Civ 5 German Civilization
Civ Bonuses, AI Info, Strategies, Unique Units and Buildings
Updated for Gods and Kings and Brave New World DLCs
Civilization's Leader: Bismarck
Civ Bonus: Furor Teutonicus
Gives a 67% chance that any Barbarian encampment you clear will give you a free copy of whatever unit was stationed there and the usual 25g. Additionally, all land units cost 25% less maintenance.
Unique Unit: Panzer
Requires Combined Arms
This is a simple Tank replacement. The Panzer has +1 movement (6 vs 5) and 80 Combat Strength vs the regular Tank's 70. Overall, a powerful and mobile unit.
Unique Building: Hanse
Requires Banking
The Hanse was added in a patch and greatly improves the German Civilization. It has the usual effects of a Bank but boosts Production as well. Constructing this in a City will give that City a +5% Production bonus for every single trade route you have with an unique City-State.
| Warmonger Hatred | Wonder Compete | Offense Build | Defense Build | City Defense | DoF | Friendly to Civs | Denounce Civs | War w/Civs | Deception Likelihood | CS Comp | CS War | |
| 6 | 6 | 5 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 6 | 7 | 7 | 4 | |
| Other Info | Bismarck can be a powerful opponent if you get on his bad side. He has a strong tendency to keep his military well-upgraded. As you can see, he's easy to anger and will denounce Civs that cross the line. If you are going after many City-State alliances, you are likely to end up at war with the Germans. | |||||||||||
Strategies/Ideas for playing Bismarck's Germany:
First, the early-game bonus from Furor Teutonicus. This will encourage you to clear Barbarian encampments to grow your Military. This frees up production in your Cities, allowing for more infrastructure, the founding of a Religion to help your budding Civ, and the creation of Settlers. You may still want a couple of Archers, but they can come a bit later than they would with other Civs. Your converted Barbarians will protect your first Cities nicely. If you clear 6 encampments during the early game, you're likely to end up with at least 4 Brutes which upgrade to Swordsmen with Iron. This sets a theme for Germany - high Productivity and a strong Military force, along with the 25% reduction in land unit maintenance to aid your income and help you form alliances with City-States.
Begin setting up Trade Routes with City-States early and try to do as many quests for them as possible. I played with a Liberty opener to go as wide as possible, setting up Cities so that they could further the range of my trade routes with City-States. Having a Coastal City on each side of your Continent can ensure that your Trade Route range goes far enough to set it up. The Caravansary and Harbors will help extend the range later on. Germany doesn't need to rush for Banking, but should try to get it as early as posisble to get the production boost, particularly if you can have all 4-5 Trade Routes (at that time) going to different City-States and ready for the arrival of the Hanse UB. Getting full benefit from the Hanse is simple - look at your Trade Route screen and make sure each new Trade Route you set up is to a different City-State. It doesn't matter where the route originates, just that each is going to a unique City-State.
Prioritize the Hanse in each of your Cities when it is available, as the boost to Production is better than that of a Workshop in most cases. This lets your Civ stay on top of new buildings while also producing modern military units.
Germany is all about Warmongering, but doesn't necessarily need to begin this really early. It is better to get infrastructure (buildings, City Connections and a few Wonders) set up for a massive surge of Military might after the Hanse is ready. You should try to build the Forbidden Palace in one of your Cities so that you have extra Delegates in the World Congress. This requires you adopt Patronage, which is not a bad idea when your Civ is going to be doing so much interaction with City-States anyway. I merely adopted it, then moved on to Commerce to reduce road maintenance and help me have more Gold overall.
Germany stands to have the highest Production of any Civ in the game when played well. Avoid doing things like chopping down trees unless they're beside Rivers - lumber mills will work well to aid your Production mid to late-game. Mines are even better with Chemistry researched. Overall, try to have a balance of Mines/Lumber Mills and Trading Posts, along with Food to allow your Cities to work all those tiles and fill Engineer specialist slots. Trading posts are important, as you will not receive as much gold from Trade Routes with City-States as you would large Civs. Build these in open grassland, farms on plains and along rivers, mines on hills. You should definitely set up a trade route immediately when a new slot becomes available, as you will instantly get the +5% in all Cities that have built a Hanse. Thanks to the production boost from Hanse, I was able to be first to get 3 Factories very easily in my game.
When it's time to choose an Ideology, you should strongly consider Freedom so that you can eventually take the Treaty Organization (level 3) tenet. This will give you 4 Influence per turn with every City-State you have a trade route with. You'll also give yourself 2 more options aside from a Domination victory - you may be able to adopt Space Procurements to let you buy Spaceship Parts with Gold. Having all those delegates from your City-State alliances, a Diplomatic win is also quite possible. Always leave your Victory options open, but never your Trade Route slots!
There is another reason for Forbidden Palace and those Delegates from City-States - you must prevent the Embargo City-States proposal from ever passing. This will completely remove the bonus you get from the Hanse, as no Trade Routes with City-States will work. This is rare, but must be avoided at all costs. You should have enough delegates to stop such a proposal, while also being able to pass Scholars in Residence or Sciences Funding to help aid your research progress - you can support a large Military, but you will also want those units to be modern and possibly more powerful than opposing Civs'
You do not have to go Freedom with the revised Germany, but it's a solid choice that also shores up some of their weaknesses. You'll have great production, but won't likely have made many Great People. Any Ideology works, but Freedom will make victory more likely by giving you multiple routes to your win. Arsenal of Democracy will boost production another 15% when making Military Units and the 50% longer Golden Ages will synergize greatly with the Hanse. Happiness from Mints, Banks (Hanse), and Stock Exchanges will also help your wide empire. The Statue of Liberty is also unlocked, giving +1 Production to every Specialist, again synergizing with Germany's bonus. Manufactories can also produce ~9 Production on a tile with Freedom's New Deal tenet, so reconsider using them to rush Wonders. After all, you will eventually control those Wonders if you go for Domination. You could see up to 50%+ production bonus with 10 or more separate City-State trade routes. Done right, this is almost overpowered and makes Germany a fun Civ to play for a massive war. You can easily take on multiple Civs at once and rule the world with Bismarck. As you can see, their unique building is better than many other Leaders' bonuses.
In my opinion, Germany has become one of the more interesting Civs to play for a Domination win. Their heavy use of Trade Routes with City-States to boost production is going to help when routes with other Civs are cut off by war.
| Sid Meier's Civ 5 is a deep strategy game. I created these individual Civilization Guides to highlight the strengths of their specials and unique units. If you have an opener or tip for playing this Civ that you would like to share with other readers, please use the comments form below. Some Guides are in need of update and will be improved to a new standard of quality or altered to reflect gameplay changes in G&K and Brave New World. | ||||||
| America | Arabia | Assyria | Austria | Aztec | Babylon | Brazil |
| Celts | China | Dutch | Egypt | England | France | Germany |
| Greece | The Huns | Inca | India | Indonesia | Iroquois | Japan |
| Korea | Maya | Mongolia | Morocco | Ottoman | Persia | Poland |
| Polynesia | Portugal | Rome | Russia | Shoshone | Siam | Songhai |
| Venice | Zulu | |||||
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