Best Build for Undead/Tactician

[p0tentialdang3r]

I am looking for information on what the best build would be for an Undead/Tactician in times of war and out of war... My current build didn't really seem to benefit me during my kingdoms first war and I haven't played this game in 5+ years so any help would be appreciated. My current build is below. My banks are so high because I figured you would always need gc.

1. Homes: 84 (9.9%)
2. Banks: 168 (19.9%)
3. Training Grounds: 60 (7.1%)
4. Armouries: 68 (8.0%)
5. Barracks: 77 (9.1%)
6. Forts: 50 (5.9%)
7. Guard Stations: 42 (5.0%)
8. Guilds: 86 (10.2%)
9. Towers: 75 (8.9%)
10. Thieves' Dens: 42 (5.0%)
11. Watch Towers: 42 (5.0%)
12. Stables: 42 (5.0%)

Again any help would be appreciated. Thank you in advance.

[Topsy]

It's in part situational, but in almost every sitation your going to wnt to remove homes, forts, armories, nad NORMALLY td(if you are facing a core with under half your tpa you can throw those in). You can also go lower bans(10-15 should do), guilds(7-8 should do), and towers(5% or something shuld do) normally. If you think your going to get hit go much much higher gs(although running a decent amount of gs is good idea for all core anywase) and run higher tg in almost any situation. I'd also run 1-2% dungeons. Haven't really looked to see how stables are on the new look undeads.

[nooblet]

Don't need armories as undead... hospitals are better...
Homes suck on heavy attacker...

Forts aren't bad if you have enough defense to prevent someone from making an extra hit on your province during war, aside from that they're a waste of space.

[Uhm hoi]

I find hospitals to be not that effective either for the undead tactician. Your immune to the plague and already have 50% less offensive losses. When you keep attacking heavily you get enough spec training points to completely replenish your army, except when you get chained, but hospitals don't work against that either. Armories are fine out of war, but get rid of them when you convert to your war build. Forts are not that great, those are only good if you are trying to become unbreakable, which shouldn't be the goal for the undead tactician. I am going to stay out of the discussion about whether homes are worth it or not. You can search for the advantages and disadvantages in other threads. Personally, I don't use them. The stables, you should make more, or none. I make about 10-13% stables during build up and raze them after the first hit I make in a war. Your horses wont leave if you keep your army out 24/7. Just plan for your hits and make a new hit the moment your army returns. That way you keep your horses, but it doesn't use up any precious space in a war. Lastly I think the amount of barracks', training grounds and guard stations are very low. Also I would advice to make more watch towers.
Out of war, I would build extra banks, armouries, guilds, towers, stables, guard stations, and watch towers. It's kind of defensive, but its great for building up quickly and doing some randoms. Out of war, it's not really that big of a deal.
When getting ready for war I would go something like 15% banks, 10% guilds, 7% towers, 10% Stables, 16% training grounds, 15% barracks', 15% guard stations, 10% watch towers and 2% dungeons.
During a war I would immidiately get rid of the stables after my first hit, and construct some extra towers, training grounds and watch towers. And then anticipate on what's happening. You might need more towers for some extra fb's, you'll constantly be rebuilding TG's, Rax' and GSs... Just look at what you need, where the other kingdom's strength's and weaknesses lie, how you could best assist your KD and build accordingly.

[Zobo]

Some hospitals are necessary. They're particularly useful because they mitigate losses with a factor <1. For instance, you're in war, you get Emerald Dragon, Bribe Generals, and Pitfalls on you.

Base losses = 1*1.15*1.25*1.15 = 1.653
Base losses with 5% hospitals= 1.455

That's a 20% decrease relative to base losses, just for a couple of hospitals. 45% instead of 65% relative is pretty big.

We just got out of a war where some of our Undeads snuck in with 0% hospitals. They got shredded when they were chained (they were the first ones to get chained as well), and became spare offense hits after day 1.

[Topsy]

base losses are 7% not 15%. BG only works 1/5 the time. After 24 hours of war you ahve an extra -25% casualties.

[nooblet]

He's saying that base losses are about 65% higher than normal with all debuffs active, and thus hospitals are more useful than would be thought.

Hospitals are still good for undead even if they don't have to worry about those loss mods... even with -50% offensive losses, undead elites are expensive, and giving undead even more sustainability is a good thing despite the hospitals being less effective for offensive losses. Defensive losses still matter, and I've had no difficulty eviscerating undead/whatever with chains when they don't build hospitals.

[crease]

He's saying that base losses are about 65% higher than normal with all debuffs active, and thus hospitals are more useful than would be thought.

Hospitals are still good for undead even if they don't have to worry about those loss mods... even with -50% offensive losses, undead elites are expensive, and giving undead even more sustainability is a good thing despite the hospitals being less effective for offensive losses. Defensive losses still matter, and I've had no difficulty eviscerating undead/whatever with chains when they don't build hospitals.

undead/non-cleric is that

[Dolgil]

Just some general comments.

Either WTs or TDs, not both. As undead have no advantage in thieving, probably you want to go WTs unless you are a scout for the kd. Then maybe TDs though SoTs are not hard to get and all you need for a SoM is 10 thieves.

Same thing about forts and GS. One or the other, not both. As this is a more offense oriented game, probably the GS.

Around 13% rax will give about a 12 hour return time on non-traditional attacks, about 13.5 for traditional. Once war kicks in, about 11 hours.

As a tactician gets extra credits in war and undead get spec conversion on traditional attacks, low banks and no arms in war. Banks and arm for pumping out of war.

With land exchanges in war, you probably need to start out with 12% guilds and 8% towers as the percentage will go down. Failure on less than 10% guilds starts getting high and there never seems to be enough runes.

As for homes, these do add extra population, give you better BE, and faster birth rate. But, these do not improve a specific part of your province, just help overall.

Once in war I find that I lose many more troops to Meteor showers and night strike than I do to attacks. If you are chained down, you tend to lose the troops anyway. Out of war, one hit can be nasty for troop losses, especially if your elites are home.

[Zobo]

I'm a huge horse fan, however, they're not as useful on UD as TGs up to about 15% TGs, maybe a little less, but still, swap those Stables to TGs.

For war:
Run higher GS. 15-30%. And lower banks. 0-10%. Let the faeries and hybrids worry about money during war.

[p0tentialdang3r]

Thanks for the input. I will weigh the options carefully and make a decision based on the very valuable information provided.

[Persain]

Thanks for the input. I will weigh the options carefully and make a decision based on the very valuable information provided.

All good advise, i will give u a bit more too. If you get chained badly as in 1500->300 acres or some such, a decent concept is to build
30-40% TG
10-20% Hostpials
40% GS
up to 20% rax

ie build as many rax as allows u to still keep armies in-out, then if u just release all your def, some thieves, drop wages to 50% and then hit as much as you can you are unlikely to be knocked out of war. You should tank through anything they throw at you and be good without aid for 4-5 days. (50% wages because GBP of taking 2-3 hits every few hours will up your ME enough that wages dont matter)

[nooblet]

why bother with hospitals post-chain? they don't mod losses enough, and with so many incoming acres there is no space for too many % buildings.

i'd just go nuts with barracks, tg, gs post-chain, possibly towers if rune supply starts becoming an issue.

[Zobo]

Though I hate nooblet on most things, he's right. Post chain, just run like.. 30/30/30, TGS/Rax/GS. And go "lololol" as they hit you, forever.

[nooblet]

Yay I have a hater! I've moved up in the Utopian world. ^_^

Post-chain 20-25% of your acres will be under construction in all likelihood, so that should be kept in mind...

In any event, people in your kingdom should be able to give better building advice, as your monarch should know better how the situation immediately looks. Most of the build strats on here don't have any context, and should be taken with a huge amount of salt. Almost no quality kingdom is going to stick with a universal strat for all situations, and if they do it will usually be a quasi-rainbow build. About the only things that are consistent are:

- Run enough of certain building types to justify having them in your province at all. These are usually the buildings that reduce something, which covers a lot of buildings. 5% gs or 5% watchtowers doesn't do enough to justify having them in your province, and 5% barracks is iffy at best. Flat-rate and capacity buildings, and boosters like banks, training grounds, forts, and some other buildings are more flexible in that running small % on them is still viable.

- Training grounds are a higher priority for heavy attacker than stables, except for races with 4 point offensive units. Regardless of unit strength, your war horses ought to be modded strongly by TG anyway. You should either set aside a lot of land for TG+stables if planning to use war horses, or plan on building a lot of TG in the near future.

- Thief Dens and Watchtowers almost never mix for any province, especially with so little land devoted to either. Forts and GS usually don't go together, but there is much more benefit to combining the two if you know the hits are going to go on a province with solid defense and strong gs.

- Lots of banks aren't always the best option, but they're going to be useful in almost any situation. You should have a lower banks minimum% like 10-15%, but 20% works if you are out of war often.

- During war, you - and your whole kingdom - should focus on one or two building types with incoming acres, rather than maintaining your existing build strat. It can get messy, but executed properly this makes your province more efficient in the areas where it needs to be. This is even better if your whole kingdom is doing likewise, with most provinces building the same things and the people immediately targetted being able to build the things that are suitable for their situation.

- Always be willing to tweak a building strategy, unless there is a damn good reason to stick with something. If your monarch tells you to build gs, ffs build gs. Otherwise building strats should be seen as rough guidelines.