From King to Emperor - ouch

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Using standard settings, no mods, Gathering storm.

Can win comfortably on King under most circumstances (9 out of 10).

So tried Emperor. Yee-ikes. The difference in difficulty is absolutely enormous. The AI has unbelievable numbers of units and hems me right in with settlers left and right.

Any tips? Any good Youtube videos that specifically cover the process of going from King to Emperor? :)
 
depending on how close your neighbours are I would generally always go scout (or slinger) and then settler as soon as pop 2.
I find it’s always important to have that second city.

As for YouTube streamers, the ones I l think are best are
- TheGameMechanic
- Omega Alden
- PotatoMcWhiskey
- The Saxy Gamer
- Broyar

They all play on deity but it doesn’t matter much. Deity is just emperor with even more bonuses to the AI
Especially Potato and Saxy have some tips and tricks videos and leader spotlights and that kind of thing besides actual games
 
You generally want to refine your early game. Try to settle your first cities near a 2+ food/1+ production tile; even if it means founding a weaker city overall. Work towards things you need right now. Until you get more established on this difficulty level, don't build wonders or found religions without good reason.

You will generally be behind in the early game because of AI bonuses but this is fine.
 
King to Emperor is the biggest step in difficulties since the AI gets an extra settler and the AI is quite aggressive in the early game. However it is fairly easy to hold of an attack with a few warriors and archers. Claiming land is first priority so get your settler production going. Learn the best approach that suits you best.
If you want to keep the peace with your neighbours don't agree to share knowledge about each other's city location unless the AI already discovered it. To try to keep the peace you want to send delegation to your neighbour AI for them to like you enough to not going into war (this is of course not a guarantee).
Coming from King to Emperor can be quite frustrating because you feel you are falling behind on culture and science if you are used to King. You must keep in mind that alot of the early things you do has a snowball effect so you need to be patient and accept you will not lead all victory conditions from turn 1.
You should also learn to use policy cards alot more than you probably was used to on King difficulty. Having the right cards in place for things you are producing is quite important as it will save you loads of hammer costs. So practice timing the cards you need.
Also, you should only go for techs/civics that you actually need. Some production costs scale with the numbers of techs/civics you've researched so it's quite important.
Early Eurekas is also quite important so practice in getting them.


Either that or just start early war and take the neighbours cities, which is the boring solution in my opinion.
 
The biggest tip is do not finish districts apart from 1-2 for eureka/inspirations until you get 5 charge builders at Feudalism, get settlers out/conquer instead.
Finishing districts slows down your expansion phase.
 
Using standard settings, no mods, Gathering storm.

Can win comfortably on King under most circumstances (9 out of 10).

So tried Emperor. Yee-ikes. The difference in difficulty is absolutely enormous. The AI has unbelievable numbers of units and hems me right in with settlers left and right.

Any tips? Any good Youtube videos that specifically cover the process of going from King to Emperor? :)
I find the most effective strategy is also the simplest: Build an army immediately. No Scout, no Builder, no Settler, no District, not even a Monument or a Granary - 4-5 Warriors and 2 Slingers. Attack your nearest Civ neighbor (not a CS) at the earliest opportunity, and completely wipe them out and take over their cities. They will have built at least 1 city, since they start with a 2nd Settler, but you want to stomp them before they build more than a couple, and before they build any walls. After that, you'll have 3 cities and lots of room to expand, and you can do whatever you want. The only complication to this approach is that you probably won't be able to get a religion, so a religious victory will be off the table, but you'll have plenty of time to win any other VC. A lot of people dislike this strategy, I think because they find it boring, but in your first couple of games at a new level of difficulty, such a straightforward approach is a good way to give yourself time and space to figure things out, and it works 8 or 9 games out of 10.

p.s. You can often capture a Builder or a Settler in the war too, so you might get the unit you passed up by building a Warrior. If you produce a Warrior and capture a Builder, you have a Warrior and a Builder. If you produce a Builder, you just have a Builder, because you can't capture a Warrior. The AI will probably have built up their cities a little, too, so you might get a Luxury or a District. Once in a while, you'll even get an early Wonder.
 
Warrior-warrior-warrior-settler-warrior-buy builder-settler-slinger-settler. That usually does it. No districts and no religion.
 
Consistency triumphs opportunity :)

If you survive early game on emperor you wont fail later.
 
Consistency triumphs opportunity

Builder first is 100% safe on Emperor and Immortal, assuming good unit management.The only time it doesn't work is when there aren't 3 improvable tiles in which case a scout is usually better.

Also you may spawn on a map with no close neighbors, or a neighbor that's not that far away but has early defense bonus (eg, America, France) in which case doing a swords or horse rush is much safer.

In any case, set build orders are too inflexible, and so I usually never recommend it. It heavily varies according to spawn. Eg. fast slinger is good on some starts but completely trash on others.
 
In defense of early warfare: I'm a roleplayer in addition to a wargamer (D&D 1st ed., ca. 1979, and no, I don't have it anymore). I'm also a student of history, political science, and whatnot, so I like to think about my growing Civ in terms of its evolving history, its ethnicities, languages, culture. Heck, even its food (no kidding - do we have wheat or rice? deer? sheep? seafood?). Also, if it's the violence aspect that turns you off, in the early game, those "wars" may be a lot of things besides warfare. Consider the time-scale, how fast units move, and so on. A single "battle" in Civ VI takes decades. The Battle of Kadesh, 13th-Century BC iirc, perhaps the greatest single engagement of the Ancient World, wouldn't even be a great part of a turn - I think it took a couple of days, maybe even just one, I'm not sure. These early wars may in reality be political power-struggles, or something along the lines of an annexation, as much as actual fighting. In fact, before Rise & Fall introduced the Loyalty mechanic, I tended to imagine that these generations-long "wars" were really a cultural, economic, and political tug-of-war, involving marriages, religious conversions, and "flower wars", in addition to genuine, blood & fire, military conquest. Additionally, if I have a religion, I usually imagine that plays a part in the shifting borders and allegiances too, because in the Ancient & Classical eras (and more recently, too, for that matter) religion and politics were often inseparable. This all changes a bit with the introduction of the Loyalty mechanic, but not a lot.

Early warfare in Civ VI is boring, but only from the wargamer's perspective, because there's usually not much challenge; from the roleplayer's and alternative-Earth historian's perspective, I find it essential. If you're a "sandbox"-type player, the fact that the AI can't fight its way out of a paper bag is a blessing, because it makes it easier to craft whatever history you want. In other words, not boring.
 
@OP: you can post some pics or a save with a start that you find challenging on Strategy & Tips sub-forum for more specific tips and/or shadow-play. That way you could compare how you go about the start with how differently other players may deal with it. Customised advice and experience is much more effective :)

Or you can also browse Game of the Month sub-forums and try some earlier or current games yourself, just reading through some write-ups and looking into posted saves can give you some good ideas. Difficulty varies each month, you can find what suits you best.
 
Never seen so watched 10 mins of an Eleanor game... he took divine spark over goddess of the harvest. I just wanted to shout and shake my screen a lot
Same here... I see people completely passing up that pantheon in the online LPs and I just shake my head in disbelief...
 
Early warfare in Civ VI is boring, but only from the wargamer's perspective, because there's usually not much challenge; from the roleplayer's and alternative-Earth historian's perspective, I find it essential. If you're a "sandbox"-type player, the fact that the AI can't fight its way out of a paper bag is a blessing, because it makes it easier to craft whatever history you want. In other words, not boring.

I am a "sandbox" player. I don't consider myself a warmonger, but could settle for a definition of "mixed" player, part builder part warmonger. The fact that the AI cannot fight its way out of a paper bag makes the whole experience boring for me, even if it has some sparks of "fun" while building up my civ; as soon as I remember that the AI just cannot win, no matter what I do or do not, especially when it resorts to aggression, immediately puts me in sleeping mode.

And no, I don't think "winning as fast as possible" is the "challenge solution". I wonder what the definition of "optimal play" is for those who propose this solution... I have yet to see a speedrun made from a non-setup-cooked start, without rerolls, any map and any civ, standard everything.

Cooked setups =/= "optimal play".

To the OP: nothing changed. The difference is in your mind. That extra AI settler counts for nothing in the long run. Convince yourself that you are still on King, play on and you will win.
 
Gets boring if you take harvest every time
RNG dictates you will not though. And you are playing Eleanor and really want lots of cities out there but sure, take another, why not!.... but seriously, it was not about harvest... he could not even remember they were called pantheons.
And the early hill chopping he did... it was too much for me.
I have not seen Broyer either, hopefully they are better than 3 of the 4. The game mechanic is ok. Where is Marb? He is pretty good. Shame @civtrader6 has given up the ghost.
 
Never seen so watched 10 mins of an Eleanor game... he took divine spark over goddess of the harvest. I just wanted to shout and shake my screen a lot
This is why I, personally, find it hard to understand the appeal of any streams of Civ.

I mean all my moves are perfect so watching anyone else would be absolutely maddening!
 
Cooked setups =/= "optimal play".

Cooked setups will allow optimal play to win faster. Optimal play under less ideal circumstances will have less of an advantage, but will still outperform suboptimal play so long as the distinction has any meaning.
 
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