Campaign order

[algame]

Is there any particular order to do the main campaigns in? As in are some easier/harder than others?

[oldlamehand]

Some campaigns I don't know. But if I remember correctly, the campaigns from the original AOE2 before The Conquerors Expansion were easier than the later ones. William Wallace (Tutorial), Joan of Arc, Genghis Khan, Saladin, Barbarossa. But I'm not sure if they've been reworked. The last time I played them was about 15 years ago.

[FloosWorld]

There are many different orders in which you can play the campaigns:

- By the year they take place (indlucing historical battles)
- By difficulty (the sword icons indicate that but shouldn't be taken too literal - looking at you final mission of Joan of Arc)
- By their original release (Age of Kings → Conquerors → Forgotten → African Kingdoms → Rise of the Rajas → Last Khans → Lords of the West → Dawn of the Dukes → Dynasties of India)
- By continent

[Kampfschwein Fjonda]

- By difficulty (1 star - 3 stars); but it won't be a perfect order I reckon

[Krosis Priest]

I recommend the original Age of Kings and Conquerors campaigns first, the ones from the new DLCs are also pretty nicely balanced and accessible. Joan of Arc and El Cid are probably the easiest (though Joan's last two missions can be tough). Then Saladin, Genghis Khan, Barbarossa, Montezuma and Attila.

I recommend avoiding The Forgotten campaigns for now, especially Ivaylo which is utterly insane.

[Marco]

Originally posted by algame:

Is there any particular order to do the main campaigns in? As in are some easier/harder than others?

Depends on the difficulty level you are going to start with.

On Standard, my order was: Kotyan Khan -> Bari -> Ivaylo -> Dracula -> Alaric -> Sforza. For now. But I know Age of King and The Conquerors campaigns, so I've skipped them for now. There's not a precise order, however.

[algame]

Cool, thanks for the info everyone, I was a dummy and did not notice the sword icons on the campaigns, which I guess is the official indicator for difficulty. I like the idea of going in release order, old school games did used to dramatically increase the difficulty with expansions as they knew the playerbase wanted real challenge after completing base game.

[Krosis Priest]

Yeah, I think the classic campaigns mostly scaled pretty well in difficulty, and also in terms of complexity between each campaign - they were originally numbered, so Joan of Arc was supposed to be the first post-tutorial campaign and it's mostly just 1v1 or 1v2 against English and Burgundians, whereas by the time you got to Barbarossa you got multiple enemies, changing quests, betrayals, enemy wonders and so on.

On the other hand, I have felt a lot of the campaigns made after Conquerors were made to be difficult first and actually good second, plus they are all just five missions which is simply too short. The new DLC campaigns feel more like "best of both worlds" (the classic storytelling approach + new mechanics) and are really good, though.