Pharaoh

"Hero who empowers buildings, heals units, collects Relics, and has a ranged attack that is strong against myth units. A successor will replace him if he dies."
In-game description

"A new Pharaoh has arisen to lead your people!"
In-game notification whenever a Pharaoh spawns from the Town Center

The Pharaoh is the leader of the Egyptians and their most powerful regular hero. He is one of two standard heroes available to them, the second being the Priest.

Players start with a Pharaoh. They do not take up any population slots but cannot be trained manually. If killed, a successor Pharaoh will emerge 90 seconds later at the player's starting Town Center, free of cost.

Normally a player can only control one Pharaoh at a time, though worshipers of Osiris can research the New Kingdom technology to control two simultaneously. Osiris worshipers can also use his god power to turn a Pharaoh into a demigod unit, the Son of Osiris, which prompts another Pharaoh to emerge.

Like Hersirs and Godis, each Pharaoh is given a unique name on creation. This is the dynastic name, and all of the Pharaoh's descendants will share it with increasing regnal numbers. For example, if the starting Pharaoh is called Ramses I, his successor will be Ramses II, and so on. If the New Kingdom technology is researched, the second Pharaoh will have a different dynastic name.

Special Abilities

"A Pharaoh empowering a foundation or building makes the Laborers working there build and gather faster. A Pharaoh may also coax more Favor from the gods by empowering a Monument. The Pharaoh is a decent fighter, but it is his ability to heal units as well as his high damage against myth units that make him a good addition to an attacking army. When a Pharaoh dies, he is reborn amongst his people at a Town Center. Set's Pharaohs can summon animals."
In-game description

Image	Name	Description
	Heal	Heal an injured allied unit
	Empower	Can empower buildings to boost resource income, construction speed, productivity, and number of projectiles fired
	Sacred Hands	Can pick up Relics and drop them off at a Temple
	Heka	Inflicts divine damage when fighting myth units
	Animal of Set	Set only: Can summon Animals of Set

The Pharaoh has the core abilities of all heroes – he has a large bonus when attacking myth units and can collect Relics. The Pharaoh cannot pick up Relics until a Temple is constructed. He can also heal other units at 10 HP per second, one of the fastest healing rates in the game.

Empower

The Pharaoh's most interesting and important ability is that of empowering Buildings.

Empowering, which works on almost all buildings, including walls, gates, Obelisks, and Wonders, but excluding Farms and Titan Gates, improves all of a building's functions as follows when done by a Pharaoh:

Buildings are built 75% faster, i.e. buildings have -42.86% construction time.
Units, excluding civilian units (Laborers, Caravans, and Fishing Ships), are trained 75% faster, i.e. the units have -42.86% training time.
Technologies, excluding Age-ups, are researched 75% faster, i.e. technologies have -42.86% research time.
Drop sites generate 20% 'extra' resources (If a Laborer gathers 10 wood from a tree which contains 200 wood, and deposits it at an empowered Lumber Camp, 12 wood is added to the player's stockpile, while the tree still has 190 wood remaining).
Monuments accumulate favor 20% faster.
Buildings attack twice as fast (reload time halved).
Obelisks and Lighthouses gain +75% Line of Sight.

The above stated bonuses are applied 70% of their stated values when the empowering is done by a Ra Priest. When done by a generic Son of Osiris, the above bonuses are at 120% of their stated values, such that:

Building construction, unit training, and technology researches are done 90% faster.
Drop sites and Monuments generate 24% extra resources.
There is no change on a building's attack rate.

Strategically, empowering is very important to the Egyptian player. In the Archaic Age, it is best to empower a food drop-off site. This offsets the laborers' relatively slow gathering rate and gives the player bonus food in preparation for Age advance.

Later on in the game, empowering can be used to boost other resources as needed, such as gold. Players can also use the Pharaoh to empower buildings to research techs faster and train units faster. However, the most dramatic improvement is with empowering the construction of buildings. This is particularly useful with structures with long building times, such as Town Centers and Migdol Strongholds.

Pharaohs can also empower Lighthouses, which speeds up its construction, and also increases the Line of Sight of completed ones.

Empowering any building or foundation casts a heavenly ray of light over the structure, except for walls and gates.

Technologies

General Technologies

Offense

Image	Name	Description
	Hands of the Pharaoh	+6 attack
	Copper Weapons	+10% damage
	Bronze Weapons	+10% damage
	Iron Weapons	+10% damage

Defense

Image	Name	Description
	Copper Armor	-15% Hack Vulnerability
	Bronze Armor	-15% Hack Vulnerability
	Iron Armor	-15% Hack Vulnerability
	Copper Shields	-15% Pierce Vulnerability
	Bronze Shields	-15% Pierce Vulnerability
	Iron Shields	-15% Pierce Vulnerability

Myth Technologies

Name	God	Description
Spirit of Maat	Nephthys	+50% healing speed
Funeral Rites	Nephthys	Refunds 5 gold on death
New Kingdom	Osiris	Grants a second Pharaoh

Bonuses

Age Bonuses

Age	Attack	HP	Range	LOS
Archaic Age	1.2	100	3	18

God Bonuses

Image	Name	Description
Archaic Age	1.2	100

Relic Bonuses

Image	Name	Description
	Arrows of Heracles	+5% attack
	Hermes' Winged Sandals	+10% movement speed
	The Khopesh of Horus	+1.0 attack bonus multiplier vs. myth units
	Pelt of Argus	+6 Line of Sight
	Thundercloud Shawl	-5% pierce vulnerability
	Tyrfing, Angantyr's Sword	Regenerate +10% of damage dealt

Gameplay

History

"The material wealth and relative isolation of the Nile Valley allowed a monarchical government to arise in Egypt at a very early date. There was little need for a strong man to hold sway by might for the defense of the realm and the control of food production. Instead, the pharaoh came to be accepted as the living god of the world who was responsible for the daily passage of the sun and the annual flooding of the river, the two events upon which food production depended. The greatest of the pharaohs also commanded their armies and built Egypt's greatest monuments. Egypt is separated into Lower Egypt and Upper Egypt. At times during Egypt's history - such as before King Menes; and during the Hyksos invasion - the unified nation had more than one ruler."
In-game compendium

Gallery

Trivia

If a Heka attack (made when targeting a myth unit) misses and hits another unit, including a non-myth unit, it still deals the stated divine damage.
The highest possible roman numeral that a successor Pharaoh can have is XX (20). Afterwards, future Pharaohs will all have XX in their name.
The Pharaoh's appearance is based on Yul Brynner's King Rameses, from the movie The Ten Commandments (1956).
The names "Larry", "Steve", and "Bubba Joe" are most likely easter eggs, as they not appropriate pharaonic or historical Egyptian names.
While some of the Pharaoh names are based on female Pharaohs such as Cleopatra, Hatshepsut, Twosret, and Sobekneferu, the Pharaoh model and voicelines are always male.

Video

List of Heroes