Tribal Wars Militia Information

Tribal Wars Militia Information by typhlosionrulez

This post should answer general inquiries about the Militia unit – should you want to know more in-depth information about when exactly to use your Militia or how to counter them, be sure to check the Militia Library below.

[d] = default value

What is “Militia”?
The Militia are a new unit that was introduced in the Tribal Wars 7.0 Game Version update. In the real world, “Militia” is the term used today to refer to a military force comprised of ordinary citizens to provide defense in times of emergency without being paid a regular salary.

Its function in the Tribal Wars game is similar – you can temporarily arm some of the population of your village to (help) defend against would-be raiders. Be aware that you cannot cancel “active” militia, they will be “active” until the 6-hour [d] timer has run its course.

The stats of a single Militia unit:

General Offense (irrelevant, militia can’t attack), General Defense, Cavalry Defense, Archery Defense

How do I recruit Militia?
You can recruit your milita from your Farm building. For those using the Graphical Village Overview – it’s the one in the top right-hand corner. It’s simply a matter of clicking into your Farm and hitting the “Call of the militia now!” link. Militia will appear in your village. Magic, ooh.

Limitations and Consequences
More! Want to be able to summon more Militia? Expanding your farm gives you a certain number of available militia every level – the default is 20. That only works up to a certain point though; once your Farm is level 15 [d] the maximum number of militia won’t increase anymore, which gives you a maximum of 300 militia units per village.

Now! You can’t just summon your militia at any time! You’ll need to wait 6 hours [d] after summoning militia before you can bring in new ones. Incidentally, that’s also the amount of time your militia will hang around after being summoned. Once you have more than 2 villages [d] you won’t be able to summon your Militia in any of your villages at all.

Less production! Oh, your resource production will also be reduced by half [d] for however long the Militia are active, meaning 6 hours [d], even if they happen to be all dead. No, you can’t dismiss them manually. That isn’t all bad though: low resource production combined with the Militia defending your village makes you a pretty poor looting target.

Left: Farm building, from which you can activate Militia
Top Right: Reduced resource production
Bottom Right: Active Militia and an activity countdown

Library
Usage Guide by the nemesis123

We have a new unit, but only a vague idea how to use it and how to counter it. It is therefore in the best interests of everyone here that someone steps up and tells us a little about militia. A little about me: I am not the best player of this game, but Ive been playing for a long time. I have recently been on world 54 and have experiences of dealing with militia in the earlygame (well only up to 600 points so far, but I will try to extrapolate).

What are militia:
Tribal wars help gives the following description of militia: If you’re expecting an attack on your village, you can use the farm to set up a militia that will defend your land. Militias may only be used for defensive purposes and can’t leave the village. Also, you are unable to make militia after you have taken your second village.

Now lets have a look at the militia statistics:

I have placed the militia next to the spearman to expose some of the similiarities between the two units. Both infact have the same general defence and cavalry defence. The militia does have a slightly higher archer defence though. One thing that is obvious from this is that the militia is only meant for defending cavalry like the spear and I will be talking about how best to expose this weakness. The second thing is that militia is specifically used for defending farming, as by the time nobling stage starts, the militia is pretty much useless other than in a last ditch defence against an enemy.

A little bit about how Militia fares against light cavalry

Assuming 0% luck and no wall (this is because your farms shouldnt have them anyway):

A level 1 farm worth of 20 militia will just about kill a farming party of 7 lcav
A level 5 farm worth of 100 militia will just about kill a farming party of 35 lcav
A level 10 farm worth of 200 militia will just about kill a farming party of 68 lcav
A level 15 farm worth of 300 militia will just about kill a farming party of 104 lcav

As you can see, even a player with a low level farm can inflict some damage on your number of lcav. But as you can probably see, the militia stops mattering at all once players get full nukes and a loss of 100 lcav is nothing. Anyway, we better get to know how to use these troops

How to use militia:
Using militia is simple, one just goes to the farm and activates it. However with activation comes the consequence of halfed resource intake for 6 hours. To put this in perspective, if one has a resource intake of 100 of each resource per hour, you would lose 300 of each resource if you called militia or 15 resources per militia if one had a level 1 farm. Of course, this completely depends on the amount of resources you have and the farm level you have.

Below is a table of the number of each resource it costs to buy a militia:

Key:
Yellow is farm level
Green is Resources level (this assumes you have the same resources level for all three resources)

The red box, as suggested by MarkHarrison is the thresh hold at which militia becomes more costly to buy than spears. This is assuming that to build one spear costs around 30 of each resource to build (50+30+10/3 = 30). One further factor that one might want to consider is the fact that spears are permanent assuming you are not attacked whereas militia are temporary. This may make you want to build spears instead of militia even when militia cost less than 30 of each resource.

This begs the question, when should one use militia. I believe one should only use militia if desparately under attack or to stop people farming you if you have a high farm level and a low resource level, though rarely do farms have this. There are some ambiguity where you shouldnt use your militia but I would suggest not using it if you have a catted farm as part of your attacks (its probably better to just dodge and build spears).

Of course, there are going to be thousands of people who are going to panic and ignore the statistics, these people are probably farms. However, that is not to say that one couldnt be hurt severely as an attacker if they accidentally attacked a farm, thinking of getting a few free resources and instead losing a large chunk of lcav. So, we need to know how to counter militia and the people who have to use them.

As I see it, there are two good ways of countering militia:

1. There is always that one persistant farm in the area that keeps building up spears and swords every time you try and farm him so some of your troops die. Guess what? That guy is probably going to be pitting over a hundred militia to fight against your lcav when they attack. And thats not good if you send 100 lcav per attack. Well, thankfully, there is a way to stop the guy summoning lots of militia. A simple knock down of the farm to level 1 will limit the guys militia to 20 and that should be easy to take care of with a few axes.

2. Its early game, you havent got catapults yet. Suddenly, your best farm puts up militia and you lose a lot of your lcav. Well, you should have probably thought a bit first before you sent lots of lcav. If you send waves of 5-10 lcav instead of 30 lcav, then you should lose very little to militia, which you can then respond with an easy axeman clear as militia are bad against axemen if you want some OD or some more resources or alternately, you can just wait 6 hours till the militia disappear.

In conclusion, militia are a bitch in the early game and benefit the people that you want to farm and take away resources that could be yours even if you manage to clear the militia. Infact it screws you in 3 ways (the lcav dying if that happens, the axes dying clearing it, the halved resources lowers your farming hauls). However, that does not mean they are not easily dealt with. I dont know if this helped anyone, as Im not amazing at this game, but anyway. :D