Good strategies for Ramesses II?

[Martinus]

Personally I tend to play SE games with him, with a twist of trying to found 1 or more religions and then using the early prophets from obelisks to generate cash so that I do not need to go into 0% science as early as under normal SE game strategies.

Industrious is a nice bonus to get all the required and optional wonders (Great Library, Parthenon, Pyramids), and Spiritual is always nice to switch from Slavery to Caste System and vice versa for pop rush.

I suppose leveraging the war chariot for some early conquest is also a good idea.

Do you guys have any comments and/or additional ideas?

 

[cabert]

Personally I tend to play SE games with him, with a twist of trying to found 1 or more religions and then using the early prophets from obelisks to generate cash so that I do not need to go into 0% science as early as under normal SE game strategies.

Industrious is a nice bonus to get all the required and optional wonders (Great Library, Parthenon, Pyramids), and Spiritual is always nice to switch from Slavery to Caste System and vice versa for pop rush.

I suppose leveraging the war chariot for some early conquest is also a good idea.

Do you guys have any comments and/or additional ideas?

going for super fast religions (via oracle+UB) is easy with him, so going cultural is really a piece of cake.

 

[azaris]

Spiritual is always nice to switch from Slavery to Caste System and vice versa for pop rush.

How do you work this without having to micromanage the specialists by hand every time you switch? Do you use the citizen automation instructions or just slog through by hand?

 

[Martinus]

How do you work this without having to micromanage the specialists by hand every time you switch? Do you use the citizen automation instructions or just slog through by hand?

It depends on a city. In a big/important city (where every specialist provides a significant bonus due to buildings etc.) I tend to do it by hand. In a less important city I simply put the focus on science (or whatever) and great people, which usually makes the governor put on the max specialists.

 

[Sisiutil]

Ramesses is one of my favourite leaders, offering a great combined ability to war and build. I think he's my 2nd favourite after Augustus Caesar.

First off: War Chariots. Awesome unit, second only to Praets IMHO. I almost always research AH first when I'm Egyptian, find and claim ponies, and then start spittin' WCs out the wazzoo. Barbs? Not a problem.

One of may favourite things to do with WCs is to post them outside my territory and watch for an AI Archer/Settler combo to waltz by. Free XPs and a free Worker! Plus you get to really hurt and weaken a nearby rival, preparatory to conquering them. Later, my ultra-promoted WCs become top-notch Knights, Cavalry, and Gunships.

And I love the Industrious/Spiritual combination. One of my favourite things to do with ol' Ramesses is to build plenty of those cheap temples along with both the Spiral Minaret and the University of Sankore, which turn the temples into gold and research mines.

Finally, Spiritual makes for awesome warmongering all game long. Build up some units in the queues, switch to Vassalage/Theocracy to produce them with all those lovely XPs, then switch back to more economic civics once your army is built.

 

[economiser]

You can also use his UB to get some early Great Prophets so you can profit off your religion by setting up a shrine.

Controlling several early religions leaves you some great diplomatic options as you can purposefully spread different religions to your rivals, making them hate one another. Spread your state religion to your future friend and another religion to your future enemy. Then you can use your shrine gold to bribe your neighbors into war against one another.

Finally, as the war wears on you can come riding in with your war chariots to mop up your rival.

 

[Sisiutil]

You can also use his UB to get some early Great Prophets so you can profit off your religion by setting up a shrine.

Controlling several early religions leaves you some great diplomatic options as you can purposefully spread different religions to your rivals, making them hate one another. Spread your state religion to your future friend and another religion to your future enemy. Then you can use your shrine gold to bribe your neighbors into war against one another.

Finally, as the war wears on you can come riding in with your war chariots to mop up your rival.

True, but religious spreads can surprise you. In one Ramesses game I founded Hinduism and, much later, Christianity. I was building Hindu missionaries, getting already to spread that faith, when Christianity started spreading like wildfire!

It may have had something to do with the fact that the Christian holy city was on the coast and therefore accessible to more trade routes.

 

[cabert]

True, but religious spreads can surprise you. In one Ramesses game I founded Hinduism and, much later, Christianity. I was building Hindu missionaries, getting already to spread that faith, when Christianity started spreading like wildfire!

It may have had something to do with the fact that the Christian holy city was on the coast and therefore accessible to more trade routes.

To avoid this, there is a very simple solution :
don't build missionaries, build a shrine .
Using the UB, you can have the shrine super early and thus spread the choice religion very fast and very early!
That's what I did with isabella (=building the buddhist shrine as early as possible). It made all my neighbours buddhist and assured me peace for 5500 years.

 

[economiser]

But there's the annoying possibility Sisutil mentioned where unless you get everyone to adopt Theocracy a late blooming religion might start spreading rapidly. This is especially possible when you are playing on continents and discover some civs after they've acquired one of your non-state religions.

I don't think you can reliably expect your religion to spread to the world just by building a shrine, no matter how early.

 

[cabert]

But there's the annoying possibility Sisutil mentioned where unless you get everyone to adopt Theocracy a late blooming religion might start spreading rapidly. This is especially possible when you are playing on continents and discover some civs after they've acquired one of your non-state religions.

I don't think you can reliably expect your religion to spread to the world just by building a shrine, no matter how early.

I reliably expect the shrine to spread the religions to all my neighbours. Who cares about the guys who cannot hurt you in the next 4000 years?