Tips for Immortal (post-patch)

[Sublime82]

Hello,

I recently reinstalled Civ V and lately have been having some frustrating experiences in immortal. Prior to the patch, I found immortal to be a perfect level of difficulty, especially in the early game. Now I still enjoy the early immortal rush period and have no problem keeping up and thriving, but the problem is now the midgame!

I was playing as the Dutch on a standard continents map earlier and by turn 150 I noticed Sweden was definitely beginning to runaway. I made peace with Ethiopia after taking one of their cities but getting stuck at the capital (+20% bonus and mehal sefaris, wasn't going to happen). At this time I also worked with Sweden to take out the Incans who were wedged in between us, with me taking their cap.

By time I got all my ducks in a row to move on Sweden, it was around turn 185. However, by this point Sweden had basically filled up every tile with hakkapeliitta and caroleans. Even with my army of gats and riflemen and later several artillery, this led to a stalemate that basically lasted 40 turns, with me killing 2-3 units a turn and Sweden spam buying them as fast as I eliminated them. Eventually I managed to break the stalemate with gw infantry and took one of his major cities, but at this time he researched flight and started buying 3 gw bombers a turn and began decimating my army. Despite me killing literally dozens of units, his army had only gotten stronger. I rage quit shortly after in frustration.

My basic question is, how can one deal with the unit spam now found on immortal and up? I've won one other game on immortal recently with Ethiopia but I didn't have to deal with a strong runaway on my own continent. This loss was infuriating because not only did I have a strong start and felt I played a strong game, but also I found el dorado grrrr! I typically play a 4-5 city tradition opening and then go warring until I conquer my continent, then I bust out a diplomacy victory after glassing the dominant civs on the other continent with my nuclear weapons. I have no problems with science or gpt... just the unbeatable ai unit spam. Also emperor is simply far too easy so the option of going down a difficulty isn't really viable.

Any ideas or general strategies are greatly appreciated!

 

[ense7en]

Immortal's gotten a lot tougher post-patch.

I personally haven't actually played too much of Immortal since, because of the exact reasons you described.

The AI seems to be becoming runaways even sooner than normal, which makes it extremely hard to deal with, since once they have their 15-20+ cities, it's insanely tough to compete with them on unit production.
And with them rush-spending all their gold, or most of it, on units now, it's actually impossible to match how many they can pump out once it reaches that point.

I'd say it's imperative one deals with that runaway BEFORE they get to that breaking point.
Paying them off and others off to be at war constantly might help slow them down, and result in a few less cities for you to conquer?


If you aren't going domination, getting to your science or diplo win faster might be necessary.
IOW, get your science output up even quicker, and try to maintain parity or tech lead.
It sounds like you were a bit behind in tech in that game, and unfortunately being a bit behind in key techs like Flight is sometimes all it takes.
If you are ahead in tech, assuming you can hold off being over-run, then you can win other ways and not worry about needing to take out the runaways...

Or make sure you get to Atomic Theory and Nuclear Fission first, and you'll be able to clear out a lot of unit spam in a hurry, including his planes.

 

[chazzycat]

I think you might have underestimated the impact of tech level on that game. Flight is simply a huge tech for wartime...like dynamite before artillery got nerfed. If there is a runaway you kind of have to beeline it to keep them at bay. The AI will spam units but they don't use them well...a couple well-position fighters will kill all their bombers. So maybe it was your tech path, not necessarily your BPT.

in general for offensive wars you want to be ahead in tech, not behind or at parity when the opponent has a good UU. you probably shouldn't attack caroleans with rifles. caroleans are perfect for the AI because their units will just heal regardless of their crappy tactics, so you need a bit more firepower to take them down.

 

[The Pilgrim]

Hi Sublime82! Welcome to CFC! A lot of newcomers here lately.

You are not, nor ever will be able to outmatch AI units spam, especially now when it spends all its gold on even more units. Thus you have to focus on having better army rather than larger. Gaining tech lead is still relatively easy. If you stick to common Tradition start, i.e. few strong core cities, by the mid-Renaissance you should surpass AI in techs and have no further problems in conquering whatever you want. Usually it's also better not to wait that long but trim your neighbors earlier with composite bowmen. By doing this you're getting more cities (= more science, culture, production, cash flow), clearing the territory for future expansion, securing your borders and providing extra XP to your units. If you plan on domination anyways, there are no downsides. When you manage all of these, have your National College up, cities happy and growing and tech-wise closing on Education before turn 100, the game is practically over.
Another key concept is bribing AI into war with each other (seems like I'm saying this a lot these days ). Bribe them hard, bribe them often. They'll waste units on their fellows and will build even more units which will eventually cause their economy to collapse. And you also can join in and snipe cities as you wish, because units or no units, AI is still horrible at combat. Hope this helps. If not, consider posting a save file. Can never hurt.
Good luck!

 

[Sublime82]

Thanks for the insight guys. I actually did have decent science output and already had flight researched, but I now see that I was severely underutilizing this technology and underestimating its use in the hands of an ai. If I had a chance to replay I would have built several fighters for defence and seen where that might have gotten me. Next time I will definitely make sure I'm prepared.

I think the main turning point was when I was sitting outside of Ethiopia's cap when he upgraded to mehal sefaris, so I was forced to back off and wasn't able to get as large of a puppet empire early as I like. Oh, and of course Sweden had himeji castle and honor in addition to the other combat bonuses caroleans get.

I'll definitely be trying some of these suggestions; I particularly like bribing the ai. I've dabbled in this a little, but hadn't really considered the full potential. If someone has to have a stalemate for 40 turns, better them than me.

 

[Moriarte]

Would like to add to what Pilgrim said. Bribing strong AI vs weak AI is sometimes a terrible idea. It is better to bribe strong AI vs strong AI, cause its likely both of them will just lose units (not cities). Make sure you have a scout in between their lands though. (to watch the epic battle)

Like my yesterdays Deity game with Isabella. Turn 200 i unlock bombers and have a worldwide science lead. 6 cities of my own. Flourishing. Dreaming of world conquest. 6 promoted bombers and 6 Rocket Artilleries. Askia's 2 cities to the north. Pacal's 4 cities to south. Askia is in between me and Sejong. Pacal is in between me and Nebuchadnezar. So, i pay Sejong to DoW Askia and pay Neb. to fight Pacal. 15 turns later both Sejong and Neb. DoW me cause we are now immediate neighbors and both Askia and Pacal are dead. Meh.

10 turns later i realize i can't win both wars and quit ...

 

[The Pilgrim]

Would like to add to what Pilgrim said. Bribing strong AI vs weak AI is sometimes a terrible idea. It is better to bribe strong AI vs strong AI, cause its likely both of them will just lose units (not cities). Make sure you have a scout in between their lands though. (to watch the epic battle)

True. Handing to a runaway more cities on a silver platter is not the best possible idea, to say the least. But a runaway AI will consider itself stronger than everybody including second best military, so it'll be willing to DoW whoever you choose, given the right circumstances. Thus it's pretty effective to bribe the strongest AI to attack the second strongest, the second strongest to attack the third strongest etc. Ideally everybody will be at war with everybody and you're left alone to wonder whore.