Diety

[GAMER01]

Has anyone ever beaten the game on Deity difficulty?....without mods

[DerEider]

Setting up special starting circumstances & limiting victory conditions.
There are some Guides with suggestions. Check them out.

[Grendalcat]

That's the one level I never have tried. Maybe next game.

[Delfontes]

Lots have, there are may videos of people playing on diety without mods, Marbrozir has a lot of videos 8-9 years ago with most civs

[friend robocat]

usually through late era starts back in the day

[Blin Master]

Yeah I got the achievement as wel. Did it via World Leader votes. Just had diplomats in every AI's capital and was Allies with every single City state. The Diplomats count as votes when you get very late in the technology tree. It takes a while but AI seems to ignore votes a lot. Get the Forbidden Palace and finish the whole City-State policy tree. Try and keep culture up so there won't be a Tourism Victory made on you and keep good relations with the AI so they don't go to war with you. Make loads of trade routes to get gold to keep gifting to City-States and even to gift to warmongering AI's so they stay of your back.

[OwlRaider]

Many people do so, on a regular basis. There are many YouTube channels of people showing deity content, from guides to full game plays, with commentary of course. 1 of my personal favorites is PC J LAW, I learned a lot from his videos and if you're struggling with deity he's a great source of information.

[Peter Erasmus Lange-Muller]

I have, a number of times. Deity is certainly very difficult, and there are some circumstances which you really can't get around if you take a risk and it doesn't pay off (like going for a wonder that's key to your playstyle and getting it yoinked away one turn before completion.) But honestly the AI in CiV is exploitable and in some cases very, very dumb. There are a lot of different ways you can stack the deck in your favor even on Deity. Warfare is an obvious example; despite their numeric advantages and sometime unfair-feeling unit spam, the AI is not good at actually using it's units and can easily be baited into traps or simply whittled down with good use of ranged/naval ranged units.

In terms of civilizations to play, I really recommend Mongolia or Korea. I think they're the most guaranteed victories, Korea because of it's ridiculous UA, Mongolia because Keshiks are a win condition by themselves (the rest of Mongolia's kit is honestly pretty mediocre to bad, but Keshiks make up for it and then some.) There are other very, very good civilizations to get victories with though. Babylon is very similar to Korea with slightly different execution, Poland is an all around solid civilization with one of the best starting biases in the game. If you're feeling confident in your knowledge of game mechanics, I highly recommend Venice; they're probably one of the harder civilizations to use to their full potential, but in the right hands Venice is a monster.

[kkeday]

My first Diety win was on a dual map playing as England. The extra range with the Longbowmen & the Naval Advantages helped a lot.
I also remember winning the Korean Scenario on Diety. I moved every unit to defend Pyongyang. Almost everyone died, but my core Ballistas (I forget the Korean name for them) all got to double shot & range. Every unit was in the red and the city had a thin red line when I killed the last Samurai attacking the City.

[Pat Fenis]

I learned so many things about deity from this play. Incredible win, I'd have never thought most of these ideas would work. Guy is cracked.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvDosx_OQs0

[GAMER01]

thanks for the responses ,looks like I have to lift my game :}

[cuavas]

My game doesn’t have a “Diety” level, same as it doesn’t have a leader “Ghandi” and there are no “capitols”. Are you sure y’all aren’t playing with the illiteracy mod installed?

[Sep]

Diety isn't fun unless you are ready to commit for it. Been there, done that.

You have to pick the victory you aim as soon as you start your game. Try to decide which victory to go later on might hamper your result. Stick to what the civilization have to offer is good. For example, aim for diplomatic victory if you pick Greece, science if babylon or korea and etc.

Most important of all... don't automate your worker and city.

[friend robocat]

the sweet spot is level 6, anything above is just for fun

[BillyJoelWilliamson]

I never did deity before modding. It just seemed like it would force you to play a certain way to get the victory. I love the modset I roll with now I don’t think I could return to vanilla.

[「HS」Interfector ex Domini]

set max turns to 1
then when you start the game, set down the settlers, and win
also be sure to make it so you lose if you dont have any cities
thats how i did it

Diety mode means AI starts with 2 settlers, 2 workers, a scout and 2 warriors, thats just the starting advantages.

the closest i got to winning without that trick was by just getting the AI to fight eachother for trade with me, and then declaring war on the losers last moment to get their cities
but this still meant one AI would be 2 big for me to handle