Introduction
I wanted to make it absolutely clear that this is in no way a guide to get optimum troops for YOUR particular team. Doing this requires a considerable amount of thought and, I believe, would be very specific to the team you are using, and the team you are facing (and any tournament rules).
What I hope this post will achieve, for you, is to give a rough idea where to aim for when you are at a point that you have some 4*s, but before you have time to REALLY put a lot of thought in yourself.
I will provide reasoning where I can, and will link to as many other advise posts I find useful as possible to help you look further into things when you get the time/inclination.
General Troop Advice
Troop Attributes
- Attack: Increases heroes attack stat
- Defence: Increases heroes defence stat
- Health: Increases the amount of health your hero has
- Healing Bonus: Increases the amount of healing your hero RECEIVES (not how much they heal others!)
- Critical: Increases the chance of your hero pulling off a critical hit
- Mana Bonus: Increases the rate at which the heroes mana generates - notable levels are:
- L1: 1 tile off VERY SLOW heroes
- L11: 1 tile off VERY FAST heroes
- L17: 1 tile off SLOW heroes
- L23: 1 tile off AVERAGE / VERY SLOW heroes
- L29: 1 tile off FAST heroes
Obtaining Troops
- You have a small chance to get 1* and 2* troops playing through single player levels. I understand there appears to be roughly the same chance per level, so your best way of maximising this is to do levels costing three flags, such as 8-7
- You have a small chance to get troops up to (and including) 3* from common summon tokens
- The only way to get 4* troops is via Epic Troop Tokens (ETTs). These can be given as rewards in chests etc or bought for 200 gems (or 10 for 1600 gems)
- For free to play players, the best way of getting troop tokens is the hidden ETTs in the Recruit II quest, which turn up about 50% of the time
Barracks
- The barracks unlocks when your stronghold reaches level 10. At this point you will want to convert a level 5 (or higher) forge (although other options are available) to a barracks.
- It takes 10 seconds and the use of a builder (but is free) to revert it back to the original building at any time. Turning it back gives you the original building back at the level it was when you converted it (so converting a level 5 forge will give you back the level 5 forge).
- Replacing the barracks either on the same building OR A DIFFERENT ONE will retain the barracks level, even if it was on a different building before.
- You can only ever have (or would need) one barracks.
XP Costs
Troops of the same colour can be sacrificed for XP (this assumed level 1 troops - you get marginally more for higher level troops):
- 1*: 40xp
- 2*: 90xp
- 3*: 200xp
- 4*: 400xp
The XP cost for a given level troop can be calculated as follows:
XPCost = BaseCost + (IncrementCost * Level)
See also: Boolz Troop Calculator
Common (1*) Troops
There are 2 types of 1* troop - attack and defence. The most useful will depend on the situation/hero, but Iāve not really thought about it much.
EDIT: Donāt bother with these - SG changed their mind about 1* and 2* tourneys so these are pointless. Again.
Uncommon (2*) Troops
There are 2 types of 2* troop - attack and defence. The most useful will depend on the situation/hero, unless you are trying to complete challenge events as quickly as possible, in which case you probably want attack troops to be able to complete them quickly.
My Goal
I have kept 5 in case I ever decide to have a mono Rare event team, or a single colour 3* tournament is declared. Iām not convinced there is much in it so have leveled whichever I had at the time as follows.
- Level 5
- Level 3
- Level 2
- Level 2
- Level 2
Total XP Cost: 1320
Reasoning
- These are useful for challenge events and tournament raids
- Doing so requires a very small amount of XP (marginally more than a single L3 4* troop)
- I really like not having my troops mixed in with each other - this keeps my ākeepersā at the front of the queue and uses these by default
Rare (3*) Troops
There are 3 types of 3* troop - attack, all-rounders and defence. The most useful will depend on the situation/hero, unless you are trying to complete challenge events as quickly as possible, in which case you probably want attack troops to be able to complete them quickly.
My Goal
I have kept 5 in case I ever decide to have a mono Epic event team, or a single colour 4* tournament is declared - Iām not convinced there is much in it so have leveled whichever I had at the time as follows.
- Level 9
- Level 5
- Level 3
- Level 2
- Level 2
Total XP Cost: 7150
Reasoning
- Unless you are very lucky or spending a lot of money you will spend months using 3* troops as your main troops
- Whilst you build up your 4* troops, your 3* troops will be used for everything - as you improve you will probably use 3-2 (3 heroes of one colour, 2 of another) teams and mono (all one colour) teams, particularly in wars or against titans
- Even once you manage to build up enough 4* troops, your 3* troops will continue to be useful for challenge events and tournament raids
- Doing so requires a moderate amount of xp (about the cost of a single L9 4* troop)
- I really like not having my troops mixed in with each other - this keeps my ākeepersā at the front of the queue and uses these by default
Epic (4*) Troops
There are 2 types of 4* troop - crit troops (who focus on defence and critical hit) and mana troops (focusing on attack and mana generation). The most useful will depend on the situation/hero, but is hotly contested.
Initial Goal
This was my goal when I started to get more than one of each 4* troop, and I believe a good general starting point regardless of the 4* troops you have.
- Level 9
- Level 5
- Level 3
- Level 2
- Level 1
Total XP Cost: 11125
End Goal
I say End Goal, but obviously an end goal would be 5 4* maxed mana and 5 4* maxed crit troops of each colour. I think this is more reasonable, and possibly doable in one human lifetime.
- Level 30 crit
- Level 11 mana (+1T - very fast hero in attack)
- Level 7 crit
- Level 5 mana (+0.5T - fast hero in defence)
- Level 3 any
Total XP Cost: 81975
Reasoning
- As far as I can tell, general opinion is to prefer crit troops. Because of this (and because I donāt think there is a huge amount in it) I went with popular opinion and am aiming to get my initial crit troop to L30
- The exception to the crit being the favourite is where you have a hero with a Very Fast special (eg Gravemaker or Guardian Jackal) in which case a level 11 mana hero will mean they charge in 6 tiles rather than 7 - this is far more helpful than you might expect. Because of this, and in light of the Rush Attack tournament type where all heroes are Very Fast, I decided to level one of each mana troop to L11
- After the first 2 troops I just leveled the next 3 I got - these can be used in war, tournaments, raid attacks, and are used enough that I think they warrant bring bumped a few levels
- Also worth noting that I have never sacrificed a 4* troop, despite having 6 or 7 of some colours
Further Information
I hope this post has helped you - even if you do not follow the levels Iāve chosen for myself, hopefully it gave you enough information to decide on levels for yourself and has proven useful. Thanks for reading!
As you can probably tell, Iām taking it a bit more easy on the forum - sorry for not replying. I am still playing the game in my alliance, Eldunarya. We would love to have you and we have spaces. We are an experienced, friendly bunch that take it easy (only war hits are mandatory). Look us up.
Links
- Raid Tournament Guide
- Boolz Guide
- Very useful mana guide
- Troops - Which troops do I keep?
- 4* Troop leveling costs
- Troops summarized
Acknowledgements
- Many thanks to @BarryWuzHere and @Kikyo for the troop guidance since I started
- Thanks to @Luiz, @Ornery, @Aerozol, @zephyr1, @_John_Doe and everyone else with comments below who helped me get to this point!
- Finally, thanks to @Annieb, @JonahTheBard and the rest of the Guardians Family who have helped to teach me and grow since I started playing many, many months ago