AOE2, AOE3, or AOE 4 for someone who is new to multiplayer.

[Mastermatta]

I own all 3 and play them solo occasionally but which game has the most beginner friendly multiplayer experience?

[Cacomistle]

Originally posted by Arthur Morgan:

Originally posted by Cacomistle:

Ok, go find me 1 pro game that was decided by landmarks. What's 1 example where a pro could have won the game by giving up their main town center, but chose not to. If this happens in 90% of games, then you should be able to click 2 random games and there's a 99% chance that you will find me an example.

If you want, I can find you a game that wasn't decided by landmarks. Its pretty much all of them, so honestly I'll just link you one at random. There's like a 1% chance I look stupid and that's actually the 1 game where someone went for a landmark snipe, but I'll take those chances.

Edit: I literally just did that. I decided to look for the first game in the elite classic finals. Well, other than the highlights at the start.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVW-QQUPSxA&ab_channel=EliteGamingChannel
Game starts at 31 minutes, ends at 42 minutes. Loue has not even so much as touched Beasty's landmarks when Beasty resigns. Explain to me, how would that game have been any different if landmarks were not a wind condition?

How about game 2, Beasty sets up trade, defends his trade, and then pushes back to wipe Loue's army and Loue resigns. Again, never touched landmarks, didn't even really go near them. Is it a coincidence and I just came across a 1% chance, or were these games where landmarks were never even so much as touched decided because of the landmark win condition?

Seriously though, I would like an answer to this.

I know how people play at low levels too. When Joe the bronze player sends 10 workers to the corner of the map while his opponent rams down his main TC, the game was not decided by landmarks. And honestly, a lot of low level players just leave under the first sign of pressure, resigning to a few longbow has nothing to do with their (in)ability to destroy landmarks.

Plus a lot players play team games. Team games aren't decided by landmarks. If you're playing a 4v4 and all 4 players on your team lost their base, you're losing that game whether its conquest or landmark. You're already wrong by default just by the mere fact that 1v1s aren't 90% of games.


I could see this argument aoe2. But are you seriously gonna tell me that games where a player loses their main tc, but comes back to win are common in aoe3? This is 10% of games, if even that. Players aren't forced to defend their main base in aoe3, so why do they consistently choose to do so?

It turns out that losing your main base is heavily correlated with losing the game, so nobody is making the decision to let that happen even without the landmark win condition.

Oh and landmarks aren't unpopular. The average player doesn't care.

Why are you so invested in defending this fruitless position? Landmarks were uneeded and unwanted. they add nothing and only detract by removing various defensive options.
pro players shouldnt be balancing a game around pro-level play, this thread is about beginners getting into the game, not people with 10,000 hours going against people with 10,000 hours.

Why are you so invested in defending an obviously inaccurate representation of the problem?

Like I said, I have no issue with you disliking landmarks. But don't tell me 90% of games are decided by them. It seems we've already agreed that's not the case because you just threw out experienced players from your argument. That's at least 10% of the MP playerbase.

If we want to talk only about bronze+silver, I wouldn't be surprised if maybe 40% of games one of the players feels like they were decided by landmarks (I'd still bet its less). But the key word is "feels". I've seen low elo legends in aoe2 and sc2, almost nobody is coming back from losing their main base, its just a lot more common that they don't leave in a clearly lost game.

[Cacomistle]

Originally posted by Arthur Morgan:

.

Btw I decided to do the same thing with low elo players. For reference I got these from searching "beasty low elo legends aoe4" since I knew he'd cased low elo games, the fitzbro one is from google before I switched to YT since google wasn't showing beasty's.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHSb7h6TmI0&ab_channel=FitzBro
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Kwq6ty2rFA&ab_channel=BeastyqtSC2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMGoWoP79C0&ab_channel=BeastyqtSC2

That first one, you could argue was decided by landmarks. I'd argue that the Abbassid player was dead either way. They lost their main tc, had no 2nd tc, had 0 units out, and all their vills were exposed. This is what I'm talking about where the Abba player could feel like they lost because of landmarks, when in reality they just had less army. But, I'll give you one anyways.

The other had nothing to do with landmarks.

And the 3rd one, not decided by landmarks but maybe you have the same issue with sacred sites.

If your 90% number was accurate, there'd only be an approximate 3% chance that those 0-1 of those games I picked didn't both get decided by landmarks. You could argue its a biased sample, but if so, find a better one. Or tell me why the 2nd/3rd game were decided by landmarks (even the 1st is dubious, that game was clearly over before the house of wisdom died).

[El Jeffe Epstein]

Originally posted by Subtle Butt:

Landmarks are fine. Most people lose because you're just in a losing position. There aren't very many games where landmark sniping actually decides the game. i.e. I won from a losing position because the enemy did not defend their landmarks. Realistically, if the enemy is in a position to kill your landmarks, you would not be able to defend anyways. And in team games, its shared between your whole team.

landmarks facilitate this which is the point you are missing, they are an unnecessary and unpopular edition.

[Subtle Butt ( >ω<)っ ♡]

Originally posted by Arthur Morgan:

Originally posted by Subtle Butt:

Landmarks are fine. Most people lose because you're just in a losing position. There aren't very many games where landmark sniping actually decides the game. i.e. I won from a losing position because the enemy did not defend their landmarks. Realistically, if the enemy is in a position to kill your landmarks, you would not be able to defend anyways. And in team games, its shared between your whole team.

landmarks facilitate this which is the point you are missing, they are an unnecessary and unpopular edition.

Facilitate what? Losing because you were in an unwinnable position? I can count with my hands how many times I've lost to landmark snipe. In team games, the landmarks are also shared so its even less probable. Again, if the enemy is in a position to kill your landmarks, something has gone wrong. 1 out of 20 games, maybe I've lost to landmark sniping. I rather have the chance of a landmark snipe than prolonging more games that are clearly won but the enemy is hiding vills. Because the chances of you winning by not defending your base is extremely small.

Like give some concrete examples of landmarks being bad for the game. What is bad that landmarks are facilitating besides saying they are bad?

[El Jeffe Epstein]

Originally posted by Subtle Butt:

Originally posted by Arthur Morgan:

landmarks facilitate this which is the point you are missing, they are an unnecessary and unpopular edition.

Facilitate what? Losing because you were in an unwinnable position? I can count with my hands how many times I've lost to landmark snipe. In team games, the landmarks are also shared so its even less probable. Again, if the enemy is in a position to kill your landmarks, something has gone wrong. 1 out of 20 games, maybe I've lost to landmark sniping. I rather have the chance of a landmark snipe than prolonging more games that are clearly won but the enemy is hiding vills. Because the chances of you winning by not defending your base is extremely small.

Like give some concrete examples of landmarks being bad for the game. What is bad that landmarks are facilitating besides saying they are bad?

again, youre missing the point. also you seem mad.
Its just a fact, landmarks are an unecessary and unpopular edition and landmark victory should have been a seperate game mode or at least timed so that you dont lose immediately when a landmark falls.

[Sylvester Sirloin]

I LOVE LANDMARKS! Only bad players complain about it because the Chinese attack with fire lancers which is in imperial age. That is the only unit that can do it and all you need to do is build stone walls to stop it.

[Sylvester Sirloin]

Originally posted by Arthur Morgan:

Originally posted by Subtle Butt:

Facilitate what? Losing because you were in an unwinnable position? I can count with my hands how many times I've lost to landmark snipe. In team games, the landmarks are also shared so its even less probable. Again, if the enemy is in a position to kill your landmarks, something has gone wrong. 1 out of 20 games, maybe I've lost to landmark sniping. I rather have the chance of a landmark snipe than prolonging more games that are clearly won but the enemy is hiding vills. Because the chances of you winning by not defending your base is extremely small.

Like give some concrete examples of landmarks being bad for the game. What is bad that landmarks are facilitating besides saying they are bad?

again, youre missing the point. also you seem mad.
Its just a fact, landmarks are an unecessary and unpopular edition and landmark victory should have been a seperate game mode or at least timed so that you dont lose immediately when a landmark falls.

Just play team games. You don't get eliminated if you lose your landmarks as long as another teammate has them.

[Sir Moisty Capybara]

Just play any game that suits you most and get enjoyment from I would say.
I can't speak for other games as for current state of things but Age of Empires 3: non-ranked it is quite easy to find game suitable to your liking (treaty mode if you want slower approach and pre-defined decks are waiting for you), but ranked... sometimes ~4 minutes of waiting and team ones can be skewed.