I can win King games every time, but as soon as you get into Emperor+ the AI's production bonuses just get silly. It's the only tangible difference in jumping difficulties, and it's frustratingly cheese.
I don't know how any of you play Immortal or Deity, the strat must be the same every game no matter what policies you choose; you have to turtle, plain and simple...
Who even plays Emperor+ and picks Progress, when the AI will just spit out settlers at a crazy pace and deny you land from multiple angles? OK, lets prioritize settling for ourselves instead! Hah, the AI will proceed to swoop in with their ridiculous armies to pick your vulnerable cities clean. The below example shows a progress Songhai with 9 units + 3 cities + workers on turn 53 (Emperor)...
There's just no matching up with all that production, and the grind is not fun
. Even after G just removed some hammer bonus and bonus starting units, it's still apparent that these production buffs are excessive IMO. I don't get how that "fake" difficulty is really fun for Emperor+ players. There's no way to even have a peaceful game on higher settings either, as you'll be outnumbered and most likely DoW'd the entire game. I'm not trying to bash VP, I'd just like to play higher difficulties and get better, but better in this case means turtle with 4 cities every game...