Despotism Challenge

[Kull]

In the "Fundamentalism is too Powerful" thread, Father Beast harkened back to the days of Civ1 and the "Despotic Conquest" strategy (conquering the world in BC using Chariots and Catapults). He also mentioned that waste levels in Civ2 effectively killed it off. Still....

We all know that the AI is hopeless, and people keep coming up with new challenges to make things interesting. Has anyone ever suggested the "Despotic Government Only" challenge? Has anyone tried it? It sounds excruciatingly difficult...especially at Deity.

[Smash]

http://apolyton.net/forums/Forum3/HT...tml?date=00:47

No cities so government, if changed(maybe get monarchy in a hut or thru capture), wouldn't matter.

[Kull]

Technically speaking, Vik did win at Despotism, but playing without cities really makes it a completely different challenge.

I've been testing it out for a few hours, and it's definitely not easy. A few comments for those who may want to try this:

1) WLTDD is helpful because it allows irrigation and mining to actually work! The only way to pull this off in the early game is with Hanging Gardens.

2) Get as many techs from goody huts as possible and try to get Great Library. You'll lose the science battle in a hurry, otherwise.

Note: Playing MGE, Deity, 7 civs, huge map, raging hordes.

[Father Beast]

Kull,
I looked at the link smash gave and saw it was much like the nomads challenge we've heard about lately. not what you were talking about really...

How about courthouses? in civ1, the rule was for no improvements except barracks, but this might be modified to allow courthouses to stem the waste problem.
and ICS, of course, though we wonder if it can truly be considered a cheat when your max city size is around 5 or 6.
I'm still playing my "endless cold war" game into the 2500's and I'll leave you to the research. But I'll be listening.