Tournament/Spire Formula SUCKS!!

[The Unbeliever]

My human city on K-world:
a) 66 expansions placed (3 premium + 63 research/province)
b) 10 researches completed in Ch.9
c) 54 AW levels

5th fight on Lv1 (ie: just past the 1st gate)
My SS = 1172 vs. Enemy SS 1301
On only the 5th fething fight?!

AND... because things aren't crazy enough just yet...
8th fight on Lv1 (ie: 2nd gate boss)
My SS = 1758 vs Enemy SS 1565

My actual researched SS is only 765! This is absolutely bonkers how the costs instantly sky-rocket well beyond what a city at this point is able to produce... there is absolutely NO WAY for an early Ch.9 city to produce enough troops without plowing itself into the ground.
Even with a Lv10 Red Chcobo + Lv10 Brown Bear + unit boosters... that's an insane amount of forced resources just to do the bloody Spire!! Add in tournament costs and any thought of city progress gets thrown out the window.

Or else I'm forced chose between staying in an active Fellowship, which maintains spire+tourny minimums, OR, forget the spire/tournaments and waste away in a crappy Fellowship but finally be able to advance my city.
Hardly inspiring game play choices, all because the devs suck at basic math!



Now on the other hand, my secondary city on W-world:
a) 58 expansions placed (1 premium + 57 research/province)
b) 9 researches completed into Ch.8
c) **Only 15 AW levels!!**

5th fight on Lv1 (ie: just past 1st gate)
My SS = 817 vs. Enemey SS 907

And for gaks and giggles, the 8th fight on Lv1 (ie: 2nd gate boss)
My SS = 1225 vs. Enemy SS 1091

Still insane numbers sure, but hilarious how a difference of;
a) 6 regular + 2 premium expansions
b) 31 researchs
c) 39 AW levels
Causes such a massive difference in overall costs...


Please Inno, please for the love god. FIX THIS BS FORUMLA!!!
How the devs cannot fathom the gravity of this screw up is beyond me... I know they honestly don't care about the players, but seriously, at least pretend to show some professionalism & semi-competence.

 

[Darielle]

I am often amazed at the ability of devs to unsee a problem when they don't want to see it.

 

[crackie]

When it was tied to squad size, people complained it hurts them to advance in research tree and doing optional techs. Though, I suppose it still hurts people to research in this current formula as people stopped entering late chapters.

 

[The Unbeliever]

When it was tied to squad size, people complained it hurts them to advance in research tree and doing optional techs. Though, I suppose it still hurts people to research in this current formula as people stopped entering late chapters.

When it was tied to SS researches, you at least had strategic choices to make... You could choose to avoid the optional SS techs, and have easier tournaments, but harder world map encounters, OR, have harder tournaments, but easier world map encounters.
(...at least, depending on how far along the tech tree you were at the time of the change of course. )

Now though, there is ZERO strategy involved. The more you advance, the more screwed over you are. The more expansions you place & AW levels you advance, well, just forget about it entirely unless you have a Lv10 Fire Phoenix AND Unleashed Unit AND Enlightened Light Range AND Mage Multiplier AND don't forget your Dwarven Armourer...
Oh, and better be able to put that out just about every week too, 'cause if you can't, boy howdy is your city going to get it's resources pummeled into the dirt!

I mean, how stupid have things become when Ch17 + Ch18 alone according to the beta numbers show for example;
IIRC 24'ish% overall troop production increase vs. 80% more troop losses. >.<

 

[Prickly Pete]

Definitely find the Tournament, Spire an Province encounters to be waaaaaay easier at lower levels then higher. Do the Spire to the first gate and then bag it. I plan on the Tournament and Province encounters to be almost all catering. In my first world I put a lot into military and then shifted that towards goods. In my new world I will avoid military as much as possible and just focus on goods.

 

[Iyapo1]

I have a catering city in chapter 7 with a lv 9 barracks, 62 expansions, and 54 wonder levels. I do not have a NoT or a DB and if I put down 3 level 4 armories even I can make enough troops to beat the first floor of the spire.
You are being deliberately hysterical and misleading. The tournament/spire formula does not out pace production until chapter 16...and it will only out pace production then if you hit that chapter with ALL production boosting wonders fully maxed.

If you can not produce enough troops to take out the first floor in the spire in chapter 9, you are doing something very wrong. Maybe you should ask your FS for advice.

 

[Darielle]

I have a catering city in chapter 7 with a lv 9 barracks, 62 expansions, and 54 wonder levels. I do not have a NoT or a DB and if I put down 3 level 4 armories even I can make enough troops to beat the first floor of the spire.
You are being deliberately hysterical and misleading. The tournament/spire formula does not out pace production until chapter 16...and it will only out pace production then if you hit that chapter with ALL production boosting wonders fully maxed.

If you can not produce enough troops to take out the first floor in the spire in chapter 9, you are doing something very wrong. Maybe you should ask your FS for advice.

The first floor is not a problem for anyone, or shouldn't be. Are you saying that's all most people are meant to do? Not wanting to be confrontational, I just wonder about that. Perhaps that's Inno's thinking, too.

 

[Iyapo1]

The first floor is not a problem for anyone, or shouldn't be.

The OP does not agree with your assessment.

This is absolutely bonkers how the costs instantly sky-rocket well beyond what a city at this point is able to produce... there is absolutely NO WAY for an early Ch.9 city to produce enough troops without plowing itself into the ground.

 

[Gladiola]

There does still seem to be some relationship between player squad size and the overall size of the fights in the Spire. I recently completed a squad size research and the size of the squads on both sides went up considerably. Given that the main concern is often not ability to win or lose but how many troops you lose while you're doing it, skipping optional squad size researches would still seem to be beneficial in the spire.

 

[Darielle]

The OP does not agree with your assessment.

It's just my personal opinion. And I get that not everyone may share it, and that's okay.

 

[Iyapo1]

There does still seem to be some relationship between player squad size and the overall size of the fights in the Spire.

Your CAL is based upon boost %, expansions placed, chapter, AW levels and required tech research completed.

Completing required squad size research has the same impact as completing required guest race building research.

 

[Darielle]

There does still seem to be some relationship between player squad size and the overall size of the fights in the Spire. I recently completed a squad size research and the size of the squads on both sides went up considerably. Given that the main concern is often not ability to win or lose but how many troops you lose while you're doing it, skipping optional squad size researches would still seem to be beneficial in the spire.

You're definitely right on that. The spire is a strange beast ... it seems to get ridiculously hard for some people and not others, and we don't know (or at least I don't) the exact formula that makes it so. I wish they'd have a clearly laid out tutorial on the subject, but I get the feeling they don't want to do that because then everyone could see how arbitrary it is.

And yeah, I can calculate it, but it seems to me that there is something else besides what is said.

 

[Gladiola]

@Iyapo1 People in my fellowship are comparing like Spire encounters in cities that have and haven't completed optional squad size researches; the cities are equal in terms of chapter, ancient wonders, expansions, etc. The overall squad sizes on both sides are larger for those who have completed optional squad size researches.

 

[Iyapo1]

@Gladiola

Premium expansion increase costs less than non premium expansions.

 

[crackie]

Tournament difficulty is no longer determined solely by Squad Size, but rather by a series of progression factors, which involve city development and research in general.

https://us.forum.elvenar.com/index.php?threads/tournament-changes.25317/

Squad Size is part of regular “research in general”, but I believe optional Squad Size has been removed from difficulty formula. I think they mentioned it in a video about tourney changes awhile ago, but I can’t find the link. @MinMax Gamer model shows optional techs are not part of CAL as well.

Tourney and Spire difficulty works similarly. Whatever the algo spits out as your squad size for the first chest/encounter determines the sizes used for rest of spire/tourney. Therefore, it’s not tied to actual squad size used by barracks purposes. Barracks squad size is for provinces only (I think).

 

[crackie]

there is absolutely NO WAY for an early Ch.9 city to produce enough troops without plowing itself into the ground.

I have an early Chap 9 city. I don’t have the troops to fight the entire Spire, but mainly bc I choose to do 20 tourney tents. If I want to fight the whole Spire, I would have to drop down to maybe 15 tourney tents, but I don’t want to because the juicy KP morsels are in doing more 10+ tents. Troops stretch further in the tourney than Spire so that’s my troop priority. I am fighting the Gateway and Lab though, but cater the High Halls. I also will mostly manual fight Lab to minimize troop loss. Since switching to fighting Lab, I do now have excess inventory. If I don’t use it, I’m not sure what am I supposed to be doing with all these goods. Hence, I spend it in High Halls and save troops in one segment. It’s still easy enough to solve the catering puzzle on the first go so it isn’t so harsh on your goods. I do agree the troop stacks do get really large quickly, even just halfway up Gateway. The Gateway is super easy to cater though. Sometimes I think it’s cheaper to cater and save my troops in Gateway too. There are many ways to solve both the Spire and tourney, but if you pigeonhole yourself to only one solution (fighting everything), then yes, it would be harder.

 

[Darielle]

I have an early Chap 9 city. I don’t have the troops to fight the entire Spire, but mainly bc I choose to do 20 tourney tents. If I want to fight the whole Spire, I would have to drop down to maybe 15 tourney tents, but I don’t want to because the juicy KP morsels are in doing more 10+ tents. Troops stretch further in the tourney than Spire so that’s my troop priority. I am fighting the Gateway and Lab though, but cater the High Halls. I also will mostly manual fight Lab to minimize troop loss. Since switching to fighting Lab, I do now have excess inventory. If I don’t use it, I’m not sure what am I supposed to be doing with all these goods. Hence, I spend it in High Halls and save troops in one segment. It’s still easy enough to solve the catering puzzle on the first go so it isn’t so harsh on your goods. I do agree the troop stacks do get really large quickly, even just halfway up Gateway. The Gateway is super easy to cater though. Sometimes I think it’s cheaper to cater and save my troops in Gateway too. There are many ways to solve both the Spire and tourney, but if you pigeonhole yourself to only one solution (fighting everything), then yes, it would be harder.

Why would you cater the high halls and then fight the lab? Most people fight the easier fights and then cater the harder ones. I'm not picking on you; I just really want to know your reasoning. It's interesting.

 

[Gladiola]

@crackie there is a definite difference in the size of opponents (and my own squads) between Spire last week and Spire this week, and the only substantial differences are 1) completion of Sorceresses research 2) upgrade of barracks from level 8 to level 9 and 3) completion of the squad size research. You may contend that it is the research and not the actual squad size that is involved, but to me that is a distinction without a difference. I'd be willing to entertain the suggestion that unlocking a new troop type or upgrading the barracks could be involved.

I haven't seen @MinMax Gamer 's calculation or justification for them, but there are many confounding or covarying variables. It seems like it would take some pretty sophisticated mathematics to develop an equation. Did he consider all the possible variables?

@Iyapo1 The comparator cities are similar in completed provinces, placed expansions and the balance between premium and other expansions.

 

[Iyapo1]

@Gladiola
You are welcome to go to his confounding website to view his sophisticated mathematics.

https://minmaxgame.com/tournament-and-spire-requirements-2020/

Edit: @MinMax Gamer
That I was confounded is no reflection upon you

 

[crackie]

The way I see it, Lab and Gateway are basically inverses of each other. It’s more efficient to fight the Lab bc catering becomes more crap shoot than skill. However, it’s “cheaper” to cater Gateway than fight it because the second half of Gateway already requests large stacks to fight. Given how easy all of Gateway is to solve catering encounters, it’s not worth the troop loss even if you can win fighting it. Same with High Halls. I can solve the catering more or less on the first try still. That saves a lot of dead soldiers.

From what I understand, the “difficulty”, as in the ratio of your troops to enemy troops, is the same for everyone at the same point in tourney and Spire. The only difference is the stack size used. Example: the ratio of your troops to enemy troops at the Frog (boss of High Halls) might be 1.5x. A chapter 3 city’s encounter might be 100 troops vs 150 enemies. A chapter 10’s Frog encounter might be 2000 troops vs 3000 enemies. The ratio is 2:3 for both, which means it’s not actually more difficult for the Chap 10 player. However, the Chap 10 city is going to feel it more when its stack of 2000 takes damage because it means more dead troops to replace. Most of us aren’t upgrading armories/barracks/wonders that frequently so the troop production rate is constant-ish. You need to be able to replenish those dead soldiers in time for next Spire or tourney. Therefore, a big part of being able to go deep in either is troop loss mitigation or conservation—knowing where you can save troops and minimize losses. So it’s not a matter of difficulty fighting or even winning, but troop conservation math. It’s a big deal bc it’s why a lot of top players left. The troop loss becomes insurmountable bc the ways to overcome it falls shorter than the increase from teching.