El_Capitan's Gaming Strategy

Rise of Legends Balance Talks

2006-07-26T19:40:00.000-07:00

Bridger's interview can be heard here: http://www.tsncentral.com/ondemand/250706534139/

I was hoping Cookies and Nut would have been more opinionated on some of BHG's responses on how they were going to resolve some of the known balance problems.

One of the most pressing concerns is the Mechanical Spider unit. BHG's solution was to lower the unit's Hit Points by 100. However, the problem isn't that it's difficult to kill, but that it kills much too easily because of their trample damage, and that the unit can be built much too quickly. Also, there's no unit before getting a Large City, besides the Hero units, that can trample except the Mechanical Spider. Not only that, it also does the most trample damage.

What was never brought up was that Giacomo's Augmentation can temporarily increase the Mechanical Spider's HP (I've been using the Doge with the Mechanical Spider, and it still survives quite well). This negates the proposed nerf, and the same problem exists.

The problem with the Mechanical Spider is the trample, and the solution should be to deal with the trample, and not it's hit points. One of the main benefits for BHG is to discuss balance issues with the online community and get their perspective. The reason it's an issue now, is because it wasn't an issue when it was just the MS and BHG balance teams playing each other.

Anyways, it was a good interview, and many issues were covered quite well.

Where are we going?

2006-07-24T20:41:00.000-07:00

Taking some time to scope things out while reading some posts about RoL, I came up with an epithany. Actually, I came up with an online dictionary, and the word "epithany" came up later...

Ahem. There's always a critic.
http://rol.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=4,750,0,10

http://www.gamereplays.org/community/index.php?showtopic=121834

If you registered to those sites and actually read through all that, my goodness, you're one dedicated individual!

What caught my attention wasn't the infrequent patches. While I'm on this subject, Big Huge Games doesn't have the luxury that Blizzard has to publish their own games, where they can dedicate all their resources into patching their own games and releasing them to the public as frequently as Blizzard does.

What did catch my attention was a reply showing the lack of support to the modding community. That perplexes me.

Blizzard came out with StarCraft and Battle.net, competitive play aside, I had the funnest time playing all these varieties of mods. Most of them were RPG related mods. Then came WarCraft III, and although I didn't get into it very much, my friends did, and they played more mods than actual versus multiplayer. The online community grew, because you bought a highly acclaimed game, and people around the world made hundreds of mini-games from it. What's not to like about that?

Then a brilliant thinker at Blizzard came up with an idea that, hey, if people are modding our Real-Time Strategy game to make their own Role-Playing Game, why not make one for them? World of WarCraft came to be, and they're raking in the dough.

Here's the rub, whoever's researching what's making money from games aren't gamers. I've seen people spout statistics showing that people buy games for the Single Player, not the multiplayer (of course, if the multiplayer sucks, they won't be buying the game for the multiplayer... duh!). I've heard that the few hardcore online players make up less than 1% of the buying base, or something to that effect.

They probably think:
1. Casual gamers are the bulk of the market.
2. They like explosions, graphics, and music.
3. They don't play online.

I don't know where everyone gets their information, but that's what I always see and hear. So I see all of my favorite genre's get geared toward the casual gamers, balanced toward the casual gamer... casual gamer this, casual gamer that. Hardcore players like me? It's not so bad. We get out of the gaming addiction and end up living normal lives by getting girlfriends, better paying jobs, etc.

Still... it makes me wonder what everyone's thinking. You have a blockbuster company like Blizzard work their way towards the eventual moneymaking game, a MMORPG, from mainly a RTS background. Everyone else? They're moving away from the online community to the confines of single player with no modding?

I remember StarCraft and all the different mods I played online. They were fun. People put a lot of imagination into the games they were able to mod. From one game, you could literally play hundreds of different types of scenarios. I particularly like the Godzilla one. Nowadays, that's all RTS's are... a hero Godzilla beating the crap out of everything, but it's not a modded RPG, it's the current state of our RTS.

Rise of Legends

2006-07-23T22:43:00.000-07:00

I finally dug in and played Rise of Legends online this weekend. Of course, I was smurfing, but if you're a noob at a game, is it really smurfing?

Anyways, it took me a while to get back into gaming, but personal and technical reasons aside... a lot has changed.

Bridger on his blog http://tales.tsncentral.com/has some good stuff, and there will be a discussion on the balance on Tuesday, which will be interesting.

Here's what I got from it in 3 solid days of playing online. Note, these won't go into much detail.

Vinci -
1. The Mechanical Spider should do hardly any trample damage, or should be slowed down.
2. Research Labs built should only give +1 Research points instead of +2. When you have a Large city, they should give +2 Research points for every new one built. Great city, +3. This will slow down the Vinci gathering bonus just slightly.

Alin -
1. They can't raid early with their initial units while the Vinci and Cuotl can. They can pull off a suprising rush for someone that's not suspecting it, but they really need a raiding ability, as I think they'll end up nerfing the Afreets. Give their berserker mode for their melee guys extra damage to workers, or something.
2. They can't raid later with their air, but that's an overall balance problem.

Cuotl -
1. They don't get Wealth to buy cities and things... and when they do buy things, their units are damaged. The only chance they have are their anti-air air guys that shoot while moving and are ungodly unbalanced, and the slow laser shooting behemoths. Please excuse my inability to name these units. =p
2. Other than than, I don't see using Jaguars or Snakes except for early raiding/defensive measures.

Air Units:
1. Anti-air air units that shoot on the move... bad for the Alin. The Alin don't have that, and they don't get a 2 for 1 deal on turret-like defenses. But why bother when the anti-air air units take down buildings relatively well, and can run away if about to die?
2. I hardly use air-to-ground air units, as anti-air air units are so strong.
3. Raiding is cool, but with anti-air air units, it's too easy to do, and too effective if done right.

Anyways, I'll see what the real experts at this game are saying this Tuesday. As for the 100k tournament coming up... I really need to ask someone to see if I'm eligible or not!

Have fun!

P.S. Where'd this crazy rumor start that I was play-balancing RoL? I had nothing to do with RoL except for mentioning it on my blog and playing the single-player demo.

3vs3 Boom Psychology

2006-02-19T13:34:00.000-08:00

Coming back from a 7 month break to play RoN:T&P, I've decided to show some of my rusty game playing abilities from today's games. I've already posted the 1vs1 with RTS_sonsi_gu, and this one will be regarding a 3vs3 game where I am positioned in the pocket as the Chinese. You can watch the game here.

Team 1:
El_Capitan (Chinese)
AU_tl (British)
GPU_ALPHA (Aztecs)

Team 2:
ElitE_El_Che (Egyptians)
ElitE_CrAsH_TesT_DuMMy (Inca)
RTS_NAOTO (Maya)

The map is Amazon Rainforest, a typical non-fishing land map with a good amount of Rare Resources and a decent amount of Ruins. El_Che and I am positioned in the pocket opposite each other, while tl is matched with NAOTO, and ALPHA is matched up with CrAsH_TesT_DuMMy.

From knowing tl's abilities, and with him being British against NAOTO's Maya, I knew he wouldn't need much help unless he was doubled. With ALPHA being Aztecs and Ancient Age rushing CrAsH_TesT_DuMMy's Inca, I figured it would be enough to slow him down. My decision early on was to boom, due to the map type, my position, and the Nations my teammates had.

The Rare Resources available made my plan easier to accomplish. Now, rather than going into the game details, I'm going to explain why unprotected booming is safe and effective, as far as this game is concerned. It has more to do with Psychology than ability, as this is perhaps my 5th game in over a 7 month period.

Instead of a typical Military boom order with 2/1/1/2, or 3/2/2/3, where the SCI and MIL lines are researched to get to the next Age relatively quickly; I do an Economic boom order with 1/1/2/2, or 2/2/3/3. The thing with the Chinese, I'm not particularly vulnerable to a rush. Plus, as long as I am one to two Ages ahead of my prospective opponent, which was El_Che, attacking me isn't a viable option.

First of all, when someone gets an Age ahead of you, you can't attack them at that point unless you're ready to, and if you're in III while they're in IV... it's likely you won't be able to hold your position of attack and will get pushed back to military superiority. Secondly, if you are 2 Ages ahead, you still have the military advantage without having to have the 2 Age-Up Military... 1 Age-ahead is sufficient.

Therefore, when I reached Enlightenment when El_Che was just reaching Gunpowder, I knew I'd have enough time to create a sufficient force with the economy I had in case he decided to attack. By the time I reached Industrial Age soon after, he would only have enough time to upgrade his army, while I was already on my way to sack his Capital with a small army of Infantry and Commandos.

I wouldn't say it's all about how the opponent's react, but when someone has a two-Age advantage, attacking seems like a suicidal decision, and booming is the next best thing... but by the time they decide to catch up, it's too late.

Spanish vs. Dutch (Australian Outback)

2006-02-19T12:50:00.000-08:00

Spanish is a better Nation. Their strengths are: getting an initial head start by finding Ruins; knowing where to raid the enemy's rare resource merchants; and on sea, displacing enemy fishing boats with their free Heavy Ship(s) from building a dock. Unique Heavy Infantry give them a particular advantage for early assaults from Classical Age to Gunpowder Age.

Weakness: Ruins. Unfortunately, their most important strength is also their weakness, since it is a bonus that can be influenced by their opponent's ability to scout.

Dutch is also a better Nation. Their strengths are: getting an early economic advantage; having self-defendable merchants against light raiders; and on sea, being able to influence the enemy's fishing by sending Light Ships (receiving one free for each dock built) to raid. They are particularly strong when left alone early, and should focus on booming when that happens.

Weakness: Time. Their economic bonus doesn't help them until they become stabilized in resource accumulation. Their Merchants and Caravans are effective against raiding Horse Archers, but not against Heavy Infantry and Heavy Cavalry. Keeping an army for defensive purposes is necessary, but having not enough or too much can be a detriment.

The showcase game for this article is where I play RTS_sonsi_gu on the Australian Outback. Watch the game here.

The map is Australian Outback, that means the Nations start closer together, and fighting usually begins on the sea. The Spanish have the advantage in the early naval battles, but the Dutch can protect their Rare Resources better from the more constricted land mass. The most important thing for the Spanish is getting their Ruins, as there are half the normal amount there usually is than on a typical land map.

My start begins with a SCI1, COM1, Dock, Market build order since I see that two very good Rare Resources are in my starting area; Silver and Dye. However, I don't put them to much use in this game. I send my free Heavy Ship straight toward my enemy's area, and catch a fair amount of unprotected fishing boats before it gets destroyed. This is the proper way to use the Heavy Ship, as the enemy must go up to Classical Age early to get a Fire Ship, or spend a critical amount of Timber for their own Heavy Ship in Ancient Age to defend against it. Light Ship raiding from sonsi_gu in Ancient Age does not do as much harm, and is easily defended by a Light Ship of my own.

In Classical Age, I build a Barracks first, expecting to defend with a Foot Archer and numerous Heavy Infantry while I prepare for an aggressive assault in Medieval Age. Sonsi_gu, spent too many resources in:

Building a Heavy Ship in Ancient Age
Building more fishing ships to replace the ones lost from my raiding at sea
Classical Age straggle raiding with a Horse Archer and a small army raiding force that gets ambushed by my Heavy Infantry

It would seem as though those resources shouldn't affect the outcome of the game as drastically as it did, but the Spanish on Australian Outback is a force to be reckoned with. Raiding the Spanish isn't as useful as being able to outboom them, and that's what I would have done if the Nations were reversed.

What's Sup? Com?

2006-02-08T22:49:00.000-08:00

I'm back! Well... kind of.

I've stopped playing AoE3 two months ago, and it will most likely be that I won't ever be playing that game again. I have visited T&P and find that I still enjoy the game and the tight-knit community, but I have too much fish to fry (I'm a vegetarian, so that's definitely a figure of speech). I will clear up my blog if it's worth it in the next month or so... if I decide to come back to the life of strategic gaming. =p

Anyways, I did check out Supreme Commander from a wikipedia and went to Gas Powered Game's new site. It looks interesting, but let's just see how it turns out.

Another ES Flaw - Resign Design

2005-12-20T18:30:00.000-08:00

In a comment from my ESO2's Poor Design article,

Van- said:
I just checked out ESO2 for the first time and I was baffled. Good god it's no Bnet. Anyway how do you play a ladder game? Or are all games considered ladder games? I played a three minute game where my opponent quit out, but I didn't get a win. Is that intended functionality?

Well, to answer this, there are two ways for a player to play a ladder game:

Game Browser - Host or Join a Game Browser game. As long as there's no Computer player or the Handicap or Cheat is enabled, the game will count as a Ladder game.
Quick Search - Play a Quick Search game, and it will be counted as a Ladder game.

I'm not sure on the exact time, but if a player resigns early enough, the game will not count. This comes as a disappointment for me as 3-5 Quick Search games a day, people cancel as soon as they see that they're playing me. I guess I can take that as a compliment of sorts, but it sure is annoying. As annoying as people who cancel a Matchmaking session when they see that they're getting matched up with a certain civ.

Anyways, the good thing about this feature is that if you get map screwed, you can quit out. However, that's another issue entirely... map generation flaws. But, there are instances of a bug where my vils get stuck on ruins. Again, that's another different issue... fixing known bugs.

As far as I can muster, the reasoning behind the early resign design (wow, I like the ring of that) was likely to prevent "point trading". Point trading was used back in the day when there was a thing called "Ratings". Two people would make new accounts and lose games to get their friend's main account to get it's rating up, and vice versa. However, with AoE3 allowing only 1 account per CD key, that won't happen. And if a person does buy 2 games to get 2 CD keys for 2 accounts to point trade for a rating that doesn't officially exist with another player that does the same thing, then ES just sold 2 extra copies and made more money. Alas, ES didn't think things through because there's no point for 2 people to do that because of this resign design... they just lost money on people with time to burn.

As for Game Browser games being able to be counted as ladder, I don't mind so much. If a person wants to use a civ on a map that favors that civ, then so be it. They still need a victim to fall for it (and there are a plenty). But would I let those type of games count as ladder game? No.

French Fast Fortress

2005-12-19T14:43:00.000-08:00

While helping a player out, I ended up writing a build order for the French Fast Fortress. Normally I'm too lazy to write such build orders, as there are many players that have shared their own methods. Might as well pitch in:

Method 1: Put all vils on Food, 2 to each hunted animal (reduces number of shots, reloading wastes vil seconds).

1st HC card = 3 coureurs

With your explorer, get easy treasures, and snipe and keep track of treasures with Food or Gold. Get those early if you can.

When you reach about 15 vils, you should be able to go up to Colonial Age. When you do go up, put 3 vils on Gold (you want to make sure you have 300 Gold by the time you get your 700 gold crate from your 2nd HC card), and make sure you choose the 500 Wood politician. So 12 on Food, 3 on Gold.

Concentrate with your explorer on finding hunted animals and treasures, this time go for wood treasures if you see them.

When you get to Colonial Age, you should be able to use your 2nd HC card.

2nd HC card = 700 gold.

Queue 3 vils to put on gold, and have 1 gold vil gather the 500 wood crate. When your 700 gold crate arrives, send all your gold gatherers to gather from it. Go up to Fortress Age and get the 7 Skirms.

Once that's done, build your Stables and 3 houses, or 2 houses and 1 market. I prefer getting the market since I can buy/sell for Wood instead of gathering for it.

When you finish building your buildings, you should get enough xp to get another HC card. Don't wait to use it.

3rd HC card = 4 coureurs.

Place them on gold. So you should have 12 vils still on Food, and 10 vils on Gold. That's good, since when you get to Fortress Age, you can make constant vils while making Cuirassiers.

When you get to Fortress Age, it should be around 6:30 - 6:45 as an average time. Send your Skirmishers ahead to your enemy and cut off their gold supply. You should be able to queue 4-5 Cuirassiers by the time they're fully made.

After fighting, you should get enough xp to use your 4th HC card.

4th HC card = 4 Cuirassiers.

It should be over by then, as you're hurting your opponent's economy while yours is left unhindered. Just cut off their gold, and keep scouting for where their vils are at.

Against another French player, this is the best option to use. Kill off their Stable first, and the game's over. If you see enemy Cuirassiers, build 5 Dragoons. Kill their Skirms with your Cuirassiers (it's better to get the xp from them and that way they can't micro-kill your Cuirassiers).

Method 2: Stay tuned, will write up a 5:00 Fast Fortress strat soon. Either for Mercs or Cuirassiers at the 5:45 mark.

ESO2's Poor Design

2005-12-17T09:20:00.000-08:00

Skizzler gives some good points about the poor ESO2 design on his website. I thought I'd give a few gripes also about what I think is stupid.

Filter Password. Who actually uses it?

I mean, does anyone actually look to filter games with passwords? Of all those games, there will only be one game you'll be able to join. Besides, why would a Host need to give you a password to search and join his game using a filter when he could just send an invite? Get some useful filters, like ping, full games, City Levels, etc.

My biggest gripe comes in the form of Custom Games. Do they really need to have Viewable Stats? I mean, it is useful when you host a "2vs2 Experts Only" game and some fella with a 12% win ratio joins and immediately ready's up. You know you can immediately boot him. However, when people see your win ratio at 89%, they pretty much want to be on your team, or leave. It makes for a long wait, especially when a lot of people online can't seem to read, or understand the differences between words like:

Be Good
No Noob
TvB
Experts Only
50% or higher

Viewable Stats. It doesn't help anybody wanting to get a game going.

What they should have done was add another option for Hosting a game. It would be similar to "City Levels", where if you chose to put "Levels 0-5", no one but those with Home City Levels between 0-5 could join. The added function would be called, "Win/Loss Ratio", so only people with a Win/Loss Ratio you specify could join.

W/L Ratio 0% - 25%.
W/L Ratio 25% - 50%.
W/L Ratio 50% - 70%.
W/L Ratio 60% - 80%.
W/L Ratio 70% - 90%.
W/L Ratio 80% - 100%.

If they had a rating system, they could use a rating level instead... but oh well.

Hosting Options. A lot of time is wasted sorting out players who join your game. Adding a few more functional options can prevent that for those looking for a good, fair game.

Remember the good old days when all you needed was just one more player to join your game? Well, the same shit happens. Someone eventually joins, then leaves (probably because they want a game with their friend, but I'll get to that later), or some noob you don't want in your game keeps joining even though you keep booting him. The worst part is, there was a way around this in pretty much all RTS games. If you host a 6-player game, you make your game allow 8-players. That way, when someone wants to get in, they can... and that noob doesn't prevent him from doing so. Not only that, if 8 players join your game, you can boot the two that are either too good or too bad. Problem solved. Except... if you do this in ESO2, like in the picture below... if there's no one in slot 2, and you change it from 6-players to 4-players, you end up BOOTING slot 5 and slot 6! WHAT THE FUCK!

Expanded Slots. Changing from a higher player slot to a lower one shouldn't boot anyone. Any Open slots should also be able to be Closed, and the game should be allowed to start.

Another thing that gets to me is that you can't invite a friend to join a game if you're not the Host. If the Host doesn't want you or your friend in the game, then he can just boot your ass. Don't they know long it takes to join a 2vs2 game with a friend the way it's set up? They should enable any player to invite another player to a custom game, not just the Host.

Inviting Options. Does the Host have to do everything? Allow players to invite their own friends to a custom game, so the Host doesn't have to. As a Host, it's annoying to have to ask the name of the person you need to invite, add them to your Friend's list, Invite them, then Remove them from your Friend's list.

There's about 3000 players online. Do you know how many are playing Team Quick Search games? Neither do I. I have tried 2vs2 Quick Search games many, many times since release... do you know how many 2vs2 Quick Search games I've actually played? Zero. All they have to do to solve this is let people know how many people are searching for a 2vs2, 3vs3, or 4vs4 Quick Search game. They can also have an update that gives data to the people online that is helpful:

There are currently 6 players waiting for a 2vs2 Quick Search game. In the last 5 minutes, 26 2vs2 Quick Search games have started.

You see how that information helps? That means I know people are getting matched up in 2vs2 Quick Search games. There are also 6 players waiting, meaning they must have different HC levels that restrict each other from matching.
Team Quick Search. Nothing about Team Quick Search is quick. We don't know if anyone else is, or has been trying, so why should we?

Well, that's it. There's actually tons more I can point out, but if they want my further opinion, they should pay me. Oh, well, there is one last thing... Coming out of a game, I usually right-click on each of my online friends and click"Whisper" to see if they messaged me while I was in-game.

There should be notification's that I received messages while in-game when I'm back in the lobby.
There should be an indication on the "Friend's List" (like a yellow circle, instead of green) whether a friend is playing in a game.

Okay, that's enough. I'll let Skizzler do the rest, he seems to know what's up.

Wall of Sheep

2005-12-16T14:51:00.000-08:00

The usage of sheep in battle has been neglected for far too long. It is now time for these chops to charge forth into a new era of evolution!

Entrap your enemy with a sheep army, as your enemy can only convert so many, you create a buffer. Thus, you are now able to use ranged units to good effect behind the safety of your sheep, and any dead sheep afterwards just makes up for a tasty meal.

On Permanent Vacation?

2005-12-14T22:11:00.000-08:00

Er... starting the next week I will be gone for either just a while, or indefinitely. Only time will tell. Until then... game on!

The Burma Excerpts on AoE3

2005-12-13T07:52:00.000-08:00

A few statements I made in discussions with Burma.

Russian Efficiency: The game being about efficiency, the Russians are the least efficient. This has to due with the ability of "queuing" vils and military. All other civs can queue 1 Barracks unit, thus being able to build 1 vil at the TC for constant production, and also enable them to build a house (if you're making Crossbowmen) or research a market upgrade, etc. When the Barracks unit is almost completed, you can complete the "queuing" for the Barracks in the last 1 or 2 seconds (since your vils will eventually make up the resources in the 25-30 seconds it needs to make it so 5 units come out instead of one), you can finish" queuing" up your Barracks units so 5 units come out. However, if you don't pay attention, you'll only get 1 Barracks unit to come out, which isn't very good. Being able to manage in this way lets one become flexible and adaptable to situations. The Russians, however, have a very difficult time managing flexibility, as well as keeping a constant production of vils while making Barracks military.

French Cuirassiers: One thing to consider during testing of units and counters are how they fare in real situations during a game. For instance, the Cuirassier's can be outmatched resources-wise if you're making the allotted number of Guard Pikemen to Cuirassiers. However, in a real game situation, it's easier to protect Cuirassiers to do their job than it is to protect Pikemen to do theirs. The only units that can kill Cuirassiers are Pikemen, Musketeers, Halberdiers, and Dragoons. However, all those units, including Dragoons, can be countered by Skirmishers. It is the ease of protecting the Cuirassiers with Skirmishers, that make the Cuirassier particularly difficult to stop... not including the difficulty in trying to raid upgraded HP French vils with their faster gathering rate.

French Overpowered?: If someone were to ask me why I thought French were overpowered due to their economic efficiency, I would say there could be many factors. I could sprout many obvious benefits that they have, but the major point I would state and begin with is: "In the hands of an equally skilled player, it is more difficult to kill French vils compared to the ease the opponent will have in raiding non-French vils, excluding German Settler Wagons."

In Rise of Nations, I compared Nation bonuses by the ease in which an opponent can take them away. For instance, one Nation gained got more resources from each Ruin they found than other Nations. All a person needed to do when going against them is to have a strategy to gather more Ruins, thus taking away the opponent's bonus. So, if we take this into AoE3, how can we rid of the French's bonus? By killing their vils that gather 25% faster. By all accounts, since their vils cost more and take longer to create, killing them should set back the French player MUCH more than non-French players. Anyways, that's how I come to my conclusion.

This is also testable, but requires more scrutiny since the results will be varied depending on what type of players are playing. Basically, change the HP values of French Vils to be that of normal non-French Vils. If the French start losing more, then that's a good sign. If they win about the same, then something else needs to be adjusted, BUT, if they are winning because their vils aren't being killed, then that nullifies the test.

Scores and Timing: After many games and tests, a player can know, or study to know, what CAN be happening without ever seeing it happen. For instance, looking at how much time has passed on a certain map, and by seeing how many points the enemy has by looking at the score. (All this data is hypothetical, btw, not actually tested) If I know the enemy makes Colonial Age at 4:00, and if I also know it takes 4 seconds for 3 vils to build 1 Barracks, and it takes 30 seconds to make 5 Crossbowmen as well as for a HC shipment to come in, and it takes 5 Crossbowmen 10 seconds to walk across the map (Hussars taking 6 seconds), then the enemy should be attacking my town within 4:40 with Hussars, and 4:44 with Crossbowmen as back-up. If I know they have a HC card that gives them Hussars, then I know at 4:40 they should be attacking. All this by seeing what time the opponent gets to Colonial Age?

[Adding this, which wasn't in the actual Burma Excerpts] When a player's score tanks downward that means they used resources they had into military. So if a player's score goes down by 1, then 100 resources were used in a creation of military. I don't know for sure, but I think it's close enough. So when a player's score goes down by 6, that means they just used 600 resources. Therefore you can easily know when a person is building military instead of booming even when you don't scout out their base, just by looking at the score and seeing how it changes.

Burma's Tests:

Deleting a TC and rebuilding a new one lets you re-make Minutemen.
Coureur de Bois (French Settler's) only gather 11% faster from Mills.
The basic Gather Rate for Huntables in the code is .84. My tests showed the basic gather rate to be .84. This is good, I thought. But, the code shows the Gather Rate on Mills to be .67 while my tests showed basic Gather Rates for Mills to be .5 (one thing I didn't ask was, if the tested Gather Rates for Mills is .5, then do Coureur de Bois gather at .61 (tested value) or 7.3 (code value)?

Herding Myths and Treasure Fighting Tips

2005-12-04T06:56:00.000-08:00

Okay, scratch what you think about herding for faster gathering. Originally, when hunting for Food, the idea is to get the animals closer to your TC to decrease villager travel time. That way you can shave a few seconds off your Colonial Age time... right? Wrong! It's actually WORSE!

Here's the thing, I tested both herding and non-herding on the same map.

Herding - First thing off the bat, collect any Food crates. You want to get vils in queue A.S.A.P. and with one vil, have it travel past the first hunting animal and shoot it towards your TC. Once done, have all your vils start gathering from it. After 10 seconds, repeat the procedure, but DON'T kill the animal. Just continue gathering from the animal that's already dead.

The reason to wait 10 seconds is because the animal or herd won't move after it's already been herded. So, once you get the herd to move closer to your TC, wait 10 seconds, then shoot another animal towards the direction of your TC, but don't kill it. The only time you should kill an animal is when your vils are ready to gather it. If you kill it too soon, you might have to travel a bit to get to it. My Colonial Age time was 4:07.

Not Herding - Just attack and hunt the nearest animal and gather from it. Simple as that. My Colonial Age time was 4:05. Go figure!

The only good thing about Herding animals is that it gets the animals closer to your TC for when you get to Colonial Age in order to protect your vils from enemy raiding... but at a cost to your Colonial Age time.

Now, if you do want to save villie seconds, only have 2 vils shooting to kill an animal (unless it's a Bison, in which case you want 5 vils to shoot at it, I think.) If you have more than 2, the vils have to reload their rifles before they can gather, so shoot them animals before the one your gathering runs out of meat, or all them vils will a start shootin'!

Anyways, that's that. As for Treasure fighting tips with your Explorer, try to use your Snipe ability A.S.A.P. on a treasure that has hard to kill mobs on it. Usually Polar Bears and Gunfighters. On lesser mobs, such as wolves, panthers, and brown bears, you can easily take a group of them out without losing your Explorer, or needing the Snipe ability.

For example, if there's a group of 4 wolves, have your Explorer shoot at the nearest one, then run away. There will be a point where the animals will turn around and run back to their initial positions. As a wolf is running back, ATTACK the wolf from range, BUT make sure all the other wolves are running back, too. You should be able to get 2 more shots before the other wolves make it back to you, and you can finish off that wolf with a melee attack. Run your Explorer back, and again, attack the wolf you want to kill as it's running back. Repeat this procedure and you can easily take a 4 wolf treasure without the Snipe ability and with just your Explorer alone with hardly a scratch.

Team Crate Boom and Cavalry Raiding

2005-12-03T20:52:00.000-08:00

A Team Crate Boom is just another type of sling. All it is, is having one teammate use his Home City shipments and Age Politicians to get Food and Gold crates. The other teammate sends ONE villager to collect the crates, as well as the starting crates. If done effectively, one teammate can reach a Fast Fortress time of under 6 minutes, and have enough gold to get Mercs and Skirmishers.

Usually, a typical build order for a German player providing the crates would be:
Starting Crates = 200 Food, 100 Wood, 100 Gold
1st HC Shipment = 300 Food
2nd HC Shipment = 300 Gold
Age Politician = 500 Food
3rd HC Shipment = 700 Gold

So, the other player collecting the crates, once going up to Colonial Age, should be going crazy on collecting Gold, and use their Age Politician to get 500 Food (or 1st HC Shipment for 300 Food). If done correctly, they can hit the Fortress Age almost as soon as they hit Colonial Age. Meanwhile, still collect some Food, but more on Gold, and gather the 700 Gold crate from their partner. Once they hit Fortress Age, they should have enough gold to end up having a Merc Shipment (by saving the 2nd HC Shipment) and a Barracks at the ready for Skirmishers.

I don't have a good replay yet of a Fast Fortress as I've planned it, but I'll provide one as soon as I get the chance. However, there is a decent 2vs2 game to watch at Age Sanctuary. A miscommunication of my plan has [All4]All4ONE_Soul bringing ALL his starting vils instead of just ONE vil to my TC. This slows his advance down, and it doesn't look good for either of us. He also doesn't go a Fast Fortress, but decides to go heavy military in Colonial Age... so my plan is scrapped for now (hey, it was our first attempt).

However, what partially saves us is that I'm able to raid effectively with my Uhlans, even with a very slow start. A trick to Cavalry Raiding is hitting two opposite places at once. If you have 4 Uhlans/Hussars, split them up into 2 groups of two. Have one group hit vils at the same time as the other. Once you get 10, split them into 2 groups of five, or 3 groups of three. Keep circling your enemy, and watch to see what units he's making. If he's making Food and Wood units, you know to check the trees, berries, or hunting animals. If he's making Gold units, you know you can hit their gold mine and any hunting animals or berries.

I will update as soon as I get or find a good Team Crate Boom for a Fast Fortress.

2vs2 Team Concepts

2005-12-01T23:16:00.000-08:00

Perhaps the best thing I can say about AoE3 is that they do have a fun game when it's not a 1vs1. A 2vs2 game is a game of a different sort, and it takes some knowledge of timing and communication in order to win.

There are two team concepts in a 2vs2 that change the nature of the game:

Shifting - Shifting is when players alternate between attacking and booming.
Tandem - Tandem is when players attack or defend as if there were only one player coordinating both armies.

Shifting- An advantage with shifting between attacks is to enable one player to get some breathing room to go up an Age. If your team has a player that can beat any player on the opposing team in a 1vs1, then shifting usually works best.

Slinging - The key to Slinging is to sieze the advantage early and put the opposing team on the defensive. By effectively doing so, it puts pressure on the player being attacked, and forces their teammate to either help, boom to the next age to help, or try to be more effective going against the teammate that did the initial slinging (but this last is usually never the case). This gives the person who tributed resources for the sling some time to boom without having to worry about being attacked. *If you know a team is slinging, it's best to help your teammate by not helping them at their town, but by hitting the player that is being aggressive in their town and try to boom to the Fortress Age. A decent game can be found here, where I slow my attack down by giving a few resources to All4ONE_Soul, who is then able to raid his opponent effectively early. I could have gone two ways; either boomed to a fast Fortress Age, or do what I did, which was wait with a raiding army until my opponent went to help his teammate, then raid my opponent at home. When his teammate comes to help, I retreat until his teammate leaves. As long asAll4ONE_Soul raids or booms while his opponent is helping his teammate, or vice versa, then we have the advantage.
Lead Shifting - Is having the quickest player attack their quickest player. This gives the slower player two options, either slightly booming to build a large counter army in Colonial Age, or fast booming to Fortress Age. Especially with being able to see your score compared to everyone else, it's easy to see which player is the stronger at that moment. A long game can be found here, where All4ONE_Soul and I play our second game together against the leading 2vs2 Supremacy team, Artosis and GeNThO. This is a typical Shift vs. Tandem game, with Artosis and GeNThO being nearly perfect working in Tandem, and All4ONE_Soul and I know nothing else except knowing when and where to hit and run. I forget a few things, such as the fact that we all start with a Barracks, and that Abus Guns take down siege extremely well. However, with All4ONE_Soul being the aggressor and taking the lead, I sit back and know how and when to react. You'll see me boom to the Fortress Age to help counter their army, retreat when necessary, and wait until I have the adequate amount of forces to engage in an attack. As long asAll4ONE_Soul knows what to do when their focus shifts to me, then everything should work out fine.

Tandem- An advantage with working in Tandem is being able to take one player completely out of the game, but the disadvantages are; that it gives the other player time to boom and help turn the tide if their teammate survives, and since your teammate is most likely complementing your army, you have to be apt and know how to split both your armies to both be attacking and defending in two different fronts. If your team is outmatched by a player on the other team, then working in Tandem works best.

Double Rushing - Double rushing can be very difficult to stop, but again, this gives the other player time to boom. Double rushing, if stopped, can end the game right then and there. Check out the Double Landsknecht Rush, if you haven't already, to see this Tandem play.
Lead Tandem - Is much like Lead Shifting, but the target is to double the slower player early to further slow them down, then focus everything on the stronger player. If someone is doing a Lead Shift, the best thing to do is just go after the player that isn't doing the attacking and take them out completely. The reason for this is because the Lead Shifter won't have enough resources to sustain their attack, and can only help their teammate out. This leaves the Tandem players time to boom together or reinforce at home for a second assault, this time against the Lead Shifter.

Anyways, there's the basic 2vs2 Team Concepts, and things may alternate between Shifting and working in Tandem with the different Civ combinations out there. Shifting is by far the easiest concept to learn, because most of it has to do with how well you do in 1vs1 games anways. However, working in Tandem can be devastating to go against if you or your teammate doesn't know how to react.

Galleon-Grenadier Rush

2005-11-26T06:45:00.000-08:00

After noting that the Galleon card does indeed bring a Galleon (I previously thought there was a bug where the Galleon card gave a Galley instead of a Galleon), I tried using the Galleon card again. I figured another nice little rush strat would do very well. It took a little trial and error, but I was finally able to make it work.

You need to be either the British, Dutch, Ottomans, or the Russians. Only those 4 civs (which happen to be non-Fast Boomers) can get Grenadiers in Colonial Age.

You also need to be at least a level 10 to get the Galleon HC card, and also be playing on a water map with a water flag.

Basic build order is simple, put everyone on Food and get to the Colonial Age as soon as possible. In the meantime, don't spend any HC cards, your very first HC will be for the Galleon. Using your scout, explore your opponent's area, and the sea closest to your enemy's base. Once that's done, move your water flag by picking it up and clicking on the area of water nearest your enemy.

Once you get up to Colonial Age, you'll have 30 seconds for the Galleon to arrive, and start producing Grenadiers. If you're the Germans, you can also do a Landsknecht/Dopplesoldner rush with the Galleon. The benefit of doing this is not having to spend any wood on building a Barracks, Stables, or Artillary Foundry. That saves wood for other things, like houses, upgrades, or military units. Not only that, your unit reinforcement will be quicker, since your Galleon can make units as close to your enemy as you're able.

The first thing to target with your Grenadiers (be sure to produce 10 of them before you start your attack), are Barracks, Stables, or Artillary Foundries. After that, target houses, then the TC. Use your 2nd HC card for military units at your own TC in case he's attacking you while you're attacking him. With the extra wood you saved by not building a military building, by all means protect your resourcing by building a tower.

If you're wondering why do a Grenadier rush when you can do a Grenadier rush without a Galleon, it's because it's difficult to have enough Wood to build a Barracks and Stables to support your Grenadiers, and have enough left-over for houses. Since you can now build any Colonial Age unit in your Galleon, if your opponent brings cavalry units early to attack your Grenadiers before you have any Musketeers or Pikemen to protect them, retreat and garrison them into the Galleon. You cannot garrison any military units in anything except ships, so this protects them very nicely until you have reinforcements. If your opponent builds Crossbowmen or Skirmishers, build Cavalry of your own to back up your initial Grenadiers. Just make your own judgement call on what to build to counter your opponent and protect your Grenadiers, since you now have an advantage in being able to build whatever units necessary while your opponent most likely only has one option if they did not do the same.

Anyways, here's a rec to see the build order at AoE Sanctuary. There's also an early version of the strat written at AoE3 Heaven by Maverick_LOL.

Have fun!

The AoE3 Balancing Act

2005-11-25T02:30:00.000-08:00

Is it still called "balancing" if you're not balancing the game, but trying to balance the "fun-factor" for the game?

Greg "ES_Deathshrimp" Street:

"We generally like to boost weaker civs rather than nerf stronger ones. It's just more fun that way. The only case where we would consider nerfing a civ is when we think it's just too risky to make so many changes. The testing might take too long, delaying the fix, or we might make the imbalance worse. But overall nerfing just tends to make the civs more similar by weakening what is unique about them. It's more fun to go the other way."

Here's the rub. The "design" of the game is supposed to make a game fun or not fun. The "balance" of the game is supposed to support the design. Changing the balance can't make the game any more fun, if it's still not going to be balanced properly.

Take the game company, Big Huge Games, the creators of "Rise of Nations". I may not like their restrictions or limits they have for balancing, but that's part of their design. Their design concept for balancing is not to have any negative penalties for Nations. I respect them for that, because they put a lot of faith in their design as making the game fun, not the balance.

When I playtested "Rise of Nations", there was a moment when the gameplay was getting polished on a balance level. Nations were pretty balanced, but games were only lasting until Age 5. In RoN, games can get up to Age 8. That's 36% of the game not being played! Until our games lasted to Age 8, the game wasn't going to be considered balanced (as far as I was concerned, and I'm sure the designers thought so as well). If the design for a game is for it to go to Age 8 and it never gets there, why even have an Age 8? See where I'm getting at?

Anyways, I wasn't part of the "RoN: Thrones & Patriots" playtest team. I gave a few balance suggestions, but they didn't quite listen. Maya got so overnerfed, they became the most boring Nation. Games lasted until Age 5 again, and rarely made it to Age 8. Games could drag past Age 5, but the game is usually decided at about that time.

So, let's get right down to it for AoE3 balance. There's 5 Ages. The design is supposed to be that you're not really supposed to get to Age 5, but if you do get there, you should have easily defeated the other player in the first place. Therefore, games, by design and correct balance between two equally skilled players, should get to at least Age 4. Do you know what unbalanced means?

It means that if a player does an Ottoman Forward Janissary Rush, and 90% of the time they do the rush they win, and out of the 10% they don't rush they lose, something's screwy. For one, the rush is overpowered. Second, if they don't rush, they have trouble against civs that can fast boom. So games involving an Ottoman are usually decided in Age 2.

Portuguese, they can't outboom the fast boomers, and can't defend the rushers. Games involving Portuguese usually end in-between Age 2 and Age 3.

Dutch, they can't outboom the fast boomers, but can somewhat defend the rushers. Games involving Dutch usually end in-between Age 2 and Age 3.

For balance, you have to give a little, and take a little. You can't just give a little and take nothing away. For the Ottoman's, their Forward Jan Rush needs to be toned down, but given something else to compensate against fast boomers.

Fast Boomers are the Spanish, French, and Germans. For these civs, going to a fast Fortress Age gives them units and/or cards that prevent any non-fast booming civ that doesn't rush from having a chance. Their fast boom needs to be slower by at least a minute.

If they want the game to be fun, the balance should support their design for the games lasting on average to the end of Age 3 or the beginning of Age 4. Not at the end of Age 2 or the beginning of Age 3. Making the weaker civs better but keeping the strong civs strong isn't going to make the game any more fun if it's just going to skip Age 2 entirely. Does anyone see where I'm going at?

I'm not the smart one here, so why listen to me? I'm not the one making millions, I'm just the guy telling it like it is, or how it should be.

What the hell...?

2005-11-25T00:33:00.000-08:00

DISCLAIMER: Read at your own risk. If there's anything I wrote that you don't like, then I HATE YOU!

Due to TGE's latest post, (and I'm thinking it's the Thanksgiving Turkey with the brandy he's been drinkin's finally starting to kick in) I thought I'd write a nice little piece of my own.

Since most Americans celebrated Thanksgiving Day over the day yonder, let's start by paying homage to the invented tradition by buying every Native American stuck in a gambling casino on a reservation a free drink instead of giving them Food and Wood. For a tradition where we say we ate with Native Americans, we sure aren't eating with them on Thanksgiving Day nowadays. Makes you think, doesn't it? Anyways, giving them free booze, that'll surely win them over to our cause! Hell, they don't take any pop cap, and might help us fight our war with Iraq. I mean the Ottomans. I mean... blah, whatever.

Buffalo, being fiercely treasured by most nomadic tribes, should cause any hunting of them to have any Natives allied to your so-called civilization to rebel. Thus, you will have to use your Bead and Drink card for your next Home City shipment to quell the rebellion (or the Small Pox card, but that's just vile rumor). I have to admit, sailing 2,750 miles in two months to bring a measely shipment of crates of 600 Wood is hardly worth getting excited over (pun was intended). I guess that's why the slave trade was so lucrative. Who doesn't use the free vils, honestly? But shouldn't the pictures of them be of black people? Oh, right, let's not go there! I wouldn't want to make some ES white man angry, or else they'll turn red like the natives, or a Korean when drunk. But you can't turn them black, ohhh no.

You can tell the people at ES aren't environmental enthusiasts. Whaling gives an unlimited supply of Gold. Except, whales aren't unlimited (except for Native Americans, they can hunt whales forever). Plus, four boats to one whale is too conservative a number. Liberals like to float their boat with more than four at one time.

Getting back to Koreans, thank God they didn't participate in this highly anticipated sequel. A civilization full of people like Iamgrunt would have annoyed the bejesus out of them warmongers who liked to march out on open fields wearing red to shoot each other. Well, I guess the Koreans were busy making Kimchee and trying to make wearing those Mickey Mouse hats look fashionable. You know what I'm talking about!

Had the British known Longbowmen would have been more effective than Musketeers, Great Britain might be even Greater today, and the arms race would have been all about sticks and stones, and nothing short of broken bones. I mean, c'mon, what's the fun of war if you keep winning? It's not like you get to rape and pillage the women afterwards... Damn, those days must have been some good times. Nowadays we only get to rape the men, and pillage the fellow soldier, but don't ask, don't tell! Just capture the Kodak moment on your cell phone's digital camera to show your grandkids all about it.

Everyone back then thought the French were Overpowered, too. Not like the French we see these days, where all they spew instead of enemy's guts is nonsense about liberty and freedom. WTF is all that about? Fuckin' Pansies. J/k, I love the French, especially their women.

Spanish women, though... man, they're hot. Portuguese women aren't all bad, either. Nothing gets me hornier than thinking about women I'll never get to have sex with. It's depressing. Oh geez, oh man! To have been a Dutch-Korean hittin' and runnin' some poor Spanish Rodelero and then gettin' some with his hawt lady at home just gets my juices flowin'! Nowadays I'm hittin' on the ladies, and runnin' away while she starts yabbering about some weird shit. Does that seem right to you?

One thing I'll never understand is Russia. Did they come across the Russian-Alaska land bridge? I mean, WTF! And who taught those poor bastards how to fight? Since when would a single Strelet have ever lived to be "upgraded"? Were they always horrible fighters even until WW II? They have such a large land, but I guess no one likes to invade cold places. That's why Canada is still Canada, eh?

Also, sheep pens. WTF! The only ones who'd want sheep are New Zealanders, and they ain't in this game. I'm not even sure if New Zealand is still a country, do they even have an army? Seems more like a large land full of sheep and ale, and with a mix of those two, you don't even want to know! I mean, what's a Zealand anyway? Sealand mis-spelled to sound cooler, like what we do with "playerz" and such? Perhaps "Zea" is how you pronounce "Sheep" in New Zealand speak. You know I love you guys, and your sheep! Sheared sheep are so soft. But I wouldn't know! Ahem.

Fuck this, I'm bored. Let's play some more games where I do nothing different to win, and do something different to lose.

AoE III Wiki by Clan Valhalla

2005-11-21T13:39:00.000-08:00

Clan Valhalla, former AoK/AoC and RoN addicts, have created a Wiki for AoE3. Be sure to check out the site and contribute information, as I will be adding some useful data there as well!

German Merc Boom

2005-11-21T04:24:00.000-08:00

Note: You'll need these cards in your deck:
2 Settler Wagons (Age 1)
700 Gold Crate (Age 2)
Black Rider Mercs (Age 3)
Hackapell Mercs (Age 3)

Probably the most interesting thing about the Germans are their Mercenaries. The problem is, they cost 1200 Gold and can only be used in the Fortress Age.

That's fine, we just need to get them to the Fortress Age first. The typical build order is simple. Build your 2 houses and for your 1st HC shipment, get the 2 Settler Wagons. Have everyone on Food.

Go up to the Colonial Age. When you're going up, keep an eye out on your Gold. You want to aim for 300 Gold by the time you get to the Colonial Age. I keep everyone on Food, and just put my 3 Settler Wagons on Gold.

When you get to Colonial Age, you should have enough Food already to get to the Fortress Age, except you don't have enough Gold yet. That's why you should use your 2nd HC shipment for the 700 Gold. In the meantime, make 3-4 vils to task on Gold.

As your 700 Gold arrives, you should get 2 Uhlans. Take those Uhlans and raid the easiest area possible for vils. After you get all your Gold gatherers on the crates, go up to the Fortress Age. Keep resourcing normally, but switch your 3 Settler Wagons on Wood. Build a Market. After that, keep building houses whenever you're able.

When you get to Fortress Age, it should be around 7:00 - 8:00 minutes, depending on the map. You should have a 3rd HC shipment available, and it'll be for the Black Riders. They cost 1200 Gold, so sell all your Food, but keep your TC to make vils to go gather more Gold. If you got Military units for going up to the Fortress Age, send them ahead to raid.

When you have your Black Riders come out, kill straggling military, then raid enemy vils. Keep building Houses in the meantime, and when you get your 4th HC shipment available, sell everything to get 1200 Gold again. This time get the Hackapells.

With 10 Black Riders and 9 Hackapells, you should easily hit and run anything that counters your Merc units. There are 2 options available at this point.

1. Build a Church and make 3 Priests to heal your injured Mercs while you continue to hit and run.
2. Build an Artillary Foundry and 4 Falconets.

Once you get both those options done, the game is pretty much over.

There are two recorded games to watch the build order. This one is on Land, and this one is on Water.

There is also a different variation, but just as effective, used by Halliron.

Have fun!

British Hydra

2005-11-20T21:51:00.000-08:00

Let's go over the British bonus real quick.

150 Wood = 1 Villager by building a house in 20 seconds.
100 Food = 1 Villager by building from a TC in 20 seconds.

Okay, it's 50 more Wood than normal houses, and takes 100% longer to build one. However, you get a free Villager.

In a rough estimate, you gather Wood at .6 per second, you need 13 vils to get 7.8 w/s, that's 156 Wood in 20 seconds. Every 20 seconds, you're going to get 10 more pop cap, and a villager.

If you gather Food at .8 per second (from Hunting), you need 13 vils to get 8 f/s, that's 208 Food in 20 seconds. If you're constantly producing 1 villager from your TC, you're only making 100 Food every 20 seconds. It will take roughly 3 villagers a minute to get 109 Wood for a house.

So, the British Hydra, is not using your TC to build Villagers, but using Houses to make Villagers. This saves your Food for making Musketeers.

1 Musketeer = 75 Food and 25 Gold in 30 seconds.
5 Musketeers = 325 Food and 125 Gold in 30 seconds.

If you gather Food at .8 per second (from Hunting), you need 14 vils to get 11.2 f/s, that's 336 Food in 30 seconds.

If you gather Gold at .55 per second, you need 8 vils to get 4.4 g/s, that's 132 Gold in 30 seconds.

So, if you have a total of 35 Villagers:
14 vils on Food
13 vils on Wood
8 vils on Gold

You're getting 1 free Villager every 20 seconds and 5 Musketeers every 30 seconds. In 5 minutes, that's 15 Villagers and 50 Musketeers.

But let's be real, you will only have 16 Villagers when going up to Colonial age. That's less than half, meaning it will take you 1 minute for a free villager (6 on Wood) and 1 minute for 7 Musketeers (7 on Food, 3 on Gold). That's excluding cards, btw.

How in the world are you supposed to get that constant production going? Well, when you're going to Colonial Age, put everyone on Wood, all 16 of them. Your first HC shipment will be 2-3 vils, then the 300 Wood. That means you'll have 19 vils (using the 3 vil card), and 2 more vils from the 300 Wood card. That's 21 vils. It take 1 minute to get up to Colonial Age, so you can gather 756 Wood in that time, making enough for 5 more Houses. That's 26 Vils by the time you hit Colonial Age (which should be around 4:30)!

Once there, build your Barracks, switch all but 13 vils off Wood to go for Food. Get your free Tower and 200 Gold. That 200 Gold gets you your 5 Muskteers by queuing just 1 Musketeer at your Barracks. In the meantime, get 1 vil from another house and 1 from your TC to go on a gold mine, and keep that going until you have 8 on it, which will be about 2 minutes and 20 seconds later.

Use your next HC Shipments for Military (building lots of houses will get your XP up), but later, for Food to build vils from your TC, and HC shipments for Wood to build more houses or another Barracks, and HC shipments for more vils to double your production. Once you double your vils on Food to 28, and your vils on Gold to 16, you can get 10 Musketeers every 30 seconds. Pretty soon you'll be capped on building houses, so try to build your newer ones near your enemy so your opponent can destroy them (you can't delete your own houses).

If you get capped on houses and run out of hunting, build your Mills. Then start building Towers and Walls with your remaining Wood. You'll maintain constant pressure, and remain un-raidable.

I posted two games on this one, this one is a low level build order to see it in action, and another game playing against WH_LordAOF where the initial strategy came to mind, but a good game in general as he kills my TC early in the game and kills about 20-30 vils and with a better kill/loss ratio, but my econ never really gets hurt and I keep making military units and Villagers without a TC!

Which is why he called this strategy the "Hydra", and I coined it as thus.

Walls

2005-11-15T15:52:00.000-08:00

I just thought of doing something funny with walls. Stay tuned!

Why a Galleon?

2005-11-15T14:45:00.000-08:00

Something I've been doing recently, but it doesn''t work very well unless your TC actually starts near the shore, is to build a Dock, even if there's no Fish. Once that's done, focus on getting 300 Wood and 500 Gold (If you're Dutch, you only need 300 Wood and 300 Gold for Fluyts, a.k.a. Galleons). When that's done, build a Galleon. If you have a Civ that can build Artillary units, it's a big bonus, since you just spent 500 Wood and 500 Gold instead of 850 Wood (for a Barracks, Stable, and Artillary Foundry).

Why a Galleon? Well, it's cannon damage does wonders to your enemy that tries to rush your TC. In the meantime, you can build any unit from it (except non-Abus/Grenadier siege). Be it Infantry, Cavalry, or Abus/Grenadiers. It lets you become flexible. However, don't skimp out on a Barracks, because if your TC is being raided, your Galleon won't attack if it's queuing units, and you need to keep making military units. You also can't upgrade units in the Galleon if you get to the Fortress Age, so just keep that in mind.

Oh, and don't use the Galleon Card, it only ships a Galley. It's either a bug or design issue that ES knows or doesn't know about. Because if it worked, I wouldn't have gotten a loss, and I would have been one happy camper with a free Galleon and no dock! =p

It should be the United States of Ottomans...

2005-11-14T18:26:00.000-08:00

They are just about every Civ's worst enemy. Particularly ones without Musketeers, like the Dutch and Germans. The Germans actually have it worse since they don't have any counters against Musketeer-type units, the Dutch at least have Skirmishers if they get enough time to mass 10 of them to hit and run with. Due to the Ottoman's ability to get to the Colonial Age with Food saved up from not having to buy vils, and a 500 Wood shipment for Colonial Age to give them housing, they only need to focus on gathering Food and small amounts of Gold to have complete numerical superiority with Jannisaries within the first 5 minutes of the game.

I initially used a little tactic to help against rushes by going up to Colonial Age first and housing the enemy (destroying their initial house). However, killing one house isn't going to make a dent against the Ottoman's, plus they have the quickest Colonial Age times anyway. The best thing to do for an expert Ottoman player is to rush about 95% of the time with Jannisaries. Forward building a Tower, getting 5 Jannisaries from it using a card, and having a Barracks with 5 more streaming out. The first thing to do isn't taking out their enemy's housing, but to destroy the enemy's Barracks. That ends the game as more Jannisaries stream to support.

You won't see ambitious players using the Ottoman's playing against other Ottoman's on matchmaking (I've had 12 cancellations in one night while playing the Ottoman's to test this theory out, losing only when I didn't Jannisary rush). TGE, if you're reading this, my first rush game against you was poorly executed. I'll show you this new one if you're online. Why? There's no advantage when you can get an easy win within 5 minutes. There's only one way to stop it if you're not the Dutch or Germans...

You need Musketeers.
You need to wall your Barracks and TC.
You need to scrub.

Musketeers are cheaper, faster to build, and slightly better against Jannisaries from a distance. Protecting your Barracks is a priority. Double wall the Barracks and use a gate, and single-wall your TC. You'll have to use your Wood shipment card. I know it sounds silly, but it's the only way.

Next, if you have resources close by, you have to wall them in, too. If not, you have to scrub. That means expanding to remote corners of the map to resource, hoping that they're not found. Meanwhile, just mass Musketeers. Scout the Ottoman and see if they get an Artillary Foundry up, once you see that, start making pikemen. Anything with speed. If you're Spanish, make Rodeleros. With those units, you have to take the fight to the Ottoman and start taking down buildings.

Anyways, don't expect to win many games against a well executed Ottoman Jannisary rush. I've played against expert players with different Civs, and used them as well. I find no weakness except for weak micro on the part of the player.

Quick Snippet - Stats, not Strats

2005-11-08T15:18:00.000-08:00

Many players aim for the top, and doing so doesn't necessarily mean having an arsenal of strats. Expert players can use the same strat and win just about every game because they stick to their guns. Adaptability, however, is something that must be learned and used later.

So, while I haven't time to post many Civ-specific strats for a while, compare stats for some of the top ranked players. You'll see some good data.

What to look for are units with the most in the "Games Used" category, and within those units, compare how much are produced. Use a ratio between them, and you get a decent analysis of how much variety you need to win a game. Take iamgrunt for example. He uses a 4:2:2:1 ratio of Crossbowmen, Musketeers, Pikemen, and Hussars. This means he uses Crossbowmen as his main staple of military units, then backs them up with Pikemen (if enemy has Hussars) or Musketeers (if enemy has Crossbowmen and Pikemen), and sometimes Hussars (if enemy has Grenadiers, Crossbowmen, or Abus Guns; or for the initial Colonial Age raid).

Now, these stats indicate a mainly infantry-type army. They will be slow moving, but difficult to defeat. A major battle will be inevitable. Compare those stats with Poked_Pillsbury, who uses Hussars more than any other player; this means he likes to raid, using quickness to prevent his enemies from raiding in return, but easy to stop if a player prepares adequately. He will not likely engage in battle, but wear his opponent down through raiding. These are the two main strategies to winning, and some variations can occur, depending on the map, natives, and civs used... but overt variations will result in stats (and strats) like mine. =p

German Landsknecht Rush

2005-11-03T02:54:00.000-08:00

Perhaps one of the most effective quick-rushes, the German Landsknecht Rush is perhaps the most bogus way to win. It's difficult to stop because it's so quick, and if you do happen to be ready for it, it doesn't necessarily have to target your TC.

To download and watch the replay, go here. There's also a Double German Landsknecht Rush done here.

Build order is pretty simple. All villagers gather Food. The Settler Wagon should be used at all times to build all your buildings. If you get 200 Wood from the starting resources, build 2 houses.

The first Home City shipment should be for 300 Food. Depending on the situation, you should have 10-11 vils when going up to Colonial Age.

Immediately start gathering Wood and send your scout to see where your enemy is, and your Settler Wagon as near as possible to where it can build your Tower. So once you get 250 Wood, have your Settler Wagon build the Tower, and all your vils gathering Gold.

You want to get 400 Gold and a HC shipment by the time you reach Colonial Age. Once that happens, use the 4 Landsknecht card and let them come out from your Tower. Put all your vils on Wood to get a Barracks and 2 Houses. Have 1 vil gathering the 500 Food Crates and keep pumping out vils.

Eventually you'll get another HC shipment. Use it to get the 3 Dopplesoldners +2 Uhlans. Meanwhile, 6-8 vils should be gathering Food, the rest gathering Gold. Once you get 10 vils on Gold, start putting your new vils on Wood and boom normally. Meanwhile, queue up a Dopplesoldner at your Barracks. By the time your HC shipment arrives, you should also have 3 Dopplesoldners coming out of your Barracks.

With your 4 Landsknecht, kill military, but otherwise focus on taking down the enemy TC. You can take one house down if you want, but it's not necessary. Your 6 Dopplesoldners and 2 Uhlans are there to clean up.

Enjoy!

Civilization Basics

2005-11-02T22:36:00.000-08:00

Okay, let's get down to business. There are 8 Civilizations, and to make it easy, I'll classify them into different playing types:

Aggressive - Most of the aggressive civs are suited well at attacking right from the get-go in Colonial Age. These civs include the Germans, Ottomans, Russians, and Spanish.
Balanced - These civs can be aggressive, but it's best to play them slightly defensively because of their economic advantages. These civs include the British and French.
Defensive - The defensive civs don't have an advantage early in the game, so using them requires extreme micro and few mistakes. These civs include the Dutch and Portuguese.

Aggressive - Knowing when to be aggressive, and when not to is key. You can rush all the time in Colonial Age, but rushing always comes with great risk. These civs have no advantage economically, so always keep your enemy on their toes.

1. Germans: Perhaps the only aggressive civ that can be decent economically because of their Settler Wagons, but they don't get many. They have the quickest rush, but they are utilized best in skirmish fighting and raiding rather than direct confrontation with opposing armies. Win the small battles, that way there won't be any big battles.

2. Ottomans: They are great at being aggressive, but that's all they are able to do. They don't have the necessary Colonial Age army to be anything but aggressive. However, for flexibility, certain Native Settlements can boost their military diversity. An oversight to their quick Colonial Age attacks is a defenseless home. If they focus too much on defense, they lose their aggressive edge, and the opposing civ will be able to boom much more effectively than the Ottomans can. Stay in big numbers and stay on the fringes of enemy territory. Once the army reaches a sizeable mass, press the attack.

3. Russians: They are the most versatile aggressive civ, but because of having to buy things in bulk, they aren't the most efficient. Being too aggressive can be a detriment, but a defensive-aggressive Russian player can be very intimidating to play against. Avoid skirmish battles and rely on using a mix of cards for shipments to mass units and attack in mass.

4. Spanish: At low levels, they aren't very good, but higher Home City levels and good cards make them the most well rounded next civ to the French. Because their bonus of getting experience quicker, being aggressive is the essential way to use them. Creeping with an army in Colonial Age if your opponent turtles in is a sure way to boost the Spanish's economy. Use a mix of Rodelero's and ranged Natives, with a mix of speed and power, they can hit and run very well while keeping a steady economy.

Balanced - Having an economic boost means you don't have to make the first move. Scout out what your opponent is doing, and be ready to counter. As long as you stay one step ahead, a decisive defensive battle can sway the game into your favor. Protect your villagers first and foremost, then worry about disrupting your opponent's economy later.

5. British: Houses are important to protect, 150 wood isn't easy to come by. One great thing about their military is being able to micro their Longbowmen, and protect them with Musketeers. Since those two units compliment each other, that's all you really need. This means you don't have to gather as much gold to spend on military. Which leaves your villagers gathering wood, which gets you to build more houses, and gets you more villagers to resource... etc.

6. French: By far the most well rounded civ, their only weakness is having to deal with archer/musketeer combo's. Higher levels give them Skirmishers to use in Colonial Age, but Native's can be a quicker solution. Upgrading the villager hit points at the market can protect them from small raiding parties, but don't skimp out on a real defense. Getting to Fortress Age gives them more room to be aggressive, so don't stay too long in Colonial Age, or you'll just be handicapping yourself.

Defensive: Sometimes the best defense is a good offense. That doesn't apply here. In simpler terms, Defense means having Towers, Archers, and Musketeers. It's only a preliminary measure to protect yourself, since the real goal is to get to the Fortress and Industrial Age where your units counter your opponents and frustrate them to no end.

7. Dutch: The most difficult and slowest of the civs, they really aren't cut out to compete with most of the other civs. However, by some chance they are able to get to the Industrial Age, it's most likely they'll be capped at 50 villagers with 5 or 6 banks. Just make a lot of Ruyters and Skirmishers, with a few Mortors to take down buildings.

8. Portuguese: The Portuguese have a few drawbacks military-wise in the Colonial Age, so prepping a good defense and allying with ranged Natives is crucial. Once that's done, focus on going to the Fortress Age and getting a Fort up. Three TC's and a Fort will give you breathing room, and that's all the Portuguese really need.

I will get into civ details later, but as a guide, try to adhere to the civ's basic strengths and find a workaround for their weaknesses.

Age of Empires III

2005-10-22T17:51:00.000-07:00

If anyone hasn't read any of my reviews before, it's best to take note that I am a hardcore gamer... meaning that I choose to play games that are more than just superficially entertaining. I enjoy playing games that take skill, intelligence, and talent... rarely do I play what the majority of the casual population play. That's neither the here nor now. I'm about to talk about Age of Empires III.

Strategy (10/35) - There isn't much to this game. Despite the depth it seems to hold, this is just a simplified version of a genre that used to uphold various aspects of something called strategy. The quickest player usually wins, not the most conniving, cunning, or resourceful. Efficiently manage resources, stay on the attack, and keep building and moving forward. That's all that needs to be done to win. I have to think more when shopping at the grocery store than when playing this game.

Gameplay (10/25) - A watered-down version of the previous Age of Empires games. It seems like there are more units, but they're all basically the same except for the names and how they look. Even the new concept with cards, it doesn't add anything unique if you want to beat another equally or better skilled player. The only times a player will use unique cards is when they know they're playing some chump, they'll want to use it just to see how good it is, and when they do, they'll be disappointed that it's not as useful as it would seem to be.

Balance (10/25) - Ah, being a Libra isn't that bad, but being Dutch sure is. At least for this game. Ensemble Studios has never been good at balancing anything except their checkbooks. Forget the different Civilizations for a minute, because if they ever get balanced, people will realize that they're all pretty much the same! Oh, and the cards should make up the difference... but 75% of them aren't worth using, and only the mercenary cards are interesting, but they're not worth getting when quantity is more important than quality!

Online (5/20) - ESO2, you would think it would be better than the original ESO, or even the Zone for those that are old enough. Think again. The interface is lousy, the usability is idiotic, and the matchmaking system hasn't been improved. There's lag, it's hard to get a 2v2 team game in Quick Search, filters are stupid, the server goes down a lot without any warning, and the list could literally go on forever. As I write this, players aren't even getting Home Cities levelled up after each game!

Overall Score 35% - Okay, maybe I'm being a little harsh. Maybe I don't like Ensemble Studios. Maybe they got lucky with the first two Age of Empires games and just hired a good marketing team to hype up the general population. Hell, all I've seen are good reviews one after the other. The only other review that I agree with is this one. And that person was pretty lenient. Anyways, don't mind me, I'm the minority in more ways than one. If you're dead set to get this game, you'll like it for being the casual kind of guy. For the hardcore in you though, you'll just end up turning all the video details to their lowest settings on a decently fast computer just to get better performance. Then it starts looking like the old Age of Empires games, but it just won't be the same.

OMG!

2005-10-17T00:20:00.000-07:00

This is the funniest shit I've read in a long time (Bantu rush discussion).

As for other news, come Tuesday, I will be writing strategy articles for AoE3, so I may be slowing down on RoN strats. However, there is WH_LordAOF's Bantu rush and some 1 City starts, so I won't fully stop for RoN until RoL comes out. Besides, there shouldn't be much strategy-wise for AoE3, but there'll be a lot of balance changes, therefore it'll seem like there's a lot of strategy, but not really.

2v2 Switch

2005-10-16T15:47:00.000-07:00

As 2v2's go, they're fairly simple, and my previous analysis about them are mentioned in my Team Concepts article.

A good practice towards team playing, however, is practicing the Switch. All it means is each teammate bringing over a Citizen to build military buildings and attack each other's opponent. There are a few reasons why this is an advantage:

One of the opponents will think they are getting doubled. In actually, that is not the case. If they relay to their teammate that they may, or are, getting doubled, this forces their teammate to attack, thinking their opponent is defenseless... so rarely will anyone boom.
If done correctly, with one switch player Ancient Age rushing and the other player Classical Age raiding, it protects both players from being raided, most particularly the player that is raiding.

The showcase game for this article is where WH_LordAOF and I play yae and ROSA_Kashmir on Old World. Watch the game here.

When watching the game, note that my slow Roman Ancient Age rush fails against the Persians. It was too slow to work anyway, but this forced WH_LordAOF's opponent from not being able to raid him. FA's to stop a rush = not enough resources for HA's to raid.

This means WH_LordAOF can keep raiding my opponent without any risk of being raided or attacked by his opponent, and if my opponent raided him, it would take a much longer time to get to him to do as much damage as LordAOF could. An option which we did not do in the game was to double either player. We could have easily helped each other out, but with our economy never getting hurt, it didn't matter too much.

Persians vs. Americans (Great Sahara)

2005-09-19T14:53:00.000-07:00

Persians are a better Nation. Their strengths are to harass their enemy early in Ancient Age, utilize their cheap CIV research for 3 Cities, and get a quick and effective economy going for a strong Medieval Assault (link will be added soon). When utilizing their Unique HI and WE's, they can effectively be an all-round Nation.

Weakness: Weak Military. The Persians against strong Nations such as the Aztecs, French, Iroquois, and Romans, which all have strong military, have to amass much more of their army in order for it to be effective in battle. Therefore the Persians need to protect their economy and not risk a direct confrontation until they have enough to do the job.

Americans are a better Nation. Their strengths are to utilize their free Governments, free Scholars from Universities, the instant Wonder bonus, and extra resources from having Barracks units. This gives the leeway to be flexible, but unless they survive until the Enlightenment Age, they aren't as tough as they seem.

Weakness: Wealth. The Americans are in great demand for Wealth in order to properly defend their economy. They will need to gather Wealth from having Barracks military until they can safely secure 3 Caravan trade routes. Since the Barracks military don't give resources if garrisoned, it's best to raid and attack the Americans early, and attacking their Military is just as good as killing Citizens.

The showcase game for this article is where I play RU_CaLLuM on Great Sahara. Watch the game here.

The Great Sahara map lacks one major resource, Timber. There are no rivers, bottleneck forests, or huge mountains to slow down raiding parties. Raiding enemy WoodCutter's Camps is the best strategy to employ, next to getting a foothold of the center Timber area. Adequate City placements can protect yourself against raids, and bad City placements can leave you hanging without a second Timber resource.

In this game, I start with a SCI 1 MIL 1 research at the Library. Military starts can be used for multiple purposes: scouting, rushing, raiding, or distraction. You can find more information on Military starts here (link will be added soon). With my FA, I get lucky to find a vulnerable Timber area at his 2nd City. I manage to kill 2 of his Citizens with a FA and HI, making him not collect Timber for a decent amount of time, and forcing him to build a Barracks and Foot Archer in Ancient Age. This enables me to not worry about him doing a Fast Classical Raid and already puts him in defensive mode.

All this stems from his poor 2nd City placement. If you're not the Bantu, Chinese, Koreans, Lakota, Persians, or Russians and don't see an immediate forward 2nd Timber area, it's best to build a Temple at your Capital to extend your borders. If CaLLuM had done so, he would have had a much easier time protecting his original 2nd Timber area by having his 2nd City closer to it.

Meanwhile, since I was the Persians, I quickly build my 2nd City near a 2nd mountain which will protect my future miners, research CIV 2, and prepare to quickly build my 3rd City in the center near the center Timber area and Buffalo Rare.

At this point I take stock of my Rare Resources. Buffalo gives me +24 Food, Horses give me +12 Food and +12 Metal, Sugar +10 Food and +10 Timber, and Relics +20 Knowledge. I know I can cap my economy at +100 without having any more than 4 Farms. This saves me a lot of Timber, which is good since that enables me to still be aggressive in Classical Age by doing a quick MIL 2 in Classical to go Rare raiding, which happens, but I only take out his Cotton Rare, which is worth losing a blind HA that dies running past a Tower.

Now, most players don't do this, and it can make a big difference. Once I get merchants to my Rare Resources, I am overcapped on Food and Timber when I reach Classical Age. Instead of making Citizens, I use ones that are over-resourcing to build my Senate, Universities, Military Buildings, and place them to gather Metal. That way I can cap +100 Food, Timber, and Metal while minimizing my overhead. You'll see me gathering +98 Food with only 2 Farms. That's efficiency! Yay!

Once I notice CaLLuM moving his Capital to his 2nd City, the game's pretty much in my favor. His only chance would have been to build a 2nd Barracks instead of a Stable, and churn out 2 HI's for every FA. He had Salt and Cotton (and Wine which he didn't see to get), which would enable him to make quite a large Infantry army, and very quickly (and very cheaply upgradeable if he had Wine). Meanwhile, I was continually making my own large Infantry army with some HC with the help of the Horse Rare.

The Rare Resources were evenly dispersed, except CaLLuM didn't utilize his Nation's strength with the Rare Resources that he had, while I did with mine. He also made the mistake of moving his Capital closer (which is rarely a good idea). Note that no Wealth went to building any Scholars or even for researching SCI 2 (CaLLuM should not have researched SCI 2 and instead built an extra University or two earlier), since I would be doing an all-out Medieval Assault. Usually +50 Knowledge is good enough to have if doing a Medieval Assault, +80 if planning a decent Gunpowder Assault.

German vs. Japanese (Amazon Rainforest)

2005-09-19T14:47:00.000-07:00

Germans are a better Nation. Their strengths are to capitalize on their ability to cap their economy. This enables them to boom fairly well at the same time creating a sizeable army.

Weakness: Time. The Germans need time in order to build their first two Granaries, Lumbermills, and Smelters in order to research the economic upgrades and cap their economy. However, the Germans have a fairly quick start, and they can remain aggressive early to slow their opponent down while getting their economy up to speed.

Japanese are a better Nation. Their strengths are to utilize their Farming bonus for a quick start and cheap Barracks military for a large infantry army. This allows the Japanese to constantly attack while preventing the enemy to boom peacefully.

Weakness: Wealth. The Japanese are in great demand for Wealth in order to protect their Barracks military advantage. They will need to secure any Wealth from Fish or Rare Resources, and once that is done, they will be hard pressed to stop with their constant barrage of attacks.

The showcase game for this article is where I play Elite_WildBoy on Amazon Rainforest. Watch the game here.

The Amazon Rainforest map is abundant in resources, and with proper defenses, can easily stop enemy raids. Booming is the best strategy to employ, but take time to note the surrounding terrain. Adequate City placements can protect yourself against direct assaults.

In this game, I start with a SCI 1 MIL 1 research at the Library. Military starts can be used for multiple purposes: scouting, rushing, raiding, or distraction. You can find more information on Military starts here (link will be added soon). With my FA, I get lucky to find a vulnerable Timber area at his Capital, and see a Merchant passing. Wildboy makes his first mistake attacking the lone FA with his Citizens. He loses 2 Citizens from my FA while I safely retreat my FA to look for any remaining Ruins. Meanwhile, my Scout finds a Cotton Rare, so I create a HI to head toward the area. It's where I think the earlier Merchant I saw passing is heading.

While all this is going on, I wait to see the best place to put my 2nd City. I see the big middle mountain with lush forests, and I want to put a City there to protect my front so I can buy me some time to play defensive and boom. In order for that to happen, I needed to build a Temple at my Capital, which is why it took me such a long time to get my 2nd City up. I did a SCI 1, MIL 1, COM 1, CIV 1 start, which is quite unusual on a non-fishing land map.

Once we get to Classical Age, I knew raiding would ensue. I figured since he knew I had a Barracks with a FA still alive, sending in a HA wouldn't be very effective. Therefore I build a Stables, research MIL 2, and create 2 HC's instead of a LC. When he follows his HC with a HA, that's when I build a LC.

I send my HC's to raid, but when I pass by some HI's with one of them, I build another FA and bring my FA that's been healing inside my Capital. It's enough to stave off the small raid-attack. I build a Tower on the left side of my 2nd City, forcing WildBoy to attack from the bottlenecked right side, or on the left side where he has to march through a long river.

The right side of the map looks very protective, which is why my 3rd City gets placed there. Meanwhile, I get to Medieval Age and see that his 3 Cities are straight down the middle of the map, and I see a Siege Factory. This means he's planning an early attack with Siege, or he just wasted 60 Timber and 60 Metal for something he's not going to use.

This is a crucial time for his attack because this is when I'm building my Granaries, Lumbermills, and Smelters. However, WildBoy makes a 2nd mistake wasting time taking out my Tower. In case he's trying to raid the WoodCutter's there, I delete my WoodCutter's Camp and build it below my 2nd City. I use that time to raid with my small army, build another Tower in my 2nd City just outside the bottleneck, and start making an army at my 2nd City do defend against his attack. He doesn't have nearly enough army to do any harm except take out my Barracks, but I promptly build another one.

My initial small army that was raiding catches his Supply Wagon and 2 Catapults. Killing those just bought me a lot of time to boom freely. The only way he can possibly catch up is to boom also. However, booming against the Germans is a very difficult thing. Once I reach Gunpowder Age, I just use my Arquebusiers and HC to raid and I build a 4th City to the left while I'm distracting him with the raiding. From there the game ends, but I would have gone to Enlightenment and built a 2nd Barracks, 2nd Stables, and a Siege Factory there to start my assault, where I would have a better position to attack without having to go around a mountain.

The Amazon Rainforest favors the Germans more than the Japanese due to the defensive nature of the map. The Japanese's only chance is to try and get a quick 3rd City start for a better attacking position with an extra Caravan for Wealth and assault the German's Capital or 2nd City nonstop in Classical and Medieval Age.

Defending

2005-08-27T03:20:00.000-07:00

There are relatively few Nations that can defend well in T&P. Now, there's a difference between defending, and defending and winning. The Maya can defend, but can't defend well and still win. My choices of defensive Nations are:

Koreans- Perhaps the best Defensive Nation. They have cheaper Towers, get free Milita upgrades, get free Citizens for each new City built, plus they repair 50% faster. Because they get free Citizens, they are able to jump start their economy, and the best asset to have for a defensive Nation is to have a good economy.
Dutch- Perhaps the best anti-raiding Nation. The only units that can take down their Merchants are HI, HC, and FA (from a distance advantage). Their economy also gets a jump start, and with cheaper COM research, they can readily boom and have an army to defend with the resources they accumulate.
Iroquois- Once they get to Medieval Age, I would say they have a good chance at defending most attacks. Their units heal in friendly territory while not being garrisoned, they get free upgraded scouts with a large Line-of-Sight that are hidden when not moving, and units not moving in their territory are also hidden. This means they can see what you're up to, move their army to trap an attacker, while booming to get to the Enlightnment Age where they can start an attack.
Chinese- Not that great at booming and not that great defensively, but their Large City bonus prevents Ancient and Classical HI rushes from being effective. This means they can safely choose to raid early, expand, or boom.
Russians- Also another Nation that is safe only when reaching Medieval Age. Large Cities are easier to defend against a HI rush, and they get their unique LC which are particularly good at fighting any unit, especially siege units. With an army of LC and a small reserve of garrisoned FA's, they can build a quick Fort that will have Spies to aid in an attack. As long as they can keep up a good economy, they can play this defensive game of killing Despot Generals, Supply Wagons, and Siege until they reach the Industrial Age where they can stop being so defensive.

The biggest thing to note when defending is to not waste resources into building Siege Factories or Siege. The plan is to to conserve resources, defend with the minimal amount of units while using the rest of your resources to keep an age ahead of your opponent and keep your economy stable.

A good example is a game I played against KIWI_Beertender. I've uploaded the game at RoN Heaven, and you can find it here.

I am the Dutch and Beertender is the Mongols on the Great Sahara map. The best anti-raiding Nation against the best raiding Nation on a raid-prone map (no rivers or clumps of forests). You'll see with Beertender's expert micromanagement, he's still able to pick off some of my Citizens and Merchants. However, he doesn't do that much damage with my economy having such a good jump start, plus I have a small defensive army that tries to win as many small battles as possible... such as taking out a defenseless Catapult.

The first Defense situation is defending the raid. With the Dutch, 2 armed Caravans (from a risky 3 City start) and Merchants can defend well against HA raids. Therefore I build 1 Tower at my most vulnerable Timber area first and upgrade Militia as soon as possible. Next, the most important thing to do next is defend against a rush. You can't defend a rush with a Stables... you need a Barracks. So, I build a Barracks at my early 3rd City and build 2 FA's upgraded, and a HI along with my Despot General. Note that I am able to take down a straggling HC with 2 Militia and 2 FA's and my Despot General without losing a single unit.

After the initial raid defense, I can safely start trying to cap my economy to +150 while trying to get my Knowledge accumulated and into Medieval Age. I build two more Towers, both at areas that can't be well protected against raids, and once I get to Medieval Age, I start making LC's, because the best units to defend in Medieval Age with proper micromanagement are upgraded LC's and FA's.

When Beertender reaches Medieval Age, you can easily see he has a superior army. However, he can't take a Large City with the forces that I have without Siege. He makes a careless mistake and I slow down his assault on my 3rd City by taking out a defenseless Catapult. Before he thinks twice about making any more siege, I'm already in Gunpowder Age and he knows he can't take it while still in Medieval Age.

I use my raiding in Gunpowder Age as a distraction while I build a Fort behind my 3rd City and build my 4th City. The worst thing that can happen when being defensive is losing a newly built City. In order for the 4th City to be built quickly into a Large City, I bring over my Democratic General which speeds up building production, and I also research my Construction upgrade at the Lumbermill.

Beertender again has Siege, this time Bombards to attack my 3rd City, but I make it up to Enlightenment Age to discourage him. He pulls away from the attack, and I figure he's trying to get to my Capital, so I take what forces I have and try to intercept him. My only real danger lies in losing my Capital at this point, since it is relatively undefended. However, once I see that he is heading to my Capital, I quickly research Minutemen at a Tower just in case whatever forces I have isn't enough to stop him.

Again, he loses his Siege by not having them protected. Note that I do not build a Siege Factory once in this game. Also, I am always one Age ahead of him. This prevents him from an all-out frontal battle, and the only real option he has is getting my Capital.

He is able to sneak past with an army while I go raiding with mine, but I know well enough that I can send reinforcements to my Capital as long as I can find a way to stall him a bit. Therefore I have an Airbase built near my Capital with Biplanes taking out his Siege. It slows him down just enough until my reinforcements arrive and I am able to stave off the attack. My economy is just so much ahead at that point that I can easily make it up to Information Age and protect my Cities before he can get to the Modern Age.

The key to playing Defensive and winning is:

Not to lose resources. Protect your WoodCutter's Camps and Mines with Towers. Upgrade the Militia and Minutemen research at the Towers when available.
Have a small army to protect against Small Army raiding, HI rushes, and Siege assaults.
Keep your economy stable. Don't waste resources in making things you won't use, like Siege Shops and Siege.
Stay an Age ahead of your opponent. This prevents them from a frontal assault on your closest City.
Keep a lookout for a sneak attack on your Capital, that is the most vulnerable City in a strong frontal defense.
Keep your opponent distracted when building expansion Cities. You can't afford to lose a newly built City.

It takes practice, but playing defensive to win can be easy. It just takes the right decisions with the right Nations.

Planning Ahead

2005-08-27T03:19:00.000-07:00

Planning ahead is a little complicated because it isn't an exact application. There are many variables in the game that can't be counted on as being fair. For instance, an opponent getting the better Rare Resources, or getting an initial lake in a Great Lakes map with two or three more fish. Planning ahead is simply a means to negate the unfairness and unbalance your opponent to where you get to be in control of the game instead of them.

A good example is a game I played against KIWI_Beertender. I've uploaded the game at RoN Heaven, and you can find it here.

I am the Iroquois and Beertender is the Greeks. On any other land map without fish, I would definitely have the clear advantage with the Nation match-up. However, Beertender takes advantage of his Rare Resources, and he surprises me by outbooming me with a better army.

Once I find out he's Greeks, I figure that he'll try to hit me hard in Enlightenment Age with a large HC army before I get there.

Once we both hit Classical, I play a little defensive until I have a small raiding army, but Beertender beats me to it. When I see his Small Army raiding force, I plan ahead to let him raid with it while I build up a counter army and hit him in Medieval. It works, and he retreats leaving me to boom slightly in peace.

I haven't scouted much of his territory yet, but I want him to think I'm going for a full Medieval Age Assault on his 3rd City. My only target, really, is his Stables. I know he will try and stop me, so I Entrench my FA's and ready my small Cavalry army to stop his HC. Once I take that down, I assess the situation. My economy isn't that strong, so I focus on that. My army needs healing, so I can't quite keep up a front line attack.

While I figure he's planning on going to Gunpowder relatively soon, I take what army I have and plan a surprise attack on his Capital. I upgrade my Catalpults to Trebuchets, but when he hits Gunpowder sooner than I expected, I have to postpone my attack and hit him in Gunpowder. I take extra care that he doesn't see my army sneaking up to his Capital by using the Ambush ability.

Once his Small Army raid begins again, I figure he's overextended his army a little in order to get back to his Capital in time. Due to that, I attack his Capital before my army is fully upgraded. I briefly take his Capital for the Capital Sack Bonus, but at a cost to losing my army. I quickly build a small defensive army, protect my front with Entrenchment, and I now have the momentum to boom faster than he can.

The rest of my plan is to keep pressure on his 3rd City while continuing to boom throughout the Ages until I know I can take it, which will mean the end of the game.

Beertender had a better kill/loss ratio than me due to his expert micromanagement, but by planning a secret assault at his Capital and keeping pressure at the front enabled me to eke out a win.

The only things that are reactionary are the micromanagement of the individual battles, whether it's stopping a rush, raiding, defending a raid, or fighting a battle. The rest of the time, you have to assess the situation and plan the best time to make an attack.

Scouting

2005-08-25T23:35:00.000-07:00

Scouting is one of the most important skills to learn in T&P. A player with a slow Nation can compete with a player with a fast Nation because of effective Ruin scouting. Fast Nations can decimate slow Nations by knowing where to raid or attack. Here's what to look for when scouting:

Ruins
Rare Resources
Possible City Placements
Opponent's City Placements

Take for example, the Great Sahara map.

Ruins: There's typically one Ruin at each corner, sometimes two. If there's two, then the 2nd one will be near the edge. There are also Ruins near your borders, usually three, including the one that's at your nearest corner. Primarily, when I scout, I am looking for Ruins to boost my economy.

Manipulating Ruins is a skill that must be mastered when going against very good opponents. Ruins give you resources for the lowest type of resource you have, except for Knowledge. If you want Food, queue up Citizens at your City until it's lower than the rest of your other resources. Grab the Ruin, which will give you Food, then unqueue your Citizens. If you want Timber, wait until you have 60 Timber and build a Lookout Tower before you grab a Ruin, but be sure not to be building the Lookout Tower, so build it kind of far away in your territory. Once you grab the Ruin to get Timber, delete the Lookout. Normally you don't want Wealth early, but to manipulate that, you just have to wait until your Food and Timber are higher than your Wealth resource... unless you have Universities, queue up Scholars.

Scouting with Citizens can be very helpful if done correctly. If you scout with Citizens (red arrows), send one to your near corner, one to your far corner, and two around your borders (one or both of these Citizens will eventually build your 2nd City). This leaves your scout (blue arrow) to go forward to scout your opponent to see what they're doing. Plus, you might be able to grab some of their Ruins.

Rare Resources: There's always one Rare Resource inside your starting territory, usually one at each corner, and a few hodge-podged around the center. Always expect your opponent to send merchants to them, thus you already have targets you can raid. If you manage to scout your opponent's territory, you will be able to see their Caravan trade route, which is also good to know for when you go raiding later.

Possible City Placements: Almost always go forward with your 2nd City placement, but make sure you plan ahead and find a good defensive and economic spot. Below, Red's best possible 2nd City Placements are indicated by the red squares. The one on the left can protect the Rare Resource nearby. The one on the right will be close enough to have access to another mountain, but it won't be very safe. Blue's best possible 2nd City Placement is just the one, but it has access to two mountains, a decent Timber area, and 2 Rare Resources.

Opponent's City Placements: You want to take stock of where your opponent has placed their Cities. If it's a minute and a half into the game and your opponent's borders haven't budged, then it's possible they're rushing. If they did build a 2nd City but it has no Timber area, then remember to raid the only Timber area your opponent has or find another Timber area within their border to raid, most likely it will be the first location they will put a Tower up, but that alone won't be enough to protect it. By scouting your opponent's City Placements, you can exploit any weakness to your advantage. If they happen to place their 2nd City sideways, there's an easy raiding spot between those Cities to harass the Caravan trade route and stop the Wealth supply, etc.

The most effective way of scouting is by sending your Scouts, Citizens, Merchants, or Slingers and Foot Archers manually. It takes some multi-tasking, but you will be able to cover ground much better and it's good practice. Keep watch on your mini-map, it will show you areas you missed or Ruins you've passed! Plus, always send your scout forward, because your 2nd City should be forward, and you'll want to find a good spot for it. Otherwise, you'll need to have your Citizens scout it out. Also, if you send your scout forward, you can take your enemy's Ruins. Do this in Team Games especially, because you don't want to steal your ally's Ruins!

I'm Back...

2005-08-12T17:13:00.000-07:00

So... what have I missed?

Romans vs. British Nation Match-up (Old World)

2005-08-12T15:17:00.000-07:00

Romans are a strong Nation. Their strengths are to quickly get up to Classical Age to raid and later set themselves up to take an over-extended enemy's 3rd City, or make their own and boom. Their Unique Heavy Infantry absolutely decimate their opponents due to their cheap cost and anti-Heavy Inftantry countering abilities. All the Romans need is to back them up with Light and mostly Heavy Cavalry against any Archer units, which is easy to do with the City Wealth bonus.

Weakness: Late Ages. The Romans are very aggressive and powerful early in the first three Ages. However, their strengths all but disappear or don't help very much the longer the game lasts, especially when the opponent player reaches Gunpowder Age.

British are a good Nation. Their strengths are to defend against oncoming attacks using their Unique Foot Archers while safely maximizing their economic commerce cap bonus in order to build a large army that will devastate opposing armies upon reaching Enlightenment Age.

Weakness: Time. The British are vulnerable to Classical Age raiding due to a slow start. Raiding prevents them from getting their economy to their full potential, and leaves them struggling to defend a very aggressive Medieval Age assault.

The showcase game for this article is where I play British on Old World. Watch the game here.

It's a quick game as I utilize the Roman's early strengths in being aggressive. I do a small raid against his rare resources, and see that he has built a decent sized infantry army. I decide to go to Medieval Age immediately and attack using a combination of mostly Cavalry units. My slow-moving Roman Unique Heavy Infantry are useless against the British Foot Archers, but I build a few of them to protect my catapults.

I prevent him from capping his economy and I easily capitalized on his mistake of building too large of an infantry force in Ancient Age, trying to protect against a possible strong raid that I decided not to do.

Team Concepts

2005-08-12T15:16:00.000-07:00

I've uploaded a 2 game series at RoN Heaven, you can find them here.

The first game is a 2vs2 on the African Wateringhole.
Team 1: TWC_Tascan (Inca) + UXD_Hamsterham (Greeks) [smurf name, probably a TWC]

Team 2: El_Capitan (Persians) + ElitE_Cops (Americans)

2vs2 games are fairly simple. In most cases, they are two separate 1vs1 games. On occasion, doubling one player and taking him out quickly usually means the game is won. However, if the other team is good, the player that's left alone either helps defend his teammate early by sending an early Citizen, or goes and takes the opposing defenseless player out while his teammate struggles to die slowly.

2vs2 Team Concepts:

Two separate 1vs1's.
Double one player, help comes from raiding.
Double one player, help comes from attacking.
Defend teammate, send early Citizen to garrison in City in case double occurs and you can build a Barracks and Stable to help out.
Teammate defends against double while you try to take the defenseless player out before your teammate goes out.

In this game, ElitE_Cops asks me to help take and hold the Wateringhole. With me being Persians, if our opponents do both try and take the Wateringhole, too, then my Ancient raiding will end up being effective (they waste Timber on Dock and boats and can't get enough Timber for Barracks)... and my raiding does become effective against UXD_Hamsterham's Greeks. TWC_Tascan is doing well against ElitE_Cops, but I'm doing better against Hamsterham. When help arrives from Tascan, I retreat and tell Cops that I'm being doubled. Cops does the right thing and takes Tascan's 3rd City, forcing Tascan to bring back his troops.

I take my time to reinforce my army and wait until Tascan leaves before I commence trying to take Hamsterham out for good. Eventually I do, and I go up to Gunpowder Age and spam War Elephants with the Capital Sack bonus to raid Tascan. Meanwhile, Cops asks for help but eventually has everything under control and the game ends.

The second game is a 4vs4 on Old World.
Team 1: El_Capitan (French) + ElitE_FleP (Maya) + FasHi0N_87 (Egyptians) + Jack_selere (Koreans)

Team 2: AoIAnarchist (Lakota) + KiWi_VirginiA (Romans) + GAD_Dinamo (Greeks) + FUN_Headshot_hun (Americans)

4vs4 games are the most complex. In most cases, the edges are faced against each other with the nearest pocket player helping out. Typically, it's whichever side breaks through first that wins the game. On occasion, the two pocket players can decide to double rush the opposing pocket players, which prevents the opposing pocket players from adequately helping their teammates out, especially if their edge players are outmatched by your edge players.

4vs4 Team Concepts:

Edge players 1vs1 while Pocket players boom to help out later.
Edge and nearest Pocket double opposing Edge player, help comes from raiding.
Edge and nearest Pocket double opposing Edge player, help comes from attacking.
Nearest Pocket player helps defend a weaker Edge player.
Nearest Pocket player booms to attack stronger Edge player's nearest Pocket player.
Both Pocket players raid the stronger Edge players then the opposing Pocket players.
Both Pocket players rush the opposing Pocket players.
Both Pocket players boom to attack the weakest Pocket player and then triple that side's Edge player.
Both Pocket players and Edge player triple a weak Edge player while the strong Edge player fights and holds a possible double.

There's quite a lot of 4vs4 Team Concepts, but a lot of it has to do with the Edge-Edge player match-ups, and how the nearest Pocket player should aid their Edge player. For instance, if your two best teammates are on the Edge, then the pocket players should concentrate on handling the opposing team's pocket players in order to keep them from doubling your best players. If your two best teammates are in the Pocket, then they have to help double their nearest Edge player's Edge player or their Edge player will get overwhelmed. If the two best teammates are on one side, then they should double their side while the other side tries to hold off the best they can defensively. If your two best teammates are left Pocket and right Edge, then the left Pocket should double the left's Edge and the right Pocket should rush or raid the opposing right Pocket player.

In this game, I am the French as the left Pocket player. Not knowing who FasHi0N_87 is, but knowing he's a smurf and pretty good, I decide to raid his Edge opponent, AoIAnarchist, who I also know is good but is the Lakota on a land map. We are the strong side.

I then raid FUN_Headshot_hun (who I thought was a smurf, but I didn't know there was a FUN clan) because I figure FasHi0N can handle Anarchist from that point on. This keeps the pressure off of FasHi0N and let's him handle Anarchist without Headshot helping.

Meanwhile, Jack_selere is having trouble against KiWi_VirginiA, so I raid GAD_Dinamo, their right Pocket player. This leaves our right Pocket, KiWi_FleP from being attacked when helping out Jack.

At this point, it seems that both their pocket players are booming and leaving their Edge players to handle our Edge players solo. With our strong side being the left, I continue to raid Anarchist and Headshot while getting an army going toward Headshot. I manage to take Anarchist's 3rd City and Headshot's 4th City while FasHi0N finishes off Anarchist.

FleP is able to secure the right side with Jack, and the game's over as both me and FasHi0n would end up going towards Headshot and I would take out Dinamo.

So, to recap. Team 1 had strong left Edge, strong left Pocket, strong right Pocket, and weak right Edge. Team 2 had strong left Edge, strong left Pocket, weak right Pocket, and strong right Edge. No offense to the player's abilities, just this game with the Nation's makes me make this judgement.

My raiding helps weaken their left Edge's strong player and left Pocket's strong player. Their right strong Edge player would have taken out our weak right Edge player, but with our strong right Pocket player to help him, I'd have to distract their right Pocket player unless he'd end up attacking our right Pocket player trying to help out our right Edge player.

This may seem confusing, but you might have to read this through a couple of times. Any alternate 4vs4 Team Concept plans are welcome.

French vs. Indians Nation Match-up (Great Lakes)

2005-08-10T22:17:00.000-07:00

French are a strong Nation. Their strengths are plenty, extra Timber gathering which helps with Classical Age Raiding and booming. A Despot General, and a free Supply Wagon, which heal their own units even in enemy territory. The second strongest Heavy Cavalry in the game next to the Greek's unique Heavy Cavalry. Cheaper and slightly faster siege (built faster, too) for taking out Cities once the raiding ever stops.

Weakness: Time. The French need time in order to get their Despot General in Classical Age. It's really not beneficial for the French to start raiding before getting it, therefore they will have a slower but stronger Classical Age raiding ability. Attacking and raiding them first can delay the French from their offensive bonuses.

Indians are a good Nation. Their strengths are to quickly get their economy capped and proceed to Medieval Age where their War Elephants become brutal raiders and fighters. Since War Elephants take out all units except Foot Archers, Horse Archers, and Gunpowder Light Infantry, they need Light and Heavy Cavalry as back-up. Therefore, they don't need Barracks units as much and can do well with the Republic government as opposed to the Despot government many other Nations usually benefit more from.

Weakness: Expensive War Elephants. The Indians need plenty of resources in order to get enough War Elephants to do damage. However, their free upgrades ease that trouble and they become formidable once they have a stable economy and an army of War Elephants. Attacking them early and aggressively in Classical to Medieval Age before they can get enough units is their only weakness.

The showcase game for this article is where I play theDude (smurf) on Great Lakes. Watch the game here.

I start off researching SCI 2 and COM 2 before going up to Classical because with the map being Great Lakes, I figure I have time and I can get a few extra resources from Ruins and get a good economy started before I aged up. However, theDude's 2 War Elephants and 1 Light Cavalry catches me off guard with a fast Classical, attacking my Citizen building my first Stable.

Seeing a vulnerable Timber area and an important Horse Rare Resource, I very easily know to put a Tower there, which helps protect me when his early raiders arrive. Even on Great Lakes, the opponent quickly seizes my weakness and takes advantage, but he concentrates too long in Classical Age and could have easily made it up to Medieval Age before I did.

With the Horse Rare Resource, I take advantage of creating a large Cavalry army supported by a healing General. If my opponent is going to make a large War Elephant army, I'm going to have the maneuverability advantage, and be able to retreat and heal my cavalry while still fighting (which is why my losses weren't very high). Once I made it up to Medieval Age and took his 3rd City, I knew a massive army coupled with healing would still be able to take his quick Gunpowder Age advancement. I move forward to his 2nd City, and I'm in no hurry to go up to Gunpowder Age. Once I take out his military and military buildings, he'll have to remake them which buys me time to advance the age safely.

It was a quick game, but the French have the advantage against the Indians and counters them well before they can become powerful.

Egyptians vs. Germans Nation Match-up (Great Lakes)

2005-08-05T19:50:00.000-07:00

Egyptians is a decent Nation. Their strengths are to utilize their Food and slight Wealth bonus into building a quick Wonder they can build an age early that will give them a slight boost into whichever field they wish to go towards (Pyramids for Military and Booming Strength, Colossus for Raiding and Booming Strength, and Hanging Gardens for Economy and Booming Strength).

Weakness: Time. The Egyptians need time in order to build their first Wonder. If they're going against an aggressive Nation, they will need an early military to defend against rushes or raids while building their first Wonder in Ancient Age.

Germans are a better Nation. Their strengths are to capitalize on their ability to cap their economy. This enables them to boom fairly well at the same time creating a sizeable army.

Weakness: Time. The Germans need time in order to build their first two Granaries, Lumbermills, and Smelters in order to research the economic upgrades and cap their economy. However, the Germans have a fairly quick start, and they can remain aggressive early to slow their opponent down while getting their economy up to speed.

The showcase game for this article is where I play WH_Georgie on Great Lakes. Watch the game here.

Great Lakes is a good map to boom. Both Nation's weaknesses are almost negated due to the distance between us. The first mistake I make is researching SCI 2 instead of building the Hanging Gardens first. By building the Hanging Gardens first, I can go up to Classical a minute sooner and gain a head start in Knowledge accumulation... researching SCI 2 almost immediately when reaching Classical Age to make up the difference as opposed to slowing down my strengths.

The second mistake is that I don't utilize the Marble rare resource which will make my Wonders cheaper than it already was. I should have built the Terra Cotta Army as soon as I hit Classical Age, enabling me to have a large Light Infantry force as the booming race goes on.

My third mistake is that I didn't make an army, which is what the Egyptian's Hanging Garden Military Boom is supposed to be about. Instead, I build a small raiding army that doesn't do that much harm. My fourth mistake is while I was raiding, I didn't take time to notice his ragtag army of un-upgraded units. A sure sign that he's been building an army and is getting ready to strike as soon as he hits Gunpowder Age.

Those are enough mistakes to cost me the game at that point, but I figure I had time to expand and start building an army in Enlightenment Age, but WH_Georgie one-ups me and has a strong force in Gunpowder Age, taking one of my over-extended Cities early, hurting my Knowledge gathering rate and changing the course of the game for good.

This was a good learning game for me, because I knew my strengths but ignored them. Rarely a game is decided after one big mistake, but it's commonplace that the game is pretty much over when one makes plenty of small mistakes. It's all about the little things.

Good Game Pack1

2005-08-05T01:29:00.000-07:00

I've uploaded a 2 game series at RoN Heaven here.

The first game, I face off against a rusty AU_sims. This was our 3rd practice game, and he's still a bit out of shape. However, the game's definitely a fun watch with never a dull moment.

The second game, I face off against 3 opponents as one of my teammates drops (the pocket player) and another gets defeated early (left side). I'm waiting for them to finish me off until I realize that I might just be able to win! This is perhaps the funnest game I've played in a long time. I'm going against 3 decent players who are all just about matching me in Ages, but not quite in economy. Their leftmost player takes out one of my teammates early and finishes off the AI that took over for AFO_Valkyrie early in the game while I'm fighting off a double.

Late in the game, GU_Phantasm builds the Supercollider and they research World Government to take out my AI teammate. They nuke my Capital and rush to sieze it, but I'm able to plan ahead and delete my Senate and build it someplace else. I'm planning on taking the City with the Supercollider and use it myself, but they almost get me at my new Capital. I have to instant-build Citizens to turn them into Partisans just to survive the brief skirmish before my army can defend it and I can build my Capital elsewhere.

Two parts to note is the very beginning where the opposing team are wondering what I'm doing since I have a 1 City start. I wait patiently going up to Classical Age and upgrade my HI in a Delayed Power Rush before I head in towards the Capital. AoIYellow-Ink has a FA ready, but I'm still able to take the Capital briefly and delete the Woodcutter's camp before it's retaken.

The second part to note is when I take the City with the Supercollider and buy/sell resources to instantly research Missile Shield and World Government to win the game.

Raiding

2005-08-04T19:56:00.000-07:00

Types of Raiding:

Ancient Age Raiding - Any Ancient Age units built to scout for Ruins and Rare Resources, useful maneuver for taking out enemy Merchants.
Fast Classical Raiding - Getting to Classical Age quickly and immediately researching MIL 2 in order to create HA and HC to raid enemy Caravans, Merchants, and Citizens (primarily Citizens gathering Timber).
Sea Raiding - Using Light Ships to raid enemy fishing boats. The quicker you raid the sea, the better off you are in disrupting your opponent's economy. Light Ships and Heavy Ships/Fire Ships make up a good raiding party at sea. Never raid with just Heavy Ships and Fire Ships. Once in Industrial Age, Submarines are devastatingly powerful raiders.
Small Army Raiding - These raids are slower than Fast Classical type raids, but they're much more difficult to counter. These usually consist of HI and LC to support HA's.
Bribe Raiding - Spies are used to protect your raiding party.
Elephant Raiding* - Only the Indians and Persians can Elephant raid. It's particularly effective to use War Elephants starting in Medieval Age.
Mongol Raiding* - The Mongols are specialized in being able to Fast Classical Raid quicker than any other Nation, but they can also slow it down and get a massive raiding force in late Classical and early Medieval Age.
Late Game Raiding - Once in the Industrial Age, Light Tanks are great for distracting the enemy while keeping up a front. In Modern Age, Fighters and Helicopters can devastate an opponent's economy if they're short on air defenses.

There are many types of raiding, and the main focus of each is to slow your opponent's economy down. Raiding without killing anything can still slow your opponent's economy if they over-protect against it.

Timing can be useful as well... when you're about to engage in a major battle for a City, have a small reserve outside behind enemy lines to raid once a frontal battle is engaged. This forces your opponent to take time away from the major battle, and they have to protect their economy. If they're garrisoning Citizens, they're not resourcing, if they're not resourcing, they're not going to be able to reinforce their army in the major battle.

Raiding is always an option if you have military units. If your military is standing around waiting for a battle that's not happening, do something useful with them and raid. It's just wasted resources if you're not going to use them. If you watch any of my games, I will hardly have any military units standing around not doing anything unless I'm expecting an attack within a minute, expecting a raid to come through the area, or my units are healing inside a building or near a Healing General or Supply Wagon.

The showcase games for this article is where I play {-DA-}hades on Old World. Watch that game here. Also a Fast Mongol Raid against poontang on Old World. Watch that game here. There's also a very good raiding game against AU_sims in the Good Game Pack1 series on the Australian Outback.

Observe that in all those games, I'm raiding and getting a good sense of what my opponent is planning. Remember, if you're raiding, you're scouting. If I see that they're building an army to attack, I start building my defensive army. If they seem to be trying to counter the raiding while trying to boom, I switch to raiding more aggressively with a small army while booming faster.

Until you can raid effectively, you won't be able to defend against raids effectively. Therefore, if you're getting raided frequently in games and can't seem to defend well against it, play a few games raiding your opponent. Find the weaknesses in their defenses because once you figure theirs out, it'll be easier to figure yours out when an opponent raids you.

Consecutive Games

2005-08-01T05:21:00.000-07:00

There will come a time where you will have to play the same opponent more than once, whether it's in a tournament, in a quick match game, or just a friendly rematch. Many people tend to think that if something worked once, it will work again. Use their thinking to your advantage, and don't fall into the trap into being predictable.

The showcase games for this article is where I play Silver_Worm on Southwest Mesa in the 1st game, followed by a 2nd game on Old World. Watch the games here.

The first game, I'm the Aztecs, with my opponent as the British. The Aztecs have a natural advantage against the British because their free Barracks units counter the British's, and they have an earlier window of spamming Barracks (Gunpowder Age instead of Enlightenment Age).

In this game, I do a classic Aztec scout/raid with the free LI and a FA (a Wealth Ruin is needed). I like to do this on Southwest Mesa because many players, even good players, tend to send their Citizen to build their 2nd City a little too late, and sometimes the pathing makes them take longer to get around a mountain. In this case, I catch his Citizen building the 2nd City with my LI and FA and I effectively slow down his early expansion. Realizing I can keep him from building it, I build a HI, but I'm too late as a group of his Citizens run to complete the City.

If you look closely at the map that I scouted with my early raiders, I can clearly see he has no 2nd Timber source except the one that's above and to the right of his 2nd City. That's where I raid first. Remember, Ancient Age raiding isn't always about raiding in Ancient Age, but finding Ruins and scouting where to raid when you're in Classical Age. However, he knows this and prepares adequate defenses to guard against me harassing his important Timber resource.

The last thing to look for in this game is the Ambush/raid with my small raiding army of HC/HI and HA. This is very useful as the Aztecs need to kill enemy units to fuel their economy.

The next game is on Old World, I'm the French while my opponent is the Greeks. It's a very lopsided match-up, as the French is my favorite and strongest Nation, while the Greeks are one of the worst Nations especially on a non-fishing map. There isn't much to mention in this game, but remember how I Ancient Age raid/scouted in the first game? Well, usually with the French, they don't need to do a SCI 1, MIL 1 build order, but I do it just to see if my opponent wastes resources into building defenses he doesn't need. I use two LI's to scout for resources (Ancient Age ruin scouting), and later see his Barracks near his Capital. Ah ha! I've already made him do something he didn't want or need to, slowing him down even further while I cashed in on his mistake. I realize later that he even built a FA from it.

So, here are a few things to remember when you're going against the same player in a consecutive game:

Don't expect your opponent to do the same exact thing as in the previous game when they won. By preparing prematurely, you waste resources and time.
If you don't know what to do the 2nd game, do the same thing your opponent did to win the 1st game. Even if you lose again, you can figure out what he did to stop you, and you can study the game and know that if they do it to you again in the future, you'll know how to stop it.
If you won the 1st game, do the same exact thing except vary it a little. Such as when I Ancient Age raid/scouted and then the next game Ancient Age ruin-scouted. You want them to find your early Barracks to make them guess what you're up to.

Play each game as you would normally, and don't be intimidated by another player's abilities. Find a weakness in your enemy to exploit, or if you know that your opponent knows your weaknesses, set up a trap for him to fall for.

Turks vs. Bantu (Australian Outback)

2005-08-01T04:17:00.000-07:00

Turks is a good Nation. Their strengths are to quickly set up a defensive perimeter and gauge the situation until assaulting a City for capture and assimilation. Cheaper Citizens give them a slight boost in early economy, and they have the most powerful Gunpowder Age Infantry as well as the best Gunpowder Age Siege.

Weakness: Wealth. The only limiting factor for the Turks is not having enough Wealth to be able to boom or raid well. Unless it's a fishing map, they must secure 3 Cities and protect their Caravan trading routes.

Bantu is also a good Nation. Their strengths are to expand towards their enemy with the extra City and raid in Classical Age with the help of a few Barracks units because of their infantry speed. They get an extra Caravan with 3 Cities and COM 1, so remember to use this to your advantage.

Weakness: Over-expanding. Against another Nation that's great at raiding or rushing, you don't want to over-extend your Cities and give them an easy target to raid Caravans or take a free 3rd City.

The showcase game for this article is where I play SR_Clovis_SL on the Australian Outback. Watch the game here.

It's a fishing map, and we both do a SCI 1, COM 1 build order in order to get early access to fishing. My 2nd Woodcutter's camp is ideal, but I really need to protect it, so I work my way up to researching CIV 1 and build my 2nd City there. When I finish, I feel the borders pushing and realize my opponent over-extended. I research MIL 1 and quickly build a Barracks and 2 FA, knowing he'll try to encroach into my territory. I get them out just in time to kill some Citizens building a Tower.

Because my Turk weakness was negated due to the Wealth from Fishing, I am easily able to switch from being defensive to being aggressive. Raiding Fishing early is always a good idea, and on Australian Outback, you have to do it with Light Ships (if you do it with a Heavy Ship, by the time it gets there to kill a Fishing boat, a Fire Ship is there to blow it up to bits). I send two Light Ships over and kill his Fishing, and in retaliation, see that he builds ships of his own. By then, it's too late, the damage has already been done.

He's soon able to recover from my early harassment and I make a near fatal mistake by assaulting his over-extended 3rd City too early with Slingers that was supposed to be ready to be upgraded to Janissaries once I hit Gunpowder Age. I make a retreat, but at a great cost.

However, once I reached Gunpowder Age before him, I knew I had enough forces to takes his over-extended 3rd City, but I needed to do it soon before he reached Gunpowder Age and upgraded his units. Once the City's taken, the game's pretty much over.

I exploited the Bantu weakness with the perfect Nation and Map. Now if I was the Bantu going against the Turks, I would definitely not have over-extended my 3rd City. I most likely would have stayed back to see where he would build his 3rd City, and raided him until I could set up a good attack during Medieval Age. It's difficult to pull a win with the Bantu against the Turks on an Australian Outback map, and this game shows why.

Bantu vs. Aztecs (African Wateringhole)

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Bantu is a good Nation. Their strengths are to expand towards their enemy with the extra City and raid in Classical Age with the help of a few Barracks units because of their infantry speed. They get an extra Caravan with 3 Cities and COM1, so remember to use this to your advantage.

Weakness: Over-expanding. Against another Nation that's great at raiding or rushing, you don't want to over-extend your Cities and give them an easy target to raid Caravans or take a free 3rd City.

Aztecs are a better Nation. Their strengths are to build an early Barracks to build Atl-Atls for searching for Ruins and go to a quick Classical Age to raid also with infantry. If you're lucky enough, you can find Merchants on Rare Resources with your Atl-Atl's and take them out.

Weakness: Wealth. Unless they raid for it, they have trouble gathering Wealth.

The showcase game for this article is where I play super_boz on the African Wateringhole. Watch the game here.

For every player out there, try to remember the strengths and weaknesses of each Nation. When you're waiting for the loading screen, look to see what Nation you have, what Nation your opponent has, and what the Map type is. Here's what I'm thinking as the loading screen comes up.

Okay, I'm Bantu, he's Aztecs. He's going to go SCI1, CIV1, COM1, build a dock and immediately build a Heavy Ship since he starts with MIL1 already researched. If I do the same thing, he'll beat me to it. I'll forget the water, let him waste Timber building ships in the water while I expand laterally and focus my military towards whichever side he's building towards. I'll have to keep raiding him so he can't build a larger raiding army.

As you watch the game, this is exactly what I did. This was my strategy, and it worked. When I raided, I hit the Caravans to expose the Aztec's weakness. They had Wealth from fishing, but they can't cap Wealth with just 5 fish, and I get Wealth with each Caravan I take out. Also, I don't get defensive, I use units to defend with, because Towers can't protect Caravans. If he takes my Caravans out, I'm pretty much dead. I'd rather lose 3 Citizens than lose a Caravan.

Now, if I was the Aztecs going against the Bantu, I'd create an anti-raiding army and trap the Bantu raiders using the General's Ambush ability. When the Bantu stop raiding, I build an army and ambush near an enemy city and take out as many Citizens as possible and then focus on taking out Caravans and any straggling military trying to stop me from raiding while I retreat and boom at home. There's a perfect game where I do this as the Aztecs, but I cannot provide the game, and will have to wait until another game comes up to show this in action.

Rushing

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Types of rushes:

Standard Rush - 1FA, 1 LI, 4 HI
Kamikaze Rush - 5 HI, 3 LI
Delayed Power Rush - 6 HI upgraded in Classical Age

Rushing is the easiest Tactical maneuver in the game. It is, however, a double-edged sword. If you rush and take their Capital City, you get a Sack Bonus of +500 resources for each resource you're gathering. If you fail, then you've at least slowed your opponent down from raiding you in Classical Age because they have to spend Timber and Wealth to defend against it, but if they're smart, they'll boom to Medieval Age and handle you then when you're at a disadvantage. You can also easily make up for a failed rush by finding Ruins, and the Iroquois and Spanish are the best Nations to use if you like having a rush in your repertoire and not worry about falling too far behind if you fail.

In team games, the pocket player in a 3vs3 game can slow down the opposing players by doing a Delayed Power Rush. The game is pretty much over if you succeed in taking an enemy Capital, and without question, two enemy Capitals. On rare occasions, you might even take all your opponent's Capital's. Such as in this game.

A Standard Rush is good to use if you want to Ancient Raid first while finding any ruins on your way to scout out your opponent. It's the safest rush, but has the lowest chance to succeed. The Kamikaze Rush is much more successful, and it's easier to protect your HI against FA's. The Delayed Power Rush has the best success in taking your opponent's Capital, because they think a Classical Age raid is coming when you do a fast Classical. There's no protection against any FA, but if they don't get a Barracks up before you hit their Capital with 6 HI, you'll take their city before they get their defenses up.

All players should know how to rush, and how to defend a rush. I've lost my Capital to a rush on more than one occasion, but I knew exactly what to do and came back to win the game. Rushing is not a sure thing, successful or not. It is useful to throw off a good player's balance, keeping them guessing as to what you'll do the next time they play you.

Rise of Nations: Thrones & Patriots

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I am a hardcore gamer, and as such, will only give a review from that perspective. Hardcore gamers can be unusually harsh about the games they don't like, and even more so for the ones they do like. We're funny that way. Each one is finicky in their own way about a game, and there are four things I look for in an Real-Time Strategy game in order for me to want to play it:

Strategy
Gameplay
Balance
Online

Strategy (33/35)- Rise of Nations: Thrones & Patriots, usually called T&P, actually increases the strategic element with an expansion to the original Rise of Nations. RoN had the three basic elements of a good strategy game:

Diverse Playing Fields - Offense, Defense, Economy.
Counter Systems - Rushing, Raiding, Assaulting, Booming.
Tactical Advantages - Counter Units, Spies, Generals, Borders.

T&P adds more by providing Governments that level the Playing field, aid Counter Systems, and diversify Tactical Advantages.

Gameplay (20/25) - The gameplay is much the same as RoN (which was very good), except the Governments speed up the game intensity. There's more fighting at the beginning, but more booming in the middle. As far as expert level 1vs1 games, it rarely gets to the Information Age anymore. I'll have to give it a slight dip in Gameplay value for that.

Balance (18.5/25) - One of the reasons the Gameplay took a decline is because of the balance of the new Governments. While a new idea improved the Strategic Value of the game, it took away being able to get to the last two Ages when it gets particularly fun and intense. That's 20% of the game not being played anymore... that's a big balance problem. Some strong Nations took too big of a nerf where they are just downright slow. Out of the 5 new Nations, Iroquois are pretty strong, Americans can be strong against weaker Nations, and the Persians and Indians are about average. The Lakota are problematic where they have a lot of weaknesses, but few very good strengths. Some of the other Nations weren't re-balanced with the new Governments taken into consideration. All-in-all, the balance job wasn't as good as it was in RoN, but at least it's more difficult to see it from most player's point of view.

Online (11.5/20) - The online interface didn't change much, and people behind routers still cannot host unless they reconfigure their router, which is a big hassle. The rating point system still encourages smurfing and point trading, and it's not very well engineered. However, the joy of playing a game against other people, being able to observe their games while they play, and almost no chugginess through lag makes it an enjoyable experience once you get around the interface.

Overall Score 83% - As I said, hardcore gamers can be harsh about the games they like. However, when I'm playing, I'm not thinking about how bad the game is and how much I hate playing it, I'm thinking about how much better the game could have been if they improved certain aspects of it. The strategy is the best in an RTS game that I've seen in quite a while, but the gameplay took a hit, and the balance went out of whack. The first RTS game from a company isn't going to have the best Online interface, so I give a lot of credit to Big Huge Games on a job well done. The second time around, there are no excuses for a poor Online experience and balance issues are supposed to be better in an expansion pack.

My RTS Gaming History

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My first experience with real-time strategy games came from WarCraft II: The Tides of Darkness. After playing countless 1vs1 multiplayer games against my older brother using a null-modem cable, or being fortunate enough to use a computer lab at the University of Washington to play LAN games, I ended up getting a quick start into the RTS experience at a young age. I was fourteen, I think.

I vaguely remember going to a playtest session for Age of Empires, but I didn't get that much into the game when it was released. StarCraft had come out and I was playing around with new strategies and won a local tournament that was supposed to go regional until it got cancelled.

I have fond memories of my first tournament experience, where me and another player made it to the finals, each winning 4 games. However, the tournament rules had a point system, and I won officially on points, but I was either too cocky or confident enough that I'd win anyway, so we played our last game.

The tournament was set for 1vs1 games on four different maps and was played in normal speed. It was a bonus for me since I played a lot on Battle.net on Fastest speed, so it was really easy. Each game had an hour and a half time limit, and amazingly a lot of games ended up lasting that long... except for mine. Especially that last game.

The final map was decided by the tournament organizers because they weren't expecting a fifth game. I had played that map countless times on Battle.net, and now that I think of it, I was cocky. I chose Random for my race when it was a Protoss/Zerg map. If I had gotten Terrans, I would have lost. Except I had gotten Protoss, and I was eager to try a strategy that had not been seen yet on Battle.net. My brother came up with it, and I perfected it. It was like practicing the crane kick after watching Mr. Miyagi do it.

I got Protoss with my random pick while my opponent chose the Protoss. It was easy enough to figure out that he'd be doing a two Gateway Zealot rush, since that was the best Protoss strategy on that map. All the other players were huddled around our computers, eagerly watching the game to see how we played. I'm not sure if I disappointed them, or amazed them, but I did a Photon Cannon rush and the game lasted less than 10 minutes.

Afterwards, my personal life took a turn, and I didn't play any games for nearly three years. Age of Kings had gotten a large online community on the Zone, and I missed out on watching or playing against all the legends. I finally got my hands on the game to play the expansion, Age of Kings: The Conquerors, just before the patch version 1.0C came out. I was already too late, but I practiced and played and improved. Being able to play well actually got me referred to a playtest job at Microsoft where I eventually ended up playtesting Rise of Nations.

I was slightly disappointed in Age of Mythology and WarCraft III, so I didn't focus much energy into playing those games. Instead, eight months after the release of Rise of Nations, I observed to see how the online community was doing with the strategies and noticed a great lack of innovation. I played a few games, enjoyed the competition, and the rest is history.

Although I feel I'm getting old and slower, and winning isn't as important to me as it used to be, I'm having a lot of fun coming up with new and inventive ways to win.

Welcome to my Gaming Strategy Site!

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I hope you find many things on this blog that will improve your online gaming experience. Sometimes people get stuck in a rut and play the same way every time to win. In order to get to a point where you can win in a great many ways, you have to improve. In order to improve, you have to try new things, form better habits, and forget your pride for a moment and not worry about losing.

Enjoy this site, and have fun gaming!