From King to Emperor - ouch

[Lord Lakely]

Emperor is perfectly winnable, but Zulu is not the easiest Civ to learn the game with if you're going to play passively. Try a civ with an easier learning curve, such as Arabia and Korea and keep on practicing. I won my first emperor gave as Australia and recently have won games as Sumeria and Georgia. It takes time to adjust to and personally, I prefer playing on King, so there's no shame in failing on Emperor. The game is supposed to be fun

Anyway,

The only differences are that the AI gets compared to King is a +20% prod bonus (meaning: earlier districts and more wonders) and an extra settler (and a lot of extra units but that's less of a problem.)

So, to catch up, you need to gain cities, either through ancient era conquest (if Sumeria, Nubia, America, Sparta, or Aztecs) or through settling them (anyone else). Conquest is great if you can get an early Campus or Holy Site out of it (which you normally can). Consider taking a city state if you start as the Ottomans for easy Jannisary recruitment later. If you decide to REX instead, get the Gov Plaza + Ancestral Hall and Magnus with Provision asap, assign the Colonization card to your goverment. Then, spam settlers everywhere and settle every location that loyalty pressure allows. The extra pop will generate enough science to allow you to catch up to and remain on par with the AI.

Always check the AI's military, culture and science numbers, especially on Civs with no bonuses to towards Science or Culture (Rome/Greece will always be ahead in culture and Korea/Sumeria will always be ahead in science.) You cannot fall too far behind. Build Campuses and Theatre Squares when behind, or units if you have an unfriendly but stronger neighbour. I also build a CommHub or Harbour in every city to ensure I get the extra trade route. Internal trade + Magnus + Early Gov Plaza gives you a reliable prod and food yield for your new cities. This is especially good if you're Persia, Cree or Inca because of their buffed internal routes.

Espionage is important to prevent the AI from winning culture or science victory. Sabotage spaceports and steal works, level your spies up by syphoning funds.

IF you're hopelessly behind, aim for diplomatic or religious victory (if Russia, Japan or Arabia). Those are still feasable, regardless of how crap your army, science or culture gets.

 

[ezzlar]

If you have 6 cities that wasnt much of an expansion, was it?

 

[Archon_Wing]

I don't have a hope in hell

The start is indeed really bad. City States are nowhere near you, production is nonexistent (I took the CAMP pantheon) However, you sorta lost the game @ turn 1 by settling that terrible capital location-- should have moved inland or on the tea for the extra early game science. Yes I know people spread memes like coastal cities are good or other similar nonsense, but as someone that wants to improve you should ignore that entirely. This doesn't mean you should never settle on the coast, but it's more of a last resort thing. In fact, in your game, I settled a dry city before some coastal ones! (that city in the west.

Also, why did you take a SS of India and not your own situation? That's 90% of the problem here. You're focusing excessively on how far behind you are. Unless they are going for victory, it doesn't matter.



I'm not sure what's sadder. The fact I built my first campus @ t155, or the fact the AI still isn't that far ahead of me in science somehow.... I had free inquiry meme but that expired already. This game is winnable but I'm pretty bored.

Oh yea, I had to open it in multiplayer because I don't have Viking DLC but I don't think that changes the save does it?

 

[MarigoldRan]

Why didn't you expand to 10-12 cities? You can easily have 12 cities by the end of classical if there's no one near you.

 

[kb27787]

looked at the save... the city is already settled?

Moving upstream 2 tiles would probably have given you an amazing early game with Temple of Artemis... Here you can still get that but ~half your tiles (and hence your early culture) are wasted on water!

Do you have a save with the capital not yet settled?

 

[kb27787]

If anyone is kind enough to try out this game and give me some tips I'd be grateful. https://1drv.ms/u/s!Anm6Wj49-MgOhaoPgDoMVRZx98VodQ

I was soooo far behind because I neglected to build districts. But I thought you are meant to postpone districts until you have claimed land and have a good army to defend it with (and repel the early game barbarian assaults). I am confused

well, coastal capital or not (lol check my renaming the cities), I've finished it (won't be winning any fast finish prizes for this one, I'm sure). I've played this completely peacefully without a single war (probably a bad idea since Persia was cranking out 250+ culture/turn at the end, and ~150-200 culture in Medieval to Renaissance--making cultural victory quite late until I had Hallyu card). I had I think only 10 cities--actually just 9 (and quite a few were settled late in the Renaissance when I saw some OK spots).

If you want a failproof strategy, make friends with everyone (gifting them a delegation and open borders should do on emperor), then completely ignore science and focus on theatres. Here you see my culture is much much higher than my science, but no need for science if you don't need hi-tech troops to be fighting anyone.

Try to get cultural alliance with your neighbor and you usually can squeeze in quite a few cities more after the initial core settling.

I recommend a few archers and a horseman for such isolated starts (barbs will spawn all over the place without any CS or civs to help you clear them).

Try to get one really tall city and put Pingala in it. Unlock all 7 governors and use theocratic legacy card for quite a lot of faith (more than holy sites give you sometimes). Your core districts early should only be theatre and commercial/harbor. Forget campi and holy site unless for era score.

 

[Horizons]

Haha oh dear, unfortunately I didn't keep a 4000 BC auto save. Will need to do this for future Emperor games.

Well, will need to try a new map and a new civ. Getting a pacifist cultural victory as Shaka that's impressive

 

[Horizons]

Loaded up a new random map and civ, and got an even worse map and worse Civ (Georgians).

Looks to me like the ability to win at higher levels is totally dependent on getting a good roll of the dice when the map is generated. But that's no fun, surely?

 

[Archon_Wing]

Looks to me like the ability to win at higher levels is totally dependent on getting a good roll of the dice when the map is generated.

I mean, no; you have a poster above you that won the posted game pretty easily and I won the game too; just was pretty bored. At no point were we at anything resembling losing.

Like I pointed out above, I did not build a campus until t150 and the AI still couldn't beat me in science by much. And besides, there's really nothing wrong with rerolling if you don't find the map fun.

Play the game 10-15 turns at atm and ask for advice. If you're playing the game 100 turns at a time, then you're sort of glossing over them.

 

[Horizons]

Okay, I have absolutely no idea how you did it.

Thought I was doing well using a military approach until I encountered strength 79 cities in 1300 AD.

Just insane. I literally have no idea how you won a cultural victory.

 

[Archon_Wing]

You don't seem to be building many districts and a lot of lumber mills; need to focus on things that will help you win the game.

Start a new game and try to play the game 20 turns at a time and then post here. Tell us why you chose a district, if you put any. If not, what else did you build?

 

[kb27787]

Ironically, I find culture victory somewhat faster on deity with a certain strat (Kongo martyr relics)... on emperor my strat would give me a much slower win.

But anyway, your problem? t191 and still only 45 cpt... you need more monuments and theatres!

And I had no idea that a certain breed of dog was actually named after a desert!

 

[Horizons]

I'm making some progress, it's an uphill struggle but I like an achievable challenge!!!!

 

[Horizons]

You don't seem to be building many districts and a lot of lumber mills; need to focus on things that will help you win the game.

Start a new game and try to play the game 20 turns at a time and then post here. Tell us why you chose a district, if you put any. If not, what else did you build?

That's what I plan to do... I just felt that this map was winnable and I wanted to beat it using a military approach with Zulu.

 

[Horizons]

I very nearly managed to win Domination, but the Indians got a diplo victory.

If I had been watching what was going on more closely I could have won. I had nukes, jet bombers and modern armour at the border with India ready to go but I was concentrating on war in the East

I guess it's more of a challenge for me than others more experienced who find it boring and can sleepwalk through Emperor. But that's what I find fun, having a good challenge but one that is ultimately possible to overcome ...

I guess you should chop all your woods instead of constructing lumbermills at Emperor and above?

 

[knighterrant81]

I very nearly managed to win Domination, but the Indians got a diplo victory.

If I had been watching what was going on more closely I could have won. I had nukes, jet bombers and modern armour at the border with India ready to go but I was concentrating on war in the East

I guess it's more of a challenge for me than others more experienced who find it boring and can sleepwalk through Emperor. But that's what I find fun, having a good challenge but one that is ultimately possible to overcome ...

I guess you should chop all your woods instead of constructing lumbermills at Emperor and above?

It just takes practice. I had to step up my game going from King to Emperor as well. It is probably the largest jump in difficulty (due to the extra Settler the AI gets). The early game is the most important, so focus your practice on the first 100 turns, and you'll be able to win on Emperor pretty handily.

Chopping got worse, and lumber mills got better in the last patch. I don't think it is always correct to chop. If you have few hills, lumber mills can serve as an alternate production source. Mines are less important now that they only provide minor adjacencies for IZs. However, it is still helpful to chop out Districts, Settlers, or a particular Wonder that you might need.

 

[Victoria]

I don't think it is always correct to chop.

It depends on how long your game is, the longer, the less value. The advice that seems to help the most is for the first 80 turns do not spend your time building districts apart from for eurekas/inspirarations. Place your districts but do not finish them (if you are OK with that) instead think, is what I am building helping me grow my empire.... settler, army, granary, builder seem like good ideas.

 

[Horizons]

Last night I was a bit pumped for a game of civ (haven't had that feeling for months, maybe even a couple of years) so I loaded up Scotland on Emperor difficulty with the intention of getting a culture victory. Managed to win it in one (long) session!

Previously, some of my decisions emphasized long-term returns over the crucial early game boost. (Bigger distance between cities, not chopping or harvesting.) You can get away with that on King or lower.

 

[Victoria]

You can get away with that on King or lower.

You can get away with it on deity as well. Once you realise
1. The AI tends not to win before T300
2. You work out that the more you concentrate your efforts just on your victory (a lot of wonders are just distracting toys for example) the higher you can go.
3. 10 cities is typically the minimum of what you need apart from RV and very fast CV.

 

[Loderingo]

Congrats on your victory!

I agree with Victoria's points. A lot of people get fixated with the ancient era and give up or reroll if they have a bad start but you have 9 eras to play with. Your first goal should be to catch up with the AI on number of cities by the end of medieval and then get ahead by the end of Industrial.

One thing I would suggest is to think more about geography (defensible terrain, choke points, canal locations) and also diplomacy (who do you want to be your allies and who do you want to be your enemies).

I also think it is very easy to get caught up in lots of small decisions and "end turn" and lose sight of the big picture. I would advise having a long-term strategy on how you are going to win the game and the intermediate steps to get there, and then reviewing every 10 turns or so.

For example, I'm currently playing the Netherlands on a large seven seas map. My first goal was to explore and build harbours on as many seas as possible. My next goal was to prepare for the arrival of my UU down the line by building quadriremes and harbour infrastructure. I befriended Georgia and Zulu as they were mainly land-based civs. I identified Brazil as my target as he had lots of coastal or near coastal cities and was also leader in culture. I made sure I got some nitre and saved up my gold for upgrades. I then launched a golden age war and took out 5-6 cities while getting Zulu to attack from the other side. I'm going to pick up the rest of Brazil's cities through loyalty. I've now got Brazil's cultural infrastructure and am pivotting to CV.

It's very satisfying when a plan you have had for 2 eras pays off. The only fly in my ointment is that Brazil built an entertainment complex on my canal tile.