What's the best way to try and win a domination round?

Start on a pangea and EXPANDEXPANDEXPAND as quickly as possible?

Start on a Terra map and then beeline to Astronomy, thus settling the entire new world? (I would have to have barbs off on this of course)

Who is the best leader for a domination win?

Either some one who directly benefits from extended war IE. Cyrus or some one who can afford extended war IE. Darius, they both have the same civ which also includes the Immortal which is the 3rd or 4th best UU for this purpose.

Cant go wrong with either.

When going for domination and you think you are falling behind in terms of where you want to be with land area, always remember that a tech advantage and good production centres will help you no end. I often find myself with just 9 or 10 cities at around 1000-1300 AD, but my tech edge in military allows me to build superior troops to just steamroll my enemies.

Domination is ironically one of the easier victory types for me. It feels like if I don't smack around the tech-whore AI personalities, they'll beat me to the ship. Once you get 2-3 good production cities pumping units quickly, and one of them with settled GG's, it's vicious. My 2nd win ever on prince was domination, with Washington. Promotions are huge too, invading a continent with SEALS that get 3-4 promotions from the start is just fun...

For Domination I recommend either pangaea if you have a UU like Rome's, otherwise you want a USA or Germany or any organized/economy type leader and a continents map. Flatten your continent with your UU or even just generic stuff, then catch up in tech. Diplo is a lot easier to manage this way too, since the overseas peeps won't usually be mad at you for killing your neighbors early.

I don't know how everyone on here gets a tech lead though. Even if I cottage heavily I still seem even or behind when I'm starting my first war...though massed siege and good army composition/promotions win the day. Once I get tons of cities though I can often tech in peace, which is when the computer is screwed.

The worst part about aggression in civ4 is how many of your douchebag citizens will stop working if you do too much of it. It often leaves me with a painful choice after conquering about half of an opponent's cities: Keep pushing, and let the already painful unhappiness build and build and build until you have exterminated your opponent, at which point it all vanishes, or sue for peace and have to put up with motherland unhappiness in the captured cities for a long time?

I usually take the first option, but either way you slice it:

http://img238.imageshack.us/img238/7628/27200693us3.jpg

There is no point in Conquest because Domination get triggered first. :D Too much redundency.

There is no point in Conquest because Domination get triggered first. :D Too much redundency.

I prefer conquest...I like wiping out my foes :D

Either some one who directly benefits from extended war IE. Cyrus or some one who can afford extended war IE. Darius, they both have the same civ which also includes the Immortal which is the 3rd or 4th best UU for this purpose.

Cant go wrong with either.

I disagree completely. There is NO WAY you can win a domination victory using Immortals. They are worth a damn only in the very early game, and might be used for an early rush, but that contributes nothing whatever to a domination win, except giving you a good start on the game. You don't end up with more population or territory after an early rush than you do after the same period of expanding with settlers. Like all victory conditions, domination is a long-term thing -- well, it is unless you're playing on a Tiny Pangaea map with only two or three civs.

The way to win a domination victory is to expand in stages, conquering one opponent at a time, then peacefully consolidating the gains. There are basically four windows of opportunity, not counting an early rush (which some players seem to focus on as if it were the be-all end-all).

The first is when you have the following techs: Iron Working, Construction, Code of Laws, and Currency. You need the first two for your military force, and the second two for your economy to be able to support a good-sized army and be able to assimilate your gains. (Remember, in domination, unlike conquest, you don't want to raze cities, you want to keep them.) You'll build a mixed force of Swordsmen, Spearmen, and Catapults, and if you have ivory you'll add War Elephants to the mix. You'll go on researching during the war, and when possible upgrade your Swords to Maces. (Unless you're playing the Romans -- the Romans have a HUGE advantage during this phase, but this phase alone won't win a domination victory.) You'll stop and make peace when you start running into Longbowmen and Crossbowmen, which are better defensive units than your Maces can handle without unacceptable losses, or when you've wiped an opponent or two and taken all their cities and you think the next one would present that problem.

The second window comes with Guilds and Engineering. You'll field a force of Knights, with Longbows, Crossbows, and Pikes for defense and occupation, and Catapults or Trebuchets for city defenses. The Knights are your attack units. Again, you'll upgrade during this war to Cuirrasiers/Cavalry, Riflemen, and Cannon. This window closes when you start running into Infantry, which again puts too much strength in the defense.

The third window comes with Industrialization, Artillery, Flight, and Radio. Your new force will consist of Tanks, Marines, Anti-Tanks, Artillery, Bombers, and Fighters. By building Jails in all your cities, plus Mount Rushmore and adopting Police State, you can reduce War Weariness to zero, and all of those should be available at this time. No upgrades here, because Mechanized Infantry, which eat Tanks for breakfast, are available before Modern Armor which are the only units that can answer them. So when you start running into Mech Inf, time to make peace for a while.

The fourth and last window is with the most advanced units: Modern Armor, Mechanized Infantry, Mobile Artillery, Jet Fighters, Gunships, and Stealth Bombers. No more stops after this, just go for it.

A domination victory is normally won during that third or fourth window. Once in a while it can be won in the second. If you win it in the first, you need to up the difficulty level or play on a bigger map or a non-Pangaea. (Pangaea is just too easy for any sort of military victory. If you want a decent challenge, play on something that requires going to sea.) And if you win it with an early rush using Immortals, you need to play on harder difficulty, on a non-Pangaea, and with more than one opponent. :p



The difference between Domination and Conquest is that in a Conquest victory you are trying to destroy all other civilizations, not gain and hold land and population. So after you've grown big enough to support extended military action with a huge army, you don't keep any more cities. Just burn them all down. Obviously, though, for Domination that's counterproductive.

The worst part about aggression in civ4 is how many of your douchebag citizens will stop working if you do too much of it. It often leaves me with a painful choice after conquering about half of an opponent's cities: Keep pushing, and let the already painful unhappiness build and build and build until you have exterminated your opponent, at which point it all vanishes, or sue for peace and have to put up with motherland unhappiness in the captured cities for a long time?



I find Justinian great for long wars. Hippodromes are a vast improvement over theatres and I run a SE with him so I'm not worried about having a low science rate since most of my research comes from specialists.

don't worry about anything except economy until you reach tanks. then convert your cottages (hopefully) or farms to vocum sineratio state property cities pumping out tanks as fast as possible. if you can reach tanks before your enemy reaches infantry you can conquer very quickly.

I was focusing much more in the fact that those leaders can either exploit war, or atleast wage it, the UU is mere icing on the cake.

domination comes in 3 kinds :
- peaceful expansion : doable with late game starts, where you already have all the techs you need anyway+ all the economic options. Outrunning the AIs isn't easy, but doable.
- early rush + settler spam: you can't really afford all those cities, thus, you will settle a bunch of cities in the last turn to get domination right away. Caste system is a good help needed for the artists without theatres.
- a "slow rush" : you expand and develop your economy in the same time. It's a bit tricky (balance always is), but it's finally the easiest way IMHO. You need a military edge + good economic potential, and you need to stop looking at the tech slider. As long as there is money in the bank, you keep fighting.

Well, there's a settler level game HOF gauntlet going on at the moment (GMinor 35) if you need to practice the settler spam tactic ;) On settler level it is easy to kill all the civs and spam settlers, the only annoyance is you need to count all the tiles to see if you have enough land to win when you build all the cities right at the end (don't need to win the turn you settle all the cities, you can win when your troops are on strike and still get the required border pops via caste system artists).

Most of my games are domination wins, I tend to do the slow expansion thing but recently got my first emperor win (in warlords expansion) with praetorians which is almost like cheating. I did settler spam at the end of that game. It was continents, my continent was big enough (it was only a small map, normal speed though, I had to kill 4 civs to get the continent to myself by 600AD, won in 1060AD). Link to game: http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ4/game_info.php?dsply=&entryID=10743

Before that I played a "highest score wins" Monarch gauntlet as Huayna and did a quick capital grab (4 AI defeated by 2000BC with Quechua, this was marathon speed, another cheese tactic), then tech up to maces and then cavalry, finish off another couple, build score, drop 5 settlers on a big Island at the end, won in 1205AD with a big score of 214094, the gauntlet winner got 473134 though). That was GMajor16. Link to gauntlet final leaderboard: http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ4/gauntlet.php?show=major&gauntlet=74&submit=Go Link to HOF discussion during the gauntlet: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=245004

My first Monarch win was a continents domination with Ragnar, rush Tokugawa early, take a city, sue for peace and get a tech off of him, take out Hannibal, finish off Toku with my elite troops, backstab Frederick, have my continent to myself. Win the circumnavigation race (easy with Ragnar), tech to astronomy, land a SoD on the other continent, vassalise weakling Spain, hold off attacks from Napoleon and Monty on the other continent until the border pops gave me the win, in 1820AD. Normal speed again. Link to game: http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ4/game_info.php?dsply=&entryID=8504

There's lots of good advice in the HOF gauntlet threads anyway, for a variety of levels/civs. take a look at them.

One small thing to add to ParadigmShifter's good advice/links :
domniation like conquest is easier on slower speeds.

Yes, the slower the better (easier), especially if you have an early UU. Quechua rule on marathon speed at monarch and above (where the AI starts with archers and stupidly never builds any warriors). Praets are fantastic as well.

Just beeline your early UU, (after getting some worker techs in the bag), spam them (with some axes/spears as appropriate for stack defence), tech to construction, spam catapults, and you should be motoring. EDIT: You can take out a civ or 2 normally without catapults if you are quick, and they haven't got cities on hills. When I say spam, I mean it, all cities with barracks should produce nothing else until you have enough to wipe out your neighbours.

EDIT: I don't like epic or marathon speed though, it takes me too long to play. Cabert will know what I am on about (GMajor 20!).

Vikings are great at continents domination, berserkers rule and can be upgraded to CR grenadiers and/or rifles.

Good wonders to get: Stonehenge (border pops quicker) if not creative, although caste system is better really. Pyramids very good too, representation is huge and police state is good as well for handling war weariness. I always try and get the Great Library for grabbing a tech lead.

I play warlords expansion, so the race to cavalry is the big thing there.

There is no point in Conquest because Domination get triggered first. :D Too much redundency.

I've gotten conquest before domination on a standard map. The way it happens is if you just steamroll AI's and force capitulation (after killing off the first 2-3). I won a "conquest" victory because I only had about 50% land technically, but everyone was dead or my vassal.

I think this happened on a terra map though, so that's another consideration. Nobody ever made it over there on the replay, in fact the barbarians had settled that continent so much watching the replay that they might as well have been an extra civ :lol: .

And while it IS easier to win domination on slower speed settings, I play almost entirely on normal speed prince now, and domination is certainly possible. Pro players might even be able to do it on deity, but I'm virtually certain that people better than me can dominate on standard speed on much higher difficulties than prince...even at normal speed!

You can essentially win domination with any leader (My Asoka RPC was a domination win with one of teh games pacifists) but some are easier. Also certain traits are better such as ORG (empire management), Agressive, Imperialistic (GGs and fast early settling), Charismatic. I think Pangea is different from Say continent or Arceopolego

Pangea: Hammarabi, Ghengis, JC are the best in no order. Prats get you an edge but the other 2 are agressive so it's sort of a push there (at least to me). Unless of course you can conquer all in teh Prat era.

Continent: Late game Ais, Germans (Both) and Americans (Lincoln and Washington). Americans: Navy seals will destroy enemy coastal cities while the UB controls costs and happiness, and the charismatic trait allows very highly promoted naval vessels right out of the gate (all you need is a drydocks). Germany allows very fast assembly plants and an indistructable Panzer based army providing you win before the AI get's advanced flight and those gunships.

Archeoplego: Hannibal, Willem, Ragnar. Financial at sea will get a LARGE tech lead which allows abuse of the UB for any of them, and the UU for Ragnar and Will. Special mention to Victoria here, use the privateers to get ALOT of GGs then mass produce alot of militaty units.

THe generic Wildcards here are Both Indians (have I ever mentioned Indians make great war-mongers) and Both Persians. Boudica is OK but she really hase nothing that keeps a massive economy afloat very well.

EDIT: Oh, of course Shaka and his UB is special for Pangea. Ditto Charlemange if you can ever get his empire going well at the beginning

I find Justinian great for long wars. Hippodromes are a vast improvement over theatres and I run a SE with him so I'm not worried about having a low science rate since most of my research comes from specialists.
The thing about that, however, is that one cottage is worth 3 people in a specialist city, and thats if you managed to get the pyramid. With improved farms, its closer to 2 people. GPP only matter if they result in something, which will only happen in 1-2 cities.

The implication, which i only just now realized, is that a CE could run at 50% culture and still perform on par with a SE...

I'm an absolute sucker for the hippodrome, domination or not.

The best way to win a domination victory is to think backwards, and here's how:

- conquest is easier than domination, if you play it right
- why is the above statement true? What are the limitations you face when going for domination rather than conquest?
- address those concerns, and your domination times will be much faster

Any aggressive, organized or financial leader should help, because your main limitation is commerce, not hammers as per a conquest game.

I find domination a lot harder in BTS than it was in Vanilla. That Aposaltic Palace is a big reason why. You can be full tilt ahead on war, plenty of money and happiness to keep going and the peace whistle will blow for a motion they passed. You can also have that happen if another AI is at war with the same one you are and they cause that AI to capitulate before you are done taking over territory. Then to finish the job, you have to take on them and someone (usually pretty strong) else. That Statue of Zeus can be a real headache too, you start fighting someone with it, and there's no time it seems without unhappy faces. I liked in Vanilla where you could just take people out based on geography. Another factor is this whole colonial maintenence biz they added in, you try to control more than about 6 cities on another continent, you better be prepared to either have a lot of merchants /towns building wealth or your science slider dropped down to 20% just to keep your economy up.

I find domination a lot harder in BTS than it was in Vanilla. That Aposaltic Palace is a big reason why. You can be full tilt ahead on war, plenty of money and happiness to keep going and the peace whistle will blow for a motion they passed. You can also have that happen if another AI is at war with the same one you are and they cause that AI to capitulate before you are done taking over territory. Then to finish the job, you have to take on them and someone (usually pretty strong) else. That Statue of Zeus can be a real headache too, you start fighting someone with it, and there's no time it seems without unhappy faces. I liked in Vanilla where you could just take people out based on geography. Another factor is this whole colonial maintenence biz they added in, you try to control more than about 6 cities on another continent, you better be prepared to either have a lot of merchants /towns building wealth or your science slider dropped down to 20% just to keep your economy up.


Generally, State Property is the civic to combat overseas empires you absorb.

Generally, State Property is the civic to combat overseas empires you absorb.

Did they fix that on the last patch for BTS? The game I played with BTS where I conquered a huge continent and kept the cities, I ran State Property and was still in the poor house from all the Colonial Maintence that didn't go away like distance maintenance did. It was huge for me, something like 50 gold per city even after courthouses. It increases exponenianlly for every city you own on a continent away from your capital.

I haven't tried taking out another continent since patching my game to the latest version from the store bought one, has that changed? :confused:

Did they fix that on the last patch for BTS? The game I played with BTS where I conquered a huge continent and kept the cities, I ran State Property and was still in the poor house from all the Colonial Maintence that didn't go away like distance maintenance did. It was huge for me, something like 50 gold per city even after courthouses. It increases exponenianlly for every city you own on a continent away from your capital.

I haven't tried taking out another continent since patching my game to the latest version from the store bought one, has that changed? :confused:

Yes, patch 3.13 changed it so that colonial maintenance is capped at twice distance maintenance. Since SP means distance maintenance is 0 then colonial maintenance is also 0. :)

Here's a somewhat related question... Is there a way that I'm not seeing, to disband one of your own cities? When I'm going for conquest wins I tend to raze most of the cities I capture, however I usually need to keep at least one or two on a given continent to use for importing troops and whatnot. So far I can't find a way to destroy that city once I'm down burning the rest of its continent to the ground. Maybe it's not possible though. If only I could nuke it once I move my troops to the next land mass.

The thing about that, however, is that one cottage is worth 3 people in a specialist city, and thats if you managed to get the pyramid. With improved farms, its closer to 2 people. GPP only matter if they result in something, which will only happen in 1-2 cities.

The implication, which i only just now realized, is that a CE could run at 50% culture and still perform on par with a SE...

Whether you prefer a CE or SE Justinian's still your leader for prolonged wars. With 50% culture a Hippodrome can give you 5 more happiness than a theatre could.

There is NO WAY you can win a domination victory using Immortals. They are worth a damn only in the very early game, and might be used for an early rush, but that contributes nothing whatever to a domination win, except giving you a good start on the game.

Of course you can win a Domination victory using Immortals. Look at Balbes' Immortal rush in WOTM7, where the world was taken over purely by Immortals, and at immortal difficulty level as well. Balbes sent immortals to every single AI's capital at once to deny them all from hooking up strategic resources, then systematically dismantling the rest of the their empires piece by piece. Magnificent.

Of course you can win a Domination victory using Immortals. Look at Balbes' Immortal rush in WOTM7, where the world was taken over purely by Immortals, and at immortal difficulty level as well. Balbes sent immortals to every single AI's capital at once to deny them all from hooking up strategic resources, then systematically dismantling the rest of the their empires piece by piece. Magnificent.

OK, let me modify what I said.

You cannot win a Domination victory using Immortals unless you are playing on a Pangaea map or other waterless all-one-continent map, which, by removing all significant elements of naval strategy, effectively drops the difficulty of any military win.

You probably can't win one except on a Tiny or Small Pangaea map, actually, because the time it takes to FIND all the enemy's capitals will be prohibitive. But you ABSOLUTELY can't do it on any map with significant water. On a Continents map, you can't even get to many of the enemies (potentially none of them) until you've researched Optics, and by then your Immortals will be hopelessly outclassed.

Even without strategic resources, no Immortal is going to beat a Longbow, let alone a Rifleman or Infantry.

I target on domination *any* game I play. If I do a space win, it means that my domination strategy failed. Note usully I play Emperor, Large / Huge / Fractal, Maraphon. Fractal means that "early" unit mega-rush makes no sense (quecha- or axe- or settlers- rush). Reason is simple - you will kill your economy by having many early cities/units and risk is high there is another continent, who will overteach you. So, more realistic strategies should be choosen playing Fractal.

My conclusion - all traits are good for warmongers. Every trait could be used. The best ones, however, are aggressive, expansive (cheap granaries = cheap whipping), organized (cheap courts). You will have two or three waves of military expansion and, when the one is started, you should whip / draft all your cities except scientific / golden / production capitals which are a core of your empire and are needed to fund your research and expansion. Don't be afraid to whip your GP farm capital. Many games I don't build classic GP farm at all. One-two early great scientists and a couple of great people to establish corporations in later game is enough, at least, for Emperor level. So instead of spending good food tiles on great people generation, I use them either for powerfull combinations cottages + mines, or farm + whipping. I think people often overvalue great people. Only early GP are really important. Size of your empire is really what matters later.

I disagree completely. There is NO WAY you can win a domination victory using Immortals. They are worth a damn only in the very early game, and might be used for an early rush, but that contributes nothing whatever to a domination win, except giving you a good start on the game.

...snip...

A domination victory is normally won during that third or fourth window. Once in a while it can be won in the second. If you win it in the first, you need to up the difficulty level or play on a bigger map or a non-Pangaea. (Pangaea is just too easy for any sort of military victory. If you want a decent challenge, play on something that requires going to sea.) And if you win it with an early rush using Immortals, you need to play on harder difficulty, on a non-Pangaea, and with more than one opponent.

RE: "winning with Immortals". Maybe it is just semantics, but if you use an early unit (Immortals, Praets, War Chariots) correctly, then your domination win is almost assured by the time they are obsolete. Sure, on a huge map you may well need knights or even cavs to finish the last AI's, but at that point, it is mop-up. The end result is no longer in doubt.

RE: Windows. Given your definitions for windows... I would expect to finish 20-30% in the first window, another 50-60% in the second window. Only time I would expect to go into the 3rd window is quick speed on bigger maps. PS...I normally play Emperor or Immortal, never smaller than standard sized maps. Only caveat, I am new to BtS. I understand BtS may be more difficult.

If folks would like to learn how to accomplish fast domination, I would suggest studying games/spoilers in GOTM or HOF....

I find it's usually better to wait until marines/tanks and flight to do the big mop up operation, the campaign moves so much more quickly. I'll usually do the first real campaign with knights, although I have been known to use axe/sword or elephant/catapult rushes if I am getting pinched out of real estate. I find it's usually better to expand peacefully until you have really strong units with good movement, because then you can conduct the warfare so much more efficiently.

Is there a way that I'm not seeing, to disband one of your own cities?

No. It's simply impossible to disband cities in Civ 4.

I find it's usually better to wait until marines/tanks and flight to do the big mop up operation, the campaign moves so much more quickly. I'll usually do the first real campaign with knights, although I have been known to use axe/sword or elephant/catapult rushes if I am getting pinched out of real estate. I find it's usually better to expand peacefully until you have really strong units with good movement, because then you can conduct the warfare so much more efficiently.

After experimenting, unless I have a ridiculous UU like immortal or Praet, it seems like the best time to start with the warring is maces/catas if you hurry to those. As long as the enemy isn't fielding knights or muskets (though you can still take these cities with numbers), you can flatten cities with blinding speed this way. Longbows hurt, but when they have no +% from cities and are colatteral'd a bit they fall fast enough. Usually just 2-4 cats per city, average 3, with 0-1 losses in maces. In terms of production that's hardly murderers row to replace, and hitting with a good stack of them means many downed cities before they recover...if they do.

Also useful because by then you probably have the useful CoL and Currency to actually keep cities.

I find it's usually better to wait until marines/tanks and flight to do the big mop up operation, the campaign moves so much more quickly. I'll usually do the first real campaign with knights, although I have been known to use axe/sword or elephant/catapult rushes if I am getting pinched out of real estate. I find it's usually better to expand peacefully until you have really strong units with good movement, because then you can conduct the warfare so much more efficiently.

I guess it depends on your definition of "better". To me "better" means finishing with an earlier date. I can't think of a time I've built tanks except maybe a quick-speed or late-era-start game. Ancient starts, epic or marathon speed - never. A tank-based war might go fast once you start it, but I expect to have finished my domination centuries before tanks are even available.

it seems like the best time to start with the warring is maces/catas if you hurry to those

If you beeline construction, catapults + swords will take cities defended by archers-axes with very good win-loss ratio. You will loose only 2-3 catapults per 7-8 AI units. The trick is to build a branch of catapults ASAP (6-7), immediately after you invent construction. Whipping helps. 6-7 catapults + more to be built later is enough to start war with mediocre AI and capture its best cities at least. WW is a problem, not its military cause probably you dont have drama at this point.

This usually corresponds to my first wave of military expansion. The second wave - macemen, knights. The third - rifles and cannons, maybe cavarly. If it was pangea, it's enough. If we've other continents, we need one ore wave with infantry and tanks.