Notes

Complete Age of Empires 3 The Asian Dynasties Hard Difficulty Walkthrough

this guide https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=196995512

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Asian Dynasties Act 1 Mission #1: The Siege of Osaka
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During the time of colonization much of Asia became largely isolationist. While the Chinese across the sea had developed gun powder and saltpeter based weaponry, the Japanese maintained a culture of total isolationism favoring 'the old ways.'

Throughout the history of Japan there was always a struggle for power. In their system of government the Emperor ruled from Kyoto under the protection of the Shogun. The Shogun would be the Prime Minister of a country if the Emperor was like a President. The Shogun ran the country.

The Shogun was selected as the most powerful general (dictator) in the country and would need the alliances of other major families in order to maintain his power. Throughout the history of Japan this splintered system of government maintained the proper checks and balances for the country.

Tokugawa from the province of Edo (now named Tokyo after him) became Shogun and his family would rule Japan for a period of 200 years until the position of Shogun was abdicated to the Emperor in 1867. This 5 mission campaign properly lays out some of the historic events leading to the rise of Tokugawa as supreme ruler of Japan.

In this first mission named "The Siege of Osaka" you are a general of Tokugawa. You are assited by a Daimyo Mototada.

Daimyo's have the ability to create any Barracks unit on the spot. This can be advantageous when you are on the move. The Daimyo also has a very high health pool.

The other hero unit (General Kichiro) is a ranged unit who has a cooldown ability that increases his damage and a cooldown ability that will teleport him and any near units to the closest Town Hall.

I will be doing this walkthrough from the perspective of heading south. From my experience heading east is impossible on hard difficulty.

Moving on.

If you want to be able to beat this mission you will need to have fairly strong macro. For more on that watch the YouTube video.

Head South and make a castle in the village. The castle is a defensive structure that also builds weak artillery units. There is relatively no strategic benefit for building it beyond the mission's goal.

Upon building this however you will gain access to a few towers that will kill the surrounding enemies.

Upon doing this you will unlock the ability to free the farmers from captivity. I'd hold off on this one. Make sure you have artillery and a decent army before doing this.

You will want to Age up before moving on. Aging up is done through the construction of a Wonder. Wonders add benefits or create units. Almost any of these is acceptable for this mission. I like the one that gives a short damage bonus.

The other thing you will need to build is the Foreign Embassy. The foreign embassy will give you the option to get units from abroad. Any of the options available are acceptable... however you will always want to order artillery pieces. These artillery pieces will help you greatly in pushing forward.

Once you have your artillery pieces it is time to push forward and liberate the farms. This is done by destroying two towers.

Once this is done the farmers don the wardrobes of various warriors and start pushing forward into the enemy. You need to push forward with them immediately. The goal here is to do as much damage as possible. If at this phase of the game you cannot destroy enough of the computer's infrastructure, the computer will overwhelm you with numbers.

If you do significant damage it will be a matter of time breaking down the wall. If you do not.... you might as well just start over.

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Asian Dynasties Act 1 Mission #2: Uprising!
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This mission is considerably easier than the last. There are two ways to do this mission on Hard Difficulty, I will describe the easier of the two.

Upon entering you will take control of a town center and some workers. You will need to build up a large effective army to deal with the enemy.

Effective here means high amounts of musketeers, some samarai, some bow ashagurai. If you can any artillery you can get will be a great asset. By the time the army arrives you should be able to afford at least one from the Foreign Embassy.

There are three villages to the north. Each one of these will supply the enemy with troops unless stopped. You will have time to wipe out one town hall before the enemy arrives. Each one of these villages will double his army so by removing this last village you cut down his army massively.

After destroying this village you should start working on construction of castles. The more castles you can get up the better. The goal here is not to wipe out the enemy... but survive. Your castles will act as a perfect buffer between artillery... and will provide artillery.

The castle will also buy you time for making even more units as your army starts to fall apart.

If you are feeling low on units pull your villagers and add them in to buffer damage.

Good luck.

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Asian Dynasties Act 1 Mission #3: Clearing the Road
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In this mission the objective is to clear the road and hold it for five minutes. But in my experience doing this on hard difficulty is largely impossible. No combinations of castles, artillery and upgrades were able to actually hold against the enemy.

The goal here has to be flipped instead to.... killing everything.

The first objective is to get a floating bastion. This can be achieved by moving to the west and destroying a tower. If you move weakened units away you do not have to lose any units to this tower. In exchange you will get a very powerful ship that can wipe out a lot of the enemy's structures.

Next up, Age up... fully. Get full upgrades. The goal here is to defend all the enemy's pushes while getting everything you need.

Your unit makeup should be musketeers, some samurais, cavalry, and artillery.

So you will clear the road... but don't build on both. Instead head north. There are barracks up here that you can destroy for a bonus objective. Just south of this you can liberate the workers for extra workers.

Continue south and there it is, the main base. Destroy the entire main base and you get an automatic victory.

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Asian Dynasties Act 1 Mission #4: Last Stand at Fushimi
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In the introduction to this campaign was the battle of Fushimi, and here it is.

This game on hard difficulty offers two main challenges, surviving and pushing.

Since defensive is required you should ignore the main directions given by Mototada.... that is to be aggressive.

Instead use all of your forces to defend the southern gates from the enemy. Do this until you have enough forces and some artillery to hold off the enemy. You will want to increase your number of harvesters so you can get a larger volume of units faster.

The main objective is to destroy a few towers to the east. Once you destroy this a new objective will activate in which you have to escort villagers east. This objective can also activate if you fail to defend the first wall of Fushimi.

To beat this objective have two parties, one closer to your base and one further from your base so that you can deal with two engagement points. If you build a Trading Post on the Zen temple you can make a bunch of monks which do not count towards your total supply count.

After you escort out 50 civilians the mission is over and you have completed it.

In this mission it is advantageous to have a lot of rifles and a few samaurai. After you have enough rifles and cannons defending your southern gate you can use rifles and heroes to escort your civilians.

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Asian Dynasties Act 1 Mission #5: The Battle of Sekigahara
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In this mission there are three enemy factions and a single enemy to deal with. After completing a quest regarding an enemy faction you will gain control of a strategic resource.

For destroying enemy forces to the south you gain control of the base which will give you access to a large number of farms and more importantly, a gold mine.

For destroying the area just north of this you will gain access to some unit producing facility. Most importantly you will also gain some defensive structures around the enemy's base which will now fight on your side.

Moving north and east of this base will bring you to a circle full of enemies. By defeating the leader who is marching around you gain control of 50% of the forces in the circle.

Taking each of these secondary objectives adds about 10 minutes of play to the game.

The mission quite simply is to have enough of your army available to survive giant pushes while still having enough of an army to push the enemy. The enemy can hit you frmo two attack paths (attacking southeast or southwest) meaning that you will need somewhat of a mobile force to deal with this.

As another option you can 'all in' and move forward, just make sure there are tones of buildings to destroy on your other front. Once your main town hall is destroyed you lose, so this option is very risky.

There are two northern attack paths. The western path has a lot of unit producing structures meaning you will face above average number of enemies. The eastern attack path has a lot of defensive structures meaning you will have to face a lot of hard to destroy buildings.

Both attack paths are about even however the defensive structures will end up being a faster method because once they're down they'll never be rebuilt.

Once you destroy the enemy's structure the enemy will spawn. This hero has about 4x the health of your heroes combined, however it does not heal. This means you can just keep making units until this guy dies.... and thus you'll beat the Japanese campaign.

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Asian Dynasties Act 2 Mission #1: To Finish a Fleet
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I'll start this guide to discuss the story of this particular Act. At first it would seem the story is a fabrication created by Big Game Studios to make for an interesting way to mix in the Aboriginal faction into the game, this is not the case. The story is actually true.

16th century China, was actually quite advanced. They had gunpowder (saltpeter) weapons long before North America. They had a printing press long before Guttenberg ever came up with one. The Chinese had vast treasure fleets that sailed across the world long before Columbus tried to find India.

The Chinese treasure fleets would sail around the local area with Chinese delicacies and trade them for spices, gold, and silver... just like the Europeans. One particular voyage went even further.

The international cartographers association came on to this when looking at a single Chinese treasure fleet voyage. They were wanting to prove that Chinese treasure fleets hit Ethiopia (an independent empire for all of time) before the Europeans did. After looking at the star charts and matching them up what they found was that the Chinese went even further... they hit America.

When the Chinese landed in America it was mostly likely in Central America where violent Mayan warriors lived. The Mayans were powerful enough to destroy five Spanish fleets with of armies... so one Treasure Fleet was nothing.

When the treasure fleet returned the Chinese were in social upheaval. The Emperor deemed that the reason for this was the influx of foreign ideas and so when a ship arrived with information about the outside world, all records were torched and the crew were all killed.

The only reason we have a surviving copy of these charts is because Christopher Columbus got his hands on them and claimed he was using these star charts to get to India... or maybe he was just reading the wrong chart.

This mission starts at the very beginning in which Captain Huang is introduced to a suspicious Admiral and a first hand.

Huang has a very powerful area of effect bomb attack that ought to be used on cooldown. His first hand has an area of effect fist attack that should also be used on cooldown.

In this introductory mission you are fighting a mirror match, Chinese.

The Chinese army forms very differently from other civilizations. Units will come clumped into groupings with definitive group roles. For this mission just make whatever units you can afford based on what resources you have available.

The opening move will be to head west and destroy a fortress. Destroying this fortress will give you access to a dock and a very powerful ship. You can also connect the trade route along this way for extra resources and extra experience.

After defeating this fortress it will be revealed that the pirates are to the east.

Send your rag tag army to the east. Here numbers are more important than unit composition. By simply having a large enough army you can right click on their main base and just win by numbers.

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Asian Dynasties Act 2 Mission #2: Storming the Beaches
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The Admiral has landed in India... and the Indians have taken the Admiral hostage. The Indians have their base on one island and you have your base on another.

First clear your island to the east of any Indians. After this setup your base, get max Age and max upgrades (you'll thank me later).

Make sure to create a decent sized fleet of ships, around five is good. You will need these ships to destroy his fleet and to lay waste to his army. Fleets do very well against his army and have splash damage from their targeted ability.

When you get a maxed out army you can land them in the south to quickly take out the southern tower. This will give you a few extra ships and a new objective.

Upon approach you can split up his army by landing your military units in the south after attacking in the north with your ships. To complete this mission quickly just right click on his Town Hall. With a maxed out army you will be able to blow down his Town Hall with relative ease.

Another objective requires you to destroy his entire fleet. With the fleet reinforcements you get from destroying the southern tower this should be easy.

As another note these fleet reinforcements can use the Mortar ability to target down the Town Center without even really needing to fight. If you send your hero in and have him die near the town hall you will have vision of it for your mortar.

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Asian Dynasties Act 2 Mission #3: Lost Ships
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The Chinese have landed in America! And the locals have taken half of your crew captive. The treasure fleet is spread out and Captain Huang needs to unify it.

This mission is pace based. By activating a treasure fleet you activate a barracks to produce units. This means it is to your advantage to do a lot of building before you move out. Build a Town Hall and get your economy going. Build up an army and get a little head start before moving out.

After taking the first ship you should build a Castle before the ship for extra protection. If you head west there is a barracks here you can destroy to stop constant attacks on this ship.

After each ship captured the number of units attacking increases, so your unit producing abilities should increase as well. After capturing each ship build a fortress in front of it and destroy the barracks to the west.

You should be Aging up and getting higher end units. For your final battle you will want largely expensive units rather than weak bow units. It would also be wise to add in some flamethrowers to chop down the vast number of Aboriginal infantry units.

When you get the final lost ship you will be told to cut down the village. You will also get a direct path to the enemy. This should be relatively easy considering your existing army size.

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Asian Dynasties Act 2 Mission #4: A Rescue in the Wilderness
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In this mission you will start off with a hand full of units, Captain Huang and a sailor. It is important to time off their high damage abilities as you won't need to use both in every encounter.

Huang will also gain an ability to destroy forest. After moving through the woods you will gain access to some settlers.

These settlers need to build a Town Center and get harvesting wood and gold fast. You are instructed to use the income from your settlers to buy units from the Zen Temple, this is a fool's errand.

Instead build a town center and get on gold and wood. Move forward and you wil run into a few defensive structures surrounded by enemies. You will have to destroy these towers. As well to the east of this are a cage filled with more units and a cage with settlers. Liberate the units first and then the settlers.

The goal here is to erect two castles along the stretch of road to intercept the enemy's army holding your men. The castles will tank damage for you and give you time to arouse more forces if you need them.

Make sure to use your hero abilities on cooldown and every single time they resurrect. They are very potent and will chew a large hole into the enemy's army.

Once you defeat this giant chunk of army you can build up as many forces as you want and attack into the enemy to finish the mission.

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Asian Dynasties Act 2 Mission #5: No Empire Lasts Forever
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This mission starts off with an escape. This part is likely the hardest part of the mission. If you are in a cave you are hidden, if you are outside the cave you are not hidden.

The large cave you go into you will be followed by a lot of enemies. The large cave also has a lot of bears. Proper use of abilities will make this go by quickly.

When you get to your base you need to maintain the super hard irregular strategy of defending small pushes and making a giant army.

There is a bonus objective of unlocking the gold mines and unlocking a back door. The back door is mostly worthless and doesn't really do anything. The gold mine however without the back door open is very useful. Just make sure to bring a few units to kill bears when you take the gold mines.

You should have a lot of hand mortars to destroy buildings, flamethrowers and a bulk of various infantry units.

Your goal is simply to destroy the two town centers meaning that once your army is large enough and have you devestated the bulk of his army you can right click on both of them to win.

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Asian Dynasties Act 3 Mission #1: Into the Punjab
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Much like the last through walkthroughs, first a little bit about the history of the Indian revolution.

After the Dutch rebelled against the Spanish their first move was to acquire territory and become a real empire, which they did. The French and British saw a need to maintain their positions in the world and so they worked to help carve up India. The giant land of India (modern day Pakistan, India, and Southern China) was a vast land ready to be conquered.

India was home to a giant expanse of mountains that cut off villages and created multiple small empires in the area, yes India was a split nation of people. The Europeans used these inter-country differences to carve out the Indian empire and use them against each other.

As British dominance grew in the seas, the Dutch Empire vanished. Various wars with the French with the help of the Germans left the French weak. This gave Britain the opportunity to take control of all of India, all of China, half of Africa, Canada, and many Middle Eastern lands.

The British were the world's bastion of power. In order to maintain this power two company's were created. First was the Hudson's Bay Company which was responsible for running the country of Canada and maintaining the fur trade. The British East India Company was created to maintain the flow of spices and resources out of India. This company was the effectively government of India up until Ghandi became Prime Minister.

In between this period was the Sepoy rebellion. This was the first crack in the British Empire. It sent a message home that they were not the noble rulers they thought they had been. The Sepoy rebellion set the East India Company back quite a bit and fed into a future determination of a nation of people.

In the Ghandi peaceful rebellion most of his supporters were wealthy descendants of Sepoys. Instead of just killing off all of the Sepoys it was determined they could bribe these people with new positions of power.

On to the game. In this mission you have to destroy Saltpeter sites and recapture the main trade route on behalf of the East India Company.

To do this you will want majority Sepoys and Elephant artillery.

The goal to this mission is to make a strong economy. This will be tougher than in previous campaigns because the Indian worker costs wood instead of food. This means you will need to have a lot of wood production which means you'll have tones of ability to make buildings but less ability to make units.

To deal with this you can take in wood shipments and have your harvesters gathering gold and food instead. With this approach you can make a lot of harvesters and grow a large army very quickly. This tactic will pay off in future missions as well.

It is a good idea to take out and capture the southern trade post (just east of your base). This will give you a tonne of resources that will pay off. If you build a Keep here it will stay protected for most of the game.

Do not go north from there. It is an ambush.

Instead head north and west of this ambush and you will be able to take out the heavily guarded middle trading post. At this point it is largely pointless to capture these. They will get destroyed very quickly unless you guard them with a lot of Keeps.

Instead just continue north to the main stronghold. Once the stronghold and his unit producing abilities is destroyed then you should build up all the trading posts. Until then he will keep sending armies at you.

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Asian Dynasties Act 3 Mission #2: Fires of Calcutta
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This is easily one of the hardest missions in the game, period. This is largely because you have to swap out your strategy so heavily and consistency does not pay off.

You should use you heroes to tank the damage since they have the most health. Your main hero has an ability to increase everyone's damage temporarily. This ability will come in handy often.

To the west of where you start is one barracks, you should destroy this before heading to the base.

When defending your base you will need three control groups.

The first control group will have your hero and will be to the south.

Your second control group will be made entirely of sepoys and be stationed to the north.

Your third control group will be made of cavalry and will assist both sides. The cavalry army will also be the one attacking all of the barracks. For the locations of the barracks watch the video.

When your cavalry is large enough you will attack barracks.

There are two barracks directly north and one to the south across the river. If the enemy attacks while you are attacking you should head this very mobile force home to defend.

As well you can have the Major build Sepoys on the spot to aid in the destruction of the barracks. Once your sepoys are done here you can just add them to a control group to help defend your home.

Destroying these barracks on hard does not slow the enemy attacks. Most enemy attacks are randomly spawned at random times.

After destroying these three northern barracks there will be a ring of barracks to the south, three of which are guarded by two Keeps.

The cavalry can head directly south and take out one additional barracks before the big switch.

The big switch will be an army of Sepoys and elephant artillery. Instead the cavalry will largely defend your base from the enemy. This slow push will take out the Keeps cost effectively and slowly.

The mission ends when all barracks are destroyed.

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Asian Dynasties Act 3 Mission #3: Resist!
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As Nanib rebels so do so many sepoys follow him.

As far as missions go this one is relatively easy. You build a Keep and start building units. There will be small attacks from time to time, but you can deal with them all very effectively if you stay by your keep.

Building reputation building pens is smart. By doing this you will have a new set of resources without cutting into your main army supply.

I use sepoys and cavalry in this mission. The high damage and armor of cavalry make them able to stomp any units, sepoys just end up being a cheap resource dump.

Push out once you have high unit producing abilities. This means that if you lose large chunks of your army you can rebuild it very quickly. To win Right Click on the enemy's base.

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Asian Dynasties Act 3 Mission #4: Raid in Delhi
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Possibly one of the easiest missions in the game you must raid Delhi, free sepoys and save the Sultan of the Mughol Empire.

The game acts as a little puzzle, avoid the enemies whereever possible, destroy explosive barrels near elephans and progress through.

The Sultan is the only one who has health that will regenerate. However the Sultan dies is an automatic loss. You need to keep enough of your units alive so that the final battle to save the Sultan will be a massive success.

As an alternative you can just move the Sultan through the enemy line as you attack in to get to the final point.

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Asian Dynasties Act 3 Mission #5: Company Confrontation
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The final confrontation of the Age of Empires 3 series is a sticky one.

In the first part of this mission you should build a keep and work on building up an army. In the beginning it will be a lot of sepoys and a lot of melee units. Very quickly you will need to get up elephants to defend against these pushes.

To the west of your base will be a constant attack of enemies. After every single attack from the north there will be a small attack to the west.

You will want to expand your base to the west. Use wood imports to power up your economy and have your harvesters get food and gold to afford an army.

Once you survive the waves you can plan to move on the enemy.

The enemy will have saltpeter supplies to the west. Destroying these cuts down the enemy's ability to create their own sepoys. The enemy also has trade routes to the north which will cut off resources and cut out their ability to make units.

Once you break in (from the back) you can capture the enemy's back two cannons. These can be used to destroy the enemy's main base and win the game. All you have to do from here is just protect these guns while they take out the main base.

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more detailed mission = https://aoe3.heavengames.com/dyn/walkthrough/index.shtml