Atten-hut! Professor Fins is back from his inter-kingdom travels and has brought back some hard-won battle wisdom to share with you about being a rally trap in the age of T7 troops. This multi-part guide will provide you with what I view as the best practices you can adopt to take rallies from those monster hitters like Tula, Junsy, Kitty, and TJP. In Part 1, we will take a look at what leads see when they look at your account and what you can do to make yourself look more appetizing. From there, we will go through your Hero/Gear/Gem combinations to close out Part 1 of the guide. For Part 2, I will cover VIP and what banners, potions, and monsters you use to boost your stats, and your troop selection. To close Part 2 out, we will cover the one thing that you have little control over – the reinforcements you receive.
Appearances Matter!
What is true in the real world remains true in Game of War. Like your momma told you a long time ago, your appearance matters. In our beloved game what you project is quite often how you are perceived and that perception is what makes a lead or spotter decide whether you are worth hitting or not.
What is the very first thing that a lead sees when they view your stronghold on the map? Your Stronghold level! So many assumptions can be made based just on the level of the stronghold that you are running. When most leads see a Stronghold in the 90s they do not automatically assume that the account is active. MZ’s release of an Instant Level 90 All Main Buildings Advancement token made sure that there are a lot of Stronghold 90 farms showing 1 Billion power in your kingdoms and that is what many leads assume when they see a Stronghold in the 90s.
Remember, the appearance of the strongholds changed from Level 99 to Level 100. At Level 99, the stronghold looks like a drab little cabin. At 100, the stronghold is bigger with gold and green accents, which makes the stronghold stand out on the map. If you are sitting with your Stronghold in the 90s, even at Stronghold 99, you are going to struggle to be seen. More critically, you may not be viewed as someone who will take a rally from a big lead. I struggled with upgrading my Stronghold to 100 because it has always been a point of pride for me to stay as small as I could for as long as I could. However, once I upgraded to Stronghold 100, the hits started pouring in again!
The next thing that many leads will look at is your Profile page. Your Profile gives critical information about your account, including a quick view of your VIP, Hero, and Gear combination, as well as your Banners and Graveyard. A quick point about your Graveyard is in order as I will cover the other topics in more detail later. If you have multiple Level 300 Heroes in your Graveyard, you are probably going to scare many leads away from hitting even though they know you are unlikely to capture their Hero in a rally. Why is this? Good leads want to stay point-positive as much as good traps do. When I see a player with a number of Level 300 Heroes in their Graveyard, I immediately assume that they have a decent account and my leads will lose points if they hit. The easiest way to ensure a clean Graveyard is to leave your Prison in deconstruct mode. Doing so ensures that you cannot imprison a Hero that hemlocks when you are not paying attention (been there, done that).
The Power your account shows on your Profile page is also important. Remember what I said about the Stronghold 90s showing 1 Billion power? My farm account has crap stats, little research done on it, no troops, and baby dragons but still shows just over 1 Billion in Power. Good leads have figured out that dead and farm accounts will show at least 1 Billion in Power at this time. That said, most leads can and do ignore anything around that Power if the account appears otherwise inactive. Does that mean that anything over 1 Billion in Power is good? Not necessarily. The sweet spot target for rally leads appears to be between 5 Billion and 10 Billion in Power. Good leads will hit Strongholds in the 100s showing that power level and what they perceive as “bad gear” all event long. Sure, it may only be one hit if you do not burn but that one hit will give you beaucoup points in the event and the lead may set another rally thinking that you are close to burning.
The final tidbit from your Profile page that leads could look at is your Kills and Combat stats. I have found this to be less of an issue than other players. Even before I reset my stats, and at the time they were reset they looked horrible as I won close to 100% of the battles and attacks and had killed well-over 25 Billion troops, I remained an enticing target. While leads do look at your stats, I do not think it is as critical as it once was. The advent of Barbarian Fortresses has pretty much messed everyone’s stats up at this point so the importance has lessened somewhat. If you are worried about how your stats look, you can always adjust them down by training up low-tier troops and have your friends hit you. You can pad your stats with low-tier troop losses for little cost, thus making you appear much weaker than you actually are!
Hero Selection
When it comes to trapping, there is somewhat of a debate as to whether Hero I or Hero III is the best choice. If I am running as a solo trap, I will usually stay in Hero I since the solo march size remains too small to do much damage to an account built to withstand rallies. To be honest, for solos my Hero selection is not at all important. When you are hunting whales, on the other hand, that definitely changes.
My opinion is, has been, and will be (until something substantial changes) that Hero III remains the single best Hero to use for Rally Trapping. Why is this so? The answer should be obvious, and it has nothing to do with the Empire Defender and Debuff stats available in the Hero III Skills. Put simply, a properly skilled Hero III can increase your hospital capacity substantially, which saves you in both T3 Resource Costs and, more importantly, points in an event. To put this in perspective, I have 13 Hospitals built in my Stronghold. When I use Hero III with Hospital Capacity fully skilled I can save 7.53 Million troops. When I activate any other Hero my hospital capacity drops to 4.63 Million, which is a substantial difference.
Now for the appearance component. What Level of Hero III should you show? Too low and you may appear trappy. Too high and leads may not want to hit you. I think the best starting point is to look at what MZ gave everyone for free. With regards to Heroes I through III, MZ gave everyone a token that raised your Heroes to Level 200 regardless of the then-state of your account. To me, that means that anyone showing under 200 for an active Hero did so for a reason. What reason, though? Maybe ego, maybe laziness, or maybe they just do not know how to use the token? If I am a lead, my assumption is going to be that they have something to hide. The bare minimum Hero III level to show at this point is Level 200, just because of the token. Based on my own experience, and the experience of other rally traps in my Alliance, you can go higher and will still get hit. My Hero III is at Level 214 and another member of my Alliance who is a frequent rally target has his Hero III at Level 266. Would I willingly go much higher than Level 266? Nope, not going there until Hero III Level 350 drops!
Gear Selection
The first point that I make when it comes to gear selection is that bait gear is your friend. For me, my bait gear typically matches whatever event happens to be running while I am baiting. During Kill Monster events, I usually sit in Monster gear in whatever Hero I happen to have active at the time. During Training events, you will find me in Hero I with training gear active. If a rally sets on me, I will swap to Hero III and whatever gear, or combination of gear, that I have decided to use for that event. Be careful that you actually have time to swap your gear if a rally sets on you or this could be you:
Ouch! And if you are curious about those dead troops, yes, they were T7s!
When it comes to bait gear, the world is your oyster! Mix things up, but be sure to change your gear if it is not working. One of my very good friends was having an awful event recently with very little action. I decided to check his gear to see what the leads were seeing and he was wearing a mix of old defense gear on a mid-200s Hero III. His appearance was too trappy, in my opinion, and probably contributed to why he was not drawing as much action as other traps were. Don’t be afraid to mix things up but be aware that old gear often signals that you are baiting. I think a better choice would be a full set of the newer gear, like Elite Marshal, with a mix of gold and purple gear pieces crafted. That looks like a lower- to mid-level spender to me and is an easy look to pull off!
Now that you have your bait gear squared away, what gear will you use to eat those rallies? The strongest defense gear set currently available is the Lycan Set. I do not, however, believe that you need to use the Lycan Set at this point. Throughout the past 30 to 45 days, my defense set has been a mixed gear set that consists of the following pieces: (1) Elite Marshal’s Ascension (helm) +10; (2) Obsidian Knight’s Battleplate (armor); (3) Elite Marshal’s Firebrand (sword) +10; (4) Elite Marshal’s Wingtips (feet) +10; and (5) 3 x Elite Marshal’s Grasp (accessories) +10, +4, +0. Given the increase in stronghold levels and other recent attack drops, I may need to begin substituting pieces of Lycan gear into this mix but probably will not do so until I reach a point where I begin losing on points.
Gem Selection
At present there are three trains of thought when it comes to gems and these three concepts are derived from the 3 most recent gem sets released – the type gems (Unbreakable, Maximus, and Atrocity) versus the Spiral Abyss Gem Set versus the Battlemark Rally Assault Set. The first thought is that emphasizing Type stats is important and selects either the Unbreakable, Maximus, or Atrocity Gem Set, or a combination thereof, to use defensively. The second thought looks at the overall set bonus and newness of the Spiral Abyss Gem Set and posits that this is the strongest set to use. The final perception is that the increase in type stats and the fact that it is the most recent gem release makes the Battlemark Rally Assault Gem Set the best to use.
Based on the stats alone, the Spiral Abyss Gem Set is the best gem set to use defensively. My primary reasoning for this is the Gem Set Bonus for the Empire Defender Attack and Defense stats, 40,000%, and 47,500%, respectively. When you equip all 7 gear pieces with the Spiral Abyss Gem Set, you see a substantial increase in the overall Empire Defender stats versus what you see when you equip 7 gear pieces with any of the Type stat gem sets. In my opinion, the Battlemark Rally Assault Gem Set is out of consideration for the simple reason that the only set bonus it provides is an increase in the Rally Attack percentage, which has no place in a defensive account. Here are the stats associated with the Spiral Abyss Gem Set embedded into the Elite Marshal’s Ascension (helm):
If I were running one troop type and thought that I needed the added Type stats, I would probably change my focus from the Spiral Abyss Gem Set and back towards the Type stats available in the Unbreakable, Maximus, or Atrocity Gem Sets. The primary reason for this is the results of the testing of the one type T7 defense set up in my earlier article. As you may recall, adding type stats is only effective if the stat matches the troops that you are running. Given the fact that Empire Defender stats apply regardless of the troops, it is a harder decision as to which will work better. Before I recommend a type-focus over an Empire Defender focus to our readers, I need to test and compare the effectiveness of both approaches.
For now, I think the Spiral Abyss Gem Set and the Empire Defender stats are the better approaches to take if you have enough gems to make 7 sets. If you do not have 7 full sets of the Spiral Abyss Gems, my suggestion would be to use as many full sets as you can and then supplement with either the Unbreakable, Maximus, or Atrocity Gem Sets depending on the troops type that you are running.
Where do we go from here?
Part 2 of this series will finish up with the appearance component of your build by discussing your VIP level and how high I believe you can safely go and still remain an attractive target. I will also cover your banner selections, monsters, potions, troop selection, and troop count, and finish the article off with a discussion of the importance of dragon reinforcements.
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!
Join the Conversation on our community sites!
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. Don’t forget to sign up for our Email Subscription that will automatically notify you when we release new content! Finally, join us in our Line and Discord channels and follow us on Facebook!
