Repro:
Select a Villager, press shift and build a Town Center.
Hold the shift key and try to put the Town Center foundation into the Settlement under construction once again. You get back the cost of the Town Center.
Video:
3 Likes
This bug is also related to the Town Center can not be finished problem:
and build too slow bugs:
If someone use this exploit, the construction speed ignores all newly added villagers and after you remove the originals, it also ignores them and the Town Center will never be finished.
Al misteries have been solved. Great. 
Please do something about it developersā¦ people is starting to abuse this, game is becoming unplayable. I donāt want to see my favorite game dying. none of us
2 Likes
Game Version: 2.8.5288199
Issue: Free town Center
Town Centers can be created for free, you use the resources to build it, then you get the resources back by performing the following steps, this can be done in single mode and also online.
Reproduction Steps:
- Pres Shift and hold it until the last step
- Start the construction of the TC .
- Once the construction have started, place the TC shadow over the construction and left click.
- Release the shift button.
Here is an example in an online game
2 Likes
Good news I think I have figured out a fix! I will fully confirm and release some sort of patch for it if possible.
3 Likes
Here is my first attempt. There is a problem with the behaviour of TC when getting damaged while building but otherwise almost works: https://1drv.ms/u/s!AvsfU0aCtYnZkltNowlQh0WSW6FJ?e=EXrOHo
2 Likes
There is one problem with this fix: unfinished Town Centers increase the population cap.
Oooh interesting - that does make things more difficult (Not impossible - I can think of ways around it). I probably need to look at a new avenue for a fix though.
1 Like
is this fix only available for Voobly version?
Men you too are doing the work of the gods.
No it will only work on the EE version - I use some commands that donāt exist in voobly version and the āfixā is not one I can port over in its current version for now. As there are some problems with this fix I will revisit it again at some point if there is sufficient interest in getting a workaround and I get any particular new good ideas. If anyone knows a way to detect a player dropping a TC plot on a settlement then I know how to do a proper working fix (On detecting a placed TC simply boot the player out of build mode - this completely fixes the issue with the small negative that you cannot shift place multiple TCs). Unfortunately dropping a TC plot does not generate a unit or increment the ānext unit nameā so cannot use that as a detector but there might be some kb command or something I missed that would work - thereās definitely something that detects it as game forbids dropping a second one if it is your first.
2 Likes
OMG, you can really save the game.
What is it that you need? what can a simple mortal can do to help u?
Basically need to figure a way to detect when a player places a TC so I can apply the fix of booting a player out of build mode. (I donāt count hotkeys as a valid means because they can be remapped)
Annoyingly for everything BUT TC I can detect when someone places it because it generates a new object - the building plot that I can detect.
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People are really abusing this and ruining online experience =(
Please, do something, guys!!
1 Like
No, shell out $30 for a Definitive Edition that will be coming out half baked next year, all after the severely dodgy launch of AoEIV.
Just wanted to say back when someone told me about this and we tested it, I found the result that you canāt fully build it fully and itās useless. Iād imagine almost everyone would just do this and itād be a lot worse if it did work.
Probably good programming ensures it doesnāt work. The āfree settlementā will be stuck as unbuildable by the amount of build points that you built on the initial settlement, so no matter if you timed it to be like 0.5, or 0.9 points built or such a value that may appear as 0 healthpoints after hitting it once, the 1st one will be required to have some building points, and the 2nd settlement will end up unbuildable and incomplete by that amount. e.g. at like 2099/2100 health, & you will have to delete and entirely redo it, spending the res anyway, gaining no pop/resource from it, as well as lost time attempting itā¦ Again I think if it was doable itād be much bigger of a problem but Iām surprised not one person pointed out that it simply doesnāt work.
Same with that ārepair lureā poseidon glitch (which was patched anyway). Was it a major problem while it was literally in the game for 10+ years? Not really, because getting a lure that stays alive (it has some tiny amount of health lol), or only gets damaged by an enemy slightly, would be near impossible. If it happened like once it was not really notable, you could just note their absurdly high score, leave the game, or do something else.
Both are bugs where this one would probably cost you the game if you tried it, and other one was nearly impossible even if you knew/planned to do it (and was also patched). Thus even if left how it is, not really a bug that should be prioritized over crashes or something else. I only write this because no one actually pointed out that it doesnāt work or they put all those video/work, but didnāt actually try it once.
Feel free to prove me wrong tho with a full video of you winning a game using this.
āOnce you get your resources back, the construction speed ignores all of the newly added villagers. If you remove all of the original builders, like I did in the video, the Town Center will never be finished.ā
Yeah itās not 100% reliable, your villagers canāt be interrupted during the building process. ALT+S (stand ground stance) hotkey on Villagers helps to avoid this problem.
Lure bug was EE exclusive. 2014-2019. It became widely known in early 2018. Many players used it online. Watch:
He is a top player and involved in the official 2.7-8 patches. What he did in the video? He deleted his own TC to counter the Lure hack. And you say it was useless, okā¦ 
I really just sighed out loud rn.
Your video is outdated, useless, and at least proves what I already said (even considering that thing is patched).
So why you are posting something that was āfixedā or āimpossible/rare/hard to doā anyway? The whole point was that no one pointed it out that itās hard to replicate, hasnāt rly broken the game at all, nor has been a big deal. If they do finally fix bugs, Iām sure it will be something easy to fix as well. Ohmy, how has the game functioned for almost ~20 yrs now with this glaring bug? The reason is itās not as āhugeā as thought.
The game functioned between 2002 and 2014 with this glaring bug:
Infinite Shades. Still works on Gameranger. Donāt be surprised.
I know. That was a point I already made, whether the glitch is there or not, itās usually not a big issue