Content

• Steps
• Method 1 of 3: Age of Discovery
• Method 2 of 3: Colonial Age
• Method 3 of 3: Fortress Age

This article is written for those who want to become a better player and is aimed at beginners. If you are having difficulty beating a computer at the "hard" level, then this article is for you. Everything written here is universal, which means that there is no preference for a particular civilization. In fact, many of the principles listed here will work for many real-time strategy games.

Steps

1. 1 Understand the differences between micro and macro, and learn to distinguish between the three main strategies.
   • The Onslaught strategy is one of the simplest, but there is a lot of risk involved. With this strategy, the player sacrifices the economy in order to build an army before the enemy finds a way to fight against him. Because the onslaught player sacrifices his economy so much for an early attack that the failure of the onslaught is often the reason other players win. The most famous is perhaps the onslaught of the Zerg from Starcraft. The onslaught in Age of Empires 3 is very difficult, because the defending player can collect the entire garrison and his inhabitants in the center of the city, where for a small fee he can build anti-onslaught fortifications.
   • The Rapid Growth strategy is also quite difficult, as the player needs to maintain a balance between economic growth and military investment.The idea is to keep military investment to a minimum during the first part of the game, developing the economy until you can overpower the enemy with your superior forces through upgrades. Just one wrong move, and your powers can be surpassed and overwhelmed at the very beginning of the game.
   • The Turtle Strategy, or Turtle Hunt as it is called, is a defensive strategy, as its name suggests. The player invests only a small part of his strength and builds more fixed fortifications like towers. When you hunt turtles, you focus on economics and defense, without building defenses to attack.
   • Macro refers to any gameplay that benefits the player in the long run. Expanding the base or taking control of the map are examples of macro. Macro refers to micro as strategy refers to tactics. With good macro, you will always have a good army and a lot of resources.
   • Micro is the opposite of macro, and refers to the advancement of individual units. Most often it is used for military units. A good micro is a basic skill that can make your troops more efficient. This skill needs to be trained, but there are many techniques that can be learned. For example, a "dance" where the player chooses a rifle unit, fires at the crowd alone, runs away and fires again. When repeating this process, the military unit cannot deliver a single blow to the rifle unit.
2. 2 Get ready to play by changing some settings in the user interface. You need to select a list of available players, which will allow you to see how old your enemy is and how many trading posts he has. The game score also shows how your progress is compared to that of the enemy. Also, make sure you can see additional information about how your settlers are allocated. So you can see how many settlers are busy collecting resources at any given time.
   • Start a regular Firefight game and target only the computer as your opponent. You should be able to beat the computer at the Hard level without too many problems if you are familiar with the interface and the game. It doesn't depend on which civilization you choose; everything you read here is relevant to the game as a whole.
   • Your choice of card matters a lot. Avoid those where there is water, as this will complicate the path to victory. Also, to keep things as straightforward as possible, avoid maps with narrow aisles. You can select "Record a Game", and thus watch your own game to find out what went wrong in the event of your loss.

Method 1 of 3: Age of Discovery

1. 1 Concentrate on collecting as much food as possible as soon as the game begins. First, collect all the crates and build a house to support the settlers who will pop up. Then concentrate on hunting or picking berries. You absolutely do not need to build mills until you have exhausted all natural resources. Also, you should create settlers from the beginning, and you should have a constant reproduction of them until you decide to age to colonial age. So make sure you have enough food.
2. 2 Pick your researcher and start exploring. You will need to find out where the enemy base is located as soon as possible. He may be as far from the border as you are, so circle the entire map at that distance from the border. Finding out where the enemy is is not that hard. It is also helpful to assign a number to the investigator. To do this, select it and press Ctrl + (number).
3. 3 Have 2-3 settlers collect wood, and consider building a shop. At this stage of the game, wood is very valuable, and building a shop will not give you an instant advantage. You will have, in any case, a stronger economy than before.If you do not have a store, then soon you will have to raise the barracks.
   • One thing to keep in mind is that when collecting resources, the settlers should be distributed around the neighborhood, thereby reducing the risk. For example, you can mine ore from two gold mines instead of one. This requires more careful observation of the details, and it may be more difficult for you to defend your settlers in the event of an attack.
4. 4 Build your buildings related to the economy, located far from the enemy and place your military units in front of him. This will provide some protection to your economy, while buildings will not hinder your troops. Build closer to the city center and build towers for defense.
5. 5 Keep your settlers hunting closer to the city center so that there is protection from pursuit. While hunting, you gradually scare the animals away from the city center, but you can avoid this if you hunt outside and towards the city center. Using a couple of settlers, you can herd groups of animals towards the city center for more safety. You may also consider building a tower / outpost / roadblock later in the game to support your hunt if it is far from your base. If you are attacked, just hide your settlers inside, and if the enemy still remains, bring your troops. This will increase your control over the map and help you spot enemy advances.
6. 6 Move to colonial age when you have at least 17 settlers. For more experienced players, it may be more appropriate to have 15, but keep in mind that you must know what to do economically if you choose this strategy.

Method 2 of 3: Colonial Age

1. 1 Start building your barracks immediately. If possible, a consignment of goods should also be sent with the troops. Once your barracks are built, start building troops. When your army reaches 10-20 people, including the explorer, start attacking. This attack will be far from the final blow, but in reality it can be decisive. If you have done a good reconnaissance, you can determine where the enemy's settlers are. At least a few of them are likely to find themselves on the hunt away from the towers and enemy forces. Capturing them will give you an advantage. First, the settlers cost resources, so killing a few of them will force the enemy to spend money on something other than military units. Secondly, the dead settler does not collect resources, so you can add to the loss any resources that he could collect. Third, you are depriving the enemy of resources. Hopefully, he will pull back his settlers and for this period of the game, of course, will not be able to collect resources with the help of these settlers. Note, this is not an onslaught. This is called pursuit and is not aimed at destroying the enemy base. Therefore, take care of your troops and do not attack buildings. In fact, you should ignore buildings and trading posts. With a bit of luck and skill, you should be able to seize the initiative at this point with your stronger economy.
2. 2 Keep producing troops while they capture enemy settlers. Many players are unable to focus immediately on building a base and participating in military operations, and it just takes practice. The buildings you need most are a store, if you haven't built one yet, and a stable. You can expect your population to grow, so keep ahead of the curve and build houses.
3. 3 At this time, expect attacks from everywhere. Instead of starting the pursuit too early, you can wait for the enemy to come to you. When he attacks you, restrain his forces with towers, etc., and immediately retaliate.
4. 4 Pay attention to your style of play. You may want to grow back quickly, or if things are going well, keep producing and shipping units.If you feel that you can produce units faster than your enemy can kill them, even while at its base, then just do it. Build another barracks and withdraw your troops as soon as possible. You may also be able to win this way if you can destroy the enemy's barracks. If your enemy is growing, in most cases you need to grow just as fast.

Method 3 of 3: Fortress Age

1. 1 Try to answer the buildings of your opponents and counter his units. In any case, as the game progresses, it gets harder and harder to give advice. For example, if your opponent builds three stables, then you should make more pikemen to counter the cavalry. But the number of lines of behavior at this point in the game is so huge that it is simply impossible to say what not to do.
2. 2 Try to boost the macro no matter what. The last units to spawn are more demanding on gold (especially artillery), so additional plantation is a good idea. Also, by this time you should have depleted all natural resources, so if your settlers are hunting and spreading around the map, then collect them, and build a mill instead. If you are low on wood, consider additional gold and buy wood from the store. But this is not profitable, so only buy wood when you need it badly (for buildings or ships). With subdivisions, you can find an alternative route without buying a tree.
3. 3 Raise your fortress as fast as possible. Be aggressive in placing your fortress, but don't overexert yourself. If you cannot return to the fortress with your own forces in a few seconds, then there is a risk of losing them.
4. 4 Don't feel limited with the 200 population limit. Remember that those who are not fighting are just ballast and the development of units is more efficient if you already have them. Moreover, don't upgrade units if you don't have them. In addition, the idea of ​​the Fortress Age is mainly about troop production and technical growth. The cards are your friends. Your card delivery is incredibly helpful. Some units, such as serfs and military, have to wait for many more useful deliveries. It is useful and necessary to increase the speed of your infantry and cavalry. Build a set that works for you, but in which you have many essential cards such as wood, food, or money, or many upgrades that will give you an edge over your opponent.