Q&A: Military 101

[Urran Voh]

Greetings! I'm Urran Voh, but you can just call me Urran, other Josh, or just Teach. Whichever you prefer. I'll be teaching you how to build a well-rounded military and how to maintain it. Any questions? And no "What's Building a Military 101?". You're post will be spammed upon!

[IFman]

*IFman walks in with his class* "To fully know the benifits and penalties of HPR, you need to learn about building a military for protection"

[The Beatles]

I have a hypothetical question for you, Mr. Urran. I have always found it hard to keep up enough of all troop types to defend against attacks. (The little blighters eat and consume soo much...) Yet I don't like many guard towers. How do you deal with this problem?

[Urran Voh]

I tend to build the same amount of Markets and Foragers. Enough of each to stay comfortably in the green for a fair amount of time (100 turns ex.), without being attacked of course, around 100-200 Barracks less than Markets and Foragers, the same amount of Huts as Barracks, and no Tents, Camps, or Guards. If I really want a good defense though, I'll use all turns except 100 and destroy all Barracks, Markets, and Foragers, then convert them into Guards (great defense, but requires a lot of cash). If this explanation seems a little vague, give me an amount of land to work with..

[Ruddertail]

If you had 10,000 acers, how would you use it, given the above layout?

[IFman]

I tend to build the same amount of Markets and Foragers. Enough of each to stay comfortably in the green for a fair amount of time (100 turns ex.), without being attacked of course, around 100-200 Barracks less than Markets and Foragers, the same amount of Huts as Barracks, and no Tents, Camps, or Guards. If I really want a good defense though, I'll use all turns except 100 and destroy all Barracks, Markets, and Foragers, then convert them into Guards (great defense, but requires a lot of cash). If this explanation seems a little vague, give me an amount of land to work with..

Actually, you only need 1/2 that many foragers

[The Beatles]

What I used to do, was, for 10000 acres:
3500 Barracks
3500 Huts
3000 Foragers

It worked rather well. But I had to sell many troops to keep going, and never managed to be able to keep enough rats (on RWL). The problem, perhaps, is that rats are too cheap for their power.

[Urran Voh]

For 10K land, I'd more than likely use 6K for Markets and Foragers (3K each), 2K in Barracks, and 2K in Huts. This way, I make a lot of cash and food, while creating a decent military and hawks.

Actually, you only need 1/2 that many foragers

Only on RWL. But on a game where food counts so much of your networth, why not make a lot of it to have a high net?

[IFman]

I said need, as in the minumum

[Zephyrus]

I have a hypothetical question for you, Mr. Urran. I have always found it hard to keep up enough of all troop types to defend against attacks. (The little blighters eat and consume soo much...) Yet I don't like many guard towers. How do you deal with this problem?

You can always industry while taking the hawk philosophy to land. That is, you don't mind losing it, knowing that you can get back that much and more on your next run of turns. It's always possible to use the method of 90/10 barrack/forager and just let your land be taken, knowing that next run, you still have your troops. Of course, hawk massers can wreak havoc on this idea, but that's why you have a nice clan bank.

[Boar the Fighter]

Why can't you put them on the market while you run turns? Pull another set off when your done.

[Zephyrus]

Why can't you put them on the market while you run turns? Pull another set off when your done.

I have a feeling that is a bug and not a feature.
Yes, the marketed troops all being pulled off at once thing should be reimplemented.
That is, the troops stack with those of the same sort.

EDIT: Or, it could be the 25% loss one recieves.

[The Beatles]

What's the problem with the market condensation?
I don't know if the loss thing even works right now.

[Gen. Volkov]

Um Yeah... great ideas and all that.. but really the easiest way to do this is to just buy one. Sell all your current troops before you use turns, then run turns generating as many hawks as you can(you can go 100% huts.. but it requires more turns than just having mos tof your land in huts and the rest in markets/foragers etc. Then after that, use the leader mission Loot to generating big bags of cash and buy mercs or off the market to whatever your desired troop amounts are. Works quite well for me. But if you want to laboriously MAKE your troops and feed them and such by running the indy(industrial) strat reccomended above. Whatever you choose, have fun, and remember MAKE UP your own ideas! Don't just follow this stuff blindly! Experiment! That's how you get better! Guthorm has a decent strat, but it can be improved upon! Do SO!

[Zephyrus]

What's the problem with the market condensation?

It wasn't there before for a while, and it probably works better with that.