Starting a new game soon, need suggestions

[ElderDarkDragon]

I've generally played rather peaceful games, culture and wonder building, etc. but I was thinking of going for a domination or conquer game and wouldn't mind some suggestions on what civ/leader to choose, map, game options etc. Since that makes for a much different play style than I am used to I would rather have some ideas than just going into it blindly and possibly be several hours or more into a game just to find it's not really what I was wanting. I'm using the Mega Pack also.

Love this mod though and with all the hours I have sunk into it over the past few years I'm glad there are still so many things for me to explore.

 

[Kevan]

Depending on your playing style, I find Ethiopia to be a powerhouse. The early culture from the Stele is great and a huge bonus for early borders, and mid game you can set yourself up for an invincible late game army. Their unique unit the Oromo warrior gets drill 1 & 2 for free, get 5xp from civics and buildings then these come out of the box at drill 4. Build as many as you can for as long as you can. When upgraded later they are superb garrison forces and attackers. If you have a leader like Churchill, they can easily suppress rebellions due to their promotions. The first strikes are very powerful and depending on the upgrade path, they become mech infantry or tanks.

You can build peacefully gaining culture, when you get muskets, just build a huge army and steamroll the world. They are amazing

your base units start with drill 4 with 2 promotions from buildings and civics. Combat 1 with agg leader or city garrison 1 with protective are additional bonuses. If you get guns and butter for the pinch promotions, they are unbeatable

if you play with field commanders, the additional free strikes from iniative promotions make them nigh invincible. 6-10 or more first strikes is crazy for rank and file troops

 

[Kevan]

Churchill, Ethiopia, continents (4), prince, revolution on, tech diffusion off, tech brokering off, standard size, normal speed.

have a go at that, main goal is to control most of your continent first, then once you have the Oromo army, the world is yours

 

[<Nexus>]

if you play with field commanders, the additional free strikes from iniative promotions make them nigh invincible. 6-10 or more first strikes is crazy for rank and file troops

Field Commanders are not really recommended since the AI cannot use them.

 

[robbyextreme]

When playing with new settings just hit Ctrl+W in game to open world builder and keep regenerating maps to see what your settings look like with several attempts. I play on Smart Map with 3 continents and many fragments to add islands for more randomness and 5 coastal tile separation to avoid early contact. Map size are standard maps so I set 15 total players so 5 players per island, enough to have some close by neighbours and room for barb cities to spawn.

As for which Civ to pick to me it doesn't matter much, I like the ones that start with agriculture and/or fishing since I play coastal starts. My favourite are anything with cavalry unique units like Egyptians, Persians, Carthaginians, the default cavalry units are good enough too since moving foot soldiers around before paved road sucks but I usually just random a civ and focus my timings around their traits and unique unit/building if they are good.

 

[Noyyau]

Try a High to Low game with your usual settings. I suggest to NOT use BarbCivs, Final Five, Start as Minors when using HighLow.
Your first civ you can play as your usual, but possibly from the 2nd civ and definitely on the 3rd civ, being on the bottom of the scoreboard, you'll definitely have to do some fighting as most if not all of the territory will be already settled, and not by your previously incompetent (or just really unfortunate) current civ.

Personally I start on Noble and some map that allows for separation of civs until late game.
Totestra (my personal favourite) on the larger sizes gives you continents with very natural-looking terrain separated by massive oceans.
Starting on Noble allows to get through the early eras quicker, later on I either manually set a higher difficulty for myself, or let Flexible Difficulty do its job. I find the most interesting stuff happens from the Medieval era onwards: more unit variety, established empires, ocean exploration, in general more choice of what to do and how to do it.

Or experiment with something completely unusual!
Boreal with Terrain Damage and Movement Limits ON makes it a challenge just to explore your surroundings, the Nomad leader trait suddenly is powerful, and the Arctic Combat promotion fundamental.
Ring maps (iirc the right name) give you a very long and narrow map, a-la Ringworld. Expect to have uncontacted civs well into the Reneissance, and the whole map probably won't be explored until late game. If playing with Revolutions, distance instability will become a major factor once you expand beyond your starting continent.

Add some house rules!
Research by columns: all techs in a column must be researched before going to the next one (no beelining!)
Upgrade only GG-led units. Suddenly choosing whether to settle that GG or attach him to a unit becomes difficult. And have you ever thought about GG-led siege units? The Charismatic leader trait is ideal for this, less xp needed for each promotion, especially as you'll have to constantly crank out new units to replace your suddenly obsolete army.

Dare to mod the xml files?
Archer bombard: despite the name, I find it makes more sense only on Siege units (Civ represents strategic ranges, not tactical). Edit the unitinfos.xml file, remove the Archer bombard ability (set the range to 0) from all archery units, and discover how artillery is supposed to work, instead of single-use city kamikazes. Wish I could make them gain exp for each successful ranged attack, but I guess that's python magic, way beyond me.
Extended High to Low: increase the number of civ changes. With 5 you'll probably already arrive to the late game, put in 10 and the game will probably get to the Transhuman era before you can switch through them all.