Emperor+ experiences?

[Shaka II]

+12 for Isabella, but what are the negatives? Don't know, but it seems that it should be enough. The size of your army is a big deterrent. I usually give in to the Ai's request for a gift or tech, if there's an implied threat and I'm not in a fighting position.

It sure is nice to have a tech bribe in case you're sneak attacked. Just as I finished with Ghandi, Napoleon invades again, so astronomy to Mao brought him into the battle. I could have done it without him, but I wasn't about to take the chance. Darn Mao razed Paris before I could capture it. I suspect a few wonders were lost. But the rest of France was mine for the cost of astronomy.

[Blake]

+12 for Isabella, but what are the negatives?

+12 is net. +13, -1 . I think she likes me.

[Shaka II]

Wow! I always wanted to see what she was like when she was friendly.

[Saurus]

Originally posted by xxFlukexx
Yeah I play on Emperor and see a lot of what Saurus has posted. Mainly #1 is what destroys most of my games. I have a screenshot of a massive war between me and Montezuma that just won't end. I mean I had a respectable army, Monty didn't even take one city, but some line was crossed going from Monarch to Emperor and I just can't keep a large enough army to keep the aggressive civs from attacking me.

In fact I think this, that the A.I attacks so very very early is a bit game ruining. Emperor is supposed to be challenging ... but sometimes you will lose early regardless of what you do. In this regard I think the game design regarding emperor level is somewhat flawed.

A.I Alexander is the perfect example of this.
He is very warlike and choses his victims carefully.
He will almost always favor attacking the human because the human (due to game mechanics and A.I bonuses at emperor level) will be weakest during the first turns.
Starting near Alexander dooms you to a certain death
at the very moment game starts regardless of what you do.
You can start building up you army on turn 1 sure ... and you may have all that Iron and horses near your capital ... Alexander will destroy you anyway becouse of the huge extra bonuses the A.I is getting that affect early game and there is just nothing you can do to stop it from happening.
Even if you focus on a large and powerful army, he will outnumber you greatly becouse of the production-curve bonus the A.I is getting.
You cannot deflect this attack against another opponent as there is nothing to bribe with during the first turns of the game. And no one is coming to assist you for the same reason.
I no longer play games were Alexander is in - If Alexander turns up, I will restart

However, if Alexander is not in and no other A.I decide to wipe you out during the first few turns of the game, emperor is nice and challening level.
I was 2 turns away from my first emperor victory yesterday and I lost becouse of bad luck only ... my last great person (80% prob for an Artist) turned out to be a merchant instead. Should it have been an Artist my third city would achieved that legendary culture and I would have won a cultural victory ...

[uberfish]

I finally beat immortal as Japan (continents, standard) Started on a continent with Mao, Alex, Genghis.

I didn't found any religions, just let Mao spread Judaism to me and converted, this kept me in the tech trading game. Mao looked to be taking too much of a tech lead so I built up a large force of samurai, cats, pikes and longbows and took all his good cities after suffering horrible attrition to defending cats and Chu-ko-nu, then went into spaceship builder mode.

Meanwhile Genghis and Alex would occasionally demand tribute, so I eventually bribed Genghis with a couple of techs to declare war on Alex, which ensured both of them would be too busy to attack me. After that war ended, I bribed Genghis to start it again. Alex eventually managed to kick Genghis off the continent altogether and predictably attacked me even though he had cavalry against tanks by that stage. Won that war easily, and launched spaceship in 1850.

Lately I'm pretty happy to have Genghis around so I can bribe him to attack other AI.

[Marid Audran]

Managed to beat Immortal, eh? That's quite a feat. Now the first person to beat Diety with standard settings, where it's supposed to be really mean (and largely based on luck), will have accomplished the unthinkable...

[solo]

Several of us have been playing many OCC games at the top three levels. Included are a number of Immortal and Deity SS wins using standard sized maps. For details and save files from these games, see my OCC thread in the Strategy Forum.

[trev]

I have won on emperor using Washington (Financial, Organised). I build a few cities quickly, not necessarily filling all the available space, then build barracks and offensive units of the best type available. I will then choose a nearby civ to attack, at this stage of the game they will have 2 archers at most in their cities, so the capture of 1 or 2 cities is easy. I then make peace and maybe repeat later against them or against another civ. The choice of civ to attack is often one with a relatively high score, sometimes top score. The surprise attack is always successful, and as well as slowly expanding my number of cities, it also prevents 1 civ from becoming a runaway leader. I attack early because they are generally still focussing on expansion and therefore are not yet highly militarized, it is even better if the barbs have founded cities as they are distracted and send their spare units there making an assault on the AI even easier. I never assault a barb city myself, it is better to le the AI's have a distraction.
Because I will build no wonders until relatively late in the game I can build sufficient units for a war and still build libraries and courthouses etc for my own cities. Once catapults are available I will build plenty of them, to bring city defences to zero and as suicide units for collateral damage so my regular units win almost all the time and therefore can get highly promoted.
I am a builder by nature, but I have found an aggressive edge is necessary for the emperor level, all my wins have been via the spaceship race, I always leave all victory conditions on. Also I try to trade with 2 or 3 civs only the whole game, so they are more willing to trade their techs with me, often choosing some lessor early civs for the trading privilege, this helping also to prevent my trading partners becoming a runaway leader. The civs chosen to trade with must also be friendly with each other for best trading opportunites.

[redstar05]

ive won a couple of deity games as the japanese on standard maps. I was at the bottom for the most of the game and was attacked all the time. At about 1700 AD, I was the first to get tanks and had about 15 before anyone else got them. I managed to wipe out everyone on my continent and won a Space Victory in 1806.

[Saurus]

Originally posted by player1
I don't know, but usually every time I tried to get early religion on Emperor (when starting with Mysticism) I succeeded and then lost the game due to serious laging because of not reaserching proper techs at proper times.

That exactly is the problem.
Trying to get an early religion forces you to comprimize with the other early techs a bit too much and becouse of the horrible upkeep cost, it will take forever to get the other early techs.

I do not try to get those early religions anymore.
Nowadays I almost always try to grab Confusiasm instead using the Oracle.
Doing this you do not need to head for mysticism instantly but can (depending on the ammount of gold you can get from your starting city + villages) research two or three other badly needed techs before starting to prepare for the Oracle by researching Mysticism + Meditation and Priesthood (while building the oracle, research Writing). When you have researched writing, chop some trees to quick-build what remanins of the oracle.
Confusiasm has the additional advantage of giving you 1 free missionairy.
Use this missionairy to convert any of your neighbour not yet having a religion to become your friend.

As with anything else, this does not always work.
Use the time as your guide ... the year 1500BC is critical .. after this there is risk of an A.I finishing the oracle every turn.
Under some odd cirmustances some religious A.I freak may even actually beat you to Confuciasm by actually researching it it the normal way before you have the oracle built.

Failing to get Confuciasm dooms you to a game whitout a religion of your own as grabbing Taoism by researhing is almost impossible.

[Shaka II]

You must not be playing pangea then. You'll always get reasonably early religion on a pangea map. And diplomatically, its advantageous to adopt the religion of your nearest strong neighbor, especially if it's Alexander. It can be very bad to found Confucianism and adopt that when Alexander is Buddhist. He doesn't need much to set himself off, and that will do it, especially if your borders are touching, and you look weak.

But I agree about going for the Oracle to get CoL, epecially if you're isolated on continents, or similar map. It's a great path, that works on emperor, and doesn't stunt your growth or tech development. And then using the GP to snag CS after that.