Faery growth

[kit]

I have never played faery tm, thus I have a question regarding the most efficient growth strategy. I am mainly interested in what is more efficient/cheap at the different sizes (I mention different sizes, because I know that the explore formula is not linear, as it gets more expensive to explore the bigger you get).
1. Explore, and use mana for ToG.
or
2. Use mana for Dice and train all the drafted soldiers.

I would really appreciate some math backing the theories up, and people mentioning their previous experiences.
Thanks.

[marve]

In protection and oop, id do two large explores, each of at least 150 acres and tog your money. After that, id start dcing.

[Talaren]

Dice -> RtV -> Leets

[Bishop]

after 1.8-2k acres with some sci you can dice, build and train military with your normal income. Before that you may need to supplement with tog.

[knucksicus]

agree with bishop