These stats were done by economist an ESOC user, this table also excludes mirrors stats but count them.
Some remarks:
Russia is the top civ on WR% but note that it was picked a lot by Haitch, the best player by a good margin nowadays, so take this with a grain of salt.
France sucks now, no matter how you see it.
Japan is very overrated by the community, it doesnāt need a nerf, just a redesign maybe.
British. I hear rumors that it will get nerfed, but it doesnāt seem OP or even strong at the highest level.
Spain, Ports and Sweden were by far the most picked civs and all of them have good WR%, so the top players think they are the strongest civs and the data supports them. I expect a nerf for those 3.
Thatās it, what are your opinions on these data?
doesnāt really change the fact the faction has 120 military pop with full eco, a fairly strong eco, amazing skirmishers and some of the best art in the game.
only issue france has is that their anti cavalry is fairly mediocre but when you got the best combo (melee cav and anti infantry) then that doesnāt matter much.
I donāt have any opinions about the Aztecs, but judging by the pick rates(which IMO are way more important than the WR% for analysis) they are not seen as a strong civ by the top players.
But France? They are in a bad state and hopefully will get a buff, f.e on the amateur championship (which is a bit weaker) they are also one of the most picked and also has the least WR% there. This already shows a pattern.
I donāt think there will be many arguments against the nerf of Sweden, Ports and Spanish. They are almost universally thought to be too strong.
It really is possible to gauge OP civs, but you need to combine win rate and pick rate.
e.g.
Russia has high win rate and low pick rate ā niche civ, very good against specific encounters but not really a general purpose civ.Not OP, not UP, but might need a redistribution of power between its units to achieve balanced state. Thereās already lots of suggestions about that.
ports, spain and sweden: high pick rate high win rate => slightly OP but not by a large margin. Small adjustments can bring them inline.
all others: in need of buffs.
China, Japan, German, British, Inca, Lakota and French can be considered UP.
As mentioned in other posts here and on ESOC, these statistics are useless without context.
The format of the tournament skews these results so that they canāt be taken at face value. The first game in the series is predetermined by the players as a fair match-up. After that, the winner can no longer play that civ for the series and has to pick first. The other player gets to counter pick. This repeats after every game: winner can no longer play that civ, winner picks civ first in the next game, loser gets to counter pick.
Since we do not know what the win % is compared to whether the civ was picked first or if it was a counter pick, we canāt really determine anything from win rates. Civs in this game can hard counter other civs in 1vs1.
For specifically French: a LOT of pro players have this civ as a comfort civ. They probably locked in this civ first and then their opponent counter picked them with a custom strategy. Going just based on win percentage really isnāt useful here.
Based on the dataset, the pick rate is probably the most interesting. It (probably) indicates which civs the top players think will bring them the best success.
āThere are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.ā - Mark Twain
the pick and pick rate % do not add up, probably on the account of mirrors. please add mirrors to the pick column for a more clear view, mirrors should only be left out of win rate statistics.
Based on the dataset, the pick rate is probably the most interesting
Yeah, thatās what I said 2 replies above yours.
But, as I said before, I donāt agree with your France assessment> OFC if it was only those stats it wouldnāt mean much, but France was the most picked on the Amateur League too and also had the worst WR% there(around 30%).
@newaoeiiiai The mirror stats are on the table, itās the last column.
I know. but they should also be added to the pick column too. as it is it can be misleading.
currently the pick columns shows that swedes were picked by players just 47 times compared to the Portuguese 52, when in reality Sweden was chosen by players 65 times compared to 64 times for the Portuguese.
You made a lot of claims in the first post that seemed to use the statistics as evidence. I am saying that the tournament statistics are not sufficient evidence. France may indeed need a boost, but youāre using statistics that conveniently leave out information. The amateur league has the same rules and should also come with massive disclaimers. If youād like to go through and spend the hours needed to determine what was a first pick and what was a counter pick, then I think you can use win rate as a reasonable statistic.
You did mention pick rates being more importantā¦ in a buried reply that is in response to Aztecs. In my opinion, that isnāt sufficient. Only people you responded to/people keeping an eye out for Aztecs will see that comment.
I think most people will come in here, look at the win rates, and then use that to further whatever preconceptions they already had. Iām just pointing out that is dangerous to interpret this data the way it is presented.
No matter how you twist it, France is UP.
Even if it were a comfort pick (it isnāt, given the low pick rate), the fact that it won only 27% of the picks means it really needs help against it counter picks, cause a 27% win rate is essentially something you get when you are extremely hard countered.
A decently balanced civ has between 45-55% win rate, with 55% being borderline OP and 45% borderline UP.
Also, spain ports and swedes had the most mirrors - these are comfort picks. Pros donāt comfort pick weak civs.
This could be true. Iām not arguing that France is not UP.
Then this is an invitation to go look at the French games themselves. High level statistics like this are not evidence. It is an invitation to dive into the WHY something is happening. I can easily see a lot of matches going Sweden vs Sweden, Port vs Sweden, Port vs Port, France vs Port/Spain. The draft system also matters. Not everyone could draft all 3 of the (commonly referred to as) OP civs.
Another thing with these statistics are how competitive were the games? Iām not sure on the seeding, but the group stage could have had Haitch and the lowest seeded pro playing eachother. Should these games count in this statistic? Those wins are most likely attributed to skill and not civ balance.
Or looking at games over time. Are a lot of France losses early in the tournament before some of the OP strats came out? You may think all the players came in prepared against all the crazy stuff. If that is the case, I encourage you to watch the Kaiserklein vs Don Artie match. Kaiser clearly wasnāt prepped for Spain Logistician water play.
Very much disagree.
Tournament setting: as explained above these summary statistics arenāt representative of reality. They might be, but they arenāt guarnteed to be
Ladder setting: With the ELO system, everyone will have a 50% win rate. You keep rising until you stop winning and balance out there. This is balanced on skill not civ balance.
French is the most recommended civ to start with. Most of the pro players also played on TAD and EP where French was very very common. Spain was seen as weak (and even hyped people up when seeing it since it was rare in tournaments. SPAIN TRAIN), and Port was seen as just a water civ. I can easily see the Kaisers of the world defaulting to French as a first pick. Those group of people even occasionally have a sort of gentlemanās agreement to not play āLameā civs.
These summary statistics are interesting. They point in which way we should start further digging into the data. Taking them at face value at a high level is reckless. Making statements based on just the table isnāt accurate. If you want to make a case for French being UP, go to ESOC and get the data on a significant number of French games. Figure out what was the first pick. Figure out how good French is on the map. Then you can come back and say something like āFrench were chosen as a counter pick in 15 games. Despite being seen as a counter and on a favorable map, they only won 45% of the games. When first picked they won 30%. The probably need a boost to be competitiveā
For the record. It looks like in the actual Pro Division tournament (Round of 16) French were only played once: Mitoe in a first round game (no counter-picking) on Saguenay playing against Perez using the Chinese. He lost.
The sample size is too small to mandate a buff based on win rate. But it does call into consideration that French were basically not used in the Pro Division. This alone isnāt enough to mandate a buff, but rather to put a red flag to look at French closer.
Iād invite other people to look into French and gather data.
Nice to see the stats, means absolutely nothing in general though due to the counter-pick format of the tournament and only being able to use a civ once.
Not surprised france is low, just a good all round civ not sure they directly counter any civ.
I agree with the pick rates that show spain/port/swe as the strongest civs, still I think they were picked a lot more just because spain/ports are the go to on water maps for basically every player. Sweden definitely needs a nerf though, hopefully itās coming soon.
Yes, but from the highest winrate stated by dev to second low pickrate and winrate.
French also got nerfed many times but still have average pickrate but lowest winrate.
I would consider these 2 civs are balance victim after DE.