Guild Battlegrounds through the Ages

We've had Guild Battlegrounds for over a year now - and I've played it in many different ages.  Some of my comments will be theory - but most of them will be extrapolated from experience.  I'm going to try and present it all as a table.  Some setups against some defenses you may need to go into the battle and hold back a non-rogue or two for the first round of combat before pressing auto.

Era	Important Armies	Pros & Cons
Iron Age	4-8 Ballistae + 0-4 Rogues - Good against enemy Ballistae and Archers 1-2 Legionnaires + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies without Ballistae 1-2 Mounted Warriors or Soldiers + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies with a mix of Ballistae + faster troops	+ Untransformed Rogues kick ass - Reliance on melee units means much damage taken at high attrition unless you work on your defense - Artillery have a hard time keeping up against heavies at higher attrition as much of their strength against them comes from the flat bonus which doesn't scale
Early Middle Ages	4-8 Catapults + 0-4 Rogues - Good against enemy Catapults 1-2 Armored Infantry + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies without Catapults 1-2 Heavy Cavalry or Mercenaries + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies with a mix of Catapults + faster troops	+ Untransformed Rogues kick ass + Weak-statted Mounted Archers aren't much of a threat to your more durable units - High movement Mounted Archers can occasionally pick off your less durable units - Reliance on melee units means much damage taken at high attrition unless you work on your defense - Artillery have a hard time keeping up against heavies at higher attrition as much of their strength against them comes from the flat bonus which doesn't scale
High Middle Ages	4-8 Trebuchets + 0-4 Rogues - Good against enemy Trebuchets and Crossbows 1-2 Heavy Infantry + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies without Trebuchets 1-2 Knights or Berserkers + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies with a mix of Trebuchets + faster troops	+ Untransformed Rogues kick ass + Strongest low-age artillery with crazy range and slightly higher relative attack compared to the defense of units of the age - Reliance on melee units means much damage taken at high attrition unless you work on your defense - Artillery have a hard time keeping up against heavies at higher attrition as much of their strength against them comes from the flat bonus which doesn't scale
Late Middle Ages	1-2 Heavy Knights or Great Sword Warriors + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies with a mix of Cannons + faster troops 1-2 Imperial Guards + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies without many Cannons 4-8 Cannons + 0-4 Rogues - Good against enemy Longbows	+ Untransformed Rogues kick ass + Fast units are starting to get more durable - Combination of Dug In on enemy artillery and less range makes this among the weakest low-age artillery relatively.  They also still have a hard time keeping up against heavies at higher attrition as much of their strength against them comes from the flat bonus which doesn't scale - Reliance on melee units means much damage taken at high attrition unless you work on your defense
Colonial Age	1-2 Grenadiers + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies without too many Field Guns or Musketeers 1-2 Dragoons, Champions, or Rangers + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies with significant numbers of Field Guns or Musketeers	+ Untransformed Rogues kick ass + Grenadiers gained a range and no longer have to take retaliation - Combination of Dug In on enemy artillery and useful amounts of defense on Musketeers make this among the weakest low-age artillery relatively.  They also still have a hard time keeping up against heavies at higher attrition as much of their strength against them comes from the flat bonus which doesn't scale
Industrial Age	1-2 Howitzers + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies without too many Riflemen or Breech Loaders 1-2 Jaeger Infantry + 6-7 Rogues - Good against enemies without too many Howitzers 4-6 Breech Loaders + 2-4 Rogues - Good against enemies with many Howitzers.  May consider adding in a couple Riflemen/Howitzers/Jaeger Infantry if there's a couple things you need to kill off when they get close.	+ Every unit other than the Fast has range - lopsided attack bonuses can be taken advantage of + You can also get many ages of troops ahead here; Up to PME are available from getting ahead on the story.  Note that you either need to be careful or be prepared to spend diamonds to revive them if you're going to use them.  Choices you make on PME map will affect how many/what type of troops you can get.  Make sure to do your research if you're planning to try for them. + Well matched unit abilities make Industrial an age where almost any fight is possible if you choose the right counter.  Fun age to manual battle in. - Many of the units do not behave as well as you might hope in auto-battles making it an age of high losses for auto-battlers
Progressive Era	1-6 Conscripts + 2-7 Rogues - Good against enemies without too many Snipers.  Snipers will get to be slightly less of a problem as you get to higher boost though as they're reliant on a *large* flat bonus. 1-6 Armored Cars + 2-7 Rogues - Good against enemies without too many tanks.  Will need to position your cars for the first round of battle usually. 1-6 Tanks + 2-7 Rogues - Particularly if you stack defense; Tanks have defense naturally higher than any unit in-age's attack so if you have defense boost ~twice as high as your attack boost you may be able to take advantage of that	+ 3 good options for general purpose units depending on what you're fighting and how your stats are built.  If you engineer the fights so that after your last Rogues are turned, they're taking the first "real" hits you're in good shape. - An era of high losses (I want to say attrition, but that has other meaning in game now), there pretty much just isn't *clean* wins.  Two wave battles can also be problematic because of this. - High defense on Tanks may make fights at high attrition impossible unless you've kept up on defense boost yourself so that they're not doing much damage to you either.  MG Team from story + Rogues could patch this issue to some extent if you're careful.
Modern Era	1-6 Bazookas + 2-7 Rogues - Good against armies without too many artillery.  Despite their bonus against artillery and Dug In, they are very very slow - they're best against armies that will come to them, turn the rogues, and then they can blow them up before the problems start.  But they're *really* good against those armies.  Paratroopers can also be an annoyance due to their ability to hide in trees combined with your slow movement. 1-8 Mechanized Infantry/Champions/Battle Tanks + 0-7 Rogues - Good against pretty much anything if you go into battle to position them right for the first turn.  The heavy of the age has the same defense as it did in PE, so they've caught up some in their ability to handle them.  May take heavy losses from ignored Bazookas on auto 4-8 Mechanized Artillery + 0-4 Rogues - Good against Bazookas and enemy artillery.  Dreadful against Paratroopers.  Mediocre against Battle Tanks and Mechanized Infantry. 8 Paratroopers (No Rogues.  Period.) - Move first + hit first is a powerful combination that'll get stressed more in later ages.  It can work here to some extent too.  Main issue is their attack isn't that high - so they might not be able to 2-shot things reliably enough at high attrition - particularly Battle Tanks and Mechanized Infantry.  Still something worth playing with some.	+ Every unit has its moments - even if most people hate to use paratroopers ;) - Can get bloody - not quite as much as PE but still lacks abilities at times to get clean wins and two wave battles may be a problem
Postmodern Era	1-2 MG Teams + 6-7 Rogues - Contact! means every Rogue turned (by anything other than an artillery) also gave you a free shot.  Good against anything without too many artillery. 4-6 Rocket Artillery + 2-4 Rogues - Good at handling enemy artillery 1-6 Universal Tanks, IFVs, or Champions + 2-7 Rogues - can help with some of the problem setups that have too many artillery for your MG teams and not enough artillery to use your own artillery.	+ Contact! + Rogues are a powerful combination + Can get very advanced troops potentially - but the method is somewhat obscure (and I've never tried it yet). - Artillery have low attack making your top choice to deal with Artillery + X struggle a bit with some setups.
Contemporary Era	1-2 Anti-Aircraft Vehicles + 6-7 Rogues - Good against everything.  Only caveat - some defenses you have to go in and hold back your AAV on. 1-3 Assault Tanks + 5-7 Rogues - Taking advantage of Reactive Armor this can be used on some very high attrition fights.  They can't do more than 4 to you - so you don't need quite so much attack boost to make it a "fair" fight.  Arctic Orangery crit can also help tilt things in your favor. 1-8 Champions + 0-7 Rogues - If you're a defense stacker Champions have higher stats than Assault Tanks and may take even less damage. 8 Strike Teams or Attack Helicopters - Move first + hit first.  Not usually overly impressive in this age, but can help in places.  Note that Attack Helicopters only move first if the defense has no Strike Teams.	+ Contact! + Rogues are a powerful combination + Can get very advanced troops - not so obscure this time, but you should still do your research if you're planning on it - it's important to have as many unresearched techs as possible if you want to get far, and map decisions matter in some places. + Missile Artillery on defense is pretty safely ignorable to some extent due to "One Shot".  AI also usually does not make good use of MIRV. + Flying is a powerful new ability even if it's not often important yet due to the issues with the in-age artillery.
Tomorrow Era	2-8 Combat Drones + 0-6 Rogues - Rogues absorb unavoidable hits in first round of combat.  Combat drones blow *anything* up in 2 hits while ignoring artillery.  For best results, fight manually - but you can auto a great number of fights with them as well.  Their biggest issue is many Stealth Tanks as they'll take retaliation when hitting them. 1-8 Stealth Tanks + 0-7 Rogues - Good against most things - main problems are enemy Stealth Tanks and Ultra APs as you get up in attrition as they'll both get in some painful retaliation.	+ Combat Drones have *crazy* high attack.  Easily can abuse them against most armies to hit significantly higher attrition than possible in other ages with similar boost. + Stealth Tanks are a generally useful Hiding unit  - Defending armies with many Stealth Tanks are difficult to deal with.  At low-medium attrition you can use Microwave Blasters.  At medium-high attrition I recommend *carefully* using some OF story troops like Sub Cruisers or Hydroelectric Eels in combination with Rogues.
Future Era	1-8 Hover Tanks + 0-7 Rogues - Best you've got against pretty much anything.  Other armies can be used against some things as minor improvements.	+ Hover Tanks do everything - Nothing handles 3+ Hover Tanks on defense acceptably at medium attrition.  You have to start cherry-picking fights to change out tough fights instead looking for the easy ones.  Not good if you're just trying to power through a specific sector! - 2 units are utterly useless (Satellite Spotters + Drone Swarms) and 1 autos poorly (Exoskeleton Soldier)
Arctic Future	1-8 Battle Fortresses + 0-7 Rogues.  Reactive Armor 3 means your units are automatically pretty tanky taking 4 hits to die without any investment in defense.  Can reach relatively high attrition even if it's not ideal for many things.  Arctic Orangery can help with the mirror (We both do 3 damage to each other normally; but I can crit for 5 and save a shot!) 2-8 Plasma Artillery + 0-4 Rail Guns + 0-4 Battle Fortresses + 0-4 Rogues.  So this looks rather like many armies but the concept is rather straight forward: Plasma Artillery deliver the beats and can fire every turn unlike Rail Guns from FE, but they can't do more than 3 damage to a Battle Fortress (so you may want some Rail Guns to help blow through that), and they can't shoot flying things (so you may want some Battle Fortresses for that - Rail Guns can help a little with that too - but only every other turn).  And you may want to fill in some slots with Rogues to absorb some unavoidable hits. 4-8 Combat Drones or Dragon Drones + 0-4 Rogues - Takes advantage of many Plasma Artillery on defense.  Combat Drones are easier to use, and *still* have enough attack to be relevant (and more than Dragon Drones on that note)  But they can't crit and occasionally Dragon Drones' multi-hit ability is useful - especially if you fight manually. 8 Recon Raiders - Move first + hit first.  As long as there's not too many Battle Fortresses on defense, you've got a good shot. 1-8 Hover Tanks + 0-7 Rogues - As long as there's not too many Plasma Artillery on defense; Dragon Drones are squishy, and stealth is reasonably effective against everything else.	+ Good all-round age with many useful army setups - Some strange units that have stats that hardly seem fitting for the age - Battle Fortresses on defense are going to be bloody
Oceanic Future	4-8 Turturrets + 0-4 ? + 0-4 Rogues - Similar to the Plasma Cannon arrangement in AF, this bumps up to be the most important army in OF due to the power of Mortar.  In addition to the things that Plasma Artillery cannot hit, Turturrets cannot hit stealthed units.  So ? may be C.R.A.B. Mechs to take out an eel or it may be Plasma Artillery if range is deemed important or it may be Sub Cruisers as a generally decent all-round unit from the age. 4-8 Gliders + 0-4 Rogues - If there's many artillery on defense and you can't out-artillery them for some reason.  There's finally a proper upgrade to the TE Combat Drone to get the AO crit back - its attack stat is not nearly so impressive compared to OF defenses though, and it loses a bit in attack range that might make it harder to hit the precise thing you want on the first turn. 1-2 Sub Cruisers + 6-7 Rogues - Can retaliate against anything but the artillery and Scimitars reliably - and Medusa can't move and are generally exposed at the start - mostly it only needs to avoid Turturrets 8 Hydroelectric Eels - There's many bushes on the OF battlefield to hide in.  You can generally plan to hide your entire army and pick off the enemy; watch out for the few enemy anti-stealth units.  Mostly a manual-battle strategy. 1-8 Hover Tanks + 0-7 Rogues - Stats are a little low, but Hides on Plains is still a very powerful ability to compensate - most anti-stealth units in age are highly limited.  Defense may also still be relevant in combination with the stealth as its not that far behind the in-age Force Field unit.  No Rogues is sometimes desirable to not catch splash damage from Turturrets transforming your rogues.	+ Solid answers for any army + Good Contact! unit + Powerful artillery with new Mortar ability + Decent Flying unit + Decent Hiding unit - Despite a very diverse slate of 10 units, most of them are just novelties and not all that useful
Virtual Future	4-8 Rocket Troops + 0-4 Rogues - Turturrets taken to the extreme against an age with weaker overall units.  Works well against everything but Ninjas.  Mortar is absolutely devastating.  No flying unit in-age to fear. 8 Ninjas - Move first + hit first 1-8 Ronin Bots + 0-7 Rogues - Force Field can help augment your defense to make them continue to feel durable if you haven't completely ignored it.  No amount of defense will make them feel good against any amount of Rocket Troops though.	+ Rocket Troops rock - Ninjas on defense are a pain - 2 units are pretty much useless
Space Age Mars	8 Sentinels - Move first + hit first + avoid any artillery.  Great against lots of stuff.  Your bread & butter army. 8 Rocket Troops - Mortar is still an awesome ability and Steel Wardens are so slow that VF Rocket Troops can win against a Max-Attrition 12000% boosted 8 Steel Warden Defense - even with no boost of their own to speak of!  Also usable against small amounts of other ground troops.  Tesla Walkers having the same initiative can mix in if you see a use for them in a fight. 2-4 Steel Wardens + 4-6 Rogues -  Force Field can help strengthen any investment you've put into defense.  Not bad all round units. 2-4 Sniperbots or Tesla Walkers + 4-6 Rogues - they're not bad units per se - but not really necessary either.  Occasionally they might be a minor improvement over one of the other armies.	+ Great fighting age with reasonable answers for anything  + Potential for super-high-attrition crazy setups either taking advantage of Flyers + AO Crit vs artillery or Rocket Troops vs slow things.
Space Age Asteroid Belt	4-6 Nail Storms + 2-4 Rogues - Pretty good against most things - can get bloody if there's many Nail Storms on defense - especially if one of them makes it to rubble. 8 Sentinels - Move first + hit first - Yup, still.  Now without AO crit.  For the toughest fights this is what I've had the best luck with. 2-6 B.E.L.T.s + 2-6 Rogues - can handle Nail Storms that make it to rubble better than most things - can't hit Hover Hammers though. 2 Hover Hammers + 6 Rogues - generally not as good as Sentinels - but you'll be winning a bunch of Hover Hammers from GE, GBG, Events, etc and against some of the B.E.L.T. heavy defenses these are usable to save you some Sentinels for when you need them. 8 Rocket Troops - can still handle 8 Shredders akin to SAM but struggles more with other stuff mixed in - mostly due to higher base stats.	- No good answer for 8 Nail Storm defenses at medium-high attrition.  Hoping for good damage rolls from SAM Sentinels and Keen Eye procs is generally your best bet.  Manual battle is recommended so you can bail if you get bad rolls before they get a chance to destroy your Sentinels. - Most units are pretty useless

Damage Calculator

Ok so I haven't posted in a looooong time.  I was posting elsewhere.  Then I was on a break.  Then I came back and was posting elsewhere again.  Well I'm back again - possibly with a flurry of posts coming up over the next couple weeks.  For this one I just wanted to throw up a handy link for a spreadsheet I've worked on for a while:  FoE Damage Calculator

So a rundown:

1) To try numbers for yourself, File->Make a Copy.  You may want to check back now and then to see if I've made corrections or improvements.

2) "Age at a Glance" tab is meant to be a quick & easy start to using it.  There's drop-downs for your unit and the age of units you want to see it against.  This allows you to compare using above age troops against your current age for instance.  It automatically incorporates most flat bonuses; you just have to specify the %s based on your stats and the armies you're trying to optimize for.

The first table shows stats based on the numbers you entered.  i.e. How much damage you do/take *now*

The second table at the bottom shows how much total boost you'd need to hit various breakpoints.  If you're just past a breakpoint that means in another attrition or two you'll be just behind that breakpoint.  If you're nowhere near a breakpoint forward or backward it means you probably need to add much more to make a significant difference.  Remember to check all the units you make use of as they're likely to have dramatically different tables.

3) "Manual Calculation" tab allows you to do a much more detailed calculation specifying all parameters yourself, including the HP of each unit which scales down their attack value (on "Age at a Glance" all units are assumed to be at full HP as most will be).  If there's a specific situation you want precise answers on this is the page to use.

4) There was a *lot* of data entry to support the "Age at a Glance" page - I can't be sure everything's 100% correct right now.  If you notice anything that seems strange, please call it to my attention :)

Daily Challenges

Overview

Daily challenges are a new feature coming live tomorrow apparently following a long beta phase and an irritating limited live release for the past month to only select accounts.  Each day you choose between two themed chests and are given a set of conditions to obtain your chosen chest.  These conditions are similar to what you'd find in events.  Some of the conditions will not appear if they're not deemed reasonable for you to do in a day (i.e. If your only available scouts are over 12 hours long, you won't be asked to scout).  After completing 7 more than you failed to complete you get a challenger's chest with better goodies in it.

I haven't played it extensively on beta, so the rest of this writeup I'll edit as I get more experience.

Tips

• Have a decent number of supply buildings in your city layout.  You will be asked to complete productions regardless of how many you have.
• Don't scout ahead - If you've scouted territory you might be asked to take it so wait til you're ready to do so before scouting.
• You can adjust the reset time to the start of your own day.  You may miss out on a day by doing this so I'd recommend you pick a time once and stick with it.

Notes

• The chests available to you each day appear to be constant for each city on your account, but vary between different people's accounts.

Challenger Chest

7% Shrine of Knowledge

7% Wishing Well

11% Rogue Hideout

20% Renovation Kit

25% 2 Store Building Items

30% 50 FP

Daily Chests

There are a wide variety of chests available to be won that include pretty much everything you can imagine for prizes.  Some of the ones I've seen so far include:

Researcher's Chest

15% 100 FP

20% 50 FP

30% 20 FP

35% 5 FP

Military Genius Chest

25% 3 Rogues

25% 3 Champions

25% 3 Military Drummers

25% 3 Color Guards

Special Military Chest

5% Rogue Hideout

10% Champion's Retreat

20% Drummer School

20% Color Guard Camp

45% 10 FP

Collector's Chest

5% Wishing Well

10% Hall of Fame

15% Victory Tower

20% Watchfire

50% 10 FP

May Day Chest

20% Maypole

30% Maypole Upgrade Item

50% 10 FP

Workman's Chest

10% Premium Supply Building

20% Supply Building

30% Supply Building

40% Large Supply Package

5 Blueprints

100% 5 Blueprints

Elephant Fountain Chest

5% Elephant Fountain

10% Chhatri Garden

10% Titan Arum Plant

10% Memorial Chhatri

10% Elephant Fountain Gate

55% 10 FP

Items Chest (Actual name unknown)

5% Renovation Kit

15% One Up Kit

20% Store Building Item

25% Boost Crate

35% Mass Motivation Kit

Medal's Chest (Actual name unknown)

5% Gigantic Medal Package

5% Extra Large Medal Package

10% Large Medal Package

20% Medium Medal Package

60% Small Medal Package

Champion's Chest (Actual name unknown)

5% Champion's Retreat

10% 10 Champions
20% 5 Champions
25% 3 Champions
40% 1 Champion

Rogue's Chest

5% Rogue Hideout

10% 10 Rogues

20% 5 Rogues

25% 3 Rogues

40% 1 Rogue

Citizen's Chest

10% Premium Residential Building

20% Residential Building

30% Residential Building

40% Large Coin Package

A Lot of Coins

100% Extra Large Coin Package

City Treasurer's Chest

25% Medium Medal Package

25% Extra Large Coins Package

25% Extra Large Supplies Package

25% 20 FP

Cultural Chest

10% Premium Cultural Building

10% Premium Decoration

30% Cultural Building

50% Cultural Building

Battle Commander's Chest

20% 5 Light Units

20% 5 Ranged Units

20% 5 Heavy Units

20% 5 Fast Units

20% 5 Artillery Units

30 Forge Points

100% 30 Forge Points

Boost Chest

25% 100% Coin Boost

25% 100% Supply Boost

25% 30% Defender Boost

25% 20% Attacker Boost

Shrine Collector's Chest

5% Shrine of Knowledge

10% Shrine of Awe

15% Shrine of Inspiration

70% 10 FP

Summer Chest

5% Bazaar

10% Tiger's Den

20% Oasis

25% Fishing Hut

40% Palm Tree

Yorkton - Week 2

Things have been going great overall luck-wise.  I managed to get two terrace farms the first week of expedition :)  I got two Temple of Relic blueprints and diamonded the other 7 to get that up.  And today I built my Lighthouse of Alexandria.  I've got a layout plan for when I get two more expansions to fit the second terrace farm in which I hope to implement tomorrow.  I'll probably switch two of my goods buildings for 2 soldier barracks, a legionnaire barracks, and a ballista camp to start the week and then move back to pure goods after finishing what I can by fighting.

For the moment I'm running the terrace farm I have built as a supply building most of the day.  I get about 16k supplies a day running it on a 1 hour cycle, which allows for about 12 quests (8 unbirthday and 4 supply collection quests combined with my goat farms(they take longer than 4 hours without the terrace farm's help so I can't complete them between coin collection quests)).  This amounts to about 4 FP and 20 goods over the portion of the day when I'm active and then an 8 hour 10 goods production overnight.

I expect I'll be aiming for one to two more weeks of Iron Age while I work on getting my great buildings in better shape and hopefully start getting to build up a small goods stockpile.

The Yorkton Plan

Been a long while since i made a post, but figured I'd share my (current) plans for the new server.  Overall my goal for this server is an expedition-centric city that while not dragging its heels is not in a rush to advance either.  The main target is GE4 every week including the current one :)  To that end my build plan:

Bronze Age : The goal here was an expedient push to Iron Age, faster than I usually do.  Instead of hanging out for slingers I went to get my Iron Age goods up asap.  This was in part because I wanted my unlock goods for GE4 in before the week started to set a good example, and in part because I'm just not so serious about the game as to want to run the 4 Slinger + 4 Spearfighter quest hourly for as many days as possible.

Iron Age : My target here is to run enough barracks to fight 2.5 difficulties of GE, with enough goods to negotiate the last 1.5 difficulties.  Overall I'm on track at the moment I believe.  My tavern is developing nicely to be able to use the Extra Turn buff.  The Halloween Event caused me to keep a bunch of blacksmiths around for a while so I could finish it and get my Black Tower, which i just did today.  After taking down the blacksmiths and putting up more cottages I now have 3 soldier barracks, 2 archer barracks, 2 stone thrower barracks, 2 Bronze Age goods buildings, 5 Iron Age goods buildings.  I hope to finish the week with enough ballistae to not need the stone throwers next week.  I also hope to be able to get a Temple of Relics up before next week's expedition.

Early Middle Ages through Late Middle Ages : Unlike some of my previous servers, I do intend to actually play EMA rather than skip through it with FP packs (for one I'm not doing enough recurring quests to make that many packs probably).  All of these ages are going to in general follow the same plan I'm using in Iron Age.  Fight 2.5, Negotiate 1.5.  Make tons of goods.  Hopefully some of that will be covered by Fountains of Youth as i age along.  No major stalls planned along these ages.  I will be skipping any province I don't need to do for story or bonus quest lines so that i can scout/complete them when events require me to once I reach an age that I want to sit in.

Colonial Age : This is the first age I might camp in.  I'll hopefully acquired some rogue hideouts by this age.  I'm going to get ahead on the map for it and use at least Industrial Age troops to fight the majority of GE - eventually all of it probably but I'll need to work on my Great Buildings some possibly before I get there.  I'll be supporting the South in the Industrial Age map as that allows you to keep both side quest slots available without unlocking the Bonus quest line (which requires you to be Industrial Age to complete).

Industrial Age : Extended camping expected - I know I'm able to fight all 4 difficulties in this age using the rapid fire cannon + 2 snipers path in the Progressive Era story.  There will be a number of uncompleted Industrial Age provinces available for events.  I need to complete my great buildings and acquire enough terrace farms and renovation kits from GE to cover my goods needs in advanced ages before I leave this age.

Progressive Era : Back to the fight 2.5, negotiate 1.5 I go.  No real new challenge to this age but it doesn't lend itself as well to camping as the previous two ages - It will be an expedient trip through.

Modern Era and Postmodern Era : Refined goods and frequently a difficulty trading on new servers make these ages a challenge.  The plan is to rely on Terrace Farms to produce a balanced array of refined goods.  I'll need approximately 10 in total (5 for current age, 5 for previous age) to be safe.

Contemporary Era : Possibly another long camp.  Anti-Aircraft Vehicle + rogues make fighting GE easier here than any other age as when the AI pops the rogues, you get a retaliation in from the Anti-Aircraft Vehicle it turns into for free due to the Contact ability.  This was sort-of possible in Postmodern to some extent too but MG Teams are relatively slow and thus a bit less straightforward to win vs artillery.

Tomorrow Era and Future Era : Advancing to these ages would mostly be to produce FE goods for the free players of the server to build The Arc.  Whether or not I make it this far depends a lot on how much I've enjoyed the server.

Arctic Future : Many would say to stop at FE, but I kinda liked it in AF - it's a bit more enjoyable fighting in my opinion.  I would make sure to have MANY FE terrace farms before I moved up though :)

Oceanic Future : Serious improvements to the game going forward would need to occur before I consider taking another city this far.

Fighting GE4 : Getting troops ahead of your age from the continent map

Alright, so in many ages fighting GE4 largely seems like an impossibility (others are not so bad) - one way to tip the scales beyond ridiculously levelled GBs is to fight ahead of your age on the continent map and win units from story quests.

Update (07/01/21): Fleshed out the later age possibilities.  Apart from trying to get FE+ troops in PME you should generally not let map or tech get ahead of story, and save as many optional techs as you can.

1) Iron Age - Obtainable (2) Armored Infantry : If you complete the story up to the point where you unlock the EMA bonus area (barbarians), and finish the bonus questline, the final reward is 2 armored infantry.  How much does this help?  Well it'll make fighting through difficulty 3 a breeze - but 4 might still need significant boost and care not to lose your precious unattached units.

2) Late Middle Ages - Obtainable Grenadiers, Musketeers, Field Guns : If you complete the LMA story it unlocks the LMA bonus area to the south.  At various points along the way this questline rewards Colonial Age troops.  To finish it entirely you will need to research the tech for Cannons - but some of the units are available very early.  How much does this help?  Some...  I'm not sure it's enough to fight 4 without losses so as with iron age some care may be required not to lose your precious unattached units.  I've heard someone say they got Jaeger Infantry (Industrial Age) in LMA and that would make things a breeze - but I can't see how that's possible as Colonial Age story has quests that require construction of Colonial Age buildings.  Only thing I can imagine is unlocking the Industrial Age bonus area but as far as I know those don't reward units.  (Note if trying that, you cannot finish the Industrial Age bonus questline and get that quest slot available for other quests again without Modern Roads (Industrial Age))

3) Colonial Age - Obtainable All Industrial Troops, Conscripts OR 1 Rapid Fire Cannon + 2 Snipers + 1 Armored Car.  The Industrial Age troops are relatively straight forward to do and enough to fight most of GE4 without difficulty combined with rogues.  The progressive era troops you have to enter Colonial age with it in mind that you're going for them.  There are a number of quests that will request things like 'Build a Residential building from the Industrial Age OR Research a tech that unlocks a residential building' so you'll need to save as many techs as you can to make sure you can fulfill that option.  In doing the Industrial Story, you should note there are 4 ways it can progress: Support the South, Support the North, Fight both, Peace.  I recommend supporting the South (fighting only the northern provinces).  The combat might be a little more challenging but you can complete the story without unlocking the bonus questline and maintain your extra sidequest slot til you're ready.  It also gives you a nice mix of all Industrial troops (I can't say for sure what troops exactly you get in the other route).  When it comes to Progressive Era, you again have the same sort of options.  Peace gives you conscripts.  Fighting the germans gives you the RFC+snipers+car.  I believe fighting the brits gives the same troops.  The good news : either progressive era troop option should be plenty to breeze through GE4.

4) Industrial Age - Obtainable PE, ME, PME troops - Most notable is the MG team from PME.  To get these it's important to stay at peace with Che Guerrero, and not to finish his last territory for as long as possible.  This will give you "Business with Che" quests which will reward you with MG teams.

5) Postmodern Era - You can get a few CE troops "normally".  There's also a method to skip the CE blocker quest in PME and get to the advanced troops listed under CE...  I've not done it myself to recommend it but the gist is that *before* finishing PME story quests you skip way ahead on the continent map, working your way through to FE map.  Once on FE map you start catching up on story and it'll bypass the CE blocker hopefully.  There are more details on this elsewhere - look around if you're interested :)

6) Contemporary Era - If you've skipped enough technologies, you can get through to OF quests here.  FE Hover Tanks are perhaps the most notable troop at this point - to get 4 Hover Tanks instead of 1 you should negotiate with Joy Danba at the start of FE story - then when you meet her again later in the map she'll give you 3 Hover Tanks.  An OF quest requiring you to finish productions in an OF production building acts as a final block preventing you from getting any further troops above your era.

7) Tomorrow Era - You can certainly finish whatever you didn't in CE here in getting to that OF blockade.  OF Sub Cruisers I find quite useful in TE.

Taverns (hic)

So taverns have been out a few weeks now...  Perhaps I should've wrote something on them earlier but I've been extra busy drinking.  Is it all worth it?  Erm, maybe...

The benefits of taverning to the rest of your game:

• Up to an 8% chance of getting a FP from visiting your friend's tavern depending on their tablecloth (neat!)
• Buffs from the tavern shop (can be nice)
• Not losing active friends who care about the tavern more than you do (ouch)

So the buffs:

• +% coin productivityy, +% supply productivity - these aren't too bad.  If you don't have a Lighthouse or St Mark's Basilica yet they're pretty darn good.  If you do have those Great Buildings they're not as significant as they just add with all your other productivity bonuses
• Extra Turn - if you negotiate expedition this is amazing.  2 15 minute buffs is enough for me to finish difficulty 3 weekly by negotiate alone.  I usually pop the first one around the halfway mark of difficulty 2.  I do use some medals to buy extra attempts during the buff's duration.
• Enthusiastic - an interesting buff.  It makes your city instantly enthusiastic regardless of happiness provided.  If you were confident about being able to keep this buff up whenever you need it you could use this to escape all need for cultural buildings or GBs that provide happiness.  I'm already committed to happiness GBs on my main worlds, so I won't be making much use of this right now, but maybe one day if I start another new world.
• Merchants - You know those ripoff merchants that offer you 1 good for 10 in the market?  These let them rip you off a bit less.  I have thought about using this one to get rid of paper gluts but haven't sunk to that yet.  Overall I do not recommend this buff and it costs a big chunk of silver to boot.
• Attack Bonus - A bit pricy and doesn't help your attacking troops' defense (like the barracks bonus, not the GB bonus), but it could occasionally give you the kick you need to get by some tough fights that you're not already two-shotting the enemy on.
• Defense Bonus - Temporary watchfires, not at all recommended.
• City Shield - Very pricy and if you have the silver to afford keeping it up you probably should be able to collect on time and avoid the need for it
• Construction Boost - A neat and occasionally useful boost, you can cut the time to rebuild to a different ages barracks or a new ages housing/supplies by up to 75%
• Recruitment Boost - Unlike the guild recruitment boost, it does not help your recruitment time from your Alcatraz which makes what could've been the most exciting boost decidedly less so.  It's also a big chunk of silver.  Still, if you have an army mostly based on attached troops using this boost can enable you to have a ready to go attached army available daily for GvG action.

You can only have one of the above buffs on the go for free at a time.  You may pay 50 diamonds to unlock a slot for a second buff but you have to do so everytime you want to use that second slot - it's not a onetime cost.  If your first slot buff expires while the second slot buff is still going you can continue to pick first slot buffs for free so if you are going to run two buffs it's recommended that you put the longer one in the second slot.  You cannot cancel a buff once it's started - so if you're going to run the 75% construction boost it'll be occupying that buff slot for the full 3 days.

My personal choices atm: 

• I'm running Supply Boost on L because I'm trying to save up supplies for leaping to Arctic Future finally and rebuilding once there.  I have ran Recruitment Boost on one day to get an extra DA or two up.  Longterm I'd like to have a city that can make better use of Recruitment Boost but will need some modifications to do so.
• I'm using 2 'Extra Turn' buffs a week on V to complete guild expedition there (I'm Progressive Era with only 30% attack boost so fighting the whole thing is out of the question).  These are short buffs so I don't have difficulty combining them with Coin Boost which I also run there in order to complete more quests daily.
• I'm considering getting my taverns on worlds I don't play much to a point where I can do the 2 'Extra Turn' buffs a week there too.  I figure an 8 person table cleared once a day should suffice for that purpose.

Now about upgrades:

• Table Size and Chairs increase your income especially in the periods when you're working or sleeping and likely to fill up.  Visitors may only try to sit once a day so the bigger the table the less you're likely to miss out on in those periods when you just can't be online.  They also unlock which levels of buff are available to you in the tavern shop.
• Collection Plate increases income per visitor.  If your table isn't full often, it's efficient to get 2 to 3 levels of this before going back to finishing up your table size upgrades (say at 10 to 12 chairs)
• Floor increases income you may get by visiting others.  If you only clear your table a few times a day but do manage to sit at other peoples taverns frequently then you should focus on this upgrade earlier rather than later (say at 8 to 10 chairs).
• Tablecloth gives your visitors a chance to earn a FP for sitting at your tavern.  It's a nice way to thank your guests and eventually may become necessary to keep some of your more active friends.

Overall I'm less than impressed with the feature, but it's here and I feel I have to embrace it.  At least some of the buffs are interesting and the prospect of having 140 friends with burgundy tablecloths is appealing as that'd be worth an average of 11 FP a day - but that's a longterm thought.  For now, I'm going through the motions and hoping someone will hold my hair because all this pubcrawling is causing me to vomit!