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I Think I'm Gwangju Like It Here
A blog about my adventures in Korea, and whatever else I feel like writing about.
A blog about my adventures in Korea, and whatever else I feel like writing about.
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Chevalier Absolutely Knows What He's Doing as Best Korea
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February 8th, 2018, 16:50
(This post was last modified: February 19th, 2018, 11:37 by Chevalier Mal Fet.)
February 8th, 2018, 17:43
(This post was last modified: February 8th, 2018, 17:49 by Chevalier Mal Fet.)
Okay! So! PBEM 8! Going on my first solo flight. Odds are this is going to crash and burn, but hey, I'll try and have a few laughs along the way, yeah?
Things have moved quickly since this morning when I left for work. Not only do we have a lurker thread, everyone's started making their own spoiler threads and we've got a player order AND we've got civ choices! Let's jump right into the juicy stuff and take a look:
So when I saw my draw my first reaction was :O Like, this is worst-case scenario for me - I wanted a random draw to narrow down my choices and make it easier to choose a civ. I was thinking I'd be happy if I got Germany, or Australia or Korea, or any good civ really. I could ignore the garbage options like Spain or France and have a relatively straightforward pick. Instead, I've got a surfeit of choices. I think the other players would kill for the options I've got, especially when you compare me to, say, Rowain or the Archduke. The only person whose picks really rival mine are Emperor, I think. So, let's look at our choices*: Korea  One of the first (if not THE first) Rise & Fall civs announced. The Koreans bring to the table the Seowon unique district. Rather than normal adjacencies, these guys like to be off by themselves, with mines and farms around them. However, they themselves need to be on hills - so I need to give up a bit of production to get them. The usual flatland tiles I stick my districts on won't work for these guys. New World settings would be real nice, I guess I should have pushed harder for those. With science-from-pop slashed in the new patch, a Campus replacement is very nice indeed. The Leader bonus likes governors, so I think I'll want to recruit as many as possible rather than building up some super-governors. The Hwacha is a Bombard that can move and fire, much like Khmer's UU (and hey, I also have Khmer!). The fun thing about Korea is that no one has had a chance to take them out for a spin yet. These guys are brand-new and the best use of them has yet to be worked out. If I take them, and do well, I could write the book, like Sullla with Rome in PBEM1 or Woden's Wondrous World of China in PBEM2. Poland  Poland is a nice, flexible civ, capable of going for religion or culture. The culture bombs from forts and encampments, coupled with Lithuanian Union, could allow for some cute plays with military engineers, giving me an actual reason to build that unit. Winged Hussars haven't been seen yet in battle, since Archduke's Macedonian rush put an end to PBEM6 before too much of the tech tree was explored. I think religious wins are STILL underrated in RB multiplayer, even after Alhambram's PBEM2 win. Poland has the muscle to actually force one across the table, though, with Lithuanian Union capable of overcoming even an enemy inquisition, and the winged hussars backing it up. There's lots of possible synergy with beliefs like Choral Music, Reliquaries, and Crusade. The Market replacement, which I, uh, don't want to attempt to spell, is a nice buff because it grants lots of flexibility to Poland. You gotta build markets to get trade routes anyway now, so this was a bit of a stealth buff for Poland (a minor one). Trade routes are great, only getting stronger as the game goes on - International Routes can bring tons of science, culture, production, and gold, or Poland can stay entirely domestic to generate monster food and production - and of course you can swap the whole civ around every 30 turns or so! I think Poland is a strong civ, if given a chance to get rolling, and I'd really like to explore a religious game with them. Khmer  Khmer, my old nemesis. Another faith-focused civ, but not as militaristic as Poland. I like the Grand Barays ability - the amenities and food bonus gives Khmer a passable imitation of Rome's Bath district, albeit with a higher cost. However, they get a faith buff, which the Romans don't get. So, the Khmer can throw cities down in dry spots, knowing they'll be building aqueducts later, and they'll never want for food or faith in those cities. Monasteries of the King further boosts Faith and food generation, meaning Khmer should have lots of populous, high-faith cities dotting the map. The Prasat, though, I'm not in love with. Martyr is a great promotion if your enemies cooperate, but if they just use scouts to murder your missionaries, you've gained nothing at all from your unique building - and I highly doubt my opponents will be willing to cooperate with me. This is a good ability against the dumb AI, but humans refuse to play fair. As a result, I just don't think the Khmer have the muscle to achieve a religious victory, not like Poland can. The Domrey is an interesting unit - I mean, who doesn't love elephants with cannon on their back? - but if we're talking bombard replacements I think I prefer Korea's Hwacha. And if we're talking religious wins, I think I prefer Poland's Golden Liberty and Lithuanian Union abilities. Nubia  Nubia is a fun civ currently being piloted by my teammate Woden in PBEM7. They've got a bundle of fun upgrades. Perhaps the flagship ability is Ta-Seti. Nubia wants to plant as many mines as possible, giving them lots of bonus production and bonus gold generation. The gold helps pay for their massive army of archers - the other half of the ability is a permanent +50% production boost towards ranged units. Nubia likes to build a large military, and it can do it quickly and early. The Pitati archer plays right into this strategy, an archer-replacement that moves quick, hits hard, and promotes swiftly. The Pitati is obsolescent quickly, so it encourages aggressive Ancient and Classical age play - you need to wring as much as you can out of these guys before Crossbows hit the field, so about 70-80 turns of usefulness is what you can expect. On the economic side, Amanitore's leader ability and the Nubian's UI come into play. Amanitore gets 20% towards all districts, letting her get them out a hair faster than her rivals. If she builds a Nubian pyramid, though, that number reaches the impressive 40%! Every district, essentially, is the same cost as a discounted district for other civs. The Nubian pyramid is limited in the terrain it can be built on, but on that terrain it shines. It also encourages Nubia to built densely-packed urban centers, as every adjacent district boosts the pyramid further, with bonus food, science, faith, gold, culture - whatever you can arrange at your city. Overall, Nubia is a strong civ that can aim at any victory type, but is dependent on early aggression with the Pitati archer to set up the base for long-term success. Scythia  Play Scythia like this. Next. Ghandi  India is another population/religious civ, like Khmer. The main difference is India's abilities are much more dependent on what your opponents are up to. Satyagraha's faith bonus is sort of meh. 5 faith per civ that's founded a religion and isn't fighting India will mean a maximum of +15 faith by the end of the game (assuming I found my own religion, of course, which I should if I'm emphasizing faith at all!), which is not to be sneezed at in the Classical age but is totally obsolete by the middle and late game. The double war weariness is nice, though, and encourages civs to leave India alone (and could probably be used offensively with a strategy of raiding and pillaging to quickly drive up an opponent's WW and exhaust them). India wants to be peaceful, though - it needs to attract as many religions as possible, to leech off their Follower beliefs. Missionaries haven't been too prominent in RB games, though, so this is probably an ability better used in Single Player. The Varu is a great unit, since the -5 malus stacks. They can't win a war on their own, but they're fine Horseman replacements and make excellent supporting units in a larger army. India can defend itself in the early ages, at least. The stepwells let Indian cities grow, and they're not as dependent on terrain as Khmer's Grand Barays. They can generate lots of food and faith, so Indian cities soon start to resemble Khmer ones - large and religious, but not particularly good at anything else. I dunno, India just doesn't inspire me. Again, if I'm going to play for religion - which seems to be all India's really good at - I'd rather take Poland and spread the faith by force. Germany  Ah, Germany. Perhaps the most beloved Civ at Realms Beyond - Germany has featured in PBEMs 1, 2, 4, and 7, or half of all games played here so far, counting 8. It's not hard to see why, but let's run down the list: +7 attacking city states is nice to expand early in the game, but nothing game-changing. An extra military spot, though, is - you can always have Conscription or Agoge or Limes running, even in Classical Republic. Very nice. The U-Boat hasn't really been featured, might be fun on an inland sea, but is more than likely going to be irrelevant. Doesn't matter, though, because Germany has FREE IMPERIAL CITIES - an extra district in every city makes German cities flexible, less dependent on population, and capable of punching far above their weight in terms of science, culture, gold, what have you. The only limitation is finding the production to BUILD everything German cities can build, but that's neatly answered by THE HANSA, a cheap Industrial district that gets boosted by damn near everything. Germany can spam these babies everywhere and have the production to match anyone in the game. Germany has yet to win a PBEM, though. Its main weakness is the long setup time it takes to get Hansas online and then the extra districts running. Most games have been settled by events elsewhere on the map before Germany could bring its advantages to bear - in PBEM1, teh was a viable challenger to Sullla's Rome, until Sullla absorbed the Archduke and yuris helped annihilate teh's army in a war of mutual annihilation before Sullla swept up both. In PBEM2, Singaboy was hampered by early barbarians, then wound up on the wrong way of an early 2v1, his army entirely out of position to save his first expansion city from the Archduke. In PBEM4, Singaboy was again hammered by the Archduke, this time leading a fleet of basically invincible GA-powered frigates to sack and burn his coastal cities. Bottom line: Germany can be great, but it needs time to get going, and usually the other players don't give you that time. I've got a ton of good choices - Korea, Nubia, Scythia, Poland, Germany - and plenty of time to choose. I'm going to mull over what my preferences are, and what I think the community would most enjoy, before I pick. *My set up picture of Seondok didn't work, so have this one of her from the loading screen of my first R&F test game instead.
I Think I'm Gwangju Like It Here
A blog about my adventures in Korea, and whatever else I feel like writing about.
February 9th, 2018, 17:01
(This post was last modified: February 9th, 2018, 17:01 by Chevalier Mal Fet.)
(February 9th, 2018, 15:41)BRickAstley Wrote: Alhambram has Poland, not you. What? Nonsense. I pulled the table straight from the organizing thread, where it clearly says - Chevalier Mal Fet Wrote: - oh. Oops. Tell no one what you saw here.
I Think I'm Gwangju Like It Here
A blog about my adventures in Korea, and whatever else I feel like writing about.
Well, since I already inadvertently started, let's analyze my opponents' civs...in brief, though, since it IS every civ in the game.
Guess we're starting with Alhambram: Poland: Quote:Poland is a nice, flexible civ, capable of going for religion or culture. The culture bombs from forts and encampments, coupled with Lithuanian Union, could allow for some cute plays with military engineers, giving me an actual reason to build that unit. Winged Hussars haven't been seen yet in battle, since Archduke's Macedonian rush put an end to PBEM6 before too much of the tech tree was explored. There, that was easy. Macedonia Alhambram was on the wrong end of Macedon in PBEM6. Lurker opinion before the game started was that Macedon was a one-trick pony, good if you were winning but not that helpful at getting you there. Archduke, of course, promptly took Macedon, launched an audacious attack against an Australia that had twice his production and equal numbers of equal tech units, and trounced them. His tactics were skilled, and he exploited the hetairoi to the fullest, fielding 5! great generals at once as his army crushed each city in turn. It really did play like Alexander the Great's campaign of conquest in action. Alhambram might want to try his hand at the same thing, but more likely he'll give this civ a pass. Japan Japan has featured in two PBEMs to date. In PBEM3, Kaiser's Japan got rushed to death very quickly - months ago at this point, as that game crawls along like molasses (has anyone seen Kaiser lately? :/). In PBEM4, oledavy exploited the Meiji Restoration and Japan's cheap Holy Sites to build a super-city on his starting archipelago. Japan's good at closely packed, dense cities, and kamikaze will synergize nicely with the inland sea. However, their unique unit is a lackluster pikeman replacement, and the Electronics Factory comes too late in the game to be useful. Still, the district bonuses alone make Japan a solid civ, if not spectacular like some others. Still, Alhambram's not gonna take this civ. America My home country is underwhelming in every Civ game I've played, with late-coming UUs or UBs and meh at best abilities to cover for it in the meantime. Civ VI is no different - the +5 combat strength on home continents is nice, but nothing to write home about, and entirely at the mercy of the map. Rowain's America in PBEM3 settled right on the continent border, costing him his bonus in half the lands in his empire! National Parks are finicky, late, and annoying, the fighter UU replaces a thoroughly irrelevant unit, the film studio is decent but comes too late, meaning poor Teddy is left with the Rough Rider UU, which is like a less cool Cossack. EDIT: WAIT! Now they get wild cards instead of diplomatic slots! That's much better, but still nothing game-changing. America remains underwhelming. Alhambram will choose another civ. England I don't know about England. I took it in PBEM7, and Ichabod's working wodners with it in PBEM3, and of course Archduke nearly won PBEM4 with it, but this civ's been tinkered with a lot. The RND no longer has its signature ability of double trade routes, but it still locks down Great Admirals for you and is cheap to build. Now, it gives bonus loyalty to cities on other continents. I have to say, so far I haven't noticed loyalty much. It punishes pink-dotting, but otherwise doesn't seem to matter - at least, not in the test games I've played. The Sea Dog is a fun, but niche unit, Redcoats are great but expensive and late-coming, and the British Museum has seemed irrelevant. The foreign continent bonus is a poor match with the Inland Sea type, as well. Alhambram might take this civ to make a naval play, but more likely he'll give England a pass. No, the Civ Alhambram will take is The Netherlands Alhambram's home country and one of the new expansion countries. Alhambram already wrote his thread title in Dutch, so it's no great act of deduction on my part. Let's take a look at Wilhemina: Major adjacencies from rivers - the key districts of Campus, Theater Square, and IZ all benefit as much as a CH does from a river. That's a nice boost. They also launch a culture bomb when completing harbors, which syncs nicely since you typically build harbors next to sea resources, but is nothing gamebreaking. Trade routes are slightly boosted, gaining bonus culture or loyalty depending on if they're foreign or domestic, but the bonus isn't great and loyalty, like I've said, hasn't seemed to matter much. We'll see. UU is a frigate replacement with a bonus attacking districts, but the real start of the show is the Polder. The Polder gets 1 food, +1 for every adjacent polder, +1 production, +.5 housing - so already like a better coastal farm. Then at civil engineering it gets a further boost of +4 gold! Late game, Dutch coasts will be amazing tiles. The main restriction on the polder is restrictive placement rules - it needs at least 3 adjacent flat tiles on the coast to be built. Still, te Netherlands look like a really solid, generalist civ. Alhambram's made no secret that he wants to take them out for a spin.
I Think I'm Gwangju Like It Here
A blog about my adventures in Korea, and whatever else I feel like writing about.
No turn yet, so let's do Japper:
Cree The Cree are one of my favorite expansion civs, although I haven't tried them out yet (I've only done one test game, as Korea). Let's run through them: Nihithaw - bonus trader/trade route at pottery, traders claim unclaimed tiles in first 3 rings that they pass through. Favorable Terms - all of Poundmaker's Alliances share visibility (as opposed to just Military). Bonus food/gold from trade routes based on camps/pastures in the sending and receiving cities. UU - Okihtcitaw: Scout replacement. Free promotion. Matches a warrior in combat strength. Higher cost. UI - Mekewap: Needs to be next to bonus or luxury resources. +1 prod/housing, bonus gold/food per lux and bonus resource adjacent. The Cree are obviously a builder civ. The UU honestly doesn't strike me as that great - sure, you don't have to build warriors, but your Okihtcitaws are going to be obsolescent pretty quick. You can't take on Horsemen or Swordsmen with them, and you can't upgrade the blasted things until Rifling! Which means all you want to do with them is scout, right? These ain't frontline combat units. In which case, you have a more expensive scout with only marginal more utility. I'd rather have the scout, honestly. The UI, though, is nice. Gold, food, and production - what more could you want? You can slap these down any place where you can't build a mine and have a decent little tile yield. On their own, not so great, but spamming these can make Cree cities highly productive. Diplomatically, the Cree are in good shape. Everyone wants to be their friend, and their trader bonuses let them get new cities up and running even more quickly (although the culture claiming is fun, it'll be finicky to manage. Do you choose suboptimal yields just to claim at most 2 tiles? Maybe! Depending on the tiles!). Overall, though, I really like the idea of a peaceful trading civ. I think this is probably the best of Japper's choices, despite the lackluster UU. Mapuche Toquoi - All units trained in cities with an established Governor gain 25% more experience in combat. +10 ![[Image: latest?cb=20161101203524]](https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/civilization/images/b/b6/Civ6StrengthIcon.png/revision/latest?cb=20161101203524){kind=small} Combat Strength bonus against civilizations that are in a Golden Age.Swift Hawk - If a Mapuche unit defeats an enemy unit within the borders of the enemy city, that city loses 20 Loyalty. UU - Malon Raider,
The Mapuche I know little about - I wasn't paying attention the week they were announced, so this is going to be my first impressions with no pretensions of thought. It looks like they're a rush civ - the UU is a Light Cavalry replacement that gets buffed near friendly territory (like Cossacks! But not as good), and the Leaer ability also encourages combat near your own borders, where Loyalty pressure is likely to be highest - so basically, wars like Alhambram's final war with Woden in PBEM2, not Archduke's long expedition against Australia and Persia in PBEM6. I don't know how much default Loyalty a city has - do you need to murder 5 enemy units in order to get the city to rebel? I dunno, this civ kind of looks like a mess to me. The UI is a good way to help the Mapuche keep up in the culture race, but if you want to win a culture win, wouldn't it be better to build Seaside Resorts on the high-appeal tiles for straight tourism? It's still good on non-coastal tiles and before the SR unlocks, of course, and is a bit more flexible, but I don't see how it contributes to the Civ's overall package. The Civ ability itself is interesting - every city with a governor has a Barracks or Stable, essentially, and the combat buff against Golden Age civilizations is nice, but situational - you can't control when your opponents enter Golden Ages, after all. Overall, it looks like this civ has a lot of interesting mechanics tied to the expansion, but they're a little garbled. I expect Japper to opt for the Cree instead - that's what I'd pick, at least. Persia Persia's a really fun civ to play, I think. The Surprise War boost is really, really strong (strong enough that most people will just declare on Persia and have done with it), and created some interesting dynamics with DOWs in PBEM6, especially when combined with Australia's ability. With so many civs now getting bonii on war declarations, diplomacy is going to be very interesting in the future (or very boring, as everyone just defaults to always war mode). The Paradeiza is a great UU, generating lots of gold and culture - better by far than the Chateau, in my opinion. The trade routes are also nice, giving another good source of culture. The Immortal is a good, flexible unit. I don't think Alhambram used them to their fullest extent in PBEM6, but the option to forgo a bit of damage in return for taking no damage yourself adds a lot of fexibility to the unit and dramatically magnifies its usefulness - it'd be intriguing to see if you could play without Archers at all through the classical age, using exclusively immortals as your mailed fist. They get buffed by a GG and Archers don't! Still, Persia has been played before, and I expect Japper to go for one of the expansion civs. This wouldn't be a bad choice, though. Russia Russia is one of the more popular civs, because it does everything well. Lavras come early, give you practically a lock on the first or second Great Prophet, and generate GPP for you all game long, making you monstrous in both faith and culture. The bonus tiles counter the tundra bias really well, and in our games where there IS no tundra start bias it's just a straight upgrade. The trade route bonus is really good in the team game (and was the reason Russia was my #1 choice there, too bad Emperor felt the same way), and of course Cossacks are also known as "boogeymen" for a reason, and it ain't their dancin' skills. I think objectively, this is Japper's strongest choice - but it's a boring vanilla civ, too, and I expect him to take one of the two original American civs. France Grand Tour - +20% towards Medieval, Renaissance, and Industrial Wonders, doubled tourism from wonders Catherine's Flying Squadron - +1 level of diplomatic visibility with other civs, a free spy, spies get a free promotion Chateau (UI, +culture, +gold, can't be built adjacent to each other) Garde Imperial (UU, infantry replacement, GG points on kills, strength boost on home continent) Oh, dear, poor France - somehow Firaxis contrived to give them an ability that is literally useless in Multiplayer. I cannot think of a time when Catherine's Flying Squadron would ever come in more handy than, say, Amanitore's district building or Trajan's free monuments. The wonder building is I guess nice to have, but China's is better, the Chateau is a neat little improvement but not worth taking on the civ as a whole to get, and the Garde Imperial is a niche, late-arriving UU. The GG points can be very strong, as we see with Macedon, but you want those in the Ancient and Classical ages, not in the Modern age! France has literally never been picked and I don't expect that to change. Brazil Amazon - rainforests add adjacencies to most districts and neighborhoods Magnanimous - Keeps 20% of GPP after recruitment UD - Carnival/Copacabana - +2 amenities instead of +1, Carnival project for tons of GPP UU - MG, a souped-up early BB Brazil has some good stuff going for it, if you want a cultural victory. The cheap Carnival district means that they should never lack for amenities, and the Carnival project gives them oodles of GE, GMer, GW, GA, and GM points, rendering Theater Squares almost superfluous ('cept you still gotta house the Great Works). Pedro's ability stacks well with this, - Brazil always starts with the meter 20% filled, meaning that all great people after the first are effectively 20% discounted. Amazon lets Brazil make good use of rainforests, but that means missing out on chopping them and replacing them with farms. The MG is a strong naval unit, but marginal on an Inland Sea map. It's a modest civ for pursuing culture wins, otherwise doesn't seem that inspired. Japper will probably feel the same.
I Think I'm Gwangju Like It Here
A blog about my adventures in Korea, and whatever else I feel like writing about.
Interesting to note that playing England in PBEM 3 didn't make a difference for me from a generic Civ until turn 80 or even after that. I started far away from coast, completely locked inside a single continent and the actual first use I had for one of their abilities was a RNDY far deep into the game. That's the problem with England. If you are unlucky, they aren't even different from a civ with no Uniques at all.
By the way, PBEM3 is not slow. It's the new Civ 6 crowd that plays unbelieveably fast. 
(February 10th, 2018, 11:20)Ichabod Wrote: Interesting to note that playing England in PBEM 3 didn't make a difference for me from a generic Civ until turn 80 or even after that. I started far away from coast, completely locked inside a single continent and the actual first use I had for one of their abilities was a RNDY far deep into the game. That's the problem with England. If you are unlucky, they aren't even different from a civ with no Uniques at all. I know, so far England hasn't really done anything for you - and yet you've put yourself in a winning position in that PBEM anyway. It's a very impressive performance overall!  And I'm just impatient to see how it ends! Play faster for my entertainment, peon! 
I Think I'm Gwangju Like It Here
A blog about my adventures in Korea, and whatever else I feel like writing about. (February 10th, 2018, 11:00)Chevalier Mal Fet Wrote: France This has actually changed in the expansion - not the ability itself, but the way it flows out into the larger game. Nowadays you get a combat bonus over other civilizations if you have better Diplomatic Visibility on them than they have on you, so Catherine gets +3 combat strength against all other major civs and her early spies let her get a listening post for another +3 about an era before anyone else can. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
![[Image: latest?cb=20161108211735]](https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/civilization/images/8/89/Civ6Movement.png/revision/latest?cb=20161108211735){kind=small}
