Favor

“	Favor is granted by the gods and is used to train myth units and research mythological improvements.	”
—In-game description

Favor is a resource exclusive to Age of Mythology and Age of Empires: Mythologies and is a measure of the civilization's standing with its chosen god. Favor is used to train myth units, research myth technologies, reuse god powers that have previously been used, and build a few buildings such as Wonders. Greeks and Atlanteans also use favor to create hero units.

In the original game, favor has a maximum resource limit of 100, or 200 for Greeks worshiping Zeus. In Retold, favor no longer has a limit. Favor is the only resource in the game, and one of few in the series, that cannot be tributed to other players. Each civilization has a different way of gaining the favor of their gods. The symbol for favor is a lightning bolt.

Greeks

Greek Villagers praying at a Temple

Greeks earn favor by praying to their gods. They do this simply by sending their Villagers to a Temple. The first Villager praying generates 6.0 favor per minute. The more Villagers pray, the more favor is earned, though this is on a scale of diminishing returns. Most of the time, having more than 8 Villagers praying is excessive.

The Greeks therefore gather favor like they do other resources. This method is far more flexible than the other civilizations' methods, is safe, consumes no resources, and can be used to get the fastest favor generation rates – if the player is willing to commit that many Villagers. On the other hand, praying ties up Villagers that could be used on other tasks.

For more details, see this section on the Villager page.

Egyptians

The Egyptians honor their gods by building Monuments. Once it is built, a Monument provides a continuous stream of favor for as long as it stands. Egyptians can build five Monuments. They cost increasing amounts of food and gold and must be built in this order.

Number	Icon		Name	Food and Gold cost	Build time (seconds)	Hit points	Favor generation per minute
	Retold	Original
1			Monument to Villagers	50	26.67	450	6.6
2			Monument to Soldiers	100	40	450	6.6
3			Monument to Priests	150	53.33	450	6.6
4			Monument to Pharaohs	200	66.67	450	6.6
5			Monument to Gods	700	80	800	13.2

The Egyptians must invest resources and villager time (and Laborers are notoriously slow at building) to generate favor. Once they have done so, however, they are guaranteed a steady stream of favor, unless their town is ransacked.

Monuments can also be empowered by the Pharaoh (and Priests under Ra) to further boost favor generation.

Norse

• Retold
• Before Retold

The Norse gain favor while engaging in combat. The generation system in Retold is very different from the original game. Instead of favor bounties depending on each individual target, the favor generation rate depends on the attacker and the amount of damage they have dealt, as well as multipliers of the combat favor rate for certain targets.

Like in the original, the trainable Norse heroes, i.e. Hersir and Godi, also trickle 0.01 favor per second simply by existing. The myth technology Hammer of Thunder granted by Thor doubles the Hersir's passive generation to 0.02 favor per second.

Attacks from different unit types generate favor at different rates:

• Human soldiers, Heroes, Gatherers, and Dwarves: 1 per 80 damage dealt.
• Ships: 1 per 160 damage dealt.
• Odin's Great Hall units (Hersir, Jarls, Godi, Raiding Cavalry): 1 per 64 damage dealt.
• Norse myth units that are trained from Temples and Docks, as well as the Nidhogg: 1 per 160 damage dealt.

Buildings, unmentioned units (Walking Woods, Fimbulwinter Wolves), and damage dealt by god powers do not generate any favor.

Certain target types also have their own multipliers when damaged:

• Huntables - animals that contain food (does not include Serpents, even though villagers use bows against them): 2×
• Herdable animals: 10×
• Chickens ("NonConvertableHerdable"): 10×
• Buildings that shoot (Sentry Towers do not count until upgraded): 0.5×
• Wall pieces and Gates: 0×
• Other buildings: 0.1×

Additionally, once 100 total favor from combat has been gathered, the rate of gain begins to slow down. This reduction increases linearly between 100 and 300 total favor gathered, reducing the rate to 0.5x upon gathering 300 favor from combat. This reduction happens regardless of whether the gained favor was spent or left in the stockpile. This reduction applies only to favor gain from combat.

The Norse please their gods by proving their prowess and honor in battle. They gain favor by causing damage to all units and all buildings except Walls. Each unit and building has a set total amount of favor that it can earn, and each blow dealt by a human or hero unit earns a fraction of this total amount, proportional to the percentage of damage dealt. The following bounties are for standard game units, as of the latest version of the Extended Edition:

• 100 - Wonders, Titans, and Titan Gates
• 4.32 - All buildings not listed
• 2.5 - Centimanus
• 2.16 - House, Drop-off buildings, Farm, myth units, heroes, Sentinel.
• 1.44 - Predators and huntable animals which fight back, strong Animals of Set (Hyena, Hippo, Rhino, Crocodile), Golden Lions.
• 1.08 - Obelisk. Human units, Siege weapons, Ships, various minor Myth Units.
• 0.48 - Weak Animals of Set (Gazelle, Ape, Giraffe), other animals, Dryad, Militia, Relic Monkeys.
• 0 - Serpent (only land Serpents), Walls, Gates, Chicken, and Ducks.

Various Norse units have bounty multipliers which leads to earning different amounts of total favor from the stated bounty amount of the same target:

• Longboat - 2.5×
• Hersir - 2×
• All human units (including Gatherer and Dwarf), Hero of Ragnarok, siege weapons (Portable Ram and Ballista) - 1.1×
• Other warships (Dragon Ship and Dreki) - 1.0×

Hersirs also passively generate a trickle of favor from the Classical Age onwards – 0.6 favor per minute per Hersir – just by existing. Additionally, animals are worth favor, so workers gain a small amount of favor from doing damage to them, i.e. hunting. The player's myth units can never earn favor.

To generate the most total favor, it is ideal to use Longboats (on water) and Hersirs (on land) rather than other units. To gain favor faster, it is better to use Hersirs and target enemy units or buildings with the highest favor to hit points ratio. The armor ratings of the target should also be taken into account, as the faster the player's units damage it, the faster its bounty is realized. Buildings should be attacked with siege units to gain favor from them faster, and with Hersirs to gain more total favor, but at a much slower rate.

Like with the Atlanteans, earning favor for the Norse is tied to strategy. If they do not fight, it is very difficult for the Norse to gain favor. This means that an attacking strategy that starts with raiding is practically imperative for Norse players. Fortunately, their bonuses and options are oriented towards aggression, and the more favor-generating units there are engaging the enemy, the faster favor is generated. Norse favor soars in a pitched battle.

Atlanteans

• Retold
• The Titans

The Atlantean favor generation is done by Oracles, which are created from the Temple with a build limit of 10. Each Oracle contributes a small amount of favor passively, which increases based on how far the Oracle's Line of Sight extends, from a minimum of 0.6 favor per minute up to maximum of approximately 3.4 favor per minute, increased to 4.8 favor per minute if the Oracle is upgraded to a hero. However, if the vision of two or more Oracles is overlapping, the overlapped area will only provide favor from one of them. A circle surrounds every Oracle when one is selected which shows their vision and favor-gathering influence.

Atlanteans who worship Rheia and research the Horns of Consecration technology are also able to gain favor passively through Town Centers at a rate of 3 favor per minute per Town Center.

The Atlanteans gain favor passively over time from their Town Centers. Each Atlantean Town Center contributes a continuous stream of favor for as long as it stands. The first Town Center generates 5.4 favor per minute, with subsequent ones generating 6.7 favor per minute. To facilitate the Atlanteans' favor gathering, they are able to build Town Centers earlier, in the Archaic Age. The favor generation can be increased by 20% by researching Horns of Consecration.

Chinese

The Chinese gain favor by building Gardens, with Nü Wa offering faster generation rate. The more Gardens a player controls, the more favor they earn. The first Garden built costs 35 food, 35 wood, 35 gold, the second costs 50 food, 50 wood, 50 gold and every garden built afterwards costs 75 food, 75 wood, 75 gold even if the first two built are destroyed. Fu Xi's gardens cost -20% wood, Nü Wa get +20% favor generation bonuses, and minor god Dabo Gong's myth technology House Altars also gives +20% generation rate for all resources, including favor.

Each Garden provides a continuous trickle of 2.85 favor per minute. The Gardens can also gather other resources. However, all of them must produce the same resource - changing the resource trickle on one Garden will change the production on all Gardens.

Comparison

• Retold
• Before Retold

Civilization	Resource generator	God	Pre-requisite	Rate/min
Egyptians	Monument to Villagers	All		6.6
	Monument to Soldiers			6.6
	Monument to Priests			6.6
	Monument to Pharaohs			6.6
	Monument to Gods			13.2
	Monument to Villagers	Nephthys	Necropolis	8.25
	Monument to Soldiers			8.25
	Monument to Priests			8.25
	Monument to Pharaohs			8.25
	Monument to Gods			16.5
Norse	Godi	All		0.6
	Hersir			0.6
		Thor	Hammer of Thunder	1.2
Atlanteans	Oracle	All		0.6 – 3.4 (since Retold)
	Oracle (Hero)			1.2 – 4.92 (since Retold)
	Oracle	Theia	Prophetic Sight	0.66 – 3.74 (since Retold)
	Oracle (Hero)			1.32 – 5.41 (since Retold)
	Oracle	Oranos		0.6 – 4.38 (since Retold)
	Oracle (Hero)			1.2 – 6.16 (since Retold)
	Oracle	Theia with Oranos	Prophetic Sight	0.66 – 4.82 (since Retold)
	Oracle (Hero)			1.32 – 6.78 (since Retold)
	Oracle	Leto	Perception	[What?] – [What?] (since Retold)
	Oracle (Hero)			[What?] – [What?] (since Retold)
	Town Center	All		6.3 (before Retold)
		Rheia	Horns of Consecration	3
Chinese	Garden	All		3
		Nü Wa		3.6
		Dabo Gong	House Altars	3.6
		Dabo Gong with Nü Wa	House Altars	4.2
	N/A	He Bo	Sacrifices	6
Relic	N/A	N/A	Ankh of Ra	3
	Town Center Village Center		Rheia's Crown	0.6

• Greek - Zeus: 6 Villagers praying generate about 28 favor per minute, 10 Villagers generate about 35 favor per minute.
• Greek - Poseidon or Hades: 6 Villagers generate about 23 favor per minute, 10 Villagers generate about 29 favor per minute.
• Egyptians: With all 5 monuments built, Egyptians get favor at rate of 28.6 per minute.
• Atlanteans: 3 Town Centers generate 18.80 favor per minute, 4 Town Centers generate 25.5 per minute.
• Chinese - Nüwa: With all 10 gardens built and the Dabo Gong or He Bo favor generation technology researched, favor generation is 39.9 per minute.
• Chinese - Fu Xi or Shennong: With all 10 gardens built and Dabo Gong or He Bo favor generation technology researched, favor generation is 34.2 per minute.
• Chinese - Fu Xi or Shennong: With all 10 gardens built, but without any upgrades, favor generation is 28.5 per minute.

Monuments vs Gardens cost comparison

Objects	Favor per minute	Total cost	Total build time	Total hit points
Monument 1:	6.0	50 food, 50 gold	20	450
2 gardens:	5.7	85 food, 85 wood, 85 gold	66	800
Monuments 1+2:	10.9	150 food, 150 gold	50	1,090
4 gardens:	11.4	235 food, 235 wood, 235 gold	132	1,600
Monuments 1+2+3:	16.0	350 food, 350 gold	100	2,050
6 gardens:	17.1	385 food, 385 wood, 385 gold	198	2,400
Monuments 1+2+3+4:	21.7	650 food, 650 gold	160	3,650
8 gardens:	22.8	535 food, 535 wood, 535 gold	264	3,200
Monuments 1+2+3+4+5:	28.6	1050 food, 1050 gold	240	6,050
10 gardens:	28.5	685 food, 685 wood, 685 gold	330	4,000

Gallery

Standard favor counter in the original game

Favor beyond 100, when worshiping Zeus, in the original game