The 10 most common mistakes players make
I actually wrote this list for myself first, because I made the vast majority of these mistakes on my own castle. The difference between a player who quits in frustration after a month and one who builds a decent empire isn't how many rubies they buy. It's that the second one doesn't do these ten basic things. Let's go through them one by one, so you can spare yourself the needless grief I went through.
1. You send defensive units into attacks (and wonder why it isn't working)
The classic rookie move. You grab everything you have in the barracks, load it into an attack on a Robber Baron and then watch half your army get left lying on the battlefield. Units in this game have two values: attack and defense. And there's a simple rule — defensive units defend, attacking units go into battle. When you send defenders to attack, it's their attack value that counts, not the defense value they're strong in. And that's the whole point: defensive units tend to have a lousy attack value, often close to zero. In an attack they're practically useless, you're just sending them to the slaughter.
Before you attack, check the stats in the barracks. For an attack you care about the unit's attack value, not its defense. On top of that, build your attacking army according to the type of enemy defense: against walls packed with ranged units send more melee units, against a mass of melee troops deploy your own ranged units. And leave the defensive units sitting at home in the castle — that's where they do exactly what they were built for.
2. You neglect food until your army starts starving
Wood and stone are visible, you build with them all the time, so everyone looks after them. Food is the silent killer. Every unit in your army eats something, and as soon as you drop into the negative, units start deserting. You log in in the morning, your army is half the size and you have no idea why.
This happened to me in the very first weeks I played — I went to bed with the balance just above zero and in the morning half the barracks were empty. Since then I've watched it almost religiously. Always keep your food balance in the positive with a margin, not on the edge. Build farmhouses, put the right decorations next to them for the production bonus, don't go overboard with the number of units you can't support, and before you take a break for a few hours, check that you're not sitting just above zero. A lot of consumption piles up overnight and in the morning you want to find an army, not a graveyard.
3. You upgrade buildings that give you nothing
The temptation is huge: you see the upgrade button, you have the resources, so you click. But every upgrade costs time and materials, and a lot of them are completely pointless at that stage of the game. Upgrading decorative junk or a building you'll replace shortly anyway is a pure loss.
Stick to priorities. First the things that generate resources and soldiers — production buildings, storehouses (otherwise your resources overflow and go to waste) and barracks. Then castle defense, if someone keeps bugging you with attacks. Deal with decorations last, and mainly for the production and public order bonuses, not for looks. And above all, don't upgrade anything that doesn't match your current level and stage of the game. One level up on the keep often unlocks more than ten minor upgrades elsewhere.
4. You waste rubies on nonsense
Rubies are your only truly scarce currency and the game is designed to make you blow them as early as possible. Speeding up a build by a few minutes for rubies? Don't do it. Buying resources with rubies when things just aren't running for a moment? Not that either. That's exactly the trap everyone falls into, and then they wonder why they've got nothing left for what's actually worth it.
Save your rubies for things with a long-term impact: permanent upgrades, builder slots (more parallel constructions is a massive accelerator for the whole game) or the really strong offers that show up in the shop from time to time. Personally I'd say another builder is probably the best investment I've ever made with rubies. Before you buy anything, ask yourself: will this save me hours down the road, or just minutes right now? If minutes, hands off. And never buy resources for rubies — you can produce those. You can't produce time, but even time usually isn't worth burning rubies on.
5. You attack blind, without spying
You see someone's castle, you have an army, so you send everything at it. And then you find out their walls were loaded with ranged units and your army evaporated without you looting a thing. Attacking without scouting is a gamble where you're almost always the one who loses.
Send a spy first. You'll find out what their defense looks like, how many units they have and how strong their walls are. Only then do you put together the attack wave — you know whether you need more siege tools for the walls, whether you're facing mostly ranged or melee units, and whether the attack is even worth it. With Robber Barons, also keep in mind that every castle has its own defense layout in the courtyard, on the gates and on the towers — adjust where you send your units accordingly. A few seconds of scouting will save you an entire army.
6. You play as a loner outside an alliance
Plenty of people tell themselves they can handle it alone and that an alliance is just an annoying chat. In my opinion it's the most expensive mistake you can make in this game. Without an alliance you're an easy target, you've got nowhere to draw protection, advice or help with defense from, and you're outside all the coordination that actually has your back.
Find an active alliance as early as you can — not the biggest one, but one where people respond and help each other. A good alliance will send you reinforcements when someone attacks you, advise you on who to attack and when, and open up access to alliance help and support. When you're new, don't be afraid to ask. Experienced players are usually happy to advise, because a stronger member means a stronger alliance. Going it alone only holds you back here.
7. You have no defense and wonder why you keep getting plundered
Attacking is fun, defending is boring — that's how most beginners think, and then they cry that someone stronger cleans out their storehouses every night. If you don't have a permanent defensive garrison in your castle and decent walls, you're a walking ATM for everyone else.
Keep a permanent defensive army at home made up of units with strong defense. Those don't get sent anywhere, they wait for raiders. Invest in walls and defense tools, because they multiply the effectiveness of your defenders. And hide your resources: what's in the protected part of your storage the enemy can't steal, what you have over the limit you'll lose. The best defense is the one an attacker looks at with a spy and decides it's not worth it.
8. You leave your builders and barracks idle
This game is largely about time passing even when you're not playing — as long as you make use of it. When you log off and leave your builders without work and the barracks empty, you're squandering hours that could have been working for you. That's the difference between a player who grows and one who stands still.
Build a routine for every log-off: give the builder a construction or upgrade, start unit production in the barracks so they train while you're away, and check that resource production is running at full tilt and no storehouse is overflowing anywhere. Ideally, time your longer builds for the night or for periods when you won't be at the game anyway. An empty build queue overnight is a wasted opportunity nobody will give back to you.
9. You rush your keep level way too fast
A higher keep level sounds like progress, so everyone hammers away at it as hard as they can. The catch is that every new level unlocks stronger opponents and higher demands, and your economy and army have to keep up with that. A player with a high keep and a weak base is just a fatter target for everyone else.
Grow in a balanced way. Before you upgrade the keep, make sure you have enough resource production, decent defense and an army that matches the new level. It's better to wait a while, finish building up your base and only then level up, than to be an overgrown newbie everyone around you raids. Progress isn't measured by the number on your keep, but by how stable the empire standing under that number is.
10. You throw resources away into overflowing storehouses
Your production is running, resources are pouring in, you log in a day later and the storehouse hit its maximum long ago. Everything produced over the limit simply went to waste. It's an invisible loss, because you don't see it on your account, but in reality hours of production are draining into nothing.
Always keep your storehouses one step ahead of production. When you feel resources piling up, either enlarge the storehouse or spend them right away — build, upgrade, train units, whatever. Before a longer break, mainly let run what will fit, and turn the rest of your resources into constructions or soldiers that will finish overnight. Resources you didn't produce can be caught up on, resources that went to waste are gone forever.
You often ask which of these mistakes is the worst
People write to me about this fairly regularly, and honestly, I don't have a completely clear-cut answer. If I had to pick one, I'd probably say playing without an alliance (point 6), because that single mistake also stops you from fixing most of the others — nobody advises you, nobody sends you reinforcements. But I'm not 100% sure someone who plays mainly defensively would say the same. For that kind of player, the worst is probably the starving army from point 2. Write me what you'd pick.
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