What's the highest difficulty level you can win on at least 90% of the time?

Installing and patching, I'd say that I can manage about 90% :p

As for playing, Warlord 90%+, Noble 80%+, and sadly, no Prince wins yet (4 tries, though. A girl can hope.)
 
I'm a little surprised @ the # of deity-class players here saying emperor and unsure on immortal. Does this mean that if I can get close to 90% on immortal that I should consider playing more deity :sad:? Deity seems completely ridiculous, while on immortal I struggle a bit. It's hard to imagine immortal ever being EASY on a consistent basis (given random maps), but still...
 
I find the only reason I lose on Immortal is an early uncontrollable DoW that sets me back or a crippling starting position or geographic location. Other than screwy random factors it's almost impossible to lose. Although I have limited success on Deity I just don't find the level to be very much fun because unless I have an extraordinary start and surrounding land I am usually forced to play what I like to call a Deity Specific strategy.
 
Being stuck on a barren island with no way out before astronomy, being choked without strategic resources, barbarian uprisings, the freak ultra-early war declaration, being the target of a holy dogpile, probability having its way with me in a string of unlikely combat losses... any of these might cost me the game.
This is before goofing around, making bone-headed mistakes, abandoning not-obviously-won games in disgust and new tricks not working out as well as hoped. This probably adds up to more than 10% even though I dominate the majority of Immortal games completely.

And Deity to me still feels like a wholly different game, one I usually find less fun and play mostly for variety. I can't imagine moving up there as my default level, even though I have a respectable chance if I take my time.
 
I'm a little surprised @ the # of deity-class players here saying emperor and unsure on immortal. Does this mean that if I can get close to 90% on immortal that I should consider playing more deity :sad:? Deity seems completely ridiculous, while on immortal I struggle a bit. It's hard to imagine immortal ever being EASY on a consistent basis (given random maps), but still...

Sometimes you get really f**ked up by the map generator. :cry: Aggressive AI and having 3 AI's with the Aggressive trait on your continent with no one else but you nearby ....
 
Sometimes you get really f**ked up by the map generator. :cry: Aggressive AI and having 3 AI's with the Aggressive trait on your continent with no one else but you nearby ....

Wouldn't two AIs be surrounded by the third AI?

:crazyeye:
 
They could form a triangle around you. It would suck pretty hard if it occurred...but AGG AI is hardly a standard setting! If we're allowed custom options...even ones that are HoF allowable, I can definitely say immortal, right as I put gandhi and freddy on a tiny map and axe rush them on marathon with no barbs :p.

We have to assume some kind of settings here or people in DMOCs or even my class would win deity everytime (duel, marathon, inca, no barbs).
 
After a few quick read through various post I was very surpise that I misunderstood and, underestimated cottages and how they work. Seriously LOL, big WTH, I was ignorant of the fact commerce comes from them because I never built them by myself manually, this is because I would automate any workers as soon as they are build, and I dont even built enough of them. I win Noble with this but only on prince sometimes. Then after learning that better micro is needed with workers(I initially thought automate workers meant they will perform the best actions available all the time), and the importance of Great People, LOL, my skill jumped instantly to win monarch easily, and haven't lost any games yet on that difficulty... Only tried emperor a few times, and won because of the chaotic nature of the game. It was standard size pangea and throughout the whole game at least two AI's are at war with another at a time, AI's have been at wars multiple times, and it was very chaotic which allowed me to even out-tech the AI's many times. Emperor is probably 50/50 for me but i dont play emperor much because I dont like too much planning and warring.

At emperor I hate it the most when a single or most AI's dont declare early wars and sit around outpacing me. I usually have to resort to a specific strategy to win the game (war early and have big land). So I stick with monarch because its funner to me, I just like to build, usually only go to war to have the same amount of land as the strongest AI's, and win through peaceful conditions.
 
CIV "standard setting" is: normal speed, normal size continents (or possibly fractal) at normal sealevel/etc, standard boxes, random civ, random opponents (default # for map size), no regen/no reload.

I personally consider a level mastered when I win 10 games under those settings in a row, I did that a long time ago for vanilla immortal, and I fully expect to win at least 90% on BtS immortal.

Vanilla/Warlords deity was a different matter tho. The best Warlords deity Apollo dates I've seen beat BtS deity worst Liberalism dates I've heard of, go figure. I've also seen vanilla/Warlords deity lead me with dozens of techs, get Liberalism in the BCs, insta-upgrade to longbows and then to riflemen at impossible dates, settle cities all over in no time, have its cities grow to 20 and then 30 at even more impossible dates, have hundreds and hundreds of units on normal size maps, you name it.

I learned a lot about rushing, blocking, squeezing the most out of little land, the technology catchup game, leveraging a minute military advantage, managing diplo, and surviving when diplo fails while playing Warlords. For all that, I have no "standard settings" games won on vanilla/Warlords deity, at the very least I selected a powerhouse civ like Inca/Egypt/Persia/Rome or Liz England.

BtS deity is harder than any Immortal, yet a lot more forgiving than its pre-Blake AI counterparts.

Take for instance the Dual Deity Challenge - a lot of players won at least one of the games, some won both. Granted, Epic made it easier, and Tectonics might have helped too, but it wasn't far removed from "standard" and we had many wins.

Then we had the Ultimate Warmonger challenge: stuck on pangea with all the aggressive warmongers, and again we had winning submissions. In my game in particular, I rushed an AI, fought off two others, completed two wonders and two national wonders, got Music first, got tech parity/in position for tech superiority by the early ADs...back on Warlords it would be unthinkable to simultaneously win wars v multiple AIs, complete wonders, and get ahead in tech.

That's why I believe 90% victory rate on "standard settings" BtS deity is within the reach of "perfect human play".
 
Well if it's not 90% on Monarch it's damn close. Monarch's a total bore for me.

I'm at a strange place with emperor now. On one hand, it should be interesting because every time I start a new game I know that it could easily go either way...but really it just depends on the map. Food and the right neihgbor combonation = win, low food and the wrong neighbor combonation = loss. I have a feeling if I ever win with low food or the wrong neihgbor combonation, emperor will be the new monarch.
 
For me, Monarch. It's still a challenge, and I don't have enough time to micromanage and improve my game to be a top contender. I haven't tried anything above Monarch yet.

I think I have won every Monarch game after my first three, where I learned that always refusing AI demands and telling them to stuff it just wasn't as viable of a strategy any more. Technically, I didn't play until I lost my last city, but I saw the writing on the wall with three enemy SODs that I couldn't defeat invading me from all sides. Now that my diplomacy is better, I can handle it with a little flair.
 
Consistently win on Monarch. I can win on Emperor, but the micro just sort of sucks the enjoyment out of the game for me. I've tried two Immortal games one of which I actually made a respectable effort before losing (the other I got slapped around like a red headed step child). :)
 
Gonna hop on the emperor wagon as well, barring any completely f*cked up random stuff its a 100% win. Begun recently to play immortal, its a lot harder would say 20% wins but definitely improving! So here is to hoping :)
 
Installing and patching, I'd say that I can manage about 90% :p

As for playing, Warlord 90%+, Noble 80%+, and sadly, no Prince wins yet (4 tries, though. A girl can hope.)

I remember when you couldn't win a Noble game to save your life; Prince will inevitably succumb. :)
 
I remember when you couldn't win a Noble game to save your life; Prince will inevitably succumb. :)
Yessir, I have improved. :)

Hopefully it won't take four months to win on the new level this time. :blush:
 
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