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Quote:
Originally Posted by LuckySports
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris121
When building a KD, recruit players based on their active hours, and then decide the roles you will all play. Having half your attackers and 2-3 TM support on the same activity schedule with the other half active together, even if it's in another window of hours(with overlap #golden) makes anything possible. That's a key to winning wars in my experience.Quote:
Originally Posted by Zombies are people too
-DM <3
Hiring part-time players for full-time positions sounds disastrous! Unless they can co-op their provs somehow... but then you need 50 of them.
And this is what separates kingdom tiers to a certain degree. So this search on "winning" is a myriad of experiences.Quote:
Originally Posted by octobrev
I know there is chemistry in some top kingdoms regarding leadership and efficient activity. Where I'm from I engage in fairly wasteful levels of activity, and coordination is nothing to rest ones head upon. I can monitor news and counter a few things, but there's no clarity in casual kingdoms because there's simply no system.
I shun organized kingdoms because I'm prevented from monitoring news and countering, as a rough rule. What they want is someone who registers as a bot and chat user and seem to care little about any other qualifications. I don't ask because it's not my goal. Everybody seems to be doing fine where they are.
Most of my posts are aimed at those who can't find traction in their standards & practices. If we look at winning wars from a preparation standpoint I can't help but recommend top feeder kingdom strats. Again, this is for kingdoms who aren't coming by victories and find life outside of war harrowing.
Pure established war kingdoms and whoring kingdoms don't really need any advice I offer, and they have the positive complexity to run a pure war or whoring strat. Because most war strats are focal they aren't ideal for whoring endeavors. They're already familiar with the way things are and have done diplomacy to preserve their station in the past. They have leadership with experience and unshakable trust from their cores, with a few exceptions. Whoring kingdoms ditto.
Now to be honest I never try to influence kingdom strat in game, where I play. The leadership and vocal core decide what they want and I try to fill a niche that's missing. The reality is that none of them ever consider the experiences of the past ages.
I'm not sure exactly why, but short memory my be a hidden strength in the casual tier. If I had to guess it's that these people simply like to play Utopia with people they know. The really hard times are forgotten, whereas top kingdoms are anything but forgetful.
This is what makes some of us unique. I'm a tweener because I hold no grudges but I remember. To my logic, about every casual kingdom should be weaponized for top feeding. This doesn't make for an ideal war strat, but it does make up for bad diplo. Meter efficiency is another casual kingdom catastrophe so the counter mechanisms have to be overbuilt. These kingdoms aren't beating pure war kingdoms anyways but a top feeder strat can allow room for prep so that respectable conflicts may be had.
Because I've done stints in micro-kingdoms I'm keenly aware of the predatory manner throughout the game, BUT with the earned knowledge of fighting back. Unlike most nominally sized kingdoms, micro-kingdoms can't be bullied because of the survival algorithm. That is, "everyone is bigger than us so we are the last in line". The only choice is retaliation or PK. There is no parachute. You can't ignore, hide or curl up in a ball.. and they do come for blood.
To further explain the micro-kingdom point, because of size equivalence in provinces we see predators from all tiers; top, war, honor, ghetto...they all come for something. You experience the broadest range of out of war conflict against kingdoms that feel their size and numbers should result in safe gains. Thus, my perception of retaliation is based in deep field research. My micro-kingdom experiences resulted in more triumphs than my casual kingdom experiences. This is because in micro-kingdoms the mutual benefit to fight back is tight nit and a shared survival idiom.
In most every other kingdom type you'll have guys that suffer and other who complain and when the CF is floated it leaves the warriors standing in the rain. The top feeder strats include t/m types built for wpa/tpa penetration and abduction resistance. Essentially you build yourself to be meter efficient on your end and less so from the enemy. Review the spell/sabotage abilities, attacker durability and penetration, hybrid assault capability in UF...stuff like that.
My kingdom watches for this. If your army is home, we can destroy it, and have in the past. We have beaten more organized kingdoms before, because they try to hold a few armies to hit a wave time, and we would see that army home and go for blood. If you are fighting a kingdom that isnt very observant, or doesnt know how to adjust their strategy to the situaion, you will probably be fine. Any respectable war kingdom (and I dont think we are there yet ourselves) would demolish any attacker that lets his army linger.Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris121
Dont rely on wave times if your kingdom can't manage them reliably. There are other ways to win.
Sure, but you won't always be in a position to destroy it, so it's situational. For example, presumably given what you have said you are not holding any armies home yourself, so if you don't happen to have people in the right range / off levels with armies coming back in that 1-2 hours, your only option is ops/spells. So situationally, you might be able to NM, NS, steal war horses, but it depends if you have someone able to do that online at the time, and that in turn partly depends what the set up of my provs are. Remember that I am not talking about a KD wide wave time, just a couple of provs hitting together ad hoc, so you would have no way of knowing in advance that we were going to do it and couldn't realistically plan for it in advance.
So I still maintain it's a calculated risk with many factors (such as those I have mentioned along with whether the person in my KD is going to be online or just disappear for 2 hours and then find his war horses gone).
This is true and there are exceptions to every rule. Say Chris121 observes a window in the rotation, then perhaps his kingdom can hash a small concentrated spearhead. This is where the game can get incredible complex if you're camping or adjusting time patterns to pound armies home. It's not a kingdom strat unless you've got real time intel feed and troop distribution. I've seen it in epic wars.Quote:
Originally Posted by LuckySports
I'm systematically too slow and mentally too lethargic to accomplish camping/timing feats myself, so my patterns are based in fighting faster thinking, faster executing players. If you ever watch boxing, most fighters suffer when facing faster opponents. This is particularly true if a very fast fighter is matched against an even faster one. The exceptions are few but notable; like Marvin Hagler. So if we pattern ourselves in this light. Marvin could throw great punches from every angle, and most importantly, with both hands. He was also incredibly durable.
How do I back up that theory? When I soloed(1 province in a kingdom shell) in age 63 I encountered BeastBlood who randomed me. I'd already been experimenting with War Spoils and when to use them. So this is more about fishing than triumph. After casting WS and retaliating I built my acres. When I pressed the Order Construction tab I had like 14 acres. I checked news and Emeriti struck whilst I was in the process. Then I retaliated Emeriti but didn't cast WS. This doesn't mean WS is wrong, it's when you have clearance.
But the bigger lesson was the value of seeing how fast top kingdoms operate. If you consider not just the computation and execution but the relevant intel digestion, this was something I'd never seen. These are important things to learn and the value of knowing shouldn't be squandered on hopelessness.
Now when engaging top kingdoms through retaliation I run a progressive aggression technique. That's a reaction to every action and the option to double up if *necessary. The reason I don't go full Monty on top kingdoms is because they tend to be *reasonable. They're experienced enough to see I'm dropping breadcrumbs to a CF. Fundamentally, this is armies out but I'm punching nw/acres where they have redundancy and I'm not maxing. When I did this to a war kingdom they were bent out of shape because they had a war on the horizon. For some reason they think it's cool to keep armies safe in my province. Anywho, even after explaining I hit said province in a nw/acre redundant spot they still weren't happy. - note: I'm not afraid of being PK'd. In other words I was so nice that I didn't interrupt their chain formation. How many guys would do that for you?
* reference code: Sleepy, or coss.
Insofar as armies struck at home, my protracted view of this was vs Freeakstyle. While I'll credit FS with fantastic work I must also fault my kingdom for overbearing micro. This was not only slow but telegraphed our intent. Management was overly concerned about maxing a hit rather than catching Freeakstyle where they didn't expect to be compromised. It's why I chose to gather my own intel and troop expenditure. And if this was the only kingdom that made that mistake.....no, this happens in a number of wave oriented kingdoms with a wave "boss" where they tell you what to send without sharing the actual defense.
Disasters ensue when wave bosses gamble with you and your position. This is particularly true of chain waves which are magnificently derailable(it's not a word but should be). Here they are gathering intel on 1-3 enemy provinces which is begging for soldier blocks and getting armies crushed at home. I know you're attacking in nw/land order lol; how could I not? Just so you know why zone tactics blossom in wave based environments.
Again, chain waves work because Timmy needs to be at school in a half hour, or my boss is watching me. I'm not insensitive to life's dictation on gameplay and thus understand the culture of chain waves. We end up agreeing on when etc. Top kingdoms have even perfected the ideal, but have also accepted that this is a campaign.
The game is a campaign as soon as you choose races and personalities. Top kingdom might even choose whoring templates first and then the race and personality that fits best. I wouldn't know, but I'd imagine.
Mini-waves can be effective too, if you do teams of people from similar time-zones. We have experimented with this briefly, but were not in a good position to fully test it.
The thing about not having wave times in a time-zone diverse group, is someone ALWAYS has an army coming home. If an army sits home for more than 30 minutes or so, the chances are really good we will be able to hit them with armies home. Bribe Generals, Pitfalls if we are trying to kill their offense, or do without if we are trying to overpop them before they can send out again. Stealing the war horses off of a Dryad can be extremely effective at dropping their offense as well. Even Propoganda has a place, if you were saving your strealth for a big run, or even get a few rogues in to do it. It's all situational on what you have available at the time. (We played to this, by some of our most active players picking up on rogue, which proved to be extremely effective in our last war, ambushing their top offenses with ops as soon as their army returns)
But everything plays into my overarching theme here. Be flexible, and play to your strengths. If you can't manage wave times, don't. Give everyone a goal to strive for, and adjust your plans as the war evolves. Finally, lean on your best players. By best, I don't mean the guy that casts spells and manages their province well but never speaks, I mean the person who is always pointing out a weakness or opportunity as they show themselves, who will nearly beggar themselves to help the kingdom. Those are the people I want in my kingdom. I don't care what someone can do by themselves, I care what we can accomplish as a group!
I do find it sadly amusing how teamwork is a very overlooked factor in the lower war tier, in a team based strategy game no less.Quote:
Originally Posted by LuckySports
-DM <3
Snatch News interpretation is an important talent and/or skill. I'm not sure which but I know I lack the talent.
In war I've noted kingdoms that evidently did a good job at SN cyphering. These kingdoms tend to squash economy more effectively and starve attackers properly.
One kingdom I interviewed after our defeat claimed they put their best players at rogue. I noticed they worked more in war theatrics than focal to rogue capabilities. They used their stealth purposefully and directed attacks appropriate to objectives. These days there are more options so these strategies are more accessible to the masses.
It's important to point out that these weren't competitive war or whoring kingdoms. They had a few dedicated players who worked together to achieve the leverage necessary for their casual players to complete the task.
Another example was a kingdom that utilized the zone tactics I've used to achieve containment and unbreakability for their top provinces with fairly low kingdom activity. Again, this was the work of a dedicated few with a casual core. Their tactics included a camper dwarf merchant, one avian warrior and one avian tac. The dwarf merchant and avian warrior were aces and caught on to me catching onto them. Despite my best efforts I couldn't break containment as they marauded the nw frontier. I knew I could take down the avian tac if I could get a break from the warrior but he'd have none of it. Besides those guys they had a sleeper orc at near chain level who dragged our guys down who got blindsided by the dwarf merchant.
The only reason I was able to make several breakthrough attempts was because I used zone tactics to resist chaining.
:O That is a bunch of info.
One more thing about chaining/ambush/max gains.
In the chain system and narrow target selection spawned from chain tactics there's a great deal of squandered offense. The passive advantage to this is, if you can't get intel you can send generous overages to ensure attack success.
The mechanical disadvantage of pure chaining is that your high powered offenses are taking unnecessary losses vs absolutely breakable targets. In essense they aren't just not hitting the targets with higher defenses, they're burning the offense they'll need to break these "last enemy" provinces.
Another factor is the "FB" target: Yknow the guy you're supposed to save for the t/ms to control. We waste too much time on these forgone targets. This is why I zone. This isn't the challenge. Some toy you can break at your whim while they hit and drain economy from your attackers is not always sound.
Very simply, there are strategies that should occur. One that works if the math is dizzying is to take what they need. One big one, especially in good dwarf ages, is time. Do not give dwarves time. Pure chaining is kind of wasted here because unscathed dwarves are absolute monsters if left alone. You have to understand how important it is to keep dwarves greatest strength(buildings/cool elite) in the pipe and not in production. You can chain some but you must get your hands on every dwarf. You want acre feed for your side and you want breakable enemies at all levels.
In my experience, it has been very rare for an attackers offense to be 'squandered' on over sending simply to break. Every attacker is chaining by sending the smallest amount of offense to break as possible, because we are aiming to chain or hit as many targets as possible. In the rare cases it happens, more often than not it is at the bottom end of the chain, where the attacks are less important.
We have had many wars where we have left those high defense provs til last because there are many mods that allow for defense to be quickly worked down. Effective chaining also removes offense from the enemy allowing you to employ other strategies like bouncing down a players large defense.
Dwarves are definitely strong in being the last to be taken down. The quick build times, and high defense elite allows for them to resist, but they are not in a vaccum. If everyone else folds around them, they too will soon fall to an organised opponent, they will just resist a little longer.