
Byzantium 9/10 Fun to play as, but would like to see some bonus towards Infrastructure.
Gaul 9/10 Same as the Maya.
Babylon 8/10 Great Civilization to play as if experienced, but not recommended for new players. It requires an astute knowledge of the Tech Tree to properly plan out a Babylon strategy.

 

[Hellenism Salesman]

With the Civilizations Expanded mod, once again, not for everyone, it really balances out the Civ and Leaders... and by that I mean it makes them all OP, but in a fun way.

I've dabbled with that mod a bit... it seems like there's a whole lot there and like its a heck of a lot of fun (but a heck of a lot to learn).

And as for vanilla balance I will say that I like that the NFP experiments and makes some daring choices, though in some cases (Simón and Basil in particular) they feel a bit overtuned. Just way too much stuff in their kits that's all way too good. It's like they stingily held back every tiny advantage with the base game and expansions and then just let go and barfed every game-winning bonus imaginable into the NFP civs. It gets a bit worrying too when the new Civs seem to be designed as better versions of previous leaders, like with Byzantium replacing Spain...