Good Leaders For Winning Conquest

[IagoAlberto]

Greetings,

I'm a monarch player, I'm pretty confidant on that level I've won every type of victory except conquest. I came close with Rome recently, I guess I should have razed more cities . . . I want to play a leader I haven't tried before and go for conquest, so who would you pick from the list below, either from an optimal play stand point or a pure fun standpoint.

The Contenduhs:

Americans: Washington
Aztecs: Montezuma
Holy Roman Empire: Charlemagne
Japanese: Tokugawa
Mongols: Kublai Khan
Ottomans: Suleiman
Russians: Catherine
Zulus: Shaka
Indians: Gandhi . . . Why the heck not . . .

Please pick from the list as I've played most of the other leaders in the game, I know cyrus rocks for war mongering, since I've won domination and near domination (diplomatic) victories with him.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

If you're playing with vassals on, conquest is actually pretty easy. Just wipe out the first civ or two you conquer (keeping their land for your cities, or just keeping their cities). Then, once you're big enough, just get everyone else to capitulate and gift them their cities back. This is beneficial in more ways than just conquest. Capitulations are faster than wiping someone out, and you have a buffer/attack dog/less maintenance, not to mention happiness in your cities from having each vassal. Vassals of a decent size (but not so big they break off) can also actually help in wars/researching techs you don't want to bother with for you (then trading them...it's actually pretty easy to get capitulated people liking you usually).

If all civs are wiped out or capitulated then you win conquest. Any civ can do this pretty effectively, though IMO the warmonger ones are better for it (as you're keeping less cities than domination attempts, you want your military stronger).

If you want to win conquest by actually destroying everything but yourself, then I'd recommend a powerful UU to get you a pretty large empire early, use that to leverage the eventual resulting tech lead, then just start razing everything like crazy. I never can be bothered to raze every little city though. That's such a pain.

 

[DaveMcW]

Quechua rush...

 

[Olodune]

Mongols: Kublai Khan

My favorite pure warmonger in the game. Just watch your economy

 

[AnitaGaribaldi]

Map: Pangaea High sea Level

My first early conquest I got with Cyrus with insane promoted Immortals. I teched only until construction, because I wasn't fast enough and one AI got longbowman. I had about four scientist researching and I had to keep warring just to keep afloat (running deficit at 0% research).

 

[huerfanista]

Liz. Powerful early game SE gets an early tech lead, financial trait powers late game economy, redcoats dominate, powerful bulbing from philosophical trait gets unstoppable tech lead for modern era win.

 

[bestbrian]

I agree that Quecha rushes are great, but HC doesn't have any warror traits (agg or cha) that will help you all game (although Fin is an uber trait that you can't go wrong with). I'm keen on Shaka; he's got great traits for rexing/war and the UB is great for spamming units/controlling costs. You're going to have to pick your battles and do alot of work to keep the econ/techs up, but he's very good all game.

 

[Danny_Archer]

Americans: Washington

Always had a lot of success with him!

 

[Yeosol]

Shaka will be by far the most fun, Impi's are hilarious. However Japan would be the more challenging choice.

 

[BalbanesBeoulve]

From that list, i'd pick Washington or Montezuma.

 

[NintendoTogepi]

I find that Indians: Asoka is very very good at warmongering.

However, from your list, I think the answer is Mongols: Kublai. He's excellent at warmongering it.

 

[InvisibleStalke]

Shaka - superb UB to hold a big empire and Impis are a lot of fun. Also expansive gets off to a quick start. Follow TheMeInTeam's advice above for getting Conquest. The only thing that makes it tricky is avoiding taking too many cities and getting domination instead. Liberating cities back to your vassals usually solves that problem.

 

[boon]

Personally i always like playing with Hammurabi for it but i usually play unrestricted leaders so i can pick rome,inca etc, but KK should do really well. washington would be interesting but his UU's come really lategame so you could run into some problems with the early game warring. I dont play on monarch yet so my opinions probably not as useful as others but when going for conquest wouldnt Agg/org or agg/charismatic be some of the more useful traits as well as a good early/midgame warmongering UU I could see Tokugawa being good but im not sure how agg/pro works together but japan's UU's are very effective for warring pre 500AD at least in noble/prince difficulties.

 

[Gliese 581]

From the list, Shaka.

 

[vicawoo]

Where are the obvious ones:

Boudica, brennus, roman leaders.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Ah yes, if forced to pick ONE leader, I'd say shaka here too. He has a ridiculous, powerful early UU, and his UB is one of the best for extensive, expansive warmongering. Not only does it cut maintenance, but it's a BARRACKS and it's HALF PRICE! This is a substantial portion of why AI shaka is more successful than other warmongers, IMO. I don't play as him much because of some bad civ 3 memories , but he's really strong.

 

[Airefuego]

Kublai Khan, with Genghis a contender too (Imp for double great general production! NICE!)

 

[Gliese 581]

Gandhi is another favourite. Philosophical + Spiritual = killer combo for switching between war and peace: military civics, builder civics, production, research (in a SE). Very adaptable.

 

[Genv [FP]]

Like Gliese 581, I've found that Ironically Gandhi is good too

 

[pangu]

Geghis and Kublai in my opinion for the fastest and most powerful warmongering. I find that it is sometimes possible (with some luck such as having non-protective AIs and having a few gold mines in a couple of cities) for either of them to take out or severely cripple 3 AIs in Monarch before they have longbows. That is 3 out of 6 AIs! But yeah, watch the economy.