DV Advice please - who to attack first? And when?

I'm playing a game on Deity, Pangaea, Standard, Standard, seeking a DV, and using as a guide Moriarte's excellent thread found here.

I think I'm doing quite well. I was lucky to get salt and my nearest neighbours are the peaceful ones (Portugal and Brazil) acting as buffers for Ashurbanipal and Shaka.

In a few turns I'll have an army together and since I'm making good time, I'd like to take a capital and up my science even more than it will be when I finish liberty and use a GE to get NC.

The problem is, I might have messed things up a bit diplo-wise.

I'm sending a caravan to Maria for science, and have 30+ turns to go on a DoF with Pedro.

Besides them, the others are further away, with much bigger armies, and some of them (Inca, Byz) may not even exist by the time I get there.

So in terms of the city development I feel I'm doing OK for a Deity game, but as far as starting to piece together a 'grand chessboard' strategy for my DV, I'm pretty lost.

On Immortal I would backstab Pedro and the knock-on effect of my betrayal wouldn't be too bad cuz by the time I conquered Pedro and one other civ, I'd have the best army on the Pangaea.

On Deity, it's gonna take me a good while longer, so I'd rather not risk that unless it's the best overall strategy.

So, what do you guys think? Should I build for a while an maybe go for my first conquest with XBs? Or sacrifice the caravan and kill Maria? Or backstab Pedro? Or hope that one of Shaka/Ashurb are busy with their wider conquests and are spread thin so I can seize them by surprise? Or something else?

I attach a screenshot and a save game and will be grateful for any advice from more seasoned warmongers. Trick is I'm using InfoAddict and Historical Religions mods, so not sure if anyone can help me. Hopefully someone can.

Special thanks to Moriarte for the great guide and LPs.

[EDIT: Oh, and of course, there's always the question of tech. Once I have NC and 3 trade routes taking science, and teching towards civil service and education, will I be in good shape in BPT? Is it ever sensible to dip into tradition after liberty and grow cities and army until Dynamite/Armor and then try a blitzkrieg sweep of capitals with artillery/Panzerkampfwagon? Or are there better things to be had in Consulates/Commerce?]

I definitely like your style! One day you complain about having difficulties on immortal, you get a bunch of critic about a huge list of things you do wrong, and instead of trying to fix these, you just jump to deity

Can't say much about this game, as I can't open the file, but I think you messed it up already. CB/XB rush is being done by making a lot of archers and then upgrade em, just before you attack. That saves a huge amount of hammers , and you do not hinder your science development ...

I guess I can see how it could seem a bit strange but it's tradition and peaceful play I have problems with on anything above King. I'm happy-ish with how I'm progressing at DVs. I have one under my belt at Immortal, though it wasn't quick. I think I can learn quite fast from this point if I put the effort in. I'm also really thankful for all the attention this community is willing to give.

Summary: I know that my chances aren't great at winning this game, but I like the feeling of excitement from playing at the top level and being only 2 techs behind at turn 90, compared with previous stabs at this.

Cheers again Dragon!

well, I advise to watch this LP : https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFWnpbmrXTopBRamdS8ITzq5LGjnE-7tN

While I like Moriarte's LPs, they are mostly late domination with bombers. Here you can see real early action.

Here is a DV tip : don't back-stab AI's because you want their capitals.

However, if you are not married to a DV, then by all means start a well planned seldom-ending war designed to take as many capitals as possible and as efficiently as possible.

dragonxxx said:

well, I advise to watch this LP : https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFWnpbmrXTopBRamdS8ITzq5LGjnE-7tN

While I like Moriarte's LPs, they are mostly late domination with bombers. Here you can see real early action.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the link. Looks interesting. Am loving the accents of the players here, especially since I'm an linguist. Dutch Domination are not two words I ever thought would go together.

DarkestOnion said:

Here is a DV tip : don't back-stab AI's because you want their capitals.

However, if you are not married to a DV, then by all means start a well planned seldom-ending war designed to take as many capitals as possible and as efficiently as possible.

Click to expand...

Cheers. I actually managed to organise a 'coup' against Maria by paying her to DoW Brazil and paying Assyria and Brazil to DoW her, so have no penalty save the capital capture. I'm not doing bad for science but I think I'll have to concentrate on just that for 30 turns now before I can upgrade everything and try to take out the potential runaways (now Aztecs and Incas).

All good practice. Even if I lose, I shall have learnt a lot from this game.

paying 3 different AI to attack Maria, at a time when you are not even ready for war is just a huge waste of money. Its completely pointless - if you want to put her on wars - when you are ready to attack - just pay her to dow some AI, and you'll not even pay for this after you attack on the same turn ...

Maybe you misunderstood. I was ready for war. The spending was to avoid warmonger penalty. It worked, so did the war. I took her capital losing only 1 unit, a barbarian brute

Wait...if you already paid Maria to DoW Brazil, why pay Brazil again to DoW Maria? Is that even possible? Isn't he already at war with her?

This thread is completely obsolete. I don't need any DomV advice at all anymore. I've chalked up around 50 Deity DomVs now.

The biggest lesson I have learned is that Honor > Liberty unless you're gonna win the game with XBs.

Wow! I don't think I have that much deity wins in total

Neither do i, but i think we should let this thread rest in peace