GOOD DAY and HAPPY SEPTEMBER, everyone!
This month’s update continues the trend of introducing a smaller (though nonetheless significant) list of tweaks, fixes, and changes to Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition. While brand-new features and additions are subjected to rigorous testing in preparation for the quarterly update, this month’s release still brings its own list of fixes and features to the game, as well as a new event with exclusive rewards to earn, and even a new challenge scenario for you to show off your skills to your friends!
Here’s the short (tl;dr) list of changes:
- Unlock new profile icons, mods, and an exclusive cheat code during the Teutons Event!
- Hold out against waves of enemies in the Barbarossa Brawl challenge scenario!
- Implemented several pathfinding improvements for Villagers.
- Gates will no longer permanently lock in the “open” position.
- Adjustments to the Arabia, Bog Islands, Fortress, Megarandom, Scandinavia, and Socotra maps.
The full, detailed list can be found below: give it a read, experiment with things in the game, and then let us know what you think about the September Update! We’re always perusing our forums for the latest discussions and chatting with you over in the game channels on Discord, so keep all the amazing feedback and inspiration coming our way!
That’s it for this month! We hope you enjoy everything and look forward to seeing you on the battlefield!
—The Age of Empires Team
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Please note that custom mods may not be compatible with the latest game update. If you are experiencing issues launching or playing the game after downloading the new build, try disabling your installed mods before trying again.
Still having trouble? Visit our support site!
BUILD SPOTLIGHT
While there are plenty of notable fixes and features to which to look forward in today’s build, here are some of the big highlights coming with this month’s update:
The Teutons Event
September 22 – October 6
This month, we’re celebrating the Teutons with a new CELEBRATION, new REWARDS, a never-before-seen CHEAT CODE, and an all-new CHALLENGE SCENARIO to test your Age of Empires II skills. We’ve jam-packed it with a ton of Oktoberfest spirit, so get in there and join us for Teu-TONS of fun!
- Unlock three new Profile Icons!
- Unlock a new Teutonic Knight statue as the jewel of your Town Center!
- Discover a new cheat code: “Put on your capes”
- Bury your enemy in Pretzel Projectiles with a new Onager mod!
- Test your survival skills in the new Barbarossa Brawl scenario!
New Rewards!
Starting TODAY through OCTOBER 6, complete in-game tasks to unlock a horde of themed goodies:
| DAY ~ | 🎯 Sign into Xbox Live. 🏆 Unlocks the Teutonic Knight in Lederhosen profile icon. 💾 *Required* if you want to save any rewards unlocked during the event! |
Each of the following challenges must be unlocked in order and on separate days:
| DAY 1 | 🔒 Survive the Teuton Challenge for 10 minutes 🏆 Unlocks the Teutonic Knight Statue Town Center mod. |
| DAY 2 | 🔒 Train 20 Teutonic Knights in Standard or Multiplayer games 🏆 Unlocks the Villager in Dirndl profile icon. |
| DAY 3 | 🔒 Win a Standard or Multiplayer game while playing as the Teutons 🏆 Unlocks the “Put on your capes” cheat code (single player only), which replaces all infantry units with Elite Teutonic Knights. |
| DAY 4 | 🔒 Survive the Teuton Challenge for 20 minutes 🏆 Unlocks the Siege Tower filled with Teutonic Knights profile icon. |
| DAY 5 | 🔒 Capture a relic in the Teuton Challenge 🏆 Unlocks the Onager Pretzel Projectiles mod. |
Keep it Forever!
Remember: if you sign in to Xbox Live at any point during the event, you’ll get to keep all of the mods and profile icons you’ve unlocked! Sign in, earn your rewards, and enjoy the Summer Celebration Event!
—The Age of Empires Team
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Event F.A.Q.
NEW! Barbarossa Brawl (Challenge Scenario)
Come, one and all, to test your skills in the BARBAROSSA BRAWL!
- Build up your defenses and prepare for an intense siege!
- Defend your Town Center against the enemy onslaught for as long as you can.
- No walls! You must rely on Towers, Castles and the might of your army.
- Maximize your score! Every second counts; can you survive for 30 minutes? 1 hour? Longer?
This special holdout scenario challenges you with increasingly more dangerous opponents in an endless siege of your Town Center. The longer you can hold out, the more points you’ll earn towards a spot on the leaderboard of your friends!
While the Barbarossa Brawl replaces the Mongol Raiders scenario, don’t worry; we’re working on a home for all the scenarios and leaderboards in the future!
The Enhanced Logging Build
The stability of the game is of paramount importance, which is why the team has created a new tool to use if you’re experiencing regular crashes and disconnects in your games. The “Enhanced Logging Build” is a Steam Beta branch of the game that can be used to generate advanced networking logs while still playing with everyone on the main game branch. While this does come at a cost of your game’s performance, it’s immensely helpful to generate logs if you know you are prone to connection issues.
Here’s how you can help!
Here’s how to access the special branch:
- Launch Steam.
- Right click Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition in your library and select Properties…
- Select the BETAS tab.
- Enter the following beta access code: 4YH2SkfG7CK5yanvrXE9qj8b
- Click CHECK CODE
- To utilize the build, select the enhanced_logging branch from the drop-down list. Your game will download a very small update (~35 MB).
Note that the beta access code will be changed periodically to reset the branch or add additional logging to identify networking issues.
As always, we want to send a huge thanks to everyone putting in the time to report, track, and help fix these issues! So here it is: THANK YOU!!! ♥
NEW! Age of Empires Support Site
As we continue to support the growth of the Age franchise, we’ve opened an official Age of Empires support hub for all of your troubleshooting needs. With an ever-growing knowledgebase of articles and solutions—as well as a dedicated support team ready to answer your questions—we’re here to help you download, run, or play your favorite Definitive Edition games!
You can also read more about the new resource in our recent blog post!
GAME
Stability & Performance
- Implemented additional safeguards to defend against unsanctioned cheating.
- Fixed an issue where queuing for consecutive matches with the same party could result in the loss of connection to multiplayer services.
- Fixed a rare desync caused when players used “layering mode” in the Scenario Editor before joining a multiplayer game.
GAMEPLAY
General
- Fixed a rare issue where Gates could be permanently (unintentionally) locked in the “open” position.
MAP BALANCE
General
- Increased the average distance between Forage Bushes and players’ starting Town Center from 8 to 10 squares.
Maps
- Arabia: Reduced the number of starting forests to 3 wooded areas per player, and increased their distance from the starting Town Center.
- Arabia: Added elevated terrain around players’ bases.
- Arabia: Reduced the size of the oases and the length of cliffs that spawn throughout the map. (Yes, “oases” is the plural of “oasis.”)
- Bog Islands: Players now start with five extra Fishing Ships on Empire Wars—thus restoring the starting economic population to the standard 27 units.
- Fortress: Removed unnecessary resource and animal spawns from the Death Match and Infinite Resource match types.
- Fortress: Now, 7 extra Villagers will appear on all game modes, not just Regicide.
- Megarandom: Fixed a particular map generation which denied some players of their starting forests
- Scandinavia: Players now start with a Mill and five extra Villagers next to their deer on Empire Wars—thus restoring the starting economic population to the standard 27 units.
- Socotra: Removed unnecessary resource spawns from the Infinite Resources match type.
- Socotra: Starting resources are now generated farther from players’ Town Centers.
AI
Pathfinding
- Fixed an issue where Villagers could endlessly bounce off each other in certain circumstances.
- Fixed a rare issue where Villagers could get stuck when navigating to resource drop sites.
LOCALIZATION
- Fixed several Historical Battles where the incorrect audio lines would play when set to Castilian Spanish.
ONGOING INVESTIGATION
As always, we are continuing to track issues reported by the community for future updates. Here is a brief update from our Production team regarding some of what is still in the works:
- Team Game Connection Issues: We are well aware of disconnects occurring during Team Games and are aggressively investigating this issue. We also need your help! If you’re experiencing (a) a disconnect during TG gameplay, (b) a disconnect during matchmaking or on the loading screen, or (c) crashing on the matchmakng screen, please read the section above regarding the Enhanced Logging Build and follow the instructions. This will generate advanced logs that you can share to help us better understand why you’re experiencing these problems.
For other known issues, please visit this page to see what’s being tracked!
DISCLAIMER
Please note that this list is subject to change, and should not be considered a comprehensive list of all the known issues we’re tracking. The above is to inform you of the team’s current priorities, which will change as other issues arise or take precedence.
For the latest updates and announcements, please visit our social channels.