The diplomatic victory. It may seem like a daunting task, but in reality it's easier to obtain than you think. In this guide you will learn that if you make the right choises, even before the game starts, you can achieve victory in the U.N. elections.

Now what you want is to look for civs that are more geared toward a diplomatic victory. Good abilities to look for would be things that boost your relations with city states. heres a list of a few with such abilities.

Greece



Ability: City state influance degrades at 1/2 the rate, and recoveres at 2x the normal rate


Sweeden



Ability: Gain 90 influance to a city state when gifting a Great Person gift towards the city state. When declareing friendship sweeden and thier ally get a +10% boost to Great Person Generation.

England



Ability: +2 Movement for all naval units
Receives 1 extra Spy


In reality you can win it as any civ if you try hard enough. But not all civs will be good choises here are some Civs to either not play, or watch out for in game.

Mongolia



Ability: +30% Combat Strength when fighting City-State units or attacking a City-State itself. all mounted units get +1 movement.


Venice



Ability:Cannot gain settlers nor annex cities
Double the normal number of trade routes available
A Merchant of Venice appears after researching Optics
May purchase in puppeted cities.


Austria



Ability: Can spend Gold to annex or puppet a City-State that has been your ally for 5 turns.


Now it may seem unusual that Venice and Austria are on here, and while they arn't that bad to play as, they can be problematic as enemies. The other thing about elimiateing city states is that they make it so that you need less votes to win in the end. However this can alos be problematic, but more on that later.

While city states are vital you may need more than just that in the end here are a few ways to get you some more votes.

Build the Forbidden Palace



Grants: 2 extra votes in the world congress and -10% unhappyness from citizens in non-occupied cities.

Become the congress leader.

When it starts you get 1 extra vote, in the atomic era you get another extra vote, and as a memeber you get one more vote as the era progresses.


Found Globalization first.

If you find it first you get one extra vote in the congress.

Win some Vital resolutions.

If you win the world religion vote you get 2 extra votes, Same if you win the world ideology vote.

Ideology Tennants.

Freedom: Covert Action: gives your spies better chance at rigging elections

Autocracy: Gunboat Diplomacy: Gain 6 more Influence per turn with City-States you could demand tribute from.

Order dose not have any Tennants that promote city state relations, so Freedom or Autocracy are better choices.

NOTICE: No matter how hard you try in single player, you will never get the other Civs. to vote for you, so don't even try.

Now getting votes is one thing, keeping them is a whole other story.

As much as you want that Diplomatic victory, the other Civs. want it more. Here are some ways to keep your votes in check.

Defend the City States!

some Civs., like the Huns and Mongolia, love war and will stop at nothing to dominate the world. If this happens, and you fear that your city state allies are in danger, pledge to protect the city states. just being allies isn't enough, you need to prove that you will act if the city state is attacked, and pledgeing to protect is the best way to do this. But this means that you need to have a stronger military to back it up. so just be prepared to be able to pretect them if need be.


Stop Austria and Venice's abilities.


If Austria is in the game all you need to do is keep the city states at ally status. Doing this makes Austria's ability null and void, as the state needs to be an ally for 5 turns in order to preform a diplomatic marrage. Venice is a little harder to control as all they need to do is send in thier special unit in and they have it in their control. however they only really become a problem when your votes start running out of steam. In this case you may have to go on the aggresive and liberate the city states. But if you want to prevent this, allying and pledging to protect will always keep them at bay.

less is not always more

Now as I mentioned before, when city states get destroyed or captured you will need one less vote to win in the end, it may seem great, but just remember the rule aplies to everyone and requires you to do more work to keep the states you currently have to stay allied with you. So in this case more City-states are better than fewer, unless you really like conflict.

Use your spies.

Spies can rig elections, giving you influance over every few turns. They can also use their coubt ability to oust the current allies and make you their ally. This is the reason why england is a good choice for an attempt at a diplomatic victory with there extra spy ability.