Act I "Blood" - Mission 8: "The Fountain Of Youth" — "Age Of Empires III" Campaign Guide

Mission 8: “The Fountain of Youth”

In the final mission of Act I of the Age of Empires 3 campaign, the Knights of St. John along with Morgan discover they have been lead astray by Alain who plans to use the power of the well for his own benefit along with the help of the Circle of Ossus, a secret society at odds with the Knights. It is up to you to destroy the Fountain of Youth in order to prevent it falling into the wrong hands.

Primary Objective: Capture the Fixed Gun

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Ice - Mission 8: The Fountain of Youth (1 of 6) — Capturing the Fixed Gun.

Your first task upon starting the level is to quickly head northeast along the landmass you landed on to capture the Fixed Gun, an incredibly powerful cannon that will make all the difference in this level. You will have to rush it and destroy the defenders quickly as it deals heavy damage taking out groups of units at a time.

Once its yours you will be awarded a Covered Wagon with which to start your settlement on this landmass. Leave your Fire Ships alone for the time being, using them in a pinch to stop attacking ships rather than using them against the fountain yet. You will get more free Fire Ships along the course of this mission so hold off on building any. Also, avoid firing on the fountain for now, the reason why will be explained towards the end of this guide.

Secondary Objective: Destroy the Circle’s base east of the Fixed Gun

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Blood - Mission 8: The Fountain of Youth (2 of 6)

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Blood - Mission 8: The Fountain of Youth (3 of 6)

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Blood - Mission 8: The Fountain of Youth (4 of 6)

This point enters the drawn out, build up and defend yourself stage of the game. While you get your Town Center built close to where it landed by the silver mine where it is dropped off. This task is probably the longest of the game considering its during this time you are fending off heavy attacks from both the red and orange bases while trying to up your economy and build up defenses.

As you grow your army, always keep a substantial amount of defenders near the Fixed Gun as the enemy seems to be able to capture it by getting close to it even when you have units nearby, which can be troublesome. They will try to do this fairly often as long as it’s under your control. Build some Docks to either side of the Fixed Gun and build some Galleons to defend the beaches and help with advancing enemies.

When you have enough forces, you can split your army, leaving some defenders while the rest travel under cover of the Fixed Gun to clear out the rest of the Circle base. As you do this, bring some Settlers to establish structures along this area, building Outposts near the upper section to provide static defenses for the structures and gatherers that will be working there.

Secondary Objective: Build a Trading Post at the Native Village (300 XP)

In the video below, this secondary objective is skipped due to the ability for it to add a long amount of extra time to this mission’s progress given the necessity to split our defenders in doing so. However if you wish to accomplish this task, send a boat with a small army to the western land mass to capture the area and construct the Trading Post.

Primary Objective: Destroy the Fountain of Youth

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Blood - Mission 8: The Fountain of Youth (5 of 6)

"Age of Empires 3" - Act I Blood - Mission 8: The Fountain of Youth (6 of 6)

Now with most of the distractions out of the way, it is time to conquer the final objective in this mission, the destruction of the Fountain of Youth. The best way to accomplish this is to start building at least 4 Mortar and calling in Falconets with your Home City cards if you haven’t already. Preferably you will have left the fountain alone till now, since destroying it slowly can trigger an attack that reaches your shores, doing massive damage before you can fully demolish the fountain.

Once you have your artillery squad ready, load them on a ship and use your Fixed Gun to clear out the small island just east of the fountain if you haven’t already. Once the Outpost and handful of defenders are gone you can drop off your artillery here and begin to fire upon the fountain with your Mortar.

Be prepared at this point for a small counterattack, as doing this triggers a single red ship to drop off 6 cavalry on that island to stop your artillery. With your ship still close by, quickly load up your artillery on to your Galleon and kill of the cavalry that should be now sitting around dumbfounded on the tiny island, following up with the destruction of the nearby enemy ship with either the Fixed Gun or your Galleons.

Once this counterattack is beaten off, drop your artillery back off on the island who should now be able to resume their bombardment unhindered. At the same time, take all your Galleons, Fire Ships and the Fixed Gun and order them to attack the fountain together. The combine fire of all these units should reduce it to rubble under a minute flat, possibly quicker.

When the fountain gets below about 25% health, a massive attack wave is triggered with Alain leading the biggest surge of Circle units yet, however with this combined fire strategy (versus whittling away at the fountain with the Fixed Gun over a long period of time) you will drop the fountain long before the enemy wave gets anywhere near your shores. The instant the fountain falls apart and crumbles into the water, this mission and Act One “Blood” of Age of Empires 3 is completed with a resounding victory.