DoC Domination Challenge

[Tomorrow's Dawn]

Civilization: French
Vassals: Chinese, Ottomans, Inca, Maya
Difficulty: Monarch
Speed: Normal
Finish Date: 1904; Turn 399

Vive la France!

I nearly fainted at the sight of Roman Cannons at 1020 AD.

The winning shot.

England & Russia conquered?
Napoleon would be proud.

Alright, some notes:

I attempted in earnest to get Russia to capitulate,
but they held out till the bitter end and preferred collapse over capitulation.
It didn't help that Spain DOW'ed me at the end, sensing victory,
and ruining my chances of vassalizing Russia.

I was able to vassalize China because they only had 3 cities on respawn (it wasn't the Mongols that collapsed them; it was the barbs, which happens on occasion).
After the Mongol collapse, they started to conquer former Mongolian land, which helped out a lot.

Poor Ottomans. Out of nowhere during the 1700s-1800s, the Mughals and the Persians decide to DOW me and carve through the Ottomans' territory.
I would've been able to finish sooner if it weren't for that.

Ironically, both Turkey & China in this game appear to have achieved some accurate real-life borders!
Except I didn't like dealing with China late-game because I wanted to kill Cixi with fire.

EDIT: How do I create corporations? I'll admit, it's an aspect of the game I never went into, even in vanilla BtS.
I was Capitalist + Free Market, etc. (all the democratic civics for the majority of the game) but I never got the option to create them with my GPs.
I am still just playing on 1.81 if that helps (Referring to that Corporation bug)

 

[Leoreth]

You can't create them, they spread to you on their own, nobody needs to found them. All you need is Corporation + a specific tech for each modern corporation (Steel for Steel Industry, Biology for Cereal Industry etc.).

 

[Jusos2108]

I conquered Babylon and India from start. Egypt vassalised after that, but they later collapsed. I let ERE flip the Levant and concentrated on teching and rasing an army of pikes and war elephants. Meanwhile I built pretty much every possible wonder there was. Arabs spawned, but I denied their flip and fought them off, but I didn't bother conquering Mecca.

The Seljuks spawned, but I stomped them easily and moved my army towards India and Samarqand. Mughals spawned, but I denied their flip (Varanasi) and reconquered Delhi. After that I disbanded all my units in India, so that the Mughals wouldn't flip them. Mongols came and were easily crushed. England and Germany vassalised around these times and I helped them reconquer their lost lands from Vikings. Germany came a real monster towards the end.

A little later Egypt and China respawned and vassalised to me, soon after Arabia collapsed and I took Mecca. Just before America spawned I built two cities in midwest and culture bombed one of them. I also gifted settlers to England and helped them conquer Mexico. To get the land I conquered some native cities in Africa and used the culture slider to get land quickly. I never adopted a religion and built almost every wonder there is.

Spoiler :

Stability and world in 1110 and 1870:

Spoiler :

 

[Fresol]

Amazing, can I see your stability screen?

I am a bit surprised you do not have the largest army in the world.

 

[Tomorrow's Dawn]

Amazing, can I see you stability screen?

Yes, and a closeup of that mini-map?

Those are some of the neatest borders I've ever seen.

 

[Jusos2108]

Thanks! I have added some screenshots to my post above. Civic stability is quite low, since I am still running representation.

Germany has the largest army, I haven't really built much units, since there was no need to mass produce due to my technological superioty.

 

[Jusos2108]

Mongols had taken China, but it was fairly weakly defended and they collapsed after I took three of their cities. Unfortunately China respawned and I had to fight them too, but eventually I was able to reach Manchuria, after which I turned west were the Mughals were fighting europeans. Situation in 1700:

Spoiler :

Mughals collapsed quickly and I was able to snatch Delhi and Peshawar. I had been whoring techs around for quite some time by now and was pretty much at par with the europeans. I beelined radio, but since I hadn't catholicism, I couldn't built the Christo Redentor just yet. I also managed to get Medicine before 19th century plague.

Around 1900 I was the most advanced nation by far and I began making some assault forces. I had been eyeing Spanish and Catholic Manila for quite some time now, when Incas offered to vassalise. They were at war with the Spanish Empire & vassals, but since I happened to have marines in a boat not far from Manila I decided to take the Incan offer. My newly founded American colonies had some difficulties against the combined armies of Spain and Aztecs, but they held. Meanwhile I took Manila and sent a GE there as well. Suddenly Japan and their recently respawned vassal Korea declared war on me, so I was fighting Spain, Aztecs, Mali, Indonesia, Japan and Korea at once. However, England and her vassal America together with USSR and her vassals Turkey and Vikings joined the war on my side and dragged their allies Dutch and India to the fight as well, so we had ourselves a proper world war.

After taking control of the Asian theatre, I sent troops to North America and began rolling the Spanish colonies with tanks and bombers. Suddenly my allie India offered to vassalise and I took their offer, since I though that they might one day control India for me. However, this meant that the Egypt and Iran declared war on me. So now every nation in the world was involved in the war.

After I was finished with Spain in NA I signed peace with them as I thought that Aztec would collapse soon and Spain had nothing worth taking anymore. USSR had just collapsed. So the attention was once again in Asia, where I had been assembling troops for quite some time now. Iran had a really big stack of cavalry, infantry and artillery, but I had bombers, tanks and mechanized infantry. After capitulating Iran my armors rolled to Egypt crushed their armies and capitulated them as well. Meanwhile I had taken Seoul, Botankou and Korea had collapsed, so Japan capitulated as well.

The power blocks and world in 1900 and 1949:

Spoiler :

I prepared my armies for taking on England and in 1976 I declared war on them, conquered rest of India, Mongolia, Canada and the Thirteen Colonies. Iran took Arabia with little assistance from me and that was enough to get 25% of land, I had over 40% of pop.

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

 

[Fresol]

Thai can dominate too?

 

[Tomorrow's Dawn]

I must ask, now I don't have much trouble getting Economy up to 170-210,
but what I generally have issues with is the tech rate.
How are you guys getting Fusion & Stealth in the late 19th/early 20th centuries?
Because I find that many AIs are unwilling to trade techs in the endgame
and around the same time you guys are at, I'm only able to maybe tech Fission/Medicine/Ecology at best.

 

[Fresol]

Fusion at 1900? That's not something I can do...

I think in general one can finish the tech tree around 1940-1950 if the game goes smooth.

 

[Tomorrow's Dawn]

Fusion at 1900? That's not something I can do...

I think in general one can finish the tech tree around 1940-1950 if the game goes smooth.

You were teching Stealth at 1902 though.

 

[Fresol]

What I did that game was to expand and build up economy and blockade the Europeans to oblivion. I got a good start so the blockade went well and that helped me keep the lead for the whole game.

I tried another Russia game, but I ended up winning a space victory because I was too slow in expanding... preoccupied with my economy and teching.

 

[Tomorrow's Dawn]

I did the Privateer blockade too and I was able to hit around 2000 beakers per turn.

Actually, in retrospect, I know what I did wrong.
I kept too many OBs with the Porcelain Tower.
I was wondering why my commerce went down whenever I signed an OB.
Well, now I know.

 

[Fresol]

And I got 5 Golden Ages... The price is I lost near 100 stability points. And DO NOT open border with other civs after your oversea colonies have grown up (before that you still need to open border to other civs, except England).

 

[Tomorrow's Dawn]

That's true, on a recent Domination game I did with China,
I reached 180 natural Economy, and I only used 1 Golden Age before the end.
I was teching Ecology by 1902, which was when that game ended.
But I was able to expand manually much better.
I guess it boils down to sacrificing tech for expansion & war or vice-versa.

 

[Fresol]

I'm playing a Persia game following Jusos2108's hint. I have to say Persia is really OP if you can conquer India early. Cuirassiers in 900 AD help you take care of every opponent, and you have all the shrines and Silk Route to boost economy. Access to all religions means you can build almost every single wonder you want.

 

[Jusos2108]

Thai can dominate too?

Yeah! I have learned that every civ (so far) can dominate.

I must ask, now I don't have much trouble getting Economy up to 170-210,
but what I generally have issues with is the tech rate.
How are you guys getting Fusion & Stealth in the late 19th/early 20th centuries?
Because I find that many AIs are unwilling to trade techs in the endgame
and around the same time you guys are at, I'm only able to maybe tech Fission/Medicine/Ecology at best.

My guess would be that you are expanding too early. I rarely trade techs late to the game, I just give some to my vassals or maybe trade/steal something less useful techs, that I have forced them to research, from them.

 

[Jusos2108]

I'm playing a Persia game following Jusos2108's hint. I have to say Persia is really OP if you can conquer India early. Cuirassiers in 900 AD help you take care of every opponent, and you have all the shrines and Silk Route to boost economy. Access to all religions means you can build almost every single wonder you want.

As you've probably realized by now that taking India has its ups and downs.

I think that I should've expanded more early in my Persia game, but the Byzantines ruin everything in the west now. I guess east is the way to go..

 

[morff]

I must ask, now I don't have much trouble getting Economy up to 170-210,
but what I generally have issues with is the tech rate.
How are you guys getting Fusion & Stealth in the late 19th/early 20th centuries?
Because I find that many AIs are unwilling to trade techs in the endgame
and around the same time you guys are at, I'm only able to maybe tech Fission/Medicine/Ecology at best.

Spoiler :

Basically you have to choose between size of your empire (represented by number of cities), where you can grow up to 10 cities without start being punished for being too big. I usually try avoid more than 10 cities before free religion (+10% in all cities), so you can build one extra city without being practically penalized. Also it's nice to have multiple religions (for happiness later; for monasteries (having extra 10-20-30 or even 40% research bonus) before scientific method (so you have SM researched 99% and wait till AI get's there, or even stack some research if you know how so you will have some go ahead for communism and physics)). You also don't want miss any bonuses of course like free techs and other bonuses from wonders or techs or events. If you are ahead enough, you can go for cca 11-14 or 15 cities just before you will have computers. After computers (laboratories and internet), you can in worst case even completely stop your research, and wait since AI research it. Don't waste your GP on GA or popping-up techs if you don't have to, use them to improve your research rate (scientists -> academies) or economy (merchant, engineer, spy) (or left them for later to avoid collapse just before the end). Also don't forget combine natural city advantages (good for production, or money/research) and other bonuses together (your best research city will get academy, and channel tunnel later; your best money city, can be for example capital or holy city will have stock exchange (should be also harbor); best production city will get ironworks etc.) - so the major trick is combine the bonuses whenever you can.

 

[Tomorrow's Dawn]

Spoiler :

Basically you have to choose between size of your empire (represented by number of cities), where you can grow up to 10 cities without start being punished for being too big. I usually try avoid more than 10 cities before free religion (+10% in all cities), so you can build one extra city without being practically penalized. Also it's nice to have multiple religions (for happiness later; for monasteries (having extra 10-20-30 or even 40% research bonus) before scientific method (so you have SM researched 99% and wait till AI get's there, or even stack some research if you know how so you will have some go ahead for communism and physics)). You also don't want miss any bonuses of course like free techs and other bonuses from wonders or techs or events. If you are ahead enough, you can go for cca 11-14 or 15 cities just before you will have computers. After computers (laboratories and internet), you can in worst case even completely stop your research, and wait since AI research it. Don't waste your GP on GA or popping-up techs if you don't have to, use them to improve your research rate (scientists -> academies) or economy (merchant, engineer, spy) (or left them for later to avoid collapse just before the end). Also don't forget combine natural city advantages (good for production, or money/research) and other bonuses together (your best research city will get academy, and channel tunnel later; your best money city, can be for example capital or holy city will have stock exchange (should be also harbor); best production city will get ironworks etc.) - so the major trick is combine the bonuses whenever you can.

Oh my gosh, thank you!

I actually knew everything except for the last bit about combining city bonuses.
I had never really thought of it that way (in cases other than Science); I'll definitely look into combining the Holy City with Stock Exchange, and etc.

But yeah...it looks like 11 cities before going all out is just the way it's going to have to go.