Blacksmiths, Armouries and Workshops (Guide) [by Rastus and Zanfrane]

There seems to be a lot of time invested way to early in blacksmiths, armouries and workshops by new players - it is one of the most common mistakes made that stunts their growth as these buildings really chew through crop surplus.

First of all, what does an armoury do? Each level corresponds to 1.5 percent in effective defensive strength. So 100 Praetorians built in a town with a level 20 armoury researched to level 20 in Praetorians will fight equal to 120 Praetorians. Thats it. It is much cheaper just to build more troops.

The above is plainly a poor investment for a small player, but for a much larger player who cannot build more troops because of crop limit, he can make 1000 praetorians be as effective in defence as 1200 praetorians. That is a better investement but he can also build a new village for a similar cost.

Blacksmiths operate the same way but on attack ratings. It goes without saying if you are doing the right thing and attacking with attack troops and defending with defence troops - it is only worth levelling up defence troops in armouries and attack troops in blacksmiths. A person on a single village raising Maceman levels in an armoury is obviously not the sharpest crayon in the pack.

Basically you ignore researching in the Blacksmith and Armoury until you are very well established.

You only raise these building levels as far as they are needed for prerequisites for other buildings. Level 5 for both is fine for all towns bar one. The one exception is your attack/artillery capital. This by the way should be your only village with a workshop as presently Rise members do not need more than one attack/artillery village.

Your attack/artillery village is unique in that it will hold very high numbers of attack infantry that exist to punch your artillery through defensive garrisons. This village is nearly always at its crop limit so it is a good idea to invest in your attack infantry at the Blacksmith. For example the only research I have done anywhere at the moment is for my swordsman in my 15 cropper capital.

Apart from that though, in general blacksmiths and armouries are a poor investment until you reach the point where you are CP capped, there is nothing else left to build and no crop left for more troops.

Otherwise though - the resources are much better spent building more troops or more villages.

****** Tip - if your about to be farmed and cannot spend down by other means quick enough, remember you can use research to spend a chunk of resources. It is not a good investment but it is better than giving the resources to the attacker. These resources would still be better spent in the barracks on more defensive troops, but sometimes you are left with an odd ratio of resources to spend.

******correction added by Zandfrane:

This is actually a correction to the above posting.

Each level rise does not correspond to a 1.5% increase. This could be due to the description given, but the mathematics shown in the faq contradicts this. The upgrade of the levels is actually a power of 1.5% rather than a coefficient. What this means is that the it would be an increase of 0.015^1 for a level 1 upgrade, but an increase of 0.015^20 for a level 2 upgrade, NOT a 20*0.015. Thus, in actuality, it is an almost 35% increase at level 20, which is much more valuable than it being a coefficient.

Thus, a 100 praetorians fully updgraded would equate to 135 praetorians, not 120.