Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings/The Crucible

The nomadic tribes of the deserts and steppes north of China, after spending centuries entangled in their own petty turf wars, finally have the hope of unification. Genghis Khan, leader of a tribe that is so small even in the standard of Mongolians, is ready for his conquest of Asia and even the world. Within years, he organized a highly disciplined army of horse archers to challenge the dominance of cultured Persia and Eastern Europe, and the technologically advanced empires in China.

Ghenghis Khan 1
This mission is very straightforward; visit the camps and do what they say. There are large amounts of Kara Khitai in the rightmost corner so avoid them. There are enough sheep on the map to satisfy the blue tribe's request, but to speed the process up, steal them from the Kara Khitai. They keep around 10 sheep walled in along with cavalry archers, approximately 8 castle lengths north and 2 castle lengths east of the blue encampment. Between the cyan and purple camps there is a relic guarded by wolves. This is the easiest way to satisfy the request of the gray tribe. Save the Kill the Tayichi'uds/Naiman mission for last when you have the most troops, then kill the Tayichi'uds as they lack a watch tower.

Ghenghis Khan 2
This mission is a fun one. Begin by killing the cavalry archers of the Taiychuds. You will then gain control of the tribe's buildings and units. There will be an early attack at the wonder, so try not to sustain many casualties. Build up your economy through the use of the herd of deer below your town center. Age up quickly as the attack launched by the Kara Khitai is difficult without walls and troops (assuming hardest difficulty). Getting to feudal quickly can't be stressed enough. Ditch loom if necessary, there are no boars. Move all your men down to the tent and scout out good areas for wall building. There are many cliffs, so use those to your advantage as they are free walls, in a sense. Gather enough stone to build the wall and some towers.

At around 90% research level for feudal, move 3 villagers down so that upon the completion of feudal, you can build the walls. Have the villagers start the wall at different ends for maximum effectiveness. Don't even bother with a gate; you won't have sufficient strength to attack the Kara Khitai for some time. Be sure to maintain stone levels sufficient for making 3 towers. If not, palisade walls will work fine. While the wall is beginning, build an archery range. Upon completion, build 15 archers. When the wall is finished, build 3 towers to back it up and garrison the archers. Note that these steps should all be done simultaneously without gaps if possible. With this defensive arrangement you should be able to sustain the attack. Once you do, the rest of the mission isn't particularly difficult.

Your bread and butter is your light cavalry. It's inexpensive once gold starts to run out, it's fast, it has decent attack for castle age, it has high HP with the Mongol attribute, and it has high LOS. Simply outproduce your opponent by putting 35 villagers on farming and 12 lumberjacks on wood to support the farms. Make 3 stables, set the gather point for 2 at the enemy base while one right next to itself. Once the number of light cavalry at the base is large enough, surge. Repeat this often and you will soon take out their Town Center. Kushluk will run away now if he hasn't already. Break through the wall, send your light cavalry in and kill indiscriminately. Finding and slaying Kushluk isn't hard after this, but he usually hides out at the end of the map, not garrisoned luckily.

Ghenghis Khan 3
Start by sending your cavalry east and finding a transport ship. Time is of the essence, so don't bother sending the ship far away to find the optimal landing site as he'll have to make a return trip to get the other soldiers in place too. Just dump them right across the river. In the north there are a few militia that are easily dispatched. Several archers will come in soon, and they are easy prey for your light cavalry. While the fighting is taking place, send the transport ship to the southern part of the island. This will trigger the villagers with their siege weapons to join your side. Quickly get 5 villagers in the transport ship and have the other one start building houses, one at a time. Save here.

Send the ship down the river and have it land about 7 castle lengths to the south of the wall. You need to find a suitable landing point with adequate mines and far enough away from enemies. If this is too difficult, enter the cheat Marco Polo to see the whole map, then load the save so that the land is fogged once again. Once you've landed, send your transport ship back to pick up the others, making sure to bring back the villager. Have the 5 landed villagers build a Town Center near gold or lumber and houses. Make sure when the Town Center is complete there are enough houses to start producing more villagers. Build up your economy as you would in a random map game. Build walls in between patches of forest, but leave one area open. The AI will try to invade this point (given the rest is completely enclosed) so build a castle and station men there.

Now it is time to take care of the wonder. Mongolian ships are above average, so load up on galleons (to counter the demolition ships) and cannon galleons to take out buildings. Once all the towers/castles have been leveled, invade with light cavalry supplemented with pikemen to deal with enemy cavalry. It might also help to transport villagers to build stables and barracks on the island to truly deliver a blow to the yellow tribe. If necessary, transport trebuchets to take out any buildings away from the water. Defeating the other camps is very easy, just create a lot of light cavalry and the game should be all wrapped up.

An alternative to the above is to return everyone to the northwest to build your village where there are some natural defenses and resources. Build an army (keeping a small contingent at the village for protection), and send them south to watch over the gate to the Great Wall and the gate to the north island to avoid any folks sent your way. Make sure to stay far enough away from the guard towers. Once you are able to build trebuchets, build 4 and send them to take care of the Great Wall gate, the north island gate and the guard towers by the gates. Move the trebuchets to the north island and take out the guard towers along the river to allow your ships safe passage.

By now, the wonder on the east island should be completed. Build a few transport ships and galleons for protection. Move your main force (plus a villager) to the east side of the north island, and send your small contingent to guard the destroyed gate in the Great Wall. Transport your main force (including trebuchets) to the north part of the east island. Build two stables, a barracks, and a siege weapons, while the trebuchets take out the gate and some of the guard towers. Now, you are ready to send your force in to destroy the wonder. Once the east island is secure, you have time to take out the mainland one tribe at a time. Lastly, take care of the hornets nest in the southeast. It helps if you build stables and barracks on the mainland inside the Great Wall, where they are closer to the action.

Ghenghis Khan 4
Your mission is to fight Khwarazm. You start with two town centers, some workers and some cavalry archers. Since your bases cannot support each other due to the map design, it's better to focus on one of them and give up the other one as soon as the first heavy attack from Khwarazm comes in. The upper part of the map offers more gold and is easier to defend, so let loose the other one. Focus on mining as much stone as you can, the upper map does not have any.

As the game starts, your first objective is to send in two trade carts to the Shah. Be there when they arrive - you have to kill him. In the meantime you can build up your economy and fight the Merkids. They only have two cavalry archers - you got four of them, as well as two hunting wolfes. As soon as they are slain, the Merkids buildings belong to you, that is two archery ranges, several houses, a mill, a mining camp (4000 gold nearby) and a market. These buildings will be attacked by the Russians soon after, but if your military grows fast enough, this will be the last attack they start. A hard counter strike will stop them for 30 minutes, that is more than enough time to wipe them out completely.

So only Khwarazm is left. Remember they are Persians, which means they farm 33% less food than you. They also like to attack with cavalry archers and paladins, and a lot of war elephants. Their forces cost a lot of food and gold - that is where you have to hit. War elephants cost 200 food and 75 gold and are easy to kill by lousy spearmen. Same for paladins.

Ghenghis Khan 5
A very easy mission. Extinguish three enemies and capture the flags near their castles. Everything is covered by cliffs, you just have to use them for your advantage.

First of all: Don't hurry, take your time. The Bohemians have no villagers and will not expand their (impressive!) army. The Polish lack resources, and the Germans are far away.

The Polish settle at the right corner of the map. They like to tickle you a bit by sending knights and siege equipment, but that's all. As they only have access to 3200 gold, their decay is just a matter of time. And by the way, a relic can be found near your own town center. Combined with miners and trade carts to the Polish market your gold income should be quite high after capturing the first flag.

The Germans are on the lower corner, but they also have a castle and a watchtower at the middle of the map. It may take you some tries, but if both buildings are down, this plateau is the perfect place to be. Use the terrain to fortify your defense. A message will appear saying that the Bohemians are nearby and three castles are needed to withstand. Don't worry, they are triggered by the number of your castles (or being attacked by you), not by time. Finish the Germans off before that. An army of archers is useful against teutonic knights, as they have a huge armor against melee attacks.

After that, research spies (200 gold) to see the Bohemian army. If you think your defenses are strong enough, complete your third castle at let the show begin.