My Training Page

Site hosted by Angelfire.com: Build your free website today!

The Training Page

Read this first

This page is especially for inter and even rook players who want to improve their game. It was made by if_ (one of a hundred unknown names).

THE BEST way to improve your game is to watch and learn from expert recorded games. The games and tips to the right aren't the newest of games, but they contain most of the basics you need to know for expert no-seige style play.

These recorded games focus on how to use Franks because they are the best and most widely used civ. These games are in Arabia because it is the best map for demonstrating skill--no trees to hide behind. Also, in these games there IS rush becasue all players should learn how to beat a rush (it isnt THAT hard).

How to Watch Recorded Games

1. Find a game you want to watch on the right and press the "game" button. A download window should pop up.

2. Download the zipped game file to a place on your hard drive that you will remember.

3. Go to the downloaded zip file and open it. Inside the zip file is one file in .mgl format. drag (or "extract") this file to your AOK saved game folder. The location of this folder is:

.> C: Drive
...> Program Files
.....> Microsoft Games
.......> Age of Empires II
.........> Saved Game

4. Once the extracted .mgl game file is in the saved game folder, all you have to do is turn on AOK; click on "single player" and "saved game" and the file you just downloaded should be listed there and should play when u click on it.

General Tips For Rooks

1. Avoid Rook Names!
Yes, its stereotypical, but certain kinds of names cause people to assume that you are a bad player. Single words with numbers on the end (like harryguy104) are considered rookish names. So are usernames that consist of an adjective followed by a noun (like Red_Monkey, or GoldenWizzard) because names like this are often suggested during zone registration, so many newer players have these kinds of names. The more original your name looks, the more likely people will not assume that you are a rook.

2. Learn Franks & Arabia!
Franks is the overall best DM civ. Other civs are great but you really need to know how to use franks before trying other civs. This is because most good players use franks, so in order to know how to play against them you need to understand them. You also need get used to arabia. Arabia is the most fundamental map because its just you and the opponent, no trees to bury yourself, not as much use for walls and towers...just your army and their army on a mostly open field. Learn about rushing and defending against a rush. Get good at arabia and you can handle the basics of combat in general.

3. Develop your Econony!
Don't wait until you run out of resrouces before you start to get more. Within the first 5 min you should begin your economy by building more town centers and pumping out lots of villagers--dont stop getting more villagers until you are at about 70 to 90. A Frank player should always build two town centers by their main pile of gold (plus TC's by other nearby gold for farming and mining) and que them all the way up with villagers.

4. Micromanage & use Hotkeys!
Every single movement of your fingers, of your mouse and of the units on your screen should be made to be as quick and efficent as possible. This is called MICROMANAGEMENT--managing your playing down to smallest level. The opening seconds are critical. Don't make your first three villagers walk a long ways to build your first buildings. build them close to where they stand. Have a plan for exactly what you are going to build when. Watch the experts in the games to the right to see how they start and how fast they are. Part of micromanagement is the use of hotkeys. Learn the hotkeys or even program your own to make your playing really fast. When quing up units press the SHIFT key to que up 5 units at a time. So instead of pressing the villager button 15 times, you can press SHIFT+CTRL C C C and it ques up 15 villies in a fraction of the time.

Hmm...I'll add some more general tips when I think of them.

My Personal Favorite Civs

1. Persians
Not the all-round greatest, but definitely the most fun and most powerful in no-siege games given that you can keep the econ going. Excellent counter to common Frank strats, best civ to counter a typical rush.

2. Britons
Siege or no-siege, Brits are a powerful and simple civ to use.

3. Franks
The most powerful and mobile civ in the game. They have the strongest paladins, the cheapest castles. This allows for the greatest map control in Arabia. A group of 30 axemen grouped together are extremely powerful.

4. Chinese
This civ has a lot of potential and if used correctly can easily counter the top three civs listed above. Their cho ku no's are fast firing archers, mixed with pikemen, camels, and towers they are very powerful. Although, like Persians, Mongols, and a couple others, they have slightly shorter firing Trebs.

5. Mongols
A much overlooked civ, fun to use and quite powerful in the right circumstances. Camels, Mangudai, champs, pikes and skirms make an unexpectedly powerful army. You have to adjust the amout of each type of unit depending on what the other side is using. If they attack with lots of cavalry, increase number of pikes camels and mangs, if the make lot of hand canonneers and skirms (to counter mangs) then increase your number of skimrs and champs (champs kill skirms very well).

6. Japanese
Very Simiar to Goths but one of the least useful special units. The Samurai is good for protecting ranged units from pikemen and champs, but other than that it does little good. Japanese can be used effectively though in no-siege games with heavy reliance on pikes and hand canoneers.

7. Saracens
Not quite as powerful in no siege games but still a great civ to use vs cavalry or on water. Its heavy reliance on gold and the fact that virtually all of its units can easily be killed with a combo of skirms and hand cannons makes it a bad choice. But if you play some moron who makes only horses or elephants then you're in luck!

8. Vikings
My favorite civ to use on water maps. 60 Viking Longboats do a lot of damage to anything. Good infantry too--fun civ to use even though its not terribly good on regular land maps. Its almost impossible to beat an equal or better player using Franks.

9. Teutons
A so-so civ, niether exceptionally exciting to use or exceptionally good. Well-rounded army and techs. By far its biggest advantage is that it has the longest trebuchet range. Its special unit is the Teutonic Knight which is the strongest of all the infantry units, but it is killed easily by archers or hand canonneers. A lot of Black Forrest fans love the Teutons since towers, longer firing trebs and walls are hard to get around with any other civ.

10. Goths
Goths can be used effectively in no-siege games vs any other civ, but they are definately one of the weaker civs. Their unique unit is the Huskarl and is useful against archers. Another advantage is that their champs only cost 13 gold!

11. Byzantines
This is one of the most worthless civs ever imagined. It lacks many signifiant technologies make it weaker and slower than it could be. Yet, it is great on water maps and is theoretically good as a counter to brits due to the really cheap skirms & pikes, plus the towers, pals, and anti-infantry cataphracts. Ive never been able to use it effectively vs Brits though. But if you need cheap pikes and skirms, the best monks, and the best boats, this is a good civ.

12. Turks
The lack of Elite Skirmishers, Pikemen, and crop rotation make this one of my least favorite civs to use. But aside from this, Turks can be quite powerful. Their elite unit is the Jannisary which is basically a little bit better than the Hand Canoneer. Not bad, but they are easy to counter with a big skirm army. Skirms are easy to kill with champs though, so make lots of champs backed with your hand canonners, maybe throw in a few camels and place towers as you go and you might just steamroll someone.

13. Celts
Great siege weapons defines this civ, so in no siege games they are at a major disadvantage; especially without hand canoneers. They do still have better than average trebs and fun-to-use woad raiders. They do have paladins but they are the weakest paladins of them all.

Old but Good Recorded Games from expert AOK players

	__CriSSis	VS	vViLdTiGeR (aka Frankzz)
	__CriSSis	VS	__XaViEI2__
A COUPLE OF THE BEST GAMES EVER - Before we get into tips and strategies, here are two games to wet your whistle. watch these and get a general feel for the pace and efficency at which good experts play.

__OmErtA

Xx_S1LvEI2_xX

DEFENDING AGAINST A RUSH - One of the biggest fears of inexperienced players is how to properly start and defend against a Frank rush. There are various ways to do this, this is pretty typical game I found that shows one way. Silver rushes Omerta (the rush is somewhat late but you'll still get the idea). I want you to notice at least the three following things:

• The Start - Notice the difference between how silver starts in this game and how Omerta starts. Omerta puts two villagers on one stable, but silver puts two villagers on two stables. That means omerta will have his stable up twice as fast as silver will and therefore will have his first paladin out faster, too.

• Building Arrangement - Look at how both of them arange their opening buildings. The buildings are ttightly packed together surrounding the town center with a few openings. This arrangement makes it more difficult for rushers to kill villagers and it usually means that the builders dont have to walk as far. Rooks spread their buildings far apart.

• Protect Castle Builders - Watch how both of these players use the same funny little wall technique to protect the villagers building their castles. It takes some practice to learn how to do this in the middle of combat, but its a good idea because castle builders are always primary targets for rushers.

There are many other noticable tricks used in this game. Just watch to get a feel for how Omerta squashes the rush and wins the game.

	_FranKzz_	VS	_TheGenius_
RUSHING - This is an example of a very good rush. Watch how Frankzz starts and what his rushing paladins kill. When playing with good people, the point of the rush is NOT to destory or overwhelm your enemy. If that is your goal you will probably fail and run out of resources. Rushing is to contain and cripple your enemy. Watch how Frankz' rush aims for villagers and as a result Genius ends up building WAY slower and by the time he gets his villagers back, frankz is already building castles right next to him and attacking with a huge army. Also notice that Frankz doesnt just build a bunch of stables and set the gather point at the enmies base and them all his pals run over there blindly to get killed. That is how rooks and bad inters "blind rush." Let me say it more clearly--DO NOT BLIND RUSH! It is usually a waste unless you are playing a rook or doing it only a little bit to keep the other guy from leaving his base. But instead its usually better to send over small and ever increasing armies, not just one pal at a time. Many of these games here have examples of good rushes (and some poor).

	I_I_DaN_I_I	VS	tOrIvIeNtIuIvI
MAP CONTROL - Controlling the map is critical and Franks excel at this with their strong paladins and cheap castle bonuses. The more of the map you control the more control you can have over your opponent and the more resources you can collect. Watch how DaN starts the game by being aggressive and keeping tOrM in his base...by rushing in a few pals in the beginning, DaN prevented his opponent from advancing on him, meanwhile gaining control of the map. None of DaN's armies are exceptionally large or powerful, but since he is controlling most of the map he can attack with small armies all over the place and slowly chip away at his opponent. However, even though DaN gets early map control, it ends up being a pretty even game. RAIDING - Watch how both DaN and tOrM raid each others economies by frequently sending in small groups of pals to kill town centers and villagers mining resources or farming. Don't let your oponent keep feeding his armies, kill the villies and town centers and also protect your own!

	I3r4zZil_M4sTeR	VS	tOrIvIeNtIuIvI
THE MARKET - Since franks dont use a lot of wood early in the game, its common for frank players to quickly make a market and sell wood until the price for it is as low as it goes. Doing this will give you a significant amount of gold. However, the price of resources at the market is universal in a game--in other words once one person sells wood it effects the price of wood in everyones market. People often race to see who can get the market gold first. Some players get so caught up in this that they make their market too early. In this game Brazzil builds a market at the typical time, about one minute into the game. However, his opponent put ALL of his first THREE VILLAGERS on the market! Most would agree this is absolutely retarded. Also, be sure not to sell resources you need like food unless you have a large surplus--and never sell stone, thats just stupid. COMPARE ECONOMIES - Compare the economies of these two players. During the game you can switch back and foreth between players. Press the pile of gold button during the game to see economic stats and look at the difference--the number of idle villagers, the number of farmers, and lumberjacks etc. Also notice how after the gold mine run out, Brazzil uses relics to get a little extra gold to stay ahead of torm, plus he has a much better economy.

	InDeStRuCtAbLe	VS	_X_WolveI2ene
MISC - Two more good players, not much new to add. Watch how InDe takes over the map even after Wolv plops castles around the sides. Also notice the unit combinations used by each side. Learning what unit combinations to use in what circumstance is a matter of experience.

I will eventually update this by including
a series of more recent recorded games.

"There are two things you must know to succeed in life.
First, never tell anyone everything you now."