Zigzagzigal's Guides - Greece (Vanilla)

Greece has a good start, very strong culture and is one of the game's easier Civs to understand. Here, I detail Greek strategies and counter-strategies - for both Pericles and Gorgo.

Legacy Guide

If you have the Rise and Fall expansion, click here for the updated guide.

This guide is no longer updated, but will remain for the sake of those without the Rise and Fall expansion.

Introduction

Note: This guide only covers content released prior to the Rise and Fall expansion. Content from any DLC pack released between the base game and Rise and Fall is marked as such.

Welcome to the birthplace of western civilization. Long before the treaties of modern Europe, the Stately Quadrille, the vast colonial empires, a myriad Christian kingdoms or mighty Rome, there was Greece. Through command of the city-states of Greece you shall have great early-game infrastructural advantages and an exceptionally strong cultural output. Key to success as Greece is playing well early in the game, and not neglecting opportunities for yet more precious culture as the game develops. Do this and the civics tree will practically research itself, giving you a head start on many cultural wonders and policy cards.

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 (assuming they have one at all).
  
• The Victory Skew section describes to what extent the civ (and its individual leaders where applicable) are inclined towards particular victory routes.
  
• Multiple sections for Uniques explain in detail how to use each special bonus of the civilization.
  
• Administration describes some of the most synergistic governments, policy cards, 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 should be given more consideration than they would be for other civs but 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, culture, gold, 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) - Describes bonuses or penalties that affect multiple tiles in a set radius. Positive examples include Factories and Stadiums (which by default offer production and happiness respectively 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 - The strategy of 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 deviation (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. Unlike unique units, buildings, districts and improvements, civ abilites do not have to be built.

Civic cards - Another name for policy cards; you fill up your government with these for additional bonuses and can switch them for free every time you unlock a civic.

Compact empires - Civs with cities close together. This is useful if you want to make use of districts that gain adjacency bonuses from other districts, maximise the number of copies of the same district in the same area, or to maximise the potential of area-of-effect bonuses later in the game.

Dispersed empires - Civs with cities that are spread out. This is useful if you want to ensure cities have plenty of room for both districts and tile improvements. 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.

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, which like civ abilities do not have to be built. Usually but not always, they tend to be more specific in scope than civ abilities. Some leader abilities come with an associated unique unit on top of the standard one every civ has.

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.

Complete information on start biases within the game can be found in the Civilizations.xml file (find the Civ 6 folder in Steam's program files, then go through the Base, Assets, Gameplay and Data folders to find the file). If a civilization is not listed as having a start bias there, it does not have one, even if you feel like you keep spawning in the same terrain when playing as that civ.

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 and offers some unique advantages on top. In some cases, there may be minor disadvantages as well, but these are always outweighed by the positive features. All unique districts cost half as much to construct relative to the regular districts they replace.

UI (Unique Improvement) - A special improvement that can only be built by the Builders of a single civilization. Unlike unique buildings or districts, these do not replace a regular improvement. Some require a technology to unlock, and many have their yields improved with later technologies. "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 built by a single civilization, and in some cases only when that civilization is led by a specific leader. These usually replace an existing unit and offer extra advantages (and occasionally minor disadvantages as well in exchange for bigger advantages).

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

Outline

Start Bias

Greece has a tier 3 start bias towards desert hills, grass hills, plains hills and tundra hills. This helps increase the odds that you can get a hill next to your Settler's starting location, allowing you to build an Acropolis adjacent to your capital for a strong culture bonus. A hill start is also useful to slow down Barbarians and enemy civs early in the game, so you have time to build Hoplites and have a more effective way to repel foes.

Civilization Ability: Plato's Republic

• All governments receive an extra wildcard policy card slot.

Gorgo's Leader Ability: Thermopylae

• Killing military units provides culture equal to 50% of their melee strength.

Pericles' Leader Ability: Surrounded by Glory

• National culture output increased by 5% per city-state under suzerainty
  
  • This does not take effect until the turn after gaining suzerain status in a city-state.
    
  • This is applied only at the national level, so it affects civic gain and domestic tourist accumulation, but does not affect city tile accumulation nor tourism from terrain after the Flight technology.

Unique Unit: Hoplite

An ancient-era anti-cavalry unit which replaces the Spearman

Research	Obsoletion	Upgrades from	Upgrades to	Cost	Maintenance	Resource needed
Bronze Working Technology Ancient era	Military Tactics Technology Medieval era	None	Pikeman (200 )	65 or 260 or 130 *	1	None

*Purchasing units with faith requires the Theocracy government, which in turn requires the renaissance-era Reformed Church civic. This number does not take into account Theocracy's 15% discount on faith purchases.

Strength	Ranged Strength	Moves	Range	Sight	Negative Attributes	Positive Attributes
25	N/A	2	N/A	2	None	+10 vs. mounted units +10 when adjacent to another Hoplite

Positive changes

• +10 strength when adjacent to another Hoplite

Unique District: Acropolis

A classical-era speciality district which replaces the Theatre Square

Research	Terrain required	Required to build	Base production cost	Maintenance	Pillage yield
Drama and Poetry Civic Classical era	Hills	Amphitheatre Art Museum Archaeological Museum Broadcast Centre	27 *	1	25

*All districts increase in production cost over the course of the game. If you have fewer copies of a district in total than the average among all players, it will be 40% cheaper to construct.

Adjacency bonuses	Other yields	Great Person points	Other effects
1 per adjacent district 1 additional for an adjacent city centre 1 per adjacent wonder	None	1 1 1	Enables the Theatre Square Festival city project Domestic trade routes to this city provide +1 International trade routes to this city provide +1 Adjacent tiles receive +1 appeal Receive +1 envoy when this district is complete

Negative changes

• Must be constructed on a hill tile

Positive changes

• -50% production cost
  
• 1 culture per adjacent district, up from 1 culture per two adjacent districts
  
• 1 additional culture from adjacent city centres
  
• Receive +1 envoy when the district is complete

Victory Skew

In this section, the civ is graded based on how much it leans towards a specific victory type - not how powerful it is. Any score of 3 or above means the civ or leader has some kind of advantage to the victory route above a hypothetical civ with no unique features. A score of less than 2 means some kind of aspect of the civ actively discourages a particular victory route. All values are subjective and may be edited in future.

Leader	Culture	Domination	Religion	Science
Gorgo	7/10 (Good)	8/10 (Good)	4/10 (Acceptable)	5/10 (Decent)
Pericles	9/10 (Ideal)	5/10 (Decent)	5/10 (Decent)	5/10 (Decent)

No matter the leader, Greece is powerful at the cultural game. With one of the highest culture outputs of any civ, you can zoom through the civics tree, pick up good wonders and tourism bonuses and find your victory path that way. Pericles is a little bit more inclined this way than Gorgo as his leader ability becomes stronger the higher your base culture output is rather than just adding culture on top.

Domination is a viable route for either leader due to the presence of a reasonably strong early unique unit suitable for making early rushes, but Gorgo's leader ability strongly encourages warring throughout the game making domination arguably the most effective path for her.

Because of the free wildcard slot available from the start of the game, Greece can make use of Mysticism's Revelation policy card (and its +2 bonus towards Great Prophet points) before any other civ aside from Poland. This helps found an early religion, but otherwise Greece lacks much in the way of advantages towards religious victory.

Finally, Greece can make a reasonable attempt at scientific victories by exploiting the early availability of Mysticism's Inspiration policy card (+2 Great Scientist points) and using their fast civic accumulation to quickly unlock corresponding Eureka boosts.

Civ Ability: Plato's Republic

The situation when you finish researching Code of Laws; you can take any combination of three starting policy cards.

As the name suggests, wildcard policy card slots provide flexibility. You don't have to make so many difficult choices between two good bonuses when you can simply take both.

Early on in the game, the Greek civ ability is at its strongest. By taking both the Urban Planning and God-King policy cards, you can get your basic infrastructure up and running faster and grab an early pantheon on top. With the Craftsmanship civic, you can have both Urban Planning and Ilkum active simultaneously, letting you construct Builders rapidly. Many early Eureka boosts depend on Builders constructing improvements, so it can give you a decent edge to science at this stage.

The absolute most effective thing you can do with an early wildcard slot, however, is pick up either the Revelation (+2 Great Prophet points) or Inspiration (+2 Great Scientist points) policy cards before anyone else is able to. All other Civs have to research at least six civics to get to that point, while Greece can do that with just three (Code of Laws, Foreign Trade and Mysticism). Picking up Inspiration early on makes it rather likely you'll be either first or second to a Great Scientist, while Revelation combined with a Holy Site makes founding a religion highly likely.


It's rather nice not to have to work hard for Great Scientist points.

Once you have the Political Philosophy civic, the extra wildcard slot helps you put together a government appropriate for your chosen leader.

Gorgo can take Oligarchy for its military bonuses while still having as many policy card slots that can hold military cards as a different civ taking Autocracy.


The +4 strength bonus from Oligarchy stacked with other bonuses makes mincemeat of the unprepared.

Pericles can take any of the government types and be able to have both Diplomatic League and Charismatic Leader simultaneously to help with becoming suzerain over as many city-states as possible. Classical Republic is probably your best option but Autocracy isn't bad if you think you can get some early wonders built.

As the game goes on, the extra wildcard slot fades somewhat in power, but remains useful. There's a lot of powerful economic cards later in the game (Heritage Tourism and Satellite Broadcasts for example, which both offer tourism) and being able to squeeze them all in is a nice little advantage to have. Aside from simply getting better governments, there's five methods of earning more policy card slots:

• Alhambra (medieval-era wonder, requires the Castles technology) - +1 military card slot, +2 amenities from entertainment, +2 Great General points per turn. More useful for Gorgo.
  
• Forbidden City (renaissance-era wonder, requires the Printing technology) - +1 wildcard slot, +5 culture. The wonder has a very easy placement requirement and comes in a technology that offers little else making it relatively easy to grab if your science is strong enough.
  
• Potala Palace (renaissance-era wonder, requires the Astronomy technology) - +1 diplomatic card slot, +2 culture, +3 faith. More useful for Pericles.
  
• Big Ben (industrial-era wonder, requires the Economics technology) - +1 economic card slot, doubles current treasury, +6 gold, +3 Great Merchant points per turn.
  
• Adam Smith (industrial-era Great Merchant) - +1 economic card slot.

Just because you have a free card slot doesn't mean there's any particular advantage to chasing more up. Instead, getting more is useful because of Greece's high culture output - you can get to powerful policy cards sooner and use lots of different strong bonuses at once.

In summary, this ability is mostly useful in the earliest eras. You can rush to Mysticism and start generating Great Scientist or Great Prophet points early, and later with Political Philosophy take a government based on its intrinsic bonuses rather than just its card slots. Later in the game, this will be mostly useful for squeezing in extra economic policies (or as Pericles, extra diplomatic ones).

Gorgo's Leader Ability: Thermoplyae

Yes, you even get culture from destroying embarked units.

With three different important civics for Greece to pick up early on (Mysticism, Drama and Poetry, Political Philosophy) in addition to all their prerequisites, it can feel difficult to balance that and the Hoplite UU when playing as Pericles. As Gorgo, however, it's a different story. Every military unit - including Barbarians, embarked units, naval units, air units and so on - that you kill gives you culture. Early on, this is rather a lot of culture and will zoom you through the early civics.

To make the most of this, you need to be off fighting Barbarians early. Get a couple of Warriors ready quickly, along with a Slinger or Archer as well if you can spare the production. Find a Barbarian encampment and kill anything that spawns outside it. A Scout or Slinger is worth 2 culture, a Warrior 10 and a Spearman 12. If you bring along a ranged unit, that means you can kill the Barbarian guarding the encampment without removing the encampment itself. Make sure no other civ is around while you're doing this, so the camp stays intact until the next Barbarian spawns.


Slingers are quite squishy so you'll want to make sure they have an escape route if the Barbarian decides to retaliate. One way of avoiding this risk is to attack them with a Warrior first until they're on low health, then finish them off with a Slinger.

Killing three Barbarians will get you the Eureka for Bronze Working, helping you to get Hoplites up nice and early. It's a good idea to get a Settler and a Trader built at some point so you can trade internally for faster production and hence a better output of Hoplites.


Boom! It's not even 3000BC yet and I've got the boost. Barbarian Scouts aren't worth much culture but killing them is the easiest way of getting the Bronze Working boost..

Grabbing lots of culture from killing units will help you get a strong government and the Acropolis district early on. The sheer amount of culture having lots of Acropolis districts can offer makes it easy to rush through the civics tree. Nationalism in the industrial era lets you form corps for more powerful units, while Mobilisation in the modern era allows armies - getting them early gives you quite an edge in combat.

Later in the game, the power of Gorgo's ability will drop off as the strength of individual units won't increase as quickly as the cost of civics. Ultimately, this is an ability that needs to be made use of early on to make the most out of it.

Pericles' Leader Ability: Surrounded by Glory

5% isn't a lot at this stage of the game, but it's a start.

While Gorgo gets a lot of culture early on, Pericles takes a bit longer for his culture to really start to pour in - but once it does, the yields can be immense. Being suzerain of a couple of city-states takes a while, so Pericles lacks the ability to rush to Drama and Poetry and Political Philosophy that Gorgo has. To make up for that, be sure to expand to a second city early and build Monuments.

Once you have a government at Political Philosophy (I'd recommend Classical Republic), you can take both diplomatic policy cards available and, unless you took Autocracy, still have a wildcard slot left over for other things. Taking both diplomatic policy cards makes it much easier to hold city-state suzerains at this relatively early stage of the game.

Aside from governments and policy cards, there are two other core ways of earning envoys for city-states: completing certain civics and meeting their quest requirements. Civics that offer envoys are usually ones at the top or bottom of the civic tree and lead into few or no other civics. Because of the high culture output you'll be generating, picking up these envoys should be no problem. Quest requirements, on the other hand, can be tricky. Many of them require a specific Eureka or Inspiration (if you research the technology/civic without it, however, the quest will be replaced by something else). The trickiest ones can involve getting a specific Great Person. Complete all the quests you reasonably are able to, and use the free envoys from civics or the ones generated from your government to deal with other city-states.

Be careful about advancing in era. Every era, city-states that aren't currently offering you a quest will offer a new one, but if you already have an incomplete quest you'll be stuck with it (unless it requires a specific Eureka or Inspiration and you researched the technology/civic, or a specific wonder and it's been built; in those cases it will be replaces). To maximise envoy gain, therefore, avoid advancing in era until you've exhausted all the reasonable city-state quests available.

Helpfully, the Acropolis district offers a source of envoys as well. You'll receive +1 envoy for every Acropolis you have, which encourages you to build a lot of cities. Keep them close together to maximise district adjacency.

Beware of warmongers who seek to attack your city-states. Early on, Hoplites can help deal with invaders, and they can be upgraded to reasonably strong Pikemen in the medieval era, but don't neglect your defences in the rest of the game. Your high culture output should help you get to corps and armies earlier than most civs, giving you a notable advantage there.


Now we're talking! Six allies and a 30% bonus. That's magnifying an already reasonably high culture output as a result of having plenty of Acropolis districts.

The end result of Pericles' enormous culture output is early access to crucial late-game cultural civics like Natural History, Cultural Heritage and Space Race. Being first to Natural History means you can grab more artefacts before other civs start taking them for themselves, giving you more tourism as a result. Cultural Heritage and Space Race have important policy cards offering large boosts to tourism.

Don't neglect science, however. Flight, Radio and Computers are very important technologies for cultural victory - Flight makes culture on terrain contribute to tourism, Radio offers you Broadcast Towers (one of the few sources of Great Music slots) as well as Seaside Resorts (and all the handy tourism they can offer) while Computers doubles your tourism output.

Ultimately, while Gorgo is the better leader for those who like to take Greece to war, Pericles is better if you want a more peaceful game.

Unique Unit: Hoplite

The unit in action. Just watch out for enemies with bonuses against anti-cavalry units.

Hoplites are the backbone of an early Greek army and a viable early unit to rush an opponent with. When adjacent to another Hoplite, they're nearly as strong as Swordsmen but 28% cheaper to build with half as much maintenance, no need for iron and an earlier technology. Mounted units are particularly threatened - Hoplites adjacent to each other are nearly strong enough to go toe-to-toe with Knights!

If you want to use Hoplites to their full potential, you have to start early. The only eureka en route to Bronze Working requires you to kill three Barbarians - a couple of early Slingers or Warriors can handle that. Settling extra cities early means you have more places sharing the burden of building up your Hoplite army. Finally, by using your extra wildcard slot to take God-King, you can secure an early pantheon and use God of the Forge for faster military unit production. You can then take both Agoge and Conscription simultaneously for a particularly cost-effective army.

Once you have some Hoplites and some Archers as well (they'll be good for dealing with enemy Warriors and Swordsmen), send them off towards the nearest vulnerable capital city and start a war. If the other civ hasn't got around to building Ancient Walls yet, just a small handful of units (3-4 Hoplites and a couple of Archers) can be enough. If, on the other hand, they have built up some defences, that's no problem - just research Masonry and bring along a Battering Ram.

When it's time to promote Hoplites, consider giving them the +10 strength bonus against melee units. It'll cover their vulnerability to Warriors making them useful in all scenarios.

If you don't want to fight an early war (whether to save production, because it isn't viable for whatever reason or because you simply don't feel like it) then Hoplites still make decent defensive units against other civs and Barbarians. Having at least three is a good idea - that way, if one is injured, it can retreat while you still have two left providing each other bonuses.

Once Pikemen arrive, Hoplites have no real combat advantages any more, so don't hesitate to pick up the Military Tactics technology if you need to upgrade your army.

Unique District: Acropolis

The Parthenon, in all its +2 culture glory.

Introduction

The Acropolis offers a few helpful bonuses throughout a Greek game, from the classical era right to the end. Getting a cheap Theatre Square with strong adjacency bonuses (if you place it adjacent to the city centre, it's already as good as a Monument) is a recipe for an enormous culture output, and the tile and civic accumulation advantages that go with it.


Look at the top-left corner of the screen. Yes, that's 101 culture per turn. At this point, I pretty much don't even need to bother about inspiration boosts.


It's not always so straightforward. Any other civ could build a Theatre Square here but Greece can't yet. Be very careful where you place your cities if you want to maximise cultural yields! Cities you conquer are particularly problematic as your opponents are hardly going to settle with your Acropolis districts in mind. On the other hand, it's worth remembering that cities have other needs aside from culture - don't ignore a really good city spot just because it isn't next to a hill.

An extra envoy

When you finish constructing an Acropolis, you will gain +1 envoy.

This is very important to Pericles as his leader ability is dependent on being suzerain over many city-states. To make the most of this bonus, try to ensure you have plenty of cities. Try also to keep them close together, so you can more easily make use of Acropolis adjacency bonuses.

For Gorgo, this can be useful for filling out envoy bonuses in city-states. Getting lots of militaristic city-states to three or six envoys makes your unit production very strong, while getting the bonuses in trade city-states ensures you have enough money to support such an army.

Putting cheaper, stronger Theatre Squares to use

For Pericles, the culture from Acropoles means you can pick up all those little civics that offer free envoys easily without falling behind in the civic tree.

For Gorgo, you can be one of the first to corps and armies for an extra military edge.

As the game goes on, you can build upon this culture output in various ways. The most immediate method is to build additional districts around your Acropoles - you'll get as much culture for doing so as you would for building a wonder next to it! An Acropolis next to a city centre and surrounded by five other districts will produce 7 culture per turn; for any other civ they'd make only 3. Even if you don't have a hill next to your city centre, getting an Acropolis and some adjacent districts up helps keep the culture yield high.

A bit later on is the the Aesthetics policy card, unlocked at Medieval Faires. Although a late-medieval civic in terms of placement on the civic tree, once you have Political Philosophy, all you need is Games and Recreation, Defensive Tactics, Feudalism and Medieval Faires. The inspiration boosts for most these civics can be a bit tricky to pick up, so don't be afraid to grab them despite missing the boosts. The card doubles Theatre Square (and hence Acropolis) adjacency bonuses, making the +2 culture from Acropoles being adjacent to the city centre a +4 boost, and district/wonder adjacency worth +2 culture each.

Aside from the direct benefits to culture, being able to easily build Acropoles in many cities will give you plenty of Great Writer, Artist and Musician points. More GWAMs means more Great Works, which means more tourism and in turn means a faster cultural victory.

Furthermore, having more Acropoles means you can get plenty of Great Work slots - particularly useful for Archaeological Museums. Because Greece's strong culture can get them to Natural History early, you have plenty of time to steal from the antiquity sites of your own and other civs before they can do the same to you. The theming bonus in Archaeological Museums only needs three same-era artefacts of different civs, which is pretty easy to achieve.

Summary

• Try to found cities next to hills if possible for the best Acropolis adjacency bonuses.
  
• Building lots of cities is the best way for Greece to get envoys early on, which is very important for Pericles.
  
• Build your cities close together so you can more easily maximise Acropolis adjacency.

Administration - Government and Religion

The administration section covers the governments, policy cards, pantheons, religions, wonders, city-states and Great People which have particularly good synergy with Greek uniques. Be aware that these are not necessarily the best choices, but rather options that you should consider more than usual if playing as Greece relative to other Civs.

Governments

Classical Era Governments

Oligarchy is Gorgo's ideal choice. Having one less military card slot compared to Autocracy doesn't matter much when you have an extra wildcard slot as part of Greece's Civ Ability, and the melee unit strength bonus goes well with Hoplites.

For Pericles, consider going for Classical Republic. Bonus Great People points will be very useful in conjunction with all the Acropolis districts you'll be building, the free amenity means you can hold off building Entertainment Complexes for longer and the government comes with enough slots that you'll be able to take both diplomatic cards available at Political Philosophy and still have a wildcard slot left over.

Medieval/Renaissance Era Governments

Monarchy is pretty great for Greece. Although the high number of military policy cards may feel excessive, Greece's bonus wildcard makes it a lot more manageable. Bonuses to defensive building production means more tourism later in the game, while more influence points means you can have an even stronger grasp on city-states. This is especially good for Pericles.

Alternatively, Merchant Republic is a good choice for either leader. Two extra trade routes means more production when used for internal trade, which means faster unit production.

Modern Era Governments

Gorgo's militaristic leanings incentivise the use of Fascism.

As Pericles, Democracy will be more suitable for helping with acquiring the last few GWAMs.

Policy Cards

Ancient Era

Agoge (Military, requires Craftsmanship) - Build Hoplites at a rapid pace, letting you overwhelm your foes with sheer power!

Inspiration (Wildcard, requires Mysticism) - A +2 bonus to Great Scientist points which Greece can acquire earlier than anyone else.

Revelation (Wildcard, requires Mysticism) - A +2 bonus to Great Prophet points which Greece also can pick up before anyone else. Once you have a Great Prophet, this card becomes useless - switch it out for something else like Inspiration.

Classical Era

Charismatic Leader (Diplomatic, requires Political Philosophy) - A great choice, especially for Pericles. This will really help you secure more city-state suzerains.

Diplomatic League (Diplomatic, requires Political Philosophy) - Good if you're still uncovering new city-states and want to get a good start on gaining envoys with them.

Medieval Era

Aesthetics (Economic, requires Medieval Faires) - An Acropolis next to your capital now produces +4 culture, and that doesn't even take into account other adjacency bonuses.

(Favours Pericles) Meritocracy (Economic, requires Civil Service) - the boost to culture on offer here can be immense, especially combined with Pericles' bonus from city-states.

Renaissance Era

(Gorgo) Native Conquest (Military, requires Exploration) - If your neighbours are using outdated units (hence limiting your culture potential from fighting them) this makes up for it by giving you gold when you kill them.

Industrial Era

Grand Opera (Economic, requires Opera and Ballet) - Deserves slightly more attention than normal due to the high number of Acropolis districts you'll have.

Modern Era

Gunboat Diplomacy (Diplomatic, requires Totalitarianism) - Like Charismatic Leader, but double the effectiveness.

(Gorgo) Defence of the Motherland (Military, requires Class Struggle) - Prevents war weariness in home territory. Seeing as you only need to kill units and not take cities for culture, you can just fight defensive wars and use this card to prevent amenity penalties resulting from that.

(Gorgo) Propaganda and Martial Law (Both Military, requires Mass Media and Totalitarianism respectively) - Both reduce war weariness, making it easier to pursue prolonged wars for culture.

Atomic Era

Containment (Diplomatic, requires Cold War) - Helps overturn city-states controlled by rival civs.

Sports Media (Economic, requires Professional Sports) - Essentially the same thing as Aesthetics but with +1 amenity for Stadiums added on top.

Information Era

(Pericles) International Space Agency (Diplomatic, requires Globalisation) - If your culture output is much higher than your science output, this can help close the gap.

Pantheons

God of the Forge - Ideal for getting Hoplites built quickly.

Divine Spark - Good synergy with the Acropolis district.

Religous Beliefs

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

Lay Ministry (Founder) - Helps add a little bit more culture from Acropolis districts.

Papal Primacy (Founder) - Maximises yields from city-states.

Religious Unity (Founder) - An excellent choice, especially for Pericles. This makes city-states give you an envoy when you convert them for the first time. You don't necessarily need a really strong faith to take advantage of this - just save up for a couple of Missionaries and that should be enough to convert a city.

Jesuit Education (Follower) - Allows you to convert excess faith into buildings to fill the Acropolis districts.

Zen Meditation (Follower) - Having a cheap unique district makes it easy to achieve the 2 districts required to get an amenity out of this.

Administration - Wonders, City-States and Great People

Wonders

Oracle (Ancient era, Mysticism civic) - Cheap faith patronage of Great People coupled with lots of Great Person points from Acropoles makes it easier to get hold of lots of GWAMs.

Apadana (Classical era, Political Philosophy civic) - A very strong wonder for Pericles thanks to the potential envoys, but extra Great Work slots early in the game can be useful for a culture-oriented Gorgo as well. Requires the Persia and Macedon Civilization and Scenario Pack.

Terracotta Army (Classical era, Construction technology) - Having lots of Acropolis districts means you could support a lot of Archaeologists later. Letting them slip through the borders of other civs and take their artefacts will help your tourism output.

(Gorgo) Alhambra (Medieval era, Castles technology) - Grab an extra military policy card slot and you can have both cards that make it easier to support an army (production bonuses, reduced maintenance, etc.) and ones that make it more effective.

Forbidden City (Renaissance era, Printing technology) - Preserves your unique advantage of having a free wildcard slot (by denying this wonder to anyone else) and makes your governments incredibly flexible with up to four wildcard slots by the end of the game.

(Pericles) Potala Palace (Renaissance era, Astronomy technology) - An extra diplomatic card slot means you can maximise envoy gain without having to use up a wildcard slot.

Big Ben (Industrial era, Economics technology) - There's loads of really good late-game economic policy cards (Heritage Tourism and Satellite Broadcasts in particular are highly important for a cultural victory) so one more slot can do a lot of good.

Bolshoi Theatre (Industrial era, Opera and Ballet civic) - Builds on your existing GWAM generation advantages.

Hermitage (Industrial era, Natural History civic) - Also builds on Great Artist generation advantages.

Broadway (Modern era, Mass Media civic) - More Great Writer and Musician points.

City-States

Antananarivo (Cultural) - Offers a good boost to culture which Acropoles can make even stronger. Requires the Vikings Scenario Pack.

Kumasi (Cultural) - Even more culture on top of your existing advantages.

Stockholm (Scientific) - If you have a lot of Acropoles, Stockholm provides a lot of extra GWAM points.

Vilnius (Cultural) - Saves you a bit of time getting through the civics tree.

Great People

Remember that these are only the ones that have particular synergy with Greek uniques, not necessarily the most effective options. Obviously, all Great Generals and Admirals can be useful for the domination victory, and Great Writers, Artists and Musicians are important for cultural victory, but it would be redundant to list them all.

Medieval Era

Bi Sheng (Great Engineer) - Triggers the Eureka for Printing, helping you get to the Forbidden City wonder sooner.

(Pericles) Piero de' Bardi (Great Merchant) - +1 envoy.

(Pericles) Zheng He (Great Admiral) - +1 envoy when retired.

Renaissance Era

(Pericles) Jakob Fugger (Great Merchant) - +2 envoys.

Industrial Era

Adam Smith (Great Merchant) - +1 Economic policy card slot.

(Pericles) John Jacob Astor (Great Merchant) - +2 envoys.

(Pericles) Simón Bolivar (Great General) - +2 envoys when retired.

Modern Era

(Gorgo) Joaquim Marques Lisboa (Great Admiral) - Reduces war weariness by 25% permanently when retired. Handy for prolonged unit-killing wars.

Atomic Era

Mary Leakey (Great Scientist) - Triples artefact tourism in a city, and also adds a one-off boost of 350 science per artefact present in the city. Greece can get to Natural History early and easily fill up an Archaeological Museum by that point, making it easy to get the full effect here.

Counter-Strategies

Greece is a cultural powerhouse with a pretty strong early-game, but they have an Achilles' heel or two you can exploit.

Plato's Republic

You can't really stop Greece from making use of an extra card slots, but you can close the gap by picking up bonuses that give you extra card slots yourself. Four wonders (Alhambra, Potala Palace, the Forbidden City and Big Ben) offer you extra slots, as does the Great Merchant Adam Smith.

Up until that point, be aware that Greece can be a threat in multiple ways (they can have two different Great Person points-boosting cards in the classical era, rather than the usual one for example) or can instead specialise in a powerful single-minded government (such as by stacking production bonuses in economic, military and wildcard slots).

Gorgo - Thermoplyae

Gorgo won't get any culture from her unique ability if she can't kill anything. Make sure your higher-strength units always have an escape route when fighting her so you can retreat them if necessary. Ranged units with a low melee strength (notably Slingers) won't give her much culture if she kills them, so if given the choice between sacrificing a Slinger or a Warrior, go for the Slinger.

One of the easiest ways to hand Gorgo lots of easy culture is to leave embarked units without escorts. Embarked units can be attacked by naval units without dealing any damage in retaliation themselves, making them easy for her to kill.

Gorgo - AI Agenda (With Your Shield Or On It)

If playing against Gorgo in the hands of an AI, she will be highly inclined towards warfare, like those that don't give up anything during a peace deal, dislike those that don't fight (or have given up items in a peace deal) and notably will try never to give up anything in a peace deal.

If you're a peaceful Civ trying to get along with Gorgo, a quick war in the ancient era (where you don't suffer any warmonger penalties) removes one barrier to friendship. If she attacks you, just try to push for a white peace (where nothing is traded in the peace deal).

If you're a warmonger, chances are you'll need to finish off Gorgo entirely to keep hold of her cities. Target her core cities first so the rest are easier to clean up later.

Note that Gorgo's war-heavy leanings means she will rarely get along with India's Gandhi if they are both present in the same map. If she shares a continent with America's Theodore Roosevelt, they are likely to have trouble getting along as well.

Pericles - Surrounded by Glory

If Pericles isn't suzerain of any city-states, he won't get his unique culture bonus. You can try competing for the same city-states by maximising your envoy gain, but perhaps an easier route is simply invading the city-states he's suzerain over.

Pericles - AI Agenda (Delian League)

Pericles won't like it much if you're trying to deny him his leader ability by competing for the same city-states. If you want to befriend him, you can just stick to city-states he doesn't care about.

Note that Pericles' desire to gain influence in city-states will put him at odds with Fredrick Barbarossa of Germany, who dislikes those who send a lot of envoys to city-states.

Hoplite

Hoplites are only stronger than Spearmen if key keep together. Keep them apart - such as through limiting their movement via Zone of Control - and they'll be easy to beat. Warriors have an intrinsic +10 strength bonus against anti-mounted units. While 5 points of strength weaker than a Hoplite next to another one, Warriors are a fair bit cheaper to build giving you a pretty equal playing field in a war of attrition.

Acropolis

If Greece can't settle a city next to a hill, they lose the powerful +2 culture bonus and have to settle for the lesser +1 adjacency bonuses from other districts. Settling cities in a manner that pushes Greece away from hill-heavy spots is a possibility, as is declaring war on them early on and chasing their Settlers away from hills with military units.

Once Greece has Acropoles set up, you can expect them to have a strong cultural output (if you're a cultural civ, there's a good chance they'll be leading in domestic tourists as a result, making them a good target for elimination). You can grab some of this culture for yourself by declaring war, getting a fast-moving unit to their Acropolis districts and pillaging them. There'll be one in practically every city, and combined with the Sack policy card (Medieval era, requires Mercenaries) you could leech quite a bit of culture from the Greeks.

Lots of Acropolis districts means lots of Archaeological Museums later on in the game. Once they have Archaeologists, deny Greece open borders so they can't steal your artefacts.

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Compilation Guides

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Individual Civ Guides

• America (Cultural/Domination)
  
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• Rome (Domination)
  
• Russia (Religious)
  
• Scythia (Domination/Religious)
  
• Spain (Domination/Religious/Scientific)
  
• Sumeria (Domination/Scientific)

[Zigzagzigal]

Changes from the 7 February Patch:

- Anti-mounted units now benefit from Agoge. This is really good for Greece, as Hoplites can be built for a much cheaper cost now!

[Zigzagzigal]

Changes from the 19 October Autumn Patch:

- The new Religious Unity belief is a source of additional envoys - particularly useful for Pericles.

[Zigzagzigal]

I think this comes about from confusing terminology within the game. "Melee units" can mean just the Warrior to Mechanised Infantry line (which I refer to as "melee infantry", it can mean both those and anti-mounted units, and it can mean anything with a melee attack.

All anti-cavalry benefit from Oligarchy, but there's no policy cards that boost production of anti-mounted. It doesn't help that generic Spearmen are a bit too weak while Pikemen are both too expensive and arrive at a dead-end technology.

[Yensil]

It's weird that hoplites benefit from Oligarchy's bonus to melee units, but not from Agoge's bonus to melee construction. Is that true of all anti-cavalry? Do any policy cards affect their production?

[Zigzagzigal]

Changes from the 27 July Summer Patch:

The Acropolis district now:

- Is 10% cheaper (like all districts)

- Is built 40% faster if you have fewer of them than the average, rather than 25% (like all districts)

- Gives you +1 envoy when you build it. This is particularly useful for Pericles, though it does now mean Greece has a strong incentive to build/capture as many cities as possible. Settlers scale up in price more harshly now, so watch out!

[ravolin]

Gorgo's Greece should also consider early war with city states (particularly if they don't have barb problems/you feel that the spawn-killing barbs is cheap). They usually have quite a few units for easy pickings and conquering the city state can give you a strong 3rd/4th city.

Also, if you're not going for a domination Gorgo, very very important to make sure your science doesn't fall behind.

[Niove]

after 45hrs in game I finally did it. GR Culture victory on DEITY. You were right ZIG and your guide helped a lot!

[Niove]

you are right. I am starting to steadily advance on the learning curve :)

[Zigzagzigal]

On Deity difficulty religious victory is arguably harder. If you can get a really strong tourism output (national parks and especially coastal resorts help, and don't forget the Computers technology) it's not too hard to win by culture. Like in Civ 5, you won't really get a strong tourism output until late in the game so it can seem hard at first.

[Niove]

great guide! I always try out the Greeks first but this time it seems that a cultural victory is one of the most difficult. Am I right or just out of practice? I play on deity.