Overview
This is just a quick guide I wrote to give you some quick tips and tricks for when you begin and how you should start a game. Hopefully this will get you on your feet.
Dark Age Building Guide
This is how you should begind the Dark Age:
1. First take 2 villagers and make a house
2. Take the third and make a house while the others are building
3. While all that is happening begin making villagers and send your scout to get sheep
4. Get sheep and send them back to the town centre while sending all idle villagers to town centre
5. Once sheep arrive tell your villagers to work on the sheep (this should all be within the first minute of the game)
Side note: Make sure the sheep are under the town centre and have all the villagers’ only working on 1 or 2 at a time.
6. Once sheep begin to run low go get a villager to lure a bow (have it shoot the boar twice and then tell it to run to the town centre)
7. Once the boar is near get every single villager to shoot to down and begin taking food from it.
8. Repeat step 6 and 7 with your second boar now once the first begins to run low.
9. Once this is done you should have around 15 villagers, make 2 new houses with 2 of the villagers and the rest go on bushes (build a mill at bushes).
10. Keep making villagers until you have 21; the new ones go on the trees and once you get 100 wood make a lumber camp.
11. Once you have 21 villagers (22 population) research loom and then go to the next age.
Side note: At any point after you kill the boars you can make a dock if you have water near you.
Side note: After you go to the next age what you do is your choice.
Hot Keys You Always Need:
Below is a basic list of hotkeys you need to know before beginning:
. ~ Next Idle Villager
, ~ Next Idle Military Unit
H ~ Town Centre
(Once you have selected a villager or building) Q – T For top Row Selections
(Once you have selected a villager or building) A – G For Middle Row Selections (If no bottom row exists this acts as controls for the top row)
(Once you have selected a villager or building) Z – B For Bottom Row Selections (If no bottom row exists this acts as controls for the middle row)
CTRL + (1-0) ~ Assigns a number to units you have selected for quick return.
(1-0) ~ Select assigned group.
Military Tips
A short list of military tips:
~ Focus on a single unit type from each building unless you see a good way to counter. (Archery Range, Stable, ect.) Making lots of different types of units will end up with you dead.
~ Don’t always make the unit your civ is good at (like longbowmen and infantry as British), players – especially humans – will expect this.
~ Make sure to use CTRL + (1-0) to make groups for units you selected, this lets you quickly select them.
~ Make use of strategies and counters, they will save you in a tight situation.
~ If the enemy is countering your units then feel free to change the units you are making, you don’t need to stick to one if it’s losing, but too much varity is a bad thing.
~ Units move at different speeds, don’t send cavalry in a group with siege unless you want them to arrive at the same time. Siege moves slower, selecting both at once and sending them will force the cavalry to move at the same speed as the siege.
Counters
In age of empires most units have something that can counter it, here they are:
~ Infantry are good against spearmen and their upgrades, skirmishers and their upgrades, and siege units (expect the mangonel and its upgrades).
~ Archers are good against infantry, this is the militia and their upgrades, and spearmen and their upgrades. Archers can also kill light cavalry quite well.
~ Skirmishers are good against archers and spearmen and only them.
~ Spearmen are good against cavalry, except the cataphract.
~ Calvary are good against infantry and archers. They are also useful at killing siege.
~ The camel is good against cavalry; it is the anti-cavalry cavalry.
~ Siege can counter everything, especially buildings, unless it’s a scorpion, which can only counter infantry.
~ With ships the galley and its upgrades are good against ships, the fire ship is good against ships as well. The demolition is good against ships and buildings, with a onetime use, and canon galleons are good against buildings.
Side Tips
Last but not least are some tips I think you should always know:
~ Only make military units early game once you’re in the feudal age, and only for defense or rushing with a couple units.
~ Don’t be afraid to make defense buildings in the feudal age, it will protect you from raids.
~ If the enemy has a better score it doesn’t mean that you are losing, but it does mean you need to speed up.
~ Farms are your worst enemy; make them your last option because of slow production and high cost. But don’t go too far away to get food; you’ll be easy to rush.
~ Don’t think you are winning if you have a higher score or bigger army, if the enemy has a strategy they can and will win.
~ Keep mindful of costs of units and your resources, in the feudal age you start with gold and stone, if you are too low on something then move villagers around.
~ The AI will always have a higher score early game, but you can pass them quickly if you are good enough.
~ Always make sure to check your civilizations special abilities and it’s tech tree, you can’t do everything in a game of Age of Empires with a single civ. Use the upgrades, units, and abilities to play the best you can and make sure you have a strategy ready involving them, you don’t want to be caught off guard because you didn’t know what you do and don’t have.
~ Before the castle age you do not get military upgrades unless you plan on rushing, or the enemy is going to rush. You need to focus on villagers.
Credits
Thank you for reading my little guide here. This was made for a friend, but I decided to post it online for those that need help. I hope this may make life a little easier on you when playing the game. Feel free to post any suggestions or anything I missed in the comments, I’ll add them in if I think it’s worth it. Anyway, I am Pengon88, and this was my guide. Ja ne!
