Deity post patch

[RedRover57]

Maybe I'm a masochist but I have been trying to play on Deity level post-patch (pangaea, all standard settings). Pre-patch I considered myself a solid Immortal player, with a few Deity wins that required proper use of rush strategies (using RA's and tech blocking). Post-patch I guess I am just too stubborn to downgrade the difficulty even though I have not been successful on Deity so far. In fact I have not played past turn 150 or so (as I was usually wiped out long before or the situation was too hopeless to continue).

I'm not complaining as I feel that Deity should be very tough (and it certainly is now), but I am curious how the Deity pros on this forum are doing post-patch. Have you come up with strategies to consistently win on Deity? If you guys can't win on Deity then it may be time for me to downgrade, but if you can then I will plod on with some hope for future glory.

I'm particularly wondering about strategies to mimic previous rush strategies like the Mongol keshik rush. Pre recent patch the strategy was pretty easy. Sign 3 or 4 (in case one gets cancelled by DoW) RA's on about turn 40 to bulb CS, Currency and Chivalry around turn 70. Build (or buy) a bunch of chariot archers beforehand for city defense and barb hunting, then upgrade them all to keshiks and start your warmongering. With this strategy you could conquer 2-3 neighboring civs before they hit rifles, and a mid-200's domination win was highly feasible (even for me).

Post-patch it seems to be a different story. I have not been able to obtain Chivalry before turn 110, which is too late since in my last game Monty was a runaway and had rifles by turn 140. I am typically a Tradition starter (Oligarchy is a great policy), but I have also tried the new Honor branch. Neither seem to get me there fast enough and I'm thinking Liberty may be the only choice (stay small, with the free settler to grab horses or iron if there is none within your capitol radius and the free GS to bulb Chivalry). REXing is not really feasible on standard pangaea as there are rarely more than 2-3 worthwhile sites near your capitol, and expansion triggers DoWs (if you are expanding you aren't building units).

Any ideas about Deity-specific strategies (particularly for domination games) would be welcomed as the other strategy threads mostly discuss lower difficulties (e.g., GL strategy which is impossible in most Deity games - in every Deity game I have played to date post-patch the GL has gone before turn 30).

 

[Tyxerxa]

I beat Immortal several times post patch and played about 20 games on Deity, but could not win a single one. yet. I tried mostly cultural and diplomatic approaches, but had some domination tries with China and Japan, but those did not work either. But let's not spoil the tactics, it is so much fun now.

Once the tactics and videos are out the fun is mostly gone.

 

[aimlessgun]

I'm currently in the middle of my first postpatch deity game (played an immortal one first) and I'm testing the AI's ability to win with the peaceful win conditions. Which means I'm playing pacifist, no offensive warfare, and going for a cultural vic. So far in the modern era I'm ahead on culture but behind on tech, and the jury is out as to whether the AI will be able to construct a spaceship with any degree of efficiency.

Another question I'm eagerly awaiting an answer to is whether the AI will spend all of it's money at the diplo vic.

But as for the aggressive warfare, I've found that to be mostly inconsequential, because of how bad the AI is at war (and also because the game heavily favors defense). 2 archers and an Oligarchy city can hold off an 8 person army. The AI dowing me has mostly served to funnel me money and Lux after their army gets crushed and they sue for peace.

The strat I'm using is pretty much a normal culture strat, small empire, get tradition then piety and beeline all the culture techs and wonders.

 

[Tyxerxa]

I tried this as well, but found it difficult to survive once the AI has artillery and bombers. How do you handle those?

 

[Zeknichov]

I'm in the same boat. Pre-patch deity was fairly easy, you could 1 city longsword rush and just puppet everything selling resources and win quite easily, as long as you had good positioning.

I just cannot find a good starting strategy for deity. The NC+GS+RAs worked perfectly last patch to actually give you an advantage over the AI in terms of technology, now I haven't found a way to keep up effectively. I also found very little use for more than 3 cities, and most times 2 is all that is worthwhile or feasible.

I mean my last Deity game I got so frustrated. I was DOWed less than 20 turns into the game, required to buy a couple warriors for defence and after defending my attacks from monty I felt like I was a good 20 turns behind on everything. By the time I recovered and expanded my military was at par or either weaker than the AIs making the taking over of another city very difficult. As I finally made my way into Monty's territory I was backstabbed by China and had to retreat in order to defend or risk spreading my military too thin and being useless to attack or defend. I must have went 100 turns with my 2 starting cities and nothing else to show for it.

 

[Randall Turner]

I've had the same experience as you have (OP).

It may be a bit schadenfreude of me, but I'm sort of happy to also hear of others having problems with the Aztecs - I officially hate those guys now.

But anyway, I've been lurking on the HOF forum to see if anyone's been successful with any sort of offensive strategy on Deity (so's I can crib their strategy), but they're in a bit of a re-tool stage. Some of the initial late-June discussion there, the consensus seemed to be that it was just a matter of working out new openings, but after a couple dozen test games myself, I'm not sure that's the case. As one of the regulars there says, they've removed most of the leverage opportunities for human players.

I'd also like to hear of any Deity wins on anything like a normal game.

Edit: In the meantime though, especially if you're playing with a non-specialist civ, no reason to get depressed - I think they've decided to make Deity for those players who are both expert and exploit quite a bit (thinking of the guy who did the "harder than Deity" mod, can't remember his name.)

 

[Kevin J]

I haven't tried to complete a deity game yet, but I've tried out a lot of different starts. Some seemed to work very well, others not as much.

 

[Randall Turner]

I haven't tried to complete a deity game yet, but I've tried out a lot of different starts. Some seemed to work very well, others not as much.

You know, though, Kev, even if you get a good opening it's problematic. I had one near-perfect first 100 turns game, I got everything - but an AI civ on another continent snowballed to the point where they were pulling ahead in tech so quickly I bailed out of despair. (As much as you can "despair" when just playing a computer game.)

I don't know, but I'm starting to think unless you can get a huge bump from something like amphibious defense on an islands map, the AI mass is daunting.

edit: I'm also going to have to sit down and figure out a catchy signature along the lines of "Cartago delenda est", except for "Aztecs suck". Let's see how much of a pain in the ass they are at Immortal first.

 

[jsolo15]

I've played a total of 10 games on Deity and usually by turn 100 I was so far behind I gave up.

I yet to achieve the GL I even had Pottery pop from a ruin. I was 2 turn away when India hit the GL. (I had two forest that I chopped.)

I gone back to Immortal Standard game playing as Spain and doing really well in turn 80 with Rome already taken out an working on China now. Both of them DoW me early about turn 30 and had their army smashed by my archers.

 

[aimlessgun]

I tried this as well, but found it difficult to survive once the AI has artillery and bombers. How do you handle those?

The AI seems fairly inept with Arty, in terms of quickly getting them set up in a good firing position. It allows me to focus fire the units that can actually capture my city and then mop up the arty with my city at 1 HP.

Havn't faced bombers yet. Will be interesting.

 

[Martin Alvito]

I've mentioned this game a couple of times. Babylon, Space OCC, 1700 AD (turn 249, IIRC). All standard settings, except the ruins were off. No hostility due to a corner start; the locals (Gandhi and Hiawatha) eventually offered DoFs and stayed friendly. The game became a big lovefest before devolving into Nobunaga and everyone that hated Nobunaga's guts, although Alex did declare on me from all the way across the world for a while.

The game started during the GL test case runs. The first time I turned off the ruins, I was able to hard build the GL on turn 40 and get Theology with it. So I decided to test Scholasticism post-patch, and discovered that it is horrible. The devs stealth-nerfed city-state production by disabling the National College for them. I also suspect that they do not run Scientists either.

Used RAs to get Education around 80, built a University and then finished off the hard build of Hagia Sophia around turn 100. Used GE on Porcelain Tower, bulbed Astronomy, took Rationalism.

After that I signed a lot of RAs and cleared cheap techs, juggling research order to maximize returns on RAs. I want to say that I got up to Rocketry on about 208 and then bulbed the tree out around 220. Bought a Spaceship Factory and started slapping up parts.

Alex became a runaway (Manhattan around 196) and Washington finished Apollo around 225. Solved that problem by bribing Alex to attack Washington for a lousy stinking 150 . Washington finished with two parts and a nuked, but held capital.

My general sense is that there are three possible outcomes on Deity right now:

- Peaceful game. Run a small civ in a corner start and expand away from everyone.
- Slugfest. Play defense early, get a tech advantage, slug your way to a winning position and hard tech your way through the tree, supplementing with RAs from the few civs that don't hate you and Great Scientists.
- Hopeless cause. I've had a few of these. Montezuma is a particularly bad neighbor; he spams enough Jaguars that I don't think it's possible to deter him, and I'm not convinced it's possible to beat his rush if you have open terrain.

 

[Randall Turner]

You also mentioned turning off ruins in the Hanging Gardens thread, Martin. Is that legal? ie, I'll do something along those lines (I'll sometimes get rid of the AI's starting scout, which has a sorta-similar effect in that the human player can get more of them), but I don't ever try to submit any games to the HOF.

 

[Tyxerxa]

Turning off ruins helps a lot. As we have no one claiming to have won on deity post patch - it is ok to try to cheese it. At the moment I try a French cultural OCC victory and am leading on culture on turn 223. Still this seems so hard at the moment, that I think sneaking a victory is the only option and OOC on an archipel map seems the way to go for me at the moment. I gave up on defensive honor openings for the moment. I am really waiting for the best of this community to share their victories (without spoilering details) with us. MadDjinn, did you manage to win already?

 

[Tabarnak]

I think they've decided to make Deity for those players who are both expert and exploit quite a bit (thinking of the guy who did the "harder than Deity" mod, can't remember his name.)

maltz

 

[Martin Alvito]

You can turn the ruins off; it's HOF legal. No one in their right mind did so pre-patch, because 60 from a double ruins pop was so strong in an environment where you could get +2 and 15% growth or a free GP with the third policy.

That may change, now that there isn't anything absolutely game-breaking available in the first twenty turns. My guess would be that the ruins will stay on for Domination (accelerated GG is strong) but go off for peaceful conditions where you need or want an early Wonder.

There are a couple of other people claiming to have won in the .332 patch. I haven't heard anyone claiming a MadDjinn-style slugfest win yet, although I suspect it's only a matter of time. It sounds like aimlessgun has a winning position and should close that out today or tomorrow.

 

[MadDjinn]

There are a couple of other people claiming to have won in the .332 patch. I haven't heard anyone claiming a MadDjinn-style slugfest win yet, although I suspect it's only a matter of time. It sounds like aimlessgun has a winning position and should close that out today or tomorrow.

menh, the game has options for a reason. It doesn't really matter if people use those 'legal' options and still claim a win. (though, specifying it matters; Marathon Duel Dom doesn't really count as much as a larger map would, but is still an option)

Only using mods (that affect the gameplay) or actually changing the .xml would negate any claims.

Personally, I haven't had the time to finish a game yet (real life things to do). I've been testing ICS starts in my spare time though. (it's easy to do now unfortunately, though I'm not convinced it's 'optimal' at all)

 

[vexing]

I also suspect that they do not run Scientists either.

they can run scientists, at least i've seen it happen before the patch. it ends up as only +1 science per specialist so not a big deal anyway.

 

[RedRover57]

From some of my recent attempts it seems like a science, diplo or culture win would be feasible on Deity if you have favorable start conditions (i.e., isolated or semi-isolated with several good city sites nearby and weak neighboring civs). But what I'm talking about is the good old-fashioned slugfest domination win.

It's not really the number of troops that the ai can throw at you on Deity. They still are terrible at combat tactics. The problem I have been having is the erratic behavior. You expect it with Monty, but now you can't trust any civ to act in any kind of reasonable manner.

One of the worst ai behaviors is almost game breaking. This is when a civ declares on you when they are nowhere near your border, presumably because they sense your "weakness". Often this civ has been friendly and a good trading partner in the past, and breaks a current RA by declaring. Sometimes they are also at war with another civ that is between you, and you never see any of their troops at your borders. Or they will send a small number of troops (like 4-5 warriors and archers) which you easily dispatch and they never send more. But the biggest problem with this is that you are basically now locked in permanent war with them. They won't accept a straight peace treaty and only want some ridiculous settlement (like all your gold, lux and 2 of your cities). So there is no chance for peace until much later in the game. Not only does the perma war deprive you of a potentially good trading partner, but if they are a civ like Arabia or Siam you could be faced with going to war with every CS that they subsequently ally for the rest of the game.

They absolutely need to fix this behavior. A civ should not DoW you when they are nowhere near your borders and particularly if they are already at war with other civs. The permanent war that ensues is incredibly annoying.

Monty is nuts but at least you know he is going to be nuts. It's when Harun turns on you from across the map for no apparent reason when you just have to wonder "WTF?".

 

[aimlessgun]

It sounds like aimlessgun has a winning position and should close that out today or tomorrow.

It's still pretty up in the air. Greece has had Apollo for a bit now and I still have 7 policies left. I think I'm going to have to assemble a nuclear strike team to go after his private continent and non-coastal capital, which is going to be...problematic.

Culture takes a hell of a long time, it seems :/

 

[Tyxerxa]

Ok, new approach. Defensive warmonigering for a cultural victory.

Montezuma + Liberty into Tradition into Honor into Piety into Freedom. 4 cities. Teching after Philosophy pretty straight to Cannons. Keeping war constantly for culture.