Rhye’s and Fall of the Maya

UHV

The Mayans’ unique historic victory conditions are:

  1. Discover Calendar by 600 AD
  2. Build the Temple of Kukulkan by 900 AD
  3. Never lose a single city until 1745 AD

Unique Power

Astronomy: -40% research costs until the end of the medieval era.

Unique Building – Ballpark

unique building

Unique Unit – Holcan

Rhye's and Fall Maya Unique Unit Holcan

The Holcan… What might be good in standard Civ 4 games (a bigger bonus against mounted units) renders it useless in Rhye’s and Fall of Civilization. The 100% bonus grant Holcans 8 combat strength against enemy knights (which still have 10!) and your main threat, Spain, will come with Conquistadors (12 strength) anyway. Furthermore your only opponent beside the Europeans are the Aztecs – so you’d rather need units with bonus against melees.

Mayan Strategy

My strategy for Rhye’s and Fall Maya is different from everything described in the strategy guides below. Mainly I was playing an isolationist approach.

Here’s the summary:

  • found Oaxaca next to the stone
  • found a second city in a nice spot in South America, but focus on improving Oaxaca
  • focus research on calendar, it is possible to get it in time with only your two cities, then head for code of laws for Chichen Itza
  • wipe out the Aztecs max. 1 turn after they arrive
  • dig in until 1745

I’d need to re-install the game to check which other city I founded in South America. But there’s several nice options for good cities. Maybe it was even Quito next to the Inca gold.

Anyway: With two good cities you’ll have enough commerce to focus on research and get to both calendar and code of laws. After that: Rush for feudalism, since you’ll need longbowmen to beat Rhye’s and Fall Maya.

The Aztecs spawn in turn 214, 1195 AD. They arrive with 4 Jaguar warriors (5 combat strength) and 4 archers (3 combat strength, but bonus on hills and in cities). I was able to take them down with 7 longbowmen, 3 Holkan and 1 catapult, with several units left.

After that, making the UHV basically means being nice to everyone, welcoming the Spanish, maybe even paying tribute.


The usual official strategy guides are still here:
http://web.archive.org/web/20090514073418/http://rhye.civfanatics.net/wiki/index.php?title=Rhye%27s_and_Fall_of_Civilization_-_Mayan_strategy

2 thoughts on “Maya”

  1. The city next to the Gold/Crab/Dye resources in Ecuador is called Uxmal for Maya. It really is a great spot, I did a mixture of your guide and the forum ones. One of the most important things was to vassalize the Inka and treating them RIGHT, so that we always exchanged technologies.

    I rarely had an economic stability rating of above 1 star, it always worried me. Yet I managed quite well: First, defeated the Aztecs and never settling Tenochtitlan. Instead I went for coast cities: Olximche first. After the Aztec not-spawn: Mayapan (right north of the Aztec Spice, later with a horse – first I regretted missing the fish 1W of that tile, then I was glad to be further away from French New Orleans) and also Coyuca (right north of the Aztec Deer, 1S of the mountains). Also settled Jamaica for Sugar and Spice, and experimented a lot with Civics switches.

    Conqueror event was Japan vs. Inka, so I sent my macemen to help. Yes, macemen, thanks to copper from Inkaland and prioritizing Civil Service over Optics. In 1850 I began settling the empty US West Coast, frantically building my economy+tech while still neglecting the military entirely. My Tech was always dragging behind, despite hugging and dealing with other nations left and right.

    In 1880, East-Coast America was surrounded entirely by Superpower France, my good friend. We finished Lincoln off, in the peacetime afterwards I gained a new vassal, newly independent Egypt. Later also Greece. Having Viceroyalty, that was incredibly important to stabilize me, too. Regrettably, the German-English Axis started WW3 in 1939 against the Allies (France+Japan, with me and Turkey tagging along). France dissolved in 1945. After losing the incredibly unproductive city of El Paso and taking over Nouvelle Orleans and Jacksonville instead, I stabilized again until America respawned in 2016.

    I stayed clear from the old world wars while Kublai Khan nuked the hell out of Asia. So I clawed my way up to first place in the ranking (until 2016), was leading candidate in the UN elections, built Hollywood, Channel Tunnel and was the second guy (after Bismarck 2016) to launch a spaceship in 2022.

    Thanks for your guide and the inspiration to go beyond UHV!!

    1. Wow! Sounds like a great game: Fun and challenging! I guess the reason I didn’t go much beyond UHV with the Mayans was how unstable I was already shortly after winning. Anyways: Reading your comment I only thought: “How come Civ5 or 6 can’t come up with Scenarios like this???” 😀

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