Hazard’s War Notes
Since the start of Alliance Wars, I have had the honor of serving as We Are Groot’s War Goddess 
. The role is intended to help coordinate team and individual war strategies. Over that time, I have made many mistakes and a few cunning moves. Through it all I have developed a general approach for guiding our alliance through wars from prep through the end of the war. The below should be considered both a work in progress as well as only one person’s viewpoint. But I hope that it is helpful to all as we move forward.
Note: Advice from current and former members of We Are Groot (notable helpful alumnae: JimMe, Sumerixeddu, Tfrench, Checker and SteveThePinkNinja) is liberally stolen and incorporated below without credit other than this one call out. Thanks everyone.
Defense
24 hours prior to the beginning of each war, alliance members have the opportunity to modify their defense teams. Each member should set the strongest defense they can as an individual with the only exception being color coordination strategy described below.
Individual defenses will contain 1 tank, 2 flanks, and 2 wings (corners). Filling your war defense is very similar to raid defenses in this regard with the sole significant difference being that the war’s Revenge Arrows provide additional offense so many people opt to increase the number of healers on a war defense team from 1-2 to 2-3. Some opt for 4 and even 5 healers (‘Let the arrows do the work!’), but these teams generally lack the offensive punch to do more than extend the battle in time. Results may vary
Tank Color Coordination
Many top alliances choose to coordinate the color of their tanks. The reasoning for shared tank color is to counter a common raid/war offensive strategy of doubling up attackers of the strong color against an opposing tank (e.g. bringing 2 blue heroes to fight Ares, 2 purple heroes to fight Guinevere, etc.) Should opponents attempt to double these colors, they will quickly run out of them in the first few rounds. This leaves the second round with no heroes of the strong color and the tanks will be more difficult to beat.
Why choose Red Tanks?
The most commonly chosen tank color is red. The reason red is selected is the fact that more 4/5* red heroes are good/serviceable tanks than any other color. This may well change as new heroes are introduced. If you have the time and ability to do a full assessment of all of the heroes in all of your alliance members’ rosters, you may find that there is another color that is better for your specific needs.
Flank Color Coordination
Some alliances choose to flank their tanks with 1 or 2 heroes of the complimentary color to the tank selection. This means that the color that is strong against the tank is weak against the flank. For example, assign green flanks behind red tanks so the strong blue tiles against the tank are less effective against the flanks.
Note: It is very hard to determine how effective these color coordination strategies are. There are precious few data to support this, so common sense and anecdotal evidence is what we have to go on.
Offense
Preparing War Rosters
Ideally, every member of your alliance will be able to field 6 strong attack teams. Since each hero can be used only once per war, this requires a minimum of 30 heroes. Due to the Revenge Arrows, healers are even more valuable in War attack teams than in raids and other E&P activities. I recommend that each roster have at minimum 6 leveled healers and preferably 12. Fast mana attackers are the next most valuable heroes to bring to wars. Get as many of these as you can leveled.
Other than that, general advice for attack teams in raids is applicable here and has been written about extensively by others more knowledgeable than I. You will want to consider color and special match-ups with specific opponents, special coordination between your heroes, and sufficient healing.
Attacking - Team strategy
When the war begins you will be faced with up to 30 teams from the opposing alliance to attack. Coordinating team attacks is crucial for scoring those few extra points that could be the difference.
Respawn times
The central gating factor for scores in Alliance Wars is the time between respawning defense teams. At the start of the war, each defeated alliance team stays inactive for 6 hours before respawning. This period of inactivity increases by 2 hours each time an individual team is killed. This results in an effective limit of 3 times each team can be killed over the course of a 24-hour war. 6+8+10=24. Add in the time required to actually fight the battles and you can’t get that 4th hit in.
Since the total value for all of the teams in an alliance is 2000 1,500 points spread out across the alliance members proportionally by each team’s HP (as boosted by troops), this would seem to set 6000 4,500 points as the limit of points that can be scored.
Value of Full Alliance Reset
The 3X kill limit and the 6000 4,500 point barrier can both be circumvented by the fact that all alliance members immediately respawn when the entire alliance is defeated. Deciding if and when to go for the reset is the most crucial component of the team attack strategy.
The goal of a reset is mainly to identify and kill teams 4X (or more) that would be limited to 3X kills without a reset. In order to do this, you must kill these teams as soon after the reset is accomplished as possible. You often will have only a 3 to 4-hour window in which these kills result in a 4X kill opportunity. Depending on the timing of the reset you may have even less.
The basic idea is this: Identify the 8-10 easiest kills on the opposing team (more if you are feeling confident or desperate, fewer if you want to play more conservatively). Kill these targets as soon as possible at the start of the war. Reset the alliance with at least 2-3 hours before these teams organically respawn. Kill the weak teams as soon as possible following the reset. Note down each team’s respawn times. Coordinate attacks to kill them at respawn. Repeat.
It is critical to kill these weak teams quickly after the reset is complete. You are likely to have to overspend both in flags and heroes to take down the whole alliance quickly enough. The worst case scenario is to invest in the reset, then not set up enough 4X kills to make up for the potential points lost to this overspending.
When to reset
While some wars may provide the opportunity for multiple resets, those will tend to be big blowouts. You won’t need to be careful about timing. The outcome will be pre-determined.
The strategically important resets will almost always only come once per war, so the key thing is to determine when to go for it. There is no hard and fast rule on this. It is dependent on a number of factors including:
- Strength of opposing teams – Is reset in the cards? Do you need the bonus flags from the second wave?
- How well your alliance attacks have gone in war so far (might give up on chance of reset if you’ve struggled.)
- Amount of time until weaker teams respawn. If they are about to organically respawn anyway, you probably won’t gain enough time to achieve your 4X kills.
- (Hardest to account for in most alliances) When will your alliance mates be online and ready to launch a coordinated barrage of attacks. This will factor in time zones as well as personal playing habits of your alliance members. Tough one to coordinate.
First wave reset
In general, I’ve found early resets to be the easiest to coordinate. Not because they are the easiest to achieve, but because they are the easiest to manage in the aftermath. Early resets mean the fastest communication to the alliance of who the 4X kill opportunities are and when they will respawn. This essentially requires a blitzkrieg mentality at the start of war. Hit hard and fast. Coordinate multiple attacks to kill the strongest players if necessary. As always, be prepared to kill the weak teams right after the reset is complete.
The downside of the first wave reset is it requires the team to be able to completely kill the opponents with one set of flags (3 each) with only members who are available at the start of the war.
Half Time Reset
If a first wave reset is not in the cards due to any of the factors noted above, it may still be possible to go for a halftime reset. This provides the advantage of having potentially more than 3 flags per active member to go into the effort. Just have a few members save some first half flags for the 11th hour (or so) of war. Often this saving will happen organically due to real life keeping members from hitting early. Sometimes you will need to request specific members save flags. Use those flags to give your alliance a head start for a reset effort when second half flags are granted.
Critically important is that you still need to kill the weakest teams right at the start of the war, and then again as part of the reset, and then again just past reset (and the fourth time in the final few hours of war).
Advantages of halftime reset:
- More flags available for reset
- Potentially better timing for alliance coordination
- Less post-reset coordination (since 3 of the 4X kills are done at this point.
Disadvantages:
- Fewer flags left means less margin of error
Rolling Reset - If at First You Don’t Succeed
If teams begin to respawn prior to your reset being complete (you’ve taken more than 6 hours in your effort to reset) don’t despair. As long as you killed the 4X kill candidates first, you can still make it happen. Just keep pushing your alliance to kill teams faster than they respawn. And most importantly DON’T reset right before you 4X kill candidates organically respawn. Wait until they respawn, reset, then kill again so you can lock in that 4X kill opportunity.
Rolling resets can happen at any time after the first wave.
If No Reset
Sometimes a reset is not feasible due to:
- Strength of the opposing teams
- Lack of coordination between members of your own alliance
- (worst case scenario) failed attempt at a reset.
The result of this is simply that you are constrained by the 3X kill limit per team. The goal at this point is just to kill as many of these teams 3X as you can.
War Timeline for First Wave Reset
- Hours -24 to hour 0: Prep time. Get defense teams coordinated and set.
- Hour 0-1: Identify 4X kill targets. Assign and kill.
- Hour 1-2: Assess effectiveness of first wave of hits. Determine if first wave reset is achievable.
- Hour 2-4: Complete first wave reset. Immediately kill 4X candidates (2nd kill). Publish list of 4X target respawn time and attempt to coordinate next kills.
- Hour 12-14: 3rd kills of 4X candidates. Publish list of 4X target respawn time and attempt to coordinate next kills.
- Hour 22-24: 4th kills of 4X candidates.
War Timeline for Halftime Reset
- Hours -24 to hour 0: Prep time. Get defense teams coordinated and set.
- Hour 0-1: Identify 4X kill targets. Assign and kill.
- Hour 1-2: Assess effectiveness of first wave of hits. Determine first wave reset is not achievable. Announce Halftime reset strategy. Publish list of 4X target respawn time and attempt to coordinate next kills.
- Hour 6-7: 2nd kill of 4X targets
- Hour 10-11: Begin Halftime reset.
- Hour 12-2: Complete reset
- Hour 22-24: 4th kills of 4X candidates.
NOTE: For both of these timelines, the assumption is that you will not need every flag on the team to complete these pushes. The remaining flags should be spent earning as many points as possible with a limit of 3X kills on all of the top 18-20 teams.
Individual strategy
In addition to following the above strategy, each player has a few choices that must be made for each battle they wage.
Choosing opponents
Where possible find opponents that you have a chance to kill in one shot but wouldn’t be surprised to die halfway through. Don’t be embarrassed to have to use 2 flags for a kill.
Setting attack teams
Always look at the opposing team’s heroes to choose the heroes you bring to the battle wisely. Going against an attack buffer or healer with big buffs? Bring a debuffer. Going against a killer AOE attack like Azlar, Isarnia or even Little John? Bring a purifier. Did the opponent double a color, double the strong color against his/her team. Consider doubling up on the strong color versus the opposing tank (careful if the opponents are using a coordinate tank color strategy. Don’t run out!)
Fleeing
If the battle is lost but you have done damage, pay very close attention to the mana bars of the opposing healers. If they are going to fire off in the next turn, strongly consider fleeing the battle before they can heal their allies. You can come in with another set of heroes and start them at 0 mana.
Working in tandems
It is both fun and effective to partner up with another alliance member to take down strong teams that you would be unable to tackle yourself. You spread the pain and the joy. You can coordinate heroes you bring on a level that is just not feasible at the whole alliance level. Try it! You’ll like it!
Conclusion
As stated at the start, this is one person’s view on how this all works. There may well be other views that are just as effective or better. I just wanted to get all this out of my head and onto paper. I’d love to debate the points, add/subtract/improve as seems necessary. Feel free to reach out to iphazard in Line if you have thoughts.
