Age of Mythology Retold: Immortal Pillars DLC review — Age of dragons

Immortal Pillars is the first DLC for Age of Mythology: Retold and reintroduces the Chinese pantheon to the game. The three Chinese gods blend new defensive options with powerful myth units and blessings. I gave all three of the returning gods a try and they all feel quite powerful. If you played the original game, you’ll notice that the Chinese gods have been completely reworked. 

The Chinese have a special worker called a Kuafu that harvests wood and gold faster than normal, as well as constructs buildings faster. The Kuafu have excellent potential for an early game economy advantage, but the high favor cost offsets the advantage. You’ll have to decide if the economic advantage is worth a slower start on myth units or using blessings.

Depending on the gods you choose, there are several distinct play styles. Infantry-focused builds with lightning weapons and significantly sped-up upgrades can dominate large battles. For those more defensively inclined, arrow towers can be added to walls and even army buildings. Long-range siege weapons will still be a problem, but for the early and mid game, towers and walls can be a pretty viable defense. There is also a raiding playstyle that awards resources for destroyed enemy buildings, which can be a risky but interesting way to maintain your economy with less population taken up by workers. 

The myth units and heroes are the most exciting aspect of the Chinese. The basic hero unit, the Pioneer, is a scout that is great in the early game and can send out a lantern for safe scouting into the enemy base. As you advance, there are powerful creatures and units to take advantage of depending on the gods you choose. The Sage can heal and temporarily convert enemies to your side. Jiang Ziya nerfs enemy units. Abilities like leaping to the backline to take out critical support units can be incredibly impactful in a fight. Taotie can consume enemies to grow larger and more powerful with each kill. Finally, we have dragons. Besides the obvious cool factor, the elemental abilities of the dragons (and phoenix) are amazingly powerful and look amazing in-game.

Immortal Pillars brings the same polish to the Chinese faction that Retold did for the base game. Everything has been updated both graphically and mechanically for game balance. The Chinese are powerful, but may be a bit more advanced to get the most impact out of. Favor is quite slow to earn and requires extensive expansion to build up. Myth units are very powerful but expensive. There are quite a few god abilities and upgrades that require focus and good micro abilities to time correctly and get the most out of them. They are fun to play but will require time to master. The care that has gone into this new edition of the classic game is evident. They could have easily resold us the same package with some shiny new graphics, but instead they have taken the time to completely overhaul the Chinese gods. Immortal Pillars is clearly the work of true fans of the game and not some nostalgia cash grab.  If you are a fan of Age of Mythology, this DLC is a no-brainer. It’s just more of a good thing.