So there's a lot to unpack in your post, and I am also bad at using quotes, so I won't go line-by-line. I also don't like to give unsolicited on total city overhauls.
But generally I'd say you'd be better served in Orcs dumping your level 1/2 wonders (CL, Needles, MM, Bulwark) and using that space for guest race goods. You'll suffer a bit in your tourney play and army growth, but its probably a good tradeoff. If you log in every 6-7 hours, you should probably have little recruiting downtime with 2 max armories, and the level 1 bonuses of MM don't make a "huge" difference.
Similarly, I'd focus on getting everything to "max-level." There are a few instances where it won't seem worth it, but as your population efficiency and culture efficiency naturally increase through each chapter, you're better served having 2-3 max tier factories than 4-6 sub-max.
The math varies for the factory type, but generally:
For instance, a level 15 marble factory produces 173/3 hours at 6 spaces. And it costs 356 population. A level 19 factory produces 373 and costs 1,050. When you factor in max-fairy residence size (68.75 pop/sq), and roads (but not including culture), you're getting about 13.84 marble per square at level 15, and 14.1 at level 19. Not a massive difference, but A. marble factories are the smallest, so this difference increases with larger-sized factories, and B. multiply that difference by your relevant boost.
Taking my time through guest race sections doesn't bother me at all -- I like the producing / trading aspects of the game and the slower progress lets me put more KP into wonders, my own and others.
One thing I'll say about Orcs. My last FS had 2 players who, like you, enjoyed slow progress. But Orcs, even if you min-max, is super-slow. Orcs basically ruined the game for them, because they were in the same (ugly) chapter for 6 months.
If you have 10ish premium expansions, you should be in good shape. Most guides recommend twice as many expansions for guest race buildings that you used in Dwarves/Fairies. If you comfortably can make that space, then going after the Phoenix set makes sense. It might not be the "best" use of space, but it also won't hamstring your progress.
I used Orcs as a time to really make my city "efficient," on a per square basis. Its a long slog of a chapter, and since you have an upgraded builder, you're going to have a lot of "hurry up and wait," situations where you spend a few days building up farms, then waiting on productions, then upgrading farms, then waiting, etc. But in Woodelves you are going to need the same guest race space (if not a bit more), and you need to make room for mana buildings. So during Orcs, I wanted to make my city as compact as possible (lining up all my residences and workshops on the short-side, maxing buildings, deleting inefficient buildings). So I ditched all my old cultural buildings, and all my pop/culture buildings except for the really great ones (mainly second and third grand prizes from the most recent event). I would think you'd be best served then, by focusing on the very efficient cultural buildings that are daily prizes and the first grand prize, and then deleting old culture and most pop/culture. Then you can build more residences if needed, and consolidate your factories.
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Your Elvenar Team
It looks to me like the prizes cover all of our bases and the prizes look very nice. Really looking forward to this one!
