Dwarf High Homes/BE strategy

[Bukharistan]

Only works if you have a broad dwarf core that all run it. The idea is that you maximize/snowball your BE bonus by running high basic BE.

Dwarf/Merchant

Late to mid-age strategy, assuming 10% pop sci and 14% BE sci, 70% food sci. Baron Rank

1. Homes: 400 (40%)
2. Farms: 50 (5%)
3. Training Grounds: 150 (15%)
4. Forts: 60 (6%)
5. Guard Stations: 80 (8%)
6. Hospitals: 80 (8%)
7. Guilds: 70 (7%)
8. Towers: 40 (4%)
9. Watch Towers: 70 (7%)

** Effects Summary (Available Buildings Only) **
1. +4,000 maximum population, +100% birth rate
2. Produce 5,180 bushels (6,475 with FL)
3. +28.3% offense bonus
4. +12.52% defense bonus
5. -21.79% losses when attacked
6. 21.79% cure plague, -32.68% military losses
7. Training about 4.14 wizards per hour
8. Produce 710 runes per hour
9. Thieves: 19.27% catch, -28.9% damage

Population:
(25+4)*1.1*1.02 = 32,5
10 peasants (10 NW)
3.5 wpa (17.5 NW)
2 tpa (10 NW)
7 def specs/acre (28 NW)
10 elites/acre (50 NW)

(could choose to run lower wpa/tpa for 100+ opa.)

Numbers:
35 dpa
87 opa

With this build at 10 peasants/acre you will have 100*1.3*1.14 = 148% BE.
With most other attackers on the server running 75% BE, you will need only half the buildings they run for the same advantages.

NPA:
115.5 (military/wizz)
55 (buildings)
10 (science)
180.5 Total

Advantages:
1. High income before war.
2. Very hard to control peasants because of the high wpa and +100% Birthrate + LP.
3. Huge sustain because of being to ToG with high income during war. Can also keep the dragons coming.
4. High draft during war.

Disadvantages:
1. Gold dragon (have to kill it very fast)
2. Chastity (but hard to keep up for long)
3. Relatively high NPA


Yes, it can be beaten (as any strategy can), but I think most KDs would struggle keeping down such amounts of peasants. You could also decide to run 3.5 tpa instead of 3.5 wpa and just kidnapp them back from enemy attackers.

[TommyB]

With most other attackers on the server running 75% BE, you will need only half the buildings they run for the same advantages.

That's not exactly how it works (15% of a building on 150% BE is significantly better than 30% at 75% BE). DBE.

1. +4,000 maximum population, +100% birth rate

BR from homes is actually capped at +75% ingame.. angel got it wrong in this case.

OK that's all, please carry on. :)

[Palem]

Oh god no...I thought this battle was over :(

[Persain]

Numbers:
35 dpa
87 opa

With this build at 10 peasants/acre you will have 100*1.3*1.14 = 148% BE.
With most other attackers on the server running 75% BE, you will need only half the buildings they run for the same advantages.

and orc/undead attackers will be on 4 peasents/acre and runing closer to 110 opa. Im not gonna argue against the homes build because it ends up being pointless (usually homes on attackers wide spread like that is a BAD idea) but if your going to do it draft down to 3-4 peasents/acre and run 16+ leet/acre. you'll be ALOT better off.

[noobium]

Homes on Dwarf (going into war) can work because dwarf can freebuild and replace the homes rather cheap when they need to. It's not the best build for starting hostile at that moment, it's what the homes so 24-48 hours after hostile starts as new buildings comes in and BE rises from new peasants. The homes also what would be built for pumping (in fact the homes you have in homes-heavy are usually left over from pumps.

Don't worry about BE at war start ffs. BE rises quickly during war (really quickly with 40% homes) unless province is peasant-controlled. Would crank up the draft rate. Play with low draft when pumping science, raise draft when going to warar.

[Thunder TA]

Vines all over again

[crease]

Vines all over again

ikr, take the worst nwpa prov, stick on some homes and dont draft any more troops and call it a strat.

[noobium]

fwiw - if you're operating homes-heavy on dwarf, you should still look at getting high training grounds (20-25%) if you are going to war. example:

30% homes
25% tg
10% guilds
5% towers
10% farms

leaving 20% for anything else you want, and using some tg/tower/farm/home land to build 10% stables (to be razed and replaced with your actual buildings 14h later). most likely that would be 10% wt/td and 10% barracks. it is possible to pick other buildings to emphasize with the homes, but the training grounds will be the most useful if immediately going on the offensive.

If I were doing this I'd prefer to pick Cleric, so that hospitals are not a mandatory building. Even with Cleric it is likely that some hospitals are desired for hostile, so you would have to pull acres from something. I wouldn't want anything less than 15% TG, and 25% TG is better for maximizing offense.

The homes are not the most powerful building for static purposes, but they are flexible if planning to shift between waving and pumping, and decent enough to fight with. Just have a plan in place to replace those homes with other buildings if you have to go to war, and reap the benefits of higher raw military/acre and the BE bump. The BE bump means that you should all jobs filled within 24-36 hours and rising BE as war progresses.
If you planned your eowcf well, you should come out of the cf/fort with maxed out building efficiency already, or close to it. BE will fall, but incoming acres and peasants should limit the BE drop. Then, in a long war you should have the benefits of maxed out building efficiency and whatever buildings you picked for your incoming acres.

It is possible to utilize lower percentages of homes and get some benefit out of them (on dwarf), but the longterm effects of BE manipulation are far less apparent as homes% drops. That is what is important - not the static resting-point BE from homes, but the adjustments to BE as acres are swapped, buildings rotated, and peasants are gained. Fewer homes (or no homes) means this happens later.
This effect is not perfect, as depopulation strategies will kill the homes advantage. You are banking on being able to avoid depopulation, or better yet be a decent enough thief to kidnap back peasants in such an event.

[crease]

theres no need to go over 18-20% of any building for a dwarf, with 40-50% homes no matter how deep you draft you will be sat on 110BE and 20% gs provides -35% losses and 20% TG's 26% offense, hosps -53%


not that im advocating use of homes in such numbers

[noobium]

Like I said, it's really situational. It makes sense to go with 30% homes or so if planning to gain acres as soon as pump ends, and planning to go back to pump once attacking for acres is done. In any event, the homes only work if the medium- and long-term plans for the kingdom coincide with using homes, and using them either means forsaking most defensive buildings or building few tg in the short term. They work okay if declaring war, but there has to be a firm understanding of what to build on incoming acres in order for the plan to work.

My estimates with homes+heavy TG and swapped stables put a decent Dwarf with 115-120 mOPA on Noble Lady rank, and relatively small sci modifiers. (I assumed +9% housing and +15% tools). The OPA rises quite a bit with BE tweaking, up to 130+ (with 3:2 elites:defspec army ratio, lots of dwarves might go for higher than that).

Bear in mind that the birthrates from homes can be a double-edged sword, as the extra peasants will not be secure against kidnap or landgrabs. That is a pretty big knock against using homes.

[noobium]

another note - when building tgs it is helpful to account for incoming acres. Overbuilding TGs means being able to prioritize a different building on incoming, without waiting for new TGs to accomodate new acres. I like 25-30% tg, which turn to 12.5-15% after doubling size - still a pretty good offense mod, while being able to build the incoming as economic or defensive buildings. defensive and econ buildings work so much better later in war rather than at war start. For dwarf this is particularly useful due to the BE boost and inability to rushbuild.

[tetley]

as long as you are razing the damn homes out and your new buildings are in before you hit or get hit, yes this is fine good. Otherwise this sucks.
Homes as part of a static build on attackers sucks

[DDodge]

Fascinating thread and strategy. A good provocative read

[octobrev]

as long as you are razing the damn homes out and your new buildings are in before you hit or get hit, yes this is fine good. Otherwise this sucks.
Homes as part of a static build on attackers sucks

^this

[noobium]

from the rough calcs i did, it should be possible to raze from 60homes to 30homes, just narrowly avoiding overpop, while maintaining maximized BE when your new acres come in. this is a pretty useful way to do a ghetto homespump with minimal effort, with the intention of transitioning those 30homes to stuff that is more useful down the road. peasants/acre would rest at around 3-4ish (effectively 0-1 pez/acre if the homes were removed). end result i got was 15.5 epa w/4 mounts/acre (this can be increased) and 7.6667 dspa, 145.5% OME when tg arrive, 141 mod opa w/o gens to open hostile.

considering that dwarves can set this up relatively cheaply, that's pretty useful. this accounted for 10% rax/gs/wt each and 2 tpa 2 wpa, 10% pop bonus and noble lady rank.

because of the remaining 30% homes, BE fluctations require fewer peasants, so it does not take long to be back on the positive end of the BE curve. razing the homes early just means losing too many peasants and tanking economy too early.

if the plan fails and the dwarf is stuck in quagmire, the homes aren't all bad for the same reason - less peasant growth needed for a greater BE fluctuation, and the homes are useful if the dwarf must return to pumping.