Zigzagzigal's Guide to Ethiopia (BNW)

Ethiopia is flexible, defends effectively and scales well with higher difficulties. This guide goes into plenty of detail about Ethiopian strategies, uniques and how to play against them.

Introduction

Note: This guide assumes you have all game-altering DLC and expansion packs (all Civ packs, Wonders of the Ancient World, Gods & Kings and Brave New World)



The earliest years of Ethiopia's history are hidden behind the mists of time, consisting of various kingdoms over 2,000 years ago. 1,900 years before the present day, the Aksumite (or Axumite) empire rose to prominence around the southern Red Sea - a major regional trading power linking the Roman Empire with India and beyond. In the 4th century of the common era, Aksum adopted Christianity - the second nation in the world to do so - and in the 7th century, Aksum provided shelter for some of the first followers of Islam. But the kingdom would begin to go into decline, collapsing in the 10th century. The Zagwe Dynasty would follow, ruling Ethiopia for a short length of time, followed by the Solomonic dynasty from 1270 onwards. For the first couple of centuries, Ethiopia would expand to dominate eastern Africa, and resume contact with European powers. But when the Adal Sultanate to the east invaded, Ethiopia was forced to call upon its European contact in Portugal - which brought Catholic missionaries with them. This led to yet more religious conflict, between the rapidly growing Catholic population and the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.

Between the 18th and 19th centuries of the common era, Ethiopia suffered from instability, as rival religious factions aimed to seize control in what became known as the "Age of Princes". After re-centralisation in the mid 19th century, there was little time until the greedy powers of Europe seeked to plunder the African continent for all it could. From 1895-6, a dispute about the contents of an Italian-Ethiopian treaty would lead to war - a war which Ethiopia won. Out of this victory, Ethiopia's status in the world would grow, giving them a greater platform, including a place in the League of Nations in 1923, but this would not be enough. Under Fascist rule, Italy would return again in 1935-6 to conquer Ethiopia. Outside powers would not assist Ethiopia until the Second World War, where it would achieve independence once again. A process of modernisation would begin, but in 1974, discontent would lead to a coup, replacing Emperor Haile Selassie with a communist regime lasting until 1991. Now, Ethiopia may be known globally for its poverty, but you can show the world it has far more. It has history. It has cultures. And it is a civilization that, despite often being left isolated in the world, has stood the test of time.



Before I go into depth with this guide, here's an explanation of some terminology I'll be using throughout for the sake of newer players.

Beelining - Focusing on obtaining a technology early by only researching technologies needed to research it and no others. For example, to beeline Bronze Working, you'd research Mining and Bronze Working and nothing else until Bronze Working was finished.
Finisher - The bonus for completing a Social Policy tree (e.g. Free Great Person for Liberty.)
Forward Settling - Deliberately settling a city next to a rival's capital, usually in order to make invasions easier.
GWAM - Great Writers, Artists and Musicians. These are the three types of Great People who can make Great Works, a major source of tourism for cultural Civs.
Opener - The bonus for unlocking a Social Policy tree (e.g. +1 culture for every city for Liberty's opener)
Tall empire - A low number of cities with a high population each. "Building tall" refers to making an empire a tall one.
UA - Unique Ability - The unique thing a Civilization has which doesn't need to be built.
UB - Unique Building - A replacement for a normal building that can only be built by one Civilization.
UU - Unique Unit - A replacement for a normal unit that can only be built by one Civilization or provided by Militaristic City-States when allied (this only applies to land UUs that are of Civs not in your current game.)
Uniques - Collective name for Unique Abilities, Units, Buildings, Improvements and Great People
Wide empire - A high number of cities with a low population each. "Building wide" refers to making an empire a wide one.

At a glance (Part 1/2)

Start Bias

Ethiopia has no starting bias.

Uniques

Ethiopia's UA and UB take effect immediately, while their UU is all the way over in the industrial era.

Unique Ability: Spirit of Adwa

• All your units receive a 20% combat bonus against the units of Civs or City-States with more cities than you
  
  • Puppeted cities and cities in the process of being razed count, so if you had 4 cities, and your rival had 2 regular and 3 puppet cities, you'd still receive the 20% bonus against their units.
    
  • City ranged attacks are not affected by the 20% combat bonus.

Unique Unit: Mehal Sefari (Replaces the Rifleman)

A gunpowder melee unit

Technology	Obsoletion	Upgrades from	Upgrades to	Production cost	Purchase cost	Resource needed
Rifling Industrial era 1st column (10th column overall)	Replaceable Parts Modern era 1st column (12th column overall)	Musketman (110 )*	Great War Infantry (250 )*	200 *	680 *	None

*Assumes a normal speed game.

Strength	Ranged Strength	Moves	Range	Sight	Negative Attributes	Positive Attributes
34	N/A	2	N/A	2	None	15% combat bonus in rough terrain (Drill I) 30% combat bonus in your capital, bonus reduces the further from it this unit is

Negative changes

• Costs 250 gold to upgrade in normal speed games, up from 200 (+25%)

Positive changes

• Costs 200 production in normal speed games, down from 225 (-11%)
  
• Costs 680 gold in normal speed games, down from 740 (-8%)
  
• Costs 110 gold to upgrade to in normal speed games, down from 160 (-31%)

Positive keep-on-upgrade changes

• 15% combat bonus in rough terrain (Drill I)
  
• 30% combat bonus in your capital, bonus reduces the further from it this unit is
  
  • Every tile away from the capital reduces the bonus by 3%
    
  • 10 or more tiles away from the capital, this bonus has no effect

Unique Building: Stele (Replaces the Monument)

Building of the Culture line

Technology	Building required	Required to build	Production cost	Purchase cost	City restriction	Maintenance
Available from start	None	Amphitheatre	40 *	280 *	None	1

*Assumes a normal speed game.

Base output	Output Multiplier	Specialist	Great Work slots	Other effects
2 2	None	None	None	None

Positive changes

• 2 extra faith produced

At a glance (Part 2/2)

Victory Routes

Note these scores are a matter of personal opinion based on experiences with the Civilization. You may discover a way of utilising the Civ more effectively in unconventional ways.

Cultural: 8/10
Diplomatic: 6/10
Domination: 7/10
Scientific: 8/10

Like the Celts, Ethiopia may appear to have low scores, but that's because their uniques tend to be indirectly useful towards victory routes rather than directly so - there's no defensive or religious victory, after all. Ethiopia scales very well with difficulty in singleplayer as computer opponents will have a head start to founding cities (so you can use your UA's defensive bonus easily) and usually, founding a religion is difficult (which the UB deals with.) As a result, on the highest difficulties, Ethiopia can perform better than many Civs with a greater focus on a single victory type.

So, which victory route to take? If you keep the number of cities you own small, you could take your UA towards a domination victory - just keep razing your conquests. Your UA encourages building tall, which synergises nicely with scientific victories, although your UB encourages building wide. Early religions tend to fit culture better than science or domination, so heading towards a cultural victory will work effectively. Overall, culture or science will probably be the most effective options.

Similar Civs and uniques

Overall

Ethiopia's strong faith emphasis very early in the game makes very similar to the Celts. Ethiopia defends better and is usually first to a religion, but the Celts have a strong mid-game happiness bonus and are usually first to a Pantheon.

Another Civ to consider is the Mayans. They also have early faith bonuses, but they clearly skew towards scientific victories unlike the less clear paths of Ethiopia and the Celts.

Same start bias

Ethiopia's lack of a start bias is shared with America, China, France, Germany, Greece, the Maya, Persia, Rome and the Shoshone.

Similar to the UA

The Shoshone also have a defensive bonus as part of their UA, but this only applies to their land units within their own territory, and the bonus is 15% rather than 20%. On the other hand, it's not tied to however many cities you have.

Some other Civs that are particularly strong in defence include Babylon, the Inca, the Iroquois and Morocco. Babylon has a unique Walls replacement that offers slightly more city strength and double as much city health, while the other Civs have uniques that make it easier to defend their favoured terrain types.

Similar to Mehal Sefari

Other Rifleman UUs include Denmark's Norwegian Ski Infantry and Sweden's Caroleans, but Mehal Sefari have more in common with Minutemen, the American Musketman UU. Why? Because of the Drill I promotion, which allows both units to get to higher-level promotions more easily.

Other UUs that start with basic promotions allowing you to get to better ones sooner include Hunnic Horse Archers, Japanese Samurai, Dutch Sea Beggars, Polish Winged Hussars, and America's other UU, the B17.

Similar to Steles

Early faith bonuses are similar to those offered by the Celtic UA and Mayan Pyramids. Another UB offering a faith bonus is Indonesia's Candi - it doesn't arrive until the medieval era, but can potentially have a much bigger faith bonus.

Unique Building: Stele

Introduction

For once, I'm breaking my usual rule of covering the Unique Ability first. Why? Because not only is the Stele avaliable immediately while you won't see any use for the UA for a while, but the Stele is by far Ethiopia's most important unique feature.

As the game's only Monument replacement, the Stele is the only UB that can be built straight away. This doesn't necessarily mean you should - with twice as much faith as a Shine on offer, there's a very high chance you'll be the first to a Pantheon even if you build something else first. It's not a bad idea to start with a Scout to get an idea of what your starting terrain is like, so you can pick the most appropriate Pantheon with the Stele faith.

Expansion

Securing a Pantheon easily isn't hard as Ethiopia, and neither is getting a religion. In order to get one quickly, you can build new cities early and make use of the Legalism Social Policy in the Tradition tree so they instantly have Steles.

Some players like to take the rather more extreme measure of building wide in order to maximise faith output. Ethiopia can have the game's strongest faith output this way (prior to Indonesia getting their Candi) which works well with faith-hungry beliefs such as To the Glory of God. The problem with this is that it renders Ethiopia's UA useless, so be sure to keep your defences strong to counteract that if you're going down such a route.

Generally though, I'd advocate building a tall empire so you can make use of Ethiopia's UA, allowing you to keep your army efficently small. Nonetheless, it's still useful to expand to at least three cities quickly in order to get a good early faith generation going (and building cities earlier gives them more time to mature.)

Grabbing a religion

Ethiopia can easily be the first Civ to a religion, hence giving the first pick of religious beliefs. It's a good idea to pick beliefs relevant to a tall empire - they can help towards science or culture, meaning you have a backup victory route if one doesn't work out later on in the game.

Due to Ethiopia's head start in founding a religion, you can get around to spreading it before anyone else. This gives you a significant advantage to religious pressure, which means you'll be able to convert lots of cities and make the most of Founder beliefs. Pick one that gives you rewards from the number of religious followers or the number of cities following your religion for the maximum potential.

Onwards

Beyond the founding of a religion, you can spend the rest of the game working towards your preferred victory route. Again, science or culture fits a tall empire best, and their technologies are close together. It's worthwhile to get around to building the Grand Temple at some point in order to keep your faith (and hence Missionary) output competitive with wider empires in the mid-game, but come the Industrial era and later, stick to using faith for buying Great People with.

Unique Ability: Spirit of Adwa

Above: Okay, there's a sea of bonuses here. But more is still useful.

So, thanks to an early religion, you're on the long road to eventual victory. But Steles aren't all Ethiopia has to offer - they also have two uniques which are intended for defensive usage, but aren't bad on the offensive, either.

On the defensive

The main use of Ethiopia's UA is to get an edge in defence against larger empires - "larger" meaning more cities. It doesn't matter if you have more land or people, what matters is your number of cities. If someone's at war with you, and they own more cities than you, all your units will get a 20% bonus against their units.

The key advantage here is that as long as you don't expand too much, you can keep a smaller or less-developed army than anyone else and still remain competitive. For most of the game, military technologies are on the other side of the technology tree to scientific and cultural ones, but thanks to this UA, you can afford to delay such detours. You can think of this ability like the Mayan or Siamese UUs - enabling you to focus on getting a domestic advantage rather than having to build a huge defensive force.

Later in the game, combat strengths of units will rise considerably in both absolute and relative terms. Renaissance units aren't too much stronger than medieval-era ones, but there's quite a jump to the industrial era, and even more to the modern era. Thankfully, the industrial era's where your UU comes along to help out, and the upgrade path for them converges with technologies useful for a tall-building peaceful Civ anyway. So, while the 20% bonus may not be enough on its own to deal with Civs with a militaristic technological advantage, by the time it could really become a problem, you've got other features to help out, too.

In summary, the Ethiopian UA lets you focus on peaceful development rather than having to build up armies.

Special Bonus Strategy: On the offensive

This strategy isn't essential to Ethiopian gameplay, but could be worth trying out.

The Ethiopian UA makes no distinction between fighting in friendly, neutral or enemy lands. So long as your opponent has a higher number of cities than you, all your units will fight 20% more effectively against all their units. This differs greatly from the Shoshone UA, where the bonus only applies to land units in their own territory. This means you don't have to use your UA defensively - you can use it effectively on the offensive, too!

If you want to go warmongering as Ethiopia, start by invading Civs with only slightly more cities than you, and work your way up to those with vast wide empires. That will ensure you start each war with the 20% combat bonus, as you can't raze capitals and as such will gain cities every war. Of course, as you take cities off another Civ, eventually your cities will outnumber theirs and you'll lose the 20% bonus against them, but by that point you should have a significant enough advantage for that not to matter.

Unique Unit: Mehal Sefari

Mehal Sefari are much like Ethiopia's UA. On the face of it, they're a defensive unit, but they also have good offensive capabilities, too.

On Defence

Mehal Sefari come at a useful time, where combat strengths of units are increasing rapidly and as such the 20% combat bonus your UA offers may not be enough on its own. With a slightly cheaper cost, the Drill I promotion and a bonus near your capital, they're an affordable and effective way to keep safe.

There's a catch, however - their position on the technology tree is a little off the main cultural or scientific technologies of the time, meaning you'll need to make a little diversion to get them. As they obsolete with Replacable Parts (which has the very useful Statue of Liberty wonder) you'll want to build plenty while you can for maximum effect.

Drill I

The main advantage to starting with the Drill I promotion is to get to stronger promotions sooner. Backed by an Armoury, you can get Mehal Sefari straight to Medic II, Drill III or Cover II, or one promotion away from Blitz or March. If you get hold of the Brandenburg Gate with a Military Academy, you can build them immediately starting with Blitz or March; the latter essentially making them super versions of Sweden's Caroleans. A unit with stacked combat bonuses healing every turn can stand up to Civs even with a significant combat advantage.

Near capital bonus

Despite the uniqueness of this attribute, the free Drill I is probably the more useful bonus. Still, this attribute is excellent for defending your capital, and can help out a little for cities near to it. If you lose your capital, the strength bonus will move to being based on your new capital's location.

Let's look at the actual strength bonus offered:

Distance from capital (tiles)	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10+
Strength bonus	30%	27%	24%	21%	18%	15%	12%	9%	6%	3%	0%

0 tiles means your Mehal Sefari would be fighting from the capital's tile. To give an idea of the distances, 2 tiles is the limit of a city's ranged attack, 3 its workable area and 5 the maximum limit it can obtain tiles in through culture. The bonus may still be noticable for the nearest cities to your capital, but any further out it'll likely be too small to make any real difference.

Together with your UA's bonus, Mehal Sefari will fight essentially as if they were one tier of technology stronger when close to your capital. Upgraded to Infantry, they can fight reasonably well against even Modern Armour. Just don't forget that your other cities besides your capital need defending, too.

On Offence

Like your UA, you don't have to use Mehal Sefari defensively. Their near-capital combat bonus can deal with forward settlers though this is rather late in the game for such a course of action.

The real advantage comes in the free promotion. As already mentioned, you can get Mehal Sefari immediately to the March promotion if backed by a Military Academy and the Brandenburg Gate. Bring a Medic-promoted unit with them, and they'll get particularly hard to kill.

Special promotions kept on upgrade

• 15% combat bonus in rough terrain (Drill I)
  
• Near capital bonus of up to 30%

Aside from the cheaper cost, (Mehal Sefari are more expensive to upgrade than regular Riflemen,) everything is kept on upgrade. Be sure to build a good number before they obselete, and your capital will be pretty much secure for the rest of the game. So long as no-one builds nuclear weapons.

Social Policies

For the rest of the guide, I'm assuming you're building tall and going for either culture or science, as that neatly strings together all of Ethiopia's uniques. As such, you should start with the Tradition Social Policy tree. Piety works decently as a second tree, though it's probably a good idea to either move into Aesthetics (for cultural players) or Rationalism (for scientific players) as soon as you can after Tradition's done. If you're playing culturally, you can always cut out Piety and go into Rationalism once Aesthetics is done.

Tradition

Opener

Together with a Stele, your capital will make 6 culture a turn, which isn't bad at this very early stage. Aside from eating up the first few Social Policies faster, it's good for expanding your capital's borders quickly to make forward settling by other Civs harder.

Oligarchy

Your UA allows you to keep a small army. This ability allows you to save even more on unit maintenance. It also compensates a little for the fact city ranged attacks don't gain from your UA's combat bonus.

Legalism

Free Steles in your first four cities! That means more faith the moment you found new cities, cutting the time it takes to found a religion.

Landed Elite

Growing your capital taller will be good for increasing its science output as well as production for building wonders.

Monarchy

This is a great source of early cash, and helps ensure a growing capital doesn't cause you problems with happiness.

Aristocracy

There's a little happiness on offer here, but the main advantage is the bonus to wonder building. It's a good idea to develop all your cities so they're capable of building wonders at a reasonably speed rather than just depending on your capital - especially if you're playing culturally.

Finisher

Now, all your (first four) cities can grow faster to help with science or wonder-building.

Piety

Piety is a decent filler tree between Tradition and Aesthetics/Rationalism, helping you to keep your religion strong through the mid-game and late-game.

Opener

You probably won't have built Shrines up to this point, meaning the faster building of them and Temples offered here is still relevant. Plus, you've got a potential shot at the powerful Great Mosque of Djenne wonder.

Organised Religion

A way to ensure your faith generation remains competitive with Civs with more cities. A city with a Shrine, a Temple and a Stele together with this Social Policy makes 7 faith a turn compared to the 3 faith per turn that would be generated by other Civs with the buildings but without this Social Policy.

Religious Tolerance

If any rival religions slip into your cities, you can make use of their Pantheon. This usually is minor in impact, as most Pantheons don't offer that much by this point. Still, this policy's needed on the way to Reformation.

Reformation

There's a couple of decent choices here, which are good late-game uses of faith. That's covered in more detail in the religion section of this guide.

Mandate of Heaven

Get an edge to generating those Missionaries, Inquisitors and Great Prophets and keeping your religious spread high. Excellent with the Great Mosque of Djenne, but still useful without it.

Theocracy

Temples now essentially act as a fourth gold building. Together with a Stock Exchange, the base gold output of cities will be doubled providing plenty of cash for things like Research Agreements.

Finisher

It'll probably be late in the game by the time you get around to finishing Piety (if at all) but four uses of unstoppable religious spread may still be useful for keeping your religion strong. It makes it easier to push through the World Religion decision in the World Congress if you have more Civs following your religion, so it may be worth considering for those playing culturally.

Aesthetics (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

Opener

Faster GWAM generation means more Great Works and hence more tourism.

Fine Arts

Building tall with a low number of cities tends to give you plenty of excess happiness. Aside from Golden Ages, now you have another use for it - mopping up Social Policies faster. Take this after Cultural Centres if your excess happiness isn't particularly high or you haven't built that many cultural buildings.

Cultural Centres

This helps to get through buildings such as Opera Houses, Museums and Broadcast Towers as soon as you need them, saving production for things like building wonders.

Flourishing of the Arts

This is a major reason for developing all your cities so they're capable of building wonders themselves - they can all get a significant culture boost that way. Plus, have a free Golden Age (and hence a production boost) at a time where there's plenty of good wonders.

Cultural Exchange

A good, strong boost to tourism. Thanks to your early-game religion, you can make use of the 40% boost from sharing a religion. Trade Routes and Open Borders aren't particularly hard to maintain, so you can make the maximum potential out of this Social Policy. Don't forget to use Spies as Diplomats - it may not be boosted by this policy, but it's still a tourism boost nonetheless.

Artistic Genius

Prior to the industrial era, Great Artist slots are rare. Additionally, this policy doesn't lead anywhere but the finisher. As such, this policy should be taken last in the Aesthetics tree. Still, a free Golden Age/Great Work is better than nothing.

Finisher

Been building plenty of cultural wonders and got plenty of Great Works? Now, you can have more tourism and culture from their theming bonuses. And the ability to buy GWAMs with faith will be useful for giving a further edge to tourism output.

Rationalism (Scientific Ethiopia favoured)

Rationalism is good for any type of Civ, and if you're playing culturally, it may be a good choice as a "filler" tree instead of Piety.

Opener

Keeping your empire happy won't be hard, so enjoy a global 10% science multiplier.

Secularism

A decent immediate science boost for those tall cities with many specialists.

Humanism

Faster Great Scientist generation means, well, more science. Use them for Academies prior to around the Plastics technology, and rush technologies with them after that point.

Free Thought

Enjoy another immediate science boost for those tall cities with Universities.

Sovereignity

This policy is stronger for wide empires, though money is money and is still useful.

Scientific Revolution

If you took Tithe or Church Property, you should hopefully have plenty of cash now, if not necessarily as much as a typical diplomatic Civ would have. Still, it should be enough for plenty of Research Agreements, which this policy makes much stronger.

Finisher

This saves some time in getting to Plastics/Spaceship techologies and hence time until victory. You can now also buy Great Scientists with faith to help cut off even more turns until then.

Ideology

Assuming you're building tall and going for either science or culture, the Freedom tree will be the most suitable. As usual, I'm assuming you're just choosing the first "inverted pyramid" of tenets (3 from level 1, 2 from level 2, 1 from level 3).

Level One Policies - Freedom

Avant Garde

Whether it's Great Scientists or GWAMs you're generating, more of them will reduce the number of turns needed towards victory. Taking this tenet first ensures it makes as much difference as possible.

Civil Society

You should have quite a few specialists around by this point, so cutting the food they need in half makes a significant difference in helping your cities to grow faster.

Creative Expression (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

Get even more culture out of Great Works, helping to eat up the remaining tenets.

Covert Action (Scientific Ethiopia favoured)

Economic Union works well in this slot as well if there's another Freedom-taking Civ with good potential Trade Route yields. Otherwise, consider that by the end of the game, you'll almost certainly have more Spies than cities (and most other Civs will only send Spies of their own to your capital) freeing up a few. By planting them in nearby City-States, you can cheaply hold alliances, freeing up some gold for Space Procurements.

Level Two Policies - Freedom

New Deal

Landmarks and Great Tile Improvements alike see a greater yield, so that's good for cultural and scientific aims alike. More culture on Landmarks means more tourism with a Hotel/Airport/National Visitor Centre, while more science on Academies and more production on Manufactories helps get the spaceship up sooner.

Universal Suffrage

Slightly better for the scientific players among us (as you're more likely to need the happiness to resist ideological pressure) but nonetheless, longer Golden Ages is useful for building wonders and spaceship parts alike.

Level Three Policies - Freedom

Media Culture (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

A straightforward and reliable way of getting a tourism bonus.

Space Procurements (Scientific Ethiopia favoured)

If you've taken a good gold-granting Founder belief and spread your religion well, you'll be able to get spaceship parts finished sooner. The costs are rather high (parts exceed 3000 gold each on normal-speed games without taking Commerce's Mercantilism or the Big Ben wonder) so you shouldn't neglect production to build some of the parts the old-fashioned way.

Religion

Religion is crucial to Ethiopia's game. Without it, all you have are wartime advantages. Thankfully, you're usually the first to a religion and hence have the first pick of the beliefs as well as an advantage to spreading it.

Following is a list of good beliefs for Ethiopia, arranged in general priority order by type. Highly-situational beliefs aren't covered, so it helps to use your own judgement a little. A faith-giving Pantheon for example can be particularly useful to get your religion completed earlier.

Pantheon

God-King

The sheer speed you can pick up a Pantheon as Ethiopia means you can make use of this and get a significant advantage in the early-game. Even one point of each of these outputs makes quite a difference. It's also a great Pantheon for denying its effects to other Civs, as it'd have to spread to their capital (and by the time it does, its effects will be much less pronounced.)

Goddess of the Hunt or Sun God

Provides an extra source of food for your cities to grow faster, so long as you have the respective terrain types.

Fertility Rites

This'll help your cities to grow just that little bit faster. Combine with Swords into Plowshares for a 25% growth bonus when not at war.

Founder

Tithe

Tithe is an excellent source of money for things like Research Agreements. It's stronger for scientific players as money matters less towards cultural victories than any other route. After all, you can't buy Wonders, Archaeologists or GWAMs with money.

Church Property

A little weaker than Tithe unless most cities around are small. Tithe can get you money even in cities it's not a majority religion in - Church Property cannot. Still, cash is cash.

Pilgrimage

The idea here is to use early conversions of cities for more faith, to be able to keep up with the faith generation of wide empires (or those with lots of faith wonders you haven't managed to pick up.)

Follower

Religious Community

Grow your cities nice and tall and it isn't too difficult to exploit the full 15% production boost here for building wonders or other such production-intensive things.

Swords into Plowshares

A worthwhile growth bonus is on offer here to ensure your low number of cities can produce the buildings, wonders and spaceship pieces you need. Pairs nicely with Fertility Rites and Religious Community.

Divine Inspiration (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

Another way to keep up with the faith output of wide empires while still building tall.

Cathedrals (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

Great Art slots are hard to come by prior to Museums, and for a tall empire, they may be limited even beyond that point. Here's a way to help address that issue.

Religious Art (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

A reasonable source of pre-Hotel tourism, and a Follower belief which is hard for opponents with your religion to exploit.

Feed the World

This can help get your cities growing a little bit faster, though the need to build Shrines and Temples early on for its full effect is annoying for a Civ which has a key advantage of being able to ignore them at first.

Enhancer

Religious Texts or Itinerant Preachers

Both of these give an advantage to religious pressure without you having to spend any faith. That's particularly good for keeping your Founder beliefs strong in the end-game, where your faith will be mostly going towards Great People.

Just War (Warmongering Ethiopia favoured)

For those of us following the unconventional route as Ethiopia, it's worth mentioning this. Your high faith output makes it much easier to spread your religion to other cities earlier on (without some rival religion rapidly replacing it) giving you a good shot at using the 20% combat bonus offered here. Together with your UA, your enemies will be facing a 40% combat bonus! Neither of these advantages work on cities, though, so be sure to bring plenty of siege weapons or ranged units to help out there.

Messiah or Missionary Zeal or Holy Order

Saves you some faith when spreading your religion to new places. Particularly useful for distant, religion-free lands where you're unlikely to be able to spread your religion there with pressure alone.

Reformation

Jesuit Education (Scientific Ethiopia favoured)

Gets scientific buildings up and running quickly, without having to spend gold. That freed-up gold can then be used for things like Research Agreements.

Unity of the Prophets

Helps to ensure the good work you did spreading your religion early on can't easily be undone.

Evangelism

Gives you a strong edge to spreading your religion via Missionaries. Goes well with Missionary Zeal or Holy Order.

World Congress

Here's a list of the decisions and brief notes on importance of some. Ones missing depend greatly on the situation you're in. Voting choices may vary depending on your game - if everyone's pushing for a policy you don't want, but your strategy doesn't rest on it, then it may be better just to abstain (or vote for it for possible diplomatic bonuses.)

Note "priority" refers to how high you should prioritise your votes if it comes up, not how much you should prioritise putting them forward.

Arts Funding

High priority
Vote no if you're playing scientifically
Vote yes if you're playing culturally

Cultural Heritage Sites

Low-Medium priority if you're playing scientifically
High priority if you're playing culturally
Vote yes if you're playing culturally, vote no otherwise (unless you have a huge number of wonders)

Embargo City-States

Low priority
Abstain

Historical Landmarks

Low priority if you're playing scientifically
High priority if you're playing culturally
Vote no if you're playing scientifically
Vote yes if you're playing culturally

International Games

High priority
Vote no if you're playing scientifically
Vote yes if you're playing culturally

International Space Station

High priority
Vote yes if you're playing scientifically
Vote no if you're playing culturally

Natural Heritage Sites

Medium priority
Vote yes if you've got Natural Wonders of your own and a cultural rival doesn't have more than you

Nuclear Non-Proliferation

High priority
Vote yes

Without nuclear weapons, late-game warmongers will have a very hard time of facing your defensive bonuses.

Scholars in Residence

Medium priority
Vote yes unless you're in the lead (or very close to it) technologically speaking

Sciences Funding

High priority
Vote yes if you're playing scientifically
Vote no if you're playing culturally

Standing Army Tax

High priority
Vote yes

Your UA and UU let you keep your army small. Most other Civs don't have such luxuries.

World's Fair

Medium priority
Vote yes

Even when playing scientifically, the World's Fair is useful for getting through things like Social Policies faster.

Wonders

Ethiopia may scale well to higher difficulties due to their defensive and religious capabilities, but they're no better than any other tall empire at wonder-building, so don't spend all your time risking building early wonders rather than infrastructure. Nonetheless, building tall gives you an advantage to building wonders over the average Civ, so there's still plenty of good things you can pick up.

As always, wonders in this section are listed alphabetically in each era, not in priority order. Wonders for routes other than culture or science are not covered here.

Ancient Era

Temple of Artemis

It's a food bonus, not a growth bonus that's on offer here, so this is a strong wonder for tall-building Civs. Faster building of ranged units is useful if you need a fast defensive force if you're under attack.

Classical Era

Hanging Gardens (Tradition Only)

A great way to grow a city nice and tall. For purposes of Social Policy synergy, it's probably best to build it in your capital. Notably, this wonder's the only way of getting a Garden in a city starting next to neither a river or lake.

Oracle

If you want to get through more policies of Piety before Rationalism if you're playing scientifically, or through the Aesthetics tree faster if you're playing culturally, the Oracle can help there. It's also one of the only sources of Great Scientist points prior to Universities.

Parthenon (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

A very early source of a small amount of tourism. It might not seem like much, but it'll really pile up over the course of the game.

Medieval Era

Borobudur

Six spread religion uses, or nine if you also have the Great Mosque of Djenne. Particularly good for when there's lots of small cities close to your land, to help ensure your religion stays dominant in your home region.

Chichen Itza

Tall empires tend not to have too many issues with unhappiness, making Golden Ages reasonably frequent. Making them longer means more gold/production/culture. Keep in mind this wonder's one of the more competitive ones.

Great Mosque of Djenne (Piety Only)

Generally the highest priority of the three Theology wonders - Piety exclusivity isn't usually enough on its own to prevent it being snatched up quickly. Get it, and your Missionaries will be essentially 50% stronger. Plus, including the free Mosque it offers, this wonder's worth 6 faith, which is rather good for dealing with wide-building Temple-spamming rival religious players.

Hagia Sophia

Similar to Borobudur, and is better if you're up against a reasonably strong rival religion due to the power of Great Prophets' religious spread ability. Alternatively, use the Great Prophet to build a Holy Site for more long-run usage.

Renaissance Era

Globe Theatre (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

Great Writing slots aren't particularly common, so here's a couple with a free Great Writer for some instant tourism.

Leaning Tower of Pisa

A competitive wonder to pick up, but one that's good for scientific and cultural players alike.

Porcelain Tower (Rationalism Only)

Making lots of Research Agreements thanks to Tithe? Make them even better with this. Plus, you get a free Great Scientist to make the long road to spaceships that little bit shorter.

Sistine Chapel (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

Offers a couple of rare pre-Museum Great Art slots, in addition to a major global boost to culture - great for resisting cultural Civs of other ideologies later on, or just getting to the good Social Policies/tenets sooner.

Taj Mahal

Gold, production and culture are on offer here - good, all-round bonuses. If you're playing culturally, Great Work wonders are higher-priority and if you're playing scientifically, the Porcelain Tower is better, but this wonder's still useful.

Uffizi (Aesthetics Only, Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

More pre-Museum Great Art slots! Plus, enjoy a free Great Artist so you can immediately make use of one of them.

Industrial Era

Brandenburg Gate

The odd one out of Ethiopia's wonder choices, but it goes brilliantly with your UU. Simply build the Brandenburg Gate in a city, build a Military Academy and then build some Mehal Sefari units. You'll be able to bring them immediately to March, making them exceptionally hard to kill on defence.

Louvre (Exploration Only, Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

I didn't mention taking the Exploration Opener in the Social Policy section as the core bonus isn't that useful to Ethiopia. Still, the Louvre offers very good pre-Hotel tourism, so if you think you can build it and fill all the slots, go for it.

Modern Era

Broadway (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

Another Great Work wonder, this time for Great Music. Keep in mind you can't trade Great Music, and this theming bonus requires that all the slots are filled with music from the same era, so you'll need to be able to generate two Great Musicans in the modern era in addition to the one you get for free with this wonder.

Cristo Redentor

Its high culture output means a decent amount of tourism for cultural players, while the reduced cost of future Social Policies is useful for anyone.

Eiffel Tower (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

12 tourism per turn. No catch, just an instant 12 tourism per turn when built.

Statue of Liberty (Freedom Only)

More production out of your many specialists is good for wonder and spaceship building.

Atomic Era

Great Firewall

For cultural players, this is an excellent way to deny rival cultural players victory, by making their bonus from the Internet technology useless against you. For scientific players, you can free up a counter-Spy and worry less about your technologies being stolen.

Sydney Opera House (Cultural Ethiopia favoured)

The last of the theming bonus wonders, this also offers a considerable bonus to culture in the city it's built in, but has the one catch of having to be built in a coastal city.

Information Era

Hubble Space Telescope (Scientific Ethiopia favoured)

This cuts the time to launch your spaceship, and is as such a very helpful wonder to have.

Pitfalls to Avoid

Ethiopia is an unusual Civ, having general advantages and a lack of an obvious push towards a single victory type. Nonetheless, that doesn't mean it can do everything. Here's a few possible errors you could make, why you shouldn't make them, and how to avoid them.

Building a Stele first without thinking

If you build a Stele very early, you'll probably end up picking a Pantheon before you know what your best option for one is. I'm not saying you should never build a Stele first, (I did in the screenshot game for this guide,) but if you're unsure which Pantheon to choose after seeing your starting location, build a Scout first to get an idea of where your other cities are likely to end up and hence what the most appropriate spots will be.

Building lots of Shrines/Temples very early on

Part of the point of Steles is that they combine faith and culture on the same building, meaning you don't need to spend production and gold maintenance on Shrines and Temples. Building up your infrastructure at this point will probably be more worthwhile.

Never building Shrines or Temples

On the other hand, as the game goes on, you'll be at a disadvantage to faith generation if you only focus on Steles. You'll need plenty of faith to compete with rival religions, and building Temples in all your cities also allows you to build the Grand Temple to keep the cities near your capital more securely following your religion. Aside from that, you can buy Great People with faith in the industrial era and onwards, so having plenty of it will certainly be useful.

Neglecting defence

Your UA's 20% bonus is good, but it's not enough on its own to prevent invasions. If your army is small, you're very likely to be attacked, so make sure it's adequate. It doesn't have to be huge, just big enough that being attacked by an army of UUs won't spell your doom.

The Spirit Fails: The Counter-Strategies

Ethiopia defends well and is nearly always first to a religion, but notably lacks a clear end-game direction, making it fairly weak against non-militaristic Civs if they haven't made good use of their UB.

Playing against the Spirit of Adwa

Ethiopia's UA only makes any direct difference at war, so for peaceful Civs, it won't be much of a problem. For warmongers, however, you've got a challenge ahead of you. Invading early using Composite Bowmen is a decent way to destroy their army and take their capital before you have more cities than them, though the diplomatic penalties associated with this (and the need to divert away from building up your infrastructure) makes it problematic in the long-run.

If you don't want to do an early rush, it's still a good idea to invade prior to the industrial era as the combined bonuses of Ethiopia's UA and UU makes taking their capital particularly difficult. Take more units than you usually would for a Civ of their size.

Playing against Mehal Sefari

Far away from Ethiopia's capital, Mehal Sefari are just regular Riflemen with an extra promotion, and aren't generally too much to worry about. Close to their capital, however, they and their upgraded varients with the combination of UA strength and close-to-capital strength essentially fight as if they're one tier of technology stronger.

The trick to dealing with these? Artillery and bomber-class aircraft, and lots of them. Mehal Sefari are strong but slow, and the range of both Artillery and bomber planes is further than they can move in a turn (without roads/railroads, that is - use a fast unit to pillage those routes so they lose any possible speed advantage.)

Keep in mind the near-capital bonus is applied with respect to their current capital, so if you intend to take out all of Ethiopia's cities, it's probably a good idea to take their strongest cities other than their capital first. That way, you won't have to face the full force of Mehal Sefari multiple times. If you're just after their capital, then by all means just go straight for it.

Playing against Steles

Unless you take Ethiopia out early on, they're almost certainly going to get a religion and almost certainly going to get one first. Nonetheless, the most effective way to weaken Ethiopia's chances at victory is to stop their religion getting very far.

If you want to stop the spread of Ethiopia's religion, capturing their Holy City and using an Inquisitor on it will make things much harder for them, but this often isn't viable. An alternative if you have a religion of your own is to build plenty of cities so your total faith output can exceed theirs, then plant Inquisitors near cities you own they're likely to send Missionaries to - it'll put them off converting your cities. A third option is to bribe someone to go to war with them, and give them Open Borders so this third Civ can capture Ethiopia's Missionaries and prevent them being used.

Strategy by Style

Early and Mid-game Warmongers - Take more units to Ethiopia than you usually would for a Civ of their size. If you actually have fewer cities than them, it's often a good idea to start by invading their strongest city, so you don't have to face both the strength of it and the strength of Ethiopia's UA.

Late-game Warmongers - Make good use of Artillery, Battleships and bomber-class Aircraft. The idea is to prevent Mehal Sefari (or upgraded varients) from being able to reach your units. Pillage their roads and railroads using fast units to keep their infantry units slow.

Cultural Nations - Make use of your Diplomats to bribe Civs to vote against Ethiopia getting the World Religion. Building more cities than Ethiopia earlier on is a good way of securing more faith than them (and hence allowing you to generate more Missionaries and Great Prophets than them.)

Diplomatic Nations - Using your money to bribe a Civ to attack Ethiopia is a good way to cause trouble for them both. Ethiopia will see lots of Missionaries being captured, while the opposing Civ will have trouble killing Ethiopia's military units. Don't worry about Ethiopia gaining too much out of the conflict; if they take too many cities, they'll lose their 20% bonus hence making them more vulnerable again.

Scientific Nations - Ethiopia's scientific game is based more heavily on Research Agreements than many, as their religion will be a major source of money for them. Weaken their religion and you weaken their flow of money and weaken their ability to get Research Agreements. Sending a Great Prophet into their cities is a lovely way of messing everything up for them for a while. Alternatively, consider switching to militaristic technologies for a moment - prior to the industrial era in particular, Ethiopia will probably be neglecting them. Then, you can perform the fine art of invasion.

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Meta-guides

These guides cover every Civ in the game and can be used as quick reference guides.

• Civ summaries (Gives a brief overview of how each Civ plays)
  
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Civ-specific guides, in alphabetical order

All 43 Civs are covered in in-depth guides linked below. In brackets are the favoured victory routes of each Civ.

• America (Domination)
  
• Arabia (Diplomatic/Domination)
  
• Assyria (Cultural, Domination and Scientific)
  
• Austria (Cultural, Domination and Scientific)
  
• Aztecs (Domination/Scientific)
  
• Babylon (Scientific)
  
• Brazil (Cultural)
  
• Byzantium (Cultural/Domination)
  
• Carthage (Diplomatic/Domination)
  
• Celts (Cultural)
  
• China (Domination)
  
• Denmark (Domination)
  
• Egypt (Cultural)
  
• England (Domination)
  
• Ethiopia (Cultural/Scientific)
  
• France (Cultural)
  
• Germany (Diplomatic/Domination)
  
• Greece (Diplomatic/Domination)
  
• Huns (Domination)
  
• Inca (Scientific)
  
• India (Cultural/Scientific)
  
• Indonesia (Diplomatic/Domination)
  
• Iroquois (Domination/Scientific)
  
• Japan (Domination)
  
• Korea (Scientific)
  
• Mayans (Scientific)
  
• Mongolia (Domination)
  
• Morocco (Diplomatic)
  
• Netherlands (Diplomatic, Domination and Scientific)
  
• Ottomans (Domination)
  
• Persia (Diplomatic/Domination)
  
• Poland (Domination)
  
• Polynesia (Cultural)
  
• Portugal (Diplomatic)
  
• Rome (Domination)
  
• Russia (Domination)
  
• Shoshone (Domination/Scientific)
  
• Siam (Diplomatic/Scientific)
  
• Songhai (Domination)
  
• Spain (Cultural/Domination)
  
• Sweden (Diplomatic/Domination)
  
• Venice (Diplomatic)
  
• Zulus (Domination)

[BigCrabTank]

Ethiopia is such a great Civ because of the great diversity in their playstyle. Last game I was up against a lot of warmongers, three empires were completely eliminated, with the Huns Ottomans and me remaining. I originally wanted to do a scientific victory, and to be honest, I probably could have, I did have a great lead with science, but since I was making enormous amounts of money, I ended up getting a diplomatic victory and my first ever victory on immortal. A great civilization, top tier in my opinion.

[Copperwire]

Ethiopia doesn't need to be played committed to a single victory. The religious choices you are offered and your map/neighbors can effect what is the right path. Sometimes, you might be aimed tall science and look up and fate gives you both mosque and pagoda right about the time you realise your neighbors are all warmongers and that one city state keeps giving you horse archers. So, you dive into piety and make a few muskets. A bit of conquest later, you own a continent, redo the math when the dust settles, and aim cultural/diplo.

It is a shame not to use the defensive ability and a shame to kill off all your neighbors before you et your UU, sure. It is more of a shame not to play the board. (actual Diety game) A lot of the other science civs don't have the flex to go off the plan - religion is flex, and Ethiopian goes to yoga class, religiously.

[Zigzagzigal]

If you mean religious pressure, then planting Inquisitors in your key border cities will stop the AI from spamming Missionaries at you. You don't need to use the Remove Heresy feature of Inquisitors; just planting them in your cities will keep AI Missionaries away.

Wide empires have better faith generation than tall empires, and as such wide empires will usually find it easier to buy Missionaries to spread the faith.

If there's an isolated city of a rival religion, one possibility is to send lots of trade routes there from cities following your own religion. The combined pressure from all of those trade routes will eventually convert it. This strategy is especially powerful for Arabia, which gets a 50% bonus to trade route-based religious conversion.

[China]

How would you recommend fighting with other civs for religious influence?

[Zigzagzigal]

It's typically not worth the risk when you can get good faith generation going anyway from your UB. Instead, you can use the production to help support early expansion - cities settled earlier are stronger.

[China]

Is stonehenge not that good on ethiopia?

[C0untzer0]

On the subject of City-States, don't forget the option for Ras Tafari's Mehal Sefari and the army of sweet liberation. Freeing a CS from warmogers gives you something to do in the late game with benefits from luxuries and votes. Not a game-winner in itself, but I find it frustrating to remain peaceful in the late game, I'm sure that others will too.

[Nkrumah]

Interesting, I thought it would only would work with full civs.

[Zigzagzigal]

It works!

[Nkrumah]

If a City State conquers multiple cities and you are at war with them and have less cities do you get the 20% bonus against their units?