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 Spanish!

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.

Spain has a coastal start bias. Their UA ability to faith purchase naval units benefits greatly from this


Gaining tiles generates & scaling with era

Inquisitors are stronger, unlock earlier, and you gain a free inquisitor when you conquer a city

May purchase naval units with




A mounted melee unit



Positive One-Off Changes

• Higher combat strength (26 instead of 24)
  
• Extra Sight(2)
  
• Can Found an Overseas City
  
• Has no penalty attacking cities(as opposed to the normal 33% penalty)
  
• Obsoletes at Combustion rather than Metallurgy

Positive Stay on Upgrade Changes

• Embarkation with Defense

*The tooltip for the Hacienda says this is border growth, but it is in fact culture


First Hacienda I built, gives +2 culture because it is next to the city. This isn't a ui glitch as far as I'm aware either, as I did out the math in the city for "culture from terrain" and it checked out with Hacienda culture, and forts properly show a bonus to border growth, so it is either a typo for it being border growth or a mistake in giving it culture

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


Spain's best victory route is Domination. The UU is great at conquering cities or just getting a foothold onto other continents, and the UA allows you to build a strong navy. Spains strong faith generation can be leveraged well into domination with the right beliefs
Haciendas give decent culture, and with the right beliefs can make Spain a decent culture civ
Haciendas also give a solid amount of food and production in the mid game
The Spanish UA and UI gives them a lot of gold, although they don't really have the diplomatic bonuses to leverage it into
Spain has a very strong religion, likely founding a pantheon before anyone except India, and being able to have strong faith generation even in the mid and potentially late game.

Spains UA kicks off the moment you found your first city, giving a little less then half a pantheon worth of faith, and a solid amount of gold, enough to either soon be able to invest in a building, or potentially to buy a unit earlier then normal. Initially you might be confused as to why you gain the gold and faith when founding a city, but when you found a city you are gaining 7 tiles no? When you gain a tile either naturally or when buying it, you get 10 gold and 4 faith, which doubles in the medieval era, and increases by 10 gold and 4 faith every era after, to a max of 70 and 28 respectively in the information era. This makes Spain very easily able to found a pantheon and even a religion with minimal to even no investment in religious buildings or even a strong faith generating pantheon


Shame Ethiopia didn't found a religion, which is kinda amazing, they are Ethiopia

Yes you do unlock Inquisitors immediately upon founding a religion instead of after enhancing, and yes they are stronger, but the really important part of inquisitors for Spain is that upon conquering a city you get a free inquisitor in the city. This means that you can easily convert conquered cities without having to invest any faith in doing so. They even still spawn on reconquered cities too, not just the first time, so in certain situations you can find yourself with a glutton of inquisitors.


We sail, FOR THE BOAT MORMONS!

Let's say you were a bit late to founding a religion, and all the good beliefs got taken, and now you don't really know what to do with your overabundance of faith. Or even if you get beliefs, sometimes you just don't know where to put your faith. With Spain, you can spend it on your navy. It still probably isn't worth it to build many triremes and dromons since you probably do have other things to spend faith on at that point, but once caravels, and especially when frigates/corvettes come around, you can rapidly build a large navy. Because of this ability, I actually wouldn't recommend picking up Zealotry for Spain, as even though they have good faith generation, it won't be that useful split between ships and land units. Use the faith for ships, and build the land units normally.

Your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to conquer a city with El Dorado in it with a Conquistador. You know, for history

The Conquistador is a really interesting unit, as you want it as much for it's military bonuses, as you do for it's utility. Knights are probably the best unit for combat in the medieval era, but they are a bit weak to cities. Conquistadors don't have this problem, and can attack cities as effectively as melee units. But conquering cities isn't the only thing Conquistadors can do. Unlike any other military unit...



They can found cities too! They actually found cities at the level of a pioneer, a unit that doesn't arrive until the renaissance, at a tech that is a bit out of the way for most civs, including Spain. This means Conquistador cities start with 3 population, and several buildings, including a castle, unlike a Pioneer. Conquistadors also don't cost population or stall growth while being built, unlike settler units. There is one catch to this however. Conquistadors can't found a city on the same continent as the capital. A continent in Civ V merely means that it isn't connected by land, so even an island separated by one tile of water counts. The early Spanish game should be focused on settling all the land around your capital, and then the mid-game Spain focuses on settling everywhere else with Conquistadors. Make sure to get Astronomy ASAP so Conquistadors can actually get to far away lands.

The last important thing to note about Conquistadors is their +2 sight. This makes them good as scouts to find a city spot to settle, as well as a spotter for siege units. Even when they become obsolete, keeping one around for the sight is good, as they don't retain it upon upgrade.

Embarkation with Defense

Conquistadors are fantastic units in their time, and even when militarily obsolete hold great utility, but it is important to note that once you can't build them anymore, you don't retain much benefit in your upgraded mounted units.

Spain has great incentive to grab land, through tile expansion, settling and conquering. However, what exactly is that land doing for you once you get it? Enter the Hacienda



The Hacienda is a pretty weird improvement for civ v. It seemingly has pretty weak and unspecialized yields. However, it uses a mechanic rarely if ever seen in civ v to give it a big boost. Adjacency. When adjacent to resources or a city, it gets a bonus to it's yields based on the type of resource. This can make Haciendas decent culture, food, production or gold tiles, or maybe all of them at once if the resource placement gods are kind. In a completely ideal highly unlikely scenario you could get a Hacienda that gives +21 yields (+3 base, +4 from tech, and +14 from adjacency, as you can found a city on a resource) which is completely insane. This is pretty unlikely though, the highest Hacienda I got had +10 from adjacency, and that was just one. I would personally say that a Hacienda spot is probably worth it if it can get 2 adjacency bonuses. In worse locations not only are you potentially blocking other better Hacienda spots, a normal tile improvement would probably be better there anyways.

Spain should start with the standard domination path of Authority followed by Fealty. If they wish to continue dominating then finishing with Imperialism makes sense, however if you want to go for a culture game, switching to Industry makes more sense


Opener: Little bit of production to help early unit and building construction, plus easier barbarians and some culture out of them and any other units you kill to boot

Tribute: Some extra yields when gaining tiles and bullying city states, both nice to have.

Imperium: You'll want to be founding and conquering as many cities as possible, as early as possible, so having the free settler and some extra yields on top of what you already get is fantastic

Dominance: Get some science out of your kills too, plus the healing will allow your units to stand a bit of a chance at surviving a followup attack after defeating another unit

Discipline: Spain has a solid economy but they are really going to struggle with happiness, so this will help at least a little with that

Honor: A free unit every once and a while plus some extra unit strength is great to see.

Finisher: If you need some units in a pinch or just like their promotions, now you can get Free Companies, Foreign Legions, and Mercenaries as long as you've got the tech for it.


Opener: Monasteries are a solid building, and with Spain's great faith generation they should be able to build them everywhere, even in a massive empire.

Nobility: Castles are great, and now they are just a tad better. The cheaper armories is a nice bonus too.

Organized Religion: You got a lot of things to buy with faith, so any extra helps

Divine Right: Reduces unhappiness by a very large amount, plus if you actually manage to keep your happiness up for any length of time, enjoy a nice bit of culture

Serfdom: You're bound to have plenty of pastures somewhere at this point, so make them better.

Burghers: You're going to be conquering lots of resources and getting plenty of We Love the King Days, so get some production out of them.

Finisher: You should always be able to have these extra yields, so enjoy them.


Opener: 2 trade routes have a lot of impact, allowing more religious and tourism pressure

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

Mercantilism: A large boost to your culture and science outputs. If there was something for food and faith and you'd have everything you could ever want.

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

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

Protectionism: More food and science both things you don't do great, so they're both welcome

Finisher: You'll have at least a few specialists, so extra production and gold from them is a good thing


Opener: Spain has a very large navy but there isn't much special about it. This makes them a little more special

Colonialism: You'll have lots of monopolies by now, get some more use out of them.

Regimental Tradition: Faster Great General and Admiral generation, as well as making them stronger, good to have on the land or on the sea

Martial Law: You'll definitely have plenty of puppet cities, and conquered ones too. Both of them will be less of a burden now.

Exploitation: A good bit of yields across the empire.

Civilizing Mission: Gold from conquering cities, and production in said conquered cities, everything you need to push the front line.

Finisher: A stronger navy, and a new way to use air units to help manage unhappiness.

Spain should go Autocracy if they plan for domination, however I believe Order serves them better for culture


Peace, Land, Bread: If you've been doing lots of conquering, both poverty and building maintenance are probably a big drain, so this helps both problems and gives some growth

Hero of the People: More Great Works is always good to see.

Communism: There are some crucial late game culture wonders, and you wouldn't want to miss them, this will help secure them.

Worker's Faculties: Free Factories is a nice boost, plus they'll now give some extra science


Five Year Plan Your Haciendas just ain't cutting it? Well now they most certainly do

Cultural Revolution: Should prove a massive boost to your tourism, especially if lots of people went order

Dictatorship of the Proletariat: If you can get your happiness up, this is the bonus that will win you a culture victory


Spaceflight Pioneers: Better engineers to secure the last wonders.

Great Leap Forward: Good to clean up the last of the tech tree.


Elite Forces: Need some new units? They're better. Have lots of old units? They upgrade faster

Military-Industrial Complex: Cheaper unit upgrades are nice for those last expensive, bulk upgrades, and hey, why not throw some science on Haciendas

New World Order: The Spanish need every bonus they can get to reduce unhappiness, and this is a big one


Commerce Raiders: A little bit of production is nice, but you mainly want this for the better ships, the extra resources is decent if you are keeping up city state allies too.

Lightning Warfare: Great bonuses to a wide variety of units. Should give your army a big boost


Air Supremacy: Free Airports in every city means that you almost don't need a navy as long as you have a city on every continent, which you almost certainly will as Spain. Also makes air units quicker to build if you need to.

Pyramids: Every settler counts for Spain.

Statue of Zeus: Conquistador's may be better then most mounted units at fighting cities, but they could still use some help


Angkor Wat: Pretty high priority wonder for Spain, will massively increase your gold and faith output

Great Lighthouse: You'll have a large navy soon enough, so making them better is a great idea.

Terracotta Army: You'll be killing lots of units, so some extra culture on top of Authority's is welcome


Alhambra(Authority Only): Add another promotion to the newly built unit pile

Karlstejn: The earlier you can get a reformation belief the better, plus you are denying it to someone else.

Hagia Sofia: Either a quick enhancer belief, converting the core of a religious rival, or founding a holy site. For Spain I'd actually recommend the 3rd option if you have already gotten an enhancer belief, as you shouldn't face much direct competition religiously assuming you've conquered a civ or two as you should have a bunch of inquisitors to defend with


Chichen Itza: Reduces empire wide unhappiness by a good amount.

Globe Theatre(Culture): A good start to your eventual cultural takeover

Red Fort(Fealty Only): Put this in a city that you're worried might get some warfare brought to it, and laugh at its invincibility.

Sistine Chapel: Increasing your culture increases your border growth which increases your faith and gold. Nice.

Uffizi(Culture): Lots of space for good art theming


Brandenburg Gate: While it only applies to one city, units coming out of that city will have a lot of promotions. But really you want it for the extra supply limit, you got a lot of ships

Neuschwanstein: A bit hard to build given it has terrain requirements, but it'll give lots of happiness that you really need


Broadway(Industry Only): Uffizi: The Musical!

Prora(Autocracy only): A very high amount of happiness, might not entirely get rid of your unhappiness issues on its own, but it goes a long way.

Kremlin(Order only): You mostly want this for the free policy


Pentagon(Imperialism only): Some free air units, and get them out faster in the future. Solid if you need the air support


CERN: Two free techs to clean up your last units, and a good bit of influence on top.

CN Tower(Culture): More tourism on everything that gives you tourism, what more could you ask for

Great Firewall(Culture): Not super helpful to you, but if an enemy civ gets it your culture win just became a lot harder

Sydney Opera House: A little bit more theming, and a bit more culture for possibly more border growth

Hubble Space Telescope Similar to CERN, you'll most likely only need one of them to clean up your final units

Settling cities most of the game, keeping up a strong religion, managing conquest on the seas and land, Spain may make these things simpler then a lot of civs, but it is a lot to keep track of, and mistakes can happen


Spain may gain a good bit of faith from settling cities and growing borders but they can only settle and grow so quickly, and will found late if at all if they don't build up enough shrines.


Spain gains a lot out of settling cities early game. Spain gains a good bit out of settling cities mid-game, mainly due to Conquistadors making it much less investment to do so. However, late-game? The amount of gold and faith you'll be getting from these cities just isn't worth the other problems like unhappiness. There are some civs, like Russia or China that can do an infinite city sprawl, but I wouldn't say it is worth it for Spain to be one of them.


Being able to faith buy ships is very useful for Spain. However, these ships aren't free. There are other things you can spend faith on, the ships cost maintenance, and take up the supply limit. Once you feel like you have enough ships you don't have to, and shouldn't keep faith buying them.


It is easy to think of a Conquistador as an early Pioneer who doesn't cost population to make, and they do that role well, but Conquistadors are also very good military units in their own right, and it would be a waste not using them for conquest.


Haciendas probably aren't going to win you the game but there isn't any reason not to optimize them. If you aren't planning out your Haciendas and are just putting them wherever you are probably wasting yields

Spain is a rapid expansionist civ, with high gold, a large navy, and a religion that will rapidly take over through conquest. However, with so many things they have to focus on, Spain may often stretch themselves a little too thin.


Spain gains a lot from settling cities, especially in the early game. However they aren't any better at it early on then anyone else. If you have a Spanish neighbor, forward settling them and cutting off their expansion will hurt them more then most civs, and they can't do much to retaliate at least until the medieval era, by that point you should be able to reinforce the new cities.

If you have a religion of your own, try your best to not let Spain take any cities, or you may have to put even more effort into reestablishing your empire as Spain puts more religious pressure on you due to inquisitors

Spain may be able to get a large navy, but there isn't much special about it. If you have enough raw production, or naval bonuses like England, you should be able to beat them back.


Conquistadors are decently stronger then knights, but most things that work on knights should work on conquistadors as well. The true strength of conquistadors isn't really in combat anyways. Stopping them from settling cities, that is a harder thing to do. If you meet Spain during the mid-game and know they are across the sea, make sure you have all the good spots near your cities taken, and maybe even some less optimal spots to try and deny Spain a landing point. If you are on Spain's continent, it probably isn't worth trying to take overseas spots away from them, their navy and conquistadors will likely be too much for a new city to handle.


Haciendas thrive when they have good land to be placed in. Just don't let Spain have the best land. As long as you are confident in your defenses, Spain will get a lot less out of Haciendas, they are a bit of a win more button for Spain, and don't help Spain much if they aren't already doing well.


Early-Game Warmongers: This is a great time to take Spain out, forward settle them to deny some expansion, build up your force, then they should be no problem.

Mid-Game Warmongers: Make sure to bring lots of pikemen or tercios if you have them researched, and the Spanish shouldn't prove much of an issue. Actually killing them is going to be hard, but conquering their capital/core territory shouldn't be too bad.

Late-Game Warmongers: You'll likely need to build up more navy then you usually would in order to take Spain on, but if you can make a landing they shouldn't be too hard to fight, it'll just likely take a while given how many cities they probably have.

Diplomatic Players: Spain will likely really struggle with happiness, so banning luxuries should hit them hard. Global Peace Accords is good too, and passing a world religion that isn't theirs should help prevent their religion from becoming too crazy outside of their own cities.

Scientific Players: Keep on top of your naval techs and you should be able to fight the Spanish navy. If you can get banking and astronomy quickly, trying to take some city spots for your own is a decent idea, just much sure your navy is strong if you do that.

Cultural Players: Spain relies on religious bonuses and gold to win a culture victory. Spain actually might even have the gold to afford to invest in most wonders they build, at least the important ones, and Spain actually has solid production too, so you will need to be on top of making the wonders you want. If you have a religion of your own, make sure to keep Spain out of your lands, not letting them conquer you or you neighbors will make it difficult for them

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)
  
• Morocco (Culture/Diplomacy)
  
• 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)
  
• Sweden (Domination)
  
• Venice (Diplomacy/Culture/Domination)
  
• The Zulus (Domination)