Speedier Barracks?

[Lemon Wren]

Everyone here is so helpful I thought I'd ask another question, after not easily figuring out the answer through Google.

I'm currently in chapter 5 and just built Needles for my archers. One of the features is that it makes barracks training faster, but I feel like this just means that my barracks are sitting idle sooner, since I only log in and play periodically. I mean, I feel like all the troop things I've added at my low level all offer this "feature," but I'm less than jazzed about it.

Am I missing something now? Or does something become available later that offers better/more training that doesn't require me to log in constantly to improve my troops?

Thanks!

 

[SoggyShorts]

With the addition of more armories you can AFK longer without your barracks sitting idle.
The biggest help will come from the Dwarven bulwark(chapter 6) (and later the shrewdy shrooms) Ancient wonders as they act like multiple armories in much smaller space.
Generally the goal is to have a queue longer than you plan to AFK (sleep/work) but that's almost impossible at the very early chapters.

Here's a calculator I made that can help:
www.tinyurl.com/trainingcalc

 

[Lemon Wren]

With the addition of more armories you can AFK longer without your barracks sitting idle.
The biggest help will come from the Dwarven bulwark(chapter 6) (and later the shrewdy shrooms) Ancient wonders as they act like multiple armories in much smaller space.
Generally the goal is to have a queue longer than you plan to AFK (sleep/work) but that's almost impossible at the very early chapters.

Here's a calculator I made that can help:
www.tinyurl.com/trainingcalc

Thanks for linking the calculator. Numbers (and Excel) make my eyes glaze over but I'm going to do my best to plug my numbers in. Questions:

How do I know what my troops per day number is?
I have three armories but they are two different levels due to current space constraints. How should I handle that in plugging a number in?
The blue box, with the BARRACKS full queue time - is that the final calculation once the other numbers get plugged in?

Thanks so much!

 

[SoggyShorts]

How do I know what my troops per day number is?

that cell will auto populate once you put your data in the green cells

I have three armories but they are two different levels due to current space constraints. How should I handle that in plugging a number in?

Sadly, my excel-fu isn't up to the task of fixing that. You can try to average the levels or reduce the number of armories
e.g. put in
2.5 armories at level 9
or
3 armories at level 7.5

It doesn't need to be perfect to get a good idea of what your city will do.
Also, it's really more of a planning tool so inputting what you will have or want to have rather than what you do have is more useful.

The blue box, with the BARRACKS full queue time - is that the final calculation once the other numbers get plugged in?

Yup. That's the number for how long you can be away from your keyboard (AFK) before your barracks goes idle

 

[Kekune]

Here's a no-math way to decide if speeding up troop production will help you: When you typically come back to the game, are there still troops training in your barracks? Or is it all finished and ready for pickup?

If they're still training, then make them train faster (upgrade your barracks or needles.) If they're all waiting for you to pick up, then make a longer training queue (add armory levels or the bulwark/shrooms ancient wonders). This will increase your overall troop output.

Like Soggy says above, your ultimate goal is for your troop queue to never go idle. However, that takes time and resources to develop. Start by balancing length and speed for your daytime absences, and work up to making it long enough to keep going all night.

(I'm tempted to edit the phrasing of that last line... but I'm gonna leave it.)

 

[SoggyShorts]

...

 

[Gladiola]

The way I tell the barracks training time with my current builds is when my barracks is empty (such as when I wake up in the morning) and I set all troop training slots to max, how long is that time? (That is found at the right side of the barracks next to the pictures of the slots.) For me it is 2.5 hours. No calculator needed. Also you can just look at the troop training time per unit for light melee and multiply it times the number of units per slot with your projected armory builds, times the number of slots. Although different troop types take up different numbers of "spaces" in a squad and in the training slot, a full slot of any kind of troop will have roughly the same training time (it will be a little different due to rounding of troops that don't have a value of 1).

 

[Lemon Wren]

that cell will auto populate once you put your data in the green cells

Sadly, my excel-fu isn't up to the task of fixing that. You can try to average the levels or reduce the number of armories
e.g. put in
2.5 armories at level 9
or
3 armories at level 7.5

It doesn't need to be perfect to get a good idea of what your city will do.
Also, it's really more of a planning tool so inputting what you will have or want to have rather than what you do have is more useful.

Yup. That's the number for how long you can be away from your keyboard (AFK) before your barracks goes idle

Ok, thank you so much!

 

[Lemon Wren]

Here's a no-math way to decide if speeding up troop production will help you: When you typically come back to the game, are there still troops training in your barracks? Or is it all finished and ready for pickup?

If they're still training, then make them train faster (upgrade your barracks or needles.) If they're all waiting for you to pick up, then make a longer training queue (add armory levels or the bulwark/shrooms ancient wonders). This will increase your overall troop output.

Like Soggy says above, your ultimate goal is for your troop queue to never go idle. However, that takes time and resources to develop. Start by balancing length and speed for your daytime absences, and work up to making it long enough to keep going all night.

(I'm tempted to edit the phrasing of that last line... but I'm gonna leave it.)

Thank you for the very clear explanation. Much appreciated!

 

[samidodamage]

For me it is 2.5 hours. No calculator needed.

Did you miss this part of Soggy's post?

Also, it's really more of a planning tool so inputting what you will have or want to have rather than what you do have is more useful.

When deciding to increase/decrease number of armories/armory upgrades or what order to upgrade the various AW's that have impacts on training time, I find the calculator immensely helpful. It helped me go from 6 armories to 4 and maintain the AFK time. With lvl 35 armories taking up 28 squares each, that was a lot of space gained.

 

[Gladiola]

@samidodamage did you miss the rest of my post, where I described how to calculate the effect of building additional armories? I'm not knocking the calculator, but not everyone likes to use them, and I described a way to calculate the effect of increasing or upgrading armories without using a calculator specifically designed for the task.

 

[Lemon Wren]

With the addition of more armories you can AFK longer without your barracks sitting idle.
The biggest help will come from the Dwarven bulwark(chapter 6) (and later the shrewdy shrooms) Ancient wonders as they act like multiple armories in much smaller space.
Generally the goal is to have a queue longer than you plan to AFK (sleep/work) but that's almost impossible at the very early chapters.

Here's a calculator I made that can help:
www.tinyurl.com/trainingcalc

Thanks again. With your helpful answers to all my questions I was easily able to plug in my numbers and get the AKF number. Also played around with it to look at potential additions. Quite illuminating.

 

[SoggyShorts]

Thanks again. With your helpful answers to all my questions I was easily able to plug in my numbers and get the AKF number. Also played around with it to look at potential additions. Quite illuminating.

Awesome, glad I could help

 

[Gkyr]

Here is some unsolicited advice:
(disclaimer: the value of different AWs is very different for each player and their style of playing.)
Both the Dwarven Bulwark (DB) and the Shrine...Shrooms (SSS) act as Armories in that they increase the number of troops trained at one time. The two differences are that DB gives free light melee troops and SSS gives free light ranged troops, and the footprint of SSS is significantly smaller than the DB (20 vs 28 tiles). For those reasons, I suggest building the DB, since it is unlocked first, but not upgrading it at all. My rationale is that upgrading is a waste of KP since light melee troops become undesirable as range troops become upgraded, (ie. archers and crossbowmen more useful than sword dancers or axe barbarians), so when the SSS becomes unlocked, just sell the DB and build the SSS in the same space, freeing up some tiles. Upgrade the SSS as desired.

Of course there are some players who want both for the combined larger troop training numbers they give. I found that I need only one with 4 armories, plus each AW increases the cost of spire and tourney encounters.

 

[Lemon Wren]

Here is some unsolicited advice:
(disclaimer: the value of different AWs is very different for each player and their style of playing.)
Both the Dwarven Bulwark (DB) and the Shrine...Shrooms (SSS) act as Armories in that they increase the number of troops trained at one time. The two differences are that DB gives free light melee troops and SSS gives free light ranged troops, and the footprint of SSS is significantly smaller than the DB (20 vs 28 tiles). For those reasons, I suggest building the DB, since it is unlocked first, but not upgrading it at all. My rationale is that upgrading is a waste of KP since light melee troops become undesirable as range troops become upgraded, (ie. archers and crossbowmen more useful than sword dancers or axe barbarians), so when the SSS becomes unlocked, just sell the DB and build the SSS in the same space, freeing up some tiles. Upgrade the SSS as desired.

Of course there are some players who want both for the combined larger troop training numbers they give. I found that I need only one with 4 armories, plus each AW increases the cost of spire and tourney encounters.

Thank you so much for this really helpful information. Most appreciated.

 

[crackie]

I have both Bulwark and Shrewdy. While I agree Light Melee are generally some of the most useless units in the game, it does mean you don’t have to waste a slot in your barracks to build them again. Also, I got my Bulwark high enough to put away 3 armories for awhile and only ran on 2. That’s 75 tiles of armory space saved and countless more tiles from residences not needed to support them! It’s a significant amount of recovered space! Plus during FAs, I can store ALL my armories and not granny gear out troops. With Shrewdy, I am back up to 4 big armories and the occasional armory camp if I have empty space I am not using. Also, upgrading wonders don’t increase CAL as significantly as other factors like plots and techs. I think the coefficient is like 300+ levels of wonder upgrades for the bigger shift to kick in. That’s 10 wonders at level 30! So the math is easy...are your wonders anywhere near that? Prob no! So upgrade away

 

[SoggyShorts]

I found that I need only one with 4 armories, plus each AW increases the cost of spire and tourney encounters.

Would you mind sharing the following?

• Barracks Level
• armory level
• Your # of Armories
• Shrewdy Level
• Needles Level
• Flying academy
• victory springs
• Bulwark Level
• Squad size

I'm curious to compare your current build vs taking 1/2 of your AW levels from your SSS and putting them into your Bulwark (and removing armories until queue length is back to what it was)

 

[Gkyr]

I am curious, too. But there is not much to work with. I have elected to suspend investing in SSS in lieu of NT and MM since the 5 day buffs seemed to have disappeared. Barracks 25, Armory 4 x 27, SSS 3, NT 16, FA 0, squad size 1941. You don't need DA (3) or MM (13)? VS=DB=¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

 

[NightshadeCS]

I also wanted to add, since this is something I didn't notice in my game for a LONG time, that you can select fewer troops to train if you are in a hurry to produce some. There is a slider bar under the troop button where you can reduce how many will be trained in that slot.

At earlier parts of the game, I found a long training queue time somewhat difficult because I didn't have a large stockpile of troops and I would run out and had to wait too long for new ones to train. The slider bar provides the solution, getting troops out fast when I needed a few more to complete the tourney, for example.

 

[SoggyShorts]

But there is not much to work with.

Ah sorry, I thought you had more invested into the SSS.
Still, if you had
3 armories + DB + SSS
instead of
4 armories + SSS

you'd have almost the exact same queue time and I'm pretty sure that your armory+culture+pop takes up significantly more space than the DB