The Fall of Rome is the sixth and final scenario in the Attila the Hun campaign in Age of Empires II: The Conquerors. It is based on Attila's invasion of Italy in 452 A.D.
Intro[]
As far as Attila was concerned, Honoria was waiting with open arms in Rome. The very next year, partially recovered from his losses, Attila turned his attention to Italy.
The Huns crossed the Alps and moved down the Italian peninsula, launching another great invasion that terrorized the inhabitants of the Western Roman Empire. He meant to take Rome, and crown himself emperor.
This was not the Rome of Caesar, mind you, but a withering Rome, beaten from earthquakes and barbarian wars. And this time, there was no General Aetius to hold off the Huns' savagery.
As far as Attila was concerned, Honoria was waiting with open arms in Rome. The very next year, partially recovered from his losses, Attila turned his attention to Italy.
The Huns crossed over the Alps, and moved down the Italian peninsula, launching another great invasion that terrorized the inhabitants of the Western Roman Empire. He meant to take Rome, and crown himself emperor.
This was not the Rome of Caesar, mind you, but a withering Rome, beaten from earthquakes and barbarian wars. And this time, there was no General Aetius to hold off the Huns' savagery.Scenario instructions[]
Starting conditions[]
- Starting Age: Imperial Age
- Starting resources: 1,600 food, 2,400 wood, 1,200 gold, 1,000 stone
- Population limit: 125 (150 in the Definitive Edition)
- Starting units:
Differences between difficulty levels[]
- On Standard difficulty, the player starts with a Castle to the north of their base, as well as two Mining Camps to the east and west, which reveal the locations of Stone Mines and Gold Mines, respectively.
Objectives[]
- Attila must survive.
- Defeat the Italian cities so that you may parlay with Rome.
- Defeat Aquileia (2, Red).
- Defeat Mediolanum (3, Green).
- Defeat Verona (4, Orange).
- Defeat Patavium (5, Purple).
- Attila must meet with Pope Leo I outside the gates of Rome.
Hints[]
- The Huns are restricted to a population limit of 150.
- Do not attack the city of Rome. It is not a threat, and you need someone left who can surrender to you.
- The Hun unique technology, Atheism, is very useful if your opponent attempts a Relic or Wonder victory.
- Do not send all of your troops on the offensive if you lack sufficient resources to defend your town.
- When you do go offensive, make sure you have many fully upgraded units, as your enemies will work together to stop you.
Scouts[]
Your scouts report:
- The Huns (1, Yellow) begin with ample resources in the foothills of the Alps. Below lie the well-defended cities of Northern Italy.
- Mediolanum (3, Green) has an aggressive army that may come looking for you if you take too long to go on the offensive. Mediolanum trains Knights and Archers and has a small navy.
- Patavium (5, Purple) also lies to the north and may attack early. Patavium is known for its Archers and siege weapons.
- In the northern marshes lies Aquileia (2, Red), which has few soldiers initially, but can eventually field Knights, Spearmen, and Scorpions.
- As the Huns advance through Italy, they will eventually come into contact with Verona (4, Orange), whose Knights, Archers, and Throwing Axemen offer the final defense of the Western Roman Empire.
- Rome itself (6, Blue) lost most of its forces fighting the Huns in Gaul. After the Huns defeat the other cities, they can walk into Rome and proclaim themselves the new heirs to the Empire.
Players[]
Player[]
- Player ( Huns): Starts with a Town Center, Villagers, forces, and Attila the Hun in the northwest of the map.
Ally[]
- Western Roman Empire ( Romans ( Italians before Return of Rome, Byzantines before the Definitive Edition)): The city of Rome in the south tip of the map. Though guarded by some Elite Centurions (Elite Cataphracts before Return of Rome), they are inactive for the entire scenario and do not make other units. After all enemies are defeated, Pope Leo I appears north of the city, and the player needs to bring Attila to him. Its only potential value as an ally is a Dock on the western coast, which can be used to trade after Milan/Mediolanum is defeated.
Enemies[]
- Patavium (Padua before the Definitive Edition) ( Britons): A city that lies rather central, between Milan/Mediolanum and Aquileia, and is the closest to the player's starting position. They have two Castles near their southern Gates, one outside walls and another inside, and also control a second Town Center in Verona. They start building their first Wonder at the 45th second of the game, and will build a second one after the player has entered Verona. They field Longbowmen. In the Definitive Edition, they also field Champions, Arbalesters, Mangonels, Petards, and Trebuchets. They behave more defensively than other enemies, attacking player buildings only near their base or after fighting an inclursion.
- Aquileia ( Celts): A city in the north corner. They start building a Wonder after the player has entered Padua/Patavium. They train Paladins, Scorpions, and Halberdiers. It is the only city without a Castle, but the Wonder site has a second set of walls, and there is a ring of Keeps around the outer wall. They are also the only enemy that build military buildings (Barracks) out of their city walls. They build some War Galleys if the player has a Dock.
- Mediolanum (Milan before the Definitive Edition) ( Teutons): A city on the western coast, and the second closest to the player's base after Padua/Patavium. They start building a Wonder at the half hour mark of the game (one hour mark before the Definitive Edition). They field Champions, Crossbowmen, Siege Onagers, Trebuchets, and Fast Fire Ships if the player has a Dock. In the Definitive Edition, they also field Paladins. They have a Castle outside walls, near the lake next to Padua/Patavium, and another by the sea. They are the only player to start in Post-Imperial Age.
- Verona ( Franks): They are the furthest enemy, in a city in the southeast, but also the most dangerous, and can only be reached after crossing the territory of one of the other three opponents. They start building a Wonder after the player has moved units near Milan/Mediolanum. They field Throwing Axemen, Paladins, Crossbowmen, Trebuchets, Monks.
Strategy[]
General[]
Attila must defeat the fortified cities in Northern Italy, which are Milan/Mediolanum, Padua/Patavium, Aquileia and Verona. Each will build a Wonder (two in Padua/Patavium's case, with a total of 5 Wonders for all enemies), and the player must destroy the Wonders before the time runs out. After destroying the Wonder of a city, destroying their Town Center will force them to resign.
The four Italian cities will build Wonders in the following conditions:
- Padua/Patavium will build its first Wonder 45 seconds after the start of the game, and the second Wonder when the player approaches its second Town Center in Verona.
- Aquileia will build its Wonder when the player approaches Padua/Patavium.
- Milan/Mediolanum will build its Wonder after 30 in-game minutes.
- Verona will build its Wonder when the player approaches Milan/Mediolanum.
Playing as Huns, the Atheism technology is useful to extend the Wonders' countdown and delay their victory (unless the player is going for the "No Wonder on my Watch" achievement in the Definitive Edition, which requires no Wonders to be completed during the game).
The player's starting position in the mountainous and wooden Alps is only accessible through three ways east (to Aquileia), south (to Padua/Patavium and Milan/Mediolanum), and west (to Milan/Mediolanum), that can be fortified easily and allow the player to boom. However, the player should be ready to create and maintain a large army of Heavy Cavalry Archers, Paladins, Halberdiers, and Trebuchets, and play offensively due to the Huns' poor defensive capabilities. Expand over the map to cut time traveling between the Italian cities and lure the numerous enemy armies into fortresses and choke points to riddle them with arrows before they can fight.
Beware that Attila the Hun is a must-survive unit, but also very weak compared to most cavalry, so he is best left inside a Castle until he needs to meet the Pope. Build the first Castle in the area occupied by the starting Hunnic army (but not too close to Padua/Patavium or Milan/Mediolanum so as not to trigger them early) as this is the enemies' favorite route to attack the starting Hunnic Town Center.
Razing the Italian cities[]
Padua/Patavium is the closest enemy and the first to start building a Wonder in the first minute of the game. It can fall to an early attack, but this is less likely in harder difficulty settings and the Definitive Edition, where they also train non-archer units. As Padua/Patavium also plays defensively unlike other enemies, it may be best to ignore it in the beginning and concentrate on wiping out the next closest enemy, Milan/Mediolanum.
Start with the Castle outside Milan/Mediolanum, next to the lake near Padua/Patavium, then the farmers outside walls, the Gate and Keeps, and the Town Center. Though Milan/Mediolanum's Champions, Paladins, and Siege Onagers are fully upgraded, they are few in the beginning and can be countered by the starting Tarkans and Heavy Cavalry Archers. After destroying the Town Center and killing their Villagers, Milan/Mediolanum resigns, easing pressure on the player, handing control of the western Gold Mines and opening a way to Rome over both land and sea. If not defeated early, Milan/Mediolanum will start building its own Wonder within 1 hour (for the HD Edition) or 30 minutes (for the Definitive Edition).
Turn next to Padua/Patavium. There are two ways to attack it: through the Gate south of the lake between Padua/Patavium and Milan/Mediolanum, or through the northern Gate not far from the starting Hunnic base. In either case, destroy the Gates and Keeps with Trebuchets and use massed Paladins to defend them from Champions, archers, and Mangonels. Destroy next the Town Center (though this will not defeat them, unlike other players, because they have another in the northern part of Verona), the Keeps lining the way to the Wonder, and the Wonder itself.
By this point Verona will have its own Wonder. Instead of continuing fighting a way through Padua/Patavium, build an army of Halberdiers, Heavy Cavalry Archers, and some Paladins and Trebuchets, and advance through Milan/Mediolanum's territory to Rome, then turn east to attack Verona in the area near the Wonder (the Verona AI ignores the western side of the map). Destroy the Castle, Keeps, and the Wonder while keeping their forces far from the Trebuchets. Do not worry if the Hunnic army is wiped out as long as the Wonder is destroyed. Verona produces many units (including Frankish Paladins) that are hard to destroy at once, but they will not rebuilt their Wonder. If the player wants to preserve their army for the next two cities, send some Cavalry Archers to fire at the walls to trigger Verona's horde of Paladins and Throwing Axemen to attack the Cavalry Archers. The player should then lure the chasing armies away from the cities as far as possible. This would buy the player enough time to destroy the Wonder and Town Center. Just make sure the Trebuchets does not come within range of Verona's Trebuchets.
Aquileia will also have their own Wonder by now. Build another army of Heavy Cavalry Archers and Trebuchets and send them through the eastern Alpine path to the hills northwest of Aquileia. Destroy the Keeps, Wonder, and Town Center without entering the city, while the Heavy Cavalry Archers shoot down their charging Halberdiers and weak Celtic Paladins until they resign.
The player is required to deal a second time with Padua/Patavium, as they are the only enemy to build a second Wonder in the same site as the first, though once weakened they will not put as much resistance as before. Verona can be attacked next by either destroying Padua/Patavium's two southern Castles and Gates and advancing from there, or by building a Dock south of Aquileia and moving the army over the eastern sea, which is the path of least resistance. Destroy Verona and Padua/Patavium's Town Centers in the northern section of Verona, after which both will resign (if the second Padua/Patavium Town Center in Verona is destroyed before they start their second Wonder, they will not resign and will have to be defeated completely).
Once all enemy forces have been defeated, Pope Leo I appears north of Rome and requests to parlay with Attila the Hun. It is unnecessary to provide Attila with a escort for this, as there are no dangers left and the Western Roman Empire never changes its stance from Ally.
Outro[]
The city of Aquileia at the tip of the Adriatic was wiped off the face of the earth. The fugitives from that pitiful city took refuge among the islands, marshes, and lagoons at the head of the Adriatic Sea and there founded the town of Venetia, or Venice.
'But what of the Pope?' I asked.
No one knows what Saint Leo said to the Hunnic king, but that very day Attila turned his army around and started back for the Hun lands on the Danube.
Attila the Hun died shortly thereafter. Since he had failed to claim Rome, he could not have Honoria, and instead brought another wife into his harem.
On his wedding night, Attila suffered a nosebleed and choked to death. For a man who had boasted that 'where my horse has trodden, no grass grows' it was a curiously anti-climactic death.
The Hunnic warriors cut their hair and gashed their faces, so that the king should be lamented. not by tears of maidens, but by the blood of warriors. Attila's bloody reign of conquest lasted nineteen long years.
Father Armand was silent for a long time. He glanced over at the head on a stake. ' A Hunnic trophy,' he said. 'I think the man was a Visigoth. He died at the Battle of the Catalaunian Fields. I keep it here so that I may see it every day and remember.' 'Remember what, Father?' I asked him.
The scent of a burning village. The sound of butchery. The way peasants would flee before the Hun riders. The way we would ride them down. The way it felt to conquer alongside Attila and the Huns.
He leaned so close I could feel his breath. 'Sometimes...
...I miss it.'
The city of Aquileia at the tip of the Adriatic was wiped off the face of the earth. The fugitives from that pitiful city took refuge among the islands, marshes, and lagoons at the head of the Adriatic Sea and there founded a state that afterward grew into the republic of Venice.
"But what of the Pope?" I asked.
"No one knows what Saint Leo said to the Hunnic King, but that very day Attila turned his army around and started back for the Hun lands on the Danube.
Attila the Hun died shortly thereafter. Since he had failed to claim Rome, he could not have Honoria, and instead brought another wife into his harem.
On his wedding night, Attila suffered a nosebleed and choked to death. For a man who had boasted that "where my horse has trodden, no grass grows" it was a curiously anti-climactic death.
The Hunnic warriors cut their hair and gashed their faces, so that the king should be lamented, not by tears of maidens, but by the blood of warriors. Attila's bloody reign of conquest lasted only eight long years.
Father Armand was silent for a long time. He glanced over at the head on a stake. "A Hunnic trophy," he said. "I think the man was a Visigoth. He died at the Battle of the Catalaunian Fields. I keep it here so that I may see it every day and remember." "Remember what, Father?" I asked him.
The scent of a burning village. The sound of butchery. The way peasants would flee before the Hun riders. The way we would ride them down. The way it felt to conquer alongside Attila and the Huns.
He leaned so close I could feel his breath. "Sometimes...
Trivia[]
- The lake between Milan/Mediolanum and Padua/Patavium has a similar shape to the river that separates the player from Milan in Barbarossa's third scenario Pope and Antipope, implying that the bridge appearing intact in this scenario is the same that was destroyed in the other.
- This scenario is the only time the Western Roman Empire is an ally and the player does not need to defeat them to win.
- As this campaign precedes the release of Age of Empires II HD: The Forgotten, the Roman cities are represented by an array of European civilizations other than Italians (something that also happens in the Barbarossa campaign). This also allows the player to face a wide variety of enemy units and to encounter different Wonders to avoid redundancy.
- In the Definitive Edition, the Western Roman Empire is (unlike other scenarios) represented by the Italians. However, as the Western Roman Empire is an ally, the Huns never fight the Italian civilization in the campaign. The original Cataphracts remain unchanged (for example to Centurions like in A Barbarian Betrothal), despite the civilization change.
- Due to Rome's civilization being Italians in the Definitive Edition, the player used to be able to train Condottieri, but this was patched out.
- In the Definitive Edition, the "No Wonder on my Watch" achievement can be earned if the player defeats all enemy cities without letting even one Wonder be fully constructed.
- If the player does not feel like bringing Attila to Rome, they can change their stance to 'enemy' and destroy the city instead.
- This is the most Wonder-heavy scenario in the game, with 5 enemy Wonders that the player needs to destroy to not lose. The highest number of enemy Wonders in any of the other scenarios is 4, in Consolidation and Subjugation.
Historical comparison[]
- Despite the name, this scenario does not reference any of the events usually called "the Fall of Rome", like The Sack of Rome in 410 A.D., the Vandal sack of 455, or the deposition of Romulus Augustus in 476.
- In reality, the Huns invaded Italy from the east (Aquileia) while in the scenario they seem to be crossing the Alps to attack from the north
- They also didn't cross the Po river so they never came near the city of Rome. In fact, all four cities destroyed by the player in the scenario (Milan, Padua, Verona, and Aquileia) are north of the river, but Verona is misplaced around where Ravenna is in reality, presumably for space. Conversely, the meeting between Attila and Leo I took place near Lake Garda, next to Verona, rather than near Rome.
- The intro claims that Aetius could not fight Attila in Italy because he had retired from the army. This is an invention made for narrative purposes (i.e. explaining why there is no massive Western Roman army to defeat like in A Barbarian Betrothal and The Catalaunian Fields). In reality, Aetius led a small force that tried to slow down Attila with guerrilla tactics around Aquileia. The reason he could not muster a larger force was probably because most of Aetius's army in Gaul were Goths, Franks, Burgundians, Alans, and other Barbarian peoples that would not fight far from their lands.
- In contrast to its portrayal in this scenario, Milan (Roman Mediolanum) is far from the sea in real life. It is shown more correctly in Pope and Antipope.
- Aquileia being portrayed as Celts may be a reference to the debated existence of a Celtic settlement before the foundation of the Roman city around 180 BC.
- Rather than being completely destroyed as in history (and as referenced in the outro), Aquileia is likely to be the city least destroyed in the game, due to its Wonder and Town Center both being within range of Trebuchets mounted out of the city.