Search
Recent Forum posts
Palmyran Guide links to wrong page ... (6 replies)
Posted 1 day ago by Fisk
RockNRoR : mod to improve AI and add ... (233 replies)
Posted 7 days ago by chab
Map options (New)
Posted 2 weeks ago by alemanparsons
Remove / copy map (New)
Posted 2 weeks ago by alemanparsons
Change missionary attributes (1 reply)
Posted 1 month ago by Fisk
David Saga II Three Roads to Hebron ... (19 replies)
Posted 1 month ago by EarlSmithIII
Designer Bio: PhatFish (1 reply)
Posted 1 month ago by Zarrr
Why am I getting a low disk space message ... (New)
Posted 2 months ago by St_Ives
Another Christmas gift (5 replies)
Posted 2 months ago by Fisk
Broken images on AoE Heaven (4 replies)
Posted 2 months ago by Grandy02
Latest Files
Poll
Advertisement
Random Screenshot
  • port2d.jpg
  • History Tidbits
    Loading Quotes...
    HeavenGames
    News Archive 1998 January – March

    January 20 News Index ] [ Main Page ]

    Vote for Age of Empires!
    Gamer’s Choice Awards 1997
    Adrenaline Vault: 
    Gamers Choice Awards 1997: Everyone must vote for this sites game of the year and real time strategy game. Please take the time to support your favorite game, Age of Empires and Ensemble Studios. Go now and vote. It will only take one minute to do.

    Please vote for Age of Empires in both the “Game of the Year” and “Best Real-time Strategy Game” categories! – The Archangel

    Elephants should not be in this game 
    Love those War Elephants
    Historicity may or may not matter in a game of this type but for what it was worth, elephants were used a LOT in the ancient wars, and they weren’t just Indian elephants either. In Roman times and earlier there was a north African forest elephant (it was a little smaller than the Indian elephant, but looked like an African elephant). This is the war elephant that was domesticated and used by the Carthaginians under Hannibal, for instance. It became extinct before the middle ages, at least partly because it was used so extensively in war.

    Anyway, since the Carthaginians _were_ Phoenicians, and they used elephants all the time (Egyptians did too, but not as often), elephants have a fine place in the game. They’re far from all-powerful anyway — they cost a lot but are vulnerable to priests & hoplites. On the other hand they look really cool and are useful in a number of situations. Especially in the early iron age. – Sandy “Sandyman” Petersen Ensemble Studios

    Hittites Kittens better than Sumerian Cats? 
    Stay out of my Litter Box!
    Sumerian catapults aren’t dangerous before they get the upgrade. Thus, you don’t have to worry (much) till the iron age. Also, these catapults cost a fortune in wood and gold –a Sumerian with 15 cats has spent about 3000 wood and 1200 gold on his cats. For that much money, you _could_ have purchased about 50 “normal” units. Of course, the unit limit means you won’t have all those guys at once — one good solution is the pre-emptive strike. Instead of waiting until they come after you with 15 heavy cats, build a dozen chariots and send them right into the enemy town. They’ll all be killed, but they should KO a bunch of villagers first, even Sumerian villagers. Don’t dink around with a defensive strategy vs. Sumerians — go for the jugular. If you do a good job, then by the iron age, they will only be able to produce a trickle of cats instead of an unstoppable mass.

    Incidentally, our experience is that in a cat duel, Hittites beat Sumerians. The extra hit points make up for the slower fire rate. But Hittite cats aren’t that much better than regular cats against anyone else. I guess it’s a trade-off.

    If you haven’t managed to keep the Sumerians toned down and their cat horde shows up outside your walls, you still have a chance if you’re a skilled player. Take your anti-cat forces (whether they be heavy cavalry, priests, fast Greek hoplites, or horse archers) and split them up into at least two groups (three, if you’re nimble enough). Attack the cats from two different directions. When the cats fire at one group, flee with it and push ahead with the other. Use only small forces for this, because large forces tend to get caught in the radius effect. Keep probing in small groups and come from all directions. The cats will be pinned in one place and have to keep their eyes open for your guys. Also, remember that the cats dare not let you get in amongst them, because their own radius effect will kill them. – Sandy “Sandyman” Petersen Ensemble Studios

    ummm. I don’t know about that. Why it is true the “Hittite” kittens have double stone thrower, Catapult, and Heavy Catapult Hits points. The Sumerians have plus 50 percent Stone Thrower, Catapult and Heavy Catapult Fire rate. I play the Sumerians allot, mostly for the extra food production, but have had no pure matches yet against a Hittite player using a Cat Vs Cat Attack . – The Archangel

    GameStats Climbing
    Moves up in the Charts!
    GameStats has hit #51 on the 100Hot Gaming Websites list.  We were #91 last update so this is quite a jump.  GameStats ranks ahead of great sites like;  MicroProse, Apogee/3DRealms, SSI, Broderbund, Diablo Battle.net, PC Games Online, Bungie Software, Epic MegaGames, 3DO and some other big players.  Thank you to everyone who visits us regularly.  We truly appreciate the support you are giving us. – Imperious Rex

    Wow! – Heaven’s Angels would like to thank Imperious Rex and the fine people at Gamestats for letting us be apart of the greatest collection of gaming sites on the internet. Can’t wait for the next update! – The Archangel

    Age of Empires Fan Sites
    Jman’s AoE Barracks Page
    The 
    Jman’s AoE Barracks Page – New Page not much there yet, but jump on over there and pay them a visit.

    Got a Fan Site that is not listed in my Links Section? Send me an email with the name of your site and the URL and I will post it up for you. – The Archangel

    Age of Empires General Strategy Tips
    Traffic Jam
    Annoyed at human opponents sneaking war galleys and triremes up rivers and around the edge of the map to pound your city? Usually, we try to build docks so as to allow the boats created to freely sail away. But docks can be used to BLOCK rivers effectively. Let’s say there is a critical water avenue into your territory you’d like to deny the enemy without having to build an expensive fleet of triremes. Pick the tightest choke point on the river and slap 1, 2 or 3 docks to block the enemy boats. If they attack the docks to break through, it is a simple matter to generate a boat or two right there to blunt the attack, or you can wheel in some cats. 3 docks costs a lot less than a fleet of triremes. 
    – Zutakan

    Your Gold or Mine
    When playing a random map, take 5-8 villigers during the stone age and build storage pits next to your enemy’s closest gold supply and mine the gold so he can’t get it. 
    – Courtney Trammell

    Kittens & Tress
    Have an Opponent who uses Trees as Walls? Quickly clear out a patch of trees by selecting your upgraded Heavy Catapults and have them attack the ground in the center of the trees. If you have a few catapults you should be able to clear out a patch of trees in a couple seconds.
     – SstrangeE

    January 19 News Index ] [ Main Page ]

    Upgrades vs Age Advancement 
    Omnivac Speaks
    Research only what you feel necessary in the present situation, NEVER research all techs from an age before going to another age, this will slow you down too much. If you don’t plan to use some units, then don’t research anything about them, like armor, better attack and upgrade to better unit (SSwordmen to BSwordmen). The first priorities should be the artisanship “family” for cutting wood faster and the +1 range to archers and wheel. Then agriculture and/or better stone miner and/or better gold miner (depending on your civ and what is your plan) . That’s the basic behind any wargames and the secret to victory, Production & Economy. Another too often neglected (in MP games) is writing. You should research it fast to help your ally(ies) if they’re in trouble. Him asking for help and knowing only he is at 6 o’clock and you will usually arrive too late and will not know exactly where the attackers are even if you have explored the area previously. If you have a partner and he dies, this means it’s a team game and you will be alone against two players. I see many game where my team pick one guy alone one after the other. That’s 2 on 1, two times in a game.

    What I find completely worthless, is the axe upgrade and building clubmen/axemen as well as researching fast armor and attack upgrade soon, for them. The cost in food is too high and you will die in the tool age. Building bowmen depend on the situation (if you can, avoid the cost in wood & food). You should build walls that will stop them (you basically start them 30 sec after you reached tool age, the time to research walls at the granary). Bowmen are very poor wall breakers and in case of trouble, you can put towers, or resign yourself to build bowmen should you see they will break in.

    The techs you have ignored can always be researched later if you want, and judge this with the resources you have.

    And lastly ,about choosing civs. After playing some games, you will find yourself using some type of units more than the others, because you feel confident with them. Choose a civ that benefit them in regards of techs they can research and the units they can build. Then you must determine how you will deals with others. I’d say you have to find solution against (in order of importance) siege weapons, priests, the fast units, err…those that move 2.0 tiles/second and faster whether missile unit or not, Infantry and elephants. You should cover all those and know what to do if you encounter a “purist” army. Naturally, you don’t build a purist army ever, so someone can exploit your weaknesses, and to exploit every weaknesses, you can’t do it with a purist army. Once the threat of any purist army is eliminated, then you can deal with any armies. After that, the winner will be the one who use them the best. – Omnivac

    Age of Empires Fan Sites
    Age Of Empries IRN Clan
    The 
    Age Of Empries IRN Clan – Great Page with Great Webmasters – has moved to a new Location. Drop by and pay them a visit.

    The Temple
    The 
    The Temple – Same name as another AoE Fan, but different site! – NIcely designed site – check them out.

    pAC_manN’s AOE tip Page
    The pAC_manN’s AOE tip Page Newbies often asked me “How do you upgrade so fast?” I just wrote the page to answer them. – pAC_maN

    About Heaven’s Link page: I visit all the other AoE sites at least weekly, I have noticed allot of pages don’t have a Age of Heaven Link up that have requested a link on Heaven. Starting this weekend I will be deleting all sites from the Heavens link page that do not have our link up and/or that has not been updated in the last month.

    Got a Fan Site that is not listed in my Links Section? Send me an email with the name of your site and the URL and I will post it up for you. – The Archangel

    Cheats
    New Cheats
    Black RiderRider – Comes back as a catapult after being killed.

    Dark Rain – Composite bowmen to stealth bowmen – Hiding like Trees.

    Age of Empires General Strategy Tips
    Where are You?
    About the location system, the one that most people that I know use, is the clock system. e.g. the top corner is 12, the bottom corner is 6, etc… – 
    pAC_maN

    My Thumb
    I’ve developed these rules of thumb: 1) Triremes rule the seas. Triremes are cheap to build compared to catapult ship or juggernaught. Plus if you account for their high rate of fire vs. the slower firing catapult ship–they do equivalent amount of damage. I think it costs too much to upgrade to juggernaught (unless you’re playing deathmatch). 2) Early in the game, I like chariots and chariot archers. They’re cheap and have good offense and defense. I station them at resource sites and let them shoot at any enemy villagers passing by. (Make sure you tell them to stay put–or they will wander off.) 3) If playing defense, archers behind walls will wipe out most attackers. Make sure you have a few cavalry or chariots to take out attacking siege weapons and priests. (Siege weapons have a longer range than archers). 4) When attacking with a mixed force that includes stone throwers, catapults, or heavy catapults–make sure they stay way in the back–until needed. They do damage to a large area and will wipe out your own units with not-so-friendly fire. 5) As far as civilizations, I like Shang, Assyrian, and Yamato. Shang has cheap-to-build villagers. But Assyrian and Yamato’s villagers move 30% faster. They collect food faster, giving a comparable advantage as the Shang’s. Plus with the wheel upgrade, they move a total of 60% faster. Use the Assyrians during land scenarios, as their archery units shoot 30% faster. Use the Yamato during water scenarios, as their warships have 30% more hit points. – 
    Red Chariot

    The Priest Defense
    In multiplayer games, use around 10 priests to defend your town. Place them behind the town fortifications and convert the troops trying to destroy your town. Do these until you’re ready to lay siege on the enemy town. 
    – Rommel L. de los Reyes

    The Best Offense
    What might this be you ask? Well everyone has heard the saying that the best defense is a good offense, right? Well my theory is that the best offense is a good defense, at least in the beginning. Get a fortress built soon! If you don’t your opponent can walk in and annihilate you. Now I wish to warn you, I have had people take my advice the wrong way. Many a newbie will build this tight fortress, with almost no building room, resources, etc. Not only do you need to make sure that peasants can safely access resources, but that you have plenty of room to build as well. Also, when setting up your walls and towers, keep them at least 10 squares from the heart of your town. Priests will reek havoc upon your villagers if you don’t. This also protects your buildings from catapult attacks and such. Most importantly, never have an entrance to your fortress! If you need an opening, click the wall space and press the delete key. Then, when you have move whatever you need to in or out of the fortress, have a villager immediately rebuild it! I usually 2 points where I do this on my walls and have a villager assigned to each one. Another fun idea in fortress building that I have used is that of gate halls. What this involves is making a long passage into your base with walls. Then line the walls with towers and archers and catapults. I have had several human players run straight into those and get mutilated. In one game I had a villager leave through another entrance and close off the entrance to the passage, sealing the enemy in. I then took priests, converted half the army(5 heavy horse archers, 6 heavy cavalry, and 4 phalanx) and then destroyed the rest. Remember, walls can mean the difference between survival and destruction. Always have peasants available to fix them. Make chambers in your fortress with walls, making it even more difficult for your opponent to get through. Well, I’m done.
     – Xla Hades Kataarn

    January 18 News Index ] [ Main Page ]

    Submit Strategy Tips – The Granary – New Files Daily
    The Search for Smiley Face – an Gamestats Contest, starting this coming Wednesday. Go to the Gamestats page for more information.

    Lewis Dreams About Heaven
    Lessons from the Clouds
    Hi!, This message is primarily written for AoE webmasters (heavens team open your eyes ;o) but I think the other players could agree. Bored to have my ##### spanked on multiplayer games, I sat down and then I thought. And I had a dream… It began as a weird dream: I was reading every strategic advice through the net , crying for help about war elephants (teaching religion merits gee I tried to sing Yolololoooo but suddenly the sky would became Grey: the sun was hidden by falling stones, and I had my place with the angels… I didn’t saw Michael though I guess he’s probably more a stone thrower than a dead priest player ;o). I was soooooooooo sad. But suddenly everything changed : a webmaster decided to give AoE LESSONS… How? well really simple. Screen captures from newbies battles, with every mistakes pointed out. And A text just below: “You newbies, look at Lewis strategy, a nice girl but definitely hopeless at AoE. Wanna finish like her in a rookie room on the zone trying to find an even worst players? so do the same. But if you wanna win, look: she should have done this, this and then this…” Then another lesson from an expert, with screen captures as well, pointing out his strategy forces, with a text explaining why he does this, how he build enough houses, how he fortifies his place etc. etc. I guess such lessons could be long to build, especially perhaps to sort the screen captures , but one a week, in my dreams, it was possible… At the end of my dream, I was given tributes by Ion Storm and Ensemble Studio after blowing their defenses in a 2 Vs me match and I was the first player in the world: to the broadcasters I was telling “that thanks to heavens great lessons, heavens are the best (is that enough hu? ;o) etc etc. Well, except for the end, is my dream possible? Is there around a Webmaster who could do something like this? It would be a good way to “see” a mistake and its consequences, and a good way to follow an expert during all the game. I saw histories about AoE matches on the net, but never in a pedagogic way (pedagogic, does it exist in English? :o/) Beuuuuah ok I stop now, again sorry for my bad English. Hope there will be some reactions to this idea… Out. – Lewis

    Point taken – Read about it here – The Archangel

    From the Ensemble Data Base
    Unit Speeds
    I thought it might be useful/interesting for players to find out _exactly_ how fast the units in AoE move, instead of the uninformative “fast/medium/slow” that is given in the rule handout. So here goes. Note that the speeds given are in tiles per second.

    ‘gator = 0.5 wild elephant = 1 lion = 1.1

    fishing boat = 1.4 fishing ship = 2 trade boat = 2 trade ship = 2.5 light transport = 1.4 hvy transport = 1.75 scout/galley/trireme = 1.75 cat trireme/jug = 1.35

    villager = 1.1 priest = 0.8

    all barracks units = 1.2

    all foot archers = 1.2 chariot archer = 2 horse archer = 2.2 hvy horse archer = 2.5 elephant archer = 0.9

    scout = 2 cav/hvy cav/cataphract = 2 chariot = 2 war elephant = 0.9

    all academy units = 0.9

    all siege workshop units = 0.8

    That’s the facts, folks. Straight from Ensemble’s Studios database to you. – Sandy “Sandyman” Petersen

    Age of Empires Fan Sites
    Age of Empires, Rob Style
    The 
    Age of Empires, Rob Style – Nice look page, easy to load and view. Drop by and pay them a visit.

    Age of Empires Fun Page
    The 
    Age of Empires Fun Page – I am making a page showing the lighter side of AOE (too many serious ones already, hehe). Check it out, and if you want to, add it to your links page. – GreyCo1

    About Heaven’s Link page: I visit all the other AoE sites at least weekly, I have noticed allot of pages don’t have a Age of Heaven Link up that have requested a link on Heaven. Starting this weekend I will be deleting all sites from the Heavens link page that do not have our link up and/or that has not been updated in the last month.

    Got a Fan Site that is not listed in my Links Section? Send me an email with the name of your site and the URL and I will post it up for you. – The Archangel

     

    Other BLT AgeToons can be found – Here

    Age of Empires Strategy Tips
    Hide and Seek
    When playing head to head build a dummy town close to his, hopefully when he scouts he spots it and thinks you aren’t all that good, while in the meantime you are doing very well with no worries, build a massive army and when he attacks your dummy town, hit him where it hurts, take his villagers out and take his town hostage. 
    – Brad Nix

    ummm.. It seems hard for me at times just to get enough resources to build what I need. – The Archangel

    The Greek Rush?
    This is one of the best, if not the best Way to demolish an opponent. If your a beginner you might think the Greeks are only good for boats, well your wrong. They have Centurion, helopolis, and Heavy Catapult. Here’s how you crush an opponent. First, build about 5 academy’s this will increase your building speed. Then build around 20 Centurions(phalanx if your poor)and 10 helopolis and Heavy Catapults. By the way, if you hadn’t figured it out you need lots of gold. Now Since the Centurions are much faster than normal they will be your primary weapon. Bring your army near their base and take out their defense with your siege weapons. I know this sounds odd but your siege weapons will be used as defense of your troops. Next, scout out their base, it helps if you scout it out earlier with some cavalry it goes a lot quicker. Then, take out all the villagers with your troops and the town center with your siege. Make sure all the villagers are dead, and have fun killing your opponent. Another way is to take out all the military buildings to prevent opposition, but always keep in mind it’s not truly over ’till all villagers and town centers are gone. Good Hunting, 
    – The Worm

    Map directions
    In response to Map Direction Conventions: (ref 17th News). We use the baseball diamond analogy here – home, first, second, and third bases, + the pitcher’s mount. 
    – HoYin Au

    January 17 News Index ] [ Main Page ]

    It won’t be long before we’ll be allowed to talk about
    Ensemble’s current projects on the net. Woohoo! 
    Sandy “Sandyman” Petersen Ensemble Studios.

    TEAM ANGEL ON THE CLOUDS!

    Ion Storm Vs Heaven AOE & Scribbb’s Empire
    Ion Storm – 0 Heaven/Scribbb – 1

     

    Ensemble Studios Heaven is Waiting for you!
    Angels fly into the Storm
    Fatcat, Scribbb (Scribbb’s Empireand myself had a little game with the Gang at Ion Storm. Present from Ion to Watch Heaven Win (With allot of Help from Scribbb!) The Romero, Seb & Pooky, great bunch of people, a real class act. Thanks guys for letting Heaven win one – it’s been a long time 🙂 Please check out the Scribbb’s Empire today or tomorrow for more information and Screen Shots.– The Archangel

    The Ion Storm Vs Ensemble Studios
    Ion Storm Review of the Games
    The 
    Internet Gaming Zone match between Ion Storm & Ensemble Studios a couple of days ago, is reviewed in-depth on the Ion Storm web site. Drop on over there and read their side of the Story about their first win againstEnsemble Studios– The Archangel

    Age of Empires Fan Sites
    Age of Empires Town Center
    The 
    Age of Empires Town Center – The AoE TC is an attempt to index AoE resources on the web. Things are still looking pretty rough, I’m spending time on content over form for now. So far there are over 100 verified AoE resources listed. – Stephen

    This is one of the Greatest New Fan Sites I have seen in a while – two clouds up (ah.. thumbs up) from Heaven – The Archangel

    Got a Fan Site that is not listed in my Links Section? Send me an email with the name of your site and the URL and I will post it up for you. – The Archangel

    Age of Empires Strategy Tips
    The Tower Issue
    Responding to the response on the tower issue. I agree that towers are a mean offensive tool, but I still think towers are to weak for defense. In tool age the towers still have a weak range and damage. They can only stand over a close area, if you tower your wood choppers your gold diggers are open to attack and vice versa. Then your second berry bush gatherers are open to attack, and so on. So the only way to make towers effective is to build more than 1, more like 3 or 4 – which means a ton of stone which means less resources like wood and food, which again means slower upgrades. If you build towers I will beat you to the bronze age and it only takes 2 cavs to knock out a tower. 
    – mikemcs

    World War II – Beach Head Walls
    This may be a stupid tip but I find it useful sometimes (usually when I am desperate and about to get clobbered in the bronze age) On inland maps with rivers only build 10 by 10 area of single tile walls one space apart this really makes it hard for chariots and other powerful bronze units to get through- gives you a breather.
     – Arseny Yashkin

    Map directions
    I was wondering what other players use for map direction conventions (ie, which way is north). I usually relate the compass headings to the orthogonal axes of the map, with north being the top-RIGHT edge of the map. This would make the bottom-left east, bottom-right=south, and top-left is west. Thus if you have a villager at the extreme left corner of the map and send him to the far right corner, you have sent him on a north-easterly heading. I would like to know if this is the same convention others use so that when I play multiplayer, and I tell my ally that the enemy is approaching from the north, he doesn’t send all his forces in the wrong direction. I have noticed that other players usually give their locations on the map by an o’clock reference and I usually use N,E,S,W. 
    – Jim Hendrickson

    More Kitten Tricks
    To wipe out cats…use the waypoint system with cav. just make them circle around the Cats and they will wipe themselves out…Just make sure that you set multiple circles of waypoints because they dont repeat them…when your units get to the last one they just stop there. – StainlesSteelRat

    January 16 News Index ] [ Main Page ]

    More Q&A With Bruce Shelley
    Working on the sequel to Age of Empires
    My good friend JusticeT at Gamestats has bought this GameCenter post to Heaven’s Attention – Bruce Shelley answers some questions submitted by Gamecenter’s readers. Some of the high lights; now on the design of Age of Empires II and discussion of an expansion pack.

    VS

    This Evens It Up – One Match Apiece
    Ion Storm – 4/3 Ensemble Studios – 2
    (There seems to be a difference of Opinion in one of the games,
    A ES player’s computer crashed, if it counted as fair match – Don’t think So!)

     

    Screen Shots Supplied by Ensemble Studios

     

    Co-Op Vs Heaven
    Scoring & Playing
    Ummmm. Myself and a couple of Angels (Vidguy mostly) have been playing Smog’s Age of Empires Page quite allot lately. It just seems we are up all at ICQ a the same time and have some time to kill between updating WebPages. As you might have noticed the “Team Angel” scores have been taken down, its just to much trouble to update with the amount of games we have been playing lately.

    Talking about play games, a first for me, A Co-Op game, really Kewl! – For those of you that don’t know how… You setup a Cooperative (Co-Op) Game with two or more players by selecting the same player number before starting a multiplayer game. They share control of a single civilization. Each player can give unrestricted (and even conflicting) orders to all units.

    Vidguy and myself teamed up Co-op mode against Fatcat and Smoggie Boy on a large island Map. At first, it was a little hard to do the give and take with a partner (allot of chatting when on 🙂 – but after the duties (and Areas of our island) were divided up thing went real smooth! – A plus of Co-Op playing, you can see how other players use their Strategies in the games, a nice bonus.

    We sent Fatcat and Smoggie down in flames with a Huge Fleet of Jugg’s. Very Pretty to watch 🙂 Plus it was fun to win once in awhile. heehaw – The Archangell

    Talking about Standards
    Heaven’s Taunt Downloads!
    You may have noticed all the user submitted Taunts in the download area have different numbers (1 – 370) – no dupes. This is so, everyone that uses the Taunts will hear the same Taunts on their systems. As a side note most of Heaven’s Angels have at least Taunts 26-60 & 370 (If not more!), so if you want to drive us crazy during a game go to the 
    Download area “The Granary and get your Heaven Taunts today!, #370 is scary! – The Archangel

    More Kittens
    Sumerian cats too powerful? 
    I love this game! Besides the gorgeous graphics, one of the best features is the game balance: no single unit or civ is supreme; there is always a counter-unit to your favorite attack force or some units or upgrades that your tribe lacks.

    That said, I find it difficult to defend/attack against a battalion (10-15 at a time) of Sumerian heavy catapults(+50%ROF); even unguarded by other units. Now, cav r supposed to be the anti-cats force but when those cats advance in numbers and in waves….everything I throw at them just get killed before they can reach or finish them. They simply bulldozed their way through my town.

    Personally, I prefer speed over brute force; smaller combined forces over larger armies. So short of building a much bigger army, is there another more strategic way to deal with them?

    I have thought of some possible approaches: 1.CONTAIN THE FIRE – using fast civ to raid early and often so those Sumerians can’t develop or build up huge army (which I’ve used successfully against slower/less experienced player) 2.FRIENDLY FIRE – using fast cav to zig-zag around those dumb cats so that they kill themselves (easier said than done-I’ve yet to master this skill) 3.FIGHT FIRE WITH FIRE – build up bigger troops of Sumerian or Hittite(double HP) cats (what if random map gives me a bad starting location?) – NeZha

    I think ES made AoE to be the way that every tactic is countered. But Hittite cats are best defense against Sumerian cats, they simply kill them, and if you have elephants with cats, its even better. – Spider

    But those darn Sumerians are pretty good farmers too. Somehow computer player advances very fast to bronze with lots of farms:-( And then, well you know, then goes that cat attack. – Sphinx

    Age of Empires Fan Sites
    Age of Multiplayers
    The 
    Age of Multiplayers – Nice Site and in German. If your a German Ager, here’s a site for you. “Bis Schon auf dem Schlachtfeld”

    Got a Fan Site that is not listed in my Links Section? Send me an email with the name of your site and the URL and I will post it up for you. – The Archangel

    My First Multiplayer Game
    Those Silly Pachyderms
    Youpi!!! had my first multiplayer game today! Beuuuuuah: I lost the game…… Well, as soon as my town center appeared, I created a peon. I remembered all the advice & strategies tips from Heaven’s: 16 peons, scouting, I even had the time to find out my yellow enemy, to send him three cavalry units an to kill him 10 peons or so, then return home… I was sooooooo glad: he’s slowed down I thought. Yep he was, but there was the blue one doing I-don’t-know-what, I-don’t-know-where…. I was at the iron age, had at least ten sentry towers in my town (as I read in the tips, you couldn’t attack one without being attacked back by two of them, except with cats of course). I sent my scout , willing to find the blue one: I had not to look far, he was 20 tiles away with a dozen of elephants and 6 cats…. First thing I learned today: elephants have no respect for girls… they merely bowled up everything. I had no cat to respond but I had need at least twenty of them to stop that guy. My question is: can we do something again elephants troops. ’cause priests, even if they are good to convert them, have no chance (the cats). Towers were useless (if only I had ballista towers, sic)… I had no walls but are they efficient again such an attack? What to do??? Hope you’ll help me! thanks – Lewis

    Two points here Lewis – Your first mistake is using the words peons. The Villagers perform better if you call them “Villagers”, they are very self conscious of this. Secondly your comments about Elephants not respecting girls, ummmm.. I will send this off to Ensemble Studios and see if this can be reported as a bug to the programming staff! 🙂 – The Archangel

    Having pachyderm problems? Here are a couple of solutions that work best for certain civs.

    Priests. Elephants are slow and stupid, teach them the merits of your religion. Playing against Persian elephants? Priests still apply, but this time put something nasty in front of your preachers. Say..centurions or even better helopolis. Instant Alpo for any who would so arrogantly refuse your conversion. Just remember that centurions work best ONE on ONE against elephants while the opposite is true for ballista/helepoli.

    Chariot Archers or Horse Archers. Hit and run or use two groups. One for the ‘phant to chase and the other to pincushion dumbo. – Bazooka

    Centurions kill elephants. But Catapults kill cents. Cavs kill Cats, but elephants kill cavs. So… You need a couple of cats to distract him with. Send a group of cavs behind his elephants to kill the cats. Then send in your cents to kill the elephants. I know, easier said than done, but that’s what you’d have to do. Remember, a mixed force is the best force. – Ibrahim

    I think priests are undeniably the best way to deal with elephants. They are great units (a bit slow but hey). But the cost is a bit steep and the build time is slow. They are much better when acquired than built.

    But those pesky cats are raining on your priest parade. So what I do is build chariots (yes chariots), you were using cav so hopefully you have the armor upgraded. Send about 5 chariots out and around the elephants and right in at the cats. You may have to weave back and forth as you come in if the cats are leading you. Hopefully, when you reach the cats some of the cats will help you kill the cat your fighting and the ones your fighting won’t be able to fire on you (min range of 2). If the elephants come in to help they will also hurt any cats that are adjacent to them. You may need more than one group of chariots to finish off the cats. Then just start converting the elephants. Don’t forget to heal them when your done and thank your enemy for the army.

    Why chariots and not cav? Chariots are cheaper and will get the job done. These are suicide troops whose only goal in life is to rid you of the evil cats. So far I have only run into one person adept enough to not lose all his cats to a few groups of chariots. In a pinch you can use villagers too, especially the Assyrian and Yamato villagers. – ZipperHead

    Age of Empires Strategy Tips
    Click or Shift
    Many people have submitted a tip about using the SHIFT key to build multiple items such as walls. This is good, but a faster way to build walls is to CLICK & DRAG. 
    – Lance

    Highland maps
    Starting villagers
    Just a couple quick questions. Has anyone else noticed that on highland maps 1 person always gets screwed on wood. Unforunately its usually me, out of the last 10 highland maps I’ve played, with 2v2 games, on 7 of them I had to walk 1/4 of the map to get a forest and then had no natural defenses so to wall in I had to build all the way around my city. The 3 times it didn’t happen were those highland maps that turn out like inland maps with landbridges all over. I even went into the map generated and generated 30 maps and they almost all gave 1 person no forest. I’ve started to refuse to play highland maps because its sooooo annoying. Inland maps are better anyway IMO.

    Second question, how many villagers do people build before tool age on average. I know it depends on the food you find around you, I personally keep building them until I hit 500 food which usually is around 24-26 villagers, and never do I advance with less than 20. – Ender

    It’s true that highlands maps have at least one player not near forests almost every games. Usually, you take care of this problem with the trees around your town center right from the start, and put a storage pit later near a good spot that you have found. This way, you can keep up with the others, and given the size of the home bases that players usually have, storage pits far from your town center would fall into your zone of control, anyway. I think it’s a way to view this, and that it shouldn’t be considered a disadvantage.

    I’m revising my starting strategy now, and I think the optimum would be 16-20 villagers. Food is usually no problem (only the time needed to find it). It is always near, and you want to avoid exploring just 1 tile away and passing by. An expanding circle is the best method, usually. There’s always near, at least 2 berry patch (average of 6 berry bushes each) and 2 elephants for a total of 2400 food. Basically, it’s more than what you need for 20 villagers and going to tool age, and what you should look for. Gold and Stone will also be no problem as they are also near (at least one patch each), and you find them in your initial exploration searching for food and a good-size forest. – Omnivac

     

    Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

    Advertisement
    © HeavenGames. All Rights Reserved. Please read our Disclaimer & Privacy Statement. © Microsoft Age of Empires.