Act I "Blood" - Mission 7: "Spanish Treasure Fleet" — "Age Of Empires III" Campaign Guide

Mission 7: “Spanish Treasure Fleet”

With Lizzie’s help garnered, the Knights of St. John set sail to Florida in the hopes of catching up with Delgado and he Spanish army. To cut the Spanish off at the knees, the plan is to steal their fleet of Treasure Ships, paying Lizzie back for her services at the same time.

Primary Objective: Capture the Spanish Treasure Ships (1/6)

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Ice - Mission 7: Spanish Treasure Fleet (1 of 9) — Freeing the group of prisoners next to the First Treasure ship.

Although not fully clarified yet, the objectives of this mission will be to capture 6 total Treasure Ships to ultimately defeat the Spanish . As the mission starts some Spanish ships will attack your small fleet. You can try to take them out but its best to move away so you do not lose your ships or the units they hold. The Paris Burning and ship holding your artillery in particular will be crucial to this mission. Make sure at least your Mortar artillery survives the first 5 ship captures as it is an essential part of the strategy covered here.

You should be able to already see the first Treasure Ship along with it’s nearby prison. Drop your forces off on the beach near here and attack the prison first, releasing its captives and adding to your forces before taking out the Outpost that controls the Treasure Ship. Once you have captured it, it is yours permanently and the Spanish can neither recapture or destroy it.

With the constant influx of gold from this and other Treasure ships we can ignore the orders of building a Town Center for the majority of this mission, keeping the Covered Wagon safe on the ships or elsewhere out of harms way. You can use the Paris Burning to train Buccaneers to replenish your forces and since they cost only gold, you can build them indefinitely. Finally the real reason we want to hold off on the Town Center is it’s construction early on triggers heavier attacks from the Spanish which will draw this level out.

Treasure Ship 2/6

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Blood - Mission 7: Spanish Treasure Fleet (2 of 9)

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Blood - Mission 7: Spanish Treasure Fleet (3 of 9)

Move northeast and you will find a Treasure to capture which grants you a Native American scout, whose fast speeds can be used to explore the area ahead of you. Keep him on a separate hotkey along with your Artillery on their own hotkey to facilitate easier moving of units that travel at different speeds.

Head up the path, going northwest now and you will quickly run into a group of native prisoners, whom upon releasing will grant you the locations and permanent visibility of 6 more Treasure ships on the map (there are 8 total with 6 needed to be captured) the closest of which is to the west, defending by a single Outpost which will be the next target. You can avoid damaging your units at all by having your Mortar out-range the outpost.

Treasure Ship 3/6 & Secondary Objective: Destroy Spanish Forts (300 XP)

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Ice - Mission 7: Spanish Treasure Fleet (4 of 9) — Destroying the first Fort from long range and capturing ship #3

Next up its time to take out the first of two forts in this mission and capture our third Treasure Ship. Moving your army along, keep them out of range of the fortress’ guns while you’re Mortar hits it from long range. This is the only real strategy that works against the fort without having a base to build more units with, so like mentioned before, you need the Mortar for this. Some Spanish are likely to attack your artillery during this process but you should be able to fend them off with ease if you grouped your units around the cannon. Once the fort falls, ship #3 is yours and adding to your supply.

Treasure Ship 4/6 & 5/6

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Blood - Mission 7: Spanish Treasure Fleet (5 of 9)

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Blood - Mission 7: Spanish Treasure Fleet (6 of 9)

Treasure Ship #4 and #5 are a pretty simple task, just north of the fort is another one of the Ships (#4) exposed on your map by the natives you rescued earlier and guarded by a single Outpost in exposed territory, ripe for the taking. Just send your forces there and overrun any defenders you encounter, remembering to build some more Buccaneers with your limitless supply of gold.

When the fourth one is yours, move your forces further north and to the right a little bit to find the fifth Treasure ship, also guarded by a single Outpost in relatively exposed territory again, but previously undiscovered by the natives you had rescued. There are also some prisoners up here you can rescue while destroying some Spanish production buildings.

Destroy Spanish Fort #2

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Ice - Mission 7: Spanish Treasure Fleet (7 of 9) — Destroying the second fort along the water’s edge.

With five Treasure Ships, the gold income should be pretty ridiculous by now. At this point you can accomplish one more task easily without constructing your base just yet. Move a boat of yours along the water going southwest until you find a bend which you should be able to see the Fort that sits atop it or alternatively, send your scout you rescued earlier to approach the southern corner of the mainland until it runs into the Fort itself.

Once you have a visual of it, you can approach with your army, artillery in tow, and once again out-range the Fort by letting your Mortar pick away at its structure from a distance. Again you should make sure to have your army between the Fort and your Mortar, but outside of the Fort’s gun range to prevent unnecessary casualties.

The Final Treasure Ship, Building a Town Center and Killing Delgado (1,000 XP)

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Blood - Mission 7: Spanish Treasure Fleet (8 of 9)

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Blood - Mission 7: Spanish Treasure Fleet (9 of 9)

Now with five treasure ships, the Spanish’s resources cut down and their Forts destroyed you can now build your settlement. The best place to do this is at the tiny strip of land at the very south of the map, where you can quickly get a base up and running with little interference unlike on the mainland. Don’t focus so much on sending settlers, opting for military reinforcements instead since the base will only have limited use to get the army up and running.

Use the ludicrous gold income you have and the home shipments you should have built up by now to quickly spur massive growth in your base. It should take about 7-8 minutes tops with the gold income you have to get a max population army ready, chock full of artillery. Buying and selling the resources you need on the Market will facilitate this process.

Once you have maxed your population, split your army into control groups with the max amount of units in each group and send them all at once, taking the thin high-ground land path to the Spanish base along the western side of the map.

As long as you avoid exposing your ground units to the Spanish Navy that sits in the body of water by their base you can really plow over everything and anything, remembering to leave the Outpost guarding any of the final Treasure ships for after you have destroyed the majority of the Spanish base and Delgado for the experience. Mortars can fire from the land to take out Naval ships giving you a hard time or alternatively, you can bring your ships in while the Spanish Navy is distracted with your ground units for s sneaky surprise attack. Capturing the sixth Treasure ship by destroying any of the remaining Outposts that guard them will complete this mission in victory.