Maybe because most of them actually are chill dads! See this one of the top posts by score on r/aoe2 https://www.reddit.com/r/aoe2/s/X7TgxJetMp
I am a chill dad and I rediscovered aoe2 a few months ago, after being addicted to Age of Mythology. Previously it was Songs of Syx, Foundation, Farthest Frontier... I think we're just a different type of gamers.
I'm not in the scene, but I used to love Age of Mythology - is the AoM scene as big, or as AoE2 become the sort of de facto classic Age of Empires game now?