Overview
The art of resource control, rather than fighting or raiding, just keeping cool and controlling the map.
Background
The best victory is when the opponent surrenders of its own accord before there are any actual hostilities… It is best to win without fighting. – Sun Tzu
It sounds odd, but games can be won without casualties too, not that it’s a realistic setting but this quote from the author of “The Art of War” holds more than meets the eye. In the Middle Ages, laying siege on an enemy was a common way to fight and end a war. A besieged city would just survive as long as it had resources to maintain itself. Despite this historical lesson, it’s a tactic rarely used in Age of Empires II. However, limiting your enemy’s resources, rather than fighting him, can be an extremely good move.
Basics
The basics of resource starvation start with two very important aspects: knowing the strengths and costs of every unit and knowing how a random map is built up.
Resources on a Random Map
Before you can deprive your enemy of gold, you must of course know how many gold mines there are on the map, because controlling one gold mine is useless if the enemy can just mine from another. Let’s take a look at the mines on some maps:
| Gold Mines | Stone Mines | |
| Arabia | 8 | 5 |
| Arena | 6-8 | 4-5 |
| Migration | 1+2 | 1+2 |
Arabia
Arabia is a rather easy map to count mines on: always 8 gold mines and always 5 stone mines. 3 gold mines close to each player and 2 anywhere on the map. While stone mines are divided as 2 relatively close ones and a random one.
Arena
Although Arena is the easiest map to starve someone, it is also the most random one. The setting of a walled city reminds most of the historical sieges, but because you can’t scout inside someone’s city, laying siege always comes as a big guess. But once you’re sure that you control 3 hostile goldpatches, it might be worth considering that he got no gold mines left. And if he has some, it won’t be a lot.
Migration
Migration gives every player one gold and stone mine on their starting island and 2 additional mines of each on the main island. But migration has more options in store!
Civs and units’ costs
You can’t blindly control someone’s gold mines and expect to win the game, it’s not as simple as that. When you’re able to take control of an enemy’s gold mine in a feudal war, you’ll probably halt his archer production, but that still leaves him 3 other units. Besides that you must also keep your enemy’s civ and their strengths in mind. If you’re playing against a Turk, controlling his gold mines may prove a great move but if you do the same against a Byzantine, you might just see an unstoppable trash flood in return.
This is however, something impossible to explain in a single article, experience will tell you when a resource is worth fighting for.
Walling Resources
A common sight on Arabia is to see someone build a tower next to the enemy’s gold. If it’s pulled off nicely, you can then claim the gold mine to be “under control”. But you can also wall one’s resources!
Recorded Game
A good practical example can be found in this recorded game of Master of the Huns Tournament: _Lz_sunday does some extreme drushing on Rodrigus (up to 10 militia) and walls his gold mines off in the dark age. This deprives Rodrigus from the most valuable counter to militia: archers. And with 10 militia constantly harassing his wood, he couldn’t afford a lot of other defenses either. Safe to say that this was one of the most original, if not the single most original match of the whole tournament.
Recorded Game
An imperative characteristic of mines is that they’re a free piece of wall. Unlike trees or berries they last for ages and can easily serve as a part of your wall. But, what if the enemy lays siege on your town and deprives you from your precious resources? It was your own fault in the first place to put your walls there! Time for some RuKie and Bender goodness.
Wood Starving
The most dreadful thing to happen on island-type games is when wood runs out. In teamgames you can trade for gold, and wood looks nearly endless. But looks can deceive. And everyone will run in the situation once where the map is cut empty. So needless to say, this phenomenon can be abused! If you’re fighting naval wars, don’t limit yourself to raiding fishing boats and hostile fleets. If you can secure a part of his coast with some galleys, cutting off his wood supply (if only temporary) you should be able to get an advantage out of that.
Recorded Game
A great practical example is this Migration game between Daut and Ruso, Daut had Vikings while Ruso had Persians. And you can clearly see how Ruso played more on securing resources rather than attacking Daut. In the end, it paid off. A truly remarkable game.
Market Abuse
This phenomenon is probably the best way to save yourself from a starvation situation and most used in Arena (where most people build a market anyways).
Recorded Game
For once I’m not gonna take an expert record to demonstrate the power of a market but a record of my own. I consider it one of my best games ever so I can guarantee it’s not a ripoff to watch. Anyhow, you can see how Skitels castles all my gold mines and pushes me back in a little area with only a stone mine and just enough room to build up a 1 TC economy. But with some extreme market abuse I managed to fight back.
Relics
On some maps it’s important to secure the relics in time. If you’re booming and manage to take some relics, it’ll give you a bigger advantage than your adversary who does not collect the relics. If you’re confident about your defensive skills, you can even goldstarve your enemy that way.
Recorded Game
When it comes to Arena recs, this is probably the rec I hate most. [HyM]fwblow shows perfectly how to abuse a relic advantage. And [RoR]xTeRRoRx shows how he doesn’t abide to all the golden rules of an RTS and loses the game in quite a shameful way.
