Gaia

From GenieWiki

Gaia is a special civilization that includes most of the natural elements including scenery (e.g. cliffs) and animals (e.g. lions).

Gaia units in AoE and AoK can have several purposes. Their primary use is for nature (hence the name), as trees, resources, and animals (lions, gazelles, birds, crocodiles, and elephants in AoE; wolves, birds, deer, wild boar, jaguars, and javelinas in AoK) are almost always Gaia units. An interesting property of other GAIA units (such as standard buildings, military units, and civilian units) is that they are converted upon entering a player's line of sight.

The GAIA player cannot be disabled in the scenario editor. It is the ninth player in the scenario file, but is referred to as player 0 in triggers.

Playing as Gaia

Gaia cannot be played by a human player in a scenario (without a cheat). To play as Gaia in Age of Empires the cheat Gaia is used, while in Age of Kings the player must type Natural wonders. Playing as Gaia gives the player a unique experience because of the very different gameplay mechanics involved, and is a window into the special properties of the Gaia civilization. By playing as Gaia or using triggers unusual events not normally possible can also be seen, for example tasking a deer in AoK to attack another unit results in it changing in appearance to a gazelle from AoE. It is not possible to win when playing as Gaia, so use in scenario design is very limited. Victory to any non-Gaia player or players will always defeat the Gaia player, and victory cannot even be awarded via triggers. There is also no way to toggle the cheat on/off, so any possibility of having a Gaia cameo role is also ruled out.