Guide - Rise of Nations Guide - IGN (2024)

Tricks & Tactics <p>Exploration for fun and profit
</p>If you want to make it big as a nation, the first thing you'll need to know is the importance of scouting and exploration. Not only will you uncover the mysterious lands beyond your immediate territory, you'll also discover Ruins which reward you with resource bonuses. Clever players will research Science techs to increase how far their Scout can see (so he'll spot more ruins) and increase the amount of resources Scouts get from Ruins. The trickiest of players will spot a ruin and avoid picking it up if they're just about to research the next Science technology. Since Ruins will normally give you the resource you're lowest on, you can also arrange to get more of a particular resource by spending enough of that resource to bring its total below that of any other resource.

<p>Nations good at exploring</p>: The Spanish. They start with an extra Scout, their Scouts see farther, they gain extra resources from Ruins, and the map is already revealed so setting up the best scouting paths is easy.

<p>Black Ops
</p>A force of six commandos, a few Heavy Infantry, and a General is a sneaky way to destroy an enemy wonder. Simply charge invisibly past the enemy using the General's Ambush ability, then plant explosive charges on the wonder with Sabotage and have the Heavy Infantry finish off whatever hit points remain! Careful though as enemy Scouts, Observation Posts, Helicopters, and Air Defenses can spot your hidden units.

<p>Watch the Flanks!
</p>Units take +100% damage from flank (side) attacks and +50% damage from rear attacks. The easiest way to make use of this is to have a group of Light Cavalry set aside, and when the battle starts run them to the side of the enemy army where they will do the most damage. The Russians have a particular knack for flanking. Their cavalry units (including the powerful Rusiny Lancer unique unit) get a bonus against siege and supply wagons, meaning that it will only take a few to flank your opponent, hit his supply wagons, and run out, letting the devastating Russian Attrition take its toll.

<p>River warfare
</p>Be aware that units in rivers move slower and take extra damage. If you can, try to catch enemy armies while they're crossing a river. Towers are great when built just behind rivers for that reason: they always cause some extra damage to the enemy during the crossing. Constructing Cities or Forts near rivers can be a double-edged sword. If the opponent tries to attack that City or Fort directly his army will take a lot of extra damage. However, if he uses siege from across the river you're going to have to run through the river to stop his siege.

<p>Medic!
</p>Remember to make use of healing when appropriate. Units heal when garrisoned inside of buildings. This can save a lot of resources if you're able to heal a large army back up to full fighting strength! Note that in Rise of Nations units can always be garrisoned back inside of the type of building that created them, so mounted units can garrison in Stables to heal, boats can garrison in Docks, and siege units can garrison in a Siege Factory. If you build Versailles (or just play the French) then you can even use Supply Wagons to heal your troops&#151;just rest your troops near a Supply Wagon.

<p>Petroleum Prices
</p>A smart thing to do immediately when you reach Industrial Age is to purchase a lot of Oil at the Market. If you reach Industrial Age first, you can often drive up the price for Oil for the other players -- and you need it anyway for useful things like the Light Tank upgrade and Airbases! Remember to get those Oil Wells going, since you don't want to be stuck buying Oil forever!

The best defense...
Rise of Nations is a strategic game which rewards thinking and planning. One way you can gain an advantage over your opponent is to manipulate the situation so that your opponent is constantly defending attacks. When players get attacked, they often play very defensively for a while until they're sure their Cities are safe. If you launch multiple aggressive attacks, they'll get so concerned with defending against those attacks that they neglect to send attacks of their own! This means that an aggressive player's Cities are often much safer than a player who builds a bunch of defensive towers everywhere, simply because the aggressive player keeps the fight at the defensive player's base.

However, don't make the mistake of launching unprepared attacks. If your attack isn't ready and your opponent manages to decimate your army, you won't be able to train another army in time to defend the counterattack if he decides to do so!

The beginning of a powerful nation

When you start off, you'll generally have a Small City, some Farms, and a Woodcutter's Camp with some citizens already at work harvesting resources for you. However, this tiny income won't be enough if you want your nation to rise to supremacy. Follow these steps, making your own choices where indicated, and you'll be conquering other nations in no time!

1. Select your Libary (the hotkey "L" also selects the Library for you) and research the bottom yellow technology. Yellow technologies are Science technologies, which do a few very important things: make all the rest of your technologies cheaper and research faster, increase the bonus you get for exploring ruins, and allow your scout to see farther.

2. Speaking of scouts, select your starting scout and click the Auto-Explore button to have him automatically begin exploring the map for you (you can also choose to plot out a route for him to follow on the minimap by shift-right-clicking various points on the map). Scouting is very important in the early portion of the game since you will find Ruins which give you bonus resources that will really help jumpstart your economy!

3. Select your Library again and research the blue technology. Blue technologies are Civic technologies and each one allows you to build another City (as well as increasing your national borders).

4. While this researches, select your City and right-click the Woodcutter's Camp to place a rally point on it. Now create some citizens at this City. Notice they automatically go directly to the Woodcutter's Camp and get right to work.

5. Select a Citizen and build a new Farm. Citizens working at Farms provide an increase to the rate which you gather Food. Repeat with a second Citizen. Note: You cannot build more than five Farms at any given City.

6. Continue creating new Citizens until each of your five Farms has a worker and your Woodcutter's Camp is full of workers.

7. The first Civic should be finished researching by now, so take a Citizen and use him to build a second City. Deciding where to place your cities is very important. First off, you will notice you can't place buildings outside your national borders&#151;so the furthest away you can create a City is right at the edge of your border (and it's usually a great idea to build it there, as it will push your territory out much further!) Try to find a spot for your second City that has a lot of forest nearby. If you can find a spot that's also near a mountain, that's even better. It's also strategically important to place cities towards the center of the map, since controlling territory allows you to access more resources and prevents opponents from harvesting those resources!

8. Select your Library once more (that "L" key comes in handy, doesn't it?) and research a green tech. Green techs are Commerce, which increase your Commerce Limit and allow you to build Markets. Increasing Commerce is an important part of growing your nation's economy, since the Commerce Limit is the maximum rate at which you can gather any given resource (except Knowledge). Commerce techs also increase the number of Caravans (and therefore trade routes) you're able to have at any given time. Twelve farmers normally gather Food at a rate of +120 Food every 30 seconds, but if the Commerce Limit is +100, you will be limited to +100 Food every 30 seconds.

9. Construct additional Farms or Woodcutter's Camps and fill them with newly-created Citizens until you have +100 in both Food and Timber.

<p>From this point, you have a few choices:</p>
A. Early Attack
B. Short-term economic growth in order to make a huge early army
C. Long-term economic growth

- This involves crushing your opponent and hopefully taking one or more cities from him. While your economy won't be as good as in B or C, your opponent's economy will be even worse shape after you capture cities from him with your military might!

10. First off, you'll want to make sure your Scout is headed towards where you think your opponent might be&#151;usually this is across the map from you, but you'll never really know the exact location. You want to find your opponent and better yet his weakest spot&#151;his second or third City once he places it. Once you find a good spot to attack, you can divert your scout to looking for Ruins.

11. While your Scout is exploring, research the first Military (red) tech at the Library.

12. Build your first Barracks.

13. Create five Hoplites and two Slingers. Send these towards the enemy City and continue creating additional units as you get the resources - set the rally point of your Barracks near the City so your units immediately move to the battlefield.

14. Attack an enemy City with the Hoplites, keeping the Slingers nearby but out of range of the City. The City will fire at your Hoplites if your opponent garrisons his Citizens, but your Hoplites don't take very much damage from this and you will eventually take his City. Your Slingers are there to attack any Bowmen that your opponent tries to use to attack your Hoplites.

15. Beyond this point, you have the following options:
-Continue reinforcing the front lines with more troops; bring 1-2 Citizens to repair the captured City and work at Farms or Woodcutter's Camps at that City.
-Advance to Classical Age, upgrade your military units and continue reinforcing the front lines.
-Advance to Classical Age and concentrate on economy (while keeping the captured city as long as possible) in an attempt to gain a crushing economic advantage

-If you've captured the City but don't think you can hold it, start Razing the buildings in it one by one to plunder the resources. You can only Raze one building at a time, so start with buildings that your opponent will miss the most, such as a University or Library.

- Use this strategy to form a large army in Classical or Medieval Age.

10. Build a Market and create a Caravan once it's finished.

11. When you have enough Food, advance to Classical Age at the Library.

12. Construct a University at each City once you reach Classical. Spend whatever Wealth you currently have on Scholars&#151;it'll really help your Knowledge income.

13. Research Commerce Level 2 at the Library and begin building more Woodcutter's Camps and Farms to increase your gather rates towards your new +150 Commerce Limit. Since Farm prices get a bit expensive at this point, you may want to stop once you have Food and Timber both coming in around +130.

14. Begin mining Metal by building a Mine at one or two nearby mountains.

15. Research Military Level 1 and Military Level 2 as soon as you can afford it. Research Science Level 2 at this point, too, if you have enough Wealth and Knowledge. Remember that if you queue up Science researches before other researches, you'll be saving money.

16. Build 2 Barracks and a Stable.

17. Upgrade to the Classical Age versions of the troop types you want to produce and begin spending all of your resources creating military units. Remember that different troop types cost different types of resources, so if you have a lot of one type of resource look at the costs of the units to figure out what you should spend the excess on.

18. When your army production slows slightly, construct a Siege Factory and create three siege units. Unless you're the French, you'll have to wait until you reach Medieval Age for a Supply Wagon, but don't forget to create one as soon as possible! Supply wagons counteract the attrition your troops may suffer inside enemy borders, so they are critical to most attacks past the Medieval Age.

19. At this point, you have another choice. You can immediately attack or you can advance to Medieval Age and upgrade the entire army that you've created. The advantages to immediately attacking is that you give your opponent a little less time to prepare defenses, and the advantage to Medieval Age is the availability of Supply Wagons and the fact that your army is significantly stronger when upgraded.

- Use this strategy to have a powerful economy, able to construct powerful Gunpowder Age armies.

10. Construct a Market and create a Caravan once it's finished.

11. When you have enough Food, advance to Classical Age at the Library. If you're feeling extra daring, you could research an extra Science tech first to lower research costs further and increase your Ruins bonuses.

12. Construct a University at each City once you reach Classical. Spend whatever Wealth you currently have on Scholars, it'll really help your Knowledge income.

13. Research Science Level 2 if you haven't already, then research Commerce Level 2 at the Library and begin building more Woodcutter's Camps and Farms to increase your gather rates towards your new +150 Commerce Limit.

14. Research Civic Level 2 and construct your third City. You should definitely start up two new Caravan routes at this point too to get Wealth coming in. You could also consider building a Temple and researching Taxation.

15. Construct another University at this new city.

16. Construct 1-2 Mines and begin mining Metal. Note that since your strategy is light on the military, you're actually able to sell some of this Metal off if you want to get more Wealth. Even with three trade routes establishes this early, your wealth income may not be enough for you.

17. At this point, your economy should be moving along at a quick rate. Remember to keep building new Scholars as the key to this strategy is to gain a huge Knowledge advantage over your opponent.

<p>Resources
</p>Rise of Nations has six resource types and each is important in a different way. While Rise of Nations' interface makes harvesting each of these resources easy, you'll still have plenty of strategic decisions to make. Here, we review each resource to point out why you want it.

• Food

- The biggest reason food is important is Citizens. Nearly every other resource is gained by assigning Citizens to work at a variety of jobs, so the more food you have, the more citizens you make, the more resources you get! Food is also required, in great quantity, for most early Age advances and all Civic research.

Guide by: Brian Reynolds; Big Huge Games