A General Guide To Rushing in AoM By Necrophyte
1. Introduction:
Rushing has been a game play option since Age of Mythology first came out in 2002. Unfortunately, due to its complex use and the false statement “I have to be a Norse civilization to rush”, rushing has lately become less popular than playing defensively, for example. With the help of this guide, I want to show you, that rushing really isn’t as hard as it might seem and that a rush can be executed by any player using any god if wanted.
2. What Is Rushing Exactly And What Do You/ Should You Do When Rushing?
Rushing is a game play option, not only in Age of Mythology, but also in many other RTS strategy games. The primary goal when rushing is to attack the opponent and disrupt his economy in the early game stage (this may differ from pro rushers who will start attacking you around 4.00 minutes to players who will tend to rush at 7.30 minutes) in order to get a solid economic advantage throughout the entire game and to eventually defeat the opponent. To achieve this, there are a few basic factors to consider when planning and executing a rush, no matter with what civilization.
3. Factors To Consider When Rushing – The “Big Five”
3.1. Never, ever let your town center be idle
This is absolutely elementary when performing a rush, no matter with what civilization. Be it villager/dwarf/gatherer/laborer production or age advancement; never stop your town center from working. Even when you train your army, always look if your town center is idle and if it is, get it back working. Villagers → Resources → Military is the rule, so continue villager/dwarf/gatherer/laborer production until you have clear advantage over your opponent.
3.2. Always focus on specific units and have a certain strategy in mind
Gear your economy in order to produce a certain military unit type. Focus on this unit type during the entire early game stage, until your opponent starts to mass their counter. But even if this happens, a good rusher will always try to first out mass his opponent with the units he focused on before rearranging his economy to build their counters. You should also always have a certain strategy in mind (for example to attack from different sides or to claim important hunting areas with a few military units or buildings) and never play without one.
3.3. Build aggressively, know where to build and put your opponent under continuous pressure
When rushing with any civilization, you will want to place your temple, your military buildings and your houses next to hunting areas or gold mines. Preferably, you should try to build either on the left or the right side of your opponent’s base to make sure that your opponent does not see what units you are spawning from your temple and your military buildings. Try to avoid building too obvious in front of your opponent’s base and always have a natural barrier (trees, hills) hiding your own forward base. If you want to rush correctly, then you should always throw all military units into battle and leave none defending your forward base, this is considered as highly inefficient. Attack in smaller groups of military units and do not boom your enemy with a big army, because this will just make it harder to micro your units properly. The advantage of smaller military units groups is the easy microing, making early raiding easier and more efficient. Here again, gearing your economy on a certain military unit type can be extremely helpful in ensuring a steady military unit flow.
3.4. Continuously scout the map, note gold mines and hunting areas and kill any villagers/dwarves/gatherers/laborers gathering resources outside of town center/tower range
I assume that you are familiar with the “Golden AoM Rule” of attacking the opponent’s economy and molesting his villagers/dwarves/gatherers/laborers before destroying his buildings. When rushing, scouting and knowing the map is an absolute must.
If you find villagers/dwarves/gatherers/laborers mining, hunting or even chopping wood outside of town center/tower range, then three things should come to your mind immediately:
1. Next time I scout, I have to start scouting earlier. I must continue scouting and never let my scout be idle until late game.
2. Next time I have to build more aggressively near gold mines and hunting areas to prevent economic expansion of my opponent.
3. Next time I have to mine gold and hunt nearer to the enemy base, so even if he destroys my forward base, he won’t find any hunting and only little gold.
Learning out of your mistakes is just as important as recent online practice and will help you evolve in any game play.
3.5. Practice your rushing skills online
Without doubt, this is most certainly the hardest part about rushing. Practicing online not only forces us to overcome the feeling of being beaten, it also gives us the chance to adjust our skills to the level we want them. But again, the more often you play online and the greater your ambition to improve your rushing skills is, the faster will you improve and become an expert rusher, a so-called “smurf”.
With the “Big Five” loosely in mind and the right ambition, your rushing abilities will improve in no time at all, I’m sure.
4. Other Short Hints About Executing A Rush
1. Do not research any economic upgrades in the early game stage, they are too cost effective. Wait until you have a steady military unit flow, then consider researching them if you have the resources.
2. Build towers and upgrade them to secure your offensive forward base
3. Know the most important hotkeys by heart, especially “h” to select your town center and “v” to produce villagers/gatherers/laborers.
4. Assign hotkey numbers to your military buildings and to your scout.
5. Watch the idle villager/dwarf/gatherer/laborer banner, immediately assign them to new resources if they are idle.
6. Keep in mind that you don’t always have to raid with cavalry, using an archers range especially on maps like Alfheim or Anatolia can be very effective.
5. Specific Rush Tactics To The Different Civilizations
5.1. Rushing with Norse
Performing a rush with a Norse civilization is the easiest way to rush and can be executed even by new and relatively inexperienced AoM players. Preferably, you will want to worship Loki as your major god when rushing with Norse because he will cause your longhouse units to train 10% faster and his hersir hero units spawn myth units after fighting for long enough. Worship Heimdall as your minor god at about 4.30 minutes, he will give you the Undermine god power and the Einherjar myth unit. Use the Undermine god power to destroy a tower protecting a gold mine making raiding easier or save it to siege the town center. Use the Einherjar to destroy buildings outside town center/tower and if possible hero range or use it to eventually siege the town center too. Use the hersir you built during age advance to destroy additional buildings and to kill as many enemy villager/dwarves/gatherers/laborers as possible to start collecting favor for your Einherjars. Notice that any good Loki rush guide will focus on gathering food and gold, this has three different reasons:
1. It will enable you to produce raiding cavaly/ulfsarks nonstop from two or three barracks.
2. You will be able to produce dwarves to preserve food before and during age advancement.
3. You will be able to build Einherjars and mass them in the early game stage.
Most players rush with Loki because worshipping him gives the player many useful advantages when rushing. But be aware! Once your forward base is destroyed, you taking the upper hand in the game becomes quite unlikely, since the Norse have a higher dependency on their forward base then other civilizations do. The only downsides when rushing with Norse are that their buildings very weak and that their myth units are slaughtered by Greek and Egyptian heroes.
5.2. Rushing with Greek
Rushing with a Greek civilization isn’t as easy as rushing with a Norse civilization and requires a certain player skill level (if you’re not going to execute a Centaur rush, which is easier). When rushing with Greek, you will always want to worship Poseidon, because he will lower cavalry costs, making early raids less cost effective and because his militia appears at destroyed buildings giving you free, moderately effective units in the early game stage. Choose Ares as your minor god at about 5.00 minutes, he will give you the Cyclops myth unit and the Pestilence god power. The Cyclops is an overpowered, yet expensive myth unit in the Classical Age, forcing the player to focus on food in the Archaic Age in order to build him. The Pestilence god power delays the opponent’s army production, enabling you to take out a Norse forward base for example. Its correct use is quite important when rushing with Poseidon. Use it immediately when you first see more than one opponent military facility or more than five opponent military units. These are clear indicators that the opponent is indeed training an army and readying his attack. As I have already mentioned, you will have to focus on food when rushing with Poseidon, this will enable you to produce cavalry and the Cyclops myth unit. During the Archaic Age, you will have about 8-10 villagers gathering food, 4-5 villagers mining gold and not more than 3 chopping wood. 1 villager gathering favor will be enough during the Archaic Age. Build your forward temple near the enemy base, nearer than you would when rushing with Loki, because your enemy will know that Greek buildings aren’t as easy to destroy as Norse buildings and because you will get militia if the building is destroyed. After advancing, take 6 villagers gathering food off of food and send 2 of them to mine gold, 1 to chop wood, 1 more to gather favor at your temple and 2 to construct your forward base. The villagers you produce from your town center after that should be put on either gold or food depending on what you lack. As soon as you have enough favor, begin training a Cyclops and start attacking military barracks when playing against Norse, houses when playing against Greek or Egypt. Try to protect your Cyclops at any costs from heroes or town center/town range. By now, your villagers should have put up a stable. Immediately train hippikons with all the resources you have and start to raid your opponent’s economy. Prevent your enemy in any way possible from advancing to the Heroic Age because there he will have access to new god powers and units. Advancing to the Heroic Age will assist your opponent in destroying your forward base and eventually winning the game.
Rushing with Poseidon is quite hard and complex. But knowing the Poseidon rush idea and its potential can be very helpful when playing against a defensive Norse or Greek opponent. When performing this rush, it is extremely important to protect your Cyclops myth unit/s at all cost/s because he/they will almost always be responsible for the game outcome. True, this strategy has been performed quite rarely, but when it was executed and understood then it was always very effective.
5.3. Rushing with Egypt
Rushing with an Egyptian civilization is one of the hardest game play strategies available in the game of AoM and has been mastered by only the fewest AoM players online. The Egyptian dependency on gold to build military barracks and towers, their slow building construction speed and the fact that you need more laborers than normal to get your economy running when rushing has made it almost impossible to rush with Egypt. Yet there are a few people I have played who have mastered the Egypt rush, mostly by outnumbering their enemy with the cheaper Egyptian military units. Anyway, you will always want to choose Set as your major god, he will reduce you Slinger’s training time, grant you free animals at your temple after advancing to the next age and give you the important Vision god power. Use it right before you advance to the Classical Age, it will enable you to see the opponent’s economy and determine his potential strategy so you can build counters to his military units. During the Archaic Age, you should have 10-12 laborers gathering food, not more than 3 chopping wood and 6-8 mining gold. After advancing at about 6.30, take 6 laborers off food and send 5 to gather wood, 1 to build your forward base together with your pharaoh. The next 3 laborers you produce from your town center after advancing should go to gold, after that you should decide what resource you need more of. When choosing your Classical Age minor god, always go for Anubis at about 5.30. He will give you the important Plague of Serpents god power and the Anubite myth unit. Use the Plaque of Serpents god power near your forward base as soon and your second barracks goes up. This will help you maintain your offensive position and support your rush. Don’t forget about the animals you got at your temple during age advance! Use a hyena to scout the rest of the map, the other animals to attack a tower when playing Norse or Greek, laborers when playing against Egypt. In the meantime you should have trained a few slingers. As soon as you have 4, use them to attack woodcutters when playing against Norse, gold miners when playing against Egypt or Greek. Take advantage of their far range and let them retreat to your forward base if you see a considerable amount of enemy military units. Your forward base will probably not be attacked if you have used the Plaque of Serpents god power correctly. When rushing with Set, attempt to build priests if you have extra gold in the Classical Age, but do not attempt to convert any animals except if you are playing on a map with an infinite food source such as Anatolia or Midgard.
Rushing with Set is very hard but not impossible and involves months of intensive online training and offline practice.
6. Rushing With The Different Civilizations – A Sum Up
Upon reading these different civilization rushing guides, you should notice at least 3 different important aspects:
1. Rushing with Norse is the best and most convenient way to rush. Their quickly erected buildings, the fact that Norse infantry can build structures and their aggressive god powers lead to an aggressive and swift play style. Most online AoM players rush with a Norse civilization, taking advantage of all these numerous virtues.
2. Rushing with Greek is not exactly easy but doable. The expensive Greek units and their slow building construction rate are looked upon as obstacles but can be offset by using your resources correctly. The most important Greek values are the overpowered Cyclops myth unit and the hippikon cavalry raid unit.
3. Rushing with Egypt is very challenging and is built upon months or even years of experience and training. Their dependency on gold and their weak Classical Age military units make them a rather defensive civilization with the goal of advancing to the Heroic Age as fast as possible to reinforce their troops with the strong Migdol Stronghold units. The only chance of rushing your enemy with Egypt is to out mass him with the cheap Egyptian military units and to radically gear your economy on a specific unit type, preferably Slingers to take advantage of their range. But again, correctly executing an Egypt rush has only been mastered by the fewest AoM players.
7. “Many Thanks To” And Final Words
At this point I think I’ve come to the end of my guide about rushing and I thought I’d maybe write down some people who supported me in completing this guide:
1. My family (thanks for giving me some free time to focus on writing this guide)
2. All 1800+ players out there (you guys are awesome, just know that every AoM player admires your skills)
3. The makers of AoM (even though I don’t know any of you: thank you so much for making such a great game)
4. Everybody who has defeated me in AoM (that is one of the only ways to improve my game play, I guess I owe you guys thanks too)
5. Many others people I just don’t remember right now
Want me to watch your recorded game and tell you how to improve your game play? I’m online almost daily and if you message me we can maybe talk it out.
SEE YA ONLINE
1. Introduction:
Rushing has been a game play option since Age of Mythology first came out in 2002. Unfortunately, due to its complex use and the false statement “I have to be a Norse civilization to rush”, rushing has lately become less popular than playing defensively, for example. With the help of this guide, I want to show you, that rushing really isn’t as hard as it might seem and that a rush can be executed by any player using any god if wanted.
2. What Is Rushing Exactly And What Do You/ Should You Do When Rushing?
Rushing is a game play option, not only in Age of Mythology, but also in many other RTS strategy games. The primary goal when rushing is to attack the opponent and disrupt his economy in the early game stage (this may differ from pro rushers who will start attacking you around 4.00 minutes to players who will tend to rush at 7.30 minutes) in order to get a solid economic advantage throughout the entire game and to eventually defeat the opponent. To achieve this, there are a few basic factors to consider when planning and executing a rush, no matter with what civilization.
3. Factors To Consider When Rushing – The “Big Five”
3.1. Never, ever let your town center be idle
This is absolutely elementary when performing a rush, no matter with what civilization. Be it villager/dwarf/gatherer/laborer production or age advancement; never stop your town center from working. Even when you train your army, always look if your town center is idle and if it is, get it back working. Villagers →
3.2. Always focus on specific units and have a certain strategy in mind
Gear your economy in order to produce a certain military unit type. Focus on this unit type during the entire early game stage, until your opponent starts to mass their counter. But even if this happens, a good rusher will always try to first out mass his opponent with the units he focused on before rearranging his economy to build their counters. You should also always have a certain strategy in mind (for example to attack from different sides or to claim important hunting areas with a few military units or buildings) and never play without one.
3.3. Build aggressively, know where to build and put your opponent under continuous pressure
When rushing with any civilization, you will want to place your temple, your military buildings and your houses next to hunting areas or gold mines. Preferably, you should try to build either on the left or the right side of your opponent’s base to make sure that your opponent does not see what units you are spawning from your temple and your military buildings. Try to avoid building too obvious in front of your opponent’s base and always have a natural barrier (trees, hills) hiding your own forward base. If you want to rush correctly, then you should always throw all military units into battle and leave none defending your forward base, this is considered as highly inefficient. Attack in smaller groups of military units and do not boom your enemy with a big army, because this will just make it harder to micro your units properly. The advantage of smaller military units groups is the easy microing, making early raiding easier and more efficient. Here again, gearing your economy on a certain military unit type can be extremely helpful in ensuring a steady military unit flow.
3.4. Continuously scout the map, note gold mines and hunting areas and kill any villagers/dwarves/gatherers/laborers gathering resources outside of town center/tower range
I assume that you are familiar with the “Golden AoM Rule” of attacking the opponent’s economy and molesting his villagers/dwarves/gatherers/laborers before destroying his buildings. When rushing, scouting and knowing the map is an absolute must.
If you find villagers/dwarves/gatherers/laborers mining, hunting or even chopping wood outside of town center/tower range, then three things should come to your mind immediately:
1. Next time I scout, I have to start scouting earlier. I must continue scouting and never let my scout be idle until late game.
2. Next time I have to build more aggressively near gold mines and hunting areas to prevent economic expansion of my opponent.
3. Next time I have to mine gold and hunt nearer to the enemy base, so even if he destroys my forward base, he won’t find any hunting and only little gold.
Learning out of your mistakes is just as important as recent online practice and will help you evolve in any game play.
3.5. Practice your rushing skills online
Without doubt, this is most certainly the hardest part about rushing. Practicing online not only forces us to overcome the feeling of being beaten, it also gives us the chance to adjust our skills to the level we want them. But again, the more often you play online and the greater your ambition to improve your rushing skills is, the faster will you improve and become an expert rusher, a so-called “smurf”.
With the “Big Five” loosely in mind and the right ambition, your rushing abilities will improve in no time at all, I’m sure.
4. Other Short Hints About Executing A Rush
1. Do not research any economic upgrades in the early game stage, they are too cost effective. Wait until you have a steady military unit flow, then consider researching them if you have the resources.
2. Build towers and upgrade them to secure your offensive forward base
3. Know the most important hotkeys by heart, especially “h” to select your town center and “v” to produce villagers/gatherers/laborers.
4. Assign hotkey numbers to your military buildings and to your scout.
5. Watch the idle villager/dwarf/gatherer/laborer banner, immediately assign them to new resources if they are idle.
6. Keep in mind that you don’t always have to raid with cavalry, using an archers range especially on maps like Alfheim or Anatolia can be very effective.
5. Specific Rush Tactics To The Different Civilizations
5.1. Rushing with Norse
Performing a rush with a Norse civilization is the easiest way to rush and can be executed even by new and relatively inexperienced AoM players. Preferably, you will want to worship Loki as your major god when rushing with Norse because he will cause your longhouse units to train 10% faster and his hersir hero units spawn myth units after fighting for long enough. Worship Heimdall as your minor god at about 4.30 minutes, he will give you the Undermine god power and the Einherjar myth unit. Use the Undermine god power to destroy a tower protecting a gold mine making raiding easier or save it to siege the town center. Use the Einherjar to destroy buildings outside town center/tower and if possible hero range or use it to eventually siege the town center too. Use the hersir you built during age advance to destroy additional buildings and to kill as many enemy villager/dwarves/gatherers/laborers as possible to start collecting favor for your Einherjars. Notice that any good Loki rush guide will focus on gathering food and gold, this has three different reasons:
1. It will enable you to produce raiding cavaly/ulfsarks nonstop from two or three barracks.
2. You will be able to produce dwarves to preserve food before and during age advancement.
3. You will be able to build Einherjars and mass them in the early game stage.
Most players rush with Loki because worshipping him gives the player many useful advantages when rushing. But be aware! Once your forward base is destroyed, you taking the upper hand in the game becomes quite unlikely, since the Norse have a higher dependency on their forward base then other civilizations do. The only downsides when rushing with Norse are that their buildings very weak and that their myth units are slaughtered by Greek and Egyptian heroes.
5.2. Rushing with Greek
Rushing with a Greek civilization isn’t as easy as rushing with a Norse civilization and requires a certain player skill level (if you’re not going to execute a Centaur rush, which is easier). When rushing with Greek, you will always want to worship Poseidon, because he will lower cavalry costs, making early raids less cost effective and because his militia appears at destroyed buildings giving you free, moderately effective units in the early game stage. Choose Ares as your minor god at about 5.00 minutes, he will give you the Cyclops myth unit and the Pestilence god power. The Cyclops is an overpowered, yet expensive myth unit in the Classical Age, forcing the player to focus on food in the Archaic Age in order to build him. The Pestilence god power delays the opponent’s army production, enabling you to take out a Norse forward base for example. Its correct use is quite important when rushing with Poseidon. Use it immediately when you first see more than one opponent military facility or more than five opponent military units. These are clear indicators that the opponent is indeed training an army and readying his attack. As I have already mentioned, you will have to focus on food when rushing with Poseidon, this will enable you to produce cavalry and the Cyclops myth unit. During the Archaic Age, you will have about 8-10 villagers gathering food, 4-5 villagers mining gold and not more than 3 chopping wood. 1 villager gathering favor will be enough during the Archaic Age. Build your forward temple near the enemy base, nearer than you would when rushing with Loki, because your enemy will know that Greek buildings aren’t as easy to destroy as Norse buildings and because you will get militia if the building is destroyed. After advancing, take 6 villagers gathering food off of food and send 2 of them to mine gold, 1 to chop wood, 1 more to gather favor at your temple and 2 to construct your forward base. The villagers you produce from your town center after that should be put on either gold or food depending on what you lack. As soon as you have enough favor, begin training a Cyclops and start attacking military barracks when playing against Norse, houses when playing against Greek or Egypt. Try to protect your Cyclops at any costs from heroes or town center/town range. By now, your villagers should have put up a stable. Immediately train hippikons with all the resources you have and start to raid your opponent’s economy. Prevent your enemy in any way possible from advancing to the Heroic Age because there he will have access to new god powers and units. Advancing to the Heroic Age will assist your opponent in destroying your forward base and eventually winning the game.
Rushing with Poseidon is quite hard and complex. But knowing the Poseidon rush idea and its potential can be very helpful when playing against a defensive Norse or Greek opponent. When performing this rush, it is extremely important to protect your Cyclops myth unit/s at all cost/s because he/they will almost always be responsible for the game outcome. True, this strategy has been performed quite rarely, but when it was executed and understood then it was always very effective.
5.3. Rushing with Egypt
Rushing with an Egyptian civilization is one of the hardest game play strategies available in the game of AoM and has been mastered by only the fewest AoM players online. The Egyptian dependency on gold to build military barracks and towers, their slow building construction speed and the fact that you need more laborers than normal to get your economy running when rushing has made it almost impossible to rush with Egypt. Yet there are a few people I have played who have mastered the Egypt rush, mostly by outnumbering their enemy with the cheaper Egyptian military units. Anyway, you will always want to choose Set as your major god, he will reduce you Slinger’s training time, grant you free animals at your temple after advancing to the next age and give you the important Vision god power. Use it right before you advance to the Classical Age, it will enable you to see the opponent’s economy and determine his potential strategy so you can build counters to his military units. During the Archaic Age, you should have 10-12 laborers gathering food, not more than 3 chopping wood and 6-8 mining gold. After advancing at about 6.30, take 6 laborers off food and send 5 to gather wood, 1 to build your forward base together with your pharaoh. The next 3 laborers you produce from your town center after advancing should go to gold, after that you should decide what resource you need more of. When choosing your Classical Age minor god, always go for Anubis at about 5.30. He will give you the important Plague of Serpents god power and the Anubite myth unit. Use the Plaque of Serpents god power near your forward base as soon and your second barracks goes up. This will help you maintain your offensive position and support your rush. Don’t forget about the animals you got at your temple during age advance! Use a hyena to scout the rest of the map, the other animals to attack a tower when playing Norse or Greek, laborers when playing against Egypt. In the meantime you should have trained a few slingers. As soon as you have 4, use them to attack woodcutters when playing against Norse, gold miners when playing against Egypt or Greek. Take advantage of their far range and let them retreat to your forward base if you see a considerable amount of enemy military units. Your forward base will probably not be attacked if you have used the Plaque of Serpents god power correctly. When rushing with Set, attempt to build priests if you have extra gold in the Classical Age, but do not attempt to convert any animals except if you are playing on a map with an infinite food source such as Anatolia or Midgard.
Rushing with Set is very hard but not impossible and involves months of intensive online training and offline practice.
6. Rushing With The Different Civilizations – A Sum Up
Upon reading these different civilization rushing guides, you should notice at least 3 different important aspects:
1. Rushing with Norse is the best and most convenient way to rush. Their quickly erected buildings, the fact that Norse infantry can build structures and their aggressive god powers lead to an aggressive and swift play style. Most online AoM players rush with a Norse civilization, taking advantage of all these numerous virtues.
2. Rushing with Greek is not exactly easy but doable. The expensive Greek units and their slow building construction rate are looked upon as obstacles but can be offset by using your resources correctly. The most important Greek values are the overpowered Cyclops myth unit and the hippikon cavalry raid unit.
3. Rushing with Egypt is very challenging and is built upon months or even years of experience and training. Their dependency on gold and their weak Classical Age military units make them a rather defensive civilization with the goal of advancing to the Heroic Age as fast as possible to reinforce their troops with the strong Migdol Stronghold units. The only chance of rushing your enemy with Egypt is to out mass him with the cheap Egyptian military units and to radically gear your economy on a specific unit type, preferably Slingers to take advantage of their range. But again, correctly executing an Egypt rush has only been mastered by the fewest AoM players.
7. “Many Thanks To” And Final Words
At this point I think I’ve come to the end of my guide about rushing and I thought I’d maybe write down some people who supported me in completing this guide:
1. My family (thanks for giving me some free time to focus on writing this guide)
2. All 1800+ players out there (you guys are awesome, just know that every AoM player admires your skills)
3. The makers of AoM (even though I don’t know any of you: thank you so much for making such a great game)
4. Everybody who has defeated me in AoM (that is one of the only ways to improve my game play, I guess I owe you guys thanks too)
5. Many others people I just don’t remember right now
Want me to watch your recorded game and tell you how to improve your game play? I’m online almost daily and if you message me we can maybe talk it out.
SEE YA ONLINE
[This message has been edited by Necrophyte (edited 07-21-2009 @ 11:15 AM).]