| 1 | [[quoteright:256:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Aoeiii-cover_2550.jpg]] |
| 2 | |
| 3 | ''Age of Empires III'' is the fourth installment (counting the SpinOff series ''VideoGame/AgeOfMythology'' as another series) in the ''VideoGame/AgeOfEmpires'' franchise. It was released in October of 2005, and is set during [[UsefulNotes/TheThirteenAmericanColonies the colonization of the New World]], with seven European civilizations (Spanish, British, French, Portuguese, Dutch, Russian and German) and the Ottoman Empire as playable civilizations. There's also a version for the Platform/NGage phone made by Giu Mobile in 2009. |
| 4 | |
| 5 | While the gameplay remains similar to previous entries in the series, several new features were introduced here: |
| 6 | |
| 7 | * The Home City, which allows you to send units, resources and exclusive techs for your civilization in the form of a deck of cards. In order to be able to send shipments, the player must gain [[RPGElements experience points]] which are obtained during normal gameplay. |
| 8 | * Trading Posts, which can be built either on specific places in Trade Routes or in Native Tribes. Building on Trade Routes allows players to acquire XP, food, wood or gold at a set interval which can be optimized with upgrades. Building on Native Tribes allows players to access new units and techs. |
| 9 | * Unlike previous games, the civilizations are far more varied, with more unique units, technologies and bonuses, along with several completely unique Home City shipments. They also have unique ways to play, playing as the Dutch and their coin-based gameplay isn't going to be the same as playing as the French and their Native-reliant gameplay or the Indians and their wood-reliant gameplay. |
| 10 | * And, akin to ''Mythology''[='=]s Age advancement system, the player must choose a Politician, who provides special bonuses, in order to advance to another Age. |
| 11 | |
| 12 | The game features a single-player campaign made of three acts (''Blood'', ''Ice'' and ''Steel''), which follows the story of the Black family over 3 centuries as they battle against the [[AncientConspiracy Circle of Ossus]] and take part in [[BeenThereShapedHistory several historical events]], with the FountainOfYouth as a key plot point across the three acts. The acts are narrated by Amelia Black, the protagonist of ''Steel''. |
| 13 | |
| 14 | After the demise of Ensemble Studios, Robot Entertainment (a development house made of former Ensemble employees) developed the updates and maintaining the ESO service. |
| 15 | |
| 16 | An UpdatedRerelease called ''Age of Empires III: Definitive Edition'' was released on October 15, 2020, and developed by Creator/TantalusMedia and Forgotten Empires and published by Creator/XboxGameStudios. It comprises the base game and its two expansion packs, and features two new playable civilizations (the Swedes and Incas), Historical Battles that cover the time period of the game, and an "Art of War" gamemode with a series of challenges designed to help newer players get into competitive gaming. In addition, some civilizations (particularly Native American civilizations) were reworked in order to be more historically accurate with their real life counterparts, and the European civilizations have new age-up options. |
| 17 | |
| 18 | Across all games, the series featured a bunch of {{Expansion Pack}}s and [[DownloadableContent DLCs]]: |
| 19 | |
| 20 | * '''The [=WarChiefs=]''': Released in 2006, it features three of the [[StrategicAssetCaptureMechanic Native American Villages]] of the base game as [[AscendedExtra playable]]: the Aztecs, the Sioux and the Iroquois. It also had several other additions, such as new buildings (the Saloon and the Native Embassy), units (gunpowder cavalry, petards and spies), and the chance to advance to an alternative fifth era for the European civilizations through a Revolution against the mother country. The three new civilizations also had unique twists, such as the Fire Pit (where villagers can dance in order to obtain a bonus, like creating healing priests, gaining more experience and raising the population limit) and unique big buttons for many buildings. Its single-player campaign, this time composed of two acts, (''Fire'' and ''Shadow'') extended the Black family's lore by focusing on Amelia's father Nathaniel and son Chayton respectively, with Amelia starring again as the narrator and providing a cameo appearance in ''Shadow''. |
| 21 | * '''The Asian Dynasties''': Developed this time by Creator/BigHugeGames and Ensemble Studios, and released in 2007. This ExpansionPack added three completely new civilizations to the game, this time from the FarEast (ImperialChina, Japan and India). It introduced new unique bonuses for these civilizations, like the Export resource and the Consulate, a building where Asian players can buy European armies and technologies. This time, the single-player campaign is set in three different historical events: the unification of Japan, the Chinese Treasure Voyages and the Sepoy Mutiny in India. |
| 22 | * '''The UsefulNotes/UnitedStates DLC''' (''DE''): Announced on April 10, 2021, during the ''VideoGame/AgeOfEmpiresIV''-centered [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OJ14RVFDGQ Fan Preview Event]] and released as a free DLC for a limited time on April 23 by completing a set of challenges (made purchasable afterwards). It features the United States as a proper playable civilization. |
| 23 | * '''The African Royals''' (''DE''): Teased alongside ''The United States DLC'', announced on July 20 and released on August 2. It features two playable African civilizations (the Ethiopians and the Hausa), alongside three Historical Battles, 15 new African Skirmish/Multiplayer maps, 5 new African native settlements, and 10 new achievements. |
| 24 | * '''The UsefulNotes/{{Mexico}} DLC''' (''DE''): Announced on September 14, 2021, and released on December 1. Features the Mexican as a playable civilization, with three Historical Battles (two of which require the United States DLC), as well as 10 achievements. |
| 25 | * '''Knights of the Mediterranean''' (''DE''): Announced on March 15, 2022, and released on May 26, it features two new civilizations (the Italians and the Maltese), 30 new random maps, 9 new minor civilizations called Royal Houses, 8 historical maps, two new game modes (Diplomacy and Tycoon) and 25 new achievements. |
| 26 | |
| 27 | The game has a [[Characters/AgeOfEmpiresIII character sheet]] and a [[Recap/AgeOfEmpiresIII recap sheet]]. |
| 28 | |
| 29 | Followed chronologically by ''VideoGame/AgeOfEmpiresIV''. |
| 30 | ---- |
| 31 | !! Age of Empires III, its expansion packs, and its re-releases show examples of: |
| 32 | * AbsurdlyHighLevelCap: The Campaign in both the original game and in ''Definitive Edition'' has a cap of 44 cards from the Home City per campaign set[[note]]Blood, Ice and Steel is the main game set, while Fire and Shadow is the ''[=WarChiefs=]'' set and Japan, India and China are the ''Asian Dynasties'' set[[/note]]. Without cheating, it is extremely difficult to unlock all the cards. |
| 33 | * ACommanderIsYou: Each civ can be found [[Characters/AgeOfEmpiresIIICivilizations in the Civilizations page of the Character sheets]]. |
| 34 | * AIBreaker: The AI has no problems with basic tasks, such as gathering resources or training humongous numbers of troops, especially on higher difficulties, but struggles a lot when they require either some creativity or... well, basic thinking. Utilising livestock, protecting villagers, building walls and effectively breaking through enemy walls, as well as successful naval assaults — are all far beyond usual computer personalities' capabilities. Not to mention that they are extremely vulnerable to certain tricks, which even beginners don't hesitate to abuse: whenever an AI settler placing down a building is harassed, its constructions are immediately "cancelled", as in self-destroyed, by the non-human player, who also seem to pay plenty of attention to demolishing every [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0wfyzuGndY single wall pillar]] of their opponent, regardless of its (non-) importance. Remember the creativity part from above? Don't expect the AI to innovate any new attacking strategies, patterns or usually even paths on the spot, which in turn makes for extremely-straightforward fighting off land. |
| 35 | * AllThereInTheManual: |
| 36 | ** Original game boxes featured extended guides showcasing comprehensive history background behind the game settings and civilizations (partly present in the game), three unique strategies for each of the eight European nations, units' costs and statistics comparison, and more. |
| 37 | ** Product developers also published an art book called "[[https://www.behance.net/gallery/735352/Age-of-Empires-III-Collectors-Edition-Art-Book Art of Empires]]" with plenty of magnificent paintings and other graphical depictions down-scaled in the game, with a lot of extra content, including high-resolution portraits, drawing concepts, and cut-out material. Pretty much absent for the expansions, which came with simple manuals only and were released after the premiere of the art book. |
| 38 | * AnachronismStew: Given how [[TechnologyLevels Ages]] work, this is inevitable: |
| 39 | ** The languages used, especially in the campaigns. It can be jarring, for instance, to hear the campaign Anglo-American heroes speak (more or less) Modern English while standard British units still talk as though stuck in the 16th Century. |
| 40 | ** Some of the factions give off this vibe. The Chinese, for instance, are a mix of both the Ming and Qing dynasties, while the British can have Medieval-era longbowmen fighting alongside musketeers as late as the Imperial Age. |
| 41 | *** The Spanish's most powerful units are based on 16th century models, despite being unlockable in the Fortress Age (roughly equivalent to the 17th) or later. |
| 42 | *** The Portuguese most powerful units are their Dragoons and ''Caçadores'' (unique skirmishers), both referencing their army in the Napoleonic Wars, but also the Rabauld, a primitive multi-barreled cannon that went out of fashion in the late 15th century. |
| 43 | ** It gets even worse in ''The [=WarChiefs=]'', where the Aztecs were incomprehensibly [[AscendedExtra elevated to playable faction]]. |
| 44 | %% (ZCE) ** The AI leaders rarely coincided in time with each other or their units and flags. |
| 45 | ** All the cutscenes in the campaigns use the same 18th century musketeer model to play random soldiers, regardless if the campaign takes place in the 16th or 19th centuries. |
| 46 | ** The United States' units in ''Definitive Edition'' eventually resemble American troops by the time of the Civil War, which (in addition to them speaking in Modern English) can make them stand out compared to the more Napoleonic-looking endgame Europeans. |
| 47 | ** With how the Mexicans are generally based on the 18th and 19th centuries, their units generally come off as this compared to their erstwhile Spanish masters. |
| 48 | ** The simple fact that this game has both the Aztec empire and Mexico existing at the same time. |
| 49 | * AntiFrustrationFeatures: All Home City Cards are unlocked and you can own the maximum of 25 shipments from the start of the game in ''Definitive Edition'', completely eliminating the need to unnecessarily grind in order to unlock them. |
| 50 | * AntiGrinding: The introduction of RPGElements, in the form of the Home City customized outside of the actual game and its cards that directly translate to the in-game shipments, also brought the expected problems, solved in the following ways: |
| 51 | ** Single- and multiplayer matches have a cap of 30,000 XP per match. |
| 52 | ** Single- and multiplayer Home Cities are separate, meaning that the amount of experience in one doesn't affect the other. |
| 53 | ** Any newly-created Home City has a starting level of 1 (10 in ''The Asian Dynasties''). However, whenever a player reaches the 20, 40, 60, 80 or 100 threshold, they are able to make another one starting from that point. Say, you open the game for the first time and establish the Spanish city of Seville at level 10. You grind it up to 75, until you get bored and want to experience a different nation — you then make yourself a nice Home City for the French, starting at the level of 60. It's not that straightforward, though, as the vanilla civilizations along with native ones form a separate set than the Asian nations, meaning that an advanced Home City of Japan doesn't provide any boost for the headquarters of the Sioux or, for that matter, the British. |
| 54 | ** After the AI resigned from the game, killing any remaining units won't reward experience points. |
| 55 | ** Some campaign maps have a cap on [[LevelGrinding the amount of experience you can gather]]. Other campaign missions, by way of being {{timed mission}}s, don't let the player level up a lot. |
| 56 | ** ''Definitive Edition'' removed the need to grind for cards for Skirmish and Multiplayer modes (Campaign mode still requires card unlocking), making the entire deck accessible to the player, but with only a maximum of 25 cards active at a time. This decision had a ''huge'' impact in the core gameplay itself, providing access to [[DiscardAndDraw unique abilities and units]] that had previously been available only to high-level players. In addition, several civs got new cards that gave them new techs and armies. |
| 57 | * AnyoneCanDie: Armies aside, a fair amount of main and supporting characters bite the dust across the campaigns. That's not counting the characters who died of old age in the decades that pass between acts. [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] in the game itself, where the vast majority of the heroes don't die upon losing all of their hit-points, but are critically wounded, temporarily disabled, and can be recovered after some time. |
| 58 | * ArrowsOnFire: Archers pull these out when attacking buildings, as well as those native dudes in Canoes during naval combat. |
| 59 | * TheArtifact: |
| 60 | ** The original game's focus on the New World still leaves echoes in the European civilizations' SettlingTheFrontier elements and the Home City shipment system, even as ''Definitive Edition'' significantly expands the game's scope and mechanics. |
| 61 | ** The Aztecs, Iroquois and Lakota (Sioux) still appear as minor tribes in the original game's campaign after being upgraded to playable factions in ''The [=WarChiefs=]''. Their native units are also different to their counterparts in the playable civilizations: for example, the 'native' Eagle Knight has a different icon and a bonus attack against infantry instead of cavalry. |
| 62 | ** Originally, the Dog Soldier was a special unit available at a Lakota trading post, besides the Lakota Axe Rider. When the Lakota became the playable Sioux, the Dog Soldier became a special unit of the Sioux and their minor tribe place was taken by the Cheyenne. Yet historically, the Dog Soldiers were Cheyenne warriors who sometimes allied with the Sioux, but the game Cheyenne can't make them. This was corrected in the ''Definitive Edition'' in two stages: first the Dog Soldier was renamed Tokala Soldier (and the Sioux renamed to Lakota), then the general appearances of the Tokala and Cheyenne Rider were switched in an update (presumably the Cheyenne Rider is now a Dog Soldier, but is not called that). |
| 63 | ** Mercenaries only relevant to the Old World like Swiss Pikemen, Black Riders, Landsknechts, and the entire Ottoman civilization (especially post-25th Anniversary Update and the ''Knights of the Mediterranean'' DLC), are harbingers from early development when the game was also supposed to feature European maps rather than only American. |
| 64 | ** The Italians seem to have been the first designed of the south European civilizations, yet they ended being discarded. As a result, the cathedral in the Spanish and Portuguese home cities is based on the Dome of Florence, which was supposed to be the Italian home city. Some of their unique units were repurposed into mercenaries in ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' (Elmeti, Lil' Bombard); others like Genoese Crossbowmen, Mounted Crossbowmen, and Architects are complete but buried in the game's code. |
| 65 | ** Crossbowmen and Musketeers have Dutch and German lines despite not being available for their respective civilizations, due to them being originally available during development. |
| 66 | ** Falconets have Portuguese lines despite the unit being unavailable for the civilization. |
| 67 | ** Female villagers have French lines despite the Courier des Bois being AlwaysMale. After the 25th Anniversary update for ''Definitive Edition'', the same is true of both the male and female Ottoman villager, replaced with the Yoruk. |
| 68 | ** Priests have Spanish and Ottoman lines despite these civilizations receiving unique alternatives (Missionaries and Imams, respectively). |
| 69 | ** The loading screen of the New England map barely covers New England, due to Maine being split off to show "Plymouth" in ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' (and Massachusetts, which includes Plymouth Bay in real life, being shown as part of ''Carolina'' since the vanilla game, of all places). |
| 70 | ** The Pampas loading screen covers about half of the area where the real Pampas are, due to a good chunk of it being split to create the Araucania loading screen, and another being shown as part of Patagonia since vanilla. |
| 71 | ** The first handful of missions in ''Blood'' are likewise a leftover from when the original game was meant to feature European landscapes, given how they place during the Siege of Malta. It wouldn't be until ''Knights of the Mediterranean'' that dedicated maps set in Europe, as well as full-fledge Maltese civilization, would make an appearance. |
| 72 | * ArtificialStupidity: |
| 73 | ** The AI just loves building armies entirely composed of Mercenaries in the ''Asian Dynasties'' expansion, ignoring the fact that Mercenaries are [[AwesomeButImpractical incredibly expensive]] and easily outperformed one-on-one by plain, ordinary units in the later ages. |
| 74 | ** The AI players rarely upgrade their regular military units or research economic technologies, have trouble landing putting their units on ships, and never, ever build walls. |
| 75 | ** AI players never fix damaged buildings. |
| 76 | ** All units will automatically attack any and all buildings nearby if idle, and will eventually try to again even if told to stop. This includes [[SuicidalOverconfidence regular infantry attempting to attack cannon-using outposts or forts]]. |
| 77 | * ArtisticLicenseGeography: The Borneo island map in ''The Asian Dynasties'' is depicted as a perfect circle. |
| 78 | * ArtisticLicenseHistory: Comes with the territory as an RTS, but the portrayal of Napoleon is an interesting example. Napoleon speaks with a [[FrenchJerk stereotypical French accent]] but he grew up speaking Corsu and Italian and spoke French with a heavy Italian accent, something mentioned in the [[ShownTheirWork history section of the game]]. And that's ignoring that he is commanding Quebecois coureurs-de-bois to set up an American colony under the Bourbon Fleur-de-Lis flag. |
| 79 | * AscendedExtra: |
| 80 | ** The Aztecs, the Sioux and the Iroquois were just native tribes in the original game. They were made playable in ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' and both acts of its campaign focus on the Iroquois/Haudenosaunee (''Fire'') and Sioux/Lakota (''Shadow''). |
| 81 | ** The Maltese were the initial playable faction in the Campaigns. They were overhauled and turned into a proper playable faction in ''Knights of the Mediterranean''. |
| 82 | * AscendedMeme: One of the pre-recorded taunts players can send each other is a hilariously British-accented "I'm in your base, killing your d00dz". |
| 83 | * AttackOfThe50FootWhatever: The "George Crushington" cheat unit. It's a giant, hopping bust of Washington that headbutts enemies to death with a [[WrittenSoundEffect BIFF! or a ZOINK!]] and shoots fireballs from its eyes. |
| 84 | --> '''George Crushington:''' '''''[[PreMortemOneLiner "CHECK IN YOUR WALLET. THAT'S ME ON THE DOLLAR BILL."]]''''' |
| 85 | --> Introduced later: '''''"CHECK IN YOUR POCKET. THE QUARTER IS ME, TOO."''''' |
| 86 | * AuthorAppeal: One of the chief developers is an Aztec fanboy. This is basically why the Aztecs were upgraded to playable faction in the first expansion rather than the Inca, who had to wait until ''Definitive Edition''. |
| 87 | * AwesomeButImpractical: |
| 88 | ** Mercenaries are more powerful than the average units they are based on [[note]]A Swiss Pikeman has 225 hitpoints and 22 melee damage compared to the regular pikeman's 120 hitpoints and 8 damage[[/note]] but they either cost too many coin or too many population to rely on them completely. Unless you're playing as the Dutch (who have more than enough coin to field an entire mercenary army), you'll generally rely more on regular units. |
| 89 | ** In the original game, going for a Revolution while playing as a European faction instead of advancing through the Imperial Age is cheaper with a 1000 each of food, coin, and wood compared to the 4000 food and 4000 coin. At first, you will unlock many unique units such as [[GatlingGood Gatling Guns]], Ironclad Warships, and Colonial Militia units. However, doing so will permanently turn all your settlers into Colonial Militia, leaving players out with no way to gather resources unless they have a factory and trading posts ready prior to revolting. Unlike the Ragnarok god power in ''VideoGame/AgeOfMythology'' (where this gameplay mechanic is inspired from), you are also barred from creating new settlers to replace your transformed ones. Furthermore, players will lose their Home City Cards in exchange for new ones. ''Definitive Edition,'' however, overhauled the system to be more viable. |
| 90 | ** Advancing to the Imperial Age will grant players the most upgrades, but not only is it costly as mentioned above, but it's more effective just to use the resources at the Industrial Age. |
| 91 | ** On the unit level, the Heavy Cannon is a ludicrously powerful artillery piece, with only a few capable of wiping out entire opposing armies of infantry, and even doing reasonably well against cavalry. The downside is that it can only be created at Factories, which produce a trickle of resource - that is of your choice - automatically... unless you choose to make that Factory produce Heavy Cannons. Also, due to a prohibitively long production time for even a single unit, you pretty much have to have the bonus Factory shipment to create them at any reasonable rate, at which point you are much better off just letting the Factories help supplement the resources necessary to build a regular army. |
| 92 | * BadassLongcoat: |
| 93 | ** The shotgun-carrying Renegados. |
| 94 | ** The technology "Great Coat" increases your Settlers's hit points, regardless of climate and the fact that their clothing doesn't change. |
| 95 | * {{Bandito}}: Some are available as mercenaries, while others are present as treasure guardians. |
| 96 | * BearsAreBadNews: |
| 97 | ** Black, Grizzly and Polar bears are the strongest wild animals in the original game, and will kick the ass of your explorer, once he has used his OneHitKill on one of them, if they are in groups. |
| 98 | ** In ''The Asian Dynasties'', even the pandas cannot be trusted. |
| 99 | * BeastOfBattle: |
| 100 | ** The Spanish explorer can train War Dogs. Other European factions get only one powerful "explorer dog" with a card improving their explorer, instead, but like the explorer, this dog will be knocked out if his [=HPs=] drop to zero instead of killed. |
| 101 | ** The Native American factions can ship packs of attack animals from their home cities ([[NationalAnimalStereotypes Jaguars for the Aztecs, Wolves and Coyotes for the Sioux, and Black Bears for the Iroquois]]). Further cards can allow Aztec, Sioux and Iroquois War Chiefs to train jaguars, coyotes and wolves. |
| 102 | ** All factions can train cougars if they research "Jungle Animal Lore" at a Tupi trading post. |
| 103 | ** In addition, the native civilizations' War Chiefs can turn any treasure guardian to their side, be it human or animal. |
| 104 | ** Indian monks can train White Tigers after being upgraded, which are more powerful than normal tigers and the land animals with the most powerful attack overall (bears and rhinos beat them in [=HPs=], however). |
| 105 | ** The Indians have a war elephant type for almost every role. |
| 106 | * {{BFG}}: |
| 107 | ** The Monitor, the Ottoman Great Bombard, the mercenary Lil' Bombard and the Royal Cannon. Guaranteed to ruin ''someone's'' day when they start firing. |
| 108 | ** Ottoman [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abus_gun Abus guns]] are portable cannons and the only infantry to deal siege-type damage. |
| 109 | * {{BFS}}: |
| 110 | ** The Chinese Changdao (literally "long sword"). If you're not paying attention, you might think these guys are actually carrying a spear. |
| 111 | ** Honorable mentions go to the Doppelsoldner, Landsknecht, Boneguard, and Hospitaller's two-handed-swords, the several Japanese units using katanas, and the pirate and corsair's SinisterScimitar. |
| 112 | * BilingualBonus: |
| 113 | ** A peculiar subversion. Native speakers of French, Spanish, German, Russian, Portuguese, Dutch, Turkish, Hindi (Indians), Mandarin (Chinese) and Japanese will have little trouble understanding the phrases used by these civilisations, as they use the modern variant of their respective languages, complete with regional dialects[[note]]Some Japanese units for instance respond in the regional dialect associated with Hiroshima[[/note]]. |
| 114 | ** Native English speakers are stuck with the British speaking in Middle English, though the American and British hero units in the campaigns and the Outlaw Riflemen mercenaries do speak Modern English. |
| 115 | ** Taverns and Saloons in ''Definitive Edition'' have visible signage labeled in the respective languages of the civilizations running them. |
| 116 | * BlingOfWar: |
| 117 | ** Your units will wear increasingly colorful armor/uniforms as you upgrade them. |
| 118 | ** Indians have unique units called Mansabdar which increase the damage of nearby respective unit (Mansabdar Urumi for Urumi Swordsman for example). Since they need to be close while still separable, they usually have more shiny (''gold'' shiny) uniform. |
| 119 | * BookEnds: |
| 120 | ** The Black family's arc with George Washington[[note]]From "Seven Years War" from ''Ice'' to "Yorktown" in ''Fire''[[/note]] begins and ends with wars involving American, British and French parties. |
| 121 | ** The original ''III'' campaigns begin and end with missions taking place on islands where one party invades another. |
| 122 | ** The campaigns of ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' start and end with a member of the Black family fighting alongside a native tribe. |
| 123 | * BottomlessMagazines: Downplayed. Units do have to reload, but they never run out of ammunition to reload with. They also have an unlimited supply of torches to throw at buildings. |
| 124 | * {{Bowdlerize}}: In ''Definitive Edition'' the Colonial Age is now known as the Commerce Age, Plantations are now known as Estates, and many instances of the word "Colony" were replaced. This was done in the wake of the George Floyd riots and the destruction of statues honoring colonial figures. It's also reflective of the game's wider scope encompassing Africa (''The African Royals'') and the rest of the Old World (''Knights of the Mediterranean''), where such terms aren't as consistently applicable. |
| 125 | * BreakingTheFourthWall: Characters often ''explicitly refer to the fact'' that they are part of a computer game. |
| 126 | * CamelCase: The title of the first expansion is ''The [=WarChiefs=]''. |
| 127 | * CapRaiser: |
| 128 | ** Both the Chinese and the Russians can go over the standard population cap of 200 to a max of 220, and the former can build Villages that provide more space than Houses and can be further upgraded to provide even more space. |
| 129 | ** The Lakota, like the Huns in the previous game, start out at max population space and don't need to build Houses. |
| 130 | %% (ZCE) * ClassicCheatCode: tuck tuck tuck. |
| 131 | * ContinuityNod: Regarding all other ''VideoGame/AgeOfEmpires'' mainline games: |
| 132 | ** The "Eye of Ornlu", a treasure that gives 200 EXP, is named after [[SavageWolves a certain wolf]] in ''II''. |
| 133 | ** The Germans have a shipment card, "Teutonic Town Center", which improves the defensive capability of town centers. This references the (eventually patched) Teutonic Town Center which, thanks to its increased LOS, was able to outshoot and defeat ''even Castles'' back in ''II''. |
| 134 | ** The Jesuit mission in ''The Asian Dynasties'' allows you to recruit Conquistadors identical to the ones in ''II'' (mounted arquebusiers with ''Morrión'' and breastplate). |
| 135 | ** The Inca War Chief greatly resembles the Aztec ruler on the box art of ''The Conquerors''. |
| 136 | ** The Japanese musical motif is almost identical to its counterpart in ''Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition''. |
| 137 | ** The Maltese have myriad techs and cards that allude to ''II''. |
| 138 | * CoupDeGrace: Japanese Monks have "Divine Strike," a random chance of instantly slaying any unit they attack as long as it's fallen below a certain hitpoint threshold. |
| 139 | * CreatorProvincialism: Abandons the EarthIsABattlefield aspect of ''II'' and focuses in colonial and revolutionary era America, at least before ''The Asian Dynasties'' came along. |
| 140 | * CreatorsCultureCarryover: |
| 141 | ** Despite supposedly beginning in 1492, featuring maps from both continents, and civilizations that never set colonies in North America like the Portuguese, Germans and Ottomans, the original game drew most of its inspiration from colonial New England and the 18th century Anglo-French wars in North America. North American maps and natives were overrepresented in comparison to South American ones, and they often represented post-Contact, and sometimes even Wild West-era natives. |
| 142 | ** It gets worse when you realize that the original game only had three South American maps (Amazonia, Pampas and Patagonia) and two native tribes, the Inca and the Tupi, with the Carib as a questionable third. Patagonia didn't have natives at all (and for that matter, still doesn't). After much criticism, ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' added three more South American maps (Orinoco, Andes and Araucania) and the glaringly absent [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arauco_War Mapuche]] as natives. Criticism was still garnered from the fact that the Inca remained a minor tribe in spite of building a far more powerful polity than the three additions and also being [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo-Inca_State longer-lived]] and [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebellion_of_Tupac_Amaru_II more relevant]] to the game's time period than two of them (Sioux and Aztecs). |
| 143 | ** Despite the original game ending sometime after the Napoleonic Wars, the white bandits that aren't pirates (Pistolero, Renegado, Comanchero) speak Spanish and wear Wild West-attire, resembling Mexican-American outlaws in the West after the Mexican-American War. ''Definitive Edition'' rectifies this with the addition of "colonial" bandits in the African maps, and highwaymen-style bandits in European ones. |
| 144 | ** The three trade units are the travois (used by the North American plains natives), a Wild West-era stagecoach, and a classic Union Pacific locomotive called "the Iron Horse". |
| 145 | ** The Saloon where you hire mercenaries is a typical Wild West saloon. ''Definitive Edition'' rectifies this by having Saloons/Cantinas exclusive to Federal American civs, while the Europeans get more appropriate Taverns instead. |
| 146 | ** The French use the Fleur-de-Lis and have Canadian coureurs-de-bois instead of settlers. However, their leader is Napoleon, who lost most existing French American colonies in his lifetime instead of setting them. He's most likely the French leader because he is familiar to Americans as the man who sold the Louisiana Purchase. |
| 147 | ** The town center's emergency militia units are called Minutemen, the name of the rebel militia in the American Revolutionary War, and look the part in their overcoats, leggings and tricornes. |
| 148 | ** The original game's ExpansionPack ''The [=WarChiefs=]''[='=]s new mechanic, Revolution, turns your settlers into American Revolutionary-era "Colonial Militia" and allows you to ship Civil War-era Gatling Guns and ''CSS Virginia''-style ironclads, even if you don't choose Washington as a revolutionary leader. The result is the same even when choosing José Bonifácio, who fathered the much later and much less traumatic Brazilian independence. The mechanic was overhauled entirely for ''Definitive Edition'', where not only more revolution options were introduced, but each revolution option has its own identity. |
| 149 | * CripplingOverspecialization: There are some unit types with low base attack damage but high multipliers against certain troops, meaning that the former are pretty rubbish against anything but the latter. Most notable examples include: |
| 150 | ** Spies: well, they kill single explorers, war chiefs and heroes, and they are strong against mercenaries. And that's pretty much it... They do get a small bonus against natives, though! |
| 151 | ** Culverins: nearly useless against anything other than ships or other artillery. |
| 152 | ** Ranged ("light") infantry — skirmishers, crossbowmen, archers and alike: with excellent ranged damage against infantry and light cavalry, but weak to anything else and with terrible melee combat. |
| 153 | * TheComputerIsACheatingBastard: On [[HarderThanHard hardest and extreme difficulties]], the AI will gain resources at a much faster rate than the player, but are otherwise no smarter than the hard AI. |
| 154 | * DamnYouMuscleMemory: |
| 155 | ** The first two games have one and two-button interfaces. This series, only one. |
| 156 | ** The priests in the vanilla games do not automatically go to units and heal them, they have a skill button for it instead, which confuses players who shifted between the vanilla ''[=AoE3=]'' to other ''[=AoE=]'' games-not to mention being very impractical due to the small area of effect and long recharge time. Fixed in the expansions. |
| 157 | ** In contrast to [[TacticalRockPaperScissors previous games]]: Camels don't have an anticavalry bonus, mounted archers and gunners are better against other cavalry than against infantry, and all melee infantry (and musketeers) get a bonus against cavalry, not just the one with spears. |
| 158 | * DamageIsFire: Justified. Historically, professional armies (before the invention of electricity or reliable lighting) carried various unlit wooden torches with them into battle tucked into various places that they could light up and use in night fighting or when they had to burn something. The number a given soldier will use in short succession is still ludicrous, through. |
| 159 | * DeadpanSnarker: Several characters and AI personalities, especially Queen Elizabeth (British) and Frederick the Great (Germans). |
| 160 | * DecompositeCharacter: In ''II'', the Pikeman upgrades into the Halberdier. In ''III'', the Pikeman and Halberdier are two separate units. |
| 161 | * DefeatMeansFriendship: The Chinese Monk is a Shaolin master who can convert defeated enemy units into disciples. |
| 162 | * DemotedToExtra: |
| 163 | ** DoubleSubverted with the Aztecs, who were a playable civilization in ''VideoGame/AgeOfEmpiresII: The Conquerors''. When they were introduced back in this game, they did so as a minor Native village. Then they became playable with the ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' ExpansionPack. |
| 164 | ** Zigzagged with the Mayans, who were a playable civilization in ''VideoGame/AgeOfEmpiresII: The Conquerors''. When they were introduced back in this game, they did so as a minor Native village. When the Mexican civilization was added to the ''Definitive Edition'', revolving into the Yucatán and ''then'' into the Maya made them somewhat playable. |
| 165 | ** The Berbers were a playable civilization in ''VideoGame/AgeOfEmpiresII: The African Kingdoms''. When they were introduced back in ''The African Royals'', they became instead a minor African village. |
| 166 | * DesperationAttack: |
| 167 | ** If you've unlocked it, you can unleash either one or (after you unlocked another) two waves of Minutemen (or Warriors if it's a Native American civ), which have middling HP and decent ranged attack, their main advantage being the [[ZergRush massive and sudden]] (you can train dozens in seconds) onrush of soldiers. The two waves can each only be used once, and their current health uniquely starts lowering immediately after they are trained, meaning that these units are only supposed to be used as an emergency last line of defense. |
| 168 | ** If you are playing against AI and have a small army ready, you can boost your attack with Minutemen. The AI [[ArtificialStupidity does not discriminate]] units according to their health points, so they can deal a lot of damage while the computer is busy shooting other units. |
| 169 | ** Unlike in previous games, Settlers/Villagers are now armed with guns (javelins for the Native Americans) and can fire them on the enemy. While this attack is pitiful on its own, a large mass of Settlers can help a depleted army fend off an attack. Amusingly, their melee damage (shown as the Settler hitting with the butt of the weapon) is more powerful than their ranged damage, and though it cannot be selected by the player, you can trigger it by walking your settlers towards the enemy. |
| 170 | ** Settlers can also attack buildings, unlike healers and attack animals. |
| 171 | * DivergentCharacterEvolution: While the various factions have unique units, bonuses and Home City options, one recurring trend in the original game had been how the European civilizations still tended to look and play rather similarly, which became much more pronounced after ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' and ''The Asian Dynasties'' were released. ''Definitive Edition'', however, has made each of the original civs more varied in both aesthetics and gameplay, especially with ''Knights of the Mediterranean'' and the 25th Anniversary Update. |
| 172 | * DownloadableContent: ''Definitive Edition'' has several: |
| 173 | ** ''The United States DLC'' adds the United States as a civilization and three Historical Battles. |
| 174 | ** ''The Mexico DLC'' adds Mexico as a civilization, as well as a related Historical Battle. |
| 175 | ** ''The African Royals'' adds the Ethiopian and Hausa civilizations, two Historical Battles and several new Skirmish/Multiplayer maps showcasing African Villages. |
| 176 | ** ''Knights of the Mediterranean'' adds the Italians and the Maltese as playable civilizations and several maps showcasing the European Royal Houses taking the place of Native civilizations. |
| 177 | ** In addition, there are three ''Hero Cosmetic Packs'' (one of them free), which allows you to change the look of your civ's HeroUnit, with events allowing you to unlock additional skins for said unit. |
| 178 | %% (ZCE) * EasyCommunication: The formation buttons. |
| 179 | * EarthIsABattlefield: Beginning with ''The Asian Dynasties'' and reinforced by subsequent updates to ''Definitive Edition'', the game includes playable maps set across the New World, Eurasia, and Africa. |
| 180 | * EasyLogistics: Home City shipments can't get lost at sea or delayed due to bad weather. This could be averted, however, by the Imperial Age, if you get the blockade tech from the Capitol building, which can block ''all'' enemy shipments for a one-time investment. |
| 181 | * EdutainmentGame: The first purpose of the game is entertainment, but there's plenty of historical information available, with the multiplayer interface having a sidebar displaying various historical facts. |
| 182 | * EleventhHourSuperpower: Reaching the Industrial Age provides access to Home City cards that can dramatically turn the tide in the player's favor, from instant fortification upgrades to free factories. Some civilizations, meanwhile, have unique late-game options in ''Definitive Edition'' that can surprise enemies: |
| 183 | ** In addition to Revolutionary France being almost a distinct civilization in itself, the "Napoleonic Era" card grants access to Imperial Age upgrades, as well as a new set of powerful Home City shipments emphasizing firepower, unit veterancy and artillery. |
| 184 | ** The Inca, meanwhile, have the "Tupac Rebellion" card, which effectively transforms an otherwise Native civilization into a Revolutionary one. Which also translates into your units being upgraded into a powerful European-style military, complete with muskets, rifles, and cannon. |
| 185 | * EmergencyWeapon: Some units, such as Crossbowmen, Longbowmen, and Grenadiers have swords and daggers for melee, but are otherwise woefully outmatched. In the case of Skirmishers in close-quarters, they resort to clubbing their enemies with their guns as a last resort. |
| 186 | * EnemyExchangeProgram: |
| 187 | ** In ''The [=WarChiefs=]'', the namesake Native American Warchiefs have the ability to convert treasure guardians. |
| 188 | ** There is a chance that any unit killed by the Shaolin Master will become a Disciple, which all look the same. Even if this unit is not Chinese. Even if this unit is not ''human.'' |
| 189 | ** The Asian civilizations in ''The Asian Dynasties'' can get support from other civilizations via the consulate, even if that civilization is an enemy. This can lead to, for example, Redcoats fighting Redcoats if the chosen consulate ally is the British. |
| 190 | ** ''Definitive Edition'' adds Incan Priestesses, who can convert any enemy unit from a distance much like the priests in the first two games. |
| 191 | * EscortMission: At some point in the campaigns, you'll have to face a mission where you need to escort a unit not affected by GameplayAllyImmortality and whose death spells game over for that mission. |
| 192 | * EverythingIsBigInTexas: Texas is one of the potential skirmish maps you can fight on. True to form, it's a wide open prairie with plenty of cows to capture. |
| 193 | * EvilDetectingDog: Pets have the passive ability of uncovering stealthy units. |
| 194 | * FactionCalculus: |
| 195 | ** The European nations are Balanced, the Asian nations are Powerhouses and the Native nations are Subversive. This is all very broadly speaking mind, as things get much more complicated once the quirks of each of the nations themselves and Home City cards come into play. |
| 196 | ** Among the Europeans, there's Spain[[note]]a well-rounded nation in terms of units and cards, able to play rushdown, boom or turtle equally well[[/note]] and Britain[[note]]an economic and naval powerhouse with a strong if somewhat straightforward military[[/note]] as the Balanced. Holland[[note]]tons of economic bonuses and potential to field lots of mercenaries[[/note]], Russia[[note]]almost everything about this faction is geared towards ZergRush, would easily qualify as a Horde faction[[/note]] and Portugal[[note]]fiddly faction with a focus on light and highly specialised units[[/note]] are the Subversives. The French[[note]]military is dominant in nearly every category and strong economically as well[[/note]], Ottomans[[note]]artillery and siege specialists[[/note]] and Germans[[note]]able to field vast numbers of cavalry and mercenaries[[/note]] are the Powerhouses. |
| 197 | ** Among the three Asian civs, there's Japan (Powerhouse), China (Subversive) and India (Balanced). |
| 198 | * FictionalFlag: The Circle of Ossus has [[https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/circle_of_ossus_2.png a flag]] squared in light blue and dark yellow, with tons of AncientConspiracy references. |
| 199 | * FluffyTheTerrible: A literal example. There is a secret unit that is called Fluffy. It can do a OneHitKill to many units. And Fluffy is "the world's ugliest dog". |
| 200 | %% (ZCE) * FrenchJerk: Napoleon. |
| 201 | * {{Freemium}}: The ''Definitive Edition'' moved to a free-to-play model featuring a rotating slate of civilizations in August 2023, as well as the ''Blood'' campaign, the Algiers scenario, and the ''Art of War'' tutorials. Full-time access to all the game's civilizations and campaigns requires purchasing the base game and its expansions. |
| 202 | * FriendlyFireproof: Firing muskets and cannons into a melee will only kill enemies. |
| 203 | * GameMod: Quite a few have come out for the original game. Some of the notable ones are: |
| 204 | ** ''VideoGame/WarsOfLiberty'' (formerly ''[[http://ageofempires.wikia.com/wiki/The_War_of_The_Triple_Alliance_(Modification) The]] War of the Triple Alliance''), which, among other things, changes the game's focus to the 19th century and dives straight into the Age of Imperialism, introduces independent New World nations (like Argentina, Brazil, Canada and the USA), new playable South American native and African factions with their own quirks, and even an additional ([[AwesomeButImpractical if expensive]]) end-game Age extending into UsefulNotes/WorldWarI. |
| 205 | ** ''VideoGame/NapoleonicEra'', which changes the focus of the game to Europe (although it also has a well-developed American civilization, led by Washington) and the eras so there is more focus on French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. Elements from the mod would later on be incorporated into ''Definitive Edition'', most notably following the release of ''Knights of the Mediterranean''. |
| 206 | ** ''The Improvement Mod'', which as per its name focuses mostly on rebalancing and improving the overall game experience, but it also attempts to make the game closer to Ensemble's original vision by reintroducing [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/WhatCouldHaveBeen/AgeOfEmpiresIII cut content]] like the Swedish and Italian civilisations and several units/buildings. |
| 207 | ** ''Hundred Days'', a Total Conversion Mod that creates a more realistic Napoleonic War game, but loses the time depth and non-European civilizations. |
| 208 | ** ''Knights and Barbarians'', another Total Conversion Mod that uses the game's engine to fight wars set in the Middle Ages, with special attention to the Crusades. |
| 209 | ** ''The King's Return'', which works as an unofficial expansion in that it doesn't change the original game's maps and factions, but adds new African maps, natives, and four new playable factions which are the Mongol, Safavid, Kongo and Oyo empires. |
| 210 | ** ''Struggle of Indonesia'', which serves more as a spin-off focusing on Southeast Asia, featuring various Malay and Javanese factions, among others, with the Dutch East Indies also playable. |
| 211 | ** ''Definitive Edition'', meanwhile, has also seen its own share of mods beginning to pop up, from gameplay tweaks to multiplayer-compatible visual overhauls that make units more historically accurate. |
| 212 | * GameplayAllyImmortality: Campaign heroes, explorers, War Chiefs, and monks getting [=KOed=] do not end in a GameOver. |
| 213 | * GameplayAndStorySegregation: [[ShownTheirWork The in-game units' info shows the developers do know that the game representations aren't accurate]], but nonetheless, there are many breaks from reality: |
| 214 | ** Muskets can fire around every three seconds in-game, while they took significantly longer to reload in real life (the Musketeer's in-game unit info states that a competent musketeer could fire 4 shots per minute). |
| 215 | ** The manual says that Napoleon grew up speaking Italian and that he spoke French with a heavy Corsican accent. His in-game persona speaks with a French accent. |
| 216 | ** The cutscenes show the Circle flying German flags and Stuart's colony flying the Pirate jolly roger. In-game, the Circle and the Blacks mercenary company fly their own flags. |
| 217 | ** Coyotes, Wolves and White Wolves look all like Gray Wolves despite their name. |
| 218 | * GenderIsNoObject: Female villagers and some campaign heroes such as Lizzie the Pirate and Amelia Black. |
| 219 | * GenerationalSaga: The campaigns of ''III'' and ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' tell the tale of the Black family. |
| 220 | * GenerationXerox: Nathaniel and his grandson Chayton protagonize the ''Fire'' and ''Shadow'' acts of ''The [=WarChiefs=]''. Both are half Native, half Anglo-American (though with the halves reversed, and Chayton also has partial Iroquois ancestry in his mother's side), who desert their mother's side to join [[spoiler:their father's side in]] a war they consider just, altering their appearance until they get a hybrid look [[spoiler: and ruining the Black family's Falcon Company's finances in the process.]] Both also seem to be the CelibateHero type, with no children until after they finish their wars in their 40s, but this is the case of all Blacks [[spoiler:except John]]. |
| 221 | * GenreShift: |
| 222 | ** To a degree; the introduction of storylines revolving around the FountainOfYouth and the AncientConspiracy pursuing it is a pretty noteworthy one for a series whose campaigns had previously been focused upon the relatively accurate retelling of actual historical events, though those show up as well. |
| 223 | ** It happens again but in the opposite direction in the expansions, as while they follow fictional characters still, they are now more grounded on reality. This was probably a result of fan backlash. |
| 224 | %% (ZCE) * GentlemanAdventurer[=/=]GreatWhiteHunter: The European explorer. |
| 225 | * GeoEffects: Some missions in the campaigns have the cold depleting your units' health. |
| 226 | * GiantSquid: Appears in ''The Asian Dynasties'', but in a completely different manner to most media portrayals. Rather than as [[AttackOfThe50FootWhatever grossly over-sized monsters from the deep]], the squids are harmless creatures portrayed about the same size as in RealLife. Additionally, they never attack you and only are only there as a food source like salmon or cod. Also, they only appear in the Honshu map, where real GiantSquid also live. |
| 227 | * GoingNative: A recurring motif for the Black family, with Morgan's Scottish lineage being mixed with Iroquois/Haudenosaunee, American and finally Sioux/Lakota blood. Tellingly, Chayton Black in ''Shadow'' is nigh indistinguishable from the Sioux/Lakota tribesmen [[spoiler:he ultimately sides with]]. |
| 228 | * GlassCannon: |
| 229 | ** In general, Artillery, Skirmishers, Archers and Riflemen. They are powerful, but when an enemy unit approaches them, they are often in serious danger. |
| 230 | ** Russian Oprichniks are fragile and have relatively low base damage which makes them easily killed by opposing military units, but have a very strong anti-building attack and a huge damage multiplier against settlers. A dozen of them can cripple an enemy's economy within a minute. |
| 231 | ** The Portuguese' unique version of the Skirmisher, the Caçador, amplifies this with even more ranged damage and even less HP and melee damage compared to the basic version. |
| 232 | ** Swedish Hakkapelit serve as a Fortress Age hybrid of Hussars and Dragoons, but what makes them notable is having sacrificed a lot of HP for the ability to hit like a truck, with an incredible 48 damage in Melee (compared to a Hussar's 30). |
| 233 | * GratuitousForeignLanguage: |
| 234 | ** The British speak [[{{Simlish}} some sort of mangled Middle English]]. |
| 235 | ** The Chinese speak modern Mandarin despite being modelled after the Qing dynasty. |
| 236 | * GratuitousNinja: |
| 237 | ** Ninja are available as mercenaries in ''The [=WarChiefs=]''. |
| 238 | ** The Japanese can also train them normally by choosing "Japanese Isolationism" in the Consulate. |
| 239 | * GuideDangIt: Most ranged attacks from infantry units attack at half the speed of melee attacks. Notably, that means musketeers will generally do more damage if attacking in melee rather than ranged. Unfortunately, this isn't written anywhere in the game, even with the advanced stats option on, forcing players to rely on fan-made databases and wikis for such information. |
| 240 | * HitAndRunTactics: All ranged cavalry can fire on the move. |
| 241 | * HoldTheLine: |
| 242 | ** Several missions in the single-player campaigns either end after the line is held, or after the enemy is cleared ''after'' the line is held. |
| 243 | ** Some of the Historical Battles also feature timed events where the player must defend their base from the enemy onslaught. |
| 244 | ** The ''Knights of the Mediterranean'' DLC added a new map type, "Historical", many of which feature a base to be defended from the onslaught: |
| 245 | *** "The Eighty Years War" requires defending players to prevent their Headquarters from being destroyed. |
| 246 | *** "The Great Turkish War" requires the defenders to prevent their Command Post from being destroyed. |
| 247 | * HorseArcher: The Ottomans, Russians, Sioux, Chinese and Japanese each have their own versions. |
| 248 | * HorseOfADifferentColor: Unlike in previous games, camels don't have a bonus against horses, rendering Indian sowars as just light cavalry that looks funny.[[note]]In a literal example of the trope, "sowar" is simply Indian for "rider", so sowars riding camels and not horses, when Indian cavalry did both in real life, is a purely aesthetic choice.[[/note]] In fact, the sowar is more likely to lose against other cavalry because of its low health points. |
| 249 | * ImmortalitySeeker: The Circle of Ossus is devoted to finding the Fountain of Youth in ''Blood'', whose water is said to give eternal life to those who drink it. |
| 250 | * ImplausibleFencingPowers: The British Explorer can be given a special melee attack from a Home City shipment that allows him to [[SpinAttack spin around, causing damage around him]]. Tends to OneHitKill skirmishers. Several characters in the main campaigns also have a similar ability. |
| 251 | * IWillShowYouX: The lines policemen can say in your Home City after getting the customization for it includes much of these. |
| 252 | * KarmaHoudiniWarranty: After escaping death and punishment throughout the campaigns, almost every BigBad in the game eats the dust. |
| 253 | * KatanasAreJustBetter: Ronin mercenaries and Japanese Samurai have some of the strongest infantry attacks in the game. |
| 254 | * KnowWhenToFoldEm: If you successfully manage to cripple the AI's economy and military, they will offer to resign from the game. |
| 255 | * LargeHam: |
| 256 | ** The AI personalities engage in this to varying extents, but Cuauhtemoc of the Aztecs stands out. A ThirdPersonPerson with a raspy voice and a lot of ego, he has such gems as: |
| 257 | -->'''(When losing a Trading Post):''' ''"Cuauhtemoc did not ''need'' that trading post!"'' |
| 258 | -->'''(Entering a large battle):''' ''"Blood! [[EvilLaugh Ha ha ha ha!]] '''MORE BLOOD!'''"'' |
| 259 | -->'''(Resigning):''' ''"No! Cuauhtemoc will NEVER surrender! ...Unless ... you '''let''' him?"'' |
| 260 | ** The Elmeti mercenary cavalry, who speaks Italian in a very over the top manner: |
| 261 | -->'''''"SI?!"''''' |
| 262 | -->'''''"ALLA BATAGLIA!!"''''' |
| 263 | * LightningBruiser: |
| 264 | ** French Cuirassiers, Spanish Lancers, Sioux/Lakota Dog Soldiers, and mercenary Elmeti and Hackapells are all fast cavalry capable of both absorbing and dishing out absurd amounts of damage. |
| 265 | ** In the Infantry side we have Spanish rodeleros. Downplayed with the Indian Urumi Swordsman (somewhat quick MightyGlacier). |
| 266 | * LivingDistantAncestor: It's possible in ''Definitive Edition'' for the Aztecs to fight against their Mexican descendants. Further exaggerated by how their respective Home Cities are technically ''one and the same'' from different time periods (Tenochtitlan/Mexico City). |
| 267 | * MagicalNativeAmerican: |
| 268 | ** Native American factions have rituals as alternatives to technologies and can improve their units, buildings and economy greatly by just having a lot of villagers staging a particular dance. |
| 269 | ** ''Definitive Edition'' heavily [[DownplayedTrope tones down]] this portrayal, replacing the Fire Pit with the Community Plaza and removing the War Chief's "Nature Friendship" ability in favor of the less mystical "Recruit Guardian". |
| 270 | * {{Mayincatec}}: Aztec, Maya and Inca (and in ''The [=WarChiefs=]'', Zapotec, and in ''Definitive Edition'', Quechua) villages all have the same type of buildings. As the Aztecs and Inca get upgraded to playable, they get unique and more accurate architecture. |
| 271 | ** Mayans, Incas and Zapotecs (and in the original, Aztecs) will occasionally appear in Orinoco (Venezuela) and Amazonia maps together. |
| 272 | ** Mayans appear in Sonora (i.e. Northern Mexico), along with the Aztec/Zapotec, Navajo and Apache. |
| 273 | * MercenaryUnits: |
| 274 | ** Every time players level up in a match, they can play a card, half of which send small armies to the Town Center[[note]]The other half are powerful tech upgrades[[/note]]. Some of these armies are composed of mercenary units which cannot be created in any other building in the civilization's tech tree. |
| 275 | ** ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' introduced the Tavern building[[note]]originally called Saloon[[/note]] for the European civilizations, which allow them to hire mercenaries in exchange for gold. |
| 276 | ** ''The Asian Dynasties'' introduced the Consulate for the Asian civilizations, which allow them to get buildings and units from another country in exchange for a civilization-specific resource called "Export", gathered automatically as the civilization gather the other types of resources. |
| 277 | ** The Asian civilizations can hire mercenaries and repentant units at the Monastery rather than the Saloon. |
| 278 | * MightyGlacier: Indian Elephants. Slower and take more population than most horse cavalry. The strongest melee and ranged cavalry (mahout lancer and howdah respectively) are elephants. |
| 279 | * MisplacedWildlife: A few slip-ups appear regarding treasure guardians: |
| 280 | ** Black panthers, tigers and giant pandas in Japan. |
| 281 | ** Snow monkeys outside Japan. |
| 282 | ** Komodo Dragons in any Asian map (none of the maps are located near Komodo). |
| 283 | ** There are no caimans or crocodiles in this game, only alligators. Doesn't stop them from showing up in all maps between Carolina and Amazonia. |
| 284 | ** Caribbean island maps are booming with capybara, deer, tapirs and turkeys. |
| 285 | ** Deliberate with the presence of polar bears in Borneo, which is a ShoutOut to ''Series/{{Lost}}''. |
| 286 | ** Black bears appear in the Andes and wolves in Pampas and Patagonia, presumably as stand-ins for Andean bears and South American gray foxes. |
| 287 | * MsFanservice: Queen Isabella, the Spanish AI personality, purrs in a [[EverythingSoundsSexierInFrench sultry Spanish accent]]. She says to ''"quit playing so rough"'' when she is losing a battle, and that she ''"can't handle all these men"'' when requesting help. When attacked by multiple opponents, she asks, ''"Why is it that I always seem to get double-teamed?"''. She calls the player ''[[{{Dominatrix}} "pet"]]'' as an ally. In addition, [[http://i267.photobucket.com/albums/ii319/THE_faethin/IsabelAoE3.png her picture in the game's encyclopedia]] [[HistoricalBeautyUpdate looks quite lovely]] compared to the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabel_de_Castilla historical paintings.]] (At least, to a modern audience.) |
| 288 | * TheMusketeer: The unit is meant primarily for ranged attack with a musket, but actually deals higher damage-per-second (and receives a hefty bonus against cavalry) with bayonet melee attacks. Ranged cavalry, similarly, have an attack bonus against artillery just as melee cavalry does, but will likely do more damage against artillery in melee mode due to the higher attack rating and artillery's damage-reduction from ranged attacks. |
| 289 | * MysticalIndia: Some aspects of the Indian civilization exaggerate its Indian-ness, such as their common cavalry riding camels instead of horses, its monks riding elephants and training white tigers, and they having an elephant version of basically every type of military unit. |
| 290 | * MythologyGag: The [[VideoGame/AgeOfMythology Armor of Arkantos]] increases hero and explorer hitpoints when claimed. |
| 291 | * NationalAnimalStereotypes: |
| 292 | ** Though the Aztecs can train a complete menagerie of warriors in animal suits (Jaguars, Eagle, Coyote and Puma), they can only train pet jaguars. |
| 293 | ** Sioux can summon pet wolves and coyotes (with the latter also being trainable by them), and also bison herds. |
| 294 | ** Iroquois can summon pet black bears. |
| 295 | ** Indians have access to a great variety of war elephants and their monks can train white tigers. |
| 296 | * NavalBlockade: This is one of the high-level abilities where you can block off a player's regular shipments from their home city. Of course by the time you have that ability it isn't really needed, but still. This ability is only enabled in the original games and in ''Definitive Edition'' games where Blockades are allowed. |
| 297 | * NearVictoryFanfare: The climatic theme that plays during the last minute of a Trade Monopoly countdown. The theme itself is also a minute long; making the theme's triumphant end even more satisfying for the winning team. |
| 298 | * NeutralsCrittersAndCreeps: Treasure guardians are special units, both humans and animals, that are not controlled by any player and watch over Treasures on a map. Guardians have to be killed or converted before the Treasure they guard can be claimed. |
| 299 | * {{Ninja}}: Available as mercenaries in ''The [=WarChiefs=]''. They serve mostly as assassins, dealing massive damage to {{Hero Unit}}s and other mercenaries. |
| 300 | * NoHistoricalFiguresWereHarmed: Nanib Sahir to the historical [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nana_Saheb_Peshwa_II Nana Sahib]]. |
| 301 | * NostalgiaLevel: |
| 302 | ** Update 13690 for the ''The African Royals'' DLC of the ''Definitive Edition'' brought back the "Arabia" map from ''VideoGame/AgeOfEmpiresII''. |
| 303 | ** The ''Knights of the Mediterranean'' DLC for the ''Definitive Edition'' reintroduced the "Black Forest" map from ''VideoGame/AgeOfEmpiresII''. |
| 304 | * NotTheIntendedUse: The War Chief's taming ability can be used to turn human guardians, not just animals. If you avoid killing any outlaws, you may end with a decent-sized force of scimitar-wielding pirates and gun-toting bandits. This can be a little game changer if you are playing Sioux/Lakota (very poor infantry) or Aztecs (no gunpowder and cavalry units, at all). |
| 305 | * OldSoldier: |
| 306 | ** Some unit icons depict men with white beards, like the Hussar, Halberdier, Janissary, and Chinese and Indian monks. |
| 307 | ** The Sentinel model from the ''Knights of the Mediterranean'' DLC grows older as the player age up, eventually getting white hair by the Imperial Age. |
| 308 | * OmniscientCouncilOfVagueness: About all that we know about the Circle of Ossus for sure is that they are the enemy, their elite units are called 'Boneguards' and they want to obtain the FountainOfYouth. Absolutely everything else is up for grabs. |
| 309 | * OneHitKill: The European explorers have the Sharpshooter and, later on, the Crack Shot abilities: the first one allows you to kill a Treasure Guardian instantly; the second is a single high-damage shot that can kill almost any land military unit (with the exception of a few mercenaries and powerful special units) in one hit (but cannot be used against villagers, artillery and ships). |
| 310 | * PantheraAwesome: The whole package of big cats appears with ''The Asian Dynasties'': jaguars, cougars, lions, tigers, white tigers, snow leopards and leopards, in the form of black panthers. They are all quite nasty to face, especially the ones available as trainable units. |
| 311 | * {{Permadeath}}: Mission-critical units who are not affected by GameplayAllyImmortality fall into this. |
| 312 | * {{Pirate}}: |
| 313 | ** ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' introduces a specialised building that can train mercenaries, amongst which the player can find pirates and corsairs. |
| 314 | ** Wokou (Japanese pirates) show up in ''The Asian Dynasties''. |
| 315 | * PlayerCreationSharing: ''[[UpdatedRerelease Definitive Edition]]'' allows user-made content (usually gameplay/civilization modifications and even maps) to be shared through the Modifications menu. |
| 316 | * PrivateMilitaryContractors: |
| 317 | ** The player can recruit powerful mercenaries from the Home City at the cost of gold and a shipment card. |
| 318 | ** ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' allows them to be trained at a saloon at a higher cost per unit, with their availability dependent on the current map. |
| 319 | ** ''The Asian Dynasties'' allows them to be trained at the Monastery. They're tagged as "Repentant". |
| 320 | * ProudWarriorRaceGuy: Tokugawa and Cuauhtemoc. |
| 321 | * PurelyAestheticGender: Regular villagers can be either male or female, but do exactly the same jobs with the same amount of effectiveness. |
| 322 | * RateLimitedPerpetualResource: |
| 323 | ** European civilisations can build the Mill (for food) and Estate (for coin), which yield resources somewhat slowly and are limited to 10 Settlers at a time, but never run out; and the Livestock Pen, which buys livestock (costing food) and fattens them over time so they yield more food when slaughtered than their cost. Native American civilisations have access to the Farm, which combines the Mill's and Livestock Pen's functions. Asian civilisations have the Rice Paddy instead, which can be configured to produce either food or coin and otherwise works similar to the Mill and Estate. African civilisations build the Field, a cheaper version of the Rice Paddy that only supports up to 3 Villagers (their equivalent to the Livestock Pen, the Livestock Market, doesn't qualify as an example since they buy livestock with coin instead of food). The Mexicans have the Hacienda, which combines the functions of the Mill, Livestock Pen and Estate. |
| 324 | ** A Factory generates a constant trickle of either food, wood or coin (depending on the configuration) without the need for Settlers, but is only available in highly limited numbers (through Home City cards and and the House of Hanover's Victorian Era technology), and losing one can be devastating (especially in long team games) since they cannot be built or replaced if destroyed. The Porcelain Tower, one of the Chinese's wonders, works similarly (with an additional option to generate a combination of all resources, including export and experience), but being a Wonder, is limited to one and also cannot be rebuilt if destroyed. |
| 325 | ** The Japanese Shrine generates a trickle of food, wood or coin and attracts up to four animals into it to increase the trickle rate (without any animals, the resource generation is very slow). The Toshogu Shrine, one of their Wonders, provides a bigger trickle and boosts the resource generation rate of all Shrines. All Shrines must produce the same resource--changing the resource trickle on one Shrine will change the production on all of them. |
| 326 | ** Whales provide an infinite source of coin. Only four Fishing Boats can gather from a single spot at a time. Whaling is slower than mining but is useful in the late game, when mines are depleted. |
| 327 | ** Every civilisation has access to Home City cards that ship resource crates and can be sent an unlimited number of times as long as you keep earning experience. |
| 328 | * ReTool: Each expansion addresses two common criticisms of the previous installment. |
| 329 | ** ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' made a few Native American civilizations playable and therefore capable of going to war with European powers on their own, not just as allies of other Europeans (and by doing so introduced gameplay heavily based around Infantry - Aztecs - and Cavalry - Sioux - which had been a staple of previous games, but could not be featured on the more balanced European colonialists); brought the UsefulNotes/AmericanRevolution centerfold instead of hinting at but walking around it, and took out the fantasy element from the campaigns in favor of historical settings (the American Revolution, again, and the Sioux Wars). |
| 330 | ** ''The Asian Dynasties'' deviated from the American theme in favor of a new East Asian setting, and introduced three historical campaigns (or "[[AlternateHistory historical]]", in the case of the Chinese one) that were neither related to each other, nor revolved around the Black family. |
| 331 | * RespawningEnemies: Frequently done in the campaigns where the player's objective isn't "destroy the enemy's base". If the player decides to storm the enemy base instead of following said objective, the enemy would rapidly spawn units out of its Town Center until they completely overwhelm the player's striking force. |
| 332 | * RhinoRampage: Rhinos might possibly be the only complete herbivore in the game to be a treasure guardian. But they also do this with style, being the most powerful animal in the game. |
| 333 | * RightHandAttackDog: In the Campaign, the Circle has a thing for guardian white wolves and jaguars. |
| 334 | * RoaringRampageOfRevenge: A recurring theme in the campaigns. |
| 335 | * {{Ronin}}: Introduced in ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' as a powerful mercenary. |
| 336 | * RPGElements: Earning experience points during a match allows the player to send shipments from the Home City. They also go towards leveling up the Home City, which unlocks a wider variety of shipment cards and various cosmetic upgrades for the city. |
| 337 | * SavageWolves: The wolves are enemies, appearing in most maps, second only to the cougar as animals go, but are actually among the weakest of the animals in the games, and the explorer can dispatch a group of them with ease. |
| 338 | * SceneryPorn: The game's graphics are a significant step up from both ''Age of Kings'' and ''Age of Mythology.'' |
| 339 | * SeriesMascot: The Musketeers are promoted everywhere, and they are the most common unit in the vanilla game. |
| 340 | * SettlingTheFrontier: Every skirmish/multiplayer game has your chosen civilizations establishing settlements in the Americas, Asia, Africa, and even Europe (with some supplies shipped from their home cities). While this has been progressively downplayed since the release of ''Definitive Edition'', this remains a major motif for the European and Federal American civs, whose Discovery/Exploration Age structures resemble glorified log cabins. |
| 341 | * ShootTheMedicFirst: Priests, missionaries and surgeons heal units automatically (at least if you're using the expansions), but the healing is done slowly and cannot be done while combat is going on. Heroes with the ability to heal can do so to anyone regardless of their movements, but the healing hero must wait two minutes to be able to heal again when they use the skill. |
| 342 | * ShoutOut: |
| 343 | ** The cheat code "sooo good" causes a little ''WebAnimation/TeenGirlSquad''-style message to appear whenever a unit is killed, such as "musketeer'd!" or "imperial howitzer'd!" All with a badass bugle sound included. |
| 344 | *** When "killed", some explorers will yell (roughly) "I've fallen, and I can't get up!" in their native language. |
| 345 | ** There is a basic red and gold customization for British harbors in their Home City titled "Edward Teach's Academy of Naval Competence". Edward Teach is a man better known as [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackbeard Blackbeard]], a pirate. |
| 346 | ** Two Home City cards that benefit Chinese Monks are "Snatch The Pebble", which allows Monks to power up nearby disciples, and "Walk The Rice Paper", which allows the Chinese to have a second Monk. These are references to a show called ''Series/KungFu1972''. |
| 347 | ** The Yojimbo mercenary is identical to Sanjuro from ''Film/{{Yojimbo}}''. |
| 348 | ** The Borneo map, despite being an expectedly lushy and tropical island, has the odd [[{{Series/Lost}} polar bear]]. |
| 349 | ** One of the random names for the Saloon building is [[Franchise/CthulhuMythos "Rlyeh Roadhouse"]]. |
| 350 | * ShownTheirWork: |
| 351 | ** Similarly to ''VideoGame/AgeOfMythology'', the developers had done their research, but nonetheless discarded the results wherever necessary for gameplay. |
| 352 | ** This is even further emphasized in the ''Definitive Edition'' release with the Native American tribes. In [[https://youtu.be/MbiUgJG6BYU?t=262 a Gamescom interview]], the developers have consulted with various tribal leaders to discuss more accurate representation of Native American tribes (one of which is with Coin mining disabled and replaced with fur trading for Iroquois and Sioux because many Native American tribes traded with commodity instead of a specific currency like gold coins). |
| 353 | %% (ZCE) * SiegeEngines: Artillery units. |
| 354 | * SophisticatedAsHell: As mentioned above, the "killin' your doods" taunt, and this gem from the same voice actress as the Queen Elizabeth AI; |
| 355 | -->''"''Really''... such a ''noob''."'' |
| 356 | * SortingAlgorithmOfEvil: |
| 357 | ** Inverted in the base game. The first three Big Bads are technically equal in threat, since they all run the same organization, but there's still a big disconnect in their day jobs, which regress from [[spoiler:the Grandmaster of the Knights of St. John]] to [[spoiler:a lowly fur trader]]. |
| 358 | ** In ''The [=WarChiefs=]'', the first Big Bad is some two-bit mercenary captain, and the second is [[spoiler:the Fort Laramie quartermaster]]. Makes you wonder where they get these huge armies to throw your way... |
| 359 | * SpeakingSimlish: Certain Native units, such as scouts, generic warriors, and those belonging to tribes whose language is now forgotten. |
| 360 | * StanceSystem: Many units not only have different attack/defensive bonuses depending on their stance, but can also go into different formations and even switch weapons, whether it's standard Musketeers using bayonets or Maltese Sentinels and their long pikes. |
| 361 | * StoneWall: The Fort is one of the most powerful defensive buildings in the game, boasting high attack power from its cannons and high hitpoints. It also has the ability to train infantry and cavalry units. Its weaknesses are its slow rate of fire, making it vulnerable to large armies attacking it all at once, and units that outrange its cannons (e.g. Mortars, Monitors). It should also be noted that the Fort Wagon, contrary to the Fort it builds, is [[MadeOfPlasticine incredibly flimsy]] and can't defend itself. Even a small group of light infantry can take it down quickly [[spoiler:which becomes a plot point in "Saratoga"]]. |
| 362 | * StrategicAssetCaptureMechanic: The game has two neutral structures scattered across the maps: |
| 363 | ** The Trading Posts are placed on key points of a Trade Route whose transport (initially a rickshaw, then a stagecoach/trading cart, then a ''train'') leaves resources (XP, food, wood, coin) on it once they pass. |
| 364 | ** Minor Faction buildings are also placed on key points of the map and cannot be damaged. Allying with a minor faction grants bonuses and new units to whichever faction allied with the Village. In ''Definitive Edition'' you can "capture" these posts and immediately begin building the Trading Post with a discount. |
| 365 | ** The ''Knights of the Mediterranean'' DLC added a new map type, "Historical", many of which feature certain assets that must be captured: |
| 366 | *** The multiplayer-only "Thirty Years War" starts with every player having a Command Post. Scattered across the map are Villages that must be captured by killing their guardians. Each Village generates resources and provides population support, or can be raided for extra income. The civilization with the highest amount of captured villages is the winner. Only the Dutch, French, German, Italian, Spanish and Swedish civilizations are allowed to play. |
| 367 | *** "The Italian War" starts with every faction having a fortified city, with four City-States scattered across a river that must be captured in order to win. Only the British, French, German, Italian, Ottoman and Spanish civilizations are allowed to play. |
| 368 | *** "The Napoleonic Wars" starts with players building their armies during a treaty period and then fighting to control all the strategic points. Only the British, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Maltese, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and Swedish civilizations are allowed to play. |
| 369 | *** "The Russo-Turkish Wars" starts with players having a Command Post instead of a Town Center that can train Military Wagons. The objective is to win via trade Monopoly by capturing Fixed Guns and Factories. Only the British, French, German, Italian, Ottoman and Russian civilizations are allowed to play. |
| 370 | * StuffBlowingUp: |
| 371 | ** Mortars, Monitors and Heavy Artillery. |
| 372 | ** No matter what graphics level you have the game at, destroying weapon caches in the Campaign will cause them to blow up. |
| 373 | ** When the Maltese Depots are destroyed, they blow up, damaging anybody close enough to them, even ''allies and owners''. |
| 374 | * SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute: In the original game, you can build trade posts in Lakota, Iroquois and Aztec villages and get from them, respectively, native cavalry (Axe Rider, Dog Soldier), ranged infantry (Tomahawk) and siege (Mantlet), and infantry (Jaguar Warrior) and ranged infantry (Eagle Warrior) units. In the ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' sequel, the Lakota (now renamed Sioux), Iroquois and Aztecs become playable factions, and their former place in the map is filled with the Cheyenne, Huron and Zapotec, who provide you with cavalry (Cheyenne Rider), siege (''Huron'' Mantlet) and infantry (Lightning Warrior) units. |
| 375 | * SymbologyResearchFailure: |
| 376 | ** The Chinese "Confucian Academy" Wonder can automatically produce heavy siege weapons. |
| 377 | ** The Aztec war huts are sacrifice pyramids. |
| 378 | ** The faction flags and leaders in the vanilla version [[AnachronismStew rarely match up]], since the leaders of the original game were mostly chosen for being the ones to first establish overseas colonies, while the flags were chosen as the most commonly used design during the colonial period. This results in Henry the Navigator flying the Portuguese coat of arms on a white background (introduced 30 years after his death), Isabella flying the Habsburg Cross of Burgundy, Elizabeth flying the hybrid English-Scottish jack, Napoleon flying the Bourbon three Fleures-de-Lis, and Ivan the Terrible flying Peter the Great's imperial standard (why they didn't just use Peter the Great as a Russian leader remains a RiddleForTheAges). Suleiman actually gets the modern Republic of Turkey flag. The only leader that can be content is Maurice of Nassau, who gets to fly a Dutch navy flag. ''Definitive Edition'' rectified some of this, changing the Dutch flag to the standard orange-white-blue ''Prinsenvlag'', the Ottoman flag to an earlier eight-pointed star flag, and the Russian flag to the standard white-blue-red tricolor. |
| 379 | ** The German flag, however, merits its own entry. It has a bizarre crowned, black, two-headed eagle over a white background, seemingly [[CompositeCharacter a combination]] of the Prussian (crowned, black, one-headed eagle on a white background) and Holy Roman Empire flags (non-crowned, black, two-headed eagle on a yellow background). ''Definitive Edition'' changed it to the yellow imperial standard of the Holy Roman Empire. |
| 380 | ** The Native American factions should not use flags, since they didn't have any in the timeframe of the game. Their ingame flags are fictional, although the Iroquois flag is based on that of the Iroquois Confederacy, and the Sioux flag is based on that of the Pine Ridge Reservation. |
| 381 | ** The Asian factions mostly follow their European colleagues. Kangxi flies the Qing dragon flag adopted in the late 19th century (although the colors and dragon had been popular before) and Tokugawa flies the Tokugawa seal on a black background (the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokugawa_shogunate actual Tokugawa flag]] was much less badass). |
| 382 | ** The Indians have a fictional flag (golden sun and lion over yellow field) that appears to be a combination of Mughal (sun and lion over green field, among others) and Maratha designs (plain pale orange field). ''Definitive Edition'' changed it to the green and gold Mughal war flag. Akbar's AI personality also names "the gods" several times, and the Indian civilization is [[MysticalIndia very clearly Hindu]], but the real Akbar was Muslim. |
| 383 | * TacticalRockPaperScissors: While it's less clear-cut than in the other games in the series, generally, Infantry > Cavalry > Artillery > Infantry applies. It generally gets a bit complex, but the intent remains clear. |
| 384 | ** Infantry is divided into three types: |
| 385 | *** Heavy Infantry includes Musketeers and most melee infantry such as Pikemen or Halberdiers, which are effective in general but especially against Hand Cavalry. Musketeer-types counter cavalry units with either bayonets attached to their muskets or a melee sidearm such as swords or spears, but their middling firing range makes them susceptible to Light Infantry and Artillery. |
| 386 | *** Light Infantry includes Skirmishers and most Archers. Their longer range makes them effective against Heavy Infantry and Ranged Cavalry, but their light equipment and reliance on distance makes them helpless against Hand Cavalry. |
| 387 | *** Shock Infantry is a subtype that has existed since ''The [=WarChiefs=]'', but was formally codified in ''Definitive Edition'', and includes "pseudo-cavalry" such as Coyote Runners meant to serve the same role as Hand Cavalry for civs without access to horses. |
| 388 | ** Cavalry is divided into two types: |
| 389 | *** Hand Cavalry includes Hussars, Uhlans, and so on, and make short work of Artillery and Light Infantry. |
| 390 | *** Ranged Cavalry includes the likes of Dragoons, and excel against Melee Cavalry. They also 'soft counter' most Heavy Infantry by being fast enough to kite them around and engage at will without much harm, especially if they have technology that increases their range. |
| 391 | ** Artillery in general functions well against buildings and fortifications, but the Falconet-type siege weapons are specifically designed to counter Infantry, and the Culverin excels at outranging and picking apart ships and other Artillery. |
| 392 | ** Civilization specific units can also be effective against units that their unit archetype is not effective against, such as the Spanish Lancer against Heavy Infantry. |
| 393 | * TechnologyLevels: The Discovery Age[[note]]renamed to Exploration Age in ''Definitive''[[/note]], Colonial Age[[note]]renamed to Commerce Age in ''Definitive''[[/note]], Fortress Age, Industrial Age and Imperial Age/Revolution. |
| 394 | * TheBeastmaster: |
| 395 | ** Explorers can get a canine companion to fight at their side. |
| 396 | ** The Spanish Explorer can train more War Dogs. |
| 397 | ** The War Chiefs can train animals and convert treasure guardians, so they often end up with a menagerie of wolves, jaguars and bears that follow them around and try to eat enemy soldiers. |
| 398 | * ThemeParkVersion: Of the 16th, 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. ''At the same time'', no less. But they [[ShownTheirWork even it out]] by providing tons of detailed background information for ''every'' type of soldier, animal, and plant in the game's world! |
| 399 | * TheMountainsOfIllinois: The city screen for the Netherlands shows Amsterdam... with mountains in the background. |
| 400 | * TheyKilledKenny: Your explorer. Technically "captured"/"fallen" rather than "killed" when his hit points drop to zero, and can be brought back either by being ransomed by the player or by having units sent to recover him. You can expect this to happen at least once per game. |
| 401 | * ThreateningShark: Great White Sharks serve as naval treasure guardians in ''The Asian Dynasties''. They can sink warships if you're not careful. |
| 402 | * TieredByName: Units are generally given specific prefixes to their names when upgraded. |
| 403 | ** European and Federal American units: Veteran -> Guard -> Imperial. |
| 404 | ** Native American and African units: Elite -> Champion -> Legendary. |
| 405 | ** Asian units: Disciplined -> Honored -> Exalted. |
| 406 | * UnitsNotToScale: When putting people inside ships and ''canoes''. The in-game database entry about the canoes {{lampshade|Hanging}}s this. |
| 407 | * UpdatedRerelease: ''Definitive Edition'' serves as this to the original game, with subsequent [=DLCs=] and free content updates substantially adding much more that was had previously been available. |
| 408 | * ViewersAreMorons / ViewersAreGoldfish: The campaign heroes tend to order or point [[CaptainObvious incredibly obvious]] things, often several times. |
| 409 | * ViolationOfCommonSense: Aztec "Arrow Knights" (longbowmen) have multiplied attack against buildings and artillery. |
| 410 | * WarElephants: The Indians live by this trope. |
| 411 | * YeOldeButcheredeEnglishe: The British speak in a baffling pseudo-Elizabethan patois that a player is lucky to understand half of. Especially odd considering all the other civ speak totally modern forms of their languages. |
| 412 | * YouRequireMoreVespeneGas: Gold, Wood, Food, and XP, along with Firepit dancers or Export depending on the civilization. |
| 413 | * ZergRush: |
| 414 | ** The Russians produce batch armies, which are cheaper per soldier. |
| 415 | ** The Chinese in ''The Asian Dynasties'' take this even further, producing mixed batches of cheap but pitifully weak troops. |
| 416 | ** The Spanish can rush enemies by spamming army shipment cards at the start. In the late game, it is possible via a combination of improvements and shipment cards to reduce the training time of their Barracks units to zero, allowing you to create instant armies with a few clicks. Just hope your opponent didn't build a lot of artillery. |
| 417 | ** There are also the Minutemen: cheap and quick to train but they ''lose'' health as they ''live''. |
| 418 | ** The Germans receive a unique cavalry unit, the [[FragileSpeedster fast but fragile]] Uhlan, for free with each shipment. |
| 419 | ** The civilizations introduced in ''The [=WarChiefs=]'' focus in this aspect (the Sioux, Iroquois, and Aztecs). However, the Aztecs pretty much thoroughly goes in rushing, as all their "big button" upgrades involve spawning a set amount of warriors, and their War Priests can dance in the Fire Pit with an improved dance unlike a typical Villager, so the production rate bonus is higher. Like the Spanish, they can also reduce the training time of their War Hut units to zero using a combination of shipment cards. |
| 420 | ** The Aztecs' descendants, the Mexicans in ''Definitive Edition'', can swarm enemies with cheap, expendable Insurgentes, which can be trained in batches of 10. |
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