Always War Challenge #1-Attila Emperor

I don’t know if there is any interest, but if you are tired of racing to the fastest SV times on deity you might try the always war (AW) variant. Essentially, the one rule is that as soon as you meet a Civ (NOT a CS) you must declare war on that turn. It means about the only thing you can do is get an embassy to see where their capital is and then declare. There is no peace ever! At least you don’t have to worry about your rep.

As you can imagine this increases the difficulty somewhat. No trades on any kind. No trade routes except with CS’s, if you can keep them in your camp. No lucrative peace deals or selling cities or getting other civs to do your dirty work.

You can win by any means but domination is preferred.

Only other rule is no use of the pillage repair exploit.

We start with the appropriate Attila at Emperor difficulty on a Pangea map. Attila has 2 dominant early game UUs, make good use of them and this should be easy to allow people to get the feel for AW. If people like it I can do a series.



View attachment Attila AWE 0000 BC-4000.Civ5Save

You almost had me until I seen Emperor Level. Either way it will be fun to read some of the posts by players who enjoy Emperor!

I'm probably so bad at warmongering that I wouldn't even be able to pull this off on Emperor

stormtrooper412 said:

I'm probably so bad at warmongering that I wouldn't even be able to pull this off on Emperor

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Just find a ruins to upgrade your warrior, then find the enemy cap.
BOOM! 1 down...

Wander around after healing-promoting your ram again... BOOM! 2 down...

And you can finish it using Horse Archers on emperor I think.

Fluphen Azine said:

You almost had me until I seen Emperor Level. Either way it will be fun to read some of the posts by players who enjoy Emperor!

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Too easy? I agree with Attila on pangea it is easy at Emp. But immortal on continents is very difficult with anyone. I will eventually post some of those that are winnable but it is not necessarily a sure thing (unlike deity SV). esp. to do domination. It is very different from standard play and it takes some getting used to managing economy, happiness etc. when you have no AIs to manipulate trade with and they are all attacking u and cutting your luxs via WC.

Mark1031 said:

It is very different from standard play and it takes some getting used to managing economy, happiness etc. when you have no AIs to manipulate trade with and they are all attacking u and cutting your luxs via WC.

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Agreed. Zero lux trades, zero strategic trades, hostile city states (can't bribe/do quests for ones that are at war with you), and World Congress attacks makes it harder than Deity Science/Diplomatic in my opinion (on Immortal).

Emperor, though...especially as Attila?

First try was a turn 128 win and it was incredibly sloppy. It also seems to be Raging Barbarians which I didn't expect. I also specifically avoided getting embassies (so blind to location of capitals, which also slowed me down a lot). There was also so much jungle/forest nearby, was crazy.


I'm reasonably confident this could be shaved down to <100 with some practice, especially knowing the map layout.

Yes I think Emp level is way too easy for this type of game. This start is pretty crazy for the Huns right? All that gold and marble and what not!! I haven't played it before but I have had this idea many times but I also thought it would be good to DOW every CS that you meet as well although I am not sure if I could win it. I believe that top players could play a game with Total War in mind throughout and win even on Deity but when I suggested this idea before I did not get any players that wanted to play it. However, if you are going to play a game like this I think you should at least allow the player to pillage only. Heck... even if you could get the Pyramids and allow Pillage/Repair it would still be very tough on Deity. I think Conts Map would be easier since it should be easier to clear out your Cont before meeting the other Civs... at least in theory. I think one big strategy is to try to claim the land asap that has gold hexes since you can't run any trade routes for gold. If you run into a map with low gold on it ... it could be very difficult but I am sure someone would figure out the winning strategy as well. One tactic would have to be Full Honor first since you can solve your gold problems by killing all those units! You might even set up a few units nearby the CS's to farm them for gold as well but since you are at Total War with all Civs you might not need to do that. It seems like Full Honor/Full Commerce/Autocracy would work amazing for this game if you can survive. If you can get into Industrial Espionage you will be able to catch up that way if you are still far behind. This game will require speed and the faster you can wipe out a few Civs the better. Should you have a rule that if you take a Civs capital you can make peace? I dunno I guess that would make it easier as well but it seems that if you are going to play this on Deity you might allow that until we see how hard this type of game is. One thing is for sure... We are not going to get a lot of players who want to play this type of game so we will not be able to see some of the more Optimal Strategies. Although I have seen some really fast Domination games with the Huns on Stand/Stand but that wasn't exactly a Total War game with no trade and what not. Also if you keep puppets you should get some workers over there and turn every hex into a trading post.

Fluphen Azine said:

This start is pretty crazy for the Huns right? All that gold and marble and what not!!

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You're guaranteed two luxuries near your capital so that's not crazy. However, the three pastures for the capital and another 3 pastures for a second city were pretty crazy.

Considering I lost like 6 units due to trying to force my way through some of the terrible jungle/forest for the nearest opponents I don't think it would really matter if the start was less amazing, though.

LordBalkoth said:

You're guaranteed two luxuries near your capital so that's not crazy. However, the three pastures for the capital and another 3 pastures for a second city were pretty crazy.

Considering I lost like 6 units due to trying to force my way through some of the terrible jungle/forest for the nearest opponents I don't think it would really matter if the start was less amazing, though.

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Well I was thinking that you are not going to suffer in gpt early with these luxes. I understand what you mean by only two luxes though. Harder on expansion I suppose. I do not know if you were doing it but if you have a lot of forest and jungle one tactic can be to get a few workers to the front and build roads all over that rough terrain so your troops can move in and out more easily. Anyways ... I think you played a great game and had a very fast win time but it is Emperor and we need to see this played out on Deity (IMO). The things you can achieve on Immortal or below do not compare to what can be done on Deity (IMHO). What SPs did you get into at the start?

Fluphen Azine said:

Well I was thinking that you are not going to suffer in gpt early with these luxes.

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Didn't work them until I need to stop growth, had things like 2 food/3 production sheep and 1 food/4 production horses to use instead!

Fluphen Azine said:

I do not know if you were doing it but if you have a lot of forest and jungle one tactic can be to get a few workers to the front and build roads all over that rough terrain so your troops can move in and out more easily.

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The problem was getting decent shots with ranged units on specific cities, not the overall travel time. But yes, otherwise I might have done that through the worst sections (but horse archers are so fast anyway!).

Fluphen Azine said:

Anyways ... I think you played a great game and had a very fast win time but it is Emperor and we need to see this played out on Deity (IMO).

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I'm not even sure you can win this type of game on Deity unless MAYBE you're someone like Attila and manage to wipe out nearby neighbors really, really fast. The thing is, you have no luxuries to trade and you have to defend your own lands from the start -- you need enough forces to potentially defend against Shaka and Ash at the same time while also being off conquering!

Obviously if all of the other nearby Civs are peace lovers it would be easier, but this type of game is brutal in general. No research agreements, the AIs love each other since they're all fighting you, you're not bribing them to fight each other, you have to defend against all seven simultaneously, etc.

Of, and of course there's no worker stealing most of the time because you declare war as soon as you meet their scout -- not many unguarded workers after that. Can't position and then easily swoop in while declaring war.

I admit I've only tried to do this on Immortal twice (first time made a lot of mistakes (forget which Civ), second time rolled Venice (and I tried! but I simply got out teched and nearby City States to swallow were awful)) but winning that (period) seems tougher than Deity domination to me.

Picking a top tier Civ or an excellent war mongering Civ would have helped, obviously, I might try it again like that.

Fluphen Azine said:

What SPs did you get into at the start?

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Liberty to free settler, then honor.

In reality, that was a bad idea and I should have gone honor from the start. Not used to trying to end games this fast to the point where science and economic bonuses in general are completely irrelevant. Might try the Honor/Commerce/Autocracy thing Consentient has mentioned at some point.

Usually if I'm going Domination I'm still conquering half the world in the modern area (through planes, (rocket) artillery, and/or ships).

never really considered it, but if you tick OCC those cities vanish instantly saving you the happiness hit from puppets. this would apply to any Civ though. might help at Deity. id probably abuse the Pillage/heal for all the remaining tiles rather than for combatants in combat. the gpt would be nice.

edit: probably full honor. no need for roads really except to speed units from your cap to the next war. id maybe take liberty to free worker then full honor, then commerce. plus it would be kind of interesting to see a deity OCC domination map with only once city left on the whole thing, haha.