Zigzagzigal's Guides - Korea (GS)

A very straightforward scientific civ, Korea can easily create an insurmountable technological advantage. Here, I detail Korean strategies and counter-strategies.

Introduction

Following this guide requires the Gathering Storm expansion.

Furthermore, it is written with the assumption you have all Civ 6 content released prior to the Leaders Pass:

• Pre-Rise and Fall content packs
  
  • Vikings, Poland, Australia, Persia/Macedon, Nubia, Khmer/Indonesia
• Rise and Fall Expansion
  
• New Frontier content packs
  
  • Maya/Grand Colombia, Ethiopia, Byzantium/Gauls, Babylon, Vietnam/Kublai Khan, Portugal

These content packs include exclusive civs, city-states, districts, buildings, wonders, natural wonders, resources, and a disaster, but not core game mechanics - all you need is the base game and the Gathering Storm expansion for those.

The Leaders Pass is only relevant when playing as or against leaders released in its content packs; otherwise it makes no difference to the game.

What is the greatest achievement? To create a realm that prospers, or to lay the foundations so that it may happen? To overwhelm the weak, or to reverse a position of weakness? To succeed because of unity, or to succeed despite division? Ahead of you lies the great golden ages of Korea; the ages of science, of industry. It is your great test to set the course; to push ever further towards a greater future.

How to use this guide

This guide is divided into multiple sections explaining how best to use and play against this specific civ.

• The Outline details the mechanics of how the civilization's unique features work and what their start bias is if they have one.
  
• The Victory Skew section describes to what extent the civ (and its individual leaders where applicable) is inclined towards particular victory routes. This is not a rating of its power, but an indicator of the most appropriate route to victory.
  
• Multiple sections for Uniques explain in detail how to use each special bonus of the civilization.
  
• Administration describes some of the most synergistic governments, government buildings, policy cards, age bonuses, pantheons, religious beliefs, wonders, city-states and Great People for the civ. Only the ones with the most synergy with the civ's uniques are mentioned - these are not necessarily the "best" choices when playing as the civ for a given victory route.
  
• Finally, the Counter-Strategies discusses how best to play against the civ, including a consideration of leader agendas if the civ is controlled by a computer.

Note that all costs (production, science, etc.) mentioned within the guide assume a game played on the normal speed settings. To modify these values for other game speeds:

• Online: Divide by 2
  
• Quick: Divide by 1.5
  
• Epic: Multiply by 1.5
  
• Marathon: Multiply by 3

Glossary

Terminology used in this guide and not in-game is explained here.

AoE (Area of Effect) - Bonuses or penalties that affect multiple tiles in a set radius. Positive examples include Factories (which offer production to cities within a 6 tile radius unless they're within range of another building of the same type) and a negative example is nuclear weapons, which cause devastation over a wide radius.

Beelining - Obtaining a technology or civic quickly by only researching it and its prerequisites. Some deviation is allowed in the event that taking a technology or civic off the main track provides some kind of advantage that makes up for that (either a source of extra science/culture or access to something necessary for a eureka or inspiration boost)

CA (Civ Ability) - The unique ability of a civilization, shared by all its leaders.

Compact empires - Civs with cities close together (typically 3-4 tile gaps between city centres). This is useful if you want to make use of districts that gain adjacency bonuses from other districts, or to maximise the potential of area-of-effect bonuses later in the game.

Dispersed empires - Civs with cities that are spread out (typically 5-6 tile gaps between city centres). Civs with unique tile improvements generally favour a more dispersed empire in order to make use of them, as do civs focused on wonder construction.

GPP - Short for Great Person Points. Districts, buildings and wonders generate these points and with enough you can claim a Great Person of the corresponding type.

GWAM - Collective name for Great Writers, Artists and Musicians. All of them can produce Great Works that offer tourism and culture, making them important to anyone seeking a cultural victory.

LA (Leader Ability) - The unique ability of a specific leader. Usually but not always, they tend to be more specific in scope than civ abilities. Some leader abilities come with an associated unique unit or infrastucture.

Prebuilding - Training a unit with the intention of upgrading it to a desired unit later. An example is building Slingers and upgrading them once Archery is unlocked.

Sniping - Targeting a specific city for capture directly, ignoring other enemy cities along the way. Typically used in the context of "capital sniping" - taking a civ's original capital as quickly as possible to contribute towards domination victory without leading to a drawn-out war.

Start bias - The kind of terrain, terrain feature or resource a civilization is more likely to start near. This is typically used for civilizations that have early bonuses dependent on a particular terrain type. There are five tiers of start bias; civs with a tier 1 start bias are placed before civs of tier 2 and so on, increasing their odds of receiving a favourable starting location.

Super-uniques - Unique units that do not replace any others. Examples include India's Varu and Mongolia's Keshigs.

Tall empires - Empires that emphasise city development over expansion, usually resulting in fewer, but bigger, cities.

Uniques - Collective name for civ abilities, leader abilities, unique units, unique buildings, unique districts and unique improvements.

UA (Unique Ability) - A collective name for leader abilities and civ abilities.

UB (Unique Building) - A special building which may only be constructed in the cities of a single civilization, which replaces a normal building and offers a special advantage on top.

UD (Unique District) - A special district which may only be constructed in the cities of a single civilization, which replaces a normal district, costs half as much to build and offers some unique advantages on top.

UI (Unique Improvement) - A special improvement that can only be built by the Builders of a single civilization. "UI" always refers to unique improvements in my guides and not to "user interface" or "unique infrastructure".

UU (Unique Unit) - A special unit that may only be trained by a single civilization, and in some cases only when that civilization is led by a specific leader.

Wide empires - Empires that emphasise expansion over city development, usually resulting in more, but smaller, cities.

Outline (Part 1/2)

Start Bias

Korea has a tier 3 start bias towards desert hills, grass hills, plains hills and tundra hills. Hills are necessary for the Seowon district.

Civilization Ability: Three Kingdoms

• Mines receive +1 science for each adjacent Seowon and farms receive +1 food for each adjacent Seowon.
  
  • This bonus also works for mines and farms adjacent to the Campuses of other civs.

Sejong's Leader Ability: Hangul

• When researching the first technology of each era, receive culture equal to double your per-turn science output.

Seondeok's Leader Ability: Hwarang

• Cities with established Governors receive +3% culture and +3% science, and an additional +3% of each for every subsequent promotion that Governor has.

Outline (Part 2/2)

Unique Unit: Hwacha

A renaissance-era ranged land unit which replaces the Field Cannon

Research	Obsoletion	Upgrades from	Upgrades to	Cost	Resource	Maintenance
Gunpowder Technology Renaissance era	Advanced Ballistics Technology Atomic era	Crossbowman (150 )	Machine Gun (590 )	250 or 1000 or 500 *	None	3

*Purchasing units with faith requires the Grand Master's Chapel government building, which requires either the medieval-era Divine Right or renaissance-era Exploration civics.

Strength	Ranged Strength	Moves	Range	Sight	Negative Attributes	Positive Attributes
45	60	2	2	2	Unable to capture cities -17 vs. city defences -17 vs. naval units Deals -50% damage to city walls and urban defences Does not exert zone of control Must set up prior to attacking	None

Negative changes

• Must set up prior to attacking
  
  • Without movement speed bonuses, this means moving and attacking in the same turn is impossible.
• 45 melee strength, down from 50
  
• Costs 590 gold to upgrade, up from 430 (+37%)

Positive changes

• Available at the renaissance-era Gunpowder technology rather than the industrial-era Ballistics technology
  
• Costs 250 production/1000 gold/500 faith, down from 330/1320/660 respectively
  
• Costs 150 gold to upgrade to from a Crossbowman, down from 310 (-52%)
  
• Maintenance cost of 3, down from 5

Unique District: Seowon

An ancient-era speciality district which replaces the Campus

Research	Terrain required	Required to build	Base production cost	Maintenance	Base pillage yield
Writing Technology Ancient era	Hills	Library University Research Lab	27 * or 108 ** or 54 **	1	25

*All districts increase in cost based on your technological and civic progress. If you have more or the same number of speciality districts as speciality district types you have unlocked and the former number divided by the latter is bigger than the number of copies of this district you have, you will receive a 40% discount.

**Purchasing districts with gold requires the governor Reyna (the Financier) with the Contractor promotion to be present in the city. Purchasing districts with faith requires Governor Moksha (the Cardinal) with the Divine Architect promotion to be present in the city.

Adjacency bonuses	Other yields	Great Person points	Other effects
4 regardless of location 1 if adjacent to a Government Complex -1 per owned adjacent district	None	1	Enables the Campus Research Grants city project Domestic trade routes to this city provide +1 International trade routes to this city provide +1

Negative changes

• Must be constructed on a hill tile
  
• All regular adjacency bonuses removed, except the +1 science from Government Complexes
  
• -1 science yield per owned adjacent district

Positive changes

• -50% production cost
  
• Starts with a base adjacency yield of 4, regardless of location.

Victory Skew

In this section, the civ is subjectively graded based on how much it leans towards a specific victory type - not how powerful it is. Scores of 3 or more mean the civ has at least a minor advantage towards the victory route.

Leader	Culture	Diplomacy	Domination	Religion	Science
Sejong	4/10 (Acceptable)	3/10 (Acceptable)	6/10 (Decent)	3/10 (Acceptable)	10/10 (Ideal)
Seondeok	4/10 (Acceptable)	3/10 (Acceptable)	6/10 (Decent)	3/10 (Acceptable)	10/10 (Ideal)

Korea isn't especially strong at cultural victories. More culture from governors or Sejong's leader ability will help a bit with accumulating civics, and together with the science bonuses will help you get to wonders sooner than other civs, but Korea has better options.

Diplomatic victories aren't an especially strong option either. The minor culture bonus may help Korea get key civics for envoys slightly faster.

Domination makes a reasonable backup path. Though Hwacha arrive earlier than the Field Cannons they replace, they're not particularly effective in offensive warfare due to their need to set up before attacking. Instead, a Korean domination victory emphasises their high science output to create a military more advanced than that of their opponents.

Religion is even less effective than culture for Korea. Aside from slightly faster civic accumulation, and the occasional spare mountain for Holy Sites as Korea's Campus replacement doesn't need them, little Korea has contributes towards such a victory route.

Science is Korea's best option for victory. Seowons produce a lot of science early on, the civ ability adds science to Seowon-adjacent mines, and Seondeok's Governors can magnify science even further. Korea will often have the game's highest science output for the first few eras, and will still be competitive until the end of the game. There isn't really anything to help build the spaceship with other than an incentive to work lots of Seowon-adjacent mines, but that's a relatively minor problem.

Civilization Ability: Three Kingdoms

Korea's gameplay revolves around their Seowons, and this is made obvious by the civ ability's dependence on it. Position your Seowons well and you could enjoy rapid city growth from stronger farms, and even more science from mines.

Seowons are unlocked with the Writing technology, and considering how cheap they are and how much science they provide, you'll probably want to beeline it right from the start of the game. The eureka boost for Writing requires you to meet another civ, which you can usually get in time. Feel free to pick up Mining before Writing if you have a very woods-heavy start.

The more cities you have, the more Seowons you can have and therefore the more science you'll be able to generate. As such, be sure to train plenty of Settlers early on.

You should usually aim to position Seowons two tiles away from the city centre, on a hill which is adjacent to as many hills, flat grassland, plains or floodplain tiles as possible. Any resources that can be farmed (e.g. rice) or mined (e.g. copper) adjacent to the Seowon will make it even better. Placing a Seowon adjacent to the city centre will give it worse yields, while placing it three tiles away from the city centre requires you to position other cities in a way so you can work all the Seowon-adjacent tiles.

Consider carefully if you want more mines or farmland. Farms can eventually be placed on plains and grassland hills later in the game, but mines cannot be placed on resourceless flat land, so placing a Seowon purely next to flat land limits your options. Consider the trade-off:

• More farms - This will provide you with more food, aiding your cities' growth, which can feed into all kinds of yields. Being able to support your population with fewer citizens working also lets you free up more citizens for other jobs, like working mines. However, extra food stops being so useful once you hit the housing capacity.
  
• More mines - You will receive more science, helping you excel in the technology tree to an even greater extent. However, you'll need to find your supply of food from somewhere else before you can afford to send all your citizens working in the high-yield mines.

Usually, you'll have a mixture of potential farmland and potential mining sites, and that compromise is probably the best route to go down.

Unique District: Seowon

Once Seowons start being built, very few civs can keep up with Korea's pace in technology for quite some time. Build upon the advantages Seowons offer and you can extend that lead even further.

The most important thing to remember is to not lose the science Seowons offer. Do not place districts adjacent to Seowons unless you absolutely have to. That even extends to the Government Complex - though it might offer a +1 science boost to cancel out the -1 science loss, making full use of the Government Complex's adjacency bonuses in that case would require putting more districts next to the Seowon.

You should usually avoid placing your cities close together to ensure Seowons have enough space and to prevent situations where placing districts next to them is unavoidable. A gap of 5-6 tiles between each city rather than 3-4 is a good idea.

Making use of policy cards

Seowons are greatly enhanced by two economic policy cards. You'll want a decent culture output to get to these quickly, so don't forget to build plenty of Monuments.

Natural Philosophy, arriving at the classical-era Recorded History civic, is the first. It doubles the +4 yield of Seowons into a +8 science boost. It's not a hard civic to get to; you only need two more civics following Political Philosophy, which is a civic you'll want as soon as possible anyway for its governments.

Rationalism, available at the renaissance-era Enlightenment civic, is the second. Though it comes with two prerequisites for its maximum effect (cities must be size 15+ and have a Campus adjacency bonus of 4+), both of those are easy to meet as Korea. Food from the civ ability combined with Seondeok's emphasis on a smaller number of larger cities means getting a few cities to size 15 eventually shouldn't be a problem.

A light in the darkness

Entering a Dark Age in the classical or medieval eras allows access to the Monasticism wildcard. This adds +75% science in all cities with a Holy Site at the cost of -25% culture. For a civ with very strong early science, this is highly lucrative.

Getting into a Dark Age in the classical era is difficult as Korea due to the +4 era score boost gained when you first build a Seowon. It'll also be hard to make the most of a classical-era Dark Age seeing as you need to build Holy Sites for Monasticism's full effect, and you'll struggle to have enough spare production. As such, if you want to use this card, you'll probably want to aim for a medieval-era Dark Age.

The best way of getting a medieval-era Dark Age is to get a classical-era Golden Age, as it increases the era score threshold necessary to avoid a Dark Age. The easiest way of building up era score for a classical-era golden age is to seek out and destroy Barbarian encampments. Training a few Archers will be useful for this purpose, and it'll also allow you to upgrade them to Hwacha later if you so wish.

Getting Monasticism is by no means necessary. After all, the culture penalty will make it take longer to get to the Rationalism policy card. As such, don't worry if you can't get a Dark Age in the classical or medieval eras.

Production spree

The Heartbeat of Steam Golden Age dedication, available from the industrial to atomic game eras, adds Seowon adjacency bonuses to production. With the Natural Philosophy policy card, that's a reliable +8 production in every Seowon city - a great help when building up Spaceports and projects for the space race.

The downside

Seowons do not gain regular adjacency bonuses, including those from rainforests, mountains, reefs, geothermal vents and districts. This can result in a lower potential science yield than the Campuses of other civs, even if the average yield tends to be better.

The biggest weakness of Seowons is their vulnerability to foreign Spies. Spies can steal your hard-earned technology boosts, denting your scientific advantage. Unlike regular Campuses, Seowons should be isolated from other districts, which means if you want to place a counter-Spy to protect them you won't be defending any other districts.

As such, you might want to rely on passive defensive bonuses against Spies, such as the Polygraph, Quartermaster or Surveillance promotions for your own counter-spies, or the Crytography diplomatic policy card (available at the atomic-era Cold War civic).

Remember it's not only your Seowons that are vulnerable - enemy Spies can also sabotage your Industrial Zones and Spaceports (making it harder to complete the space race in time), and remove your Governors from your city centres.

Summary

• Never place districts next to Seowons unless it's unavoidable
  
• Don't neglect your culture - the sooner you get Recorded History and The Enlightenment, the better.
  
• Try and get a Golden Age in the industrial, modern or atomic game era for bonus production from Seowon districts.
  
• Use the Crytography policy card and the Polygraph, Quartermaster and Surveillance promotions later in the game to keep enemy Spies away.

Sejong's Leader Ability: Hangul

With Horseback Riding complete, I can get to Political Philosophy faster without needing to invest in Monuments.

Both Korean leaders have relatively unimpactful leader abilities to make up for the massive immediate impact of the Seowons. While Seondeok gives a consistent boost to science and culture, Sejong gives you occasional bursts of culture allowing you to catch up with civics despite a minimal cultural investment. Without the need to chase Governor promotions, Sejong can double down on science at the expense of culture.

Key to maximising Sejong's culture boosts is maximising your per-turn science output, something you'll want to do anyway. Settling a lot of cities, building Seowons and building mines around them will work effectively. The classical/medieval Dark Age wildcard Monasticism is especially effective for this purpose due to its immense boost to science in cities with Holy Sites, although you'll lose per-turn culture as a side-effect.

To minimise wasted culture, when you're about to research your first technology of a new era, it's a good idea to focus on civics that you're unlikely to get the inspiration for.

Seondeok's Leader Ability: Hwarang

Right now, Pingala's offering +15% science and culture anyway, and another +15% on top via this leader ability.

Though a relatively small bonus, Seondeok's leader ability helps to build upon the huge science output Seowons offer while also helping your culture to not fall too far behind.

This bonus is scaled to how many governor titles you can get. You can obtain governor titles from the following civics:

• Early Empire (Ancient)
  
• State Workforce (Ancient)
  
• Defensive Tactics (Classical)
  
• Recorded History (Classical)
  
• Medieval Faires (Medieval)
  
• Guilds (Medieval)
  
• Civil Engineering (Industrial)
  
• Nationalism (Industrial)
  
• Mass Media (Modern)
  
• Mobilisation (Modern)
  
• Globalisation (Information)
  
• Social Media (Information)
  
• Near Future Governance (Information)
  
• Future Civic (Future) - grants +1 Governor title every time it is researched.

You can also gain governor titles from:

• Randomly from a tribal village on turn 30 or later
  
• Building a Government Complex
  
• Building any Government Complex building (up to a total of 3 titles)
  
• The medieval Great Merchant Irene of Athens
  
• The renaissance-era Casa de Contratación wonder (grants three titles)
  
• The industrial Great Merchant Adam Smith

You can reliably get six governor titles by the end of the classical era by having a tier 1 Government Complex building along with the Defensive Tactics and Recorded History civics. That's enough to have a fully-promoted governor in one city for a +18% culture and science bonus, or perhaps +9% culture and science in two cities.

Using Governors

Consider carefully where each governor should be positioned. The science/culture bonuses won't apply while they're being relocated, so you'll generally want to keep them put once you assign them.

If you want to concentrate your governors in a small number of cities, look out for cities with a high quantity of hills surrounding their Seowons. Via Korea's civ ability, they'll have a high base science yield and hence stand to gain the most from a large multiplier.

If instead you want to spread out the governors among a range of cities, consider the following notes on each governor type:

Amani, the Diplomat

Amani is mostly useful placed in city-state. For the sake of maximising culture and science, she'll usually be one of the last governors you'll want to recruit - but she has one very useful application within your own cities - her Local Informants promotion greatly reduces the effectiveness of enemy Spies when placed within a city. Consider recruiting her later in the game to protect a key Spaceport city.

Liang, the Surveyor

A decent choice as a second or third governor for Korea. The extra Builder charge is immediately useful, and the general bonuses offered in promotions can help support a strong city.

Magnus, the Steward

A good early choice, dependent on your starting terrain. Initially, you'll want to place him in a woods or rainforest-heavy city to exploit the extra production and food from cutting them down. Around the time factories arrive, move him to the middle of your empire so you can make the most of the powerful Vertical Integration ability.

Moksha, the Cardinal

Most of these advantages are based on the religious game, which Korea isn't particularly strong at. As such, he should be one of the last governors appointed.

Pingala, the Educator

An immediate boost to culture and science along with promotions offering more, combined with Seondeok's leader ability, makes Pingala an ideal first choice. All his promotions bar Curator are directly relevant for Korea.

Reyna, the Financier

Reyna's bonuses are mostly useful for gold generation. This can be useful for supporting Hwacha warfare. Later in the game, she also offers a bonus to power generation from renewable energy - useful if you want to power a city without creating pollution and associated loss of diplomatic favour.

Victor, the Castellan

A largely defensive governor based around making a city a tough target. If you have an aggressive neighbour, recruiting him early might not be a bad idea. Additionally, he only takes three turns to establish in a city rather than the usual five, so you'll get your science and culture slightly sooner (especially if you're targeted by a lot of Neutralise Governor missions). On the whole, though, you should favour more directly useful governors first.

Beware of Spies!

Just as the Seowon is vulnerable to Spies, so too is Seondeok's leader ability. Enemy Spies in your city centres can disable Governors for a few turns, denying you precious culture and science. Use Spies as counter-spies on your city centres or adjacent tiles and make use of policy cards that boost your defensive espionage abilities to help keep your opponents weak.

Conclusion

Seondeok's leader ability, like Korea's civ ability and the Seowon district, is a simple one. Look out for governor promotions, protect your city centres from Spies and enjoy a culture and science boost.

Unique Unit: Hwacha

If your high science output is starting to make neighbours nervous, they may be tempted to start a war. The Hwacha is a strong enough defensive unit to convince them otherwise.

Getting to Hwacha

Hwacha arrive at the renaissance-era Gunpowder technology, rather than the industrial-era Ballistics technology Field Cannons need. This helpfully allows you to circumvent the military unit-heavy bottom half of the technology tree for a while while still being well-defended.

If you want to unlock Hwacha early, there's two possible routes to go:

• If you have good production and/or weak gold, beeline Gunpowder once you're done with Writing and Mining.
  
• If you have a decent supply of gold but poor produciton, beeline Machinery first after Writing, then head to Gunpowder. This allows you to upgrade units into Hwacha once Gunpowder is unlocked.

Either way, be prepared to make deviations from this path when necessary for key Builder technologies (e.g. Irrigation if you need plantations) or on the path to certain eurekas. Examples of the latter are:

• To boost the classical-era Construction technology, you need a Water Mill, which requires the ancient-era Wheel technology.
  
• To boost the medieval-era Military Engineering technology, you need an Aqueduct, which requires the classical-era Engineering technology.

Hwacha can still perform well even into the modern era, so producing a few of them (or upgrading Archers/Crossbowmen to them) as soon as possible allows you to neglect further military development for quite some time. That frees up production for other uses, such as building Universities or training Spies.

Defensive Usage

Hwacha have a good amount of firepower at an affordable price meaning you don't need to construct masses to make your opponents think again about invading you. Position Hwacha in cities, Encampments, on hills and behind lakes to keep them safe from counter-attacks. Their defensive strength isn't terrible, but you'll still want to ensure they take as little damage as possible.

As city wall ranged attack strength is tied to the highest ranged strength any of your units has, training your first Hwacha will make your walls much stronger at attacking enemies.

Offensive Usage

The need for Hwacha to set up before attacking limits their potential offensively, but there's ways to mitigate this. With a medieval or renaissance-era Great General, Hwacha will have enough movement to move and fire in the same turn - and even more strength. Bring along a Knight or Musketman to finish off enemy cities.

Korea's fast research allows you to get Hwachas at a time where other civs have nothing better than Knights. Hwacha boosted with Great Generals have a massive +17 strength advantage over Knights, allowing you to reliably kill them in two hits.

Against city walls, unpromoted and unboosted Hwacha deal slightly less damage than Catapults, but have far. far more defence. Hwacha have a much better chance of surviving to good promotions, helping them address their weakness against cities.

Once another civ reaches the industrial-era Ballistics technology, it's generally best to stop using Hwacha offensively. Cuirassiers can deal large amounts of damage easily against Hwacha, and generic Field Cannons both defend better and are more mobile as they don't need to set up to attack.

Obsoletion

Hwacha corps and armies have enough firepower to see them through to the atomic era, assuming you can keep them safe from counter-attacks. Upgrade them once Machine Guns are available as Machine Guns are far stronger and more mobile.

Summary

• Hwacha give Korea a defensive edge while allowing Korea to postpone some key military technologies
  
• Use of Great Generals can make Hwacha viable aggressively as well.

Administration - Government and Policy Cards

Note that the Administration sections strictly cover the options that have particularly good synergy with the civ's uniques. These are not necessarily the best choices, but rather options you should consider more than usual if playing this civ relative to others.

Government

Tier One

Classical Republic is a reliably good government choice which supports your early science expansion.

The Audience Chamber makes an ideal complement to Seondeok's leader ability and the food from Korea's civ ability, letting you grow your Governor-boosted cities even further. However, the Ancestral Hall helps you to produce Settlers faster, allowing you to create more cities for additional Seowon districts. The more cities you have, the more science you'll get out of Seowons. It's particularly ideal for maximising the culture Sejong produces.

Tier Two

Merchant Republic offers a good assortment of policy cards, and its bonus gold for cities with governors also fits well with Seondeok's leader ability. Consider Monarchy as Sejong because it needs a much smaller civic diversion for a leader who's likely to have a poor culture output most of the time.

The Intelligence Agency is your best choice of government building. More Spies will help you keep other civs from stealing your eurekas, disabling your governors or sabotaging your Industrial Zones and Spaceports.

Tier Three

Communism works best, as the production bonus tied to governors fits neatly with Seondeok's leader ability, while the +10% science modifier builds on both the Seowon district and the civ ability, as well as Sejong's leader ability.

The Royal Society is the best choice of government building. Letting you use Builders to help rush space project parts compensates for Korea's lack of production bonuses.

Tier Four

Synthetic Technocracy's power and city project production bonuses makes it ideal for a scientific game, and therefore ideal for Korea.

Policy Cards

Classical Era

Insulae (Economic, requires Games and Recreation) - All the food from Korea's civ ability needs to be accompanied with extra housing if you want your cities to really become strong.

Natural Philosophy (Economic, requires Recorded History) - All Seowons now contribute +8 science per turn (unless you've placed a district next to one). That'll help you zoom through technologies and build quite a considerable lead.

Medieval Era

Feudal Contract (Military, requires Feudalism) - Want to build Hwacha faster? You'll need this policy card.

Medina Quarter (Economic, requires Medieval Faires) - More housing to go with your Seowon-adjacent-farm-food.

Professional Army (Military, requires Mercenaries) - A cheaper upgrade path for ranged units helps you upgrade them to Hwacha as soon as you've unlocked Gunpowder.

Renaissance Era

Logistics (Military, requires Mercantilism) - Hwacha aren't very mobile, so the extra movement provided from this movement will really help in defensive wars.

Machiavellianism (Diplomatic, requires Diplomatic Service) - Faster Spy training helps you to cover your vulnerability to Spies.

Rationalism (Economic, requires The Enlightenment) - Meeting both requirements for this policy card's full effect is really easy as Korea, granting you an enormous boost to your science output.

Modern Era

Five Year Plan (Economic, requires Class Struggle) - An upgraded version of Natural Philosophy, which also makes your Industrial Zones stronger.

Atomic Era

Cryptography (Diplomatic, requires Cold War) - This reduces the effectiveness of enemy Spies, keeping your scientific advantages secure.

Integrated Space Cell (Military, requires Space Race) - Korea's strong at science but lacks production advantages for building space project parts. Cover the weakness with this.

Future Era

Non-State Actors (Wildcard, requires Cultural Hegemony) - Give Spies the Polygraph, Surveillance and Quartermaster promotions, and they'll be extremely effective at defending your Seowons, Industrial Zones, Spaceports and governors.

Administration - Age Bonuses and World Congress

Age Bonuses

Only bonuses with notable synergy with the civ's uniques are covered here.

Free Inquiry (Golden Age, Classical to Medieval eras) - Stronger eurekas nicely complement your high early science output.

Monasticism (Dark Age, Classical to Medieval eras) - Adds +75% onto an already impressive science output at the cost of needing to build Holy Sites and losing 25% of your culture output. As Sejong, careful timing of this wildcard just before you research the first technology of a new era can get you a lot more culture than it costs.

Pen, Brush and Voice (Golden Age, Classical to Medieval eras) - Helping your culture to catch up to your science will make it easier to get certain eurekas, and more importantly, get to the powerful Rationalism policy card.

Heartbeat of Steam (Golden Age, Industrial to Modern eras) - Let all your Seowons add plenty of production.

Robber Barons (Dark Age, Industrial to Information eras) - Though it does come at the cost of amenities, this provides a much-needed source of late-game production for Korea to help with space projects or building things to trigger eureka boosts with.

Automated Workforce (Dark Age, Information to Future eras) - Helps you with space race projects at the cost of amenities and loyalty.

Sky and Stars (Golden Age, Information to Future eras) - Korea's breakneck research speed can make it difficult to pick up eurekas, so getting some for free will help cut a few turns off researching parts for space projects.

World Congress

How you should vote in the World Congress will often be specific to your game - if you have a strong rival, for example, it might be better to vote to hurt them than to help yourself. Furthermore, there may be general bonuses to your chosen victory route or gameplay which are more relevant than ones that have stronger synergy with civ-specific bonuses. Otherwise, here's a list of key votes that have high relevance for this civ relative to other civs.

Border Control Treaty - Effect A (New districts built by this player act as culture bombs) on yourself

New Seowon districts will immediately take surrounding tiles, allowing you to get the most out of Korea's civ ability.

Espionage Pact - Effect B (The chosen Spy operation is unavailable) on Disrupt Rocketry, Neutralise Governor, Sabotage Production or Steal Tech Boost

Preventing any of these missions will help prevent you being disrupted on your path to victory.

(Seondeok) Governance Doctrine - Effect A (Appointing and promoting the specified Governor type yields 15 diplomatic favour) on whichever Governor you're likely to promote soon.

You definitely won't want Effect B to happen, as it will disable a certain governor type (and potentially costing you science and culture).

International Space Station - Always vote in favour

This is a top-priority scored competition for Korea. Your Seowons will help you win the competition, while the rewards help you speed up the space race and therefore win the game sooner.

Nobel Prize in Physics - Vote in favour if you have a good overall generation of Great Scientists, Merchants and Engineers.

Korea's incentive to have a lot of Seowons helps with winning this scored competitions, and free eurekas aid with getting through the technology tree even faster.

Patronage - Effect A (Earn double points towards Great People of this class) on Great Scientists

Lots of Seowons can mean an enormous amount of Great Scientist Points - with this on top, you can rapidly generate all the Great Scientists you need.

Urban Development Treaty - Effect A (+100% production towards buildings in this district) on Campuses

Greatly helps you to develop your Seowon districts.

Administration - Religion and City-States

Pantheons

Divine Spark - Got a lot of Seowons with Libraries? Now enjoy a lot of Great Scientists as well.

God of Craftsmen - This is a bit of a gamble considering strategic resources that can be mined don't turn up immediately at the start of the game, but it can reward you with very productive mines, especially when adjacent to Seowons for the extra science bonus. That can make up for Korea's lack of production bonuses.

Religious Idols - Mines over bonus or luxury resources and adjacent to Seowons will make some good overall yields.

Religious Settlements - Fast expansion early on can create a huge scientific advantage with help from Seowon districts. A bonus early Settler will really help.

Religious Beliefs

You can have one founder, one follower, one enhancer and one worship belief.

Cross-Cultural Dialogue (Founder) - Bonus food from Seowon-adjacent farms helps you grow larger cities, allowing you to make good use of this bonus science.

Feed the World (Follower) - Bonus housing to complement the stronger food yields of Seowon-adjacent farms.

Jesuit Education (Follower) - Save yourself the trouble of building Seowon buildings when you can simply buy them. This is particularly effective if you were using the Monasticism Dark Age policy card and needed to build a lot of Holy Sites for the science boost.

City-States

Bologna (Scientific) - Get even more Great Scientist Points out of your Seowons.

Geneva (Scientific) - Offers a 15% science boost when you're not at war, building on Korea's high base science output.

Mitla (Scientific) - Cities with a Seowon (which will generally mean all of them) will grow faster, making good use of the extra food from Seowon-adjacent farms.

Nalanda (Scientific) - Mines adjacent to Seowons add extra science, but farms don't. Instead, consider building Mahavihara improvements on those flat land tiles instead.

Taruga (Scientific) - Build on your strong science output in cities with strategic resources.

Administration - Wonders and Great People

Wonders

Etemenanki (Ancient era, Writing technology) - Together with the Seowon district, you can get incredibly strong early science outputs. Place the city's Seowon next to as many floodplain tiles as possible for the best yields.

Great Bath (Ancient era, Pottery technology) - Generally this wonder is too risky to build, but it does go well with Seowon farm bonuses to support a huge early city.

Hanging Gardens (Ancient era, Irrigation technology) - Make the most of your Seowon-adjacent-farm-food.

Temple of Artemis (Ancient era, Archery technology) - Want to grow an even bigger city? Here's an option for you.

Great Library (Classical era, Recorded History civic) - The main draw for Korea is the free random eureka boosts whenever another civ recruits a Great Scientist. Civs like Korea with high science outputs are usually kept in check by the difficulty of obtaining eureka boosts, but this will help you circumvent that problem.

Petra (Classical era, Mathematics technology) - Highly rewarding if you can find an area with a lot of desert hills. Desert hill mines with Petra and boosted by a Seowon are incredibly powerful.

(Seondeok) Casa de Contratación (Renaissance era, Cartography technology) - Every governor promotion you can get will make Seondeok's leader ability stronger, and this wonder adds three.

Oxford University (Industrial era, Scientific Theory technology) - Magnify your already-impressive science output in a city.

Ruhr Valley (Industrial era, Scientific Theory technology) - Extra production from mines makes already good tiles even stronger, and helps prepare you for building space project parts.

Great People

Classical Era

Euclid (Great Scientist) - Eurekas can be hard to obtain when you're researching very quickly. Euclid is the one of the first of several Great People to offer free eurekas, helping to ensure you research as fast as you can.

Hypatia (Great Scientist) - All Libraries permanently produce extra science, and thanks to your UD, you should have plenty. Combine with the Rationalism policy card for even more.

Zhang Heng (Great Scientist) - Three eurekas.

Medieval Era

Abu Al-Qasim Al-Zahrawi (Great Scientist) - Gain a free random medieval/renaissance eureka.

(Seondeok) Irene of Athens (Great Merchant) - Adds an extra governor title, or, in other words, +3% science and culture for one city.

Omar Khayyam (Great Scientist) - Two eurekas and an inspiration.

Renaissance Era

Emile du Chatelet (Great Scientist) - Three renaissance/industrial eurekas.

Isaac Newton (Great Scientist) - Permanently stronger Universities. This goes great with the Rationalism policy card.

Leonardo da Vinci (Great Engineer) - A random modern-era eureka. Also makes Workshops provide culture, which is helpful for ensuring your civics can keep up with your technologies.

Industrial Era

Ada Lovelace (Great Engineer) - Lets you get the Computers eureka without needing to get to a tier 3 government first, saving a little time when researching necessary space technologies.

(Seondeok) Adam Smith (Great Merchant) - Adds an extra governor title.

Dmitri Mendeleev (Great Scientist) - Get two free eurekas.

James Watt (Great Engineer) - Permanently make Factories stronger, helping you build up the production base you need to handle building Spaceports and developing space projects.

Modern Era

Alan Turing (Great Scientist) - Get two free eurekas.

Albert Einstein (Great Scientist) - A free eureka and permanently stronger Universities.

Alfred Nobel (Great Scientist) - Get a free eureka.

Nikola Tesla (Great Engineer) - Extra production for Factories and Power Plants to help you develop those space projects.

Robert Goddard (Great Engineer) - Produce space projects faster and get the Rocketry eureka.

Atomic Era

Erwin Schrodinger (Great Scientist) - Gain three eurekas.

Jane Drew (Great Engineer) - A good food yield doesn't mean a lot without housing and amenities to keep up with it. Jane Drew is one of multiple Great Engineers who can offer you both housing and amenities.

John Roebling (Great Engineer) - More housing and amenities.

Sergei Korolev (Great Engineer) - Who needs to worry about scraping together some late-game production for space projects when you can use a Great Engineer to skip through the process?

Information Era

Abdus Salam (Great Scientist) - Not done with research yet? Abdus Salam grants you all information-era boosts so you'll be done in no time.

Carl Sagan (Great Scientist) - Lets you rush through a space race project.

Stephanie Kwolek (Great Scientist) - Cut down the costs of remaining space projects.

Wernher Von Braun (Great Engineer) - Also can rush a space project.

Counter-Strategies

Korea has a huge science output, but has few strengths that are not derived from that.

Civilization Ability: Three Kingdoms

Korea is highly encouraged to develop around their Seowons. This creates a cluster of tile improvements which are practically begging to be pillaged. Mines provide gold when pillaged; farms heal your units.

If you border Korea, you can take tiles off them via the Border Control Treaty World Congress resolution. That causes you to create culture bombs when creating new districts, which can take land off other civs so long as the tiles don't contain completed districts or wonders.

Sejong's Leader Ability: Hangul

Sejong's leader ability helps him to neglect culture in favour of maximising his science output - but emphasis should be on the word helps. The overall culture contribution of this ability is rather mild and only occurs at a few points in the game, most prominently very early in the game where Korea can get a huge science lead from Seowons. This culture is also added at an empire-wide rather than city-specific level, so Sejong can be quite bad at accumulating new tiles. You can use that to your advantage by buying tiles next to his Seowons before he can use those bonuses for himself.

Sejong's Agenda: Neo-Confucianism

An AI-controlled Sejong likes civs that are behind him in culture and science. He dislikes civs that are ahead of him in either of them. He will never have the Cultured or Technophile hidden agendas as these conflict with this main agenda.

This agenda can in theory make Sejong a good ally if you're falling behind in both culture and science. Then again, considering how powerful Korea can get if unchecked, be sure that his own science output isn't overwhelmingly strong before you commit to not going to war.

For anyone who's ahead of Sejong on science, he's unlikely to be a threat given science is his key advantage by far. However, for a cultural civ that fails the agenda due to a high culture, but not science, output, this can be more of a problem. It may be worth reinforcing your defences along a border with Sejong just to be safe.

Seondeok's Leader Ability: Hwarang

The big problem with Seondeok's leader ability is its dependency on governors. Not only does it mean Korea needs to keep a small empire if they want the most efficient use of this bonus, but it's also vulnerable to Spies. Spies can disable governors for a few turns via the Neutralise Governor mission. You can also use the Governance Doctrine resolution in the World Congress to deactivate Governor Pingala (the Educator) for a few turns - it'll most likely hit Korea harder than any other civ.

The bonus is also disabled for some cities while Korea moves around Governors. If your diplomatic visibility with Korea is high enough, you can see where their Governors are. If Korea has a religion, you may be able to encourage Seondeok to move Moksha (the Cardinal) by putting religious pressure on their other cities. Alternatively, declaring war might encourage her to move Victor (the Castellan) to wherever your angle of attack is.

Seondeok's Agenda: Cheomseongdae

An AI-controlled Seondeok likes civs with high science outputs and dislikes those with low science. Seondeok won't have the Technophile hidden agenda as it overlaps with her trait.

Fellow scientific civs shouldn't have too much trouble here, and a domination civ determined to keep up to date might be able to make up for some diplomatic penalties from warmongering, but religious and diplomatic civs might struggle here.

Unique Unit: Hwacha

Hwacha can make Korea a pain to invade once they're on to renaissance-era technology (to see where they're at, open up the technology tree and look for Seondeok's icon at the bottom). Thankfully, their lack of mobility means they won't be too hard to handle if you're in a defensive war (try swarming them with Knights, or attacking them from the coast with Frigates).

If you intend to attack Korea, it'll be easiest to do so earlier in the game. By the modern era, you have units strong enough for Hwacha not to be so much of a problem, but Korea's huge science output might make their army tough to defeat.

Need to attack Korea while Hwacha are at their full power? Knights are mobile enough to be able to catch them without being first hit, and can then hopefully retreat to safety. For coastal areas, Frigates will be great as standard ranged units have a -17 strength penalty against naval units. Finally, Musketmen with the Tortoise promotion can resist Hwacha attacks reasonably well.

Unique District: Seowon

If Korea places districts next to Seowons, they become weaker. If Korea's expansion is constrained, and they have to settle cities closer together, it's more likely that they'll have to do this. Pushing Korea into settling coastal cities isn't a bad idea - not only will they have less land spare before they have to squeeze in districts, but they'll also leave more of their coastline exposed to Frigates and other naval ranged units that Hwacha can't easily handle.

Seowons also have the problem that they have to be constructed on a hill, which means Korea will want to avoid settling in wide open spaces. By taking the hillier spots first, you'll force them to either take an inferior city spot or leave it for you.

But assuming Korea gets the good city spots and builds Seowons perfectly, they have yet another flaw - they're really vulnerable to Spies. Normally, Counter-Spies protect their district and all adjacent ones. For Korea, Spies dedicated to their Seowons will only protect them unless they're able to reach the Surveillance promotion. They won't be able to protect all their Seowons, city centres, Industrial Zones and Spaceports with the few Spies they have. Go ahead and steal some eureka boosts, disable their governors and sabotage their space race infrastructure.

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Gathering Storm

Compilation Guides

• Civ summaries (Start here for an introduction for all civs)
  
• Civ-specific tricks, secrets and clarifications (Ideal for more experienced players)

Individual Civilization Guides

• America - with persona packs* (Cultural/Diplomatic/Domination/Scientific)
  
• America - without persona packs* (Cultural/Diplomatic/Domination)
  
• Arabia (Religious/Scientific)
  
• Australia (Domination/Scientific)
  
• Aztecs (Domination)
  
• Babylon (Cultural/Domination/Scientific)
  
• Brazil (Cultural/Domination/Religious/Scientific)
  
• Byzantium (Domination/Religious)
  
• Canada (Cultural/Diplomatic)
  
• China (Cultural/Scientific)
  
• Cree (Diplomatic)
  
• Egypt (Cultural/Diplomatic/Religious)
  
• England (Cultural/Domination/Scientific)
  
• Ethiopia (Cultural/Religious)
  
• France* (Cultural/Domination)
  
• Gaul (Domination)
  
• Georgia (Diplomatic/Religious)
  
• Germany (Domination/Scientific)
  
• Gran Colombia (Domination)
  
• Greece (Cultural/Diplomatic/Domination)
  
• Hungary (Diplomatic/Domination)
  
• Inca (Religious/Scientific)
  
• India (Domination/Religious)
  
• Indonesia (Cultural/Domination/Religious/Scientific)
  
• Japan (All)
  
• Khmer (Cultural/Religious)
  
• Kongo (Cultural)
  
• Korea (Scientific)
  
• Macedon (Domination/Scientific)
  
• Mali (Diplomatic/Religious)
  
• Māori (Cultural/Religious)
  
• Mapuche (Cultural/Domination)
  
• Maya (Scientific)
  
• Mongolia (Domination)
  
• Netherlands (Scientific)
  
• Norway (Domination)
  
• Nubia (Domination)
  
• Ottomans (Domination)
  
• Persia (Cultural/Domination)
  
• Phoenicia (Domination)
  
• Poland (Cultural/Domination/Religious)
  
• Portugal (Diplomatic/Scientific)
  
• Rome (Domination)
  
• Russia (Cultural/Religious)
  
• Scotland (Scientific)
  
• Scythia (Domination/Religious)
  
• Spain (Domination/Religious/Scientific)
  
• Sumeria (Diplomatic/Domination/Scientific)
  
• Sweden (Cultural/Diplomatic)
  
• Vietnam (Cultural/Domination)
  
• Zulus (Domination)

*The Teddy Roosevelt Persona Pack splits Roosevelt's leader ability in two, meaning the game with it is substantially different from without - hence two different versions of the America guide.

The guide to France does not have two different versions because the Catherine de' Medici Persona Pack only adds an extra optional leader ability and does not change the existing gameplay - as such the guide is perfectly usable by players without it. "Black Queen Catherine" with the Persona Pack is identical to Catherine de' Medici without it.

Rise and Fall

These guides are for those with the Rise and Fall expansion, but not Gathering Storm. They are no longer updated and have not been kept up to date with patches released since Gathering Storm. To look at them, click here to open the Rise and Fall Civ Summaries guide. The "Other Guides" section of every Rise and Fall guide has links to every other Rise and Fall guide.

Vanilla

The Vanilla guides are for those without the Rise and Fall or Gathering Storm expansions. These guides are no longer updated and have not been kept up to date with patches released since Rise and Fall. To look at them, click here to open the Vanilla Civ Summaries guide. The "Other Guides" section of every Vanilla guide has links to every other Vanilla guide.

[Michael Myers]

good

[Zigzagzigal]

I think the format works better for a turn-based game - with a video guide, finding specific information often means playing back the same bit over and over again. Plus a text guide has CTRL+F functionality and that kind of thing.

[h0gan]

Great job! Much prefer a written guide to a 35 minute tutorial/lets play combo.

[Zigzagzigal]

Thanks; fixed it!

[lifeordeath2077]

Hey I did notice that you listed the H'wacha as having one range in the outline. Big fan, you inspired me to make a similar set of guides for a popular modpack for civ v

[Zigzagzigal]

Turns out I put "Hwacha district" twice! Thanks for the correction.

[EmperorOvaltine]

Excellent guide! Just wanted to point out that the entry for Border Control Treaty says "Hwacha districts" instead of "Seowon districts" :P

[orthostatic]

Just dropping a line to say thanks for the guide; looks like you put a lot of time into presenting this. I'm testing Civ6 on a new Linux installation and will try the guide out. :) Cheers.

[Dønis]

A downside to add would be that Seowons do not benefit from any adjacency bonus from mountains/reefs/geothermal vents, making it a net loss as you can't even built farms or mines on those hexes.