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Things to work for and things to avoid
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The Dangers of the Gold Chain.
Many players become caught in a subtle trap of thinking that they can produce gold coins via the gold coin production chain. At level 24, all of the buildings are available, so why wouldn't you just make them and produce 1,000's of coins a day?
On the surface it all looks and sounds good, so why doesn't it work? Lets take a closer look and identify some of the challenges it brings to the table. The worst thing about this trap is that players often feel something is going horribly wrong, but it's very hard for them to put their finger on it as they're too close to the problem.
1: The Searching
It takes a tavern geologist 4 hours and a fast geologist 2 hours to locate gold deposits. This is already a warning sign, as you need your geologists to locate vital other resources to aid in your development.
Stone, Marble, Copper, Iron, and Coal need to be located and renewed, so while you have geologists tied up on locating gold, your other production chains and materials for upgrading are grinding to a halt. To look for and to locate gold under these conditions, you need far more than just tavern geologists.
If you still want to do this, then I'd recommend you have at least 6-9 other types of fast geologists before you even consider tying them up with gold searches and renewals of gold mines.
2: Building Licences
Another unapparent one comes back to building licences. Early on, these licences quickly become a premium, so tying up 10+ with mines, gold smelters, and coinage trying to produce gold coins means you will quickly run out and start to fall short in other areas of production. This means you will either need to beg from your guildies, or buy your shortfalls off the TO thus spending those precious coins you're producing.
There's no really good solution for this except to buy more building licences via gems using real life $$, otherwise you'll need to wait until later on as you add more buildings that aid production but don't tie up licences which will take time.
3: The production chains are costly and slow.
Each step to make your gold coin, takes time.
a: The mines are 12 minutes + travel time to a storehouse per round.
b: Your gold smelter is another 12 minutes + travel time and work preparation. It also needs two times the amount of nuggets that it will produce. (unbuffed 2 nuggets and 8 coal = 1 gold ingot per building level of the Gold Smelter.)
c: Coinage takes 24 minutes + travel time and work preparation to produce 1 coins unbuffed from 4 gold ingots per level of the Coinage Building.
Again, there's no good solutions for this. Quality buffs will help, but the cost of say rainbow snow isn't likely to be covered by the coins you'll produce. Gold Fever isn't quite as long lasting nor as heavy a boost, but it's not expensive to procure. It will boost mine production.
4: Materials
If by chance you do happen to solve the first three difficulties, materials is going to be nasty. Coal is heavily tapped by other chains, so to produce enough you will likely need to add more coking plants which means more foresters and pinewood cutters which in turn means even more building licences.
See section 2 for tips.
Conclusion:
Producing gold coins isn't a winning strategy early in your settlers career unless you are going to spend real life $$$ to buy extra licences and geologists. Even then, there's far better things you could use those gems for. At higher levels when you do have spare licences and geologists, feel free, but lower levels and without spending money, it's just a trap that's sucked in and chewed up far too many players.
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Conserving Building Licences (Cutter/Forester ratios)
Fine Tuning your island when you're new is critical to making sure your island continues to develop and grow. The more storehouses you have, the faster goods will be produced with the ideal being to have a storehouse in the middle of a hexagon of production buildings.
I've already gone over the gold coin trap, and why it's not a valid chain to pursue (especially early), but this time I'll touch on one of the least understood areas of the game, the ratio of foresters to cutters.
Most players will have far too many foresters servicing their cutters, but how many is too many and what's the correct ratio? It differs from types of wood, but here's my ratios and they've withstood the test of time.
Pinewood - 8 foresters 23 cutters (roughly 1 forester per 3 cutters)
Hardwood - 6 foresters 15 cutters (roughly 1 forester per 2.5 cutters)
Exotic - 4 Foresters 6 Cutters (2 foresters per 3 cutters)
It doesn't mean you need to have all of that to have the perfect production chain, but it's all about the ratio of cutters to foresters, so if you have 6 pinewood cutters say, you will need at least 2 foresters to satisfy the cutters and keep them producing. Should you wish to maintain the forest on your island, you would need to increase the foresters slightly, or to make sure that they are regularly buffed.
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Generals
One topic which comes up time and again is about generals. How to skill them, and what are the best generals to have? These are two of the more common questions and both can have a huge impact on what generals to concentrate on getting. Ignoring quartermaster generals which are only used to transport troops, there's currently 24 generals in the game, some of which are the same as each other, to all intents and purposes. Loosely categorised, these generals will fall into a few categories. Premium, Suicide, and Blocker. Some generals will span more than one category, and obviously if your best general happens to be a Tavern General, he's your premium attacker. Bearing that in mind, let's have a quick look at them.
Premium Generals: These are generals you'll use time and again in attacks to finish off camps or sectors with blockers delaying other camps. Each has a unique ability which makes them the General of choice for certain adventures or styles of adventuring. You can win generals over time from events, but if i had to rank generals in order of preference, the list below would be it.
1: %Champion Nusala(NUS) Premium/Suicider - Most consistant hardest hitting first strike general.Loses ground in harder Elite adventures, but always manages to sneak into most as a suicider.
2: %Younger Gemini General(YGG) - Premium/Suicider - Most consistant lethal attack of any current general.
3: General Boris/General Sylvana(Bor) Premium/Occasional Suicider - This is a general you'll use time and again. He also adds extra XP per camp he's involved in attacking. He can be used in suiciding, and hits at 700-1000 damage and has first strike, flanking, and splash.
4: Older Gemini General(OGG) - Premium Highest number of troops of any general. Also has first strike and first aid which lowers losses in adventures.
5: *Major General(MG) - Premium Second highest number of troops of any general. Nearly as good as OGG, but OGG is better in every category.
6: Champion Anslem(ANS) - Premium/Secondary Suicider - Hits as hard as Nusala. His ability to reduce the enemy troops to their minimum attack heavily reduces losses. Not as versatile in suicides as Nusala as he doesn't have first strike.
7: $Resolute General(RG) - Premium - Like General Loudmouth, RG excels at any camp where Vargus does. The losses are higher than GLM, but occasionally lower than Vargus in lower adventures, but in adventures where elite units are used, RG becomes the best of the three hands down due to using Swordsman, not mounted Swordsman as their defensive unit.
8: $General Loudmouth(GLM) - Premium/Secondary Suicider - This general slightly outperforms Vargus inasmuch as he will have less losses vs the same camp, but is much harder to come by. he was only released once in 2021, and hasn't appeared since. He has 10 less units than Vargus.
9: $Champion Vargus(VAR) - Premium/Secondary Suicider - Lighter hitting than Nusala and Anslem, but not by much. His skill of preventing flanking makes him valuable, but it reduces his effectiveness as a suicider although still useful in places.
10: Ghost General(GG) - Premium - This general is often overrated, but it does have some very useful features. It boosts Hp of accompanying units by 20% and lowers the accuracy of the enemy units by 50% which helps to lower losses. She arrives in adventures faster than any other general, but the Cloaked General whose speed she matches. Her attacks finish faster than most generals which can help with making blocks safer. That all sounds good, so why so low? This general's negatives are low damage and not quite perfect accuracy but even worse than that is that it has last strike. Last strike makes this general more of a curiousity that players will outgrow. The fact it has 1-Up is nearly pointless with it only hitting at the end of each round. It's long term usefulness, as better generals are released, is highly questionable. There are adventures that she shines in, and can perform quite well which is why I still rate her as a premium general. She's also been readily available, so many players have her in large numbers.
11: Steadfast General(STG) Premium/Suicider/Blocker - As a premium attacker, she comes into her own on the high difficulty rating adventures, however her biggest use is as a blocker where she ranks extremely high.
12: General Tremble Beard(GTB) - Premium/Occasional Suicider - This general adds 200% to any XP he's involved in attacking. He also adds star coins. His let down is no skills to boost accompanying troops and disappointingly low troop numbers. This is why he rates so low in the list
13: General Juan(Juan) - Premium/Occasional Suicider - This general adds 100% XP to any enemy troop kills he gets. He has natural first aid (20%), but he has a lower than a 200 troop count, and offers no boosts in combat to accompanying troops which is why he rates so low. Remove his 100% XP boost and all you have is a secondary suicider. He does have first strike, flanking and splash with moderate minimal damage.
**14: General Mary Christmas(Mary) Premium - This general adds 100% XP to any camp she's involved in attacking. She's often used in scout runs to maximise adventure scores. Can cause added losses.
15: Loner General(LNG) - Premium/Possible Suicider - This General is highly accurate and skilled with Master Planner will do over 2000 damage. He also has high troop numbers and adds 50% attack to offensive units accompanying him, so why is he so low on this list? The short answer is he lacks flanking, nor does he give it to any of his accompanying troops. That oversight makes him dated compared to other generals. He will shine in certain adventures. That plus his first strike, higher troop count, and higher than average damage is why I rate him as a premium general. Having said that, you will not find any adventure where he's the star of the show. He does okay vs Nords, but Nusala which is about his closest comparison just does it better.
Notes:
% Due to suicide options, these generals are extremely damaging in packs. The more you have of them, the more likely it is you can do zero/ very low loss adventures.
* Major General would be my go to if I had no OGG. With at least 1 OGG, MG's usefulness drops him much lower in the list. Having said that, MG can be bought using beanstalks from the Merchant (Epic tab)
+ General Loudmouth, Resolute General, and Champion Vargus all remove flanking or the targeting of the weakest unit and force the enemy camp to have to attack your defenders first. Any one of these generals is useful in a wide range of adventures and will come up time and again. While I haven't widely tested it, it may well be that RG may be the best choice in certain camps purely because he has more support troops. If you're looking to add GLM or RG to your adventures, look for guides with Vargus and match the defense units of the attack for quick simming.
** With Juan entering the game, chances are Mary will slip out of the premium generals and into the secondary/occasional blocker category. He's likely to outperform her in the SIMS once he starts to appear in them as neither general boost combat performance of their troops, but he has first strike and flanking along with 700 minimum damage.
Secondary Suiciders:
Ignoring the generals above which can also be used for suiciding, these secondary suiciders can also be lethal in packs.
1: Master of Martial Arts (MMA) - Suicider - Three of this first strike general will deal roughly the same damage as Nusala when comparing single unit suicides. Well worth knowing as many players have these in large multiples.
2: Frosty General(FRG) - My initial reaction to this general was it looked awesome. Comprehensive testing has show it to be otherwise, but it's still useful as a back up suicider to YGG and like YGG it's deadly in bunches. It looks good. It hits hard, and has higher HP than even YGG, but it lacks flanking. This single lack of an ability removes it from a premium spot and places it firmly in second tier suiciders and while it boosts defensive units attack which sounded good, it doesn't give them flanking either making these boosts less useful.
3: Cloaked General (CLG) - Loot Spot/Suicider - This first strike general is wildly inaccurate, but occasionally he will hit every bit as hard as a YGG. His worst hit is still equal to MMA's best, which is why he's on the list of second tier suiciders. Like the Ghost General he has the fastest travel time, combat round, and recovery time of any general making him very useful for Loot Spots(LS). He lacks flanking which is a gross oversight, and that also relegates him away from being a premium general, and into obscurity. Nowhere near as useful as an MMA suiciding unless it's vs a single troop camp.
4: Field Medic General (FMG) - Suicider - The best 200 unit suicider in the game where first strike is unimportant. His ability with first aid heavily reduces losses.
5: Lord Dracul (Drac) - Suicider - This first strike general is useful here and there, and there's still some guides about the place which use him.
6: Veteran (Vet) - Suicider - This very occasional suicider can still be dragged out and have them cobwebs dusted off them on the odd occasion for a suicide involving more than 200 units (265 max if skilled)
Blockers:
1: Tavern General (TG) - Blocker - His slowness in combat rounds makes the tavern general the best blocker in the game. There's only a few adventures where STG outperforms the TG.
2: Steadfast General(STG) This dual purpose general can be skilled as a blocker and I've used her in quite a few guides. In some cases she outshines even a TG where it comes to pulling off a lengthy block and MOD can rarely match her, but he's easier to come by.
3: Master of Defense (MOD) - Blocker - While Steadfast General(STG) tends to be slightly better and in more places which is why I ranked him 3 rather than 2, he's more readily available
Secondary/Infrequent Blockers
1: General Log (Log) - Rarely used - Maybe in an occasional shotgun block. (multiple generals with a single unit extending the time for attacking generals to get past the interception area)
2: General Grim Reaper(Grim) - Can be gotten free during the Halloween event. Basically a repackaged BHG.
3: Battler Hardened General (BHG) - Cheapest general for gems. Frankly keep saving as the day when BHG was premium are long gone.
4: General Bighelmet (GBH) - A more expensive version of a BHG.
5: Mad Scientist (MAD) - Well named as you'd need to be mad to use gems to get one. An overpriced general with no real saving grace except you can suicide block with him.
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Conserving Building Licences (Guild Quests)
Joining a guild is optional, but being in one generates a variety of advantages. Having players to talk to online, others to buff your production chains, and to do small trades to assist in completing quests is a quick rundown on a few of them.
Being in a guild allows you to do guild quests which happen to be the largest generator of Guild Coins. These coins can be used to purchase a variety of premium buildings which would otherwise cost gems or large sums of coin newer players can ill afford to purchase. The more active the guild, and the more players within the guild that complete it, the greater the bonus guild coins generated for the players that participated within the guild. These quests happen daily, so try to get on at least once a day to complete the quest and save up the coins for buildings, especially where you have shortfalls in your production.
All of these premium buildings require no building licence which allows you to increase your production in other areas where you may have shortfalls, so it's in your best interest to complete the guild quests, especially if you're new to the game, or not planning on spending real life cash on purchasing gems.
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Understanding Combat (The basics)
How combat works is often a mystery to even experienced players, so without getting too complicated, hopefully this guide will increase your grasp of the topic, and shed some light on how it works.
Assuming that the skill Confident Leader was not selected while skilling the general, a combat round will vary from 7-20 seconds. For now only Ghost and Cloaked General are at 7 seconds with Tavern Generals being the slowest at 20 seconds. Every other attacking general is 10 seconds. This knowledge is used in part in designing adventures with blocks, which is a whole other topic in itself, but for now leaving blocks aside, let's dig into the combat round itself and how it works.
A combat round has three phases, and damage is applied at the end of each phase.
Phase 1: First Strike units - All of your first strike units, and those of the enemy including generals/bosses will attack during this round. Damage is applied simultaneously, before moving onto the next phase of the combat round.
Phase 2: Normal Units - Most of your units will fit into this category.
Phase 3: Last Strike Units - Last strike units including generals/bosses.
Understanding how and where damage is applied is also important. Regardless of when damage is applied, defensive units are attacked first (Some bosses are considered defensive units) unless the unit has flanking in which case, the enemy unit(s) with the least HP will be attacked first. Splash is also important at this point, because without splash the maximum amount of enemies killed per attacking unit is 1 regardless of how much damage that unit can do.
First Strike Units (Usually have the lowest HP and are therefore the most likely to be hit by flanking enemy. All attack during the first strike phase, and their damage is applied first)
Basic: Cavalry
Elite: Knight, Mounted Marksman
Defensive Units (All attack during the normal phase)
Basic: Recruit, Militia, Soldier, Elite Soldier
Elite: Swordsman, Mounted Swordsman
Offensive Units (Normal phase)
Basic: Bow, Longbow, Crossbow
Elite: Marksman, Armored Marksman
Heavy Units (Last Strike phase)
Basic: Cannoneer
Elite: Besieger
The other thing to take into account is accuracy of the general and of the units with that General and how that ties back to damage. Any unit with 0 accuracy will still inflict it's minimum damage. Some units such as say Caltrops (0-20 damage) will be rendered harmless by Anslem whose skill "Dazzle" reduces accuracy of enemy units to 0%
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Understanding Combat (Intermediate)
Some players remain unaware of how combat actually works. Some even watch a replay of a fight, but don't appreciate the subtle nuances of what they're seeing. In this series of videos vs Nords I hope to better explain to people exactly what they're looking at, and why I ranked Nusala #1 and YGG #2 in my list of best generals. I also hope to show why even though I still rated Loner General on my list of premium generals at last position. It comes back to lacking flanking which I'm hoping you can more easily see over these three videos I'll be including in this post. First off let's meet the protagonists and the enemy.
https://i.imgur.com/eo4wBTk.jpg
(Click here for full image)
The first thing I'd like you to notice about the enemy is that the Valkyrie are the only normal unit. All of the rest have last strike, meaning that they're heavy units. If we can work out a way to remove any Valkyrie in a camp during the first strike round, or perhaps with a suicide attack , then we can use offensive units to remove the rest all before any of the armies within a camp gets a chance to react! The other thing you may notice is that the Valkyrie have the least amount of HP. That makes them vulnerable to flanking. So any unit with first strike and flanking will automatically have an advantage vs Valkyrie.
So keeping this in mind, the first choice general is Nusala. Not only does she hit quite hard, she also has first strike, flanking and splash. He skills give flanking and splash to offensive units. Perfect!
https://i.imgur.com/nsmV3zG.jpg
(Click here for full image)
(Nusala in action vs Nords)
If you watch the video carefully, you'll see Nusala destroying the Valkyrie by herself and her damage goes so far as to remove units in the next formation. The next round sees the crossbows polishing them off. If there had been another formation of defenders within the enemy camp they would have taken out the group with the lowest HP first due to flanking. More on that later.
In comparison let's look at Loner General and why he's inferior to Nusala despite having similar skills which allows him to affect offensive units by increasing their damage. This becomes more apparent in higher adventures than The Nords, but the Nords is still useful in highlighting where his issues lay.
(Important exception. LNG is lethal vs single unit camps with normal or last strike attacks where his lack of flanking ceases to be an issue. Additionally he increases the damage onto units such as AMM so he can be better Nusala under the right conditions. This is why he still rates as a premium general even though those exact conditions tend to be rare.)
https://i.imgur.com/OS0ynAQ.jpg
(Click here for full image)
(Loner in action vs Nords)
Watching carefully, you'll notice that the cavalry destroy the Valkyrie and that Loner general expends his damage onto the unit with the highest HP rendering his attack mostly harmless. However the follow up by the crossbows tears through the rest of that unit and into what was left from the cavalry charge. The additional damage from Loner paying dividends.
https://i.imgur.com/eSsbNU8.jpg
(Click here for full image)
https://i.imgur.com/ABKMbBK.jpg
(Click here for full image)
(YGG and OGG in action vs Nords)
This attack is a classic example of the destruction to an enemy camp that YGG brings which is why he ranks so highly in the Premium General stakes. he also gives defensive units +10% accuracy and flanking. His high accuracy and massive damage renders the unit accompanying him as unimportant. The follow up by OGG finishes the camp off. If you watch the attack carefully you'll see that OGG's damage goes onto the unit with the least amount of HP (flanking skill again) and that the crossbows start from the unit with the highest HP and work through those then into the next group before finishing off the last of the units that OGG's attack left standing.
https://i.imgur.com/J9Hvl52.jpg
(Click here for full image)
The last general I tend to use in Nords is General Tremble Beard to take advantage of his increased XP gain of 200%. In every other regard he's not a great general, but with books, we can at least make him somewhat useful even if only as a suicider. By giving GTB Master Planner(MP) we increase his accuracy to 100% meaning he will always do his maximum damage(485). We can increase his damage with Juggernaut, plus add Garrison Annex to increase his maximum troops from a pitiful 160 to 175. Add in Unstoppable Charge to give any first strike unit additional damage plus splash and under the right circumstances he can be useful. Overrun is likely wasted on GTB as you're unlikely to ever find a boss camp you can use him on, but maybe you can use him to suicide on one. The skill only affects bosses, so in retrospect it may well have been better to place those books in Hostile Takeover to generate some additional recruits or in Rapid Fire. Not because you'd seriously use GTB with Bows, but more so you can save on Tomes by using manuscripts instead.
I hope the reader walks away from this with a better understanding of how combat works. The next topic I'll be covering in combat is more advanced getting into how and why I skill generals as I do.
Note. There is no wrong way to skill a general provided you put some thought into how you want to use it. Technically you could reskill generals based on every adventure you run, but that would get rather costly so it's a tradeoff of flexibility vs usefulness and possible increased losses.
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The importance of Storehouses and how they affect production
When a player is first starting out and building licences are tight, they often neglect to place storehouses to increase production. A quick look at the diagram shows you where the best locations are. Always remember that the further away from a storehouse that a production house is, the less productive the settler becomes as his time is wasted walking to and from the workshop. Three well placed sawmills can be far more productive than ten poorly placed ones. Over a short period of a few minutes the effects are hard to see, but over the space of a year, those effects become very meaningful.
This fact is never more critical than during an event featuring fields such as Valentines and Halloween.
The basics is that production within the workshop is 35 minutes,so if your settler could teleport they would make 864 trips per field over the three week period. That's not a lot of trips, so surely walking a bit further won't matter right? Wrong. The further the settler has to walk, the less productive they become. On a plus side, the travel times are halved for event fields so 16 seconds becomes 8, 24 seconds 12, etc.
As for the impact
8 seconds costs you 2-3 trips over the entire period and that's your best result.
12 seconds costs you 3-4 trips
16 seconds costs you 4-5 trips
etc etc
Now for the second consideration. For events you really want to avoid uneven travel times if you're planning to use something like a Love Tree. The Love tree's buff lasts for 6 hours. If you do your buff from the tree a few minutes out from the end of it's cycle you get 11 trips out of the field. If it's longer than 8 minutes (or less depending on just how far the settler is walking) then you get only 10 trips for that field or fields, and yes over time staggered times will cause them to wind up on wildly different finish times, so overall it may well be better to have 3 fields at 12 seconds rather than 1 at 8 and the other 2 at 12.
Hopefully this helps people to understand their production that little bit better. Happy settling
https://i.imgur.com/xr3GDYq.jpg
(Click here for full image)
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Understanding Combat(Advanced Concepts. Using a Combat Simulator)
So you've been looking through the guides, but alas the guides that are out there just don't suit our needs. We're missing certain generals, or we have generals we'd like to test out. So how can we go about testing our theories?
Removing the social aspects and the pretty graphics of the game what you have is all based on mathematics. That means we can use a combat calculator usually called a combat sim for our generals to test them out. This can also help you to decide if that new general you just got is actually worth investing hard to come by books into it.
I've designed several adventure guides, and my go to simulator can be found at(The Settlers Online Combat Simulator).
It's updated regularly and widely used by many adventure guide designers. It also allows you to customise existing generals, and to export and import the lists. In a later post I'll get more into how to select the right general based on what's there at the camp, but certain generals will come up time and again as your likely best option. Technically you can use a single general to complete any adventure provided you don't care about your losses. The brute force approach isn't ideal and often leads to expensive failed attacks, so let's look at using a sim. As I've been doing Nords, we'll stick to that for now.
(Using a Combat Sim)
In the video I first off showed you some of the options of the sim, and then moved on to simming a camp. I first used the simulator's option 'find best attacker' to show me roughly what units would be best and at a light iteration of only 100 repetitions, before moving onto refining it.
During my refining tests, I shifted repetitions to 100000 to reveal any potential outliers which happen when you get 'bad random rolls'. It revealed that there was some with the potential to lose cavalry if the fight extended into a second round. Adding cavalry was doing the trick slowly, but adding far more crossbows solved it.
So for camp 23 of the Nords, several options in generals exist where you don't lose any units, so for the next sim, let's test out various generals on Camp 1 which is a far tougher prospect.
As these are skilled generals I'm using, I'll reveal how I have my generals skilled during the video, and explain why in a later post.
(Testing Nusala and YGG)
(NUS) 1ES 75B 104XB Losses: 1ES 75B 33-103(avg 51.27)
(YGG) 1ES 145B 9XB Losses: 155B
So while not ideal, both generals could be used. The reason they're not doing too well is they lack the troops to be effective vs all of the HP within that camp, so lets add more numbers by using generals with access to more troops.We'll also test using Militia for generals that struggle to get it done with recruits. The main reason to switch out different troop types is due to speed. As it was, I dropped OGG back to 10 repetitions just to speed things along.
(Testing GG LNG MG and OGG)
NUS 70M 1ES 109XB
GG 61M 1ES 168XB
MG 100R 1ES 184XB
LNG 92R 1ES 152XB
OGG 93R 1ES 201XB
Note:
1: While it may appear that LNG gave a slightly better performance than OGG, OGG will "rescue" far more troops as his natural first aid skill is 20% compared to LNG's 10% meaning that OGG will lose less troops once the dust has settled.
2: This is certainly not the best method to attack this camp, these attacks would work. However as all of the troops there have last strike, it could very easily be weakened by suicide attacks by literally any general in your army.
I hope this little series of videos helps people to get over the fear of simming. It can be quite rewarding to develop your own strategies in attacking camps.
As always happy settling.
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Understanding Combat(Advanced Concepts. Designing Potential Blocks in a Sim)
Many players are terrified of blocks. They don't understand how they work, or they've messed up a couple of times so now they're too scared to try it again. So let's talk about how they work, and why so many use them. For this one, I'll show you how to configure the simulator I use which is (here)
The first thing to understand is that not all camps can be blocked although technically you could use a shotgun block which is a series of generals suiciding on a camp to hold it in combat for an extended length of time to give your attacking generals time to either enter the camp you want them to attack or to leave the zone controlled by the camp you're blocking. Shotgun blocks are an advanced concept, but fairly easy to use. I have one in a guide for The Lost City using 2 x TG, and suggest you could add a third if you're struggling to pull it off. Three gives you 60 seconds which should be plenty of time.
(The Lost City)
The generals used to block have a path they walk to get to a camp. The basics is every 3 flags is 10 seconds. The revelie goes for 4 seconds for those that leave sound on. The longer a block goes for, the 'safer' it can be considered. For this test, I'm going to use the adventure Ali Baba and the Young Woodcutter. So lets look at the (G1) sector.
G1 features three camps which need to be either eliminated or blocked for the sector to be considered beaten. One of the three camps can be defeated without losing any troops, so provided we can develop a long lasting block, we can use a general to eliminate it while having the main attacking general attack the leader's camp.
A quick look at camp 4 shows that the enemy within groups have various skills, but nothing to be too concerned with. While the horsemen are first strike, they lack flanking, so they'll expend their energy onto the attacking general's defensive units. The desert marksmen have flanking, but lack first strike, so they can potentially be killed by our units with first strike. The shrewd thief also hits in the normal round and is low hp for a boss. There's plenty of generals that can get the job done, but Boris offers a boost to fast units and he also adds more XP(+50%) making him perfect for this job.
Camp 3 is also vulnerable to MMM. GTB (200% XP boost) cannot quite carry enough troops to pull it off without losing some, but Mary (100% XP Boost) certainly can. As an added bonus, so can Boris without losing any troops even if somehow Mary accidentally gets intercepted by the camp we're trying to block.
Below is a YouTube video showing the design process and how to use the sim
(Adjusting the sim after calculating the attacks to sim the block)
Camp 3: 110 Desert Marksmen 100 Stone Cannon
(Mary) 215MMM (20 seconds)
Camp 4: 120 Horseman 80 Desert Marksman 1 Shrewd Thief
(BOR) 24MS 151MMM (20 seconds)
The attacks don't last very long, and while the walk through the camp we need to block takes time, maybe we can sim up something that will work.
So now let's move on to the critical camp.
Camp 2: 180 Sword Wielder
TG 197MS (280-318.07-460sec)
MOD 198MS (150-169.23-250sec)
STG 195MS (130-151.25-380sec)
TG was the easy winner with his block lasting a minimum of 280 seconds which is over 4 minutes. More than enough time for the attacking generals to arrive. The MOD blocks the camp for a minimum of 2 minutes 30 seconds with STG blocking it for 2 minutes 10 seconds making them ideal for use in speed runs with scouting and obs active.
The rest is just calculating the steps to avoid being intercepted.
Below is a layout using two generals, but a third can easily be added
General's Layout Close Up
https://i.imgur.com/UYtuRfK.jpg
(For Full Picture)
General's Attacks and Blocks
https://i.imgur.com/diNv8fl.jpg
(For Full Picture)
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Understanding Combat(Advanced Concepts. Skilling Generals)
https://i.imgur.com/AVVN6uk.jpg
(Click here for a full picture)
One of the question I am regularly asked is what's the correct way to skill my generals? It seems a fair question so why is it so difficult to answer.
The main reason is that your needs as a player from your generals will change with your level. As you develop your island and have access to greater amounts of resources after developing your production chains, the loss of a few extra units becomes more acceptable if you can increase the speed of your adventuring which in turn increases your XP you can gain within the same period of time. Skills you may have ignored before such as Jog and Navigation now become desirable on all of your generals and you stop using any general that doesn't have it.
You cannot take all of the skills available so you need to pick and choose. Certain skills will come up time and again whereas other skills you'll rarely use.
Speaking broadly, the skills on the left side of the table directly affect combat either by reducing the effectiveness of the enemy, or increasing the effectiveness of certain units in combat and the skills on the right are more passive in the way they affect your general more outside of combat with only a single exception which reduces a combat round but doesn't directly affect damage being Confident Leader.
So let's dive a bit deeper into each skill on the left. Any skill in green has potential issues. Those in black are more useful.
Note: No general used as a blocker should have any of the skills on the left as it may affect blocks and force you to have to sim. In some cases blocking with this general will become impossible rendering it useless and costing you either gems or books to reset it. You've been warned.
Rapid Fire - Affects Bowman by increasing their damage. With no other skills it's not particularly useful for most adventures with Nusala and Loner benefiting most from it.
Juggernaut - Useful for Premium Generals and Suiciders as it increases the damage of your General and adds splash to their skills if they don't already have it
Sniper Training - Affects Longbowmen and Marksmen. Two of the least used units in the guides. I suggest looking elsewhere to place your valuable books.
Overrun - Decreases the health(HP) of enemy bosses making them easier to kill. Premium generals which are likely to attack leader camps will benefit most from this skill. Suiciders won't be alive long enough to benefit from it. Don't forget that YGG is often used as an attacking general and will benefit from this skill despite being used as a suicider quite regularly.
Unstoppable Charge - This skill increases damage from your first strike (swift) units by 3 and also gives them splash. Cavalry and Knights benefit from it most as neither has splash naturally. While Mounted Marksman also benefits an additional 3 damage isn't great and MMM already have splash naturally. A useful skill for generals that regularly use swift units such as Boris.
Battle Frenzy - This skill increases the damage what's left of your army is doing after each combat round. Premium Generals with the exception of GG, YGG and Anslem are likely to benefit least from the skill as generally speaking their battles finish far too quickly for the skill to even kick in. Anslem and YGG with their lower troop numbers are likely to see far more rounds far more often.
Cleave - This skill only affects Elite Soldiers and instead of increasing it's defense which might have made it useful, it increases their attack which isn't what defense units are supposed to be for. Why this skill is even considered being worth codexes reveals just how little the developers understand the game's dynamics.
Weekly Maintenance - This skill affects your heavy units by increasing their damage. Both Cannons and Besiegers benefit from it. Unfortunately Garrison Annex is also available at this level meaning that this skill will rarely justify getting 3 codexes. The Generals that benefit from it the most are those with very large armies such as OGG and MG.
Lightning Slash - Generals with small armies and high damage benefit most from this skill. YGG and Anslem spring to mind. For other Premium Generals the next skill is far better.
Master Planner - Almost always the best skill available. Adding 10% accuracy to your general and their troops is huge. Elite soldiers, cannons and all elite units from Swordsman to Besiegers will have 100% accuracy meaning they always do their maximum damage in combat.
Now for the right side aka the more passive skills. Unlike the left combat skills, there isn't really any one of them I'd call useless, but I will say on Premium Generals with the exception of Garrison Annex which increases the number of troops a general can have, any book placed on the right side reduces that General's maximum damage. The more books there is on the right side, potentially the less useful that general becomes. Once you understand that concept, things gets easier.
First Aid - Useful skill. In single unit suicides having just one manuscript here will stop that unit from ever dying regardless of how often it's defeated in battle. It will always be resurrected after the battle is over even if the battle was lost. It's the key to how zero loss adventures are designed.
Jog - For higher level players, this skill becomes critical especially as maps become larger with more distance to cover.
Hostile Takeover - Useful in as much as it generates Mercenary Recruits. Once you have access to Elite Troops, this skill becomes less useful, but still worth considering.
Navigation Crash Course - At higher levels this skill will become critical on all of your generals. Generals without it will tend to get left home.
Fast Learner - Boris, Mary and Tremblebeard are better choices if you want an XP boost. I wouldn't recommend it as there's only a limited amount of books available especially by this level and quite a few choices. As it is, if you're using Jog x 3 Navi x 3 Juggernaut x 3 Overrun x 3 and at least 1 book in First Aid, you've already used 13 of your max 21 books. Assuming you will be grabbing Garrison Annex and say Master Planner, that's another 4 for a total of 17, so just 4 left. With Unstoppable Charge and Battle Frenzy still without books... You get the drift.
Just a Flesh Wound - Arguably the least useful skill on the right side. Once a battle is finished all of your generals spring back to life anyway, so it's iffy if this skill will even see use as adventures rarely last long enough for it to be a thing.
Garrison Annex - Up to an additional 15 troops for your generals. Even OGG approves. This one is basically a no brainer to take, but it does limit you as you're only allowed 6 codexes in any General.
Confident Leader - There's an adventure here and there where this skill might be useful, but it's rare. If an attack is that time critical i suggest you use GG as she has it naturally. If there was ever an update allowing more books into a general, I might consider using it then. Until that happens, not so much.
Bounty Hunter - A great skill in a bad spot. With three other better skills available to you generating star coins just doesn't make a deal of sense.
1-Up - A great skill for your suiciders. Nusala and YGG benefit greatly from this skill.
In conclusion feel free to totally ignore what I've outlined here. Perhaps you insist on having fast learner on all of your generals even if it does slow them down. Or maybe you like generating lots of recruits. maybe you only want books in first aid on certain generals. As I said at the start, there's no wrong way to skill a general, but there's some skills you should seriously consider the long term consequences of before adding it to one.
Happy Settling
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Understanding Combat(Advanced Concepts. Lacking Generals to Suit a Guide)
https://i.imgur.com/BKBpJKG.jpg
(For a full view click here)
There are so many guides available these days using so many generals yet the only general I can state with authority that everyone has access to is the original Tavern General. Hopefully by now if you've been following this series you've experimented with and have an understanding of how to use the sim. If not I urge you to read the other posts on this thread outlining how to do so.
With Easter just around the corner, it's likely General Sylvana (which is basically a reskin of an older general called Boris) will be available again. She should be perfect to use to outline how generals can sometimes be used to substitute for each other.I'll refer to her as Boris from now on as I have one of the originals and I usually refer to her as Boris to avoid confusion.
He can often be used in place of Anslem, and the Major General can often be used in place of the Older Gemini General. Sometimes Boris can be used to replace both.
For this example I'm going to use an older guide of mine from back when I didn't have Boris. Vargus also featured in it. He can be replaced with the Resolute General or General Loudmouth if you have either available. If not, he can be more problematic to replace due to his skill of removing flanking from both himself and the enemy. That doesn't mean he can never be replaced, just that the losses can be higher. Having said that, Boris often betters him in certain camps as will become apparent during this exercise.
For this guide I'll play around with Aladdin & the Oil Lamp.(Fast Loot)
To see the full guide as outlined please refer to this link here
Generals Used
Older Gemini General (MP), Vargus (MP), Anslem (LS), Steadfast General, Younger Gemini General (1-Up) x 3
Optional Extras: Older Gemini General (MP) x 2, Vargus (MP), Anslem (LS)
Troops Suggested: 1000MS 500K 600AMM 1000MMM 600B
Tested Losses: 493MS 180K
Usually this would be a bad guide for what I have in mind as I'm going to assume we have none of these generals available so we'd be better off finding another guide, but for an example, this is useful. Instead we have only a small selection being the Tavern Generals(TG), Major General(MG), Sylvana(BOR), Loner General(LNG) and maybe Ghost General(GG) as I've noticed many players seem to have her in multiples.
(G1)
Camp 8: 210 Mounted Sailor 1 Steersman
(ANS) 37MS 128B Losses: 36MS
(BOR) 42MS 153B Losses: 35-41MS
(GG) 45MS 185B Losses: 34-44MS
(MG) 64MS 221B Losses: 56-62MS
(LNG) 63MS 182B Losses: 56-63MS
Camp 0: 120 Sailor 100 Cannon Master
((OGG) 295MMM Losses: 0
(BOR) 195MMM Losses: 0
(GG) 230MMM Losses: 0
(MG) 285MMM Losses: 0
(LNG) 245MMM Losses: 0
Camp 1: 250 Battle Hardened Sailor
(OGG) 22MS 273MMM Losses: 18-21MS
(BOR) 22MS 173MMM Losses: 18-22MS
(GG) 20MS 210MMM Losses: 14-19MS
(MG) 24MS 261MMM Losses: 19-23MS
(LNG) 25MS 220MMM Losses: 20-24MS
Camp 3: 70 Sailor 70 Mounted Sailor 70 Boatswain
(VAR) 31MS 164MMM Losses: 25-30MS
(BOR) 9MS 186K Losses: 8-9MS 18-21K
(GG) 14MS 201K 15B Losses: 9-13MS 21-29K
(MG) 18MS 246K 20B Losses: 15-19MS 34-43K
(LNG) 19MS 206K 20B Losses: 15-19MS 34-43K
Camp 4: 100 Sailor 100 Petty Officer Second Class 1 Captain
(OGG) 295MMM Losses: 0
(BOR) 195MMM Losses: 0
(GG) 20AMM 210MMM Losses: 0
(MG) 285MMM Losses: 0
(LNG) 245MMM Losses: 0
Camp 5: 150 Boatswain 100 Cannon Master
(VAR) 28MS 167MMM Losses: 23-27MS
(BOR) 195K Losses: 38-44K
(GG) 230MS Losses: 43-56MS
(MG) 285MS Losses: 55-63MS
(LNG) 245MS Losses: 51-60MS
Camp 9: 130 Battle Hardened Sailor 120 Mounted Sailor
(ANS) 42MS 123MMM Losses: 32-41MS
(BOR) 195K Losses: 38-44K
(GG) 230MS Losses: 43-56MS
(MG) 285MS Losses: 55-63MS
(LNG) 245MS Losses: 51-60MS
Camp 10: 250 Mounted Sailor 1 Mutineer
(ANS) 45MS 120B Losses: 45MS
(BOR) 54MS 123MMM Losses: 39-53MS
(GG) 61MS 169B Losses: 45-61MS
(MG) 87MS 198MMM Losses: 69-86MS
(LNG) 87MS 158MMM Losses: 69-86MS
(G2)
Camp 11: 270 Battle Hardened Sailor
(OGG) 26MS 269MMM Losses: 22-26MS
(BOR) 27MS 168MMM Losses: 22-26MS
(GG) 25MS 205MMM Losses: 19-24MS
(MG) 28MS 257MMM Losses: 23-27MS
(LNG) 29MS 216MMM Losses: 24-28MS
Camp 12: 80 Battle Hardened Sailor 90 Mounted Sailor 80 Boatswain
(VAR) 51MS 144B Losses: 44-50MS
(BOR) 13MS 142K 40B Losses: 10-13MS 19-24K
(GG) 20MS 140K 70B Losses: 16-20MS 23-34K
(MG) 25MS 213K 47B Losses: 21-25MS 39-51K
(LNG) 25MS 213K 47B Losses: 21-25MS 39-49K
Camp 60: 150 Mounted Sailor 100 Petty Officer Second Class 1 Captain
(OGG) 41MS 254MMM Losses: 34-40MS
(BOR) 21MS 174MMM Losses: 17-20MS
(GG) 28MS 40AMM 162MMM Losses: 21-27MS
(MG) 41MS 254MMM Losses: 34-40MS
(LNG) 41MS 204MMM Losses: 34-40MS
Camp 18: 80 Sailor 80 Mounted Sailor 100 Boatswain
(VAR) 39MS 156MMM Losses: 33-38MS
(BOR) 11MS 184K Losses: 8-11MS 24-30K
(GG) 15MS 185K 30B Losses: 11-14MS 33-38K
(MG) 22MS 243K 20B Losses: 17-21MS 50-60K
(LNG) 22MS 203K 20B Losses: 17-21MS 49-61K
Camp 19: 100 Battle Hardened Sailor 160 Mounted Sailor
(ANS) 33MS 132B Losses: 32MS
(BOR) 22MS 153MMM 20B Losses: 18-21MS
(GG) 36MS 124MMM 70B Losses: 27-34MS
(MG) 44MS 201MMM 40B Losses: 37-43MS
(LNG) 47MS 141MMM 57B Losses: 40-46MS
Camp 20: 250 Mounted Sailor 1 Mutineer
(ANS) 45MS 120B Losses: 45MS
(BOR) 54MS 101MMM 40B Losses: 39-53MS
(GG) 62MS 168MMM Losses: 45-61MS
(MG) 87MS 198MMM Losses: 68-86MS
(LNG) 87MS 158MMM Losses: 69-86MS
Camp 21: 100 Sailor 100 Mounted Sailor 70 Petty Officer Second Class
(VAR) 38MS 157MMM Losses: 31-37MS
(BOR) 14MS 181K Losses: 11-13MS
(GG) 29MS 140K 61B Losses: 21-25MS 30-40K
(MG) 27MS 207K 51B Losses: 23-26MS 51-58K
(LNG) 27MS 218K Losses: 23-26MS 19-24K
Camp 22: 50 Battle Hardened Sailor 100 Mounted Sailor 100 Boatswain 1 Steersman
(ANS) 28MS 31K 106B Losses: 26-27MS 31K
(BOR) 34MS 51K 110B Losses: 24-33MS 24-30K
(GG) 29MS 80K 121B Losses: 21-29MS 30-42K
(MG) 36MS 80K 169B Losses: 31-36MS 50-69K
(LNG) 36MS 80K 129B Losses: 31-36MS 50-69K
Camp 37: 120 Sailor 150 Petty Officer Second Class
(OGG) 295MMM Losses: 0
(BOR) 195MMM Losses: 0
(GG) 230MMM Losses: 0
(MG) 285MMM Losses: 0
(LNG) 245MMM Losses: 0
Camp 39: 100 Battle Hardened Sailor 80 Mounted Sailor 80 Petty Officer Second Class
((OGG) 35MS 70K 190B Losses: 31-35MS 56-69K
(BOR) 22MS 69K 104B Losses: 19-22MS 55-69K
(GG) 24MS 91K 115B Losses: 18-23MS 34-48K
(MG) 32MS 57K 148B Losses: 34-40MS 56-68K
(LNG) 25MS 70K 100B Losses: 19-22MS 55-68K
Camp 50: 50 Sailor 210 Petty Officer Second Class
(OGG) 295MMM Losses: 0
(BOR) 195MMM Losses: 0
(GG) 230MMM Losses: 0
(MG) 285MMM Losses: 0
(LNG) 245MMM Losses: 0
Camp 51: 270 Mounted Sailor
(ANS) 38MS 127B Losses: 37MS
(BOR) 36MS 159B Losses: 31-35MS
(GG) 48MS 181B Losses: 40-48MS
(MG) 72MS 213B Losses: 64-71MS
(LNG) 72MS 173B Losses: 63-71MS
Camp 54: 250 Boatswain 1 Captain 1 Giant Cannon
(STG) 118K + (OGG) 295AMM Losses: 118K
(LNG) 118K + (BOR) 195AMM Losses: 118K
(LNG) 118K + (GG) 230AMM Losses: 118K
(LNG) 118K + (MG) 285AMM Losses: 118K
(LNG) 118K + (LNG) 230AMM Losses: 118K
Camp 53: 250 Petty Officer Second Class 1 Steersman 1 Giant Cannon
(YGG) 1MMM + (OGG) 10MS 138AMM 147MMM Losses: 6-10MS
(LNG) 39K + (OGG) 10MS 138AMM 147MMM Losses: 6-10MS 39K
(LNG) 200K + (BOR) 13MS 182AMM Losses: 8-12MS 200K
(LNG) 200K + (GG) 7MS 223AMM Losses: 3- 6MS 200K
(LNG) 39K + (MG) 10MS 138AMM 137MMM Losses: 5-8MS 39K
(LNG) 39K + (LNG) 10MS 138AMM 137MMM Losses: 5-8MS 39K
[color="black"}Camp 56: 250 Battle Hardened Sailor 20 Mounted Sailor[/color]
(YGG) 1MMM + (OGG) 18MS 277MMM Losses: 14-18MS
(OGG) 33MS 262MMM Losses: 27-32MS
(BOR) 28MS 167MMM Losses: 22-27MS
(GG) 25MS 205MMM Losses: 19-24MS
(MG) 36MS 249MMM Losses: 30-35MS
(LNG) 37MS 208MMM Losses: 31-36MS
Camp 58: 70 Sailor 200 Battle Hardened Sailor
(OGG) 19MS 276MMM Losses: 15-18MS
(BOR) 19MS 176MMM Losses: 15-18MS
(GG) 18MS 212MMM Losses: 13-17MS
(MG) 20MS 265MMM Losses: 16-20MS
(LNG) 22MS 223MMM Losses: 17-21MS
Camp 59: 250 Cannon Master 1 Informant
(YGG) 1AMM + (YGG) 1AMM + (YGG) 1AMM + (OGG) 37MS 258MMM Losses: 18-36MS
(OGG) 73MS 140AMM 82MMM Losses: 36-72MS
(LNG) 50K + (BOR) 73MS 122MMM Losses: 36-72MS 50K
(LNG) 50K + (GG) 60MS 100AMM 70MMM Losses: 30-60MS 50K
(MG) 73MS 140AMM 72MMM Losses: 36-72MS
(LNG) 95MS 150MMM Losses: 53-94MS
Some of the takeaways from this exercise
1. Sometimes the only way to defeat a camp is to weaken it with suicide attacks. You'll also notice that on harder camps, MG was the best choice from all of the options that was available in my make believe scenario. That was especially apparent on the last camp where even Loner struggled despite having far greater hitting power than MG. That's why if a player doesn't have an OGG MG rates so highly. If the Loner had been skilled with anything else but MP, he would've needed a suicider to weaken it first like the other generals did. Even just a few more units would have also have caused him to need one. A few less units and he breaks it just as easily as MG did, but that's the difference in why he ranked at 14 and MG ranked in the top 5. There are camps only OGG or MG can break, whereas for LNG there's usually a better option. That doesn't make him a bad general, it just means that over time and as you gain more generals, you'll use him less.
2. Boris gives 50% extra XP from any enemy troops he defeats. As your level increases GG which can at times give a better performance on a camp will be used less often because the few extra troops lost is well worth the additional XP you gain from Boris. Overall Boris gives a solid performance and with his +50% bonus to XP you get, it should be fairly easy to see why I ranked him in the top 5 as opposed to GG which I ranked at 10.
3. An unusual thing you may have noticed is with Anslem. Anslem causes all of the units in a camp to have 0% accuracy meaning that they're hitting at their weakest. Because of this, if Anslem defeats an enemy in one round the losses will be constant rather than having a spread which is more typical for generals because of the randomness of the attacks. The only reason Anslem has some variations after the first round is because it depends on how many units was killed on both sides as to what will happen in subsequent rounds. In some adventures Anslem is by far your best choice of General. The only reason he's not in my top 5 is because of Boris. Boris caused him to take a hit, but not as much of a hit as Vargus has taken. Since the release of General Loudmouth and the Resolute General, Vargus has dropped sharply. He may well drop out of the list completely and become a suicider at a later date. Time will tell.
4. Camp 54 requires suiciders to weaken it to a point that a general can defeat it regardless of what generals you have available. However once suiciders have removed the boatswains, the captain and giant cannon are easily defeated using any general that's been skilled with Master Planner(MP) and Overrun by using AMM as your army which brings me back to the importance of skilling. While there's no one correct way to skill a general. Consider first how you are planning to use it and strategise accordingly.
In conclusion every guide could be presented something like this, but they take hours to do. Also not everyone has skilled generals, so then you need to do a separate guide for unskilled ones, and so on.
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Skilling Explorers
https://i.imgur.com/frvXK4S.jpg
(Click here for full image)
Important Note: Please use common sense while skilling explorers rather than slavishly following this guide. Consider what's the most likely length of time you will send out an explorer on a search. Which are the explorers you are most likely to skill for artefact or rarity searches, or even if you will. Certain explorers suit certain lengths of treasure search such as the following three explorers:
Humble finds additional treasure on short and medium treasure searches
Benevolent will find buffs on very long and prolonged treasure searches
Romantic finds additional treasure on long, very long, and prolonged treasure searches
Obviously the way you will skill these explorers will differ to the more generic skill up. So bearing that in mind, feel free to read up, and switch and change the spots to suit your game style.
Explorers are the hidden driving force behind many a successful player. The more you have the better you will do during events. Unlike generals there's no such thing as a bad explorer. Even your lowly tavern explorer will nett you a positive result from an event and will pay for itself over and over again long after the cost to purchase it from the tavern is forgotten.
Explorers can be roughly divided into five types.
Those that give bonuses for adventures such as Keener and Intrepid
Those that give bonuses for treasure such as Humble, Emphatic and Courageous
Those that give bonuses for both treasure and adventure searches such as Princess Zoe and Adventurous
Those that give bonuses for treasure, rarity and artefact searches such as Motherly
Those that are event Specialists such as Fluffy Butte and Snowy
During events all of your explorers will be out on treasure searches even those that specialise elsewhere. While short treasure searches is the best to maximise your returns, I'd argue that medium and long are the better choices to maintain your sanity and to not interfere with your adventuring. Additionally certain explorer types benefit more from doing longer types of treasure searches whereas others benefit from shorter ones.
So keeping all of this in mind, lets strategise where and how to place books into your various explorers.
First off, a quick look in the total books available for specifically Adventure Explorers shows only 13 spots of a possible 21 meaning we need to place 8 books elsewhere. My suggestion is that 6 of those books go into manuscripts, specifically Pilgramage and Mountain Boots aside from the three you likely already have in Fearless Hiker.
Ideally all of your explorers will have a minimum of 6 manuscripts in them. 3 x Fearless Hiker (Shortens the Search time for all adventure searches by 15%) and 3 x Mountain Boots (Shortens the search time for all treasure searches by 9%) and that 3 more manuscripts are used in either Pilgrimage for the bulk of your explorers (Shortens search time for long treasure searches by 15%) except for Humble Explorers who should not be used past medium search to take advantage of their skill so instead those three books are switched to Lucky Detour.
For Tomes I use 6 books, regardless of the type of explorer, but where I use them differs and for Humble Explorer I use 9 tomes
For exclusively Adventurer types I use 3 x Wild Determination (90% more map parts on Adventure Searches) and 3 x Travel Expenses (Reduce the adventure search costs by 30%)
For all other explorers I use 3 x Extended Weekend (Shorten the search time for medium treasure searches by 15%) and Sturdy Shovel (add 9% more loot on all treasure searches). Humble the other three I use in Loot Wagon.
Last but not least is Codexes. I personally always use 6, except for Humble where I only use 3 which is 3 x Pathfinder.
For Adventurer types I have 3 x Trouble Seeker (30% chance of finding an additional adventure) 2 x Pathfinder (Shorten the search time for all searches by 10%) and 1 x Sophisicated Pillager (30% chance of an adventure bonus quest). You could switch that book to Pathfinder to drop all searches by 15%. Notice that's ALL searches, not just treasure and the Adventure Bonus Quest reward can be iffy at higher levels.
For all Treasure Types except Humble I suggest 3 x Sabbatical (Shorten the search time for very long by 15%) and 3 x Pathfinder (Shorten the search time by 15% for all searches). While you could use Streetwise Negotiator for 1 codex and sacrifice say 1 book from Sabbatical, the bonus quest involves finding an amount of a rss and the reward for doing so isn't that great, so the skill is iffy. For a codex, I'd have expected better, but hey to each their own.
For rarity and artefact type explorers if you choose to run them, shift one book from Sabbatical onto the required search type. I strongly suggest you only use Motherly Explorers like this as she will reward each search with 4 slots thereby increasing your chances of getting something decent.
How or even IF you skill explorers is up to you. I've run explorers without skills for years quite successfully, but this guide may give you a few ideas for if you've started to think about it. I suggest at worst popping in the 6 manuscripts on both the leftmost and rightmost sides for most explorers except maybe Humble as it's unlikely you'll use him to look for maps, similar to how you're unlikely to use a Romantic to do so either due to how slow they are, but for a generic skill up, you might just to reduce the amount of books needed to get to the skills you really want to add. In this game and with books and skilling things, everything's a trade off.
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Great work as always DL, appreciated.
Can BB make this a sticky please?
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How I skill my Generals
https://i.imgur.com/R9e6yHA.jpg
(click here for the enlarged version)
This is not the only way to skill them, nor is it likely to be the best way as specifically customising your generals to suit the adventure is far better, but how I skill is very flexible and can be used without alteration over all adventures when generals are needed, including scout runs. As always there's a trade off so you will suffer slightly more losses for certain camps and be unaffected on others.
One thing you'll notice with skilling is that regardless of who is suggesting it, that certain skills will come up time and again. For premium generals skills such as Juggernaut, Overrun, Garrison Annex, and Master Planner(or Lightning Slash) are almost universal. Because of this, my guides are very likely to work without having to exactly match how I've done it.
For anyone interested, my guides can be found here.
(Click here for my adventure guides)
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Using Explorers
As I've previously mentioned, there's 5 types of explorers. This is a complete list of how I use my explorers outside of events, but I do occasionally place all of my explorers onto adventure searches except for humble, romantic and scared. It's a great way to replace or add to the adventures which have been used up during an event or to prepare for the next one if time's running out and you're not happy with the numbers you have available to you.
Be aware that all adventure searches use resources and all treasure searches replenish them so strategise accordingly.
I've broken down the way I prefer to use my explorers into the three major types outside of events which is treasure(inc rarity and artefact), adventure, or both.
Adventurous Explorer (both)(50% more treasure, lower costs for adventure)
Benevolent Explorer (treasure)(extra buff on very long and prolonged only)
Bewitching Explorer (treasure)
Bold Explorer (both) (50% treasure + buffs for both treasure and adventure)
Candid Explorer (treasure)
Courageous Explorer (treasure)
Emphatic Explorer (treasure)
Experienced Explorer (both)
Explorer (Tavern) (both)
Fluffy Butte (both)(event specialist)
Humble Explorer (treasure)(short or medium only)
Intrepid Explorer (adventure)
Keener Explorer (adventure)
Lovely Explorer (treasure)
Lucky Explorer (both)
Motherly Explorer (treasure)(rarity and artefact x 4)
Pirate Explorer (treasure)
Princess Zoe (both)(chance of a buff and adventure on treasure and always finds a buff on adventure search)
Romantic Explorer (treasure)(long, v long, prolonged only)
Royal Explorer (adventure) (can find tokens)
Savage Scout (both)
Scared Explorer (treasure)(finds extraordinary items)
Snowy Explorer (treasure)(rarity and artefact x 2)(event item x 4)
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Where do I make the combat tools?
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Lenaburg
Where do I make the combat tools?
What do you mean?
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How I Rank Generals(Advanced Concepts)
The game has released a new general for the latest event. Exciting times, but is it a must have or a dud? You head to your favourite sim, but alas the new general isn't available on it yet, so with no way to accurately test it how can you decide if it will be worth your precious event item?
This is the question I get asked so many times. So let's look at three generals that have been released while I was away, and why I consider one of them is a must have, one is a maybe if you have the spare event items, and one is a dud I don't recommend.
Nutcracker General (200) (3900HP) (500-2000DMG) (70% ACC) Normal Combat Round Flanking & Splash Recovers 20% of lost unit after every battle. Units HP +30%.
Miraculous General (200) (300HP) (400-800DMG) (80%ACC) Last Strike Natural 1-Up Skill. Recover 45% of lost units after every battle.
Resolute General (200) (3000HP) (400-600DMG) (85%ACC) Normal Combat Round Increases the HP of Soldiers, Elite Soldiers and Swordsman by +100%, for an initial cost of -30% to their damage dealt, and allows these specific units to deal Splash Damage. Enemy Offensive and Heavy units deal 30% reduced damage. The formation also prevents his troops from being Flanked by the enemy. Every turn spent in battle makes the general and professional infantry units strike +50% harder.
A quick look at that already starts to organise which general is going to sim from best to worst regardless of how you skill them up.
A: Miraculous General will always be the worst of the three and here's why.
Pros:
1. Recovers 45% of his losses with natural first aid making him the current highest general with the skill in the game.
Cons:
1. It's attack is within the last section of the combat, so it's relying on the units that are accompanying it.
2. Unlike GG which makes the list of premium generals, it doesn't affect the accompanying units with in it any way. Sure you can skill it to affect them, but why when there's better generals offering better skills.
3. Lacks splash meaning you'll need to invest 3 x manuscripts into Juggernaut for the general to gain the skill.
4. It has low HP so it's use as a potential blocker just isn't there. Add in as a suicider it would rank behind even FMG which attacks in the normal round.
So overall if i had to rate this general out of 10 in the three categories 2/10 from Premium, 2/10 as a suicider 1/10 as a blocker.
B: Nutcracker General. Overall he's iffy if he's worth investing in. His damage spread coupled with lower than normal accuracy also pushes it into the questionable category. Worth picking up if you lack a decent amount of suiciders, but you're be less likely to use him as you gain more generals.
Pros.
1. Attacks weakest target first (Flanking skill)
2. Boosts the defense of all accompanying units thus lowering losses
3. Higher than average HP and a decent amount of minimum damage
4. Natural First Aid
Cons.
1. Lacks First Strike
Overall the Nutcracker General would have been a premium general 8 years ago. Now it's more like the MMA. Not a bad general, just not good enough to be considered a "must have" any more. Could you use him on an adventure and invest books into him like you would with another premium general? Certainly, but I personally wouldn't. If I had one and I had the books to spare, I'd treat him more like a quality suicider rather than a premium general. He's slightly better than MMA once you add Juggernaut to him as his maximum damage is higher. With his natural first aid being higher and also boosting the HP of units with him, he's one of the better second tier suiciders in the game. I'd recommend Master Planner on him rather than 1-Up due to the difference in damage from his minimum attack in comparison to his maximum. With MMA the spread is 500-550, so 1-Up means I get to inflict at worst that minimum damage twice, so 500 x 2. Whereas with Master Planner that attack is limited to only one time or 550 which is lower than the 1000 damage that two attacks would give me. If you look at my post on how I skill my generals, you'll notice that is my overall strategy.
Overall rating: Premium 4/10 Suicider 6/10 Blocker Unlikely as his attack is likely too high.
C: Resolute General. Of the three, he's the pick of them, and a must have if you have the event items to get one and here's why.
Pros:
1. Removes flanking from the enemy. (One of only three generals with this skill. General Loudmouth appears to be no longer available and Vargus costs gems)
2. Reduces the damage of offensive and heavy units by 30% which will help to reduce losses.
3. Doubles the HP of your defensive units which will have to be killed first due to the removal of flanking
4. The longer the battle lasts, the harder the general and defensive units will hit. (+50% per combat round)
*5. In adventures 10+ this general is currently the best of any general that removes flanking.
Cons:
1. Lacks flanking so the offensive and heavy units will be around longer
2. The defensive units start at -30% damage, and while that's not their job it will may still cause the combat to last for more rounds
So overall rating: Premium 8.5/10 (Easily a top 5-10 Premium General). Suicider 3/10 (His minimum damage puts him behind better generals more suited to it, but he could be used in a pinch.) Blocker: 1/10 The general's damage increasing every round makes him unsuited to this role, but only one premium general straddles that line anyway being the Steadfast General, but then again she's the most versatile general in the game and the only general that can be used in all three categories.
This post is already far larger than I meant it to be, but I hope it helps you to understand how to pick out the diamonds in the rough from the generals you'll likely never use.
*See my post on Substituting RG for Vargus below as to why he's just better.
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Generals (Substituting RG for Vargus in guides)
In elite adventures (10+), the Resolute General is better than General Loudmouth and Vargus despite not having first strike.
To understand why, you need to understand that Mounted Swordsman have 250HP and Swordsman have 150, but RG doubles the HP for soldiers, elite soldiers and Swordsman. Swordsman also hit harder than Mounted Swords, so the initial loss of attack power isn't a factor. Assuming that your RG has Master Planner, your Swordsman will have 100% accuracy thus doing max damage which is 80 (56 after losing 30% on their first attack) which is still higher than Mounted Swordsman at a maximum of 50 damage.
This means that there's a quick way to use him in any guide featuring either Vargus or General Loudmouth by replacing the Mounted Swordsman with Swordsman. You could even use the troops as outlined in the guide (See below for an example) even though RG has more troops than either of them.
As an example of a quick substitution
From my guide on Oil
Camp 3: 70 Sailor 70 Mounted Sailor 70 Boatswain
(VAR) 32MS 163MMM (Losses: 25-30MS)
(RG) 32Sw 153MMM (Losses: 22-27Sw)
(GLM) 32MS 153MMM (Losses: 24-29MS)
A more complex one from Young Woodcutter
Camp 5: 80 sword wielder 80 mounted bowmen
(VAR) 36MS 57AMM 102MMM (Losses: 29-34MS)
(RG) 36Sw 47AMM 102MMM (Losses: 28-32Sw)
(GLM) 36MS 47AMM 102MMM (Losses: 29-34MS)
Obviously for some of these attacks, using more troops would further reduce losses, but this is more of post to explain how to deploy this general and why you should strive to acquire one when he next becomes available.
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Various Ways to Skill Ghost Generals
One of the questions I'm continually being asked about is how to skill ghost generals. Much depends on where you're at in your Settlers career, but for many veteran players, they look for speed over losses. bearing that in mind let's look at how and why I have 4 different ways to skill them.
https://i.imgur.com/AlTjdKZ.jpg
(click here for the enlarged version)
(alternative set up for TR using jog. It should give the same result if no canteen or GFH is being used.)
https://i.imgur.com/ZPCyg9I.jpg
(click here for the enlarged version)
Set up 1: Battle frenzy is the most used set up for a ghost being used as a premium attacker. I use this particular set up in many guides including Bonaberti Business.
Set up 2: Sometimes ghosts are just better with cavalry units. Although rarer than with battle frenzy (about 15% of guides where she's the best option) they still crop up often enough that if you have extras you might consider skilling a couple this way.
The last two set ups are only for use with elite soldiers and not useful for any other unit as the skill cleave is unit specific.
Set up 3: Tomb raiders(TR) is easily the most popular co-op and ghost is often used by players who have plenty of additional resources. We are talking a significant loss of damascene swords per TR, so the last two set up are for players with resources to burn. Juggernaut is better than jog as in TR the ghost doesn't need to move around within the adventure so the additional general damage eliminates the chance of a second round on camp 2.
Set up 4: The Whirlwind(WW) is the second most popular co-op and also often used with ghosts for speed. this set up allows the ghost to travel within the adventure taking advantage of jog for additional speed. The additional losses in TR using the WW set up is very slight 0-2 per run and you gotta get unlucky to get 2.
I hope this post clears things up.
As an aside, if you're using ghosts for TR (or WW) and have an Outdoor Canteen and/or a Grand Field Hospital, seriously consider using the buffs as it will reduce your losses and speed up the overall run. See the spoiler below for additional information
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you have resolute general skilled with battle frenzy but combat sim indicates theres no difference on outcome of a battle skill or not.
does the battle frenzy skill even work on resolute general?
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Yeah it does depending on the adventure. BF only makes a difference after the second round due to increasing damage reducing the amount of units left to do damage to your units in the third round and higher. There's times where unstoppable charge may nett a better result too if the adventure uses a lot of cavalry units.
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Understanding Combat (Advanced Concepts)
Players sometimes get caught up in thinking that every general needs to be skilled exactly the same as to how the player that designed the guide they've decided to use did it.
That's actually not true as there's many times combat only goes for one round. How you skilled your general won't affect the result of the combat as there's no skill available using books that directly affects how much damage that gets inflicted on your units only how much damage your units dish out. The variation in losses is from the mobs contained in the camp your attacking and their accuracy and not in how your general was skilled if the fight went one round. Even Unstoppable Charge is unlikely to matter although there are times it will. (See below)
First aid triggers after the combat is resolved not during it and Overrun reduces the HP of bosses not their damage.
Unstoppable Charge may reduce losses by killing mobs before they get a chance to inflict damage as it increases the amount of damage that fast units do. However the increase is only slight so there's a chance it may end up not do anything.
The same with Battle Frenzy. However the longer the combat goes for, the more likely it is to have an impact in reducing both the length of the combat, plus the amount of damage taken by your units.
Hopefully this post helps players to gain a deeper understanding of combat.
Shout out to topfangear for his earlier question which inspired me to do a deper dive into another area of combat which players often struggle with. topfangear might already know this stuff, but it can be difficult to grasp
