An honest discussion about the use of Homes

[goodz]

Yep... artisan is terrbile

Homes are not great in 90% of scenarios, when they are used generally you only need 10-15%

[vines]

Keep tell yourself home are no good. I reather you not use them. However, if you want to have an edge use my strategy. As for the question about when does a Artisan have better population than a shepherd, the answers is a Artisan always has a better population per acre as long as the artisan uses 10% more homes. For example, say a shepherd province is 400 acres with 10k population and using 10% homes that spepherd gets an extra 420 population. Now say there is a Artisan province with the same land, same population, and 10% homes that Artisan gets an extra 448 population. I got this number by doing the fallowing: 40(ten% of 400) * 11.2(the # of people one home add for an Artisan) = 448 As you can see the artisan has the edge in population per acre.

This forum is the best place to get your info if you want to learn how to play the way the best play. You will come across a lot from people trying to disprove the Vines Strategy, however, these people are less player or they have no clue what the rules of the game are. If you want good advice, know that, my posts are the first place you should at after you have looked at the game guild.

[Palem]

For example, say a shepherd province is 400 acres with 10k population and using 10% homes that spepherd gets an extra 420 population. Now say there is a Artisan province with the same land, same population, and 10% homes that Artisan gets an extra 448 population.

Well there's yer problem...

[gojete]

vines i have run 80% houses myself or so. I have achieved ubber numbers of opa , dpa and tpa, i think i had a 60 dpa army out with 90 opa and 4 raw tpa or something, i cant really remember.I didnt even know that you existed when i did this so you dont go saying that i stole your strat. I just thought about it by doing calculations and came up that max draft and pop from homes would give the highest dpa opa and tpa ever possible , higher than with any other strat.


Once i had those numbers, i could not do a steady growth, it seems to me that it was a good static strat, like for a t/m , , but once one wants to grow, damn. Elites are really expensive , i did not even have farms or towers or banks, all my resrouces came from plundering as an avian warrior and high tpa i could steal most things yes, but plundering money after 100k networth is really hard to do. Most people dont have more than 400,000 gc anymore.
Now you are speaking with a person that has done over : So i mean business.
Total Attacks Made 267
Total Wins 254

And so one wastes all the stealth into scanning for plunder targets, there is not enough left for stealing.
I have scanned the world over 3 times this age already. kingdom by kingdom

I did not try using 70% homes and 30% armouries though, maybe that way.but my attack times would be reduced.

With 80% homes i could reach over 200 opa if all elites.

Anyway, right now im filling up my dungeons ive got 20% already, i need a higher tpa so that no one releases my prisioners, in my pipe dreams i wished to have a province of 50% dungeons 50% libraries, or 30% dungeons 30% libraries 30% homes and 10% guilds for a 95% draft or something.
I wonder if anyone has ever tried this things.
I can do this things because i like trying it all, even if it doesnt work it does not matter , i keep attacking the same in or out of war, i just dont want to play like everyone else , and it seems that there are more than 1 way of being succesful in this game.

[VT2]

The n00b is strong in this one.

[DHaran]

Enough with the trolling, multi.

[ittlecas]

I dont know if dragon is still reading this thread but I just stumbled on it and I think I may be the one that was in his kd last age and running 40% homes, and never even knew I started this debate til now :)
Anyways, I just wanted to show my basic math as to why I liked homes and I didnt go to the total-vines strat (as balance is needed according to my numbers). I am also ignoring the BR bonus as its just icing on the cake:

Example prov has 1000 acres (25ppa or 25000 pezzies), no sci for simplicity but as its already been stated; more sci = greater effects for homes
1% homes = 80 more pop and reduce the jobs by 250 (reduce the jobs means I can put more pezzies to troops or workers without hurting BE [which has also been proven to be bad by ragnarok) for a total of 330 more people that I can use however I want:
as workers they = additional 743 income; or as def units = 1650 def (1320 for orcs and 1980 in the case of humans); or as elites (total off depends on the race 7 offense is about middle ground or 2310 offense)

All other buildings are assuming 0 homes and 50% draft (total 12500 pezzies and 12500 troops; the higher the draft the worse the numbers get as BE is affected more and more) AND I'M GIVING YOU 100% BE although anybody but dwarves will be at less than 100%.
1% banks = 250 gc + 1.25% income (approx 373 gc) = 623 gc
1% stables = 600 horses (600 offense) [a plus of horses is that they dont increase wages but its very little in wages, a minus of horses is that they dont defend ambushes either]
1% forts = 1.5% more def (if 100% troops are in def units we get 938 defense while elites, thieves, and mages reduce the total def bonus)
1% TGs = 1.5% more off (if 100% troops are elites and we go with the x7 average we get 1313 offense)
1% dungeons = max 200 prisioners = 100 gc and and 600 offense
1% arms = just use the power tools in angel and you'll see that arms are almost never better than banks which we've already seen are worse than homes
1% hospitals = -3% losses. At this size an attack may average around 600 fatalities on an attack. So 1% hospitals will save 18 lives. If those are all elites it will cost about 12,600 gc. If the homes are used to generate income, they will pay to retrain the troops in about 17 hours. If they are all off specs, homes will pay for them in 7 hours. Your playing style will decide if its worth it on this. But then, who doesnt get 12k gc every hour!?
1% TDs = 3% more to TPA. If you have a 10 TPA, to exaggerate, this will mean you get the equivalent of 300 thieves (remember homes is 330 extra units)
No other building can be compared to homes as the advantage cannot be simulated with more population. *Additional comment is that homes+buildings are better yet so I'm not saying building are worthless*


Now lets look at practical examples with an attempt to pump military def (def spec 5):
40% homes and 0% forts
Max pop = 28,200
Jobs = 15,000 and we must put 10050 pezzies to work so as not to affect BE which means we have a possibility of
22.6k income with 18,150 in military, thieves and mages. But we'll throw them all into def for referance giving you 91k Def - BEST DEF
OR
15,000 pezzies working for 34k income and leaving 13200 in def specs giving you 66k Def (Still 100% BE with lots of extra workers)

30% homes and 10% forts
Max pop = 27,400
Jobs = 17,500 and we must put 11,725 pezzies to work so as not to affect BE which means we have a possibility of
26k income with 15,675 in military, thieves and mages. But we'll throw them all into def for referance giving you 89k Def
OR
17,500 pezzies working for 39k income and leaving 9900 in def specs giving you 56k Def - BEST INCOME

0% homes and 40% forts
Max pop = 25,000
Jobs = 25,000 and we must put 16,750 pezzies to work so as not to affect BE which means we have a possibility of
36k income with 8,250 def specs or 56k Def (40% forts will give about 36% bonus at 100% BE)
OR
we put the same 10050 pezzies working for 22k income, drop the BE to 60% and now the 14,950 def specs give you 90k def (less than 40% homes gave you plus your other 60% of building are now hurting due to the BE)

Conclusion: Look at the 3 options closely. If you want max income, the 30% homes are better than 40% or 0% homes (for even better income you just drop your draft and true max income is 0 homes and to have all pezzies working but you'll have no military at all). If you want max military, the 40% is better than 30% or 0% but you'll lose a bit of income. As you increase the % of homes above 40%, your max military will continue to increase but your income will continue to decrease. If you could pillage and thieve all your gc, well more homes are better. But if you want to be self-reliant for gc, somewhere between 30 and 40% is the sweet spot, balance with more military and more income for all races and all personalities.


On all these numbers, you have to remember that as you increase the % of most buildings, its effective bonus per % drops ... except with homes. So the numbers get worse as you increase the percentages. Also, the homes increase flexability. I can easily choose more income, more offense or more defense with the troops I train or dont train since all my bonus off/def is in the troops and not in the buildings (which would have to be razed and rebuilt as banks/TGs/forts).

In a recent war, I was hit with tornados taking out 30% of my buildings, meteors, fireballs gallore, and chastity. I was lucky to get rid of the chastity and I was able to bounce back in 1 day. But I do see how fireballs and chastity are the 2x WAMMY which would REALLY hurt anybody!
What I would like somebody to expain a little is why 0 pezzies are worse for a high-homes strat than a 0 homes strat. Neither produce income and both will take forever to come back from as pezzie growth (with or without high BR) is almost null (200% BR on 0 pezzies is still 0 births). And yea I realize 0 pezzies = o pezzie death so dont flame me on it .. its an exageration. I also realize that the 0 homes player will still get his bonus from his buildings, although it will drop as BR drops with no workers, but the high-homes player also gets his bonus from still having a really large army and as BE drops, his bonus will NOT be affected. Only when the high-homes players loses a lot of troops to attacks, thats when he does loses his bonus.
Also I dont understand the complaint that a high-homes player will suffer from greed and riots. I find that inspire army almost totally off-sets greed and riots do almost nothing to me. I ignore them as they have no major effect on me. Also the increased military wages is negligable (I remember somebody did the math in this thread but I cant find it really quick. What ragnarok has already proved though is that homes = more income. a small increased wages makes little difference).
The last question that I would pose is about arson and greater arson. Would the high-homes player be more volunerable to arson? This is a much more common and easier thief task and if a high-homes player suddenly lost just his homes to arson what would be the effect? (sudden overpop I would think)

I also realize what others are saying about homes being worthless in war as I have been switching from homes to other buildings once war starts (as you get hit and gain acres you build other things in stead of homes) but the bonus of high-homes to start the war is that your BE is better going in and your new buildings will be more effective with this high BE than if you already have a bad BE and just getting worse during the war. Also a high-homes player starts a war with TONS more troops than the 0 homes player so when he converts buildings, his massive army becomes that much MORE massive (if it were a static prov, this would be a problem as your BE would drop like a rock as excessive draft becomes a problem but since your in war, you can expect lots of dead solders and keep the draft % at your max for an effective prov). IMO but not that it matters much ...

PS - I didnt post a lot of the math as I'm lazy and if you want to punch holes in my unconfirmed logic, well feel free. But the fact is that I'm presenting my strat and the benifit of homes vs other buildings where ragnarok already did the hard math of the benifit of homes on BE and income. I also have an excel spreadsheet which allows me to adjust numbers on the prov and see overall advantages and disadvanges based on the formulas here and the wiki and otherwise so I dont accually do all the math, I let the machine do it and the machine tells me homes are good up to a point.

[gojete]

God it will take me 2 days to read all that, i quick red it anyway and remembered my initial home calculations from last age:

I did hours of calculations too, my goal was to get good at math once more, i did not expect to get addicted to utopia again..., god damned utopia sucking my life once more!...

Anyway my final numbers at 1000 were something like this.

At 1000 acres with 100% homes =
35,000 pop
If all elites 35,000 4 generals 200% wages = 335000 mod offense=335 opa
Or as i hoped to do:

10,000 arpies , 50,000 raw dpa, army out
4,000 thieves raw 4 tpa
4,000 wizards raw 4 wpa
17,000 drakes 148,240 mod off with 4 generals 148 opa
5 peasants, thats me and my 4 fine women. and i would consider having a barman, a cook and all that too. all female, im sorry if theres any feminist here, i just love women ,im sorry for being a pig and all that.

You can move the numbers however you want, 100% homes is the most ubber strat there is. I dare you to reach this numbers with anything else (maybe 100% dungeons) .

Its all about the simplicity of not having to calculate for bonuses of other buildings, i also found out the uselesness of horses, and that many buildings are more for the sake of fantasy and roleplaying environment than for actual use.

I dont know what nw i would have at 1000 acres but it might be over 220 or 240, if you add a 10% pop and building sciences, 50% thievery and 50% magic, the numbers will just pop out the chart.
This is ,an, in theory, invincible province,

The problem would be that , once built, which really is the easiest part, how to mantain it? and can it grow? theivery and plunders for resources? maybe a growth of 2.5% per utopian month? attacking only conquests so as not to get too fat?

In any case, this was my dream province. I wish i could build it, or someone else to try it out. I ran out of invites and its very hard to convince any of my provinces into trying it out since we are focused in killing.

If anyone is up for it, we could figure out a way to try the project.
I am very worried because my kingdom wants wars and I, on the other hand ,want to try weird builds. Ive already done my share of succesfull warfare and monarchy in previous ages. I would like to spend my time doing research instead of war related activities which are way too time consuming.

I am up for forming a new test lab kingdom but we would all have to try and do build strats, there would be no " we are bored we want to war" " i want to grow and be the biggest province because of a size ego trip" or " i want to make it to the top charts" or "i need to , i need to i need to whatever" there would be no other needs than those of testing weird builds that no one else dares to try. And once we have our dream provinces, can they actually work? keep a steady growth?

I know a way of getting unlimited money too. My kingdom is now fully focused in warring and destroying the enemy, All our unlimited money ,we use for funding dragons one after another and destroying other kds. Remember its called the OGT BANKING STRAT so that you remember the name once everyone starts using it. I came up with it first.

we could also form an alliance where since i already got a killing machine kingdom, yours could do the testing and we cover your back ?

[VT2]

Stop stealing my thun- vines' thunder, I mean.

[Palem]

5 peasants...
This is ,an, in theory, invincible province

Made my day =]

[DHaran]

VT2 stop trolling with multi accounts, it's not even funny, it's just lame. All you deserve is an IP ban. Even if it ain't VT2, gojete is still a troll, and you guys should stop feeding him.

[Dragons Mate]

At least we don't have Vines and this new guy collaborating together to come up with rediculous strats!

[Ethan]

ittlecas - Shortest rebuttal ever: NW

Everyone keeps focusing on OPA and DPA, but those are "fake" values when it comes to gains - the people your "size" are the same NW, not the same land. So you need to compare DPNW, not DPA.
Also - max BE isn't good. Spoken from someone who had argued it was for a long time - if your "raw" BE is over 95%, it is too high, you should draft more. Run the numbers (hold income constant by adding banks stolen from the homes/forts) and you'll see, even for DPNW, that this is true. (It is even more true for DPA, since higher draft increases NW.)
BTW, a raw BE of <80% for non-dwarf also isn't smart, as now it *is* too low. There is such thing as too much draft, it just happens at higher DR than 100% BE.

[DHaran]

For the love of god, stop feeding them!

[goodz]

@vines 8 People extra per home on a shep so 10% homes at 400 means 40 homes...

Shepard:
((10000+(40*8))*1.1= 11352 pop
Artisan:
((10000+(40*8*1.4)= 10448

Artisan is miles behind....

@ 100% homes 400 acres:
artisan total pop:
14480
Shepard total pop:
14520

It never gets higher population... math wins