Rise of Nations: Roman Castle in Age I

Sounded innocuous and impossible to me too. But get this, it CAN be done, and it works well in border push strategy.

If you are Romans in Rise of Nations, then do give this tip a try to put your opponent on the backfoot. No one wants to attack a well defended outpost, even if the outpost is right next to your borders especially because its being guarded by a castle, and god knows how many units are garrisoned in there! Add to the additional territory push that Roman castles have, and you are literally taking away the opponents lands!

The key to this tactic is getting early ruins.

Remember, that Romans have Mil 1 researched at the start. A castle costs 281 wood.

Here’s what you do –

1. Go Sci 1
2. Do NOT build farms, they consume wood.
3. Instead fill up on lumber by all the villagers you create
4. Use the additional villies and scout to capture ruins
5. Start building 4 outposts (do not complete the building, just start the building so you consume the wood that you are getting via ruins, so now you keep getting wood via ruins). The key is to keep your wood lower than the rest of the resources without really using up wood.
6. Once you have 4 outposts queued. Now start building the farms, and booming. Target Civ 1
7. Once you have Civ 1, go near your opponents border and plonk your second city there.
8. Cancel the outpost building (all 4 of them). This should give your wood back to you!
9. Now start building the castle!

Now you have a well defended outpost as your opponents next door neighbor. Start booming, build a barracks, and garrison some units in there.

And remember to PUSH!