Civahaulic
Chieftain
How to win at Deity.
With civ 5 just days away, I wanted to quench my desire to best Civ 4 on the hardest setting - Deity.
In order to say you really beat it, IMO, the setting have to be:
Fractal
Standard map size
Normal Speed
Barbs on
Randomly selected opponents.
Random events were off, mainly because of the "You just lost your capital to a Barb uprising" event. Lucky huts were off, but I don't think that makes much of a difference.
I picked Ramsey as my leader because I knew from before I started that I wanted to squeak out an AP diplomatic victory. He has the 2 traits you want to win via AP Cheese: Spiritual (for frequent civ changes, cheap temples and monasteries) and Industrious (to build the AP). He also has the UB that lets you get Theology first: the obelisk. He also has great starting techs: Agriculture and The Wheel.
The first thing you need to do on deity is make sure the barbs don't kill you. That means building enough ARCHERS, AXEMEN, or WAR Chariots to fog bust and keep your city safe: Normally, this is about 6. Warriors are very weak at actually defending, but that first or 2nd one can explore and sometimes make it back to be your "we fear for our safety" sentry within your capital. Unless you have horses or copper in the BFC, (probably going to be researching AH before BW, but your map will dictate this), you will want archery and archers to fog bust. You will probably not have time to research both BW and AH before archery, before the barbs are causing havoc, so tech order is likely to be one or the other, and then archery if no special resource pops.
You will need at least one coastal city to win (to spread the AP religion).
After basic improvement techs and BW, you're going to need to research:
Myst
Writing,
Masonry
Monotheism,
Polytheism
Priesthood
You need all of them to be able to bulb Theology.
You also want to block your neighbor so you have enough room for a few cities. You can win with just one, (if it's coastal), but it will be much easier with around 4-7. If that neighbor happens to be shaka or monty, well, this guide isn't gonna be enough to help you.
Ideally, your neighbor will be one who loves brothers of the faith and who probably won't declare at pleased.
Gift your neighbor(s) a non happiness resource as soon as you have writing. Open boarders ASAP.
You want to get your 2nd or 3rd city with a big food up and running with an Obelisk and running 2 specialist priests. You will use this priest to get theology, found Christianity, and build the AP.
The only turns in the game you will be in Christianity are the 5 turns from the turn before the Apostolic Palace is finished until the next possible switch (back to your neighbor's religion).
Next you will want to tech toward currency. If you can trade stuff cleverly, that's great, but In the game I won, I had CHARLEMAGNE as my only neighbor on the island and the only tech I was able to trade for the ENTIRE GAME was monarchy.
It didn't matter.
Spread Christianity in all your cites. Build Christian Temples and Monasteries.
If you have 2 neighbors, figure out which one of them you can get to +9 or +10 friendly. Spread Christianity to all of their cities. If you can do it for 2, that will make it easier. If you only have 1 neighbor (like I had) then that's all you can do.
After currency, beeline for optics. And I mean beeline with build wealth and being at 100% science.
Then STOP TECHING AND BUILD WEALTH. You don't need any other techs to win the game, unless it's for a Fav Civic (see below)
Go meet the other civs. The turn you meet them, ask for open boarders. Do not trade with any of these civs until you have met with all civs.
You can usually get open boarders gifting a tech, going to no state religion, or (if they already have all your techs), give them gold. Don't give them techs on the Astronomy line, because the sooner they have Astronomy, the sooner you get DOWed and lose the game.
In my game, one of other civs was TOKUGAWA. That meant I had to tech up to BANKING, go to his fav civ (merch), no state religion, and Give him 800 gold before he would open borders with me.
When you are making changes out of your state religion (the one of your neighbors), ask them for gold the turn before you do it, 50 gold is fine. That will give you 10 turns of peace if they accept.
Prove the world is round.
If you meet a civ or 2 with no state religion, you will spread Christianity to the LAST and to their SMALLEST city. Don't get crazy, you don't need to find the absolute smallest, but don't do a 16 pop either. You only want to spread it to one city for all overseas civs, and to one of their smaller cites at that. IF they are in theology, you can gift them the missionary (which sometimes works) or BRIBE them into Organized religion with your stash of cash.
Use your Gold supply to bribe your close neighbors for an additional +4 trade relations boost.
One last tip, take advantage of daisy chaining missionaries on Caravels. You Can move a Carvel 4 spaces (if you proved the world is round) and have another Carvel their waiting for it, unload the missionary to the unmoved Carvel, Rinse and repeat. By doing this, you can move a missionary half way around the world 2 turns!
I didn't even try for liberalism, good thing too, as it went in 420 AD and I had no trading partner.
I won the diplomatic victory in 1280 AD. Can you do the same or better? I bet you can!
Questions? Comments?
With civ 5 just days away, I wanted to quench my desire to best Civ 4 on the hardest setting - Deity.
In order to say you really beat it, IMO, the setting have to be:
Fractal
Standard map size
Normal Speed
Barbs on
Randomly selected opponents.
Random events were off, mainly because of the "You just lost your capital to a Barb uprising" event. Lucky huts were off, but I don't think that makes much of a difference.
I picked Ramsey as my leader because I knew from before I started that I wanted to squeak out an AP diplomatic victory. He has the 2 traits you want to win via AP Cheese: Spiritual (for frequent civ changes, cheap temples and monasteries) and Industrious (to build the AP). He also has the UB that lets you get Theology first: the obelisk. He also has great starting techs: Agriculture and The Wheel.
The first thing you need to do on deity is make sure the barbs don't kill you. That means building enough ARCHERS, AXEMEN, or WAR Chariots to fog bust and keep your city safe: Normally, this is about 6. Warriors are very weak at actually defending, but that first or 2nd one can explore and sometimes make it back to be your "we fear for our safety" sentry within your capital. Unless you have horses or copper in the BFC, (probably going to be researching AH before BW, but your map will dictate this), you will want archery and archers to fog bust. You will probably not have time to research both BW and AH before archery, before the barbs are causing havoc, so tech order is likely to be one or the other, and then archery if no special resource pops.
You will need at least one coastal city to win (to spread the AP religion).
After basic improvement techs and BW, you're going to need to research:
Myst
Writing,
Masonry
Monotheism,
Polytheism
Priesthood
You need all of them to be able to bulb Theology.
You also want to block your neighbor so you have enough room for a few cities. You can win with just one, (if it's coastal), but it will be much easier with around 4-7. If that neighbor happens to be shaka or monty, well, this guide isn't gonna be enough to help you.
Ideally, your neighbor will be one who loves brothers of the faith and who probably won't declare at pleased.
Spoiler :
Gift your neighbor(s) a non happiness resource as soon as you have writing. Open boarders ASAP.
You want to get your 2nd or 3rd city with a big food up and running with an Obelisk and running 2 specialist priests. You will use this priest to get theology, found Christianity, and build the AP.
The only turns in the game you will be in Christianity are the 5 turns from the turn before the Apostolic Palace is finished until the next possible switch (back to your neighbor's religion).
Next you will want to tech toward currency. If you can trade stuff cleverly, that's great, but In the game I won, I had CHARLEMAGNE as my only neighbor on the island and the only tech I was able to trade for the ENTIRE GAME was monarchy.
It didn't matter.
Spread Christianity in all your cites. Build Christian Temples and Monasteries.
If you have 2 neighbors, figure out which one of them you can get to +9 or +10 friendly. Spread Christianity to all of their cities. If you can do it for 2, that will make it easier. If you only have 1 neighbor (like I had) then that's all you can do.
After currency, beeline for optics. And I mean beeline with build wealth and being at 100% science.
Then STOP TECHING AND BUILD WEALTH. You don't need any other techs to win the game, unless it's for a Fav Civic (see below)
Go meet the other civs. The turn you meet them, ask for open boarders. Do not trade with any of these civs until you have met with all civs.
You can usually get open boarders gifting a tech, going to no state religion, or (if they already have all your techs), give them gold. Don't give them techs on the Astronomy line, because the sooner they have Astronomy, the sooner you get DOWed and lose the game.
In my game, one of other civs was TOKUGAWA. That meant I had to tech up to BANKING, go to his fav civ (merch), no state religion, and Give him 800 gold before he would open borders with me.
When you are making changes out of your state religion (the one of your neighbors), ask them for gold the turn before you do it, 50 gold is fine. That will give you 10 turns of peace if they accept.
Prove the world is round.
If you meet a civ or 2 with no state religion, you will spread Christianity to the LAST and to their SMALLEST city. Don't get crazy, you don't need to find the absolute smallest, but don't do a 16 pop either. You only want to spread it to one city for all overseas civs, and to one of their smaller cites at that. IF they are in theology, you can gift them the missionary (which sometimes works) or BRIBE them into Organized religion with your stash of cash.
Use your Gold supply to bribe your close neighbors for an additional +4 trade relations boost.
One last tip, take advantage of daisy chaining missionaries on Caravels. You Can move a Carvel 4 spaces (if you proved the world is round) and have another Carvel their waiting for it, unload the missionary to the unmoved Carvel, Rinse and repeat. By doing this, you can move a missionary half way around the world 2 turns!
I didn't even try for liberalism, good thing too, as it went in 420 AD and I had no trading partner.
I won the diplomatic victory in 1280 AD. Can you do the same or better? I bet you can!
Questions? Comments?
