With the successive re-releases and expansions, Age of Empires II kept on piling difficult mission after difficult mission, and although several of the reworked missions in Definitive Edition have lowered their difficulty level, in many cases it was actually amped up.
Therefore, the game deserved its own page with some of the levels that made even seasoned players cry. Behold!
open/close all folders
Age of Kings
- Joan of Arc:
- Mission 5, "The Siege of Paris," on any difficulty level other than "Standard." The English now have fully developed and highly aggressive Longbowmen that can snipe you dead from far away or lead you to their towers and castle's range. Once inside the city, the simplest mistake will have you swarmed with all the possible enemy troops in the city, including Longbowmen, Champions, Halberdiers and Siege Onagers. Even if you manage to evade all these foes, there's still the matter of leading Joan and at least 6 out of 10 villagers through a huge Burgundy attack safe and sound. And the most difficult part? There are NO HEALERS to support your forces.
- The Definitive Edition's version of "A Perfect Martyr," the final mission, is one of the few cases where the increased population cap actually makes it harder for the player's side. Even after you defeat the Burgundy and Shrewsbury factions, the main English faction can and will send waves of Longbowmen and Trebuchets to invade your base and defend theirs. The long range of their unique unit and the deadly AI micro mean that even your own castles, siege and cavalry will have trouble fighting them. It also doesn't help that you start in the Castle Age, while your foes begin in Imperial, and all three send their initial assault forces against you simultaneously not long after you capture Burgundy's fortress.
- The Saladin campaign is the most difficult of the original campaigns despite being numerically ordered as the third one in the Age of Kings, made worse since you are restricted in the worst way possible almost every single scenario. Even the Definitive Edition, where the population limit for most scenarios is raised enough to let you support both a healthy army and economy, only makes things slightly easier on you by raising the population cap from 75 to 100, as opposed to 125 like in the other campaigns.
- "Lord of Arabia," the second scenario, seems designed to screw you over in every way possible. You can't advance past the Castle Age, start out with next to no resources and almost no units, and your opponents (especially Reynald's Pirates) can do everything you can't, including advance to the Imperial Age. It doesn't help that the Saracens have a lackluster early game, which you are stuck in for the majority of the scenario. Also, you get the privilege of defending two towns, Medina and Aqaba, who do virtually nothing for you (save for occasionally tributing you resources) and constantly nag you about crusaders attacking their caravans.
- "The Horns of Hattin," the third scenario. The objective is to capture a Relic from an enemy faction. Like the previous scenario, you start in the middle of the map while trying to defend against multiple enemies from all sides, except this time you cannot build any stone fortifications whatsoever. This also means no creating Mamelukes from the Castle. If you are playing the HD version, you won't have access to the post-Conquerors expansion stuff, so you're out of luck with building Palisade Gates (though you DO get to build them in the Definitive Edition). Even worse, you start in the Feudal Age with mostly unpromoted units and low resources while your enemies are already in the middle of the Castle Age, making defending or even advancing to the next age near impossible.
- "Jihad!", the fifth scenario, has you up against Tiberias, Tyre, and Ascalon. You start out in the Castle Age with very few resources, no military units, and only three villagers. Your base is a small fort, once again stuck in the center of the map, with Tiberias to your east, Tyre to the northwest across the ocean, and Ascalon to the south (Tyre and Ascalon start in the Imperial Age, while Tiberias will advance about half an hour into the match). Tyre and Tiberias will waste no time in hammering at your little fort, while Ascalon will go for a Wonder victory fairly early in the match, while you're still getting your legs under you. While there are a few ways to turn the tide (there's plenty of resources on the map, and Tiberias will eventually offer you a truce for a large gold tribute), they're all contingent on you surviving long enough to put up a meaningful defense against the overwhelming power of the Crusaders.
- "The Lion and the Demon," the last mission in the Saladin campaign, tells you to build a Wonder in Acre while repelling continuous assaults from Genoese warships, the Templars' rams and Teutonic Knights, French gunpowder units, Jerusalem's Champions, camels and Trebuchets, and Richard the Lionhearted, who can spam you with Longbowmen and Trebuchets AND has two unique Trebuchets with crazily-boosted range. The only upsides are that sometimes the AI might bug out after the initial assault and you'll only have Genoa to contend with, and you can try to build the Wonder on an island where only Genoa’s ships can attack it... unless you're playing the Definitive Edition, which fixes it so that the island is now too small to build a Wonder, and moves the Genoese to the shore along with the crusaders. And speaking of the Definitive Edition, if you want the scenario's achievement, you have to destroy all five of your opponents rather than building the Wonder. The good news is that, eventually, all five factions will run out of gold and stop attacking, but surviving long enough to starve them out is difficult in itself.
- Genghis Khan:
- The third scenario, "Into China," pits you up against four Chinese factions: the Tanguts, Hsi Hsia, Jin, and Sung. It would be a fairly standard scenario if not for the fact that the Jin start building a Wonder after not too long, located within an Imperial Age-level stronghold across the sea, forcing you to rush to scrounge enough resources to raise an amphibious assault force before the clock runs out. Playing this scenario on the expansions made this slightly easier as you can train Petards in the Castle Age to rush through the Jin's base, which isn't protected by the Great Wall like the other factions. Though if you want the Definitive Edition achievement, you have to blitzkrieg the Jin before they start building their Wonder.
- Mission 4, "The Horde Rides West," already has the gimmick that your forces are split between two bases and armies on either side of an impassible mountain range, but playing it in anything but the base game is made more difficult by the fact that The Conquerors gave the Persians a unique technology to make their War Elephants faster. Hope you can micromanage your Monks.
- Barbarossa:
- The first mission is between this and a Wakeup Call Boss, because unlike the other first missions in the other campaigns, which are often the easiest levels, "Holy Roman Emperor" begins with you surrounded by six enemies and tasked with capturing four of their Relics. Better put the Teutons' defensive bonuses to use. The Definitive Edition bonus achievement is to kill every other faction on the map, which can turn into an hour-long hunt for the Last Lousy Pikeman hiding in the woods if the AI decides not to surrender when their town is destroyed. "Furor Teutonicus" indeed.
- Barbarossa's third mission, "Pope and Antipope," is like hell after the first two warm-up missions. The player must convert the Cathedral at Milan. The problem is, Milan is a massive, fortified city that will quickly jump into the Imperial Age, and has an AI that is fairly aggressive about keeping its land clear. Milan is also backed up by the River Guards, who have a base pretty much on your doorstep and will persistently harry you as you try to establish yourself. Also, you start with no villagers and a handful of monks, which means you have to poach a villager from Crema (a hostile town that will also start raiding you soon) or your ally, Carcano. By the time you've established yourself, Milan and the River Guard are typically so entrenched that defeating them is a huge grind. The Definitive Edition adds an achievement to this level, which is to convert the cathedral without converting any villagers. Good luck.
- Barbarossa 4, "The Lombard League," starts with your small fort getting trashed by Padua, which sets the tone quite nicely. The objective is to build a Wonder inside the walls of Padua, Venice, or Verona, but good luck getting anything inside their walls. All three will throw maxed out units at you pretty much as soon as you start making any progress, with Venice's warships in particular posing a deadly threat (not helped by the Teutons' mediocre naval bonuses). Thankfully, you have an ally...Henry the Lion, who betrays you again as soon as you build a Castle (and don't think not building a Castle will help; even if you stay allied with him, he will never fight the Italians). The Definitive Edition makes the scenario even harder, because Verona, which in the original game made only fragile Hand Cannoneers, Monks and Scorpions that could be disregarded as a threat, will now contribute deadly Frankish Paladins, making them a serious threat in their own right.
- The final mission, "The Emperor Sleeping," gives you a ten-minute grace period to prepare defenses before the Saracens and Persians wake up and start spamming Elite Mamelukes, Heavy Cavalry Archers, Onagers, Trebuchets, Monks, and of course Elite War Elephants. The only good news is that you have a competent AI ally for once and the expansions' boost to the elephants' speed is made up for slightly by giving the Teutons access to Halberdiers. The bad news is that even if you defeat the Saracens and Persians, you still have to break through Jerusalem's defenses to reach your objective. The Definitive Edition changes Jerusalem from being heavily fortified but empty, to endlessly spewing soldiers. It also disables the Spies technology, which you could previously research for a pittance early on to gain awareness of every move your opponents make.
The Conquerors
- While the first three missions in Attila the Hun are cakewalks, the last three ramps up the difficulty considerably, especially in the Definitive Edition:
- Mission 4, "A Barbarian Betrothal." You have three enemies: Burgundy, who is weakly defended and can be persuaded to join your side; Metz, a fairly well-defended town; and Orleans, a massive stronghold that will frequently launch powerful attacks at your position and respond to any aggression with a swarm of Paladins, Halberdiers, Elite Throwing Axemen, and even use Trebuchets to break up your horse formations or counter your own siege equipment. Even worse, once you finally destroy the Town Center of Orleans, the Roman Army spawns, a massive force of top-tier units that can completely turn the tide of battle if you exhausted yourself taking the city. If you're not playing the Definitive Edition, you can destroy the Roman Army faction's placeholder unit to keep their reinforcements from spawning, otherwise, you're in for a fight.
- Attila the Hun 5, "Catalaunian Fields," isn't any better. You are told in the briefing that the scenario will play out similarly to a multiplayer death match, meaning everyone starts the battle with a huge pile of resources to immediately spend on an army and base-building. God help you if you're not good at rushing. You will be attacked frequently and mercilessly by hordes of spammed units, from Elite Cataphracts to Elite Huskarls to Heavy Cavalry Archers. And if you want the Definitive Edition achievement, you have to win in half an hour. While you can rush the Alans almost immediately and the Visigoths soon after, the Romans are represented by the Byzantines, one of the strongest defensive civilizations in the game, and thus can shrug off wave after wave of your attacks.
- Attila the Hun 6, "The Fall of Rome." You have four enemies, the Italian city-states of Patavium, Aquileia, Mediolanum, and Verona. All four of them are located in fortified cities, they all churn out well-balanced armies of top-tier units that are difficult to counter, and they all go for Wonder victories. Fortunately, taking out Patavium and Aquileia is fairly easy, but Mediolanum and Verona both send waves of Paladins (in Verona's case, Frankish Paladins) backed up by archers and siege weapons, which will rip through your archers and light cavalry in seconds. Even worse, when you actually get to Verona, Patavium goes for a second Wonder, forcing you to drag your armies all the way back to raze them again. Doesn't sound hard enough? There's an achievement for destroying every Wonder before it gets completed, which takes an already stressful Timed Mission and makes it even worse. Good luck!
- El Cid:
- Mission 4, "Black Guards," can be quite an annoying level. Your objective is to keep El Cid and King Alfonso alive while taking out the Black Guards' six docks. The problem is, your enemy will constantly raid your base, and punish you every time you venture forth to grab resources. A big tempting gold pile on the coast? The Black Guards navy sends Galleons against your miners. Want to get some extra food by putting down a dock and some fishing ships? The Black Guard navy sends more Galleons. Would you like some free upgrades from sending a monk to study at a friendly mosque? The Black Guards might well burn it down. Because of this, the easiest path to victory is building your base conservatively, even if it means relying on your Market to get most of your gold.
- By AoC standards, mission 5, "King of Valencia", is not too forgiving. After migrating El Cid and friendly units that join him towards the city of Valencia, you will be tasked with protecting a Wonder until it is completed. First of all, you're forced to wait for ally Villagers to construct it, as opposed to building it yourself. The second and more pressing issue, though, is that your enemy starts with a hefty Imperial Age army with lots of advanced siege weapons that can easily wreck the Wonder before you spot them. Since you start in the Castle Age, improving your level of technology to better hold off your opponent requires a lot of resources, something not helped by the limited wood you have access to. Additionally, there's very little room to fight off his units because there are several Bombard Towers just outside of Valencia's northern tip, where the Wonder site is.
- The Battles of the Conquerors has the "Lepanto" scenario, in which you have to build and defend a Wonder on a beach while facing the wrath of the Turkish navy. You'll constantly be attacked by both warships trying to bombard your settlement from the sea and landing forces consisting of Elite Janissaries that can easily tear your base apart. You can counter-attack and try to destroy the Turkish docks and transports to stop the flood, but you'll find that the AI cheats and spawns transports in a bay regardless of whether the Turks have any docks remaining. And if you want the DE "Battleship" achievement, you have to beat the mission without a single Turkish transport landing on your shores.
The Forgotten
HD Edition
- The original Bari campaign is only three missions long, but it compensates for quantity of challenge with sheer quality.
- Don't even get anyone started on the second mission, "The Rebellion of Melus". Easily one of the grindiest missions in AoE history, you're restricted to the Castle Age and must defeat a Post-Imperial Goths opponent with a well-fortified stronghold and unlimited resources. Although you're allowed to train Elite Cataphracts, Two-Handed Swordsmen, and Capped Rams and have access to infinitely respawning gold and stone mines, making any progress whatsoever requires a lot of careful strategy, as even the strongest armies you can muster will get stomped flat otherwise. Worst of all, you're forbidden from constructing additional Castles, so not only is it difficult to maintain a forward base, but you're stuck relying on the single Castle you inherit from Potenza to produce Elite Cataphracts and Petards, both of which are pivotal in shifting the tide in your favor.
- The third mission, "The Great Siege", is an utter nightmare, but for completely different reasons. The whole scenario is one long streak of Side Quests where the very slightest hiccup will cause you to be defeated. There's a seemingly countless number of units and buildings that must survive along the way, and protecting each one requires the perfect strategy. Unlike his two ancestors, Andreas Nautikos is a complete wimp, with a paltry 50 hit points, so he pretty much has to be kept out of combat at all costs, despite his importance to the progression of the story. Your Norman adversaries will outnumber you regularly, so unless you have godlike micro skills, you won't stand the faintest chance at success. To push the level of annoyance even further, the scenario's trigger system arbitrarily forces your units to be in a limited area at a time by briefly removing control of them and tasking them back into the legal boundaries. Because of this, you're prevented from scouting to get more of a combat advantage, and if your army veers out of bounds in the middle of a battle (which is likely, considering the amount of micro necessary), it will disintegrate out of nowhere. Another nuisance is that due to a mistake in the most recent patch, there are two extra players in the mission who will spawn a Dark Age Town Center in a random part of the map, and they will screw up the mission's trigger system and force you to reset the game if you're unlucky.
- The last Sforza mission, "A New Duke of Milan", is notorious. Your goal is to cut off Milan's economy by raiding their countryside until they capitulate. You start with extremely limited resources and must immediately build up a strong base virtually from scratch to hold off two enemies who will assault you relentlessly. The stronger of your opponents sends most of their troops from a fortress that's virtually impregnable due to your inability to produce siege weapons. Unless you finish the Palisade Walls you're given and erect a Castle as soon as possible, you'll be absolutely flattened under the weight of their Cavaliers and siege engines. The only gold on the map is far away from the safety of your starting camp, so being able to afford important technologies like Bodkin Arrow and Ballistics or produce more Genoese Crossbowmen to stop those dreaded Cavaliers becomes a serious grind that forces you to abuse your Market like crazy. Even if you make it far enough to reach the Imperial Age and complete all of the side quests, you're suddenly faced with one more vicious enemy who automatically spawns military units for 15 minutes. This mission is so brutal that even TheViper had to play it several times
before finally beating it. - In contrast to the first two missions, Prithviraj 3, "The Elopement," can be straight-up brutal even on Standard difficulty. One mistake can get you killed at the beginning, where you'll have to find a lot of berry bushes because guards will likely end up ganging up on you. Then you have an enemy base and an army on your tail if you go west, though it's far less harsh if you go east to the bandit's base and get extra gold in the process, to a base where your gold will run out fast, the closest gold supply is out of town near the enemy navy.
- Battles of the Forgotten:
- "Dos Pilas". After acquiring the titular city, you will eventually face an invasion by Calakmul that's impossible to defeat and be given the choice either to join them to fight Tikal or flee to Uaxactun and defeat Calakmul. Either way you go, your main opponent has unlimited resources and a large, well-fortified Imperial Age base, forcing you to hurry your economy so that you can stand up to their level of technology. Along the way, however, you will also have to contend with any cities that have been captured by opposing forces. Additionally, you're forbidden from building any additional Town Centers, making the journey up a lot more difficult. It doesn't help that you can't produce Trebuchets.note
- "Honfoglalás" is quite a doozy. To begin with, the mission is basically an entire campaign condensed into a single scenario, as it's divided into several phases that force you to rebuild your economy from scratch each time, and you won't be allowed to advance to the next age until finishing each section, after which you age up automatically. The major kicker that earns this mission such infamy, however, is the section in which the Byzantines request your aide against the Bulgars. At this point in the mission, you're still restricted to the Castle Age, yet the Bulgars will have reached Post-Imperial Age and have access to fully-upgraded Halberdiers and Tarkans.note Since the enemy AI behaves like a normal random map player, their economy will be so huge that they'll be able to spam fighters seemingly forever. Because of this, your only chance at defeating them is to build a deathtrap of garrisoned Castles and Guard Towers to keep their army distracted while you sneak other units with your Transport Ships to destroy their economy and production buildings. If you're not really patient, you won't get far.
- The scenario "Langshan Jiang." Your objective is to protect five transports and build a monument in your town, while defending against endless waves of enemies from the east and west, army and navy, including siege weapons, and you only have 25 minutes to clear the enemy ships and towers. And since the transport is AI-controlled, it will merrily sail right into the teeth of any hostiles you might have missed. The situation can be alleviated slightly if you pay 2,000 gold to some pirates to ally with them, but you'll really need the gold for just about everything else. And don't think escorting the last transport to your base is the Instant-Win Condition, instead you have to actually have your workers build the Wonder, at which point the AI will throw absolutely everything at you, attacking with Cannon Galleons from the sea and landing assault forces with siege equipment to test whether you thought to upgrade your base's inland defenses while you were clearing the lake.
- "Bapheus" is notoriously difficult, mainly because the town you are given to build is located at an open area of the map where it is difficult to defend and build your economy effectively, and you start off at the Feudal Age while your enemies are at Castle Age. Not only that, you have to deal with four different enemy factions that constantly attack you. Considering how the Turks are infamously known for their weak early game, this can catch newer players off-guard.
Definitive Edition
- While the majority of the revamped Alaric campaign is pretty easynote , the final mission, "A Kingdom of Our Own", is such a monstrosity that it single-handedly justifies the campaign's three-sword difficulty rating on the main menu. Your goal is to construct and defend a Castle in three different Gallic cities, all of which will attack your base with formidable armies. You have no allies this time around and start with nothing except a few Villagers and a handful of infantry units, so you'll need to put your huge initial gold supply to effective use really quickly. On top of that, you have one additional enemy who will eventually Zerg Rush you with Goths infantry until you kill his Hero Unit. If you wait too long to stop him, he'll become virtually invincible and you'll never be able to get past his infinite unit spam to even reach his hero unit. Even if you go for him before he can build up his economy, you risk leaving your own base open to annihilation by the three Gallic factions, one of which builds several Trebuchets alongside the rest of their army with each assault. It's during situations like this that you realize how much of a liability the Goths' complete lack of Stone Walls can be. If all of this wasn't overwhelming enough, the Western Roman Army will declare war against you after you've built your first Castle inside one of the Gallic fortresses, and their Cataphracts will likely give you a hard time as the Goths.
- The reworked version of Dracula 3, "The Breath of the Dragon", is practically as brutal as the real Vlad himself. Despite the opening phrase being simplified, the four towns feeding the main Turkish stronghold of Darstor will now regularly attack your base, which is right smack in the center of the map with limited resources and vulnerability to warships. Between the Ottomans and their allies, there are five enemies who will harass you from all sides of your puny island. Orsova and Obluciza are already quite advanced at the start of the mission and they only get scarier later on, while the comparatively weaker factions of Novoselo and Rahova are tucked away by the outskirts of Darstor, making them hard to take out early. Even after you manage to subdue the four towns, the Ottomans will continue hammering you with Elite Janissaries, Bombard Cannons, Hussars, and Heavy Camel Riders for pretty much as long as all of their military buildings are still standing. If you don't come in with the perfect strategy, you're in for quite a thrashing.
- Bari 4, "The Best Laid Plans", at least before Lords of the West came out. Oh boy, where to even begin? You start in the Castle Age, while your two primary opponents are in the Imperial Age. Both will constantly attack you with their superior armies, giving you barely any room to catch up. Worse still, you aren't allowed to build any new Castles, limiting your defensive options to the one Castle you start with, in addition to Towers, which your enemies can easily steamroll due to their heavy use of siege weaponry. And if you thought the Holy Roman Empire and Papal States were the extent of your worries, you're sadly mistaken. In the middle of your struggle against the Teutonic Knights, Cavaliers (later Paladins), Halberdiers, and Trebuchets pouring in from the north, another enemy will regularly harass your economy for as long as their riverbank Tower is standing. Even more insulting, your only ally at the beginning will turn against you just six minutes into the mission and won't switch back until you destroy their Castle. You're given several side quests to aid you along the way, but with all the pressure you face, it's unlikely you'll even have the wiggle room to take most of them on. Among these, one player will initially offer an alliance at the hefty cost of 1000 gold (which is risky, considering how much you'll need that gold otherwise), but if you take too long, they'll become yet another enemy for you to ward off. Whether you decide to win by defending your Castle for an hour of game time or by simply destroying your enemies, you're in for a truly brutal experience. However, when Lords of the West updated the mission so that the Norman Mercenaries are now properly represented as Sicilians instead of Franks, the difficulty as a whole was significantly reduced, as the first wave of Teutons no longer steamrolls you with Ironclad Rams and Trebuchets, and Capua now takes a few more minutes to turn against you.
- "The Fate of India," the penultimate Prithviraj scenario, has you and the other three enemy AI players beginning with resources similar to Deathmatch mode. As such, the enemies will swarm you with cavalry, and said enemies include the Persians with their mighty War Elephants. The most difficult part? It is a Timed Mission similar to a Relic Victory, and you have to destroy the monastery located in each of enemies' bases, although the timer will reset for each monastery destroyed. It was made even harder after the Dynasties of India DLC since now you no longer have access to Halberdiers or even Pikemen to deal with the War Elephant spam.
- Pachacuti:
- The second scenario, "The Field of Blood," is, like "King of Valencia" from the El Cid campaign, a Wonder victory scenario where you're relying on an ally to build the thing. You start with a large Castle Age base and two allies that will feed you resources regularly so long as you defend them, because they have almost no soldiers (and what few they do have will gladly chase Chanca scouts into enemy territory and get slaughtered). Making things worse, while you start in the Castle Age, you don't start with Feudal Age techs researched, so getting your units up to snuff requires a massive resource investment. The Chancas, meanwhile, have unlimited resources and will come from the west, east, and south almost constantly, requiring you to fight a war on multiple fronts - and since Cuzco is big, it's hard to move units around quickly enough to counter their assaults. Once the Wonder finally goes up, the gloves come off, and Anccu Huallac steps in, sending waves of siege weapons, Kamayuks, and Jaguar Warriors (which the Incas don't even have access to), which will effortlessly roll over you if you aren't prepared. Not hard enough? There's an achievement for doing it without building any walls or gates. Have fun!
- Pachacuti 3, "War of Brothers," has you moving your army through the Andes to attack the fortress of Calas and slay Urqu. The catch is that you aren't allowed to train Villagers, and can only build an economy by convincing Villagers you encounter along the way to join your side. If enemy raiders slip past your army and attack the resource buildings and workers behind your lines, you're officially screwed. To make matters worse, every few minutes a large Hostile Inca army will spawn on the edge of the map and proceed to follow the road all the way to your starting point, attacking anything in its path. So you're not only besieging a well-defended fortress, you have to time your attacks so you aren't blindsided by another wave of Hostile Inca.
- Battles of the Forgotten:
- The Definitive Edition version of "Honfoglalás", while not as tedious as its infamous HD counterpart, requires a lot of trial and error to complete and is arguably even harder as a whole. To begin with, the first half of the mission has you controlling a "nomadic" civilization, and you won't be able to play normally until you defeat the Avars. Although there are several benefits to being nomadic, this requires you to strategize very differently from a traditional Age of Empires II scenario. Additionally, you will need to time your transition from nomadic to sedentary gameplay at the perfect moment, as although Great Moravia can be defeated while you're still nomadic, thus sparing you a major threat later in the game, East Francia will quickly become a severe danger to your weak base as they enter the Imperial Age, not to mention their walled city is virtually impossible to take down without advanced siege weaponry, which requires you to go sedentary. You have the option to declare war on the initially benevolent Bulgarians instead in exchange for a large tribute of gold from the Byzantines, but this adds one more enemy for you to defend yourself against besides East Francia, who are lethal enough on their own.
- "Cyprus" is one of the grindiest missions in the entire game because not only does your rival live in a heavily fortified Byzantine base and have unlimited resources, but they will reconstruct their production buildings until you slay all of their Villagers and raze their Town Centers. The lack of Relics and the Britons' horrible cavalry certainly don't help. Even if you focus purely on Longbowmen, you have to constantly micromanage them against your opponent, lest they all fall to a single Onager shot.
- "Langshan Jiang" is renamed "Lake Poyang" in the Definitive Edition, but is otherwise little changed. You do now have a ten-minute grace period to clear the path before the first shipment arrives, but the time between later shipments is reduced to 15 minutes. And don't even think about trying to counter-attack your enemies to wipe out their docks, your main opponent has been given several Purposefully Overpowered towers that can One-Hit Kill anything you throw at them and have greater range than trebuchets.
- "Bapheus" is still quite difficult in Definitive Edition. Although the opening section has been removed and you now start in the Castle Age instead of the Feudal Age, your enemies (aside from the Catalan Company) have been quite buffed, as all of them now advance to the Imperial Age and train much stronger armies. This also means you'll have to worry about Trebuchets, Bombard Cannons, and/or Siege Rams threatening your defenses from all sides. Additionally, the scenario's achievement is to not ally with any of the other Turkish factions, giving you one more enemy to deal with.
African Kingdoms
- Despite being rated "easy" on the main menu, the Tariq ibn Ziyad campaign can be exceptionally difficult at certain points.
- Mission 2, "Consolidation and Subjugation", is merciless, especially in Definitive Edition, where the enemy AI is more aggressive. The mission is very similar to "The Breath of the Dragon" from the Dracula campaign in that you begin by capturing a city in the center of the map that's surrounded by rivers, while the second part of the scenario pits you against several enemies who will all attack you incessantly. Since every one of them regularly deploys Battering Rams, you'll need more than just a few extra Towers and Castles to fend off their invasions. You're forbidden from building Docks, so you can scratch warships off your list of defensive options. As if the constant pressure isn't bad enough, all four of your rivals will attempt Wonder victories, much like "The Fall of Rome" in the Attila the Hun campaign. It certainly doesn't help that two of your foes are Zerg Rushing Goths, and one of them commands a base so heavily fortified that it's a real pain just to reach their Wonder site, let alone defeat them entirely.
- Mission 4, "Crossing the Pyrenees" is a Baseless Mission where the player has to cross the harsh cold mountain range to reach the destination with the Hero Unit, at least one Trade Cart and fifteen military units. The map gimmick is that there are cliff passes that drains the player's units' hitpoints while the alternative route is an impregnable fortress. Enemies patrolling the cliffs are not affected by the HP drain and benefit from higher elevation attack bonus by default, meaning that the safest way to cross the mountain range is to lure the patrolling enemies with the hero unit out of the cliff into an ambush, which can easily take up to an hour at least. The only saving grace is that the player is not bound by a timer.
- Mission 5, "Razzia", starts off deceptively easy, as you're merely tasked with destroying three weak Feudal Age villages with a well-equipped initial force. After their Monasteries are razed, however, the scenario turns into a traditional build-and-destroy mission, where you receive just five Villagers to establish a base virtually from scratch. By contrast, your two main enemies begin with huge fortresses and fully upgraded armies, neither of which will take long to descend upon you at full force. One enemy has multiple bases scattered across the northern side of the map, while the other controls one of the most difficult fortresses to destroy in the entire game, not only due to their ability to spam fighters to the very last production building, but also because their city is on a narrow peninsula, meaning your army will be barraged with Galleon bolts in addition to their already relentless land force. As an extra annoyance, large packs of Frankish Paladins will station themselves at the three conquered Aquitanian Villages, where they will remain for the rest of the game, so if you need to push out for more resources, you have to be careful not to accidentally aggro them at the worst possible moment.
- The last Sundjata scenario, "The Lion's Den," was so difficult upon the initial release of The African Kingdoms that it was made significantly easier in later patches. Originally, you start off in the Castle Age, at the eastern corner of the map with a few units and some reasonable amount of resources. Your enemy starts off in the Imperial Age, and will not only attack you constantly, but at some point they'll start building a Wonder. Said enemy is Malian, and makes full advantage of this by sending beefed-up Cavaliers and surprisingly tanky infantry thanks to their pierce armor bonus. The map is modeled after "Pyrrhus of Epirus" from Age of Empires I, which was also notorious for its insane difficulty, giving the players an impression on how challenging the first game was. As was the case in that mission, your enemy's base is extremely difficult to breach, regardless of where you plan to approach them. If you try to launch an attack from the sea, you'll have to deal with a huge navy and several deadly towers guarding the enemy's shores. If you go by land, you'll face several defensive structures reinforced by Trebuchets, Arbalesters, and Onagers that will rip even a large attack force to shreds unless you're methodical. Considering the Wonder condition, you're under serious pressure not to lose any momentum going in. Additionally, you have no Relics to capture or allies to trade with, so if you waste all the closest gold mines trying to break the enemy stronghold, you'll be forced to rely on the gold deposits on some heavily-guarded islands. This mission was eventually changed so that you start in the Imperial Age and the enemy AI is less aggressive. Nonetheless, you'll still need to have good micromanagement and booming skills to build an army strong enough to clear your opponent before time runs out. Additionally, for the Definitive Edition achievement, this mission is the only one which has to be completed on the hardest difficulty.
- The third Yodit mission, 'A Fallen Crown', is a major jump in difficulty even for the already difficult Yodit campaign. You're tasked with killing the Aksumite emperor, Dagnajan, before his military convoy leaves the area. The problem is, Dagnajan's convoy is a massive army of War Elephants, Monks, Crossbowmen, and Dagnajan himself, who is far and away the strongest unit in the game. You start in the Feudal Age, with almost no resources, very few units, and no base at all - you have to build up from nothing. While you try to build up a force big enough to challenge Dagnajan and carry out the optional objectives, you'll be dealing with the Begemder Kingdom, which controls almost half the map and will build up into a serious threat very quickly, if you can't find some way to deal with them. Although the mission was made a bit easier in a patch, the Definitive Edition achievement, which requires you to complete every single side-quest before Dagnajan begins his march, is still no easy feat.
- The Francisco de Almeida campaign opens with "The Old World", in which your first goal is to destroy three Aragonese military camps while simultaneously defending a small town on the east side of the map. The problem is that you're given several handicaps that put you at a serious disadvantage, forcing you to think far outside of the box to keep up with your rival. The most pressing issue is that you're not allowed to train any new soldiers and will only be able to expand your army by locating various bands of troops scattered across the map with your hero unit. The Aragonese, on the other hand, start with a large army and are perfectly capable of replenishing their numbers for as long as any of their bases are still standing. It certainly doesn't help that despite being in the Castle Age, they're able to train Cavaliers, which will quickly puncture your limited forces unless you've already found most of the allied soldiers hiding in the woods. On top of all of that, the Aragonese have two generals patrolling the battlefield with their packs of Cavaliers, and if they spot you before you're ready, you're in serious trouble. The only relief is that there are a few friendly healing units nearby, including a Priest who will follow your soldiers around for as long as they're in his sight. You better be sure to take advantage of your healers, as there's no way you'll muster the strength destroy all three enemy camps without their aid. The second half of the mission, thankfully, is much easier, as you inherit several buildings and units to defeat one more enemy, but it'll most likely take you a few attempts before you can finally make it to that point.
Rise of the Rajas
- Gajah Mada 2, "Unconditional Loyalty", is a tough one for many players, as you're tasked with puncturing a thick bulwark of walls, towers, soldiers, and siege weapons to rescue King Jayanegara, who is fighting off the enemies from the center of the map. Not only do you start with limited resources and get raided constantly, but you will lose if you take too long and Rakrian Kruti defeats Jayanegara. Although you can quickly find an ally who can help you breach Trowulan's defenses, you'll have to build up your army fast, lest you be unable to make any progress. Oh, and after you save Jayanegara, you still have to escort him to an area in the other side of the map, which is dominated by enemies who won't surrender until the bitter end. On a somewhat positive note, the powerful Gajah Mada Hero Unit does not need to survive this mission, so you should make good use of him early on.
- For the most part, the Suryavarman I campaign is one of the easiest post-Conquerors campaigns. However, the fourth mission, "Challenging a Thalassocracy", is a bit tough due to the fact that you have to protect an ally from two aggressive enemies and will lose the mission if they fall. Unlike The Dai Viet Uprising below, your opponents will strike your own base in addition to your ally's, so you won't always have ample room to reinforce your ally's fleet if they're being attacked. It also doesn't help that the battle takes place primarily on water, so you're stuck relying on the Khmer's mediocre navy and can't take advantage of their main strengths, not to mention both of your foes are Malay, which are one of the most dominant seafaring civilizations in the game.
- The entirety of the Bayinnaung campaign, as each scenario tries to handicap you one way or another.
- The first scenario, "The Burmese Tigers," has a primary objective of besieging a town in the center of the map to capture its Monument, except you have to worry about a secondary objective of killing a particular king unit before he flees to a fortress. If he manages to succeed, his faction will start sending armies your way even while you're busy with the primary objective, but the only way to kill him off is to tear down a specific wall with your elephants and use them to block him. And did we mention that you start in the Feudal Age while most of your enemies start at the Castle Age, and the city starts off at the Imperial Age?
- The second scenario, "The Mandalay Cobra," is also a pain in the ass. Like Saladin's "Horns of Hattin" mission, you cannot build any walls, towers or castles, but the scenario's other gimmick is that there's no gold near your base, and you can't build a Market. Instead you have six Monasteries with Relics in them generating your gold income, and the damned things are so fragile that those Relics are instantly destroyed if they leave their starting Monasteries for any reason. Two enemies to your east will regularly send raiding forces to destroy your Monasteries and Relics, while an enemy immediately across the water to your west will attack your docks and fishing ships. And the scenario's objectives are to raise 4,000 gold and also put together an army capable of besieging a city and killing its king unit.
- The third scenario, "The Royal Peacock," gives you the choice between defeating everyone for a military victory or going for a Wonder victory. Either way, you'll be building a base from scratch in a jungle surrounded by enemies, with limited safe resources to harvest. You have the option of allying with one of your rivals to make things easier, but there's a catch - if you defeat one of the other factions or build your Wonder, your "ally" will be given a massive influx of resources, advance to the Imperial Age, and backstab you. At the very least, not all of your opponents will catch up to your level of technology, but you're still up for quite a fight if you build too close to the water or forget to guard the corridors to your base. That this is arguably the easiest of the five Bayinnaung missions says a lot about the campaign's infamous reputation.
- The fourth mission, "The White Elephant," takes place on a maze-like mountain map covered with cliffs and rivers, and teeming with enemies that ambush your army as it trudges up to meet them. Your main objective is to put each of the four Relics your starting Monks are carrying in four different Monasteries inside enemy cities to turn those settlements to your side. You have a population cap of 40, the only unit-producing structures available are in those enemy cities, and there are only a handful of Villagers scattered around the map to harvest resources. The enemy settlements are defended with walls, towers, castles, elephants, and worst of all, Monks that will happily turn what few units you have against you. Your own Monks, as previously mentioned, are carrying Relics, making it that much harder to use them to heal your army or convert enemy units. Oh, and you have a 700 year time limit (roughly an hour of game time) to complete your main objective. You'll need incredibly good micro-management skills to race against the clock, with the added handicap that you're "racing" with lumbering Elephants, arthritic Monks, and whatever siege equipment you build to help crack the enemy's defenses.
- The fifth mission, "The Old Tiger," is a fixed-force, micromanagement-intensive nightmare, similar to The Great Hunt. Yes, that Great Hunt. Your main objective is to escort a Monk Hero Unit to four shrines that are unfortunately inside well-fortified enemy bases. You have no resources or buildings to produce additional units for this part of the mission, so any Monk or siege weapon you lose is a major blow (and you can't repair your siege weapons, so you better keep them well guarded). You're up against four different factions (three sharing the same color), all of which will not only throw waves of units at you near-constantly, but will also upgrade their units, while you're stuck with a late Castle Age force. Even worse, the only ranged units your army gets are Arambai, which do great damage but can't hit anything unless they're at point blank range. Trying to go for the shrines will result in being caught in a constant pincer attack, while attacking the Rakhine and Portuguese infrastructure means grinding through their considerable defenses while they spew units at you. You have a second force primed for a naval invasion on the far side of the map from the Monk hero and his bodyguard, but actually breaking through the enemy's coastal defenses and Portuguese navy to merge your army is easier said than done. The second part of the scenario, where you're finally allowed to train new units to wipe out the enemy, is easy by comparison, but even so, the resources you are given are limited unless you convert one of the Portuguese Feitorias, so you better make sure to destroy as many of your enemies' production buildings as possible during the first half of the mission, or else you won't be able to make much progress before running out of supplies. Additionally, the Monk hero isn't the only unit that has to survive; even after you're done escorting him to all four temples, you will automatically lose if his bodyguard falls in battle. Bringing him to safety is no easy matter, as not only will your land army be badly depleted by the time you're done with the temples, but your ability to get him on a Transport Ship to flee to your northern base ends up depending on whether or not the Rakhine and Portuguese navies are blocking your way; if they're already ravaging your docks before you're ready, keeping the hero alive will be that much harder.
- Like Bayinnaung, the Le Loi campaign is merciless almost the entire way through, kicking off with three difficult missions and ending with a bang.
- The first scenario, "The Dai Viet Uprising," tasks you with liberating five Vietnamese villages by destroying Ming garrisons in them, while at the same time defending two allied settlements from Chinese reprisal. The problem is that one of your allies suffers from massive Artificial Stupidity, cannot rebuild destroyed defenses, and will quickly fall to the Ming forces and cause you to fail the mission unless you constantly babysit them. Oh, and you're restricted to the Castle Age, and the Ming attacks are coming out of heavily-fortified bases whose Imperial Age defenses simply outclass what siege equipment you have access to.
- The second scenario, "The Mountain Siege," is a Hold the Line mission in which you cannot build any additional towers, castles, walls, or trebuchets. You and an allied player are atop a mountain fortress surrounded by Ming forces, who constantly attack with elite infantry, heavy cavalry and siege equipment, while your objective is to muster a force to break through the Ming's lines to the east without losing all castles within said fortress. While your ally will churn out elite units, their AI isn't particularly good at handling hostile siege weapons, so you have to keep an eye on your gates and towers lest a Ming ram smash them down. And don't think clearing the east road wins the scenario - after that objective is met, you have to continue to defend the fortress while the Ming attacks intensify, so that small groups of friendly soldiers can spawn every other minute and flee off the edge of the map (assuming they don't encounter a stray Ming soldier along the way) until forty of them have escaped.
- The third scenario, "The Battle at Hanoi," is actually made more difficult by the Definitive Edition. In the original version, you could build up your economy early by pillaging Ming buildings for wood and gold, which you could use with food tributes from friendly villagers to build an army and wipe out the Ming base before the scenario activated their normal AI. The Definitive Edition fixes that by removing your access to anything but food until you cross a river and the Ming "wake up," so by the time you reach a friendly mountain fortress and start collecting resources, your opponent will have fully-upgraded Imperial Age troops, while you start in the Castle Age without the benefit of a Blacksmith to upgrade your soldiers. Worse still, there's only one safe stone deposit near your base, and getting more will have your miners working literally right outside the Ming's north gate, or circling around the enemy city dominating the map's center to reach deposits all the way where you started. It's a race against time to get your economy going and build some defenses before the Ming start sallying forth with Cavaliers, Elite Chu-Ko-Nu, and Capped Rams. Oh, and your Villagers can't build Monasteries, so your only source of Monks is from one Monastery that flips to your side, located on a peninsula jutting into the water west of Hanoi, and the Ming are perfectly willing to level it with their navy.
- Despite mission 4, "Reaching South", finally being a step down in difficulty (which doesn’t mean it's easy, especially since the Definitive Edition AI is more aggressive), the brutality quickly picks up again in mission 5, "A Three-Pronged Attack". As the title suggests, you're required to simultaneously manage three separate bases and must defeat a handful of enemies that all train powerful armies. Unlike previous missions, where you only have to fight against the Chinese (whose unique unit is at least weak to the Vietnamese's two unique units), this one pits you against a Khmer enemy, as well as another Vietnamese opponent, in addition to your two regular Ming rivals. Thus, not only do you need to constantly keep track of all of your bases, but you also have to frequently adjust your strategy depending which of your foes becomes most dangerous. The only reason this is one of the easier missions in the campaign is that you start in the Imperial Age. Additionally, there's an achievement where you're not allowed to lose any of your hero units, preventing you from neglecting one of your bases to focus purely on the others.
- Mission 6, "The Final Fortress", was already a mouthful in HD, but in the Definitive Edition, it's an utter nightmare, due to the fact that both the Ming Vanguard and Ming factions will regularly assault you from the very start. Like the previous mission, you begin with multiple bases, but in this case, you really need to make the most out of both, as your two enemies with hit you like a truck from both sides of the map well before you have the chance to finish setting up your economy. Even if you can break past the Ming Vanguard's endless swarms of fully upgraded units, conquering Dong Do is still no easy feat. Not only is the fortress full of Bombard Towers to support its numerous Castles, but the army guarding the city is more diverse and difficult to counter than ever before, with Onagers to deal with your ranged units, Monks to convert your Battle Elephants, and a mix of Chu Ko Nu, Halberdiers, Cavaliers, and the campaign-only Flamethrower unit for anything else you throw at them. Hopefully you don't forget to keep harvesting resources, since you'll be needing as much as you can possibly afford.
The Last Khans
- Tamerlane:
- The third scenario, "Harbinger of Destruction," pits you up against three extremely aggressive enemies who are plentifully supplied by a well-fortified Italian city on a very hard-to-reach part of the map. Early on, before you even have the chance to take one of them down, all three will send large armies against you at once, making it difficult to build up a sizable force, let alone survive. Although you can eventually get some extra help from a couple of allies, as well as a reinforcement party, any aid will likely be too little, too late if you aren't clever. Similar to "Into China" and "Jihad!", one of your opponents goes for a Wonder victory, forcing you to act fast amidst constant raids on your settlement. Making matters worse, the scenario doesn't allow you to build farms, so you'll need to obtain food by hunting or fishing in dangerously exposed areas, receiving occasional tributes, or raiding Trade Workshops guarded by enemy troops.
- Tamerlane 5, "Scourge of the Levant," pits you against six different opponents, and while the Armenians and Georgians aren't hard to deal with, the four Saracen players are all quite formidable, and their specialty of camelry and Monks is difficult to counter as the Tatars. It also doesn't help that you start with zero villagers and the Turkish village you ultimately capture is located in a very central part of the map, making it a constant target of enemy raids. Luckily, the northern area next to the lake, where your initial buildings are, is easy to wall off, and your enemies won't attack you with too many siege weapons, but you'll still need to take out one of the Saracen bases early to hold out long enough.
- Ivaylo:
- Mission 3, "Tsar of the Bulgars", tasks you with moving your starting band of cavalry northwards to defend a Bulgarian town being attacked by the Mongols, Tatars, and Cumans. The tricky part is that your economy is almost entirely dependent on tributes, making it difficult to amass a force large enough to fight back, especially since you're under immense pressure from the very moment you arrive. All three of your foes will assault your stronghold constantly, so you'll have to spend your limited resources wisely to finally get a chance to breathe. The scenario becomes significantly easier after you've slain all of the Khans in either the Tatars' or Cumans' camp, which will cause the faction to become your ally and fight back against the Mongols, thus distracting them away from your citadel, but even killing the Khans is harder than you'd think, due to the complicated layout of the Tatar and Cuman bases that could easily result in bad engagements if you don't look ahead.
- The final scenario, "Where the One-Eyed Man Is King", while not the hardest per say, can be quite tedious if you don't know what you're in for. To begin with, it's essentially two scenarios in one, as after you defeat the Hungarians, you'll lose your entire army and economy, forcing you to rebuild everything from scratch after you meet with Nogai Khan (although fortunately, you keep any technologies you researched). While the first half of the mission is fairly easy once you know how to build your economy with the tools you're given, things start to become frustrating during the second half, as defeating both of your enemies is quite a grind. Since the Poles are represented by the Lithuanians, their giant army of relic-boosted Paladins and Leitis is guaranteed to give you a tough time, especially since they're supplemented by a diverse force of Monks, Trebuchets, Elite Skirmishers, and Halberdiers. Their base is also extremely big and well-fortified, making it difficult to slow down their unit production. On the other hand, while the Genoese Gazaria won't invade you nearly as often as the Poles, their town is completely surrounded by water, forcing you to invest in a navy, something not easy to do considering they already control the sea with an iron fist.
- Kotyan Khan:
- The second mission, "The Battle at the Kalka River", requires you to defeat the Tatars so that you can escape from the Mongols, whose base is so extensive that they're more or less unbeatable. Not only are the Tatars extremely aggressive on their own, but the Mongols will eventually break past your ally and start attacking your base with units that are far too numerous and technologically advanced for you to stand up against, essentially making this a Timed Mission without a set timer. Let's just say if you haven't already made considerable progress against the Tatars by the time the Mongols reach you, you're in serious trouble. As you're limited to the Castle Age, you must rely on the Capped Ram to destroy the Tatars' Castles and Town Centers, slow as it may be. There is also an achievement for beating this in the Feudal Age, so you'd better put the Cumans' Battering Ram bonus to good use fast.
- The third mission, "Saving the Huts", is similar to the previous scenario in that your fragile base will be subjected to constant pressure from both the Tatars and Mongols before your own army is large enough to deal with them, forcing you garrison your villagers in your Town Centers to hold the enemy off until you have the technology to bring the fight back to them. Worse still, in a sort of perspective reversal of "Pax Mongolica" from the Genghis Khan campaign, Subotai will arrive with reinforcements 40 minutes after the first swarm of enemies raid your base. Since his troops quickly acquire full Imperial Age upgrades while you're restricted to the Castle Age, your army won't be any match for him, forcing you once again to complete your main goals quickly before the Mongols are too much to deal with. By the time you've freed all of the tribes, you better hope that Subotai's army isn't following you to Hungary, since the road leading there is full of Tatar soldiers and defenses that are hard enough to deal with on their own.
Lords of the West
- Mission 2 of Edward Longshanks, "A Man of God", wastes no time laying down the pressure and doesn't pause for a moment. Much like Saladin's "The Lion and the Demon", you have to defend the city of Acre against a flurry of enemies for a certain period; in this case, you need to survive for an hour of game time. Both of your foes train large, aggressive armies, while one of them advances to the Imperial Age and starts cascading you with fully upgraded siege weapons towards the end of the mission. The worst part? You're restricted to the Castle Age and cannot construct any Castles or Town Centers, making it nearly impossible to have a comfortable advantage all the way to the end. Even if you try to trade with your allies, the Mamluks' navy will relentlessly chew out your Trade Cogs, while your Trade Carts are easy targets for Aleppo's land forces. Oh yeah, you also have to protect an ally and will automatically lose if both of their Castles fall.
- The Grand Dukes of the West's fifth mission, "The Hook and Cod Wars". You start with a cramped base that's vulnerable to naval attacks on all sides and have to make your way to destroy three Castles from an extremely powerful opponent on the opposite side of the map. Your available resources are severely limited unless you attack some garrisons guarding the Dutch villages and clear the path to more gold and wood. Not only does your main enemy attack you with advanced siege engines and fully upgraded Burgundian cavalry, but you also have to ward off an additional foe who will constantly harass your shores with their navy and send Transport Ships with Longbowmen to threaten your starting Town Center, which you aren't allowed to lose. With so much going on, you really need to make the best use possible of your initial resources and especially take control of the water before you get overrun.
- Mission 2 of The Hautevilles, "Roger in Sicily", can be quite rough if you don't prepare yourself early on. After capturing a city with a fixed force by slaying its emir, you're required to defeat four other strong opponents without much help aside from some occasional reinforcements sent by boat. Even though you'll inherit a large and decently fortified base, your four rivals will steamroll you with huge armies that can quickly wreck your economy if you forget to add more defenses and train a sizable force of your own. The worst part is that the invading forces will converge not too far into the mission, giving you far less flexibility to deal with each one of them. The only upside is that defeating the other emirs only requires you to slay their Hero Unit, which will occasionally leave the safety of their fortress and become easy prey for you, and you inherit everything that each one leaves behind.
Dynasties of India
- Babur's second scenario, "The Last Timurids", begins with Babur, Qutlugh, and a few light cavalry being forced to flee to Herat, which is at the opposite end from where they started. Upon their arrival, you are tasked to defeat the two Uzbek factions on the map, both of which will overwhelm your base with siege weapons and cavalry just as you start building a base. Located to the east is Kabul that will offer an alliance with you, but in order to get the achievement "Never Trust a Campaign AI", you also have to decline this offer, giving another enemy to worry about.
- Rajendra:
- The very first scenario, "The Successor", tasks you on a night raid to weaken one of the enemies on the map before the sun rises, except it is not made clear which points should be attacked on the objectives menu. Once time is up, you will get villagers and are able to build a base, but the Chalukyan Army wastes no time in sending a huge force before you can even start building proper defenses, which gives way for Manyaketha to finish you off with their Imperial Age army while everyone else is stuck in Castle Age.
- The second scenario, "Deeds of the Father" requires you to defeat Mannaram and Polonnaruwa with limited economy and population space. The real challenge comes when they are defeated. You are given villagers to build up a proper economy, but this makes Ruhuna more aggressive and send waves of elephants and Two-handed Swordsmen (despite being in the Castle Age) frequently. You can stop the elephant production by destroying King Mahinda's castle in the middle of the map, but it is heavily guarded by Ruhuna's military buildings endlessly spawning units to begin with.
- The third scenario "Rising Star" starts where the third Suryavarman mission left off, where you have to escort the Grand Chariot and the Envoy across the sea. Like in Vinlandsaga, the deep sea damages your ships passing through it, but the shallow waters near the coasts are littered with pirate ships. Expect lots of resets if you do not know the map layout beforehand, or even knowing the existence of lumber piles that can be collected to repair your ships. Upon reaching the Indian subcontinent, the mission doesn't get any easier as you will be bombarded by the Chalukyan Empire from both land and water. Your allies on the map will turn on you should their respective castles are damaged enough (or if enough time passes), which can catch you off guard should you only focus on defending one ally. To get the achievement "Eye of the Tiger", you must defeat Srivijaya, Madurai, the Chalukyan Empire, and Bengali Pirates before getting 10 prestige points (which automatically wins the scenario).
- In the fourth scenario "Sacred Waters", you have no economy and have to rely on tributes and supply ships to get resources. The main objective is to destroy three castles in Mahipala's base, which is located behind two other fortresses that you have to break through. The problem arises when Mahipala is also going for a Wonder victory in case you take too much time dawdling around, and his base is guarded by a massive balanced army of Rathas, Elite Battle Elephants, Champions, and Arbalesters. Adding to the frustration, you have to destroy those three castles before Mahipala finishes constructing the Wonder to get the achievement "No Wonder You Won".
