The first stage of building a master city is understanding how the economy works and how people get their food and resources.

1. There is no money! Food is used for currency and bartering. I.e. people use food to purchase their goods.

2. Farmers, nobles, and the palace get food directly from the fields.

3. Government workers (craftsmen and soldiers) and the educated elite get food from going to bakeries.

4. Common and luxury shops get their food from customers.

5. Entertainers and servants get food from their clients or employers (mostly nobles).


Educated elite:
Priests - work in health care, religion, education and funery services

Scribes - asses taxes, work in exchanges and collect tarifs from merchants

Overseers - manage monument construction and mining/quarying.

Commanders- lead soldiers in the army (critical for military scenarios).

A basic city setup - tips

1. A palace + 6 farms
2. 3 brickworks and 1 bricklayer
3. 4 common shops
4. 2 Noble Estates, 1 entertainer + 2 servants
5. 4-6 luxury shops (depending on local resources).
6. 1 priest
7. Public services: school, apothecary and shrine.
8. A scribe to assess taxes
9. Public services: build a hospital (build temples only when you have an overseer and small basalt statues available!)
10. 1 granary.

Note: take advantage of brickyards to reduce the transport time for brick layers. This significantly speeds up construction. Try placing one next to the cemetery for example.

After setting up your basic city start thinking about overseers and labourers as you will need them for temples and monuments. Also set up funery services.

The Nile will flood every year and there are three seasons. In the following order,
ACKHET - FLOOD
PERET - PLANTING
SHEMU - HARVEST

When Peret begins farmers will automatically go to work in the fields. There is no need to place fields like in other city builder games. Crops produced are wheat, barley, and vegetables. Wheat is used for bread production and barley for beer. Food is taxed by scribes to fuel the economy.

Tips:
- A fully upgraded palace can manage 10 farms
- Small noble estates: 4 farms. Medium: 6 farms. Large: 8 farms.
- Food stored in threshing areas spoils quickly so build a granary which holds around 2000 food max.
- For every 4 Noble estates select one to produce only wheat to increase overall yield.
- Scribes are a must for increasing food stores. Build their houses close to the farms and papyrus makers. (Scribes count more taxes with papyrus). Remember that scribes also need access to luxury goods when placing them.
- 1 scribe can comfortably count all fields for around 30 farms. The ratio is roughly '1 scribe to 4 noble estates'.

Failed flood - when this happens food and taxes will be low so using the E button open 'edicts' and distribute current food supplies to the people to tide them over.

Common Wares

Linen - Flax fields.
Mats - Rushes and Papyrus Reeds
Baskets - Rushes and Papyrus Reeds
Pottery- Clay (dug from the Nile banks).

Common shops will almost always need to be built on the Nile banks otherwise they can't access their resources.

In the common wares household it is the woman who produces the goods as well managing the needs of her family. The husband and children collect the raw materials.

Tips:
- pottery is the easiest good to produce.
- most lower to middle class homes are happy with three types of common ware.
- build common shops on the Nile banks
- build common shops close to each other to increase the matriarch's efficiency and productivity.

Luxury Goods

The elite households and palace require Luxury items. Like common shops, build them next to their natural resource or import from the world map. The man of the house produces the wares while the matriarch manages the home. Their child collects resources.

Jewelry - quartz and imported items such as (gold, turquoise, and emeralds).
perfume - flowers, myrrh, henna and oil trees
cosmetics - henna, kol (lead) and copper.
furniture - acacia tree, papyrus and cedar (imported from world map).
sandals - rushes, papyrus and leather
sculpture - clay, copper, tin and basalt

tips:
- if importing luxury raw materials, place the drop off points next to the luxury shops.
- build an exchange: scribes work here to distribute raw materials. Build next to luxury shops.
-luxury shops can also benefit from servents allowing their children to go to school to become graduates
- servants can help jewlers and cosmeticians collect quartz and kohl in the desert

Public services are the backbone for a well functioning city.

Health services:

The hospitals and apothecary should be placed in the centre of the city as all citizens require accessibility.
Apothecaries provide basic care while hospitals provide specialist services.

Tips:
- Build a hospital and apothecary in each new community of the city and dedicate a priest.

Education :

Education is available to elite children and the children of wealthy luxury shops. Education is crucial for having a healthy flow of graduates.

Tips:
- build a school next to elite households and lux.
shops.
- build a school in the early stages of the city and allocate your first graduate (priest) to education.
-Papyrus is used by educator priests to increase the speed of education. Educator priests should have regular access to papyrus.

Religion:

All citizens require worship facilities. Although the elite have more available time for religion.

Tips:
- build shrines and temples in the centre of the city.
- build a temple to Osiris, Hathor and Hapi as citizens will want to worship these gods the most alongside the patron god of their city.

Temples and cult temples:

These larger worship facilities require small or large basalt statues for a dedicated statue. Overseers will manage the construction and a stone carver will create the statue.

Note: shrines do not require a statue or overseer services to be built/functional.

Nobles manage farms. The more noble estates you have dictates the amount of farms in the city. So the higher their level means they can manage more farms and increase food production.

Nobles have higher lifestyle needs compared to peasant and middle class citizens.

Tips:
1. Small estates can manage 4 initial farms.
2. Estates can upgrade to 'large' and manage a total of 8 farms.

Ways to upgrade noble estates to large:
1. Having access to a tomb (or yacht)
2. Having access to a gardener to buy fruit trees (which replaces beer with wine).
3. Having a complete cult temple in the city allows nobles to build a shrine. Thus alleviating pressure on public worship facilities.
4. Suspend noble tax payments via edicts. And allow luxury shop keepers to purchase raw materials for free

Entertainment:
Nobles enjoy hunting and so appreciate access to a weaponsmith and having local entertainers.

Religion is central to the Egyptians. And so it must be possible for citizens to access their gods when they need.

Osiris - God of agriculture and of the dead.
Osiris is one of the principal gods and citizens will want to worship him during the peret and shemu seasons. And after the death of Pharaoh.
*Build a temple to him in any city*

Hathor - Goddess of love, music and of harvest.
All citizens will want to worship her during shemu. *Build a temple to her in any city.*

Hapi - God of the Nile.
As the Egyptian way of life is centralised on the river Nile Hapi is an important god. And citizens will desperately want to worship him if the annual flood fails.
*Build a temple to him in any city where farmers particularly have access.*

The worship of the following gods will suffice with dedicated shrines ONLY. Unless they are the patron god of a city.

- Ra (patron of overseers and labourers). However all citizens will want to worship him from time to time.

- Isis (patron of women and healing). Citizens will want to worship her during a pandemic.

- Horus (patron of elite men).

- Bastet (patron of children. Citizens will want to worship her when a child is born).

- Ptah (patron of craftsmen).

- Anubis (god of death and mummification). After a death citizens will want to worship him.

- Thoth (God of wisdom and patron of scribes).

- Sobek (patron of commanders).

Set - (patron of soldiers).

Maat - (Goddess of justice). All citizens will want to worship her from time to time or after a crime.

Amun - (patron of peasant citizens).

Cult Temples:

All cities with a specific patron god will expect a dedicated Cult Temple. Hover the mouse over the 'worship satisfaction' to discover the city's patron god.

Commerce via the world map is required to access raw materials not available in the city.
Note: Cedar wood can only be imported.

Other times opening commercial contracts can bump up current reserves (if available in the city).

Some scenarios require the setting up of certain commrcial contracts in order to complete the scenario. This depends on the scenario.

Tips:
- always look to import copper as a priority as it is used by cosmetians, sculptors and kopesh makers.
- importing basalt is useful for building temples and statues early on or if you are not in a position to quary it with an overseer/labourers.
- cedar is only required for yachts, furniture and chariots which are not often required to complete a scenario.

Merchants:
- merchants buy and sell luxury goods to the elite such as incense and furs. Which helps them to upgrade (only nobles).
- for land merchants build a merchant centre to centralise them in elite districts.
- for sea merchants place a merchant's centre next to the Nile banks to build a quay.
- scribes can be allocated to collect food taxes from merchants but it's not really worth it in terms of revenue.

Barge landings:
- required to receive ships via sea or river trade. A barge landing is a necessity in any city as a lot of trade is via the Nile (particularly basalt statues).

Certain scenarios are military based. And so require a standing army which will fight in campaigns via the world map.

A military camp consists of soldiers, a commander, a bakery, common wares, weaponsmiths, armor and chariot manufacturers, and a training camp. It's also worth setting up a hospital as soldiers are prone to serious injury.

Military camps should be close to common ware materials and acacia trees. And will often require copper,tin or cedar wood. Shipwrights and chariot makers need Cedar to build warships and chariots.

TIPS:
1. Allocate Navy commanders in order for the shipwright to start making warships.




2. A steady supply of leather is difficult to provide after cows disappear. import from world map if possible.

3. Kopeshes are not mandatory weapons to have. (I usually don't produce them and it's better to save the copper.)

4. Commanders allocated to Army services will train your soldiers at the training camp.







ENEMY RAIDING:
- Soldiers will automatically act as city guards even if dedicated to the army.
- Guard posts are not really worth building.

Walls and security:
Walls are useful for protecting your city against raiders in military scenarios. But can require a lot of bricks. Therefore it is more feasible to have a strong army presence in your city.

Prestige measures your success as a leader.
There are certain methods to increase it whereas certain scenarios depend on achieving a certain amount of it.

Ways to increase prestige:
- upgrade your palace (useful in early city development)
- tombs
- monuments: including pyramids, obelisks and statues.
- commercial and military/construction endeavours on the world map.

Prestige will naturally decrease over time if not maintained and will suffer a large hit if Pharaoh has no tomb upon his death.

Tombs
Elite citizens will expect tombs. Above all Pharaoh requires a tomb! And after in order of importance, the royal family, nobles and elite graduates.

Note: I only ever build tombs for Pharaoh, the royal family and nobles (to help them evolve their estates). Graduate workers aren't super important.

Pharaoh has the most need of a tomb and so a tomb must always be ready in the event of his death or the player will suffer large losses to prestige!

Types of tomb:

Mastaba - the humblest of tombs. (Built from bricks and by brick layers). Small, medium and large.

Pyramids - reserved usually for Pharaoh and the royal family. Very small, small, medium, large and great!

Funerary services:
Only the elite class require this. Build mortuaries and dedicated priests next to the palace and nobles.

Monuments:
Obelisks - commemorate commercial and military endeavours. Require an overseer, labourers, and granite Obelisks. Can build small or great.

Stele- like obelisks they commemerate endeavours and require an overseers intervention and granite.

Statues:
- sphinxes require bricks whereas others require small or large basalt statues and an overseer.

The Overseer and Labourers:

An overseer can manage a variety of jobs including the construction of monuments and the mining of raw materials like stone and metal.

Labourers move heavy loads like stone blocks and statues and the minumum requirement is 4 Labourers.
Note: you will need only 4 Labourers to build statues, complete temples and Obelisks.
Whereas pyramids require a much larger workforce.
- For mining, usually one or two labourers will access and work a mine.

Tip: Build labourers camps close to the sites they will work at.

Labour camps will require a bakery, common wares, and a hospital (health services). TIP: Sometimes there are small oases in the desert with reeds and clay pits. Look carefully!

Building the larger sized pyramids is a massive endeavour.

Tips:

1. Have at least 50 labourers. This equates to around 1,200 food per year.
2. Fine limestone almost always needs to be imported from the world map.
3. 1 overseer is sufficient. He can concentrate on querying stone before focusing solely on construction. However, having 2 is ideal.
4. Build pyramids next to quaries and place cargo drop off points close-by when importing limestone.
5. If possible, build barge landings close to pyramid site to speed up importing.
6. Stone carvers are required to complete the pyramid. Have them in your labour camp.

TIPS:

1. Always be in the mindset of building homes next to the resources and services they need! Managing this correctly is vital.

2. Farmers, common wares, brick and papyrus makers should be built on the banks of the Nile.

3. Luxury shops should be built next to their resources. However, this isn't easily achieved for jewelry or cosmeticians as quartz and kohl are in the desert.Therefore build servants next to these shops in order to speed up the supply chain.

4 Nobles should be built next to the services they require. The more local services they have, the quicker they can upgrade.

5. Educated workers should be placed next to their places of work and have a local bakery.

6. Health and Religious services should be built in the centre of your city allowing even access.

Edicts are helpful to manage a crisis in your city in urgent situations.

You can access the edicts menu by pressing 'E' on your keyboard


TIPS:

- When the Nile flood fails, issue food to your people (as long as you have the reserves in your granary).
- To help nobles upgrade, you can suspend their tax payments. And allow luxury shop keepers to purchase raw materials for free
- If you have a large worship problem and a high level of dissatisfaction , hold a religious holiday.

NOTE: It is better to have a festival during Shemu. If you have one during Peret or Akhet you risk your farmers not tending to their fields on time.

Regularly consult the worldmap for international & national affairs. Including military campaigns, exploration, commerce and monument building.

Your completed cities and notable monuments/events will remain gold on the map for you to remember. However, previously built temples do not seem to have any effects in your current city or offer worship facility.

Completed world map - New Kingdom