Rotting a runaway civ with the Statue of Zeus with Sitting Bull

[MassRiflemen]

So, I decided to build the Chichen Itza and the Statue of Zeus with Sitting Bull and spam drill four hill archers with castles next to monty's latest assimilated empire and waited for him to Dow me next.

About 300 turns later Monty had 20+ war weariness and one population cities, and I finally overcame his tech lead (he ran away with the game) about 120 turns in. Then other civs lashed out and finished him off from the other side (it over 250 turns before his power rating dropped to second place).

I now believe the Statue of Zeus is the best wonder the game. Never give peace. There would have been no other way to win.

 

[Kaitzilla]

Statue of Zeus is a strong defensive wonder for sure.
The AI doesn't handle unhappiness well.

How much war weariness did Monty accumulate?
It should be visible by mousing over the portraits in the diplomacy screen.

If I recall correctly, war weariness does not accumulate with battles fought inside one's own borders.

Rotting a super power down to 1 pop cities is pretty determined.

 

[MassRiflemen]

Statue of Zeus is a strong defensive wonder for sure.
The AI doesn't handle unhappiness well.

How much war weariness did Monty accumulate?
It should be visible by mousing over the portraits in the diplomacy screen.

If I recall correctly, war weariness does not accumulate with battles fought inside one's own borders.

Rotting a super power down to 1 pop cities is pretty determined.

MOnty kept wiping stacks of elepult and later cannon+grenadiers into hill 3 CD1 Drill IV longbows while I was afk.

So long as you don't research rifling, the chien itza gives +25% against gunpowde units as well. I've wiped izzy's conqs with sitting bll's longbows +chicen itza.

Research the assembly line tree prior to rifiling, you go from longbows. for infantry (ironically, a research line I learned from AI monty). It's Sitting Bull's most reliable strat.

Although, I'm now considering Dowing the entire world with statue of zeus with sitting bull. I'll upgrade super crossbows to machine guns.

 

[Plains-Cow]

MOnty kept wiping stacks of elepult and later cannon+grenadiers into hill 3 CD1 Drill IV longbows while I was afk.

So long as you don't research rifling, the chien itza gives +25% against gunpowde units as well. I've wiped izzy's conqs with sitting bll's longbows +chicen itza.

Research the assembly line tree prior to rifiling, you go from longbows. for infantry (ironically, a research line I learned from AI monty). It's Sitting Bull's most reliable strat.

Although, I'm now considering Dowing the entire world with statue of zeus with sitting bull. I'll upgrade super crossbows to machine guns.

What was the difficulty setting? You generally can't hold out against the AI on Emperor or higher for hundreds of turns if they have a tech lead on you, happiness issues or no. They'll trap you in your cities and pillage while eventually sieging you down one at a time to nothing.

 

[MassRiflemen]

What was the difficulty setting? You generally can't hold out against the AI on Emperor or higher for hundreds of turns if they have a tech lead on you, happiness issues or no. They'll trap you in your cities and pillage while eventually sieging you down one at a time to nothing.

Immortal, Huge Lakes.

You must be thinking K-mod AI, where the AI is smart enough to pass the bait border cities.

And yes, Sitting Bull can indeed hold out 200-300 turns on longbows. By the time they have grenadiers and cannons, your longbows all have Drill IV, Hill Defender III and City Defender III + counter promos, from all the elephants, cats, trebs and macemen they suicided earlier.

The 25% defense bonus from Chicen Itza, combined by grenadiers NOT getting a bonus vs longbows, makes it so that a stack of 40 superbows can hold it down until assembly line.

It's by far the least exciting way to win a game, but it works. I've replicated it a few times now with a marble start playing Parth+GL+pacifism while sitting behind two sets of 20 superbows and one set of 20 mobile bows to reinforce whereever the enemy stack is comming from.

 

[Kaitzilla]

I sometimes daydream about Sitting Bull and forts.

A line of them along the border, with a 25% defense bonus that can't be bombarded down.

Archery units with 75% city garrison bonus from promotions that apply inside forts.

Perhaps a lucky hill or forest to add another +50%!

Longbows could just stroll from one fort to the next with 12.

 

[Plains-Cow]

Immortal, Huge Lakes.

You must be thinking K-mod AI, where the AI is smart enough to pass the bait border cities.

And yes, Sitting Bull can indeed hold out 200-300 turns on longbows. By the time they have grenadiers and cannons, your longbows all have Drill IV, Hill Defender III and City Defender III + counter promos, from all the elephants, cats, trebs and macemen they suicided earlier.

The 25% defense bonus from Chicen Itza, combined by grenadiers NOT getting a bonus vs longbows, makes it so that a stack of 40 superbows can hold it down until assembly line.

It's by far the least exciting way to win a game, but it works. I've replicated it a few times now with a marble start playing Parth+GL+pacifism while sitting behind two sets of 20 superbows and one set of 20 mobile bows to reinforce whereever the enemy stack is comming from.

I want to see you do a game with screen shots and win this way. It sounds pretty cool. An AAR for the forum would be great. I just can't believe that cannons aren't enough to do you in.

 

[MassRiflemen]

I want to see you do a game with screen shots and win this way. It sounds pretty cool. An AAR for the forum would be great. I just can't believe that cannons aren't enough to do you in.

The cannons hurt

I sometimes daydream about Sitting Bull and forts.

A line of them along the border, with a 25% defense bonus that can't be bombarded down.

Archery units with 75% city garrison bonus from promotions that apply inside forts.

Perhaps a lucky hill or forest to add another +50%!

Longbows could just stroll from one fort to the next with 12.

Play raging barbs on a huge map as Toku of the Native Americans, and you won't have to daydream. Archers and dogs lining the rear side of rivers, and hill forested forts (don't cut any forests and settle your cities in a grid 3 spaces apart).

 

[Plains-Cow]

The cannons hurt


Play raging barbs on a huge map as Toku of the Native Americans, and you won't have to daydream. Archers and dogs lining the rear side of rivers, and hill forested forts (don't cut any forests and settle your cities in a grid 3 spaces apart).

Immortal AI has attack stacks of 50-100 units. How long do your bows hold out? There's no way you could DOW more than one AI at a time, let alone the world, and have statue of Zeus still save you. I haven't played a game like this, but don't see it working. How soon do you declare your first war?

 

[MassRiflemen]

Immortal AI has attack stacks of 50-100 units. How long do your bows hold out? There's no way you could DOW more than one AI at a time, let alone the world, and have statue of Zeus still save you. I haven't played a game like this, but don't see it working. How soon do you declare your first war?

I never tried DoWing the whole world. Perhaps dropping to Emperor it might be possible to DoW two or three of the top AI's simultaneously. I think you are correct that on Immortal you couldn't hold out against more than two, especially when cannons arrive.

It does however seem to be a solid strat against a runaway aggressive AI like Monty or Shaka though.

I should also mention that I am rarely alone in these wars. I'll often send the bows to Elizabeth or Darius (or some other good techer) to help hold out against Monty/Shaka/[add crazy dude here] and then PA them later to accelerate the Assembly Line tech (I'll tech tings that they didn't, so we marry into Assembly Line). Once you're in a PA, the AI you allied with can't end the war, allowing you to continue the rot fest.

The problem of course with this approach is that the Statue of Zeus doesn't kick in until the PA is achieved if you're fighting on allied soil; however, it does allow you to safely reach flight and industrialism long before they do. This also means you will have to changes their civics out of police state (since they will get fascism rather soon) every time they change to police state. So you need 4-5 spies in place at all times.

 

[Gumbolt]

Not sure always war games would work on a huge map. What speed are you playing at? Epic or marathan?

 

[Plains-Cow]

I never tried DoWing the whole world. Perhaps dropping to Emperor it might be possible to DoW two or three of the top AI's simultaneously. I think you are correct that on Immortal you couldn't hold out against more than two, especially when cannons arrive.

It does however seem to be a solid strat against a runaway aggressive AI like Monty or Shaka though.

I should also mention that I am rarely alone in these wars. I'll often send the bows to Elizabeth or Darius (or some other good techer) to help hold out against Monty/Shaka/[add crazy dude here] and then PA them later to accelerate the Assembly Line tech (I'll tech tings that they didn't, so we marry into Assembly Line). Once you're in a PA, the AI you allied with can't end the war, allowing you to continue the rot fest.

The problem of course with this approach is that the Statue of Zeus doesn't kick in until the PA is achieved if you're fighting on allied soil; however, it does allow you to safely reach flight and industrialism long before they do. This also means you will have to changes their civics out of police state (since they will get fascism rather soon) every time they change to police state. So you need 4-5 spies in place at all times.

This story changes greatly if you're telling me that you make permanent alliances to get this strategy really off the ground along with lots of spies constantly doing their thing.

Would still like to see a game of this because I don't see how it's possible on Emperor or above. It sounds like a way to kill your economy and let other AI tech away.

 

[Gumbolt]

This story changes greatly if you're telling me that you make permanent alliances to get this strategy really off the ground along with lots of spies constantly doing their thing.

Would still like to see a game of this because I don't see how it's possible on Emperor or above. It sounds like a way to kill your economy and let other AI tech away.

There is a game option for perm alliances if an AI is friendly once you have communism. It's a bit broken as I got an AI to give me almost 800+ gold a turn.

 

[Plains-Cow]

There is a game option for perm alliances if an AI is friendly once you have communism. It's a bit broken as I got an AI to give me almost 800+ gold a turn.

I'm aware. I believe that fascism also enables permanent alliances. There's an option to enable them in custom game modes. It's pretty wild when one gets rolling.

However, the point is that I wasn't aware that this "bleed them white" strategy was done under the banner of a PA situation.

 

[Gumbolt]

Maybe it was fascism. Only used it once.

 

[MassRiflemen]

Maybe it was fascism. Only used it once.

Both communism and fascism enable the PA.

If you're trying to get a PA with an aggressive leader like the Khans, you either have to tech communism yourself, or wait for them to tech fascism, since they don't tech communism.

One of the problems with PA'ing an aggressive leader is that you can slow down their tech rate at the time its needed the most (before industrialism and flight) just after they complete fascism. So the general rule of thumb is to wait a little longer to PA them.

Gandi, Mansa and Rammy all tech communism on their own, so you can let them do the research and hit them up when they complete the tech. Try to tech biology and/or electricity while they tech communism so you don't overlap when you PA.

 

[dankok8]

IIRC in the latest AI Survivor Game 1, Shaka's capital had 21 unhappy faces from War Weariness when he lost the Statue of Zeus city to Gandhi. Plus 5 unhappy faces seeking Emancipation for good measure. Then again that's Deity and that's Shaka who build stack of 100+ units but still... Statue of Zeus is pretty darn strong in this scenario.

 

[Kaitzilla]

IIRC in the latest AI Survivor Game 1, Shaka's capital had 21 unhappy faces from War Weariness when he lost the Statue of Zeus city to Gandhi. Plus 5 unhappy faces seeking Emancipation for good measure. Then again that's Deity and that's Shaka who build stack of 100+ units but still... Statue of Zeus is pretty darn strong in this scenario.

Shaka was running Police State from pyramids, so -50% war weariness.

 

[dankok8]

Shaka was running Police State from pyramids, so -50% war weariness.

Imagine if he wasn't. Police State is his favorite civic which isn't the case for most AI... and still 21 unhappy faces

 

[Gumbolt]

Imagine if he wasn't. Police State is his favorite civic which isn't the case for most AI... and still 21 unhappy faces

The issue is he had a 120 unit stack that got wiped out. My understanding is war weariness is based on where the unit was produced. If all his core cities lost 10-20 units they would be hugely impacted. The nukes too would of killed his happiness too with so many dead units. It all stacks up. Shaka if he can get going and doesn't do something stupid can become a monster. Sadly here he was suiciding units on barb cities early on. Fighting wars he was not going to win when he should of been capturing barb cities or settling the best land till he had construction. I wanted him to be a winner but he just lost the plot and seems automated to just keep DOW'ing whatever the odds. In fairness would he of known what a nuclaear weapon was if so backwards?