A handful of hints | The basics AoW III Guide
Last update: 11 May 2016
1. Find your favorite race. The best thing to do is play through several scenarios with each one, to find out which one suits you best and which one you had the most positive feelings with. Thanks to this, you will max out on your effectiveness, both in the development of the Empire and combat, and also you will enjoy the game more, because it is way better to play as the character that you know and like.
2. The same goes for the class, whose influence on the game is also great, especially as far as research and spells, available for the leader, are concerned. Various race-class combinations ensure different bonuses; thanks to experimenting, you may find a combination that will make you indestructible. The selection that you make should be defined by your playing style, e.g. if you prefer a defensive game, the Theocrat is a good choice, where Warlord or Dreadnought is a good option of offensive players.
3. Explore the map - it is imperative that you discover as much of the map as possible, before your opponents do, collect more resources and defeat independent parties, thanks to which your units will gain some experience and the cities will be allowed to develop freely, after you have cleared the structures of the unwanted units.
4. Take care of your leaders - in most cases, losing them is irreversible and it takes some time, after all, to level up a leader and obtain equipment for him. Make sure that he does not roam about the map all by himself, because he is an easy target then.
5. You should also ensure good relationships with the independent cities, which are going to task you with various missions. After you complete some of them, you will receive new units, gold, sometimes some items and, in some cases, that city may join you. If you do not worry about your karma, you can easily attack that city but, this is connected with the loss of karma and potential losses in battle.
6. If you control Dwelling you can profit from that, in a certain way. The available units are quite expensive but, they stand out with useful skills and good statistics.
7. You should make sure that your army is heterogeneous and that there are many various units in it, best if they inflict different types of damage. This will allow you to use their skills, in battle, to the fullest and ensures higher maneuverability in the battlefield.
8. Remember to do everything that you want to do, before the end of the round - so, select a research, the buildings that you want to erect or the units that you want to recruit. Also, you should remember to use the movement points, available for the units, and move them on the strategic map.
9. At least to some extent, it is worthwhile to learn about the skills of units, the available class-dependant researches and spells. This will enable toy to select better tactics and selection of the army, while fighting a representative of a given class and race.
10. Save the game often. This will allow you to replay your battles, in the case of disadvantageous results, and to replay the key moments in different ways, if they fail to serve their purpose.
The beginning of the game
Appropriate beginning is half the success. At the beginning, regardless of the scenario, race and class that you have selected, you need to attend to several things, which will help you gain the upper hand. These are several things that you need to take care of, since the beginning of the first turn.
1. Join a hero. At the beginning of the game, there are going to be various heroes to want to join your army. It is a good idea to capture this opportunity and extend special care over those heroes, ensure them with proper guards and also try them out in the battles at the beginning, for clearing the structures and in fights against the Independent teams, to let them raise their statistics, just by a bit, and gain some useful items.
2. Select your mission. From the very beginning, you should ensure better upgrades, which will be useful at that moment. Remember that, if you choose no research, the research points are lost. A bad idea is to lose your leader in the initial battles - then, the progress in research will e halted, until the leader respawns. Also, you will not be able to cast spells then.
3. Discover as much of the map as you can. Dispatch units in every possible direction, the best ones are those with lots of movement points and skills to decrease the cost of moving over various terrain types. This will allow you to collect the nearby mineral deposits, free upgrades for the city and research points. The knowledge about the nearby cities and the location of enemies is soon prove to be a key in the foreseeable future.
4. Clear the areas around your Throne City. What is meant here is the structures that spawn all sorts of opponents. This will ensure you steady development, your units will gain some experience and your leaders may find some interesting item.
5. Ensure the development of the city and expand its defenses. Try to build, as fast as possible, buildings that provide production points and barracks which will ensure you with better units. Also, a wooden wall will come in handy, which ensures some advantage, in the case of an enemy onslaught.
6. Complete the missions tasked to you by the independent cities and Dwellings. Usually, they are not difficult and they only consist in defeating the opponent. As a reward, you will receive gold, units and sometimes, that city may even join you. This is a much cheaper option than "buying" an independent city and it is the scarcity of gold that you will have to worry about, at the beginning of the game.
7. Try to rebuild the destroyed city, to the extent possible. This is a much better idea than to start a new city from the scrap. If this is not a possible option, remember to found a city where there are many structures that ensure various bonuses.
8. Start recruiting your units. Each unit takes some time to be created. The earlier you start, the earlier your army will grow stronger. Also, you should remember about the constant expansion of cities. If you are not at war, with anybody, at the moment, you can decrease the ratio of recruitment but, you should still conduct it, until you reach the number of units that satisfies you. Peace is never long-lasting and the opponent, who is coming your way is rarely amicable. You should always keep the Roman phrase "Si vis pacem, para bellum" in mind.