How to win Sid Meier’s Civilization II at Deity level

If you struggle to win Civ2 at Deity level you might want to read this.

In the early phase of the game, expand as fast as possible.

Your first city should produce one Warrior, who should immediately seek out a village and then another Warrior to maintain order.

Use the Warrior to achieve scientific advancements and gold from villages. Unless you consider it cheating, save before entering a village and reload if the result doesn’t satisfy you. Also, if you want to know where the villages are you might want to save the very first round, cheat, reveal the map and take a screenshot of it. Finally reload. It takes a little bit of the thrill away though.

Believe me, you don’t want a friendly unit. It will cost shields one of your cities and sometimes even create waste which will force you to disband it anyway or worse the game will disband another unit on your behalf which you have valued more. Very rarely, at the deity level that is, will you get a unit that does not need support from any city (a NONE unit). A NONE settler is of course also valuable because it allows you to build roads and irrigation without costing food and shields any city. Therefore, do not build a city with this settler as building a city causes the settler do disappear.

In the meantime produce a Settler. Once the population of your city reaches two rearrange tiles so that it yields as many shields as possible. Don’t mind if food production is low or zero.

Use the Settler to establish a new city and repeat the procedure above. Try not to overlap city areas but at the same time try to get as much special resources as possible. Also note that cities that have access to sea can build more improvements later in the game (e.g. Harbor) and each sea tile yields two trades. Whale areas are preferable.

At this stage you might want to avoid contact with other civilizations. At least in the Gold Edition (which I assume you play in single player mode) the AI always dislikes you and does everything to start a war.

Once you have two or three cities use the one that has the most production potential to build a wonder. Build a temple and keep two defensive units in it. This will allow it to grow to size 4 and with Oracle built 6. If you got hills nearby, build mines.

Wonders you want to have are those which keep your citizens content and happy. Therefore, you want to build Oracle, Hanging Gardens, Michelangelo Chapel.

Later in the game Adam Smith’s Trading Co. will be essential to keep your finances intact.

If you are on an island and there is another civilization on it, you want to destroy it as quickly as possible. Use Legion, Elephants or Crusaders. If it’s a very early built city an Archer will be enough and if you are extremely lucky you will find an unguarded city in which case a Warrior will do.

Generally speaking you don’t have any chance to maintain peace. However, do wait for others to declare war or demand tribute to provoke it. If you have a Spotless reputation you will sometimes find one civilization conveniently situated behind your enemy which is willing to sign a strategic alliance with you. It will distract your enemies on one side while you attack on the other.

At the point you have 5–10 cities and discovered Monotheism you can use one or two cities to build wonders, two or three cities two produce Caravans which will help you build said wonders and finally the remaining cities to build Barracks and Crusaders. Triremes in case you need to attack another island. Now it’s the time to conquer.

Remember, the advances you want are Monarchy — in order to choose a better government type, Monotheism — to produce powerful units (Crusaders) and any advancement that will give you wonders you need and better your finances. King’s Richard Crusade is a nice addition to that because it allows one city to produce wonders at a fast pace.

Use Caravans to help build wonders and boost trade.

I usually switch from Monarchy directly to Fundamentalism foregoing Republic once all civilizations that aren’t democracies have been destroyed. Some people like to switch to the Republic as soon as possible in order to earn a lot of gold. That’s of course in theory a good idea. You want to have a lot of money in order to be able to incite revolts in rival cities rather than having to go through the excruciating process of attacking each city with eight or so crusaders.

In theory there is no difference between theory and practice but in practice there is. You will be constantly at war and under Republic units don’t establish martial law in a city (hence, you will have disorders). Each unit under Republic cost a shield, whereas, under Monarchy three are for free. Not to mention Fundamentalism where you get 10 units for free.

Anyways, try to be at war only with one civilization at a time and have it declare the war. Trade with others. Gain scientific achievements, earn money, expand. Favor buying cities in order to save time (incite a revolt). If you need to conquer a city, traditionally destroy city walls first (use diplomats and spies after you have discovered Espionage).

Accept the fact that you won’t have it all. At least, as wonders are concerned. You probably got used to being the first to build every wonder on every level but it’s not going to be the case on Deity. Just focus on the important ones.

A side remark about settings. I like to set the barbarian level to villages only. The reason is that even though I lose 50 points I am not annoyed with a horde appearing here and there. It’s time consuming and doesn’t add anything to game play value. Sure it’s challenging the first time but after a couple of times it’s just a pesky task to kill them. No fun, no challenge, just annoying.

Other settings are pretty much default. Normal map size, 7 civilizations, standard rules, etc. I don’t have time to play long games these days so I never play on the bigger map. I recently tried the small map. I find it the most fun. On Deity it will still take at least 8 hours to finish but you avoid the long and tedious wars with other civilizations.

Finally, once there is only one enemy city left. Leave it. Don’t capture it. Sign peace. You don’t want to win like that. You want the additional 400 points from sending your spaceship to Alpha Centauri. Also, at this point set luxuries to the highest possible level (where you don’t lose money). Population will burst. Under Democracy a city that celebrates the president day grows by one.

Hope this helps.

Comment below if you find this helpful. Has any of the tips made you win?