Tips and Tricks Realm

Many players build walls, but better players build double or triple rows of walls. If you don't have the resources, you can also build houses or other structures behind the walls, slowing down your opponents' advance. To send units along a pre-selected path, choose waypoints for your units. Hold down SHIFT and right-click all the points you want your units to follow. When you finish selecting the path, let go of SHIFT, right-click and the units will take off to follow the path. Appoint a Villager as Repairman. You can repair a ship that is being attacked if that ship is close enough to shore. Human players are usually smart enough to destroy the Villager, so be careful. Be ruthless, even with your own men. If a Villager has outlived his usefulness, press the DELETE key to remove him and open up another unit slot. Grouping forces by type enables you to plan battles with precision. Groups that are too large will get in each other's way, so keep the groups small and mobile. CATAPULTS GOOD!! There's nothing more satisfying than hearing the fwoom-thump of the catapult's arm firing its stone at your enemy. Get some, and get them fast. Catapults are dangerous enemy units, so you need your own counterbalancing force. Build a Stable and Archery first. Archers are good base soldiers, and the Stable will provide a Scout. Use the Scout as a sacrificial explorer, running around the map to find resources and enemy locations. Go after your enemy's Villagers. They're easy to kill, cost money to reproduce and will put a serious crimp in your opponent's resource gathering. If you're an Artifact Collector, protect them by loading them onto a ship and hiding that ship in a protected waterway. Pay attention to the terrain. You can use some terrain like cliffs and water as defenses. And remember that high ground in AOE matters. Weapons fired from high ground can do more damage. Catapults on high ground equals great fun for you, much anguish for the enemy. The Heavy Horse Archer is fast and has a large number of hit points. They're great for quickly raiding a town to take out the enemy's valuable Villagers. Sometimes, you don't have to build a Fishing Ship to gather seaborne food. If there's a square full of fish near to the shore, Villagers can do the harvesting. Developing a civilization is fun in single-player, but can be suicidal in multiplayer games. Most AOE players like to attack quickly. Military concentration is essential. If you have the resources and the foresight, an excellent survival technique is to build another town center far enough away from your original location. It can spread the resources pretty thin, but it can provide a surprise element in counterattacks. Don't use cheats in multiplayer games. It's funny once or twice but the cheats seriously unbalance the game.

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