Top Tips for Defensive Play - Age of Mythology

Age of Mythology Retold (Xbox): Defense, Towers, and Walls

This is an Xbox-focused beginner guide I put together for Age of Mythology: Retold on how I think about defense—towers, walls, and using the map and buildings so I’m not caught flat-footed when someone pushes in. I’m assuming you’re newer to the series; if you’ve played a lot of AoE or older AoM, some of this will be familiar, but the pathing and economy quirks here still matter. Overall I’m trying to connect early vision, cheap barriers, and when gold-heavy walls are actually worth it.

Opening: Century towers

• I usually spawn with a few Century Towers around the base. Early on they’re mainly line of sight; they aren’t fully defensive until later.
• They can garrison population (about 10 in the example shown) so villagers or units can duck inside if they’re shot at.
• After I hit Age 2, those towers can be upgraded so they fire on enemies—that’s when they start doing real work.

Major god defense: Hades Sentinel

• Defense can start at major god pick. I’m on Hades, who gets a defensive god power out of the gate.
• On Xbox I open the leader wheel with LT + X and choose Sentinel.
• I target my Town Center (or an ally’s TC—nothing else). Stone guardians spawn around it. I can preview placement and rotate with the right trigger so I don’t clip terrain and lose a sentinel (e.g. only getting three instead of four).
• No real downside: it’s free, recharges like other god powers in Retold, and I like it on the main TC where most of my economy sits.
• Sentinels idle until enemy units enter range, then they shoot. They can be killed, but the power comes back for another drop on a TC.

Buildings as walls

• Unlike Age of Empires IV, units can’t walk through gaps between touching buildings here—tight building placement blocks pathing. In AoE IV, units can slip between buildings; in Retold, touching buildings act like a wall line if there’s no gap.
• Tradeoff: I save on literal walls, but a god power or mass siege can wreck everything I used as a barrier and open the base badly.
• Houses are the common choice: cheap and replaceable. I avoid turning my most critical buildings into the only wall line—discretion matters.
• I can also use this to force longer paths (e.g. sealing a gap between a Temple and trees) so attackers (and sometimes my own villagers) have to go the long way around.

Trees and map control

• Forest isn’t just wood—it’s a pathing block for me and the enemy.
• If I clear trees that were shielding a vulnerable approach (especially toward the opponent), I might open a lane I didn’t intend. Safer wood might be behind my base or away from the main attack vector.
• I sometimes leave certain tree lines standing on purpose to keep a natural choke.

Ringing towers with houses

• Sentry / watchtowers (upgraded Century towers) shoot but also draw fire. Online I often see houses packed around a tower.
• Upside: Melee can’t adjacent-attack the tower cleanly—opponents need ranged, siege, or god powers, which is a bigger ask.
• Downsides:
  • Units may fail to path into the tower, so I can’t garrison for safety if I boxed it in too tight.
  • Villagers might trap themselves while building—worth babysitting the build.
  • If the ball dies, I can lose houses + tower and get pop-capped until I rebuild.

Walls: cost, gates, upgrades

• All walls use gold (no stone resource in AoM). That competes with units, upgrades, extra TCs, temples, etc.—opportunity cost is high, so I only commit when the gold plan supports it.
• Xbox build: A at one end, drag, A at the other; villagers build the segment.
• Gates: select a long wall segment between columns and convert it. HP drops slightly vs a plain wall section (example: 600 wall segment vs 500 gate after conversion, with column HP called out separately in the demo).
• Per-age upgrades vary by civ, but walls can scale to very high HP, gain line of sight, and pick up hack vulnerabilities on some tiers—check the upgrade card before I pay.
• vs AoE IV: no units on walls; any melee can hack at any wall (not “siege-only” like stone in AoE IV).

Watchtowers: cap, placement, vision

• Retold caps watchtowers at 20—enough that I’m rarely starved, but it stops ring-the-map tower spam.
• When placing, the blue radius is attack range—I aim for overlapping coverage (e.g. near 360° around a core) so massed fire hits early.
• Forward tower on a contested resource or expansion route gives:
  • Early minimap / map vision of incoming raids.
  • Arrow cover for villagers on that gold or berries.
  • Garrison option for those same villagers.

Extra vision: civ tricks, Signal Flares, relics

• Egypt: Obelisks from the Priest—big LOS for little gold.
• Atlanteans: Oracles—units that expand vision passively.
• Greeks (my game): no obelisk/oracle equivalent, so I lean on towers and Signal Flares from the tower UI—buffs LOS for all my buildings for a window.
• Relics (grab with heroes, drop at temple): some grant tower arrows, TC population, or building LOS—all of which feed defense if I scout and secure them early.

Age 3: Fortresses

• In Age 3 I unlock the Fortress on the military side of the build menu (Greeks: favor, wood, gold). I can build up to 10—strong keep-like defense that also trains units.
• The radius shows attack range. I treat placement as area denial—securing a forward TC, proxy pressure, or key gold/farms.
• Fortresses are landmark-style progression: I need at least one to advance Age 3 → Age 4.
• Stats called out in the video: ranged attack, 20 garrison slots vs smaller tower garrisons—good panic bunker for villagers on two nearby golds (or similar clusters).
• Garrison on Xbox: hover the building—door icon on the panel—select villagers and press X to send them in; rally point + hold X to dump everyone out, or tap X to eject one at a time.
• Town bell still pulls workers into shelter in the demo; note that idle-villager D-pad up may not list garrisoned villagers, so I watch the building panel (e.g. “20 villagers”) so I don’t lose track.