Domination on Deity on Rough Terrain

[Plumfairy]

I'm usually an Immortal player, but recently I've been trying my hand on Deity. I've run into a situation in my current game that seems literally unwinnable:

I'm playing Arabia, and I started next to the Zulu on a pangea map that's extremely rugged: hills & mountains all over the place, with the (very) occasional valley here & there. I was planning on trying for Domination anyways, so starting next to the Zulu didn't bother me much... it just meant I had to do a Composite Bowman rush rather than waiting for my Camel Archers. I built up an overwhelming force of Bowmen by turn 55, along with a couple spearmen for meatshields.

....and nothing doing. With the forrested/jungle terrain, my bowmen often have to be right next to the cities to attack them. And the rough terrain means my numerical advantage doesn't matter much; the cities & Zulu units can chew my units up as they very... slowly... advance.

Are there some maps that are simply unwinnable on Deity? On Immortal, I could win any map if I played it differentlly. But this set-up seems literally impossible. If I play peaceful & try to outtech the Zulu, they'll easily overwhelm me when they get their Impi. And invading before they get Impi doesn't seem feasible. I suppose I could bribe them over & over to attack other civs, but that always seemed like an exploit to me... and even so, there's a good chance they'd eventually run out of other opponents & come kill me.

 

[Sclb]

Usually rough terrain means you can't conquer them with CB. With Zulu specifically, you won't be able to conquer them easily with XB either, since their unit directly counters them. Your best bet is to wait until artillery I'm afraid. Usually Zulu tech pretty slow after Medieval so if you can get to artillery quickly, you have a pretty good window to kill them before they get GWB/GWI.

Every map is winnable on deity, the same strategy might not always work on deity, and you'll have to learn to adapt to the map and dirt. When in doubt, you can resort to peaceful play and kill them in modern/atomic/information era. By that time your tech should be at least an era ahead making it easy. Remember Zulu is extremely easy to bribe, so when you see their carpet coming, bribe them to attack another civ. You don't have to worry about them conquering every other civ, since that's unlikely to happen due to horrible ai war strategies. Usually once they start 3-4 wars, they'll be overstretched and you can easily get the entire world to dow them and they'll likely start losing cities.

 

[stormtrooper412]

yeah, CB rush is quite impossible in rough terrain, I think only Keshiks work there because of the crucial extra movement that Camels don't have. Or perhaps try Incas, they can move on hills faster.

Another option is to rack up experience for earlier siege units to try and get them to Indirect Fire if that's even possible but in that case might as well just wait for Artillery.

 

[Plumfairy]

Usually rough terrain means you can't conquer them with CB. With Zulu specifically, you won't be able to conquer them easily with XB either, since their unit directly counters them. Your best bet is to wait until artillery I'm afraid. Usually Zulu tech pretty slow after Medieval so if you can get to artillery quickly, you have a pretty good window to kill them before they get GWB/GWI.

Every map is winnable on deity, the same strategy might not always work on deity, and you'll have to learn to adapt to the map and dirt. When in doubt, you can resort to peaceful play and kill them in modern/atomic/information era. By that time your tech should be at least an era ahead making it easy. Remember Zulu is extremely easy to bribe, so when you see their carpet coming, bribe them to attack another civ. You don't have to worry about them conquering every other civ, since that's unlikely to happen due to horrible ai war strategies. Usually once they start 3-4 wars, they'll be overstretched and you can easily get the entire world to dow them and they'll likely start losing cities.

Hmm... yeah that makes a lot of sense.

Or perhaps try Incas, they can move on hills faster.

Yeah, the Inca are all kinds of OP. Most people seem to place the Inca one tier below the "God tier" civs, but I like them just as much as the Babylonians or Polish. Plus they're really really fun.

Another option is to rack up experience for earlier siege units to try and get them to Indirect Fire if that's even possible but in that case might as well just wait for Artillery.

Even with the +experience Honor policy, my siege units rarely get much experience. Regular ranged units can eventually get the Logistics promotion thanks to their ability to move & shoot in the same turn. Also, they're tough enough to withstand one or two attacks from infantry & cavalry of the same tech level. Siege units, don't have either of those advantages, so my siege often struggle to gain even 1 promotion from xp.






Followup question:

Any of the 3 starting policy trees can work for Domination games. But in most cases, only Tradition is viable for a "Go tall & tech until Artillery" strat. Unfortunately, you usually have to pick your first policy or two before you know exactly when & where you need to launch your first attack. How would you handle it if, for example, you had already picked two policies in Liberty before you discovered that your conquests will require Artillery? Do you just finish the left hand of Liberty (for the settler production) and then switch to full Tradition? Or would you finish Liberty, even though it doesn't give any growth bonuses?

 

[stormtrooper412]

I think it's in between. When going Liberty I see two main paths: Either you CB rush someone and use their cities to grow your own, or settle 7-8 own cities and start killing when you're ready