Tower Rushing

Rushing is a great way to slow down your enemy and one great way to do it is tower rushing. Because Regicide games start with 1o villagers and has a castle at the start of the game sometimes it is not that easy to tower rush in a regicide game especially if the other player has planned his building correctly. Your best chance is if his gold mine is located a little far from his castle and to the direction of your camp , otherwise it is hard work to harass a good player with a tower rush. Instead one of the best tactics I use when playing a team game is building a castle near your enemy and harassing him. In a four on four team game this can be done with devastating effects and I have played in many games where my team won by using this tactic. Following is a guide in how to execute it.
First of all to execute this successfully good communication between team members is essential , if you don't bother to type and inform your team members about your plan its likely that this plan will be doomed. This guide assumes your playing 3-3 or 4-4 but this can be applied to 2-2 as well but its a little difficult.
The image explains where the castle should be built. Castle should be in the middle of the trade route so not only you harass them with your soldiers but also you stop their trading as well. Ideally one of the players in the middle should build the castle since once near the enemy should concentrate on building armies more in case the plan backfires. The key to doing this successfully is to build the castle without your enemy knowing it until the castle starts firing at the defenseless trade carts. Building a castle is one thing but the most important thing is to defend it and harass the enemy that is cornered. Trebs are not available till the Imperial age so if you did this at the start of the castle age your enemies don't have a way to knock down your castle without coming close, so other two players coming for support should build archers to take care of swordsman and pike men to take care of cavalry. Remember that a balanced army always comes out on top.
After building the castle defend it and start attacking the enemy trapped in the middle if all players seems to be coming to attack your castle your ally in the other corner also can join in the battle otherwise he should defend. If you do this correctly one of your enemies will be well left behind in case of going through ages ,effectively making it 3-4 game.
One important thing to remember and one mistake most people make when executing this strategy is forgetting about their economy in the heat of the battle , It may seem all right if your winning since you can build up easily without much trouble but just in case this plan backfires and you find yourself attacked by the enemy your economy is the thing that will get you through. So whatever you do don't forget the basic things I have mentioned in the previous posts.

Little things that keep you in the game
Keeping the king alive

Does the fastest with the clicks always win ?

Age of Empire is a Real Time Strategy (RTS) game. One criticism of RTS games are that they are click feasts , where the guy who clicks faster usually wins. Lets check out if this criticism is valid for Age of Empire's as well. Remember that I'm discussing about the Age of Empire's 2 Conquerors expansion here.
While being familiar with the keyboard short cuts and ability to click through building fast is a great help is doesn't necessarily make or break a player. According to my experience the most important thing in AOE is the ability to build a balanced army and move your units according to the strengths of your civ. Below are some of the features I find that lifts AOE above just a click feast.
* Ability to give rally points to buildings, For example you can give your town centers rally point to a tree and the created villagers will go there and cutting wood straight away so you don't have to click on every created villager and assign them some task.
* Town Bell , which immediately garrisons your units. Not the most recommended thing to do though.
* Advance command options for units , so you can use them for defense or offense.
* Ability to queue your unit production.
* Automatic recreation of farms when you queue them.

Here are some things that can be done to improve it further , some things that I have found useful in other strategy games like Rise of Nations.
* Auto explore feature of units. This is one of the cool things I found in Rise of Nations , where you click the auto explore button and the unit will start exploring the map automatically. This is not the most efficient way to explore but at least that's one more less thing to do.
* Idle villager will go to a lumber camp or mine and start working , this also I found in Rise of Nations
* Can give a command stance to a building, like set the buildings command stance to defense so the units created from that building will get the same command stance.

Small things like that make sure that the guy who clicks fastest doesn't always win , but he sure has a little advantage , so don't make this an excuse to not to know your keyboard shortcuts. Feel free to comment on the issue. Happy gaming !

How to get through the early rush

In the first previous post I gave some points how to go for a archer rush build. This time I'll give some tips how to avoid and get through the first rush. Remember that if you defend correctly without letting him do you some considerable damage you have a big advantage over him resource wise. In a team game you have to consider many things when preparing for a rush. Your location is the first thing to consider. In a 6-8 team game if your located in the middle you can be a bit complacent about where you place your lumber mills and other buildings but if your in the corner you have to build your base in a systematic way so it isn't easy for your enemies to take you down.
If your in the bottom part of the map then your lucky since you have an automatic protection from the side that is most likely an attack could come, since your castle is situated nicely to the side the attack could come. Castle's have a great attack and a range so its almost impossible to do an early rush from the side the castle is on.
If somebody's rushing you with archers when your still in dark age then you have a long way to go learning to play Regicide type of games. Mostly an early rush will come when your in Feudal age. Mostly he will rush with some Archers and pike men or Archers and swordsman. If the bases are not that near the enemy have to spend some time moving his units and finding a nice place to attack giving you more time. Protecting your town center with houses is a good way to save your villagers and farm without much hassle. Build your house close to each other around your town center.Leave some space for farms as well. Building your lumber camps near the castle is another thing you can do to avoid falling back in the economy.
When someone is rushing you should at least have some archers to defend your base. Without an army it is pretty much impossible to defend a base. Best units to defend a base are archers. If you are very good at moving your units a small force of archers can defend until help arrives or until you build up the army. Remember that enemy has to come to your base so other than his initial force he has to spend some time to bring in more troops. Move your archers back and forth between the castle and the town center , this way he either has to come and kill your archers ( getting hit by the castle and the town center in the process ) or he will have to destroy some buildings that are out of castle and town center range. Archers are poor at taking down building so you have a slight advantage here since his archer force is wasted because he didn't kill many villagers. Target his swordsman if he brought any of them since they are good at taking down buildings.
If you have successfully defended one of the best things to do is send your remaining force to his base. Most likely you will have some archers left so take them and try to take out some of his villagers. Since he concentrated on attacking most likely he hasn't planned his town well so look for vulnerable spots and try to take out some of his villagers. In future I'll give some tips to how to do a tower rush and how to avoid one.

Archer Rush Build

As the title suggests this post is a guide to doing an archer rush. Although this can be done by any civ some civ's have an advantage because of their bonuses,like the low cost farms of Teutons will reduce the wood spent on farms and help produce more archers.

1. H , Shift + C , Shift + C
This will produce 10 villagers from your town center
2. Select all your villagers and build a mill near the bushes. ( B , I )
Search around and find the bushes immediately as this is vital to a quick rush
3. Select the first created villager and build a lumber camp near the trees. ( B , Z )
Set the rally point of your town center to a tree near the lumber camp so the newly created villagers will go there.
4. Search with your King and scout and find the 8 sheep nearby your base and send them to the town center.
Sheep are free food so you should make full use of them. If there are any deer around send tow foragers to hunt them. More free food... , and what about wild boar ?? attach with three to four villagers and when he comes to attack send the villager that is attacked near the mill and around it if its not dead by the time he gets there.
5. Select the sixth create villager and send him to build a mining camp near the gold mines ( B , G )
Send the next two villager to the mining camp.
6. Send the ninth created villager to build a mining camp near the stone.
Stone is needed if your rush was unsuccessful and you need to defend.
7. Use the tenth villager to build a house ( B, E )and then a barrack ( B , B )
After building the barrack build about 3-4 more houses depending on your wood.
8. Advance to Feudal age
If you have found the bushes quickly and build up properly you should reach 500 food during the house is build. After clicking advance to feudal age send 4 of your foragers to the lumber camp.
9. First things to do in Feudal age
Research double bit axe ( lumber camp ) , Gold Mining ( mining camp ) and wheel barrow ( town center ). Build two archery ranges and a blacksmith. Start producing archers and some pikemen if your worried that the enemy might have cavalry ready when your rushing.
10. Attack
Soon as you produce 15-20 archers and some pikemen send them to one of your enemy bases. Do the upgrades for archers in your blacksmith if you can spare the gold. This is a must for Spanish player since their blacksmith upgrades doesn't cost gold.

Little Things That Keep You In The Game

In one of my previous posts I gave some tips on how to keep your king safe. But keeping the king alive alone wont win you games. If your base gets destroyed and your not able to produce armies to support your allies , chances are you will eventually lose the game. In this post we'll look at some things you can do to stay in the game , even if your base is destroyed.
Some civ's have a advantage when it comes to surviving. For example since the Huns don't need houses it is pretty easier to build up again when your playing Huns. Since most civ's don't have this luxury they have to prepare with a backup plan.
One thing that you can do is not to build all your houses nearby in a heap. Because the enemy players can easily destroy all your houses once and seriously slow your progress. Build some around your base and build in your allies base as well. Always have a small base setup with about 5 farmers and 5 woodcutters working. Make this small base as far away from the battle line as possible. If possible build a castle near that base this not only gives you additional protection from harassing horse archers it also gives you population capacity of 20 limits. Build your unit producing building behind the base and like houses don't build them all in a heap. This is one of the easiest ways an enemy can destroy you. Since all your unit producing building are destroyed and your villagers are running it will slow you down considerably. Building some unit producing structures near your small base is good idea.
If you feel like you cant defend your base the best thing to do is flee to the small base you setup and build up there. First thing you have to do is setup the Market and start sending those carts again. Usually an overrun of a base happens during mid game or late game. So you should have plenty of resources at hand except gold. So build up some barracks and start producing some Halberdiers. Their great at taking out raiding cavalry. If you have relics in your base make sure to take them with you since they are a important source of gold. Even when rebuilding don't just defend , send some units to their trade route and harass them since when their concentration is not on you , you can build up easily. If you see your allies base getting destroyed and you thing you cant help him out best thing is attack the enemy who's attacking your ally since most of his army is near your allies base. Always remember offense is the best form of defense.

Flooding Infantry with Goths

Barrack units are the most cheapest units in the game and with Goths they become even cheaper , 25% cheaper to be precise when it come to imperial age. Add perfusion ( One of Goths unique techs) to that and you have a civ that is capable of producing mass armies very quickly and very cheaply. With Anarchy ( The other unique tech of Goths ) you can start producing Huskarls ( Goth Unique Unit ) from barracks so it is very easy to take care of archers. Because of their ability to produce large armies almost instantly it is very hard to destroy a Goth base and very hard to stop a Goth attack when in full flow. One civ that can take out Goths easily is Turks because of Janissaries. So be a bit careful when playing against Turks. With Huskarl Goths have a barrack capable of countering almost any unit in the game. If your enemy hit you with Cavalry you can instantly produce some Halberd's and counter attack them.No civ can match the infantry of Goths and Huskarls just demolishes archers. Goth Barrack units also have a +1 attack against buildings so destroying building with Champions is not a problem since they already have a attack bonus against buildings.
Another advantage with Goths is that it is not that dependent on gold ,so protecting trade routes is not that much of a hassle. Mostly in games that goes for a while Goths usually end up with lots of extra gold. Don't waste those gold buy some stone and build up some castles so you can go to the battle front without worrying too much about your base defense. Food and wood is the most important things you need. Experienced players usually try to kill Goth wood cutters early because it seriously slows down their progress. Be sure to protect your lumber camps , put up tow lumber camps in two locations so you want get stuck with no wood.
Goths are a great civ to play and a great civ to support any civ. Because of the team bonus ( Barracks work 20% faster ) alone they are a good ally to have. So have fun playing Goths.

Ruling with Turks

Turks are a very impressive civ especially in the late game. Their unique unit Janissary can take out Infantry and Cavalry with ease , but are vulnerable against spear men and archers. So try to avoid engaging civilizations like Britons , Chinese and the Mayans. What make this unit unique is there incredible damage , especially so when attacking as a bunch. A fleet of janissaries can take out a cavalry fleet easily if used correctly. Turks also have an additional +2 range for bombard cannons , bombard towers and cannon galleons. This is also very useful since you can take out any castle except the Teuton castle without getting hit , so you don't need to build Trebs.
One disadvantage of playing turks is that they are gold heavy civ so you need to protect your trade route by all means. Since your best unit is produced from the castle you need a lot of stone to build few castles. And if the enemy take outs few of your castles you'll be helpless since your cavalry or infantry is not that strong. So it is always better to be defensive in the early game since you can rule in the late game.
Best way to counter Turks is using archers. Try to rush him with some archers early and take out their gold and stone miners as quickly as possible so he want be able to build some castles quickly. Harassing the trade route is also a good way to slow down the turks , since they are heavily gold dependent. Another this you must avoid with Turks is try to attack a fleet of Janissaries with a small forces of Cavalry. I have seeing countless players trying this and coming back without killing a single janissary. Always attack with archers and you have a pretty good chance of coming out on top, Britons can totally own Turks because of their superior range.

Team Game Starategies

In AOE you get team bonuses for different civilizations , some are impressive but some are not that impressive. For example the Spanish team bonus is very impressive since your trade carts generate 33% more gold. Team bonuses where the unit production speed increase are also good. Huns ( Stable ) , Brits ( Archery Range ) , Goths ( Barracks ) and Celts ( Siege Workshop ) improves unit production rate by 20%. So when selecting civilizations in a team game it is important consider these team bonuses. And once you select your teams it is important that use them effectively. For example if one of your team mates is playing Byzantines and you haven't made any monk , then your wasting the 50% more healing rate your monks get because of Byzantine bonus.
Trade carts play a big role in team games. Protecting your trade routs is a must especially if your playing a gold heavy civ like Turks , Spanish or Teutons. Always build your market close to your castles so it is well protected. And when sending carts to an allies markets don't send all to one market , this is a very risky strategy since if his market gets destroyed you have to redirect all your carts to a another market , delaying your gold income. The number of carts you create depends on your civ and the population limit. With most civ's if its a 200 population limit game you can create about 30 carts , but for civ's like Goths you don't need that much since you dont't need huge amounts of gold. Another important thing to remember is that if your market gets destroyed you should immediately create a new one and signal your allies. Otherwise he might not notice that his trade carts are not working and suddenly finds himself short of gold.
Since trade routes are very important one good way to slow down your enemy is to attack there trade route. Trade carts have low hit points and can be killed easily. You can create about 10-15 cavalry archers , go straight to his trade routs , kill about 5-6 trade carts and retreat to your base. If you keep doing this he either has to post some units there or have to send units to protect the route again and again. This not only limits his gold but distracts him as well making his progress very slow. When taking trade carts always try to take trade carts of gold heavy civ's like Turks , Huns or Spanish.

Sneak Attack Strategies

In the last post I talked about sneak attacking with Huns , Since every civilization doesn't have Tarkans lets see what other civilizations can do. One of the best options is to send some Petards followed by Cavalry Archers. Petards have an attack bonus against buildings so they will make quick work of Castles. Some civilizations have siege engineers ( University ) which makes the Petards really destructive. Always make sure to follow up with some Cavalry Archers to finish off the King. Normal Archers are also good but they are very slow to move and very vulnerable to attacks.
Another good combination is about 5-6 trebs and Cavalry Archers. Japanese have bit of an advantage in this move since their trebs fire and pack faster. Be sure to take some pike men or Halberdiers to protect the trebs from Cavalry units.
Even if the King escapes your sneak attack if you play your cards right you can get a considerable advantage. When a sneak attack comes some players panic and send their kings to the allies base , this gives you a slight advantage since now he doesn't have control over the building the King is in , so your chance of the next sneak attack increases. And when a sneak attack comes your opponents focus is primarily on the king , so make this a good opportunity to kill some of his villagers. And sometimes he might pull his armies back giving you sometime to regroup. So sneak attacks are one of the best ways to win Regicide games. In the next post we'll see some general things that can and should be done playing AOE.

Sneak Attack with Huns

In the last post I talked about sneak attacks and some basic steps to avoid them. Now I tell a sneak attacks strategy that is unique to Huns. Huns unique unit is the Tarkan , a mounted unit with lots of pierce armor and a attack bones against buildings , just the type of unit you need to flatten a castle. 9 fully upgraded Tarkans can destroy a Teuton castle. But you don't need to destroy the whole castle to kill the king. Once you reduce the hit points to about 80% the units in the Castle will jump out. But usually at that stage the other player has probably build more Castles around it so its better to take as many as you can. Just as the King comes out you should be ready with your Cavalry Archers. Huns have both the Thumb Ring ( Archery Range ) and the Parthian Tactics ( Archery Range ) available to them making their Cavalry Archers one of the most formidable in the game , plus their 30% cheap so Huns can produce them cheaper than other civilizations. A quick kill and your victorious.
Most players who are aware of this tactic usually directs the castle attack toward the Cavalry Archers and tries to kill the Cavalry Archers first , you be sure to protect them as much as you can. If this tactic fails and you weren't able to kill the king be sure to retreat and heal your units. Tarkans and Cavalry Archers are not cheap so you should use them sparingly.As a added bonus researching spies ( Castle ) is 50% cheap for the Huns.
This trick is unique to the Huns , But what are the methods that can be used by other civilizations. More of that in the next post.

Sneak Attacks

Your playing a team game and your team has gotten strong and pummeling the other team , and suddenly you get the dreaded message "You have being Defeated". Someone from the other team has sneaked in and killed your king. This is one of the great things about the Regicide game , A quick well planned attack can turn the tide of the whole game. So what kind of techniques can you use to do this kind of attack. And more importantly how can you avoid such attacks. Before explaining the attacking method I'll give you some basic things you can do to avoid this kind of attack.
First of all after searching the surrounding area with the king and put the king inside the castle. Castle's are the strongest building in the game and have some offensive capabilities as well. If your searching with your king make sure to put your king in the Castle. I have lost some games and have seeing many others loose as well because they forgot to garrison their king.
The next thing is to set the gather point of the garrisoned castle to another building which can garrison units. Initially this could be the town center , but later in the game it should be a castle. This all but eliminates the possibility of a sneak attack by a small force. King is one of the fastest units in the game and you cant chase it and kill. Most attackers bring in some archers with the attacking team specially for the king. So you must be careful in setting the gather point. If your attackers are in the way of your gathering building and you have no other suitable structure left its better to run into your allies base.
Another thing you can do is set the rally point of the troops created in your base near the castle.This automatically gives you some defense against sneak attacks.
Building up some building around the castle is another great way of thwarting these attacks. I usually build some houses around the castle so if they sneak in with a set of Tarkans or Paladins they have limited area to attack the castle.
If you follow the above steps your pretty much safe from a sneak attack , but it doesn't guarantee safety. Most sneak attackers wait till its the battle heats up and then attack so most probably when a sneak attack comes you will be engaged in battle elsewhere.
So after taking all those steps always watch the mini map closely , since its your best indicator of sneak attacks. More on how to execute a sneak attack in the next post.

Whats the best Civilization

So what are the best civilizations when it comes to Regicide , I guess the civilizations with good defenses are the best when it comes to Regicide. Civilizations that are good at rushing is not that important since every player starts with a castle in Regicide. But still with the right combinations of units you can take out some of the villagers of the other player and hamper his progress.
My favorite civilization is Teutons. There extra line of sight is important in finding the early resource spots , and their farms cost 33% less , which helps you to save some wood ,that can be used to build some archers or pike men.
When it comes to Castle age also Teutons have some advantages. They get Murder Holes for free so you save 400 stone there which you can use to build more castles. This is quits a big advantage since to research Murder Holes you have to build the University as well.
Enter Imperial age and you have the full advantage of the Teutons defense. Teuton unique tech give Castles +3 range making them dangerous defensive structures and some times excellent offensive structures as well.
Added to that Teutons enjoy the full stable except Husbandry which is not that important. And they also have the whole range of Blacksmith upgrades , full Barrack , all farm , lumber camp and stone mining updates. So this is my favorite civilization when it comes to Regicide.

Welcome AOE Regicide Lovers

I have being playing AOE for a long time and one of my favorite game types is Regicide. But unfortunately I don't see any content in the web discussing the strategies that can be adopted playing that game. So this blog is especially for Regicide lovers who just loves to kill kings. If your playing a multi player game the random map games can take a long time , especially if your playing teams of four. But in Regicide you sneak attack , kill the king and win the game. So all AOE lovers out there if you love Regicide this might just be the place for you.