Best way for lower level players to grow post-1.0.8

Gameplay Chat (PC/Mobile)
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All us mobile/PC players have been really thrown for a loop with the new ways in which resources are gained and spent, and the lower level players more than anyone. I’m kind of mid-range (244), with lots of progress to make, and since the patch I’ve been like a hamster in a wheel trying to churn resources out as fast as I can. I finally put some thought into it, and I have a few ideas as to how best to grow given the current economy.

  1. Build one, or at most a small handful, of good PvP teams.

You need to win PvP. No way around it. But you don’t need tons of teams for that purpose. At most, you’ll need 3-4 so you can adjust your fighting style to match the enemy you encounter. I think any more than that and you’re putting too many resources into a place that doesn’t maximize returns at this point, because…

  1. Save the rest of your souls for low-level troops of low rarity.

Why the heck? Because of Kingdom Power Levels, that’s why. At this point I’ve realized that getting to 3 stars is going to take ages at the rate Traitstones drop, but 1 star is very achievable. Apart from getting the troops themselves, the fastest way to climb the Power ladder is leveling them, and the most efficient way to do that is to start with the most common troops and level them a few times until it’s cheaper to level Rare troops, and so on, always leveling the troop that requires the fewest souls. You don’t need all your troops maxed to get 1 gold star, so once you hit that point, quit leveling that kingdom’s troops. This gets you double tribute rewards, and if you only get double tribute with all kingdoms, that’s still better than double tribute chance with a couple kingdoms and regular tribute for the rest.

  1. Increase Kingdom Power in kingdoms to achieve a good balance of resources.

I’m not sure what the optimal balance is here, but it’s going to be different for each player. The earlier in the game you are, the more important gold is. Souls you obviously want so you can level more troops, so that’s probably the next most important unless you have a hard time getting enough glory to buy the weekly rewards. Maximizing your souls and gold allows you to level your kingdoms (thus increasing their chance of giving tribute), and souls boosts your power level so you get more out of them. The idea is to get a snowball going so your resources are constantly getting better.

  1. Level your kingdoms like you do your troops.

Level up ALL your kingdoms to level 4 or 5 before you try to get any of them to level 10. The increased odds of tribute chance are worth it, considering it takes a loooong time to get all the way to level 10 and get that coveted kingdom bonus. Also, the more kingdoms with a decent chance of giving tribute, the more likely you are to get multiple kingdoms at once, netting you keys and gems too. At some point, you’re going to need some kingdom bonuses to compete in PvP, but focusing on resource development earlier on will make that an easier goal to reach by the time you need it.

So, any other thoughts on this? These are just the things running around my head, but I’m sure there are other good tips out there.

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Good thoughts all, but depending on your chosen team, the +1 Magic from Karakoth can make a big difference to killing power and therefore speed of PvP wins.

Getting all 20 Kingdoms to level 5 rather than level 3 costs more than gettting Karakoth to level 10, so I’d suggest considering getting Karakoth to level 10 earlier. Certainly after Karakoth, there’s good value in getting all Kingdoms to 4 or 5 before levelling your first Attack bonus Kingdom.

I’d also add that when levelling Kingdoms to 10, Karakoth first, then Atttack bonus Kingdoms, then Life, then Armor.

However, when increasing Kingdom Power, boost whichever Kingdoms are easiest to get to the next level because they’re all very close in value until reaching five gold stars (and I estimate that players will have all Kingdoms levelled to 10 before getting even one Kingdom to five gold stars).

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Order of Kingdoms to 10 is probably best Magic > Attack > Life > Armor :wink:

Would be great to know what’s the most efficient way to get Kingdoms to one star or three stars!!

I am guessing 5 stars is going to require almost all Mythics, fully traited :frowning:

One star requires 1200 points
Two stars requires 1700 points
Three stars requires 2100 points

50 points per troop, 25 points per trait, 10 points per level …

2100 = 8 troops (400) + Level 15 on 8 troops (1200) + 20 (4 lots of 3, 4 lots of 2) traits (500) …

Just ramblings :stuck_out_tongue:

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Aside from maxing out what you’re actually using …

Levels 1-10 are the easiest, followed by 11-15 - 16-20 is expensive.

The first tier traits for Commons, Rares and Ultras are all limited to Minor and Major Traitstones, so they’re easy and should be the first priority. Maxing out Commons’ traits is easy because it only needs 4 Runic for the 2nd tier and one Arcane Traitstone for the last - and the Arcane will be something limited to Commons and Imps, so it will be in less demand.

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My 2 cents - as a player who is almost the exact same situation/level etc. as the OP.

To reiterate and elaborate the point again:

PvP - this is probably one of the best ways to gain a regular income. Getting Rank 1 each week irrespective of bonuses, is a sizeable resource injection. Aim if possible to achieve Rank 1 on reset day (Monday) and by the simple process of daily PvP glory rewards (+16) and those generated by gaining the required wins to achieve the rank - when combined with the week end bonus - should be enough (or very, very close too) to enable you to purchase the following weeks event weapon/troop/chest etc.

E.g. This weeks event chest is 400 glory (for a guaranteed troop) and I have almost earned this back this week so far just by doing the above.

My tip though is to ensure you play on a difficulty setting that allows you to gain a reasonable number of wins in a reasonable amount of time. Yes, theoretically you could play on Warlord 5 and after several hundred games your uber beginners peasant team may snatch that elusive 1st rank…but the small boost of resources this gives is (in my opinion and at my/the OPs game level) offset by consistently placing 1st on an easier difficulty and not tearing your hair out getting there! :laughing:

Once you’ve got your Rank 1, you can simply pop the difficulty back up again for challenges/quests etc.

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best bet is to spend money on gems to get vip 8 I believe. That allows your troops to start at level 10 or vip 9 which is a massive soul saver. Beyond spending money I’m personally doing the Kar to 10 then everythign else to 5 and then focus on the other kingdoms.

I think focus on rockworms and there traits is effective for newer players. 4 brown and kara gives them 12 damage with relatively easy to get trait stones. Even with most of the legends I’m finding 3 rock worms and a purchased prismatic orb is pretty effective fully traited even with the orbs nerfs. I suggest going through all the quests because you level quickly and get pretty fair amount of trait stones I’ve even pulled 2 or 3 celestial from questing. It also ups your daily gold.

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Any rough guess on cost of VIP 8?

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I’m not clear on the Kingdom power as I haven’t messed with that yet (I’m level 64). Karakoth, for example, says troop types are Monster, Human, Daemon and Elemental. If I level any of these troops types do they count? Or, only the ones when you filter by Karakoth in the troops panel?

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I’ve seen exact numbers floating around but not sure. It’s more expensive than it’s worth for most people.

Filter for Karakoth is what you’d look at but that’s not the raising people are mainly talking about. That’s just kingdom level.

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Probably close to $400.

I look at the VIP levels as a bonus. You really don’t want to look at them as a main reason for supporting the game. If you do that, they look very expensive.

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Agreed. 400 probably is pretty close. I think I’ve spent 500 on the app and another 500 or so on the console so I mix the two up.

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So your best bet for a new player is for them to spend at least $430 USD. Are you sure? I’m not. Maybe if they really like it AND have no concerns about money.

That’s more like it… TO BE FAIR, if you played it for a couple days and decided it was all you were going to do, the VIP bonuses are a great boon to have near the beginning for the stated reasons. Not to mention that you’d be buying more things (likely Gems) that you would also get to use.

Also, I am sort of under the impression that the VIP bonuses are going to be helped along in the future. Because some bits are currently underwhelming.

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Kingdom Power Levels (measured in STARS) are set within that kingdom. They are separate from the Kingdom Levels (measured in NUMBERS, 1-10). Yes, that is confusing. Do they need to at least rename something here, maybe.

To raise a Kingdom’s Power Level, you have THREE things - all based on the troops within that kingdom (the ones that show up when you filter your list by that kingdom, and press the ‘show-all’ button for good measure).

  1. The troops themselves. 8 troops, 50 points per troop, total 400 points max.
  2. The traits on those troops. 8 troops, 3 traits per troop, 25 points per trait, 600 points max.
  3. The levels on those troops. 8 troops, 20 levels per troop, 10 points per level, 1600 points max.

If you are trying to get a kingdom to a certain breakpoint, use the easiest obtainable traits and levels first. But more importantly, if you are low on resources (at the time or in general), focus on maxing out whatever team you are actually using.

Additionally, actually maxing out a Kingdom’s power level is EXTREMELY difficult. Don’t aim for it. I’m over lvl500 and the best I have are 3-star Kingdoms.

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Eh, that’s not really a “strategy” though. The point of this thread is to discuss methods of building resources rather than just buying them up, because obviously buying them is the easiest, fastest way to get there.

@actreal: Fair point about Karakoth, but it does depend on your team. If it’s AoE, or otherwise gets a big boost out of magic, then that would probably be worthwhile, and certainly it’s the first Kingdom I’d max, but if the troops in your team simply get one additional damage when they gain magic, I’m not sure that gets you much.

@Shimrra: The downside there is that you need TONS of Minor Traitstones just to get a Rare troop to max their traits out. I do agree, though, that adding some traits here and there can be a good boost. E.g., I don’t really use a Rockworm team, but I’ve slapped two traits on Rockworms already simply because my standard PvP team doesn’t need any Earth Traitstones, so it’s a good way to use them. I also agree with your point that maxing out your PvP team is a priority, especially as you climb in level and start to fight tougher PvP matches.

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Considering I have a perspective of starting on 1.06 with console and starting 1.07 on the app yes. It’s nearly impossible for you to do anything worthwhile without dumping money into the game now. You don’t even really have option of joining a top guild to get carried because you need all your gold now. Console I don’t have to spend money. I get 100-200 iron keys a week and at least 30 magic keys a week and thats with my guild not being in serious mode. Now that we’ve decided to take 1st I expect to see 45+ magic keys per week. For me to be able to even win on a semi consistent basis has required me to spend money or devote an absurd amount of hours to it. So choice of 16 hours a day to just get by or toss money at a game I like to at least get the troops I want it’s an easy choice. I’d prefer not to feel like I need to spend money to even be mildly competitive. I’d prefer to only spend money to be high end but now I have great troops even a mythic legend but I can’t afford to level them because soul farming is so terrible.

If a new player wants to play casually and still advance I don’t have much advice for them other than play on the xbox or ps4. If you want to do it here wait and see if the dev’s make some changes.

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I beg to differ. Money can be a strategy to enhance free/mostly play. I didn’t say to buy the resources but the most effective manner to maximize resource farming is to get vip bonus of level 5 or 10 and go from there. But if you don’t want to go that far spending money on a bundle/gems is a good way to enhance as well. Getting a top armor or a good weapon can make a world of difference. You can spend under the cost of a new game and get an impact to help things. Without the money it’s miserable now. It’s either money, tons of hours, or top guild and a top guild won’t help on resource farming.

But along the lines of what you said focus on a really good weapon such as summers fury this will allow you to complete arena with sub par teams. War and peace is an alternative but difficult to get if not impossible for a totally free player sub 100.

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Karakoth or level 5 Kingdoms? Interesting debate.

My opinion is that all kingdoms should be upgraded to level 5 first, then Karakoth should be leveled to 10 for the magic bonus. I think the tribute bonus is much more important at the early levels, because resources are in such short supply. Alternatively, if you leveled kingdoms only to 4 first, you would save 75000 from the jump to five, which would give you a good head start towards your level 10 Karakoth (115000 gold to take a level 4 kingdom to level 10.) The level 4/level 10 deal is a decent compromise. Of course, if you are starting out as a new character, you have to buy entrance to most of the Kingdoms, and that in itself is fairly expensive. Those last 10 or so cost 4000 each, which is enough to get a new Kingdom to level 4. Hmm. I’m starting to talk myself out of it.

Now if you are a brand spanking new character, you start with Karakoth available, and it only costs 250 to unlock. It will cost an additional 122,500 gold to get it to level 10. That much gold is very difficult to earn early. You have crappy armor, you can’t win PVP matches and usually are in a crappy guild, if any. Plus, quests are a losing proposition. You don’t start netting money from those until you have upped your bonuses a little. A plus one magic bonus when you are under level 50 is HUGE. (It’s pretty sweet when you are level 140 as well.)

I guess I’ll flip flop.

I’m starting to think this may be the best advice. Further, don’t even bother buying new kingdoms unless you absolutely have to. Those last ones are spendy when you are just starting out. I’d buy the kingdoms until they exceed 1000 gold. It’s worth owning them because they start giving you gold as soon as you unlock them (20 per day.) It takes a long time to pay for the cover charge, but a residual income is a pretty nice thing to have. Get the Karakoth magic bonus first, then start getting the remaining Kingdoms to level 5. Then start collecting gems so you can buy dragon armor, and level the rest of the Kingdoms to 10, in the order stated above. Then save more gems for the celestial armor, and start on souls and get all your troops to mythic status. In between all this, buy lots of keys so you can ultimately obtain all the troops, plus the 2000 or so additional troops needed to ascend them. And none of this will happen until you are in a good guild (unless you are rich and don’t mind spending lots of money on the game) so you need to find one of those early. Wow. I almost wonder why I even started playing? :hushed:

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I suppose it would make more sense if you view it from my perspective. I find grinding on games generally rewarding. It’s a part of the game and it gives you something. Grinding on here has been reduced to the point of being tedious. When grinding becomes tedious I equate it to a job. Do I get a return on it? If it’s tedious not much. If I compare to say rage of bahamut where I grinded and it was tedious at times but my reward was signifcant value in accounts for my time spend grinding. This game gives little reward for grinding initially especially. It gives no reward for when you quit the game. At least rage I had 20,000 holy powder which I sold for .20 each and accounts as well as cards to sell. Gems all I get is my enjoyment and when it becomes tedious my enjoyment drops. It was bad enough before soul farming meant I can’tuse my favorite troops but I need to use random troops but now I need to use a valkyrie loop team.

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Why would it? It’s a game. Its aim is to make the developers and publishers money, and presumably let lots of players have fun. Its aim is not to make you money.

No one is making you do this. If you don’t enjoy it don’t do it.

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Yet you constantly toss out that you don’t want it to be pay to win and I’ve repeatedly pointed out that games out there that have made more in a year than this will likely make in it’s lifetime use an approach that allows players to play casually and hardcore and have a system in place that allows players to get money back for their time. It makes the developers a LOT more money. It attracts a LOT more players. It creates significantly increased customer satisfaction.

I’m thinking you’re not undersanding what I"m saying. If you’re going to make a game tedious to the point where I have to either pay money or dedicate more than 8 hours a day to get anywhere then I’m not and the average consumer isn’t going to enjoy it. but if you want to go that route at least provide some features such as trading that will allow me to make back my time investment. If they returned the farming to 1.07 or 1.06 level I wouldn’t have an issue but in current form a newer player which you’re clearly beyond out of touch with has an absurd struggle without paying. Yet sirrian repeatedly points out 90% of the players are in the struggle zone.

So it’s one or the other either they’re in it to make money or they’re not you use whichever suits your current stance. I’ve listed ways they could increase profit without following the current avenue. They’ve ignored me but listen to admitted free players. That makes me think maybe I should cancel all my credit card payments and leave this to you. You would clearly prefer a minuscule player base with no competition where you can play around to your hearts content with your mass of resources gained simply because you started earlier while I’ve dumped in a significant amount and get to struggle anyway. not good business sense.

Thank you captain obvious. I would very much appreciate it if you would keep obvious statements and your broad sweeping statements away from me. If you’d like to have a reasonable discussion I’m game but you tend to, not just with me, make statements without really supporting them.