The Deity Challenge Lineup - Game #8 - Mongolia

Well, I didn't play the whole game but started from the last save before getting York T58 which was from T39 when I founded a pantheon. I did everything as much the same way as I could apart from making peace with Lizzy.

Few things unrelated to me changed the course of the game, though. Attila took 2 Polish cities badly hampering Casimir and DoWed pointlessly Pachacuti later. Alex went for CSs much earlier and Monte didn't even DoW Lizzy.
I took York T77, NC T83, CS T86, captured London T87, Liberty finished T88 and finally Pachacuti backstabbed & Monte just DoWed on T89. Didn't bother with Oracle this time so I went T97 instead of T81.
T100 6 Keshiks due to lack of money and 3 more ready in two turns.
T111 Monte off the map and T112 Cusco leaving Inca with one 0 hp city as Greek missionaries prevented capturing on that turn.
Poland has 3 cities, Attila 2, Portugal 2, England 1 & Alex half a dozen, 8 CSs allies but not that much military. Attila DoWed few turns ago but is offering warriors and knights and nobody has any units. Sure, no one is paying full price for anything either but I'm still in positive gpt & happiness.

Nothing drastic compared to the other game but in practice this seems way faster & should be easily over before T150 if I'd bother to continue.

Incan front
have Cusco (mostly because of a missclick - a keshik ran out of moves in range of the city so I pushed everything (was sure my 1 move frail landshneks would die 1 by one)) - Incans targeted the kesick (which miraculosly even survived) .. Got nice gold peace deal (~600 + ~80/turn )

Greek front
2 keshiks ,1 horse and 1 Brilliant commander (khan) keep the Greeks at war (for fear of him stealing crucial city state allies if at peace) .. They pay for their upkeep by occasionally killing units/caravans and burning cities when the happy situation allows for it ..

Poland War - winged husars are annoying - they killed some of my landshneks and even got 1 logistic keshik .. Still I'm taking (and burning cities) - will have own lancer meatshields in 3-4 turns

With nearly 2k gold in the bank and army group Incan veterans dog-piling Poland shall fall quickly ...

Sadly will not get to finish commerce before the end of the game (narrowly) ..

There are serious issues with getting oxford in time - as I don't sell/gift cities (burn) - cannot build oxford .. Probably won't need cavalry on this one (maybe prebuilding Oxford for lancers is the mongolian way to go ? That is all they lack - cheap, mobile, sturdy meatshields ) ..

Still a slow slog. Still not enough troops. I was scouting around Cusco with my 2 best Keshiks, and they got cut off when I got the border threat - I guess I should have said no, instead one got thrown SE and died in 2 turns, the other thrown W and could only take potshots until Cusco was ready to fall. Captured Corinth quickly with some help from Alex, burned a GG taking Tiwanaku, burned 2 GG approaching Cusco with GW - 5 wonders, he had 2 elsewhere and built a 3rd quickly, bastard. He had no gold, so got 2 cities I sold to Portugal after looting 1 GWork. I never seem to get many GWorks when going Dom.

I was healing up to turn on Alex, when Kasmir moved a 2nd GG to steal Tenochitlan's luxes - not on my watch! Killed him with my garrisoned Scout, and decided to rush most of my Keshiks up in case it got ugly. He was suffering -34% unhappy penalty! Killed a few, but not much happening, so ran back to Alex. Killing about 3 units a turn, but it is slow going.

Finished Honor, took Commerce open for a whopping +4gpt, ugh. Getting harassed by Alex's CS's, but have a few of my own. Bulbed Chemistry for mines, just bulbed Mil Sci, going to upgrade the newer Keshiks to Cav first. Have 2 Lancers. XB's mostly have range & log. I assume Oxford Dynamite in 9 turns. I don't have enough canons yet. This is my first go with Mongolia, and first time doing the Artillery rush. I feel I could have done much better. I put 350 to WF, but I think I could have won it, only 57% complete, everyone is at war.

I should probably hit Attila on my way to Warsaw, but he has been a good buddy all game. I take the leaders too personally, LOL. Makes the game more fun.

I haven't finished my 1st attempt and since I really didn't try to use the UU for this Civ I decided to play 2 games. I see that Chariot Archers are much easier and very nice when upgraded down the road. I played up to turn 88 or so and took out England early around t60 and now working on the Aztecs. This game is much smoother with CAs into Keshiks! I went Full Liberty and getting up the NC t89.

A little odd you missed that with all the info out there and here on this site (also since your experience level is so high). I know Glory7 has mentioned this many times when he shows how to bootcamp his archers always warning not to take the city too early since you get way more XP when shooting and getting hit by cities.

liberty ? how many cities did you get to settle squeezed between Aztecs and England ?

Not many I had 2 expos only. I wasn't really trying to do an ICS or anything special I just went Liberty for the practice and I wanted to use a GS to get to Chiv faster. My Liberty and Honor game needs alot of practice. I am 2 deep into Honor now at turn 110 just taking out Monty's cap. My games are always way behind benchmarks and what can be done but I kinda like a game where I get to use everything that I want to down the road. I was just a bit suprised you just seen the 3xp to 2xp with cities thats all. I learn something new everyday on this game myself!

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Went 3 city honor, started hardbuilding settlers as soon as karakorum hit 4 pop. It was much too late for aztecs to settle near the salt, so my southern expansion was suboptimal, i got the other two salts and the marble/horses. My third city was even worse, near the silver south of york. I had to settle that one on flat land because england already had a settler there and it was then or never. Built the NC turn 84 while building zeus in my second city. England dowed me and I defended with 3 CA + spear + archer. I stupidly lost the archer which cost me big going forward as I had trouble garrisoning enough cities during england conquest. After peace treaty I dowed england with 8 or so CA and two horse. He had the great wall so I was only able to take york, then I waited picked off is units waiting 3 turns for chivalry turn 108. Took london 110, now at turn 111 im about to attack aztec because he built chichen and machu. My happiness is at zero so I i'm already anticipating having issues with that in spite of chichen.

This was my 2nd attempt... using Keshiks this time. My first try is most likely a Science VC but I put that game on the back burner after remembering CAs upgrade to Keshiks. My early game was pretty smooth but it was a long slog for me mid game. I was going to turtle up after awhile and just blast off as usual but I kept pushing this game and since Poland and Portugal would not give me peace I figured Id try to dominate the world!

Long story short... I used the UU for a very long time. I was suprised to see that 7 Keshiks is enough to keep sniping out rifles and what not. Ofcourse I was using a band of workers and missonaries for my front line and I kept taking them back over and over. First I took out England and over to the Aztecs and after that down to the Inca and back over to Alex. I decided to just wipe Alex out to help my CS's along. After this I marched over to Genghis and had to retreat when Poland showed up to help him out. I hung out at the Inca Capital till Poland gave up for awhile. So back to taking out Genghis. I razed a few of his cities and took his cap which had alot of nice wonders. Wow, Globe Theater and Sis Chapel really gave me alot of Culture when I won the Worlds Fair. I think I was pulling like 450cpt for those 20 turns. That's pretty high for my style of game.

Poland and Portugal would not give me peace so I played the waiting game and I was having trouble getting my Artys down to help since I left alot of land open and it got backfilled by Genghis. I fought Portugal a long time for CS's and eventually beat her in that race. Once I got Bombers and Paratroopers into Nukes and upgrade to Xcoms I finnally nuked the last two caps and dropped in about 4-5 Xcoms at each Capital for a turn 291 Dom VC. This is not my 1st Dom win but it is my first on this Deity Challenge Post so that is nice to have something other than SV. Dom takes very long for me and alot of clicking... I mean alot of damn clicking lol! Anyway it was fun and it was very easy actually after I took down the first 4 Civs. I was suprised how far behind Poland was on Science. Ofcourse I was pulling over 1500spt for a long while. That's very high for my style as well. Anyway fun game and wish it was my 1st try but oh well, it is what it is!

Social Policies: I went Full Liberty, Full Honor, 1 deep into Comm (wagon trails), Full Ratio and 6 into Order.

On a side note I was looking how funny my mini map looks. Usually its very color cooridinated but this time it is all over the place, very splotchy!

Poland is a beast, has over 1/3 the map, wiped Portugal off his back, has triple my production, and he has had Autocracy for like 20 turns (I am 2 turns away from my 3rd Factory). I "rushed" Arty and it barely made a difference. I only took down his one city SW of Att Court with them, and I've spent like 12 turns blasting ground forces instead of hitting cities. I probably should have gone after Lublin, I would likely have had it by now, but I figured I'd bee-line for Warsaw thru Poznan. Asshat has 2 settlers waiting to fill the void from his razed city.

Although we all know the AI typically sucks in combat, Poland is flying his Winged Hussars around like a pro. Flanking with 3 units every battle, he has killed off all of my original Keshik/Cavs, and just got my first Arty, hence the quit. Up North he took an Aztec city (temporary capital) which I liberated easily, but he took my ally Cahokia too, so I have been red happy a while now. I stand a much better chance of liberating that than pressing on into the sausage grinder down south.

This is the first Deity Challenge I didn't finish. First Arty rush, and it was pathetic, I will likely not try it again, just no science, and no real edge as he had Rifles long ago. Plus I had the GW, and it seems stupid to give that advantage up when the main opponent has a great fast unit.

You played a great game... don't take it too hard about the first non finish, this happens now and again. I had some troubles with Poland myself, I had to retreat and let him come to me. I waited forever to Nuke him and drop in the Xcoms. Funny my game was odd because I hardly seen any of his Hussars, he kept throwing Rifles at me which I kept killing for all that gold. That really is the first time I didn't see a huge Hussar Army from him. When I put him to war with Portugal he basically showed her who is boss lol! One thing I've been doing lately and you might call it cheap but I have this wall of workers and missonaries and his Hussars can't get as far into my ranks. That pretty much goes for any Civ Im at war with I use a wall of 5-7 of these for vision and bait. It could be considered an exploit but I find it pretty funny with the AI loves to take that bait!

I feel for you after reading your post because Im trying this old Persia #3 challenge and I want to throw in the towel being 15% France in Tech. Im hoping once I get labs up in my 8 cities I can catch up to him but it is looking grim. I used to always think I was dead meat but after playing out most of my games and winning most of them Im always suprised how the AI blows a won game lol. Anyway you'll crush em next time!!

One question... did you upgrade all your Keshiks to Cav? In that picture it looked like it. I was in the same spot with a tight funnel since the Huns had a city there and the fight wasn't wide open. I never upgraded any Keshiks. I had all of them with Range/Logistics and they were strong enought to kill even his Rifles/GWI. Ofcourse being in the Red happy doesnt help much , sometimes I raze my cities down a bit to help get back in the green even if I have to go to 1 pop lol!

After looking at your pics you look like you have a way better set up than my game. Maybe you just needed to raze one of those Expos that you took over. Also you rushed in a bit huh ... just a thought, next time try to use those rivers and have your Logistic Troops/Arts smash him when he crosses and can't move anymore lol! Oh and ya he looks like super Poland. In my game he and Portgual made a pact to war me so they never went to war with each other till I bribed him at the end. In your game it is obvious he didn't want to play nice with her lol.