Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition

After a few tries I realized something: Hoplites are overpowered, at least in this mission. I finished the entire mission in under 30mins, including defeating orange army.

All this applies on Standard difficulty.

1. GREEN + ECONOMY
Right at the start, gather all your army and get the relic to Green. Enter their base through the northern gate, very close to the edge of the map. Just right-click to the flag zone and don't bother killing enemies. Once your relic is in the flag zone, the city becomes your ally. Use your troops to kill Orange units in the northest village, build a trade center there and this village will provide with ressources. Ignore all other Neutral villages for the rest of the mission.

In the meantime, boom your economy with a big focus on food and gold. After collecting berries I simply built a lot of farms. I had 15 villagers on food and 10 on gold, 7 on wood. There are loads of gold mines close to the northern Green gate, you can't miss them.
With your economy booming, get upgrades from storage pits and start producing LOADS of Hoplites. You don't need anything else than them. They tank very well and deal very good damage. They also destroy walls rather quickly. I added 10 bowmen in the mix, they died very quickly to catapults and I never replaced them for Teal and Red so I suggest to just go with Hoplites.
For reference, I had two chariots, 10 bowmen, 10 hoplites (and the relic) when I attacked purple.

2. PURPLE
With your army ready, it's time to get the relic to Purple. Game timer was 11:40 when I started attacking them.
When your army is in front of Purple's northern gate, SAVE. Start attacking the gate and some scouts will arrive quickly. They'll open the gate and you have to use that to get inside their base. Don't bother killing them just yet, pathfinding will be a mess so you might have to load the save if you didn't manage to enter.
Once you're inside, right click to the flag zone and focus Orange soldiers. Once they're all dead, the city becomes an ally. It shouldn't take more than 2mins.

In the meantime, keep producing Hoplites and send them near the northern Teal gate.
After I captured Purple, I sent a villager to build three Academies near Red so that I could produce Hoplites faster in anticipation of the last attack.

3. TEAL AND RED
Same strategy applies. I attacked Teal at 17min with an army of 16 Hoplites and 5 bowmen. Teal have loads of bowmen but your Hoplites can tank them easily. Attack their gate, wait until one of their units opens it so that you can get inside and to the flag zone. Kill Orange and this city is yours.
When you get control of the third city, Orange will attack your allies and your city on several fronts. I just didn't bother, you can easily deal with them after getting the relic to the last city.
You'll have plenty of time to spam Hoplites production before attacking Red. Repeat the same strategy (attack gate, wait for them to open it, go to the flag zone with your relic).


Achievement unlocked at the end of the mission.