Recap: after beating my first Monarch game. I beelined to Deity. Seemed like a such a good idea at the time. The result?


http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=274054


Instead of dropping down to Emperor or Immortal, I opt to take another chance. This time, the mighty Inca should prevail! (I remember doing the same thing with Alpha Centauri, skipped a couple levels and went straight for Transcend. It work)

I changed a couple settings this time. Barb is turned on, and there will be 18 civ. Still huge map, so plenty of space for everyone. But I'm definitely going for some type of early rush to secure more land.

The settings
http://img509.imageshack.us/img509/8308/civ4screenshot0023lg5.jpg (http://imageshack.us)


Starting the game
http://img381.imageshack.us/img381/6092/civ4screenshot0000qi4.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Doesn't seem so special at first glance. But it was determined later that this start offers many long-term strategic advantages. My last game was lost during the modern age. Not going to let that happen again.

Ancient Age...

http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/4260/civ4screenshot0001xi9.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Too many forest and jungle. I opt not to purchase a worker until I get some tech ready. Should probably bought an extra fishing boat. Cuzco would become my science city.

Big plans for the quechuas.

http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/5418/civ4screenshot0002mh7.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

10 turns of universal peace. Also takes 10 turn to get to Dutch territory. :D Look at those juicy workers. The Dutch didn't even have time to send me some -1 you declared war on my friend diplo modifiers. With the Dutch eliminated, I'm all alone on this continent.

http://img392.imageshack.us/img392/8730/civ4screenshot0003xc9.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Found my 3rd city. It would become the production capital. But I need to chop away all those jungle. The barbarian horde is now knocking on my door every turn. I am also very short on wealth. Still waiting the former Dutch capital to recover.

http://img385.imageshack.us/my.php?image=civ4screenshot0004re5.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Found another city for stone. In general I never build monument. Instead I use Inca's UB to do the first culture pop. This tactic delay my access to stone. I'm not going for the Oracle this time around. By chopping the Pyramid, I would be able to acquire happy faces without Monarchy. Thus I can ignore the religion tech path altogether.

Something I never experienced happened: my city upkeep was so high that I can't afford to field more units. My research was already in the tank. Thus I went for Alphabet just so I can build research :lol:

http://img393.imageshack.us/img393/1461/civ4screenshot0006cs5.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

The Vikings spread Buddhism to us and we convert. Switched to OR. Amsterdam is going to be my GP farm. My tech situation has improved after I start assigning scientist specialists.

Barb settled Shangian at the perfect spot. I use my CR axe to civilize them.

An overview of my land
http://img391.imageshack.us/img391/4242/civ4screenshot0007il9.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Classical Age...

Once Optics is done, I build some boats to conduct greeting missions. Turns out I'm still lagging in tech. Taj was built when I was thinking about the TGL :lol: But I'm definitely catching up. Liberalism race is on.

Pop my first GE. Used it to one-term UoS. Seemed like a good idea at the time. But I would switch to free religion right after liberalism, so maybe not.

Got it!
http://img381.imageshack.us/img381/3558/civ4screenshot0009ef4.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

I traded for Guilds and Banking. Researched Economic myself and still got the GM :eek: Definitely did not expecting that.

My military production has been slacking quite a while now. So the Viking seize the opportunity and invaded

http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/1700/civ4screenshot0011ge1.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

The AI was doing some amphibious assault. I thought it's throwing units away until I check Berserker's special trait :eek: Fortunately my city culture bonus still stands.

At this point I am one of the tech leader. But the AI would take a brief tech lead soon

Industrial Age...

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/250/civ4screenshot0012tp2.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

The game seems to accelerate very quickly from this point onward. If I don't start my exponential growth early I would had been left out cold. I managed to build SoL despite trading for democracy at a very late time. Cost me one GE though. Again, I'm beelining for The Internet for youtube.

http://img385.imageshack.us/img385/6175/civ4screenshot0013ac2.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

This time, I make sure I'm the first one acquiring Computers. I was 10 turns behind getting to Plastic but it doesn't matter. I saved two GE to one-turn the Dam. All of a sudden my empire became much more productive. Machu's Ironwork is almost ready. In retrospect, I shouldn't had build the HE there. I also keep discovering gold in those hills near the production capital. Gold is nice but it actually drop my hammers total :lol:

Not sure why but everyone was declaring war on the Egyptians. Although she backfilled tech with me most of the game, I joined the war when being asked. She had one city left and won't last much longer.

Modern Age...

http://img384.imageshack.us/img384/6517/civ4screenshot0015dq9.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Japan invaded! I even broke my own rule and accept their tribute for my world map(the only tribute in the whole game). Nevertheless, the newly constructed railroads comes in handy for relocating defense troops. Japan sent many stacks, but never all at once, so I wasn't too threaten.

Count down to youtube: 17 turns.

http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/4829/civ4screenshot0016br4.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Zulu invaded! Only one stack though and they didn't cost much damage.

http://img393.imageshack.us/img393/6767/civ4screenshot0017kg9.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

The Internet is done :king: At this point the game is pretty much won. All I have to do is prevent a mega dog pile, which never happened. The last bottleneck is the Apollo program

http://img393.imageshack.us/img393/1352/civ4screenshot0018qp3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Space Elevator = 1 turn, costing another 2 GE. Triggers my last GA to accelerate spaceship production.

Victory!

http://img178.imageshack.us/img178/8053/civ4screenshot0019cg2.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Spaceship parts are divided amount my cities. Thanks to the Dam, space elevator, and aluminum, all the parts take less then 15 turns. Notice that Byzantine sneaked in a city on our land :rolleyes:

http://img501.imageshack.us/img501/6020/civ4screenshot0020vs6.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

The launch

http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/571/civ4screenshot0022el4.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/8856/civ4screenshot0024tc2.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
stats

Final score: 71361. My 2nd and last Deity game :D

maybe im missing something but why do you start with two cities?

Good game, but is new random seed on reload that option that allows you to reload to gain better combat odds (never try it so I could be wrong on this one)? Also, you put advance base start with allows you to gain a better starting than usual. To my knowledge AI at deity level start off with 2 extra settlers and 4 archers. How could you eliminate them by taking out 1 city with only 2 archers?

maybe im missing something but why do you start with two cities?

I chose advanced start with the default number of points


Good game, but is new random seed on reload that option that allows you to reload to gain better combat odds (never try it so I could be wrong on this one)? Also, you put advance base start with allows you to gain a better starting than usual. To my knowledge AI at deity level start off with 2 extra settlers and 4 archers. How could you eliminate them by taking out 1 city with only 2 archers?

To be honest, if a barb archer capture my quechua-defended city in turn 50, yeah I will probably reload. I'm definitely not good enough to pull-off iron man. But combat-wise random seed really wasn't a big deal. I station my quechua in forest square and just let the barb run into them. I was the defender in all the invasions so I just let their stack run into my troops during the AI turn. I did re-roll some GP though. I need a lot of GE and has no use for GA.

Also, sometimes the game behave in a funny way. Let say I am about to finish up education and want to trade for philosophy so I can start on liberalism. Wang is the only one to put it on the table. I don't want to pay for the steep price so I delay the trade until the last turn. But one turn later Wang withdraw his offer entirely for no reason and now I'm screwed. In those instances I would reload and try something else.

I chose advanced start because it appears to eliminate AI starting unit bonus. Try it yourself, you might be surprised. The Dutch had only one city, two archers, three workers, 3 fishing improvements, farm, roads, and a scout. They were just asking for it. :p

well, gratz for the win, but do you want to show anything special here? Or just that the game can be beaten with those settings ?

Congratulations on your win -- but it's not really a deity game now, is it? You've made two fairly significant modifications to the game: you eliminated the AI's initial bonus, and you changed your distribution of great people.

Okay, yes, "deity game" is a technically accurate description, but you certainly didn't play what most people would call a "deity game".

You can win any difficulty level you like if you mess about with the settings, but if you leave everything on normal and just play a standard game, then Civ will start to show you why it's such a good game. A normal Deity game is a huge challenge on normal settings, and I'm afraid you won't be able to win it. Most players work their way up one difficulty level at a time, and they learn new stuff about the game and the many different ways there are to play it, gradually over time and through trial and error, (speaking personally I remember a huge amount of error - LOL).

One major shock to the system is to learn that the tactics and strategy that may work well at one difficulty level, do not necessarily work at the next difficulty level up, and that the game significantly ramps up the challenge each time you move to a higher difficulty level. It's a game that really can and will kick your ass if you just leave the settings alone and play it in a reasonably balanced state. The normal default settings are about as balanced as you can get it, but even those are distorted if you play on small maps or with few rival civs, as they will result in an unbalanced game that favours the human.

Playing the game using normal difficulty settings is as challenging as you want it to be, and each player finds a level that is fun for himself / herself, and it doesn't matter if that's Noble, Emperor or Deity, as it's not a competition. The game is hugely challenging and enjoyable if you just leave the settings alone and allow it to show you what it can do. What it can and will do to all of us is happily jump up and down on our heads until we learn from our mistakes, and develop an arsenal of different tactics that we then use at different times in different games to beat it.

So, to give civ a chance, just pick a difficulty level you think you can play at and then play it on normal settings to see what happens. It really is an amazing game, if you just allow it to do it's thing.

Regards - Mr P

Haha you guys crack me up. As far as I know some HOF games have barb turned off. They are still impressive feat. My original goal was not to create a HOF entry, so I could care less about certain stipulations. As far as I'm consider, no world editor means a win is a win. Oh I also re-roll my starts, if you must know.

Advanced Start with the default number of points is just a game variant that makes the opening a bit easier. It certainly does not negate the ungodly AI production/food/research bonus. I really have a hard time feeling sorry for the AI when a civ starting on 5x5 island still managed to get to Future Tech by 1800AD. Besides, it's not like all the options are stack in my favored. No tech brokering means I won't able to tech trade myself into immortality. 18 civ and huge map also make the game slightly harder. ;)

When you are in the learning stage, it is much easier to go step by step. By using advanced start, I gave myself a chance to develop my mid and late game. In my Monarch games all the games were won slightly after Rifling, so there is much no incentive for tight play. So all that's left is to practice opening and transition game. Afterward we can talk about things like Iron Man.

Those pretty pictures might implied I find Deity isn't challenging. Believe me, I was sweating all the way until The Internet. And I learnt so much. I will do a few more write-up to demonstrate some subtle insight I picked up.


PS: I just check my HOF and I was wrong about the difficulty level I usually play. Beside this game, most of my games are on Monarch and there is 1 Emperor win (no advance start).

Playing a Deity game really made me appreciated certain game mechanic. It seems like I can just do whatever in Monarch and it won't have much effect on the overall outcome. One of the things I started to appreciate much more is time synergy

For example, I used to ignore the Pyramid and would use HR to bust my happy cap. Now I use build/whip library and build farm early so that when Pyramid is chopped, I would do an instant transition into SE to boost early research and GPP rate. The extra happy cap comes in just the right time for two extra scientists. Moreover, I get to ignore the religious tech path for quite awhile.

I also start to question the usefulness of industrial trait and stone/mable resource. It seems like I have to chop, overflow whip, or hurry produce to even have a chance at any world wonders. So are those extra hammer really worth it compare to say, the philosophical trait? :confused:

I replay the opening of the game to see how it can play differently. By 10AD I have roughly the same research rate, but my slider is down to 30%, compare to 50% like it used to. Rex can be dangerous but it really pays off after court house. Also I was able to build TGL, Parthenon, THG. The difference is much more aggressive pre-chop.

A lot more micro management is required during the start, for example
http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/1271/civ4screenshot0026yi7.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
I'm building a Quechua to let the city grow. But when the city reaches size 4, I would switch the queue back to worker and delay the quechua by 6 turns. The reason is I have enough barb defense at that point so 6 movement points don't worth much. But delaying the unit allow me to save 6 wealth worth of unit maintenance. ;)