Late game war against stronger enemy

[Yakinator]

I am playing on Monarch difficultly level on a continents map as Bismark(Exp/Ind) of Germany. Zara has vassalized Shaka and is currently the leader in technology and military power. I am at war with Togukawa and Brennus due to a forced AP resolution. It is 1928 and I'm concerned that Zara will win a space victory soon unless I attack him.


How should I go about successfully conducting a war with Zara without getting militarily overwhelmed? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

My Empire

 

[Yakinator]

Here are some screenshots of the current situation

 

[DaveMcW]

#1 in land but #3 in GNP? That implies you are doing something wrong...

Build up all your cities to pop 20. You'll need to build some farms and buy some happy/health resources. Then your superior economy will let you win a war or just launch first.

 

[futurehermit]

You have the largest empire, but your population and science are...not so good. To me, this means you need to grow your cities larger sooner and focus more on cottages (and/or more specialists).

Best way to bring down a stronger enemy is nukes imo.

If that isn't an option, then get yourself a very strong airforce, draft infantry like crazy, and build a pile of panzers. Throw in some antitanks, other counterunits, etc. If you draft hard, you can see a sharp spike in your power graph.

EDIT: I see DaveMcW beat me to it. Great minds think alike, they say

 

[Birdman6]

I agree it looks like your cities are all mediocre in size, so you have a lot of land not getting worked. Why have they not grown larger?

It may be too late to overcome Zara militarily but I don't want to sound defeatist. You'd have to get a large army in shape real fast...easier said than done but when facing superior technology you need advantage in numbers.

As far as battlefield tactics, I might suggest surprise attacking that 14-size city which seems close to your borders. It's a large enough target that taking it will make an impact on Zara. It also puts you in striking distance of the capital if things are going exceptionally well (not likely). So I'd raze that city and then retreat quickly to your borders to prepare for a counterattack, in which you'd ideally destroy the bulk of Zara's army. Then move back in and take the capital.

The obvious flaw with this plan is you have a long border with Zara and there's no telling where the counterattack will come. Defending that border is a huge chore. Also, you might not be able to execute a full retreat before your already-weakened units come under counterattack.

As hermit said your best option may be nukes. If you do this be sure to nuke Zara's uranium mines on 1st strike.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

1. Fix up your cities to be more productive.
2. Build a lot of siege and panzers/whatever.
3. Declare war on zara
4. Let zara send his stack into your territory
5. Hit it with collateral and mop it up at a tremendous K/D advantage
6. Start taking his cities.
7. Unless someone else is threatening culture/space, you can probably at least win time just by beating zara out of 1st.

 

[Yakinator]

I agree it looks like your cities are all mediocre in size, so you have a lot of land not getting worked. Why have they not grown larger?

I got bogged down in wars against Shaka and Sitting Bull due to lack of siege and built too many military units. Also my cities have high unhealthiness due to Industrial Parks, Assembly Plants and Coal Plants. Also, my hapiness cap is around 10-12 in most cities

 

[Birdman6]

I got bogged down in wars against Shaka and Sitting Bull due to lack of siege and built too many military units. Also my cities have high unhealthiness due to Industrial Parks, Assembly Plants and Coal Plants. Also, my hapiness cap is around 10-12 in most cities

Interesting, could you post a screenshot of one of these struggling cities?

 

[Meatbuster]

I see unhappy cities. Run Hereditary Rule to make good use of your obsolete units. Or make peace with your intercontinental rivals... they may be causing you war weariness. And Nationhood for drafting.
Build more fighters and bombers as it makes modern wars much easier.
I can't see it clearly, but you do seem to have railroads, meaning it will be easier to move your panzers to where the attacks are coming from. Just have infantry/marines stationed at your border cities, while having your stack of doom against the 14 population city. You don't need to strike and take it quickly, just draw the enemy forces and discourage them from counterattacking your other cities. If you succesfully siege it, you can reduce it down to one defender then make the enemy to put more troops there. Then you can bomb it again, kill the defenders... etc. With a couple of bombers, you may be able to take out a weakened high tech unit with one of your cuirassers or riflemen even, saving your more powerful units for defense.

 

[Yakinator]

Just have infantry/marines stationed at your border cities, while having your stack of doom against the 14 population city. You don't need to strike and take it quickly, just draw the enemy forces and discourage them from counterattacking your other cities. If you succesfully siege it, you can reduce it down to one defender then make the enemy to put more troops there. Then you can bomb it again, kill the defenders... etc. With a couple of bombers, you may be able to take out a weakened high tech unit with one of your cuirassers or riflemen even, saving your more powerful units for defense.

I really like this idea. In addition to distracting Zara/taking out units, I could just nuke Zara without any consequences, because I doubt Zara would nuke his own territory to get rid of my army

I see unhappy cities. Run Hereditary Rule to make good use of your obsolete units.

I agree, I don't think Universal Suffrage is helping me much

Best way to bring down a stronger enemy is nukes imo.

Didn't really consider using nukes, but I think nukes would work well, especially if I can draw Zara's armies into one place using Meatbuster's strategy

 

[Birdman6]

As far as happiness goes, how many happy-providing resources do you have? As you get late in the game you should be able to stock up more and more, either via land grab or trade.

 

[Yakinator]

I managed to trade for some health/happiness resources and get my city populations up. As I was doing so, I beelined computers and built the Internet, allowing me to achieve tech parity. I then decided to build nukes and attack Zara. I fought a defensive war while constantly nuking Zara, and I then finished him off with a massive counterattack once his offensive army was destroyed.

The problem was that while I was fighting, Joao managed to gain a significant lead in the space race and vassalize Brennus. Although I was at tech parity with him, Joao's tech rate was significantly faster, especially due to the fact that my land was devastated by global warming and fallout from some of Zara's nukes. I managed to get a beachhead on his continent with an SOD of about 70 units. Although I destroyed a large portion of Joao's army by getting him to attack my beachhead, he won a space race victory around 2010. I did not have enough EPs to stop him(I could only run the EP slider at 30%.

Thanks for the help guys. At least I realized that this game was actually winnable. In retrospect, I could've won by playing peacefully for a space race victory.