It’s a fun game mode that is less popular and requires some niche game knowledge and a specialized deck. But it absolutely fun to start from scratch and strategize your way up to victory.
I am making this post purely for entertainment and discussion about the game mode. I would like to share some some strategies I like to do with less conventional civilizations.
For those who don’t know this survival game mode, you can host a game and select for the map either Eurasian Steppe - Survival (has Trade Posts) or Unknown - Survival (no Trade Posts).
Premise: There are no resources on the map. You start off with your usual villagers and resource crates. But now you have to rely on home city shipments to build economic buildings and rev up your economy.
Some notable strong civs on this map include: Mexico (versatility to rush and boom), Ottomans (free villagers and powerful shipments), Dutch (powerful gold eco from banks after setup), India (guaranteed early wood income to get set up).
European civs (Russia, Portugal, Spain, etc.) are average on this map. They usually have to rely on Homestead Wagon Age 1 and use their civ boom strategies to get going up the in ages. Everything is a relatively slow crawl to finally get the two factories in Age 4 to pump wood.
Native American civs have a pretty difficult time usually due to glaring holes in their economy. Without great wood crate cards or good mechanisms to get infinite wood, Aztecs and Lakota have glaring mid-late game wood problems, which leads to problems getting all farms/estates set up and eventually trying to max out their military upgrades. The Haudenosaunee can get away with setting up their eco due to free travois from age up and from home city cards. Inca fairs with the best with infinite wood shipments, wood dance, and the kancha wood option. All of them struggle with coin too, with exception to Aztecs due to strong coin shipments.
The other two Asian civs (Japan and China)… Japan seems to do well with guaranteed early food income from berries and a decent wood income from shrines. China is a bit slow, but doable once the Porcelain Tower helping out with wood.
As for African civs… I’ve seen Ethiopia fair relatively well, but I don’t know anything really about Hausa.
For me, I don’t play the strong civs (Mexico, Otto, Dutch, India) and get bored of the standard European civs. I’ve been trying to make the Native American civs work on survival, to some degree.
My Lakota strat goes something like this:
Build teepee
Team 6 Bison
Advanced Estate
-age up with 400W-
Build stable, market
13 Bison (ensure constant fast food flow once 6 bison are up)
700G (for age up)
-age up with 12 Bison and 20% hunting boost-
1000W for an estate and farm and plaza
Now, depending if we need to fight -
5 rifle riders
(Eco should be set up enough for a little food and gold to fight)
Or if it’s slow and we need to boom to keep up -
8 villagers
North American Trade
-age up with the food option-
(while aging, put a ton of villagers on plaza for XP)
13 bison
Lakota gets significantly weaker from here on out. Since gold income is so slow, you may actually never reach age 5. Best to mass up here with cav and slow the enemy down from reaching age 5.
One possible way I have tried is to focus heavily on food and then use Fur Trade. But it leaves you vulnerable economically, especially if the enemy pushes and you don’t have food to fight.
Do you guys play survival? And what are your favorite strategies?