2v2 Sid Meier Difficulty Guide

This guide details our learnings from almost a month of trying to beat Sid Meier difficulty in 2v2. Hopefully this will help you and your friends actually beat this crazy challenge.

Background Information (Map Info)

Sid Meier is a difficulty added in the Deity++ mod. Below is a graph detailing the bonuses give to AI on Sid Meier difficulty (basically double everything compared to Deity).


No other mods were installed except for QoL mods which made no difference to actual gameplay, thus they will not be listed as they have no impact on the gameplay. Below is the world/game configuration used for the first winning game we played.
Religious victory was disabled as we believe it is too easy and we wanted a harder challenge. Score victory was also disabled and there was no turn limit (although you would definitely not survive until the turn limit so it doesn't really matter). As far as we know, we are the first people to beat Sid Meier difficulty in 2v2 using these settings.

Rationale

The leaders we used in this game were Kristina of Sweden and Pedro II of Brazil. We went for a diplomatic victory because we believe science, culture, and domination are not viable due to the many bonuses given to the AI on this difficulty. Whether early game or late game, even with set seeds and chosen AI leaders, it was impossible to win these victories.

Sid Meier difficulty is inherently hard due to the many bonuses the AI receives. What makes 2v2 especially difficult is that the AI gives each other eurekas and inspirations. Considering the insane amount of culture and science they generate, playing against teams is exponentially harder than free for all.

After many attempts, we found that we would often lose to a culture victory as the AI would get rock bands in the renaissance era and there was nothing we could do about it. This meant we had to prioritize culture early on so we could generate enough domestic tourists to combat a cultural victory. Science was never too much of a problem as we never survived until that late into the game and the AI would win other victories before science. We never really lost due to a domination victory but the attacks of the AI are extremely deadly due to their amount of starting troops and their inherent production bonus. We lost many games due to being swarmed with troops two eras ahead of the current era that have also formed corps/armies with multiple promotions.

In this setup, the role of Kristina is to generate diplomatic favor and culture, thus being able to generate domestic tourism while also swaying the votes of World Congress and other events that may occur. As Sweden, she also has unique World Events such as the Nobel Peace Prize which awards a diplomatic victory point if won.

Complementary to Sweden, Pedro was chosen because of his high yield bonuses received from rainforests, making him a strong religious civ with high production and science (coming from high campus adjacencies). He makes up for the lack of science and starts a religion: with his high production from work ethic, he can rush crucial wonders needed for a diplomatic victory (i.e., Potata palace, Mahabodhi temple, and Statue of Liberty).

Strategy

General Overview

Kristina starts with commercial hubs, then transitions into theater squares and industrial hubs. Government plazas and diplomatic quarters should be built when over more important things are not being built. She should start with craftsmanship since she needs to settle many cities for her theater squares. Build ancestral hall if there are more cities being settled. Otherwise, build the audience chamber. Starting with commercial hubs ensures she has enough money later on to buy district buildings. Spam settle as many cities as possible.

Pedro starts the game by rushing a religion to secure the "work ethic" follower belief; this allows us to have very high production in the mid to late game once we unlock the civics cards given by the theology civic. We picked cross-cultural dialogue this game for the extra science yields. After rushing holy sites, Pedro should seek for high-adjacency campuses to make sure the team isn't falling behind too much in science.

Surviving Wars
The AI will most likely declare war in the classical era, although they may also declare war in the ancient or medieval era. If the AI declares war in the ancient era, you are almost guaranteed to lose as you would have to spam troops to survive while the AI is still developing. You won't have military tradition or oligarchy and you won't have enough production to counter the massive amount of troops the AI starts with, therefore it is better to just restart.

In the classical era, if you see the AI moving lines of troops towards you, go for oligarchy, make sure you have military tradition, and start making troops. The AI is still not the most intelligent, so if you can make a horseman or man at arms in the capital and garrison with troops around it, you will probably be fine. Having ancient walls is ideal. If you built walls, they will send trebuchets your way. Make sure to take them out in time before they take out your walls. If you were able to survive the first war without casualties and continue developing afterwards, you will probably survive the next war in a similar way. However, once the AI reaches the modern area, you will likely not have a way to be able to defend. They will have various armies with 4 promotions of modern era units while you're still in the renaissance or earlier, so you have to win before they take you out. In our game, we were able to survive until the modern era by purely stalling, but we were on the brink of death as all we could do was stall.

So, what about the Swedish Caroleans? The good thing about Caroleans is that they're on the civic tree, meaning you're likely to get then earlier since Sweden is going for culture. They're good for defense and won't be taken out in one hit, even more troops a few eras ahead. Apart from this, try producing horsemen or warriors which exert zone of control to slow down enemy troops as they can only move 1 tile if they move next to a unit that exerts zone of control. After 10 turns of war, try to make peace immediately, even if the terms are not great. Don't lose too many troops or let the AI win too much because they will be less likely to make peace.

Conclusion

Even with the strategies mentioned, it is still extremely hard to win on Sid Meier in FFA, let alone on teams. Victories will be luck dependent and you will fail multiple times. Winning in Sid Meier requires luck in various areas. You need a good spawn, which includes yields, resources, enough land to settle, etc. You need good opponents who are actually possible to beat (I would recommend banning some insane culture civs because there is no way you can beat them legitimately and seeing them would just mean gaining experience through a loss or just restarting, so there's no point). I realize I can go on and on, but you get the idea. I hope this guide has been of some use, and I hope you will be able to meat Sid Meier. Thank you.