DeletedUser67788
Guest
Hey there w67 people, I've been reading these forums the whole time I've been here, but I've been a bit rare of post this time around. Most of you probably aren't familiar with me, but I thought I'd farewell you all regardless. I'm not leaving due to any in-game events, but rather because I have somewhat of an adventure before me.
Anyway, that's all besides the point. In the short time that I've been here, I've written a few short bits and pieces for the benefit of my tribe. Little pseudo-guides for the most part, some of them just thought-provoking concepts and some of them a little bit more technical. I thought I'd share each piece here on the off chance that it could be of benefit to anyone who cares to read it, as I do believe in sharing the knowledge and teaching people wherever I can.
While for some of the more experienced TW readers here, you might find some of it a little bit obvious, keep in mind that you are not necessarily the target audience here. There is a little bit of crossover in the guides, I slapped most of these ones together pretty quick, so it doesn't quite have the organisations that I would have otherwise liked to provide.
If I had thought to store my older guides somewhere, I would have been able to post another 10+ good pieces, but unfortunately I didn't have that insight. If any of you have any of my (non-redundant) guides from previous worlds available, then it'd be great if you could post here to share it out.
Due to time restrictions I can't format these for the externals either, shouldn't be too much of a problem... I hope.
Farming with zomgTW
(Since the zomgtw website has been down, please use this replacement link until it is repaired)
[SPOIL]The Book of Hazad - An Excerpt
Farming with zomgTW
Here is a quick little farming guide I've slapped together for all you lovely folks.
As with all of my guides, they are free to use and share.
Don't be a douche though, acknowledge me as author!
*** This guide expects that you have premium and are familiar with it ***
Contents:
1) Farming with zomgTW
2) Bookmark farming with zomgTW
3) Bookmark farming with multiple villages
4) Bookmark farming for maximum efficiency
1) Farming
2) Bookmark Farming
3) Bookmark farming with multiple villages.
4) Bookmark Farming for Maximum Efficiency
Guide brought to you by Hazad
Special thanks to Allyboo and any other wonderful people responsible for zomgTW
Cheesasaurus too, for making that gnarly script.[/SPOIL]
Attack Tagger which Includes the backtime:
[SPOIL]Before I start - yes you need premium for this. Also, Internet Explorer is pretty crap for using scripts. Firefox and Opera are the browsers of choice (Opera also has some sweet other technical abilities that make it the #1 choice for TW players)
Attack tagging scripts are probably the first scripts you should familiarise yourself with. You should always have a tagger ready to use, never know when you will log on with 1000+ incoming attacks later in the game.
When you have an incoming attack (get someone to send a fake at you if you need to), you just click on the attack link to view the attack overview screen. You can run an attack tagger from there, and it gives you some good options for renaming the attack.
If you are new to scripts, you might be better off just copying the script into your quickbar and trying it out a few times. The information I have included afterwards, while not difficult at all, can sometimes be a bit confusing the less tech-savvy among us.
This script is only valid for w67. It is very easy to make it available for other worlds, just ask.
If you don't know how to use scripts, ask someone who does who can explain it to you.
The reason why I like this script particularly, is that it has the {return} variable in it (bolded and underlined below). This is the backtime, the time when the enemy troops return back to the point of origin. Brilliant for backtiming.
Now, see that bit up the top of the script that reads like this:
Those are the instructions the script has for changing the name of the attack.
When you run the script, it will rename the attack something like this:
I colour coded it so you can see which variable relates to which output. Bit of a information overload isn't it? This is modifiable, which is good. You can cut out some of those terms (including the squiggly brackets around them), and you can enter other thing to make it easier on the eye.
Mine script currently says:
and when I tag an attack it looks like this:
BT = Backtime.
Those numbers at the end are the attack ID. Very useful to learn about reading attack IDs, but that is a guide for another day.[/SPOIL]
ID Tagging with Opera (this is an old one)
[SPOIL]The Book of Hazad - An Excerpt
The art of ID-tagging
This is a guide I wrote a long time ago for my tribe on w32.
This might not be so useful to you early in a world, but it would certainly be of use later down the road. The cool thing about this method, is that it is a very fast way to tag incoming attacks, but it also gets more accurate the more incomings you actually have.
This is a notoriously difficult concept to grasp for newer players, so don't get too frustrated if it doesn't make sense to you at first (I'm sure I could re-write it to make it easier to understand, but I don't have the time).
Strategy, Diplomacy and Propaganda
[Spoil]The Book of Hazad - An Excerpt
Strategy and Diplomacy
Intro
Ok I wanted to write a little bit about strategy, because I'm afraid that some people just don't get it. There are a few really common misconceptions about diplomacy, and what it all means. These misconceptions seems to permeate through the 'average' (and less than average) tribes and it really puts them at a major disadvantage. This is just a concept piece, nothing too specific, but maybe a few people can learn about other ways to think about their surroundings. I'm sure while reading this you might consider that it all sounds a bit obvious, but consider whether you are using every single tactic available as a tribe to overcome an enemy, I bet there is always something more you can do. This is also something that extends from both the player level, up to the whole tribe level.
Strategy
Strategy might not be what you think it is.
Consider the Trojan Horse for example. Historical accounts state that the battle of Troy was won via this delightfully deceptive tactic.
The Spartans, knowing that their numbers were severely lower than the Persians, sought the narrow pass in the mountains at Thermopylae to hold them off for as long as possible.
These are just two popular records of different strategies. Throughout history there are so many examples of feigning retreat, guerrilla warfare, blocking retreat, striking a weak spot etc etc. The list of tactics is long, wars are almost never fought 1v1 on a level battlefield, and even if they are both sides are constantly moving cavalry, infantry and archers (or marines, tanks and drones) around to get an advantage.
In Tribalwars you are dealing with people. People can be clever, they can be manipulative, they can be deceptive. Keep this in mind always. Every mail you send and every post you make in your tribe forums, you need to consider that these might be seen by the enemy. Be careful with the way you word things, try to say things in such a way that you could justify it later if needed.
You need to be thinking constantly about ways you can get ahead of your competition. Don't just sit idle during a war and throw nukes at each other, THINK. Even when you aren't in a war, that's no excuse not to be using every card in your deck to try to get ahead. Here are a couple examples:
1) It's all about numbers
Don't fight alone if you can avoid it. Having multiple tribes fighting the same target is a bit of a no-brainer. This idea of tribes fighting honorable battles is garbage. More than likely they'll be happy to have another tribe start attacking you, so don't give them that opportunity.
Note: I'm going to immediately contradict myself and say that you don't HAVE to gangbang some tribe every time. Make sure you and your tribe members have the balls to fight a larger target. If you always gang up on your enemies, then all of a sudden you are the one getting gangbanged, your members might be inclined to shit themselves and bail on you. You've got to find the balance, hardened members who aren't afraid of being the underdog, or protecting them with diplomacy for a quick win, this can be very tough sometimes indeed.
2) Strong players = strong tribe.
In retrospect, this should be point #1. There is no substitute for having strong players. When I say 'strong' players, I don't necessarily mean the ultra fast growers, though growth is certainly a factor. A strong player also isn't someone with a huge number of troops, though this is also a factor. A strong player to me is someone who grows at a decent rate, is regularly and reliably active, maintains a good number of troops, and has the knowledge and desire to use those troops intelligently. A defensive player with a ton of troops is useless if they are never willing to support a tribemate. An uber active top 20 account is also pretty useless if they are only concerned with their own growth, with no interest in the affairs of the tribe.
Weak players can often be really detrimental to a tribe. This is often the essence of why mass recruiting tribes are so weak. Even though there might be 15 strong players in there, the other 30+ members might be dragging the tribe down. The weak ones will bleed support, not be able to contribute offensively, and in the end you'd be better off feeding them to the stronger players. Your tribe will also be more appealing to other strong players who are deciding which tribe to join, so this can often have an accelerating effect for your tribe.
Don't be afraid to kick people who aren't performing. You don't have to be a douche about it, you can be polite, maybe give them a few tips on how they can improve next time, but make sure the quality is always being selected for.
3) Creating the tribal mentality.
This can often be the hardest thing to do in a tribe. You want everyone in the tribe to firmly believe that the tribe is worth fighting for. There are so many factors here that it would be a major essay by the time I cover everything. If your tribe doesn't use skype are will be at a pretty big disadvantage in this area. Skype is a great way to discuss all the shit going on in TW (and real life) in a more easily digestible manner than tribe forums. If you know that your tribemate nearby follows the same football team as you, likes listening to the same shitty death metal as you, are you more or less likely to want to fight to save their ass when they are in trouble? Yeah, that's why it's important.
Getting people involved in the running of the tribe is a good way to create enthusiasm too. Too often there is a rift between leadership and members. They need to know that you are worth following, they need to know that you are an active leader. As long as the information isn't 'sensitive', make sure you post it for everyone to see. Ask them 'should we attack tribe A or B next?', even if you already know who you will be going for next, ask them the question, and try to persuade them to your perspective through discussion. Let yourself be swayed if someone comes up with a good counterargument though. Your players will often have good suggestions and advice, and even if they don't their questions can often make you do more research into the topic. The cycle feeds off each other.
4) Diplomacy
Diplomacy is so much more than just colours on the map. If your diplomatic agreements were made like this:
Tribe A - "Want to be allies?"
Tribe B - "ok"
Then chances are your alliances aren't worth a thing. They are destined to fail as quick as they were made. Give it some context, please. Make mutual protection pacts against a certain tribe, or join together with an ally to attack an enemy. Or agree to a NAP with a tribe because they are a barrier between you and another tribe that you'd rather not have a border with just yet. Look at the greater image, think outside the box, and think about what you are doing. Allying everyone around you serves no purpose except making you feel safe behind an ally cushion, and this has a very very high tendency to end in failure for you.
There are so many options, agreements and demands your can make of others, why would you restrict yourself to the boring old ally, NAP or enemy options? If you want to know who the competition is allied to, why not make it a condition of a NAP that they always disclose their current diplomatic agreements? If your feeling devious, agree to fight a common enemy and then don't fight. Watch as the tribes around you destroy themselves while you sip wine and giggle at it all (though there is a lot of room for things to backfire when you do this).
You can make any demands, conditions or requests that you want. Stop being so 2 dimensional in your thinking.
5) Politics and Propaganda (pnp)
The externals are certainly a good place to present yourself. If you make well thought out posts you will be held in much higher esteem than if you don't. If you try to keep your posts on a positive tone, it can open up so many doors for you later on. People will often want to recruit me, based purely on the fact they assume I know what I'm doing from my forum posts (oh, how wrong they are!). Other tribes will also hold you in higher esteem if you post well, don't underestimate how important it can be.
PnP does not end at the external forums though. The way you present yourself in-game plays a big part of it. Whenever you post on your own forums, you are selling the brand name that is YOU. Your own tribemates will like you more if you represent yourself well on your own forums. Similarly, if you have shared forums you are representing not only yourself but your tribe. Mailing the opposition, same deal. In fact, I'm a big fan of mass mailing the whole enemy tribe for a nice bit of in-game pnp. Just by breaking the ice you'd be surprised how many people will tell you they aren't happy and are willing to spy.
Just like I said in the diplomacy segment, think outside the box. You're playing against humans here, you can appeal to them, intimidate them, seduce them. Don't feel like your options are limited, explore new options.[/Spoil]
Quick and Dirty guide for Diplomatting
[SPOIL]The Book of Hazad - An Excerpt
Quick and Dirty Methods of Diplomacy
Since I'm leaving the diplomat seat vacant in this tribe, I thought I'd post a couple quick points about the way I like to do diplomacy.
As I've said in my other piece about strategy and diplomacy, I think that diplo and player quality are the two most important aspects to a tribe. I won't go over all that stuff again here though, I wanted to just give a summary of points about things you need to do to be a good diplomat. This is not just for the person who plays the role of 'diplomat' in your tribe, this holds true for anyone on the player level up to the tribal scale. Just because you are a player with no formal position in your tribe, does not mean you are not a representative.
1) You hold the weight of your tribe on your shoulders. If you are rude and obnoxious to everyone who tries to contact you, then you are just securing tomorrows enemies. If you are too polite and seem weak, then again, you will be choosing tomorrows enemies. Get used to that idea, if you don't like it, best stay away from tribal leadership.
2) You will get many messages every day. There are lots of stupid 'can I haz ally plox' messages, don't let them wear you down.
3) Tribalwarsmap and TWStats will be your two best friends. Every time you hear of a new tribe, you should be looking at the map to see where they are in relation to you. Check out their members, look at their stats. Tribalwarsmap has a ton of features, if you aren't familiar with them then learn.
4) Don't outright reject people. If someone requests an alliance and you call them a pointwhore noob, you are making sure that they never want to speak to you again. You want to be respectful all the time, you never know when todays noob can be useful to you tomorrow. Instead of saying an outright 'no' to them, try saying 'not quite yet'. Let people think there is a chance for things to go the way they want in the future.
5) It's not about what you know, it's about who you know. You need to make sure you are approachable, sometimes all it takes is a single mail to someone and 10 minutes later you've got yourself a tribe who's willing to fight the same enemy as you. You speak to someone, and two months later they'll remember you as that guy they spoke to so they'll be inclined to mail you again with something new. You really do need to be the politician. I'm a strong advocate for using shared forums and mass-mailing tribes when the occasion calls for it. It increases your familiarity with people, and makes you more approachable. Mass-mail especially can be a really powerful tool. Here is an example of a mass-mail I sent recently:
(Background: My tribe(MF) entered into war with MAFIA, who then had CRG join in against us, this message was sent to all of CRG)
Just by making contact with this tribe, people mailed me back immediately offering to spy, offering to join my tribe if I wished, all sorts of things. After discussing this mail a little further with their leader, I was offered a ceasefire, within hours of war being declared. I'm not a peace loving surrender-monkey, so I'm not inclined to just accept peace and alliances with every tribe that offers it, but having the option there gives me strategic options, which is the core of diplomacy.
6) Your use of language is pretty important. You need to be able to linguistically side-step things when needed, you need to be able to word things with flair (clever wording is an intimidation technique on it's own!), you need to be able to read between the lines when someone mails you, you really do need to be a politician. I really do hate to say that, I don't much like politicians.
7) You need to have a familiarity with the capabilities of your tribemates. No point sparking off a war and not realising the whole frontline is useless.
8) It's also very important that you lead by example. Encouraging everyone to be a selfless team player becomes a little redundant if you don't demonstrate those qualities yourself.
Well that's all I can think of for now. I hope I've given you more appreciation for the role of diplomacy than just assigning blue, red or purple to other tribes on the map. It is a deep task with many facets, and I truly believe it is this depth that keeps players coming back year after year to have another attempt at this infernal game.[/SPOIL]
Good luck ya'll.
Anyway, that's all besides the point. In the short time that I've been here, I've written a few short bits and pieces for the benefit of my tribe. Little pseudo-guides for the most part, some of them just thought-provoking concepts and some of them a little bit more technical. I thought I'd share each piece here on the off chance that it could be of benefit to anyone who cares to read it, as I do believe in sharing the knowledge and teaching people wherever I can.
While for some of the more experienced TW readers here, you might find some of it a little bit obvious, keep in mind that you are not necessarily the target audience here. There is a little bit of crossover in the guides, I slapped most of these ones together pretty quick, so it doesn't quite have the organisations that I would have otherwise liked to provide.
If I had thought to store my older guides somewhere, I would have been able to post another 10+ good pieces, but unfortunately I didn't have that insight. If any of you have any of my (non-redundant) guides from previous worlds available, then it'd be great if you could post here to share it out.
Due to time restrictions I can't format these for the externals either, shouldn't be too much of a problem... I hope.
Farming with zomgTW
(Since the zomgtw website has been down, please use this replacement link until it is repaired)
[SPOIL]The Book of Hazad - An Excerpt
Farming with zomgTW
Here is a quick little farming guide I've slapped together for all you lovely folks.
As with all of my guides, they are free to use and share.
Don't be a douche though, acknowledge me as author!
*** This guide expects that you have premium and are familiar with it ***
Contents:
1) Farming with zomgTW
2) Bookmark farming with zomgTW
3) Bookmark farming with multiple villages
4) Bookmark farming for maximum efficiency
1) Farming
If you aren't sick of farming, you're either a weird, twisted little person or you aren't doing it right. It can be a real pain in the ass to send lots of farm runs out, but here's a trick to do it without even bothering yourself with the map.
If you aren't familiar with using scripts, then I suggest you look at some script guides and such. In this case, we are retrieving a script that will enter village coords and desired troops into the rally point with a single click, so you can simply press 'attack' and 'ok' without the need to consult the map. In fact, by using this script the neurons in your brain will likely become lazy and flaccid, so it might be best to read a book or draw a picture or something in between all the farming. Just do something with your life besides TW every now and then, please.
Back in the day when these scripts first appeared, it required a manual collection of village coordinates that you wished to farm. Thankfully with the invention of zomgTW, you can get a whole lot of farmable village coords painlessly. There's even a few custom criteria you can set for your search. Onwards to zomgTW!
www.zomgtw.net
1) Follow the above link. Select the world you are playing on. Click on 'Farm Finder'. Enter your account name where it is requested (you can enter multiple players if you want to share farms, but who wants to share?).
2) From this screen you can customize your village search somewhat. I won't insult your intelligence by explaining each of the criteria, you can figure this out on your own. What I will quickly outline though, is the 'Output type'.
'co-ords' - gives a list of coords. Easy.
'script' - Gives a basic script to run from the rally point.
'one script' - Gives a single script that can cover up to 30 villages
'links' - If you are a non-premium player you can save a list of links
'csv file' - Gives a list of hyperlinks.
3) Unless you otherwise know what you are doing, select 'script' from above.
4) It will think for a few moments, then it will give you the desired output script along with a second small script which resets the farming sequence back to the closest village. Slap that script in your quickbar, and get farming soldier!
If you aren't familiar with using scripts, then I suggest you look at some script guides and such. In this case, we are retrieving a script that will enter village coords and desired troops into the rally point with a single click, so you can simply press 'attack' and 'ok' without the need to consult the map. In fact, by using this script the neurons in your brain will likely become lazy and flaccid, so it might be best to read a book or draw a picture or something in between all the farming. Just do something with your life besides TW every now and then, please.
Back in the day when these scripts first appeared, it required a manual collection of village coordinates that you wished to farm. Thankfully with the invention of zomgTW, you can get a whole lot of farmable village coords painlessly. There's even a few custom criteria you can set for your search. Onwards to zomgTW!
www.zomgtw.net
1) Follow the above link. Select the world you are playing on. Click on 'Farm Finder'. Enter your account name where it is requested (you can enter multiple players if you want to share farms, but who wants to share?).
2) From this screen you can customize your village search somewhat. I won't insult your intelligence by explaining each of the criteria, you can figure this out on your own. What I will quickly outline though, is the 'Output type'.
'co-ords' - gives a list of coords. Easy.
'script' - Gives a basic script to run from the rally point.
'one script' - Gives a single script that can cover up to 30 villages
'links' - If you are a non-premium player you can save a list of links
'csv file' - Gives a list of hyperlinks.
3) Unless you otherwise know what you are doing, select 'script' from above.
4) It will think for a few moments, then it will give you the desired output script along with a second small script which resets the farming sequence back to the closest village. Slap that script in your quickbar, and get farming soldier!
2) Bookmark Farming
I'll explain the concept first, and then at the end I'll give step by step instructions on how to set it up.
The concept:
Go and have a look at one of your attack reports. You can see down the bottom there are a few handy links that look like this:
» Attack this village
» Attack again with the same troops
» Attack again with all troops
The one we want to look at today is the middle one, 'Attack again with the same troops'. Notice that if you press it, it takes you straight to the attack confirmation page, and all you have to do is press 'ok'.
What we used to do, was go through all our reports one by one, and save these links to our bookmarks. We could then open however many we want (I used to open 50 at a time), and we could then just roll through each tab and press 'ok'. Quick and easy farming, the problem was that it actually took quite a while to set up. That's where zomgTW comes into things:
www.zomgtw.net
This website has several pretty cool tools available, if you are unfamiliar with it then I strongly suggest you see what is on offer there. The tool we are looking at today though is the 'Bookmark Helper'. Basically what it does is from your reports page, it goes through and pulls the report ID out of each one and throws it into a link, which pretty much serves the same purpose as bookmarking the 'Attack again with all troops' link.
Instructions:
1) First thing you need to do is send your farm runs out. Right now I've got 400 LC, I've sent out 200 farming attacks at 200 different villages, each attack consisting of 2 LC. You can of course use the script obtained in section (1) of this guide to send out your attacks.
2) When you get your reports, put it in your archive (or better yet, create a new folder in your reports for this). This is important, because reports will disappear after a few days if you leave them in the default folder. You need to save them or it will not work for long (yeah and it should go without saying that you shouldn't manually delete them either)
3) If you get a yellow or red report, delete it. You don't want to keep throwing troops away one the same village for no reason.
4) Go to zomgtw (follow link above), find the world you are playing on, and click on 'Bookmark Helper'.
5) Follow the steps given on zomgtw.
6) It will give you a link to a page full of stored bookmarks. From here you can add additional reports, or you can start farming.
7) Now you can farm quickly, without thinking. All that freed up brain power can now be used to ponder how much of a travesty it was that Chewbacca never got a medal at the end of Star Wars.
The concept:
Go and have a look at one of your attack reports. You can see down the bottom there are a few handy links that look like this:
» Attack this village
» Attack again with the same troops
» Attack again with all troops
The one we want to look at today is the middle one, 'Attack again with the same troops'. Notice that if you press it, it takes you straight to the attack confirmation page, and all you have to do is press 'ok'.
What we used to do, was go through all our reports one by one, and save these links to our bookmarks. We could then open however many we want (I used to open 50 at a time), and we could then just roll through each tab and press 'ok'. Quick and easy farming, the problem was that it actually took quite a while to set up. That's where zomgTW comes into things:
www.zomgtw.net
This website has several pretty cool tools available, if you are unfamiliar with it then I strongly suggest you see what is on offer there. The tool we are looking at today though is the 'Bookmark Helper'. Basically what it does is from your reports page, it goes through and pulls the report ID out of each one and throws it into a link, which pretty much serves the same purpose as bookmarking the 'Attack again with all troops' link.
Instructions:
1) First thing you need to do is send your farm runs out. Right now I've got 400 LC, I've sent out 200 farming attacks at 200 different villages, each attack consisting of 2 LC. You can of course use the script obtained in section (1) of this guide to send out your attacks.
2) When you get your reports, put it in your archive (or better yet, create a new folder in your reports for this). This is important, because reports will disappear after a few days if you leave them in the default folder. You need to save them or it will not work for long (yeah and it should go without saying that you shouldn't manually delete them either)
3) If you get a yellow or red report, delete it. You don't want to keep throwing troops away one the same village for no reason.
4) Go to zomgtw (follow link above), find the world you are playing on, and click on 'Bookmark Helper'.
5) Follow the steps given on zomgtw.
6) It will give you a link to a page full of stored bookmarks. From here you can add additional reports, or you can start farming.
7) Now you can farm quickly, without thinking. All that freed up brain power can now be used to ponder how much of a travesty it was that Chewbacca never got a medal at the end of Star Wars.
3) Bookmark farming with multiple villages.
I've covered the details in the first 2 sections, so I'll keep this succinct.
Go to the Farm Finder on zomgTW, enter your desired details and select the 'one script' output type. This provides a single script that covers the selected villages with no doubling up of farms.
Using what you've learned in both sections (1) and (2), you can now easily save bookmarks across many of your villages.
Go to the Farm Finder on zomgTW, enter your desired details and select the 'one script' output type. This provides a single script that covers the selected villages with no doubling up of farms.
Using what you've learned in both sections (1) and (2), you can now easily save bookmarks across many of your villages.
4) Bookmark Farming for Maximum Efficiency
Ok so now that you're sick to death of sending out thousands of attacks every day, it's time to start thinking of ways you can make things more efficient. This does take a bit of time to set up, but it will result in a pretty huge increase in your efficiency.
The concept is simple; you measure the resource production in your farms, and you send the exact number of LC required to clear them on a regular basis.
For example, if a barb near you is producing 145 total resources every hour, then you can send 2 LC (160 carry capacity) to the village every hour to collect it. It doesn't have to be an hourly thing of course, you can set any time increment you wish, though the more frequently you do it the smaller the window is for someone else to take those resources in between.
To do this, you'll need to know how to do the bookmark farming already.
You'll also need some method of calculating the the number of units you need to send in your preferred time period. Fancy a bit of mental arithmetic? No? Oh well try this instead then:
Cheesy Battle Report Enhancer
javascript:$.getScript('http://bit.ly/twcheese_BRE');void 0
1) Scout a village.
2) Run the Battle Report Enhancer script on the report. Up in the 'Raiders' section, you can select 'periodically raid resource', select your desired timeframe and it will tell you how many troops you need to send periodically.
3) Attack with the suggested number of troops.
4) Bookmark your reports (use zomgTW, same method as above)
5) Send your troops out hourly and feel that smug self satisfaction in your efficiency.
Managing reports for all this can be a bit messy. Be organized.
The concept is simple; you measure the resource production in your farms, and you send the exact number of LC required to clear them on a regular basis.
For example, if a barb near you is producing 145 total resources every hour, then you can send 2 LC (160 carry capacity) to the village every hour to collect it. It doesn't have to be an hourly thing of course, you can set any time increment you wish, though the more frequently you do it the smaller the window is for someone else to take those resources in between.
To do this, you'll need to know how to do the bookmark farming already.
You'll also need some method of calculating the the number of units you need to send in your preferred time period. Fancy a bit of mental arithmetic? No? Oh well try this instead then:
Cheesy Battle Report Enhancer
javascript:$.getScript('http://bit.ly/twcheese_BRE');void 0
1) Scout a village.
2) Run the Battle Report Enhancer script on the report. Up in the 'Raiders' section, you can select 'periodically raid resource', select your desired timeframe and it will tell you how many troops you need to send periodically.
3) Attack with the suggested number of troops.
4) Bookmark your reports (use zomgTW, same method as above)
5) Send your troops out hourly and feel that smug self satisfaction in your efficiency.
Managing reports for all this can be a bit messy. Be organized.
Guide brought to you by Hazad
Special thanks to Allyboo and any other wonderful people responsible for zomgTW
Cheesasaurus too, for making that gnarly script.[/SPOIL]
Attack Tagger which Includes the backtime:
[SPOIL]Before I start - yes you need premium for this. Also, Internet Explorer is pretty crap for using scripts. Firefox and Opera are the browsers of choice (Opera also has some sweet other technical abilities that make it the #1 choice for TW players)
Attack tagging scripts are probably the first scripts you should familiarise yourself with. You should always have a tagger ready to use, never know when you will log on with 1000+ incoming attacks later in the game.
When you have an incoming attack (get someone to send a fake at you if you need to), you just click on the attack link to view the attack overview screen. You can run an attack tagger from there, and it gives you some good options for renaming the attack.
If you are new to scripts, you might be better off just copying the script into your quickbar and trying it out a few times. The information I have included afterwards, while not difficult at all, can sometimes be a bit confusing the less tech-savvy among us.
This script is only valid for w67. It is very easy to make it available for other worlds, just ask.
Code:
javascript:c='{unit} {sent} {coords} {player} {duration} {distance} {return} {attack_id}';p=["Scout","LC","HC","Axe","Sword","Ram","***Noble***"];function V(){return 1;}window.onerror=V;function Z(){d=(window.main||self).document;aid=d.getElementById('editInput').parentNode.innerHTML.match(/id\=(\d+)/)[1];function J(e){vv=e.match(/\d+\|\d+/g);return (vv?vv[vv.length-1].match(/((\d+)\|(\d+))/):null);}function K(e){f=parseInt(e,10);return(f>9?f:'0'+f);}function L(g,e){return g.getElementsByTagName(e);}function N(g){return g.innerHTML;}function M(g){return N(L(g,'a')[0]);}function O(){return k.insertRow(E++);}function W(f){return B.insertCell(f);}function P(g,e){g.innerHTML=e;return g;}function X(e){C=B.appendChild(d.createElement('th'));return P(C,e);}function Y(f){return K(f/U)+':'+K(f%(U)/T )+':'+K(f%T);}U=3600;T=60;R='table';S='width';s=L(d,R);for(j=0;j<s.length;j++){s[j].removeAttribute(S);if(s[j].className=='main'){s=L(L(s[j],'tbody')[0],R);break;}}D=0;for(j=0;j<s.length;j++){s[j].removeAttribute(S);if(s[j].className='vis'){k=s[j];if(t=k.rows){D=t.length;break;}}}for(E=0;E<D;E++){l=t[E];m=(u=l.cells)?u.length:0;if(m){u[m-1].colSpan=5-m;if(N(u[0])=='Arrival:'){Q=new Date(N(u[1]).replace(/<.*/i,''));}else{if(N(u[0])=='Arrival in:'){v=N(u[1]).match(/\d+/ig);}}if(E==1){G=M(u[2]);}if(E==2){w=J(M(u[1]));}if(E==4){x=J(M(u[1]));}}}y=v[0]*U+v[1]*T+v[2]*1;n=w[2]-x[2];o=w[3]-x[3];F=Math.sqrt(n*n+o*o);H=F.toFixed(2);E=D-2;s=L(k,'input');i=s[1];h=s[0];h.size=T;B=O();P(W(0),'Distance:').colSpan=2;P(W(1),H+' Fields').colSpan=2;B=O();X('Unit');X('Sent');X('Duration');X('Name to');c=c.replace(/\{coords\}/i,w[1]).replace(/\{distance\}/i,H).replace(/\{player\}/i,G);for(j in p){z=Math.round([8.00000000128,8.8888888888889,9.7777777751704,15.99999999488,19.55555555493,26.666666666667,31.111111111941][j]*T*F);A=z-y;if(A>0){I=Y(z);B=O();P(W(0),p[j]);P(W(1),A<T&&'just now'||A<U&&Math.floor(A/T)+' mins ago'||Y(A)+' ago');P(W(2),I);C=W(3);q=C.appendChild(i.cloneNode(1));r=C.appendChild(h.cloneNode(1));r.id='I'+j;r.value=c.replace(/\{duration\}/i,I).replace(/\{sent\}/i,new Date(Q.valueOf()-z*1000).toString().replace(/\w+\s*/i,'').replace(/(\d*:\d*:\d*)(.*)/i,'$1')).replace(/\{return\}/i,new Date(Q.valueOf()+z*1000).toString().replace(/\w+\s*/i,'').replace(/(\d*:\d*:\d*)(.*)/i,'$1')).replace(/\{unit\}/i,p[j]).replace(/\{attack_id\}/i,aid);q.onmousedown=new Function('h.value=d.getElementById(\'I'+j+'\').value;');}}}Z();If you don't know how to use scripts, ask someone who does who can explain it to you.
The reason why I like this script particularly, is that it has the {return} variable in it (bolded and underlined below). This is the backtime, the time when the enemy troops return back to the point of origin. Brilliant for backtiming.
Now, see that bit up the top of the script that reads like this:
Those are the instructions the script has for changing the name of the attack.
When you run the script, it will rename the attack something like this:
I colour coded it so you can see which variable relates to which output. Bit of a information overload isn't it? This is modifiable, which is good. You can cut out some of those terms (including the squiggly brackets around them), and you can enter other thing to make it easier on the eye.
Mine script currently says:
and when I tag an attack it looks like this:
BT = Backtime.
Those numbers at the end are the attack ID. Very useful to learn about reading attack IDs, but that is a guide for another day.[/SPOIL]
ID Tagging with Opera (this is an old one)
[SPOIL]The Book of Hazad - An Excerpt
The art of ID-tagging
This is a guide I wrote a long time ago for my tribe on w32.
This might not be so useful to you early in a world, but it would certainly be of use later down the road. The cool thing about this method, is that it is a very fast way to tag incoming attacks, but it also gets more accurate the more incomings you actually have.
This is a notoriously difficult concept to grasp for newer players, so don't get too frustrated if it doesn't make sense to you at first (I'm sure I could re-write it to make it easier to understand, but I don't have the time).
[/SPOIL]Hazad said:First of all, this guide is entirely AreYouKidden's. I am only writing it because he is too lazy and I am bored out of my head right now.
Ok so we can not always be sitting at the computer effectively tagging incoming attacks. Sometimes you can log on and unexpectedly find yourself with hundreds or thousands of attacks that weren't there when you went to sleep.
There is a method however, of easily comparing the attack IDs of attacks and labelling them efficiently. The best part is, it becomes more reliable with more incomings to tag.
You will need a few things to do this properly:
1) Opera
2) Understanding the use of the Opera Links panel
3) An incoming attack tagger script
4) Premium of course
Ok if you got these things you are ready to tag like a mofo.
Step 1
Go to your incomings page, and press Ctrl + Shift + L.
This is similar to the opera links panel, however it is a Links Page
Ok check out this image.
http://i33.tinypic.com/10glc3o.jpg
The first thing you need to do is enter the work 'attack' into the text box. It will filter out all the unneeded links. (see red circle in the pic above)
See the green circle? When you push on the 'address' tab it will order the links via their address (url).
If you look at the blue arrow, you can see the attack ID is in the address. This replaces the need for using the sort script to help label attacks.
Step 2
Ok now your attacks are all in order by their attack IDs. It is time to open them up and tag em.
If you have lots of attacks landing, it might be wise to hit the 'Lock' button on the panel to prevent annoying refreshes. This button is highlighted in green in the pic below.
Ctrl+click on top one
Shift+click on bottom one (or your desired number)
Right click > Open in background tab
Open up 50 or so unmarked attacks.
http://i34.tinypic.com/j911d3.jpg
Step 3
Run through each tab pressing your attack tagger script.
Now I will post a few pics for this part of it, because it is tricky to explain. Basically what you want to see is a specific pattern. Since the attacks are all opened in order of their ID, you should be able to pick out some options here.
AYK sent me these pics, because at the moment he has a few thousand incomings that he could pick from. I put numbers next to the corresponding attacks, so you can see an actual example of this backtagging being used.
Prepare to be impressed with my use of Paint.
In this pic we see the attacks have been arranged in order by their ID.
Now in this one AYK has opened up each attack individually to show the timing options
If you understand what I have written so far, you can see that he could have potentially marked those attack accurately, even 34 hours after they had been sent at him.
Using this method you can now effectively tag many incomings accurately. Don't try to tell me that's not a good thing!
Strategy, Diplomacy and Propaganda
[Spoil]The Book of Hazad - An Excerpt
Strategy and Diplomacy
Intro
Ok I wanted to write a little bit about strategy, because I'm afraid that some people just don't get it. There are a few really common misconceptions about diplomacy, and what it all means. These misconceptions seems to permeate through the 'average' (and less than average) tribes and it really puts them at a major disadvantage. This is just a concept piece, nothing too specific, but maybe a few people can learn about other ways to think about their surroundings. I'm sure while reading this you might consider that it all sounds a bit obvious, but consider whether you are using every single tactic available as a tribe to overcome an enemy, I bet there is always something more you can do. This is also something that extends from both the player level, up to the whole tribe level.
Strategy
Strategy might not be what you think it is.
Consider the Trojan Horse for example. Historical accounts state that the battle of Troy was won via this delightfully deceptive tactic.
The Spartans, knowing that their numbers were severely lower than the Persians, sought the narrow pass in the mountains at Thermopylae to hold them off for as long as possible.
These are just two popular records of different strategies. Throughout history there are so many examples of feigning retreat, guerrilla warfare, blocking retreat, striking a weak spot etc etc. The list of tactics is long, wars are almost never fought 1v1 on a level battlefield, and even if they are both sides are constantly moving cavalry, infantry and archers (or marines, tanks and drones) around to get an advantage.
In Tribalwars you are dealing with people. People can be clever, they can be manipulative, they can be deceptive. Keep this in mind always. Every mail you send and every post you make in your tribe forums, you need to consider that these might be seen by the enemy. Be careful with the way you word things, try to say things in such a way that you could justify it later if needed.
You need to be thinking constantly about ways you can get ahead of your competition. Don't just sit idle during a war and throw nukes at each other, THINK. Even when you aren't in a war, that's no excuse not to be using every card in your deck to try to get ahead. Here are a couple examples:
1) It's all about numbers
Don't fight alone if you can avoid it. Having multiple tribes fighting the same target is a bit of a no-brainer. This idea of tribes fighting honorable battles is garbage. More than likely they'll be happy to have another tribe start attacking you, so don't give them that opportunity.
Note: I'm going to immediately contradict myself and say that you don't HAVE to gangbang some tribe every time. Make sure you and your tribe members have the balls to fight a larger target. If you always gang up on your enemies, then all of a sudden you are the one getting gangbanged, your members might be inclined to shit themselves and bail on you. You've got to find the balance, hardened members who aren't afraid of being the underdog, or protecting them with diplomacy for a quick win, this can be very tough sometimes indeed.
2) Strong players = strong tribe.
In retrospect, this should be point #1. There is no substitute for having strong players. When I say 'strong' players, I don't necessarily mean the ultra fast growers, though growth is certainly a factor. A strong player also isn't someone with a huge number of troops, though this is also a factor. A strong player to me is someone who grows at a decent rate, is regularly and reliably active, maintains a good number of troops, and has the knowledge and desire to use those troops intelligently. A defensive player with a ton of troops is useless if they are never willing to support a tribemate. An uber active top 20 account is also pretty useless if they are only concerned with their own growth, with no interest in the affairs of the tribe.
Weak players can often be really detrimental to a tribe. This is often the essence of why mass recruiting tribes are so weak. Even though there might be 15 strong players in there, the other 30+ members might be dragging the tribe down. The weak ones will bleed support, not be able to contribute offensively, and in the end you'd be better off feeding them to the stronger players. Your tribe will also be more appealing to other strong players who are deciding which tribe to join, so this can often have an accelerating effect for your tribe.
Don't be afraid to kick people who aren't performing. You don't have to be a douche about it, you can be polite, maybe give them a few tips on how they can improve next time, but make sure the quality is always being selected for.
3) Creating the tribal mentality.
This can often be the hardest thing to do in a tribe. You want everyone in the tribe to firmly believe that the tribe is worth fighting for. There are so many factors here that it would be a major essay by the time I cover everything. If your tribe doesn't use skype are will be at a pretty big disadvantage in this area. Skype is a great way to discuss all the shit going on in TW (and real life) in a more easily digestible manner than tribe forums. If you know that your tribemate nearby follows the same football team as you, likes listening to the same shitty death metal as you, are you more or less likely to want to fight to save their ass when they are in trouble? Yeah, that's why it's important.
Getting people involved in the running of the tribe is a good way to create enthusiasm too. Too often there is a rift between leadership and members. They need to know that you are worth following, they need to know that you are an active leader. As long as the information isn't 'sensitive', make sure you post it for everyone to see. Ask them 'should we attack tribe A or B next?', even if you already know who you will be going for next, ask them the question, and try to persuade them to your perspective through discussion. Let yourself be swayed if someone comes up with a good counterargument though. Your players will often have good suggestions and advice, and even if they don't their questions can often make you do more research into the topic. The cycle feeds off each other.
4) Diplomacy
Diplomacy is so much more than just colours on the map. If your diplomatic agreements were made like this:
Tribe A - "Want to be allies?"
Tribe B - "ok"
Then chances are your alliances aren't worth a thing. They are destined to fail as quick as they were made. Give it some context, please. Make mutual protection pacts against a certain tribe, or join together with an ally to attack an enemy. Or agree to a NAP with a tribe because they are a barrier between you and another tribe that you'd rather not have a border with just yet. Look at the greater image, think outside the box, and think about what you are doing. Allying everyone around you serves no purpose except making you feel safe behind an ally cushion, and this has a very very high tendency to end in failure for you.
There are so many options, agreements and demands your can make of others, why would you restrict yourself to the boring old ally, NAP or enemy options? If you want to know who the competition is allied to, why not make it a condition of a NAP that they always disclose their current diplomatic agreements? If your feeling devious, agree to fight a common enemy and then don't fight. Watch as the tribes around you destroy themselves while you sip wine and giggle at it all (though there is a lot of room for things to backfire when you do this).
You can make any demands, conditions or requests that you want. Stop being so 2 dimensional in your thinking.
5) Politics and Propaganda (pnp)
The externals are certainly a good place to present yourself. If you make well thought out posts you will be held in much higher esteem than if you don't. If you try to keep your posts on a positive tone, it can open up so many doors for you later on. People will often want to recruit me, based purely on the fact they assume I know what I'm doing from my forum posts (oh, how wrong they are!). Other tribes will also hold you in higher esteem if you post well, don't underestimate how important it can be.
PnP does not end at the external forums though. The way you present yourself in-game plays a big part of it. Whenever you post on your own forums, you are selling the brand name that is YOU. Your own tribemates will like you more if you represent yourself well on your own forums. Similarly, if you have shared forums you are representing not only yourself but your tribe. Mailing the opposition, same deal. In fact, I'm a big fan of mass mailing the whole enemy tribe for a nice bit of in-game pnp. Just by breaking the ice you'd be surprised how many people will tell you they aren't happy and are willing to spy.
Just like I said in the diplomacy segment, think outside the box. You're playing against humans here, you can appeal to them, intimidate them, seduce them. Don't feel like your options are limited, explore new options.[/Spoil]
Quick and Dirty guide for Diplomatting
[SPOIL]The Book of Hazad - An Excerpt
Quick and Dirty Methods of Diplomacy
Since I'm leaving the diplomat seat vacant in this tribe, I thought I'd post a couple quick points about the way I like to do diplomacy.
As I've said in my other piece about strategy and diplomacy, I think that diplo and player quality are the two most important aspects to a tribe. I won't go over all that stuff again here though, I wanted to just give a summary of points about things you need to do to be a good diplomat. This is not just for the person who plays the role of 'diplomat' in your tribe, this holds true for anyone on the player level up to the tribal scale. Just because you are a player with no formal position in your tribe, does not mean you are not a representative.
1) You hold the weight of your tribe on your shoulders. If you are rude and obnoxious to everyone who tries to contact you, then you are just securing tomorrows enemies. If you are too polite and seem weak, then again, you will be choosing tomorrows enemies. Get used to that idea, if you don't like it, best stay away from tribal leadership.
2) You will get many messages every day. There are lots of stupid 'can I haz ally plox' messages, don't let them wear you down.
3) Tribalwarsmap and TWStats will be your two best friends. Every time you hear of a new tribe, you should be looking at the map to see where they are in relation to you. Check out their members, look at their stats. Tribalwarsmap has a ton of features, if you aren't familiar with them then learn.
4) Don't outright reject people. If someone requests an alliance and you call them a pointwhore noob, you are making sure that they never want to speak to you again. You want to be respectful all the time, you never know when todays noob can be useful to you tomorrow. Instead of saying an outright 'no' to them, try saying 'not quite yet'. Let people think there is a chance for things to go the way they want in the future.
5) It's not about what you know, it's about who you know. You need to make sure you are approachable, sometimes all it takes is a single mail to someone and 10 minutes later you've got yourself a tribe who's willing to fight the same enemy as you. You speak to someone, and two months later they'll remember you as that guy they spoke to so they'll be inclined to mail you again with something new. You really do need to be the politician. I'm a strong advocate for using shared forums and mass-mailing tribes when the occasion calls for it. It increases your familiarity with people, and makes you more approachable. Mass-mail especially can be a really powerful tool. Here is an example of a mass-mail I sent recently:
(Background: My tribe(MF) entered into war with MAFIA, who then had CRG join in against us, this message was sent to all of CRG)
Just by making contact with this tribe, people mailed me back immediately offering to spy, offering to join my tribe if I wished, all sorts of things. After discussing this mail a little further with their leader, I was offered a ceasefire, within hours of war being declared. I'm not a peace loving surrender-monkey, so I'm not inclined to just accept peace and alliances with every tribe that offers it, but having the option there gives me strategic options, which is the core of diplomacy.
6) Your use of language is pretty important. You need to be able to linguistically side-step things when needed, you need to be able to word things with flair (clever wording is an intimidation technique on it's own!), you need to be able to read between the lines when someone mails you, you really do need to be a politician. I really do hate to say that, I don't much like politicians.
7) You need to have a familiarity with the capabilities of your tribemates. No point sparking off a war and not realising the whole frontline is useless.
8) It's also very important that you lead by example. Encouraging everyone to be a selfless team player becomes a little redundant if you don't demonstrate those qualities yourself.
Well that's all I can think of for now. I hope I've given you more appreciation for the role of diplomacy than just assigning blue, red or purple to other tribes on the map. It is a deep task with many facets, and I truly believe it is this depth that keeps players coming back year after year to have another attempt at this infernal game.[/SPOIL]
Good luck ya'll.
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