Age of Empires III: The War Chiefs - Gameplay Changes

Gameplay Changes

There are no major changes to the mechanics to Age of Empires 3 - players are still expected to gather resources, build armies and send them to attack opponents. Instead, there are a number of new concepts introduced, whilst existing concepts have been expanded. On some maps, Copper and tin mines have been added, but these generally do not produce as much coin as the gold and silver mines. Sometimes the copper mines can produce 2000 coin, the same as silver, whereas gold mines produce 5000 coin.

Home City shipments have been slightly reworked. Decks can now go over 20 cards by allowing one extra card for every ten levels of the Home City currently in use, up to a maximum of 25. There are new cards and a new Level 40 Home City tier of cards are available for all civilizations.

While the Aztecs have a home city, the Iroquois and Sioux have five members of the Tribal Council: the Chief, the War Leader, the Shaman, the Wise Woman, and the Messenger. They all offer different units, supports, and improvements. The tribal council is present in the game when a native civilization advances in age (replacing the politician system of the European civilizations), the player can select to promote a candidate to the Tribal Council and this confers a bonus on the player. The candidates offer higher bonuses at later ages. Typically the type of bonus remains the same (extra units, bonus resources) and new candidates become available at higher home city levels.