Diety and 1.21f help.

[Fishboot]

I've been playing Civ 3 avidly for a few months now, and I've become proficient at winning on Monarchy and Emperor (with a nice start). However, when I've attempted to move up to Deity, I've been hitting a brick wall. I can only win with Civs that have overpowered ancient UUs (Persians and Iroquois). A lot of the strategy on this forum seems to be based around things that no longer work in 1.21f. I was a big fan of the "Vassal state" strat on earlier patches, but peace renegotiation no longer seems to produce anything except from completely crippled one city civs, who don't have anything to take anyway.

Even beyond obsolete strategy, I really have no method of forming any kind of serious attack against a Diety level AI without powerful UUs. In a recent Japanese diety attempt (standard, default settings, 7 enemies) I managed to create a very dense build of seven cities in some decent starting grassland before being hemmed in by enormous AI civs; I made a small army of swordsmen and headed off to attack Persia. To my shock they had already filled up their 6+ size cities with musketman defenders and were effectively immune to my offense. I probably could have sped up my development by creating fewer cities, but beyond that I don't believe I could have gone much faster in my early game.

Is there some method I could use to get out of this "hemmed in, age-and-a-half-behind, dead before 0 AD" rut I've fallen into with deity?

[BillChin]

You might try Civfanatics. The May Game of the Month (GOTM) is Deity level, so download it and try it, then read the spoiler thread and see how the best players made easy work of the game.

Also check out the Hall of Fame power plays thread (do a search HOF, or power plays), and Greyfox's tournament. The tournament has an Emperor/Diety level. You'll get lots of good input from players in the tourney.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/

[DrSpike]

On deity build 3-4 cities and start churning out units. Either chariots to upgrade to horses, or warriors to upgrade to swordsman. As soon as you get iron working/horseback riding max cash for later upgrades. You should aim to have a large army to attack with by 1250BCish. Pick a neighbour and take their land/techs, you can leave them a couple of cities a la vassalisation if you want, I rarely bother any more. Then decide whether to continue conquering or settle down for a nice builder game. You should aim to be close to the AI in tech by AD, and shouldn't have any trouble keeping up after that with all the land you now have.