I am perhaps just a step ahead of you. My last game I wiped out the next-to-last enemy city in 1798, but that's about a hundred years ahead of my previous best.
My deity game improved dramatically when I began to push the expansion. I'd always striven to build really good cities, placed to allow complete growth without overlap or wasted spaces. I still haven't managed to break the bounds and explode into Dave's true ICS strategy, but I believe that if I did, my game would improve even more. Why? Civ is all about choosing the right investments with the highest payoffs. On average, nothing pays off better than a new city, because that new city is the source of all production, including other new cities. Even if you don't want to build a lot of cities and get stuck with lots of management, you should still probably build your first 6-12 cities as fast as possible, even though it means forgoing lots of other stuff that has great value. Cities have greater value.
My power skyrockets in the Middle Ages when I've finally got Michelangelo and trade enhancers in place so that I can switch to republic and celebrate most of my cities every turn. I don't hurry to get to republic, but explosive growth under representative government is a huge factor in my game.
If you haven't already, study happiness. Outraged citizens become valuable when you treat them well; they turn happy with just two luxuries, rather than four (or six, as you might expect). This allow your cities to celebrate and grow with relatively few luxuries. This is one of the biggest advantages of huge expansion: more outraged citizens who readily become happy.
But what do I know? Many people here say that fundamentalism is by far the easiest way to win; I've never played it. Most people seem to think that trade caravans are the most important thing in the game; I almost never build a caravan for anything but to build a Wonder from. I've got to work on my roundedness.
My deity game improved dramatically when I began to push the expansion. I'd always striven to build really good cities, placed to allow complete growth without overlap or wasted spaces. I still haven't managed to break the bounds and explode into Dave's true ICS strategy, but I believe that if I did, my game would improve even more. Why? Civ is all about choosing the right investments with the highest payoffs. On average, nothing pays off better than a new city, because that new city is the source of all production, including other new cities. Even if you don't want to build a lot of cities and get stuck with lots of management, you should still probably build your first 6-12 cities as fast as possible, even though it means forgoing lots of other stuff that has great value. Cities have greater value.
My power skyrockets in the Middle Ages when I've finally got Michelangelo and trade enhancers in place so that I can switch to republic and celebrate most of my cities every turn. I don't hurry to get to republic, but explosive growth under representative government is a huge factor in my game.
If you haven't already, study happiness. Outraged citizens become valuable when you treat them well; they turn happy with just two luxuries, rather than four (or six, as you might expect). This allow your cities to celebrate and grow with relatively few luxuries. This is one of the biggest advantages of huge expansion: more outraged citizens who readily become happy.
But what do I know? Many people here say that fundamentalism is by far the easiest way to win; I've never played it. Most people seem to think that trade caravans are the most important thing in the game; I almost never build a caravan for anything but to build a Wonder from. I've got to work on my roundedness.
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