2.build order
3.matchups
4.recorded games
thx to aaryn_gend for help
1. preamble:
the aztec all out rush is an all or nothing strat most of the time, it's basically about spamming unit shipments and outmassing the opponent early on. it's a good rush on the robot patch and can
still work on the fanpatch even if it's alot weaker, but most people won't predict that you'll use it, which means it has the element of surprise here.
2.build order
age1:
send 2 vills on hunts and gather the crates with the other 3, i like to send 1 villager directly to a wood crate to get the firepit up asap (possible in under one minute), the xp is really important for the shipment spam. After you've gathered all crates send all vills to gather food on hunts. 1st card is 3 villagers. age up with 12vills +3 vills of the hc, which makes a total of 16 pop (15 vills 1 warriorpriest). use the 2 skull knight politician.
Even though herding a bit in age1 is always good, i don't suggest doing this until you klicked the age-up button, because aztecs age up time will be kinda late then, try being in colonial 4:30ish, instead of 4:40 or even worse 4:50ish
The warchief can make the rush even stronger. There is a small trick to get much more xp, which is really important for a shipment spam since a few seconds can decide if you win or lose.
The trick is to double the xp the killed units yields when your warchief is around but is not dealing out the last hit, a converted guardian will do the last hit.
A polar bear for example will grant 50 xp instead of 25 which is in fact a big difference. A coyote usually gives 20 xp if killed by a converted guardian
Useful treasures: wood treasures (always useful for houses, units, warhut), coin treasures for some extra puma spearmen.
During the transition to colonial send most of your vills to wood, depending on the starting wood crates and treasures you've gathered, but most of the time it'll be over 10 vills on wood during transition.
Send 3 vills towards your opponent, and finish building the warhut BEFORE you hit
age 2, because the 2 skull knights have to arrive at the warhut. So you can start harrassing with them immediately, in some matchups for example vs brits or spain you can take down the age-up tower with them, in some cases if your opponent hasn't scouted you well, taking down their rax/stable shouldn't be too hard either.
Upon hitting age 2, send approximatly 8 vills on wood and 7 on food (always depending on treasures, starting crates and what units you wanna train first (coyote need way more on food than wood), dont build vills yet, only build houses and send shipments(depending on civ,) and build some units in the warhut. You should have built two houses after starting to built your warhut, which makes for 40pop when hitting/slightly after colonial.
important cards for your deck:
sometimes the age 1 4 jaguar card can be useful if a lot of good treasures are available(like on yukon), they will also make the rush a bit nastier
If the rush failed: the game isn't lost, your opponent shouldn't have an eco much superior to yours, if you see that your rush won't cut it, pull back and mass, start making vills again, aztecs have strong cards to aid their eco, 5 vills+4 vills, 3 warrior priests. With 4 warriorpriests start the dance on the firepit to get more of them. On fanpatch the limit is 6 in age 2 and on robot patch it's the maximum of 10 for all ages. They boost train times with fertility dance and make your units stronger in battles.
Can also be abused for water dancing, healing units in age3 or the SK dance in age4
Be careful if you see colonialmilitia in your opponents deck, most aztec unit gets killed with one shot, in this case take mapcontrol and kill everything which isn't in range of the tc and try to harass him constantly
to be sure if he did sent the card yet or not, simply look if his TC has more than 100 anti ship attack, if he does, the card has been arrived.3.matchups: (for 1.02 robot patch)
mirrors: don't rush, age up with more vills and make vills early age 2 also
japanese: on lower levels an easy matchup for aztecs, only very decent players can defeat it
india: agra fort can be devastating don't rush if you see a fort and rush if there is none
chinese: dont let him mass unit, destroy villages if possible, hurts the chinese player early on.
Later, if you get a good coyote mass and coyote combat and wp on attack dance, there is nothing the chinese player can do against them(on RE patch)
iroquois: don't rush, one of the most difficult matchups, they get their units faster and their mass is better
sioux: rush works, be careful of bowriders
german: ulans can be annoying, they also got some strong age2 shipments, still possible to win with the all out rush
french: coreurs can be a real pain, always be careful against french, rush can still work though
portuguese: cm can be a pain, but otherwise its a more simple matchup
spanish: wardogs! kill the explorer, still an easy matchup
ottoman: idk, imo rush works, don't let him mass too many abus, try to keep the amount low with your coyotes, maces just murder jannissaries
british/dutch: they can hide behind banks/manors with some wall pieces they can defend very well, otherwise an easy matchup
russian: they got their blockhouses + great shipments as in 13 strelets, 4+5 cossacks and can mass army very quickly, so all out rushing isn't the best thing to do here also.
