Age of Empires tips: April 2012

Sunday, April 22, 2012

Do Mail ever Expire?

I have a F2P Account and would like to mail my Premium Items to myself to store them for if one day i get Premium Civ but want to know if there is an expiration date?|||

EDIT: checking on this right now...

|||Lol, like one hour after I receive a message it says "About to Expire." :P|||dont you mean 3 days?
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30 or 3 which is it?

Also then rather than having to resent yourself the item before the expiration date there should be an archive button to lock mail so it can't be deleted.

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wilmer0072000 wrote the following post at 08-26-2011 5:15 PM:
I have a F2P Account and would like to mail my Premium Items to
myself to store them for if one day i get Premium Civ but want to know
if there is an expiration date?

You can't mail rare/epic items to yourself. A way to store rare/epics in your mail is to trade your rare/epics to someone who is premium, so he can send (not COD) them to your mail.
|||That is gonna be hard considering i don't have any friends who are premium so findig a random premium player isn't an option as they can just keep the item and scam me.

Skirmish Hall Info Please

I've looked around and I cannot find any specific information on what will be in it. Can we please get some idea of what this package will contain.

Will there be Death Match, ffa, 3v3, 4v4, etc? Will we be able to host games and allow other to see and join them if they want like we were able to do in the Zone? Will game stats be available...

Many of us play age for the RTS/PvP part of it, and to be honest, the skirmish package is all I really want at this point. Can we please get some info on this with some details. If there is a post orsitewith this information, can someone please direct me to it, as I have not been able to find any info on this.

Thanks in advance.

|||I want to know if it will be PvP or comp stomp only :S Thats not even confirmed yet...|||

This article should be of assistance you you all:http://aoeo.heavengames.com/articles/previews/sneak-peak-analysis/

Port Opening

Hey so when a person joins my party it auto pops up saying Harrison41 has a restricted Nat and may have trouble connecting to games and i never am able to play CO-OP and i dont no how to fix this can someone please help me?|||

http://forums.ageofempiresonline.com/forums/post/50252.aspx

Search is here for everyone. Hoping this helps.

|||Some routers don't play nice. What is your internet gateway device, and your connection type (cable/DSL)?

from free to premium

hi all, just a simple question for those of you who started playing free and then upgraded to premium.

do you think it's worth it? i've been playing free (greek) since the release day, and i'm thinking about moving on to premium (well, someday. still plenty to do before i reach that level 40). first i wanna explore the game a little more though, maybe also try out the egyptians, and so on.

the obvious reasons i'm considering it are: lack of storage space, impossibility to use all those cool unit/tech upgrades, and a thought that struck me just recently: once i reach level 40 and/or complete all the quests, there'll be virtually nothing left than PvP (and skirmish?).

so what do you once-free-now-premium-players think? are you having "more fun" now that you've upgraded?..
|||Itdefinitelyis more open and more fun. No more restrictions..and it is only $20. You get hours of enjoyment. Consider what $20 buys you... Movie and a popcorn, a book, a feed at McDonalds, a CD but the game fun outlasts all of that.|||

I upgraded to premium when I was about level 10. Kinda early actually now that I mention it, but oh well, I ask a ton of questions like you are doing here, it helps when you find someone capable of answering questions properly :D

Anyways! It seems like you're aware of the things you get with premium. I'd say if you like the game then yes, it's worth it. More crafting, advisors (you know what Advsiors are?), blue&epic items trading and equipping, more storage, PvP (ranked) from lvl 25+, statistically a better chance to win unranked games and also quests will be easier with blue gear ofcourse, some more minor things I guess.

So yea, I personally enjoy the game alot, even despite its current fixable flaws I actually love it so I got premium and I don't regret buying it so far. I just like this game style too much. The AoE gameplay alone is worth it for me really. RTS and (MMO)RPG combined though, is just amazing and they've done it well. Wearing better gear and crafting just adds to that for me.

Hope I helped!

|||I had a free account until lvl 9, before I nuked it and created a premium account afterwards. It's nice to be able to use the items, and the star tech definitely helped for that elite tower mission. (I had to use like 4 star techs to do it. It was ridiculous.) Not too interested in PvP, but I will probably play a bit of it here and there when I lvled up a bit. On general questing though, I don't think I have yet to encounter a mission where I feel like I NEED premium. (I am just starting Argos.) In fact, I might just create a free account later and see how far I can go without equipping any gear as a challenge.
|||When i first started my lack of storage was the main reason i considered going to premium. But then once i figured out some easy farming methods i decided not to go premium. I'm waiting to see what new civs come out (aswell as other new content) and i want to also see over time which is the best civ from the bunch. If i'm going to spend $20 i might aswell spend it on the best Civ. Currently on paperEgyptians are better than Greeks however perhaps the new civs would be the new powerhouse. So i don't mind waiting. I have plenty of things to do to keep me busy. Normally i don't do 1 lvl per hour (i actually do about 1 quest per hour)so it will be a while before i hit lvl 40. Besides multiple accounts and the other civ on the same account will keep me pretty occupied. Then once i reach lvl 40 i can PvP with all the best gear possible for a F2P Civ. Maybe after owning other F2P players at lvl 40 then i might switch over to Premium. But for now saving my money for Battlefield 3 is a better option.|||Aren't they going to do balance changes if a civ is too powerful though? So, if you buy a civ now thinking that it is the most powerful, it might get nerfed hard in the next 2 months. And this doesn't even take account of the possible metagame changes.
|||That is true but if i'm going to go premium one day i want to go premium with the most powerful civ at the point in time. Sure months from then the civ would get patched but at least i got to take advantage of the powerhouse on PvP before it gets nerfed. While all the civs can be balanced out over time there will always be a slight advantage when it comes to balancing (especially if used correctly by a smart player). All games that adjust balancing have this flaw.|||What I mean is, wouldn't it be better to go premium with the civ you are most comfortable using, seeing how the play styles of the civ most likely going to be different? After all, the strongest civ can change with balance patches, but the civ that suits your style would not change easily.
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Well you are right in that sense aswell. Me personally i love using War Elephants to take everything out. Chariot Archers can hit and run and cover War Elephants early on and then once you hit the Golden Age Elephant Archers go perfectly with War Elephants to cover each other then you throw in those Chariot Archers for a early horse archer rush that is impossible to counter and that is why Egyptians own the Greeks and have a nice playstyle to go along with it. Not to mention the early economy and cheap units to make a powerhouse even more deadly. That is why Egyptians rock but who knows next month they may get nerfed for all we know however you are right the playstyle will still be there. I like Egyptians since it suits my style and everything so they are perfect for me. However the Persians in Civ 4 with those powerful early Immortals were instant game over from the start of the game so i'm hoping Persians with Immortals will own here aswell.

To put it simply look at it like this:

Greeks = Ghost Pro + Ninja Pro using FAMAS w/ Silencer or Campers Paradise

Egyptians = Lightweight Pro + Marathon Pro using AK74u w/ Rapid Fire = Rushers Galore

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The magical build you just posted gets destroyed hard by sarissophoroi/podromos y'know...

Too bad most people dont use them enough as they have tunnel vision and only build stables for the almighty hippikon, and even more tend to attack the wrong guys with the wrong units (podromos are the anti cavalry, dont send em at the archers as thats the sari's job).

Also please keep in mind that elephants are huge resource hogs, an equally skilled greek player going sarissophoroi/podromos should have far more then you do or he's doing it wrong. Remember that you need a fortress to make your elephants, which takes a good while to build and is extremely easy to harass with greek cavalry unless you build proper defenses.

Not saying your strategy is bad, its just nowhere near as impossible to counter as your saying. As with every strategy it has weaknesses (sari + podro are both cavalry and thus are weak to anti-cavalry as an example).

Also phalanx (epic advisor card) rip war elephants a new one.

|||I paid and It is GREAT!

I say do it|||yep and im glad i got that phalanx epic card ealrier tonight everyone is like 5-10k fro it and im like looooool and now its fun to use :)

It is possible to play 2 vs 2 Unranked whit an arranged team? How?

i wanted to play 2 vs 2 unranked whit a friend but we dont know how, or even if it is posible. we tried queuing as a group but it sais we cant queue cause were already team up. please someone answer.
|||You can't|||

Wow, so sad to hear that, thats kind of lame :(.

Ranked matches 2 vs 2 are whit arranged team?

|||nope, hopefully this feature is coming in the future though, real bummer...|||

Well....You can play a custom game and have it like that. 2v2 Custom game.

|||Unranked with no rewards and you need to find two willingopponentsbut yeah, their are custom matches.

AOEO on MMOHUT

and it looks bad...... oh man I almost wanted to shove broken glasses in my eyes while watching this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8uTRhkNH9E&feature=feedu

First the lv7 commentator is matched against a lv40 player in sparta PVP. Then he gets demolished when his opponent isn't even good. He also commented on how pay-to-win plays a large role in this game just like all other reviews. This is only his first impression about the game, and chances are other new players may experience the same problem. MS really needs to step up and fix the game before its ruined.

It's sad..............

|||What do you expect? He had idle villagers when he has 20 population, and floating on freaking 800 gold before 40 supply. Am I surprised that he lost?
|||oh don't forget to read the comments. Most are not happy with p2w.|||The part when he got attacked he had enough resources for another 40 hypa's. It probably won't save him, but it won't be nearly as 1 sided as it seems.
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I think you're missing the point. It's his FIRST game and he gets to play with lv40 players in epics.Most noobs won't be happy with that.

|||I am not missing the point. I agree MS's matching needs some tweaks, without questions, but instead of starting to bash them here now, we should comment on his game play on the video so others can what actually made him lose.
|||personally ill be leaving because its so hard to get a pvp match :( i hit 40 and im tired of questing. when i want a match it usually takes 15-20 min. even aoc i get games wayyyy faster than that.
|||What did you expect ? 10/10 review ? As I said before, the game was released too soon with too many issues and it's going down.|||Yawn.|||*cat nap*|||MS will not step in, I hope they do not step in. I hope this game goes to the gutter because the lack of communication and the slow progress along with the pricing are terrible and someone must pay for this mistake and I hope they do.|||You do realize you are wishing the end of the aoe series, the end of a game with great potential, the end of the mmorts genre, if ms pays so do we. And they will step anyway this game was just released early. Pricing is great, just get one premium civ and that's it.|||Highly doubt if this fails that it would be the end of either AoE or MMORTS games. Look at Square Enix. FFXIV was a dismal failure yet they are still pushing along other FF Games to continue the series|||Maybe, but FFXIII is making me think twice before buying its sequel. (I never bought any of Square's MMO.)
|||Just give it a week of two. So people can get level 40. When that happens you'll find a game within 2 seconds any time on the day. We had it like that in the beta. With just 1k people :)

Competitive Age of Empires

I'm a new player, and am considering purchasing the Egyptian premium content pack.

I'm ok with spending the money - $20 instead of $50 is imho a good price to pay for a game.

However, I'm curious - what's the competitive multiplayer environment in Age of Empires Online? This being an MMO, it seems like you might have issues in ranked PvP related to players who have had more time to collect items for their units and/or earn better advisors, gear, etc.

Coming from StarCraft 2, I'm used to a pretty finely balanced PvP experience. I wasn't by any means a top level player, but from my experience, lack of balance will kill an RTS.

So, i guess my question is what's the current state of ranked pvp? Is it pretty well balanced or is it simply a measure of who has better items for their units?

|||See for yourself:http://www.youtube.com/iloveaoeonline|||

Hi and welcome,

be sure to jump in on this posthttp://forums.ageofempiresonline.com/forums/thread/97195.aspxIt is live and active at the moment!

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Hm... I'm not really concerned about the matchmaking... I'm sure that'll work out, and if I want to try PvP before level 40, it'll be my own fault if I lose.

I'm more concerned about balance at the higher end of competitive multiplayer: how do items affect balance? What about advisors, perks etc? Are the Egpytian and Greek civs currently balanced against each other?

|||Egypt>Greece that should change with upcoming patches, as for items, their prettystandard, better items help but don't think someone with a sword that gives 5% damage then your units will win because of that, premium>non premium but it is hard to quantify the deference, it's not HUGE though, I'd say the premium player has a fair edge but it's not an always win deal.|||

The gears in this game make certain games impossible to win.

Champion War Elephants need nerf.

I didn't know they had 70 dps to begin with until recently, that's terribly not catered to PvP but chaotic childish fun.

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"Egypt>Greece that should change with upcoming patches, as for items, their prettystandard, better items help but don't think someone with a sword that gives 5% damage then your units will win because of that, premium>non premium but it is hard to quantify the deference, it's not HUGE though, I'd say the premium player has a fair edge but it's not an always win deal. "

You must be kidding, right? How do you think a "freemium" player would be able to challenge a premium player benefitting of much better gears, ultimate techtree, and advisors?

BTW, in order to answer the OP, this game is pretty much unbalance. I don't know if things are going to improve, but currently IMO its quitte crappy.

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"You must be kidding, right? How do you think a "freemium" player would be able to challenge a premium player benefitting of much better gears, ultimate techtree, and advisors? "

You must be kidding, right? How do you think a "premium" player would be able to challenge a freemium playerbenefiting from similargears, and a tech tree without star techs but more points on normal techs?

too lazy to think of something more creative ;)

|||At top level play the game is quite well balanced (I personally think Egypt > Greece but the game is still new...). Items/gear become less of a problem as you play more because everyone eventually gets lvl40 epic gear on their essential units.|||

"You must be kidding, right? How do you think a "premium" player would be able to challenge a freemium playerbenefiting from similargears, and a tech tree without star techs but more points on normal techs?

too lazy to think of something more creative ;)"

Or because you can't really have a reasonable defense against that argument? A single tier 1 adviser alone can throw balance out the window with 10%+ build speed increase. If you think that is a difference too hard to "quantify", you just suck at quantifying because that's just straight up match breaking buff that no free-to-play players can have.

And the difference between epics and uncommon are more than 5%, it's more like 13%+. Even 5% is a huge buff and it can easily triple that. That sort of one sided stat changes break competition between free-to-play players and premium ones.

Not that free-to-play players can even compete on the ladder anyway, but to think that those two are evenly matched is foolish.

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dang, my first responsedisappeared, ah well... Of course it isn't even, but if I played a f2p player who is considerably better then me i would get my but kicked.

http://www.youtube.com/user/iLoveAOEonline#p/u/10/7FeoorRFCoM

You can't really have a reasonable defense against that vid ;)

I love copy paste

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today i started sc2 again after 1 yr or something absence since aoeo was boring me to death with all the stupid grinding all high lvl players are doing and the difficulty to find quality games cause some people want to have only best of the best gear before pvp ing.

This game is at launch and i cant find pvp gamez, wtf is wrong???

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Well aoe is not like sc2. Plus sc2 was kind of imbalanced when they released the game when the tops playerson most of the regions were Terrans. But they fixed the game they nerfed the Terrans and buffed the other races, now sc2 is a good game since is kinda balanced.

I think that you need premium for be competitive on this game, but I think that real pro rts player will beat a random premium. Since an uber micro will beat unit spammer. But is the premium player have some decent rts exp, he have not hope.

The problem with this game and the pvp is mostly the trueskill crap, that *** suck. I'm talking because that lame systems kinda cripple some other games like DoW2 vanilla and CR, since that failing system was matching new players with lvl 30+ players with more than 100w. The trueskill matchmaking needs to stay away of rts. This game will be get better if they adopt the Sc2 model I think that DoW2 retribution is using the same model.

|||Except that SC2's MMR is a variation on True Skill/ELO. If there's a problem, it's not a problem with True Skill, but how they used it.
|||The DoW2 problems with TrueSkill are due toRelic's particular implementation of the algorithms rather than the system itself. TS is more versatile than ELO and can rank a wider variety of games (like FFAs, individual ranks in 2v2s, etc. while ELO can only rank head-to-head games). Placing new players against players with TS rank 30+ is not a unique problem as it can also occur with ELO. The standard TS system used by MS is giving new players a rank of 25 with a variance of 8.3. It's similar to how ELO gives new players a certain rank like 1600. On another RTS using ELO, I was at rating 1550 (default of 1600) and I was playing opponents with ELO ratings above 2000. As long as the implementation of TrueSkill is not particularly problematic, then there is no problem with using that system rather than ELO.

Australian Players

Anyone playing this in australia? please feel free to add me as a friend. Need to visit friends to continue some quests.

I'm in Adelaide, South Australia

|||Queenslander here. I would love to play some quests, friendly PvP and Crete Booster. I will add you. Level 21 at present.|||I live in NZ, is that close enough?
|||Victoria here|||

Victoria - game name is:

AussieMarkMelb

THere is also a whirlpool thread and I told the Australians to join the Marathon server

Loot and the unlucky

I do not want loot handed to me but I have become very discouraged from bothering to get the guardian treasures on every level. I still do it but it has, so far, proved worthless. I see people in trade, in the 20's maybe, offering more epics and rares for sale than I have seen in either premium greek or egyptian combined. I understand it is random but when random attacks it becomes annoying. I am still using some horrible equipment simply because I keep getting either broken items in chests or the 800th copper arrow or some other such item I have sold 200 times (same stats or worse). It becomes boring, not entertaining, to see this over and over. Especiallyadvisers. I am at a loss. I can either pay everything I own to get one or hope I find more besides the awful quests ones.

I get that random chests is part of the fun but when luck is against you fun disappearsrapidly.When I see people begging to to be done with their numerous 25%+ damage epics at my level I get kind of bummed. The best I have found is like 12% white or green heh.

Okay that was a screed... I admit it. Is there any difference between heavily guarded,moderatelyguarded and lightly guarded? I have found one of my few blues from a light and gotten numerous broken junk from heavy. Not looking for consistency, Even moe's chests have been very unkind to me heh. I just don't know... it is getting boring playing a half an hour to see more broken junk. Sure, it will be fun to see an epic but considering my percentages (I know, can'tcounton black or red in roulette) it is just depressing.

|||I think Heavily Guarded vs Lightly influences the number of chests you get. Like Heavily is mostly 3 chests but Lightly will be 1-2 chests more often. The loot in the chests is not affected as far as I can tell. It's just how many chests you get per camp/hut.
|||

Light is 1 chest.

Medium is 1-2 chests.

Heavy is 1-3 chests.

I don't think there's any weighting, you are just as likely to get 1 chest from a heavy as 3. I also think they all have the same loot quality.

I've found chests from certain quests have a higher chance of giving rares. For example I did most of the camel gauntlet challenge and nearly all the chests I got as rewards were giving me blue items.

|||You also get a lot more xp for the more heavily guarded camps.

Best Game Ever. (Sarcasm(SO MUCH of it))

This is the worst game ever by far. if I could i would manifest this game into a human being and bend it over aguillotine, and I havn't even logged into the game yet. That being said, heres what happened :)

First, 5 hours ago I saw MMOhut did a review of it! looked fun. Then kinda of got more and more depressing the more i watched the review. But I was like, "Hogwash!" and went to go download it anyway.

After it's quick download, i proceeded to log in, it requested a windows live account, I have 30 of those, but I made a new one just to make sure it would work. After logging in, it said i needed a product key, after the odd expression left my face as i confirmed that, Yes, this game really is free. I Turned to the one person I could trust. google.

After google'ing for some time, I learned, you need to purchase the game in order to play it, as the odd expression reappeared on my face, I left and read some more. some said to reset my internet while logging in and to type aaaaaaaaaaaaaa as the product key, none prevailed, But then! something new happened! my live account got locked for trying 3 times and failing, horray! so i made a new one, did more google research, looked on forums, read a few posts and thought they may be asking for my user id number on windows live, they were not. Went to make a forum post asking, no "Post new thread" button existed. So i proceeded to restart spam the game, and after 5 restarts a new button appeared saying Purchase game, clicking this button it opened up the windows live marketplace, and I quickly found age of empires online, and purchased it for 0 dollars! horray i can finally play the game! nope. this only allowed me to post on the forums, the game still is asking for a product key, I thought, maybe its back at the live marketplace under the game info? nope.

So after 3 hours of attempting to login to a game thatsupposedlysucks terribly bad, I am still unable to even get past the login screen.

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8uTRhkNH9E) MMOhut videos averaging 20k views a day+. this will quickly become the number one result for youtubeing "Age of empires online"

So I thank you AoE, I now snuggle with my ps3 a little bit closer at night while knowing I never had to use live to play games :)

Edit 1: I also forgot to mention the 20 minutes of trying to figure out how to contact live's support. (they dont have one for pc games)

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/Support/PC/contact-support

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So you trust PSN over LIVE? lol what a joke have fun hugging you PS3, Dont forget they got hacked for months. Good security they have lol. And you dont need a product key dam. And there is support. Grow up.

(Also you haven't played it yet so how you can be like this lol.

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So not smart enough to install a game, and haven't actually played yet.

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Please repeat this statement with proper use of grammar and the English language so I may understand it as you intended it.

Thank you.

|||I think your the one who needs to use spell checker. It's Now! not Know, And what i don't understand is that you are complaining about a game you haven't even played. Wow you have seen a review that's not the same to playing. I mean come on dude you can't even install it. It doesn't need a CD Key lol. And there is support are you crazy why the hell wouldn't there be lol.
|||

Lol... Dude I didnt face any problems while running the game first time. What i did:

1. Created WL account (I didnt have one before);

2. Purchased the game for $0;

3. Downloaded the game installer using WL client;

4. Installed the game;

5. Started playing...

Dunno but you might have done something wrong... The game havent asked me a single time for any key.

|||He probably tried to sign up for XBL Gold or something which would have asked for a possible time card.
|||

Congrats on pointing out one spelling error in that entire paragraph, there was 3 btw. you missed two. :)

and I wasn't complaining about his spelling, I simply could not understand what he was saying.

It's my fault I cant install the game because im bad and I cant spawnnonexistentproduct keys out of thin air?

kay.

|||I downloaded the correct verision, and installed it perfectly, it just keeps asking for my product key no mater what I do.|||You don't register for the game. Just load the launcher and log in with any XBL account, like the one you are posting with. Done.
|||Download windows live market place. Sign in with your msn ID. Search in games for age of empires online. Download it. Download the files in patcher. Play. Or just click on download at www.ageofempiresonline.com|||http://forums.ageofempiresonline.com/forums/thread/76765.aspx|||All you have to do is click, Play for free and it downloads the game also downloads the MarketPlace and Framework or w.e ect its like a bundle download.
|||Found it :) Thank you to the only helpful person on the thread.|||I don't know why everyone is just saying to click play and it works, because it's obvious it doesn't.. it was asking for a key

Easy with the farming, slugger

I have played this quest several times, and have also got my reward, but it still appears as not completed in my quest list over and over again. What do I do wrong? Is this quest repeatable as all my other quests? (It doesn't say anything about that)|||Abandon it, if you got the reward :)|||

It's one of a series of quests each with a slight name change where you have to build 10 farms faster and faster. The mission repeats 5 times, from 10 minutes down to 5 minutes, resulting in a nice villager purple item if you complete all of them.

If it is exactly that instance of the chain that keeps repeating then abandon the quest, re-accept it and complete it again, if your still having issues drop them a line in the tech support forum.

Repeatable quests have blue icons instead of yellow icons.

|||Ok thanks. I didn't know that the mission repeats itself 5 times. Then I'm gonna finish the quest :)

Permanently Lost Inventory Slot?

I just installed AoE Online the day before yesterday to give it a try and started an Egyptian Civilization. I got to the point where I was sent to Sparta by the Hellenic ambassador to talk to Leonidas. I did and he had a quest for me which I subsequently picked up. Upon picking up the quest I received an Arena to place in my capital city, but apparently I can only do so with Premium. However I do not intend to get Premium, at least not untill the release of the next two Civilizations (more interested in Celts and Persians). In the meantime I am stuck with a blueprint in my inventory which I can not use, can not sell, can not trade, and can not delete. In effect this means my inventory has just shrunk with one slot, while the game's inventories aren't that big in the first place.

This imo, is ridiculous. I am perfectly fine with being unable to play the game to its full extend without premium. I am not fine with the game's free to play experience being progressively limited to force me to get premium. Honestly, it is stuff like this that makes me reconsider whether I will get premium at all.

Is there a workaround to this problem, can I get rid of the blueprint, or can I delete my city then recreate it with the same name (and start again from scratch)?

|||There's no way to get rid of the blueprint as of now. It sucks, I know. However, you can delete your city and create it with the same name. I did that a week ago when I upgraded my account to premium just so I can experience it fully. In fact, I don't think that the city name is unique, since I have saw someone else with a city name of Cairo.
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As of now the only way to get rid of it is to reset your city by deleting and starting over and not accepting these types of quests. I know it sucks i did it too. Also you should also never turn in quests that give you a premium item. That way it's one less item slot being taken up or one less ripoff from the store then if one day you go premium you'll have the items storage free the whole time.

I'm sure they will correct this problems because every single F2P is mad at about this obviously. It just pisses everyone off because they are clearly trying to push you into getting premium by quickly jamming your inventory with premium items. Their should be an option for us to either allow premium items (on F2P Civ) or not. But theydefinitelyneed to remove the can't delete item restriction. It is like False Advertising because you are progressively being more limited as you progress in a F2P account. It's this kind of scam attempts that pushes F2P Players away who may one day get a premium civ or were undecided about it and some will even leave and never look back because of this. So yeah this has to be fixed ASAP or this game isn't going to last very long for all of us.

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The loss of an item slot, a true travesty of justice happening before our very eyes.

You can recreate your city, it deletes instantly then you just recreate it. There are a variety of home city terrains, three maybe four, so you might want to recreate it a few times untill you get one you especially like.

There are a few different item slot hogs you have to watch out for if your too cheap to pay and it really matters that much too you. Someone made a topic about it for the egyptian side of things but this forum moves so fast that damned if I can find it. The Arena, the advisor hall, treasury and a couple of monuments are the ones you have to look out for, you will have to get at least one to progress the campaign though, the Trojan Horse and the Large Step Pyrimid depending on the civ. Wouldn't be able to give you the exact mission names though, so you'll just have to check the quest rewards for them untill they fix this 'issue' in a patch.

|||

There are a few quests you need to look out for that lump you with items that you cannot get rid of.

http://forums.ageofempiresonline.com/forums/thread/97185.aspx

If you find any not listed in my thread please provide me with the specific quest name and item name, i'll be sure to add it to the opening post.

Easy to Mass Units

Title says it ...

I am trying to macro as hard as i can and most times i can get max at about 8.00-8.30 with slinger/camel

maybe this is to much? i mean maybe they should lower gathering rates/nerf training rates a bit?

|||Egyptian is supposed to train faster, since their units are twice as weak.|||i mean generally game speed eggyptian are training faster but is a greek able to handle a 140/140 push if he has 80 pop?|||

Concidering slingers and camels specifically don't do much damage against things they don't directly counter, I'd say yes, 80 pop of greeks would slaughter that.

Greek Spearmen > Camel and slinger spam.

A good player will scout you out, see what your building and build counter units and tech accordingly. Item cards significantly change the way the game is played as well so there is no 'ultimate army!', spears with anti-infantry armour backed up by toxotes with extended range and snare will play significantly differently to an army that just stacks damage and relies on built in counters.

Egypt as a rule has a better economy and more spammy troops, Greek on the other hand get better troops.

Rock, Paper, Shotgun: AOEO Review

The RPS opinion is worth more than most other sites' combined. Mods should read the comments on the article for some nice feedback.

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/08/26/wot-i-think-age-of-empires-online/#more-71234

|||

Some great quotes:

'I guess that’s what I thought about the game and that’s all I can really say to you. Age of Empires Online is good. But it isn’t Utopia.'

'- On the implementation of many points-based systems of earning to which the world owes nothing and is made a poorer place in which to live.

Points. Numbers. Points. These are the spinal cord of any MMO and many games besides. Age of Empires Online is in love with points.'

|||

The game itself is great but the grinding just killed it for me during the beta. Has it improved to any extent? or is it still several hours in you find yourself finally being able to go to the 2nd age.
Trillbysays:08/26/2011 at 13:51
Nah, you get to the 2nd age lickety-split. But that is where I left it too, because the slow pace and the lamentable level design (kill 8 towers; collect 500 wood; build 10 spearmen), and also the total lack of any compelling narrative put me off. At least in the traditional WoW clone, you quickly build a sort of relationship with your character – here, you are simply following orders ad infinitum.

|||"Age of Empires Online is good. But it isn’t Utopia.

In Utopia, there are Celts."

An overall favourable review.

Game is a Rip Off.

I will start out by saying whoever designed the pricing sistem is a/are complete tool(s).

When i registered i had to select my country and it wasn't in the list so i ended up leaving it on the UK only to find out later i have to pay in Pounds witch is about 3 times more expensive than my own currency since the average wage in my country is about 110 euro per week ( 450 a month) .

For a new player that registers it doesn't state anywhere you in what currency you are supposed to pay i am sure if people knew this they would pick the lowest one ( probably USD ) and even that is pretty pricy but more affordable i mean come on 20 USD compared to 20 Pounds thats over 50% more expensive.

So why rip off people and charge them more for the exact same thing compared to other people why discriminate and have only a couple countries listed from that you can register , this is unprofessional to an extreme especially for a F2P game. I enjoyed the game up to lvl 10/11 but i am running out of space and i will never buy the civ pack at this price so i will end up leaving and other players like me will do the same.

There are a lot of other better games out there that aren't complete assholes to spend money on. Money is different in every country but value should always be the same everywhere.

|||

Why do you have to pay in pounds?

geee I don't know... maybe because you picked UK

as for your country not be on the list, well if its not there it means it means it's not supported and it's ilegal to lie about your infomation online AND you just put that out in the open on a microsoft forum.

*slow clap*

|||

@ jack pipsam that's rather stupid tbh, he just wants to play he can't help it his country isn't supported...

@ OP, Just try to sort this out with customer support, or select a country that shares your currency. Where you from? South Africa or something?

|||

I dont claim to know the ToU in and out but cant find anywhere about that its 'illegal' to not choose the correct country (which is not even on their list)

Closest I can find is about billing that you agree to keep your billing current at all times (which I believe can be changed if you log into your Live ID)

|||

I'm from Europe , but that is irrelevant . I won't contact support because this is just embarassing and unprofessional they obviously don't take their customers seriously if they decide to fix it good for them...

@ jack , sir you are stupid and have no idea what the word FREE means in F2P . And whos at fault i can't fill in my real country me or the people who designed all this put your thinking cap back on.

Also for those who will come in saying the game is F2P to spare me the time to type later here it is.

"Free-to-play can be compared topay-to-play, in which payment is required before using a service, andfreemium, a more general term and abusiness modelin which a product is offered free of charge while a fee is charged for users to access premium features."Freemiumis abusiness modelthat works by offering a game, product or service free of charge (such as software, web services or other) while charging a premium for advanced features, functionality, or related products and services.

GamePro had stated, in response to the costs, that "AoEO is the most expensive mediocre RTS ever made, defeating the entire purpose of taking the series free-to-play.

Is it me or is there Most expensive and Free in the same sentence .

PvP Automatic search

I don't like the automatic search definitely! And i'm sure i'm not the only one.

Devs, please give the players the possibility in their own city's arena (even if you want to keep the Sparta automatic one)

1/
to create (host and set) their own games, games that they can name
whatever they want (ie : " 1vs1 Expert", " no Peon Rush 2vs2 fun game", "Clan xxx vs ...")

2/to see the list of the games opened, or in game, with the list of the players in each game

3/ a lobby room where we can chat with others players joining the game while waiting the party to be full to lauch the game

It's the minimum a community need to exist in a str game !

|||Its called the Arena....you can host custom games - can choose teams + custom map.|||

And to find players, we have to flood every ten seconds the general channel ?

2 vs 2 Cool Game 1/4

2 vs 2 Cool Game 2/4

2 vs 2 Cool Game 3/4

...

|||You dont remember MSZone lol?|||

Sure i can remember :o)

I'm dreaming of it with the aoeo gameplay, not you ?

|||Sure I am!

Its just chats were spammed all the time just like you said before|||

I think that Sparta Arena is the best way for ranked matchs, anyway would be great a host gaming unranked system where u don't need to spam to play, just create the game with the rules u want.

But I think Sparta Arena is the best way to create a ladder :)

What to do at lvl40?

I've been lvl40 for like 6 days now, but there is like nothing to do, or is it just me? I'm wondering what other lvl40's are doing? I mean pvp is broken, nobody wants to coop Crete, and I got bored with doing the same quests on Elite over and over again, quite fast, especially since I only get crap loot anyway (except Lots of Rogues, which is nice and fast! :) ). So should we wait for the next patch, or? Suggestions!?
|||PvP|||except for the matchmaking, how exactly is pvp broken?|||

"except for the matchmaking, how exactly is pvp broken?"

Well, you give the answer in your own question...

"So should we wait for the next patch, or? Suggestions!?"

I guess you should be waiting for the next pack charged 10€ by now. It's time to make monney for microsoft.

|||Well there is hardly anyone playing pvp so it takes quite some time to find a match, and when I do find one it lags quite hard, could be me but I never have connection issues with any game.
|||The matchmaking alone won't stop me from liking the pvp.|||If your primarily interested in PvP, make some friends, join a clan, pioneer some strats that no one has thought of.
|||Kind of wondering that at Level 25. I love the game, but it seems that now the only quests available to me are the repeatables. Is there nothing new after Level 20. Playing Premium Greek. Sure wish they'd get Skirmish Hall out early. I fear that if they wait until the "Holidays", I may have to resort to getting a life.|||That should not happen. I am at lvl 21 and I haven't even started Argos yet, and there's Cypus after.
|||

Do you know what you have to do to access Cyprus?

|||

Do you know what you have to do to access Cyprus?

Get yourself to level 29 and it will show up as an available quest with the guy next to your palace(the building where you spend tech points).
|||Dont worry, theyll make us get lvl 60 soon, obviously, paying (joke 11) ... really, pvp is dead? :S:S
|||uninstall the game :)|||

@boy you have to collect 100 pine planks in order to get to troy.

@smartjack why should he uninstall?

@topic: play pvp or try the other civilisation out ;)

matchmating gets better if you played 10-20 games.

Level 40 gear

People whohavealready reach lv40 I was wondering how the epic shops lv40 gear compares to other epic lv40 gear? Is it worth spending empire points on the ones in the shop or is it a better idea to use the gear found in chests (in general I'm talking I know in some case the other one might be better than the one that usually is)|||

Generally the epic gear from the shops is very good.

If the epic gear from drops is better at all it's only by a very small margin.

|||Okay thanks. I thought I would find out so I can try and fine the best gear for my fast approaching level 40

Premium Vs Free

I just decided to start playing this game, I have been a huge fan of AOE for as long as It has been out. I was hoping there new game would go a different way but everything is online now so I am not surprised. Personally I was wondering what the difference is between a premium account and a free account. And what all the different ways are that this game has you spend money. I don’t mind spending money on a game but I am not someone who wants to spend money if it’s not worth it.|||

Premium is pretty much REQUIRED if you want to play competitively. You can only equip good gear and get higher tiertech if you're premium. Play a few levels before you make the decision however.

|||Andy is assuming you are only here to play PvP, the rest of us think the game is great, although it needs a tweek or 2.|||

Best advice i can give you is to try the game in free mode and determine if it offers you sufficient enjoyment, if you find yourself wanting to play despite the limitations, because say .. you love the game, then it may just be a good investment for you, but that's not something someone else can decide for you.

Try before you buy..

|||So far i am having lots of fun with the game, i have a few grudges with PvP (level 6 sent up against a level 22... wonder who won) But other then that i am enjoying myself. the 20 seems to be worth it as you get to fully unlock a entire civ.

Possible Spoiler of Things to Come?

In the description of Cyprus, it mentions having influences from Greece, Egypt, Persia and... Assyria. Hmm, Assyria? They could've included other obscure, more... island influential empires like the naval civs of Phonecia or Crete, but they chose Assyria. Maybe i'm overthinking things, or maybe Soylent Green ISNT people.|||I WANT ROMANSSSSSSS! *sob sob sob*|||I want assyria
|||I just wanted to point something nifty out is all... and create a lot of rampant speculation!|||They might have put it in to go here what could be then never do it XD but that would just be cruel doing that and I doubt they would. The chances are it might be over thinking. It is a bit like the fact the Defence of Crete hardest option islabelled40+ possibly hinting that they will raise the level cap in future. Only time will tell and they are both most likely nothing.|||I think 40+ just means you're godly or something... but this is just peculiar. Why Assyria of all empires to mention?|||I think your tin foil hat is on too tight. I should know, I just came from the Star Wars The Old Republic Release Date Speculation Thread :P
|||But... but I have evidence... and my hat is great, it grants stat boost!|||Before I pack up for Hurricane madness, I will say that if Asyria does become playable, at least it'd have a good story reason to go to Cyprus.

Only one way to get rare and epic crafting recipes...

Besides pure luck the only way to get rare and epic crafting recipes in this game is to hand your gold over to someone else, if you can even find someone with the recipe willing to sell it (I am not talking about the rare consumable recipes).

Does anyone else see how broken the system is?

|||EDIT: Before I let myself go, I'm just curious, what do you think it should be like?
|||

Before I let myself go, I'm just curious, what do you think it should be like?

You can buy rare and epic gear with empire points and faction points, why not rare and epic recipes?

|||Because then nobody would trade? No economy because there won't be a market anymore?
|||Seems dumb to me as well. Been playing since pre-release and have yet to see one epic workshop design. I would say the crafting system is broke.|||

I don't understand all the whine... It's an epic craft item, it's obvios it should be rarer (Is this proper expression? ) then weapons themself. A weapon is a one time sell, as if you get a recipe and start crafting the rare/epic items, you'll get a bunch of coins out of it, hence, you haven't got one yet.

Excuse my English please :)

|||

Because then nobody would trade? No economy because there won't be a market anymore?

In other games trainers teach the rare and epic recipes and they sell like crazy in trade chat and on the AH, I know that from doing it.

|||Any chance that game is WoW?

Quests keep bugging??

This keeps happening to me:

Theres a particular type of quest, that asks you to kill a specific unit on the map. Lets say for this example the quest asks you to kill 6 Guardian Hippokins.

You find the 6 enemy units on the map, you kill all of them and you look at the quest tracker and it says you only killed 4/6.

After that, i end up killing EVERY enemy unit on the map and the other 2 kills are just not possible to gain.

I have had this happen multiple times on multiple different quests, specifically the quests in Cyprus, is anyone else getting this?

|||Yeah, you're not the only one getting this. That problem already existed during beta, it still exists and I'm sure it will exists for the next months / years. Hours of wasted time because of that bug
|||I've done the same quest "Defeat Ledrai" from Cyprus 4 times now, each time it almost takes me an hour, everytime I kill the southern "General" I do not get the kill for it, so I can never complete the quest - I can not complete Cyprus because of this... I give up. Guess thats the end of my AoE career -.-|||

Try killing them in a different order.

It's a bug, and they're planning on fixing it.

|||This is a known issue that we're working to address in a future patch.

Parthenon blueprint

By mistake i deleted this blueprint and by the time i realized, it was already too late to use the undo sell tool. So if anyone drop one and its selling, plz answer this tread or give a in game mail. Also, if anyone knows how i can get it back, it would be must appreciated by my part.. kinda sucks knowing my town will nva have a Parthenon -_-
|||you cant get it back once you destroyed it. you can only undo aber you sold it.

Crafting - level limits?

Are there any limits for crafting in level of player? For example, can lvl 1 player build "School", learn lvl 40 craft recipe and craft it?
|||I think so...|||Recipes have a level restriction.|||I guessed that Recipes level restriction means what level you need to use this item, not level you need to craft it. Or the level of recipe means what level you need to craft it?
|||is it correct?
|||any idea?
|||The level requirement for a recipe is the capital city level you need to use and equip this item. There are no level restrictions for crafting things.

I really like the game.

However, I'm lucky if im able to get one game an hour.. unranked matches are full of newbs so I only play ranked. I get maybe one match an hour :(
|||well, that wont change anytime soon, since cause of the M$ policy game is loosing players everyday.
|||

Is not lesser games better than playing no games?

Gives you a chance to practice age times, different builds and what not. By the time you have everything down pat there might be a few more people playing ranked.

|||Which server are you playing on? On Marathon it doesn't usually take more than 5 min to find a game.|||i agree with OP, unranked is no fun cuz of nubs, ranked means not able to find games. I JUST WANT TO SPAM GOOD GAMES CUS I SUX BALLZ IN THIS GAME :(:(:(:(:(.
|||

Only going to get worse because people are leaving this game in droves. Soon, there's going to be no one in queues at all. Enjoy every battle you can get at this time.

|||lol people arent leaving this game in droves.. actually, the player amount is increasing every day.
|||

I disagree from what I've seen.

First few days game was full of players and coop missions everywhere, now I haven't been able to find a coop partner for 4 days.Chat is also quiet compared to release. Certainly all games have a "settling" period, but it feels a bit more that the game just doesn't deliver.

|||You bore us with the same post over, and over everyday. It must suck in life that the only entertainment is to come to a Microsoft board totroll.|||I'm sorry I forced you to read the forums.|||So your saying that he cant keep complaining because they wont change it? I usually thought that's what everyone does. Carry on with your threads.

pvp is a pile of...

I've given this game a chance. I've gotten to level 26, unlocked pretty much ever unit, even paid £20 quid for the *** premium. And I still can't easily jump into a 2v2 game with a friend. It's pathetic. You can't even play a pvp game while in a party. My only option is to go to the stupid arena and advertise a 2v2 game in general chat. And that just doesn't work. I've managed to get 2 people to join so far, only to have them leave because I'm a higher level than them.

It's pathetic. Back in AoE 3 I could easily host a game, invite my friends, put us all on the same team, and within a few minutes people would fill up the spaces and we could have a nice, balanced game.

In AoE online, which is marketed as a social game, I can only play with my friends if they are on the same server as me (a friend of mine had to restart his city just to play with me), and we can't do any ranked or unranked automatches in Sparta. We are forced into either waiting hours to find some people to play with on general chat, or doing 1v1s which are hopelessly unfair considering he's level 7.

AoE Online needs to allow parties in sparta. Even if it's only unranked, being able to play a quick game with a friend(s) is an ESSENTIAL part of a multiplayer game for me.

Oh, and the matchmaking and "trueskill" is a pile of crap. I've only lost 1 game so far (because it took me 1:30 to work out that I had to build a new TC when my first one got razed lol) and the rest haven't even been close.

Seems to me like they designed this game for the quests, city buildingand *** equiment, and added half assed pvp as an afterthought.

|||

gearing up and grinding levels to unlock units/upgrades and improve your army shouldnt be taken into account for pvp on an RTS game. Ultimately, the game will match low/high level players in even months down the road, causing "auto-wins" or "auto-losses" for teams. F2P players will get steamrolled by premium players in epics, the games will rarely be balanced between players. Idk why they thought exclusive world of warcraft system would be a great idea in this genre with no "vanilla" alternative to play a regular skirmish with the ability to use anything at your empire's disposal where skill and not gear/level/what you can and cant make or upgrade is not taken into account. Even if it awards no experience, no sparta points, no rank, or anything, this gear and level emphasis takes the fun factor out of an RTS game that has such great gameplay. Grinding level is tedious when a lot of quests entail starting from the ground up.

I was wow'ed by this game until I realized just how much time it will take to be at a point in the game i was in in Age of Empires 1 (which is being able to play against other players on even footing).

|||

"gearing up and grinding levels to unlock units/upgrades and improve your
army shouldnt be taken into account for pvp on an RTS game."

True.

In an MMORTS game though...yes. So what's your problem?! Ah yes, I see, you thought AoEO was a typical RTS. Oh too bad.

Bye then.

|||No, I caught on quickly that that was what it was. Doesn't mean the pvp is working in this system. Look at the forums. It's all complaints.
|||The game is great, i love it to death save for one part... PVP. I want to do pvp but when i join i get thrown into matches where people are 20-30 levels higher??? I was just talking to a level 22 who i got my butt kicked by (not to horrid he was cool about it) but he informed me that he and a level 35 had faced a level 5 and a level 9 in a 2v2 match. The PvP system needs to be based by level. lets face it when endgame comes who wins dark age of golden age?
|||Give it some time as the game was just released last Tuesday. Many players are still just questing and experiencing what the Single-player portion has to offer before they hop into Multiplayer.|||Your friend did not have to restart his city, you can transfer your cities to any server with the "Transfer Empire" button before you log in.
|||

That's what he tried to do, he said it made him level 1 again :/

To everyone else: I wasn't complaining about the equipment etc (although I hate it, I can accept that it is part of them game) but the system of pvp. First of all I want to be able to play with friends on other servers even if I can't trade with them or talk to them in general chat, and second (a much bigger problem) I want to be able to party up in unranked 2v2. It ruins the supposedly social experience this game claims to have when I am so restricted in what I can do with friends. Sure I can trade with them, but if I wanted to watch a bunch of icons with small numbers on them change hands, I could have bought a pack of cards for 99p. I play this for the pvp, and the pvp (especially with friends) is 100% bollocks.

|||

That sounds like a rather serious issue your friend had, did he report it to community@ageofempiresonline.com?

The currently most active PvP community is on the Marathon server. Yes, there are imperfections in the experience that we're working to address. Our content model allows us to make additions that will improve your PvP experience so thank you for the feedback.

|||Brutish....it takes five minutes to move your city to another server if you wish to play with someone there. Maybe that's too long for you, but if you plan it before you go to the restroom or whatever, it wont seem so long. Also....please keep in mind that this is both a brand new game, and that it's not a RTS.....it's an MMORTS...It's DESIGNED to be quest involved, with an economical system, rewards foraccomplishments, etc. It was never intended to be like the first 3 AOE's. I think you understand that part, so let that just be a general statement to those who obviously don't. However; keeping in mind that this is not just a standard RTS type pvp/pvc(player vs. computer), you should expect the pvp aspect of the game to relate to the MMO aspect of the game. If Microsoft desires to add an RTS style pvp system to the game, FOR people who aren't interested in the interactive society oriented portion of the game, then more power to them...but for you to expect it??? I don't think that's really fair. You had the chance to play for free and see what the system was all about, and should have seen the difference immediately. If the standard RTS style of interaction is what you desire in a game, why did you ever leave AOE 3 and come here in the first place? Just a question.....not trying to say "get out"...I genuinely wish to know why? Who knows???? It seems like many desire what you want....maybe not a ton of you demand it, but there are many who would like to see it...Maybe Microsoft will eventually give it to you. :)|||

Try reading my post maybe? My biggest complaint was that I cannot get into an easy game with friends. I specifically said in my last post that I'm not complaining about the MMO part of it or the equipment etc. I'm complaining that the matchmaking never finds me a fair opponent (in either level, skill or quality of equipment), sparta doesnt allow parties, the arena only works if you want to play against friends and not with them.

Although I don't like it, I can accept that is isn't the same as the last few AoE games. But if they are going to use the name AoE, they could at least have put effort into not losing features and functionality that were in the last few games. I'm not asking anyone to get rid of persistant cities, I just want pvp that isn't useless.

|||

Thanks for the reply.

He was only level 5 or something at the time, so it's not that big a deal. It was just an annoyance for him to have to do the first couple of quests again. I assumed that you always had to restart in order to move servers: if that's not the case and it was just a one-off bugthen I suppose that's ok.

Are you saying that partying up (at least for unranked 2v2s) is a likely addition? Or is it just something that is technically possible and will likely not happen?

|||

I agree and I am a game designer.

The gear part should be customization, not levelling up gears. that stuff belongs in MMORPGs

|||

I agree with the PvP options being really disappointing out of the gate. I had a friend of mine all ready to go with a premium purchase, but then I discovered how limited PvP really is. No teams in matchmaking, and no custom games at all save the basic private matches.

She backed out of the premium purchase, and we backed out of buying defense of crete. Now my friend has lost interest entirely and I've lost my co-op partner.

You know, I think I can understand what the thought process behind launching the game like this. You have all those co-op quests, launching with defense of crete, and you think the social aspect is well covered initially. Well it sounds good.

But a lot of people come to this genre for PvP.... against strangers, against friends..... sometimes both. The stuff RTS games have been doing for over a decade.

Maybe it's the evergreen model thing, but ah...... I think a lot of people are being turned away because a lack of PvP features. I hope theyprioritize it soon.|||this has been suggested a couple times i think: they should make pvp matchmaking cross servers, not only search on the server you are playing on. especially ranked pvp, because the highest ranked player could be on a server full of noobs, which makes it too easy to get a higher ranking.

How many people are in a server?

server stats anywhere? how many online now, how many people are part of a server...etc ??|||type /who
|||around 2k for each english server half for the other servers
|||What makes me feel worried is that there are only 309 players ranked... Aoc, wich is a 2001 game, has like 600 players all time, so like 1200 active players at least, here are 309 in all servers, pvp has a future here? :S
|||I got numbers from 2k-3k most of the time, but of course, not everyone is online at the same time, so the true number of players per server is probably much higher. As for ranked ladder, I honestly do not understand why make the separation. People are not going to play ranked without good gear, when they could play unranked instead and not "tarnish" their record.
|||

AZTCuRe wrote the following post at 08-27-2011 2:20 PM:

What makes me feel worried is that there are only 309 players
ranked... Aoc, wich is a 2001 game, has like 600 players all time, so
like 1200 active players at least, here are 309 in all servers, pvp has a
future here? :S

--------------------

Probably because no one wants to play PvP until they get to level 40. The average player is putting in a couple hours a day. So maybe in a month most active players will be at 40 and there will be more people PvPing. A lot of those people might also wait at 40 until they have a lot of epic gear. People always want to give themselves the best chance before playing ranked PvP.

Advisors

I'd like to get everyone's opinion on the best advisors for each age, from a PvPperspective if that matters. Thanks!|||It all depends on how you play... There's no right answer.|||

Obviously, but I'd just like some opinions on what people are finding to work for them!

Problem empire people

Hello, I have a problem that when I want to visit an empire of a person, he says to me that I cannot that it is due to the configuration of network and not as solving it thanks

I have moderate nat

|||

This should be in Game Support but since I'm here.. :)

While in the game click the HOME button. The GFWL screen will drop down. Click SETTINGS then NETWORK.

What does UPNP say?

What does NAT say?

|||I think there might be some mis-communication here as the poster doesn't appear to be natively english speaking, i think what he is getting at(and i by all means could be wrong) is that his privacy settings prevent him from communicating with other players and viewing their capital.

That's usually a privacy setting configured inside the xBox live account, i know this because i had mine set to friends only myself, until playing AoEO which basically forced me to change that setting just so i could communicate with other players in-game.

If that's not what he's getting at, then i'd say you have it covered Bill... ;)

Blueprints becoming unusable?

I had four Medium Greek Residences in my inventory while I collected the delphi stone needed to use them and figured out what I wanted to do with them.

I just looked at them, and now they require 8 oak planks...and are grey and labeled 'unusable.' What happened? How do I fix this?

|||I also had some of my blueprints turned unusable, do they come with expiration date or something?|||

It's an old bug. In an old beta build some decorations were literally listed as "junk" randomly when sometimes it shows the proper description as "decoration".

Logout and login again and see if there is any change.

|||

It took me three login attempts but now they're back to normal.

Wow that is annoying.

|||Definately a bug, i remember that myself from beta(it's one of several bugs that are still present unfortunately).

Hopefully it's a trivial problem(in terms of coding) and will be fixed in the next patch.|||*** I sold mine lol, well at least from now on I'll know better than to sell them.

Seperate free and premium pvpers?

as you may have noticed, there are alot of people saying its a pay2win game. becouse for example a premium lvl 40 player will always win against a equaly skilled f2p lvl 40.

why we dont just seperate them? f2p can only play unranked matches, while premium only can play ranked matches. nobody can say anymore that you have a pay2win game and it will make much more fun for f2p players.

|||EDIT: delete this post pls
|||NO! I pay and I need to win!|||

"NO! I pay and I need to win!"

Lol

|||They wont do that because there gonna be no reason for f2p players to upgrade their account.|||oh there are reasons...
|||sorry but that will never happen, do that and no edge=no reason to pay= unhappy microsoft.|||

well, maybe that would motivate them to make content which is worth the money instead of mere advantages. i did get premium, but i did it mainly for the extra units, and was disappointed to find that there is a lot less actual content than i thought. it's mostly %age boosts to units, not real content.

in short, they spent almost zero effort on making the premium content.

|||

You cant seperate the two because then premium owners wouldnt have PvP until level 25 which is when you're allowed to do ranked.

People just need to deal with it or pay, its that simple. And any idiot can still lose with a premium civ, same as any smart person can win without one, having premium doesnt guarantee a win, although someone being higher level provides alot more advantages against someone whos lower but that happens with or without premium.

About time!

http://www.own3d.tv/live/63791

1.30 hours of eggie gameplay

enjoy

|||

About time is over stay tuned for more streaming in the near future !

|||Nice for you to do this, especially so that I have something to watch when there's downtime with MLG. Watching a high master's play is just...... impressive.

Duck Tron?

So I was playing an Argos quest solo, when all of the sudden the sound clip from Duck Tron starts playing (search for Duck Tron on Youtube).

I didnt have anything else running, so it had to be from the game. Is this supposed to be some weird easter egg? I have no idea what triggered it.

|||As far as I know nothing like this is in the game. At least it wasn't in the beta/pre-release. A way to make sure it's not the game, mute Spartan.exe while running the game in Windows Volume Mixer. This way you can rule out it's the game or not.
|||Duck rolled

Second Premium Civilization

Hey I was wondering if we already passed the tutorial-like quests in first civilization, why is that we need to do it again for the second premium civilization? Isn't it a bit redundant? What about future civilizations, are we gonna need to do tutorials for each of them though we already know them by heart?|||There will be pro civs that will start you at level 20, for the same price or so as a premium civ.

Co-Op

Co-Op is not showing the quest to the secondary person. Only way to get thedescription is to ask the party leader. This should be fixed as to stop confusion.

|||It shows if you both have the quest in your quest log. If it is not showing, that person is not on the quest, and is just there to help.|||

Yes, I know that.. I've completed the quests and I'm helping others. Just to add, same thing happens if you're Greek and helping on an Egyptian quest as the quest is not available to your civilization. As more people complete quests or help with cross civilization quests this can become an issue...

You cannot save during a quest??

I have been looking forward to the release of AOEO for a long time, but already, I see one huge glaring flaw with it that boggles my mind. If you are disconnected while doing a quest, it does not save your current state so you can return to it - it resets it. WTF?? I was just disconnected 10 minutes into a quest, and now have to start from the beginning. How on earth could they release a game that does not even save where you are currently at? Am I missing something?
|||Well, no, you cant save during a quest. Quests are usually done in 10mins - 1 hour ish, but yeah, its not fun if you get disconnected when you are almost done with it. But then again, i have never got disconnected during a quest, so no idea how you feel. =p
|||Because it's an MMO. You can't save persistent progress, so if you disconnect then you have to start the quest over again. It's much like how in WoW, if you disconnect during an instance, your group probably isn't going to wait for you, and so will kick you out. The progress you'd made during that would be lost, and you'd have to start over.
|||

If you are going to make the WoW comparison, it would be like losing any quest progress you make on any quest if you don't complete it before signing out. It is a ridiculous design decision, especially with how unstable the servers seem to be. I have been disconnected twice so far.

I am fine with not being able to save my progress on my own, but it should allow you to resume where you were if you are disconnected.

|||True enough. That actually would be a pretty good suggestion.
|||This was brought up during the beta. I think you will find it was alot lower on the priorities list than other things. Its also is alot of work to integrate something that might occasionally save you a couple of minutes completing a quest. Whilst it would be great to have, Id rather see them making progress on more integral parts of the game.
|||They should try to make this a higher priority because paying customers like me won't invest any more time in this game until a feature like resume from disconnect is implemented.. it is disheartening to see you get to almost the end of a quest and then get disconnected for no reason, just because your internet connection has a little hiccup.
|||Quests are very short, i would prefer an offline mode were you can complete the quests you have already gotten personally.

Quick Question Regarding Recipes

Who controls the Recipe (like a Workshop or School Recipe for instance) after it has been activated, The City or The Building? In other words if you pack it up into a blueprint and ship the blueprint to another players city does that player have to buy that recipe or is the recipe already coming along with the blueprint since it was already used.|||

I would very much like to know this as well actually :)

It would make alot more sense that it's stored on your account, server-side though, but with this game anything is possible xD

|||Can you sell crafting schools? Never tried.|||I doubt it seeing as everyone gets them and they stay in your city when you switch to another school. Also it prevents farmers from sending the schools not in use to new accounts. Otherwise you would see a lvl 1 nationwide pandemic just for schools.

So the new civilization need to pay money ?

So the new civilization need to pay money ? i am a player don't usually pay money in games i just think if the new civilization need to pay

lots of free players will out with AOEO. Although AOEO is a good game but there aresomany limit, and there aretoo less players in game.It is hard to find a coopplayer for quest/pvp match in spata.

Is this game really for free? I don't think so!

a online game : usually there have 60%players or maybe more who will not pay to play. Don't give up this 60% because if we don't get this 60%

who can the premium player defeat?

One more thing i wana to say isabout the 40Lv.

I have a 40Lv greek civi and when i reached 40Lv i can't gain any more exp soit is mean less for slove quest ..and therehave no defferents with otherthat are notreach the max Lv? Its disapointed me.And i tried to PVP at spata ,its hard to find a match and when i found they saw i am 40level some of them will surrender at the begining ... plz give me a clearaim for leveling up=]

I wana to say thatIstill like this game ~.~

p.s. my english is sucks-.- hope you guys can understand my words:P

|||

Celt can be played free, while Persians is premium only. They may or may not release more free content or levels later on for existing civs, that remains to be seen, but I take it that you have done each quest at least once? Also, have you tried the elite quests?

As for who can the premium player defeat? If you played like me, probably not many people, even if they are playing free.

PvP hopefully will get better when they fix a few things, and as more people reach lvl 40.

|||The Persians are going to be a "pro" civ, meaning you need to pay to play them at all and they start at level 20. The Celts as mentioned above will work just like Greece and Egypt, you can play them for free or upgrade them to premium.

RTSGuru.com Review Scores AoEO an 8 out of 10

RTSGuru.com score AoEO an 8 out of 10

http://www.rtsguru.com/game/255/features/189/Age-of-Empires-Online-Review.html

Review Summary:

Great game. Fun to play and above average in quality. You should try it.

Age of Empires Online is hugely entertaining, highly innovative, and immensely successful but greed has slightly mired the experience.

|||After looking through all thenegativeposts this has made my day.|||

Yeah, it all depends. If you get a reviewer who just wants another version of AOE that you install, sign up for the multi-player match-making server, and start playing full tech battles, then they're going to be disappointed even though they're not understanding what AOEO supposed to be. I think it's worth a shot to try and expand the RTS genre to a larger audience.

I loved AOE I and II, but the truth is that I didn't play them that much and tried PVP a grand total of two times. StarCraft II? It was interesting for a bit, but I didn't make it through the Single Player campaign. So that's another $60 sitting on my shelf collecting dust.

So far, things seem to be going OK. Just pay attention to chat. There are people playing this game who have NEVER played an RTS game. They don't know how to create units, move their peasants, or anything else they're supposed to be doing! Time will tell whether or not this experiment will work.

|||

Hmm "greed has slightly mired the experience"

$100 is greed? And you not wanting to pay is not greed?

I never knew the center of this universe revolved around them

|||

I had to post it after seeing people posting the negative ones. An 8 out of 10 from RTSGuru is great :)

|||

No body plays this game for over a week and gives it over 5/10

The only reason is the slow progress and the lack of skirmish mode.

They need to re do the elephant model too... looks like a fat cartoon ball and it's just terrible.

and only 2 civs?

at launch they needed the following:

at least 3 civs

skirmish mode

better pvp system

They actually released theCretedefence before skirmish? lol, seriously what's more AOE like? skirmish or the defence booster pack? pathetic...

|||

Boss Brood

An 8/10 is an OK score. For an Age of Empires game it's pathetic. The fact that the best you could find was an 8 proves many peoples point that the game sucks and is poorly conceived as a money trap.

|||

An 8/10 is an OK score. For an Age of Empires game it's pathetic. The
fact that the best you could find was an 8 proves many peoples point
that the game sucks and is poorly conceived as a money trap.

Orly? You may want to look at the scores of the previous games before you call it pathetic. lol

|||

http://www.metacritic.com/search/all/age+of+empires/results

AOE 2 = 92

AOE 3 = 81

AOEO = 72

AOE 1 not listed, but I'd say it deserved to be in the 90s because it was awesome at the time. The numbers speak for themselves.

|||9/10... I guess I am nobody.|||

agree with the review, don't agree with the value. It should be somewhere between 6-7/10.

Misunderstanding comes mostly from the "free to play" statement, and paying so much for the future content sucks ballz. I understand paying 20$ for premium, and maybe 20 more in future for the content i would need or want to try, but paying 100$ or 20$ now and another 20$ on the next patch and another 20$ on the next one won't bring you players into this game.

|||He probably gave it 8/10 because he never got past level 10 when the questing turns abysmal.|||

As a MMORTS, AoEO has to please RTS fans and MMO fans. It's not RTS fans or MMO fans, as many people think here -at least in these forums, a real nest of whiners and trolls: the silent pleased majority isnt wasting his time here-

I happen to be a RTS and MMO fan. Played both. For long. Very long. And I really enjoy AoEO.

9/10 for me, a lot more to come from this always evolving MMO, which made also a solid RTS.

|||

the silent pleased majority isnt wasting his time here

Does that mean you arent as pleased as you think you are with the game? Just an observation by your post. As you put it anyways

|||People trolling in the forums seem to have fooled themeselves into thinking they are fighting a holy war against every injustice in the world from over priced games, greed, and deceptive advertising, they fail to notice most people are happy. The coregame playis great, the game is evergreen, it's addictive, andincrediblyfun.

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Villagers....

Would it be possible to hotfix the Villagers life to half of what it currently is now? Maybe 75 life instead of 150. With easily obtained gear, advisors, and upgrades; I see Villagers with well over 375 life rushing within the first few minutes of a PvP game. And completely winning. Maybe look at their bonus damage on buildings too?
|||Hehe,, the solution to villager rushes is not a major nerf to villagers like you want, but learning the proper strategy to counter the vill rush. Repair your town center is key.|||anx5 bonus damage for the tc wont hurt either|||

I understand how to defeat a Villager Rush. Even so, it's still "iffy" and more to the point, a completely unacceptable strategy for a game like this. To boil the potential strategies of this game into a Villager Rush is sad, sad, sad. But....it happens...ALOT.

Villagers NEED a nerf. They have more life than some military units and can deal decent enough damage to be obnoxious. Remove the temptation and nerf Villi's back to their intended purpose.

I don't mind a rush...but I do mind a brainless tactic completely enabled by a lack of game balance.

|||People who get villager rushed have to fix their RTS skills. You are supposed to have barely the same amount of villagers than the oppoment + you have the forum! Learn to micro your workers, attack, repair (repair is incredibly powerful for the moment). Their villagers cannot prevent you from repair AND destroy the forum at the same time.|||When I see a villager rush, I type "RIPTHX4PTS EZEZEZEZEZ"
|||I'm pretty sure you didn't do that when I villager rushed you... (Didn't end well for me but I suck)|||I thought you are supposed to type BIT BY BIT!!!
|||The problem is that villagers have a huge damage bonus to buildings which doesn't make any sense to me. It's really apparent in the defend the pyramid challenges, where 10 angry villagers can quickly destroy the pyramid even with 30 villagers working on it (my first attempt I didn't know they were coming).
|||

Yeah, oglix brings up a good point. The tc should have some kind of bonus vs. villagers.

It's not like anyone would ever town center rush...

|||

Every time i see the noobie vill rush i type after counter the attack... " keep your noobie, childish play style" and then they resign...

I don't and will never accept this noobie play style...oooh i beat someone! how did you beat them? i used my vills 2 mins into the game...

What the heck is the point of having MILITARY buildings and MILITARY units if your going to win like this..instead of having warriors on the loading screen just put villagers picking berries.

you canjustifyyourself all you want i don't care. The fact is they'll nerf villagers eventually..

I would rather earn my win than against a childish play style.

Fortress units: how good are they?

Hi there

sorry for the misleading title of the thread: in fact, I didnt want to ask if they are good or not, cause they are obviously good, but how good in the long run, compared to non-fortress units?

Just the example of the greek anti-buildin unit, the Somatophylax: is it wise to produce them in Age IV? Or are they still better to standard barrack units then, even if you cant equip items on them?!

Thanks for sharing your point of view on the subject :)

|||

107 views, zero replies.

I'll start to think that what someone said is true: forums are populated only by the whiners and trolls.

Please reply if you have any kind of thought about these units. Thanks!

|||

Once you have full epic gear most of theadviserunits become pointless.

Early game, levels 10-35 they're pretty good.

|||

I would agree with gman's answer. For much of the leveling up process, many ofthe advisor units seem better. Some of the units are rather unique and fun to use. After getting epic gear I belive you are better off using advisors with economic benefits or military boosts.

The Greek Heteroi and Pezheteroi, the Egyptian Desert Swordsman aresome that many would consider perhaps worth using even in end game.

|||they get pretty useless in pvp if every1 has epic gear, but you can use still use them in quests like lots of rogues- elite or breaking eggs to make an omlett.
|||

Armored Elephants+Speed Consumable+Old General Heron = Luv

well, now that we cant use consumables anymore in pvp and heron was uber nerfed, i guess its not as good as it used to be

still an awesome unit though, those elephants. and kopesh swordsmen will easily beat all but the most souped up upgradedinfantry with ease. and who upgrades thier hypastist past lvl 3 anyways

stange about the heliopolis though, no one likes? pretty good stats even at age 4

|||Epic adviser units are supposed to be comparable to wearing epic level 40 equipment with all tech upgrades according to a dev post. I got a blue adviser for building the desert horsemen early on and they were ridiculously powerful (over 1000 health, like 75 DPS IIRC, my camals at 20 are like half that still). I just got an epic desert archer adviser last night, haven't had time to play around with them yet.
|||

If you have a rare or epic quality unit adviser that fills a roll that your army tech doesn't have, it can be an efficient way to make your army more well rounded.

Also upgrades from blacksmith affects them, so they do scale pretty well thanks to that.

I wouldn't touch uncommon or common ones though.

|||

The Khopesh Swordsman at age IV for egypt are really really good. They do bonus damage against infantry like the axemen, but their bonus is probably higher since that is usually the case with the "very good against xxxx" units. I only have the green advisor for them, and they have like 900 hp, i wanna say 29 dps, and only cost 40 food and 40 gold. Imagine what the champion version would be like? I don't think my axemen would be able to compete no matter what gear I put on them.

Downside is that they come out of the fortress. So they are a lot harder to mass up or replace than axemen.

|||they are quite imbalanced. The train time for desert swordsman is about half of a slinger, gotta be kidding me!|||Their trained from a building considerably more expensive and harder to spam then a barracks, with 4 barracks the train time for slingers isbetterthen desert swordsman. For me stomyphalanx seem to just steam roller any kind of defensive structure, they make the "Destroy the fort" quests really easy, even elite units don't have as much health as them.|||

What's your "technic" for collecting the blue/purple fortress unit cards?

Random chests?

|||Kryptophoros wrote the following post at 08-27-2011 11:20 PM:

What's your "technic" for collecting the blue/purple fortress unit cards?

Random chests?

Buying them in trade. So far I bought Epic Roamer Djer (desert cavalry) and Rare Helepolis Engineer.

Cavalry are disgustingly good at quests. They spam pretty fast too.

[Suggestion] The Mediterranean Dock: The Quest Home

The Mediterranean Dock.

This new faction should be home to one of the continous wonders of the world. Here at the Mediterranean Dock, you can challenge your friends to complete some of the hardest quests known: The Quest YOU Create! Yes that's right, here at the Mediterranean Dock you should have the ability to complete quests created by your friends. At different levels throughout the game you should unlock new parts to the Quest Creator that make your Quests the Best in the World. There would be a leaderboard for you to follow that keeps track of how many players have played your quest. There could be a wide, online storage of quest created by your friend or maybe someone on the other side of world. Explore the dimensions of your friends imagination by doing his quests and recieving REWARDS!!! Yes that is right REWARDS. There would a Mediterranean Faction Point, that allows you to buy new parts to your quest creator. Also here at the Mediterranean dock You can create your own Maps and Scenarios.

For many people, they get bored at level forty. If at about level 10 this faction is unlocked, and you get new equipment through leveling then this could easily be a long time consumer for many players. Players would love this game, because they could create there own quests and explore the quest creator by playing all sorts of different quests. Also there are many people who love to play scenarios, so there could be a building where hundreds of scenarios are stored for you to scan through and choose the one you would like to play the most.

BUT WAIT THATS NOT IT!!!

There also could be a CO-OP compatible mode for the scenarios where you can go to scenarios with a friend. Some scenarios would require multiple players to play, so there could be a quick search just for scenarios and quests(some quests may require a friend too). And don't forget the "Testing Building" where you could test out new Scenarios and Quests.

ANYBODY LIKE??? POST HERE!!!

* And for those of you who are on strike and just post negative comments about this game, please don't post about how terrible this game is in this topic. This topic is strictly for the purpose of finding out if people would like this idea of being able to create quests and scenarios in a different faction where you could choose for the reward(with GPG agreement of the Reward).

*and who knows, maybe in the future there could be a unit creator that is added???*

|||I was tempted to just ignore the thread, on one picky reason alone.. the title does not describe the content of the thread(use a descriptive title - it's what they're for). It's a good idea you have there, you're really not doing it justice by using an eye-catching(but poorly descriptive) title. I point out the title issue as a means of constructive criticism, as like i said already, i like your idea.|||

sounds like an ok idea, but i have a feeling they would charge extra for that even if you had a premium account.

my one question: how would they make sure the rewards were not out of proportion? it could be abusable if you made a quest with 50k exp reward that takes only 1 minute to do. how would you stop that?

EDIT: i just realised you wanted the rewards to be points for the quest creator rather than xp. but it's still abusable: if someone wanted to unlock all of the quest creator options they would just get a friend to make a fast, easy quest and farm it.

|||

After each quest is finished in the produciton stage, the quest is sent to GPG with your idea of a suitable award amount. These quests could also give xp with it.

P.S like the title now?

|||Having user created scenarios would take away from money gotten from their Booster packs, hence this most likely will not be added, sadly.|||

a nice idea, espicially about having a totally seperateregionjust forscenarios,although id prefer to have the traditional scenario editor avalible in the main menue formorecontrol and ease of useand beingable to work on it offline for people with bad connections

would love to also be able to play scenarios in the skirmish hall with freinds!

"Having user created scenarios would take away from money gotten from their Booster packs, hence this most likely will not be added, sadly"

ah, josh, you ruined it :( atleast let me imagine ill be able to play fort wars in aoeo, such awesome battles

|||Without real rewards their will always be an incentive to get booster packs.|||

Well rewards can be very minimal and maybe couldn't provide any gear. Maybe this could just be a "add-on" shop that way you can do more when creating quests and scenarios.

Rotating Buildings In Your Main City?

Hey Fellow Players Of Age Of Empires Online, I Just Have A Quick Question, And A Quick Answer (If Possible Would Be Nice). I've Searched Up This In The Groups, And Didn't Find What I Was Really Looking For, So The Question Is; Is It Possible To Move Buildings In Your Main City (Out Of Quests/Campaigns)?

Thanks For The Answers In Advance.

|||I discovered how to do this just now. Use the mouse wheel to rotate the building.
|||

Right On, Thanks Man. I For Some Reason, Just Can't Stand The Placement When You Could Make Room Simply By turning A Building >.>...

Again, Thanks A Lot.

how do you train fortress units?

I click my fortress and there are no units there to train... yet I hear about these special units you can get from there! I am premium greek.|||You need an advisor that gives that unit.

(PvE) Wololo Report: Synergy of the Egyptian gods

After hitting Lvl. 20, I've been extensively using priests all the way up to level 30. I must say, there are some impressive results (only regarding PvE though, haven't tried Golden Age PvP, though Set priest villie sniping still continues to be of use).

I've made a new discovery between the Bros of the Egypt: Set and Ptah. I've mentioned in another place that the Insanity! mechanic is the same as the Convert mechanic, except it changes your enemies to a "Treasure Guardian" type of unit. The power isn't that your opponent lost a unit, but that the computer, unlike us players, does NOT have any equipment! Therefore, you've made an enemy significantly weaker than before, being an easier target!

However, the importance of Insanity! is best exploited with one guy, the Priest of Ptah. I don't know whether this is a bug or not, but it is worth sharing: Insanity units converted to your side, are fully healed. Otherwise, usually converted units are so damaged that they don't make a difference at all. Converting an elephant or hippikon from 5% to 100% hp is significant. As much as I like priests, I don't think that this was intended, and may need fixing. Otherwise, it creates another function to making sure you infect as many melee units with Insanity!. Note: I've usually had 10 Ptah priests when combat begins, usually losing 1 or 2 to ranged units. Using converting priests is an all or nothing tactic until you have enough priests there.

A little strategy I've placed together for Age 4:

I've used this ratio in making an attack squad: 5 Ptah, 3 Set, 1 Ra. So far, it has been very effective. On the first Cyprus quest, I lost twice trying to spam Camels and Spearman. Finally, I resorted to my usual strategy, and it worked amazingly well. Whatever ground I gained with my priests, I kept. However, I'm highly envious of the Greeks since they get the Staff of the Horse for their priests. Would've made this level incredibly easy spamming them in Age 3.

|||Aren't 'insane' troops a threat to your own soldiers too, not just the enemy? If so, I wouldn't want to go restoring an elephant to full health that turns on you lol. xD|||

This is very interesting...

And especially with proper micro the neutral units can be almost alwayscoercedinto doing what you want...

|||@BFJoshua2: He is saying to inflict insanity to an elephant, than converting it with a Priest of Ptah...
|||

might actually be a use for insanity. So far, i've been very unimpressed.

Yay, i just turned a unit neutral who was on the front line so that he could... uhh.. keep attacking me like he was before. yay.

The fact that they lose all gear advantages is something i had missed. So maybe i'll bring some Sets along in the future. I'm still not convinced they are worth it though.

Oh, and I know Ptah has an area effect convert. But has anyone ever actually seen him convert more than one guy?

|||

I think the general consensus is that it's more like splash effect
than area effect. Using one Ptah, I find that as soon as you convert
one, a few will follow a little bit afterwards. But most of the time, I'll have more than 10 priests, so it's really hard to know. With a group of them, I've seen up to 5 guys convert at the same time.

I agree...Set priests are still iffy, but I'm trying to work out all of the utility possibilities with them. They can't save the day the same way a Ptah priest can. My Ptah priest has 1k HP...literally a brick wall.

How many of you guys actually make it to Age 4 in PvP or PvE?

Random Thought: PvE...Protoss vs. Egypt? o.O

|||i've seen one ptah convert 2 houses and a spearman in one conversion. but that was with epic lvl40 staff, and it was in beta

Why do thay say that it's a pay2win game?

I dont get it. Really.

I've played a couple of pay2win games. They are REALLY different then AoEO. There you can spend up to $10 for a SINGLE battle. Ofc most players spend moderate sums of $0,1-$0,5 per battle (which is still huge considering amount of such battles), but there are some rich people that like feeling themselves "Gods Walking Amongst Mere Mortals" for whatever it costs. I have personally watched one lady spending $1000 during one day (lottery for rare in-game items). And players who dont pay anything are simply meat shields for ones who does. Or they "mine" 6 hours per day for 1 hour of PvP.

Why do they say that AoEO is pay2win game? You can buy a premium civ for freaking $20 and feel completely comfortable in both PvP and PvE. The game is yours FOREVER. You'll might want to buy another civ, booster packs, skirmish hall etc, but thats gonna be a purchase of CONTENT. Not WINS. In sc2 you pay $60 to play the game. Here for $60 you can buy both civs, crete defense and possibly skirmish hall. Its even MORE than you need for playing.

I have personally bought premium civ and I'm happy with what I got. Thats all I need for PvP.

|||People call it pay 2 win cause premium do better then free, your right, it's not true p2w.|||It is pay2play actually, not pay2win. Consider free account as demo.|||

I think it's because AOEO is attempting to be a solid competitive game, but the business model is setup in a way that could be pay2win. Heavy gear reliance and updates (boosters) that might need to be purchased in order to compete.

It certainly isn't as bad as some P2Ws but it has that potential if GPG really tries to squeeze its player-base for cash.

|||

Its actually Microsoft who determines financial policy, not GPG.

And I think it's too early yet to judge about buisness model. For now I see no reason to buy Crete Defense if I want to play only PvP. The difference will be immaterial.

|||It because people stupidly thought that Microsoft, the company known to be so greedy/money taking that it is often called "Micro$oft" (I am sure it's no one on the AoE:O team though), would make all content to this game free (or the gameplay elements at least).|||It's pay2win because you need to spend money in order to gain a significant advantage over players who don't spend money. There is no way that a free player will be able to get the same power as a paid player.Do you get it now?|||

FreeLancerXD wrote

You can buy a premium civ for freaking $20

Well most people can not. Here it is from 28-35$ for one civ that means 30$ for just a littel part of the game.

|||The game is p2w because you have to buy a premium civ in order to be competitive and can't buy premium items with in-game money.|||

I don't have any rare gear and haven't bought a premium and I win 5 out of 6 games, even against higher level premium people. I hope you guys realize all the gear isn't THAT good, like for spearmen something that boosts 37% dps only adds 3dps, normal gear that boosts 24.4% only boosts 2 dps.Regular gear is quite common so at most you are getting a 1dps advantage which is gone if you don't tech up through the blacksmith and the other player does. These are negligible differences that can be nulled by better micro and strategy.The joke is on you if you think you suck because you don't have gear, you just suck and have something to scapegoat, consider that.

I play this game for the strategy element, its great and just like oldschool AOE, thedecisions, control of the map, and adapting to your opponents units is how to win the game. I could care less for the gear and have better things to do than grind which is good, I don't need to.

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here's a couple of premium advantages for you:

+50 stone, wood and gold at the start of a game. half price farms. cheaper and more powerful towers, storehouses, docks. all units are permanently faster and have more health andhigher damage, can critical hit, and can regenerate health automatically. free resources for owning a market. half price academy upgrades. and that's just the star techs.

advisors can give you 65% off storehouse economic upgrades, 20% cheaper villagers, 10% more range on all archers, 15% faster training of any unit type, 20% more caravan income, unique units (including hetairoi which are the only unit which demolishes siege)...

and then you have the ridiculously powerful epic equipment. i've seen plenty of weapons which give units 60%+ more damage, plenty of armour that gives more than 60% more health. did you realise that a 25% boost to health and damage costs 1800 resources ingame and can only be bought in age 4? this gives you more than DOUBLE the benefit, costs NOTHING ingame and is already given to you at the start of the game. someone could put such good equipment on their units that a F2P player would have to buy all the upgrades ingame just to be on the same level as the starting units of the P2P player.

if the premium player is even close to the skill level of the f2p player, they are almost certainly going to win. hell, if a player has the premium civ, lots of star techs,and a bunch of epic equipment and epic advisors focused on one unit type, i would not be surprised if that unit could take out it's own counters from a F2P player for 1:1 cost/cost ratio.

pay to win.

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Schlepph0denwrote:
Here it is from 28-35$ for one civ that means 30$ for just a littel part of the game.

Guys, here's the deal... I've just bought the Premium Greek with MS Points purchased from an online reseller, because my country is not supported in windows/xbox marketplace. And guess what, I paid 30$ for 2100 points, so the 1200 points used for the premium civ were just 17$ (that's US dollars). Consider this option instead of buying with credit card or paypal in Europe, where the price for a premium civ would be 20 EUR (approx 29 USD).

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hell, if a player has the premium civ, lots of star techs,and a bunch of epic equipment and epic advisors focused on one unit type, i would not be surprised if that unit could take out it's own counters from a F2P player for 1:1 cost/cost ratio.

Now lets see,

Spearman with optimal anti hypapist level 40 epic gear

400 health 21.5 dps .30 armor vs. melee. 54 food cost, 18 gold=72 resources

Hypapist with optimal anit infantry uncommon gear

353 hitpoints,13 dps,.35 armor vs. melee,2.26% critical hit chance,150% extra damage to infantry,30 food 25 gold cost=75 resources

say for every say a player has 1,000 super resource which can be used as any resource

1,000/72=14 spearman

1,000/75=13 hypas

14*400=5,600 total health

13*350=4,550 total health

21.5 dps-35%~14 dps

32.5 dps-30%~22.5 dps

14*14=196 group dps

22.5*13= 292.5 group dps

Assuming all units are able to attack simultainiusly and damage is distributed evenly

5,600/292.5= a little over 18 second to inflict that much damage with that much dps

4,550/196= a little less then 23 seconds to inflict that much damage with that much dps

Therefore if a f2p player uses hard counters they will beat a p2p player.

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As far as the current state of the game goes, complaints probably stem from the marketing of the game as 'free to play'. If you're serious about the game, pay your $20 (or whatever regional pricing is, $25 here in Australia) and you'll be on the same even playing field as everyone else. Otherwise, well, you're still getting what amounts to one hell of a demo. Either way, nothing to complain about for anyone who knows better than to expect everything for nothing.

The real test of the integrity of the model will be when new civilizations are released. If the Celts and Persions are overpowered in PvP, if you need to upgrade to one of them to stay competitive, it will be becoming 'pay to win'. I think balance is going to become a very flammable topic, and something a lot more people could more reasonably become indignant about.

People already get hugely upset in games like SC2 where their favourite race feels underpowered, just because that's the one they want to play and win with. How much worse would it be if it's the one civ you've paid for and put time into that now looks underpowered compared to people paying for newer ones?

People complaining now about 'pay to win' are pretty laughable, but if the developers don't tread carefully, it might start looking like less of a joke.

|||If past trends are any indication the new civs will be the best. AoE3 for example, Iroq, sioux, japs, india, china, aztecs, all some of the best if not the best