How to Win in Age of Empires II

The Dark Age

Create villagers. Villagers are key to a great economy. Villagers gather resources which can be used to build, create, and research stuff later on in the game. The trick is to have enough villagers to support what you are trying to accomplish at the time.

Scout out with the 3 beginning and scout to find your sheep as fast as possible. These sheep should then be moved under the town center so the villagers have an instant drop off point and don't need to run to drop the food off. Six villagers is the optimum to have on sheep at any one time. It will insure constant villager production. You should now use the next created villager to build a lumber camp and the next 2 villagers should go there too. The berries should be close to the town center, the next 2 villagers should be sent to berries as well for a total of 4. You then want to send some more villagers to wood and a few more to sheep, remember to create one or two far before you click to feudal.

Complete a build list. Here is an approx build list: Villager 1 - food, Villager 2 - food, Villager 3 - food, Villager 4 - food, Villager 5 - food, Villager 6 - food, Villager 7- lumber camp, Villager 8 - wood, Villager 9 - wood, Villager 10 -Lure boar, Villager 11 - Build a mill, Villager 12- berries, Villager 13 - berries, Villager 14 - lure boar, Villager 15 - berries, Villager 16 - wood, Villager 17 - wood, Villager 18 - food, Villager 19 - food, Villager 20 - food, Villager 21 - food. Here is it explained a little better in a condensed video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WtukDHXy9GU&list=PL891DE10D2EFEA2E6

Explore with your scout. Number him 1 by pressing Ctrl + 1. That way, you can quickly go to him by simply pressing the 1 key. Start by exploring the black areas around the explored area. Since you need to know the map, the scout is vital. Start by scouting around your base in a circle then when you have found everything you need, 6+ sheep, gold, stone and at least one decent lumber site start scouting for your opponent, a good starting point is directly across from you.

Create villagers as soon as the chance comes by. You shouldn't drop villager production unless you are going full aggressive, or have 120 villagers (In 200 pop)

Research Loom when you need to. A good player won't research loom until he is about to go feudal. However, if you don't have the food to create a villager it can be a good time to do loom. Also if your boar is far away, or the game is laggy it can be a good idea to get loom before you lure it.

The Feudal Age

Create more villagers and add 2 to wood and 1 or 2 to forage bushes. The sheep should have run out by now,so you can start to explore the other places including the enemy and your allies. You should now have at least 4 people on wood by now.

Build a blacksmith and/or market. Blacksmiths cost 150 wood each, and markets cost 175 wood each. The thing is that markets are slower to build, and blacksmiths has a lot of upgrades for the military later on that you can use.

Research Horse Collar (in the mill) and Double-Bit Axe (in the lumber camp). They are good upgrades for the economy.

Create 2 more villagers. Build a farm after you build the market. Farms cost 60 wood and cost 60 wood to reseed. It is better once you hunt deer somewhere farther away from the town center. Each deer stocks up to 140 food, and there should be at least 4 of 'em there.

Build a mining camp near gold, not stone. You don't need stone in the Feudal Age, so get gold. Have 2 villagers go on gold. You need 100 more gold to advance to the Castle Age. The Feudal Age should only take about 7 or 8 minutes. You need 800 food, 200 gold, and a blacksmith and a market to advance to the Castle Age. If you have extra wood, build a barracks farther to the enemy. On top of a cliff is best because infantry can't get up there by climbing.

HaveAt least 15 villagersA scoutAt least 650 foodMillLumber campMining campAt least 100 woodAt least 200 gold200 stoneBlacksmithMarketLoom, Horse Collar, and Double-bit Axe researched

Wait until you have 800 food. Then you can advance to the Castle Age. Keep exploring with your scout. By now, you should have at least 50% of the map explored (unless you are playing with a normal, large, or giant map).

The Castle Age

Research Heavy Plow and Bow Saw immediately. If you do not have enough resources, then you will have to wait. Also, research other stuff that is good too, like Gold Mining and Stone Mining (Stone Mining should be researched later unless you want a castle as the "2" buildings).

Build a Monastery and a University. Universities should be built first because they have fairly priced but powerful upgrades. Monasteries should be built later in the game unless you are planning a siege in the early Castle Age. Continue to create villagers, and research Wheelbarrow or Town Watch (Wheelbarrow may be too expensive, but do not use your food on Town Watch of you have less than 100 food). You must build another Town Center though. More villagers = more resources = better military = better chance that you will crush your opponents.

Build up your military. Build a Barracks, Archery Range, Stable, Siege Workshop, and other buildings. The order is listed below.BarracksStableSiege WorkshopArchery Range

Make the infantry in one group, the archers in another, the cavalry in another, and the siege units in another group. You should have 4 military groups. Continue to build up your military slowly, but DO NOT FORGET ABOUT YOUR ECONOMY!!! If you forget about it, you will not have enough resources to build up your military, well...you will lose. Keep creating more villagers until you think the mark reaches 50 for villagers and 50 for military units (15 infantry, 15 archers, 15 cavalry, and 5 siege units).

Do the economy stuff before the military stuff. This will make it easier, as the economy will boost, leaving you with many resources for the military. When you reach 1000 food, 800 gold, and a castle or 2 Castle Age buildings, you can choose to advance to the Imperial Age and continue to work on your military for an easier win. Or, you can lead your military of 50 troops (it is actually a lot in this game) and destroy everyone. You should advance to the Imperial Age if there are more than 2 enemies, and just attack if there are 2 or less enemies. If you are planning to do the military attack, go ahead and crush everyone. If not, here is what you do in the Imperial Age.

Imperial Age

Research all the important stuff like Crop Rotation, Two-Man Saw, Stone/Gold Shaft Mining, and other stuff that are important. Research your unique techs in the castle because no other civilization has the unique techs you have. If your enemy has many buildings, it is best to rap up 1 or 2 trebuchets until you attack.

Continue to create villagers. You should at least have about 80 villagers. Create 20 more (don't worry; you do not have to do it all in one time) 5 at a time. Villagers are surprisingly strong and usually scare off siege weapons when you tell them to attack. When you reach 100 villagers, all you should be concentrating on is the military. Reseed farms as usual, and rap up your military. Create many units so that you have 50 infantry, 25 archers, 20 cavalry, and 5 siege units. If you are playing the Goths, you have a +10 population which means you can fill in 5 more villagers and some trebuchets. Now, with 100 (or 105) units, go crush your opponents as you've never done it before!!!

Alternate Method

Have all villagers that you start with collect food from sheep or berry bushes. Produce as many villagers as you can. Once you create your first villager, make him build a house then set him on food.

Use your scout to look around your area for additional resources. Once you have five villagers on food, get five on wood so that you have ten villagers altogether.

Wait until you run out of food resources, have all five food villagers build a mill near your town centre. Once they are done, have each of those villagers build a farm and add five farms to the mill queue. Have your wood villagers build a lumber camp near a large forest and get wood. Get two more villagers for constructing buildings and have those two build a barracks and dock if needed.

Advance to the next age.