One funny game we played was a Tool war game - tool start and stay in tool - I thought it would be fine, but it was not I first thought to use some quick army - like scout, it was really expansive and not effective at all vs dshea's axer/slinger/bowmen army. One can not make more TC either, so I have to keep sending vills from my home town to build up forward bases when they got killed - I lost the land battle, but finally made up with the navy - scout ships. Macrat was lucky and the random gud gave him Roman with those half price towers :-) One did not know either what your ally were doing - we did not talk at all. Thinking back, I know now the best army in such a game would be TOWERS, SCOUT SHIPs, and SLINGERS + AXERS and maybe mix with some bowmen . Anyway, my question here is : Do you really want to try those weired settings ? After played one year AoE/RoR, I found it is default game most exciting.