To improve game play we have introduced some basic rules to our games.

1. No castle pushing before 35mins

This means that you are not allowed to build a castle in your opponent’s base that will impact on his economy. Having this rule means you will not kill off a lesser opponent with the use of only 650 stone a bit of gold and wood. This rule is more meant to give lesser players the chance to get a good econ and get into the game. The reason that flushing is allowed is because people that will flush somebody in a 4vs4 are very vulnerable to a teammate of the flushed player showing up with a few knights. With a castle drop however you can still seriously hurt somebody his economy while not being at a big risk yourself. You are using buildings to fight a war, instead of spending precious resources during feudal in a flush. A main example would be a Frank doing a 15-16min castle and sending 15-20 vills over to drop a castle covering the main gold stone and wood economy of an opponent. The Franks villagers can then start mining / lumbering under the protection of the castle while a onager starts pounding the opponent his TC. A lot of people will say that you should just make sure you have enough troops ready to counter such a move. In a game with people of an equal skill level this could be a valid argument. However as skill levels within _StaR_ are from rookie to good inter it is not justifyable and a castle drop could ruin the whole game.

2. No Bombard Tower Push

This means that you are not allowed to advance your way into an opponent's base by just building overlapping bombard towers. Although this is not the same as a castle push (for a start you can't do it until you reach imperial) we have come to regard this tactic as unacceptable in our games. However, if you are one of the fortunate few who get bombard towers, you can use them to defend your own base.

3. Random Civs, Random Map

Playing with _StaR_ you will soon become a multi civilisation / multi map player and know the pre and cons of all civilisations and maps in the game. Although this might seem very hard for some rookies, you will learn very quickly, and be competitive no matter what civilisation or map you play. We believe that we should get the most out of this game. Playing rated you often will see games on Arabia or Green Arabia, played by people that have specialised in one civ and one map. Unfortunately this leads to a very specific game play that does not allow you to explore all facets of this great game.