Is Age of Empires 4 Hard to Play for New Gamers?
At first glance, Age of Empires 4‘s dizzying number of menus, resources, units, and technologies can overwhelm newcomers. Managing an economy while scouting opponents and conducting attacks certainly qualifies as a steep learning curve. But while mastery requires tremendous practice, AOE4 offers guidance that makes competency very attainable. Between adjustable difficulties, sculpted tutorial content, and an enthusiastic fanbase sharing advice, the latest release rewards persistence with immense satisfaction.
Conquering a Complex Gameplay Loop Takes Study
Age of Empires indisputably falls on the complex end of real-time strategy titles. The continuous cycle of harvesting resources, researching advancements, producing troops, and maneuvering forces demands serious multi-tasking skills. According to statistics aggregated by ESPORTS TALES, top Age IV players execute over 300 actions per minute (APM), several times higher than competitor RTS franchises like StarCraft 2.
New players obviously can‘t match that sheer speed, but the mechanical fundamentals still require dedicated practice. Setting waypoints for consistent villager production, efficiently distributing lumber harvesting camps, and hotkeying to production buildings are all critical techniques, for instance. Of course as matches progress into military conflict phases, commanding group formations, flanking maneuvers, and target-fire directives introduce further minute-by-minute intensity.
The sheer number of strategic dimensions from economic growth to army composition makes for dizzying initial sessions. Should new players tech quickly to certain advanced troops or play a slower long-game? Is heavy cavalry worth the gold expenditure? Each question presents pros and cons to weigh regarding opponents‘ decisions – a paralyzing prospect for an RTS newcomer.
AI Matches Scale from Total War to Total Stomp
Thankfully, Age of Empires 4 allows users to tailor that competitive PvE difficulty to their current skill level through some very forgiving settings. At Normal difficulty, the game‘s AI poses hearty expansion challenges but rarely overwhelms on sheer numbers. Ramping downward to the Easy or even Very Easy settings, the computer opponents focus almost solely on base building, freeing up humans to experiment with troop compositions and control schemes without distraction.
To quantify a skill spectrum, against Easy AIs, achieving a functioning late-game economy with unique unit counters to opponents generally results in victory, indicative of early RTS competence. At Normal, keeping pace with AI expansion and achieving small, strategic victories via favorable unit matchups shows midfield proficiency. On Hard, consistent success demands sharp scouting, identifying enemy weaknesses while masking your own infrastructure vulnerabilities. And for top Age IV players, Hard and Hardest AIs still can’t keep pace thanks to human ingenuity, adaptability, and micro-control finesse.
Expect a Week of Play Before Competing against Humans
Throughout my first 60 to 80 hours learning Age of Empires 4’s mechanics, even moderate difficulty AI opponents exploited my clumsy build orders and unfamiliarity defending rushing forces. Only after methodically working through the Art of War tutorial missions and incorporating community guidance around gold income did I stand a chance. Finally defeating a Hard AI for the first time proved a crowning RTS achievement, spurred by proper cannon rush defenses and smoothly amassing supply stockpiles for huge attacking waves.
Emboldened by AI victories, I waded cautiously into 1v1 ranked multiplayer for my next learning phase…and promptly suffered a barrage of early defeats. Human creativity surpasses any AI limitations; contests against living opponents provided valuable lessons around anticipating off-meta harassments. Through another dozen grueling hours learning scout rushing patterns, workshop unit counters, and responding to water maps, competitive potential emerged. Currently I’d evaluate myself moderately competent up to Platinum leagues, though surely humbled again upon reaching Mythic or Conqueror tier foes online.
Where to Find Support Accelerating Your Competency Climb
While the built-in Art of War tutorials communicate every Age IV mechanic, and AI skirmishes offer safe competitive environments to hone skills, Age of Empires 4’s passionate playerbase publishes guidance making the journey smoother. Reddit communities like r/aoe4 provide beginner builds to abuse and common lower-level mistakes to avoid. Well-produced YouTube tutorials from content creators like Aussie Drongo, Spirit of the Law, and T90Official break down proficient multiplayer techniques at every scope from unit micro to late-game imperial affluence. I consumed these guides voraciously between matches while climbing to stability against humans.
Build order references in particular provide frameworks to enmesh your personal strategies into. Knowing benchmark villager, military, and economic targets to hit by certain ages prevents single losses from snowballing while keeping pace with online opponents. Of course encyclopedic civilizational knowledge proves similarly invaluable reacting to revealed enemies and capitalizing on asymmetric unit strengths. Even for singleplayer enjoyment, digesting guides to achieve milestones like conquering a Hard AI in under 20 minutes brought immense satisfaction. The Age IV community graciously pours insights that smooth the difficulty curve.
Conclusion: Persistence Through a Challenging but Rewarding Journey
As wealthy kings and conquerors of past eras could attest, mastering economy, military, and technology to forge an enduring empire promises difficulty but lasting glory. By modern standards, Age of Empires 4 certainly poses a relentless test across battle tactics, base building, resource harvesting, and much more. Yet beyond outward complexity lies a strategy experience welcoming dedicated newcomers through robust guidance mechanisms.
Those willing to stomach some brutal early defeats, pore over tutorials, and gradually refine their game knowledge will conquer the campaign, achieve breakthrough victories on higher difficulties, and find multiplayer thrill. My own path from bumbling villager chases to orchestrating audacious naval assaults has etched profound enjoyment thanks to community support. And the journey continues proving immensely rewarding 60 hours later. For any player seeking rich strategic challenges, Age IV stands ready to test your mettle…and lift you to well-earned power in due time.
