Tuesday 26 November 2013

POST MORTUM: 40k Tactics: Dealing with riptides

 Dealing with Riptides

 
Theres no getting away from the fact that with the tau's lattest expansion, the riptide has been making waves on gaming tables across the land. With its scary arsenal of devastating firepower, dual benefits of manauvreability and survivability as well as an amazing model to round out the package its sure to be popular amoungst tau gamers for sometime to come.  So if we're going to be facing these mechanised gaming bullies then we best get our heads around taking them on.  Im going to share some insights into what makes the Riptide such an intimidating foe for so many people, as well as some tactics for tackling the mightiest of the firecastes resources, the powerhouse that is the Riptide.

Know your foe

One of the most important things in tackling any threat your likely to face is in knowing exactly whats its capable of.  The riptide is a veritable swiss army knife of a unit being tough, fast, good in close combat [thanks to being a monsterous creature] and being absolutely devastating in the shooting phase.  This is one of the biggest reasons its so intimidating to face, theres just so many ways in which it excels it can be hard to best decide how to counter it.  That said its certainly not invulnerable and as it does take up a fair chunk of points.  The threat of the riptide is often worst then the damage it will do if you keep calm and take steps to mitigate the damage it will inflict.

Tough

With toughness value of 6, a 2+ save and an invulnerable that can be boosted if needed the riptide is the epitamy of tough.  What does that mean for us?  Well for one we shouldn't "expect" to take one down in a single turn.  If that happens then great but plan for it to be around for a while, and chip away at its wounds throughout the game, this way we can mitigate the damage they will do to our army during the game and get the edge of the pyschological game.  

One of the most important things about tackling riptides is knowing when to ignore it and when it needs to be dealt with.  As it is so tough to take down, and we are going to assume that were not going to kill one in a single turn then anytime there is a target which we are more likely to take out, with weapons that could target the riptide we should be seriously weighing up that decision. 

Thats not too say you should completely ignore it.  Unchecked its got the potential to slignificantly put a dampner on your battle plans.  Another great thing about chipping away at a riptide is that you can put it in danger of killing itself with a nova charge, which is highly satisfying.  If this happens doe try not too look too smug as they pack their favourite model away.  The threat of killing themselves with nova charges can be enough to sow that seed of doubt in their mind, and stop them making the decision to charge up at the oppertune moment. 

Manauvreability

The riptides boosted movement allows it to get out of dodge at a pinch, or to relocate quickly to make the most of cover and maximise its use of firelanes.  However it isnt an eldar jetbike squadron, so it can definately get pinned down and have its escape routes cut off.  The question then just comes down to do you have the chops to deal with it once it has been cornered.

Close Combat

Being a monsterous creature has many benefits, one of the biggest being the ability to do smash attacks allowing the riptide to threaten "most" things in close combat.  It will instant kill most characters and by pass most armour saves meaning there are a select number of units out there that are capable of taking it down when things get personal.  Luckily it does have a limited number of attacks, which means most other monsterous creatures get a slight edge against it, and if you can bring numbers to bare that can actually hurt it then you should be able to overwhelm it.  

Another thing that helps out our friend the riptide, is overwatch, and all the tau shenanigans that come with it.  However dont be too scared of overwatch, it will need to get lucky to score multiple hits and only models within 6" get too give supporting overwatch not the whole unit, so plan out your charges and take down the support the riptide has and you can leave yourself in a position to take him out.

Riptides will often be advanving, so may even leave the oppertunity for you to get in when its out unsupported anyway.

Make sure you have the tools for the job when you do make it into combat, bearing in mind unlike many other Monsterous Creatures out there the riptide isnt fearless and so even beating it in combat by a point or two could see it taken out be a cheeky sweeping advance.



FIREPOWER

This is where the Riptide really shines, especially with its Ion Accelerator.  With the options of multiple high str low Ap shots, or a large blast with a huge range and buckets of customisation from all the tau support system options.  Remember that it has gets hot as well as the ability to nova charge, so if they wanna rock out the big guns, they should be rolling for both.





There are three main ways of tackling the riptide at range.  Firstly throwing low AP high strenghth weapons at it like plasma and lascannon shots, in order to try to get as many wounds to stick as possible.  This is probably the most traditional approach to killing high toughness 2+ save units and would certainly be the go too approach if it wasnt for that shield. Number two is to play the numbers game and puts lots of shots into it.  when doing this high strength will help out, so tesla destructors, autocannons assault cannons etc are the kinds of things that will be useful here, however things like sniper rifle fire or massed poison shots are also viable options.  When taking the Low AP route its invulnerable and boosted shield can really help it out however one small grace is that the tau player will have to decide what to do in his turn and you can plan your strategy accordingly.  The third option is multi-shot lower str low ap weaponry.  If you happen to have acess to a few dark eldar ravagers broadsiding with 9 str 5 ap2 shots for less than half the points of the riptide cannot be a bad choice, while Starcannon loaded warwalkers are equally appealing, especially with guide and doom available.

In general if your opponents shield is boosted then starting with weapons with more over the lower ap shots is preferrable, and then if the riptides wounds get low you can try to finish it off with higher ap weaponry.  If it doesnt have the boosted shield and you have the high ap firepower, then weaken it first and then use weight of numbers to finish it off.

An honourable mention has to go out to grav weapons and in particular the Centurians when it comes to riptide hunting.  These are the one of the closest things that come to a hard counter, with grav weaponry being at its optimal efficiency when deployed against things high good saves and toughness.



 
KILL THE PATHFINDERS

One of the things that makes Riptides so good is that they can use marker light hits, to get rid of your cover saves.  In general no cover save means a Riptides Large Blast will do twice as much damage, as well as being likely to score more hits.  Do yourself a favour and make pathfinders your Priority kill.  Suddenly the Riptide wont seem so scary as you may actually get a cover save for most of your army.

TBC.......................

Monday 25 November 2013

Loot Multipiers: clash of clans tactics [basic]

LOOT MULTIPLIERS


In clash of clans loot Multipliers are an important factor that affect how much loot you'll get when you raid, who you should be raiding as well as who is likely to be raiding against you.  Knowing this can help you plan raiding strategies, affect your base design and also help you decide what league you should be in.



 
PENALTIES AND BONUSES

When you raid in clash of clans, potentially you get a penalty or bonus, based on the comparitive town hall levels of you and your opponent.  The bigger the difference, the bigger the multipliers.  If you are raiding against someone with a higher level townhall than yourself you'll get bonuses.  If your raiding against someone with a lower townhall you'll get penalties.  The multipliers for the Differences in townhall levels are as follows:
These figures are before the loot multiplier is applied. The loot multiplier is what is behind the loot "penalty" and the loot "bonus". The amount of available loot = calculated loot x loot multiplier. The loot multiplier is determined as follows:
  • 5% for attacking someone with a Town Hall (TH) 4+ levels lower than the attacker's.
  • 25% for attacking someone with a TH 3 levels lower than the attacker's.
  • 50% for attacking someone with a TH 2 levels lower than the attacker's.
  • 90% for attacking someone with a TH 1 level lower than the attacker's.
  • 100% for attacking someone with a TH level equivalent to the attacker's.
  • 110% for attacking someone with a TH 1 level higher than the attacker's.
  • 150% for attacking someone with a TH 2+ levels higher than the attacker's. 
HOW DOES THIS AFFECT YOU?

in practice you are likely to be raiding against bases with townhalls that are either your own TH level or 1 level higher or lower than your townhall.  This is because, in general any bases more than 1 townhall level below you will probably not net you a great reward and any base with a townhall 2 or more levels above you will likely be a very difficult raid.



Knowing this means you can plan who to raid against.  When you enter a match online you will be matched against someone who has up to 200 trophies more or less than you. If you want to raid against people with a town hall level close to yours you'll need to be in a trophy range that reflects that. Climb too high, and you'll find the bases you have to raid are just too well developed for you to gain any advantage from.  Drop too  low and the loot you'll get wont make it worth the time and elixir investment your putting into your raids.

Of course there are the occasional exceptions.  If your th4/5 you may stubble on the occasional badly design townhall 7 one-box that gives you some amazing loot, or at TH7 you might come across that TH5 with maxed out storages and collectors who's been saving for some expensive upgrades.  Take those oppertunities whenever you can, but always keep in mind the Loot multipliers and this will help you to clash accordingly.

HAPPY CLASHING

Wednesday 20 November 2013

ARTICLE REQUESTS

if theres anything you'd like to see written about, just post up a request in the comments section

40k, fantasy, clash of clans

Tuesday 19 November 2013

Dealing with Flyers in 40k

How to Clear the skies

Whilst the advent of 6th edition meant that everyone and their uncles, mums, lovers grandson uses flyers, using them well is still something i rarely see on the tabletop.  In fact like many of the "ultimate armies" that have come and gone it seems that the fundamental power of taking an army that is inherantly more powerful than 90% of the ones you'll face across the table, flyers can often be so easy to win with that many players aren't really using them to their best advantage.

Now i know this may seem like an oxymoron.  How can people be using them wrong, if they are helping them to win games?  We'll the simple fact of the matter is that many people STILL have trouble getting to grips with flyers, and dont know how to shut them down affectively.  Plus if you win most of your games off the back of having a more powerful, harder to counter army than your opponent and dont really have to stretch yourself to win then you dont really get any better  at the game, and infact you become a bit complacent and this is where the stick jockies can come unstuck.  Even when they are played well, there are plenty of downsides to flyers that can be exploited, so that even a necron flying cricus can be shut down and allow you to be the one coming away with the victory.

What makes flyers so good?

The key to knowing how to shut something down, is knowing exactly what its strengths and weaknesses are, and then turning that to your advantage.  You see if you know whats the best thing for that Storm Raven in the enemy army to be doing, then you can make sure your prevent them from doing that very thing, and have a plan in place for when they do this.

Speed: Flyers are fast, Very fast, and being able to jump from one side of the board to the other can be a HUGE advantage.  Especially in games that revolve around objectives.  This is why the flyers capable of transporting troops are so highly regarded in particular.

Durability: Flyers can be incrediably difficult to bring down.  Anything without skyfire, or that isnt flying themselves will need 6's just to hit, therefore tradional anti-armour like lascannons arent very affective.  Whats more template weapons cant affect them, so that Vindicator that usually Smashes aside battle tanks is useless in helping win the battle for the skies.  On top of all this they have the option of jinking, potentially giving them a cover save that may stave off that crucial attack when its really needed.

Firepower: Alot of flyers pack a resonable amount of firepower, and whats more they don't have to snapfire most of them when they've moved either.  This means they can bring alot of juice to the table.

What are flyers weaknesses?

Manuvreability: Most flyers can only make a single turn, at the start of their movement phase AND must move at least 18".  This means that there will be parts of the battlefield that suddenly become inaccessable to the flyer on its next turn.

Mediocre AV and HP:  flyers armour value ranges from 10-12, which isnt all that great when it boils down to it.  Even str 6/7 is a threat to most flyers, and luckily most decent anti-air and str 6-7 weaponry fires multiple shots, so is likely to score enough hits that something sticks.  Even str 4 will worry a flyers rear armour.  As flyers dont come with Hull points to spare, then even a few Glancing hits from boltguns could lane flyers in trouble.

Downtime: Flyers dont start on the table, and will ALWAYS miss turn 1.  Any turn in which they cant see the enemy, or flyer off the table means even more downtime, where the flyer has no real impact on the game.  If you can use movement against the flyers, the you can end up where even without taking them out they have done nothing for half the game.

***

Along with these things there are things in our army that are affective against flyers and making sure we get these into our armies is a fundamental part of taking the fight to the enemy. So with these things in mind how do we use them to turn the tide against the flying menace and into our favour.

FLYERS

lets get the obvious out of the way, flyers are a great way of dealing with flyers.  This doesn't mean you need to fill up your force org with flyers, but having one or two certainly gives you some great tools for the job at hand. Obviously the biggest advantage they have is being able to shot using their full ballistic skill.  In the flyer vs flyer war going 2nd is actually a big advantage, as you want to be able to get the first shot at the enemy and force his decisions in the movement phase. 

Flying monsterous creatures also deserve a special mention as they get all the advantages of a flyer, in that they can shot at full BS, and they can vector strike.  This is great as it means you can move over the top of another flyer in order to vector strike it and get into a advantagous position ready for later turns.

The winged tyrant with 2 sets of twin-linked devourers gets a special mentions as it forfills all the hallmarks of a great anti-flyer unit with plenty of mid str shots, all of which are twin-linked as well as the Vector strike.




Now if something were a flyer and could vector strike, then that would be anti-flyer gold, but thats just crazy talk, theres nothing that would be able to do both.....oh yeah unless you count the helldrake.


SKYFIRE and INTERCEPTOR

Just like flyers, skyfire is very useful, as flying at full BS means plenty of hits and most flyers are reasonably vulnerable once it comes down to it.  A lot of armies nowadays have dedicated anti-air capable units, especially thanks to Flakk missiles but also with things like Hydra flakk tanks, the new marine hunter and stalkers there really are more options then ever, and it seems likely GW will keep giving us new toys with which to tackle Flyers and more codecies get updated.
Interceptor takes it to the next level as you dont sacrifice the ability to take on ground units, plus the option to take and out of sequence shot at those dakka jets that have just arrived can mean avoiding damage all together.

FORTIFICATIONS
Fortifications came into 40k at the same time that the rules for flyers were updated, and along with fortifactions comes the AA weaponry that they can mount.  Games workshop have added even more variety to the number of fortifications available to generals battling in the 41st millenium with new buildings for apocalypse, but the 2 im going to focus on are the orignal, tried and tested Aegis defense line and the bastion.

Aegis defense line.  The main thing this brings is the option of an Icarus Pattern lascannon, or a Quadgun.  However the other thing it brings is cover for your forces. These are very popular in armies favouring a strong "gunline" protecting its home objectives.  One of the best things about it is that if you have a decent sized troop choice behind it, they can go to ground and have a 2+ cover save.  If you set these up right near the board edge, flyers will struggle to get an angel where they can deny your cover.  As long as they arent packing an AP3 torrent flamer then you should be fine.....

Bastion: Again this brings a choice of Anti-Air weaponry and cover for the squad ontop.  however it has the advantage that unit can go inside the bastion.  The bastion itself is one of the hardest things to destroy in 40k as it has no Hull points, which means glancing hits dont do anything to it, and very little to the unit inside as long as they have a reasonable save.  The thing i think is most under appreciated about the bastion is that it gives you cover for any vehicles in your army [or you could hide a monsterous creature, unit, or whatever behind it.  Bastions work great in any army that packs alot of armour, as its affectively another tank, abeit one that cant move, on the battlefield.  This splits the enemy anti-armour amoungst another target whilst being extremely durable itself.  In particular its fantastic against necrons as their tesla weaponry is basically useless against it, and their gauss weapons can only glance.  The other thing with a bastion is that it can only be targetted as long as its occupied.  Therefore you can start with a unit behind it, and if your opponent goes first they cant destroy it.  Then you move your unit into it.  This may be a small boon, but it could be the difference that gives you the drop in the enemy, and at the very least means your unmollested when it comes to that first round of Intercept fire.

The bastion is something I would recommend for any army, and I think for its points is a bargain.  

Movement

It may seem counter intuative but you can use one of the flyers biggest strengths against them.  Because you know flyers are going to have to move 18" there is a bubble of safety, where they wont be next turn.  coupled with their restriction to make one turn at the start of their movement, they will also have blind spots that can be predicted.  when you take into account the range of their weapons this could mean than a poorly thought out movement could cost your opponent.  Two good examples are stormraven and the night scythe.  Both have range 24".   This means in theory if they shoot you they have to be  at most 24" away.  If you move directly towards them 6" then next turn they will have to move past you and not be able to target that unit [dependent on mountings etc].  Now of course they may be able to shoot a different unit instead, so its all about recognising what are their priorities.  Also this can be mitigated to some extent by keeping your units close together.  This may mean that becasue your opponent is closer to move units, then you move to get the position where you can hit rear armour, which opens up your whole squad to rapid fire.

Weight of fire

Against flyers weight of numbers is your friend, as you want to be able to get as many hits as possible, whenever you can.  Rolling lots of dice, means your bound to get a few 6's, just ask any ork player.  A unit of longfangs with 5 missile launchers has a reasonable chance of scoring a hit, and is a much better place to start your shooting phase.  Sure IF it comes down to it it may be that you fire that single lascannon hoping for a 6, but you only if there isnt a better target, and only once youve fired all the better options first.  Units of autocannons, ork loota's, assault cannons, high yield missile pods, or even a rapid firing unit of fire warriors. 

Twin-Linked

Just like weight of numbers, Twin-linked means your rolling more dice, meaning more chances to roll those 6's.  Twin-linked weapons are right up there on the list of desirable elements to help deal with flyers.  Once again str6+ is desirable, 8+ great and multiple shots are even better. 

Broadsides get the smiley face here, but auto-cannon dreads, scatter laser wave serpents and many other choices really fit the bill as well.


Cover

using cover is just as useful against flyers as it isnt against any other army, in fact more so in some ways as it can be easier to restrict LOS to a flyer whilst they can struggle to use the cover to their advantage.  Keeping infantry in cover will often mean half the number of models will die when they come under fire, and if they are only getting to shoot your squads for half the game anyway then they could struggle to clear units off the board.  Going to ground is often a great choice, as you'll need to score 6's anyway you might as well get the bonus save.



Psychic powers - Divination

Divination is a great benefit when it comes to taking on the flying menace.  Firstly the Primary power gives you twin-linked weaponry, and we already know twin-linked weaponry is great against flyers....this is even better than regualr twin-linked as you can put it onto whatever unit you like [ish].  This means you can put it on to higher str weaponry for example, and guns with a decent ap value, meaning when you score those hits, they realling stick.  Next up perfect timing means a unit can ignore cover saves, so no Jinking from those nasty flyers.  

Luckily flyers dont get invulnerable saves....unless of course you count the hell drake.


COMBINED ARMS

As with any challenges you face on the battlefield, combined arms, and correct prioritsation is the key to success.  All of the above a great things that will help you to tip the balance, but to be truely affective, your going to want to combine as many of the above into your gameplan as possible.  Luckily lots of the above are great against other enemies you'll face as well, so all isnt lost if you happen to face an army with nothing in the skies.

I hope you found some of the above useful, and if you have anything you feel you can add, any tactics youve found against flyers, or anything youve found useful please leave a comment.

Monday 18 November 2013

Clash of Clans [adv] Base design - the art of staggered junctions

As im sure you know, base design can be very important in clash of clans.  Regardless of if your a trophy hunter, that doesnt want to get their base smashed in while their asleep, or if your a farmer, wanting to protect those valueable resources, then an affective base is going to help you with that, and one key factor in base design is Proper junctions.

So what is a proper junction and why do you want it?

well a proper junction is a connection between two sections of wall, that has at least two spaces between the next segment.  An inproper junction therefore is a connection between two sections of wall that doesnt have at least 2 spaces between them.


If we have a look at the image above you can see looks of examples of an inproper junction circled in red whilst the proper junction  is circled in grey.

Now imagine a wallbreaker or two making a run and exploding against the inproper junction between the tesla and the gold mine next to the barb kings platform. The explosion would mean that theyve just opened up two compartments.  Happy days to the Wallbreakers and their Buddies that are surely steaming in behind them.

Next if you release the wall breakers at the bottom corner they would target one of the corner sections, and either open up the archer tower OR the scetion with the pump and mine.

Photo
 Heres another example of staggered T-junctions. This is my base that is a modified version of Pingfao's tesla theme park. Each section is at least 2 away from the next connection which means Wall breakers are only every going to get through one section at a time.  The only exception here is on my "tesla boxes".  If i were to swap so my tesla was inside the mortar compartments, and my bombs were in ta smaller box, then i could maintain fully staggered junctions.  Basically ive given up that advantage, with the gain of having another target that giants will lock onto before they break into my cor, and usually if they were to stick down many wallbreakers here, they will bust open the other edge of the boxes first and then go after the corner compartments.  This is where pingfao's design's excel, the whole thing is staggered junctions which means its going to take a long grind to get through Or mean you need a hell of alot of wallbreakers.

Staggered junctions are particularly important on the outer shell of your base design, as this is where wall breakers have the easiest time getting too, and farming raiders with lots of goblins will wanna break open the outer compartments to send in waves of goblins/archers to pick off exposed storages.

This is not only important against wall breakers but any troops smashing through an inproper junction will end up exposing more than one compartment, exposing more of your internal structure, taking less time to get through the bases layers over all and meaning you can say bye bye to that hard farmed resource sitting in your collectors.

hopefully this helps give a little guidance on how to make your own base designs more robust.

please feel free to comment, and happy clashing

CLASH OF CLANS- [Basic] Troop Stacking

Troop Stacking:


Im sure most experienced clashers are more than aware of this already, however for those new to clash of clans I introduce troop stacking

Clash of clans is a game thats all about Time Vs Reward.  How much time does it take to build?  How much time will it take to earn the gold to get the next upgrade? how much time can i commit to raiding. What could i be building instead in that time? and how many resources per raid will i be able to grab with that combination of troops and spells

troop stacking is a basic technique that mitigates a little of the time constraints involved in playing clash of clans.

When building troops in your barracks and dark barracks, you can Queue up any number of troops, up to the barracks maximum.  Once the capacity of your army camps has been reached then the barracks will continue building the next "troop", getting it ready for when it has a space.  This means when there is a space for it, the troop that had been "stacked" into the queue, will be ready instantly, assuming it had been waiting the required amount of time.

Knowing how much time you'll have between raids is the key to making the most out of "stacking".

During a raid you'll have the time your raid lasts that troops will be building and therefore its always worth stacking troops whilst raiding.

Secondly whenever you idle you should be building, ready for the next time you get to raid.  However you should overstack your barracks in order to minimise your build times.  If for example you have a max capacity of 200 troops at your army camps, and you'll be out for an hour, you could potentially set your barracks to build your 200 troops for the raid, AND each barracks could be building a dragon "overstacked".  Once your back and the instant the space is available those dragons will go into your army camps and thats 80 less troops you need to build for the next raid.

You really want the highest build time troops to be your "overstacked" troops to cut out as much time as possible between raids.  This generally means that if your only going to get to raid for 15 minutes during lunch, the you can probably get in two full raids rather than just one.


So hopefully useful to any new clashers out there.  Happy Clashing

Saturday 16 November 2013

Clash of clans- Prioitising upgrades th7-8

Hello Clashers, below i thought i'd share my thoughts on upgrading, with the hopes that at least one or two of you find it useful. There isnt nessacarily a set "this is the best" way of doing things, however i think its good to have a plan behind what you upgrade and when. In general This kicks in from around TH7ish, as before that its often based on how long things take. I will tend to only ever have one of each defense upgrading at anyone time, this means you can still have decent coverage.

Priority 1* - Walls:

Well upgraded walls make a HUGE difference to the sucess of a raid. Upgrading them is also instant, so anytime you have a builder free and the gold available you can put it into walls, and unlike that tower upgrade you wont need to wait 5 days to get the benefit. If people are raiding and they see highly upgraded walls they will think twice, and often if they dont think twice they'll find themselves getting into trouble during their raids.  This is probably the biggest mistake clashers make, i've certainly done so myself.  *That said you need to balance wall upgrades with your towers so you dont end up with builders sitting idle and a base thats really under levelled.  Get used to planning out those upgrades so that for example if you'll have a builder ready in 24hours and your going to spend 1,000,000 gold, then you can farm up to 1,500,000 and pump some resources into those walls before you move on.

Gold Priorities Priority 2 - Splash Damage 

Priority 3 - Air Defense Great air defense can be the difference between stalling a big well planned assault, or losing all your resources in a raid. Great against Dragons, and angels... very popular for th6-th8 raiders as well as minions. Lets face it when you have a dragon or angel in your army camps and you see more fireworks then gandalfs cart then you take the re-roll and go look for someone easier to take out.

This is really important to stop your base being overun by hoards of barbarians, archers and goblins. Early townhall levels i prioritise the mortar due to the gold cost and build times, however from th7 prioritise the wizard towers. Its actually my favourite tower as its punishes hoardes whilst its damage is significent enough to worry groups of giants, hog riders etc
                                                                                  


Priority 4 - Clan Castle centralised clan castles are one of the harded things to counter and take into account when raiding, plus it helps with attack as well. Early level more troops win raids, and the build times really low for what your getting.





Priority 5 - Single Targets 

This includes your cannons, archer towers, tesla etc. Upgrade tesla whenever you have the gold free, as the build times mean you have to wait around a while before they are up and running. You'll be thankful laters as they are great vs high HP targets like dragons, golems, giants and off course pekka's plus there great attack speed makes them pretty good at clearing barbarian swaves, or taking out Wallbreakers before they deliver their load. Earlier levels i prioritise the archer towers due to their range and versatility, at TH8 i prioritise cannons as gold cannons can be the difference between someone deciding against raiding you and keep on looking for that juicier target. They are quite a visual difference that people pick up on in that first 5/10 seconds of scanning bases.

Priority 6 -  Elixir Storages and Pumps: I'd prioritise storage over pumps. You want your storage to be at least enough for your most expensive upgrade at the level, prehaps a little higher to give you spare ready for the next upgrade. The reasons i put storages and pumps as 6 are a:You can raid to get resources instead b: Being better upgraded puts you as a bigger temptation when it comes to raiding. i know i certain love to see a base thats got maxed out collectors and a low upgraded defenses and walls, as there will be alot of juice in those badboys. If you dont have as much time to raid then you may wanna make these a bigger priority. I'd prioritise gold over elixir as there are more things that you'll need gold for, and generally my mines are about 1 level above my pumps.


Elixir Priorities

Priority 1 - Army Camps More troops = better raiding = more resources.  The difference between 180 and 200 troops is MASSIVE!  Not only does it only to to raid against potentially tougher bases, but it also means you can raid more often.  If you only need to use 100 of those troops to take out a weaker base, then you can raid a second base straight away.  If youve stacked your barracks then you
potenially could have filled half that by the time youve finished the raid.

Priority 2 - Laboratory. You really want to be upgrading EVERYTIME you can. Better troops = Better raiding = more resources.  Try to make sure you have a builder free when your lab is ready.

Lots of clans prefer upgraded archers, infact many clans will ask for a minimum level just to join, so if your unsure then you cant really go wrong.


Priority 3 - Dark Elixir Drills and Storages

Before TH8 then barracks will be priority 3. However by TH8 you will probably already have your barracks where you want them anyhow, but those DE troops and heroes can tip the balance and brings in some interesting new raiding tactics, PLUS having affectively more barracks overall means you can build quicker and raid more often.




Priority4 - Barracks:

Gives you access to the cool stuff. Depending on your raiding style and builds will determine how many of each level of barracks you will need.  Again once your comfortable with raiding tactics you'll know what you'll need, but you'll always want at least one of the highest level barracks for your TH level.  If you wanna do cool stuff like Drag-ions [dragon/minion raiding] or have multiple PEKKA's reaping havoc then you'll want more barracks fully upgraded.

Priority 5 - Gold Storages and Mines:

I'd prioritise storage over mines. You want your storage to be at least enough for your most expensive upgrade at the level, prehaps a little higher to give you spare ready for the next upgrade. The reasons i put storages and pumps as 6 are a:You can raid to get resources instead b: As with elixir pumps, mines being better upgraded puts you as a bigger temptation when it comes to raiding. If I see mines like the ones pictured above, outside walls with its troughs filled like a 2p slot machine at southend sea front, theni know just a few nudges and i'll be bringing home the big bucks, and probably only using about 20 goblins plus a few giants, archer or barbarians to get it.  WIN



Dark Elixir Priorities

Dark elixir is probably the widest open to different approaches.  it will probably be the latter stages of TH8 that you start looking into upgrades using Dark elixir and there really are a number of ways you can approach it.  If you find yourself using minions in every raid then abviously this should be at the top of the list ;)

Priority 1 - Heroes you get heroes for FREE, when raiding. The better they are the better you will raid, without having to train them each time.

They start off reasonably quick to upgrade, for example the level 2 barbarian king takes 12 hours.  However the main drawback is that it actually increases his respawn time by 4 minutes as well.
Priority 2 - Troops Just like your regular troops, better DE troops = better raiding = more resources. Your Priority for them will vary depending on your Raid tactics. I like piggies and minions, but at higher level raiding those golems are useful. The upgrades on DE troops make a significant difference, and high level tactics will often revolve around DE troops [ie golem or witches].



Cheers for reading, and have fun Raiding. If your an active player/donator and want to join a clan look up tonnes more dmg.