Misotu
King
- Joined
- Jan 10, 2006
- Messages
- 934
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Deity can be very, very difficult or really not that difficult at all, depending on your settings and the type of victory you want.
You could consider playing a few games for the Elite Quattromasters competion on the HoF - might as well submit your victories
and it's quite good fun as a competition. Deity games count for all levels of EQM, so they're handy 
Here's my top tip for the inefficient assassin seeking less arduous Deity ventures: Religious victory.
This is really just a question of technique and choosing relatively friendly opponents. I enjoy these games and they are fairly short to play by comparison with, say, Space or (aargh) Time. I've got Deity now on every map size every speed (I think. Anyway, I'm close
). I've used loads of different civs successfully, even those which don't appear to be anything like ideal at first sight. I've even won at Deity after I've missed out on the Oracle - but that type of game is strictly for masochists.
Bear in mind that I do not get the best results
After a couple of games, you will probably improve on the outline below ...
Try choosing an industrious civ for your first shot. Bismark is good - he starts with a scout which is extremely useful, since locating the other civs is supremely important.
AP victory tips:
Obviously each game is slightly different and the map has a big influence - a central position takes years off your final date (and is the one thing I hardly ever seem to get, gnash). Being close to Hattie/Ram is very helpful. Sometimes, you might find that Hattie & Ramses share a religion & spread it to you. This is a clincher
Sometimes christianity will spread to another civ without a religion (usually Roosevelt in my case) and he then converts and spreads it to all 10 of his enormous cities. This is generally the death knell.
The real killer is war among the AIs. All of a sudden, you have relationship negatives for trading with worst enemies. Tragically, this can deal a death-blow to your cunning plot.
Tech order with regard to non-critical-path techs is a personal choice. I generally find that I leave bronze-working and alphabet until after I have Theology because I don't usually need to chop the Oracle and there are quite a lot of techs to research to get Theology to come up as a free tech option. Maths is nice to have but not necessary, so I usually do that last, but at Deity it sometimes happens that the AIs have alphabet quite early so I don't need to research it. They will often trade it
Other friendly candidates for opponents include Mansa (who will give +1 for sharing discoveries after 4 tech trades) and of course Asoka & Gandhi. I usually avoid unpopular civs (although other players don't). The Khmer, for example, love organised religion but are usually hated by all and sundry so I avoid them and try to build a world full of peace and love
Give it a whirl. You'll like it

Deity can be very, very difficult or really not that difficult at all, depending on your settings and the type of victory you want.
You could consider playing a few games for the Elite Quattromasters competion on the HoF - might as well submit your victories


Here's my top tip for the inefficient assassin seeking less arduous Deity ventures: Religious victory.
This is really just a question of technique and choosing relatively friendly opponents. I enjoy these games and they are fairly short to play by comparison with, say, Space or (aargh) Time. I've got Deity now on every map size every speed (I think. Anyway, I'm close

Bear in mind that I do not get the best results

Try choosing an industrious civ for your first shot. Bismark is good - he starts with a scout which is extremely useful, since locating the other civs is supremely important.
AP victory tips:
- Choose a map with a single land mass and take high seas, so you hopefully won't have to move your missionaries huge distances. Or, you could consider Terra - I haven't actually tried this because I needed other map types for EQM, but I bet it's a good option.
- I suggest marathon speed initially - there are a lot of units to move around. No barbs of course - you can't escort all those missionaries! No vassals.
- You do need a start with reasonable resources, but it doesn't have to be spectacular. 1 gold and a couple of food will do it, but I would suggest 2 gold and 2 corn/rice/wheat for a comfortable ride.
- Tech-wise, depending on what civ you've picked, get mining and farming to exploit your resources, bee-line priesthood, build the Oracle while researching writing, monotheism, take Theology as your free tech.
- Aside from the obvious, key techs are BW, for chopping out the AP and missionaries; Writing for open borders; Monotheism for organised religion hammer-boost, missionaries without monastery and the relations boost with Hattie & Ramses (switch into this as soon as you can and give them Mono if they don't research it); Alphabet for tech trading; Maths for more valuable chops - and then any and all other techs for trading purposes.
- Don't get one of the early religions. You want the AIs doing that. Gandhi, Mansa and Hattie are extremely proficient at spreading their religion to other civs.
- Build only one city - this is all you need at Deity.
- You need to get some of the other civs to vote for you so choose friendly ones but include Hatshepsut and Ramses. They both favour org religion - which you will be running as soon as poss anyway.
- Explore, explore, explore. Huts are nice, but you don't tend to get anything spectacular at this level. More important is locating every other civ as quickly as possible, so choose a sensible exploration pattern and use several units.
- Spread the AP religion to each civ, but only *after* they have converted to another religion. Unless they are your best mates, spread it to their smallest, poorest city where possible. Otherwise you're in trouble on the vote
- While remembering the above, spread the AP religion to Hattie/Ramses early, particularly Hattie. She will then spread it herself to her own cities but is extremely unlikely to convert and will vote for you in the elections.
- When you've built the AP or are sure of building it, give away (don't trade) Theology to everyone for the +4 relations boost, win that first election for leader, switch to no religion to get rid of the negatives. You generally need relations of +8 with a civ for them to vote you a victory - open borders gives +2, tech trading should net you +4, years of peace +1 and Hattie/Ram will have +2 upwards for their favourite civic. You don't need everyone to vote for you - focus on those 2 and divert all spare missionaries to their civs. Trade every tech you have with everyone.
- Do not use the "Grrrrrr!" technique. It is counter-productive for this game type.
Obviously each game is slightly different and the map has a big influence - a central position takes years off your final date (and is the one thing I hardly ever seem to get, gnash). Being close to Hattie/Ram is very helpful. Sometimes, you might find that Hattie & Ramses share a religion & spread it to you. This is a clincher

Sometimes christianity will spread to another civ without a religion (usually Roosevelt in my case) and he then converts and spreads it to all 10 of his enormous cities. This is generally the death knell.
The real killer is war among the AIs. All of a sudden, you have relationship negatives for trading with worst enemies. Tragically, this can deal a death-blow to your cunning plot.
Tech order with regard to non-critical-path techs is a personal choice. I generally find that I leave bronze-working and alphabet until after I have Theology because I don't usually need to chop the Oracle and there are quite a lot of techs to research to get Theology to come up as a free tech option. Maths is nice to have but not necessary, so I usually do that last, but at Deity it sometimes happens that the AIs have alphabet quite early so I don't need to research it. They will often trade it

Other friendly candidates for opponents include Mansa (who will give +1 for sharing discoveries after 4 tech trades) and of course Asoka & Gandhi. I usually avoid unpopular civs (although other players don't). The Khmer, for example, love organised religion but are usually hated by all and sundry so I avoid them and try to build a world full of peace and love

Give it a whirl. You'll like it
