These guides are designed to help players who are new to Civ but still interested in Vox Populi, familiar with Civ but new to Vox Populi, or even those well versed in Vox Populi who just want to see if there's anything they didn't know about a particular civilization. I am actually a big fan of Zigzagzigal's Civ guide series, and it really helped me learn a lot about the game, and I wanted to bring a similar experience for fans of the Vox Populi or Community Balance Patch modpack. For those interested in the modpack it can be downloaded here[forums.civfanatics.com]

Anyways, without further ado, onto the Moroccans!

Before I go into depth with this guide, here's an explanation of some terminology I'll be using throughout for the sake of newer players.

Beelining - Focusing on obtaining a technology early by only researching technologies needed to research it and no others. For example, to beeline Bronze Working, you'd research Mining and Bronze Working and nothing else until Bronze Working was finished.
Finisher - The bonus for completing a Social Policy tree (e.g. +33% Great Scientist rate and +25% growth in all cities from rationalism.)
GWAM - Great Writers, Artists and Musicians. These are the three types of Great People who can make Great Works, a major source of tourism for cultural Civs.
Opener - The bonus for unlocking a Social Policy tree (e.g. +25% Great Person Rate and +100% construction of guilds in Artistry)
Tall Empire - A low number of cities with a high population each.
UA - Unique Ability - the unique thing a Civilization has which doesn't need to be built.
UB - Unique Building - A replacement for a normal building that can only be built and used by one Civilization.
UI - Unique Improvement - A tile improvement that can be made by workers that doesn't replace any other improvement that can only be made by a single civilization
UU - Unique Unit - A replacement for a normal unit that can only be built by one Civilization or provided by militaristic City-States when allied.
Uniques - Collective name for Unique Abilities, Units, Buildings, Tile Improvements and Great People
Wide Empire - A high number of cities with a low population each.
XP - Experience Points - Get enough and you'll level up your unit, giving you the ability to heal your unit or get a promotion.

Morocco has a desert start bias. This may be one of the worst start bias in Vox Populi as Morocco has no specific desert bonuses, but a lot of their bonuses will help mitigate the downsides, plus Petra is always a useful option that a desert start will leave you in prime position for


+1 to all Yields in your Capital per unique Trade Route partner, scaling with Era.

Trade Route Yields to or from Moroccan Cities are not affected by distance.

Can plunder Trade Units connected to unowned Cities without needing to declare war.



A mounted ranged unit



Positive One-Off Changes

• Higher combat strength (34 instead of 33)
  
• Higher ranged strength (42 instead of 41)
  
• Obsoletes at Mobile Tactics rather than Ballistics

Positive Stay on Upgrade Changes

• 25% combat bonus in friendly territory (Homeland Guardian)
  
• Ignores terrain cost

*This bonus can theoretically stack from multiple kasbahs, although it's only possible to have two kasbahs affecting a single coast tile
**This bonus can stack from multiple kasbahs, but it also stacks with the +2 to fishing boats, meaning a kasbah actually gives +2 +1 to adjacent fishing boats

These scores are merely my personal opinions from playing and examining this Civ, you may find other uses for the Moroccan uniques that make you disagree with a certain ranking


Morocco has no bonuses towards a domination victory, and is actively discouraged from doing so due to needing as much variety in their trade partners as possible. However they do have a strong defense due to their UU and UI
A culture victory is Morocco's best route, as their Kasbahs and UA give solid culture, the Kasbah culture in particular can easily be converted into tourism with hotels, airports and stadiums.
Morocco also lacks any bonuses towards science, however they arguably have the potential to have the biggest capital out of any civ due to their UA, but that growth doesn't translate to your other cities, in fact your other cities will suffer as you most likely won't be using internal trade routes
Diplomacy is a solid second choice for Morocco, although none of their bonuses strictly speaking help you in this regard. Their UA doesn't actually give you a lot money, nor does it help much in diplomacy, however your incentive to trade with lots of partners, especially lots of city states, means that bonuses from statecraft and freedom are very natural for you to use, and you will be earning more gold as you will be sending more ITRs much earlier in the game.
Morocco actually has decent potential for a religion as their UA does give faith, but it isn't quite as strong as other civs who specialize in early faith generation. Still, it could be a leg up against civilizations with no faith/religion bonuses.

Above: It may seem a small bonus just looking at one yield, but this applies to every yield, making it a decent boost to your capital's efficiency.

The Moroccan UA is a 3 parter, but I'd say two of them are fairly minor, although they certainly have their uses. The meat of the UA comes in the +1 to all yields in your capital per ITR. This increases to +2 in the medieval era and +1 every era after that, to an eventual +7 in the information era


Above: Late game with 19 different trade partners. (This is a standard map) Life is good in Marrakech.

This bonus is probably most impactful in the mid-game around the renaissance and industrial era, when you've finally discovered every civ, most if not all of the city states, and your sea trade routes finally get some range and deep sea travel, but it is still impactful in the early game, and even in the end game. Your capital will most likely be the strongest on the map in just about every way, and no matter what you wanna use it for, Wonders, gold, units, etc. it will excel at any task given.

In order to maximize this bonus, you need to make sure you are trading with as many different civs as possible. Each city state also counts as a different partner, so the goal should first be to trade with every city state you can, as a civ sending a trade route to one of your cities will give you the bonus from your UA, so make sure once you are trading with every possible city state to check who's trading with you before you start trading with other civs.

Normally when sending trade routes you always go with whatever will give the most money, but that's not as much of an option with Morocco. However that's where the second part of their UA comes into play


Above: Note how every city above Orleans has very similar gold received. All those below it are simply that low because I'm not allied to them

The second part of the UA is that distance does not effect the amount of gold generated by trade routes. There are several things that can change how much gold a trade route normally generates, including

• Buildings
  
• Resource Diversity
  
• Whether it's a sea route or a land route
  
• The amount of gold each city produces
  
• Distance

Morocco however, takes distance out of the equation meaning that trade, mainly with city states, is much more consistent. Overall, while this doesn't have a huge effect on how much money you are making, you will still most likely be making more money considering you aren't going for optimal trade routes.


Be a shame if someone not associated with Morocco in any way whatsoever plundered this poor defenseless Japanese cargo ship...

Definitely wasn't me, can't declare war about it sorry

The last part of the UA allows you to plunder any trade route that isn't being sent to one of your own cities without declaring or being at war. It definitely can have a decent effect on an enemies economy, especially if you can stake out a ship or two near a major city, you can build up a bit of pocket change while being a nuisance that the enemy can't really do a ton about. Against the AI it will make the receiver of the trade route upset with you but actually has no effect on your relation with the trade route owner. It's not something I would go too crazy with, as you would prefer not to bring war upon you as that's a trade partner lost, possibly more if they have city state allies, but it can be a fun thing to do if you spot the odd ship or even caravan roaming about.

The Moroccan UA may be powerful, but it's the Kasbah that forms the core of the Moroccan victory route. You will most likely want to beeline Chivalry as soon as you get your worker techs. Pick up Writing and Philosophy first to increase your science on the way.



The Kasbah is one of the most interesting UIs in terms of its placement requirements. Instead of being locked by terrain, or not being able to be placed next to each other, the Kasbah has to be placed next to a city. This means that at most you can have 6 Kasbah per city, less if the city is coastal. However, the Kasbah has several abilities that make it so you don't have to design your city placement solely around them. First in order to address the coastal problem, Kasbahs give culture to adjacent sea tiles, and gold if there's a fishing boat. You also don't have to worry about settling next to resources either, as the Kasbah will add them to your trade network as if you had built the normal improvement required to get them, similar to a great person building. I'd personally say you should still avoid settling next to resources simply because the tile with the resource would likely have had a great yield with a normal improvement, so having featureless Kasbah tiles are still going to have about the same yields as if it was on a resource, but if trying to settle this way reduces the amount of resources the city would have total, don't worry about some slight yield drops, if anything it is increasing the efficiency of each individual citizen.

The most important part of the Kasbah though, is the amount of culture it generates



Comparing a Kasbah to the French Chateau, a fairly similar unique given they both arrive on Chivalry, both give defensive bonuses, and both give large amounts of culture, a fully upgraded chateau will give slightly more culture, as well as more gold and food, at the cost of no production and arguably stricter placement requirements. The Kasbah does also give culture to adjacent sea tiles, but unless you settle one tile inland (in which case the sea tiles will still be largely useless given the lack of buildings that increase sea tile yields) this will not make up for the lack of a Kasbah or two in terms of lost culture. In general, consider the Kasbah a slightly worse, but slightly easier to place version of the chateau


One of these things is not like the other...

Assuming that on average each Moroccan city can build 5 Kasbahs, with one coastal tile preventing the final placement. That's a total of 22 culture after radio(4 per Kasbah and 2 on the coastal tile), meaning around 16 guaranteed tourism per city, assuming you have a hotel, airport and stadium. This may not sound like a massive amount, but consider that's 4 standard theming bonuses, so actually yes, it is a fairly large amount. This along with the mass of Moroccan trade routes to every civ, means your tourism can snowball in the late game.

Say you're playing a game against Morocco, it's the industrial era, and oh, you realize their capital is looking like a juicy target, and you really wanna rock those Kasbahs. What could possibly stop you from invading, the defense bonus of the kasbah is only gonna help so much after all right? Enter the Berber Cavalry.


Berber Cavalry may not benefit from the defensive bonus of the Kasbah but that's not gonna stop me from putting them there anyways

Berber Cavalry are easily some of the strongest defensive units in the game, with higher strength then a normal cavalry, ignoring rough terrain cost, and even having a combat boost in your land, pretty much nothing in the industrial era will be able to beat it.


Above: Combine Berber Cavalry with the Himeji Castle for a cool +40% bonus.

Berber Cavalry do lose most of their strength outside of your own lands. While they might do the job of cavalry a bit better due to higher base strength and ignoring terrain costs, they certainly aren't strong enough to justify throwing the diplomatic game out the window for an era or two. Note that the homeland guardian bonus is determined by where the Berber Cavalry is, not where their target is.

In conclusion, make sure you keep around a good detachment of Berber Cavalry to deter attackers. One thing to note is that they won't help you much against naval units, so if you are worried about a naval assault you will most likely still need to build up a decent navy.

• Homeland Guardian (+25% strength in friendly territory)
  
• Ignore Terrain Penalties

Start with Tradition as your UA will beef up your capital, might as well keep stacking on that bonus. Statecraft might seem an odd one for a cultural civ, but this will help improve the trade routes you are sending to city states, so choose that second. Finish with Industry to further increase trade route potential.


Opener: The extra population will make sure that once you can build trade units you'll likely have higher production to get it out faster.

Justice: The early production will help with your first caravan, as well as any early wonders you want to build

Sovereignty: Border expansion is nice, plus this is some artist generation for early tourism

Ceremony: The extra science will help clear up any remaining worker techs and give a boost towards sailing for cargo ships

Splendor: I always recommend going Splendor before Majesty because Splendor can give a good amount of culture, getting you to finishing tradition quicker.

Majesty: Considering your capital is going to be very large, and likely have a lot of specialists, this ensures your growth isn't stumped.

Finisher: Get a bit more use out of your great person improvements! Plus hey, a stronger capital never hurt yeah? Have a throne room!


Opener: Small bit of gold and a few extra yields in the capital can't hurt

Trade Confederacy: This is the main reason I wanted to go Statecraft, better trade route yields, and some influence with all the city states you are trading with.

Foreign Service: Helps give a more traditional boost to gaining city state allies if you want to go the diplomatic route. Extra spies are a nice addition as well

Shadow Networks: A big boost to science, especially if you go the diplomacy route and get as many city states as possible

Consulates: At this point you are still probably almost exclusively trading with city states, so being able to generate tourism from that is a nice boost.

Exchange Markets: An extra trade route, bonus tourism modifiers from having trade routes with other civs, possible monopolies, a fantastic boost, especially for Morocco

Finisher: Less policies required for wonders might not come in great use as you have strong culture for someone going down statecraft, but if you do play the diplomacy game the extra yields every vote is nice


Opener: Two free trade routes for 2 new partners.

Free Trade: Extra gold from ITRs is always a good thing

Division of Labor: Seaports and Train Stations are normally expensive buildings, but now they are in line with other buildings. Also a large boost to your production and gold outputs

Entrepreneurship: Gold and production, the industry tree knows what it wants, and you do too.

Mercantilism: A good bit of extra science and culture. Who ever said Industry was just gold and production? Wait a minute...

Protectionism: More food and science, and your gold goes farther, that's very nice

Finisher: Morocco is likely to have a lot of specialists in the capital at least, so this is a great boost.

Freedom is best for Morocco due to it's focus on trade routes.
Note that civs going for a cultural victory need to have two level 3 tenets in order to build the Citizen Earth Protocol and win the game, if you are going for a diplomatic victory you might need/want less of these policies


Economic Union: 2 trade routes, 2 more opportunities for a unique partner.

Civil Society: Adding extra food to all your Kasbahs is a good idea, as well as on a lot of other improvements

Avant Garde(Culture): You'll soon be making the final tourism push, you'll want to squeeze out as many GWAMs as you can. Still useful for diplomacy for the extra great diplomats plus potentially fulfilling a city state quest

Creative Expression(Culture): Make your great works work as hard as your Kasbahs towards tourism

Covert Action(Diplomacy): Makes your spies better at getting those tricky city states your diplomatic rivals don't want to give up.


Universal Healthcare: A free hospital in every city, possibly before you even have biology researched, is amazing.

Transnationalism(Culture): Corporate franchises actually increase Tourism towards the civ you found them in, so getting a few extra will help

Arsenal of Democracy(Diplomacy): Get a bit more out of your great people with extra influence whenever you use them.

Capitalism(Culture): Will help with the large amounts of specialists you likely have


Treaty Organization: Again increasing the benefits of trading with city states. Integral to a diplomatic game but still useful in a cultural one

Media Culture(Culture): This will push your Tourism over the edge and you should be able to convert even high culture civs, at least with a musician or two to back you up.

Petra: An extra trade route this early really allows your UA to flourish, with your start bias it should be easy to pick up


Colossus: Same concept as Petra, although you might not be in as great of a position to get it if you didn't start coastal. Generally has less competition though, so you should be able to grow a second city enough to build it if your capital isn't coastal

Great Library: A free tech is incredibly useful, and will go a long ways towards getting to Chivalry

Oracle: Similarly to the Great Library, a large amount of science will help getting to Kasbahs, the culture is a nice plus too

Roman Forum(Diplomatic): A free great diplomat plus slightly better diplomatic units will help a lot, but this is a highly contested wonder


University of Sankore(Tradition only): A bit of extra science every now and again is nice, plus it won't have a lot of competition


Globe Theatre(Culture): A great start to getting tourism going through non-Kasbah sources

Himeji Castle: This will stack with your Berber Cavalry's bonus to make them truly unstoppable defenders

Leaning Tower of Pisa: Take a GWAM if you're going culture, or a Great Diplomat if you're going diplomacy

Sistine Chapel: Better for a culture victory, but the extra culture across the empire can still help get crucial policies for diplomacy sooner

Summer Palace(Diplomacy): A necessary wonder for any diplomatic game, allowing diplomatic units to get to any city state regardless of what hostile neighbors borders are in the way

Uffizi(Culture): Lots of tourism and culture


Palace of Westminster(Statecraft only): An amazing wonder for a diplomatic victory, but if you took statecraft anyways, even a cultural civ can pass beneficial proposals and prevent detrimental ones, plus you're taking it away from someone else who could use it to win

Soho Foundry: Give one of your cities a big production boost, perhaps one that isn't your capital so two cities can be well equipped to build wonders?


Broadway(Industry Only)(Culture): Again lots of culture and tourism. Unlike Palace of Westminster there isn't much reason to build this if you aren't going for the victory type that suits it, save to take it from a rival

Cristo Redentor(Culture): Lots of base tourism and the potential for more from hotels. Integral to any culture game

Empire State Building: Free great person plus some extra income

Statue of Liberty(Freedom Only): A good amount of production plus a free policy


Cern: Two Free Techs and +100 influence with all city states. Incredible regardless of victory type, but especially good for the diplomatic route

CN Tower(Culture): Either will help finally break the last stubborn civ who won't succumb to your tourism, or just speed up the last bit you need to get on everyone who's already beginning to fall

Great Firewall(Culture): Important to get as any other civ who gets this will prove a massive roadblock to a cultural win

Hubble Space Telescope: Similar to CERN, you can't go wrong with 2 great scientists, which almost equates to 2 free techs

Sydney Opera House(Culture): Few extra great work slots, plus a free policy to finish out your freedom policies, or even maybe start investing into artistry to get a small boost

Morocco on the surface doesn't have the most obvious path to victory, so between that, and the things you need to do to get the most of your uniques, mistakes are bound to happen.


Unless you are trading with every civ and city state in the game already, sending multiple trade routes to 1 civ is a waste of yields


Similar to the last note, a trade route not sent to a unique civ is a waste of yields for Morocco


Morocco's UA implies that Morocco is a tall civ, however that really isn't the case. Their capital will be very large, yes, however, Kasbahs are what is going to most likely win Morocco the game. So the more cities Morocco has, the more Kasbahs they can build, which means they get more tourism.


Pretty much the only reason Morocco should declare an offensive war is to stop someone from winning, or maybe to liberate a city state or two. Otherwise, a war means angry people, and less trade routes


Berber Cavalry are very powerful defensive units, and should be the only land defense you will need. However, they come fairly late, all you have before that is Kasbahs, and while they help somewhat, they can't defend you on their own, and even Kasbahs take a bit to get up. You'll want to make sure you have a good defensive force until Berber Cavalry can protect you.


With their focus on trade, Morocco will want at least one major coastal city to make sure they can get trade routes to everyone, however, a coastal city means 1 or more spots you can't put a Kasbah down. While they give some culture on the coastal tile to make up for it, it is still lost yields. Try to put cities inland if at all possible, especially if putting them on the coast doesn't yield any luxury resources

Morocco is one of the hardest civs to fight in the late game, but lack early defenses, and can often be beat to a cultural or diplomatic victory by more specialized civs.


Morocco is heavily reliant on trade routes, but also rely on a strong capital, not as much as a civ like Venice, but this is still an exploitable weakness. They will likely try to send as many trade routes from their capital as they can as it will make the most money, so stake out some ships, and when you see a few trade routes declare war. If you are a diplomatic player yourself, get enough city state allies and declare war on them, denying them several unique partners. Embargoing city states is also an option, but be wary that you yourself aren't relying on them either. Make sure to keep an eye on your own trade routes passing near Moroccan territory, they could disrupt your trade network as much as you want to disrupt theirs.


Even though Morocco is likely to have a very strong capital, they still might tend to go somewhat wide to try and get the most out of their Kasbahs, as how many they can build is limited by how many cities they can found. If Morocco is your neighbor, forward settle, prevent them from getting as much land as possible. If you are trying to fight Morocco when they have Kasbahs but before Berber Cavalry, try to rush in mounted units of your own to prevent them from using the defensive bonuses. Make sure to pillage them too as they will damage your units just from standing near them. The goal is to first surround a city, take out the Kasbahs, then deal with the units.


The best advice to beating Berber Cavalry is to kill Morocco before they even become a factor, but if you do end up having to fight them, attempt to lure them outside of their lands, they're only moderately stronger then regular cavalry without homeland guardian, so it shouldn't be too hard to take them out with ranged units or even a few melee units. Naval units are also a great option if they have several coastal cities, you may not be able to do much to the Berber Cavalry, but neither can they.


Early-Game Warmongers: Morocco should be a fairly easy target, no issue for you.

Mid-Game Warmongers: Rush to take out the Kasbah tiles as fast as you can and Morocco shouldn't be too big an issue. Try to pillage their trade routes if you can. Don't let them get to Berber Cavalry.

Late-Game Warmongers: Try to lure them outside of their own lands, or wait for air units and nukes. Morocco is a strong defender and will be hard to take out on land without overwhelming numbers.

Scientific Players: Morocco should prove little competition in this front. Maybe use your technological advantage to steal any important cultural or diplomatic wonders if you can afford too.

Diplomatic Players: Most diplomatic players should have an advantage over Morocco, as you will most likely have Statecraft bonuses, putting you in a mostly even playing field excluding any uniques you have. Morocco could prove troublesome in raiding your own trade routes however, so try to bribe someone to attack Morocco if it's possible to keep them from being a nuisance, or even declare war yourself and just harass their trade network.

Cultural Players: Morocco has a strong capital, but not the raw production bonuses of certain cultural civs. They have a great unique improvement for culture, but it isn't the absolute best in that regard, and they'll struggle to generate tourism in other ways. The best bet for a cultural player is to try and outproduce them and make sure they cannot grab essential culture wonders they need to complete their victory. Kasbahs are great but they can't win the game on their own.

These guide cover every civ in the game, and can be used as a quick reference

• Civ Summaries

• America (Domination/Science/Culture)
  
• Arabia (Culture/Science)
  
• Assyria (Science/Domination)
  
• Austria (Diplomacy/Culture)
  
• The Aztecs (Domination/Science)
  
• Babylon (Science)
  
• Brazil (Culture)
  
• Byzantium (All)
  
• Carthage (Domination/Diplomacy)
  
• The Celts (Domination/Culture/Science)
  
• China (Domination/Culture)
  
• Denmark (Domination)
  
• Egypt (Culture)
  
• England (Domination/Diplomacy)
  
• Ethiopia (Science)
  
• France (Domination/Culture)
  
• Germany (Diplomacy/Science)
  
• Greece (Domination/Diplomacy/Culture)
  
• The Huns (Domination)
  
• The Inca (Science/Domination)
  
• India (Science/Culture)
  
• Indonesia (Domination/Culture/Science)
  
• The Iroquois (Domination)
  
• Japan (Domination/Culture)
  
• Korea (Science/Domination)
  
• The Maya (Science/Domination)
  
• Mongolia (Domination)
  
• The Netherlands (Diplomacy/Domination)
  
• The Ottomans (Domination/Science)
  
• Persia(Domination/Culture)
  
• Poland (Domination)
  
• Polynesia (Culture)
  
• Portugal (Science/Diplomacy)
  
• Rome (Domination/Science)
  
• Russia (Science/Domination)
  
• The Shoshone (Domination/Science/Culture)
  
• Siam (Diplomacy/Science/Culture)
  
• Songhai (Domination)
  
• Spain (Domination/Culture)
  
• Sweden (Domination)
  
• Venice (Diplomacy/Culture/Domination)
  
• The Zulus (Domination)