I'm seeing a pattern in my games

[Ray K]

Note, this is for Tiny & crowded maps:

1. build a barracks
2. make early contact with your worker, trade for warrior code
3. crank out veteran archers
4. sweep through the continent with 4-5 of them.
5. use your first leader to build pyramids in one turn
6. starting building your empire to get temples and mapmaking
7. yawn
8. build galleons, repeat with swordsmen
9. upgrade offensive units as necessary

Here's a nice trick. Say you've got the Babylonians down to one city. Offer peace and take every advance, communication, worker and gold piece he has (he'll gladly do it). Presto! In one fell swoop, you've caught up in the tech race and more than made up for your early lack of science.

Then take the city. What kind of a king gives away all of his leverage, anyway?

[Skeeve]

Ray,
I think I can vouch for that strategy. The first map I played was on a Tiny Crowded world and I found the other civs to be quite militarily weak. Well, probably because I was playing on Chieftan level to get a feel for the game. But I wasn't focusing on military either.

Anyway, do you think it would work on the tougher levels?

[Ray K]

Originally posted by Skeeve
Ray,
I think I can vouch for that strategy. The first map I played was on a Tiny Crowded world and I found the other civs to be quite militarily weak. Well, probably because I was playing on Chieftan level to get a feel for the game. But I wasn't focusing on military either.

Anyway, do you think it would work on the tougher levels?

Well, Regent is a cakewalk like this, I'll try it on Monarch next.

The nice thing about this strategy is the one-turn Wonders you get from the leaders

[David Weldon]

Skeeve,

So far the consensus seems to be that this is the almost the only way to have a chance at Deity.

Of course the specifics can vary, but even on larger maps, it is essential to conduct a very early grunt rush and take neighboring civ's cities and tech from them before they can take too much advantage of their bonus production and overwhelm you. It helps if you fight without losing units (read: use fast units), but only with this bonus popluation base and the increased economy that comes with it can you keep up with the AI later in the game.

[Yohan]

I waged war for 5 centuries, taking over half of a large continent in the process, but didn't get a single leader. That's nuts. I was playing with the Egyptians--religious, industrious. Even though I wasn't militaristic, you'd think I'd get at least 1 leader. Nope. That strategy depends on a random occurrence: leaders.

[Skeeve]

It might be very tough to play on the DEITY level on a HUGE world with only a few Civs - such as 3-5.

In this situation, you might never run into anyone to wage war with for so long that by the time you do they will already be too powerful. On the other hand.... perhaps you could just focus on relentless expansion, building settler after settler and so on.

[David Weldon]

Yohan:
I don't think the strategy depends on great leaders, but they definitely help if you get them. I normally use my first to rush build the FP instead of a granary, however. In my view the important part is not the specifics of his list, but the spirit of early domination before the AI is ready to defend himself.

Skeeve:
I assume that you increase the # of players as you increase map size. If you try playing Deity on Huge with only 3 civs, I think you're done for. No matter how fast you try to expand, the AI does it much faster, and they'll steamroll you once you finally make contact. Without the ability to basically merge two or three early civs into one almighty empire (making up in size what the AI gets in production and science bonuses), it will be extremely difficult to win at Deity. I'm sure people will do it but right now the early warfare tactic seems to be the one with which most people are having success.

[vmxa1]

Leaders are very hard to come by for me. I had 4 elite legionaries and they had many battles and none every made Leader and Romans are militaristic.
I thought you could not rush the Forbidden Place, it would not let do it.

[David Weldon]

Anyone want to take this? No one? OK, I'll answer:

There are things you can rush via normal methods (money or population), and there are things you can rush only by using a great leader (wonders, palace). The FP is considered a small wonder, and it can be rushed with a great leader (which is what I meant).

I agree that leaders are very rare, and that's why I mentioned it: because I think rushing an FP is a better use of a very limited commodity than rushing the pyramids is. Of course this depends on a whole bunch of factors, and thus the all-important phrase "I think" .

[Zanzin]

Even playing as a militaristic civilization (germany), I've found leaders rather hard to come by...only had 3 so far, and I've been at war for a long time.

I can't seem to get leaders when fighting barbarians either. Does anyone know about this?

[David Weldon]

Yes, in fact you have it exactly right. You can't get leaders from barbarians. You can only get them from real enemy civs.

[Enigma]

I agree with David that the FP is by far the best use, without using a great leader you can never build a FP in a corruption ridden city.

In my most recent game as Perisians I got 3! leaders before I made it halfway through the medieval age, I made an army, an FP, and rushed in the hanging gardens. The immortals help- once you get elite immortals enemy spearmen never stand a chance.

The probability of an elite Immortal beating a fortified regular spearman in combat (The AI almost never builds barracks) is 90%, plus immortals are good on defense. This is just a leader factory because your elite units are basically unbeatable if you make enough.

Even veteran immortals still have a 82% chance of beating veteran spearmen fortified in a city... I love da Persians.

The FP basically gave my economy and production a huge boost, now the area around my second capital is almost caught up to my main area in infrastructure, I am focusing on cash to help it catch up.

[Berzerker]

Can someone explain how to rush build a wonder with a leader? I followed the civilopedia's instructions to rush build Hoover with a leader and I kept getting the "cannot hurry the wonder" message.

[Grunthex]

Put the leader in the town. On his turn, look at the little icons at the bottom. One is 'Finish Production' or some such. There's a hotkey I don't remember, but if you click it, bam.

[kmj]

Originally posted by Enigma
I agree with David that the FP is by far the best use, without using a great leader you can never build a FP in a corruption ridden city.

With democracy and a courthouse, it's not so bad in a moderate sized city with a fair number of mountains. Still takes quite a while, but it can be done. Heck, just yesterday I got my first Great Leader ever, in any game. 'Course, I'm sure I've warred much less than most.