Attila Deity Domination Guide

Cromagnus said:

BTW, I was referring to your comments about 40 and 70 HP units.

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ZOC helps.

I don't think there is an "upper tier" for players like you-or maybe you are already there.

TheGrumpyBuddha said:

But what turn should you have the NC done by?

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Update: Carthage on Archipelago is way more fun! Can anyone link me to a good deity guide for that? The search function here isn't that great.

I liked reading this guide and I do feel like trying it out as soon as my work leaves me some time !
Thx cromagnus

Very nice guide ... you've thought of everything ... in the "gold standard" of guides.

I like playing all war games, hence my name. They're much more exciting than any other victory condition which, to me, is just a long sequence of hitting end turn after watching the AI juggle units in a random manner.

I could do the CB/xbow rush easily in G&K with any civ at immortal consistantly and diety on many occasions. The upgrade to BNW seemed to kill the warmonger in favour of the builder so I haven't enjoyed the expansion pack until I discovered this thread.

This horse archer rush is so much fun but I haven't been successful yet.

First game was standard setup with random civs, random placement. My nearest neighbour planted his second city (open plains) touching my capitals cultural border on turn 3. So I had my first puppet (with 3 lux) with 2 horse archers and a warrior around turn 35. Got the capital on approx. turn 40. "This is going to be easy" I thought but I got bogged down with Rome in hills around turn 70ish. He had the largest military and no one could be bribed into fighting with me. By the time he was dead, I was well behind schedule. At around turn 160, things got very slow, armies of over-promoted horse archers were only doing 8 or 9 damage points on a city per shot.

So I reloaded the initial save and started again with the same map - obviously easier because I knew where every one was. I only got one extra ruin but the random number gods were kind to me; got a battering ram, culture, and mining.

It's now turn 127. And it's starting to bog down again.

Taken out 4 civs, 3 to go. I've just taken out Sweden who had the Great Wall. I had to raze 2 cities just to get to Stockholm - burnt 4 GG's just to get through. England, Byzantium, and Mongolia still have their capitals. Byzantium have a huge number of cities. They were bribed into war against the Mongols eons ago but neither side has done much damage. England have just got long bows.

The battering rams were much less effective than I remember (haven't played them since unpatched G&K as they were just so powerful). In this game, I changed to horsemen as soon as possible.

I seemed to loose a lot of horse archers between promotions 3 and 4 - really easy to get them to level 3 accuracy - much harder to get them to logistics. In previous CB rushes, I would rarely attack a capital until I had at least 2 logistic CBs but that takes time. As this challenge is to go as fast as possible, there's no time to pick off small fry first.

Don't think I will take this one through to the end. I will roll for a new map and new opponents and try again.

Thanks Cromagnus for making BNW fun again.

warmonger said:

I like playing all war games, hence my name. They're much more exciting than any other victory condition which, to me, is just a long sequence of hitting end turn after watching the AI juggle units in a random manner.

I could do the CB/xbow rush easily in G&K with any civ at immortal consistantly and diety on many occasions. The upgrade to BNW seemed to kill the warmonger in favour of the builder so I haven't enjoyed the expansion pack until I discovered this thread.

This horse archer rush is so much fun but I haven't been successful yet.

First game was standard setup with random civs, random placement. My nearest neighbour planted his second city (open plains) touching my capitals cultural border on turn 3. So I had my first puppet (with 3 lux) with 2 horse archers and a warrior around turn 35. Got the capital on approx. turn 40. "This is going to be easy" I thought but I got bogged down with Rome in hills around turn 70ish. He had the largest military and no one could be bribed into fighting with me. By the time he was dead, I was well behind schedule. At around turn 160, things got very slow, armies of over-promoted horse archers were only doing 8 or 9 damage points on a city per shot.

So I reloaded the initial save and started again with the same map - obviously easier because I knew where every one was. I only got one extra ruin but the random number gods were kind to me; got a battering ram, culture, and mining.

It's now turn 127. And it's starting to bog down again.

Taken out 4 civs, 3 to go. I've just taken out Sweden who had the Great Wall. I had to raze 2 cities just to get to Stockholm - burnt 4 GG's just to get through. England, Byzantium, and Mongolia still have their capitals. Byzantium have a huge number of cities. They were bribed into war against the Mongols eons ago but neither side has done much damage. England have just got long bows.

The battering rams were much less effective than I remember (haven't played them since unpatched G&K as they were just so powerful). In this game, I changed to horsemen as soon as possible.

I seemed to loose a lot of horse archers between promotions 3 and 4 - really easy to get them to level 3 accuracy - much harder to get them to logistics. In previous CB rushes, I would rarely attack a capital until I had at least 2 logistic CBs but that takes time. As this challenge is to go as fast as possible, there's no time to pick off small fry first.

Don't think I will take this one through to the end. I will roll for a new map and new opponents and try again.

Thanks Cromagnus for making BNW fun again.

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Hah, well, you're welcome!

It's very easy to get bogged down by the Great Wall. If you don't feel like you can break through it easily based on terrain and cultural boundaries, you might consider looking for another target. Better to have only one opponent left with the GW on t130 than to have 4 opponents left because you spent 30 turns breaking through the GW. During those 30 turns all the other opponents will have gotten tougher. And sometimes it's really easier to go after a different, more approachable city first. You don't want to be fighting an AI's units inside the GW, so if you chew through them by attacking a more approachable city, (narrower cultural boundaries, better terrain) you can often face the capital undefended, and get a flatland approach.

Regarding the loss of units: I try to keep my horse archers at lvl 3 alive, sacrificing a lvl 1 or 2 if necessary. Logistics is just so powerful, it can really change the momentum of the game dramatically to lose that unit instead of getting logistics with it two turns later...

I've been busy with real life so I haven't had time to finish the guide but I will be adding more detail and removing the Work In Progress tags when I'm satisfied with it.

The game really will bog down after t120 due to AI technological advancement. It's still winnable, but it depends on who is left. If the strongest opponent is on the other side of the map, and they're #1 in tech, it can be tough. It also depends on each civ's unique units. If you have an opponent like England, they will tend to get longbowmen around t120 or even earlier. And those can really ruin your day. So, you absolutely want to take out England by t110 or so if possible. If possible, sick England on someone else to get their units out of position, or if possible, killed. But if, as you say, you're having no luck with getting people to DoW each other, it can be tough. I find myself asking each AI if there is anyone they'll DoW almost every turn.

The key really is to take out opponents quickly in the early game, while the Horse Archer is still competitive without logistics. The faster you chew through people, the faster you'll get Logistics, and then suddenly the game gets a lot easier. For me, I found that each successive attempt got easier, as I got better at taking people out quickly.

Focus on improving your diplomacy, trading, choose your targets wisely and try to take out your opponents as fast as possible with minimal losses. Each poor decision can add 5-10 turns to the game. As you get more confident about your combat tactics and make better diplomacy choices, you'll take out opponents faster, but it also requires that you be more aggressive. Experiment how far you can push the envelope without failing a city capture. You want to be aggressive, but you also need to time each strike well. If you only have 2 horse archers in position, with 2 more en route, moving a warrior into range to absorb damage for those 2 archers isn't as effective as waiting for the other 2 to arrive. This "dead time" waiting for reinforcements can be spent baiting the AI with workers to draw out their troops.

Also, I'll add a section on this, because it's so valuable: Try to keep your meatshields between 90 and 99 health. This will ensure that the city attacks them first, giving your horse archers at least one extra round of firing before any have to retreat. I take this for granted now, and I think I left it out of the guide.

I don't have a problem with lack of aggression - I have the opposite. The only way I know how to play (civIII, cIV, and all versions of CiV) is all out war. If anything I'm too aggressive - pushing too far in front of reinforcements and having to retreat and wait.

I started a new game and had an unbelievable start. Turn 1 warrior pops a ruin for trapping; T7 ruins gives upgrade to ram; T11 ruin gives gold; T16 ruin gives culture - this is on deity FFS.

As soon as I popped the ram, I switched the cap to produce a warrior. I had meet a Polish scout that had come from the south. I sent my scout down to find Poland with my ram following behind. Found Warsaw on T11 on a river junction with mountains behind - it would have been a bugger to take when it was properly defended. As soon as the warrior was made and in position (T24), I attacked with the ram and warrior with a slightly damaged scout as city bait. Warsaw was mine on T27 and Poland was dead on T40. This made Egypt, Hiawatha and Rome furious and they all declared on me. I'm in a three way war at T50.

Egypt and Hiawatha sent massive armies - chariots,warriors and spearmen followed by the Iroquios UU (forgotten its name) and cats. I ended up with 3 logistic horse archers and 2 at level three. We met at Warsaw - It took lots of turns but all invaders died. Both have now lost their capitals and are left with a nothing city each.

Big brave Rome sent a scout to die for the cause.

It's T90 now and I'm just setting up to destroy the Romans. As I've only meet one other civ, there's no one around to help so I allied with a CS on Rome's borders with a river between them. Augustus is happily burning his army against their pikes.

I don't think I will get this done by T120 as I have no idea where the remaining guys are hiding. But it's been fun. Thanks again for writing this up.

One new discovery for me. I had thought that chasing barbs would only get my army up to level 2 and seeing as they start at level 1 rather than level 0, I took them off barb duty after their first promo. Then I discovered that barbs will get the horse archers up to level 3. This makes a huge difference. Can't believe I'm just find this out after playing this game for years.

Yeah, that's not limited to HAs. The rule on all units that come with an embedded promotion (like HAs with Accuracy I, Winged Hussars with Shock I or Longbowmen with Range) that didn't come from an XP building (barracks, etc.) is that the promotion doesn't use any XP, so they can still acquire XP from barbs up to the 60-XP level, which will get the HAs to Accuracy III. Same applies to units that are built in your Alhambra city (start with Drill I)

warmonger said:

One new discovery for me. I had thought that chasing barbs would only get my army up to level 2 and seeing as they start at level 1 rather than level 0, I took them off barb duty after their first promo. Then I discovered that barbs will get the horse archers up to level 3. This makes a huge difference. Can't believe I'm just find this out after playing this game for years.

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Well, it's an Attila thing, not a general rule. Or rather, any UU that starts with a free promotion is considered lvl 1 even though they would normally be lvl 2. So Horse Archers can promote to Accuracy III off barbs, but War Chariots can't. There are a lot of other UUs like that, including Battering Rams. You can promote a Ram to Cover 2 and Dill I just by getting attacked by barbarians. It's handy.

Don't be surprised if you can finish by t120. Scouting goes quickly with Horse Archers. Make sure you have writing before you meet the rest of the civs so you can immediately ask for an embassy. If it's t90 and you only have 4 opponents left, you might be able to take Rome out by t100, one more by t110, and then split up your army to take the last two out at once.

Here was the timing on my t111 game. Delhi on t100, Gao on t108, Rio on t111.

I had 3 opponents left on t90, and my first sight of Rio and Gao (other than through my embassy) was with my army.

I won't at all be surprised if someone following this guide achieves a t100 victory before I have a chance to try again. I think the reason it took this long for someone to try is that no one thought it could be done. It makes me want to try the same thing with Gandhi's War Elephants. They're expensive, but so much stronger.

Cromagnus said:

It makes me want to try the same thing with Gandhi's War Elephants. They're expensive, but so much stronger.

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War Elephants are powerful but spoiled by Gandhi's UA.I think the best way to use WE is to slaughter enemy units as many as they can,negotiate peace and then demand whatever you want-luxuries,cities with more than 6 citizens,Gold...These things will help Gandhi get out of his happiness cap much faster.

This is a sick guide. Thanks man. How might you tweak it if you were merely trying to clear a continent out (so as not to cripple other aspects of your civ moving forward)?

This guide helped me take two capitals early in an Emperor game-Assur at turn 16 and Constantinople at turn 45, securing my continent and setting me up for naval domination.

First try on emperor resulted in a turn 134 victory! Misstankes that slowed me down was bad scouting and not leaving solidiers behind to guard conqured luxuries from barbarians.

Next try will be immortal. This was to easy.

Thanks for a guide to fun gameplay!!


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Huns are a sicck warmonger civ. Sick guide for sick army!

-For early wars with HAs. Horse archer is like a supreme unit in early era. Only problem is, you need good scouting of enemy lands in front of enemy city.

-best terrain for horse archer applications in game, is a wide area, with preferrably hills nearby to scout ahead into enemy city (worst terrain is arguably flatland forest)

-horse archer formations are mainly the following: ranged wall (usage against more numerous enemies), or ranged horseshoe (you envelop numerically inferior enemy)

-chokepoints also work against horse archer (unless you are using logistics, in which case you can "rotate" units out of line of fire, after shooting at city)

-chokepoints will not matter much at logistics horse archers (or with keshiks or arabian camel archer, for the same reason you can "rotate" units out of line of fire)

-casualties will sometimes be inevitable (e.g. capturing enemy capital). In this case, it is best to delay the attack when all the enemy field army has been killed.
Then you surround the enemy capital 3 tiles away, from all directions. On the next turn, you move into the city bombardment range, and start whittling down the city defenses, with ALL units.


Problem for me, at king level is always the naval invasion to clean up the other continents.
Well, true enough, you win if you just make a precision strike at the capital, but where's the fun in that kind of war. I want the enemy vanguished utterly.

What's the best way to go about it, regarding e.g. city defense strength and fregate bombardment?

When do fregates go obsolete in bombardment and do fregates + ironclads have any utility if the city defense is growing?

hai said:

This is a sick guide. Thanks man. How might you tweak it if you were merely trying to clear a continent out (so as not to cripple other aspects of your civ moving forward)?

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If you're merely trying to clear your continent before meeting the other one, you almost don't need a guide, because taking 4 capitals with Attila is practically a no-brainer. But, I know what you mean: How would you get the most out of it?

Well, I would change a few things. I would dispense with Honor, and go Liberty. You can't ignore science, so you need to build, not just warmong.

Also, you're going to clear your continent before you even get Logistics. By the time you invade the other continent, assuming that's even your goal, Horse Archers will be Knights and lose those promotions.

So, whether you intend to play peaceful or not after clearing your continent, I'd go for a more balanced start. You probably want to go 2-city NC, and you probably should wait to take *most* capitals until more like t70, to give the AI time to build Wonders you can capture. But you should still be sure to raze/capture all cities by t120 to avoid someone showing up with a Caravel and hating you for it.

I think it is possible to rush Astronomy and win a continents game with Horse Archers, but it's tricky at best. So, I'd be thinking Frigates or going for a peaceful victory.

If I was going to try to win with Horse Archers, I'd go on a rampage early, take the free Settler last to get that reduced culture cost sooner, and annex as soon as I could build Courthouses. That way you have a settler to send over to the other continent for a beach-head, which you'll need without ships.

Laurwin said:

Huns are a sicck warmonger civ. Sick guide for sick army!

-For early wars with HAs. Horse archer is like a supreme unit in early era. Only problem is, you need good scouting of enemy lands in front of enemy city.

-best terrain for horse archer applications in game, is a wide area, with preferrably hills nearby to scout ahead into enemy city (worst terrain is arguably flatland forest)

-horse archer formations are mainly the following: ranged wall (usage against more numerous enemies), or ranged horseshoe (you envelop numerically inferior enemy)

-chokepoints also work against horse archer (unless you are using logistics, in which case you can "rotate" units out of line of fire, after shooting at city)

-chokepoints will not matter much at logistics horse archers (or with keshiks or arabian camel archer, for the same reason you can "rotate" units out of line of fire)

-casualties will sometimes be inevitable (e.g. capturing enemy capital). In this case, it is best to delay the attack when all the enemy field army has been killed.
Then you surround the enemy capital 3 tiles away, from all directions. On the next turn, you move into the city bombardment range, and start whittling down the city defenses, with ALL units.


Problem for me, at king level is always the naval invasion to clean up the other continents.
Well, true enough, you win if you just make a precision strike at the capital, but where's the fun in that kind of war. I want the enemy vanguished utterly.

What's the best way to go about it, regarding e.g. city defense strength and fregate bombardment?

When do fregates go obsolete in bombardment and do fregates + ironclads have any utility if the city defense is growing?

Click to expand...

Frigates work on Deity up to t200, later if they're promoted. So on King, probably like t300.

Waiting for ironclads weakens Frigates too much. Use Caravels at first, Privateers as you have time to build them. If I'm up against a high-defense city, I bring overwhelming force with Frigates. Unlike land wars, navies can move to the next city quickly. So there's less harm in overkill. Overwhelm that city fast to minimize casualties.

But, really, the goal should be to not face high-defense cities. Get Navigation *early*. I go Liberty, plant the Liberty GS as an academy, shoot for a crazy early NC, and use Oxford on Navigation. I try to have 6 Galleas ready for upgrade AND the cash to do it. This is actually not as hard as it sounds if you clear your continent quickly, because you can easily be building 4 Galleas at once at Compass. Then you can build 2 more and 2 Caravels at Astronomy. Then I go all out units: 4 Frigates and 2 Privateers while my first 2 navies (3 Frigates, 1 caravel each) take out two AIs at once. Etc.

As I mentioned in my above post, you have to modify the Attila strategy a lot for Continents. This guide is for all-out Pangaea war, and so it would really not work that well for Continents.

Gustavus Rex said:

First try on emperor resulted in a turn 134 victory! Misstankes that slowed me down was bad scouting and not leaving solidiers behind to guard conqured luxuries from barbarians.

Next try will be immortal. This was to easy.

Thanks for a guide to fun gameplay!!


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You're welcome! Keep in mind that on each successive difficulty level you must be more efficient. I think I managed a t88 victory on Emperor when I was experimenting with this, and my first try on Immortal was like t146, because I didn't start fast enough.

I see logistics being debated some, I feel its necessary for the ability to move, shoot then move again which the HA doesn't get normally. It also seem to come pretty quick if you level up on some barb camps first. On archers I would normally take +1 range first.

I realize this might be obvious to most players but I didn't see it mentioned.

I must say, capturing two capitals by turn 20 with one unit because a warrior happened to upgrade to a battering ram on turn 5 is pretty sick.