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    Your Elvenar Team

Tournament Participation: How to get the most out of it

DeletedUser6372

Guest
Now then, I would like to start off with a few acknowledgements and caveats:

1) The raw number crunching is from an AMAZING guide on Tournaments by Mykin found here. Credit goes to him for saving me hours of hassle with math-related stuff.

2) Each Fellowship has their own way of doing things. If your FS has rules concerning Tournament participation, make sure you do that instead of what I am saying. But if your FS is more laid back... this might help.

3) I make no claims about being an expert, I am just reporting findings which I have gathered over the past few tournaments as a relatively new player who has hit upon a few techniques that have SIGNIFICANTLY increased the rewards I get out of tournaments.

4) When I say 'second, third, fourth', I am using this with regards to how close they are, not necessarily their order on the tournament screen. Usually, it is the same, but not necessarily always. Check your prices before committing.


The Basics

  • Be in it to win it. Starting, but not finishing, a tournament province is a complete waste of resources. Don't start it if you are not confident you cannot claim all eight encounters.
  • Point returns increase on a binary scale (roughly doubling) with each star within a single province. So, if you want to hit higher FS rewards, you need to focus on one or two provinces
  • KP and Relics are obtained more rapidly by spreading out more provinces, but that also gets very expensive very rapidly, so there is a diminishing returns point where it becomes no longer cost effective.
With these in mind, there are a few strategies I can share with you:

1) The FS Supporter


This is a strategy designed to optimize your FS's progression on the Tournament rewards, which helps everyone.

  • Pick one or two tournaments, try your hardest to get all six stars in them. If you can't do two all the way through, make sure to complete even your closest province over anything else. Completing all six stars in a province is worth just over 3k Tournament Points, and the closest province is going to be the cheapest/easiest. But 4 star is only around 700ish points, and 3 star is a mere 300ish points. So by going from 3 star in 3 provinces to 6 star in 1 province, you multiply your returns fivefold.
  • Prices/difficulties are based on proximity to your town. Usually, the closest is the first one on the list, but not always. Check your costs in your first three or so provinces to determine which one is cheapest. Focus on that one.
  • Don't bite off more than you can chew. If you find your third or fourth province is getting too rich for your blood, drop 'em and just focus on the first and maybe the second.
  • By that same token, if you can afford it, picking up 3 star in your third and 4 star in your fourth province can net you significant KPs', but don't do that at the cost of not completing the first one or two.
By focusing on one or two provinces, you maximize your Tournament Point progression, which helps everyone in the Fellowship. As far as the battles or costs are concerned, there's no reason anyone cannot complete the first province. It is ridiculously cheap at virtually every stage of the game. And it nets you over 3k points.

If 20 players in a guild hit 3k points, that's 60k points, which is Tier 4, and half-way to Tier 5 reward. That's pretty amazing, for a minimal investment of resources or troops. Hitting your second one nets you 6k, so if even half the FS hits that, and the rest at least hit 3k, that's up in the tier 5-6 range.

2) Casual Contributor

Let's say you can't hit those admittedly difficult timings to get all six stars. We get it, you've got a life, and it may include such things as Work, Sleep, Family, a Significant other and/or Kids. And that 16 hour timer is REALLY awkward. Say it starts at noon, the refresh pops at like 4 AM. That's almost never going to work out for anyone. You've got some time, but not a whole lot, you need to hit more than one a day, which isn't something everyone can do.

So how do you meaningfully contribute without having to wake up in the middle of the night just to click on a button for a damn game? Simple:

  • Hitting 5 Star in a province will still net you 1500 points. You can easily hit this by doing the tournament once a day. Since most 'competitive' FS require you to do your daily visits anyway, this should not any more of a schedule inconvenience to you, and the resource costs are relatively trivial for your closest province. If you can't manage to make your schedule work for 6 stars, then at least hit 5 star on your first province.
  • You can afford to spread out a bit more. Try hitting 3 Star on your third province for the extra KP. But make sure your second province also hits 5 star before you start going for bonus content.
  • While not contributing as much as the previous method, you still will contribute 1500 TP for your closest province and, if you hit your second province, that's another 1500, so you still hit the 3k mark between the two. Granted, you aren't cranking out 6k for completing them, but that's still not shabby. And you might pick up a few more KP trolling some of the extra provinces.
The key here is that you aren't going to be dead weight, you are still significantly contributing to the tournament for the FS, and maybe able to pick up a few extra KP here and there in the bargain. This is less of a 'hardcore' strat, and just requires daily participation.

3) KP/Relic Snatcher

This is a strat for those who don't really care about contributing to FS TP. Either your FS doesn't really care about it, or you just won't be able to make it online daily, or maybe you're just a one-person FS who is playing solo but still wants the benefits from tournament participation. You won't get any runes this way, but you will be able to speed up your progression through the tech tree.

  • Your participation will be the inverse of the two strategies above. You'll only hit your first province up to the second star, unless it happens to be a boosted good and you want the extra relic from 5 star.
  • Unlike the others, this is specifically done by the position in your Tournament screen, because what you get for completing stars is based on their order here. So when I say first, I literally mean the first one in your tournament listing, even if it isn't the cheapest.
  • Your second and third provinces will go out to three star. Stop there.
  • Your fourth province, however, you're going to try to hit 4 star for a whopping 16 KP and Relics.
  • Your tournament points will suck. 2 star in 1st, 3 star in 2nd and 3rd, and 4 star in 4th comes out to a mere 1542 TP, and most of THAT is from your very expensive 4th province. Even the casual contributor above is going to more than double that, and do it far less expensively. If this is a problem for your FS, then you may need to find a FS more friendly to your participation style.
  • The timings are going to be easier here because you only need, at most, four stars in any given province, so while you are hitting more tournaments per time you go, you aren't going as often, running them parallel.
  • Nets 46 KP in total, and 46 Relics (52 relics if you hit 5 star on your first province).
  • VERY expensive to hit that 4th province that hard, that's going to end up being pretty brutal, and not everyone will be able to complete that. In which case, do what you can. If you go 3 star, you only end up with around 1k TP and 40 KP, and not bothering with your fourth province is going to leave you with a respectable 30KP and relics, but a fairly lackluster 700ish TP.
Basically, this is going to be using the Tournament to fuel your research very rapidly. Even if you can't hit that fourth province, hitting 2 star in your first and 3 star in your second and third is going to net you 30KP, which is pretty respectable, and I would suggest this as a 'very casual participation' tier, simply because you get so much for so little relative cost.

In Conclusion

Tournaments are extremely lucrative if you know how to work them. Hitting 2k or more with 20 players nets every single player in the FS a total of: 15KP, 6 Relics, a Rune, and some spells. That's bonus, in addition to and on top of what you get for your personal participation. And hitting 2k is really a LOT easier than I originally thought it would be. The trick is to focus on one or two instead of spreading yourself out too thin. For those just in it for the KP, your 4th-6th provinces can be expensive, but produce a ton of KPs, YMMV.

So, does it work? Well, let me show you my latest score. Mind you, I'm still in Act II, and I only joined about a month or so ago. Also, note there's around fifteen hours left in the tournament, so these aren't the final numbers for my FS, most of the members haven't finished their provinces yet. But still... not bad for a newbie.

EDIT: thanks to Mykan's response, I have edited a few things for clarification about the closest and thus the cheapest is not always the first one on the listing.

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DeletedUser6572

Guest
A 12 hour timer would be so great.

*goes back to the top to re-read Sneaky's post*
 

Mykan

Oh Wise One
Note that while the first province is almost always the cheapest there is the odd occasion that it is not. Proximity of the province to your town is important and sometimes your second province will be closer to the town then the first. In that instance the second province will be cheaper and get the rewards you normally get in the first province. This can occur in other tournament provinces, not just the first, but it is quite noticeable in the first province.
 

DeletedUser6572

Guest
Thank you Mykan, I didn't realise location had anything to with it. I was wondering what was going on. I have so much to learn!!!
 

DeletedUser6372

Guest
Note that while the first province is almost always the cheapest there is the odd occasion that it is not. Proximity of the province to your town is important and sometimes your second province will be closer to the town then the first. In that instance the second province will be cheaper and get the rewards you normally get in the first province. This can occur in other tournament provinces, not just the first, but it is quite noticeable in the first province.
Post has been edited to reflect this. Curiously, this only affects those aiming for Tournament Points. Those just in it for the KP are going to go strictly by numbering, as that is how rewards are handed out, as per the charts in your excellent guide.
 

Mykan

Oh Wise One
Post has been edited to reflect this. Curiously, this only affects those aiming for Tournament Points. Those just in it for the KP are going to go strictly by numbering, as that is how rewards are handed out, as per the charts in your excellent guide.

Actually I think its impact is the other way around. If the cheaper costs and greater rewards are suddenly 1 province further out it is worth unlocking it and then ignoring the closer province. The first province often has 3 runes (round 3,4,6), if you wanted runes and this was in the second province due to proximity you would want to know this as it impacts you. Similar for KP/relics there are often higher rewards for the closer in provinces not to mention cost compared to value.

For example doing province 1 round 1 and province 2 round 5 might be cheaper and better rewards for cost compared to completing only province 1 to round 5. This is looking only at this special case scenario of course.

The visibility of future rewards that we now have helps to make it easier to spot this situation.
 

DeletedUser1766

Guest
It is a great post but I have only ever made 5 stars once. Being Australian I am usually asleep when the tournament starts and often asleep when the timer clicks over to the next round. As I need my sleep I usually only manage 4 stars even though I do the tournament every day. I do 4 stars in 6 provinces with an attempt to manage 8 but I rarely do 8 beyond level 3. The first 3 provinces are vital for an individual as these will give you 4 runes if you complete them to level 4.
 

DeletedUser6372

Guest
It is a great post but I have only ever made 5 stars once. Being Australian I am usually asleep when the tournament starts and often asleep when the timer clicks over to the next round. As I need my sleep I usually only manage 4 stars even though I do the tournament every day. I do 4 stars in 6 provinces with an attempt to manage 8 but I rarely do 8 beyond level 3. The first 3 provinces are vital for an individual as these will give you 4 runes if you complete them to level 4.
Actually, you should have a fairly easy time of hitting 5 star at least.

* Hit tournament when you wake up.
* Hit tournament before going to bed.
* Hit tournament next day when you get home from work for the next three days.

Also, if you read my post concerning the third strategy of getting maximum KP and Relics for yourself, you'll see that is precisely the strategy I suggest. However, it also minimizes your Tournament Points. But getting 5 star in your first two provinces shouldn't be too expensive, and you can still branch out as you see fit for decent TP as well as rewards.
 

CrazyWizard

Oh Wise One
this tournament is a disaster lol, very hard.

anyway, if you want to get the max out of your troups, I have calculated all values agains it's favorite bonus enemy here for each race.
hopefully this way it will be easier to compare for you which unit is the best for you to use.

but dont just look pure at the damage values, factor in other variables as well like, movement range, attack range, production speed (if applicable) defences ect.

Elves:
http://crazywizard.info/en/bb_unit_elves.html

Humans:
http://crazywizard.info/en/bb_unit_humans.html

I will try to write a guide on this province tomorrow, but I am breaking my head over how to exactly solve this puzzle myself.
I have also updated the gems province guide for human, with the new insight I gained while using human units in my battles.

*note: just in case you dont get what the value's between ( ) are, these are the values when calculated back to 1 weight. this way it's easier to compare the differen units with different weights.

enjoy
-CW
 

DeletedUser1766

Guest
Actually, you should have a fairly easy time of hitting 5 star at least.

* Hit tournament when you wake up.
* Hit tournament before going to bed.
* Hit tournament next day when you get home from work for the next three days.

Also, if you read my post concerning the third strategy of getting maximum KP and Relics for yourself, you'll see that is precisely the strategy I suggest. However, it also minimizes your Tournament Points. But getting 5 star in your first two provinces shouldn't be too expensive, and you can still branch out as you see fit for decent TP as well as rewards.

The tournaments are 16 hours apart. I manage to do the morning one at about 9am but I am in bed long before 1 am which is when the next round is available. I once managed to get 5 levels as I was awake when it started but that is quite rare as they usually start in the middle of the night.
 

DeletedUser4494

Guest
It SUCKS that you can't play in tournament if you are not in a FS. The designers should have made it possible for non-FS players to do tournaments
 

DeletedUser1766

Guest
It SUCKS that you can't play in tournament if you are not in a FS. The designers should have made it possible for non-FS players to do tournaments

I am surprised that you cannot play tournaments on your own. Have you tried? You always get personal rewards for your own effort, the same as you did when it was just your neighbours. The only thing you would not get would be the extra fellowship rewards.
 

DeletedUser6372

Guest
I am surprised that you cannot play tournaments on your own. Have you tried? You always get personal rewards for your own effort, the same as you did when it was just your neighbours. The only thing you would not get would be the extra fellowship rewards.
They changed it a few months ago so that it is FS only.

They did that because the old way pretty much made it impossible for newbies to compete in tournaments effectively against larger players. It is much better now.

If you don't want to join a FS, but DO want to compete in Tournaments, simply create your own one-person FS! Problem solved.
 

CrazyWizard

Oh Wise One
The tournaments are 16 hours apart. I manage to do the morning one at about 9am but I am in bed long before 1 am which is when the next round is available. I once managed to get 5 levels as I was awake when it started but that is quite rare as they usually start in the middle of the night.

I am lucky, I have to go to work at 6, so I do my tournament at 5am then I do a quick round at 9pm before I go to bed.
Since they are the early rounds I can autocombat myself trough it all.
 

CrazyWizard

Oh Wise One
this tournament is a disaster lol, very hard.

anyway, if you want to get the max out of your troups, I have calculated all values agains it's favorite bonus enemy here for each race.
hopefully this way it will be easier to compare for you which unit is the best for you to use.

but dont just look pure at the damage values, factor in other variables as well like, movement range, attack range, production speed (if applicable) defences ect.

Elves:
http://crazywizard.info/en/bb_unit_elves.html

Humans:
http://crazywizard.info/en/bb_unit_humans.html

I will try to write a guide on this province tomorrow, but I am breaking my head over how to exactly solve this puzzle myself.
I have also updated the gems province guide for human, with the new insight I gained while using human units in my battles.

*note: just in case you dont get what the value's between ( ) are, these are the values when calculated back to 1 weight. this way it's easier to compare the differen units with different weights.

enjoy
-CW

After a second thought this tournament ain't as bad as I thought. 9 weeks is a long time and i simply forgot how this province worked.

I have uploaded a guide on the marble province here
http://crazywizard.info/en/bb_provinces_marble.html

comments are always welcome.
 
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