The Deity Challenge Line-up #33 - Songhai

[Shark Diver]

Thanks Consentient, I'm hoping to actually play a few of these recent challenges as soon as I finish the slog that my Ottoman game turned into (it will be a Dom victory a few dozen playing hours from now).

Having never tried the SS strategy, I didn't know you could win with it with such low tourism. I figured you had just gotten bored and your warmonger nature took over really early, which I found humorous. CV through domination is sort of like a diplo victory through strength of arms.....both are probably historically accurate.

 

[beetle]

I would have thought that opening with the SS gambit, but not having that work, would have put a player too far behind to catch up.

I am also very impressed with the wholly peaceful CVs that players report. Really, I have no idea how that works!

Paying attention to culture/tourism while conquering half the civs seems like it would be a very satisfying play style, so I hope to get better at that. I did that with Egypt for DCL 34, but it was slower than SV would have been.

 

[consentient]

Well I know that SS has been done on Deity, but the only reported case was one of the very best players with a dream start, I believe.

I will certainly have another crack at it with another civ set up for wide religion. It's tricky enough getting the pantheon on most maps!

So while I am still happy that I won by CV, it has to be said that this was only by wiping out the Cultural leaders completely, and severely reducing another (leaving him with one pitiful city). So it wasn't pure SS at all. Hence the 'Domination Sites' and other a.k.a.'s.

SS doesn't need much tourism because you're doing it around T150 where most civs have pitiful lifetime culture. The problem is that in this case a few of them were not quite pitiful enough.

 

[beetle]

I will certainly have another crack at it with another civ set up for wide religion. It's tricky enough getting the pantheon on most maps!

Hmm, are you thinking about trying SS on the Egypt DCL? Too soon?

So while I am still happy that I won by CV, it has to be said that this was only by wiping out the Cultural leaders completely, and severely reducing another (leaving him with one pitiful city).

No shame there, that is pretty typical for Deity CV wins, is it not?

So it wasn't pure SS at all.

Actually, I would not characterize it as SS at all. Sure, you had SS, but it played out like a pretty typical Deity CV win. In hindsight, the policies you put into Piety would have been better spent elsewhere -- but you still had a very aggressive finishing time on a map that was quite challenging!

 

[consentient]

Hmm, are you thinking about trying SS on the Egypt DCL?

Nah, I already completed the Egypt DCL by conventional CV. Spoiler for the map: There is almost 0 chance of an effective DoW on the human player, so it's quite suitable for peaceful tall. I pushed it out to 6 cities. Good fun.

No shame there, that is pretty typical for Deity CV wins, is it not?

I don't think so, actually. I generally like a style of win that is conquest-driven CV, like in my Poland ICL run, but I think most are turtling to Hotels/Internet/Airports.

Actually, I would not characterize it as SS at all. Sure, you had SS, but it played out like a pretty typical Deity CV win. In hindsight, the policies you put into Piety would have been better spent elsewhere -- but you still had a very aggressive finishing time on a map that was quite challenging!

It was completely different to my usual CVs. If I compare it to the Egypt run, there was almost no similarity whatsoever.

 

[GiovDenti]

T307 Dom

Finally I did it! I won a Deity Domination game.
I know is not much and my timing was far from decent.
However, it was really hard for me. I have to thank you Consentient for the mind changing guide for noob deity domination. I used to make every and each mistakes reported in your guide and, for me, domination victory on higher level was out of question.

Spoiler :

6 city: Liberty (Piramid) + Piety + Rationalism + Autocracy (8picks)
I kept a very good diplomatic record in the first phase of the game. Winning first capitals on defensive rather than offensive wars.
Conquest order: England - Huns - Austria - India - Germany (w/Venice) and finally I executed a 2 turn nuclear missle + Xcom sneak attack on my friend Morocco

This is the final attack


These are my starting 6 cities


Demographics

 

[stormtrooper412]

I tried to do a Tradition science game. It was slow because of near constant harassment by neighbors, but still tt went generally well until Ideologies sunk my happiness and a neighbor used a citadel bomb to steal my lux. I managed to steal one worker from a CS, built two and bought one. Still I had Tradition done by T84 and Education on T111. Things were starting to look up but then it collapsed, I was kind of quite disappointed.

IMPORTANT The spreadsheet will not be updated for the next 10 days on the account of me being on holiday. Someone can pinch hit in the meantime or keep an intern sheet and I'll update the bulk when I get back

 

[Sclb]

For some reason, I can't download the map for this DCL. When I click on that link for the save file, it just shows a blank image with 1x1 pixel.

 

[Acken]

There's a good chance old DCLs files got wrecked in the migration are haven't yet been enabled. Someone that has the map can try to reupload it maybe, I don't have this one.

 

[Sclb]

Seems like this DCL is the only one that I couldn't download, I checked most of the other Acken era DCL and they work fine.

 

[adcarrymaokai]

Seems like this DCL is the only one that I couldn't download, I checked most of the other Acken era DCL and they work fine.

Yeah, this is the only one I cannot download myself. Thankfully, I haven't yet deleted it from my files, so here you go:

 

[Acken]

I tried to do a Tradition science game. It was slow because of near constant harassment by neighbors, but still tt went generally well until Ideologies sunk my happiness and a neighbor used a citadel bomb to steal my lux. I managed to steal one worker from a CS, built two and bought one. Still I had Tradition done by T84 and Education on T111. Things were starting to look up but then it collapsed, I was kind of quite disappointed.

IMPORTANT The spreadsheet will not be updated for the next 10 days on the account of me being on holiday. Someone can pinch hit in the meantime or keep an intern sheet and I'll update the bulk when I get back

I'm currently keeping track of new entries until you get back.

 

[Sclb]

Went Piety to take full advantage of the UB. Also went Tradition without honor for late game domination. Only started the real war around T260 when I have tanks+rocket arty+bombers. Didn't bother to cut science and ended up with nuclear missile, stealth bombers, modern armor for the final capital. I also unlocked xcom the turn before. The only military tech I'm missing was the giant death robot and it would take another 10 or so turns to get. The pillage gold bonus made it possible to finance it without honor finisher. I'm sure I can win a science victory much quicker but I wanted to try late late game domination at least once.

Took the reformation belief that allow purchase of any great person, and helped since my SP were all over the place and never finished a single tree except trad. All my original cities except capital had 3 faith buildings in addition to shrine/temples. Too bad the AI with SS died before he had a chance to spread it to any of my cities. That would be a nice CV if it happened.

SP: full trad, full piety, 3 rationalism, 3 commerce, 9 order
Autocracy would be better for dom, but I wanted to try to get the science boost earlier with order. Happiness was never an issue as I also passed world ideology: order. Tier 3 order tenet made it possible to annex/raze without concern for happiness. I probably annexed too many cities as a result. SP cost was very high without liberty, only the massive cpt generated from SistineC/hermitage/stolen works/faith buildings saved me.

Tech was typical of science game until modern era. Oxford on Radio to reach modern quickly. After that, beeline military tech including Railway for Kremlin.

Wonders: Great Mosque of Djenne (for RP), Sistine, Big Ben, PT, Kremlin, Neuswanstein, Eiffel Tower (mainly for happiness), Sydney Opera House, CN tower, Pentagon, Hubble, Great firewall. Missed Brandenburg gate as it is very good for the extra xp when I don't have honor.

Spoiler :

Started with 5 city NC with tradition, stole 2 workers from Attila, 1 from the CS next to him, blocked southern chokepoint so Attila can't settle until he learned how to swim.
Liz was a problem like others said in my game too. Attacked my northern city at the coast by the desert around T200 with +range gatlings. It was mainly annoying since I already at modern era and clear that it was gonna be a stalemate since my main army wasn't ready and I can't hook up oil yet. I didn't have anything worthwhile that can deal with range 2 gatlings. Luckily she gave up easily after I killed a few with the city/arty attacks.
Attila wasn't a problem since I kept him fighting Bismark/Venice/Morocco, but he still managed to settle 2 cities in my face until I razed them when I started the push.
Austria was eliminated early by England, India was eliminated by both Morocco/England. Many of the CS got annexed by Venice MoV, and most of the remaining ones were annexed because of the constant wars. Even if I owned all the remaining CS, Diplo V still wasn't possible by the time I ended the game, and I did have all but 1 CS.
After the first war with Liz, she was nice to me with DoF and went order with me, her tourism with world ideology: order kept me at content despite my tourism being 0 at the point in the game. Morocco went freedom and was cultural leader but still that didn't do anything to me. Attila went autocracy, got crushed and actually lost cities and stayed at something like -30. I took the opportunity and destroyed his empire when Germany/Venice/Morocco asked for DoW with Huns. He got destroyed by bombers/rocket arty/tanks, and I also took Berlin from him which he got in earlier war.

Next up was Morocco, with his defensive wonders, his cities were around 150 strength and my tanks weren't cutting it until I got modern armor. I had to wait for the slow rocket arty to do most of the work. He also had mainly defensive air force and tons of AA guns that slowed my planes down a bit. I haven't seen an AI build that many triplanes/fighters in a while. I took also Delhi from him which has a lot of nice wonders such as FP and CI. By the time I took his last few cities, I got stealth bombers and it really got easy since his anti air was useless. I only left him with 1 city so that his tourism is negligible.

England was next, had 3x my army score when I started the war. It was impossible to defend my cargo ships and I had to rush buy a tiny destroyer/missile cruiser/nuclear sub navy to defend my fishing boats. Even then I still lost some boats. England had GLH+exploration which makes it difficult to chase down her ships. My 2nd army attacked York/London while my main army worked its way up to Vienna. Most of the stealth bombers focused near her capital as Vienna was lightly defended. As London falls, I took all her gold for peace and use some to rush a nuclear missile and got my navy including nuclear subs to Venice to finish him. It was funny seeing every AI immediately goes afraid as soon as I have the missile. My 2 nukes got Venice down from size 40+ to 6.

 

[Grendeldef]

Slowly crawling through the old ones - T225 Dom and pretty much hated every turn post 50; the early turns I just disliked. Apart from finding Kailash relatively early everything else was a miserable failure and the last 50 turns were 45 turns too long.

Spoiler :

Settled on site, stole a worker from Lizzy T8, 2nd city near Kailash, T37 One with Nature pantheon and I'll do something with T62 religion but after intial Pagodas ended buying GGs.
Nobody settled near me so no caravans to other civs and I didn't want to settle a 6th city pre-NC as even the 5th was only for a lucky Petra which gone well before I had the tech, same with Pyramids & Oracle.
T82 Liberty, T88 enhanced but should've planted the prophet as I had no chance of spreading mine against India, Morocco & Venice the best part being when Attila started ICS spree settling next to a waiting Morroccoan missionary even though they were at war.
Teching was slow so I didn't much think what take until Maria started marching towards me so Machinery & Chivalry before Education. Too bad she got York with a piece deal and I never made peace with Lizzy just to get even some xp.

Only had Morroco as DoF so money could've been better but I also decided to further test the UA so no road/harbor connection to any city other than my original settlements. My navy included a single Trireme blocked my Mombasa so screw the seas.

York was an easy catch and London after that but T124 10pop capital without a single building, not cool. Not the optimal solution but I continued towards Vienna which was taken T141. India was never more than neutral so an obvious next target especially as he was fighting with Morocco. Meanwhile Attila was beating Bismarck but unwilling start any more wars also it's hard to bribe when one is running negative gpt. The worse part of his actions were the gazillion new cities including few GG bombs which took Kailash away amongst other but I had no troops near so had to live it at that.

India had to wait before I got Arties T164 as Xbows without logistics against def 80 cities are next to useless. I also had to annex Vienna to make 3 GG bombs to reach Delhi after which it fell T176. Same turn I DoWed Attila but didn't expect anywhere near as much resistance as I got partly due to my totally useless CS allies. I also started sending Arties towards Venice. Berlin should be easy enough to take with leftovers from Hunnic war. Prebuild 3-tile wide road network from Delhi to Marrakech to give a chance of quick capture but the Attila war wasn't going much of anyhere so I had to sent Morroco against almost dead Austria when our DoF ended. I also learned that Attila had a city in 4th tile near Venice so I had to take those out, too.

T204 DoWed finally Morocco, took Mumbai & Bregenz in 2 turns and started 4 GG chain bomb to take Marrakech T212 only to find out that ND nor FP wasn't here, other than that a nice city. Peace was not an option as with his money all my CSs could've been gone in a turn.

Attila's court was taken T210 and obviously his capital moved to the closest city of Berlin so the war continued. During the wars I lost more units than in any game in recent history partly because I wasn't keeping a close eye to anything and found endless ghost units after my movement was cut short by surprise ZOC. Double digit negative happiness didn't help either and suddenly 70def cities were one-shotting my Gatlings.

Berlin & Venice T225 were relatively easy to catch I got few Arties in position and Bismarck even had worse happiness issues than I did.

Full Liberty, Piety opener, Full Honor & the rest in Autocracy but didn't Clausewitz until 5 turns before the end.

Odd map and as much as I hated it during the game I might take look at again in years to come as this could've been so smoother had I found the Venetians earlier than they sailed near me. Also the 3 happiness from NWs I could've used and most certainly tried to settle near Kilimandjaro.

Morocco was the powerhouse despite of being in long wars with India & the Huns which had surprisingly large number of XBows and naval units.

The others weren't teching that fast either before getting into Industrial that I decided to leave PSchools for the next round. Had built/bought few of those and used the 3 GSs I had gotten Plastics early enough to ease the pain of taking safety first attitude with my Arties.

Spoiler :

 

[adcarrymaokai]

T317 mV. Really long and messy game, but I actually had fun. And apparently, you can be behind in tech and still win, as long as you have enough production and gold to pump out your lower tech units and outspam the AI.

Anyway. I went Liberty and opened Piety for Mud Pyramids and then decided to finish off Piety to get a Reformation. I picked Religious Fervor to buy industrial and later era units, and let me tell you: this Reformation belief is complete and utter sh*t. Artillery costs 2000 faith, tanks cost 3000-3750 faith depending on the era... TOTALLY NOT WORTH. However, I thought that my religion wasn't bad, as I picked 15% growth rate and 15% border growth pantheon. Combined with mud pyramids and liberty opener 1 cpt, you get nearly Tradition-like border growth and a bit of food.

The plan was to do a modern armor rush, but I was falling on behind in science and my economy was in such mediocre shape that I had to bulb scientists and Oxford Combustion to start a war because war is almost always a profitable engagement. So I started war with tech deficit, and it took me quite a while to finish the game.

Part 1. Western war. This was actually the easier half. I bought 3 artilleries with faith (2k faith per piece) and upgraded Mandekalu cavalries into landships to go after Liz. I actually puppeted 4 of her cities: 2 for oil, London as cap, and 1 other for strategic positioning. That got me into massive unhappiness, and the only solution was to plow through the wonderwhores to the south, which I did from the captured English city. I had previously orchestrated multiple wars between the AI's, so by the time I had come to Vienna, it got barely captured by Ghandi, so I DoW'ed him and took it for myself, getting a few wonders and upping up my happiness. Maria gave a city in peace deal, which I sold to Ahmad for 4000 gold and asked him to DoW Ghandi, which he happily did. Then I took another Austrian city which belonged to India and sold it to Ahmad. Once I took Delhi, I sold it for 9999 gold because the game won't let you get more, even though he was offering me 408 gpt for it on top of that. But... oh well. I used the 10000 gold to buy more troops and immediately attacked Ahmad, taking Delhi and soon capturing Marakkesh.

Part 2. Meanwhile, Bismark eliminated Attila and spread to 23 cities, becoming the tech leader. He was the first in military, and my spies couldn't steal anything even with an Autocracy policy which allows to steal twice as fast. I think at one time it said "gathering intelligence: 614 turns." Well, ok. By that time I had some aircraft and tanks, so I quickly took Attila's Court. However, then it became a massive chore to chew through his army and to take cities. His high army score was due to his massive navy which consisted of destroyers, battleships, missile cruisers. Every time I took a city, he would retake it with his navy. But it was to my advantage because at least that oil wasn't going into Panzers. By the time I got to Berlin, he started dropping XCOMs, which was really scary. It must have taken me over 50 turns to get through the German peninsula and to take a few cities from him. Every turn I would lose 3-4 tanks/modern armor, but I would also buy/build just as many, so it was simply a war of attrition. After I took out Munich and saw Enrico's border, I quickly signed peace with Germany and rushed to Venice, citadel-bombing him up to the city.