First Domination: Advice Needed

[Black Waltz]

Well in my latest game I decided to go against all that I have ever been in Civ games. Usually I am a passive sort of fellow with a fairly large standing army that can punnish any nasty AI that declares war on me. However, this game (Prince, high sealevel, large map, epic game, France, Napoleon) I decided to be a little more aggressive... I found myself on the largest continent and after several wars I mannaged to take it for myself as I researched Riflemen. However, I am at a loss as what to do next.

I have around 12% to go for a domination victory. Persia is my closest rival with a parity in tech. There are several weaker nations who have either been isolated or have been... Exiled to the outer islands due to my need for living space...

I have won the last two games with a spaceship victory and I really want to have my first domination (I didn't even mannage it with Civ III). The only problem with this game is that moving all of this military around is very tedious. I have been tempted just to pack in the game. But I want this win under my belt so I can say at least I have achieved a purely miltary win... So any advice would be great.

 

[dalessi12]

If you want to end it quickly, you should adopt nationhood, and draft musketeers. If you have theaters, you can up culture a little (to combat the effects of drafting) at research's expense. I would lower research to zero and use the gold influx to buy units. I would build (buy) more ships in my coastal cities, while drafting. I would make (buy) a few cavalry, riflemen, grenadiers, and more than a few cannon. I wouldn't bother upgrading old units, or replacing longbows with riflemen, I would use all promoted and new units for war. If you draft a musketeer, and one currently being used as garrison is more promoted, switch the two.

As for where to attack. I would suggest making the trip over to Frederick. He doesn't even have Education, so is limited to pre-gunpowder units only. He would offer little resistance. If you want to attack Hatty, I would declare on Elizabeth. As it stands now. Hatty has a Defensive Pact with Cyrus AND Elizabeth. If you declare on England, Hatty will declare on you, and I believe, the Pact between Hatty and Cyrus will be cancelled (due to Hatty's declaration on you.) Declaring directly on Hatty will mean war with Persia (i.e. not good).

If you are bored and want to end it as soon as possible, I would draft and produce nothing but miltary (no granaries, universities, etc). I think it will take Germany's land and Hatty's land to get to 60%. I predict these two wars would take less than 50 turns (including building, travelling, conquering and border expansion), but it could take slightly more.

I often get bored and quit games when the result is obvious but tediously far away. But if you have never had a domination victory and want one in your Hall of Fame, I suggest spending the hour mauling Germany and Egypt.

 

[Cam_H]

dalessi12 offers some excellent advice.

You've clearly broken the back of this game, and you're right, it is pretty much a case of churning out units and taking cities from this point. The only real threat is possibly from Cyrus in the form of an invasion, which could spell the end of a few of your cities at worst.

First thing I did was change civics (Theocracy and Vassalage) so new units are appropriately promoted. I also went through your cities and reviewed the build instructions; there were a few instances of cities getting unnecessary 'health' or 'happiness' improvements, and the city manager had often given you specialists which were pretty wasteful I think in this instance.

The technology path was essentially Artillery (immediately) > Communism (for The Kremlin and State Property) > Assembly Line (Infantry and The Pentagon) > Combustion (Destroyers and Transports).

For a little while it was simply a case of pumping out Cavalry, Artillery, and Galleons.

Germany was my first target; relatively large and with only Medieval units. I was a little uncertain as to whether to raze or hold many of these cities, however with such mild opposition, I felt that even if a city did flip that it would be no problem to recapture. With the aid of The Kremlin, I rushed Theatres and Libraries and in some instances Universities in new cities at bargain-basement prices.

Russia was more of a concern, and Catherine had Cossacks. Isabella invited me to join her conflict with Catherine and the time was just about right anyway, so I obliged. I was startled by how second-rate Catherine's military was with hardly any Cossacks at all (and I did knock out her access to Horses as a priority). This time however I was more inclined to raze and resettle. Cyrus slipped in a city following my decimation of the Russian mainland.

As noted when I attacked England for that last annoying city, I ended up with Hatshepsut declaring war as per her Defensive Pact, however the only fallout from this was that I ended up with two of her island cities. There were no diplomatic ramifications from Persia or Spain.

The saved game is about to go into Domination. A bit like yourself, I'm a fairly passive-type player, so experienced warmonger players and/or more meticulous players would probably have finished this off many turns earlier. I did start to get a little lazy in terms of city management (including automated 'trade network' workers to build my railroads).

So advice ... consider your civics, manage your city build order so you're working on something of some immediate use, don't always trust the governor and in particular look to correct cities with poor food production - imho overall there was a good job done.

 

[Black Waltz]

Yes. I think that purely military is the way to go. The reason I had switched civics was because after my war on the continent I had slipped somewhat in research due to the expense of holding the Arabian and Egyptian cities and I had wanted to get some improvments down.

Anyway, I think I will take the advice of taking down Germany and then Egypt. And then vow to not play another pure military game in my career if I can help it.
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And mission complete. I went for Fred, he fell fairly easily. Then I decided that I may aswell take out Cath... However, once I did that I was left sitting on 59.70%... So after awhile I declared war on Izzy, took the one city that she had taken on the Russian Mainland then proceeded to... *ahem* nuke Salamaca (The island city to the south of my continent) and then take it with a single Infantryman. Mission complete. My first and hopefully last domination. Thanks a lot for the advice.

 

[Cam_H]

then proceeded to... *ahem* nuke Salamaca (The island city to the south of my continent) and then take it with a single Infantryman.

I guess whatever gets the job done!

With regard to Isabella, I have not ever had her at 'Pleased' while running a different religion to her until this game (that is, my attempt).

Well done on your win.