Wins on short number of turns

Hello Fellow Die Hard Civ Fans,

I have always wondered how players on this forum can win on just 200 turns or 300 turns. What is it that I am not understanding. I play Civ more for relaxation more than anything. I play on Chieftain or Warlord and play on Marathon setting to make it a lengthy game for the day or weekend. I play against 10 civs and 20 - 25 city states. I don't typically focus on military units until later in the game when my tech allows me to build stronger units. I build a lot of wonders which takes a way from building or start to build large military armies. So by the time I get into a position to start taking over other civs it's about turn 250-400. By the time I finish the game it's about turn 1000. For most people on this forum this is Way To Long.

Are those who win on difficult levels only focusing on military units from turn one to finish as quickly as possible. I would like to know what your tricks are to win a game so fast.

Thanks

Brew God

Massive focus on science over everything, and in BNW, building only a small enough units to defend yourself really early on, but getting a really fast national college and an early 4 cities with tradition. On deity the game naturally goes faster because you can send trade routes to the AI for lots of early science (because of their early science bonuses), and you won't be the early tech leader so your first spies are going to be more effective. For social policies, the best combo for almost every civ (sadly) appears to currently be full tradition/patronage/consulates (pledge to protect every city state)/full rationalism, and then go in to ideology policies depending on your needs. Military wise, you'll want your army to be mostly composite bowmen/crossbowmen at the start, there is a brief period of time where you'll want a ton of artillery, and then when flight starts, bombers and fighters kill off everything.

Deity and really fast finishes follows a very specific formula of what to do, only making minor adjustments from game to game based on where you are and who your neighbors are. I pulled off the formula successfully for deity once, but I'm now planning on going back to emperor next time I play so I can actually vary my build and do stuff that will be a bit more fun.