I have been playing for some time now and have found the following strategy to be quite useful in my style of play. I dont usually go for military right away - my battles are almost always after 0AD. Anyway, here are my 2 cents...
SCIENCE
I think the early stages of the game (ancient era) is one of the most important. What i do early on is to set my science to zero and buy and sell techs to the other civs until around 2000BC or until I have bought WRITING from the other civs. Once I have that, I set my science to max and go for literature and from then on sell techs to the other civs. I never research optional adv except for literature. I let the other civs do it for me and once they have it i buy it from one and sell to all the others. Since early on, you have been selling techs, you wont have any problem with money even if your science is 100%. I always never get into a deficit because the other civs pay me. BTW. I usually stop selling science once the other civs reach middle age and instead just sell luxuries. This way, they allocate part of their money paying you instead of research which slows them down. :crazyeyes With them lagging in science, you now have the opportunity to pick and choose what tech to distribute to all the other civs. If you see that once civ has discovered a tech that you already have but all the others dont have yet, i sell that tech to all the other civs. this way, no civ can get money for all the hardship he has put in researching a tech.
All my cities have libraries - in fact all of them have culture-generating improvements (from temple up to research lab).
I usually get 4 techs per turn once i'm in democracy and when i'm after the middle ages (my science is just set to 40~50% and still get 4 turns/science)
As for tech research, i go for democracy as fast as possible and convert at once. Democracy makes your workes work faster, which allows faster land development. Land improvements in turn allows you to generate more gold, production and food which equates to more moneyand faster research.
MILITARY
i never invest much on military in the early part, just 2 units (warriors or spearmen) per city to help happiness until i reach democracy. And from then on, i try to build units that are either spearmen or horsemen. If you have already discovered gunpowder, that is okay, just pillage your saltpeter and keep producing spearmen or horsemen until you have enouch force to defend (usually 2 spearmen per city) and about 10~15 horsemen. Once you have leonardo's workshop and have discovered tech for cavalry, i upgrade all horsemen to cavalry and spearmen to whatever (riflemen or infantry, whichever comes first). The reason is because spearmen/horsemen takes a lot faster to build than rifleman or infantry. Which means, you have less time building units and more time focusing on building improvements. this is why i play greeks most of the time since their hoplite provides 3 defence giving you enough protection a lot longer.
If i have warriors remaining, I upgrade those to swordsman and together with cavalry, attack the nearest neighbor with the least amount of tech (preferably those that dont have gunpowder yet) and neve stop until that civ is extinct. I also try to do it when the civ in question do not yet have any pacts so that I will not sever relations with other civs. (if you aim for diplomatic victory, it is very important not to have any civ that are furious or annoyed at you) If you are certain you can eradicate the civ, I try not to raze cities but if you think there is no way to destroy all of them, i will raze cities bigger than 3 pops. to avoid defections. All workers captured i usually assign to build road, mines, rails, irrigation, etc.
all my original settlers then is added to the existing cities to make them grow. Foreign workers are free and your workers are 1 gold per turn - do the math...
If you need to conquer a civ in another continent, try to pick a city that is small enough that you can bring down to 1 pop with your artilleries or bombers. Try to rush an airport inthat city so that you can send reinforcements whenever you see fit. next is to rush library and temple. Since it is a one pop city, you should never worry about defections at all but build library and temple just in case.
ASSIMILATION
Once I have intelligence agency, I usually put a spy and every civ and check their government type in the military screen. If they are in anarchy, i lauch a lot of propaganda attacks on cities that have luxuries. Propaganda works much more effective when the civ is in anarchy. This way, you get the luxury without having to go to war nor trade for it and you maintain good diplomatic relations. AI doesnt seem to mind that you are trying to assimilate their cities. Be careful when putting spies though, since a lot of failed attempts will make AI get annoyed, furious and even declare war on you. It happened to me twice.
Also, in between my biggest culture producing cities, I build 1 or 2 cities and only build population generating improvements on them (aqueduct, hospital). If you still have some of your original workers, add them to these cities. Once the city reach more than 15 pop points, I sell it to the next richest civ (you being the richest). They will offer insane amount of moeny for it. AI seems to relate city worth to city size so the bigger the city size, the higher the price they are willing to pay for it. I once have the FRENCH pay me 455 gold/turn plus 620 gold for a 22 pop city. since the city is in between your biggest culture porducing cities, they will ALWAYS revert back to you usually before the deal expires (< 20 turns). then you can start all over and sell it again to another civ.
RESOURCES
Whenever possible, try to get a monopoly on rubber. No rubber for AI means no infantry, tanks, modern armor and mech infantry which means greater chance of military success, shorter wars, and lesser chance of war weariness. I NEVER TRADE RUBBER once i have a monopoly. In fact, i never trade rubber period.
Coal is also very important since it allows you to build rails which gives you an almost impregnable defence in case other civs attack you. This is because there is no movement penalty so all units you have can counter attack any treat.
WONDERS
Build all possible small wonders and all possible GREAT WONDERS. This is a quite a huge task though and something i have yet to achieve. I have never been able to build the ironworks improvement. As for great wonders, I have been able to build all wonders except for 2 or 3 in the ancient era. I have yet to find a way to be able to build all ancient era wonders in MONARCH level. I was able to do it before in REGENT level as the americans since they are industrious and allowed me to develop the land quite fast.
VICTORY CHOICES
Once I have reached and built all wonders possible except UN, I save the game and treat it as a decision tree kinda thing. Depending on our mood, you can either go for diplomatic victory and once thats done, reload the decision tree game and instead of diplomatic victory, go for the spaceship, etc. This way you get to see most of the victory screens (they're not really that impressive) without spending a lot of time starting on a new one.
BTW.
In case you want to know, I have never played on DEITY level yet, only monarch level and usually win in around 1700s in the score of 4000s. I have played as americans and greeks (way better than americans, imho). I'll probably try FRENCH next time since they are also COMMERCIAL. COMMERCIAL seems to have a better hold on corruption especially when your city also has courthouses. but agian, it depends on how far the city is from your palace.
I dont think this strategy will work in deity though because of the tremendeous advantage of the AI in production. I think in DEITY, hte only way to go is war, war and more war. That is why i havent played deity yet, i dont like wars all the time. I want to see all my cities big and cultured and containing all the latest and greatest improvements.
HOPE THIS HELPS...
SCIENCE
I think the early stages of the game (ancient era) is one of the most important. What i do early on is to set my science to zero and buy and sell techs to the other civs until around 2000BC or until I have bought WRITING from the other civs. Once I have that, I set my science to max and go for literature and from then on sell techs to the other civs. I never research optional adv except for literature. I let the other civs do it for me and once they have it i buy it from one and sell to all the others. Since early on, you have been selling techs, you wont have any problem with money even if your science is 100%. I always never get into a deficit because the other civs pay me. BTW. I usually stop selling science once the other civs reach middle age and instead just sell luxuries. This way, they allocate part of their money paying you instead of research which slows them down. :crazyeyes With them lagging in science, you now have the opportunity to pick and choose what tech to distribute to all the other civs. If you see that once civ has discovered a tech that you already have but all the others dont have yet, i sell that tech to all the other civs. this way, no civ can get money for all the hardship he has put in researching a tech.
All my cities have libraries - in fact all of them have culture-generating improvements (from temple up to research lab).
I usually get 4 techs per turn once i'm in democracy and when i'm after the middle ages (my science is just set to 40~50% and still get 4 turns/science)
As for tech research, i go for democracy as fast as possible and convert at once. Democracy makes your workes work faster, which allows faster land development. Land improvements in turn allows you to generate more gold, production and food which equates to more moneyand faster research.
MILITARY
i never invest much on military in the early part, just 2 units (warriors or spearmen) per city to help happiness until i reach democracy. And from then on, i try to build units that are either spearmen or horsemen. If you have already discovered gunpowder, that is okay, just pillage your saltpeter and keep producing spearmen or horsemen until you have enouch force to defend (usually 2 spearmen per city) and about 10~15 horsemen. Once you have leonardo's workshop and have discovered tech for cavalry, i upgrade all horsemen to cavalry and spearmen to whatever (riflemen or infantry, whichever comes first). The reason is because spearmen/horsemen takes a lot faster to build than rifleman or infantry. Which means, you have less time building units and more time focusing on building improvements. this is why i play greeks most of the time since their hoplite provides 3 defence giving you enough protection a lot longer.
If i have warriors remaining, I upgrade those to swordsman and together with cavalry, attack the nearest neighbor with the least amount of tech (preferably those that dont have gunpowder yet) and neve stop until that civ is extinct. I also try to do it when the civ in question do not yet have any pacts so that I will not sever relations with other civs. (if you aim for diplomatic victory, it is very important not to have any civ that are furious or annoyed at you) If you are certain you can eradicate the civ, I try not to raze cities but if you think there is no way to destroy all of them, i will raze cities bigger than 3 pops. to avoid defections. All workers captured i usually assign to build road, mines, rails, irrigation, etc.
all my original settlers then is added to the existing cities to make them grow. Foreign workers are free and your workers are 1 gold per turn - do the math...
If you need to conquer a civ in another continent, try to pick a city that is small enough that you can bring down to 1 pop with your artilleries or bombers. Try to rush an airport inthat city so that you can send reinforcements whenever you see fit. next is to rush library and temple. Since it is a one pop city, you should never worry about defections at all but build library and temple just in case.
ASSIMILATION
Once I have intelligence agency, I usually put a spy and every civ and check their government type in the military screen. If they are in anarchy, i lauch a lot of propaganda attacks on cities that have luxuries. Propaganda works much more effective when the civ is in anarchy. This way, you get the luxury without having to go to war nor trade for it and you maintain good diplomatic relations. AI doesnt seem to mind that you are trying to assimilate their cities. Be careful when putting spies though, since a lot of failed attempts will make AI get annoyed, furious and even declare war on you. It happened to me twice.
Also, in between my biggest culture producing cities, I build 1 or 2 cities and only build population generating improvements on them (aqueduct, hospital). If you still have some of your original workers, add them to these cities. Once the city reach more than 15 pop points, I sell it to the next richest civ (you being the richest). They will offer insane amount of moeny for it. AI seems to relate city worth to city size so the bigger the city size, the higher the price they are willing to pay for it. I once have the FRENCH pay me 455 gold/turn plus 620 gold for a 22 pop city. since the city is in between your biggest culture porducing cities, they will ALWAYS revert back to you usually before the deal expires (< 20 turns). then you can start all over and sell it again to another civ.
RESOURCES
Whenever possible, try to get a monopoly on rubber. No rubber for AI means no infantry, tanks, modern armor and mech infantry which means greater chance of military success, shorter wars, and lesser chance of war weariness. I NEVER TRADE RUBBER once i have a monopoly. In fact, i never trade rubber period.
Coal is also very important since it allows you to build rails which gives you an almost impregnable defence in case other civs attack you. This is because there is no movement penalty so all units you have can counter attack any treat.
WONDERS
Build all possible small wonders and all possible GREAT WONDERS. This is a quite a huge task though and something i have yet to achieve. I have never been able to build the ironworks improvement. As for great wonders, I have been able to build all wonders except for 2 or 3 in the ancient era. I have yet to find a way to be able to build all ancient era wonders in MONARCH level. I was able to do it before in REGENT level as the americans since they are industrious and allowed me to develop the land quite fast.
VICTORY CHOICES
Once I have reached and built all wonders possible except UN, I save the game and treat it as a decision tree kinda thing. Depending on our mood, you can either go for diplomatic victory and once thats done, reload the decision tree game and instead of diplomatic victory, go for the spaceship, etc. This way you get to see most of the victory screens (they're not really that impressive) without spending a lot of time starting on a new one.
BTW.
In case you want to know, I have never played on DEITY level yet, only monarch level and usually win in around 1700s in the score of 4000s. I have played as americans and greeks (way better than americans, imho). I'll probably try FRENCH next time since they are also COMMERCIAL. COMMERCIAL seems to have a better hold on corruption especially when your city also has courthouses. but agian, it depends on how far the city is from your palace.
I dont think this strategy will work in deity though because of the tremendeous advantage of the AI in production. I think in DEITY, hte only way to go is war, war and more war. That is why i havent played deity yet, i dont like wars all the time. I want to see all my cities big and cultured and containing all the latest and greatest improvements.
HOPE THIS HELPS...
