Since we are getting towards the business end of the tournament, I would be curious to hear y’all’s opinion on what has been the most entertaining set so far?

Of course I’d recommend watching them all and Memb and all those involved are doing a fantastic job.

I’ve included some of my favourites but Reddit polls only go up to 6 so I have an option to write another below.

View Poll

Ik a bunch of you guys have seen Celts and Shinto already, but I decided to rework Hindu and make other misc. fixes. enjoy.

Age of Mythology 2 Presentation (Hindu, Celts, Shinto) - YouTube

As the title says, is it ?

Had back to back matches like this. Don't be a that guy. Respect your opponent and resign.

I joined one last night, and I'm extremely new but I had 2 teams fast castling outside of my base well under the 20-minute mark LOL

Edit: Just to clarify so I don't get down voted into oblivion. I just picked up the game a few days ago because of KotD tournament on twitch and the autumn sale on steam. I know and am prepared for being trash at this game for probably many many hours. I just thought it was hilarious and maybe an inside joke within the community to label games as "NOOBS ONLY" 😂

Hi all! With this thread I end my Arbalester + Siege civs series. This time, I’m focusing on closed maps (mainly Arena). Early game eco bonuses become a bit less important, but mid-game bonuses gain importance. In this case, the availability of Bombard Cannons has been given a higher relevance. As it happened with open maps, there were many candidates for the list, and again I have tried to weigh the pros and cons of each of the civs. Ethiopians, Italians, Koreans, Portuguese, Saracens and Vietnamese (especially this last one) didn’t make it to the list, but by a very close margin. You can argue for any of them to be on the top5, tbh. I start with number 5:

5th - Byzantines: Along with their fast Imperial into Monks and Trebs potential, Byzantines can surprise with a good Arb + Siege Ram push with their Imperial Age advance discount, which also gives time and saves resources to research the Arbalester upgrade and Chemistry for BBC. This civ is one of those you won’t want to face in late game, and the need for an aggressive playstyle can put a big pressure on the opponent. A late switch into Cataphracts + BBC + any counter to what your enemy decides to use against you (Halbs or Camels against Cavalry, Skirms against foot Archers, and any of them against Cav Archers) will deal the ending blow to the opponent, although a mix of the three discounted units with siege could also be enough.

4th - Bohemians: One of the top civs on Arena, maybe they are made for a slower push (especially Pike + Siege), but, for a civ with Chemistry available in Castle Age, all mining techs for free and Halbs who shoo any mounted unit or Hussite Wagons who laugh at enemy range and protect fellow ranged units, we can’t underestimate the strength of an Arb + Siege push. The things that draw me back from ranking them higher are the strength of their Pike + Siege push, Arbs not being FU, Siege Ram not being available or their strongest siege unit (Houfnice) being locked behind a costly upgrade.

3rd - Khmer: This civ doesn’t feature the building requirements, which can lead to a straight +0 pop Dark to Castle Age advance. If we add up their freedom farms, Khmer can unintentionally boom into Imperial and overwhelm the opponent with Arbs, Siege Rams (with that farming the upgrade is very easy to afford) and 3 Cavalry units. The BBC is missing here, but the strength of the Khmer push is undeniable.

2nd - Poles: The main drawback of the Folwark is that, to take full advantage of it, you must surround it with farms, which is not possible on an aggressive map like Arabia, since it would leave your vills unprotected to Cavalry or ranged units. On Arena, though, that problem doesn’t exist, and Poles can boom easily to afford anything. With Arbalesters, Siege Rams, BBC and Obuchs (who unlike most infantry units, only take 1 damage from FU Skirms), the Pole deathball can be devastating.

1st - Malay: To me, this civ takes the number 1 spot, with their faster advancing times meaning many more vills (2 on the way to Feudal Age, 3 on the way to Castle Age). But they can also advance faster for relic picking, they can Elephant rush, they counter meso civs with their Karambits, they get FU Arbalesters, BBC and trash 2-Handed-Swordsmen. It’s incredible that a civ with 3 bonuses towards water can be so strong on a pure land map like Arena.

What do you think about the list? I’m sure you have different ideas to the ones I proposed! Let me know about them and have a nice day!

looking for people to coop with me on this 11. I'd love to help you complete that as well.

Hi everyone, I see a couple of videos where people try out the mexicans. I really would like to try it as well before buying it however I don't know if it's possible for everyone.

My laptop's dispaly is 3:2 but not important, all dimensions are okay to me.

Wallpaper websites shows very less variety of wallpapers of Age of Empires 2. Maybe I don't know how to search lol

I prefer high quality of image.

Any recommendation?

Trying to get my friend into the game and want to show him a cool pro match. There was one viper game in the Red Bull tourney I thought of, but I’d like to know what you guys think!

Watched a few Viper’s play in this tournament and he seems to just boom boom and boom without walls or military. And this pretty much dragged the opponent’s aggression and eventually out-boom them and win. I think this strategy only works for a pro like him who is incredible in micro-ing and protecting their vills. For any casual players this strategy would have been gg in castle age.

Turkans

​

and also... TATARKANS

I remember AoE EE used to be up to 75% off on Steam Sales all the time, which made Sense bc it was an old game.

In the past year or two however, it hasn't been on Sale even once, despite newer remakes such as AOE 2 DE and AOE 3 De being on sale quite often. Does anyone know why this is and if it ever will be on sale again.

Unfortunately Key Sites such as g2a aren't exactly much cheaper.

This is quite unfortunate, as I own the game and would like to play it with friends who have lowend systems but don't want to pay 28 bucks.

The ranked queue screen becomes frozen, only the timer and my teammates civ and color update, but I am unable to click anything. Have been having this issue since the last patch update, don't know if it is under investigation already.

View Poll

I was playing thru the El Cid campaign last night and noticed my monks appeared to be automatically converting nearby enemy units on multiple occasions. Am I crazy or has there been a behavior change? Or maybe I was just hearing enemy monks (didn’t see any on the field but I suppose they could have been active elsewhere).

I swear, when there's some noise of some kind in the background my brain tricks me into vaguely hearing the classic clashing swords sound. I don't think I need to reference it with a link or something, I'm sure you fucks can play it like a tape in your heads just imagine two knights fighting each other. But for real, I can't be the only one right?

Hi all I play on DE and have just come to the end of playing the majority of the campaigns excluding a few I didn't find that fun. I've never really messed with mods or custom scenarios and just wondering if there's any really well done scenarios I can start of with that are really fun thanks!

When are the times you see a good use for them that you make them?

I think it's legal in a lot of countries. I think I'm not the only one who thinks betting in Aoe2 tournaments like how people bet in sports is fun.

Wouldn't it be fun and also great for someone to host a tournament then provide a platform for people to bet on then have like 10% or 20% of the money added to the prize pool?

What do you guys think?

Time for another weekly round of questions.

Talk about everything from build orders to advanced strategies.

Whatever your questions, the community is here to answer them.

So ask away!

Recently been lagging a lot in AOM EE on Steam, but not sure why.

Internet speed test says I'm 166 Mbps download, 10.9 Mbps upload, so should be fast enough.

Have a newer laptop designed for gaming.

Don't have any other programs open.

What am I doing wrong? Whenever I play, other players have the yellow/red circles by their name but someone always says I'm lagging.

​

What do I do? Thank you in advance!!

Quick question from a bad AOE player. When you get wrecked in team games & you escape (play mostly Nomad), what would the best way to help your teammates, growing my eco again & getting to imperial as soon as possible, or making military units to help your teammates out? Had a game that we lost, even that we had the numbers advantage 3v2, I worked on getting to imperial, but once I did, the enemies had also wrecked my teammates, so should I done military & delay getting to imperial?

Hey, been hearing a lot of whining about these civs in treaty mode, I exclusively play 1v1 supremacy so I have no idea but I was wondering what exactly makes them OP?

From what I can see US lacks a lot of eco cards compared to other civs, and state militia have been considerably nerfed since release. Ethiopia seem to have no reliable income of influence late game because once the mines run out you can no longer gather from monasteries with your abuns/villagers. Eco seems weak too with no factories and lack of cards like refrigeration and royal mint.

Hey,

I'm trying to figure out something about display sizes and in-game zoom.

There's two monitors; 24" 1080p and 27″ 1080p.

Game's zoom is set to 50 % for 24″ monitor. What zoom i need for 27 inch one if my goal is to have 1:1 ratio from same watching distance? Ie. if i have those two monitors set up side by side and watch a game i see everything same size, but more space with larger monitor.

Any thoughts? I also have same question for UI, but the zoom question is more important.

There was recently a post which lauded Sicilian bonuses and claimed they haven't been figured out. It's also one of my favorite civs to play and would really enjoy hearing how people have learned to use them.

Here is two topics:

1. How do you maximize making use of the first crusade? Often I find myself using it in an attempt to comeback when I am behind but it proves not enough. How can I use it most decisively to win games?

2. There has been lots of discussion about how knight play is very strong because of bonus damage reduction. Does anyone play archers or is it not worth it because they can still be countered with stronger archer civs, siege, or cav?

Title says already plenty…

I am playing ranked team games. 2 vs 2…my teammate just leaves me 2 seconds in game. I tell the other team I won’t try 2 vs 1 and leave the game too.

After this I have to wait 10 min. And it certainly isn’t the first time this happened.

https://www.ageofempires.com/news/vote-your-ranked-map-rotation-starting-november-30/

Hi everyone. I'm looking for mods that improve the game or add some QoL or convenient thing without altering the gameplay too much. I'm also interested in mods that have more diverse AIs (I'd like to see a wall every now and then). Even graphical improvements are welcome :) .

Thanks!

I find that im able to be calm and have a relatively high apm during early game eco, sometimes getting to a position where im ahead and everything is going smooth.

But

As soon as i start making military and push towards the enemy base i find i start to panic and make alot of simple mistakes (not keeping production up, failing economy at home base, missing to get upgrades, etc..)

If you have any tips for improvement i would love to hear it! :)

// Kindly, a Low elo (Legend?)

I remember rise of rajas, 3 of the campaigns had a real fuck you type missions. Still have nightmares about the Vietnamese siege mission. My least favorite type of missions are the timed ones.

I saw someone in a thread below ask for the inca kallanka build order.

Here are a few games on it seeing as it is quite good and possibly inca meta right now, all games are between top120 and top 10, hope this helped

​

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcPUSnuURXU - alternative version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVwYinRoea4 - my version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhKAD6BKfS0 - original version

I lose every game in early feudal. It’s all just MAA every single game now. I can’t walk everything. I’m just behind and constantly defending and frustrated. I try to play but i always lose fights in equal numbers. I just don’t enjoy it anymore. It’s hard to keep up with how I should do things differently when the updates change the game so frequently. I’m not having fun anymore.

just a command to have them drop at the nearest collection site and retask whatever they were doing

After watching for a few days, I think cav civs are picked a lot more than archer civ for their mobility even when most players wall all of their base. In most matches I never see a match where an archer civ beats a cav civ. Maybe I missed some games but this has been my overall impression. I’ve been trying to use archers but the slow speed and micro-intensive nature just doesn’t prove to be that effective in Arabia. This seems to even apply to high elo players especially in this tournament, which kinda overturns the previous notion where archer civs are OP for high elo players. Am I correct here?

Okay, so I finally figured out how to get explorers to build forts in the build area of the explores actions, but now I want to do the same to town centers, but put the various wagons like bank and factory wagons to the train area of the town center.

How would I go about doing that???

Which is better and why ?

Hi everyone,

Do you miss the old days of playing Huns Wars over and over on Voobly? Have you heard of the days of Huns Wars and want to give it a shot yourself? Well on the Mid-Elo Tourneys Discord we are holding a small Huns Wars tournament for all interested. Huns only, on Arabia, every match. This tournament will be open to players of ALL elo. However, players will be split into groups of 8-16 based on their elo so you will only be playing players within about 200 of your elo.

The discord is found at https://discord.gg/2edfSyn

Sign-up at https://forms.gle/Vr16adNoikiNEnyT8

There will be no prize pool for this tournament. It is just for fun. However, we run other tournaments throughout the year for all interested in joining the discord.

Can anyone show me a general treaty deck I always get kicked for not having a treaty deck lol

What are the differences, and would a post-imperial Bulgarian or Malian infantry fare better?

hey guys vote on my straw poll:

https://www.strawpoll.me/45866950

choices are by area/culture but you are obviously welcome to leave a more specific comment if you want to.

think i missed something? tell me!

Hello guys,

​

This is a list of the most imbalanced civs in the game imo which they give unfair play with unfair advantage hard to deal with and make the game so broken when playing with/against them and kill the fun the game and my idea about the ban draft system in ranked:

First lets talk about some civs and how to ruin the game by playing with/against those civs:

*1-Burgundians\*

A very insane civ with insane bonuses and ridiculous design in many ways which they are:

* The OP economy: gives you a very huge advantage with insane 50% discount and bening age before which give unfair play and remove the skill factor and make the game waaaaay harder against them, a monasteries that work like half Fetorias with their relic bonus and farms make gold.

* Insane military: Having a cavalier upgrade in the castle age (despite the lack of bloodlines) with 50% discount and once you hit imp you already have 50% cheaper Paladin makes you puah your enemy super fast and hard which no civ can do at all with insane powerspike and late game instant army with their revolution.

*2-Sicilians\* Broken tough civ with broken bonuses make them one of the most unfair civs t9 play with/against with many faces:

* Military: Insane 50% bonus reduction from any bonus damage making their knights, archers and infantry one of the most broken units in the game with no counter. 2 insane UTs one gives you 35 big army of tanky infantry like Huskarl and the other one make their knight line more broken with +1/+2 armor in addition to their 50% reduction damage.

* Buildings time: 100% building for castles and TCs making them s9 easy to boom and play and have 0 risks with droping castles and TCs everywhere.

*3-Teutons\*

A civ that have the most bonuses in the game with broken stables units in melee fight same for barracks and insane eco.

* Military: the free melee armor for both stables and barracks make them one of the most broken civs in the game with very hard way to counter. Knights with free melee and free resistance bonus to conversion and with their more melee even pikes and camels feel like a meh counter to them.

* Insane eco: A farms everywhere, 2 farms with cost of one, who cares if you have horse collar or not?! They are free farms anyway make their boom and eco insanely strong which support their insane knights with their free melee and free resistance to conversion.

*4-Cumans\*

Are you struggling with eco? Military? No worries here is the deal! Insane broken eco with 2nd TC in feudal. Takes longer time and feel your enemy will push you hard?! No worries, military buildings cost only 100W so you can make 2nd TC and military buildings at the same time to defend or attack! Or you can just ignore the 2nd TC and go insane early military rush with like 3 stables or 3 ranges! You fear that your enemy gonna trush you? No worries we give you siege workshop in feudal and capped rams in castle!

*5-Lithuanians\*

The most broken civ in last Khans and if not in the whole game with 0 weaknesses!

* Eco: small but with big insane early powerspike that makes you take the control of the map super early before your enemy do anything! With 150F start in thr bank you can do 17/18/19 pop and still have great resources in the bank and make the game waaay harder to your opponent to counter!

* Military: Knights have free attacks with getting relics up to +6 attack in castle age if you got all! Hard to do?! Don't worry your monasteries work 20% faster which means your monks will be out there before your enemy monks which make the things easier to you! Got only 2 relics in castle age?! More than enough! Your enemy have strong archers? Don't worry we give you 10% faster move skirms and a UT that give your skirms and halbs more PA! Your enemy have great melee units?! No worries at all we give you broken UU that completely ignore the melee armor! Even the poor Slavs boyar die to them same for the counter camels.

*6-Franks\* You like knights? Lovely! Here is the civ you want!

* Military: 20% free hp (bloodlines) on your stable with more on Paladin and cavalier in imp up to192hp! Hard to get?! No worries! Here is a 25% discount on castles spam them everywhere to protect your eco or rushing your enemy! You fear your enemy make so much counters?! No worries with already having cheap dirt castles we give you a great UU that have melee damage with range that counter pikes and even camels! You fear the eco? Here is:

* Economy: Free farms upgrades the whole way and 15% work on bushes early game!

*7-The mesos and the Eagle line!\*

Oh no! Too bad no stables! Poor guy! Here is a cheap dirt unit called the eagle that cost 20f only and 50g spam them the whole day with 0 eco and 0 brain with tanky armor and great mobility! Your enemy make counter like knights or Longswords?! Raid his eco and let them chase you or catch you with your eco with their 60F and your 20F! Knights? Make pikes or keep flooding eagles, pike cost 35F, eagle 20F both of them is less than 1 knight's food cost! Archers?! Anyway...longsowrds?! No worries you have already FU Arbs/xbows and even cheaper (Incas/Mayans or slingers (Incas) or even better military production and better monks and barracks (Aztecs). Economy problems?! No worries! As Mayans you already start with more vills and have 15% longer resources and cheaper archers and bulky eagles! Aztecs half free wheelbarrow start in dark and 50 gold and insane gold mines in the relics! Incas? Houses with ×2 pop, cheap castles, cheap towers and great tech tree better than the previous both!

*8-Bulgarians\* You fear that your enemy have better military? No worries here is an instant free militia line upgrade makes you push your enemy super fast MAA then add stable! Fear your enemy have better power?! No worries 50% cheaper blacksmith upgrades with 80% faster research making you early rush one of the most broken after you already sent your free MAA! You fear your enemy better eco or map?! Here is a semi-castle called Krepost make it everywhere with half castle cost to defend your eco or even rush your enemy with it! Oh no your enemy have great archers! Here is a 50% discount on the whole siege upgrades! Onagers and siege rams everywhere!

*9-Chinese\*

You like eco and military and smooth play? Here is the civ you want that have everything!

* Economy: Oh no! You fear that you will be behind? No worries you already start with 6 vills! Not only that wait! 10% free more food on your farms and cheap technologies the whole way!

* Military: What do you want? Archers? You have all! Stables? All. Barracks? All blacksmith? All and all your military technologies are cheaper too!. Great UU melt anything when in hand and very flexible tech tree! Do whatever you want! From this list I can forgive the Bulgarians only however they still need a tweak imo, but all other civs need a tweak and nerfs the whole way ASAP and the devs should do it to make the game more stable and more fun to play, not ruin it with making it more imbalanced with giving weird and blind bonuses!

​

From this list I could say ok for Bulgarians for now, but imo they need a tweak, other civs indeed need a change ASAP.

​

*The importance of introducing the ban draft system for the civs in ranked and why it should be in game\*

The ban system become so important with having more civs in the game, and I am pretty sure we will get more civs later! However, more civs means harder balance and more broken stuff. It seems the balance take so long and so much time and effort to add in the game and to fix the civs, so here came the importance of having a ban draft system in ranked unitl we have an acceptable balance between the civs, and here is my idea about this system:

* The system will be *Optional\*; so you are free to take it or not on the ladder.

* The system should have 3 bans, and imo they are not enough because imo we need even 5 but 3 bans draft as start is ok.

* When the player pick the civs that he wants to ban, he will not play against them in the ladder nor to play with them which is the normal case in tournaments.

That's all, I will be happy to read your opinions and replies.

That's it, that's the post. Let them keep their knight identity and their cheap castles and their smooth eco, but make those castles more fragile. They go up fast, they go down fast. Job done. What do you think?

How do you get gold in the Art of War Naval Battle? I've tried sending away weak ships, tanking fire with fire galleys, sniping demos, those ships are just too damn clunky to micro and I end up losing too many for gold, not even close.

Disclaimer: I know that my gameplay will not really benefit from this. Still, only gold medal I'm lacking, I want them all now.

I haven't seen him in many games lately and don't know what his form is like. I watch T90 a lot but haven't been seeing him as much as I used to.

Is it just me that I've been missing his games or has he just not been playing as much and is he still the best?

Hey Reddit! Some of you may already know that I arrange community tournaments on a regular basis, from ≈ 1000 ELO all the way up to 2k+. Recently I started a concept of "express tournaments", starting with Arena express a few months back. It is exclusive, in the sense that I only announce it in my discord ( https://discord.gg/v3AXag5u ) , has 16 or 32 spots maximum, and will span over a short period. The tourney launches at a set date, or as soon as the number of max participants has been reached. A small tourney like that = more exposure on my stream, and a high probability that your games will be casted.

Currently, signups are open for the following concepts:

"Silly tourney" (I couldn't come up with a better name), there will be 16 spots. OPEN ELO, signup at your own risk, as any and all trolling is encouraged. Signups will still require the player's aoe2.net-profile and discord name, so opponents can know what level they're up against. See screenshot for settings - All players are to play with 200% handicap, which I believe should speed up any game we get (though, you never know). Singe elimination, BO 3 all the way. Map pool: Arabia (Always Game 1), Runestones, Hideout, Socotra and Acropolis. No home maps / bans, the loser of the previous game picks what map to play. Hidden civ pick, no reuse for the BO3. No boar laming allowed, sheep stealing, luring/killing deer or resource walling is fine. The tournament will kick off at December 1st, or as soon as we have 16 signups. Players are encouraged to schedule their next match at their earliest convenience, and the final has to be played before December 22nd.

Nomad Express:
In principle, it will be Open ELO, but whether the format will be small groups or a larger single-elimination bracket, depends on the ELO of the participants signing up. My aim is for each bracket (if more than one) to not span over more than 200 ELO, as far as practicality goes, but this limit may be extended, for practical purposes. BO3 - Nomad only - But don't expect to get all your tryhard civs! To eliminate mirrors, and diminish the Persians/Malians/Lithuanians picks potential, this draft preset will be used: https://aoe2cm.net/preset/ZjQTO , and the higher seed will host the draft. Hidden civ pick, no reuse. The tournament will kick off at December 1st, or as soon as we have 32 signups, and brackets are released. Players are encouraged to schedule their next match at their earliest convenience, and the final has to be played before December 22nd. Should the ELOs be close enough that one huge bracket is sensible, this deadline may be extended.

If Nomad or handicap isn't of interest, do feel free to join my discord anyway, as I'd like to run "Arabia express", "Acropolis express" etc. moving forward. Polls may be started on occasion too, to decide the map for the next express tourneys. :)

something about T-shirt, cup, etc., maybe in-game skin?

how the fuck do I beat these things. mass imperial eagle scout+halb has crushed me every time

What if we give scouts extra +1 or +2 attack versus other scouts in the dark age? This would make laming boars/rhinos/elephants harder: right now, if the enemy scout is taking your boar and you notice immediately, and have your own scout in position, you still might not be able to stop it. The reason is that your two choices are to 1) hit the enemy scout or 2) block the boar. Option 2) is kind of useless if the enemy doesn't mismicro: for example they can just stop their scout and wait. Option 1) is currently weak because scouts have very low damage versus other scouts: if the enemy scout has 25 hp after taking two boar hits, you still need 9 hits to kill it - often this cannot be achieved in time.

Here is a clip of MBL laming Vinchester's rhino (spoilers for KOTD4!): https://clips.twitch.tv/PoorFuriousVelociraptorSSSsss-yqjsfC6C4ub7nDWb . Admittedly, MBL only took one hit from the rhino; still, Vinch was there instantly, and was unable to stop it (the clip doesn't show the end - it was very close, MBL had 1 hp left, but successfully arrived at his TC).

Are there any negatives to giving scouts a +1 or +2 attack bonus vs other scouts in dark age? I haven't found any yet. On the other hand, I think this would balance laming well: it would still be possible, especially if the enemy scout is out of position, but now it would become very risky if the enemy scout is nearby.

What do you think?

I know it's pedantic, but it bugs me

I searched around and couldn’t find anyone else with this issue. But, I’m having some weird glitches where it’s almost like original AOE sprites are taking over my game. Example - all scout cavalry now take the form of the goofy one from the original AOE with a javelin. Champions now appear as AOE1 long swordsman/legions, and monks only appear as the old school priests. What’s going on here?

Also arrows from castles and such take the form of the original AOE horse archers!

So while playing some AOE4, i have noticed a lot of people like the simplified early game. Specifically the fact that the early eco micro is significantly reduced.

One thing i think AOE2 could benefit from it having villagers auto prioritize one sheep at a time and only move to a second if the first is full. This would make it where you can just put sheep under your TC and not have to worry about queuing up actions from your villagers to makes sure they take one sheep at a time.

At a high level this would affect almost nothing, but it would reducing the focus and amount of clicks needed under your TC at low-mid elo, letting people focus more on scouting and strategy.

That post is going to be a bit cocky, my excuses, but it just bothers me so much that, after a year of Sicilians, casters, players and even pro-players seemingly still don't understand how strong the bonus damage reduction really is. Even now, when all GL-players are using them as one of the strongest EW-Civs and also a very strong Arabia-RM-Civ ^{(very humble remark: I made the case for them already back in April}) people still act like counter-units are viable against them, that you can just make Pikemen or Camels and you will be fine.

In my opinion, once you start to invest into counter-units against Sicilians, you're basically dead. Honestly, every time when I face Spears or Pikes or Camels as Sicilians, I am like "lol, I won", and every time it's correct. Because you will just kill the counter-units. You started production earlier, you have better numbers, you just engage and kill the counters easily with almost no losses and your opponent is left with no army. Even when you find yourself outnumbered, you can always make a counter to the opponent counter and you always have the much better composition.

To put some perspective, the damage output of some counter-units (all with even upgrades):

Bottom line: All Knight-counters need 50% to 100% longer to kill a Knight. Think of it as an attack speed reduction of 50% for Camel-line and of 90% for Spear-line.

Camels do comparable to Longswords, I think. Spears need to have even numbers to kill Scouts, but can never engage in the typical 1v3 or 2v5 fights that you want to have against a scout rush. Pikes are basically Spears, Halberdiers are basically Pikemen.

Heavy Camel is the only exception as they do just fine - but not great - against Cavalier, but that's only with Blast Furnace and they also die so hard to Pikes or Halbs that this should also be a bad investment in most cases.

T90 once called Sicilian Knights "generic Knights" and I still can't get over it (that was very early after they came out, tbf). In my opinion, they are literally the strongest Knights in the game, because Knights are very strong anyway and they just can't be countered, they break the game logic.

I think when facing Sicilians, you have to always invest heavily into gold-army and you have to do have power-compositions in mind very early on. M@A into Archers-Scouts in Feudal, make damage with the Xbow-power-spike, go 1TC Knights-Monks in Castle Age or mass Cav Archers - bottom line: you can only go for armies with huge damage output, because otherwise Sicilians will always have the better composition with bonus damage vs no bonus damage. And once the Sicilian numbers get out of hand, you never can come back, because you just have no counter-options and they also kill your economy fast with the Knights.

I think it's basically the central winning condition in Sicilian-games: If the opponent is forced into counter-units, the Sicilians win. If the opponent can avoid the need of counter-units, the Sicilians lose.

Afternoon. So I played a 2v2 earlier, and my team mate surrendered quite early on and quit. I then went on to win the game. What happens to my teammate who left/surrendered’s ELO? Ty

Hey,
I'm interested in buying some aoe 3 de stuff, https://store.steampowered.com/app/933110/Age_of_Empires_III_Definitive_Edition/
does anyone know when does this end ?

So USA has excellent cards, as we all know. They have access to the absolute best shipment in the entire game (Virginia Plans) as well as tons of others... but a lot of cards go... overlooked by united states players. For example when I see various builds and strategies for age 2 play in particular with united states, everyone is always quick to go with Virginia for Virginia Planning, forgetting its crucial weakness of being slow as balls, as it delays your first REAL shipment by 40 seconds, for 80 seconds total (assuming your next shipment doesn't arrive fast or slow). Its best used for fast fortress strategies or strategies with intense card setup such as the USA villager push. But its not made for age 2 fighting. Speed is important in the second age in particular after all.

Therefore, for all of you who seek and desire age 2 united states play, allow me to introduce you to the Massachusetts Federal State, and its completely slept on card i have been using for LOTS of age 2 strategies and is ENTIRELY overlooked. This card, is Boston Tea Party.

Boston Tea Party is a resource transferal card that lots of civs have, and trades everything you have of 1 resource for much more of another. They are generally not used in supremacy and are mostly used for treaty players. However, the United States and Mexico civs have a special variant on these shipments. Obviously I can't speak very much on Mexico, but I'll absolutely be testing it out with them too. For now, let me talk about United States and Boston Tea Party

There are 2 aspects of the United States and Mexico resource transfer cards that make them unique:

1. No matter how much or little food (or wood if your Mexico) you're going to transfer, you get a bonus 350 coin stacked on top of it.
2. The shipment arrives fast, specifically, 5 seconds.

Neither of these changes affect treaty much at all. When your playing treaty you could very well be working with 100,000 resources to get transferred, so an extra 350 doesn't make a difference, and neither does the fast arrival...

BUT

For supremacy it's excellent, as receiving flat bonuses of resources mean much more in the early stages of a game when your opponent could run into your base at any second, and it arriving fast means you don't need to wait for it to come in at all like you might 700 coin, and can begin massing right away. In short, although these are resource transfer cards usually associated with treaty, United States' and Mexico's in particular are DESIGNED to be used in the early stages of the game.

In early united states age 2 play, the most common unit that comes to mind is the state militia, however lately after the nerf i have found the unit to be generally underwhelming and prefer other units... and every other united states unit costs coin. So I propose to you this build order i often employ against Lakota and ottomans and other civs prone to early aggression that potentially stops the fast fortress you're probably used to doing:

Start with the standard opening of 3 CDB and aging with 15-16 vils

In transition, decide what unit you would like to start. If you would like to start hussar, regulars, or sharpshooters, set 5 to wood until you get a house and then everybody to food. If you would like to start with age 2 carbines (remember they aren't shit anymore) set about half and half to macro for a house and lee's legion immediately upon aging (as soon as you have 350 wood total switch everyone back to food)

As you hit age 2, if you need to send a card to get access to your desired age 2 unit (long rifles for sharpshooters, lee's legion for carbines) do so immediately and follow with Boston Tea Party.

If your starting hussar or regulars, build your military building far enough away that you can place your flag at its base and THEN pop Boston Tea Party

No matter what you do, after Boston Tea Party, comes Springfield Armory to get your unit upgrades while you mass. From there play it by ear, if you need to mass more do it, if you need Hamiltonian do it, if you need to age do it. Its very open ended. You will very often find your able to ignore coin for a while as the tea party can easily give you anywhere between 1500 to 2000 of it

I used this strategy yesterday against an ottoman player who massed age 2 janissaries. I massed sharpshooters and got counter infantry rifling for a whopping 3.5 multiplier with 22 range. He got absolutely demolished. By contrast, if i had gone state militia it would have been much more of a shootout with heavy losses on both sides, and would also result in me funneling all my resources into a food-wood army, Making it much more difficult to mass anti-cav at a moments notice (which i had to do in that game) mass cavalry at a moments notice (which i also had to do that game), or have good siege (which i also had to do that game)

Overall, lately i have started doing this strategy against any manor of opponents who attack me early, out micro them with superior units, and have a strong eco behind it. And i think this is an incredibly slept on card

Soon i will try to get a YouTube video showcasing this strategy... preferably before Mexico releases. BTW expect more posts videos, and invented build orders from me for Mexico!!