The BEST 1v1 Arabia Strategies | AoE2 Tierlist

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Edits by / @k1aoe

[@730sano]

The perfect Ao2 video finally here !

[@zeekbt_dores]

I'm actually really surprised you didn't mention the strat I always lose to: whatever my opponent happens to choose

[@HeraAgeofEmpires2]

Thats an S tier strat

[@SuperUux]

@@HeraAgeofEmpires2 you should record a build for that one!

[@wikeradd380]

Sometimes we just have to accept the fact that we cant be alway winning and sometimes our opponent is just better at being a fvcking cheater

[@pointteaboy7113]

Please do this tierlist every now and then. The meta is constantly changing and it's interesting both from a players point of view (to get updated on how good a given strat currently is), and from a historical point of view, to see how some patch changes the meta. Like one of your video says, nowadays people are getting feudal faster than before. Legacy 21pop scout rush or 22pop double range archer rush seem to be completely outdated because they are too slow.

[@ihmpall]

+1 I want a mining camp positions tier list

[@veronica9634]

i absolutely agree, i would love to be able to go back and see how the meta changed.

[@pointteaboy7113]

Hera has just done a 14 pop feudal vs capoch as mongols on scandinavia, with smooth follow up. Mind blowing.

[@BoxerSaint_]

I haven't even finished the video and I'm already sharing it. This is content I would pay for, but super pumped its free. Keep it coming, Champ.

[@wt891]

Great video Hera, I can’t wait to have these strategies in mind when you make your civ tier lists!

[@Ruichen8104]

Thank you so much for every detailed tutorials. Hera you are the best!

[@TheSlackOne]

Thanks, Hera, I really appreciate all the technicism in your videos. Please, keep it up :)

[@edwardblom2661]

Damn good video theme, again. I feel like many of these strategies have switched places during the last two year. If that’s not a healthy meta, I dunno what is.

[@derikaem8021]

thank you for this list. i recently started playing random opening strategy out of a list of 5, comprising 1.drush 2.MAA 3.scouts 4.archers 5.other (towers,trash,flush,fc) however, i felt like i need a larger list, so your video is the perfect content for me now

[@pointteaboy7113]

Can you include more situational strategies. 3 militia drush. Drush into maa (only harrass and keep miltia alive and upgrade them).18p straight tower rush. Maa tower rush. Good old spear skirm rush. Drush FC into xbow. (it's suprising it's not even in the tierlist). Drush FC into UU.

[@TheCotonBalboa]

Very interesting, thank you Hera

[@Markeeper23]

Simply the best, most committed AoE2 content! In terms of gameplay even better than the well prepared content from “Spirit of the Law”. Keep up this great work. Love it to watch your content and games, streaming!

[@Iindstrom]

this is amazing, more of this please!

[@largestar]

It turns out Hera went for all scount rush in the final except the very last game. This video is a jabait and part of his strat of winning KOTD

[@Tommy1nnovates]

14 strats :) thnkyou for the notion of the tower strat. Its my favorite, to avoid range units and be able to use infantry. thnks man

[@youcanthandlethetruth5433]

Dude out here spitting gems with a headset he's not listening to anything on lmaooo 10/10 content

[@synergygaming65]

Scouts and archers D tier when it used to be the bread and butter of all Arabia games 10 years ago. Meta changes have transformed the early game into a race for castle.

[@whossname4399]

not true at the top level. Normally at the top level there's extended archer/skirm play before going up to castle

[@GallowayJesse]

In high level level games early feudal aggression from both sides results in prolonged feudal age At lower levels it always has been a race to castle

[@MathewCowdery]

I have been stubbornly doing this strat for months now even though I've noticed some of the problems with it. I didn't realize it was considered a bad strat at the top level though, I just thought I needed to practice and tweak it some. However, the more I experiment with it the more I realize that the switch to archers right after scouts is just too costly and there is a big window where you are really vulnerable if you're opponent commits to building army and then counterattacks once he's got enough spears to defend from your early scouts. This is especially true with someone going for archers. You just can't defend against his counterattack unless you make skirms.

[@ricardocunha5590]

Thanks a lot for sharing 🤲✌️

[@opale-opale]

Thank you!

[@hansoskar1911]

from a game theory perspective you should pre-mill drush some percentage of the time bc it forces your opponent to scout you early and not greedy push deers from another galaxy. Scouts->Archers is not a planned strat but more an adaptation into full feudal. Wall-> FC feels like the natual counter to pure Archers since its slow out of the gate and doesnt do a lot when not counter the opposing military purely by existing.

[@CragHack]

Underrated comment.

[@ChaosEIC]

The game theory perspective shatters when everybody can just quickwall your pre mill drush.

[@DarkPrinceNeo]

If you're good you can lure two deer and still scout the pre-mill drush in time, or you could just blindly open with archers

[@philahn9846]

great tier list because its actualy distributed - not like those tier lists where EVERYTHING is S/A tier

[@whossname4399]

Sometimes it makes sense to put everything in B tier if all options are fairly equal. It felt like a bit of a stretch to include the FC strats in this list because I kind of doubt we will see them in KotD. He might have done that just to flesh out the tier list because he has gotten complaints like this before.

[@philahn9846]

@@whossname4399 it was well distributed even without the FC strats

[@user-kf7qg3hz2v]

A tier list does not necessarily have to be distributed.

[@Hansmaffai]

Played a lot of malay recently with the french opening into archers/crossbows. The +1armor on the militia makes them insanly strong against vills and even quite durable against early archers without fletching. In castle age i add some LS to my xbow unless my opponent has more archers than i do. The free armor makes the addition cheaper than knights and even just a few put immense pressure on my enemy, busting down walls, killing skirms, sniping siege and even enemy monks don't work.

[@jankelar6714]

I do archers into a couple scouts as my go to feudal strat (note that im 1100 elo) because I like how it sets me up for a knight follow up in castle. My strengths are early game - 3 archer rush with fletching, then get scouts to counter the usual panic skirms. Then in castle I trade my army asap with my knight transition and try to boom like a mad man. My other strength is early imp, where I usually try to go for a castle on a hill and win the treb war.

[@MrJubbyjubjub]

Nice tips man. Also when are you releasing your new build order list? Was going to be some point soon right

[@mitch7918]

Watching this after NAC 5 and the regrouping/pathing patch is funny. "S-tier" strat considered abandoned/dangerous because of devs.

[@Leon.Stanic]

Ooh this is a good video.

[@SurvivalistAoE]

Thanks Hera

[@HeraAgeofEmpires2]

np my bro!

[@noobling8313]

Nice mind games! I’m now expecting you to go trush into smush every game.

[@estebanmoretti3323]

hera you legend!!!

[@estebanmoretti3323]

Gerardo leyenda!!

[@slimjong-un5743]

Big D play sharing your fave strats before a huge tourny

[@oscarnaughton9892]

this is great

[@Edlay_]

Babe wake up, new Hera tier-list video

[@barrybai5123]

There are at least three more strategies that people have seen: TC douche, and Hoang push, dark age laming+ vill fight. But these are very specific to certain civilizations

[@MrBubs-yu4wm]

Missed opportunity to call strat #2 the “French Press” ☕️

[@shadowsun4055]

I see what you doing Hera... As the next tournament approaches you publish a video with an inverted tier list trying to dissuade your opponents when it comes to the most likely strategy you're going to apply... very smart, very smart...

[@HeraAgeofEmpires2]

not that deep, i just gave away everything I know because I value quality content over surprising my opponents

[@afz902k]

Probably all pros know how strong archers are, and will still die to the strat because it's that stronk

[@renaryugu4205]

Is the French drush good with meso civs as well or not?

[@daandevos122]

I feel as though there's a couple of strats missing, like trushes (M@A->Trush, or straight trush), fc->xbow, spearskirm forwards (as dragonstar often does) and so forth. At least during previous editions of KOTD, I remember seeing these openings (like Vinch or Yo, who trushed relatively often). edit: Ok, I wrote the message in the middle of the video, trushes were mentioned in the end...

[@damianvergaradominguez8484]

i miss the trush, also I like maa into skirms to counter archer play

[@Megabomberman87]

Great to see so many viable strategies without getting into niche stuff like donjon/pike, eagle etc. So much better than the comic all in feudal trash wars of days gone by.

[@lucianobuono3228]

Does anybody have a build order for the two militia drush? Is it pre-mill?

[@Madoxbeatbox]

how do you see scouts > knights > long swords, as an option if your opponent goes fully halberdier? I usually go scouts into knights and do skirms against archer civs, if they add pikes early, but skirms die too easy against cav civs and just also go knights and halberdier feels awkward sometimes, especially if my opponent is massing halberdier so its impossible to match.

[@Madoxbeatbox]

before I would add scorpions but I feel like they are just too slow and also die too easy if my opponent adds cav.

[@markvanderwerf8592]

Given the popularity of archers is 1 range skirm an option too? For example you play a cavalry civ and are pretty sure your opponent will play archers. If you go scouts you might feel you do minimal damage and will be pushed into skirms and skirms upgrades anyway. Isnt it an option to open defensive skirms (1 range but don't get gold). You can make 1 archer to push off a drush if necessary but you basically go straight skirms to counter archers and delay gold intake/blacksmith upgrades as much as possible to get your farm eco up faster. For example with Bulgarians, open up 2-3 militia/MAA pressure. Then 1 range to counter their inevitable archers but play it passive (reactively get blacksmith upgrades when necessary). Just get castle ASAP playing with minimal amount of skirms or pressure a bit with Maa+skirm. The idea being to delay gold mining so you can get horse collar and farms faster knowing you want to go into skirms+knights later anyway.

[@imsoxs]

pre-mill drush: 2:58 2-militia drush: 4:53 maa > archers: 7:31 maa > scouts: 10:17 archers > xbow: 11:50 full scouts: 15:29 scouts > archers: 17:31 scouts > knights: 19:07 scouts > skirms: 20:05 walls > boom: 22:18 fc > uu: 24:21 fc > siege/monks: 25:25 longswords: 26:44

[@ussgordoncaptain]

Hey can you explain when you should do loom before feudal vs Loom after feudal? I currently always do loom before feudal just because I'm bad but I see you hitting feudal w/19 vills and no loom which seems better than my 18 vills w/loom age up but sometimes you loom before feudal. I think the archer paths (scouts, Xbows, knights) should have been included separately like you did for scouts.

[@Mattroid99]

My guess is that Loom before feudal is good vs faster paced civs (So you don't get bad surprises), while Loom after feudal is when you need to be as fast as possible and get that initial tempo going

[@momobo5889]

Hearttt Practice!

[@Katalmach]

When you mention Archers > XBows, does this include 2 range play? If no, then where does 2 range fit?

[@estebanmoretti3323]

hera, i didnt finish my video yet. maybe you talk about it and i haven't got there yet. what about pikes + skirms or MAA+skirms?

[@ottomann4846]

Against straight archers you can make 2-3 scouts, fully wall your base and then go castle age no?

[@gersondacunha4494]

It takes balls to make a video like this right before an event like kod, says much about you. Good luck in there

[@PrasenjeetKumarAuthor]

Fantastic video! You forgot scouts into cav archers strategy? Or is that not so common?

[@isaacberger2561]

God bless… This? This is a man for the people. 🙏

[@danielbentley7117]

I feel like straight archers is really difficult to pull of vs. more aggressive strats like man at arms and scouts unless your micro is top Level

[@wt891]

I wish archers weren’t so strong. As you went over it’s just too strong to open archers and just mix in a couple of spears or scouts as needed. I think scouts strategies need a little bit of a buff and infantry still needs another buff

[@terrab1ter4]

Great list, very informative Where would you put feudal age eagles? Is that a viable strat for meso civs or is it too expensive/slow/weak?

[@ashleythomas1988]

I do it all the time in ew and win when against people with even 200 rm elo more than me

[@CragHack]

​@@ashleythomas1988 Really? I do it in EW and lose to people 200 ELO below me! 😂

[@giuliomasiero4686]

A few times I have encountered spear+skirms, especially from byzantine opponents. Maybe it's ridiculous at high elo but on my way to 1400 I have died more times than I care to admit to it. Forces me to go into maa which throws me off.

[@olivertate4983]

Hi Hera, thanks for an interesting video. For the Meso civs, where does full eagle or eagle/spear fit into this list? (Is it just garbage? :D)

[@teddyhaines6613]

Eagle scouts have a 60 second training time in feudal age, which makes a full eagle play in feudal pretty much infeasible.

[@luciangrand1943]

Hey Hera, just wondering where the ‘animal scouts’ (Eagles and Camels) would go. Full into either is uncommon or rare for heavy Feudal, but jw.

[@HeraAgeofEmpires2]

eagles are a great addition to archer opening, and camels are good addition to scout opening, but on their own they are bad till castle age

[@engandreas86]

Have watch alot of your videoes and this video made me sub - This is great free content! (I dont sub alot XD)

[@MonikKhare]

What about drush > fc and one archery range vs two?

[@etc0898]

Where is the classic normal drush after the mill. I am out of the game for some time so is the strat not common anymore?

[@dustyacer]

huh interesting, was just talking to morley games asking if he'd update his build orders (one of which was the straight archers). And he said no one goes straight archers anymore , which i did find kinda weird. Nice to see its still good!

[@HeraAgeofEmpires2]

morley isnt a pro, always take those opinions with a grain of salt

[@dustyacer]

@@HeraAgeofEmpires2 ahh actually turns out i misunderstood him, he says 2 range archers is non existance but literally just released a 1 range build order.

[@DarkPrinceNeo]

@@dustyacer He probably meant two range which is better for 2v2, while for 1v1 people go one range blacksmith

[@codymarcusen5704]

I would love to know anyone's thoughts on 2-Range Archers versus 1-Range Archers. Hera specifically mentions 1-Range in this video, but I've always done 2-Range. Primarily thinking about 1v1. If 1-Range is the new meta then why is it better than 2-Range?

[@DarkPrinceNeo]

@@codymarcusen5704 1 range has been meta for 1v1 for a long time. If you go two ranges, then the other player just goes 1 archery range skirmishers to hard counter. In 2v2 you need two ranges. If the other player goes skirmishers they get rolled by your cavalry ally.

[@TheRLification]

If you go MAA wouldn't following it up with scouts be good to deal with the archers that will counter the man at arms? I normally go scouts and it works well enough but was thinking maa would be good to hit earlier and because it's harder to counter with spears

[@whossname4399]

A major issue that Hera missed is that this strat is very food heavy at a stage in the game when food is fairly limited.

[@HeraAgeofEmpires2]

archers do really well against scouts if he adds 1-2 spears. So going scouts to counter them doesnt make sense, usually skirms + scouts can beat arch, but not just scouts

[@vojtechvanek1686]

Archers into scouts are also good because they take all the different resources so you can balance your economy better sd hoc

[@jonathanramos6148]

I would like to see favorite opening strat per civ. Like like for franks their best strat is 19 pop scouts

[@spinyslasher6586]

What about Drush->Archers-> Longswords? Or is that too long to be considered an opening?

[@markvanderwerf8592]

If straight archers is so good is there even much point in scouting early? All the early push strats (tower rush, drush, maa) are countered by fast archer it seems. Pushing deer seems to gain much more value then than scouting opponent? To really know what they are doing you want to scout them at the 9 minute mark anyway, earlier might not have much use. Deer pushing also keeps the scout close to home for defense and potentially punishing an opponents scout if you go up earlier.

[@eLurkr]

I never considered how mills on hills are more susceptible to attack

[@zockertwins]

Anyone know a place to get nice and up to date infos like this for 2v2? I feel like Hera focuses more on 1v1 and occasionally 4v4 (which is totally fair of course!).

[@danielbentley7117]

Play 1v1, it will improve your team game skill

[@jprp12]

Hi hera! Im a bulgarian player and I was interesting to know if there is a good build for them to go into longswords? Until now i have been using your bulgarian 3 men at arms rush build but its 3 years old now and I wanted to know if it is still viable and how it should be followed for going longswords. Also, good luck with the tournament!

[@zeynelaoe]

U can see a video from hera maa bulgarisns

[@kerwynpk]

Bro the subtitles are too funny

[@nicolas-7549]

I predict Hera going FC > Unique units all along King of the desert Tournament

[@CoffeeAndBusiness]

I’m 30 years old and just starting learning aoe over the past 2-3 years. I’m only 1030 elo man. Idk if I’ll go higher. I actually got tilted and quit playing ranked, so I have no clue what my elo is now.

[@slimjong-un5743]

Full Skirm opening = GOD TIER

[@ordinaryrat]

What if you start off with scouts and then transition when you see what your opponent is making?

[@HeraAgeofEmpires2]

thats usually a good idea. So for example ill go scouts, if i see my opponent on archers ill go skirms, if not ill prolly aim for knights

[@afz902k]

Why no eagle strats mentioned?

[@iwersonsch5131]

Survivalist proposed raising the Palisade pierce armor from 5 to 6 so that xbow are 2x weaker vs. walls. What's your take on that?

[@redacted_redacted_redacted]

He should have gone over the Persian Douche. It just feels like throwing a hand grenade into your opponent's start.

[@user-jy6vr9sz8b]

we can do pre-lumber drush with every civ (maybe D-tier)

[@codymarcusen5704]

I would love to know anyone's thoughts on 2-Range Archers versus 1-Range Archers. Hera specifically mentions 1-Range in this video, but I've always done 2-Range. Primarily thinking about 1v1. If 1-Range is the new meta then why is it better than 2-Range?

[@Mattroid99]

Because 2 range is very all in as far as I know, you cannot back up a followup as you are going to be very tight in resources It works in team games because the pocket will do the natural followup to counter skirms anyways (Scouts), but in 1v1 is a big risk and you won't be able to pivot into a counter plan, and if it doesn't work you can be in serious trouble

[@codymarcusen5704]

@@Mattroid99 Ah, that makes sense. Appreciate the insight!

[@Lexoka]

Hera: "I highly encourage everyone to give these qualifiers a shot." Me: "Bro, I can't even beat the AI."

[@afz902k]

Any of the strats in the video executed well enough can beat extreme AI in a 1v1, so just practice any build order and you'll be fine friend :)

[@Lexoka]

@@afz902k Thanks! I'm sure I'll get there eventually, but I don't have much time to practice, these days. And I'm pretty sure I'd still be very far from the level required to qualify, hehe :)

[@afz902k]

@@Lexoka oh yeah but you'll definitely be beating the AI consistently on a high enough difficulty level, mad props!

[@Lexoka]

@@afz902k I hope so, thanks! I'm not there yet, though.

[@Blogcovay]

So, the Age of Archers is booming, I guess

[@abdullahjanjua7337]

Hera what about tower rush I know it’s not meta anymore but I can seriously see players like yo tatoh vinch and even Viper going for it and even winning games with it so it is a real start

[@abdullahjanjua7337]

Hera I did watch the whole video but just simply commented before I finished 😅😅😅

[@sunepedersen8537]

what about team games?

[@zaphuploads]

Maybe Romans will be a good civ for Longswords BO?

[@lol-zm5gj]

why no drush fc > uu???? its the best when you play a civ like spanish.

[@anilkarakaya9343]

As I said years ago. You are becoming more and more handsome. Splitting some truth to just boost your mood dear

[@botond3141]

What about all in eagle? I don't see it often so shouldn't rank higer than C, only 3 civ can go for eagles, but I'm honestly curios about it, about others oppinion. Was a great video, loved it.

[@timloose748]

The biggest problem is the low training time for eagles in feudal age. If they changed that eagles probably would be used in feudal more often

[@jennystrandqvist1568]

Drush into FC kind of missing. Know wouldn't rank very high but at least it focus on annoy/control opponent while the two featured are damage focused.

[@HeraAgeofEmpires2]

not a good strat, F tier, almost unplayable now

[@tomyrobinson3196]

The developers need to buff man at arms against quick walling

[@jokoska]

That would fundamentally change the early game since quick walling is the only defence against surprise MAA. Maybe they could try it to shake things up someday. It would be a sweet team bonus, something like infantry+3 attack against unbuilt structures.

[@bobdole6768]

Crazy how much the game has changed, if I remember right 10 or 15 years ago the meta was basically mostly trash in feudal age like skirms and spears.

[@shadowsun4055]

wait, why mma and skirms are not on the list?

[@kbrink21]

Plot twist: Hera is lying about the best strats to mislead his opponents

[@ottomann4846]

How is MaA + trush not here? As in MaA + a single tower on their berries. I feel like this really wrecks scouts and all FC builds. Ah, you end up talking about it at the end.

[@nl_161]

At around 1000 elo pre-mill drush is still strong, esp. with new goth

[@praevasc4299]

At around 1000 elo one can die even to a 5 militia drush into man at arms if caught by surprise...

[@nl_161]

to be fair at around 1000 elo one can also throw with a pre mill drush, when they run straigjt under the tc

[@jonathanramos6148]

I dont even know what my opening or strat is lol. I go 25 pop 3 militia drush to delay scouts an wall up fast.but dont fc. My castle time is around min 20, but if my opponent is fc and lets me go up fast ill castle at min 18. But can hit castle as late as min 26 with a lot of pressure

[@bingbongbingbongbingbongbi4384]

Great vid but what about 3 tc boom into gg?

[@AS.47]

"What about tower rush?"

[@niks2584yt]

no eagle civ strats? :(

[@crx122]

So Hera, you don't feel tower rushes are viable in top play? I have seen successful tower rushes done at top level, where the opponent wasn't expecting it, or a delayed tower rush when they see their opponent is being greedy, and they have been pulled off successfully. I understand it is situational, I just thought it could be a viable option, and it isn't predictable in any way IMO. People are luring deer more than ever, and scouting way later, giving you many opportunities to sneak vills out. Now this is an 1800 level ELO asking someone who is arguably #1 in the world about this, so I may be completely misinformed. I'd really like to get your input on this though, thanks.

[@ruffymaru]

I don't get it. Why straight archers are good against trushes? I thought archers die to tower fire.