Deity: What am I missing?

[carath63]

Aaaaaaggggghhhhh!

It is now turn 229 and Shaka has had flight for about 6 turns. He suddenly has about 6 GWB close enough to hit my army and took out all of my cavalry and two of my artillery. I am out of oil and can't buy any more fighters and do not have anti-air yet. I still haven't taken his first city and he is still bringing up waves of riflemen.

This is about when I rage-quit. I don't have a strategy to take out Shaka when he is this big.

 

[mbbcam]

My "strategy" for Shaka is to use the *Really Advanced Setup* mod, and make sure he isn't in the game. He is one challenge I am not prepared to take on.

I have given up countless times at about the stage you are at. I can get a couple of capitals with XBs, but I can never transition to the next phase. I think the first phase requires so much of my attention that I don't have any to spare for planning and preparing for what to do next. I never have enough troops of the right kind ready for the next stage. I have also stalled in my present game, despite getting Artillery very early (for me).

I will go back and watch a few more videos.

 

[beetle]

This is about when I rage-quit. I don't have a strategy to take out Shaka when he is this big.

I would go back to the turn before you got the double-DOW from Shaka/Suleiman and see if you cannot bribe Shaka to DOW Suleiman.
Then make peace w/ Gandhi, wait for Delhi to come back to full health and get 3+ arty two hexes from Shaka’s cities. When you are in position, bribe Shaka to DOW everyone, and then DOW him.

 

[carath63]

I would go back to the turn before you got the double-DOW from Shaka/Suleiman and see if you cannot bribe Shaka to DOW Suleiman.
Then make peace w/ Gandhi, wait for Delhi to come back to full health and get 3+ arty two hexes from Shaka’s cities. When you are in position, bribe Shaka to DOW everyone, and then DOW him.

Thanks. In this particular game the map layout makes this problematic. The only remaining civ that borders Shaka is India, and they are too weak to do anything. Everyone else is too far away and do not have artillery or flight at this point. Despite an early Dynamite (for me), I was too slow getting my army in place to take advantage of my tech lead except for Delhi. I also believed I was pretty early with flight so I wasn't preparing for Shaka to get it as well, and didn't build any defenses against his GWB to protect my troops.

Are there some guidelines for mileposts to hit and turn ranges when certain key military units are effective? In Moriarte's Korea video, he hits Dynamite around turn 160, and he is the tech leader or close to it at that point. He also doesn't have Shaka, and Atilla is pretty far away from him and hasn't really overrun his area yet.

 

[mbbcam]

While I think mileposts are important (in that you are going to have a hard time if you don't hit them in reasonable time) I think there is more to it than that. What strikes me about Moriarte's Korea LP is the preparation of numerous things with an overall plan in mind -- and it is a plan that takes the shape of the map into account. It also exploits Korea's ability in Science. It's a plan that won't necessarily work with another Civ, or another map. You can see how early he maps out the path he is going to take, the route to conquest. It sounds like the map you have demands a different approach. Some of the powerful Civs can just run away with things if they are surrounded by weaker neighbours and have some terrain advantages. Even the experts give up at times when the situation is against them.

I have been guilty in the past of playing to a "recipe" that concentrated too much on a narrow range of things. And that narrow range mostly had to do with immediate concerns. I get the feeling that one also needs to predict what will be happening in the future, based on one's knowledge of the game, and play also for what is going to happen in 30 turns, 50 turns, 100 turns. Certain AI behaviours are very predictable -- they are programmed to behave in a certain way. Some AIs are going to build every wonder they can find, America will fill up the map, and the Mongols will attack all the city states. So I suppose one needs to have a plan to deal with what the neighbours will do. After all, they are also trying to win the game, and will do whatever it takes.

 

[beetle]

@carath63, do you have a ~T195 save? I would be happy to try different things, and share what worked for me, rather than make guesses that might not be actually helpful.

In this particular game the map layout makes this problematic. The only remaining civ that borders Shaka is India, and they are too weak to do anything. Everyone else is too far away and do not have artillery or flight at this point. Despite an early Dynamite (for me), I was too slow getting my army in place to take advantage of my tech lead except for Delhi. I also believed I was pretty early with flight so I wasn't preparing for Shaka to get it as well, and didn't build any defenses against his GWB to protect my troops.

In my experience, the main benefit of DOW bribes is not so much to get help (which can backfire anyway) but just to get you more time, gain better control of game pacing, and to maximize later trade opportunities.

If Shaka agrees to DOW Suleiman, that gets you 3-10 turns to move your GWI to Delhi. You asked about Buffalo-promoted Riflemen, and I agree, they are tough and not so vulnerable to Artillery or even Bombers. You need GWI that fortify in place (and rarely attack) while you wear them down with Landships.

If Shaka kills off Gandhi, and you recall him, that is great for you! Shaka will not re-DOW Gandhi so long as he is at war with you. In addition to reducing your warmonger score, any Indian city you liberate immediately creates safe (neutral) territory that works as buffer space against Shaka.

If Shaka DOWs everyone, that spoils his lux trades, opening opportunities for you. Also later, should you eliminate him from the game entirely, it will be a minor warmonger penalty rather than a major one.

 

[BlackWizard]

Have you build citadels with your generals? They are very effective if positioned correctly. You can even position one right next to city center if that is strategically good place. That way you have other melee unit healing in city and you can switch their places if necessary. Also having medic next to citadel unit is good

 

[carath63]

Have you build citadels with your generals? They are very effective if positioned correctly. You can even position one right next to city center if that is strategically good place. That way you have other melee unit healing in city and you can switch their places if necessary. Also having medic next to citadel unit is good

When I was playing with the Honor tree and got a lot of generals I would do this more often. I should be weighing the advantage of planting the general vs getting the 15% bonus in these situations. I often end up with more generals than I know what to do with by the late game, so I shouldn't be so reluctant to use them this way earlier in the game.

 

[beetle]

I am trying to win by domination using Harun (Arabia). Let me know if you would like me to share.

 

[carath63]

I am trying to win by domination using Harun (Arabia). Let me know if you would like me to share.

That would be great! I haven't played Arabia on deity yet, but can use help with any civ.

 

[raider980]

I've been thinking of trying some Deity games too. Only done one so far; a recent GotM, and resigned when it became obvious I wasn't going to be able to dominate before the AI launched. I didn't try all the tricks mentioned in this thread though.

I've also been playing consentient's new challenge series, still on the first one. The third should be a Deity game so I need to get in some practice.

If you all would like to play a game from the same initial save file I'll be up for that. As mentioned before by others, I've watched Let's Play's and the circumstances I run into never seem the same as what I watch. Maybe if a few of us played the same game we could get some insight from each other.

 

[beetle]

Okay, game is up. I put it in its own thread and mostly borrowed the formatting from the CDG series, except that I did not try to think of “achievement points”.

Arabia is good for domination in that they can make use of the Chariot Archers which otherwise are an early strong unit, but they loose their promotions when they upgrade to knights. So mostly people use CBs. Chariot Archers (as compared to CBs) are available earlier and have extra move, but you need horses.

The starting spot is pretty strong, and your immediate neighbors are manageable. You should be able to snag a religion if you want. I was not fast enough in my first play, so I am trying again, hoping to manage the far-away-runaway a little better.

 

[carath63]

I haven't gotten to trying the Arabia game. I keep going back to Poland and trying domination from there.

Things are improving. I have been going Tradition for the last few games and I'm consistently getting dynamite by turn 160-165. I can take a few capitals and my economy and happiness are not too bad. In the last game I had Shaka for a neighbor and was able to keep him busy until I had artillery and then I took him out pretty easily. I followed this with Nebuchadnezer who was nearby as well. But as I prepared to move on to the next neighbor, Arabia, and I had finished researching flight (around turn 210 or so), so did everyone else, and suddenly I got DOWd by both Arabia and Austria, who were building GWB and triplanes faster than I could, and my army was soon reduced to a pile of rubble.

Should I not bother with GWB at all, and just build triplanes to defend my army at that point? I feel like I'm ahead, so I build some bombers to help, but then I don't have any fighters and get trashed when the AIs catch up.

Back to the drawing board...

 

[beetle]

@carath63, I think you should experiment with reloading and diplomacy, since that is an important part of Deity play as well. Few turns before they DOW you, can you bribe one of Arabia or Austria to DOW the other? Did you see if you could get Nebuchadnezzar to DOW Arabia or Austria before you DOW’d him?

I always build Triplanes before GWB.

Would you like me to roll and share a Poland map? There would probably be at least the three or four of us playing. The Arabia game kind of took a life of its own, quite different than what I was expecting! It turned out to be good for the best players, but not so instructive for those of us struggling! Poland, I think, works better DOM for games that are just getting started in the Industrial age.

 

[carath63]

@carath63, I think you should experiment with reloading and diplomacy, since that is an important part of Deity play as well. Few turns before they DOW you, can you bribe one of Arabia or Austria to DOW the other? Did you see if you could get Nebuchadnezzar to DOW Arabia or Austria before you DOW’d him?

I always build Triplanes before GWB.

Would you like me roll and share a Poland map? There would probably be at least the three or four of us playing. The Arabia game kind of took a life of its own, quite different than what I was expecting! It turned out to be good for the best players, but not so instructive for those of us struggling! Poland, I think, works better DOM games that are just getting started in the Industrial age.

Yes, that would be cool. I am not too hopeful in my current attempt, as America is steamrolling everyone. I'll try Triplanes first as well. It makes sense as long as the artillery is working to not start adding GWB, but focus on protecting the artillery and cavalry.

 

[beetle]

Okay @carath63, I am planning to share a Poland map for this weekend, a 3-day holiday for some of us in states. If you have criteria beyond playing Poland, please mention them in the CDG Series Discussion Thread.

EDIT: Poland game is up.

 

[carath63]

After giving up on the CDG Poland Map, (I will try it again for my next game), I rolled another Poland, Pangaea, game to take another stab at domination and Deity. This game is at around turn 260 and I am pretty close to winning it.

A couple of keys that I think finally got me over the hump:
1. I drew a very good start with lots of food, production, and different luxuries near the capitol.
2. My nearest neighbors did not expand near me. Suleiman had his capitol on my "border", which was a good 8-10 tiles from my nearest city, but he decided to expand towards Germany instead of me. Korea put down a city about 6 tiles from me, but after I had already settled my 4 cities. My other neighbors were either across the inland sea or had a few layers of city states to keep them away from me.
3. Shaka was not in the first ring of neighbors. He is the only one who was able to spam cities, and I kept him busy declaring war on everyone else until I got to dynamite.
4. I went tradition, got a fairly early NC, and then CB to put up some defenses at my borders, but then bee-lined the education techs before heading to dynamite. I got to dynamite about turn 160, was generating about 400 BPT at that point, and was second in techs only to Shaka. By turn 200 I was ahead of everyone by close to 10 techs.
5. Russia completely took out Korea, and I had her DOW Portugal and Austria, so nobody liked her and they weren't too sad when I rolled in and took the Korean capital, a few more Korean and Russian cities, and then after slogging through an isthmus, got o Moscow. Along the way I resurrected Korea, so he became an instant friend and trading partner.

From that point, I went after flight and managed to get it well before anyone else. I rolled over Suleiman, taking only his capital, as he only had a few cities and they didn't have anything. I then moved on Germany, coming at Berlin from two directions, while Shaka kept him busy as well. About this time everyone but Korea was denouncing me, but it didn't really matter. I got my ideology (order) about 20 turns or more before anyone else did. Unfortunately, no one picked order, and I had several turns with 20+ unhappiness until I claimed wonders and works to reduce the pressure.

I have taken Shaka's capital, and am mopping him up on my way to the Austrian capital, and then I will end the game in Portugal.

I am hoping not all of this was just good luck, and that my gameplay has improved so I can repeat this on the CDG Poland map in the near future.

 

[beetle]

Congratulations @carath63! If you can routinely win Dom VC under T300, that should be good enough for most maps!

FWIW, I never was able to get a timely win from the CDG Poland map that I posted. Even after playing it several times, I could not tell you want the hold up was.

 

[carath63]

The final tally: I took the last capitol on Turn 297. I was first in every demographic and score.

I would like to try the CDG Poland map, but I am also looking for a next configuration with another civ where to put everything I learned into practice and get more consistent results on Deity. I have two science victories, (Poland and Nebuchadnezzar), and one domination victory. So, I could make an attempt at a diplomatic or culture victory. Would you try Alex with diplo, or France (or someone else) for culture?

 

[beetle]

Diplo is pretty easy, so no need for Alex on that one. The only civ I can make the CV work is Polynesia, but even then you need suitable coastlines. The recent CDG Polynesia is actually pretty good IMHO for CV.