Did you know that there are more than 45+ commanders to choose and play with in Rise of Kingdoms?
As a free-to-play player, it can be a lot of commanders to work with. Which is why we created a commander guide to teach new players like you how to pick the best starting commanders to play with.
Each civilization comes with an epic commander and they all have their own strengths and weaknesses.
Some commanders excel at defending your cities, while some are good at gathering resources and some are great at conquering your enemies.
Depending on your gameplay and strategy, you might want to be careful with which starting epic commander you want to start with. Because that epic commander you will start with is the one that you will invest in the long term.
Without further ado, here’s how to pick the best starting commanders in Rise of Kingdoms based on your gameplay and strategy.
Best Starting Commanders in Rise of Kingdoms
In Rise of Kingdoms, there are 11 starting commanders to choose from based on which civilization you want to play with.
It is important that you look at each civilization’s traits and decide if the starting commander associated with it is what you want to focus as your main commander.
Below is a list of the starting commanders in Rise of Kingdoms:
- Baibars
- Belisarius
- Boudica
- Eulji
- Herman
- Joan of Arc
- Kusunoki
- Pelagius
- Osman I
- Scipio Africanus
- Sun Tzu
Baibars
Baibars is the starting commander for Arabia and one of the most powerful offensive commanders who specializes with cavalry troops.
His active skill deals splash damage upwards to five targets and does a moderate amount of damage. Additionally, they slow down the enemy’s movement which turns them into an easy prey.
Baibars also give major attack, defense and march speed when stacking cavalry troops only. His talent build also can be used to further increase the march speed of troops and to increase damage against garrisons.
It’s easy to see why Baibars is the most favorable starting epic commander for players who want to be able to maximize damage and speed. Although defense is what he lacks.
Belisarius
Belisarius is a solid barbarian hunter commander who excels at dealing extra damage towards barbarian and neutral units. If you are looking for a good starting commander to level up quickly, Belisarius is the best pick.
Why? Because his talent build gives bonus experience whenever you kill barbarians that makes the whole leveling phase easy to do so. And if you pair a secondary commander with Belisarius, both will get boosted experience.
Belisarius isn’t great against players due to relatively low damage. Also most of his skills and talent points are focused on mobility, which makes him a good pick for blitzkrieg attack.
Boudica
Boudica is another stellar peacekeeping commander who also does extra damage towards barbarian. Unlike Belisarius, Boudica excels at leading multiple troops.
She also gives increased experience gain and does a moderate amount of damage with her active skill that reduces the target’s attack by 25% and removes 100 rage from the enemy’s rage bar.
One of her passive skill grants her troops a chance to restore heals and rage, which makes it very likely for her to cast active skill more often.
Boudica is the starting commander for Britain and is one of the best choices for both PvP and PvE due to the chance to deal 150% increased damage.
Eulji
If you prefer to play with infantry troops, Eulji Mundeok is the right commander to pick with and he excels at defending your city.
Eulji Mundeok is the starting commander for Korea and comes with a defensive skill set that bolsters infantry troops’ attack and defense by 15%. His active skill reduces the enemy target’s defense by 30% — a decent drop.
Not only that, troops under Eulji’s leadership also have a small chance to deal 100% increased damage. Which makes Eulji a formidable garrison commander to protect your city as he gains an additional 5% defense bonus.
Hermann
Hermann is the starting commander for Germany and one of the best silencers in Rise of Kingdoms due to his active skill which prevents your enemies from activating their active skill.
Despite the fact that Germany is a cavalry civilization, Hermann is still a popular choice for defending your cities and stacks well with archers.
There are some commanders who have powerful nuking capabilities in Rise of Kingdoms and only a few can disable them like Hermann.
You can easily disable enemy nukers by doing Hermann + Boudica duo since they stand to gain from increased rage generation to be able to maintain high silence uptime and work together well.
Joan of Arc
If you prefer to focus on progression, i.e upgrading your buildings, training troops, and researching technologies. You will need a lot of resources to be able to sustain your city.
Which is why Joan of Arc is the best starting commander for gathering due to her strong gathering talent tree. She gets a 25% gathering boost that cuts down the time to bring resources to your city.
Not only is she amazing for bringing in resources, she is great for PvP battle due to her active skill.
All troops will get a massive 30% bonus in attack, defense and health. If you max Joan of Arc out, she gets 25% increased normal attack and generates 50 rage per second for 4 seconds after using her active skill.
To get Joan of Arc as your starting commander, you will have to pick France.
Kusunoki
Another good garrison commander to pick is Kusunoki who is great at dealing damage to multiple targets and works well with archers.
His active skill is already strong and goes upwards to 550 per target. His troops also will have a chance to deal another 900 damage to the target (450 per second) for 2 seconds.
If you stack archers only under Kusunoki’s leadership then they all get 15% attack and defense bonus. On the battlefield he is great.
But if you have him as your garrison commander whenever someone attacks your city, then he will counter 7% of the incoming attack. A solid defensive commander for starting players who pick Japan.
Pelagius
Some players would prefer to stick purely to cavalry. Luckily there is a defensive commander who specializes in cavalry and that is Pelagius.
He is the starting commander for Spain that excels at providing defense and health bonus to the cavalry troops under his leadership, yet a popular commander among Rise of Kingdoms players.
Here’s why: his active skill deals 600 initial damage and 300 damage afterwards. Plus it restores 100 rage which allows him to use his active skill more often.
Plus, one of his passive skills has no timer restriction on healing. Which means his troops can heal back-to-back that improves his army’s ability to endure long battles.
If you max Pelagius out, then the cavalry troops will get a 15% boost to both attack and defense.
Osman I
Sometimes a commander that does direct damage is great to have. Osman I is one of the starting commanders for Ottoman that does a serious amount of direct damage with his active skill.
Unlike other commanders, Osman I is great at conquering your enemy cities and works well with all troops. He is able to lead 10% more troops.
If you command him to attack a city and when the battle lasts for more than 30 seconds, then all of the troops under his leadership will go into berserk mode, increasing the damage done by 15%.
Scipio Africanus
Scipio Africanus is the starting commander for players who pick Rome as their civilization in Rise of Kingdoms. This epic commander plays the game a bit differently.
Since his active skill doesn’t do any damage at all, all of the damage is done directly by the troops. Which means Scipio Africanus actively buffs his troops and weakens the enemy’s defense to do more damage.
Just like Osman I, Scipio Africanus leads 10% more troops which will benefit a lot from buffs and debuffs on the enemies.
Sun Tzu
One of the most popular starting epic commanders in Rise of Kingdoms is Sun Tzu. You can get him if you pick China as your starting civilization.
Sun Tzu is the best commander and works well with a lot of other commanders, including legendary. That’s because of his passive skill that increases the damage of active skill.
His active skill hits up to 5 targets and does a moderate amount of damage. But with the 20% active skill damage bonus, it further increases his overall damage done.
Plus, his passive skill increases other commanders who already do serious amounts of damage with their active skill allowing players to deliver even more devastating blows. Which is why Sun Tzu is a very popular commander to play.
Conclusion
Now you know which commanders are the best and how to invest them right. You can start leading your armies to glorious victory.
If you are looking for more useful guides and tips to dominate your enemies with ease. House of Kingdoms is the biggest Rise of Kingdoms guide that covers extensively on everything.