Deity Challenge 2 - Byzantium, Continents

[wloff]

Turn 104, one of my best Deity starts yet.

Spoiler :

Was the second to found a pantheon thanks to the religious city states, second to found a religion at turn 56 thanks to Festivals and Mt. Kailash. I took double founder belief: both Tithe and Ceremonial Burial along with Mosques, Religious Community and Itinerant Preachers once I enhanced.

I went for a 4-city Tradition type start, settled next to Mt. Kailash quickly for the religion and got other two settlers out around turn 45. Germany had settled away from me so I went ahead and settled my third city close to his capital to snatch three unique luxuries. Bismarck wasn't happy about me settling so close, but we had a DoF so he just kindly asked me not to settle there anymore and I agreed.

My 4th settler was on his way to settle towards the Mayans when they encountered a massive horde of Atlatists and Warriors. I settled the city quickly before he had the chance to declare - his troops wandered between my 4 cities for a good 10 turns before he finally did. At that point his atlatists and warriors were facing my composites and cataphracts, so the war was more like a slaughterfest. It turned out that the atlatist horde was pretty much his entire army, so I immediately pushed back with my composites, took two of his cities and burned a third to kick him out of the game.

My growth and economy is a bit behind due to the wars and unhappiness from puppets, I finished NC on turn 104 and my religion hasn't yet spread at all, but I think I should be able to start building my economy and science real fast now. I'll probably need to settle one or two more citie just to gain access to the ocean, the rest will be puppets from my unavoidable wars with Liz and Otto -- basically everyone acts friendly but gives me awful trade deals, so I think a double DoW is only a matter of time

I'm thinking I'll go Patronage down to the science bonus before opening Rationalism, just to get use out of my gold income which is only going to get better once I can spread my religion and spam trading posts for my puppets. I have no idea which victory condition I'll eventually go for, but all (except culture) seem quite reachable at the moment.

 

[Moriarte]

Well, i made it to turn 260. UN was finished, 12k gold in treasury. Scheduled to win on turn 270. 7 CS were still alive and Haile & Cathy loved me. Unfortunately, in the end i was one CS short. There was no way i could flip that last CS, since Bismark (friendly all game) backstabbed me 3 turns before elections. That CS was Bismark's ally...

Anyway, i am not into replaying, so, i ll be trying my luck with Austria .

 

[Wargizmo]

That's brutal Moriarte. I was going to play a similar diplomacy strategy since I'm not confident my science will be enough for a tech win. Trying to decide whether to detour to flight before going plastics.

Does anyone know if it's possible to buy oil off the AI if I haven't researched it myself yet? If it is I might burn some great scientists to rush for flight and try to take a few more cities.

 

[EEE_BOY]

Turn 104, one of my best Deity starts yet.

Spoiler :

Was the second to found a pantheon thanks to the religious city states, second to found a religion at turn 56 thanks to Festivals and Mt. Kailash. I took double founder belief: both Tithe and Ceremonial Burial along with Mosques, Religious Community and Itinerant Preachers once I enhanced.

I went for a 4-city Tradition type start, settled next to Mt. Kailash quickly for the religion and got other two settlers out around turn 45. Germany had settled away from me so I went ahead and settled my third city close to his capital to snatch three unique luxuries. Bismarck wasn't happy about me settling so close, but we had a DoF so he just kindly asked me not to settle there anymore and I agreed.

My 4th settler was on his way to settle towards the Mayans when they encountered a massive horde of Atlatists and Warriors. I settled the city quickly before he had the chance to declare - his troops wandered between my 4 cities for a good 10 turns before he finally did. At that point his atlatists and warriors were facing my composites and cataphracts, so the war was more like a slaughterfest. It turned out that the atlatist horde was pretty much his entire army, so I immediately pushed back with my composites, took two of his cities and burned a third to kick him out of the game.

My growth and economy is a bit behind due to the wars and unhappiness from puppets, I finished NC on turn 104 and my religion hasn't yet spread at all, but I think I should be able to start building my economy and science real fast now. I'll probably need to settle one or two more citie just to gain access to the ocean, the rest will be puppets from my unavoidable wars with Liz and Otto -- basically everyone acts friendly but gives me awful trade deals, so I think a double DoW is only a matter of time

I'm thinking I'll go Patronage down to the science bonus before opening Rationalism, just to get use out of my gold income which is only going to get better once I can spread my religion and spam trading posts for my puppets. I have no idea which victory condition I'll eventually go for, but all (except culture) seem quite reachable at the moment.

you managed to settle all juicy city locations

That's brutal Moriarte. I was going to play a similar diplomacy strategy since I'm not confident my science will be enough for a tech win. Trying to decide whether to detour to flight before going plastics.

Does anyone know if it's possible to buy oil off the AI if I haven't researched it myself yet? If it is I might burn some great scientists to rush for flight and try to take a few more cities.

yes you can buy oil, even to limit their war capability.

 

[Crafty Bison]

Played first 70 turns. I'm giving culture vc a whirl, just for giggles, as I've done double enhancer with tithe or double founder with tithe and cerimonial burial/church property a lot.

Spoiler :

settled on the river hill SE. 2nd city end of the river next to kailash. 3rd on the coast/lake between deer and double mountain as Germay settled north/east (I thought about 2 tiles NW on the river hill mountain tile but decided against). Just put down 4th and final after NC on the SW coast and river NW of the wine between Constantinople and Palenque.

Religion is festivals, religious texts (Only one other seemed keen for religion so I went for double enhancer), world church, itinerant preachers. For followers I thought cathedrals and monastries would be close, took cathedrals, then monastries went, so I'll try to steal a GP of theirs later for the cap. Just enhanced and took the +15% hammers over +8 hermitage culture to get a couple wonders/ get unis fast etc.

I noticed quick noone was keen to get any wonders so I went up and got HG late fifties. DoWed Pacal with comp bows to liberate Yerevan, and razed Chichen Itza to resettle Antioch. Germany also DoWed, so I got 2 peace deals . Looks like Germany is going CI so I'll take that when built as i won't get it, I'll try for the theology ones, HS mainly to stop anyone else getting it, GMoD to get after the other continent/s.

I'm out of Tradition and gonna hit liberty to the culture policy before piety as I'm going at 4 cities. Dunno how to break into reneissance, have a coastal city and one observatory city so maybe astro, but have enough trading, and really don't want to go after the SC if someone else builds it, so maybe acoustics, especially cos HG means I don't need the maritime CS's yet and the 3rd city got a tonne of lux's. Oh well, will decide after Education.

 

[Wargizmo]

Alright finished it turn 257

Screenshots:

Spoiler :

Diplomacy win. I could have probably got away with science as well since I surprisingly was tech leader after about turn 200 and only one AI had even built apollo by the time the game was over. Weird.

Battle Report:

Spoiler :

Following on from my last post, I decided not to invade Pacal again, opting to go for the tougher opponent of Germany, mainly because I was already at war, and did not want to take the diplomacy hit for declaring war.

I rejected peace with Bizmark and took Cologne with Xbows, a trebuchet and knights, I sued for peace shortly after. I beelined for public schools, and then decided to tech flight, unfortunately no one had oil so I detoured to oil before flight; great scientists and a research agreement with the dutch helped me get there fairly quickly and I started building and buying great war bombers.

I originally was planning to take Berlin, but a surprising DoW by Arabia meant I needed all my great war bombers in London to defend. Germany predictably joined Arabia in the fight and I was forced to fight on two fronts, Cologne in the south was under siege from Berlin, and both Germany and Arabia had troops bearing down on London.

I fought them off and counter attacked Germany's city of York. I took York and then sued Germany for peace. Unfortunately I was unable to hold York against the Arabian Horde and was once again forced to retreat to London. During this time my tech had been going really well, I had rationalism up to free thought, order up to planned economy and a city surrounded by jungle trading posts with an observatory.

While holding Arabia off I managed to tech plastics and then united nations (bulbed with oxford) and it was here I made the decision which probably won me the game. I had 1 great engineer generated from faith, and I decided instead of rushing the UN I would rush Sydney Opera house, this extra policy allowed me to get philanthropy. Although the UN came much slower, this extra time allowed me to build up more gold, which was more effective with the policy.

While the UN was building I teched up to radar and then sold all my science buildings. Upgrading all my bombers was the turning point in the fight and it wasn't long before the Arabs were begging me for peace.

Although Ethiopia was fairly competent at buying up the city states, the 4000k gold I had saved up along with the gpt I sold only the last turn was enough to buy up most of the city states. And because I had only declared war once all game (against Pacal) all 3 of the AIs on the other continent voted for me.

Overall I really liked this map, the superpowered religion was really fun at the start, and the terrain provided some really interesting battles for the rest of the game.

Interesting fact: The city of York was owned by 4 different Civs at various points throughout the game.

 

[beezany]

Congrats, Wargizmo! I think you're the first person to report a win for this map! I'm glad you enjoyed it. I had a lot of fun with it, right until I rage quit. Very interesting terrain to work with, and reasonable opportunities to play with religion as Theodora.

 

[budweiser]

I have made it to turn 100. I am attaching a screenshot and a save because I would like some tips from the diety players.

I solved the Mayan question at the expense of my reputation. Everyone hates me. But I am strong so I dont care.

England attacked me, but I bought an CS alliance and all her men died. I just got my second G prophet so I can enhance this turn. I'm wondering if I should slog it out and advance through Germany or could I get a science win from this position?

 

[teino]

Even though I don't have that much experience with deity, I might try this soon. Also, maybe a note for the next challenges, I, and I'm sure other people, don't have all the dlc, so maybe only use goty+g&k?

 

[budweiser]

Even though I don't have that much experience with deity, I might try this soon. Also, maybe a note for the next challenges, I, and I'm sure other people, don't have all the dlc, so maybe only use goty+g&k?

Sounds good to me. I'd like to suggest we keep working backwards through the G&K civs also, except for Russia.

 

[teino]

turn 22: got lucky with 2 tech ruins, got pottery + writing, then built great library and bulbed drama and poetry. still on my first city.

 

[beezany]

Also, maybe a note for the next challenges, I, and I'm sure other people, don't have all the dlc, so maybe only use goty+g&k?

I'm not sure what's in GOTY so I disabled all DLC for this game (except for the expansion). Unless I made a mistake, in which case please let me know so that I can figure out how to avoid it in the future.

 

[teino]

I'm not sure what's in GOTY so I disabled all DLC for this game (except for the expansion). Unless I made a mistake, in which case please let me know so that I can figure out how to avoid it in the future.

from Steam:

• Includes the Following Civilization V content
• All 4 Cradle of Civilization Map Packs (Mediterranean, Asia, Americas, Mesopotamia)
• Civilization Pack: Babylon (Nebuchadnezzar II)
• Double Civilization and Scenario Pack: Spain and Inca
• Civilization and Scenario Pack: Polynesia
• Civilization and Scenario Pack: Denmark - The Vikings
• Explorer’s Map Pack
• Official Digital Soundtrack (Soundtrack not available on the Mac)

 

[beezany]

That's everything but Korea and Wonders of the Ancient World, right?

 

[Old Peter]

I refuse to do a diplomatic victory. But Moscow is so well protected (inland and all grrrr) and I mostly have land units. And Cathy is on her way to a scientific victory...

 

[Old Peter]

Domination victory at turn 264

Cathy was not easy at all though.

I really think Missile Cruisers were my big edge, look at them

Very good map. Hard one. Perfect one. Thanks for nice forums also

 

[jeespoks]

Spoiler :

I was wrong about the starting location. It proved to be pretty nice spot. The warrior went automated to the south and revealed more luxes south. I settled my cap to the south coast. I wanted to get early access to the sea and try to rush a coastal city with Dromons early if there wouldn't be enough room or good spots to settle. All the luxes (six within the range of cap) would pay for the units.

Further exploring revealed a LOT of room for settling and very juicy spots too. So instead of an early rush (I hadn't found an AI coastal city at this point yet) I tried to settle more cities asap and went with Tradition. Settled 2nd city close to the Faith mountain, the 3rd city to a spot with a lot of luxes (5 total) close to Bismarck (I had DoF with him just before settling so he didn't DoW me right away).

I wanted a city close to Maya and there was again a juicy spot, it had a lot horses, cows and sheep and that's exactly what I needed since the cap and especially the "faith city" wouldn't have a great production. It was a close one because Maya was wandering around with a settler there but I beat him to it.

I planned on DoWing Maya once I get enough units but luckily I got him to DoW me by insulting him. He attacked a bit earlier than expected and I had only 4 CBs at the time but 3 more were almost finished building and I rush bought 1 more CB and a Dromon so when I countered him I had 8 CBs, 3 Dromon and a Warrior and his cities fell withouth much problems. Unfortunately Maya had probably been just building mainly units, he had no wonders and I got the cap with only a library and a market, the 2nd city had only a market. I razed his last city, it was crap. Maya was out of the game.

Germany DoWed while I was attacking Maya and I had to rushbuy another CB in the city close to him. He came with many units but luckily he didn't have many ranged units and the terrain was in my favor. After I killed 6-7 of his troops he offered a peace (my city was really close to going down and I was about the sell all luxes and take a big loan to rush buy a wall there).

I suspected Bismarck might attack me again after the peace deal expired. He had Hamburg on coast and I started to move my Dromons there but unfortunately I couldn't get there from south because of the ice. His two other cities were in middle of jungles. I decided to just keep him off my cities and try to get Galleases, Crossbows and Cataprahts and attack London next. Elisabeth was "Friendly" but offered me only 15g for 1gpt so she would attack me soon. Meanwhile England and Arabia DoW'd Germany and Bismarck wasn't giving much problems for me.

 

[DrZ]

I will also give this map a shot, thank you very much for posting it!

 

[Moriarte]

Domination victory at turn 264

Impressive!

Since domination victory is your specialty, could you post 3-4 screenshots from midgame, possibly..

I find Deity domination the hardest to achieve. And even when i am in tech. lead, i always seem to prefer to go for 'safer' diplo or science wins. I am especially interested to see what army composition you use to confront Deity AIs' mid game and late in the game.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Light Cleric]

Oh hey I actually got to start on this finally.

Spoiler :

Got my 4 cities going. Bismarck predictably didn't like it but I positioned the city in a way that his Landsknect spam couldn't get in. The problem was it forced me to divert a lot of resources there and prevented me from improving the Citrus and Gold. I thought it would never end until I was able to get a Legion in(thanks Almaty!) and drop a Citadel, at which point he gave up and gave me a bit of gold.

About 20 turn after Germany attacked, Pacal backstabbed me(am I the only one who gets backstabbed by Pacal ALL the time?) but he didn't anything out of it and finally gave up and gave me a little gold as well.

The problem is I'm running kinda behind on tech from being spammed hardcore by two civs all game long. Germany is pushing for a science victory hard and has the tech lead. The other problem is going to be Cathy on the other continent, she's become a massive runaway. This is going to be a rough one.

The good things are :
1) I managed to get my religion well-established even though there were two other religions on the continent, getting 40 gpt from Tithe right now.
2) Elizabeth and Harun are actually friendly, after Lizzy went Hostile on turn 3 and denounced me on turn 9 and suddenly snapped back to Friendly on like turn 30.
3) I've gotten so much experience from these fights that I've got several heavily promoted Xbows(including one with Range+Logistics) and a Knight near March who should make a mean Tank down the road. I didn't make more because...yeah, fighting Germany in Hills/Jungle with Horses?

My plan is to get to Scientific Theory soon and then push to Biology/Flight(and bulb Flight with Oxford). Thankfully I have enough Faith that I can probably get my first GS from faith fairly quickly.

You guys sure know how to pick the hard maps! We'll see how this goes...