imMapex's Sexual Assyrian Guide of Doom and Stuff (Deity Approved)

I'm having a hard time understanding why you go for Temple of Artemis; it doesn't help you at all in the early game for your attack. You could achieve more city growth in the early game with a granary/watermill, and you can build more archers for your attack if you don't go temple of artemis. Also, do you really want the 10% growth on your city puppets?

The way I see it, ToA is hurting the early game growth of your city and the timing of your attack in exchange for late game benefits that dont seem to align with puppet cities.

baboon said:

After playing and winning Emperor with the 3 city tradition start described in these forums, I'm now playing this Sexual strategy. Although I'm often not sure what to do after the first few conquerings, it's definately fun as hell to play

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IMO, I'd continue conquering if I were you, raze through all cities except capitals, and win domination Victory. Target your nearest neighbor and steamroll from there, building roads through cities, and keep the trade route up early to maintain economy.
I prefer trading with city states, because we'll crush other civs eventually.

Bob Morane said:

imMapex, what's your timeline for early attacks on Deity?

I've just tried this out, but by the time i was finishing my first Tower (near T70), Rome DoWed me with 6 Ballistea, 4 Legions a couple spears and warriors and a few chariots.

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Bob, Bob, Bob, haven't you been reading the Deity threads? You should be able to defend yourself with just a couple of archers. Also, Rome would be happy to attack someone else for 7gpt, no doubt. It's impossible that he wouldn't -- if he doesn't accept the deal, you're clearly doing it wrong .

DiscoZerg said:

I'm having a hard time understanding why you go for Temple of Artemis; it doesn't help you at all in the early game for your attack. You could achieve more city growth in the early game with a granary/watermill, and you can build more archers for your attack if you don't go temple of artemis. Also, do you really want the 10% growth on your city puppets?

The way I see it, ToA is hurting the early game growth of your city and the timing of your attack in exchange for late game benefits that dont seem to align with puppet cities.

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Well, for one, in BNW it doesn't make as much sense to leave all of your cities as puppets the whole game; with the sopol modifier for cities reduced and the tech penalty for cities, it makes more sense to annex once you have the happiness and opportunity so you can get some science buildings up and squeeze more culture out of the city. Not to mention that the happiness bonuses you can get late game from Order for Monuments (which seem to be very low on puppet governor's priority lists these days) or Autocracy for Courthouses go a very long ways towards solving the happiness problems a warmonger is liable to experience late game, to say nothing of all the other happiness tenets tied to buildings that may take a long time for a puppet to get around to building, if it does at all. Ironically, annexing often helps your happiness in the long run.

The other half of it is that early game growth tends to be more sharply limited by happiness in BNW, which means there's not as much merit to pushing massive growth right out the gate. In this light, ToA is a means of improving your growth and setting you up to consolidate your gains from early war in the mid game without pushing your happiness too hard in the early game.

Do I think the ToA rush is the end-all-be-all? No, but I tried it and it worked quite well and so I think it belongs in the toolkit as a viable strategy.

imMapex said:

Assur Build Order: Scout - Scout - Temple of Artemis - Shrine/ Worker/ Archer - Settler - Granary - CB - CB - Siege Tower - CB/ Royal Library - Royal Library/ Caravan - NC

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I would recommend losing the Caravan; it's just a waste of a trade route spot that would be better served by a Cargo ship for 2X the food, hammers, or gold.

TheGrumpyBuddha said:

Bob, Bob, Bob, haven't you been reading the Deity threads? You should be able to defend yourself with just a couple of archers.

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Well, maybe i'm a better Deity player then, cause all i needed until Modern era in my latest attempt was a single Composite Bowman (pathfinder upgraded with a ruin mind you)
Of course, i was at the far end of the Pangea with a nice buffer of City States between me and Cartage. Only close neighbour was Maria who was kind enough to "offer" me two workers early and then became my friend for the rest of the game after we made peace.

Yet, this doesn't help much when you try to go on the offense, what this guide is all about I really have a hard time believing it's possible to conquer anything with so few units on Deity (defense is different). I would really like to know what's the timing for such an attack. I suspect it's very tight.

how about another post?

Is ToA buildable on deity?... (haven't really tried TBH it comes at a time where your cap is usually busy building shrines/granaries/libraries... but I wonder if it's better than a granary...)

This was a great read. Its nice to see a strategy markedly different from all the same old stuff.

Fun read, but I take issue with a number of things in the guide.

* First, Assyria is early-conquest easy mode. This guide may work, but only because of that. Also, in the post-patch era, you can't wait until ToA to build archers... For self-defense you better start building them sooner than that!

Here's my guide:

Step 1) Choose Assyria
Step 2) Warmong - Yes, it's a word. I don't care what you say.
Step 3) Win



Ok, seriously though.

* ToA is usually gone fast... like before turn 30. Good luck building it that fast. And it's a waste IMHO for warmongering. When warmongering, I'm done building ranged units around turn 40... and ToA doesn't make them cheaper soooo...

Also, 10% growth rate is not as good as a Granary in the early game, and also, remember, it's not +10% food. It's +10% growth rate. Meaning, that if you're at +1 net food, you're at +1.1. As opposed to if it were like, having 5 citizens eating 10 food, and having +10% food, taking you from 10 food to 11 food for a net of +1. Whereas, a granary is minimum +2 food, often +3 or 4. (To get to +3, you'd have to be +30 net, over that amount consumed by your population...) Even if it were based on total food, you'd still need 30 food before it beat Granary. So yeah...

Also, ToA does not allow for a faster rush... not at all. Archers = 40 hammers. 4 Archers = 160 hammers. ToA = 185 hammers. Toa + 4 Archers = 185 + (0.85*160) = 185 + 136 = 321 hammers. You could build a Granary AND 4 archers faster. 15% faster is nothing. The key to warmongering isn't pumping out tons of units. It's winning battles efficiently with very few units.

* One Royal Library is fine, but many? You won't steal *that* many. And you don't need to be building units in every dang city. (See above)

And you shouldn't be creating great works of writing, IMHO... you should be saving GW to bulb during World Congress, assuming you ever even see the World Congress. Sometimes, Assyria takes over the world before there IS a WC. ;-)

* Happiness issues. Your free techs may make up for the fact that all the cities you're capturing are slowing down your tech growth, but it doesn't help your happiness. Lots of puppets is bad. Instead of hurting your tech rate and happiness, keep as few cities as you can. Sell them in trade deals or raze them.

* There are more issues, but rather than sit here and make fun of your build, I think we should have a dance-off. That is to say, someone pick a map (Standard, Standard, Diety, Pangaea, Assyria) and let's have a contest. Fastest ToV wins. Style points for winning without Modern Era tech. Double Style points for winning without Rationalism. Triple Style points for winning without Industrial Era units.

Deal? ;-)

I tend to have some issues with this guide too. Tried it a couple times and failed, maybe cause of bad luck (Incas or Zulus as the only close neighbour makes early conquest difficult), but

Cromagnus said:

* ToA is usually gone fast... like before turn 30. Good luck building it that fast. And it's a waste IMHO for warmongering. When warmongering, I'm done building ranged units around turn 40... and ToA doesn't make them cheaper soooo...

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In most of my games, ToA doesn't go before T40, sometimes later. It's very possible to get it by this time, but yes, it will slow down your ranged units production rather than speed it.

Also, 10% growth rate is not as good as a Granary in the early game, and also, remember, it's not +10% food. It's +10% growth rate. Meaning, that if you're at +1 net food, you're at +1.1. As opposed to if it were like, having 5 citizens eating 10 food, and having +10% food, taking you from 10 food to 11 food for a net of +1.

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No, he is right and the tooltip is wrong. See this thread for more on this

Also, ToA does not allow for a faster rush... not at all

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Yep, it will slow you down and make conquest harder. Archer + Siege Tower rush seems better to me.

One Royal Library is fine, but many? You won't steal *that* many. And you don't need to be building units in every dang city. (See above)

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Well, RL is just your everyday Library with a bonus. You will build Libraries in every city won't you?

I won't be annexing that many cities, so I won't have many libraries. He seemed to imply you'd be getting them in a lot of cities. Maybe the puppet city AI will build them? Or maybe he intends to settle a lot of cities?

Oops I forgot that ToA's description lies. Still doesn't provide the extra growth until you finish building it, assuming you get it. ;-)

And everything else still applies... I don't want growth in puppet cities, I can't afford the early game hammers, and we should be rushing mathematics and construction.

EDIT: Ok, I've started my Assyria game. Going full Honor because... because RAR! ToA completed on turn 24. GL on turn 27. Yep. Deity folks. Even the Pyramids aren't reliable post-patch. But I don't care because I'm beelining Mathematics, leveling my archers, making my warrior into a medic, and I planted my first city on a gold mine that I sold for GPT on turn 18. I'll have enough money to buy a Siege Tower the turn I finish Mathematics. And capitals WILL FALL. RAAAAR.

Oracle and Great Wall completed on T61.

Wow. Warmongering post-patch is... different. I took one city. Just one. A CS. Half the AIs in the game DoW'd me. I took one of Morocco's cities next, and the OTHER HALF DoW'd me. Two cities and the whole map DoW's you?? Warmongering = nerfed.

EDIT: Ok, it's the CS. Taking ONE CS is an "EXTREME" Warmonger penalty. You can take multiple AI capitals with less penalty. What the heck?? That seems broken. One CS and you are DONE. Fine, fine, I'll adjust. This game is a loss though, but lesson learned.

Ok, one more try as Assyria without capturing a CS!!

Cromagnus said:

EDIT: Ok, it's the CS. Taking ONE CS is an "EXTREME" Warmonger penalty. You can take multiple AI capitals with less penalty. What the heck?? That seems broken. One CS and you are DONE. Fine, fine, I'll adjust. This game is a loss though, but lesson learned.

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Well, you're wiping a small, non-aggressive civilization off the face of the earth. People won't like that

Light Cleric said:

Well, you're wiping a small, non-aggressive civilization off the face of the earth. People won't like that

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Haha, fair enough, it definitely makes sense. I was just used to the prior BNW state of affairs, where you could generally get away with capping one CS.

Also, I think this change *really* nerfs Genghis Khan. He's built to capture CS. Of course, Genghis wasn't exactly a weak civ before. This brings him back down to earth a bit. ;-)

Emperor level player. I had a lot of fun employing this strategy (minus the ToA) before the fall patch. Once I got a couple seige towers up, cities fell like sandcastles. After the patch, cities still fall like sandcastles, but the war monger hate is considerably worse. I still win, but it's a pain when you get world wide DOW's. And forget about getting any more than 3 gpt from ANYone after you take the first capital. It is fun, however, getting techs so easily and, when the towers convert up to trebuchets, they're usually double promoted against ranged attacks.

The patch has made war mongering way less fun. I'm thinking of playing civs that get their unique unit later now, like Arabia, so that perhaps I've built up some positive diplo points before I start getting the diplo hits.

This is damn too easy on duel map vs AI.
First try and I won on deity level against Babylon on turn 84.
Thanks for this guide, this is awesome.

PS : Sorry for bumping this guide but I really like it.

superresistant said:

This is damn too easy on duel map vs AI.
First try and I won on deity level against Babylon on turn 84.
Thanks for this guide, this is awesome.

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Well, any 1v1 on a duel map vs the AI is pretty much the same...

GenuineRisk said:

Well, any 1v1 on a duel map vs the AI is pretty much the same...

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Agreed. CB rush will end any AI in duel. Take honor opener, spam 5/6 CBs, 2 horse. Done.