The Crucible expands alongside the release of Raiders of the North!
We’ve seen your love for the new Crucible game mode that was introduced with the Dynasties of the East, and closely monitored your feedback eager to further improve upon it. This mammoth expansion further builds on the original concept and design, delivering on what you wanted most. The coming update to the Crucible includes: Two Player Co-op, a huge increase to the number of available Boons, an updated Progression System, two entirely new ways to play with the addition of Conqueror Mode and Custom Mode, and much more!
If you already own Dynasties of the East, all of the base changes to the Crucible will be available to you with the next Age of Empires IV update on October 29. But, there’s more! Owners of Raiders of the North will gain access to four exclusive new Crucible Missions: Sea Raiders, Scottish Isthmus, Lost Desert, and Thunder & Trumpets.
We’ve put together a deep dive of all the new features, missions, and changes coming to the Crucible on October 29, plus a detailed FAQ at the end to answer any of your questions. Repel the invaders, and hold the line!
Pre-Order Raiders of the North Now!
Raiders of the North is available for pre-order now on Steam, Microsoft Store, and XBOX, launching October 29th!
*Raiders of the North will be available for purchase in the PlayStation 5 store on launch day.
2-Player Co-Op
All Dynasties of the East and Raiders of the North Crucible missions now support both solo and 2 player co-op! Invite a friend or use the automatch queue to quickly find a teammate at any time.
When playing in Co-op mode, mission difficulty is scaled appropriately, so if you and your friend normally play on Hard difficulty you’ll want to keep the difficulty selector on Hard for Co-op mode too.
Four New Crucible Missions
Unlock these new missions exclusively with Raiders of the North and experience the Crucible like never before. Each new mission introduces an interesting twist that rewards exploring and conquering the entire map. Meet a host of new boss units, points of interest, and side objectives which add limitless variety to each Crucible run!
Sea Raiders
From the North Sea come longships bearing a tide of raiders who crash upon your shore with a ferocity rivalling the fiercest squalls. Yet, you have survived those storms, and you will survive these Viking raiders. But for how long?
Scottish Isthmus
From sea to heathered hills, the clans of the northern isthmus must band together. You face an onslaught of treacherous Scots, loyal to the English crown, who surge from the south to take control of your lands. Safeguard the nearby villages and the North shall rally to your aid.
Lost Desert
Long ago, these invaders from the west claimed this land as their own, building many fortresses under the banner of the Knights Templar. They dare to try tame the desert. Show them that in time, all things return to the sands.
Thunder & Trumpets
In the crush of the Sundarban expanse, the approaching enemy cannot be seen, but they can be felt and heard. The Tughlaq’s elephant cavalry quakes the very earth. Here, in the jungle ruins, no boons will be gifted to you. You must raze the fortresses of the enemy to earn them.
Boons
25 New Boons
We’re adding a variety of new and exciting Boons that introduce new synergies, fun mechanics, and interesting trade-offs. There’s a wealth of new Boons to discover and combinations to experiment with, such as:
Gain even more Boons with “Objective Reality” and get an additional Boon pick whenever a side objective is completed.
Use “Trojan Ram” to destroy enemy Rams from the inside with help from some hidden allies.
Collect as many Heroes and Champions as possible and then choose “Special Forces” to multiply their stats.
New Boon Browser
To make exploring and managing Boons easier, we’ve added a new Boon Browser where you can view the effects of every Boon in the game. You’ll also find information on three new Boon-related systems:
Boon Unlocks: Complete challenges to gain access to powerful new Boons.
Boon Vetoes: Whenever you unlock a Boon by completing a challenge, you also gain one Boon Veto. A Boon Veto can be used on any Boon to prevent it from appearing during missions. This gives you some limited control over the ever-growing number of Boons.
Boon Ascension: What if Boons could be upgraded to a second tier? Every. Single. Boon… That’s Boon Ascension in a nutshell. Use Perk Points to upgrade Boons or earn upgrades for free each time you complete a Talent Track. More on Talent Tracks in the next section. Once a Boon is ascended you’ll only see the improved version in all future Crucible matches.
Perk points are also now uncapped and can be earned indefinitely.
New Progression
Talent Tracks
Every civilization now has its own unique Talent Track, awarding a set of new bonuses as you progress. Each time you complete a Crucible mission and earn Perk Points, you also earn an equivalent amount of progress along the Talent Track of the Civilization you played. Each Talent Track has 15 levels and awards a free Boon Ascension at the final tier.
3 New Perks
Woolly Friends keeps you extra warm thanks to additional starting Sheep.
Breakthrough grants a free random technology each time you advance to the next Age.
Eager Hands increases Town Center production speed and has been separated into its own perk, apart from Hasty Production.
2 New Crucible Modes
Conqueror Mode
For those seeking a new challenge, we’re completely revamping Conqueror Mode so that it’s more varied and challenging than ever before. Compete for your place on the weekly leaderboard, with unique mutators and missions rotating into play each week. Conqueror Mode creates a completely level playing field, with a fixed number of Perk Points to spend and all other progression disabled specifically for this mode. Our aim here is to create a mode that has competitive integrity without asking you to grind for hundreds of hours to earn enough unlocks to be able to compete. That also means that Conqueror Mode will be a real tough challenge for players of all skill levels.
Mutators
We’re introducing 25 new mutators, each of which creates unique and challenging conditions. Here’s some examples of what you can expect:
Bullion Ban prevents Villagers from mining Gold.
Tech Debt limits the number of technologies you can research in a match to just 15.
Darkness reduces the line of sight of all units to 1/2 a tile.
Each week, four Mutators are selected at random for Conqueror Mode. Everyone plays with the same Mutators to see who can best strategize and execute against an ever-changing challenge.
Perks
In Conqueror Mode, everyone is given a fixed 5,000 Perk Points to spend. Choose your perks wisely to best overcome the week’s challenge.
Score, Not Time
Instead of limiting Conqueror Mode to only the highest four difficulty levels, we’re opening the mode to anyone who wants to embrace the challenge, regardless of skill level. However, instead of chasing the best completion time, you’ll now compete for the highest score. Score is simply your survival time modified by a multiplier that increases with difficulty level. While the highest difficulty will still offer the highest scoring potential, everyone now competes on a single global leaderboard.
Bring a Friend!
Conqueror Mode can be played alone or in co-op with a partner. Scores are tracked separately.
Custom Mode
Are four Mutators at once not enough? How about all of them? Or some combination in between? In Custom Mode, you can choose exactly which Mutators you want to activate. You’re still setting a score for each mission, and the more Mutators you activate, the higher your score multiplier becomes. You’re also completely unrestricted in your use of meta-progression, with full access to all perks, talents, and boons if that’s how you want to play. Each mission has its own record of your best score achieved in Custom Mode, we can’t wait to see how high this can go!
Crucible Balance & Tweaks
We’ve made a big improvement to how difficulty scaling and endless mode work, with difficulty progression now continuing to spawn additional units in each wave rather than switching to modifiers immediately. This means that entering into endless mode on easier difficulties will be a much better experience with larger scale battles.
We’ll also be sharing a full release note nearer to the release of Raiders of the North which includes balance changes to Boons, Boss Units, and more.
Pre-Order Raiders of the North Now!
Raiders of the North is available for pre-order now on Steam, Microsoft Store, and XBOX, launching October 29th!
*Raiders of the North will be available for purchase in the PlayStation 5 store on launch day.
FAQ
Yes. Both DLC unlock The Crucible and a core set of features, in addition to the 4 missions which are unique to each. Boons which were released with Dynasties of the East are now considered “core” and are unlocked automatically alongside any Crucible content. Co-op mode, Boon Ascension, and Talent Tracks are all considered core features that come with either DLC.
Yes. To start a Co-op match in Standard, Conqueror, or Custom Mode with a second player in the lobby, both players must own the respective DLC for the selected mission.
When you queue for Co-op quick match you’ll first select a difficulty level and a match will only be made with other players who are searching for the same difficulty. Using the mission preference system you can down-vote up to 3 missions. You must own either Raiders of the North or Dynasties of the East to be able to enter the quick match queue, however, you will be able to match into any mission. You’ll be less likely to match into a mission if you don’t own the respective DLC, but in favor of keeping matchmaking times short we don’t prevent this entirely.
Quick match is only available in Standard Mode. To play in either Conqueror or Custom Mode you must have a second player in your lobby.
Yes. All of your progression earned in Solo mode carries directly into Co-op and vice versa.
No. You will have unique times and scores for your achievements as a Solo player which are separate from your records in Co-op mode.
We’re adding a second tier to every Boon in the game, this upgrade permanently increases that Boon’s power level. Boons can be ascended using Perk points at any time. As a bonus reward for completing any Civilization Talent Track you can also ascend a Boon without spending any Perk Points. Boons which previously had an upgraded version that could be obtained as a separate Boon in-game, such as Heavy Charge → Overwhelming Charge have been reworked into ascended versions of the base Boon.
Each Civilization has a bespoke talent track available in the Crucible’s Advancement Menu. Whenever you earn perk points with a civ inside Crucible, progress is made along that civ’s track. Each level of the track offers Crucible specific buffs for that civilization and culminates in a Boon Ascension token.
Yes. In Crucible missions trade is enabled between players from Age I with no requirement for a market. Mongol stone restrictions still apply.
No. There are a number of Boons which are only shown to you when they are applicable. Stone Sentinels only works in the Thunder and Trumpets mission so you’ll only see it there. Similarly Handy Cannons cannot be shown to a Knights Templar player as that civilization does not have access to Handcannons. Keep this in mind when using your Boon Vetoes.
Nololo. We made the decision early on to disable all sources of unit conversion for balance reasons.
Become an Age Insider!
Insiders unlock access to exclusive news, updates, and opportunities to provide feedback about future releases. Here are some of the perks:
Access to private forums where you can interact with Age developers
The chance to join exclusive beta opportunities through Steam and the Windows Store
Channels to provide feedback and inspire quality changes in your favorite Age titles
