UD/Cleric Build Help Age 61

[IngolfTheWanderer]

gonna go UD/Cleric next age. any build suggestions? thanks in advance folks

[noobium]

step 1: be tactician or warrior instead

step 2: TTTTGGGGGGGG and stables maybe. raze the stables once ponies are out to build something you really want.

step 1 is optional but highly recommended.

[IngolfTheWanderer]

i am going Cleric because my KD had issues with long wars last age when we mostly had UD/warriors. hence going cleric for more sustain....

[Milkman]

You got already -50% offensive combat losses.You already have spec conversion to elites. Why add even more sustain? Better focus on economy and peasant management. Add some prov's who can keep their peasants, cast ToG and send aid to the attackers. That might be a better course then adding more sustain on a race that already has the most sustain of all attackers. In long wars the side with the most peasants wins :P

[crease]

You got already -50% offensive combat losses.You already have spec conversion to elites. Why add even more sustain? Better focus on economy and peasant management. Add some prov's who can keep their peasants, cast ToG and send aid to the attackers. That might be a better course then adding more sustain on a race that already has the most sustain of all attackers. In long wars the side with the most peasants wins :P

prolly cause his kd got smashed all at home repeatedly and dont have the activity to play tact.

[tetley]

20% TG
15% Rax (based on activity)
20% GS
15% WTs
10% Towers
10% Guilds
8% Stables
2% Dungeons

Is probably what I would run.

[The Real Bonny]

You got already -50% offensive combat losses.You already have spec conversion to elites. Why add even more sustain? Better focus on economy and peasant management. Add some prov's who can keep their peasants, cast ToG and send aid to the attackers. That might be a better course then adding more sustain on a race that already has the most sustain of all attackers. In long wars the side with the most peasants wins :P

Spot on, play tact and probably run 10% Hospitals and after 24 hours war you get a -25% mil losses as well to stack for your defensive troops, as too many modifiers on losses with offense become really negligible on offense using cleric.

[StratOcastle]

People always recommend the most efficient rout and it doesn't always work because everyone else is doing it. Cleric as a difference maker is in it's sustain. Sustain in this case is nw retention.

~ oh, let me insert the obligatory: anyone can be chained. So we can continue... ~

When I play cleric, applied to elf or undead, my focus is on occupying a nw area that allows me to feed enemy attackers down to our chained while using my leftovers to reinforce the gap. Though enemy chainies can hit up it still doesn't carry the authority of a max attack. This also opens them to our chained for max gains.
If you can establish a gap, you offer a refuge for chained provinces to climb and recover. Meanwhile you have opened a nw gap that can result in ' chain stalling '. That is: the bigger provinces above your nw under duress have a landing pad. If an effort is made to hit selected nw differences the ability to chain is diminished and your kingdom has a platform to attack enemy UB.
If you looked at AMA initial ' deal break ' wave vs CR you would've seen a classic model. Though I suspect their tactics are far more advanced it serves notice that the nw middle of AMA was occupied by elves(50% losses). Their first stike was to force CR elves to the bottom. I could go on about the fact that it was diplo not combat that stopped this machine....

[IngolfTheWanderer]

Thanks Strat0castle and tetley. you guys gave me the info and advice that i was hoping for! the rest of you, i came here honestly asking for help on how to build UD/Cleric and you guys just tell me to do something else, next time maybe if you don't have any suggestions that pertain to the original question don't respond?

[topsy's revenge]

Seeing as age 61 hasn't started yet and thus you haven't picked cleric yet suggesting tact over cleric isn't a bad idea. This is compounded by the fact that you gave no situation that you need the build for. UD in general is more static than other choices but situation still matters qutie a bit. Tetley's is in general pretty solid, although i personally don't like stables(but rob ponies might not be as much of an issue for your kd). Id put the stables in homes(or 5% into rax if you have the activity for that)

[IngolfTheWanderer]

The Situation is this: My KD went 4/5 most of this age then lost our last 2 wars. one went for over a week IRL and even though we were winning we had to WD the other we got obliterated (like -11.6k acres in 48 hours). therefore next age my KD is going for heavy sustain for long wars while staying UD Heavy Attacker core so we have the ability to hit hard but still have at least half our Heavy Attackers as UD/Cleric for the sustain for long wars. My KD is quite active and in the last 2 ages have had moments in the top 10 warring KD's multiple times, though no EOA crowns. We win most of our wars at min time and want to learn as a KD how to win longer wars.

[noobium]

The problem with Cleric attacker is that the major threat to attackers is overpopulation, t/m ops, and bloating to a size where their offense is useless, not their offensive combat losses.
The same is true with Undead in general. -50% off losses is less important to Undead than Plague and needing no food. Also their overall military strength is higher than Orcs due to their spellbook, the aforementioned need of no food, and an extra point of defense on their elites.

Most people pick Cleric (and Undead) so they don't have to build hospitals, which frees up land for other uses. Stacking the losses mods of Undead and Cleric does make sense for this purpose as well, since Undead by itself would probably still consider hospitals. Tactician and Warrior are still better though.

You said you were "winning" when in reality you most likely fell into the standard trap of having bloated attackers and not eliminating t/m threats. Cleric will not help you prevent that. The only way to stop that from happening is to have better ops defense or to kill the t/ms faster.

That said UD/Cleric is fine and the standard Undead builds as mentioned above work. I would prefer overbuilding Training Grounds to 25-30%, so that your province can take in significant acres and still have a substantial OME mod.

[Milkman]

It is pretty much what noobium says. Sustain does not contribute that much for long wars. Long wars are settled by the side that can grow into their captured acres the best. T/M are the ones who's job it is to prefent the enemy to exploit the acres they gained. If you have no way to combat T/M effectively your attackers might not be able to do anything with the acres they gained. I am not saying that cleric is a wrong choice but it does not compensate for what i think makes your kd lose long wars. As far as builds go. Being cleric you don't need hospitals. Put that extra 10% in gs, wt or banks. It depends on the situation. Lots of enemy halfers go extra watchtowers. A big t/m that needs to be broken? Extra tg might help. Facing orcs? More gs. Be fluent with your build and adapt to tge situation.

[StratOcastle]

My triad is hospitals gs rax for undead cleric, no hospitals for elf. I often get flack for my builds until proven in war. What goes unmentioned is that hospitals work for offense and defense. I'm not saying this is better, but I've accrued enough wars to support my style.
I fully agree handling t/m is paramount to undead success for lack of defense. I support integrated cores of cleric, tac and warrior because they each serve a vital interest. Warrior aimed at breaking UB, tac for intel and speed for opportunity. Let me stop here because the other little dirty secret that hurts army in/out is the use of 'campers' that strike predictable enemy movement. So tac isn't simply volume attack, the speed gets you in position for attacks of opportunity. I prefer dwarf tac for camper because it can camp due to Mystic Aura use by an active.
Warrior bonus works both high and low for gains so it's a great finisher. Warrior thus can increase the nw envelope. Cleric is your head-to-head combatant that can both absorb and distribute punishment. Built properly it retains it's position. Cleric is not the glory hound, you are the grunt that establishes a bridgehead. My key here is to have gs that hold acres to retain the dspecs that are suffer low loss due to hospitals. My use of rax is only part of my strategy of relaying taps in 3-4 hour intervals. This is dependent on ops clearance. Continuous acres coming in and a perpetual motion in troop deployment. This requires hyperactivity so I don't recommend it as a kingdom system. You must be prepared to fully deploy at the first hint of chaining.

[IngolfTheWanderer]

Thx Strat0castle. your advice is exactly the info i was looking for once again.