Really Fast Diplomatic Wins

Immaculate

unerring
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Jan 22, 2003
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I've read about some really fast diplomatic wins.

Does anyone have a general idea of how to go about this?

What is the general tech-path?

I realize that lots of the appropriate techs can be light-bulbed, but which ones specifically?

Also, cottages and 1-2 (or 3?) GP farms or specialists?

I've seen dates of 1200 or so but can't replicate so far.

PS: I am playing monarch/emperor (but will try this on monarch until i can get it right a few times).

Immac.
 
I'm guessing the 1200 dates are on marathon where the turns scale differently and probably comparable to 1500 AD or so on proper difficulty levels.

You can lightbulb philo, paper, education, printing press, scientific method, physics, electricity. But not radio or mass media. I think at least one GP farm is necessary in order to get a fast win date since at least 7-8 scientists will be useful, which suggests an economy weighted towards Pyramid SE. (pyramids will also get you an engineer for the UN)
 
Check out SGOTM 3. The russian teams built it in the 13th century, that's epic speed, monarch. Us mere mortals built it in the late 1500s.

Uberfish has basically has the strategy down (adding astronomy in there if you can delay CS and theology until after you get optics), with the first engineer used to build great library and delay the second one a long time until the UN is built. You want a pure scientist pool (big) and a pure engineer pool (small, just pyramids), so rush great library in your GP farm and make lots of scientists. That means no national epic, so you want philo civ.

I think we used our scientists on machinery, astronomy, two on scientific method, then took physics with liberalism and used the free GS and another one on electricity. Then got a GE to build UN.
 
I don't think that one should avoid national epic if pursuing diplomatic victory. GA is not a disaster. If you get GA ot two, you can always burn them on radio or mass media, you need those techs anyway.
 
you need drama and music for that. Of course a GA at that stage is likely more beakers than drama + music. and if you selfresearch them you have 2 GA's.
 
The easiest two difficulty levels to get insanely early diplo victories are (strangely) settler and deity :crazyeye:

Speed isn't really a factor in either game, normal or quick are actually better as the games don't take too long.

On settler, Peter or Frederick are probably the best as they are philosophical and start with a scout. Scout like crazy and hope you pop a settler or two from goody huts. Build 5-6 cities. Farm everything (no cottages) get a scientist for academy and then get a GE from Pyramids and forge, then employ mass scientists. Use Oracle for Education maybe and the GSs on Sci Method, Physics, Electricity etc. Liberalism for Radio. Once you research Mass Media, switch science to 0% and swap to Universal Sufferage and buy the UN when you can. If it all works well you should win before 1000AD.

On deity, play OCC :lol:. Elizabeth is best. You need to start with gold/gems. Tech straight to Alphabet (via Pottery). Cottage everything and trade like crazy with everyone and hope you can get to Mass Media before they launch (usually in 1300s). No religion. WastingTime wrote an article about it here

The OCC approach on Emporer should see you get victory before 1300AD if you have a nice city. Probably 1400AD on Monarch. Using the settler style approach would work better on Monarch probably.
 
I tried beating deity on weekend. Peter was my choise, as suggested. One city challenge was my choice also. I got lucky start and found AH from hut! Started worker ASAP to improve corn and pigs while beelining to alphabet. I was first, I was able to trade techs like AH and mysticism to better ones! I waited until first AI was near discovering alphabet by himself, and traded it for everyone else for things like math, IW, monarchy, calendar and finally (with other tech of course) currency. I got first GS who built academy. In that point I had a tech lead. Wow, I never thought I could actually be tech leader when playing deity! :king:

I had a some border skirmishes with Mehmed, but he sent only lonely chariots and horse archers, and they were easily destroyed. Rumors about massive stacks on deity were just a urban legend! :lol:

I went for Liberalism even I thought I may not have a change. Was second on CoL (lost confusianism by 1 turn!), got 2nd GS ready to lighbulb philo and switched to caste system and pacifism. I backfilled again with CoL, but did not trade philo away yet. Built NE to get even more GSs. When I finished CS I had three more GS ready to lightbulb paper and education (had to research one turn by myself, though). At that point everyone else already had paper but no one else had edu.

I had around 30-35 turns to liberalism (epic speed), it was going to be tight race. Got two more GS, I settled them on capital. Both reduced research time by 2-2 turns, which was nice. I was first and I won by one turn! Took printing press and beelined towards mass media. I lost race to physics, but was first on radio (time to backfill again to get steel and assembly line for fast UN production).

Built UN around 1500-1550. I had played my cards right, everyone was pleased or friendly to me, expect Ragnar and his two vassals. They had a small majority, hence I had no hope for diplomatic victory even everyone else voted for me. Ragnar continued his campaign (vasallized eventually Roosevelt, Gandhi, Mehmed and Hannibal!) and finally had enough votes for diplomatic victory. I actually had a slim change for space victory, because Mongols were not very fast building SS parts (their land sucked), Ragnar was warmongering and his vassals were crippled. I never get the internet in time (stupid me!), if I had beelined to it immediately I might have had a change. I had a very impressive production capacity, SS casings in 3 turns!

Have to try again, that was not so hard! :)
 
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