Grepolis Units Comparison and Misc. Guide

Grepolis Units Comparison and Misc. Guide by cobblemix

Alright, so Cobble here, doing my last big guide.So, as many might know, I am the original Unit Comparer.., and my name is Cobble
So below, i will be posting my 3 old guides, and 2 new ones, along with loads of information and tactics. They will be the last guides i do, unless something spectacular happens. So.. without Further ado, in order.. My guides.

Here’s the Menu for today
1: Hoplite vs. Chariot
2: Bireme & Light Ship vs. Trireme
3: Manticore vs. Medusa
4: Wall Spying
5: Bireme vs. Fire Ship
6: Overview
7: Perfect Defense
——–Perfect Nuke
——–Perfect Buildings
8: Tactics
9: Gods’ Spells & Battle Points
10: Academy Research Guide
11: Mythical Units
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1: Hoplite vs. Chariot
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vs.

Now the question begs, which is better? The Hoplite or the Chariot? So i did some research and and all results will be in 5 categories: Time, Resources, Defense, Attack, and Speed & Farming

Background: Hoplites and Chariots are both Sharp units with good blunt defense. Hoplites take 1 farm space, when Chariots take 4. In order to compare equally, every test has to involve 4 hoplites since Chariots take up 4 farm spaces.
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First contest: Time ( at Level 16 Barracks)
4 x 0:18:28 Hoplites = 1:13:53
1 x 1:17:07 Chariots = 1:17:07

Hoplites win

Second Contest: Resources
4 x (0 Wood) (75 Stone) (150 Silver) Hoplites = 300 stone and 600 silver
1 x (200 Wood) (440 stone) (320 silver) = 200 wood, 440 stone, and 320 silver

Hoplites win for overall resources needed

Third Contest: Defense
4 x 18b 12s 7d Hoplites = 72b 48s 28d
1 x 76b 16s 56d Chariots = 76b 16s 56d
Which results in the facts of: Chariot have +4B, Hoplites have +32s, and Chariots have +28d

Chariots win in blunt and distance, and Hoplites are best in defending against sharp (between Hops and Chars)

Fourth Contest: Attack
4 x 16s Hoplites= 64s
1 x 56s Chariots= 56s

Hoplites win for sharp attack

Fifth Contest: Farming & Speed
4 x 8 Hoplites = 32 carrying w/ 6 Speed
1 x 64 Chariots = 64 carrying w/ 18 Speed

Chariots carry twice as much at 3 times the speed
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Overall:
Hoplites are faster to Train
Hoplites don’t cost any wood, but Chariots save you some silver
Chariots are better to defend against blunt and distance, but Hops will knock out your sharp with their defense. Go for Chariots for defense
Hoplites Have a higher attack
Chariots best Hoplites at farming and movement
Individually, Chariots are better. But Farm space wise, Hoplites are your choice

*Chariots are very good in the fact that they are emergency supply units. You can easily recruit them through a friends favor. In the situation of attack, a friend or alliance member can cast multiple amounts of chariots to help you out. They are quite fast, and good attackers. Speed is everything!*
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Situation

So lets say you have 50 hops, and 40 chariots. Do you attack with the 50 or the 40? You attack with the 40 chariots. Look at it farm space wise, not # wise. 160 (4 x 40) is better than 50 (hops) farm space. You have to realize the farm space, and not the actual #. So to correspond units, 40 chariots FS* is equal to 160 hops. The hops are better for Offense, and chariots for def.

So 40 chariots are better than 50 hops FS. But at equal FS, 160 hops will always be better than 40 chariots (40 x 4 = 160).

*FS= Farm Space

2: Bireme & Light Ship vs. Trireme

vs.

As a sequel to the land unit comparison, here is the sea unit comparison.

And Here come our competitors! On the south side of the stadium, its the Bireme and Light Ship. On the north, the mighty Trireme.

Now the categories today are: Attack, Defense, Speed, Resources, and Time. In order to compare equally with Farm Units, we must have all units equal the same FS. Therefore, the Competitors will be 5 Biremes and 4 Light (80 FS altogether) and 5 Triremes (5 x 16 = 80).

First Competition: Attack
5 x 24 Biremes + 4 x 200 Light = 920 attack
5 x 180 Triremes = 900 attack

Although i don’t recommend using Biremes in an attack, B & L win
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Second Competition: Defense
5 x 160 Biremes + 4 x 60 Light = 1040 defense
5 x 250 Triremes = 1250 defense

Triremes win.

1-1
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Third Competition: Speed
Bireme (15) + Light (13) means we go with the Light (slower) = 13
Trireme = 9

Bireme and Light win
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Fourth Competition:Resources
5 Biremes (4000 w, 3500 st, 900 si)+ 4 Light(5200 w, 1200 st, 3200si) = 9200 w, 4700 st, 4100 si
5 Triremes = 10000 w, 6500 st, 4500 si

B & L win again
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Fifth Competition: Time at Level 20 Harbor
5 Biremes (10:14:30) + 4 Light (11:55:08) = 22:09:38
5 Triremes = 14:53:55

Trireme pulls out strong
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Alright, so look at it this way. You can build 5 Biremes and 4 Light Ships in 7 hours more than 5 Triremes with the same amount of FS and less resources. If you send out your Triremes to attack, you have no defense at home. Rather if you send out your 4 Light Ships, you still have 5 biremes at home.
With the 1.14 update, Triremes have lowered their recruitment time, but its going to take more than that to make the Trireme useful

So i see Triremes as good defense units only to be used in escorting Colony ships or that can act as Offensive units in desperate times of need.
But overall, stick with the Biremes and Light Ships, they are more farm space and battle strength efficient

3: Manticore vs. Medusa

Since most of the Mythical units are hard to compare because they are soo unique in their stats, Manticore vs. Medusa was the closest i could get. So with out further ado, The Fight

vs.

Again, the 5 categories will be: Time, Resources, Defense, Attack, and Speed & Farming. 90 Farm units will be used in order to compare equally. 5 Medusa and 2 Manticores

So lets get this fight going.

First contest: Time
2 x 7:59:27 (with Level 10 Barracks)Training Time + 2 x 81 hours [with 5.0 favor product.(405 favor)] Manticore = 15:58:54 + 162 hours = 177:58:54
5 x 5:32:57 (with level 10 Barracks)Training Time + 5 x 42 hours [with 5.0 favor product.(210 favor)] Medusa = 27:44:45 + 210 = 237:44:45

Additional:
1 Manticore = 88:59:27
1 Medusa = 47:32:57.
So individuality doesn’t matter, as Farm Space is crucial.

Flat out straight, Manticores win by 59:45:51. Or pretty much.. 2 1/2 days
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Second Contest: Resources
2 x 4400 wood, 3000 rock, 3400 silver Manticore = 8800 wood, 6000 rock, 6800 silver
5 x 1500 wood, 3800 rock, 2200 silver Medusa = 7500 wood, 19000 rock, 11000 silver

Ouch, Manticore wins
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Third Contest: Defense
2 x 170b, 225s, 505d Manticore = 340b, 450s, 1010d
5 x 625b, 435s, 375d Medusa = 3125b, 2175s, 1875d

Medusa wins at Defense, by alot, 2785b, 1725s, 865d more
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Fourth Contest: Attack Sharp
2 x 945 Manticore = 1890
5 x 425 Medusa = 2125

Medusa wins again.. By a stunning 235 in Sharp
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Fifth Contest: Speed & Farming

2 x 360 = 720 carrying w/ 22 speed & ability to fly to islands without ships
5 x 400 = 2000 carrying w/ 6 speed

Further Math.. 6 speed there and 6 speed back = 12 relative Medusa
22 speed there and 22 speed back = 44 relative Manticore
44/12=3.666= 3. This means that you could have your Manticores do 3 farm runs to a farm in the time it takes a Medusa to do one..

Therefore. 720 x 3 = 2160.

Manticores win with Faster Farming (I don’t recommend refarming a already farmed farm) (________________________________________

Overall:
You can produce FS Manticores 2 1/2 days faster than FS Medusas FACT
Manticores cost less, but Medusa save wood
Medusas own Manticores in Defense, suggesting that you get more for your money with Medusa
Medusas also win in attack.
Manticores win at Farming. With the ability to move 3x faster to get more resources. Also, Medusa’s require a transport boat in order to move from island to island. Manticore’s do not. (they can fly )

This also means that in attacking, Manticores skip naval defenses and go right to land units. Medusa’s have to face biremes, and the Transports could sink.

So for movement, Medusa’s require 5 Transport boats, which would play in resources and time for the boats, -> 5 Transport Boats = 11:28:05 Training time at level 12 harbor. 2500w, 2500st, 2000si, 35 more population, chance of sinking. This would change the Medusa to 10000w, 21500st, 13500si; TIME unchanged because you can recruit at same time.. This changes medusa speed from 6 to 8. Contest results remain the same. Unless you want me to go all out and include Transports in farm space requirements, thus changing the number of Manticores and Medusa’s compared.. but then i would have to revamp the whole guide.

My vote: Stick to Medusa’s for attack and defense, although it will take you FOREVER to train them. So the fact that Manticores are more readily trainable is a big part. Your opinions are comments are most welcome

The winner in my book is……….

MEDUSA

4: Wall Spying

&

Now, i am not quite sure if anyone has ever thought of this, or if someone has already mentioned it.. But i’m going to go after it. The idea is that you can use the wall & battle point total to effectively know how many opponents you’ve defeated. Now this might seem obvious, but its different that you might think…
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Situation 1: You are attacking someone. (Pretty simple).
Somehow this unworthy opponent has enough time to gather support and your attack “Fails”. So all you see in the report is your troop losses and ???. Now I take it you’d be a little upset that you don’t know how many troops you lost.

Here’s how you find out.
Step 1: Go to your wall.
Step 2: Record everything you’ve defeated as an attacker. Jot this down somewhere. Be sure to include exact amounts of each unit
Step 3: Send your attack and hope for the best
Step 4: After the attacks (if you get the ???) Go to your wall
Step 5: Again, record the new amount of everything you’ve defeated as an attacker exactly
Step 6: Subtract Step 2 From Step 5 and you will find how many troops you defeated in the battle.
Step 7: Record the change in Battle Points and see if it matches up with your results from S5-S2.
Step 8: Thank Cobblemix

I found this out from when i had never engaged in any naval battle, at all. So when i attacked the conqueror in the Battle of Maribor, i checked my wall and found that i had defeated 3 Biremes, and 2 Triremes

Now this doesn’t how many troops are in the city, but it does tell you how many you have left.

This is helpful in these cases

If you scout someone directly before an attack, and no attacks or support land in between the spy and your attack, this will help. You will gain the total number of troops from the spy report. Now let’s say your attack “failed”. You simply check the “Wall Difference” and Voila.. you know how many troops you defeated. To check the number of troops your opponent has left, simply subtract the “Wall Difference” From the Spy Report.. and Presto, yet again you win.

5: Bireme vs. Fire Ship

vs.

So once again, the Competitions. The goals here are to see which unit is better to use.. The Bireme, or the Fire Ship? So i did some research and and all results will be in 5 categories: Time, Resources, Defense, Attack, and Speed & Farming

Pretty Simple, yet complex.

Farm Space: 1 Bireme = 8 FS
Farm Space: 1 Fire Ship = 8 FS
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Alright, so First off

1st: Attack
1 Bireme = 24 attack
1 Fire Ship = You can’t attack with Fire Ships

This is a pointless competition, but it has to follow format.. soo…

Biremes win
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2nd: Time
At Level 20 Harbor..

Bireme = 2:02:54
Fire Ship = 0:49:39

Essential, you can build 3 Fire in the time it takes to build 1 Bireme

Fire wins
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3rd: Resources

Bireme = 800w, 700 st, 180 si
Fire Ship = 500 w, 750 st, 150 si

Fire ships save you wood and silver, and only cost 50 st more

I’m giving it to the Fireships
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4th: Speed
Very Important, supporting

Biremes = 15 Speed
Fire Ships = 5 Speed

Biremes are 3 times as fast as Fire Ships, and therefore, can support quicker

Biremes win
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5th: Defense

Bireme = 160 Defense
Fire Ship = 1 Defense

Now it might seem that Biremes win, but here is the turn.

The 200 LS Test, The 100 LS Test, and the 50 LS Test.

First off, the 200 LS
100 Biremes = Losses: 100 Biremes, 67 LS
100 Fire Ships = Losses: 100 Fire Ships, 100 LS

2nd: 100 LS
100 Biremes = Losses: 100 Biremes, 77 LS
100 Fire Ships = Losses: 100 Fire Ships, 100 LS

3rd: 50 LS
100 Biremes = Losses: 57 Biremes, 50 LS —Remains:43 Biremes
100 Fire Ships = Losses: 50 Fire Ships, 50 LS —Remains: 50 Fire Ships

Now, it appears that The Fire Ship Wins!! It defeats more LS, with less losses.

4th: Special 5 LS
5 Biremes = Losses: 5 Biremes, 4 LS
5 Fire Ships = Losses: 5 Fire Ships, 5 LS

Now it is for sure, that the Fire Ships proves to be a better defender, easily represented.
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Overall:

Fire Ship wins in Production time, Resources, and Defense
Biremes are Faster

Biremes provide fast support, Fire Ships provide stronger, slower support.

Research: Each Requires 8 Research Points.

Note on Fire Ships:THESE DO NOT KILL TRANSPORTS, HYDRAS, OR COLONY SHIPS. They fight last, and so are useless to defend sieges because the Colony Ship defends before them.

Users’ Comments

GDogg-Another reason why fire ships are useless – they only defend against war ships. If a city had 1000 fire ships in the harbour and you send in a colony ship with some transports, the fire ships will just let them sail straight in. the fire ships will then remain in the harbour for the duration of the seige and actually protect the forces that are in your city conquering it.

Trelane-But the absolute best defense is…………..being online lol. Those who play this game 24/7 have a huge advantage because they can see the attack coming and either mass defense or dodge. So check into the game regularly.

You can mass hundreds of biremes in the harbor of a colonization attempt or in response to an incoming attack (so you should have lots of biremes). Stacked biremes are the single most effective naval defense (but you need to be online to do it – so partly your strategy depends on how close you are to strong opponents). Offensively, The only way to bust this up is lightship nukes. By nuke I mean 100+ lightships with the 10% boost from Zeus.

Also with massive offense you can crush 50 biremes. Just check the simulator on what 125 lightships can do to 50 biremes. For those building two cities each with 50 biremes/50 lightships, consider having at least one city that has the high strength lightship nuke.

Also – when you attack with massive force you loose less ships and it takes you less time to get the nuke back up to full strength.

Need a place to hide your offense? – have a massive naval defense town.

Small players need to build navy and worry about raids? – coordinate with your neighbors and hide your ships in the massive defense location.

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Willcx-

Now to answer the Bireme Question
Yes, you also need biremes. They are useful to protect your CS during Conquests. Also useful to shield your towns, but don’t count too much on them.

Build say 30 in each town if you like. But also build naval towns that will supply your towns with bireme defence and also more LightShips!

This way if an enemy attack comes, you can pool all your biremes into the attacked city.

6: Overview

Sharp Land Unit Comparison

Hoplites are the better, if you have to decide between Chariots and Hops, but Chariots are Great Emergency units, as you can use Divine Favor.

Naval Combinations Comparison

Trireme turns out to be almost pointless, better tactics used with Bireme & Light Ship, and you get more for your FS

Sharp Mythical Unit Comparison

Medusa is the best all around unit, Defense & Attack, and is the superior mythical unit.

Naval Defense

Stick with Biremes, faster, better, and can defeat colony ships and transports. Fire ships, however cannot. Stay with Biremes, although a little bit of Fire Ships doesn’t hurt

Mythical Units
Overall

Minotaur: generally in the middle; reasonable defense and offense. One of “the Gods Hoplites” I might call them. Not the cheapest or most expensive. If you had to choose one unit, these would be near the top of my list on making a army out of only these units. Minotaurs should probably be used mostly in situations when you want to build a unit that can do a reasonable attack or defense. If you build any significant number of Minotaurs, you should build about 20 archers for every Minotaur and you will have a very (I mean, VERY) balanced defense. Building these archers will mean a large disbalance in resources, so you will want to be able to get rid of stone on something else easily (ie, you happen to have farming villages on your island which will take stone and give you wood or silver). Minotaur will never be a really efficient attack unit, because they require transports, so they could be killed in the harbor, but, more importantly, Horsemen have a better attack per population statistic.

Manticore: Heavily offensive. Conveniently a flying unit, and so does not require ships. Reasonably expensive, but not the highest. Not bad on favor cost per population. This unit you might be able to build a true army of, but it would, of course, take a while to accumulate the necessary favor of. When building these units, you should probably consider the advantage that, except for Medusa, these are the most efficient Sharp attacking units. So if you have a large number of Manticores in your city, it should be in your offensive land city, or in a special divine unit city that you might build :S. And remember, if you are being attacked in your city with the Manticores, unless you are sure of winning, get your Manticores out of there, they have a terrible defensive stat. MAnticores are a unit I encourage you to build, overall

Cyclops: Even when you have to build or send in support of archers to account for the Cyclops weakness in sharp, and even when you have to build fast transports to make it, it is not a terrible unit. Personally, I would not build it simply because it has better stats then some units in both attack and defense, but it does not have great stats, even though alone it is okay, but when accounting for extra archers, transports to carry them, LS to escort them, etc, the abilities of Cyclops seem to decrease. But if you happen to worship Poseidon and you happen to have a surplus of sharp defense and are lacking on ranged defense, and most of your nuke power is in ranged (ie, slingers) already (to maintain the idea of a pure nuke), then Cyclops should be a good unit to build.

Medusa: Awesome Attack and defense stats, but it becomes limited because it needs transports to carry it, and therefore can be sunk in the harbor, it needs the most favor per population and the most resources (insane there :S), it is much harder to build. But if you happen to see in your barracks that you can build a medusa, then you should take the chance, unless you know that you will need the favor for other things or have other plans for it. The medusa will always be (probably) the most efficient unit per farm space (in attack/defense) in grepolis, probably only beat in certain fields by more specialized units (ie, only beat in one field, ranged defense, by Cyclops).

Harpy: Arguably the best farming unit in Grepolis, but not a great defensive unit. It’s defense stat is worse then any other unit in grepolis, because no other unit in grepolis is so weak against any one area of attack. Harpy has a reasonable attack stat, which makes it all the better for farming, it can clear people and then take a good number of resources. If you chose to build 3 horses for every one harpy you built, then you would have a more balanced defense (153:73:73), without falling back really far in any one area. And building horses with harpies would allow you to preserve the offensive focus of a city. So I suggest that if you feel like building harpies, either (a) build them with 3 horses per harpy, or build them with 3 swords per harpy. So it is no disaster to build harpies, just remember to build them in mostly offensive cities, to take advantage of the offensive stat, and to balance out the failure of the ranged defense, be it through support or building units in the city.

Centaur: Very mediocre in all fields except a couple. The only two fields that I would say that centaur did very well in were in Loot and favor, it is not a great build because it’ attack stat is covered much, much better by the slinger, and because Pegasus is also an Athena unit, centaur just gets dwarfed by it in defense, centaur can be built, but I would consider it better to use your Athena favor more on things like wisdom, Heroic Power, and Pegasus.

Pegasus: Not terribly expensive, which is always a plus, and it is the Uber defensive unit of grepolis . Grepolis already favors the defensive for many reasons, which makes the Pegasus all the more powerful. When you build Pegasi, you might want to consider building a unit which can balance out its lesser abilities in sharp and distance defense. And remember, because many people have quite a few horses, which are blunt attack, this makes Pegasus even better. You should probably build a few archers with your pegasi to help a bit in the balancing out of the defensive stats, although you could probably get away without archers for compensation, because Pegasus’ defensive stats are already better then many unit’s stats :Smirk:

Hydra: Great in it’s battle stats, but it’s failing is in that it can not get it’s necessary resources collected as easily as the regular ships. If you are ever building either a mixed naval, offensive naval, or mixed in general cities, then whenever you happen to have the resources to build a Hydra, do it, it will rarely hurt you. But you should remember, Hydras are SLOW! They will make good C-Ship escorts because a C-Ship is slower then them, but with a Hydra you can never get your attacks or support anywhere as quickly, unless you are also using regular transports.

All in all, My favorite units are

(a) Pegasus: Arguably the best defensive unit in Grepolis, quickest support possible by any unit, it is not terribly expensive either;

(b) Manticore: Unlike Medusa, this unit is not terribly expensive, and it has a good offensive stat in an area not covered well by regular units (hoplites and chariots are not that offense-focused), it can fly, which is always a plus, and it is faster then all but Pegasus and Harpy, meaning that it can surprise people in attack much more easily.

7: Perfect Defense 

Perfect Defense
600 Amount Of Swords
200 amount of Archers
500 Amount of Hoplites
90 B/10 F Amount of Biremes/Fire Ships
2100/3000 Total Farm Space Used
900/3000 Unused (or 3520 if you have thermal Baths & Plow)
1420/3520 unused

-6:2:5 Ratio of Swords, Archers, Hoplites
186 blunt, 158 sharp, 239 ranged, 583 total, 44.8 per FS
Vs pure nukes of each type(FS) kills 10.39 Slings, 10.15 Horse, 9.88 Hops.
All around much closer to as-even-as possible. Balances out with militia. Still ever so slightly skewed towards most popular attack units but no major weakness.

-You need both Biremes & Fire Ships because Biremes can stop Transports & Colony ships, and Fire are the better against Light Ships.

Thanks Aurave

Level 25 Wall + Tower = 141.9% + 10% Fighting/Defending Boost. A must have.

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Perfect Nuke
200 Amount of Slings
300 Amount of Horses (FS 900)
10 Amount of Catapults (FS 150)
80 Amount of LS(FS 800)
63 Required amount of Transports(FS 441)
2491/3000 Total Farm Space Used
509/3000 unused
or 1029/3520 w/ Thermal & Plow

Also

200 Slinger
200 Hoplite
150-200 Horsemen

150 Light ships
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Ideal Polis
All of the Ideal Building levels

25 Lvl Senate
40 Lvl Farm
20-30 Lvl Barracks
20-25 Lvl Temple
30 Lvl Warehouse
35-40 Lvl Timber/Stone/Silver
30 Lvl Academy
20 Lvl Harbor
25 Lvl City Wall
10 Lvl Cave
10 Lvl Market
Theater/Baths/Library/Lighthouse
Tower/Statue/Oracle/Merchant

Now this varies with your choice of Cities: Naval or Land, Offensive or Defensive
Suggestions and Ideas are most Welcome. Never get Merchant Shop, and Lighthouse is only good for Pure Naval Cities

Incomings.. Spells
So now I will compare which is the better..

Desire, or Zeus’s Rage & Sea Storm

First off..
Desire-140 Hera Favor. Attacking Troops fight 10% weaker.
Zeus’s Rage-300 Zeus Favor. Destroys 10-30% of Attacking Land Troops
Sea Storm-280 Poseidon Favor. Destroys 10-30% of Attacking Sea Troops

Examples:
100 LS vs. 100 Biremes.
100 Horses vs. 100 Chariots

First off.
The Sea Comparison
Control: 100 LS vs. 100 Biremes = 23 LS remaining, 0 Biremes
With Desire: No change?
With Sea Storm at 30% Damage: 70 LS vs. 100 Biremes = 0 LS remaining, 15 Biremes
With Sea Storm at 10% Damage: 90 LS vs. 100 Biremes = 12 LS remaining, 0 Biremes

The Land Comparison
Control: 100 Horses vs. 100 Chariots = 21 Horses remaining, 0 Chariots
With Desire: No change??
With Zeus’s Rage at 30%: 70 Horses vs. 100 Chariots = 0 Horses Remaining, 1 Chariot
With Zeus’s Rage at 10%: 90 Horses vs. 100 Chariots = 13 Horses Remaining, 0 Chariots

I think the Desire usage is broken on the simulator..

8: Tactics

Hera Mass Production. By Yondo

So, props to Sandman10372 for this idea – he developed it, and then helped me to try it out too, so if you find it helpful, send him a thanks!

—

Objective: To create lots of units, quickly (in this case, I used horsemen)

Spells Used: Happiness (Resource Buildings create resources 50% faster for 12 hours – 120 favor) , Population Growth (Barracks units create 100% faster for 12 hours – 80 favor)

How to Do It: First, cast your Happiness. Make sure you have enough favor so that in 12 hours, you’ll be able to cast it and Population Growth again (or get a buddy to cast one on you, like I did). For 12 hours, you’re working as usual, but producing 50% more resources. Then, as Happiness nears its end, cast Pop Growth. IMPORTANT NOTE – Barracks units queued up only are reduced if they are queued while population growth is cast. It doesn’t affect already queued units. Then use your Happiness one last time, so to keep your warehouses full.

It’s critical that during your Population Growth time you pump in as many resources as you can – when Population Growth ends, you’ll want you put as many horsemen in queue as possible to take advantage of Population Growth’s benefits.

By doing this, I wound up making one horse every 26 minutes – which comes out to a little more than 24 horses in that time, or more if I get a huge warehouse at the end of it. And all in a short amount of time.

How This is Useful: This Combo is handy if you need to replenish losses quickly defensive, or if you need to prepare a quick assault against a fortified or recently battered city. Or you can think of something, I’m sure.

Questions, comments, idea below, please!

—-

This is an example of a Combo, and a good one. If you can think of others, using different Gods if you need to, try ’em out and post them!
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Spying Tactics By Yondo

Spying isn’t really a waste of money, if performed right.

What I generally do is send 1050 silver out – 50 more than the minimum, in case the opponent has a lvl 1 cave and just has a full stash of silver.

Then, when he hits, I get a report. Or, I don’t – but if I don’t get a report, the opponent learns about my espionage attempt, but he also loses 1050 silver from his cave.

Therefore, unless he keeps adding silver, he’ll eventually run out. A level 5 cave only holds 5000 silver, after all.

So, I send another spy, this time paying 1050. Why not send more? Because if I send a spy out paying him 4000 silver, and the enemy only had 1 silver in his cave, I’ll have wasted a lot of money. So I keep sending spies at 1050 a time, draining his cave until finally one breaks through.

Sure, the enemy might get 4 reports saying you spied on him, but if he got one, why not give him 4 reports? Doesn’t change anything. If he knew you tried, you might as well succeed.

But there you go! How to spy.

——–

Some more questions, I’ll answer:

Yes, he can only be used once, regardless of success or failure.

If the spy fails, the enemy’s coin is drained. Read above.

No, but if the spy fails, the enemy DOES know that you sent it, but nothing about your city.

I can’t say for sure, but I’d keep at least 1100 silver in your cave, if you can.

The higher the cave, the more silver you store in it. So, you can pay your spy more for an attack (though I would only send 1050 silver at a time), or you can keep TONS of silver in the cave, so enemies have to pay even more to view your city.
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Yondo

Ships and Roles
Biremes: Best at defending against attacks. Best employed to defend sieges.

Light Ships: Best at killing ships. Most effective in quantities greater than 30. Best employed to protect attacking transports and to break sieges.

Fire Ships: Quick to create, useless at offense, and kill attacking ships 1:1. THESE DO NOT KILL TRANSPORTS, HYDRAS, OR COLONY SHIPS. They fight last, and so are useless to defend sieges because the Colony Ship defends before them. Dumb, I know. Best employed to make your city less attractive to attack.

Triremes: Why would you have these? Don’t make these unless you’ve got some genius scheme I don’t know about, in which case, I encourage you to share on the forums.

9: Gods’ Spells & Battle Points

I have written this mini guide to answer some common questions regarding spells and their good usage, and also when you can or can’t use spells.

GENERAL NOTES:

MAXIMUM FAVOUR IS 500
If you have 2 or more cities worshipping the same god, the max is still 500. All citiess contribute so it just fills up faster but its still 500 max.

OFFENSIVE ARMY SPELLS
Offensive army spells can only be used when enemies have sent an attack on one of YOUR cities. These spells are Zeus Rage, Sea Storm, Desire.
If you have different towns worshipping different gods, you can use any spells available to you to use on incoming enemy attacks.
Example 1: If enemy is attacking your Hera town, and you have a Zeus town, you can use Zeus’ Rage on him.
Example 2: If enemy is attacking your friend, you cannot use any spells on that enemy attack. Only your friend can.

WHAT HAPPENS IN CONQUEST
If you are in Conquest and are inside the city, you can see what enemy attacks are incoming, (the town doing the conquest will have a timer, clicking on this will bring up a pop-up city screen, click the tab that brings up Forces Movements)

During the time of conquest, you may see enemies sending attacks in. However during the 24 (or 26) hour siege, you cannot cast any spells against those attacks.

SPELLS: (Obvious spells with simple usage is omitted)

ZEUS:

DIVINE SIGN
EFFECT: sends 1 chariot.
GOOD USAGE:
1) Cast on ally town if they are being attacked.
2) If ally or you are conquesting, (inside the town already), then cast on that town. Your ally or you will get the chariot. And then after the siege when town is theirs, they have a ready supply of good farming troops to use.

ZEUS’ RAGE:
EFFECT: destroy 10-30% of the enemy’s land units.
GOOD USAGE:
1) these CAN be used on ships attacking you! If the enemy fleet is carrying land forces, it destroys 10-30% of the land forces onboard.

BOLT:
EFFECT: reduces a random building by one level. Special buildings and Agora do not get hit. A city can only be hit ONCE every 4 hours by Bolt. After 4 hours, the city can be Bolted again.
GOOD USAGE: Terror tactics. Hitting enemies in retaliation, or for weakening him.
If several bolters work together, then it is possible to hit a city constantly, 6 bolts a day, every day for a week will anybody off! Especially if it hits his expensive farms – thus reducing his ability to build troops!

ATHENA:

PATRONESS
EFFECT: sends 5 random low level troops to any town. (no one has got higher than hoplite from this spell)
GOOD USAGE:
1) cast on allies that are being attacked
2) bolstering up your new towns so you have a defence force, and farming force.

CITY PROTECTION
EFFECT: protects a city from SPELLS ONLY for 12 hours.
GOOD USAGE:
1) Use defensively, if your town is constantly being hit by Earthquake or Bolts
2) use offensively when attacking an Enemy town, this will stop his friends sending him Patroness, and Divine Signs.

HERA

Hera is one of the alliance’s favourites and is covered in detail elsewhere.
Remember: Population Growth needs to be cast first, and THEN add Troop Builds to the queue.

POSEIDON
Again, Call of The Ocean needs to be cast first, and THEN Ship builds added to the queue.

Kingly Gift: Gives the selected city 800 wood. only 25 Favor

Any other tips, questions not covered etc. Please post or send to me to add.
_______________________________________________

Battle & Culture Points By N3mesis

BATTLE POINTS

Battle points are a way to keep track of who is actively engaged in fighting.
You receive 1 point for every citizen used to make the unit you killed. Your opponent receives the same whether attacking or defending.

** Note: You do not receive battle points for killing units that farming villages put up to defend themselves. You only receive battle points from player to player combat.

Q: > How many BP I earn from killing specific unit type?

Here is the BP Table:

Q: > How many BP / CP I need for my next city?

As first we need to explain AGORA Culture overview:

There are four different events that raise the cultural level of a city:
City festival:
> Require Academy level 30 + resources to organize; duration is 24 h
Olympic games:
> Require Academy level 30 + 50 gold (premium) to organize; duration is 5 days!
Victory procession:
> Require Battle Points to organize; duration is 8h!
Theater plays
> Require Academy level 30 + Theater (special building) + resources to organize; duration is 5 days!

As you see above, the fastest way to get CP is by killing the enemy. For a Victory procession 300 enemy units need to be eliminated. Or calculating how many BP you earned by killing enemy from the table described before.

300 killed infantry = 300 (BP) = 1 Culture Point (CP)

Step by step:
For 2nd City – is free and u can get it right after u learn conquering and have Colony Ship.
For 3rd city you need 3 CP
For 4th city you need 9 CP
For 5th city you need 18 CP (i forgot, need confirmation)
For 6th city you need 30 CP
For 7th city you need 45 CP
…etc…

NO ATTACKING = NO BattlePoints = NO CITIES!

GOOD HUNTING!

10: Academy Research Guide 

In the Academy you can research new things such as technologies or new units for your city. These researches and subsequent discoveries only apply to the city that made them. Everything must be researched individually in every city which means it is very possible to have different research strategies in almost every city you have.

Research points are a form of expendable resources. The more you expand the academy the higher the number of research points you have available. There is an upper limit of 120 per city. However you can receive +12 further research points through the building of the Library on a city. You should spend these wisely as it is impossible to research everything within a single city.

It is possible to undo your research using a culture point, you can find culture points in the culture tab in the Agora!

WILLCX’s RESEARCH ADVICE
[With N3mesis opinions]

++ number in () are the research points needed ++

LEVEL 1 – 3:
SLINGERS: excellent offensive (4)
ARCHERS: excellent defensive. (8)

LEVEL 4 – 6:
HOPLITES: essential defensive. (8)
CITY GUARD: useless. [Agree with Willcx – Enemy when kill your militia takes 0 BP and u have instant defence, but this research is capped to level 25 farm – so is not a big deal and worth to upgrade.]
http://wiki.en.grepolis.com/images/a….pngDIPLOMACY: good (3)

LEVEL 7 – 9:
DEMAND TROOPS: not good. [Depends – when u have lack of units after enemy assault or your invasion this comes usefull]
BOOTY: excellent. (3)
CERAMICS: excellent (4) [Useful only when u have 1 city and you wanna conquer ASAP and u need res. space]

LEVEL 10 – 12:
HORSEMEN: essential offensive. (8)
PLOW: excellent. (4)
TRAINER: useless [Disagree – You always build units and u need them ASAP]

LEVEL 13 – 15:
BIREME: essential defensive. (8)
CRANE: useless. [This is like ceramics – read]
CONSCRIPTION: excellent, save resources(4)

LEVEL 16 – 18:
CHARIOT: not good. [Depends – there is always debate Hoplites vs Chariots. I favor chariots for many aspects.]
LIGHTSHIP: essential offensive. (8)
ARCHITECTURE: very useful, save resources. (6) [You need it only once till u max city buildings. Than you look at it as burden.]
SHIPWRIGHT: useless [Disagree – You always build this unit]

LEVEL 19 – 21:
FIRESHIPS: useless. useless. useless [Agree ]
CATAPULTS: useful to have in 1 city. (8)
CRYPTOGRAPHY: useless.
DEMOCRACY: useless

LEVEL 22 – 24:
COLONY SHIP: depends if this is conquesting town. Generally I have all towns able to conquer eventually. (0) [It costs 0 research points – build it when u can!]
FAST TRANSPORT BOAT: excellent (8)
METEOROLOGY: useless. [Agree – once you clear island is battle between islands]
BUNK: essential (6)

LEVEL 25 – 26:
TRIREME: poor choice [Discussion needed – I fovor them.. (dissapointed during last battle on attack with them)]
PHALANX: essential (9) [THIS IS MUST IN ALL TOWNS]
BREAKTHROUGH: limited use.
MATHEMATICS: essential, save resources(6)

LEVEL 28 – 30:
BATTERING RAM: essential (10) [THIS IS MUST IN ALL TOWNS]
CARTOGRAPHY: essential (8) [Usefull]
CONQUEST: depends if this is a conquesting town. (0) [It costs 0 research points – Develop it when u can.]

As you can see, the above uses 115 research points. (or 123 including catapult)
A maxed out Academy will only give 120 research points. so in order to have the catapult you will need to lose something. (democracy)

NOTES:
Chariots: I just use spare Zeus favour and usually to kick start a new conquest. (new conquests have zero troops, so always useful to have 10 chariots to use to start farming)

TRAINER and SHIPWRIGHT are useless. Much better to use Hera’s Population Boost, and Poseidon’s Call of the Ocean. ..and if you have developed this research u have +10% faster build

11: Mythical Units

Here I will be comparing EVERY mythical unit and Harpy will be used in odd quantities because I prefer to keep the rest of the # down. I will use amounts of each unit such that the total population is 360, so 12 Minotaurs; 8 Manticores; 9 Cyclop; 20 Medusa; 30 Centaur; 18 Pegasus; 25 5/7 Harpies.
Now let us begin:
First Contest: Time
Remember, Favor takes far more time to produce then the units, unless you have an insanely high favor production for one god, so I will list the production times even though they mean little.
Minotaur: 54:05:24+485hrs=~540hrs(~22.5days)
Manticore: 72:07:26+648hrs=~720hrs(~30days)
Cyclop: 71:46:02+648hrs=~720 hrs(~30days)
Medusa: 125:03:54+840hrs=~965 hrs(~40days)
Centaur: 68:17:14+600hrs=~668 hrs(~28days)
Pegasus: 72:03:36+648hrs=~720hrs(~30days)
Harpy: 72:02:16+668hrs=~740hrs(~31.5days)
I rounded on these times. Minotaur win. Medusa Fail. But remember, win you are making multiple divine units, you can (and sometimes must) start the first of the multiple divine units before you have all of the favor for the next unit. So these times are just to get an idea of which unit takes the longest when only producing a few (or one ).
——————————————————————————————————————————————
Second Contest: Resources (without favor)
Wood ; Stone ; Silver ; total
Minotaur: 16800; 7200; 37200; 61200
Manticore: 35200; 24000; 27200; 86400
Cyclop: 18000; 37800; 30240; 86040
Medusa: 30000; 76000; 44000; 150000
Harpy: ~41200; ~10300; ~35000; ~86500
Centaur: 5200; 9000; 21000; 35200
Pegasus: 50400; 6480; 1440; 58320
Medusa fail. Centaur wins.
——————————————————————————————————————————————
Third Contest: Defense
Order: Blunt; Sharp; Distance; total
Minotaur: 8100; 3600; 6720; 18420
Manticore: 1360; 1800; 4040; 7200
Cyclop: 8505; 90; 11790; 20385
Medusa: 12500; 8700; 7500; 28700
Harpy: 2700; 1800; ~27; ~4527
Centaur: 4500; 13500; 1800; 19800
Pegasus: 16200; 4500; 5400; 26100
Medusa wins; Harpy and Manticore=FAIL
——————————————————————————————————————————————
Fourth Contest: Attack
Minotaur: 5040 blunt
Harpy: 6840 blunt
Manticore: 7560 Sharp
Medusa: 8500 Sharp
Pegasus: 1800 Sharp
Cyclop: 6804 distance
Centaur: 4680 Distance
Medusa wins, Pegasus FAILS.
——————————————————————————————————————————————
Fifth Contest: Speed and Loot (Farming)
Speed
Here you may assume that any units EXCEPT Manticore, Harpy, and Pegasus (flying units) have a speed of whatever your navy’s speed is because on real attacks or supports of other players, you will generally be going by boat, but I will provide the regular speeds as well
Manticore (flying): 22
Minotaur: 10
Cyclop: 8
Medusa: 6
Harpy (flying): 25
Centaur: 18
Pegasus (flying): 35
Pegasus wins, Medusa fail

Loot(without Booty)
Minotaur: 5760
Manticore: 2880
Cyclop: 6804
Medusa: 8000
Harpy: ~8742
Centaur: 6000
Pegasus: 2880
Harpy wins. Manti/Pegasus fail
——————————————————————————————————————————————
Favor (times based off of a level 25 temple in a speed 1 world)
Straight Amount (time in days; hours)
Minotaur: 2424 (484.8 hrs or 20 days and 4.8 hours)
Manticore: 3240 (648 hrs or 27 days)
Cyclop: 3240 (648 hrs or 27 days)
Medusa: 4200 (840 hrs or 35 days)
Harpy: ~3343 (~668hrs, or ~27 days 20hrs)
Centaur: 3000 (600 hrs or 25 days)
Pegasus: 3240 (648 hrs or 27 days)
Minotaur wins. Medusa fails

Now:
VS.
I will use 400 FS of each side. 8 Hydras vs. 25 biremes and 20 LS.
First Competition: Attack
Okay, first a review of individual units. A hydra has 1000/50, or 20, attack per pop, as does the Light Ship, and Biremes have 24/8, or 3, attack per population. Now this means that LS is still equal to Hydra, but using the numbers of each unit I listed earlier:
Hydra: 8*1000=8000
Regular ships: 24*25 + 20*200 = 600+4000=4600
Hydra wins
——————————————————————————————————————————————
Second Competition: Defense
Individual units:
Hydra: 715/50=14.3 per pop
Bireme: 160/8=20 per pop
LS:200/60=3.33 per pop
Bireme is well ahead individually, but overall:
Hydra:715*8=5720
Regular:160*25 + 60*20= 4000+1200=5200
Hydra still wins
——————————————————————————————————————————————
Third Contest:Speed
Individual:
Hydra:8
Bireme:15
LS:14
Bireme wins with LS very close behind
Overall:
Hydra:8
Regular:14
Regular win this one
——————————————————————————————————————————————
Fourth Contest: Resources ( I will throw in the favor for Hydra)
Individual per pop. Wood; Stone; Silver; Favor
Hydra: 108 ; 56 ; 76 ; 8
Bireme: 100 ; 87.5 ; 22.5 ; 0
Light Ship: 130 ; 30 ; 80 ; 0
In general, I would say bireme is the best :S
Overall (favor times are for a 5.0 favor/hr):
Hydra: 43200 ; 22400 ; 30400 ; 3200 (640 hrs)
Regular: 46000 ; 23500 ; 20500 ; 0
Regular wins in general, especially with favor tipping the balance
——————————————————————————————————————————————
Fifth Contest: Time
Remember, favor production time almost always greatly outweighs regular time.
Overall:
Hydra: 93:19:52 + 640 hrs = 733:19:52
Regular: 2:45:00*25 + 4:00:00*20 = 68:45:00 + 80:00:00 = 148:45:00
Hydra wins on the regular build time, but if you add the favor production it really adds up. And if you had Hydras such that they added up to 360 population (as in the other myth units), then the favor production would take 576 hrs (24 days) which is faster then other myth units.
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