AOE3 Forums

What I dont get, no matter how many times I hear it, is that it is somethow better to have only one or two villie gathering crates, and having the rest hunt straight away. How exactly is this more effective than simply using all of the villies to gather the starting crates?

I have heard that before, but i dont think it makes a real difference and if it does not enough to cause you to win or lose a game.

I know, I was just wondering why professionals promote it so much.

It only makes a 1-2 second actual difference; I personally have all villies on starting food crates until I can queue my first villie, then send all but one to hunting. It really doesn't matter, but the thing to avoid is that silly villager pathing problem where all villies try to gather the same crate, and 2-3 of them just walk back and forth. I always try to make shure they're doing something useful.

if you shoot at a hunt at the first 2 or so seconds of the game, the herd wont run away, so it saves a lot of time instead of walking to the other side and shooting it back, but it only works if your villies kill it in 1 volley (2 french cdb or 3 villies kill almost every hunt in 1 volley) and then usually the rest gather crates and all vills coming out of tc go to food.
 

After you've gotten the 100 resources required to train your first villager, it's generally best to send vils out to start hunting. I do this mainly because crates run out so quickly that you often have idle villagers standing around if you try to move them all at once. Also, if you send out one villager while the others are gathering, he can start shooting the hunt back towards your TC so that the other vils don't have to walk as far. If you want to learn more about these things, check out my Early Game Guide over at rtsprofessional.com.

Thanks everyone, thats really helpful and Ill try and do that in all of my games now. Have yet to look at MrMilos guide tho...