Please advise on this seemingly winnable game

[dylanmeditates]

Hi,
I'm stuck on immortal for the last... 4 years I'm posting a game save, so let me know if the attachment works and the file and everything flows with the whole automatic bug mod issue etc.that we see a lot of.
I play pangaea, no huts no events, immortal, 'normal' settings, usually random coastline but sometimes if I'm frustrated I'll retreat back to 'solid' coastline. Lately, winning at the very least 10% of all the maps I roll (I try to play through every single roll, even shite ones) I'm confident with 'random' coast though, and eventually want to win with these conditions on deity.
So anyways... I roll this initially decent looking map, I'd give the starting position+ leader combination a B, maybe B+ if it kept showing more effort to make things easy for me. Unfortunately it immediately does not- although I was able to worker steal washington and get peace with him very quickly with no losses, I just don't know where to go next. I'm thinking about how I've been taught to try to get 6 cities (but no more, bc then your research drags) and then try to lib cuirs eg, or steel etc. But I don't see 6 good cities here. Plus, no horses for HA rush on washington. And no elephants. I'm still going to try to win by settling like maybe 4 cities and going for engineering or something but just wondering what other peoples's input is.
And while I have you, I've been thinking about how maybe a good way to approach the game is to race to how fast you reach the end game, which for me means how fast before I'm building troops in every city, with golden ages going as much as possible, serially vassaling each AI one after the other, often skipping over the one strongest AI because I don't need their land to reach domination anyway. Is this a good way to think of the game, or are there other high win % endgames I should be open to? I think of cultural and space as kind of fail safe strategies that I only do if I have to, because domination (if possible) is usually best option. Is this correct?
Another thing that happens is I get lots of vassals, but the war slows down before I hit domination and I can't compete with the remaining civs huge+high tech armies, but then I win bc either myself or one of my vassals builds UN and i vote myself the diplo winner.
I am interested in developing a kind of all-encompassing strategy flow chart for how to win but the game is so complex!

 

[dylanmeditates]

(this is the game upload)

 

[Major Tom]

Hi, interesting intro, but I dont understand the poll. Lib steel sounds nice, so do a megacottagecity, but what conditions are we talking about?

 

[sampsa]

If you want people to shadow your game, post the starting save. I think you've already made some very poor choices (starting with a work boat to improve a clam when there is a 6-tile available is a clear mistake, teching AH is just , should probably grow to size 5 pre-settler with these tiles/tech choices). It's not "bad" yet though, I know many players here would always win from this position. Just saying that your early game needs some work.

You have also been taught some silly things. Your research does not drag after 6 cities, if those cities are decent. If you don't have 6 good city spots, then you don't found cities, you take them. You definitely don't need to try to win liberalism in every game. I don't quite understand why you mention engineering but not construction. A catapult attack on a weakened AI who doesn't like to build units (it's Lincoln btw, not Washington) has a 100% success rate on immortal (assuming done in a sensible way, but it's really not very hard). Even archers are good enough for support if you really lack horses/metal/phants.

 

[gaash2]

If I have horse, HA rush is the easiest way to ensure victory from my experience. Otherwise I like catapults + anything. I'm not as good as many players here, but in my experience, waiting until lib/cuirs to wage war (and sometimes even waiting as late as knights/engineering) is usually too late for me to reliably win on IMM. I need a 500BC (or earlier) war to have a high chance of winning.

 

[Major Tom]

I find that too risky. A solid early setup and early Lib/cuirs is a rather safe winning formula for me. How is your initial setup of builds and tech. Perhaps post a new game with screenshots for advice. People are really good at giving advice here.

 

[Pedro78]

Not going to comment a lot, but your poll already reveals an extremely clustered mindset. Elephant rush is not incompatible with "lib cuirs". You cannot define nor characterize a game's entire strategy with a simple war/wonder/whatever. Every game is different, every game is complex in its own way. There is no defined pattern to play Civ4. 99.99% of the moves you'll make/see are situational, and I'm not exagerating. There are games where you'll Axe-rush on deity, there are games where you'll build Chichen Itza (youtube.com/watch?v=I9gvdsc8agM), there's everything in this game. My point is that there is no answer to why you're not winning consistently on IMM. The solution is to play games, ask for "situational" advice and learn to "read" the situation. That's my 2 cents

 

[gaash2]

I find that too risky. A solid early setup and early Lib/cuirs is a rather safe winning formula for me. How is your initial setup of builds and tech. Perhaps post a new game with screenshots for advice. People are really good at giving advice here.

Interesting.. I find a lot of issues waiting until cuirs for war.

(1) My diplo probably sucks, but not being DOWed before then is rare
(2) The AP can seriously slow down an attack that late in the game
(3) Sometimes an AI gets very strong by that point