So, you’ve kissed the ring and thrown your lot in with the Owls, and now you’re looking to further reap the rewards in the Medieval Era. Add in more envoys and, well, you get the idea.

Pericles generates envoys when he builds his unique culture district (the Acropolis), and gains +5% culture for each suzerainship Greece has. Cyrus gets an extra trade route capacity earlier than most, and can leverage that to his advantage by strategically grabbing city states. Matthias’ ability to gain unfettered access to envoys in order to levy their military might is absurd, especially at pivotal tech switches such as Swordsmen or Musketmen. Leveraging your governor Amani to place two envoys at a city state when established might also let you start grabbing first-time suzerainships in order to generate that sweet, delicious era score.Ī quick shout out on the absolute madness of this initial ability – Matthias Corvinus, Cyrus, and Pericles are particularly hot on this particular secret society. Trade routes providing envoys is a renewable way to generate envoys starting very early, and may incentivize pushing towards Harbors and Commercial Hubs faster in order to expand your trade route capacity. Membership with the Owls of Minerva will let you run both.

This can make the early game choice easier – often, if your civilization is not producing any faith per turn, you would be inclined to sacrifice the production provided by Urban Planning in order to run God King so that you can secure your Pantheon. Should you be fortunate enough to be granted access to this most prestigious society, you’ll immediately gain an additional economic policy slot in your government, and any trade route sent to a city state will generate an envoy there. If the AI beats you to it, you might have a hard time gaining entry until later down the civic tree when you start to earn envoys via policy. Meeting a city state first gives you an envoy there – meeting second grants nothing. Your entry to the Owls of Minerva requires you to send an envoy to a city state, and has an 80% chance of occurring, lessening as more civilizations join the society. Getting going with the Owls of Minerva is no more difficult than any other society in principle, but is heavily impacted by how sovereign your territory is, and how lucky both you and the AI get with scouting. Yearn for policy slots? Keen to hit triple figure envoys in your local city state? Does the thought of more trade routes make you hot under the collar? Locate your local sewer, take a left at the second grate and do your best gang sign impression – the Owls of Minerva are at your disposal. If keeping city states in your clutches and holding sway over your allies’ secrets is more your jam, consider the owls of minerva. Somewhat less occult than the voidsingers or the hermetic order, our next society offers a playstyle more in keeping with diplomacy and espionage.

Civ 5 how to get spies