Suggestions for TSG2

Well, with the apparent ease of the walkovers in TSG1, I'd suggest we bump to prince and take an excursion through the tech tree, with either space or culture victory targeted for TSG2. Or diplo I suppose, but I still haven't figured out exactly how voting works there (is it all about getting the city states to vote for you?)

dV

In the game I played recently, every single civilization voted for itself in the UN vote every time. This meant that all I had to do was buy alliances with City states to win. That seemed stupid, so I put it off and went for a cultural victory instead. As it stands now, the diplomatic track seems a bit useless to me.

bluexmas said:

In the game I played recently, every single civilization voted for itself in the UN vote every time. This meant that all I had to do was buy alliances with City states to win. That seemed stupid, so I put it off and went for a cultural victory instead. As it stands now, the diplomatic track seems a bit useless to me.

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I actually had a pretty exciting diplo game...its a process of building city state allies and managing your relationships with the AI civs. Trying to be neutral/friendly to everyone is not easy, and you need all the resources you can get to get those votes secured so war is a major distraction.

Once I started getting close to victory, the other mega civ launched a full on invasion, he could see I was going to win. My b-line to globalization had left me with a high tech navy but a low tech army. I struggled to hold the choke point with heavy naval bombardment, outnumbered and out teched on the ground...it was pretty damn epic, and the battle was bloody and ended up fairly even...he was creeping forward very slowly, heading to the capital of a vital city state ally. But couldn't quite get there in time...a few more decades and venice would fall and surely I would have lost.

It felt like 300 or helms deep!

As far as GOTM I recommend diving right into King...prince seems too easy and I was not one to win on immortal or diety in civ4. I think a big part of what people find boring about non military victories, is the difficulty is too low. Its funner when you have stiff competition from the AI. King was the first setting where I started to see some really solid play from the AI ( although not without some pretty bad tactical mistakes )

da_Vinci said:

Well, with the apparent ease of the walkovers in TSG1, I'd suggest we bump to prince and take an excursion through the tech tree, with either space or culture victory targeted for TSG2. Or diplo I suppose, but I still haven't figured out exactly how voting works there (is it all about getting the city states to vote for you?)

dV

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The person who builds the UN gets 2 votes for themselves, the other civilizations will all vote for themselves UNLESS they were wiped out and then had a city liberated, in which case they will always vote for their liberator. Let's say Germany captures all of Rome's cities, Rome is eliminated from the game. But then Egypt comes and takes one of their cities* back from Germany, and chooses to liberate it, rather than puppeting or annexing. Rome comes back into the game, and will vote for Egypt in a UN election.

More importantly, the City-States also get a vote, and they will vote for whoever has the most influence with them UNLESS captured by a civ, then liberated by another, in which case they'll always vote for their liberator regardless of influence. If you've built some cities that are bringing in a lot of gold, you'll be able to win over most if not all of them with 500/1000 gold, especially if you go down the Policy tree that improves City-State bonuses.

I'm not sure how many votes you need for victory, I think it's determined by map size, or total civs and city-states.

So it's a viable option, I've gone for it myself in games but not been successful yet

* It might have to be their capital, I'm not totally sure, I've only read about it, not actually done it.

hendo said:

The person who builds the UN gets 2 votes for themselves, the other civilizations will all vote for themselves UNLESS they were wiped out and then had a city liberated, in which case they will always vote for their liberator. Let's say Germany captures all of Rome's cities, Rome is eliminated from the game. But then Egypt comes and takes one of their cities* back from Germany, and chooses to liberate it, rather than puppeting or annexing. Rome comes back into the game, and will vote for Egypt in a UN election.

More importantly, the City-States also get a vote, and they will vote for whoever has the most influence with them UNLESS captured by a civ, then liberated by another, in which case they'll always vote for their liberator regardless of influence. If you've built some cities that are bringing in a lot of gold, you'll be able to win over most if not all of them with 500/1000 gold, especially if you go down the Policy tree that improves City-State bonuses.

I'm not sure how many votes you need for victory, I think it's determined by map size, or total civs and city-states.

So it's a viable option, I've gone for it myself in games but not been successful yet

* It might have to be their capital, I'm not totally sure, I've only read about it, not actually done it.

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ye u're right, i've just win a game with diplomatic victory and the number of votes depends the number of civs and city-states in the game. who have the majority of votes will win, the easy way to win is to be friend of all city-state 1,2,3 turns before the votes lol..

On a randomized game, I ended up with Gandhi on an Island map. That was tougher than I expected, especially going for a cultural victory with the Bollywood achievement (3 cities max). Land was scarce, it was difficult to find resource clusters, and any city states on the same landmass as a major civ got attacked by them. I ended up with a city smack dab in Montezuma's empire.

Diplo is all about buying city states, and optionally wiping out some civs to win quicker and cheaper. Alex is the leader of choice of course. UN is pretty deep in the tech tree...
...for a cultural victory however you dont need many techs, maybe radio for broadcast towers, but nothing else.

Problem is that at least up to king difficulty and on small and smaller maps these victory types are far too easy...provided you always have 1-2 units per city and/or military tech lead.

...coming to think of it...contrary to civ4, on small and smaller maps and up to king, domination is the quickest and easiest victory type!

I agree, that if it's going to be domination win again, then the level should be at least King. I'm no civ master and had a tough time on monarch in Civ 4. But after 3 games of Civ 5 I'm playing Immortal to get an exciting game and resistance from the AI.

Culture seems by far the hardest way to win. I managed to just win on prince in AD 2040, because I got a lucky in the end. But maybe it's just me not playing the culture strategy right...

Domination is simple, culture is run in HoF now, diplo is plain stupid - let's do science. At least King, much better immortal.

for a cultural victory however you dont need many techs, maybe radio for broadcast towers, but nothing else

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Redentor is the key. Maybe also grab Plastics for hydroplant and Globalization for Sydney Opera, if culture lags behind research

TSG1 was just that easy cause of the difficult level and pangaea. Make Archipelago -> start position on a small island without strategic resources.. that will be way harder

Lexad said:

Redentor is the key.

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Key? I don`t think so, nice to have but comes pretty late. Is it even multiplicative or does it just make up for one extra city?

Key is Stonehenge for the initial boost, then Piety tree, then rushing to Acoustics and Archeology (If we still had a culture slider I would stop research at this point ). Pick Freedom + Constitution ASAP as free policies from last Piety policy to double culture. And don`t get more than 3 cities (plus maybe puppets).

karmina said:

Key? I don`t think so, nice to have but comes pretty late. Is it even multiplicative or does it just make up for one extra city?

Key is Stonehenge for the initial boost, then Piety tree, then rushing to Acoustics and Archeology (If we still had a culture slider I would stop research at this point ). Pick Freedom + Constitution ASAP as free policies from last Piety policy to double culture. And don`t get more than 3 cities (plus maybe puppets).

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You can hoard culture points until you get Redentor and then get discount for a score of policies.

But while you are waiting, you won't get any benefits from the policies you could have had already.

I suggest prince level, since not all participants are experienced civvers.

I'd pick domination once more, but on a harder map type (small continents?), with a civilization whose unique units arrive later than Rome's, and with the additional requirement that two policy branches must be completed.

How many do you need? I'm sat with most of Freedom and Patronage and couple Tradition, 10-12 total.

As for AI competence, even inexperienced players find little resistance from AI even on Immortal (with reloads, though) as of now. Any not fast-military game at low level is bound to turn into landgrab with puppets working cottages.

I've been trying King and Emperor of late and it all turns into Warfare no matter what I do. All goes well until some AI manages to bribe 2 more into warring you.

From defending yourself you get labeled bloodthirsty and no matter what bad leads to worse and it's all constant warfare from then on.

Granted, it looks as if taking cities is one of the triggers for being labeled bloodthirsty, so I might try to play defence and not puppet cities from offending nations on that initial war to see if relations don't deteriorate.

As for victory condition: I'd like a space/science one, as I haven't managed it yet.

So: Space/Science, defensive war, try to keep relations civil. Mayhaps Wu?

Ribannah said:

I suggest prince level, since not all participants are experienced civvers.

I'd pick domination once more, but on a harder map type (small continents?), with a civilization whose unique units arrive later than Rome's, and with the additional requirement that two policy branches must be completed.

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This would barely bump up the difficulty. The AI is absolutely pathetic at the lower levels. I haven't tried imm/deity yet.

Taking your settings on prince:
(a) 2 archers + 2 warrior/spear (early) are enough to take out any AI on your own continent (puppet them, not annex). Build quite a few trading posts around your capital.
(b) Navigation (assuming ocean between continents) -> easy to bulb/research to. Then swim 3-4 horseman to the next continent & crush. repeat if there is a 3rd continent. the barb boats are no problem at prince. I've used a worker to swim for 100+ turns (exploring) on an archi map with no barb harrassment at all. Horsemen are overpowered early units. Horse is easy connect or have a city state provide.
(c) 2 policy trees -> use some gold from your conquest of AI cities to keep a couple of culture city states allied = enough culture to fill 2 trees with very few (if any) culture buildings. Tradition + Honor trees most likely.

Not the only way to win it, maybe not the fastest...but still very easy on prince.

cas

ps...I vote for science. King difficulty minimum. Same reasons Lexad already stated.

karmina said:

Key? I don`t think so, nice to have but comes pretty late. Is it even multiplicative or does it just make up for one extra city?

Key is Stonehenge for the initial boost, then Piety tree, then rushing to Acoustics and Archeology (If we still had a culture slider I would stop research at this point ). Pick Freedom + Constitution ASAP as free policies from last Piety policy to double culture. And don`t get more than 3 cities (plus maybe puppets).

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Lexad said:

You can hoard culture points until you get Redentor and then get discount for a score of policies.

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The hoard culture until Redentor didn't occur to me until after my recent culture win on prince, but that seems potentially powerful.

I think my approach in policy order was Freedom and Consitution early, and before piety, and took that last piety policy last, so the two free ones were the final two, and the most expensive ones (in terms of culture) ... but maybe not in terms of time ... could be that you want to use the last piety policy just before Redentor and Broadcast towers come online. If culture production is high enough after those two, the time cost may be maxed in the middle, not the end.

Are you sure that three cities, (other than puppets) is the sweet spot? I played with three plus puppets in that culture game. I am not sure what the policy cost ramp up is, but adding a 4th city that I control is potentially a 33% increase to my controlled core culture output ... if the policy culture cost increase in less than 33%, then a 4th city might make sense. Each added controlled city is less marginal added culture output, so there is some stopping point.

dV

My vote is for a Science victory. Cultural is fun, but I go for that a lot so its gotten boring. I suggest King/Standard Speed/(Arabia/Archipelago) or (Iriquois/Continents)

Ballcrusher said:

I agree, that if it's going to be domination win again, then the level should be at least King. I'm no civ master and had a tough time on monarch in Civ 4. But after 3 games of Civ 5 I'm playing Immortal to get an exciting game and resistance from the AI.

Culture seems by far the hardest way to win. I managed to just win on prince in AD 2040, because I got a lucky in the end. But maybe it's just me not playing the culture strategy right...

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My first culture attempt with Napoleon on prince finished the policy tree too late to get Utopia done before 2050. So tried again with Monte and used the three city plus puppets approach, got it done 2015 (prince again). That time forgot about Hermitage until late.

Monte's sacrificial captives are a small boost to culture, which gets some of the early policies quicker.

dV

took that last piety policy last, so the two free ones were the final two, and the most expensive ones

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As free policies do not increase the cost of the next, you should not wait till the end. On the contrary, the earlier you use it, the faster you get the benefits.