Very short summary for Deity Level

[GeoffB]

This is for playing against the AI at deity level.

1) At the start of the game maximize food for growth.

2) When you get swordsmen (or Mounted Warrior if you're Iroquois), go to war. Make sure you have an ancient-era unique unit.

3) Keep fighting until you get a great leader. Use it to build your forbidden palace.

4) When the AI gets musketmen, stop fighting and start building improvements. By this time you should be one of the larger civs on the map.

5) Concentrate on catching up in science. Don't fight too much, but try to make your rivals fight each other, and then take advantage of the situation.

6) Build Theory of Evolution. This may be the first great wonder you build, and it should give you the lead in science.

7) Once you have the lead in science, the world is your oyster. You can win the space race but it's faster to just build a lot of tanks and win by conquest.

 

[tupaclives]

I disagree with 2) you do not need an AA Unique unit.
UU's are not necessary to win at deity. I've won at it with the English, with Russia, with America, with France and with China. None of them have a UU and yet can all win at deity. Do agree that you need AA war though in most cases.

Why stop when the AI gets muskets? Whats wrong with knights? Why not use cats to soften them up first?

Also why keep fighting till you get a Great Leader for the FP? It is still just as easy (ok maybe not just as easy but pretty close) to win by handbuilding the FP.

Agree with your other points, although my first Deity game was as the French with no food bonuses at the start when I didn't war till the middle ages (started when the AI got muskets) got no great leaders the entire game and didn't build any wonder apart from the UN and still won (diplo victory) so just because you miss a wonder or dont have an AA UU or take a while to war, does not mean its impossible to win.

Still I do agree in principle with most of your points.

 

[GeoffB]

Tupac,

You're right, this is not the only way to win, but I think this strategy makes it easier to win and get a good score. You don't need an ancient era UU, but if you're doing a lot of fighting at that time anyway, it helps. And you don't need a great leader to build your FP, but if you can get a great leader early in the game, I think that's the best thing to do with it, rather than build an army or whatever.

The reason I say stop fighting when the AI gets musketmen is that if you start fighting when you get swordsmen, you will be overextended by that time, and meanwhile the AI is getting ahead in technology. At first it's easy going when they only have spearmen. Pikemen give you more trouble, but you can win with acceptable losses. But when you go up against musketmen you will lose units faster than your enemy, and you can't keep that up for long. And if you have been concentrating all that time on war instead of development, you probably won't even have knights by the time they get musketmen.

 

[rysingsun]

aa wars are one strategy for winning on deity.

they are not the only strategy.

i rarely fight in the aa on deity and they are by far the majority of my games. my strategy for a long time has been to build no army at all until the industrial age. but that's just me.

 

[GeoffB]

Rysingsun,

I am fascinated - how do you do it? If you have no army, why don't the other civs attack you and wipe you out? And if you don't expand by conquest, you won't have many cities. How do you earn enough income to keep up in science? This is deity level you're talking about, right?