One of the current debates among the trap community centers around the use of Synergy boosts when taking rallies. Some players believe that you should use Synergy Health for the troop that is strong against your attacker. For instance, if the attacker sends an Infantry missile with a boosted Inferno dragon, those players would activate a Hydro Health Synergy Boost. Other players believe that you should boost the weaker troop type, which would be Cavalry troops, and activate a Terra Health Synergy Boost. To solve that debate, Team RealTips conducted comparison testing of the two Synergy Health Boosts to determine which defensive position is stronger. As a bonus, we also conducted comparison testing between Hero III and Hero IV while using Health Synergy! I need to thank Tamir TT of ~DRK for helping me science this stuff out and her for her patience during the testing process!
The “only because my editor made me do it” Disclaimer: The stats and defensive data present in this article are current as of the date of publication. As anyone who plays Dragon Dimension knows, MZ is always releasing new components to the game. With every release that occurs, the information contained in this article will become staler (unless updated, of course!). Use this information at your own risk!
The Wheel of Death Explained
Before we get into the testing protocol, school is in session! Are you paying attention to Professor Fins? Good!
Most players are aware of the Wheel of Death in Game of War. The basic premise is that each troop type is stronger and weaker against other troop types. If you look in your Barracks and click on any troop, Infantry, Ranged, or Cavalry, the description provided tells you what each particular troop is strong and weak against as to the other types. Basically, the wheel is described as follows: Infantry is strong against Cavalry but weak against Ranged; Ranged are strong against Infantry but weak against Cavalry; and Cavalry are strong against Ranged but weak against Infantry. In short form, we often refer to this concept as CIRC, which leads to the following Circle of Death depicted here:
From this diagram, you should have a better idea of what our testing is about. In summary, the question is whether it is currently better to boost your strong or your weak troops on the fly. Why do I say “On the fly?” Put simply, once a rally sets there is often very little time to make adjustments to your account. The fewer adjustments you have to make (who has time to swap out seven gem sets!?), the more likely you are to succeed against the rally.
The Test Account Stats and Testing Protocol
As you can imagine, I again used my own account as the crash test dummy. To give you an idea of the relative strength of my account at the time the tests were conducted, here are my stats for both heroes that were used (you will understand why I am showing you my Hero IV stats later):
Here are my Hero III stats:
Here are my Hero IV stats:
My Hero III is currently Level 188 and for these test hits, I defended with my Elite Marshal Set Gear with Maximus gem sets embedded in each piece. My Hero IV is currently Level 99 and to save time I used the same gear set up when I switched heroes. The other adjustments to my account included placing a Level 46 Were Polar Bear (for the Ranged stats) in my wall and using my banner preset that included both Elite Ranged and Elite Cavalry banners for the type stats available with these banners.
The attack set up for our test hits remained the same. Ms. TT maxed her Infantry Type stats, boosted using Inferno Attack Synergy, and skilled her Level 124 Hero IV to strengthen her solo attacks using the skills available to do so with Hero IV. Unfortunately, I cannot share TT’s stats with our readers. Suffice to say, Ms. TT hits pretty darned hard even when she sends a solo!
Speaking of solos, since that was the attack configuration we were using to remove the variables that could creep in from filler accounts, I had to adjust my troop count downwards from where I would ordinarily run as a rally trap. To remove as many variables as possible, I reduced my troop count to 22,500,000 T6 troops, roughly double Ms. TT’s solo march size, and spread them evenly across Regular, Strategic, and Wild troops. This set up gave me exactly 2,500,000 of each troop presently available. For each hit, I retrained my troop count back to this baseline and healed all four of my dragons between each hit.
The Testing and Resulting Data
For our first hit, I used Hero III and boosted using a Hydro Health Synergy. Remember, this meant that I was boosting the troop type that is already strong against Infantry (Infantry is weak against Ranged).
The results of that hit are easier to see in the graph below. For ease of reference, I collated my troop deaths by type, rather than separating them between Regular, Strategic, and Wild troops since the losses were fairly equal among the different classes of troops.
As you can see, I lost significantly fewer Ranged troops to this hit and the highest losses I sustained were to my Cavalry troops (Cavalry troops are weak against Infantry). Overall, my total losses between all three troop types were 4,559,513.
Now, let’s see what happens when I swap Hydro Health Synergy for Terra Health Synergy but all other factors remain the same. For this hit, my Cavalry troops, which are normally weak against Infantry, are now boosted.
Here is the loss graph for this hit:
Surprised? I was! I lost significantly fewer troops across the board on this hit. What I found even more surprising was that the losses between Ranged and Cavalry troops evened out significantly. The best news, of course, was that my overall troop losses dropped significantly considering that I only lost 1,205,675 troops using this configuration.
To make things interesting, I also wanted to see how this defense configuration played out while using Hero IV with Inferno Synergy Disruption skilled. The bonus information I wanted to obtain from this testing was whether Hero IV was better defensively than Hero III.
Here are the results from the test hit using Hero IV and Hydro Health Synergy:
And the graph:
As expected, the graph shows that our Ranged losses remained much lower, at 247,157 deaths, and our Cavalry losses were the highest at 3,600,000. These results validate what we saw with Hero III. Will that hold true when we use Terra Health Synergy with Hero IV?
As you can see from the results of using Terra Health Synergy with Hero IV, we continue to see validation of the results we achieved with Hero III.
And our final loss graph for these test hits:
Using Hero IV, our Ranged and Cavalry losses remained fairly equal but were significantly lower than when we boosted Ranged and our overall troop losses were smaller.
The primary advantage that I found with using Hero IV from these results was that it killed slightly more of my attacker’s march. Unfortunately, the additional troops killed were not sufficiently high to be statistically significant in my opinion.
My Final Thoughts on the Best Defensive Configuration
Based on the testing shown here, it is clear that boosting your weaker troop obtains the best defensive result. This means that Cinder was right and that people really need to start listening to her in the trap rooms (LOL). There is no logical reason to boost the troops that are already strong against the type used by your attacker but many of us, myself included, fell into the habit of boosting what was available first (Hydro Health Synergy) without taking the time to really consider how the introduction of Terra Health Synergy should have changed our approach to defending. It just goes to show that Game of War is fluid and ever-changing and that failure to adapt can hurt.
Many players may wonder why the losses evened out between Ranged and Cavalry when we switched to Terra Health Synergy. You must recall that our Ranged troops were already strong against Infantry. By activating a synergy boost that targets our Ranged troops, we were only making them even stronger. By strengthening our weaker troops, here Cavalry, we are positioning our account to be as strong as possible against our attacker. Best practice, in my opinion, would be to set up defensively to strengthen the troop type that is weak against your attacker. You could play around with this, to some extent, by swapping out your gems, monsters, and banners, activating different type potions, or even using Hero I for the type stats to switch up which type you strengthen. As I reviewed the reports from these test hits, I was struck by the question of whether I could further minimize the losses that my Infantry troops faced by possibly adding in more Infantry type stats by using, for example, Unbreakable Gems instead of Maximus Gems. The only way that you will know what works for your account is by trying different type stat setups and taking hits. The more you know, the stronger you can make your account with the items you already possess!
What I found more interesting in these tests was that Hero IV was NOT the better defensive Hero, at least not for my account. I have taken rallies using both Hero III and Hero IV and my unscientific reports were telling me that my Hero IV set up with Synergy Disruption was stronger than my Hero III set up. This does not appear to be the case. That may very well change as I continue to level up my Hero IV and obtain additional Hero Skill Points. But for now, I will stick to Hero III and boost my weaker troop if I think my attacker is strong enough to require me to do so.
Where to go for Additional Information
Team Real Tips has guides for pretty much all aspects of Game of War. Remember, our beloved game is constantly changing. Thus, the burden remains on YOU to educate yourself on those changes. Read the blogs released by MZ! Ask questions of RealTips writers in our Line rooms and on Discord! Remember, there really is no stupid question and we are happy to help you understand the stats that you are working with!
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