Alternate Pyramind Grab

[uberfish]

The point of this approach isn't actually getting the pyramids faster - it's getting them for free. 450 hammers is an awfully large chunk of your early production if you don't have either industrious or stone.

[gus_smedstad]

Yes, it's cheaper, but not anything like free. You have to build the Oracle and a Forge, which is 270 hammers right there. Yes, those give benefits besides the Engineer, but you're forgoing both straight expansion and a Civil Service slingshot. It's also slow enough that it frequently fails, it's more likely that you'll lose the Pyramids entirely than if you build them.

I guess it's the last part I find most frustrating. I'm expecting to get the Pyramids, and often I don't get them, or something interferes with the critical timing of rushing the Forge like a barbarian attack.

- Gus

[uberfish]

It IS quite likely that you'll miss the pyramids - which is why I suggested playing as Mao where machinery is a very good option.

The engineer can pop Parthenon as another alternative too and I'm surprised the philo/GP fanatics on this forum haven't mentioned it yet - and as a plus you can drop it in a new border city to boost its culture and keep the great artist spawn controlled. The AI seldom builds this one before 500BC in my experience.

[xxFlukexx]

Awesome a new pyramids start. I don't think I've ever tried for the pyramids on Emperor without stone, it would be awesome if I can get the pyramids in most of my games now, that would make things a whole lot easier. I finally got some times to test it out:

Using Mao (China) as he is Philo and Org so I figure he would be perfect for an Emperor attempt, here's my common attempt:
3400 BC Worker done
3280 BC Pottery done, starting cottages on floodplains
2840 BC Size 3. Starting settler (17 turns) Size 4 would get -1 healthy
2120 BC Settler and Priesthood done. Starting worker (10 turns) 3 trees pre-chopped in capital
1720 Second worker done, starting on oracle and chopping.
1400 BC Oracle done + first chop in second city.
3 reloads after after lots of barb archers leads me to restart and worldbuilder add in a few troops. (Dunno why everyone's strategy builds 0 warriors and never runs into barb problems)
725 BC Great Engineer done, AI built Pyramids in 875 BC
reloading to 2120 BC, don't think that second worker was good.
1560 BC Oracle done. Worker moving to second city site.
1280 BC Forge up, Engineer assigned.
750 BC Great Engineer done, too late again.

Bouncing the worker back and forth between two cities pre chopping and then real chopping like mad can barely work but I can't do it fast enough.

Here's the initial save, looks like decent terrain.

http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=68058_AutoSave_Initial_BC-4000-Pyramids.Civ4SavedGame

My problem isn't really with any of the times, I can pop out the Oracle just under 1800 BC, but then nothing is pre-chopped in city #2 so I get a prophet instead.

I am guessing that lack of hills and no food resource makes it near impossible to pull off. Since I need perfect terrain I don't like this strategy as much as when I first read it. Even when I had a food resoucre and hills and no floodplains I was barely able to get a Great Engineer by 925 BC and 875 BC. Two times the AI got the Pyramids faster with stone (1120 BC and another one somewhere in 1000s BC) 900-950 BC is right smack dab in the middle of the danger zone for the AI building the pyramids.

I agree with gus and uberfish, this is very, very risky. Unless you start out with great terrain, don't even bother. I dunno though, I guess you could call this a trick to use with awesome terrain but I already got tons of those.

[-SafaN-]

Marathon game, continents, monarch, betty

Ok i'll show my version of the forge-pyramid start, and its power

4000 bc found london on spot, we first go for mysticism - polytheism for the religion. Building worker first.



3960 bc, village gives gold

3820 bc, village gives gold, Initial warrior destroyed by a lion

3660 bc, alex ... fun

3440 bc, asoka and napoleon

3380 bc, worker finished and starts mining

3060 bc, founded hinduism (not changing state religion) researching bronze working

2400 bc, bronze working, made a several wariors, and found bronze near. Researching wheel, chopping settler while still growing (by swapping over to warriors)



2060 bc, finished settler, now chopping a second worker, after wheel we go to priesthood.

2020 bc, founded York, starting warriors there until we have metal casting.



1930 bc, priesthood researched, starting oracle in london (chopping with two workers now)

1780 bc, pottery researched going for writing alphabet

1670 bc, oracle finished, got metal casting, now building forge in york while wariors in london

1430 bc, forge finished, assigned engineer, now starting granary in york since it has very few food
in the meanwhile london started a baracks. We also have open borders with the others and i can see two barbarian cities



1130 bc, i converted (finaly) to hinduism, because both alex and mansa are hinduist now

980 bc, alphabet researched, goin on to literature and backfilling techs

930 bc, like u can see I failed with 1 turn
It was meant to make the engeneer first, so i could make the pyramids, then the great prophet in londen, for the hinduistic shrine.



anyways, u can see i'm leading in tech and my military isn't that bad.

[Alkis2]

Just to make things worse for you

I managed to do it two more times on Emperor but I lost both games nevertheless.

In the first Huayna, on another continent killed two other civs and became far too strong, in the second I was completely boxed in by that Egyptian girl with the funny name. Maybe I should have attacked her but she was friendly towards me and while I was building my army she even gave me a tech for free. That broke my heart

[The_Paladin]

Hmm... I must admit I've had better luck than this in my games getting the great engineer to grant the pyramids. I do play on Marathon speed though... so maybe that's the difference right there. Maybe, for whatever reason, marathon makes this strat easier. Also it seems that playing on a larger map helps as well... small maps give the AI's less to do and they are more likely to start a wonder then.

There are quite a few detailed posts here that indicate this strat is probably not very good on normal speed though. So a good word of caution to would-be users.

It makes sense that the pyramids are harder to get than the oracle is. The pyramids only require masonry whereas the oracle requires priesthood. Fewer AI's will research priesthood than masonry so therefore your competition for the pyramids is greater.

Also a quick look in the XML files tells us that the AIs have some fixed probability to start a wonder whenever it is possible to do so (I believe there are some other nuances as well to indicate what types of wonders they prefer). That means that earlier wonders will often be chosen before later ones since that tech is available first.

For example suppose we're looking at the AI playing Mao. At point A Mao is deciding whether to build a wonder or not. He currently has masonry and polytheism but does not have priesthood or sailing. Therefore if he chooses to build a wonder he only has the Parthenon or the pyramids to build. Let's assume he doesn't choose to build a wonder but instead an archer. Now at point B he does this same check again... and again and again until he finally decides to build a wonder.

So in order for him to build the oracle, all those earlier "checks" would've failed. Of course he could start a second wonder in a second city, which further complicates things, but inevitably that second city would be slower than the capital so that isn't a big a concern.

But the trend in this, at least, is that the earlier the wonder is available, the more heavy the competition for it is.

IMHO even though I posted this strategy, I don't use it much. Not because I haven't got it to work (again it was either marathon or I was just lucky) but because I don't like having to give up my early academy.

Maybe people will have better luck with this approach. I still use the oracle to get metal casting (Farseer) but instead of generating a great engineer first, I get a great scientist to get an academy in the capital. I then get a forge soon after - you don't have to rush... just get it at some point. If you want, your powered capital can usually research CoL fast enough to found Confucianism (I usually go for archery first and still manage to found that religion).

To me this is almost as good as a CS slingshot but doesn't carry the risk incurred by delaying the oracle build. You still get +50% research in the capital and you get +25% production. That's almost the same as running bureau. Plus you can power your research towards bureau at some point and get an additional bonus over standard CS slingshots.

Anyway after I get that academy I usually get a third city to get a forge and start generating a engineer. You have a choice here... you are generating three kinds of great people: prophets, scientists, and engineers. All can be useful to you at this point. The scientist can give you philo for free (pacifism), the prophet can form your holy shrine or help you with CS research (if you haven't researched masonry - so you definitely can't go for the pyramids then), and the engineer can get you any of the classical era wonders you want.

Personally I'm liking all three options... though I favour the scientist at the moment... the scientist can get you pacifism, found you a second religion (or a first if you missed CoL first), and speed your production of your third GP... which ironically hasn't really cost you anything then. The third GP will pop out about the same time he would've anyway. I mean the cost for the third GP went up by about 50% (200 to 300 total GPP required) but your generation of GP points also went up 50% by pacifism so it equals out, approximately, in the end.

Of course using the GP to get CS is a nice option as well... that gives you both an academy, a forge, and bureau in the capital. Very nice boost! The great engineer is kind of a nice option too. If you use him to grab the hanging gardens you can generate even more GE's faster - a definite nice option when you can pull in +15 GE points a turn (with pacifism). You can pretty much grab all the key wonders you want with those engineers, if you focus on generating them. Plus you can time the hanging gardens well this way... to get it when it will be of the most benefit.

You can do these in any order... but if you want that GE second you do have to rush a forge into your third city to get him before that prophet... its easier to get the GE third though after a second GS or a GP.

Anyways that's my current start. Give it a try if you like .

[couerdelion]

I will definitely try this one out. Saladin would be a very useful leader to go for this because the starting factors and traits all help. Beth’s another one where thjs ought to work. Great Engineers for non-industrious leaders make a rather useful mix.

It would be helpful to at least state what speed you are playing at (rather than just difficulty level). At least that way I can compare the relative times of completing certain things. For one thing, I don’t think I can ever recall the Pyramids being finished before 1000 BC at Emperor difficulty, but this date on Epic speed is equivalent to 1600 BC on Standard speed.

[The keeper]

Originally posted by The keeper
Just curious if this has happened to anyone:


Use an engineer to rush a wonder. It isn't built right away, just gives it only 1 turn left.

Before your next turn, someone completes the wonder - and then your engineer has been turned into a token ammount of gold.

I should have kept my mouth shut.

I pop rushed a wonder using 5 citizens. And I still didn't get the wonder because another civ got it instead. If it can happen pop-rushing, it can happen with an engineer.

[couerdelion]

I shouldn't laugh at this but...

Originally posted by The keeper


I should have kept my mouth shut.

I pop rushed a wonder using 5 citizens. And I still didn't get the wonder because another civ got it instead. If it can happen pop-rushing, it can happen with an engineer.

Well at least you can now probably promote an axeman to a maceman with all that extra money

[Swiss Pauli]

The 'anti-Ghandi' approach worked well on Monarch-Epic, with the Colossus thrown in for extra GPP to get the engineer (a bit risky though).

However, I don't think Ghandi had stone as it was 500BC when I got the Pyramids and Oracle was never in doubt after I hutted Mysticism.

Generally, it seems good for a high-food map.

[Tomb.]

i have tried this on emperor / standard 3 times and succeeded 2 times.
The one i lost was to a human player with stone and got me the Great Library.

I've used Lizzie, because Phi gives you the GE even faster.

Nice tactic!

[couerdelion]

Tried something like this yesterday with Cyrus although ended up chopping whole swathes of forests in Pasargadae to get the Oracle and Forge in quick succession. It certainly speeds up the Engineer since you get the Prophet points in the same city. Unfortunately it makes it more pot luck that you get the Engineer.

So here’s the fall back.
1) Research CoL and snag Confusion
2) Don’t research masonry until the last minute
3) Perhaps research Polytheism

These are your likely options

1) Great Prophet – part research CS, create shrine
2) Great Engineer – build Pyramids if still available/build Parthenon/lightbulb Machinery and get some Crossbows out there to reek revenge on an unfair world

I got beat to the Pyramids before the Great Person arrived but when they did I got myself a Prophet. What is a little surprising is that the GP/GE rate on the city seems stuck on 50:50 despite there being 5 GP points invested each turn. It should at least drift towards a GE. Civil Service lightbulbed and spent another 15-odd turns to bring in a half decent gold from the capital.

Not exactly great and by 1 AD I do feel a little backward in the game. Perhaps this might have something to do with my war with Vicky. Her 5 cities against my 2 cities was not exactly what I would call a fair fight. I still, got myself a holy city and a worker so the old lady got soundly whipped for her affront.

[tetley]

This is going to sound noobish, but hey, I'm humble. I don't think I want to play Emperor. For games as long as Civ, I don't like to lose (if it were AOE3, sure, crank the diff up and I'll be done in 20 mins). But it sounds like a Pyramid grab is the way to go on lower difficulty. That way your Philosophical Pacifist Bureaucratic Mercantile Republic can bypass slingshot and churn out the early GP's.

[Swiss Pauli]

Originally posted by Swiss Pauli
The 'anti-Ghandi' approach worked well on Monarch-Epic, with the Colossus thrown in for extra GPP to get the engineer (a bit risky though).

However, I don't think Ghandi had stone as it was 500BC when I got the Pyramids and Oracle was never in doubt after I hutted Mysticism.

Generally, it seems good for a high-food map.

I've repeated the exercise on a couple of other starts and got everything built without hut-luck. In one of them, I survived a bout of Barb-pillaging in my capital pre-Pyramids and then a (semi) shock attack from Izzy once I'd completed the wonders and was spamming chariots (I felt I was a sitting target). Thankfully, Izzy only had a bunch of archers!

Need to play on (as Mao) to Machinery as I still feel a bit weaker than by doing a CS Sling. I'd did reload one as I got a GS (12% chance) and not a GE...