What type of victory do you find hardest to obtain?

[WJF]

Conquest. You need to do it so damn fast on most map types just to avoid domination victory. Even then the game is set up to stop early expansion so after winning two quick wars early on in the game, you have to then spend a hell of a lot of time scrabbling for cash to start another.

 

[Panda]

About 90% of my games ended in Domination victories. The game was always over before a Time victory.

 

[Chopperhead]

time is definatley the easiesest way to win. I have never lost if I could not manage to win another way and it came down to final score. spaceship would be the next easiest. Conquest would definatley be the hardest though without a doubt.

 

[JCricket]

Time, with absolutely no doubt, is the hardest, since it's the most boring way to win ever! I would lose my patience and quit pressing Enter a long time before 2050, so there is no chance for me to accomplish this one

 

[Thalassicus]

It's easy to win Conquest if you're already near the level of Domination. Raze all the cities you take after 50%, instead of capturing them, and you won't gain any more land area. You just need to plan staging areas for bombers, which is why you stop capturing everything at 50% if going for Conquest, giving you another 15% of leeway.

 

[LordKestrel]

I've won several times with every type except Diplo. I've yet to win that way, and it always ends up either becoming a time win/loss or a space win.

Cultural is somewhat broken unfortunately, if you're playing an occ, it should change the win condition from 3 cities to 1. By leaving it at 3 cities it's impossible for an occ game.

 

[Cyberstar]

I finally won my first cultural victory. I played a small world, warlord on quick and followed many of the guidelines on the post about how to win culturally (sorry I don't have the link, but it's in this strategy forum). Most were new ideas to me, many on how to specialize cities well. I had 6 cities and play Elizabeth. The red coats sure came in handy when I got invaded near the end by Montezuma's knights and calvary. But he gave up quickly because I had a defensive pact with America. I didn't get nearly as many great artists as I was hoping, only about 5. I think I got more great scientists. In my 3 top cities, after building everything of cultural importance, I turned on culture learning. I only built a couple of important wonders. I tried to build the parthenon, but was beat out. I did found two religions on my beeline toward philosophy. Isabella sent in her fighters on the turn that I won. Ha! It was the first time for me to see this victory movie. The downside is that my score was Dan Quayle. My final score was still lower than most of the other players, even though I won the game. It was 2038 or something like that.

It was a good learning experience, but I prefer a little bit more war along the way. In this game, I was working away just hoping that no one would invade until my fate was set. I prefer a stronger military.

 

[cfacosta]

Cultural is by far the hardest for me to win. If I ever try, this nauseous feeling builds up in my stomach. Eventually I buckle and declare war until I get the domination or conquest victory.

 

[LeSphinx]

For me, it's diplomacy.
As I play 2 game with no war from me.
I constructed the U.N. and was elected as secretary UN.
But in order to win by diplimacy, you need 3or4 civ voting for you between the 6 or 7 lefts!
It's very hard. even I try to give a lot of money and they still not vote for me!!!!

LeSphinx

 

[King Flevance]

I find Conquest the hardest as I always play on huge maps with 1 less player than default suggests for larger emipres. (Usually Huge map - 10 civs) Eradication of 1 empire is a gamelong Crusade without any help. BTW I LOVE that you can suggest a specific spot for an ally to focus his military on.

 

[flytyer]

I would also have to say that conquest is most difficult for me as well. The days of taking 2 or 3 units and being able to get an enemy city are over. Almost all units have an opposing unit that will cancel it out. You have to be very diverse in your war planning and it just takes so much time to do.

 

[Zhahz]

1. Diplo
2. Cultural

I think I could pull off cultural if I planned for it and executed the plan well, but since I've yet to even try it....that'd be a problem. It's just not that appealing of a victory type to me and some of the tactics one must emloy to setup a cultural victory go against my usual ways, making it difficult for me.

I stunk at diplo in Civ III and I continue to stink at diplo in Civ IV even though Civ IV diplo is vastly improved. I have this tendancy to crush my friend AIs since they're nearby and otherwise infuriate other AIs via refusing their incessant and idiotic demands, particularly on continent maps since I tend to like consolodating my starting continent under my own glorious rule. I mean, I almost always start off as friends with the others on my future continent but that all comes to a halt at some point - and the heathens you meet later rarely befriend you that late in the game. Even when I'm in a peaceful builder mode I usually feel the need to have a whole continent of my own - so I can build more!

I've had better luck on pangea maps where I might have enough friend AIs that they last a bit longer before assimilation. Even so, my few attempts at diplo victory have been miserable failures and I always felt lucky that I didn't lose after building the UN to the AI power that ended up in control.

 

[Deep_Blue]

I find diplomatic victory the hardest. When I try to plan for it from the beginnig I always end up with random results, for example in my last game I was supplying Spain with resources for 80 turns before I discover the are annoyed because I am their worst enemy!!! also I spread my state religion in USA and Russia using missionaries where both converted to my state religion automatically for few turns before adopting free religion civic just to annoy me .
It is very hard to make every one happy in civ4 , it is even hard to just make one leader friendly.

for cultural victory I thought it is impossible but I got one last night , It needs planning from the beginning where you have to choose techs and wonders carefully