Thank you for the feedback. I suppose I can explain stuff.
Don't look at it as having to explain yourself. So you're making a load of mistakes...doesn't reflect on you as a person. Christ, the mistakes I used to make when I played my first 1000 hours don't bear thinking about!
Instead, think of it as learning. Everything you do is therefore another step towards better play. The first steps are the easiest. Going from being a 4 star to a 5 star player is the hardest part, because it requires the most concentration and a lot of practice. I'm too lazy to do it, so I'll never join the ranks of the very best players.
I thought as liberty, playing "wide" you have to build a lot of cities, even if it means they aren't very good. As long as they have a few good tiles it should be ok?
No. If you want a peaceful VC then Liberty works best with around 8 cities. But for Domination, especially if you start war early, you don't need that many. Three is enough to pump out some archers ready for CB upgrade by T55-65. What Liberty does that makes it the best opening tree for Domination is:
- 1 free Settler, so you only really need to build 1 more
- hammers, to get the army out faster
- 1 free worker, to help improve the hammer tiles and luxes
- access to Pyramids, a.k.a. the best Wonder in the game for Domination
- Free Golden Age when you most need it, esp. for Persia!
- Happiness once your cities (including those you'll capture) are connected
and most importantly, through the finisher, is the ability to still have the NC reliably by T85 at the latest. You finish Liberty, choose GE, and use him on the NC. So you can have a large army AND NC, plus all the above stuff.
I had 3 online really early, then I took Mongolia's capital, peaced out and built more cities.
This was the first major mistake. Had you used those hammers for units, and the gold maintenance on the granaries etc. for unit maintenance, you could have used those units to pillage and capture, and, well, had more units. If you swing by the thread for the Arabia Deity Challenge, you can see a screenshot of my army halfway through my Domination sweep. And I've had bigger. Check also the old Deity Challenge #5 when I ended up with Tanks. You know when you try to play peaceful and the AI sends a carpet of troops at you. You want to be that carpet in a Domination game.
Also, if you have enough troops (and you should) you can make separate armies to conduct simultaneous wars on different fronts. I recently won a game with Mongolia where I had two armies and swept the Pangaea to win around T140something.
I didn't seem outteched militarily and I had trebuchets and cannons before my opponents. That's why I thought I was doing well
In which case, I'd say you were lucky. You were still researching Chemistry on T182 whereas I would have Dynamite and Industrialisation by then in most games. The AI tech speeds vary, but I doubt you'd still have the edge by the time you got much further across the landmass IN MOST GAMES. For one thing, by beelining Dynamite, you risk having the last few opponents get to Flight before you can prepare for it.
I thought my army was a good size tbh. I don't really know how to make it bigger!
Don't build those extra cities, and train more units.
My usual army sizes in games with game-long war:
1st Army: 6-8 CBs, 3 Melee
2nd Army: 5-6 XBs, 5 Melee (for faster killing of troops), usually Knights, 1-2 Trebs
3rd Army: Cannons and Knights (later Cavalry)
4th Army: Artillery and Cavalry.
By T182 in most games I would probably therefore have (factoring in some casualties): 10 XBs basically retired or for picking off units from Range. 15-25 Artillery and 10-25 Cavalry.
Build them in waves, as and when new techs emerge
Atlanta was placed intentionally in a bad place, just so I had a coastal city on that coast which could pick up the marble. I didn't intend for it to grow much.
Yeah, you have to get out of that way of thinking. Settlers are the most valuable units and you should find the best spots you can. Although I didn't like that map, if I HAD to play it, I would have gone 2 city Honor, and rushed Mongolia T50ish while his pants were down, units off somewhere else.
Seattle went down to get the Incense and to be a staging area for the invasion of Austria (needed a place to go back and heal units fast). I didn't think it was in a bad place. I wanted to spread my religion so I thought building a city here might help
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You don't need staging areas. Heal units when they need it, but have more of them so the fresh ones can take over from the injured ones. And you should not expend any resources making a religion in a game where the aim is to capture capitals. Clearly, with that much Incense, you could get a lot of faith from GoF, so a Shrine might be worth it, so you can save up for some MidGame GMs, but I certainly wouldn't worry about it spreading.
Chicago and San Fran, again, built for the UL's
ULs give happiness, which you also gain more of by having less cities, remember. Building a city just to get a lux is not worth it. And listen, don't take my word for it if you think I'm being harsh by calling those cities worthless. Ask better players than me, or better yet, watch their videos.
I intentionally also did not work specialists. Reason was, I figured if I work the specialists I'll grow slower. I'm already stunted playing liberty, so I might as well work as much food as possible.
Once the city is size 10, it can work a University and still grow, provided you've developed it properly. Again, watch some videos and see how others do it.
Consequently, I didn't use a single great scientist or great engineer the whole game. I only used great prophets and great generals. I also didn't build any wonders except the national college around t100.
That's a pretty late NC. Try getting it before T85 in your next game and if you do, you'll see the difference it makes.
Even when going Domination, I give myself the following benchmarks for BPT:
T80 (just before NC): 40 beakers
T110 (around the time of Education): 80 beakers
T130 (nicely into the Renaissance with all Unis staffed): 130 beakers
If by T150 your BPT doesn't exceed the turn number, you're doing it wrong.
And as for those Great Scientists, you should use them to Bulb the key techs. If you can get to Fertiliser by T150, with a Great Scientist, a RA and Oxford University, it's only a short distance to Dynamite. There is a Moriarte game when he gets Dynamite in the 150s on Deity with Korea (ok they are great, but still the principles are the same).
With Domination, EVERYTHING comes down to how easily your troops can shred the AI units and capture cities. Practise on that Arabia map I mentioned before. Camel Archers come at a time when they massacre the AI cities.
That's why no one ever talks about a Pracinha rush.
