Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition News

Today’s hotfix is aimed at addressing pressing performance and gameplay related issues.

💬 DISCUSS: Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition Forum
🗣 JOIN: The Age of Empires Official Discord

[h3]Stability and Performance[/h3]

• Fixed an issue that could result in freezes or crashes during gameplay.
  
• Fixed an issue that allowed Units to be fused as a single entity in one tile following a certain order of commands.

[h3]Ongoing Investigation[/h3]

• We are still looking into an issue where the Quick Play screen will freeze upon finding a match when having any Team map bans selected. In the meantime, please do not select any Team map bans before queueing to avoid the issue.
  
• We are still looking into additional reports of games freezing or crashing on all platforms.

[h3]:alertalert: DISCLAIMER[/h3]This list is subject to change and should not be considered a comprehensive list of all the known issues we’re tracking. The above is to inform you of the team’s current priorities, which will change as other issues arise or take precedence.

For the latest updates and announcements, please visit our social channels.

WHAT: Server Maintenance (Matchmaking Servers)
WHEN: Wednesday, May 22 @ 2:00p PT / 5:00p ET / 21:00 UTC (Countdown)
EST. DOWNTIME: 1-2 HOURS

[h3]GAMES & PLATFORMS IMPACTED[/h3]

• Age of Empires: Definitive Edition (Steam / Microsoft Store)
  
• Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition (Steam / Microsoft Store)
  
• Age of Empires III: Definitive Edition (Steam / Microsoft Store)
  
• Age of Empires IV (Steam / Microsoft Store)
  

[h3]OBJECTIVES[/h3]

• Routine server updates and maintenance.

[h3]DETAILS[/h3]This coming Wednesday, May 22nd, the platform team will be taking the multiplayer servers down for regular maintenance. Please note:

• Ranked matchmaking will disabled exactly one hour before the maintenance window to prevent disruption to newly-formed matches.
  
  
• Any matches still in progress at the start of the maintenance window will be disrupted when it begins.
  
  
• DURING THE MAINTENANCE WINDOW, YOU WILL STILL BE ABLE TO LAUNCH THE GAME, BUT WILL NOT BE ABLE TO MATCHMAKE OR ACCESS ANY ONLINE FEATURES.

To prevent any interruptions, we recommend wrapping up any games at least 10 minutes before the maintenance window. The downtime is expected to last between 1 and 2 hours. You can watch this thread with any changes to the schedule as they arise, as well as the all-clear when the maintenance is complete.

Thank you for your patience!

Today’s hotfix is aimed at addressing stability and performance issues, along with some map fixes.

Be sure to dig down into the post below to get all of the smaller details before hopping in-game and checking them out firsthand.

Thank you again to our amazing community members, all of whom have helped to make Age of Empires what it is today!
—The Age of Empires Team

💬 DISCUSS: Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition Forum
🗣 JOIN: The Age of Empires Official Discord

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         ◆ HOTFIX 113358 ◆

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Game

[h3]Stability and Performance[/h3]

• Fixed a variety of crashes.
  
• Addressed an issue preventing the game from starting on certain Windows 10 and earlier systems.
  
• Resolved a crash when loading old Return of Rome saves in Single Player mode.

[h3]Graphics[/h3]

• Animated Profile Icons are now moving as intended in the Player Icons menu.

[h3]Settings[/h3]

• Clamping mouse to window now works properly with multi-monitor setups on any monitor.

[h3]Xbox[/h3]

• Fixed an issue that caused navigation issues in the Radial Menu when playing with a controller. Positions of items in the radial menu should be back to normal.
  
• Fixed an issue that caused the Y button in the controller to behave unintendedly when a building was selected depending on the current Age or the player’s civilization. The Y button should now produce the intended unit for each building no matter the Age or civilization.

Random Maps

[h3]General[/h3]

• Fixed a bug that caused villagers to sometimes generate on top of forest trees, making them unable to work or move, when playing Empire Wars.
  
• Fixed foragers or miners sometimes not generating in the appropriate number when playing Empire Wars.
  
• Fixed mills and mining camps sometimes generating off-grid.
  
• Fixed villagers sometimes not properly depositing resources to mills and mining camps.

[h3]Map Balance[/h3]

• Cliffbound:
  • Added preventative measures to ensure villagers no longer generate trapped inside forests when playing Empire Wars.
• Dunesprings:
  • Relics are now more evenly spread out across the map.
    
  • The player’s starting gold deposit has been reduced from seven to five tiles.
• Golden Stream:
  • The middle now scales more appropriately when playing on larger map sizes.
• Hollow Woodlands:
  • The spacing between the player’s town centres and the water is now more even.
    
  • Adjusted resources to ensure a more balanced distribution between players.
    
  • Heavily decreased the chance of villagers generating trapped between forest trees.
    
  • Neutral huntable animals now spawn in groups of three, instead of groups of four.
• Isthmus:
  • Fixed a bug that allowed players to sometimes wall across the unbuildable terrain.
    
  • Increased the width of the unbuildable terrain.
    
  • Fixed stone not generating on the small islets when said islets are generating too close to the edge of the map.
    
  • Islets now generate more evenly between the two bodies of water.
    
  • Islets have been increased in size, allowing for more resources and easier building placement.
    
  • Fixed islets not generating appropriately when playing on larger map sizes.
    
  • Fixed units behaving strangely when fighting around the central pyramid.
• Karsts:
  • The player’s starting stone deposit has been reduced from five to three tiles.
    
  • Minor aesthetic adjustments have been made.
• Mountain Dunes:
  • The elevation on the map now scales more appropriately on larger map sizes.
• River Divide:
  • Shorefish now consistently spawn on the player’s side of the river.
• Sandrift:
  • Fixed some incorrect terrains occasionally appearing out of place on the map.
    
  • Fixed a bug that caused forests to not generate correctly for all players.
• The Passage:
  • Fixed some forests acting like straggler trees, making them removable by placing buildings on top of them.
    
  • Fixed relics sometimes not being retrievable when generating on shallows that were too small.
    
  • Fixed resources sometimes generating further away from the player’s town centres than intended.
    
  • Docks and watch towers are now exclusive to Empire Wars and generate much farther away from enemy docks.
    
  • Fixed player-specific resources sometimes not generating on larger map sizes.
    
  • Fixed a bug that caused forests to not generate correctly for all players.
• Shrubland:
  • Added preventative measures to ensure villagers no longer generate trapped inside forests when playing Empire Wars.
    
  • Relics are now more evenly spread out between the players.
    
  • Fixed relics sometimes being inaccessible after generating inside forests.
    
  • Fixed the relic on Capture the Relic being entrapped and impossible to retrieve.
    
  • Slightly reduced the number of forage bushes on the map.
    
  • The player’s starting gold deposit has been reduced from seven to five tiles.
    
  • Fixed relics sometimes generating trapped between forage bushes.

[h3]:alertalert: DISCLAIMER[/h3]This list is subject to change and should not be considered a comprehensive list of all the known issues we’re tracking. The above is to inform you of the team’s current priorities, which will change as other issues arise or take precedence.

For the latest updates and announcements, please visit our social channels.

Hey Community!

Today we’re ready to launch our May Public Update Preview available via a Beta branch on Steam: This will be a small and focused update to address priority issues including critical bugs affecting gameplay and stability, much desired adjustments to the new Red Bull Wololo: El Reinado Ladder maps, and other important issues from your reports!

Our teams are still working to investigate issues with Quickplay matches not starting or becoming unresponsive. We’ve also temporarily adjusted the penalty players receive when leaving a match early (for our quickplay users only) so no one is timed out from this issue.

While our PUP is only available on Steam, we do want to let console players know that we’ve also got fixes for Xbox planned for the next update to address reported issues with both the radial menu and y-button functionality.

Best queue times while searching for Lobbies in PUP continue to be:

• 11:00am-1:00pm PT
  
• 6:00pm-8:00pm PT
  
• 7:00pm-9:00pm GMT

Thank you for playing, and we look forward to your feedback in the Steam forums:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/813780/discussions/30/4357872852123023203/

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[h2]Game[/h2]
[h3]Stability and Performance[/h3]

• Fixed a variety of crashes.
  
• Addressed performance issues affecting users on Windows 10 and earlier systems.
  
• Resolved a crash when loading old Return of Rome saves in Single Player mode.
  

[h2]Settings[/h2]

• Clamping mouse to window now works properly with multi-monitor setups on any monitor.
  

[h2]Graphics[/h2]

• Animated Profile Icons are now moving as intended in the Player Icons menu.
  

[h2]Gameplay[/h2]

• Addressed an issue where foragers were not dropping off food to a nearby mill.
  
• Fixed an issue where units could repeatedly attempt to attack a neutral map object (such as a pyramid) they cannot interact with.

[h2]Maps[/h2]

• Cliffbound:
  • Added preventative measures to ensure villagers no longer generate trapped inside forests when playing Empire Wars.
• Dunesprings:
  • Relics are now more evenly spread out across the map.
    
  • The player's starting gold deposit has been reduced from seven to five tiles.
• Golden Stream:
  • The middle now scales more appropriately when playing on larger map sizes.
• Hollow Woodlands:
  • The spacing between the player's town centres and the water is now more even.
    
  • Adjusted resources to ensure a more balanced distribution between players.
    
  • Heavily decreased the chance of villagers generating trapped between forest trees.
    
  • Neutral huntable animals now spawn in groups three, instead of groups of four.
• Isthmus:
  • Fixed a bug that allowed players to sometimes wall across the unbuildable terrain.
    
  • Increased the width of the unbuildable terrain.
    
  • Fixed stone not generating on the small islets when said islets are generating too close to the edge of the map.
    
  • Islets now generate more evenly between the two bodies of water.
    Islets have been increased in size, allowing for more resources and easier building placement.
    
  • Fixed islets not generating appropriately when playing on larger map sizes.
    
  • Fixed units behaving strangely when fighting around the central pyramid.
• Karsts:
  • The player's starting stone deposit has been reduced from five to three tiles.
    
  • Minor aesthetic adjustments have been made.
• Mountain Dunes:
  • The elevation on the map now scales more appropriately on larger map sizes.
• River Divide:
  • Shorefish now consistently spawn on the player's side of the river.
• Sandrift
  • Fixed some incorrect terrains occasionally appearing out of place on the map.
    
  • Fixed a bug that caused forests to not generate correctly for all players.
• The Passage:
  • Fixed some forests acting like straggler trees, making them removable by placing buildings on top of them.
    
  • Fixed relics sometimes not being retrievable when generating on shallows that were too small.
    
  • Fixed resources sometimes generating further away from the player's town centres than intended.
    
  • Docks now spawn much further apart when playing Empire Wars.
    
  • The dock and watch tower now only generates during Empire Wars.
    
  • Fixed player-specific resources sometimes not generating on larger map sizes.
    
  • Fixed a bug that caused forests to not generate correctly for all players.
• Shrubland:
  • Added preventative measures to ensure villagers no longer generate trapped inside forests when playing Empire Wars.
    
  • Relics are now more evenly spread out between the players.
    
  • Fixed relics sometimes being inaccessible after generating inside forests.
    
  • Fixed the relic on Capture the Relic being entrapped and impossible to retrieve.
    
  • Slightly reduced the number of forage bushes on the map.
    
  • The player's starting gold deposit has been reduced from seven to five tiles.
    
  • Fixed relics sometimes generating trapped between forage bushes.

The 1v1 ranked ladder for Empire Wars will be temporarily shelved and replaced by a new 1v1 ranked ladder for the upcoming Red Bull Wololo: El Reinado tournament. This is a new ladder that levels the playing field as you compete for ELO and opportunity. The map pool is also being updated to the Red Bull Wololo: El Reinado tournament maps, providing the pool with a welcome refresh.

Fear not, however; some time after the tournament has concluded, the prior Empire Wars ladder will be restored and existing ratings and leaderboards will return to the state they were in before this swap-out.

The Team Game ladder will also receive an update to the map pool, but the TG ladder is not associated with the tournament – only the 1v1 ladder. This means that your Empire Wars Team Game rating and statistics will remain unchanged during this period.

[h3]Why is the ladder being temporarily reset?[/h3]
The new ladder is being used as part of the upcoming Red Bull Wololo: El Reinado tournament as a method to qualify for the event. In order to ensure an even playing field for all competitors, the leader board has to be temporarily reset. The four with the highest Elo rating achieved on the leaderboard by the 28th of July will be directly invited to the Red Bull Wololo: El Reinado event taking place at the Castillo de Almodóvar del Río in Spain.

[h3]How does this affect you?[/h3]
Your experience will remain the same; however, you may find that your 1v1 rating will require a few games before it settles. With this change, you will be able to experience what it’s like to play on the settings and maps of one of the biggest tournaments for Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition. The ladder holds no restrictions, anyone is free to play on the ladder whether they intend to participate in the tournament or not.

Please be aware, there is a Controller Only ladder visible for Red Bull Wololo: El Reinado for those playing on Xbox. However, this ladder will not be eligible for qualification. Remember to enable crossplay, as qualification will only be available to those on the cross-play enabled ladder.

Click for more information on the tournament.