How do you usually win the game (conquest, culture, space, etc...)?

[War4War]

I have never won by anything else than the spaceship. I'd like to win by conquest but it just takes forever. In my current game I'm in 1950 and am the #1 civ by far (2000 vs 1300 for second civ in score, regent level). I'm a few techs away from the first spaceship parts and it's very tempting to just build them and end it. The other option is to start building a huge army to conquer/destroy all other civs which I know is going to take forever (std map size, 3 civs to conquer (others are already dead)). And since I already know that I am going to win the game, all that war effort is just going to be tedious... Might as well go for the quick spaceship.

I would just like to know how you people manage your games. If you usually win by conquest I'd be interested to know how soon you start your conquests. I think in my next game I'll disable the spaceship. This way, no temptations...

 

[Moulton]

I made that space ship decision awhile back. I even parked battleships and carriers off the coast of France to soften up the turf prior to the invasion fleet. But it would take my invasion force about 12 turns just to get there, and then whatever it took to complete the invasion. I saved the game, and might go back some day and do it just to see how it goes.
I have 2 space ship wins, 3 culture and 1 UN at this stage. And not a few losses

 

[Arrian]

All of my victories, excepting the latest one, have been via the Spaceship. Domination takes forever, and conquest would be even worse unless it's done early on a pangea world. I attempted 1 UN vote, and lost, so now I just build it to prevent a defeat. My latest game - domination win - worked out perfectly from start to finish (Monarch, Standard/Continents/Normal/ Normal/4billion/Babylonians) and the endgame conquest required for domination went quickly.

My general problems with domination:

1) There is usually a lot to conquer, even if you are ridiculously strong. It's not hard, just tedious.
2) If you're strong enough to conquer 66% of the world, you're strong enough to build the spaceship, which is easier and less tedious.

-Arrian

p.s. The UN defeat I suffered just annoyed me: Germany and England were at war. Me vs. Elizabeth in the vote, Bismarck votes for.... you guessed it! Elizabeth! That was the last time I held a vote.

 

[War4War]

I hear you people! I've had the same experience so far. In my current game I'm trying for a domination victory but I started a little late, 1988... However my initial progress was really impressive. I conquerred 6 cities in my first turn with minimal losses. The only thing that stopped me was terrain. My tanks were not in range of the next city so I had to wait. I'm in 2005 now and the once mighty Iroquois empire has one city left. I still have to kill the Japs and the Germans. The Japs will be tough since they have the mech inf. I just fear that I won't have enough time to finish it. What is the last year of the game? Is it 2050?

 

[Psychlone]

2050 ends it, yeah. But you can still play on after that for no score if you just want the thrill of conquering it all.

I disabled UN and spaceship victories. All of my wins have been either cultural victory, or ranking victory. I have yet to see a complete conquest.

 

[Dragon2]

Dominance victory is possible at Monarch, and somewhere on this forum I posted the map on which it happened. I'll try to find the thread and bump it.

I always play with a standard map, large continents, and start with a despotic rush. For some reason I usually get placed on the small continent. That leads to an easy spaceship victory -- take over the continent, and the AI doesn't know how to invade you.

But one time I ended up on the large continent. By the mid 1800s I had taken it over and had Mech infantry. So I kept building military units and fortifying them in one coastal city. This eliminates the micromanagement; all you need to do each turn is railroad new units to that city.

Once I had a dozen transports, battleships to escort them, and about 200 units including plenty of artillery and mech infantry, I landed 96 units in one turn on the other continent and sent my fleet back for 96 more reinforcements. Next turn I built a city, then used up a worker and rushed a barracks. From that city I conducted a scorched-earth invasion, destroying all improvements as I expanded my territory. I was surprised how quickly the game was over.

This was before the patch. With crippled Communism and city flips it will be somewhat harder.

The secret is to build all the units you will need to win the game while you are at peace. This takes no longer than building a spaceship. Then you ship them overseas in two or three convoys -- that's all the naval activity. Then pillage and bombard until the opponent can no longer build many defensive units. If you pillage with Maech Infantry, even conscripts, the enemy has to attack you, and you usually win the battle. Never attack a city until all defenders are down to one hit point. This takes lots of artillery, but it's worth it.

In my one and only Emperor-level game I decided that I couldn't win an intercontinental war and settled for a spaceship. I went back to Monarch because the gameplay is more varied and still a reasonable challenge.

I've never tried playing on a single continent. I assume that if you get a tech lead it should be fairly easy to conquer everything.

Could someone post a map on which they have won by dominance on Emperor level?

 

[Ironstone]

I reckon that Conquest would be a real toughie on most map/civ number configurations. I did manage one - just to get the set - but it was a cheesey affair with only a couple of civs against me.

Ditto with Domination - I came close on one 8 civ game but the sheer number of cities to manage became too much to contemplate so I started razing as I went with the third and fourth civs that I wiped. So my one domination victory was a cheesey small map low civ affair too.

Space ships are my favourite (love that reward video!) with 2 of them. But the one I've done the most of is 100,000 point culture which seem achievable on a range of maps. Probably harder on huge maps with few civs as they'll all have heaps of room to expand and muck up your need to get double everyone else's culture points.

The one that does seem a bit easier than the others is Diplomatic. Thanks to reading the answer here somewhere to someone else's question about them I was able to follow the tactics that worked for the other posters and score a pretty simple one by building the UN and quickly greasing up to the other civs just before the vote.

The tip I read (and it certainly worked for me) was to establish Mutual Protection Pacts with as many civs as you can just before the vote (not too early or you'll get dragged into a war). Hang the cost if they get demanding - you're about to win in a turn or two! Might be a bit of a disaster if it didn't come off though!!

 

[Naozhuo]

You know, I'm sure nobody means any harm, but I am getting pretty tired of seeing "Japs" on these forums.

 

[Toasty]

Yea, we don't mean to be offensive (I presume you're Japanese/of Japanese heritage?), it's just that us being Americans are too lazy to take the time to spell out 'Japanese' . Then again, we don't go around calling the Chinese 'Chinks'...but that isn't an obvious shortenting .

 

[War4War]

Sorry 'bout that Naozhuo. As you said, no offense intended. It's just a shortcut And even when some posts may contain some hostile attitudes towards the Japanese, I'm sure it's clear to you that it's only towards the AI controlling that civ in the game and not towards Japanese people. The Japanese civ will be the "bad guys" in one game just as Americans or Germans or any other civ will be in another. It's just a game

Now regarding the main topic. I agree with you Ironstone regarding the city managment. It gets out of hand when you start conquerring everything. And I also found that the commercial shortcomings of communism really get in the way once you start having zillions of cities. I find it hard to get a positive cash flow without trading with other civs. And once you declare a world war, goodbye luxuries and other trades.

To continue the story of my previous post on this thread, I finally won that game by domination. I finished off the Japanese in 3 turns. A few years later, i.e. once my newly erected temples in the ex-Japanese cities kicked in and the city territories expanded, I won the game. And as you pointed out Dragon2, I built up my army during peace time (a massive one...) and airlifted it to the Japanese continent. The rest went very well. I had some losses but I was numerically superior so no problem. Also I didn't bother bombarding. I'd rather build an extra modern armour than a bomber. A bomber will reduce an enemy hit point once out of maybe 5 tries. A tank has much better odds and it won't be shot down by fighters... I use bombers mostly for road bombardment. But that's useless if you're about to conquer that territory anyway. And artillery moves way too slow for blitzkrieg-type advances.

I was surprised at how easy and fast that domination victory was. I started my wars in 1988. Less than 50 years. So it is doable. That was done on a std map with 4 main islands. Regent level. I'm appending the last saved game if anyone wants to take a look.

 

[Naozhuo]

No, I'm not Japanese. Like I said, because it's used alongside nonexistent words like "Babs" it's obviously a shortening and not being used as a slur, but since it DOES happen to be an ethnic slur it seems pretty insensitive to use it. But thanks for not going apesh*t when I pointed that out.

 

[Naozhuo]

And, oh yeah, I know that "bad guys" just means the computer AI. As an American, I never expected to hear myself call Abe Lincoln a... well, there's no need for that.

 

[LeroyJr]

My victories have came either by culture or diplomacy.

I am a megaropolis guy and love to have a handfull of just maxed out cities with everything in them and produce 100+ shields and/or 100+ science a year. In my last game I had two cities at 40+ in size and three more at 35+. Not worth a damn for shields but sure crank in the cash.

So while I am building these cities I generally fall behind in the number of military units on hand and always rank near the bottom in the demographics on military service. Of course the AI sees that and tends to declare war on me. That is one of the glitches in the game though. Sure I do not have the pure number of weapons but I have better ones than the AI and if I turn my megacities to War Mobilization the AI is going to get a butt whooping like never before. Late in the game I am cranking out Tanks and Mech Infantry in a year or two from 20+ megacities. I just overrun the opponents.

The funny thing with my diplomatic wins is I never greased the AI once before the vote. Did not actually know how it worked at all and won the first time 10-3 (I always play on a huge map with all the civs). It was a good thing I performed genocide on the three missing civs so they did not get to vote. I always make a point of offering a gift to other civs when I talk to them. Good will and all that jaz. When someone declares war on me my "polite" friends do not need much convincing to come to my aid and buddy that declared war is now getting it from all sides. Sometimes when I have lots of cash I come off as the good guy by donating cash to someone in a war. I also donate to the other side and I do not think the AI realizes that I am playing both sides.

I have no idea how people win these domination games as quick as they say. "Oh ya, I wiped out everyone by 500 BC" and so forth. Early wars for me seem like a lesson in futility as my Horsemen and Swordsmen get massacred by a wandering Warrior and so on. I ran my original worker into the Russians one game about 10 squares from my Capital. I asked for a trade and 10 turns into the game they knew every other civ and I swear that my Military Advisor said the best unit they have is "Mechanized Infantry". Not really, but they overran me with no problem about 20 turns later with about 15 horseman coming over the hills. So 35 turns into the game I get overran by 15 horsemen and wonder how exactly they could have cranked those out plus have built the settlers to found their new cities.

Just seems like everytime I find an early Civ my goal is survival let alone go at them.

 

[LeroyJr]

As for the "Japs" thing I think this game is bad for getting that out of people. Maybe it is because it is ussually in a war setting and ussually in war settings being politically correct is not as important. I always find myself cussing at the AI Civ and sometimes find myself not using the politically correct name for that civ.

 

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by LeroyJr
I have no idea how people win these domination games as quick as they say. "Oh ya, I wiped out everyone by 500 BC" and so forth. Early wars for me seem like a lesson in futility as my Horsemen and Swordsmen get massacred by a wandering Warrior and so on.

It is very possible to win in the early days. As a matter of fact, it doesn't take much to win the game, if you conquer early. If you wipe out a neighboring civ, you will be twice your original size.

I usually use sword, and lots of them. But don't pussyfoot around with war. Build at least 10-20 swordsmen, you'll do just fine.

 

[EdwardIV]

The spaceship win seems like the easiest by far, I just don't understand how you can have enough turns. I am the newest of the newbies, and my current game with england is in 1988 and i am at the begining of the industrial age. I never seem to have a problem with war, I just can't come up with enough cities to research all the way to the modern age before the game ends. The UN also seems doable especially with the mpp tip

 

[Magnus]

I generally win Diplomatically, as that is my favorite aspect of the game. I have also won Culturally, but that is kinda boring.

 

[Hobbes]

So far, domination, conquest, culture and diplomatic. The type of victory depends on the civ I'm playing and how the game started.

 

[eyrei]

I almost always win diplomatically, with the occasional cultural or spacerace victory. I usually am the most powerful civ by the beginning of the modern age, and since the AI is no match for me strategically, conquest or domination cease to be exciting after the first couple battles. I just build the UN, sign mpps with everyone but the other nominee, and then declare war, wait for them to attack one of my units, laugh as everyone declares war on them, and then call a vote. I sometimes wish I could up the level once I get to this point to make it more interesting.

 

[zebomba]

How do you call a voting?
Usually I build the UN just to prevent voting so I can stomp them properly.