I Found a Strategy GENIUS at 1000 Elo | AoE2 Coaching
Table of contents
- Small decisions in early game strategy can make or break your success—focus on optimizing your build order and scouting thoroughly!
- Always scout your opponent's base thoroughly; knowing where to attack can make or break your strategy.
- Focus on stabilizing your economy before expanding with additional Town Centers.
- Never mine stone with Huns early game—focus on wood and food to boost your economy and stay ahead.
- Don't just build a castle—make it count! Always ensure it's strategically placed to pressure your opponent effectively.
- Level up your game by hitting those key upgrades and pushing faster—don't let your opponent catch up!
Small decisions in early game strategy can make or break your success—focus on optimizing your build order and scouting thoroughly!
Hello everyone and welcome back to another video. Today, we're going to be doing another Rec review at around 1K Elo. We're at 1K 80, and we have Sand Bascal, the guy who sent in the WCK, playing as the Huns. He is up against Tourinho, playing in red as the Burgundians.
I noticed right away that Sand Bascal has the handicap sign, but I'm not sure if that's real or fake. Either way, we're playing as the Huns here, so let's see what we can do. We'll probably fast forward through the Dark Age and I'll keep an eye on you as we normally do for these Rec reviews.
Huns vs. Burgundians is actually a pretty nice matchup. I feel like Huns should be favorites. If you just get the cavalry as soon as possible, it's usually a good game plan. We have a nice map as well, with the gold and wood being together. Scouting could be improved a little bit; you should go in circles. You would have found this back wood line, which could have been helpful.
I noticed we're also going four to wood, which is probably too much. You're going to get this boar late now. This is exactly why three to wood is better. Normally, it's two in my recent builds, but with Huns, it's three because you start with less wood. The perfect number with Huns is absolutely three. Going four is going to delay us a little bit, and people think all of these little numbers don't matter, but they really do. They actually matter quite a bit.
Now we're going to start luring deer. This is usually where idle TC starts ramping up. It ramps up a little bit, 21, 24. Honestly, this is why I don't recommend luring deer at lower levels, but it's okay. It's something you'll learn from over time. It's completely fine.
Everything else looks okay. The four to wood actually, I just realized, could be okay if you're dushing, but I don't think you're going to go for that. Three wood is a better opening, but overall, you're doing pretty well here. Just develop and get to the Feudal Age as quickly as possible.
Wait, you just randomly queued a bunch of villagers. What's actually the plan here? Are we making a barracks? Are we actually rushing in the end? You just queued up a bunch of villagers. I think you might be trying to do some sort of fast castle. Oh wait, you just canceled them. Hold on.
It does still look like we're going for some sort of fast castle because we're at 22, 23. Now we're going to go like 25 pop up and we're going mining camp. Some weird stuff is happening right now. I'm going to wait before I comment because if we're going to go fast castle, this is okay. I don't mind the build order. Some sort of fast rush, maybe some FC cavalry archers.
This is pretty good actually. I did mess around myself with FC cavalry archers maybe like a year ago. I still remember it, and the strat is actually really not bad with Huns and Tatars. It's kind of like some all-in rush. I gave it some cringy name I don't remember exactly, but I know for a fact firsthand that FC all-in cavalry is actually quite solid.
The point is going to come in, we might get punished with no loom. Oh no, we can trap him. No way you actually trapped him though. But we have no loom, we might lose the villager if we're not careful. You have to kill him fast. Oh no, I think we're going to lose a villager. The trap was really nice, but I think we're down a villager.
You got punished for no loom. Only get no loom if you're upping fast or else you risk getting punished. Going fast castle with no loom is super risky; you're going to get punished every time.
By the way, the setup is fine. We scouted our opponent, but you did a really poor job. When you scout your opponent, you have to do a loop around your opponent's base. Doing this thing where you just scout your opponent and then leave is not effective. Now you don't even know where his wood is, you don't know if he's taking gold, you have no idea about anything regarding his base. You're completely blind. You only know that he's opening stable.
Definitely make sure to do one loop around your opponent's base. It helps you later when you want to know where to attack. You don't even know what his base looks like. It might be completely open here, and obviously, it's not.
Always scout your opponent's base thoroughly; knowing where to attack can make or break your strategy.
Loom is super risky; you're going to get punished every time. However, bywise is okay, not too bad. The setup is fine; we scattered our opponent, but you did a really poor job. When you scatter your opponent, you have to do a Looper on your opponent's base. Doing this thing where you just SC your opponent, where are you even going? You just left because now you don't even know where his wood is, you don't even know if he's taking gold; you have no idea anything about his base. You're completely blind; you only know that he's opening stable. Definitely make sure to do one loop on your opponent's base; it helps you later when you want to know where to attack. You don't even know what his base looks like; it might be completely open here. Obviously, it's not this Woodland, but it's important to know this to know where to attack and if you can attack later on in the game. That might come back to haunt you.
It looks like we are going for fast Castle. A little bit too many on berries though. I guess you're fast castling, so okay. The build is not bad; it's okay. Cal archers—yeah, FC Cal Archer. Interesting, I haven't seen this build. I don't know if you guys knew about this build down at 1K Elo like that. It's actually kind of a hard build to do, so I'm pretty impressed. Now, what you have to do is see a few more farms. You probably skip horse collar, but you want to get bitx as soon as possible. I think you put too many on berries though. It should be something like six or seven on berries, not ten. If you want to know the exact numbers, because now all your berries went out and you don't even have farm setup. You probably want to have something like four to seven on gold—four for one range cure. I don't recommend that; I recommend two ranges with seven on gold, something like that. It's kind of like an—not an all-in, but like a very aggressive fast Castle into cavage strat, because they're so cheap, right? You can spam them out quite easily with hunts, and CA in general are quite strong. So yeah, that's what I recommend here.
Let's see how it goes. It's not a bad opening. You're going to come back and scout him now, which is nice. See the gates? I made a video about this gate; this Palace at gate is very weak. That's a nice area to target there. I hope you're aware of that for later. Take one hit there, no problem. So far, so good. Our opponent's playing quite well, actually. He's getting wheelbarrow; he got the Bosa. I don't know why he's not getting horse collar—that seems like a big waste with Burgundians to skip that. He's also doing ten on berries, guys. It's maximum six on berries. I feel like I'm yelling into a vacuum here; nobody's listening to me.
Alright, we're going to get up to Castle. You have only one range with one on gold, so at this point, I really just have no idea what you're doing. I don't think you know what you're doing. Now you make the second range. What were we doing the past two minutes? Okay, no problem. I forgive you, brothers, no problem. Second range coming up now. We're going to go two range c c archers. Right off the bat, obviously, I've never seen this wck before, but what you have to do is do a lot of damage with the CA right off the bat here, like as soon as possible. We need a lot of damage, but I'm already noticing some problems. Number one, you don't have enough gold income to sustain two range production. In fact, you don't have enough even for one range production. If you're sinking a lot of resources into these two ranges, I want them to be working 100% consistently, right?
In general, if you're going to go fast Castle, you put yourself behind a lot in terms of eco collected. You're going to start falling behind a lot now. Actually, you should be falling behind a lot because your opponent should have more vills, but your opponent has 2 minutes 23 seconds idle TC time. He is down six or something villagers, or at least five villagers on idle TC time, which is crazy to me. Wow, you should be down like five or six vills now and down like a thousand resources because of this FC, but I guess you got away with it because your opponent is idling his TC a lot. But I guess, yeah, that's the situation.
Either way, we still have to do a lot of damage upon hitting Castle Age, so these archers should go across the map right away, which is very good. We don't have Fletching, we don't have Bosa—these are all things that we want to work towards. You don't want to add a TC right away; you want to add farms, get Bosa. Yeah, this is good. Yes, yes, get Bosa, get upgrades first. If you fast Castle, don't rush to add TCs.
Focus on stabilizing your economy before expanding with additional Town Centers.
Your opponent has 2 minutes 23 seconds of idle time, which means he is down by at least five or six villagers. This is quite surprising because typically, you should be down by five or six villagers and about a thousand resources due to a Fast Castle (FC) strategy. However, you managed to get away with it because your opponent is idling his Town Center (TC) a lot.
Upon hitting Castle Age, you need to do a lot of damage. Your cavalry archers should go across the map immediately. It's important to note that you don't have Fletching or Bow Saw yet, which are upgrades you should work towards. Instead of adding a TC right away, focus on adding farms and getting Bow Saw. Get upgrades first if you fast Castle; don't rush to add TCs. Stabilize your economy on one TC first, continue making the army, and then look to pick up upgrades before going for a TC. The next steps should be Fletching, Bow Saw, and Horse Collar. Only after Horse Collar should you look for a Town Center.
Your cavalry archers should start harassing right away and maybe even start breaking the gate. The red player made an interesting move by building the range outside, which is unusual. Despite playing well with the economy, the red player is doing a few weird things. You need to pressure as fast as possible. Often, players go for a Siege Workshop, but it's puzzling why you are wasting time with cavalry archers running away instead of attacking the gate. The whole point of the Fast Castle is to get an army that your opponent can't fight. If he fights you, you can just run away, and his scouts will die to your cavalry archers.
You need to break in as quickly as possible, and the fastest way is through the gate. A forward Siege Workshop is interesting and suggests an all-in cavalry archer strategy. However, you might not have enough cavalry archers to hold against knights or cavaliers, in which case you would need monks. You are giving your opponent too much time; try to break in faster. Finally, you are breaking in, but don't let him repair the gate. If he does, break somewhere else.
It's shocking that you didn't break in at all, which should be a huge red flag. Your opponent has 3 minutes 30 seconds of idle TC time, which is crazy. A Mangonel is coming out now, but your attack ground missed the target. This mistake is slowing down your push, which is really bad because when going for a Fast Castle, your economy back home is weak, and you need to do something with your archers or cavalry archers.
You are going to Stone, which is completely wrong. Your plan should be Bodkin Arrow, Bow Saw, and maybe a stable for Bloodlines—nowhere in the plan is Stone. Spending 100 wood on Stone is essentially deleting three villagers. The stone will not be useful until much later.
Now the skirmishers are coming out, and you are hitting your opponent's units effectively. Despite the earlier criticism, you are now hitting your targets well. The push is still alive, which is good.
Never mine stone with Huns early game—focus on wood and food to boost your economy and stay ahead.
In the game, Bodkin Arrow and bow saw may be stable choices for Bloodlines, but that's it. Nowhere in our plan is stone, and I will show you why. You spent 100 wood and essentially deleted three villagers. I will show you when you will use that stone, and the answer is going to be much later because there's simply nothing you can use stone on right now.
The skirmishers come out, and it's good to see some action. Now you're hitting, and you're really hitting well. When I criticized him earlier, he took it to heart and said, "I'm hitting my units, his units, I'm hitting though." That's good; you took out four cavalry archers there. Honestly, I don't mind that; it's just a bit of fun. The push is still alive, which is good. We actually took care of the skirmishers, but we're going to lose the mangonel. It's probably good that we lost it because that mangonel was a menace to our society.
All of this trading back and forth, the micro you did, it's fine. What I care about is what's happening back home. Now you're floating food and gold, but you can't spend any of it. What you should be doing is getting more wood instead of stone. Those three villagers, instead of the 140 stone you have and the 100 wood spent here, should be 140 wood plus the 100 wood on the mining camp. You should have an extra 240 wood in the clock pile, and that's a Town Center (TC). A TC on wood is something more productive. What are you even on stone for? If you want a castle, the way to do it is to put a TC on stone so you can make more villagers and eventually mine enough stone for a castle. Mining with three villagers would take forever.
This reminds me of a comment I got the other day. Someone said they put one villager on stone at the start of the feudal age, and then when they hit the castle age, they have a castle ready. That was their idea. I said it's obviously not the way to go. You're essentially deleting a villager and losing 100 wood for the entirety of the feudal age just to have a castle ready when you hit the castle age. This kind of thinking, although it sounds good, is really bad in practice because you're taking away from your potential resource gain and development just to have some flexibility or to have the castle come in at a certain time. It's not the way to go at all. You want to start by investing more into the stuff that pays back right away instead of the stuff that never pays back.
Now, because we're on stone, we're stuck on one TC. Our opponent adds a second TC, and if we start to get out-boomed, it's not because of anything up until this point. Up until now, we have equal resources collected and very similar villagers. If we start getting out-boomed, it's right here. They have to fix it. I'm going to make it very simple for you now: never mining camp on stone with Huns in this situation. It's not even close to being a correct call; it's actually a very big mistake. I want to make that extremely clear because I don't want people to be confused, thinking, "Oh, well, in this scenario it wasn't good, but maybe in another scenario it is." It's almost never good, guys. It's 100% never the right call. I would rather see you mangonel your own units on purpose than take stone with Huns in this scenario with the mining camp.
Even now, you have enough wood for a TC. You should be getting horse collar, wheelbarrow, and just dropping a TC. There's no reason to be on one TC unless you can't afford to add another one or your strategy specifically requires you to be on one TC to spend all of your resources on the army. But when you have resources not being spent, there's no reason not to be on another TC. I can tell you're worried about the aggression and the offense here. Nice, that's a good trade. Well done. Maybe you save it, maybe unlucky, but still a good trade—one for one plus we got a knight.
What you need to do now is actually put the pressure on. We have a lot more army than him. You need to get Bloodlines, for example, and continue trading with the cavalry archers. We're trying to do something because right now our opponent is actually pulling ahead in villagers. Do we want a forward castle? Hold on, what? No, no, no, no, no. What is that castle doing? When you go for a forward castle in the castle age, you have to make sure it's hitting something.
Don't just build a castle—make it count! Always ensure it's strategically placed to pressure your opponent effectively.
I can tell you're worried about the aggression and the offense here. Nice, that's a good trade, well done. Maybe you save it, maybe unlucky, but still a good trade, one for one, plus we got a knight. What you need to do now is actually put the pressure on. We have a lot more army than him. You need to get Bloodlines, for example, and continue trading with the Cav archers. Right now, our opponent is actually pulling ahead in villagers.
Do we want a forward Castle? Hold on, what is that castle doing? When you go for a forward castle, you have to make sure it's hitting something from your opponent. This hill is a great castle location, by the way. It's actually a fantastic castle for a different time period. This is a good Castle when you have a huge economy, you're up to Imperial Age, and then you go for this Castle so you can Trebuchet your opponent from this area. But this Castle, when you're in Castle Age, does not do enough because basically what you're doing now is just controlling an area, a hill, which doesn't help you until later on. Your opponent can just ignore this Castle, boom in the back like he's doing, make a castle here, and then just treb it later, having more economy than you.
Unless you're aiming for an Imperial Age, are you aiming for a one Town Center fast Imperial Age? You are a menace to society with one TC fast Imperial Age with Hun Cav Archers and forward Castle. I think you watched my Patreon video because I did highlight how good fast Imperial Age with forward Castle is, but it doesn't have to be like one TC fast Imperial Age. Let's see how it plays out.
With that in mind, this Castle is not the worst then. A safe castle that will let you treb your opponent is not bad, actually. So with the fact that you're going to go Imperial Age, it's not too bad in that case. By the way, now you can add a TC. Interesting, I don't even hate what you're doing. It's actually kind of good. Getting Imperial Age and then adding a TC is not bad. I just don't think you needed to be on one TC for 30 minutes. You could have been on two TCs and aimed for the fast Imperial Age rather than one TC just to make it easier on you. One TC is usually for pushing in Castle Age.
I made a video about this, by the way, it's on my channel. I think it's called "Let's Talk About Town Centers." One TC is usually all-in push in Castle Age, whereas two TCs is playing towards this fast Imperial Age timing. What you're looking for is two TC play, and all it would mean is that you'd be at like 80 villagers now. If you were at 80 villagers now, you wouldn't have just 23 Cav Archers with little upgrades; you'd probably have like 40 Cav Archers with full upgrades. So what you're doing is not bad, but you didn't set up correctly. On the way up, you'd add the third TC instead of the second.
Nonetheless, your opponent is choking a little bit, and you're getting some nice trades, which is nice. Overall, you're doing quite well. You should be winning here. Your opponent did pick up a villager lead, but he just idled so much. This is a classic example of you making so many mistakes, but because your opponent made more mistakes, you didn't get punished.
I like what you're doing. I don't mind the game plan. If you did the same thing on two TCs, I think it could be really good. I might try it myself; it actually sounds amazing, to be honest. It's really quite nice.
Now you hit Imperial Age. I want to see Imperial Tech right away. There's a problem with some of you guys that you hit the next age and it's like you're not even excited about it. Why did you even click Imperial Age if you're not going to use it? Trebuchet, Bracer, nothing—you don't even care. It's like when you get someone a gift, and they don't even unbox it; they just leave it there for like 2-3 years.
Bracer is coming in finally, but the treb should be right away. Why did you get this Castle? Get a treb. Where's this MTC? It's at the back, he's smart. Get a treb and start taking out his buildings. That's the whole point of the forward Castle. Now I'm starting to think you didn't watch my Patreon video. The fast Imperial Age with forward Castle is only to set up the forward treb. That's the whole idea.
Level up your game by hitting those key upgrades and pushing faster—don't let your opponent catch up!
Guys, when you hit the next age, it's like you're not even excited about it. Why did you even click Imperial Age if you're not going to take advantage of it? It's like when you get someone a gift, and they don't even unbox it; they just leave it there for 2-3 years. They didn't care about the gift, simple as that.
Braces are coming in finally, but the trebuchet should be right away. Why did you get this Castle? Get a treb. Where's this MTC? It's at the back. He's smart. Get a treb and start taking out his buildings. That's the whole point of the forward Castle. Now I'm starting to think you didn't watch my Patreon video. The fast forward Castle is only to set up the forward treb. The whole idea is to get to Imperial faster and have the treb in your opponent's face. It's very hard to outplay that. It's basically the best way to win any game of AoE2. Right now, your Castle is there. There we go, treb. How much? Two minutes later, you have the first treb coming out. Two minutes later, again, you guys need to get excited about getting to the next age. When you get to the next age, it's like you're a kid in a candy shop. You have so many options, and you need to pick something out. You should feel a little giddy. You don't get to Imperial Age and start waiting two minutes, just chilling. This treb should hit the Town Center right away.
I like your economy, honestly. I really like your play style. It's amazing. You have a good amount of economy with some aggression and forward area. You're still making vills, which I respect, while making an army. I really like your gameplay. It's good. I really like your ideas. It's nice. You're doing the hard stuff really nicely. Now, the second Castle is very, very good. Perfect. It sets up the treb nicely to treb this as well. The only danger with this Castle is that it's downhill, but it shouldn't be a problem if we have the guys trebbing even here. We should have Bloodlines, good micro, and husbandry. Get upgrades on your army; you can afford it. And then more trebs; you can also afford those too. You just have to be doing what you're doing but faster. Especially since your opponent was in Castle Age for so long, the two minutes you gave him now he has two castles. If you started trebbing him right away, he'd have no chance to even get to Imperial and start trebbing you back, which is the only way we lose this, by the way. The only way we lose this is if he just trebs us back and clears up our army and somehow out-booms us. But we're doing well with the economy. It's good. Wheelbarrow coming in.
Honestly, I'm really impressed by your gameplay. You're up a lot of scores, by the way. I'm really impressed by a lot of your gameplay. You have the knowledge. I don't know if you might just be getting lucky. Hold on. You might be getting lucky with the castle position and the Imperial maybe. But if you're actually thinking about these things and hitting the timings nicely, you're doing an amazing job. The timings you're hitting on this push and this idea are really good. If you do this consistently and just fix a few things back home, like being on 2TC instead of one, you have a really nice future ahead of you, to be honest. You're doing the strategic part really nicely. Now you're going for capped ram. This is when I think things are going a bit wrong. Capped ram is not good on low economy.
Again, what's happening here is that you're actually just doing too much. You don't understand your position that you have low economy. Capped ram is not good on low economy. Trebs are much better. Good snipe here. Once again, still lacking Bloodlines, still lacking husbandry. All of those things are way better than capped ram. Remember, it's one siege unit, one gold unit, or one gold unit, one trash unit. Or if you want to do double gold comp, you want to have one melee unit, one ranged unit, and one siege unit, always one siege unit. Mixing in capped ram with treb doesn't really make sense. You need to have a very specific reason to mix two siege units, and usually, it's like bombard cannon plus something else if you need two siege units. Now you're going to go ballistics again. That's an upgrade we could have gotten earlier. Capped ram is going in, trebs are going in. Still, I think we're doing enough right. We're doing enough right. We should be fine. You could also get armor on Tarkin, but overall your pop is climbing nicely. You're holding on to the position. Dive those cannons maybe, and GG's called. Wow.
Brilliant game. Again, I'm really impressed. Your sense of strategy was fantastic this game. I rarely say that at 1,000 ELO, I know, but that's how you know I'm being truthful. Amazing stuff with the forward castles. Those were perfect. The third TC is great. Everything looks good. Maybe you don't need to fast Castle even because I know you went for fast Castle. That's a very risky strat. I don't hate it. Continue doing it if you want to. What I would recommend is to use the same strat if you want to play Hun. No problem, same strat, but just go for a second TC. The second TC is what builds into this faster Imperial with the forward Castle and just get to your more important upgrades faster. Get the Bloodlines, get the chemistry faster, get the armor on Tarkin faster if that's what you want to go for. Don't waste time with capped ram; it's not necessary. Continue making vills. You stopped near the end. Continue making vills, get to 200 pop, and yeah, this is great. Your ability to do aggression while maintaining the economy back home was fantastic. Honestly, I'm leaving this very impressed by you. Seriously, well done.
I hope this review helps a little bit. Dark, do a bit more work. You don't have to do a fast Castle. You can build into the same gameplay with Scouts into CA. You just have a bit more economy. But if you want to fast Castle, what I mean is you fast Castle, you open with one TC for the first few minutes, you get Basaw Horse Collar, you get Bodkin Arrow, you start massing CA, then you add a second TC instead of the mining camp, and then you continue to develop into the forward Castle. So, second TC even on the stone, or second TC on the wood first, and then you go on the stone would be much better than going to the stone with one TC. Hope that clears up a few things. Hope that just makes your existing gameplay much better. When you get to Imperial, first of all, push faster and get your more important upgrades faster. You will have a really good time playing and winning more games.
Thanks for sending in the review. Thank you so much for watching on YouTube as well. Hope you guys did enjoy it. Make sure to like, comment, and subscribe. If you guys want more content from me, check me out on Twitch for my live streams and Patreon for my exclusive content and exclusive videos to help you guys get better. Both of those have the links in the description. Thanks for watching, and I'll catch you guys in the next one. Peace.