Researching for dummies

Starting Strategies

You have a couple of options to choose from when you create your mage...

• Rushing for land with relative simple units available in the beginning of the game (not discussed here; only advisable if the reset has just begun)
• Gelding for off-color spells, heroes etc. (not discussed here; only advisable if the reset has just begun)
• Researching as quick as possible (YEAH! discussed here!)

Whereas some people employ subtle variances and optimizations, this guide presents a simple and straight-forward method of completely researching quickly.

No matter how you decide to start off, make sure that you keep enough forts to stay alive!

First, Second and Third run

• it's often advisable that you not keep an army as keeping an army is often a waste of land and resources (extra towns, farms, nodes are required)
• exploit Apprentice and Council Protection status to your benefit: don't spend more than 120 turns on the first run and don't move if you are attacked into Council Protection; leave protection when YOU are ready for it

Research-Only Start

First Run (120 turns)

Use the first 120 turns in the following manner:

• disband all the troops you get initially
• explore a few turns - build workshops one turn by one turn (build a few farms if you need to)
• explore a bit more - build some workshops, towns, farms, and a few guilds
• watch your geld income using status report, watch your population growth
• if your population is close to max: build extra farms and towns
• keep food production (from farms) and residential space (mainly from towns) in balance

If you don't grasp the above: go read Players Manual sections INTERIOR and MAGIC , then read this again!

On non-Lightning servers, by performing the steps above, you should be able to build to:

• 800 land
• around 400 workshops
• about 350 land in farms-plus-towns
• remaining small amount of forts, barracks, nodes etc.
• No guilds yet - we'll build those in the 2nd run

On Lightning, the exploration rate is increased drastically, and although you want to follow a similar process, you should have roughly twice this much land by now and won't be able to exploit Council Protection.

Second Run

On all servers other than Lightning, after saving up 200 turns...

• explore/build to 1500-1650 land, 40-50 turns at a time
  • keep 10-14 forts
  • build guilds on new land
  • check your status report every 40-50 turns to make sure your geld storage and production is acceptable (don't geld crash!)

At 100-150 SL, you may want to force your research path to research blue spells until you get concentration (which you'll need extra nodes to upkeep.)

On non-Lightning servers, you will probably want to stay at 1500-1600 for the duration of research in order to take advantage of Council Protection.

Third Run and Beyond

Until you are nearly done (within 50 turns) with research, continue researching. You may want to actively research by spending turns on the research page, or you can let passive research do its job and keep doing the explore/build routine.

Refer to the Spell Level page to ascertain when you are nearly finished with research.

Financing your Research

• don't keep an army (see basics of troopless defense), so that won't cost you geld
• If you keep an army: make it disbandable m.p. eaters. Disband it when you are spending big amounts of turns doing the research.
• watch your geld stock (make notes) to see how fast it is dropping. Perhaps at some point you need more geld... someway.
• you could sell some items
• increase your geld income by building more towns/farms (check your status report to make sure that Food Production & Residential Space are balanced)
• use the geld/tax feature if you need gold in a hurry
• spells that increase your geld income usually are not worth the their m.p. upkeep/turn investment/node-landuse during research phase

Basics of Troopless Defense

• as long as you are not attacked: spend every turn researching
• when you are attacked and are 'in council protection "P"' : DON'T MOVE ANYMORE: You'll lose council protection by moving 1 turn (or by not spending turns for 48 hours, see Players Manual, section on Protection.
• if you are in Council Protection, wait without moving until you have accumulated ~200 turns (480 on Lightning)
• be on the watch for an incoming attack; if you are attacked, check yourself on the rank list: if you are in "P", don't move anymore just wait for turns
• rebuild your forts when necessary

Speeding Up Research

See also section on MAGIC in players manual

• more guilds = faster research
• Use Concentration to reduce the number of turns used to research a spell
  • the effectiveness of Concentration depends on what colour you are: Green/Red: cast after spell level is ~200, Blues cast & re-apply every 100 spell level, white/black cast & re-apply every 150 turns
  • to re-apply concentration, acquire another level in the Skill Grand Enchanter (this saves turns and mana)
• acquire a "Sage" hero
• investing geld in donations to gods, CAN give you concentration level 777, and that will speed up research for a brief while (research a big spell in one turn!)

Exiting Research

When you are within 50 turns of finishing research, you should destroy down to 500-800 guilds and prepare to upkeep an army (e.g. build nodes, farms, and towns for summoning, enchantments, and recruitment) and have your first attack run. By the time you're starting to climb, your mage will have passively researched your last spell.

Alternative Strategies

Geld start, switching to research

This is an alternative way, aiming to get less land and workshops at turn 120, but more geld in stock saving you from worries. Skip it if you did the above.

First run

• try a gelding start (on 550-ish land, Geld Optimizer Applet), for the first 120 turns.
• don't bid on anything, just sit and wait for 200 turns (max turns) before you move out of Apprentice Status and enter the battle zone.

Second run

• do 50 turns more gelding (to 170 turns)
• then explore to about 1550 land
• then build workshops 1 turn by 1 turn to about 399
• build to 8 forts
• then build guilds on the remaining land
• start researching advanced and simple spells until 0 turns.

Third Run and Beyond

• with 200 new turns
• destroy A PART of your Farms, Towns and 100 workshops (in 1 and the same turn) and build the remainder with guilds.
• you will have enough geld from the first gelding day to keep researching.

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