Looking for Domination Victory Guidance

BruinBound

BruinBound

Warlord
Joined
Jan 24, 2015
Messages
161
Let me preface this by saying I am pretty unfamiliar and terrible at domination victories. All other types, I think I am pretty solid. However, I do not have anything close to that comfort level on deity when going for conquest.

I thought maybe the most helpful thing for me (and others trying to learn) is to post a recent game and ask for advice. I'm not so worried about things like my city placement and build orders as I was just practicing early rushes and did these without my usual thought.

This is my starting empire as Egypt. I went 3 cities and I filled out the honor tree (right-side first).
Spoiler :


I pulled off a bit of a long war against Catherine. When I went to war I had 5 War Chariots, 1 Horse, 3 CBs, and 1 Spear. This is the empire I took:
Spoiler :


Inca to the west (sorry the tooltip is blocking some of the map, actually some jungle there IRC):


Siam to the North (and the West too because he's Ram):
Spoiler :


My tech-tree as of now:
Spoiler :


General advice is helpful, but the major questions I'm hoping to get guidance on:
  1. What mistakes do you already see?
  2. Should I have taken Novgorod also?
  3. Who should I target next? Siam is a really awkward shaped empire with a lot of jungle. Inca is a little more exposed but I am afraid of splitting myself apart for Ram (I had to bribe him off once when I was at war with Russia).
  4. When should I go to my next war? Should I quickly rebuild a few War Chariots I lost and go after Inca? Wait a bit for XBs or Trebs? Wait for artillery?
  5. Future tech path? Should I even bother with education or straight down the military line?

This is the part of the game where I am unsure about the future direction I should go, so hoping to learn!
 
Well, you seem much better at this than I am so my advice may not be really good:

1. You need to double that army. Usually that much is enough to blindside a neighbor even for me, but most LPs/screenie writeups have at least twice as many units spearheading the assault.

2. No, but I wonder why you kept St. Petersburg, it's quite useless and a happiness sink because I don't see a unique lux.

3. I'd go for Inca but the Siamese city between is in a really bad position for you. If Incas and Siam are already at war, you should have a good shot at taking them both out eventually.

4. Incas seem rather ripe for taking.

5. I'd go straight to XBows right now. You shouldn't have gone Engineering, that delayed the XBs by a fair bit
 
BruinBound said:
the major questions I'm hoping to get guidance on:
  1. What mistakes do you already see?
Click to expand...


  1. Science is too low. Cities are too small.

    On Deity, even when going for early warfare you need to grow those cities. So Civil Service early is essential.

    You don't need Tradition-Peaceful levels of Food (like +20 or whatever) but you need them to be as big as they can be. I see a paucity of workers. I think you needed a lot more.

    [*] Should I have taken Novgorod also?
    Click to expand...

    No, definitely not. It's too bad that Cathy had no Wonders to give extra culture. My guess is she went Piety as she often does now. She used to be the most reliable Liberty Domination civ but now she acts completely counter to victory, and just spams missionaries and prophets.

    [*] Who should I target next? Siam is a really awkward shaped empire with a lot of jungle. Inca is a little more exposed but I am afraid of splitting myself apart for Ram (I had to bribe him off once when I was at war with Russia).
    Click to expand...

    Ideally, you wouldn't have allowed yourself to get so far behind in tech when the terrain means a XB would have been difficult, but either way I think you need to concentrate on tech-ing to Dynamite ASAP. So Civil Service > Education > Chemistry > Fertiliser and using Oxford for Dynamite. Grow those cities and make some workers.

    Or, quickly build 8 XBs and used those, along with the upgraded Chariot-Knights to take Cusco. But be quick about it.
 
you seems to lack a plan and planing ahead - thats never good in civ ...

20 turns ago latest you should have figured you wont take all world with chariot archers .. and therefore never started building something like statue of zeus

imo take 1 or 2 more cities - rostov and pitsan.. and sell them for good peace deals - lux and money right after taking.

After stop warring totaly and go full science/ happynes - try kill rest of world with artilleries or so.
Its proly even to late to demand tribute from some CS?!
 
tommynt said:
you seems to lack a plan and planing ahead - thats never good in civ ...
Click to expand...

Haha, yes I agree its never good, which is why I came here :)

Based on some of the comments, it seems a lot of people are saying maybe do something with XB's but really waiting for artillery is the safest bet. In which case I need more growth/ tech. So was it a mistake even going after Russia early? If I am starting at artillery, why not just go 4 city tradition? Any benefits of the early rush when the target doesn't have any useful wonders?

Based on the answers above, I would like to know when you guys think an early rush will actually be helpful. When I have an incredibly soft wonder-spammer with no military and easy terrain next to me? Hopefully this isn't the only case.

Agreed about more workers and not build Statue of Zeus.

As always, thanks for the replies. It is very appreciated!
 
Wonders are fine... if you know what you want to do with them. Disregarding growth and science is fine... if you know you won't need growth and science. As tommy said, your issue is lack of a plan. For Domination victory, it's crucial to have a target military tech at which you'll do most or all of your warring, and plan your entire game around maximizing that window.

For example, it's actually totally possible to conquer the entire world with War Chariots. But if you want to do that, you should mostly be spamming War Chariots start to finish. No need to build Libraries. If this is your plan, you also shouldn't be going Honor -- Liberty is the way to maximize hammers for spamming disposable troops.

However, if you want to do most of your conquering at a later tech (i.e., Crossobws), you need to work way harder on science. The faster you get to Crossbow tech, the more time you have to use Crossbows. Your early game should revolve around reaching Machinery ASAP with money to upgrade 8+ Crossbows. Ideally you can also do a bit of conquering with CompBows and/or War Chariots without slowing your science.

Instead, you seem to have split the difference between these two approaches, and now neither is possible. You probably won't be able to finish conquest without Artilleries, which will take forever to unlock... and if you want to win the game with Artilleries, you should be planning for this from the start. AKA get science get science get science.
 
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