Mission 2: “Hold the Fort”

In the level Hold the Fort, Amelia Black and her forces are holed up inside of a Fort with Major Cooper and Beaumont. They are surrounded by the Mexican army and your task here will be to hold out against assault for 15 minutes until help arrives in the form of the US Army.

Secondary Objective: Upgrade both Trade Routes to Trains. (300 XP)

"Age of Empires 3" - Act III Steel - Mission 2: Hold the Fort (1 of 5)
Building Outposts at the fort gates.

Pretty much as soon as the level starts, you can accomplish this objective with ease. Pull the Musketeers from outside the fort back into the inside of the facility before spending resources to upgrade both routes. Since the railroads will be your main source of income, doing this right away is good for your economy in the long run. Take Amelia and a Settler, or Railroad Worker once they show up inside your fort, and have them build Trading Posts on all the open spots along both routes as soon as possible. There are six total with two inside your fort and pre-built with two to the northeast and two to the southwest. Set all of them to resources instead of experience to fund your defense.

Primary Objective: Survive until Cooper’s men arrive.

Make sure your artillery around the fort walls is in bombard mode to attack approaching enemies. Keep your units inside your base and refrain from building any Settlers beyond a simple handful to construct buildings and harvest a bit of wood from the trees in your fort or collect resources from pallets. The first card you send for should be the Factory which should produce Heavy Cannon non-stop that will be added to the wall defenses. Build some Outposts by the gates to your fort, primarily the southeast and northwest sides while working towards upgrading them to have cannons.

Send for a Fort once you get your second card and construct on the southwest side of the base between the two Trading Posts, which should be sufficient to keep that side defended for quite some time. Don’t spend any money on artillery, instead relying on the cannon produced by your Factory for this purpose while allowing the rest of your funds to be diverted to the production and upgrade of Musketeers. Try to send for the Advanced Arsenal card as soon as possible and purchase all the upgrades for Infantry to vastly increase the value of your Musketeers.

Defense will be focused around keeping cannons by the wall to quickly wipe away the attacking Mexican forces, prioritizing the enemy cannons to keep them from breaking through your walls. Keep an eye on these walls to repair them as they take damage, especially considering how cheap it is to do so, considering the units and buildings it saves you. As long as you continually pump out Musketeers and kill the enemy cannon ASAP, then you should have little problem surviving for the 15 minutes until reinforcements arrive.

Some final notes in defense: If your Outposts or Trading Posts outside your base begin to take heavy attack, allow them to fall. Bringing forces out of your base is a bad idea and can quickly go poorly for you. Just repair the buildings when you get the chance to extend their lifetime. If the Outposts built just outside your gates fall however, make sure to rebuild those as the lack of them can lead to the Fort being broken into.

Primary Objective: Destroy all the Mexican Army’s Town Centers

Once Cooper’s army arrives, it becomes an almost guaranteed victory with massive squads of Infantry Calvary and Artillery that will probably push your population capacity far past 200. Take the majority of your defenders from the fort, leaving some behind to cover the northwest side and have them plow over the southeast Mexican bases. The three enemy town centers will be visible on your mini-map to make things easier. Simply steamroll your way to success, following up on the northern enemy base once the south is clear.

Last Updated on October 5, 2020 by Standard of Entertainment