Civilization Thread!

[Sousa]

No, it's true.

[stokeriño]

For clarification: is the crux of the great big awesomeness of Arabia basically the making of cash off trade routes (plus the Bazaar, which is pretty nifty)?

Started an Arabia game last night (Small map, random map type, Prince, put barbs back on just to remind myself of their pointlessness)...ended up on what was either an Archipelago or Fractal map or something, with only one other City State on my thin strip of land. Probably not ideal in that regard.

However, in a way that will no doubt bemuse and/or annoy Sousa, my starting point was awesome for food. Mecca's full scope contains four Fish, two Crab and one Wheat. There's also an Ivory and, stretching its borders even further, I've managed to nab some Gems and Spices too. And more to the point, all the buildings/wonders you can get that add production output to fish and/or coastal tiles means it's super-industrious to boot. The rest of the thin stip of land around me is either hills or forest, which only adds to this.

In light of Mecca's greatness, and the view that most other land on this map is comparatively meh, I've taken on something of an self-enforced One City Challenge where I've made Faith a priority for the first time ever...just to see how that goes. Currently somewhere around the year 1650 and just got Public Schools/researching Industrialisation, so it seems to be going well.

[Sousa]

Yeah, that's... not an ideal Arabia map. Sounds like it was Archipelago, which is not great for Arabia. Continents or Pangaea are where they shine; I rate them high because those are the two map types I usually play. I'd definitely plan to go tall with that, which Arabia can do really well.

It's not just trade route cash (and religion spread) that makes Arabia great; virtually all of Arabia's uniques are really amazing. Bazaars have obvious uses (trading for happiness or cash), and double oil is a very nice bonus that lets you build a shit-ton of planes, which are pretty much the best unit for war in their time since the AI doesn't know how to use Fighters. And then there's the Camel Archer, which can move into range, attack without a counter (due to range), and then move again to get out of the way of a counter.

So basically, Arabia is really good at everything because commerce is a versatile category for bonuses (you can buy your way to basically any victory), and if you want to take them to war you get extra help.

[stokeriño]

Strolled to a 1984 culture victory in that game.

Faith can be bloody effective if you take no half-measures with it. Particularly if you complete the Piety policy section and therefore get the extra religion bonus (unless you're Byzantine and already have it), then pick the option that lets you buy any Great Person with faith once you reach the Industrial Age. Whether you're churning out Scientists, Engineers, or (as I did towards the end) Musicians to send on tourism booster missions, it's a great option to have. And perhaps more importantly, allows you the added flexibility to mix it up or change tactics without having to have completed the appropriate science/culture/etc. policy section first.

[Sousa]

Today I learned that fighting a war with very little siege and a whole lot of Knights is a terrible idea...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5nlD2CR7tI

[NobBe Nobbs]

Today I learned that fighting a war with very little siege and a whole lot of Knights is a terrible idea...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5nlD2CR7tI

What the fuck is the context for that?

[Sousa]

This!

[Plubby]

And it is incredible.

[Sousa]

I'm really surprised at how much I love the Songhai. They're sort of boring on paper, but if you manage religion well and go down Piety then you get a building (Mud Pyramid Mosque) that gives +2 Faith, +2 Culture, +2 Happiness (Religious Center follower belief), +10% Gold (Theocracy policy), and +1 Food (Feed the World religious tenet)... all without maintenance. Pretty rad.

[Sousa]

...guys, a terrible thing has happened. So awful I scarcely dare give it utterance.

...

...

i really like portugal.

[MDK]

You've become everything you've ever hated.

Joining the Tea Party next?

[Sousa]

I just got baptized again and rededicated my life to christ oh god what is going on i don't even

[TKz]

I won my first BNW Cultural Victory! Woo! Brazil + Jungle tiles + Brazilwood Camp is INSANE. +3 Gold, +2 Science, +3 Culture! Had a few problems with people getting pissy over my spreading religion everywhere (which almost screwed me midway through when my city connections were blocked by Siam not wanting open borders anymore), but never had a war. It was great, my inital worry was that Japan would be a huge problem, but after the first 1/4 of the game they essentially became my attack dogs. Someone catching up on culture? Give Japan some GPT to go to war with them. Someone looking like they're about to invade? Japan, can you take care of that for me?

Lots of fun. Not sure I'd play Brazil again, though. I've tried a few times before and if you end up in a war early on, you're looking at a fucking tough game if you haven't worked on your army at all. So someone like Atilla setting up camp around you is pretty much a death penalty.

For my next game I'd like to win a science victory, but I didn't have much luck with that last time as Korea, who're supposed to be science based.

[Sousa]

Babylon is good for science, too. The Maya can get the job done in that direction as well. And of course anybody who can multiply gold (Dutch, Arabia, fucking portugal, Morocco) can get the job done with research agreements.

[Sousa]

America - 1/10: Absolutely the worst so far, hands down, and I'll be amazed if anyone is worse than this.

Look at how optimistic I was, you guys. "Oh, sure, it can't possibly get worse than marginal unique units and a horrible unique ability! It's not like there's going to be a unique building that's worse than the building it replaces or anything, right? ...right?"

[TKz]

Babylon wasn't too bad. If I'd had a jungle start I imagine I would have crushed it straight away. I think it would have been more fun if I didn't end up on a small island with just enough room for 3 cities and barely any strategy resources. By the end of the game my science lead was unbelievable though, I was in the Information Era when others were just reaching Industrial. I think I won the Science Victory by 1911.

[stokeriño]

Is it me, or is there always one Civ on any map who whores mass city state support (somehow - I know I never have the bloody money to do it) and spends most of the mid-game dicking on you and whatever victory route you've chosen to pursue in the World Congress?

I'm looking at you, usually-Poland-but-this-time-Polynesia.

[Sousa]

Yeah, that's Ethiopia in my current Iroquois-are-awful-and-can-get-fucked game. More often than not, though, if somebody's doing that, it's Greece. Greece is probably the biggest asshole AI outside of maybe Shaka.

[stokeriño]

Maybe if you could plant forests in this game, the Iroquois might be marginally less useless (unles you can and I've just missed this). But then you'd end up planting 'roads' of forests everywhere, which would look a little bit hilarious on the map.

[Sousa]

The thing where forests act as roads is literally the only thing I like about them, and even then it's not nearly as good as the Incas' comparable ability. I'm just finding my production slowing down pretty considerably now that I'm at Industrialization just because I don't have the usual Workshop % boost. I only have something like ten forests in all of my territory (I went wide with Liberty--because I didn't have a choice, screw you very much the shoshone). I could see them working really well on a heavily forested map type, but on a bog-standard Continents map they're worthless. The nicest thing I can say is that at least Mohawk Warriors look cool.