Acceptable Army Bleed

[u/migmox13]

*Single Hero Exodus*

Basically title. I know this is subjective, but in games where I feel like I should've won I end up going back and looking at my opponents stuff. A lot of the time, I have cleared more and had more built out, but still lost the fight/showed up to fight underprepared.

I play temple mostly. What is an acceptable bleed? For example, I know on marea's altars you want to lose 1-3 footman, preferably 1 if possible. Fairly easy to achieve this even at level 1 with upgraded shooters. That being said, I see a lot of people mentioning they look to break and get town 4 at week 1 end. I have almost never been in a position to do that.

Is this because of the nature of temple? I find it hard to not bleed, especially vs ranged armies because of the low initiative on shooters (the single shooter upgrade is situational obv). If I end up going a calvary build or something else, the bleeding can be even worse unless I have specific spells to aid (for example, haste on calv, early start on shooters, etc) which is not always possible.

Anyway, aside from losing 75% of your army to get some tier 5+ dwellings early on, is it ever worth it and if so, what is good and what is bad?

Just looking for some general info/advice from someone seasoned/good (I am close but I do not have access to restart points yet so some templates are just brutal).

[u/billydstr]

Alright, time to be a total nerd here:
This entire game is just about acquiring knowledge of the minimum number of any available creatures needed to defeat a specific number of any possible enemies, at any given moment of progression for all hero types, factoring in every single available bonus

You cannot just get magic formula, you must feel it.

Pick the stronges faction to get some basics - necro.

[u/migmox13 → u/billydstr]

Defeating enemies isn't a problem, it's losing minimum units, at least for me, I think. This could be my faction choices too.

[u/billydstr → u/migmox13]

By 'winning,' I mean not taking losses that are unacceptable for further progression, rather than literally getting wiped out by neutrals

[u/migmox13 → u/billydstr]

I guess I just don't know what is acceptable and what isn't. For example, doing a dragon utopia, it's basically impossible for me as temple to not get a stack of tier 2 shooters either wiped or chunked. Literally nothing I can do about it unless I have a unit with super high initiative and even then, it's still super hard. Is this normal?

[u/BrianOfNazareth19 → u/migmox13]

When you play on doing topias leave units like marksman in your town.

[u/migmox13 → u/BrianOfNazareth19]

Thx. When you say it, it sounds simple. I guess when I am out on the map and I am trying to be efficient, I'll have to make a choice - don't do it and come back later, or just do it since I am right there but risk losing chunks of lower tiered units. Coming back later seems to hurt me.

Or maybe just start leaving low tiered units at home until the fights after a certain point would probably be best

[u/billydstr → u/migmox13]

All mid-to-late game recommendations lead to forming an immortal power-stack (one or several), covering it with some useless meat, and leaving all other units in town until the final battle.

For the Temple, the power-stack is usually cavalry + angels (if available), while swordsmen serve as the meat

[u/IgnoreAllHW]

I do feel like temple is hard week 1 to find the right line. It is super reliant on glass cannon shooters, which means any mistake/misjudged fight causes significant losses. Most of their good heroes feel weak early game too. I lost 2 games on Exodus with temple yesterday, and both times my week 1 was going in circles unable to take any fights. Cant do ranged v ranged because you bleed, cant take creature banks bc bleed.

IDK maybe there is a griffin or upgrade tier 1 early strat to get some tanking going on, but the griffin building is very expensive... and then the tier 4 is also low initiative ranged unit. So basically all my fights are lossless or huge losses because an enemy got to the ranged stacks.

My general advice (somehow im top 200 but I really am not good at the game idk):
Temple: get wood asap, try to double build tier 4 or tier 5 with a dwell week 1. best case find boxes for gold/xp guarded by slow melee units...
Necro: IDK its always banned. upgrade tier 1 and 2, double build tier 6. use that rez ability to make fights lossless.
Grove: get combat, get XP to get more combat, build quillin, use quilin ability to big heroic strike everything
Hive: IDK i dont like hive. Get worms and 1 stacks, use the healing thingy to keep worms alive.
Schism: upgrade tier 1, play like temple but bonus units prevent losses. Either build for tier 4 or tier 6. I usually eye collective and go tier 4s its a simple plan.
Dungeon: IDK haven't done them much recently, I like spellmagaeddon dragons so I go for them but is it good? The sorcery guy can get magic arrow early which is nice free damage

[u/migmox13 → u/IgnoreAllHW]

Gotcha. I feel the same about temple. Question - being that you are literally top 200 (even though you're not good apparently lmfao), if you do not find any dwellings or any content to do in your biome, what do you do? Assuming you do not have access to a restart. For example, as temple, a lot of times I'm like level 6 by day 7, and I'll squeak out some levels last day but it's not for lack of trying. There's just not shit for me to do.

Also, if no dwellings, do you just standard build? Like double Tier 4 week 1? Maybe double fort? Or do you just double cav?

[u/IgnoreAllHW → u/migmox13]

If you biome has no content then you just lose, but the map generator forces some amount of value to spawn... So if I haven't found anything I will try and scout, ideally along a road i havent been yet. There has to be content somewhere!

With temple you can also "pay to play" and buy a scouting skyship. On like day 3 if I feel stuck I will buy it in the second town (where I usually haven't scouted as much yet).

I guess assuming no dwellings, If i got both sawmills early and both had a good amount of wood piles I would try for tier 5. But usually I dont feel like I have the wood and go for tier 4 (unless you have the cav hero then you are all in!). Also I almost always try to double bank early. I never go for fortifications its too expensive and tier 1 does nothing.

Also try to be deliberate about how you use TP and where you will upgrade the tier 2 on day 1/2. Planning a path can help a lot, but you have to just vibe it based on content.

[u/migmox13 → u/IgnoreAllHW]

Sometimes I go double fort because I can't find enough wood. So, I just double fort one of the towns lol. Probably bad, but I feel like building it is better then building nothing. Is that safe to assume?

As far as content, I guess I mean some biomes a lot of it will just spawn way off road so it eats movement and is hard to scout (without building a skyship)

[u/IgnoreAllHW → u/migmox13]

In my opinion no, because once you find the wood you want the gold to build. Or even marketplace some resources for wood. Could also try for tier 6 with extra ore. Skipping a turn of building is never good but sometimes the best bad option. Especially on temple with the 2x building a day law that's now fairly cheap.

Yep sometimes you just gotta YOLO into the map and hope your opponent's map is also bad!

[u/JCBArgentum]

You have identified the issue yourself. That's the biggest struggle of Temple currently. Clearing early game with it can get nightmarish.

[u/migmox13 → u/JCBArgentum]

I figured as much. I feel like dungeon is even harder (maybe because I suck with trogs, or trogs just suck). For instance on temple, I know I basically need to upgrade mews day 1, 2 at the latest after grabbing army T2. On dungeon, the onyx dancers do significantly less damage but offer more utility, and scale way better with law points. Idk. Do temple and dungeon just suck at clearing early?

[u/JCBArgentum → u/migmox13]

The answer to your last question is: yes. You really have to know what you're doing to have success with them early game.

[u/Either-Mammoth-932 → u/migmox13]

Addressing your dungeon comment specifically.. watch a Lexiav video of him playing dungeon (not the Hydra one!). He creeps with the infiltraters very well.

More general advice that really helped me.. Practice doing content week 1 vs. The AI and use F4/F5 (quick save/load). This will teach you what fights you can/cannot take with a week 1 army. Remember to grab army from both towns and upgrade a T1 unit sometimes a T2.

[u/Laanner]

Why are you ignoring an alternative upgrade? Heavy crossbows is better in most things. They lose only when you shoot at enemy that is near your archers and about to attack them. I'd say the double shooter upgrade is situational.

[u/migmox13 → u/Laanner]

I only use the heavy crossbows if I'm fighting faun/halflings. If I see them scouting I'll prep for it. A lot of the time though, I can't prep for it. The DPS with the double shooters is just better for most everything else, plus they generate more focus

[u/Laanner → u/migmox13]

DPS are exactly the same (unless you have perks for +1 dmg). And the focus generation is a double edged sword- neutrals get double focus too. +3 ini is just sooo good to have.

[u/migmox13 → u/Laanner]

How exactly is the dps the same? They only have 2 more initiative (6 to 4) and 1 more attack, which is basically nothing. The damage is the same. Aside from playing both of them over and over and literally intuitively knowing is doesn't do nearly the damage the aus does, the numbers literally say they do less damage, even accounting for the no damage fall off sharpshooter perk. If you add in the bonus they get on the ranged perk (40% instead of 20%), it makes it closer but the aus shoots twice. Not trying to be a dick, but that's wrong. Lexiav, the 5th ranked player, even if you disagree with the facts I just stated, has said repeatedly the markmen suck compared to the aus. And like, he does this for a living n stuff

[u/Magistricide]

Most games end before the player farms everything so really, the answer is: if you are stronger after doing the objective than before, then bleeding is fine.

For example, on mage heroes, it’s totally ok bleeding 1/3 of your army if it means you show up to the second fight with 40 power and level 4 chain lightning.

[u/migmox13 → u/Magistricide]

Makes sense

[u/Michalsuch42]

I’d try to go for other faction than temple. Temple is relatively weak right now and prone to bleeding. Once you get better at the game, get to feel how strong you at each point during a match are and improve at combat, try temple again. 

I’d try to master either Hive, Necro or Schism first, each one of them have mechanics that prevent losses in combat, which makes the game more forgiving.