Power Rankings: Episode 1 – S4

Orange:

“That’s right folks I got a prime piece of land right here on the peninsula of Florida, it’s just a beauty folks and you could have a stake in it! Right now I’m selling stonks in Florida for only $28, get in while it’s hot! Your investment is guaranteed to double within two weeks, GUARANTEED!”

Mic cuts off, MacGregor waves to the audience before leaving off-stage.

“Alright that should do it, scamming these idiots is gonna be my easiest scheme yet! Can’t believe they fell for it so hard they put me in 50th to start, 50TH! Hah! With this shit land? Not even a chance.”

Cloudy:

Saba opened episode 1 by immediately tripping and falling off a cliff. Granted, the cliff was pretty short, so they didn’t have far to fall, but still. So far Saba is the only civ other than Florida that has not found a second city, even though they have two settlers wandering around—and yes I confirmed they are moving. Furthermore, both Mogadishu and the Mamluks have settled in their direction, especially the latter, who plonked a city right next to Saba’s capital on the Red Sea coast. It’s not too late for Makeda to turn her situation around, but it’s been made needlessly harder by this sluggish start.

Shaggy:

“CBRX Hotline, how can I help you?”

“Are the Finns finished or just Finnish?”

“Ehhhhhhh, we'll see. People seem really excited with how Ume-Sami and Latvia are starting out and the Finns are doing the whole 'slow European civ' thing that usually ends in an early exit. Next caller!”

Leman:

Shawnee didn’t move ranks at all. Seneca, our current North America leader (spoiler) settled towards them twice and they’re already looking cramped. This isn’t a death sentence, but honestly, basically what we expected. With Shawnee’s history of passivity and Seneca and Osage’s history of aggression I don’t really expect Shawnee to surprise me.

Altima:

Singapore may be stuck on jungle islands with bad production, but at least they picked a good pantheon for their location. Good for them.

Altima:

Rome’s been slow to expand, but it’s early and they’ve got time and terrain to give them space. Their stats are a bit mid, but again, “early” and “time.” We’ll see if they can ever break out of the Italian prison.

Msurdej:  Oh look Koxinga! You managed to meet expectations! And by that I mean, you settled two cities, and didn’t immediately get pinned in. And considering how many people screwed that up, that gives you a higher rank. Don’t let it get to head too hard though, your stats (especially your army size) are leaving a lot to be desired.

Cloudy:

Taíno’s settlement on Hispaniola is nice but it’s the wrong direction if they want to stake out a claim on South America. That said, so far their closest neighbor, Florida, is underperforming, which gives them a small boost.

CelestialDalek:

Tehuelche is failing really badly in the stats. Although the stats don’t mean much at turn 30, failing in the stats means a lot more than being high up in the stats right now. Why are they so low? Because they start in frigid tundra and haven’t done anything so far. All of their nearest neighbors do not start in the tundra, and are therefore doing better. They’ll probably do some more interesting shit later.

CelestialDalek:

Rozvi is on two cities. How much else do you want me to say? Uhh. Eswatini, who is probably going to be their biggest rival, has three cities. That’s one more than two. They have the 8th largest army, which at this point in the game means absolutely jackshit. They have a bit of space to settle. Their second city placement was ok I guess. The same issues that plague Rozvi’s initial chances as discussed last time persist. I’ll just use this spot to congratulate Nope on hitting three officially published mods, which is the same amount of cities that Eswatini has.

Leman:

It’s still early so if you’re a Bathory fan I wouldn’t get too upset yet. Still, Royal Hungary ended the part with only two cities, not finishing their first tech, and no fun ruin rewards don’t really inspire too much confidence. That being said, the one thing Royal Hungary does have going for them is a pretty decently sized army. Perfect for taking advantage of an already embattled Makhnovia or an overextended Bavaria.

Msurdej:  Vijayanagara had a less than ideal start, and they run the serious risk of getting boxed into the Indian subcontinent. If that happens, it will be much harder to break out, especially with how mountainous the area can be. For that reason, they’re falling more than a dozen ranks.

Reformer:

Bukhara had a pretty mild part. We didn’t really see them after the initial introduction. But from the minimap we can tell a few things. Firstly, their second city was settled on one of the worst locations available. Secondly, Afsharids settled directly towards them. And finally, Kazakhstan settled westward…though this was not directly towards Bukhara, it does act to cut off Bukhara somewhat. Bukhara does still have good opportunities for settling eastward, but we are not confident in their abilities, and so far we’ve seen nothing to convince us otherwise. Au contraire, Afsharids - whose abilities we do have confidence in - are a likely threat in the future. The Afsharid second city notably has quite a bit more production available.

Rosay: Kanem-Bornu in principle is a perfectly fine civ, until you look at all of its expansion opportunities: literally just fucking sand. Desert tiles are the second worst tile in the game, (the worst being snow) because you get nothing out of them unless you can get near a bunch of floodplains or hills, which Kanem can’t really get a bunch of. Now normally they could expand outward to the coast to mitigate this somewhat, until we get into the second problem with them: strong opposition. Sierra Leone is already playing a great early game and while Ndongo... isn't, they still have plenty of nice jungle and hill tiles to grow into while Kanem does not. Still, anything can happen and we could just suddenly have a Kanem-Bornu superstate, but don't get your hopes up

Rosay: Honestly, I think Latvia has a chance to be kinda alright this cycle. Now hold on, I don’t think they'll dominate western Russia, let alone Europe, those honors go to Kazan and Sami for me respectively, but they could be just enough of a thorn in the side of the regional hegemon to at least tilt the game up slightly. The reason for this: map control. Right now a large chunk of Eastern Europe is just open, and Latvia is a primary contender to just put some people down and hope for the best. This is better than their initial diagnosis as a rump civ who was going die to an invasion by major powers before the future era, so it’s something

Altima:

Jungle start, two cities, crap production. Plenty of space left tho.

Orange:

No third city in sight, and almost no second city either. Kalmyks find themselves the target of the first actual war (no the attacks on Goguryeo and Burgundy aren’t going to come to anything), and yeah the anarchist army is looking a whole lot bigger. But as can be seen by our rankings, we don’t think they’re gonna fall just yet, likely gonna be some squabbling and Makhno getting close to taking a city, but he’s gonna fall short. But maybe we’re wrong, in which case blame this on Cloudy, or Emu, maybe Rosay (I didn’t actually check who ranked them high and I’m not going to, so you’ll just have to assume it was these three).

Vihreaa:

It seems as if Henry V is looking to play all offense, no defense, so far this game. Being so bold as to settle his second city on the European mainland, England puts themselves squarely in contention with Burgundy. I’m sure they won’t take that lying down. Meanwhile, the Faroe Islands sneakily settle northern Scotland, dividing the already small region that is Great Britain between two civs. With the expansiveness of the Faroe Islands, England will need to settle quickly before the Faroes establish a strong core on the island.

Msurdej:  Can I get an “OOF” in the chat? The Crow had a poor episode this week, being one of the lowest in North America with only a pair of cities compared to three from the Yellowknives and Seneca. But while it’s a slow start, there’s still plenty of time and space for Ol’ Joe to turn it around.

Rosay:

In the test runs, the Qarmatians tended to take the Arabian peninsula and barely anything else, currently they have the eastern half of the peninsula with the jury is out on if they will do much else. Honestly, their fate is entirely reliant on if the Afsharids forward settle their direction which is to be determined

Orange:

They’re still on two and their second city was, to be honest, a bit shit, but they got another settler out, but it’s looking to go east… Look, the Khoshuts need to quickly lock down the Bengal Delta asap, that’s their goal right now and it seems ol’ Gucci Khan hasn’t gotten the memo yet. At least they got safety, safety in the mountains from any terrible wars or random people in an as of yet unknown submarine yelling at them about “bad plays”.

Lasqueto:

Ikko had a bit of a quiet first part, still confined to Japan. Them settling Kyushu might mean we’re in for another of those games where the Japanese civ turtles and leaves the north unsettled, but that’s just vibes. They’re tied for second place in tech though, being an island civ, and have generally pretty good stats. It remains to be seen whether they’ll be able to do anything with them.

Vihreaa:

Well, well, well, Makhnovia. If I had a nickel for every time we had an underwhelming civ from the Ukrainian region with a black and white color scheme being underwhelming, I’d have at least 2 nickels by now! Although it’s still probably too early to tell (LOL). Makhnovia with a slow start, only settling one city in close proximity of their capital is not showing much initiative, while other civs in their neighborhood start to assert their claims on the untamed land around them. They still have lands to their north that remain untouched, but the clock is ticking, and other empires might just strike first.

Lasqueto:

Shajar al-Durr starts off X4 by shoving her second city in Makeda’s face, showing that she has serious cajones if not much common sense. On one hand, this has probably cucked Saba out of any serious relevance and thus gives the Mamluks uncontested reign over the Nile. However, that relies on them filling in the space between and not overextending themselves. It might also turn out that Saba has teeth.

Emu:

Everyone's meh-est civ Ecuador gets off to a whelming start, not fumbling anything but not making any spicy plays either. In the popularity poll they wound up with one person expressing the mildest possible support and no one else reacting to them at all, and I don't really see that changing. They're really just our token modern civ here. They're not good, they're not terrible. They haven't gotten much worse, they haven't gotten much better. They're just Ecuador.

Vihreaa:

Goguryeo drops 14 ranks… just because i suppose! Actually, they seem to have a bit of a tech concern! Them along with Florida have only researched 8 total techs, according to Cloudberg, suggesting that they aren’t discovering as many techs as their neighbors. Aside from that, they started fairly typical, as they settled 3 cities in close proximity, all around the north of the Korean peninsula. Still too early in the game to start making sweeping conclusions about just about any civ, so large fluctuations such as this are still not completely out of left field.

Shaggy:

“CBRX Hotline, how can I help you?”

“What's going on with Osage?’

“Not much, no rank change, North America is still celebrating Settlefest. Next caller!’

Cloudy:

Dai Viet’s seven-point drop is not attributable to anything other than noise, and they remain in roughly the middle of the pack. So far nothing unexpected has happened in their area, and it’s anyone’s game.

Shaggy:

”CBRX Hotline, how can I help you?’

“Why are the Ndongo haters jumping around?’

“Inefficient settling and some lagging stats. Next caller!’

Leman:

Tiwanaku takes a big tumble because they only settle two cities and generally don’t look as excellent as we thought they’d be. Seven population, low production, small military, no pantheon. Tiwanaku just missed hitting all the marks we were looking for at this point in the game. Don’t worry though. Tiwanaku still has time to get back in the game, but this isn’t the best start.

CelestialDalek:

The Dzungars got the first wonder of the game. Although we only ever saw one city from them, they in fact have two cities! They are also in a 5-way tie for the 9th-most productive civ on 22 production. What does this mean for their future? Nothing! Nothing at all! These early part stats might as well be randomly generated if you aren’t in the bottom 10. Don’t envy the job of us PRs right now. Wait a few weeks.

Orange:

Javraganak starts off alright with three cities putting them ahead of the pack, but they don’t have very good land and are still stuck in Alaska blocked off by other civs. Though honestly I think they should be a bit higher. They got their third city down on the coast as they continue to expand south just as they should, they got plenty of land around, and the Yellowknives are going to be much more distracted with Crow. So they’re sitting pretty for now, which is good, but it could be better. Let’s hope they don’t slow down.

Reformer:

Maguindanao is the very model of an average start. They’re on two cities, exploring the archipelago, trading with Singapore, and they’re among the first civs to a pantheon - though the pantheon isn’t all that useful for them, and won’t help them towards a religion, which they would prefer to have. Nothing particularly exhilarating is happening in the neighborhood as a whole. Very quiet place. Wahgi got to three cities towards the end of the part, but that’s not significant at this point. But what IS noteworthy is Maguindanao’s stats. As a whole, they have 6th best stats on the cylinder right now, a great sign for their future, especially when considering the fact that some of the civs nearby - Singapore and Siam, notably - are bottom 10, stats-wise. Obviously, I must note that differences in stats are rarely indicative of long-term success…but one must admit that this gulf between Maguindanao and Singapore this early on is statistically significant.

Emu:

Our new Big River has some Big River shoes to fill, starting right below the fearsome New Holland and not doing a whole ton about it so far. Personally I vote we start calling them Little River if they don't shape up. Rio Pequeño. Has a ring to it. I say all this like they're doomed or something, which they're clearly not. I mean, they have plenty of space to turn things around, and they don't tend to do too badly for themselves, especially if Tehuelche just sits in their tundra. But still, there's a reason we're all so confident in their neighbors to the north.....

JDT:

Eswatini skyrockets up 21 places to 27th. They have successfully established a decent core of three cities, and with Ndongo and Rozvi starting worse than expected, there's reason to be optimistic. Though it's too early to draw definitive conclusions, this starting position and the strong stats and location of Eswatini all bode well towards them becoming the winner of the South African thunderdome, especially if Rozvi and Ndongo fail to rebound from their poor starts. So, don’t be surprised if the battlers in blue keep South Africa to themselves in the near future. Though, they may want to train up some warriors first…

Shaggy:

“CBRX Hotline, how can I help you?’

“Is it true that Part 1 rank velocities are sustainable?”

“Oh you sweet summer child. Next caller!”

JDT:

Bora Bora gets off to a great start, becoming an early follower to the 3 city club and racking good stats and pop. While they’re still stuck on the isles of Polynesia, they are encroaching the mainland, and with all this, go up by 13.

Msurdej:Pueblo has plenty of room left to expand. And with a bad opening from the Crow, it might give Po'pay time to craft a good empire. They certainly have a strong start with their production. But this early in the game, it’s too early to call. I’d chalk this drop up to static in the middle of the pack.

Lasqueto:

There’s not much to say about these guys. Their stats are pretty weak and they haven’t put out any new settlers yet, so they’ve taken a bit of a tumble in the rankings. This early on it doesn’t really matter though.

Rosay:

I'm chalking the Alaouite's slight drop from the pre-royale rankings due to general uncertainty, and hype from surprisingly strong performances from vaguely nearby neighbors Burgundy and Bavaria, but they are still a very solid civ with a ton of potential. Unlike some civs who are just stuck with shitty flat desert (looking at you Kanem) the Alaouites have a nice mix of coastal and mountain tiles to help make up the desert disadvantage. There is also the added bonus of Rome underperforming, allowing for the Alaouites to simply rush the Mediterranean coast to gather up some sweet sweet map control. What I'm really excited for however, is their eventual faceoff with Sierra Leone, which not only should provide the cylinder with a war amongst equals, but could also provide us with a UU MUSKETMAN FACEOFF BABYYYY

Altima:

The Burg gets up to a strong start, counting to four while some are still stuck on two. We’ll see if this is a stepping stone to success or the first step in a long stagnation- their region is tight, competitive, and has hucked out more stillborn empires than not. As-is, they lack a military and they’re slightly behind on techs, but it’s early game so the differences can be made up with time.

Vihreaa:

The Yellowknives jump up one rank, still being the highest ranked civ in the Arctic circle in North America (this is the Metis all over again!) The Yellowknives will certainly have a large expanse of space to settle into, as their neighbors slowly creep in their direction but not direct forward settles yet.

Shaggy:

“CBRX Hotline, how can I help you?“

“Mogchamp?”

“Mogchamp”

Leman:

Kazakhstan checked off all the necessary boxes to have a good start to this game. Three cities - check. No stupid early wars - check. No Selkup cities on your doorstep - check. That’s all you can ask for this early on - it’s a great foundation for the future.

Shaggy:

“CBRX Hotline, how can I help you?”

“Is it high Noongar yetgar?”

“No, check back later in a few centuries when Noongar is big enough to have a sustainable standoff on Australia. Next caller!”

Reformer:

Wahgi is part of a prestigious club. A club whose members have 3 or more cities. Early expansion is key to a successful early game, and Wahgi seems eager to partake. Stats-wise, they’re kind of middle of the pack, which is perfectly fine for a civ focusing on early expansion. They might even have another settler out as of the end of the part. Hard to say since we didn’t get to see them after the initial introduction. But Wahgi won’t have time to rest. Most nearby civs are expanding at respectable speeds as well. Bora-Bora, Palawa, and Noongar are all at three cities. Pausing to rest will simply mean getting left in the dust while others boost ahead. So don’t let up now, Bol’im!

Reformer:

Kazan falls a bit from our Ep 0 PRs. I imagine this is primarily due to being on two cities in a region with so much available land. Still, 29 turns is not enough to say how expansive they’ll end up being. But do note that Kazan has instead built up a respectable Ancient Era army. Obviously, this army won’t be worth much if it doesn’t get used, but there is a perfect opportunity opening up just to the south. Makhnovia has declared war on Kalmyks, distracting the Kalmyk troops greatly. Now, if ever, is a chance for a successful early game war. Distances between civs here are still great enough that punishing the warmonger penalty will be difficult, and Kazan would most likely get off scot free. If nothing else, Kalmyks and Makhnovia both getting distracted is good news for Kazan even if they decide to just settle peacefully. More concerning is Kazakhstan solely settling towards Kazan…

Emu:

Mexmax comes roaring up into the upper echelon of civs, gunning to prove that Central America can actually work as a start. It's not really much of a mexmaxmix either, outside one outlier our mexmaxmax and mexmaxmin are only separated by 9 ranks, an accomplishment you usually only see this early from civs who everyone agrees suck. Central America is theirs for sure, it's just breaking out of the region that's the problem.

Leman:

The big debate about Palawa before the game’s start was if not starting on the continent properly would have been too much of a detriment to take advantage of a historically powerful starting location. Turns out, not really all that much. Palawa already has a pair of solid cities on the continent, and that’s just about all you can ask for from a civ in the first thirty turns.

Cloudy:

Sierra Leone is expanding along the coast toward Kanem-Bornu which is the right move in all respects. K-B is their weakest neighbor and the coast has all the fertile land, so this is exactly what we were hoping they’d do.

Leman:

Bavaria doesn’t have much room to start. You know that, I know that, we all know that. Apparently, even Ludwig knows that, as he comes out of the gate swinging settling three cities, putting his full total up to four, tied with neighbor Burgundy. Hopefully, he’ll continue to settle well, not get punished by any of his neighbors, and not get boxed in like many a European civ before him.

CelestialDalek:

Pontus is in a good position, and not just in the color scheme rankings. The beautiful purple civ has plenty of space available for them right now and seems to be nice and expansive: currently, they have three nicely-placed cities. They’ve got the Levant settled, the rest of Turkey is available to settle, and Greece looks appealing. Their stats aren’t impressive right now, but let me reiterate: this means nothing for most civs. I look forward to the eventual dominance of our beautiful purple overlords.

Cloudy:

Mongolia is just doing its thing, expanding quietly across the steppe, and we don’t know yet which neighbor they’ll run into first. One thing I do want to point out is that they settled Beshbalik in a spot with almost no food, which is unfortunate. Otherwise not much to report.

JDT:

New Holland drops by 4 as they fail to impress with their start as much as some other people, including only recently settling city no.3. It really doesn’t matter though, they have good stats and all the space in the world. And like they say, it's not how you start, it's how you close.

Lasqueto:

Nivkh starts off the season strong with 3 cities well placed to fill out their corner of asia. Their stats are nothing shabby either. The war with Goguryeo probably won’t go anywhere and might be a drain on resources, but it doesn’t seem like they’re too committed to it. Expect them to stick around up here for a while.

Emu;

Shang makes a mammoth jump, going from 47th all the way to 6th on the back of every strength you can think of for a civ this early on. Lots of settles, aggressive settles, high stats (second overall, in fact), even a coalition war. Not that they're likely to actually take a city, but it's a good sign for the future. Combine that with the fact that everyone thought they were going to eat shit instantly and we have some stonk market millionaires. Or just the two, really, considering the only people who put any significant stock in them were two of the rankers. No one expected this, but I don't think there were a whole lot of shang dislikers so it all comes out alright.

JDT: The Faroe Isles go up 2 ranks… for settling a single city. Ok granted, they do have good stats to back it up, including the most techs researched thus far and good production, and that one city is in Scotland, showing a willingness to be aggressive and probably the best terrain to take over in their immediate vicinity. Still, seems to be a decent bit of glazing, no? Ah whatever, I’m just salty. These vikings have set themselves in a good position to win Britain and then hop off into the great unknowns to conquer.

Cloudy:

Harappa has made the correct opening move, settling into central India to cut off Vijayanagara and claim some of the region’s most fertile territory. This is what we were hoping to see when we ranked them 17th going into episode 1, and so far our first impressions have bolstered our confidence even further.

Shaggy:

“CBRX Hotline, how can I help you?”

“I'm planning a fishing trip for a little weekend getaway, any suggestions?”

“Well I hear the Selkups are keeping a good stock in their neck of the woods and have continued to have a strong showing early on. Let's see how the season progresses, though. Next caller! Oh wait, the lines are empty.”

Cloudy:

The Seneca hold steady in second after a strong start, founding two cities to immediately cut off a large portion of the Shawnee’s expansion options. Furthermore, the Shawnee have basically no army and are already being menaced by the neighboring Osage, so it doesn’t look like Seneca is going to have any threatening civs nearby—a big advantage to a civ that already has one of the largest Voronoi areas.

Leman:

People were high on Ume-Sami before the game started thanks to their strong tests, solid uniques, and good starting location, and so far Ume-Sami has done nothing to counter those lofty expectations. They got their third city out, haven’t gotten into any stupid wars, and the Finns even kindly founded a very capturable city on their doorstep. It’s hard to say anything definitive about Ume-Sami but we like their chances.