| “ | Start atop a hill with scarce resources and venture into the valley to uncover valuable deposits. Be cautious, however; your enemies seek the same treasures. | ” |
| —In-game description | ||
Himeyama is a random map in Age of Empires IV: The Sultans Ascend. It is an open map with relatively sparse resources where each player begins atop of a hill and a single pond lies in the center.
Features[]
The defining terrain on Himeyama are the hills on which each player spawns that surround a single pond in a depression in the center of the map. The pond is small and only contains a few Shoreline Fish, so while building a dock can bring food in the early game, the fish deplete quickly and do not offer the same returns as on other hybrid maps with more water. Two highly contestable Sacred Sites spawn on opposite sides of the pond at varying distances from it. Four Trade Posts spawn in team games, with one in each corner, but in 1 vs 1 there are only two, and their placement is less ideal, almost always offset significantly from the corners. Relics can spawn anywhere on the map except for on the starting player hills.
Resources[]
Resources on Himeyama are relatively sparse, which is somewhat compensated by the slightly greater amount of nearby resources on the starting hills. Players' hills start with two medium Berry Bush patches, two Small Gold Mines, two Small Stone Outcroppings, and 4 small circular woodlines. However, not all of these are within range of the starting Town Center, and the hills are wide open and hard to close off with walls, so these resources are not necessarily all safe. The remaining large berry patch per player, standard Deer and Boar spawns, and Small Gold Mines and Stone Outcroppings are distributed around the map. There are no Large Gold Mines or Stone Outcroppings, so the total amound of gold and stone is less than average. Wood is quite sparse in the middle of the map, and mostly distributed irregularly around the edges. The number of Shore Fish in the small pond in the center does not scale proportionally with the amount of players, so their potential payout per player decreases as team sizes increase.
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