Deleted User - 3135
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Spent quite a while in this game, it is scary to think that it has been three years or so. And after a lot of successes, and also a fair few failures, I can say Bloodhood is being laid to rest. Though this is not a goodbye thread, I made one of those a year ago, and still came back for a last world. No, this is in fact, a sort of guide, or actually more like a collection of tips put together by myself. I'm not going to try make this mind-boggingly complex and in-depth strategy that will confuse and be too ideological. This will simply be some of the best tips and comments on issues that I think a leader would be best reading. It should be useful to beginners and more advanced leaders alike, and I will cover any more issues should there be a request to. I have put the chapters in spoilers, some are quite short, but some are very lengthy. Enjoy.
Leadership role
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How useful is a Leader?
The answer is not as easy as yes or no, not because I can complicate it, but because there are two sides to the issue. Essentially, the issue is about, what is more in important in a tribe, the quality of the membership base? Or the quality of the leader? The answer is not so hard to understand. Looking at a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being the membership base being the most important and 10 being the leader is most important; at the beginning of a game, the position on the scale is 10 with the leadership being most important. As the game moves on, the scale slowly falls from 10 to 1. This does not happen quickly, and is in fact most likely rather slow. On the scale, it would only get to below 5 probably when many players are getting above 250K points. This isn't something random I've shaked up but a genuine ideal. The impact of a leadership on a tribe in the beginning of the world, irrespective of premade or other, is huge; diplomacy, recruiting, general management of the tribe and P&P have the largest effect at this point in the game. Due to this, a tribes success relies upon the ability of the leader. Once you get further into the game, co-ordination and the players themselves take more of a role in how the tribe does, as player mobility between tribes becomes greatly decreased and the tribe success starts to slowly single-handedly rely on how that tribe does in war. The leader becomes more of a motivator and fighter himself rather than a diplomat, recruiter, or even P&Per.
Leadership Structure
Fear not, the above did have a point to it. Since assuming the above is correct, you now get onto important issues on how the structure of the leadership should be laid out. Which again will be matched to the time scale in the world, due to how important a leader is.
Leading me to say that at the start of the world, when leadership is more important, it is very important that there is a sole leader; and that this sole leader is up to standard, that means good on P&P, good at persuading people, being proactive, friendly and active. In having this, the sole leader is then needed to be able to give the tribe the direction it needs, able to recruit in what areas he/she wants to and do whatever deals necessary. It is far more efficient to have just one leader, in terms of decision making, knowledge, and the workings of a tribe. At a time when leadership is most important what you do not want is a reactive, not proactive, 'council' that vote on decisions. You may love democracy, but remember that having one leader rather than a few is actually more democratic, as long as everyone consents to that leader being the leader. And if your in the tribe; you do consent.
As you get further and further into the game, and co-ordination gets more important, and the leadership is perhaps less influential on the tribes success, this is when a tribe would want to broaden its leadership. Every player goes through activity issues, to then rely on this player can be unreliable and for that player to be relied on co-ordinating on top of everything else it can be too dependant on that leader, and as such, an unnecessary risk. You will also find that many players as you get through the world will develop a great number of personal friendships with other players, these can often be utilised if that player with the contacts is in the leadership. For these two reasons, it is often then best as you get deeper into a world, to start to spread responsibility, one player taking on everything is no longer such a great idea. Especially when you now want your main leaders responsibility to be less of a diplomat, but more of a war leader. I would still argue for a defined leadership structure, so that decision making can be decisive if things are looking desperate or intribe arguments are starting to escalate; but generally, delegation of leadership should start to increase the more you get into the game.[/spoil]
Recruiting
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Often an issue to all tribes. More inexperienced players it is a matter of how to recruit? What to do? Well, in the interest of being more accessible, I will simply say, befriend. The best way to recruit is make friends. Get friendly with local players doing well then entice them into your tribe. It will help you once they are in your tribe also as they will be much more likely to follow your word and be more loyal whilst more active on forum and creating a feel good atmosphere. Don't send some tacky recruiting mail, just very simply, talk to them. Be humble, not arrogant, be friendly, not hostile. If you can't get over this simple hurdle, that as a tactic is hugely effective, then you shouldn't really be a leader.
Then to the issue of who to recruit? Well it relates to my point above. Talking to a player is the best way of knowing what that player will be like. You can judge their activity, their likelihood of being active on a forum and also their experience. Don't start relying on something stupid like troop counts (earlier on) and OD, just talk to players who are doing well (say top 40/50 continent), get a good feel for them and you should know whether they will fit in, don't be afraid to think, no, they won't fit in.
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Diplomacy
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Diplomacy, perhaps one of the key roles of a leader. A player called Teyla perhaps once outlined to me how important it is. Teyla was one of the early giants of a female player in early TW. She co-created 6XIG6 (later became ROA) in world 3, which I was in and later in world 4 saw her create the tribe w00t, a name that gained success on multiple worlds and included such players as Litwol, Free-eek Alphabonkers, Matt- and Stonerbus. W00t was also the tribe that took down one of the most talented premades ever made, OA. Just a bit of description for you there, but she said to me, that whoever controls the diplomacy, controls the tribe. That, whoever does the diplomacy, is the leader. She said that diplomacy was all-important. Where maybe I would argue that issues such as recruiting are often underplayed, she brings up a big point. Diplomacy, is nearly always the main deciding factor in a tribe’s future.
What is Diplomacy?
Always remember that essentially, diplomacy is primarily a defence mechanism, a way of deflecting the blow a tribe may give you by giving them multiple enemies or quite simply, divide and conquer. Do not see it as an offence technique, it is a way of weakening your enemy or strengthening your defence, it will not grow your tribe, only your players conquering villages will do that, so never rely on it alone. Coalitions are useless to be in unless you are going to take advantage of the situation and go in there and do some damage, take some villages, get something for yourself.
Merging
Let's start with merging, it is to do with diplomacy even if not to do with your diplomacy list. Many people are opposed to merges. Why? Because it is a fast track option to more land, more points, higher rank. It seems like taking the easy option. First thing to say, don't be afraid of the easy option if it is the best option! But secondly, you must judge if it is the correct option, for it may not be that at all.
First thing that must be considered is do you need it? What will merging a tribe into you add to your tribe? What location do they hold, how good, active, and talkative are they? Some of the questions that you may want to ask yourself. For example, if you are a k44 tribe what will merging a K56 rank one continent tribe do? Will they really be able to support you? There are four occasions I suggest merging may be a good option:
1. When you control an area but barely, and do not have the player base and density in the area that you may need and may give you a weak spot as a result.
2. Manic inactivity. If you have a lot of inactivity and have a load of actives wanting to merge, then them joining should strongly be considered so that the burden of inactivity is relatively less.
3. Bringing in more experienced players to the fold if you have a lack and there are not so many good recruiting prospects, this is when merging is more like recruiting several players at once.
4. Last choice. If things are not looking so well, a larger tribe is gunning for war that you think you can't win, your tribe is dwindling in numbers and unable to keep up, you are losing a war and may need help. Merging could be an answer.
Merging as explained above can bring its advantages. But just remember its disadvantages:
1. Possible knock to morale. This is likely, to happen, since you may lose that community feel that you had before, which may take some time to get back as players don't know each other so well and feel less inclined to speak.
2. Disloyalty, some of those players you bring in may already be disloyal to their current tribes, nevermind yours, this is a risky move, bringing in players you have not built any kind of relationship with, loyalty issues will be present.
3. Leadership split. If you start bargaining for leadership positions, things could start to get messy soon, to an extreme length even a power struggle. Even if you are the one firmly in charge, barons may start to fight, it does happen.
4. Loss of credibility. You are likely to suffer a huge knock to your reputation if ever you had one, and tribes are more likely to look down on you, if it was a sizeable merge.
5. Increased inactivity as players begin to question whether they feel like staying as the tribe they were fighting for is no longer existing, it can take a lot of effort for some to join in with a new tribe.
6. The refugee problem. And not only that, possible diplomacy problems that may come with them, and issues others have with them.
Merging is risky business, but done in the right circumstances, and done correctly, it can work.
To NAP or not to NAP?
I will say, do not be scared of NAPs. Many put forward the argument that NAPs are useless because all you are doing is limiting your targets, where that tribe will not help you against an enemy. But as I said above, divide and conquer, is a very good technique. However small or big a tribe, there is no shame in putting them for later so that you can go after a tribe gunning for you in the present. You will be much more successful in war by taking one enemy down then another afterwards rather than taking two enemies at the same time. As the Native American saying goes:
“If you chase two rabbits, you will lose them both."
Do not be afraid to use NAPs to your advantage, though obviously hide the craft of doing so, or you may not look so good on the forums. Though whether you say that there is a possibility of more than a NAP in the future or not, to be honest, a tribe is being foolish to think that you will never think of breaking that deal you have. How to break up a NAP? Well people normally come up with all sorts of excuses, sniping, recruiting refugees or just plain we felt like it. If a tribe breaks a NAP with you for some reason or another, don’t believe it because of that reasoning the likelihood is, they want your villages, pure and simple.
Allies
This is always seen as the big issue of diplomacy. How many, where, who, and what. My first bit of advice is that there is no perfect number, you could have one, you could have 4, it depends on your situation. However, do not get too many. For every extra ally you get, you devalue your other alliances. And devaluing alliances is never a good thing, you devalue them, and they become nothing more than glorified NAPs. And if that happens, they will be less likely to co-operate in your plans, and become increasingly unreliable. Do not let that happen. You need to know your allies plans, you need to co-ordinate your plans alongside theirs and you should often seek to give advice and help (without damaging yourself), for they will normally return the favour. Be your allies friends, and you will find a relationship of trust building up so that you are secure in that alliance.
Secrecy or not?
Many often ignore this issue, but I think it quite a large one. It is the issue of whether you make some of your tribe’s diplomacy known, or not. Now there is never much use in showing off your NAPs, but alliances is a different matter altogether. Some tribes often show their alliances, and this does have it’s advantages. If a tribe is going to war with you, they will be much less hasty about it, for they do not want to land themselves in a two on one scenario. However, as they say, knowledge is power, and to deny them that knowledge may often be held back due to not knowing your alliances. However, I suggest that most tribes will often lead with ignorance, or get some kind of backup plan should you happen to have any unexpected allegiances. But whatever you decide, remember, you are trying to use them knowing or not knowing in an attempt to put them off warring you. You will have the advantage by choosing your wars, not letting them choose them for you, so holding them off is often a better idea.
Coalitions and Alliance blocks
We seem them so many times. Mostly early in the game, against tribes that is taking over a continent, smaller tribes band together in an attempt to overcome that tribe through numbers. But as I explained earlier, diplomacy is a defence mechanism, to draw out fire. Since none of those tribes normally are able to give much damage themselves, the coalition usually fails due to them just being picked off one by one without much harm being given to the tribe being ganged up on.
But that is only the early example of a coalition, there are many later examples also. Though called coalitions, sometimes it turns into a bit of a world war. In an attempt to make sure they do not get outnumbered, a tribe may have a few allies, and are known publicly, so that tribes do not attack them since they know they will be taking on too much on. Though that then turns into the tribe wanting to attack only being able to, if they bring in a string of alliances so that you have alliance systems against each other. It is rare that this happens, for alliances often cross-over, but it is not totally unheard of. It will mostly happen if a sort of more than two alliance has been created, such as the CA (central alliance) in w3 or the LFKD alliance in world 5 and so on. Basically those tribes agree to only be allied to each other, which creates a series of ally blocks. Whether this is a good idea or not, it is up to you, where you will find much of the diplomacy job is already done for you, finding yourself on the losing side is never nice. But what it does do is put much more dependence on your tribes fighting skill rather than a leaders diplomacy skills, so do what suits your tribe.
Be 'nice'
Last tip on diplomacy, be nice. Be respectful, look to be honest, even if you’re not. In this game, people are not amazingly brilliant at thinking with their heads all too often. Give them a few compliments and so forth will often have them doing what you want. Present a positive image of yourself and you will find the deal you get for your tribe is a lot better. Do not let issues such as pride and arrogance get in the way of getting the best deal for your tribe.
Though don't be afraid to present a false image, be cunning, or whatever else if it comes to your advantage. But on the surface, observer the niceties.
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Play the game
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Learn to play before you lead.
And when I say play, I mean able to play every part of the game very well. That means being good at various aspects from lightning startups to early and late stages of nobling. This is such a huge bit of advice that it is difficult to explain how important it is. Not all of the best players are best of leaders, but the best of leaders are the best of players.
Starting with early on. A tribe can be built quite easily upon your success at the start, even at the 500-point level. Secure yourself a top 20 spot (not too early on for obvious reasons), and all players whoever they are will give you immediate respect. People will be more likely to listen to you, you will be able to befriend those other players doing well around you easier, and developing loyalty around you, and your tribe will go from strength to strength. Early on there is no better indication for a player than how good a leader is in that tribe, so do well, and you hand yourself a huge advantage. Throughout the game being a larger player tends to grant respect, but early on it is often crucial in recruiting a member base that you want.
Later on in the game, though recruiting becomes less of an issue and your tribe is not just judged upon you as a player, and rather your leadership skills, being able to play is an essential part of leadership. If you do not understand how the game works in detail, and are not able to think of possible defence, offence and co-ordination tactics that work well then your tribe is given a huge burden. And do not think defence and offence are just co-ordinating issues, since they are more often than not tie closely in with expansion and diplomacy. And to master both of those you have to know the game inside and out and be a great player yourself. Whilst knowing the rules so that you do not go over that line is also essential.
Leading from the front
This is perhaps an area I never actually followed, despite knowing the huge advantages it brings late game. I have often been criticised for this point and I myself acknowledge it. Leading from the front can often bring large advantages. For one thing, you are running into the heart of battle, some players will always be fearful of jumping into a battle they can’t win, if you jump in without hesitation, it is likely to put some of those on the fence head first into the battle. Secondly, you are able to assess the situation yourself, realise what is going right and wrong in a war, and know the next best step to take. How to adapt to a situation, and how to get the upper hand are often easier when in the battle yourself. Thirdly, late game is all about attacking and co-ordinating, by playing yourself you are granting your tribe a player you know will never betray, since you are the tribe.
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Motivation
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This is perhaps a point relating to my first points. Motivation. It is an influence a leader can give right through the game, from the start to the end. Influence players to be more active, more aggressive, and more responsive to commands. Do not underestimate how the smallest of words can have an impact. Tribalwars like many things works on the margin, you want to increase that margin as much as possible to give you the best chance possible, every bit of motivation given by a circular or your active presence on your own forum or on P&P can have a huge effect overall. I may only write a small paragraph on it, compared to my other points, but it is very important.
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P&P
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I'm not going to lie and say my P&P presence was down to me wanting to further my tribes interest, genuinely its because I wanted to be on there. However, it is still important to a tribe, and deciding to stay off it because you think it childish could have bad effects. Early on it is important in diplomacy, and recruiting, your image can often effect the decisions of others, meaning giving a good image can be very important. Further through the game, relates to my above point of motivation. Doing well on P&P against opponents can spur on a tribe to improve in a war. If you can sustain a good P&P presence whilst losing a war, in a lot of cases you can sustain that losing streak, often for months, maybe more. The last reason for P&P is using it as a tool. It is very easy to spot many tribes attitudes to other tribes by reading what they post, whilst being able to mislead other tribes yourself. You can make them underestimate, overestimate you, or even just befriend them. Compliment them indirectly, and they will take the compliment without you looking to be sucking up or looking like you want something. Don't underestimate P&P as a tool, it can be used, perhaps myself I used it too much, since on more than one world I have been called a politician, but nevertheless, it can be used very effectively.
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Pro-activity
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Now I've gone over a few very in your face aspects, perhaps a bit more less covered aspects. First, pro-activity. This will always be important in a world, but it is essential early on. Pro-active, not reactive. There are numerous opportunities, be them merges (yes they can work), diplomacy deals, possible recruiting or anything else you can imagine. Even just forming relationships with opponents that may be essential later on. I once decided to look at the most active players on P&P and befriended them ingame, so that they would then give me and my tribe good ratings on P&P. A pretty cunning tactic, but you are there for your tribe, not moral goodness.
But the essential point is, that with pro-activity comes opportunity, good image, reputation and furthering of your tribe. Remember, if your not going forwards, your going backwards.
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Vision
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Always my favourite... vision. Give your tribe a vision. A clear objective of what you want to be doing, a direction, a path. Give your tribe inspiration and direction and you will see them act more as a tribe and less of a group of players. You will see they will become more active and more willing to fight for the tribe rather than themselves. And the feel-good atmosphere can have a spiraling effect upwards often, and ties in with the issue of motivation. Give your tribe vision, and often, your members will chase after that vision.
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Numbers
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Another big discussion. What kind of numbers is good in a tribe? Well, you start to hit one of the most unanswerable topics there is. That can lead you to the issue of family tribes, mass recruiting, and elitism. Many players will go very indepth, large debates, a large amount of theory, about what is mostly unable to be tested and is all a lot of opinion.
It is actually very very simple. A player in a tribe can either be a negative or a positive. Look at it like this, every player in a tribe naturally contains a negative. Having more numbers in a tribe can detract from the atmosphere, and are an extra village that could be attacked and is a liability in needing to be supported. However, this negative can be wiped out and reversed into a positive by that players actions. If that player supports when asked to, he/she is bringing something positive to the tribe, if they post on the forum, they are giving yet more positives to a tribe, if they take down targets or even solidify a tribes area, yet more positives. If you include the extra number as part of the negative, it is then about evaluating whether a player is overall negative or positive. Which then means, if you just have positive players in your tribe, numbers is no longer an issue as by nature the extra weight of numbers is taken as a negative but outweighed by the positives those players bring in.
In summary, numbers don't matter, it is whether the players you have give to the tribe, if you have a tribe of 200 it's unlikely they all do, it's about keeping those that do, and clearing the dead-weight.
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Location, Location, Location.
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It is a thing often looked at. If you look at a map of any world you will always notice that the best way of dividing tribes is often by just drawing a line down a continent line. Continents are actually just an easy way of looking at the co-ordinate system, but nevertheless, it still manages to mould tribes. But location does not just mean that and perhaps not really what I mean, perhaps more old school players may remember a tribe called POKE, a premade tribe that started with a delay so that it circled the world. Obviously, it failed. It was an interesting experiment though. Most tribes go for continent play, rule a continent, then target another one or two continents. POKE did the opposite and tried to be as separated as possible.
Which brings to my point, what is the best way, spread out to increase growth early on and get on top, or more squashed in to control an area pretty much from the starting stages of nobling. Perhaps the most fun way is to be spread out, but by far the best for a tribe is to be compact. There are a huge amount of reasons for this, so I will try go through the ones I can even remember. First of all, a simple reason, co-ordination, co-ordination makes it easier to take on opponents as you gang up on players, and help fill in for your tribemates deficiencies, often to help clear a village or help them with defence. It means that taking down a target is often faster and less prolonged. Second advantage, is less vulnerable to attacks/coalition early on, since you cannot be picked off. Third advantage, psychological. In a war situation, should a players core villages be more heavily surrounded by blue, they will be more willing to send a lot more support and a lot more willing to send their back nukes to help out the tribe nobling. They are also a lot less likely to run after a target whilst your not looking. No matter how good a leader is, it generally does happen. The basics is, a player in a tribe controlled area, will adopt a lot more gung ho approach, which is what as a tribe you want. You want as many troops involved in a war as you can. The last, and perhaps most important advantage of it, is just the general better fighting ability that results from a more compact tribe. If you are more compact as a tribe than the tribe next to you, you have more villages closer to attack, and more villages closer to defend yourself. They will have longer duration times on average than you will. You have more close range fire power, and ability to defend is greatly increased. Whilst faking their further back villages to divert support becomes more effective. This whole point is even more exaggerated in the newer church worlds.
More compact tribes may feel a bit cramped, and some players may not like it, but compact then grow, rather than spread out then fill in the gaps is the fastest way of doing things. Ofcourse if you take it too far overtop then players don't get any good starting nobles, but mostly, people have the send to not recruit everyone in your 15x15. Best way to do it is often just get 50 or so on a continent, aiming to get the continents best. Remember many of these players will end up quitting, which strangely will only serve to your advantage, which is covered in my next point.
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To noble or not to noble
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Just incase the subtitle is confusing, know that this is about the issue of whether to intribe noble or not, whether to gift the account to another player or not.
Starting with the idea of intribe nobling... starting with a little story. On speed world 2 I had the pleasure of competing against players such as Thar and Alpha, whilst being in the same tribe with players such as Jamm, Vpar2, Grawler/Krakkan, matty1.23, Ender_Wiggin Baldhor and more. In the world when someone was quitting, vpar2 said on the irc channel, not to noble the villages, because when you intribe noble your not getting anything, you aren't increasing your tribes villages by any amount. I found it amusing when I heard the same thing a couple more times later on. There are some that believe that you should not intribe noble and instead let players go abandoned as your not gaining anything by taking them. Well, obviously straight away it can be see that it is a pretty retarded theory, since intribe nobling is not gaining villages, the point is to put a plug in the losses that you are getting by a player quitting. There is only two worlds in which this is not the case, and these are the high performance and speed worlds where the objective is not to get as many villages as you can to rule the world, but rather to eliminate your opponents. So vpar2 was correct for that world, but for others who say you should let go abandoned instead of taking them, it's a backwards theory. Which rules out the first option of doing nothing.
Which gives you two options, move the account to someone else, or to intrbe noble. Let's start with the latter. And with another little story. In world 6 I myself had a P&P clash with a tribe called KoD, in argument over what I considered a very negative style of play. Obviously there was more to it than that, but that was just one argument. What was argued was that they had an inbuilt advantage due to the way they played. They had a high rate of players quitting, and had a policy of their top players, getting priority over villages. This meant their top players would noble a lot of intribes, and to fill in the gap of those players leaving they would recruit rim side of their tribe. So they were basically eating themselves whilst recruiting more villages into their tribe. Obviously they were nobling other villages too, but it was just an argument that they could sustain larger growth because of the high amount of quitters, top players intribe nobling and just recruiting to replace players. The reason why growth is increased because of intribe nobling is simple, less waste of troops on free villages, more villages getting coins/packages. And though my argument was that this is perhaps a more boring way of playing, intribe nobling and then recruiting is a great way of giving a tribe increased growth for players.
However, increasingly popular is the option of gifting accounts to other players. This means no wasting nobles on intribe nobling and sustaining that membership base. However, gifting accounts is not always as perfect as it may seem. Again, the main point is actually just psychology. About 70 percent of the time a gifted account to another person is not going to be played as well as it is by the original account owner. Whether it is a pride issue, with their name not on the box, or the fact that their slow start because of not knowing the account leads to gradual decline, players often don't do as good a job. This can mean the account does worse, the player is not a regular in communication within the tribe, and when increasing amounts of accounts are gifted, you are actually starting to look at a big big problem.
However, that is not to say I would rule it out completely. There are three areas where I would say you should gift over intribe noble. The first is where you know you have a player not in the world that is going to do a good job, someone who you are friends with, and are very sure that they will do well and that they have the hunger to go out and conquer with the account. The second is when a player in your tribe is nobled, the interest they have in the world can often overcome the hassle of a new account and the existing communication they have in the tribe often just continues. The third is to do with area. Fringe accounts, where a player is either a bit further away from the rest of the pack and players would have to noble a bit away to intribe noble, or where they are on the edge of a war, it is perhaps best to hand it to another player. Monitor it closely, if it does well with the new account owner then job done, if not, then try get another account owner. The risk of doing this is often better than letting it go barbarian or intribe nobling.
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Fun
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And my last tip of all? Fun. The game is fun, you can go in great depth like I have done, but after all it is fun. Am I saying just enjoy it? Well actually, no. What I'm saying is that the simple ideal of fun can often go over the head of many other concepts. It may not be better to spread yourself out or play in small numbers, but tribe will, because they find it more fun. You can utilise this yourself to increase your experience on a world, or you can actually use it as a way of leading your tribe, make them realise it is a game, and that in the interests of fun, they follow you, or make an opponent know that you fighting them is nothing personal, so that you don't start an often harmful mudslinging contest on P&P. The idea of fun can be used as an instrument or a path, it is your choice.
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Thank you for reading if you did :icon_wink:
Bloodhood
Leadership role
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How useful is a Leader?
The answer is not as easy as yes or no, not because I can complicate it, but because there are two sides to the issue. Essentially, the issue is about, what is more in important in a tribe, the quality of the membership base? Or the quality of the leader? The answer is not so hard to understand. Looking at a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being the membership base being the most important and 10 being the leader is most important; at the beginning of a game, the position on the scale is 10 with the leadership being most important. As the game moves on, the scale slowly falls from 10 to 1. This does not happen quickly, and is in fact most likely rather slow. On the scale, it would only get to below 5 probably when many players are getting above 250K points. This isn't something random I've shaked up but a genuine ideal. The impact of a leadership on a tribe in the beginning of the world, irrespective of premade or other, is huge; diplomacy, recruiting, general management of the tribe and P&P have the largest effect at this point in the game. Due to this, a tribes success relies upon the ability of the leader. Once you get further into the game, co-ordination and the players themselves take more of a role in how the tribe does, as player mobility between tribes becomes greatly decreased and the tribe success starts to slowly single-handedly rely on how that tribe does in war. The leader becomes more of a motivator and fighter himself rather than a diplomat, recruiter, or even P&Per.
Leadership Structure
Fear not, the above did have a point to it. Since assuming the above is correct, you now get onto important issues on how the structure of the leadership should be laid out. Which again will be matched to the time scale in the world, due to how important a leader is.
Leading me to say that at the start of the world, when leadership is more important, it is very important that there is a sole leader; and that this sole leader is up to standard, that means good on P&P, good at persuading people, being proactive, friendly and active. In having this, the sole leader is then needed to be able to give the tribe the direction it needs, able to recruit in what areas he/she wants to and do whatever deals necessary. It is far more efficient to have just one leader, in terms of decision making, knowledge, and the workings of a tribe. At a time when leadership is most important what you do not want is a reactive, not proactive, 'council' that vote on decisions. You may love democracy, but remember that having one leader rather than a few is actually more democratic, as long as everyone consents to that leader being the leader. And if your in the tribe; you do consent.
As you get further and further into the game, and co-ordination gets more important, and the leadership is perhaps less influential on the tribes success, this is when a tribe would want to broaden its leadership. Every player goes through activity issues, to then rely on this player can be unreliable and for that player to be relied on co-ordinating on top of everything else it can be too dependant on that leader, and as such, an unnecessary risk. You will also find that many players as you get through the world will develop a great number of personal friendships with other players, these can often be utilised if that player with the contacts is in the leadership. For these two reasons, it is often then best as you get deeper into a world, to start to spread responsibility, one player taking on everything is no longer such a great idea. Especially when you now want your main leaders responsibility to be less of a diplomat, but more of a war leader. I would still argue for a defined leadership structure, so that decision making can be decisive if things are looking desperate or intribe arguments are starting to escalate; but generally, delegation of leadership should start to increase the more you get into the game.[/spoil]
Recruiting
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Often an issue to all tribes. More inexperienced players it is a matter of how to recruit? What to do? Well, in the interest of being more accessible, I will simply say, befriend. The best way to recruit is make friends. Get friendly with local players doing well then entice them into your tribe. It will help you once they are in your tribe also as they will be much more likely to follow your word and be more loyal whilst more active on forum and creating a feel good atmosphere. Don't send some tacky recruiting mail, just very simply, talk to them. Be humble, not arrogant, be friendly, not hostile. If you can't get over this simple hurdle, that as a tactic is hugely effective, then you shouldn't really be a leader.
Then to the issue of who to recruit? Well it relates to my point above. Talking to a player is the best way of knowing what that player will be like. You can judge their activity, their likelihood of being active on a forum and also their experience. Don't start relying on something stupid like troop counts (earlier on) and OD, just talk to players who are doing well (say top 40/50 continent), get a good feel for them and you should know whether they will fit in, don't be afraid to think, no, they won't fit in.
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Diplomacy
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Diplomacy, perhaps one of the key roles of a leader. A player called Teyla perhaps once outlined to me how important it is. Teyla was one of the early giants of a female player in early TW. She co-created 6XIG6 (later became ROA) in world 3, which I was in and later in world 4 saw her create the tribe w00t, a name that gained success on multiple worlds and included such players as Litwol, Free-eek Alphabonkers, Matt- and Stonerbus. W00t was also the tribe that took down one of the most talented premades ever made, OA. Just a bit of description for you there, but she said to me, that whoever controls the diplomacy, controls the tribe. That, whoever does the diplomacy, is the leader. She said that diplomacy was all-important. Where maybe I would argue that issues such as recruiting are often underplayed, she brings up a big point. Diplomacy, is nearly always the main deciding factor in a tribe’s future.
What is Diplomacy?
Always remember that essentially, diplomacy is primarily a defence mechanism, a way of deflecting the blow a tribe may give you by giving them multiple enemies or quite simply, divide and conquer. Do not see it as an offence technique, it is a way of weakening your enemy or strengthening your defence, it will not grow your tribe, only your players conquering villages will do that, so never rely on it alone. Coalitions are useless to be in unless you are going to take advantage of the situation and go in there and do some damage, take some villages, get something for yourself.
Merging
Let's start with merging, it is to do with diplomacy even if not to do with your diplomacy list. Many people are opposed to merges. Why? Because it is a fast track option to more land, more points, higher rank. It seems like taking the easy option. First thing to say, don't be afraid of the easy option if it is the best option! But secondly, you must judge if it is the correct option, for it may not be that at all.
First thing that must be considered is do you need it? What will merging a tribe into you add to your tribe? What location do they hold, how good, active, and talkative are they? Some of the questions that you may want to ask yourself. For example, if you are a k44 tribe what will merging a K56 rank one continent tribe do? Will they really be able to support you? There are four occasions I suggest merging may be a good option:
1. When you control an area but barely, and do not have the player base and density in the area that you may need and may give you a weak spot as a result.
2. Manic inactivity. If you have a lot of inactivity and have a load of actives wanting to merge, then them joining should strongly be considered so that the burden of inactivity is relatively less.
3. Bringing in more experienced players to the fold if you have a lack and there are not so many good recruiting prospects, this is when merging is more like recruiting several players at once.
4. Last choice. If things are not looking so well, a larger tribe is gunning for war that you think you can't win, your tribe is dwindling in numbers and unable to keep up, you are losing a war and may need help. Merging could be an answer.
Merging as explained above can bring its advantages. But just remember its disadvantages:
1. Possible knock to morale. This is likely, to happen, since you may lose that community feel that you had before, which may take some time to get back as players don't know each other so well and feel less inclined to speak.
2. Disloyalty, some of those players you bring in may already be disloyal to their current tribes, nevermind yours, this is a risky move, bringing in players you have not built any kind of relationship with, loyalty issues will be present.
3. Leadership split. If you start bargaining for leadership positions, things could start to get messy soon, to an extreme length even a power struggle. Even if you are the one firmly in charge, barons may start to fight, it does happen.
4. Loss of credibility. You are likely to suffer a huge knock to your reputation if ever you had one, and tribes are more likely to look down on you, if it was a sizeable merge.
5. Increased inactivity as players begin to question whether they feel like staying as the tribe they were fighting for is no longer existing, it can take a lot of effort for some to join in with a new tribe.
6. The refugee problem. And not only that, possible diplomacy problems that may come with them, and issues others have with them.
Merging is risky business, but done in the right circumstances, and done correctly, it can work.
To NAP or not to NAP?
I will say, do not be scared of NAPs. Many put forward the argument that NAPs are useless because all you are doing is limiting your targets, where that tribe will not help you against an enemy. But as I said above, divide and conquer, is a very good technique. However small or big a tribe, there is no shame in putting them for later so that you can go after a tribe gunning for you in the present. You will be much more successful in war by taking one enemy down then another afterwards rather than taking two enemies at the same time. As the Native American saying goes:
“If you chase two rabbits, you will lose them both."
Do not be afraid to use NAPs to your advantage, though obviously hide the craft of doing so, or you may not look so good on the forums. Though whether you say that there is a possibility of more than a NAP in the future or not, to be honest, a tribe is being foolish to think that you will never think of breaking that deal you have. How to break up a NAP? Well people normally come up with all sorts of excuses, sniping, recruiting refugees or just plain we felt like it. If a tribe breaks a NAP with you for some reason or another, don’t believe it because of that reasoning the likelihood is, they want your villages, pure and simple.
Allies
This is always seen as the big issue of diplomacy. How many, where, who, and what. My first bit of advice is that there is no perfect number, you could have one, you could have 4, it depends on your situation. However, do not get too many. For every extra ally you get, you devalue your other alliances. And devaluing alliances is never a good thing, you devalue them, and they become nothing more than glorified NAPs. And if that happens, they will be less likely to co-operate in your plans, and become increasingly unreliable. Do not let that happen. You need to know your allies plans, you need to co-ordinate your plans alongside theirs and you should often seek to give advice and help (without damaging yourself), for they will normally return the favour. Be your allies friends, and you will find a relationship of trust building up so that you are secure in that alliance.
Secrecy or not?
Many often ignore this issue, but I think it quite a large one. It is the issue of whether you make some of your tribe’s diplomacy known, or not. Now there is never much use in showing off your NAPs, but alliances is a different matter altogether. Some tribes often show their alliances, and this does have it’s advantages. If a tribe is going to war with you, they will be much less hasty about it, for they do not want to land themselves in a two on one scenario. However, as they say, knowledge is power, and to deny them that knowledge may often be held back due to not knowing your alliances. However, I suggest that most tribes will often lead with ignorance, or get some kind of backup plan should you happen to have any unexpected allegiances. But whatever you decide, remember, you are trying to use them knowing or not knowing in an attempt to put them off warring you. You will have the advantage by choosing your wars, not letting them choose them for you, so holding them off is often a better idea.
Coalitions and Alliance blocks
We seem them so many times. Mostly early in the game, against tribes that is taking over a continent, smaller tribes band together in an attempt to overcome that tribe through numbers. But as I explained earlier, diplomacy is a defence mechanism, to draw out fire. Since none of those tribes normally are able to give much damage themselves, the coalition usually fails due to them just being picked off one by one without much harm being given to the tribe being ganged up on.
But that is only the early example of a coalition, there are many later examples also. Though called coalitions, sometimes it turns into a bit of a world war. In an attempt to make sure they do not get outnumbered, a tribe may have a few allies, and are known publicly, so that tribes do not attack them since they know they will be taking on too much on. Though that then turns into the tribe wanting to attack only being able to, if they bring in a string of alliances so that you have alliance systems against each other. It is rare that this happens, for alliances often cross-over, but it is not totally unheard of. It will mostly happen if a sort of more than two alliance has been created, such as the CA (central alliance) in w3 or the LFKD alliance in world 5 and so on. Basically those tribes agree to only be allied to each other, which creates a series of ally blocks. Whether this is a good idea or not, it is up to you, where you will find much of the diplomacy job is already done for you, finding yourself on the losing side is never nice. But what it does do is put much more dependence on your tribes fighting skill rather than a leaders diplomacy skills, so do what suits your tribe.
Be 'nice'
Last tip on diplomacy, be nice. Be respectful, look to be honest, even if you’re not. In this game, people are not amazingly brilliant at thinking with their heads all too often. Give them a few compliments and so forth will often have them doing what you want. Present a positive image of yourself and you will find the deal you get for your tribe is a lot better. Do not let issues such as pride and arrogance get in the way of getting the best deal for your tribe.
Though don't be afraid to present a false image, be cunning, or whatever else if it comes to your advantage. But on the surface, observer the niceties.
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Play the game
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Learn to play before you lead.
And when I say play, I mean able to play every part of the game very well. That means being good at various aspects from lightning startups to early and late stages of nobling. This is such a huge bit of advice that it is difficult to explain how important it is. Not all of the best players are best of leaders, but the best of leaders are the best of players.
Starting with early on. A tribe can be built quite easily upon your success at the start, even at the 500-point level. Secure yourself a top 20 spot (not too early on for obvious reasons), and all players whoever they are will give you immediate respect. People will be more likely to listen to you, you will be able to befriend those other players doing well around you easier, and developing loyalty around you, and your tribe will go from strength to strength. Early on there is no better indication for a player than how good a leader is in that tribe, so do well, and you hand yourself a huge advantage. Throughout the game being a larger player tends to grant respect, but early on it is often crucial in recruiting a member base that you want.
Later on in the game, though recruiting becomes less of an issue and your tribe is not just judged upon you as a player, and rather your leadership skills, being able to play is an essential part of leadership. If you do not understand how the game works in detail, and are not able to think of possible defence, offence and co-ordination tactics that work well then your tribe is given a huge burden. And do not think defence and offence are just co-ordinating issues, since they are more often than not tie closely in with expansion and diplomacy. And to master both of those you have to know the game inside and out and be a great player yourself. Whilst knowing the rules so that you do not go over that line is also essential.
Leading from the front
This is perhaps an area I never actually followed, despite knowing the huge advantages it brings late game. I have often been criticised for this point and I myself acknowledge it. Leading from the front can often bring large advantages. For one thing, you are running into the heart of battle, some players will always be fearful of jumping into a battle they can’t win, if you jump in without hesitation, it is likely to put some of those on the fence head first into the battle. Secondly, you are able to assess the situation yourself, realise what is going right and wrong in a war, and know the next best step to take. How to adapt to a situation, and how to get the upper hand are often easier when in the battle yourself. Thirdly, late game is all about attacking and co-ordinating, by playing yourself you are granting your tribe a player you know will never betray, since you are the tribe.
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Motivation
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This is perhaps a point relating to my first points. Motivation. It is an influence a leader can give right through the game, from the start to the end. Influence players to be more active, more aggressive, and more responsive to commands. Do not underestimate how the smallest of words can have an impact. Tribalwars like many things works on the margin, you want to increase that margin as much as possible to give you the best chance possible, every bit of motivation given by a circular or your active presence on your own forum or on P&P can have a huge effect overall. I may only write a small paragraph on it, compared to my other points, but it is very important.
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P&P
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I'm not going to lie and say my P&P presence was down to me wanting to further my tribes interest, genuinely its because I wanted to be on there. However, it is still important to a tribe, and deciding to stay off it because you think it childish could have bad effects. Early on it is important in diplomacy, and recruiting, your image can often effect the decisions of others, meaning giving a good image can be very important. Further through the game, relates to my above point of motivation. Doing well on P&P against opponents can spur on a tribe to improve in a war. If you can sustain a good P&P presence whilst losing a war, in a lot of cases you can sustain that losing streak, often for months, maybe more. The last reason for P&P is using it as a tool. It is very easy to spot many tribes attitudes to other tribes by reading what they post, whilst being able to mislead other tribes yourself. You can make them underestimate, overestimate you, or even just befriend them. Compliment them indirectly, and they will take the compliment without you looking to be sucking up or looking like you want something. Don't underestimate P&P as a tool, it can be used, perhaps myself I used it too much, since on more than one world I have been called a politician, but nevertheless, it can be used very effectively.
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Pro-activity
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Now I've gone over a few very in your face aspects, perhaps a bit more less covered aspects. First, pro-activity. This will always be important in a world, but it is essential early on. Pro-active, not reactive. There are numerous opportunities, be them merges (yes they can work), diplomacy deals, possible recruiting or anything else you can imagine. Even just forming relationships with opponents that may be essential later on. I once decided to look at the most active players on P&P and befriended them ingame, so that they would then give me and my tribe good ratings on P&P. A pretty cunning tactic, but you are there for your tribe, not moral goodness.
But the essential point is, that with pro-activity comes opportunity, good image, reputation and furthering of your tribe. Remember, if your not going forwards, your going backwards.
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Vision
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Always my favourite... vision. Give your tribe a vision. A clear objective of what you want to be doing, a direction, a path. Give your tribe inspiration and direction and you will see them act more as a tribe and less of a group of players. You will see they will become more active and more willing to fight for the tribe rather than themselves. And the feel-good atmosphere can have a spiraling effect upwards often, and ties in with the issue of motivation. Give your tribe vision, and often, your members will chase after that vision.
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Numbers
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Another big discussion. What kind of numbers is good in a tribe? Well, you start to hit one of the most unanswerable topics there is. That can lead you to the issue of family tribes, mass recruiting, and elitism. Many players will go very indepth, large debates, a large amount of theory, about what is mostly unable to be tested and is all a lot of opinion.
It is actually very very simple. A player in a tribe can either be a negative or a positive. Look at it like this, every player in a tribe naturally contains a negative. Having more numbers in a tribe can detract from the atmosphere, and are an extra village that could be attacked and is a liability in needing to be supported. However, this negative can be wiped out and reversed into a positive by that players actions. If that player supports when asked to, he/she is bringing something positive to the tribe, if they post on the forum, they are giving yet more positives to a tribe, if they take down targets or even solidify a tribes area, yet more positives. If you include the extra number as part of the negative, it is then about evaluating whether a player is overall negative or positive. Which then means, if you just have positive players in your tribe, numbers is no longer an issue as by nature the extra weight of numbers is taken as a negative but outweighed by the positives those players bring in.
In summary, numbers don't matter, it is whether the players you have give to the tribe, if you have a tribe of 200 it's unlikely they all do, it's about keeping those that do, and clearing the dead-weight.
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Location, Location, Location.
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It is a thing often looked at. If you look at a map of any world you will always notice that the best way of dividing tribes is often by just drawing a line down a continent line. Continents are actually just an easy way of looking at the co-ordinate system, but nevertheless, it still manages to mould tribes. But location does not just mean that and perhaps not really what I mean, perhaps more old school players may remember a tribe called POKE, a premade tribe that started with a delay so that it circled the world. Obviously, it failed. It was an interesting experiment though. Most tribes go for continent play, rule a continent, then target another one or two continents. POKE did the opposite and tried to be as separated as possible.
Which brings to my point, what is the best way, spread out to increase growth early on and get on top, or more squashed in to control an area pretty much from the starting stages of nobling. Perhaps the most fun way is to be spread out, but by far the best for a tribe is to be compact. There are a huge amount of reasons for this, so I will try go through the ones I can even remember. First of all, a simple reason, co-ordination, co-ordination makes it easier to take on opponents as you gang up on players, and help fill in for your tribemates deficiencies, often to help clear a village or help them with defence. It means that taking down a target is often faster and less prolonged. Second advantage, is less vulnerable to attacks/coalition early on, since you cannot be picked off. Third advantage, psychological. In a war situation, should a players core villages be more heavily surrounded by blue, they will be more willing to send a lot more support and a lot more willing to send their back nukes to help out the tribe nobling. They are also a lot less likely to run after a target whilst your not looking. No matter how good a leader is, it generally does happen. The basics is, a player in a tribe controlled area, will adopt a lot more gung ho approach, which is what as a tribe you want. You want as many troops involved in a war as you can. The last, and perhaps most important advantage of it, is just the general better fighting ability that results from a more compact tribe. If you are more compact as a tribe than the tribe next to you, you have more villages closer to attack, and more villages closer to defend yourself. They will have longer duration times on average than you will. You have more close range fire power, and ability to defend is greatly increased. Whilst faking their further back villages to divert support becomes more effective. This whole point is even more exaggerated in the newer church worlds.
More compact tribes may feel a bit cramped, and some players may not like it, but compact then grow, rather than spread out then fill in the gaps is the fastest way of doing things. Ofcourse if you take it too far overtop then players don't get any good starting nobles, but mostly, people have the send to not recruit everyone in your 15x15. Best way to do it is often just get 50 or so on a continent, aiming to get the continents best. Remember many of these players will end up quitting, which strangely will only serve to your advantage, which is covered in my next point.
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To noble or not to noble
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Just incase the subtitle is confusing, know that this is about the issue of whether to intribe noble or not, whether to gift the account to another player or not.
Starting with the idea of intribe nobling... starting with a little story. On speed world 2 I had the pleasure of competing against players such as Thar and Alpha, whilst being in the same tribe with players such as Jamm, Vpar2, Grawler/Krakkan, matty1.23, Ender_Wiggin Baldhor and more. In the world when someone was quitting, vpar2 said on the irc channel, not to noble the villages, because when you intribe noble your not getting anything, you aren't increasing your tribes villages by any amount. I found it amusing when I heard the same thing a couple more times later on. There are some that believe that you should not intribe noble and instead let players go abandoned as your not gaining anything by taking them. Well, obviously straight away it can be see that it is a pretty retarded theory, since intribe nobling is not gaining villages, the point is to put a plug in the losses that you are getting by a player quitting. There is only two worlds in which this is not the case, and these are the high performance and speed worlds where the objective is not to get as many villages as you can to rule the world, but rather to eliminate your opponents. So vpar2 was correct for that world, but for others who say you should let go abandoned instead of taking them, it's a backwards theory. Which rules out the first option of doing nothing.
Which gives you two options, move the account to someone else, or to intrbe noble. Let's start with the latter. And with another little story. In world 6 I myself had a P&P clash with a tribe called KoD, in argument over what I considered a very negative style of play. Obviously there was more to it than that, but that was just one argument. What was argued was that they had an inbuilt advantage due to the way they played. They had a high rate of players quitting, and had a policy of their top players, getting priority over villages. This meant their top players would noble a lot of intribes, and to fill in the gap of those players leaving they would recruit rim side of their tribe. So they were basically eating themselves whilst recruiting more villages into their tribe. Obviously they were nobling other villages too, but it was just an argument that they could sustain larger growth because of the high amount of quitters, top players intribe nobling and just recruiting to replace players. The reason why growth is increased because of intribe nobling is simple, less waste of troops on free villages, more villages getting coins/packages. And though my argument was that this is perhaps a more boring way of playing, intribe nobling and then recruiting is a great way of giving a tribe increased growth for players.
However, increasingly popular is the option of gifting accounts to other players. This means no wasting nobles on intribe nobling and sustaining that membership base. However, gifting accounts is not always as perfect as it may seem. Again, the main point is actually just psychology. About 70 percent of the time a gifted account to another person is not going to be played as well as it is by the original account owner. Whether it is a pride issue, with their name not on the box, or the fact that their slow start because of not knowing the account leads to gradual decline, players often don't do as good a job. This can mean the account does worse, the player is not a regular in communication within the tribe, and when increasing amounts of accounts are gifted, you are actually starting to look at a big big problem.
However, that is not to say I would rule it out completely. There are three areas where I would say you should gift over intribe noble. The first is where you know you have a player not in the world that is going to do a good job, someone who you are friends with, and are very sure that they will do well and that they have the hunger to go out and conquer with the account. The second is when a player in your tribe is nobled, the interest they have in the world can often overcome the hassle of a new account and the existing communication they have in the tribe often just continues. The third is to do with area. Fringe accounts, where a player is either a bit further away from the rest of the pack and players would have to noble a bit away to intribe noble, or where they are on the edge of a war, it is perhaps best to hand it to another player. Monitor it closely, if it does well with the new account owner then job done, if not, then try get another account owner. The risk of doing this is often better than letting it go barbarian or intribe nobling.
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Fun
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And my last tip of all? Fun. The game is fun, you can go in great depth like I have done, but after all it is fun. Am I saying just enjoy it? Well actually, no. What I'm saying is that the simple ideal of fun can often go over the head of many other concepts. It may not be better to spread yourself out or play in small numbers, but tribe will, because they find it more fun. You can utilise this yourself to increase your experience on a world, or you can actually use it as a way of leading your tribe, make them realise it is a game, and that in the interests of fun, they follow you, or make an opponent know that you fighting them is nothing personal, so that you don't start an often harmful mudslinging contest on P&P. The idea of fun can be used as an instrument or a path, it is your choice.
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Thank you for reading if you did :icon_wink:
Bloodhood
