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    Your Elvenar Team

Steel Tournament: Advanced Battle Tactics

Gkyr

Chef
This post is to help Elves get over a defeat that stands in the way of progress in the Steel Tourney. Battle difficulty does not increase uniformly. The numeric ratios may increase from Tourney round to round and from Tourney province to province but success is a matter of habitual lineup choice, experience and field obstructions. Therefore, getting over one 'insurmountable' encounter may bring a series of easier victories. If you find this post useful, then bookmark it.
There are many experienced fighters in Elvenar and others may have different strategies that work well for them. These tips are what works well for me. This advice is directed to Elf gamers who are at least in chapter 9, but principles may help Elves in earlier chapters and Humans in earlier and middle chapters.

It helps to have a fully leveled [10] and fed Fire Phoenix, and an Unleashed Unit Upgrade (Or Dwarven Armor) and an Enlightened Light Range. Magnificent Mage Multiplier is not necessary in this Tourney unless you are going all out because your Mages play a minor role here (less than 10% of battles). The Fire Phoenix is not necessary but it means that you will be using this strategy a little earlier in the Tourney. I often battle without it until things get challenging.

Default conditions: The steel Tourney is dominated by Mages. As battles get more challenging, complimentary HR Steinlings, HR Cannoneers and LR Archer types are put into the opposition lineup.

Default gamer lineup: This lineup makes a great deal of sense for both auto-fighting (AF) and manual fighting (MF). As most know, but for the record, the order you place your troops will match the order of the opposing lineup. Therefore is makes sense to start by placing a buff-advantaged troops opposite your opponent. As a default choice, Archers and Rangers are put opposite Mages and HM, I use Banshees opposite HR, Orc Strategists opposite LR and Golems opposite LM.

This is a first approximation only. For one thing, the opposition does not cooperate by staying in 'their lane' to attack the troop opposite them. For another, this may result in placing Banshees too near opposition Archers that will have first strike against them. Looking at the filled lines across the field from each other may give additional information for a switch, then the auto-complete button can be clicked if you are not into MF. As mentioned, this lineup can be filled in this manner for AF. The 'advanced' strategy begins when this setup results in a Defeat.

Back from Defeat: Of course you can always cater a defeated encounter. But for fighters, the quickest bounce back from defeat and to move on in the Tourney is to repeat the same lineup but use MF instead of AF. This requires some MF experience and I strongly suggest getting some somewhere along the way. As most know, but for the record, the game algorithm does not always make strong moves and is incapable of waiting or retreating for strategic advantages. Especially with LR against Mages, it is best to move your LR into the back corners so that they do not get shredded by the Mages or Steinlings and LM in round 1. Then the melee troops can be whittled down a bit in round 1 by your Golems and Orc Strats (for LR) before bringing your Rangers or Archers out for the middle and end games. This frequently 'snatches Victory from the jaws of Defeat'.

If this doesn't work or if you think you do not have the buff power to make MF work there is a further tactic that has won quite a few difficult encounters for me in the Steel Tourney; in fact, it has never lost. However you must be in chapter 14 for the Gruff Orc Warrior upgrade and chapter 15 for the VV upgrade. I do not use it routinely because it depends upon melee troops which are disgustingly slow to battle in MF mode and cannot be used if the field obstructions are dense. Also I don't train a lot of them to have on hand. If you use this tactic, you might as well use MF to get over this one difficult encounter before proceeding further with AF. This tactic uses troops that are ignored in general by the Elvenar gamers. Successful battles by your mates convinces you to copy their strategies, especially if they are top scorers. Troops that have the reputation of being 'useless' are never given a chance to display usefulness in niche situations. Nevertheless, these units have the highest attack and/or health stats and are therefore useful. Among these are Drone Riders, Sinister Cerberus, Vallorian Veterans (VV), and Gruff Orcs. Substitute the Dogs opposite the Mages, Drones opposite LR, VV opposite HR and Gruff Orcs opposite LM. The opponent will 'jump lanes' of course but keep after them (MF) with the advantaged counterpart. VVs are slow to get to the HR but the Dogs quickly shred the Mages. The Drones get most of the LR but they draw fire from every one of the opposition and do not survive, ever. You will lose a lot of troops but you will wind up with a Victory. Usually the Mages are the first to fall to the Dogs. After the Mages are gone I move the Dogs to the opposite side of the field in order to preserve what is left against the shredding they receive from the Steinlings.
The fun in MF is how to survive the challenges and this is how I do it. This niche pairing can work in other types of Tourney, but more on other Tournies later.
 
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crackie

Chef, Scroll-Keeper, Buddy's #1 Fan
This is a first approximation only. For one thing, the opposition does not cooperate by staying in 'their lane' to attack the troop opposite them. For another, this may result in placing Banshees too near opposition Archers that will have first strike against them. Looking at the filled lines across the field from each other may give additional information for a switch, then the auto-complete button can be clicked if you are not into MF.
In autofights, your own LR will also not cooperate and stay in their lane to attack the enemy Mage if there are enemy LR present. They will target the enemy LR first instead of Mage you set them up for, complicating the fight more than necessary. I think this is why so many mobile players prefer using Cerebus. He is better at ignoring LR first and going after enemy mages.
 

Gkyr

Chef
I think this is why so many mobile players prefer using Cerebus. He is better at ignoring LR first and going after enemy mages.
Two things:

I have always thought my Cerebri were bitches. Properly speaking, of course.

The advantage of auto-fighting with the dogs is offset by their low initiative (not that I am saying anything that is new or unknown). They take their hits from Mages and LR before they get to do their terrible deeds. And they are effective even as wounded. The result of this is that, for being able to wail through the Mages, the opposition exacts a toll on the dogs that are not as quickly trained in the training grounds as Archers or Crossbowmen [sic] are in the Barracks. Dogs make good progress but AFighters run out of them part-way through the T provinces unless they are brown-bearing it. Anyone have a different experience?
 

Yogi Dave

Well-Known Member
In autofights, your own LR will also not cooperate and stay in their lane to attack the enemy Mage if there are enemy LR present. They will target the enemy LR first instead of Mage you set them up for, complicating the fight more than necessary.
Is this true with Rangers? They have the specs of mage killers. Since I've gotten the 4-star crossbows I tend to not use rangers as much. The rangers are mainly for a mostly mage battle. For mostly mage and LR enemy battles, I use the crossbows. I hate using dogs and tend to manual more of them since you always, always, always lose from some to a lot in a battle. But, when the enemy calls for it, they go out there and die for the good of the city.

Troop training times in the 3 buildings are the same for me since the time shorting AWs are all maxed and the training buildings also have the same training time shorting. Since I very rarely use orc warriors or banshees, I only train dogs and orc strats in the training grounds which helps me restore those troops.
Therefore is makes sense to start by placing a buff-advantaged troops opposite your opponent. As a default choice, Archers and Rangers are put opposite Mages and HM, I use Banshees opposite HR, Orc Strategists opposite LR and Golems opposite LM.
I've found that putting the LR in the top and bottom (4 & 5) is often a bad choice. This is because the top and bottom pieces too often can't move to the middle and moving to the outside often doesn't let them get close enough to target the enemy. Putting them in the above and below (2 & 3) spots seems to work better in general. They often have a choice of three enemies they can reach on the 1st round and they are now out of the way for the top and bottom troops to move. Of course, this is not always the case. It also seems the 3 spot is very good for a LR in a multi-wave spire battle since it's the only troop that starts in the same position each wave.

Disclaimer: I'm human in the world and this thread is directed for elves. But I think my comments are valid for both races.
 

Killy-

Well-Known Member
If there are only mages and LR on the opposite side, than you want to focus down the LR first anyways with your rangers or not (at least with some booster buildings and only using rangers on your side)?
 

Gkyr

Chef
I've found that putting the LR in the top and bottom (4 & 5) is often a bad choice. This is because the top and bottom pieces too often can't move to the middle and moving to the outside often doesn't let them get close enough to target the enemy. Putting them in the above and below (2 & 3) spots seems to work better in general. They often have a choice of three enemies they can reach on the 1st round and they are now out of the way for the top and bottom troops to move. Of course, this is not always the case. It also seems the 3 spot is very good for a LR in a multi-wave spire battle since it's the only troop that starts in the same position each wave.

Disclaimer: I'm human in the world and this thread is directed for elves. But I think my comments are valid for both races.
Depends. If one is autofighting it is likely to be a bad choice but if one is manual fighting it is an excellent choice because it gives you an advantage that the machine algorithm doesn't have and that is the ability to strategically retreat into the corners while the HR and LM clear out the opposing LR and LM, clearing the way for the attack-advantaged LR to wipe out the enemy LR, Mages and HM. If there is an enemy dog I retreat my LR and Mages into the furthest corner and put Golems between them and the dog and come out in round #2.
 

crackie

Chef, Scroll-Keeper, Buddy's #1 Fan
The advantage of auto-fighting with the dogs is offset by their low initiative (not that I am saying anything that is new or unknown). They take their hits from Mages and LR before they get to do their terrible deeds.
Cerebus does have a defensive bonus against mages though, which lets them handle playing sitting ducks to mages first a bit better, esp compared an Elven Archer that can’t reach to take his shot due to obstacle or something. Elven Archers, except 4* ones, do not have such protection against mages, which is kinda interesting as every other LR has some defensive bonus against mages.

Is this true with Rangers?
Yes.

It will depend on how quickly you can kill those enemy LR, which is influenced by how much buffing and what province you’re on. Obviously, the more buffs one places, the sloppier one can be about fighting. This is why I don’t really have too many tutorials about matchups, even though I know it’s what people want. They want recipe guides, like when facing X enemy combo, use Y unit combo. But there are many variables to consider. For example, @Yogi Dave does high average of tourney and is a chap 20 player. He likely battles with many buffs down, has access to late game units, military wonders, and prob fully leveled Fire Phoenix and all those types of toys. How you fight Province #50 isn’t necessarily how you would fight Province #5 either. Therefore, one can’t advise a player in chap 5 to necessarily fight the same way. Hence, I am hesitant and avoid making many blanket umbrella statements.

I've found that putting the LR in the top and bottom (4 & 5) is often a bad choice.
I tend to put Rangers in those slots if LR is needed, esp against mages, bc they do have an extra movement compared to other LR in your arsenal. I think that, above all else including their strikeback, is a Ranger’s best asset. They can reach more mages on opening shot.
 

Yogi Dave

Well-Known Member
Level of a troop also matters a lot. As an example, when I started playing the game in early '17 people in my FS talked about how good the dogs were against mages. So, when I got the training grounds, I trained them and sent them in. They were often just cannon fodder, even in manual battles. Since a 1-star dog only moves 5 spaces all too often the Abbot got 2 shots at it before the dog got to bite him, if it lived that long. In so many cases, the new troop or upgrade of it is the best choice, but you have to be careful. A new troop is 1-star. Consider the example of a 1-star ranger versus the 3-star archer. The ranger only survives in a very limited number of conflicts whereas to the archer has a much greater survivability. When the ranger became 4-star I used it in a lot more battles than I do now that the archer is 4-star. So, just a little word of warning when choosing troops of the same class, but a different number of stars, or in some cases the same star.
@Yogi Dave does high average of tourney and is a chap 20 player. He likely battles with many buffs down, has access to late game units, military wonders, and prob fully leveled Fire Phoenix and all those types of toys.
Yep. All my military AWs are maxed as is my fire phoenix and twilight phoenix. So, with the fire phoenix fed every troop has a 90% attack bonus and 40% 30% health bonus. Then there are the 5d buildings and zero-cooldown time and twilight phoenix. Plus, at the higher levels I peek at the arena and will manual fight for certain type battles. I've looked at some arena setups and think this will be easy with 5 stacks of a troops and get wiped out. When I setup the same troops and do it manual, I often lose less than 1 stack worth of troops, much less a full stack. Crazy computer algorithms. Though sometimes, it was a bad troop choice by me and time for me to say 'oops' and surrender. Well, it's not 'oops' I say, but it's a family game.
 
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Henroo

Oh Wise One
Level of a troop also matters a lot. As an example, when I started playing the game in early '17 people in my FS talked about how good the dogs were against mages. So, when I got the training grounds, I trained them and sent them in. They were often just cannon fodder, even in manual battles. Since a 1-star dog only moves 5 spaces all too often the Abbot got 2 shots at it before the dog got to bite him, if it lived that long. In so many cases, the new troop or upgrade of it is the best choice, but you have to be careful. A new troop is 1-star. Consider the example of a 1-star ranger versus the 3-star archer. The ranger only survives in a very limited number of conflicts whereas to the archer has a much greater survivability. When the ranger became 4-star I used it in a lot more battles than I do now that the archer is 4-star. So, just a little word of warning when choosing troops of the same class, but a different number of stars, or in some cases the same star.
You are certainly correct that the 1 star versions of Mercenary Camp troops rarely outperform the 3 star versions of barracks troops. I think the 1 exception to this might be Blossom Mage. Even at 1 star I think they outperformed 3 star Sorceress. However: I think once the Ranger gets its 3 star promotion it is the best light range unit in the game and remains so. I have already been through the chapter 18/early ch 19 period of time where my Archers were 4 star and my Rangers were still 3 star. And I feel my 3 star Rangers were still outperforming my 4 star Archers during this phase. It is truly no contest now that I have also gotten the 4 star Ranger promotion. Also only elven players have Archers. Human players have Crossbowmen and those do not perform as well as Archers. In my human cities, the difference between Crossbowmen & Rangers is even more pronounced than the difference between Archers and Rangers in my elven city.
 
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