Isolated on Higher Difficulties

[Argoth]

I'm curious what people do when they find that they're on their own contient with not other civs when playing on a higher difficulty (let's say monarch or above). I've seen that tech trading is crucial at higher difficulties, so what do you do if there's no one to trade with?

Just curious.

 

[DaviddesJ]

Focus on making contact. Bypass other techs that you can trade for later. If there are multiple AI groups, you can profit by contacting all of them before they contact each other. And, of course, you don't need to build as much military.

 

[Cam_H]

Once I have worked out the isolated predicament, I tend to go into 'Cultural Victory' mode, madly chasing religion and prioritising buildings with cultural output. City specialisation becomes particularly important.

I should point out that I haven't run into this predicament often (patches?) - the last time was on Monarch.

 

[yavoon]

Once I have worked out the isolated predicament, I tend to go into 'Cultural Victory' mode, madly chasing religion and prioritising buildings with cultural output. City specialisation becomes particularly important.

I should point out that I haven't run into this predicament on any of the games with a level higher than Monarch.

and how do u get religions on say emperor if ur isolated? It'd be a huge task IMO to found 3 religions and certainly not more.

I just lost a game where I was genghis and on a continent w/ louis/tokugawa, I unfortunately had to kill louis first, and the continent was small. and being w/ only tokugawa is like isolation, only u also have to fight a lot of wars....I was mad backwards technologically when the other continent which had, saladin, mansa, washington, gandhi, alexander I believe on it. it was brutal.

if I were isolated I'd cottage spam like all fricking heck. ur best options will be cultural if u manage to get the religions quick enough, space if u get the internet before they do, and diplomatic....

 

[Eqqman]

and how do u get religions on say emperor if ur isolated? It'd be a huge task IMO to found 3 religions and certainly not more.

The easy answer is to capture a city with a new religion from one of your enemies. So you're forced to get a fast Astronomy and your progress is stalled until then. Maximize the benefit from the war by trying to capture a city that has more than one religion that you don't. Switch to organized religion to get out the Missionaries you need to send home. If you're a peacenik at heart then gift back the city once you've transferred the religion(s) back to your home continent.

The hard answer is less sure, but it also relies on Astronomy to get contact with other civs. Activate open borders with everybody you meet, each turn there will be a chance that a religion will spread to one of your cities. However, the chance of religions spreading is based on the amount of religions currently in a city. So a mistake you would probably make is to spread the one or two religions you do have to all of your cities. For this trick to work you want to have as many cities with no religion at all in them. If you're really desperate try to produce Great Prophets to gift them to the AIs with holy cities to encourage them to build the Shrines. Since you're across the water they are very unlikely to be sending you Missionaries, so a Shrine + Open Borders + No Religion is the best odds you can get of a religion spreading on its own.

 

[yavoon]

The easy answer is to capture a city with a new religion from one of your enemies. So you're forced to get a fast Astronomy and your progress is stalled until then. Maximize the benefit from the war by trying to capture a city that has more than one religion that you don't. Switch to organized religion to get out the Missionaries you need to send home. If you're a peacenik at heart then gift back the city once you've transferred the religion(s) back to your home continent.

The hard answer is less sure, but it also relies on Astronomy to get contact with other civs. Activate open borders with everybody you meet, each turn there will be a chance that a religion will spread to one of your cities. However, the chance of religions spreading is based on the amount of religions currently in a city. So a mistake you would probably make is to spread the one or two religions you do have to all of your cities. For this trick to work you want to have as many cities with no religion at all in them. If you're really desperate try to produce Great Prophets to gift them to the AIs with holy cities to encourage them to build the Shrines. Since you're across the water they are very unlikely to be sending you Missionaries, so a Shrine + Open Borders + No Religion is the best odds you can get of a religion spreading on its own.

while certainly u can look into that idea w/ astronomy, it takes a lot of techs, which u have to largely get urself. and then u have to have an army, send them over the ocean and attack before they go obsolete(unless ur playing marathon).

the other idea sounds like what u do in diplo victory(pray). at any rate if u cottage spam to all hell then if u r lucky enough to get a bunch of religions right at astronomy there is some chance u can use that to win culturally. and if u dont u can get the internet and that can win games too.

 

[Jet]

My only real strategy is to try to take advantage of the fact that I don't need an army. The time it worked best was recently on warlords/Monarch as Huayana on a 10-city continent. Busted all fog with Quechas, cottaged with Fin, and scored a good number of wonders (including the Colossus) with Ind. Actually the Great Wall was helpful; usually in that situation I find it hard to produce enough units to bust all the fog. But after I got 3 cities up I was able to do it when Quechas were still useful for it.

 

[Cam_H]

and how do u get religions on say emperor if ur isolated? It'd be a huge task IMO to found 3 religions

ch ongf vifj lkp 4x kgj ndlj kk pfjvnl Monarch not Emperor dfvlnk nrkjn jcvnlk.

cgjknl gxlkbg dfhhl founding three religions is quite possible on Monarch pkdvn ubjo jflkn.

 

[yavoon]

ch ongf vifj lkp 4x kgj ndlj kk pfjvnl Monarch not Emperor dfvlnk nrkjn jcvnlk.

cgjknl gxlkbg dfhhl founding three religions is quite possible on Monarch pkdvn ubjo jflkn.

=D .

 

[Cam_H]

I really shouldn't even post in threads that uses the term "higher difficulties" until I get more than *one* Emperor win under my belt!

 

[pigswill]

Currently involved in a emperor level SG (with raging barbarians!) with an isolated start so any advice is useful.
Doesn't help that Cam H has one more emperor victory than I have!

 

[apopholeus813]

playing on higher levels you're gauranteed no tech trading opportunites, even with 'allies' unless you're willing to pay through the nose.