As many of you know, I am active in many of the Game of War Line rooms (Line Display Name: FinsUp / Line ID finsupgow) and I am always willing to answer player questions in the rooms or via Direct Message. If I do not know the answer to a question, I am always happy to find the answer or to test your theories to determine the best practices one can take in building their account. Recently, there have been 4 questions that it seems many players would like answered:
Question 1: Does the Pantheon work defensively?
Question 2: Which dragon is better for reinforcing – your strongest dragon, the dragon which is strong against the attacking march, or the dragon that bolsters your weaker troop?
Question 3: Does Battlemark work defensively?
Question 4: Does another player’s battlemark help me defensively?
As the answers to these questions can determine your success on the battlefield, Team RealTips conducted testing of Pantheon functionality, reinforcing dragon effectiveness, and battlemark functionality. Again, I need to thank Tamir TT of ~DRK for helping me science this stuff out and her for her patience during the testing process! I also want to send a big shout out to DeadlyHugs for his willingness to test the Battlemark functionality and for using his dragons to reinforce me during the testing process. It is the contributions of players like Tamir and Huggy that make it possible for me to provide this kind of information to our players. Please shoot them a heartfelt “Thank You” when they are burning you during KvKs!
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 and sometimes even changes stat functionality without notice. 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 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 the Hero that was used, Hero III, throughout the tests:
At the time of testing, my Hero III was Level 200 and for these test hits, I defended using my Elite Marshal Set Gear with Maximus gem sets embedded in each piece. In my wall I had the following Monsters active: (a) Level 50 Were Polar Bear; (b) Level 50 Bone Ice Dragon; (c) Level 50 Turkey Drake; (d) Level 48 Stone Golem; and (e) Level 50 Golem. The only other adjustment to my account was the use of my Elite banners for the type stats. Given the parameters of the testing, I did not activate any available boosts.
The attack set up for our test hits remained constant. Ms. TT used her strongest troop and dragon combination, Infantry troops marching with her Inferno Dragon, and skilled her Level 144 Hero IV to strengthen her solo attacks using the skills available to do so with Hero IV. Finally, the attacking Hero was dressed up in a combination of Power Shaman and Behemoth Slayer gear that TT liked to use at that time.
As with previous tests that I have conducted, the setup used was for defending against solo attacks so we could remove the variables that may creep in from filler accounts. That being so, I adjusted my troop count down to 6,000,000 of each T6 (except siege, of course) spread evenly across Regular, Strategic, and Wild troops. For each hit, I healed my troop count back to this baseline and healed all four of my dragons between each hit.
Given the different concepts that were being tested for this article, our first hit provided the baseline against which all future attacks would be measured. Here is the report for the baseline test:
As you can see from the report, 4.81 Million of my troops were wounded but I was able to kill 7.99 Million of TT’s troops. Again, for this test my pantheon was not activated, I had no reinforcements, and I did not battlemark TT’s stronghold.
The Mighty Pantheon Tested
As many of you know, Cinder recently wrote an article about the Pantheon and I will not rehash her awesome guide here. In summary, the Pantheon contains a number of boosts that increase certain stats depending on which Deity is activated. As noted in Cinder’s article, once the boost is activated you will not see a stat increase in your overall stats. Many players are curious as to why this is and, unfortunately, I am not able to answer the “Why” issue. However, this has caused many players to question whether the Pantheon even works.
To answer this question, I activated my Apollo’s Fire boost, which was at Level 19 at the time of the tests, and immediately gained the following stat increase: 46,800% Empire Defender Attack, 82,800% Empire Defender Defense, and 31,500% Empire Defender Health. Was it worth it?
A visual comparison of the baseline test against the Pantheon report clearly shows that the Pantheon functions as it is supposed to. Here is a side-by-side comparison of the two hits:
As you can see from these results, I was able to save 2.53% of my troops from being hospitalized and killed an additional 2.10% of TT’s troops with my Pantheon activated. Based on these results, I strongly believe that activating defensive Empire boosts within your Pantheon when you are rallied would be a best practice at this time.
Dragon Reinforcements Tested
As you may recall, the question posed was which dragon presents the strongest defense for reinforcement? Post-testing, the answer surprised me. Recall, if you will, the wheel of death that was discussed in my previous article. Each troop type available is strong and weak against another troop type. For example, 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. As applied to the game, when a player sends an Infantry missile against your stronghold then your strongest troop against that attack would be Ranged and the weaker troop would be Cavalry. With regards to Dragon reinforcements, this has caused many players to postulate that you should either reinforce with your strongest dragon (Inferno for most players) or with the Dragon that is strong against that particular attack (Hydro in this example).
For our first hit, I asked Hugs to send his Inferno dragon to reinforce my stronghold as it was his strongest dragon. Here is the report for that hit:
Here is my analysis of the hit:
As you can see from the report, overall I lost 5.34% less troops and killed 13.97% more of TT’s troops. This is a decent result when compared to the ratio of losses to kills present in the baseline.
For the next hit, I requested a reinforcing Hydro dragon. Recall, this dragon, which is linked to Ranged troops, should be my strongest against this particular attack. Here is the report for that hit:
Here is my analysis of the hit:
When you compare the results of the Inferno reinforcement against the Hydro reinforcement, you clearly see that Hydro provided an advantage. I lost 7% fewer troops and killed just under 3% more of TT’s march, which would appear to make the Hydro dragon the better choice over the “strongest” dragon.
For our final test, I requested a reinforcing Terra Dragon from Hugs. Given the results from the past two hits, I was unsure what to expect here but hoped to see that the Terra dragon reduced my losses when compared against the Inferno test. Here is my report for this hit:
And the comparison graph:
As I had hoped, I suffered less losses when compared against Inferno reinforcement. What was not expected, though, was that the kill count did not change. Although both of these factors are true, the end result with Terra reinforcements was still better than what was seen with Inferno reinforcements.
Based on these test results, my takeaway is that I will always request that my Alliance reinforce using the strong against dragon or the weak against dragon. Why the weak against dragon? Because it strengthens my weaker troops, which lessens my losses to some degree while providing the same kills. Obviously, the strongest reinforcing dragon is the one that is strongest against the oncoming attack.
Battlemark Functionality
As you can see, I saved the best for last. Battlemark functionality has been a hot topic amongst players since it was first introduced into Game of War. If you think back, the Draconic Battlemarks Research Tree was our introduction to Battlemark functionality in this realm. At that time, the research nodes in the tree indicated that using battlemarks increased your Troop Attack, Type Attack, Type Defense, and Troop Attack Debuff. Later nodes, Draconic Battlemarks Expansion, Draconic Battlemarks Advancement Research, and Draconic Battlemarks Evolution Research, continued with the same stats we saw in the original research tree but increased the stats with each release.
The main issue that players have had with Battlemark functionality is that they could not tell whether it worked. For instance, when you look at your Overall Boosts page, the only Battlemark components addressed are the Attack functions even though the research states that Battlemark has a defensive component, as well. Thus, many players questioned whether Battlemark even worked defensively. In fact, early testing by Cinder led her to conclude that Battlemarking your target was ineffective as a defender. As more and more players questioned that result, I decided to test battlemark functionality myself to see if MZ had worked a change. Here is the result of my test hit when I marked my attacker:
When you compare this against the Baseline test that appears earlier in this article, the following comparison is available:
The outcome of this test clearly shows that defenders should mark their attackers to reduce their losses. While the number of troops killed does not change significantly, at 0.25%, the troop saved percentage, 14.25%, is significant.
How many times have you been hanging out with people from your Alliance (hive mind, anyone?) when another Alliance ports in and starts rallying each of you one at a time? It happens quite often, especially during KvK events. If you are the first target, you are usually able to mark the lead and your mark will stay active for some time. Now, for the final question we tested – What happens when someone in your Alliance has already marked your attacker? Does your stronghold obtain any benefit for an active battlemark that you have not set? Based on the research, my thought was that a battlemark was only effective if it originated from my stronghold. Here is the test hit for which another player, Hugs, had an active battlemark:
Here is a comparison against our Baseline test:
As you can see, the difference from when Mr. Hugs marked the target versus our baseline report was 0.25% or less. To be frank, I find this statistically insignificant. Thus, my position is that the person who needs the boost available from the battlemark needs to be the one who marks the target. I strongly believe that this carries over to both attack (rally leads) and defense. Thus, the best practice for rally leads would be to mark the target yourself rather than allowing members of your alliance to mark for you.
My Final Thoughts on the Best Defensive Configuration
Based on the testing shown here, and testing done for my last article, my best practices have expanded somewhat. Here is a rundown of what I will be applying in the future:
- When I activate Synergy, I will boost my weaker troop (i.e., run Terra Health Synergy when my attacker leads with Inferno).
- I will activate Empire defense boosts in the Pantheon.
- I will request that my Alliance reinforce using the strong against or weak against dragon.
- I will do everything I can to ensure that I have personally marked my attacker.
- I will continue to swap out my type-stat Monsters based on what the Lead is sending (but only because it is easy to adjust on the fly).
- I will maintain an even build across all 3 troop types and all 3 kinds of troops.
- I will remember that Game of War is fluid and ever-changing and that failure to adapt can hurt.
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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