Guaranteed strategy for winning Civ II on "Deity" level (almost) every time

I played hundreds of hours of Civ II back in the day. Many a sleepless night and wasted weekend. But I did learn how to beat the AI and win almost every single game, even on Deity level.

The key strategies that worked for me were:

1. rapid expansion and settlement The AI weighs your total territory when deciding whether to declare war on you or not. You are far less likely to be the target of aggression if you hold a lot of territory/cities. Group your cities near each other so they can reinforce each other in event of conflict. Build roads to connect your cities as soon as you can.

2. no improvements in cities for a long time The higher your city population, the harder it is to keep them happy. Keep your city populations low by building settlers and expanding. No improvements in cities, not even granaries for a long time. Improvements just cost money anyway which you should use for science. Having many cities with small populations is better than few cities with big populations. Big cities cost a lot to maintain and are vulnerable to conquest. Spread your bets. Defend your cities well. AI also pays attention to your number of military units. Weakness invites aggression.

3. avoid war at first, focus on expansion If you encounter a weak culture near you early in the game, eliminate it if you can. Otherwise make peace. You want conflict on your terms when you're ready. Going to war with your pants down results in disaster. Provoke the enemy to declaring war when you can crush them swiftly. Always destroy aggressive cultures. Never make peace with them unless you want to buy time, otherwise they will use the peace to build up then attack you later.

4. use caravans to store value so you can build key wonders rapidly It's been a while, but among the critical key wonders are those that make citizens happy in all your cities, like JS Bach's Cathedral, Cure for Cancer or Women's Suffrage. Other key wonders provide you with military advantage, like Great Wall. UN is good because it blunts aggression against you.

5. when at war do not screw around. Convert entire economy to war production and crush your enemy totally -- especially the aggressive cultures. Focus on one at a time.

6. Use spies aggressively. Spies are great for stealing technology and sabotaging city walls. Don't even bother to attack a walled city until you have howitzers which can attack walled cities without a penalty. Put an embassy in other capitals so you know when they are at war or what wonders they are building (so you can make sure you get them first).

I used this strategy and was able to win on deity 4 out of 5 times. I became boring after a while. Still love Civ II though.