My Strategy for Beating Immortal with Egypt

[mikeydlaw]

I say my strategy but I'm sure this strategy has probably been discussed here already or similar variations. I wanted to post anyway for future reference and perhaps someone might find it useful.

Settings are...
Egyptians, small map size, pangaea, standard game speed, random opponents. Everything else is just set at default, and of course immortal.

Initial strategy is to win via cultural victory however you may end up winning through domination depending on how strong your opponents are late in the game. The best thing about this strategy is you can fall back on cultural victory if they have a ridiculously large army. You can also use this for the one city challenge as I don't build any cities and only puppet a few cities.

This strategy is also not fool proof as it requires building both Hanging Gardens and Great Library which occasionally the AI will beat you to it. However if you get both then you are in a good position to win the game.

In the beginning

Starting position is really important so a start with marble, river and decent production and as many workable tiles as possible is essential.

Overview
If you time it right you can switch from Great Library to Hanging Gardens with 1 turn to go then by the time you finish Hanging Gardens you will have researched Philosophy and can research Civil service with your free tech from Great Library (CS sling shot). You should get a new policy about this time which will allow you to get Legalism giving you a free Burial Tomb, switch on your great artist specialist straight away.

Once you get to about population 6 or 7 in your capital switch to production focus and make sure you get your Marble hooked up as soon as you can. I also go and capture my neighboring civil states Worker as soon as it pops as your capital will grow super quick with hanging gardens so two workers is useful. Farm pretty much everything by river tiles, build lumber mills and mines elsewhere, no need for trading posts.

Build order...
Monument -> Worker -> Granary -> Library -> Great Library (switch to Hanging Gardens when Mathematics discovered) -> Hanging Gardens -> Great Library

Research order...
Pottery -> Mining -> Archery -> Writing -> Masonry -> Animal Husbandry -> Wheel -> Mathematics -> Trapping -> Philosophy

Policies...
Adopt tradition then honor, then all policies in tradition. Aristocracy -> Oligarchy -> Legalism (only if you have Philosophy, otherwise Warrior Code then Legalism. Try to avoid killing too many barbarians so that you can get Legalism) -> Landed Elite -> Monarchy

Classical/Medieval Era

Overview
You want to build National College then the Oracle then the Chichen Itza. You may also need to build a few pikeman at this stage to help defend your city. You also want to start stock piling cash, trade everything you possibly can ensuring you have enough happiness to keep growing your capital.

Every great artist that pops build a landmark near you capital and lock that tile to ensure it's always used.

The next step at this stage is to get to Machinery so you can upgrade your archers to cross bowman. You should have about three archers (purchased) and either a spearman (if you got an upgrade from ancient ruin) or a warrior.

It's about this time you want to start building roads towards your neighbors so that you can move your army quickly.

Then you want to do a Gunpowder/Chemistry slingshot using the free scientists from the Oxford University and the Porcelain Tower.

Build order...
Stoneworks -> National College -> Oracle -> Chichen Itza -> Hagia Sophia -> Notre Dame (use engineer from Hagia Sohpia) -> Porcelain Tower (use scientist for Gunpowder) -> Workshop -> Forge (if useful) -> Ironworks -> Oxford University (time it to be built as soon as Gunpowder available) -> Barracks -> Heroic Epic -> Armory

Research order...
Bronze Working -> Iron Working -> Construction -> Theology -> Education -> Engineering -> Machinery -> Metal Casting -> Physics -> Steel -> Gunpowder (Free) -> Chemistry (Free)

Policies...
Complete all honor policies

Renaissance Era

Overview
It's now time to take advantage of your cannons, so buy as many as you can and build about an equal number of cannons as musketman. Two armies should do it 3-4 musketman and 3-4 cannons in each with a great general and your crossbowman. Make sure you get a couple of scouts so you can work out who to attack first and where, sometimes it's obvious other times not so much.

When promoting units I usually focus on cover defense for my musketman, that combined with the 10% flanking bonus from the Discipline policy and 25% bonus from your Great General means you should be able to roll a couple of opponents relatively easy. Also medic is useful as well.

I mainly only puppet capitals and the odd city in between to stop other opponents from settling there and messing up your trade routes.

Build the Sistine Chapel if AI hasn't built it and once your army is big enough build the Opera House and assign artists and build The Hermitage

You should now have quite a bit of cash coming in so start strategically allying with civil states and adopt Patronage and beeline for Scholasticism.

Upgrade all of your mustketman as soon as you get rifleman and likewise your cannons when you get artillery. You should pop a scientist well before artillery, I just hold on to it and use it to research artillery once it is researchable (I'm not sure if that is the optimal way to use it though).

Build order...
Scouts x2/Canons x8/Musketman x8 (as many as is needed, keep an eye on military strength in demographics) -> Sistine Chapel (sometimes you might not get this) -> Taj Mahal

Research order...
Horseback riding -> Chivalry -> Acoustics -> Printing Press -> Metallurgy -> Rifling -> Fertilizer -> Banking -> Economics -> Military Science -> Dynamite (Free)

Policies...
Complete all honor policies

Industrial Era

Overview
By this stage you should be pretty much unbeatable. Unless one of the other Civ's have managed to do a lot of expanding/conquering themselves and have signed a lot of research agreements. It's quite important to get Porcelain Tower to stop them from teching ahead too far. If that is the case then you might want to just go into defensive mode and go for Cultural victory.

Beeline for Archaeology and build a Museum (assign artists) and Louvre then beeline for Telepgraph and build Cristo Redentor and get Radio for Broadcast Tower and Eiffel Tower. Then go for Mass media and if your capital is on the coast you can get the opera house as well which is a big bonus.

Once I have adopted all of the Patronage policies I then adopt all Piety and then all Freedom policies.

This strategy may not be 100% accurate as I am just going from memory and each game is different anyway so you may need to modify it slightly but providing you get a good starting position and no body beats you to the Great Library and the Hanging Gardens and you can effectively defend your capital until you research Gunpowder and Chemistry you should win most of the time.

 

[Xile]

How many times do you have to reroll to get GL + HG + marble start? The strategy might as well be "reroll until you're 1st to discover skilldorado".

 

[notadummy]

yeah, I don't think this strategy is viable on emperor+ because getting GL and HG both are pretty impossible

 

[mikeydlaw]

You probably get Marble about 20% of the time, marble is not essential though, in fact Great Library is probably not essential either. It just makes it more challenging. I'd say Hanging Gardens is pretty essential though. If you do get a good starting position with Marble you have about a 50% chance of getting both GL and HG. If you are focusing on only having once city I can't see how you can avoid restarting a few times anyway if you get an average starting position. Anyway perhaps I should have put noobs guide or something in the title.

 

[Tabarnak]

Maybe replace HG for a couple of CBs to get earlier puppets? Cash overflow could be sent into maritime cs to maintain a large growth into capital and spare luxs.

3 maritime cs = HG for capital(plus food bonus for puppets)

The idea is : When to military explode? At CBs? At Crossbowmen(this is probably the most optimal time to attack at immortal/deity)? Steel(upgraded jags ftw)? Chivalry maybe?

 

[mikeydlaw]

My initial strategy was to go to war with crossbowman and pikeman using oxford university to get Machinery. From memory I found it difficult without iron/catapults. I found using this strategy that I was able to defend most of the time until I had cannons/musketman which usually gives you a massive advantage. The same applies when you get artillery. I actually thought this made it a little too easy for Immortal level. Also by that stage your capital can crank out cannons/musketman in around 3 turns. However as the others mentioned it's more hit and miss but I've done it enough times to ensure it's not just fluke.

You could build a second city to secure iron or ally with a CS with iron then you could probably go to war much earlier and not be so reliant on HG.

 

[Schalke 04]

My initial strategy was to go to war with crossbowman and pikeman using oxford university to get Machinery.

Education and Machinery are in the same tech row. Therefore I don't see the point of using Oxford for Machinery. You need universities in all cities plus Oxford itself. That takes a very long time. You should rather go for Machinery straight for a military strategy.

 

[mikeydlaw]

Education and Machinery are in the same tech row. Therefore I don't see the point of using Oxford for Machinery. You need universities in all cities plus Oxford itself. That takes a very long time. You should rather go for Machinery straight for a military strategy.

The strategy only involves having one city and university is usually built in 3 turns. I agree though it didn't really save you that many turns using it for Machinery. Maybe better used for Rifleman.

 

[Slvynn]

only one city? wait, but in your queue for building u didnt mentioned units...

 

[mikeydlaw]

only one city? wait, but in your queue for building u didnt mentioned units...

You usually don't need to build any units until you get Gunpowder/Chemistry, you buy three archers at the beginning of the game and upgrade them to crossbowman when you can. Often your warrior gets the spearman upgrade from an ancient ruin and that can be upgraded to a pikeman. Those units along with a great general, the 10% bonus from the Discipline policy and the 100% defensive bonus from the Oligarchy policy is usually enough for defense. You can buy additional units if needed from the trade of your resources.

 

[Light Cleric]

It should probably be noted he's playing on a Small map(so there are only 5 AI opponents and therefore less competition for Wonders) and Egypt often gets Marble in its start bias to go with its UA so this might be doable since the margins for Immortal are a bit wider than Deity.

 

[Slvynn]

For deity and in many cases immortal you may find urself dead if wait much with having 2nd melee unit and just buy archers. Some AI , on Deity even more so , come very early with quite nice CoD which inlude cats... if you lucky with landscape, nice.. hills and rivers indeed good, but there problem to withstand enemy advance with mekee swarm.. esp if its something like jags or rams or just good stack... having 1 war 1 archer with 7 jags and archer and catapult (mabby less on immortal, or just add another archer to ur side ... ) .. did u tried your low prod boy-only units strat on different maps , in crowded situations? If its " Immortal lucky landcape if no aggressive ais too near" strat then it bit different than just strat for anycase win... imo it risky abit, but i like the idea and surely i will try something like this with adjustments if i roll Egypt and will have marble and landscape will be easy to defend.

 

[mikeydlaw]

For deity and in many cases immortal you may find urself dead if wait much with having 2nd melee unit and just buy archers. Some AI , on Deity even more so , come very early with quite nice CoD which inlude cats... if you lucky with landscape, nice.. hills and rivers indeed good, but there problem to withstand enemy advance with mekee swarm.. esp if its something like jags or rams or just good stack... having 1 war 1 archer with 7 jags and archer and catapult (mabby less on immortal, or just add another archer to ur side ... ) .. did u tried your low prod boy-only units strat on different maps , in crowded situations? If its " Immortal lucky landcape if no aggressive ais too near" strat then it bit different than just strat for anycase win... imo it risky abit, but i like the idea and surely i will try something like this with adjustments if i roll Egypt and will have marble and landscape will be easy to defend.

I tried this a few times on Diety and never got the wonders at the beginning. I'm not really ready for Diety yet though, I've only just stepped up to Immortal. There have only been a few occasions where I have been overwhelmed by the opposition army early on but you are right in that it's a big advantage if your capital is somewhat isolated. I guess by the time the AI gets a decent stack you have upgraded to crossbowman by that stage.

Although in saying that the last game I won with this strategy I had Greece right next to me and they rushed the Romans who were a fair way to the east of me. No idea why they didn't attack me first.

I just tried a similar strategy to this with the Babylonians (same settings) and came pretty close to winning, it's the first time I have played with them so I'm pretty sure with a few adjustments I could win consistently. I didn't go for GL just HG and then followed pretty much the same tech path and build order. I had a pretty good starting position though. Policy wise I didn't go for honor just tradition/patronage/freedom. I used all of my scientists to research techs. A two city approach might be more effective for this strategy but happiness becomes an issue.

 

[The Pilgrim]

mikeydlaw, you should have pointed out your strategy applies to vanilla. Many questions and 'criticism' would have been eliminated.

 

[S.K. Ren]

Egypt is one of those stupidly broken ICS civs. Burial Tombs + Religious Center = +4 Happiness in each city with no gold maintenance SPAMSPAMSPAM Just keep about 4-5 Archers floating around to stop rushes and you're golden.

Edit:Vanilla still stands... just only +2 Happiness.

 

[mikeydlaw]

mikeydlaw, you should have pointed out your strategy applies to vanilla. Many questions and 'criticism' would have been eliminated.

Yeah I wasn't sure which icon to use, I think the one I have just added is the right one?

 

[The Pilgrim]

Yeah I wasn't sure which icon to use, I think the one I have just added is the right one?

IMO, if you add G&K icon, people get it, if you use just CiV or none, not necessarily. These days by default everybody assume everything is G&K related.