“ | Artillery that fires an exploding shell at buildings or ships. | ” |
—In-game description |
The Morutaru (Japanese: モルタル, katakana for "mortar") is an artillery unit in Age of Empires III: The Asian Dynasties that is unique to the Japanese and can be trained at the Castle once the Industrial Age is reached, and by Shogun Tokugawa. It is the Japanese version of the Mortar.
Overview[]
Compared with the Mortar, Morutaru are slightly cheaper and take up 1 less population per unit. They also cause less siege damage, have less hit points and move slower than Mortars when in Limber mode, but faster when in Bombard mode. Just like Mortars, they are extremely potent long range siege and anti-warship units.
Much like Flaming Arrows, they have almost no set-up time and can hit-and-run ships, or snipe buildings and retreat quickly.
Since an update in Knights of the Mediterranean, Morutaru can attack enemy land units, especially effective against massed infantry. Attack range against land units is shorter than the building attack range.
With the Morutaru Range card, Morutaru acquire an amazing 44 range (and 48 Line of Sight). The only Mortar that beats its range is the Portuguese one, with 48 range and 52 Line of Sight.
Upgrades[]
Morutarus automatically get +0.75x multiplier against Walls in the Industrial Age*.
Age | Upgrade | Cost | Effect |
---|---|---|---|
Honored Morutaru | 250 food 250 wood |
Upgrades Morutaru to Honored (+25% hit points and attack) | |
Exalted Morutaru | 1,000 wood 1,000 coin |
Upgrades Morutaru to Exalted (+50% hit points and attack); requires Honored Morutaru |
Further statistics[]
As Morutaru are unique to the Japanese, only technologies that they have access to are shown in the following table:
Unit strengths and weaknesses | |
---|---|
Strong vs. | Buildings, ships, infantry |
Weak vs. | Arrow Knights, cavalry, artillery especially Culverins |
Improvements | |
Hit points | Professional Gunners (+10%) Tar Kilns (+5%) |
Attack | Smokeless Powder (+5%) Heated Shot (+50% multiplier vs. ships) Somali Ajuran Engineers (+20% multiplier vs. Frontier fortification) |
Line of Sight | Gunner's Quadrant (+6) Town Watch (+3) |
Speed | Trunion (+15%) Apache Endurance (+5%) |
Train time | Immigrants (-10%) |
Cost | Mapuche Ad-mapu (-10% coin cost) Golden Liberty (-5% coin cost) |
Other | Meritocracy (-20% upgrade cost) |
Home City Cards[]
As Morutaru are unique to the Japanese, only their cards and other civilizations' TEAM cards are shown in the following tables:
- Click for a list of Home City Cards related to the Morutaru
Some cards are highlighted with: | |
Green | TEAM Shipment that is sent to each player in a team |
Red | Shipment that can be sent twice |
Blue | Shipment that arrives fast (5 seconds) |
Chinese[]
Card | Description | Age |
---|---|---|
TEAM Engineering School | Artillery, Fixed Gun, Siege Elephant, Flamethrower, Ram, Mantlet, and Haudenosaunee Mantlet train time -15%; Heavy Cannon, Great Bombard, Rocket, Flying Crow, and Gatling Camel train time -5% |
Dutch[]
Card | Description | Age |
---|---|---|
TEAM Coehorn Mortars | Mortars, Hand Mortars, Morutaru, Consulate Mortars, Grenadiers' Mortar attack, and Sebastopol Mortars get +20% attack |
Indians[]
Card | Description | Age |
---|---|---|
TEAM Shivaji's Tactics | All units get +5% hit points and attack |
Japanese[]
Card | Description | Age |
---|---|---|
TEAM Odzutsu Mortars | Artillery get +10% attack; Samurai replace a building attack with a hand mortar attack with a range of 12 and get +2 Line of Sight; Incendiary Grenades can be researched at the Golden Pavilion | |
3 Morutarus | Ships 3 Morutaru | |
4 Morutarus | Ships 4 Morutaru | |
Morutaru Range | Morutaru get +10% attack, +4 Line of Sight and Bombard attack range, and +2 Barrage attack range | |
TEAM Sengoku | Unit upgrades cost -20% | |
Bakufu | Daimyo and Shogun Tokugawa get +5% speed, +10 Line of Sight and train units 15% faster; land military unit train time -20%, artillery and banner army train time -10% instead |
Maltese[]
Card | Description | Age |
---|---|---|
TEAM Knights of the Round Table | Ships 1 Hospitaller for each Town Center owned by the player; all units get +2% hit points |
Mexicans[]
Card | Description | Age |
---|---|---|
TEAM Mariachi | For the next 30 seconds, military buildings work 400% faster and units get +10% speed |
Spanish[]
Card | Description | Age |
---|---|---|
TEAM Spanish Inquisition | Ships 1 Inquisitor; all units get +10 Line of Sight |
Chinese[]
Card | Description | Age | HC level |
---|---|---|---|
TEAM Engineering School | Abus Gun, Grenadier, Culverin, Falconet, Mortar, Organ Gun, Mantlet, Ram, Light Cannon, Petard, Horse Artillery, Siege Elephant, Morutaru, Flaming Arrow, Hand Mortar, and Flamethrower train time -30%; Heavy Cannon, Great Bombard, Rocket, and Flying Crow train time -5% | 25 |
Dutch[]
Card | Description | Age | HC level |
---|---|---|---|
TEAM Coehorn Mortars | Mortars, Hand Mortars, Morutaru, and Consulate Mortars get +20% attack | 1 |
Europeans[]
Card | Description | Age | HC level |
---|---|---|---|
TEAM Artillery Hitpoints | Artillery, Abus Guns, and Grenadiers get +15% hit points | 10 |
- "TEAM Artillery Hitpoints" is available to the Ottomans and Portuguese.
Indians[]
Card | Description | Age | HC level |
---|---|---|---|
TEAM Shivaji's Tactics | All units get +5% hit points and attack | 25 |
Japanese[]
Card | Description | Age | HC level |
---|---|---|---|
3 Morutarus | Ships 3 Morutaru | 1 | |
4 Morutarus | Ships 4 Morutaru | 10 | |
Morutaru Range | Morutaru get +10% attack, +6 Line of Sight and range | 25 | |
TEAM Cheaper Unit Upgrades | Unit upgrades cost -20% | 1 | |
Bakufu | Daimyo and Shogun Tokugawa get +10% speed, +20 Line of Sight and train units 100% faster | 10 |
Spanish[]
Card | Description | Age | HC level |
---|---|---|---|
TEAM Inquisition | All units get +10 Line of Sight | 10 |
Changelog[]
The Asian Dynasties[]
- Morutarus cannot attack land units.
Knights of the Mediterranean[]
- With update 13.58326, Morutarus can attack land units with the Barrage attack and the Bombard attack has a ×1.25 multiplier against Walls in the Fortress Age, which is increased to ×2.0 upon reaching the Industrial Age.
History[]
“ | In the late sixteenth century, when armies of Japan returned from their military campaigns on the Korean peninsula, they brought with them many lessons in siege acquired from their sophisticated Korean enemy. Unfortunately, use of the mortar, a military art that the Koreans had perfected, was something in which the Japanese did not appear interested. They continued their usual practice of importing European cannons. However, in 1639 the Japanese played host to visiting Dutch advisors who demonstrated a mortar for the Shogun and his representatives. The demonstration caused an uproar even though not one shell fired hit its intended target. | ” |