Greetings fellow battledawners!
This guide is for beginners as well as intermediate players though I'm sure it will not hurt the experts from reading up on a couple of points as well.
Before i go on to the units there are two things that you must be doing already:
1. Starting from tick 1.
2. Voting daily.
3. Active like crazy.
We shall now proceed with the guide:
1. EARLY DAYS:
At the beginning of an era your focus should be on resource production but REMEMBER to keep resources aside for units.
* What units to build?
Start off with infantry armour spam for quickly capturing resource ops as well as some noobs who get out of protection and then leave the game without building units.
Within the first 24 ticks its a good idea to use some of the blue tokens to upgrade to damage.
Damage can be amazingly effective in the first 100 ticks and can be used to great advantage.
Using a vehicle build early on will be a good idea since almost everyone builds anti infantry weapons in the first few ticks.
*How to use them?
This is what your small force can comprise of:
a. 5-10 spam infantry.
b. 5 armour vehicles
c. 5 damage vehicles
(if you've been voting and using your tokens carefully you might even have upto 10 damage and armour vehicles by tick 25-30)
Use the spam to capture resource and blank ops.
Use your damage to protect your captured ops when needed but mainly use them to protect your colony from spam attacks. (You'll be out of protection because you want additional resource production!)
Using a careful mixture of armour and damage (2:1) you can conquer small colonies early on.
REMEMBER: DAMAGE CAN BE AMAZINGLY POWERFUL DURING THE FIRST 100 TICKS. USE THEM WISELY AND LET THEM GAIN EXPERIENCE.
*Basic tactics and rules:
a. Never ever launch an attack that will take more than 4 ticks.
b. Never launch an attack against players who have more units.
c. No conquer or outpost is worth losing more than 1-2 armour (at this stage).
d. Never try and grab what you cant hold easily.
e. Stay active for the first 100 ticks. This is so that you dont miss out on the free conquers that might come up.
f. Avoid wasting energy too much as its easier to get a feel for the enemy units by looking at a players statistics. (Note: This idea fails after tick 100).
2. TICK 100 ONWARDS
By now you should have RANGE upgrade and your intitial army should be pretty intact too since damage kills most of the enemy before your armour units are hit.
FORGET ABOUT DAMAGE NOW.
Build range and armour in the golden ratio.
Whats the golden ratio? (2:1)
Keep your damage in your base using it only for defending against very small spam attacks.
*What to build?
Range and armour. Thats it. 2 range units for every 1 of armour.
Your forces should be something like this by tick 150:
a. 10-15 spam infantry.
b. 20 armour vehicles (Or its equivalent in infantry or tank build)
c. 10 damage vehicles.
d. 20-25 range vehicles interspersed with some beam as well as explosive weapons (or its equivalent in infantry or tank build)
*How to use it?
While this depends on the way your alliance plays at this stage this is what you should be doing generally:
a. Using your forces to consolidate your hive.
b. Launching forays into neighbouring areas.
c. Probing into further areas beyond your immediate control.
*Basic Tactics:
a. Get as many conquers and mines and wells as possible but never enter into any battle in which you may lose more than 2-5 vehicle armour(Or its equivalent in tank or infantry.). Not worth it right now when you need as many units as possible.
b. Be greedy for crystals. They will disppear quickly if you dont take them.
Never waste for than 5-10 vehicle armour (Or its equivalent in tank or infantry.) on crystals.
c. If you're leaving your hive its a good idea for alliance armies to travel together. Safety lies in numbers.
d. Use your combined strength to get garrisons and other free crystals and mines and wells and conquers.
TICK 500 ONWARDS:
No one can predict what will be your state right now.
Are you ruling your subcontinent?
Are you already being hammered into submission?
Are you at war?
Are you at a cold tension?
A lot depends on your alliance. (I cannot stress this enough. Good players get screwed because of bad leadership or poor teamwork.)
Anyway, your unit build should be like this:
2:1 range is to armour ratio.
2 extra armour squads for every 10 squads built with the above ratio.
1-3 extra damage squads for every 10 squads built with the above ratio.
*Why damage?
While you should remember:
NEVER EVER FIGHT A BATTLE YOU CAN'T WIN WITH MINIMAL LOSSES.
There may come a time when you're forced to attack an enemy with a comparable army size.
This is where experience and damage decide whether you're annihilated or you scrape through.
Damage are exceedingly powerful in conflicts lasting more than 2-3 rounds and while this is not common any major alliance can easily expect 4 round battles when in major wars.
*Battle tactics:
(Here i would recommend you go back to the strategy page and read up on strategies for war)
But a couple of common pointers are the same:
1. Attack in a group. Never go solo.
2. Always establish a safe zone to where your army can retreat and sleep while you rest in the midst of a war.
3. Never leave your army in unfamiliar territory. You risk being nuked and attacked by agents.
MY GOLDEN RULES:
1. BE ACTIVE.
2. VOTE.
3. NEVER EVER GRAB WHAT YOU CAN'T TAKE AND HOLD.
4. PLAY WITH THE BEST TO BE THE BEST. ALLIANCE MATTERS!
I hope that helps in some small way.
Good luck and happy gaming.
