This this the guide for completing Marble Age: Remastered on hard difficulty with maximum result in minimum turns (200/200 on turn 270 for Athens, 190/190 on turn 246 for Sparta and Corinth).
The basic mechanics
- Focus your efforts
- The essence of the game is the correct choice of the next goal (opening a key technology, construction of a building, etc.) and achieving it in the shortest possible way. After that, the next goal is selected. Don’t go in all directions at once. If your current goal is a technology, maximize your culture in all reasonable ways.
- Develop your economy
- If there is no clear goal for a certain period, then perform general economic development. The approximate algorithm is as follows. Maximize the population until you reach the limit. If there are enough jobs for everyone, raise the population limit. If it’s not enough, do buildings to create new workplaces.
- Avoid famine
- It’s usually necessary to keep the population from falling, because even a small negative population growth can lead to starvation and a sharp reduction in the population. For example, if at this stage your priority is culture, keep enough farmers so that the population does not decrease, and put the rest of the workers on culture. Also, you should usually keep the money stock greater than 0 (avoid bankrupcy).
- Attract settlers
- The exception to rule 3 is the mechanics of attracting settlers. Attraction occurs when you buy a population limit and a lot of workplaces for farmers that cannot be processed by our current population (and also provided that the assimilation of previous settlers is completed). In this case, at the beginning of the next turn, as a result of the arrival of immigrants, our population will be equal to about 60% of the farmers’ limit, regardless of the current population. Therefore, on this move, completely remove all farmers and move them to other jobs.
- Don’t produce resources over limit
- After reaching the population limit, keep the necessary number of farmers to maintain the population (rule 3), and redistribute the rest to other jobs. The same applies to the army and the fleet limit.
- Don’t forget your ships
- If you produce a fleet, place newly produced ships on the trade routes at every turn.
- Don’t lose merchants
- Merchants are lost when the trade disappears (if the relationship with the city falls below 2). It is necessary to monitor this and remove merchants from the city in time. Be sure to remove merchants from all cities before the unification of Greece.
Athens – 1st stage. Dorian invasion (T1 – T30)
- The key to pass this challenge: not later than T29 you need to complete the task to increase the population to 150 (this gives +30 warriors) and open the Physical Training technology (this will allow you to produce several extra warriors to repel the attack).
- To do this, sequentially set and complete the following goals:
- Discover technologies: Craft – Farming – Mythology – Mining – Pottery. During this period maximize the Culture
- Settlers attraction. Maximize Production until you accumulate 50 hammers. Then simultaneously build Houses and Gardens. On the next turn your population becomes 34. It does not matter how much it was before. Therefore, until this moment, don’t grow population at all.
- Discover technologies: Kilning – Physical Training. And at the same time grow population up to 150. Workers’ priority: Culture > Population > Production. This goal must be completed not later than T29.
- Training of a sufficient number of warriors to repel the attack. You need to accumulate strength 33. If necessary, build a Gymnasium.
- T30 – repel the Dorian attack. Select “Exterminate captives”. After repelling the attack immediately ally Larissa by 2 envoys.
- City appearance: Sparta and Knoss from the game start, T15 – Corinth, T30 – Larissa
- Scouting: T11 – Peloponnese, T21 – Thessalia
Athens – 2nd stage. Persian invasion (T30 – T52)
- The key to pass this challenge: not later than T51 conduct 3 alliances (this gives +200 warriors)
- Sequentially set and complete the following goals:
- Discover technologies: Education – Trade – Eloquence – The art of negotiation – Marble processing. Maximize Culture. Simultaneously produce the required number of hammers and build the Library and the Marble quarry. After discovery of the Eloquence and accumulation of sufficient amount of money ally Sparta (usually it’s about T35).
- Second settlers attraction. Maximize Production, the secondary priority is Culture. At this stage you need to discover the Legislation and build the Market. Then discover Water supply, accumulate 2000 hammers and simultaneously build the Well and the Field. On the next turn your population becomes 360.
- Alliance with Pella. Worker priorities: Money, then Population. The alliance must be conducted not later than T51 (you recieve 200 warriors). If Corinth attacks us, stop the attack by an envoy.
- In parallel with the previous task, prepare the defense. You need to discover Reinforcements and build the Walls not later than T51. If there is enough culture, also discover the Seamanship to unlock merchants.
- The Persians attack on T52. Choose “Prevent the crossing” (you need 2.8T Greece strength).
- City appearance: T45 – Pella
- Scouting: T31 – Epirus, T41 – Macedonia, T51 – Cretan Sea
Athens – 3rd stage. Further play on Greece map (T52 – T133)
- The game becomes more flexible. The priority is economic development.
- Approximate order of technologies: Wheel – Writing – Mathematics – Irrigation – Democracy – Monuments – Mechanic – Civilian reserves – Tactical formations – the rest in arbitrary order
- Approximate order of buildings: Fountain – Barn – Road – Academy – Agora – Marble workshop – Drill field – the rest in arbitrary order
- City appearance: T60 – Rhodes, T80 – Ephesus, T89 – Sardis, T120 – Troy, T130 – Miletus
- Envoys. Ally Corinth, Knoss (not later than T94), then the rest of the cities as you accumulate envoys and money
- Merchants. After the first merchant appears, start trading with Corinth (buy hammers). Gradually raise the number of purchased hammers to 8000.
- Challenge “Alexander the Great” (T67)
- From T57 to T66 send to Macedonia all the troops produced and the part of the population that does not have workplaces. On T66 send money, increasing the probability of passing the challenge.
- Challenge “The rise of Rome” (T90 or T95)
- Rome attacks on T90. You can postpone it to T95 giving 20K gold.
- For the victory you need to accumulate approximately 30K strength including allies.
- The main work is done by the allies, to which Corinth and Knossos must be added by this time.
- Produce a certain amount of army to increase the strength to the required level. To do this, you must discover Tactical formations and build a Drill field.
- Challenge “Skythian invasion” and the unification of Greece (T90 – T132)
- After successfull completion of the first 4 challenges, the most difficult part is over. Gradually develop, explore all technologies, build all buildings, ally all cities, accumulate money and army needed to defeat the Scythians.
- All problems with money are solved by building the Athena’s statue (+500K gold per turn). Don’t delay this too much.
- Accumulation of the resources is very easy. At the end, you will have to spend a dozen moves waiting for Miletus and the Scythians.
- The Scythians come at T132. Pay them money until their strength is reduced to the level where you can attack them. 5.4M of gold should be enough.
- After that, take back all merchants from trade routes and unite Greece. For maximum game score, choose the Republic.
- Accumulated scouts, envoys, merchants, generals, settlers remain when you move to the world map, so it’s better not to waste them.
Athens – 4th stage. Play on the world map (T133 – T270)
- Approximate order of technologies: Crop production – Craft – Farming – Pottery – Trade – Mythology – Education – Writing – Physical training – Mining – the rest in arbitrary order
- Start to construct buildings only after adoption of Christianity (T160). Approximate order of buildings: Gardens – Field – Houses – Market – Library – Gymnasium – Marble quarry – the rest in arbitrary order
- City appearance: T133 – Rome, Paris, Cologne, T160 – London, T169 – Attila’s Camp, T180 – Antioch, T227 – Mecca, T237 – Cordoba, T247 – Baghdad, T257 – Cairo
- Scouting: Italy – Gallia – Germany – Britain – Phrygia – Syria – the rest in arbitrary order
- Ally Paris, Cologne, London, Antioch immediately after their appearance. Other cities should be bought by merchants or allied by envoys near the end of the game. Don’t ally Rome as you need money to pass the challenge “Hun invasion”.
- Trade with Rome, Paris, Cologne, London, Antioch. The best option for Rome is to sell hammers, for other cities is to buy their specialized resources (Paris – population, Cologne – hammers, London – culture, Antioch – army).
- Challenge “Christianity” (T145 – T160)
- The essence of the challenge is to starve all the pagans
- On T145 choose “Demonstrate interest”
- Completely stop the production and purchase of food before the adoption of Christianity
- Worker priorities are Money, Production and Culture. Put some sailors to hold the existing number of ships
- In cases of famine, pay off first by culture, then by population, then again by culture
- On T160 you recieve 100K of population. By this time, the probability of an uprising is 0. Adopt the religion
- After that, immediately build Gardens and Field and rapidly restore the population
- Challenge “Hun invasion” (T169 – T189)
- On T169 give them 4,4M + 4,7M + 5,1M + 5,4M + 5,8M = 25,4M gold. You may do it some later but it will be more expensive
- To accumulate money: get a reward for completing the first task – 2 alliances and 1 trade contract (10M gold), don’t spend money on an alliance with Rome, do not build excess buildings, sell hammers to Rome
- To win, you need to build a certain number of warriors, but the main work will be taken over by the allies
- Challenge “Justinian’s Plague” (T209 – T219)
- The task is to save 300K citizens
- On T209 perform an evacuation 3 times for 24M gold
- Then, as soon as it becomes possible, take “Close the city” and “Close buildings” (6 times)
- In cases of famine, pay off by culture and money
- Worker priority is Population
- Challenge “Arabian invasion” (T267)
- On T266 give 100M+ gold to decrease the army of Arabs
- The key to accumulate money is timely construction of the Athena’s statue
- Winning the game (T270)
- You need 300M gold + 300M culture + all cities are allied or bought or conquered + 4 colonies are settled
- Cities are easiest to buy by merchants
- Get money by timely construction of the Athena’s statue
That’s all we are sharing today in Marble Age: Remastered How to Complete with Maximum Result, if there are anything you want to add please feel free to leave a comment below and we’ll see you soon.
Credit to mviner