It’s the mix of humor (and the silly irony of figured like Genghis or Attila being pacifistic) and unconventional tactics. Anyone with practice can learn to defend, boom, and counterassault the AI. But learning to exploit the design elements of the campaign maps, utilize units for ways they were never intended (like his repeated use of heavy cavalry to divert enemy fire, more like Hussite Wagons to escort his siege and monks), exploiting AI (like his use of naval units to divert the enemy warships or straight up block transports), and the very specific conditions for victory/defeat. It’s treated lightly, but each of these scenarios requires some careful thinking, and analysis of what the *real* victory condition is from a programming standpoint. Playing this as if it were a historical battle with more reasonable wind conditions is doomed to fail, hence really silly but effective techniques like bumrushing the hill in the last Joan of Arc scenario rather than defeating the English to actually capture the hill.
There is a hidden secret way to deal with Richard better... you send him 10k gold tribute then u private message and tell him that templars and the others are all under command of Barbarossa. watch him ally you. why would he do this? everyone betrays Barbarossa. its in the rules.
It's not just that everyone betrays Barbarossa. In this hypothetical case, Richard actually HATED the Hohenstaufens. Henry the Lion was Richard's brother-in-law. When the Saxons' power grab for the Holy Roman Empire failed and when Barbarossa punished Henry, Richard swore revenge. So yeah, Richard would jump on any chance to get back at Barbarossa.
I have win easily this mission, where i have just rushed the cyan (free ocean after), blue then the yellow. But i lost 1 hour for kill the gray and red. Do the achievement, ignore the objective.
@@zoiuduu Tbh, that's something I think the scenario designers fucked up. They often start you in super disadvantageous positions during those scenarios and often even say stuff like "don't attack they're too strong" or whatever (meaning they actively discourage you from doing the thing that wins games), and over half the tutorial campaign only tells you how to move soldiers, gather resources, go to the next age, and to train soldiers and take down a tower or whatever. None of the campaigns teach you about build orders, rushing, harassing or anything even though that's how you win the Age of-games most easily.
@@bosbanon3452 Ha. Sweet. Kushluk, Kuchlug, Quqluq, I've heard it spelled a million different ways. Probably none of them are quite accurate. Neither the Naiman nor the tribes who would become the Mongols kept written languages.
I fucking love that you gave The Lion and the Demon a go on DE. You could've taken the easy way out, but you didn't and it was the most scrappy and entertaining and twisty mission to date. Huge props!
T-West: *uses his troops to distract the enemy* Me: "You can't sacrifice an entire division like that! Those soldiers love and defend our nation! How can you betray them?"
"I'm pacifist, I don't want to harm people!!" *sacrifices 558 poor souls in the last mission alone* Really enjoy these videos, very well cut and edited.
Man, I have vivid memories of the second Saladin mission moreso than any of the others thus far. I have a distinct memory of coming home from middle school and playing that map for hours...
I was feeling cheated with the last level until I realized how much time was left. Those rams moving against Richard was glorious. Idea: bait his onagers into team attacking the trebuchets
I'm soo glad you also did the last scenario on DE and not only on AoK. I would have still accepted it if you did it in AoK, because your video title only said AoE not DE
In the final mission, you can take out Jerusalems TC in with your starting ships alone. I did it by accident one time, and they resigned within the first 5 minutes of the game.
I like how half of the missions are explained in a minute or so, and then the second and 5th mission take a little bit more explaining so they are 2-3 minutes but it took 8 and a half minutes to explain the Tomfoolery of the last mission lol
11:35 there is one trick I observed in the older versions of AoE2 (not sure if it still works on DE): when you place an storage facility next to a gaia-placed unit, villagers can actually harvest it for no resource associated. First time I saw this was in Barbarossa's last campaign in the original version of AoE2 (first release, when hero units were still active for monk conversion). The trick is simple: after a villager is done with chopping/picking a resource, there is a small chance of picking/chopping a gaia unit in the surroundings (cactae, rocks, tombstones, even rugs/carpets), just one hit and the gaia element is gone for 0 resource, and the villager goes to the next resource available. It also works with hunting, but only with eagles, who die after 2 hits and explode like cobra cars, but only happens when a eagle passes by a hunting area right after the animal is fully harvested, once again, the eagle just explodes for no resource. Last time I saw this was in the earlier versions of The Conquistadors expansion, in El Cid campaign, when a rock next to a stone quarry was harvested by a villager after the original stone was depleted. Quite weird bug being honest. Not sure if it is of any relevance nowadays for speedrunning, but it is something I observed looooong time ago, but I never found a way to trigger it with 100% accuracy. 😷👍
@@HeartBurstHD also : second mission you must kill Kushluk, fourth mission you assassinate the Shah... going around that would be tricky For the first mission, maybe luring them to Ornlu ?
@@HeartBurstHD for 1st mission you can still convert them though, sadly you cannot exploit diplomacy anymore. So you need to protect your monk will do it
Over a hill a single condotiero surveys his camp and his men , seing their bonfires light the night sky ,he makes his mind , to go against the very principles of his profession , on this night he swears to never again take another man's life, to achieve his goals with cunning rather than brute force , to found a principality without bloodshed and becone a true renaissance prince , viva sforza!!
Man this is legendary stuff! It took me around 3 hours to win this scenario on standard difficulty, this guy did it in half the time without killing any units
Man. Deleting the transports was surprisingly dark. Like, that's such a terrifying idea. Imagine you're trapped on a boat, packed into the hold with the other soldiers. Then, you hear the crew of the boat begin to pray in another religion. Then, before you can do anything, they scuttle the ship, with you and all the others trapped inside. It's like something out of a horror movie.
You’re pacifist runs remind me of the ghost runs in the thief series, where players try to reach the objective without knocking out enemies. And I love it.
An impressive accomplishment on the final Saladin mission. That one's tough even without going for pacifism. Especially now that the island trick has been removed
Probably the easiest way to deal with the hero trebs is to wall them in somewhere away from your base. Their minimum range prevents them from being able to free themselves.
@@T-West Oh, wow, you are the biggest youtuber to reply to me, I love this series and your sense of humour. Have you considered doing the StarWars Age of Empires campaigns? If I remember they seemed easy to exploit and sequence break.
Some may still argue that winning campaign missions by 'victory condition' workarounds etc is technically taking advantage of the AI or whatever. But after watching him beat The Lion and the Demon fair and square, seeing the Crusaders learn of peaceful ways (by force), one must arrive at the conclusion that this person may be classified as an absolute madlad.
So I just randomly discovered these videos, and holy wow! These are really well put together given your channel size. Maybe I'm a little confused about that, but regardless, this is top notch material and I'm really impressed. Keep up the excellent work!
Hmm... T-West makes a video referencing Fatslob and the Saracen team bonus on the same day that SoTL releases a new video on the cost of walling... I feel a conspiracy afoot
excelent series.thank you for the videos =D love the torch passing within joanna, barbarossa and now saladin. dont think that aztecs, mongols or huns will cope with the ways of pacifism. Maybe Rodrigo Dias de Vivar, El Cid, listened to this stories and got inspired. who knows. even attila listened to the pope...
He did it. The absolute madman. He actually did it.
He found a use for the Saracen team bonus.
Get rektered, Spirit of the Low!
But...he use it for selfish purpuse lol. Not as an actual team strat
@@cl8804 You mean Spirit of the LOL! Or if you're an Orc, Spirit of the KEK!
@@nicotube4178 but the team can use it alose 111
@@MALEMization He meant "Spirit of the law"
"But Your Majesty, every single soldier sent to the Holy Land for the last 300 years has abandoned Christianity".
"Send more, I said".
The absolute gem of a comment
-Saladin, where are you going with that great army?
- No worries, bruh, pacifist run.
Just passing
11
icarly meme: carly (Egypt): whatcha got there?
Spencer (saladin): a smoothie
ostrich (saladin's army)
Tourism.
Lol. In that time, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Anatolia [now renamed Turkey by it's Central Asian colonists/invaders] - was majority Christian.
*Shoots enemies down from allied TC*
"Why would *Aqaba* do this ?"
Clearly our Crossbowmen are simply donating their crossbows to the staff of the Town Center so *they* can shoot the enemy.
"it's not cheating if you don't get caught"
I still can't explain to myself why I am a fan of your pacifism series, but keep them coming
Man Genghis Khan will be hard, if not impossible
Probaly cuz he got you to the dome of the rock by peacefully following the teachings of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
I use it to help me
It’s the mix of humor (and the silly irony of figured like Genghis or Attila being pacifistic) and unconventional tactics. Anyone with practice can learn to defend, boom, and counterassault the AI. But learning to exploit the design elements of the campaign maps, utilize units for ways they were never intended (like his repeated use of heavy cavalry to divert enemy fire, more like Hussite Wagons to escort his siege and monks), exploiting AI (like his use of naval units to divert the enemy warships or straight up block transports), and the very specific conditions for victory/defeat.
It’s treated lightly, but each of these scenarios requires some careful thinking, and analysis of what the *real* victory condition is from a programming standpoint. Playing this as if it were a historical battle with more reasonable wind conditions is doomed to fail, hence really silly but effective techniques like bumrushing the hill in the last Joan of Arc scenario rather than defeating the English to actually capture the hill.
Spirit of The Law needs to see this awesome use of the saracen team bonus
Crusader coalition: We did it! The Saracen city has fallen!
TWest: YOU FOOL! YOU JUST ACTIVATED MY T R A P C A R D !
Funny enough this is what actually happen at real history
@@satriapratama3162 epic
As a wise starfish once said: why dont we take the city and push it somewhere else
lol
I would like to meet that starfish. Tell me good sir...where i can meet this amazing creature?
@@xed_i2070 he lives near a pineapple under the sea
"It's not cheating if we don't get caught"
Famous last words.
There is a hidden secret way to deal with Richard better... you send him 10k gold tribute then u private message and tell him that templars and the others are all under command of Barbarossa. watch him ally you.
why would he do this? everyone betrays Barbarossa. its in the rules.
It's not just that everyone betrays Barbarossa. In this hypothetical case, Richard actually HATED the Hohenstaufens. Henry the Lion was Richard's brother-in-law. When the Saxons' power grab for the Holy Roman Empire failed and when Barbarossa punished Henry, Richard swore revenge.
So yeah, Richard would jump on any chance to get back at Barbarossa.
i've never completed the lion n demon..ever...n this guy does it without kills-twice!! well done sir!!
i completed on easy and took me 3 hours, when there is a lot of enemies, u need to attack soon at list one of them, it makes a huge difference
Hahaha weaklings (my cobra engine intensifies)
@@zoiuduu Or type 'i r winner' ;)
I have win easily this mission, where i have just rushed the cyan (free ocean after), blue then the yellow. But i lost 1 hour for kill the gray and red. Do the achievement, ignore the objective.
@@zoiuduu Tbh, that's something I think the scenario designers fucked up. They often start you in super disadvantageous positions during those scenarios and often even say stuff like "don't attack they're too strong" or whatever (meaning they actively discourage you from doing the thing that wins games), and over half the tutorial campaign only tells you how to move soldiers, gather resources, go to the next age, and to train soldiers and take down a tower or whatever.
None of the campaigns teach you about build orders, rushing, harassing or anything even though that's how you win the Age of-games most easily.
Kushluk likes this series
Edit: The end was epic, I didn’t expect it.
If Kuchlug lives past his own funeral I'll be pretty impressed.
Just get villager to build palisade wall around him and then convert him then delete him. I'm more excited to see Latter 3 missions.
@@MrPathorn you can't convert heroes
@@xotl2780 kuchlug mean idiot in Javanesse
@@bosbanon3452 Ha. Sweet.
Kushluk, Kuchlug, Quqluq, I've heard it spelled a million different ways. Probably none of them are quite accurate. Neither the Naiman nor the tribes who would become the Mongols kept written languages.
"We'll rely on the Saracen team bonus..." *breaks out laughing*
"Fatslob the passages"
I fucking love that you gave The Lion and the Demon a go on DE. You could've taken the easy way out, but you didn't and it was the most scrappy and entertaining and twisty mission to date. Huge props!
T-West: *uses his troops to distract the enemy*
Me: "You can't sacrifice an entire division like that! Those soldiers love and defend our nation! How can you betray them?"
"I'm pacifist, I don't want to harm people!!"
*sacrifices 558 poor souls in the last mission alone*
Really enjoy these videos, very well cut and edited.
“There are many causes I would die for. There is not a single cause I would kill for.”
― Mahatma Gandhi
Damn the Lion and the Demon got to be your best one yet. Absolutely insane.
Man, I have vivid memories of the second Saladin mission moreso than any of the others thus far.
I have a distinct memory of coming home from middle school and playing that map for hours...
I was feeling cheated with the last level until I realized how much time was left. Those rams moving against Richard was glorious.
Idea: bait his onagers into team attacking the trebuchets
"The European murderer's shall DIE in this desert."
T-west: "Is that a challenge?"
8:50 Galleon casually floating through elevated terrain :D
me too saw that
That's Black Pearl
haters will say its a bug. I say the water around the holy land is pure as glass, enough that sand even in ship-deep water is visible.
"WALL THEM IN" top 10 most epic moments in anime
It was super smart xD
My childhood memory of Acre in Saladin 6 is three times as big as it really was, and I'm always surprised every time I see it
might be slower scrolling speed in hd edition lol
Dude: Saladin, where are you going with that great army?
Saladin: don't worry, I'm doing a pacifist run :3
I'm soo glad you also did the last scenario on DE and not only on AoK.
I would have still accepted it if you did it in AoK, because your video title only said AoE not DE
You ended creative assembly's whole career bro
Is this a joke I don't get or did you confuse Ensemble Studios and Creative Assembly?
@@ConquerorDash my brain farted
In the end you had more converted units than lost ones.
"Now it's the warmongers who will know true fear."
11:35 that's the ultimate pro-gamer move. I'm in awe.
more monks are killed in a single scenario of twest than in my entire childhood.
In the final mission, you can take out Jerusalems TC in with your starting ships alone. I did it by accident one time, and they resigned within the first 5 minutes of the game.
Yes indeed, they resign if your ships kill their TC and Villagers. Too bad I can't let them kill the Villagers, though.
I think even normal AI will rebuild the tc if it has enough res and a civ
Good luck trying to not kill Kuslak
Run away, run away!!
It's maybe possible, if he could lure him to die of his own mangonel shot or something like that
I think Khushluk should be an exception since he's a dastardly villain who doesn't deserve mercy
And Persian Shah
@@MeanGuy969 everyone deserves mercy. That's the way of pacifism!!
Me: As if Saladin can refuse killings.
T-West: (A "few" clever pauses and saves and monk dancing)
Me: (Subscribe)
5:17 nice description for baptism.
I like how half of the missions are explained in a minute or so, and then the second and 5th mission take a little bit more explaining so they are 2-3 minutes but it took 8 and a half minutes to explain the Tomfoolery of the last mission lol
WOW this series is a masterpiece! that last scenario was a rollercoaster of emotions
I'm loving this series, and the editing is just enough to keep the viewing experience enjoyable while not becoming overwhelming.
11:35 there is one trick I observed in the older versions of AoE2 (not sure if it still works on DE): when you place an storage facility next to a gaia-placed unit, villagers can actually harvest it for no resource associated. First time I saw this was in Barbarossa's last campaign in the original version of AoE2 (first release, when hero units were still active for monk conversion). The trick is simple: after a villager is done with chopping/picking a resource, there is a small chance of picking/chopping a gaia unit in the surroundings (cactae, rocks, tombstones, even rugs/carpets), just one hit and the gaia element is gone for 0 resource, and the villager goes to the next resource available. It also works with hunting, but only with eagles, who die after 2 hits and explode like cobra cars, but only happens when a eagle passes by a hunting area right after the animal is fully harvested, once again, the eagle just explodes for no resource. Last time I saw this was in the earlier versions of The Conquistadors expansion, in El Cid campaign, when a rock next to a stone quarry was harvested by a villager after the original stone was depleted. Quite weird bug being honest. Not sure if it is of any relevance nowadays for speedrunning, but it is something I observed looooong time ago, but I never found a way to trigger it with 100% accuracy. 😷👍
I thought u cannot even complete El-cid, but after saladin, that would be a piece of cake i think
You are an absolute madman. Trapping the enemy in the ruins of your own city was a stroke of genius.
Super SUPER Epic video. I LOVE It man
I love this series, keep it up!
Why do I have the feeling that a no-kill run will be harder for Genghis Khan's campaign ?
Well, if I am right, in the first mission you must kill 1 of your allies in order to win.
@@HeartBurstHD also : second mission you must kill Kushluk, fourth mission you assassinate the Shah... going around that would be tricky
For the first mission, maybe luring them to Ornlu ?
@@HeartBurstHD for 1st mission you can still convert them though, sadly you cannot exploit diplomacy anymore. So you need to protect your monk will do it
on the 1st mission after a long time you just win without doing anything iirc. idk if that is still there in de
dont forget the Huns, it seems a running theme to nomads
Holy shit, I thought the Last Mission would be Impossible for you
Over a hill a single condotiero surveys his camp and his men , seing their bonfires light the night sky ,he makes his mind , to go against the very principles of his profession , on this night he swears to never again take another man's life, to achieve his goals with cunning rather than brute force , to found a principality without bloodshed and becone a true renaissance prince , viva sforza!!
Disclaimer : no wolves were harmed in the beating of this campaign
Man this is legendary stuff! It took me around 3 hours to win this scenario on standard difficulty, this guy did it in half the time without killing any units
Man. Deleting the transports was surprisingly dark. Like, that's such a terrifying idea. Imagine you're trapped on a boat, packed into the hold with the other soldiers. Then, you hear the crew of the boat begin to pray in another religion. Then, before you can do anything, they scuttle the ship, with you and all the others trapped inside. It's like something out of a horror movie.
16:30 I laughed out loud at the wall in :D Amazing series.
You’re pacifist runs remind me of the ghost runs in the thief series, where players try to reach the objective without knocking out enemies. And I love it.
An impressive accomplishment on the final Saladin mission. That one's tough even without going for pacifism. Especially now that the island trick has been removed
Probably the easiest way to deal with the hero trebs is to wall them in somewhere away from your base. Their minimum range prevents them from being able to free themselves.
The AI was very aggressive in ramming them free when I tried that.
@@T-West Oh, wow, you are the biggest youtuber to reply to me, I love this series and your sense of humour.
Have you considered doing the StarWars Age of Empires campaigns? If I remember they seemed easy to exploit and sequence break.
@peterroe2993 Never played the SWGB campaigns before, always wanted to try them out.
It's like Saladin employee lots of preachers, but the enemy choose to die rather than join Saladin's Faith. Seem accurate.
Whoah chill
I love how that when you said the speech about Saladin's journey, it matches with the Saracen Main theme
I subscribed today, what an amazing idea for a series, I'm absolutely loving this!! Good luck with the rest, can't wait to see more
I'm so glad you played both strategies for the last scenario it was really fun to watch
Some may still argue that winning campaign missions by 'victory condition' workarounds etc is technically taking advantage of the AI or whatever. But after watching him beat The Lion and the Demon fair and square, seeing the Crusaders learn of peaceful ways (by force), one must arrive at the conclusion that this person may be classified as an absolute madlad.
Cool video bro, 10:19 that phrase make me have nightmares
You did a GREAT job keeping the video exciting. Well done :)
Congratulations on achiving such an amazing feat! That trap at the end was sublime!!! I hope you will continue this series
So much hard work to do just to keep peace ☮️ Incredible 👏
"For 300 years we were holed inside the walls"
Me: sounds like attack on titan all over again
Really hope you keep trying with each campaign and make it a whole series and carve out your slice of AOE2 history :)
keep it up!
The commentary alone on this is gold, let alone the content!
Wonderful... especially that storyline of Saracens where they wall off themselves for a 300 years and victory is theirs😂 loved it 👌🏻👌🏻
Nice, last video I commented, that you could do saladin and now there it is! Awesome!
I don't know if you do anything else on this channel... I just watch this series and I really like it!
Day god knows of quarantine: I'm marathonning these for some reason and keep getting hearts. Positive reinforcement
So I just randomly discovered these videos, and holy wow! These are really well put together given your channel size. Maybe I'm a little confused about that, but regardless, this is top notch material and I'm really impressed. Keep up the excellent work!
you are not just a skilled and intelligent player
you are also a nice movie director and a prefect comedy actor
TWEST is best, im sure
Love the Tyrese Galleon just casually crossing that peninsula at 8:50
Wow man.
Always thought the last scenario was impossible with pacifism.
You're an ace!
Keep it up!
Man I love videos like these. Can't believe I found it only just now.
Thanks! Glad you enjoy them.
Great video as always!
Man I am truly amazed by this series and I really like your voice, it is quite soothing. I hope you could do more voices videos, you are awesome!
Do the forgotten , I rewatched these ones countless times and they are still entertainig. Something new would be apreciated by everybody:)
Hmm... T-West makes a video referencing Fatslob and the Saracen team bonus on the same day that SoTL releases a new video on the cost of walling... I feel a conspiracy afoot
Man, you are f...ing crazy... the Lion and the Demon the way you did it IS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!
Haha, when I tried the final Saladin mission, I didn't know how to delete houses and I didn't know about the secret island so I didn't even try it.
That is some dedication man, well done.
Awesome series, please keep it up :)
you are becoming my favourite aoe channel
keep up with the great work
excelent series.thank you for the videos =D
love the torch passing within joanna, barbarossa and now saladin. dont think that aztecs, mongols or huns will cope with the ways of pacifism. Maybe Rodrigo Dias de Vivar, El Cid, listened to this stories and got inspired. who knows. even attila listened to the pope...
Amazing, just amazing, I thought the last one was imposible. Congrats!
Losing Acre at the last scenario while building the wonder at the island makes it more historically accurate lul.
@16:30 sykw!!! nobody expects the saracen inquisition
You are so good, wtf, and your videos are so clean!
Monks& Rams.
Can't wait for their next album to drop.
You are an absolute genius man. I love your content.
You're an absolute madman.
And I love it.
Damn nice channel with nice content, subscribed! Hoping to see ALL campaign pacifism mode.
These vids are trailers
Real challenge is getting gold in every challenge in art of war....
And 0 kills.....
Waiting for it
Crusader: *You must kill everyone to take Jerusalem*
T-West: *Hold my Pacifism*
Dude that Longbow you converted almost killed the Frank Hand Cannon at 15:00 :D
A Freakish delight Especially The lion and the demon Superb effort
What an absolute, legendary madman!
The ultimate juggler of Saracen's team bonus, Spirit of The Law! needs to see this!
I can't believe you did the last one, immense
that Galleon at 8:49 cruising on land up and down lol
good job on that last mission, i struggle with it even playing it normaly. WP :)