Rhye's and Fall of Civilization - Persian strategy
From Rhye's Mods Wiki
Contents |
Persians (UHV)
The Historical Victory Conditions
-Control 8% of world territory by 600AD
-Control 7 world wonders by 700AD
-Control 2 holy city shrines in 700AD
You'll have the MOST trouble with the first condition, controlling the 8% of world territory by 600AD... To put this in world map terms, to give yourself a safe margin of error, you need to conquer Babylon, India, Egypt, and Greece as well as settle all of the Indian peninsula, and (just to be on the safe side) also go after Rome or Carthage, whichever is weakest.
That's a lot to do in only about 2 1/2 hours of game play... So here's how it's done:
Opening Moves
You begin the game right up against Babylonia. Now, I’ve played tons of games as Persia, and each time, I let the game auto play from the start. I’ve seen many different openings… However, the typical starting situation is Babylonia controlling Shush to the west. Don’t attack Babylonia right away, Shush will flip to you on the 3rd turn. Besides, if Babylon is controlling it, there’s a 50/50 shot they’ll declare war over the flip and you’ll get a few extra starting immortals…
But I’m getting ahead of myself… I settle Parsa right on the starting plot. Why not go one square south to found my capital on the ocean? One word: PLAGUE. Now that the earliest plague has been removed, it’s not much of an issue anymore, but should the plague ever come back to the early turns, isolationism from other civs is a plus. I’m sure the starting placement of Parsa isn’t really an issue anymore, so do your own thing if you want. As for me, I stick with a historically accurate location.
Your second settler should be sent north to the horse resource. Even though the square one plot to the north of the horse resource is a much more defendable position against the barbarians hordes, you need to begin building immortals immediately. Seriously, there’s just no time to waste building a pasture… Found your second city right on top of the horses. When your workers arrive on turn three, send them after the second settler with a road. Connect your cities to the horse resource and start pumping out immortals…
Send one of your archers a few squares north of the horses to check out the goody hut. Once in a while it’ll still be there with a fortified barbarian warrior guarding it with his life. Use your free barbarian attack to snag it. (Ignore the combat odds, you’ll win.) It’s usually good for a few pieces of gold or, at the very least, a nice promotion for the lucky archer.
Before you end your first turn though, it’s important to switch civics. Might as well get the revolution over with while you still only have one city… Switch to hereditary rule and slavery. Even though you have access to a religious civic, you have no religion. Don’t give yourself a second turn of anarchy for no reason…
Technology
What is the most important technologies to have when playing Persia, going for the UHV? I’ve tried a bunch of different combinations, and I’ll tell you what works best… I was against this at first, but now I know that it’s essential: CONSTRUCTION. You need to go through mathematics to get to it, but you need that too, so it all works out. The only other tech you need is Currency. Let me explain why this is the way to go…
MATHEMATICS
All the immortals in the world aren’t going to allow you to conquer a city with 2 or more spearmen defending it. You need something to break down the walls and do some collateral (softening up) damage.
CONSTRUCTION
1.The Great Wall is a necessity! I didn’t think so, at first, since the barbarians that come down from the north can easily be defeated with a few fortified spearmen, but this isn’t the whole of the issue. You’ll be conquering wide amounts of territory in a Persian game, and you simply can’t defend your massive borders from ALL of the game’s barbarians… The Great Wall will ease the pressure a great deal and allow your focus to remain on attacking rather than defending…
2. Elephants are fun! They take a while to build compared to the immortals (which are quicker than archers), but the elephants do some serious damage. When you think Persia, you think elephants, enough said.
CURRENCY
Immediately after construction, you need to get to currency. At some point, your coffers will be empty and you’ll be forced to drop your science down to about 10% (or even 0%), but you need to get currency before this happens… IF you can only get one other tech, currency is it. You can use currency to build “wealth” in your cities to support the massive army you must build and currency also allows you to extort your neighbors for gold (before you kill them). Money will be one of your biggest headaches…
Now for some ass kicking…
TARGET #1: BABYLONIA
A few people have mentioned that going after India first is the way to go. Sure, India is the weakest at the start, but trust me, they’ll still be weak once you’re done with Babylonia… Babylonia however, will only get stronger… They MUST be first. How your first attacks go with Babylon will dictate whether you win or lose the UHV. There have been a few games where, at spawn, Babylon had already collapsed. This isn’t the norm though. Chances are, Babylon will declare war on you on turn three when they lose a city to you. This is what you WANT to happen. You get the extra immortals this way…
Babylonia can be a hard nut to crack. About 80% of the time, they have bronze working and have already mined the bronze to the northwest. Pillage this mine immediately! If you don’t, you’ll have more spearmen to deal with than you can handle. You MUST take Babylonia down with ONLY your starting units, which is why the immortal boost with Babylonia declaring war on you is so helpful. If you get into a long, drawn out conflict with Babylon, you’ve lost.
Check each city before you attack. You’re already at war, so roam free through their territory and scout them out. If one or two of their cities are already defended with spearmen, don’t get your panties in a knot, it’s okay. Go after the cities only defended with bowmen first. I figure, on average, it takes about 2 immortals to kill a bowmen at full fortification. Since most Babylonian cities will only have one or two, you should be fine. Take the promotions as they come, but make sure you promote toward the vs. shock improvements. You’ll need this if you’re going to go up against the spearmen.
If you’re lucky, after taking the easy Babylonian cities, they’ll collapse. If this happens, DON’T DECLARE WAR ON THE INDEPENDENTS YET! Let them live happily ever after, for now. If you manage to capture all or most of the Babylonia cities, good job. Either way, make sure Babylon is dead before you move on. If there was a tough defender you never got to, don’t worry, the independents can never keep a good defense going for long, by the time we come back to them, it’ll be easier.
TARGET #2: INDIA
While you were killing the Babylonians, your three core cities should have been pumping out immortals. You’ll need about 6-10 immortals to conquer India. Bring a few vets over from the remnants of Babylon and supplement them with the new recruits. Declare war on India and roll right in.
At the very worst, Delhi is defended with three archers, usually less. Six immortals can whip through 3 archers like butter. Send another immortal 3 squares south of Delhi. If there is a mine on the hill there, it could mean that they have iron working and have the iron necessary to build spearmen. Pillage that sucker to save your ass. I think in all the games I’ve played though, India only had iron twice. It’s a rare occurrence.
India typically has 3-4 cities. They’ll probably collapse after you take two though. Finish them off. You need all of India’s core cities early. Delhi should immediately begin building both temples, for Hinduism and Buddhism. Hire two priest and then start pumping out settlers. You need to colonize all of the Indian peninsula. India’s other cities can either help you with the settlers or build workers for you. Either way, the production values of their cities, in addition to their distance from where the majority of the next fights will take place, make them horrible for producing military units. Delhi on the other hand is excellent for producing wonders. Once you have the maximum amount of priests going for your great prophets, it may be wise to grab any wonders still not built.
When the prophets do show up, have them build the Hindu and Buddhist shrines in Delhi. There you go. Keep Delhi around until 700AD and your set with one goal. Don’t forget the settlers though, get all of India in your culture.
TARGET #3: THE INDEPENDENTS
Now it’s time to mop up the rest of Babylonia. Have you built the great wall yet? If not, you need to get on it. China will get to that Great Wall pretty quick and you need to beat them to it. As I said before, the Great Wall is essential.
While battling it out with India, it’s a good idea to get a mix of catapults and immortals lined up for your attack on the Independents. With Judaism founded in an Independent city, the culture defense is pretty high sometimes. You’ll probably need the catapults. Also, if there are spearmen left over from Babylonia, the catapults are invaluable. All in all though, the Independents shouldn’t prove too much trouble.
Once you’ve got the Jewish holy city in your possession, it’s a good idea to send one of your great prophets from India to build a shrine there. Make sure you have both shrines in Delhi first though, as Arabia will fight pretty hard later in the game for Jerusalem. The money from the Temple of Solomon will be a HUGE bonus.
This is another good time to switch to Judaism as your religion and adopt the organized religion civic if you have time to build some stables or barracks. The building time bonus is nice, but not required. Most of your cities won’t be too big to where you’ll need the happiness from the religion, but it’s never a bad thing.
TARGET #4: GREECE
Again, if you’re lucky, Greece will be playing a sloppy game. I’ve found that, most times, they choose to defend their cities primarily with archers rather than their more expensive phalanxes. However, don’t be intimidated if you roll up on Greece to find a heavily defended city stocked with phalanxes, you have catapults. Attack with your catapults for the collateral damage. Even if you lose some catapults, it’ll weaken the phalanx/archer defenders enough to where your immortals will do some serious shredding.
Right about this time your economy is in the toilet. You have tons of worthless cities all over Iraq and India that are doing nothing but wasting away your money. Have some of the non-military producing cities start producing wealth to slow the decline. Your science is probably at 0% by now and you’re still losing money. Make sure all of your cities are only defended with one archer, if that, and get rid of any excess military fat. This is another reason the Great Wall is essential. You can slack on defense. No civ is going to mess with the immortal horde, barbarians are a different story though.
Greece shouldn’t be too hard, unless you have an ULTRA STRONG Alexander, but I’ve never seen it.
Target #5: EGYPT
About half way through my assault on Greece, I begin my attack on Egypt. Especially if the Plague hits. Don’t hesitate to take advantage of the plague if Egypt comes down with it. Egypt differs in attack strategy slightly… By this time, elephants are a good idea. They are a lot more expensive to produce, but when heading into Africa, it’s worth it.
I wait to attack Egypt until now because of barbarians and natives. By now, Egypt is getting clobbered by camel archers from the west and natives from the south. They are usually pretty weak from this dual fronted assault. Of course, go straight for pillaging their copper to the east of their capital. The elephants are nice because, even if you get caught in some barbarian/native crossfire, the elephants can usually hold their own. Catapults are again, essential.
Once you’ve captured Egypt (and Greece), you’ll thank yourself for building that Great Wall. Barbarians will build up at the northern borders of Greece and the western border of Egypt. The natives are a different story though. You’ll have to build 2-3 axmen and have them fortify your southern most Egyptian cities. The natives walk straight through your borders even with having a Great Wall.
Check your progress!
If the victory screen shows you shy of that 8% land area, you have one of two options. You can switch gears and start building up your culture, or you can keep the ball rolling and go after Carthage (usually collapsed in Independents/Barbarians by now) or Rome. I go with whichever I have more troops near… You probably don’t have calendar yet, so you have no idea how close you are… If you see the Vikings spawn, you pretty much have no time left. However, with Babylon, India, Greece, and Egypt in your hands, you should be doing alright. Build an Elephant in India and send him to conquer Pagan… Why not?
Once you’ve passed 600AD and you’ve got that little 1/3 going on next to your name, you’re home free. Start fixing up your economy some, disband some units. Not everything though… Here comes Arabia…
You can probably last 100 more years. You should have two religious shrines in Delhi, probably another one in Jerusalem, but when Arabia spawns, they’ll probably take it from you. You’re probably sick of war by now, so a little peace would do you good. Give in to the city demands of Arabia. You’ve already got the 8%. Let Ur drain on Arabia’s economy for a while… Kiss Arabia’s ass. The last thing you need right now is another fight on your hands.
As for the 7 world wonders goal, start counting. Chances are, with all of your conquests, you’ve made it to seven wonders. The Lighthouse and Pyramids in Egypt, the Parthenon and Temple in Greece, Oracle in Delhi, Stonehenge from Babylon, and your very own Great Wall is 7 right there… China typically builds the Hanging Gardens, so you can forget about that, but hey, you’ve got a 100 years left to run some elephants through the jungle if you’re getting desperate…
BTS Addendum
by Virdrago
Now that Ethiopia is in, taking over their empire can be quicker than moving over to Rome or Carthage, and also easier for the first condition. I won on BTS by going through Babylonia, India, Greece, Egypt, and finally Ethopia in that order.
Addendum
by Pacifist
You'll get your highest score ever if you win with Cyrus on Monarch mode (I got a 28000 score!). Some mistakes to avoid and some shortcuts to victory:
1. If you don't see Gilgamesh in the Fertile Crescent, reload. Gilgamesh usually means that Babylon only has warriors and no Asharittu archers which take a heck of a beating out of your immortals. Also, if Gilgamesh doesn't declare war on you after Shush flips (or if Shush is still independent), go back and reload a step or 2.
2. Spare one immortal (or 2 archers) from your war with the Babylonians. Open borders with India and send your unit (s) to just east of the iron (so that when you occupy that tile right after you declare war, they can't build anymore spearmen). Also, when you've collected your veterans from the Babylonian war, send them to the patch of grassland northwest of India; when you do declare war, this patch is usually outside their cultural influence, and you can reach Delhi in 1 move, just to the forest north. Blitzkrieg is always more effective than slow advance. Also, your immortals have an advantage against axemen, so kill them first.
3. Parsa is a wonderful production town once it has forges, so trade for metal casting from either the Romans, Greeks or Carthaginians. Count your wonders: in my game only the Oracle and Stonehenge were built and captured by me, so I had to build the Pyramids, the Parthenon, the Great Wall, the Colosseum, the Moai Statues, the Colossus and the Temple of Artemis. If I had another turn or 2 I would have gotten both the Great Library and the Shwedagon Paya. There's always the whip but use it only in towns that can grow quickly (like Babylon).
4. If you're unlucky enough, India will not have built any of the shrines (like in my game). Because you cannot depend on Delhi to produce both great prophets in time, you have to make the closest big city (Parsa) your other great prophet city. I sent Buddhist, Hindu and Jewish missionaries to my capital and build 3 temples there for 3 priests. Got both great prophets at the same time. Do this early to reap the monetary benefits. (Think of the eastern part of your empire as financial, wonder and culture oriented). Obviously don't send your prophet towards Jerusalem as Arabia will want it.
5. Conversely, you'll need good troop production in the western part of your empire. Hattusas is good but it will not be big enough. Babylon and Shush should build barracks (and stable if you have time) and Babylon should build the Colosseum as soon as feasible. Make sure you have enough workers to build roads through Asia Minor to get to Greece; you can always come back and pasture that sheep and farm the wheat.
6. Egypt will provide a lot of your gold (Ramesses likes big towns), so protect your towns from the impi and camel archers with at least 3 units in each of your Egyptian cities.
7. Ethiopia does not need to be conquered, if they become your vassal they count towards your area controlled. In fact they were instrumental in researching Aesthetics for me (since I was behind in science due to my large empire).
8. When you're done with your Greek campaign, either build Byzantion (or if the Greeks built it, keep it) and send most of your troops (including several war elephants which are great against horse archers) there as a choke point. Your Great Wall will not protect Greece. Build walls and send a great general there for leading your troops. (For the majority of the game, I had no troops in most of my smaller Asian cities because there were no enemies around.)
9. Assuming you've built the Pyramids, leave calendar until all your cities have expanded to a fat cross with the free monument, as this will help your land goal a lot.
BTS UVH 1.186
By The_K
Just a small update since the time limit got shorter. This is for the monarch difficulty. Send most of your units to Babylon. If Shush exists you should wait with your troops a turn or two at the border for it to flip to you. After that, take the fight to Babylon and take him out fast. Send a few of your chariots north to Samarkand and a few east to India. They can easily take out both the independent city and India. Now, you can find India in many situations, but there should always be at least Delhi, even if it is barbarian or independent. Take it.
Afterwards, go for Greece. They usually have a poorly defended Athens so take that and destroy their iron. They will soon crumble into independent cities and you can mop them up.
Egypt should be left for last. However, a nice tactic is to declare war early and just send a unit or two down there to make sure they don't get copper and horses. Keep that unit down there until you can spare reinforcements.
Build wonders, you'll need them. Your research should definitely be math-construction. No real need for anything else, you'll need the money. If you can build the oracle you can get construction that much faster. (as for currency, you'll research it later when your cities develop). Don't forget to build settlers and libraries (for culture). I have taken a screenshot of what area you should control to have enough. I have one city too many in it (Siwa). Remember to raze the cities you don't need to save on maintenance. And build the Great Wall.
Blitz Opening
By Jack Rackham
At first glance, the game appears almost unfairly stacked in favor of Persia. The starting ground is not great for the long haul, but excellent for a quick start. Their massive army complements this, giving them speed out of the gate matched only by Mongolia and Turkey, but unlike Mongolia and Turkey who have to slug their way through old and entrenched civilizations, Persia is surrounded by rich builder civs with second-rate militaries. Combined this with their unique power, and Persia is one one of the best candidates for a domination victory (matched IMO only by Russia). Their UHV should be easy. It isn't.
1. 8% of World Territory by 140 AD (turn 150)
2. Two Holy Shrines in 350 AD (Turn 164)
3. 7 Wonders of the World by 350 AD (Turn 164)
Like many civs, Persia has one victory condition that's a gimme, one that would be easy if you didn't have to worry about the other two, and one that's a total ballbreaker.
Two holy shrines is easy. India starts right next door with two holy cities, and Jerusalem is easily conquerable within 15 turns. The trick is, none of these will likely have the shrine when you start, so you'll need to train some prophets. You have enough time to get four or five great people before the buzzer, so that's not too hard. And with the new classical age timeline, you don't even have to worry about Arabia grabbing one when they spawn.
Seven wonders is made easier by the fact that you can capture rather than build some of the wonders and harder by the fact that your two shrines don't count toward the limit. You start with the techs required to build six wonders, two of which your neighbors will almost certainly have built for you. Unless you want to count on (you don't) the Greeks or Romans to research and build a seventh wonder like the Parthenon or Coliseum so you can steal it, you'll have to research the techs for one or two yourself. The problem is, you have to do this while you're engaging in rapid expansion that's going to wreck your economy.
Expansion is the one that really makes this UHV fun. Eight percent is a big chunk of the world. You'll need about 95% of the historical Achaemenid Empire, plus about four more well placed cities (Remember, widely spaced landlocked cities give you the most bang for the buck in terms of land percent.). It's likely that you will be losing money even when set on 10% science. Luckily, you have the army to do most of this even before you get newly trained reinforcements to the front. Remember, your vassals do not count towards your eight percent, you have to do it all the hard way.
Opening Moves:
Settle either Persepolis or Shiraz. Shiraz is a slightly better site, but Persepolis gives you a bit more land. Settle Artacoana next to the horses. Switch to slavery and hereditary rule. Organized religion is unnecessary so long as you take India early and use Delhi as your prophet pump rather than sending missionaries to Babylon or Persepolis to make temples. Do not select a state religion at any point; the culture is more valuable than the happiness. You want a lot of territory, not good cities. Gauge Babylon's strength, if they have bronze hooked up, you might consider reloading, because this will slow your initial invasion a bit. Have your workers hook up the horses near Artacoana and the bronze near Shush before doing anything else. Send most of your Immortals at Babylon, no more than four soldiers towards India, and about three chariots through enemy territory in Palestine and into Egypt. Have Persepolis and Artacoana build an archer each to use as garrisons for the cities you're about to conquer. If you built Shiraz, build your work boat instead. Once you have a few resources hooked up, your capital can build horse archers and wonders. Your first research should be Aesthetics, not Mathematics, as I'll explain later. Early Conquests:
With a little luck, it is entirely possible to defeat Babylon, Egypt, and India with your starting troops in under 25 turns. If you know how to do that, you'll free up Shush, Babylon, and your capital to build wonders, settlers, and research rather than troops. Shush may give you a few troops when it flips. If you got Babylonian Bowmen, throw them at the walls of Babylon for sacrifice collateral, and then mop up with immortals. Don't worry about the other cities too much, Babylon should collapse soon enough, and you're going to want to burn Nineveh, Tyre, or Ur to save your economy anyway. Lacking bronze, India will have only archers and maybe even just warriors. Again, hit the capital only, and ignore other cities, barbarians or instability will finish the rest for you. You're not hitting India this early for the land. You could conquer them at any time, and face only token resistance. You're conquering them so that you can whip out two temples and start on those prophets early. The Chariots you send to Egypt won't be enough to conquer it, though you might steal one city if you're quick, aggressive, and lucky. The chariots are there to recon in force. When you declare war, head for the copper and the horse to see if Egypt has hooked them up yet. If so, you may be in a little trouble, but nothing your eventual ten to one numerical advantage won't be able to handle. If they have hooked up or or are in the process of doing it, burn them quickly, Egyptian spears and axes are very difficult without catapults. Once their resources are burned, you can continue to raid the Egyptian countryside or head back across the Sinai to regroup with the survivors from the invasion of Babylon. Once the city of Babylon is down, heal the survivors and head to Israel, your immortals will make short work of Jerusalem's archer garrison. Don't bother with heavy garrisons, or even any garrison at all if your feeling bold. Barbarians are still weak, and you can whip immortals for one population if you see enemy chariots or horse archers coming. Gather all of your western army and head for the Sinai. Since you cut Egypt's access to strategic resources, they will have few if any good troops. If they have only archers, your immortals and chariots will steamroll them. If they do have a few axes, don't worry, they won't be able to build more, and you can just beat them in a relatively short war of attrition. A few horse archers can help here. Once that's done, send two or three immortals to capture Samarkand/Afrosaib, and and burn any other independent cities you see. Your conquests are done; you still have about two percent to go, but you can do that with settlers. Note: If you're not feeling adventurous enough to fight a three front war, then only attack Babylon and Egypt at first, but make sure you still hit India early so you have time to get those great prophets. You should have Samarkand, Artacoana, Persepolis, Delhi, Babylon, Shush, Jerusalem, Thebes, and one or two other Egyptian cities, and your economy should be circling the drain.
Research and Economy:
The traditional research order is Mathematics, Construction, Currency. It's not a bad plan, but it was better in earlier versions than in the newer ones. The reason for that research order is so that you can get the Great Wall, but since the timeline has been altered, barbarians won't come until much later. You should be able to finish your eight percent before you even see your first camel archer. Plus the new spear-based immortals are excellent border guards against barbarian cavalry. Currency is still nice for the floundering economy, but you probably aren't going to get it using this research path until after you have eight percent of the land, or are very near. Instead, you are going to go after Aesthetics. Aesthetics unlocks two wonders, and one more with meditation, and only costs half as much as the Mathematics-Construction combo which may only get you one wonder since China and Rome tend to beat you to the punch on the Hanging Gardens, Coliseum, and Great Wall. You can accomplish all your goals with only Aesthetics, so if your economy gets in trouble, you can just turn off research once this is done. To keep your economy afloat, you're going to get Stonehenge, which is probably under Egyptian control, and if not, then under Indian or Babylonian control. Stonehenge lets you switch to Caste System and set Merchant specialists. Set as many citizens to merchants as you can. You will likely still lose money, just not as fast. If you still want currency, you can now get it quicker than if you had just beelined straight to it. The Oracle will probably still be available when you start, so use it to get Mathematics. You may even beat China to Confucianism. All the Merchants will eventually get you a Great Merchant, which can bulb Currency. If the Oracle is already built, just wait until someone will trade Mathematics to you for Monarchy and Aesthetics. The only other useful tech is alphabet, which you can usually get from Carthage or Rome. It lets you trade with China and Greece, but it's not entirely necessary. Iron working is mostly useless since you already have copper and don't really need swords. The only real benefit is a few extra production in your capital.
What to build:
Delhi of course should start whipping temples, but most of your other big cities have a bit more flexibility. You'll want to build a few settlers, but it's probably more urgent to get a wonder or two. You won't need too many soldiers beyond garrisons since you probably won't need to invade Greece, and soldiers cost money you don't have. Most of the cities you capture should start building wonders, even if they aren't particularly good production sites. (Even if you lose the wonder, you still get money to keep the economy going.) Your three core cities will be Persepolis/Shiraz, Shush, and Babylon. One should start pumping out immortals and horse archers along with Artacoana and Samarkand. The other two should build wonders and a settler or two. Oracle is useful for getting early currency, or you could use it to get literature, which is useful for the two extra wonders. The Pyramids is another good one since it lets your cities grow earlier, making the land area requirement somewhat easier. The Temple of Artemis is another handy wonder since it gives you a chance for a great prophet and a great merchant. Jerusalem may be the only coastal city you get early, so you should start on the Great Lighthouse or Moai Statues there quickly. If you're lucky enough to get a coastal city from Egypt, build there whatever coastal wonder Jerusalem isn't. If you didn't get a second coastal city, build one immediately. The two coastal wonders will take a long time, so consider those cities out of action for most of the game. When you get Aesthetics, build the Parthenon quickly, but you can wait a while on the Statue of Zeus since no one else is likely to build it. Egypt should build a mix of settlers and cheap troops. If you want, you can later use them to take Carthage or Ethiopia out for a bit of land. Your first two wonders should finish around the same time you finish your initial conquests. If you haven't already, start building settlers, but do not settle them yet.
Greece:
You may feel an urge as Persia to go and crush the Greeks. Resist it. You're an intelligent person, you've read about Marathon, Artemesium, and Thermopylae. A Persian invasion of Greece in Rhye's is likely to go about as well as the actual Persian Wars. Phalanxes will chew up most your immortals and chariots. Horse archers and axemen can handle them, but it's expensive and time consuming, and Greece really doesn't have a lot of land, so they won't help you much to your eight percent. The only reason to take Greece is for wonders, and only if you have to. The same rules apply for Rome. They are far away, and hard to take, so only do it if your seven wonder goal is impossible without an invasion. If you must invade either of these civs, be smart about it. Hit the capital in the opening moves of a surprise attack, then hold your ground. You're there for wonders, not land.
Endgame:
You've conquered Egypt, Babylon, and India. You're close to eight percent land area, and you still have as much as 30-40 turns left. Remember those settlers I told you to build but not settle? Well now is the time to settle them. Send them to empty and landlocked areas of the map some distance away from your existing cities. You're going to drop them all within a few turns of each other and use artists from caste system to grow their borders in a couple turns. Remember, you're not looking for good cities, you're looking for land. So don't be afraid to build cities that you would normally never consider. You only need one, maybe two more in India. You could build one on the ashes of Gordium in central Anatolia. The rest are going to be terrible cities, but don't worry, Riyadh, Tashkent, Tripoli, all work fine. Of course, make sure you've still got something in the bank to pay for these for a few turns. A soon as you've got to the eight percent, the win condition will trigger, even if it isn't turn 150 yet. If you can finish your seventh wonder around this time, you'll trigger a golden age, thus saving your economy. Once you have your eight percent, you can gift your bad cities away, let them fall into enemy hands, or counteract their costs with more merchants and wealth. After this, you can lose cities so long as your stability is ok. All that's left is to make sure you get your second prophet and bunker up until 350 AD.
