Beginner's Guide

Hegemony III: Clash of the Ancients takes place in the Apennine Peninsula (location of the modern day nation of Italy) in Europe. Players may expand their realm over the Apennine Peninsula and unite the different cultures in the area. This page contains a beginner's guide with first steps and some references to video providing more advanced tips.

Before Starting the Game
Set the difficulty to "novice" if you are new to the game and just want to learn the mechanics to avoid frustration while learning.

For your first campaign carefully consider your Starting Position. You want to pick an easy faction. Tip: Rome is not an easy faction.

Turn on the Tutorial for extra tips how to navigate the interface and play game mechanics.

There is an in-game help function in the menu where you can look things up. With F1 you can (always) get context-sensitive help.

Pay attention to the Loading Screen Tips. They tend to be helpful, especially if you are new to the game.

Save often (you can use F5) - the unforseen will happen, decimate your armies and leave you watching in horror as unseen enemies descend upon your unprotected borders stealing away your prized cities.

The pause button is your friend, wars on many fronts are common in this game and pausing lets you issue the orders you want in battles you can't watch.

Playing the Game
You have a starting city, and maybe some starting units as well. There are also bridges and camps: Bridges allow you to cross rivers, while Camps allow you to establish a forward place for your units to stay and provide you with more vision. There are various building upgrades for your cities, forts and bridges, such as Walls, Watchtower and Market.

Your 4 primary resources are Food, Gold, Wood and Recruits. There are various assets which you can capture using your units, in order to gain more of these resources. Wood is very important in the early game because you need to upgrade your buildings. Food, however, is the most important resource throughout the game: Without food your units will do badly, without food your cities will riot.

You select units/cities/etc. using the left mouse button. Clicking on a target object using the right mouse button then will bring up a control wheel from which you can choose the appropriate action (if there are more than one possible). This way you can e.g. connect a city to a ressource building or order a unit to capture a brigdehead.

Little by little while creating new units and by capturing assets and other cities, you try to expand your empire in order to establish your hegemony. You can get an overview of your assets in the asset list.

In sandbox mode as well as in campaigns, there are various random or scripted objectives which reward you well, when you complete them.

A Quicky on Battles & Warfare
Keep your troops well stocked with food - otherwise their morale will suffer. Morale is the key to winning fights, one unit can take on five if their morale is better.

Watch those flanks, your units morale will plummet if they are succesfully flanked for an extended period of time.

Intel is the key to victory, always scout out your target cities before considering invasion to be sure that you have ample forces to win the battle.

Retreat is a very valid tactic, if you can't win the battle don't be afraid to fall back. Nothing will be gained if your troops are slaughtered, you might also possibly pull your enemies into a trap if they chase you into your territory.

Tips for a better Economy

 * Tips for a better Economy

Tips for Warfare

 * Tips for Combat and Warfare