Hints and Strategies

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The Basics

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Don't spread attacks over several provinces at the same time. In most cases, it is better to conquer one province before attacking another province.

Prioritize which provinces to conquer. In general, provinces that provide more victory points per hour are better targets. However, it is also good to take away provinces from your nearest competitor. In some seasons, there may be provinces on the outer ring that no one is taking - conquering those provinces could provide victory points for the duration of the season. Outer ring provinces can also be good targets for some players who are playing at odd times and there are no defined targets in the inner rings.

Don't waste resources, as an individual and as a guild.  Don't spend more resources than you can afford. Don't spend diamonds on extra turns when negotiating - it is better to cancel the negotiation and try again as goods are easier to replenish than diamonds.  Don't build province building just for the sake of building them - construct only what is necessary, when necessary.

If the guild is winning the season handily, save resources. Taking 1st place by 1000 victory points is just as good as taking 1st place by 100,000 points.

As each person is limited in the number of encounters that can be completed daily (attrition), so also does the guild have a limit. The objective is to use those encounters to best effect.  Each league level, increases the number of advancements a province requires to conquer it; Copper 40, Silver 70, Gold 100, Platinum 130, Diamond 160.   Thus, as attrition climbs for each player, advancement becomes more expensive and harder - a group effort is required to spread attrition about.  It is necessary for each player to do their part each and every day as contributions not made cannot be made up.

A player who can both negotiate and fight can usually maximize advances by negotiating first, then fighting. Early on, the average encounter might take an average of 20 goods (taking into account that negotiations are cancelled after 3 unsuccessful tries). If a player has 200 goods available, that might mean about 10 encounters or 20 advances. If that player fights first, by the time fighting no longer becomes possible, attrition will already be high and negotiating could already take 200 goods or more for a single encounter.

There is nothing to stop two guilds from cooperating with each other. Besides not attacking each other, attacks can be focused on each other's closest competitors. Of course, competitor guilds may also be in alliance. A problem with being in an alliance is that only one guild can take first place. On the other hand, will it be possible to take first if two or three other guilds are allied against you?

Depending on locations of players involved in the competition, there may be daily quiet times when very little fighting is done. Provinces taken a few hours before that quiet time not only benefit from the 4-hour lockdown, but also from the ensuing quiet time. Similarly, certain opponents may have quiet times and taking their provinces a few hours beforehand would also be beneficial.

In addition to your guild having a limit in number of encounters that can be won, so also do the other guilds have a limit. By carefully monitoring an opponent guild's activity, it should be possible to determine when they have used up most of their ability for the day. At that point, a conquered province cannot be retaken at the end of the 4-hour lockdown. On the other hand, waiting too long to engage an enemy may mean they are gaining points every hour for provinces that could be taken away earlier.

If you are a fighter, you should consider increasing your attack/defense. GBs such as CdM, AO, Kraken, etc. will all be helpful. (Virgo Project probably won't help too much because of the limited number of times it fires even at high level). If you are a negotiator, anything that increases the amount of goods you generate daily will be helpful. Star Gazer might be a good idea (although the amount of goods it gives is rather limited).

At both, the individual level and guild level, Guild Battlegrounds is all about resource management. As said in the first paragraph, do Not spend more resources on any given day than you can replenish. Do not spend diamonds to get one extra attempt while negotiating unless you have diamonds aplenty. (Although if you spend diamonds for extra negotiation attempts, you may soon find your surplus of diamonds dwindling fast.) Once your personal limit for the day has been reached - STOP!  That being the same for the guild treasury, do Not spend down goods by constructing province buildings that mean little strategically.  Think about the placement of the province and decide how to best utilize any buildings. A province near the guild's base or in the midst of other owned provinces probably won't be attacked soon, so defensive buildings like the Outpost or Decoys won't provide much benefit.  

 

Intermediate

 

As what should be basic strategy, select, at minimum, a single member from the guild who will serve as a Commander to guild members - announce and mark individual provinces as target so everyone in the guild can concentrate on that one single province till conquered, then and only then moving on to the next province.  At intermediate level, it will be best to have at minimum 2 members serve as Commanders, 3 being better.  This GBG leadership team should be all linked in communication to debate strategies and objectives.  The 2 or 3 should divide themselves as around the clock watchers of the map.  The Map will need to be monitored around the clock - as once a province is concurred it is only locked for 4 hours, after that 4 hour timer, the province is opened to attack again - expect rival guilds to be watching.

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With the opening start of a new season, the first objective is to make a bee-line for the center of the map and once there take as much of the center as possible.  Afterward, start working on the outer ring, the number 2 provinces, to inclose the center.  All while looking at what the competition is doing.  

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                         see the white colored tiles, showing a beeline to the center, then spreading to either side <and, yea, that's 125 Attrition>

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Watchtowers and Siege Camps are very important to use during this race for the middle, as time is critical and keeping attrition at bay will allow your members to go further in advancing provinces.  

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Remember, the highest paying provinces are the middle "bullseye."  The goal should always be - have and hold as much of the middle "bullseye" as possible for the longest amount of time.  The center provinces pay so much in Victory Points that you would literally have to hold double as many outer tier provinces to equal, or triple 3rd tier provinces, or quadruple 4th tier...

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                            the "bullseye" in yellow (highest points), outer ring or 2nd tier in green (2nd highest points), 

                            3rd tier ring in blue and 4th tier ring in purple.  Grey is HQ locations

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Clock watching - Once you have ownership in the center, the Commanders should start orchestrating ownership of the outer tier 2 ring, with optimally a 2 hour difference between providences owned next-door.  You should try to optimally have 2 two hour offset provinces next to provinces you own.  This allows for you to seesaw back and forth in gaining and expectedly loosing provinces to rivals, owning 2 two hour offsets gives you a buffer if you were to loose one of them.  In this fashion, the more challenging maps will take on a kinda checker-board look - your guild color intertwined with the rivals.

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This back and forth province swapping can be maintained by the orchestration of the Commanders guiding guild members where and when to concentrate their attack, again one at a time till concurred.  Another way to accomplish this swap is by partnering with another guild - creating an alliance to swap provinces back and forth - this will make rival guilds to this alliance very challenged to break into this province swap block-aid.

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As learned already in basic strategy, you may only attack provinces next to ones you own.  To expand on that, if you are attacking a province and a competing guild is attacking the same province, the one who reaches the advancement level first wins, the loosing guild's advancement will cut in half after the province is won but this 1/2 remained will be left on the province, saved for re-attack after the 4 hour lock period.  Having this retainer on the provinces is very nice, as when you can attack it again, your new effort will be added to the left over retainer - making conjuring faster and easier.  However, this retainer is only retained if and only if you keep a province next-door.  In other words, if you loose the adjacent provinces then you also loose all effort you have in advancement and/or retainer on surrounding provinces.  Hence the mention in preceding paragraphs that optimally you should have 2 (2 hour offsets) adjacent provinces to one you own, thus saves you from cutoff if you loose one.  On the inverse, you can use this knowledge as a strategy -- Say, if you and rival is both attacking a common province, then instead of just racing with the rival on the target, you could target the province the rival currently owns (if you are adjacent to it, obviously).  By attacking this way, if you can take the currently owned province before the rival takes the other target, then you gain not only the rival guild province but the rival guild also looses all advancement on the original target (if they do not own another adjacent province).  To further enhance this strategy, don't take the originally targeted province for 2 hours - this sets you up to sea-saw back into the adjacencies once the 4 hour lock releases 

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Races and slowing your rivals -- this is were Decoys, Traps, Outposts, and Fortresses come into play.  Decoys and Traps are used to increase attrition rates on rival guilds when they are advancing on provinces you own.  Outposts and Fortresses are used to increase the advancement requirement for provinces you own.  If you are racing with a rival for a common province (as explained above) and the rival targets your owned province then you can place one or more of these buildings up to slow the progression of the rival, thus giving you advantage on your advancement.

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Advanced

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At this level, the Map will be turning over very fast, expect provinces changing every 4 hours.  Guilds are going to be extremely active - I have partaken in conquests that concurring a province literally took less than 1 minute - Yes, less than 1 minute.  To achieve this you must have a significant number of active players with significant resources.  But, more importantly a board of Commanders to steer the guild in the correct path and watching the map constantly.  This literally ends up being like a real full time job, so treat your advanced Commanders well.

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At this level, timing will be extremely important.  A Board of Commanders will lay out a strategy of turning over provinces in a timed, clock work like fashion - strategy planning will be required - Also, it maybe advisable to have participating members organized into squadrons around the clock, to spread out attrition and guarentee available players during morning, noon, afternoon, evening, night, and overnight.

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As a defensive means you can advance provinces around you to just under owning them - sitting on the province to buy yourself time and preventing rival guilds from attacking the "just under" province (wasting fights).  This also allows you to set up timing for turning over provinces.  This strategy is extremely effective when partnered with a guild alliance, effectively building a "just under" wall of provinces protecting your center.

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A defense to such strategy is if you own the "just under" provinces then you can place a Outpost or Fortress, there by increasing the required advancement, this will buy you time to advance elsewhere or if you need the "just under' province to turn over, then a increase in the required advancement may entice the rival to increase their advancement, then once they are over the original base requirement, you can delete the Outpost or Fortress - this will immediately drop the requirement back, thus immediately turnover the province.  Kinda a carrot and stick approach.

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Other tactics include diversions - kinda like that 2 way Tic Tac Toe trick - entice the rival to hit a province while they are enthralled you can sneak and hit another province, may not be the grand prize but setting you up for cascading back into high-point provinces.  As there is no way to defend the direct attack of a province, you must always be preparing a route back after timed turnovers.

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      notice on this image several of the strategies we speak of:  notice the white guild and orange guild checkerboard like

      pattern of swapping providences back and forth, also notice that a white owned providence is adjacent to at least 2 other

      white owned provinces, thus if one access is lost another still exists (remember provinces must be adjacent to one another

      for attack).  Look at the banners, provinces are fill to within a couple of contacts before flipping - this means that anyone

      else attacking will be simply wasting fights, as it will only take one extra fights or two to flip the province for the holding guild

      In this pattern on alliance (between white and orange guild) they will be able to flip each province in a coordinated fashion,

      like running along a spiral from the center - thus, keeping a coordinated time frame of turning provinces every 4 hours

      (this allows for a continuous supply of fights and rewards for guild mates).  Thru literal alarm clock setting, every 4 hours 

      fighters can plan on being on-line.  Once the province is lock-released an onslaught of mates can all hit one province at

      a time, thus filling it to within 5 fights of flipping and then hold and go to next.  This alliance completely shuts-out other guilds

      as can be seen on this map - other guilds are confined to the 3rd and 4th rings squeezed out of the profitable center.

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The last thing I'll mention is -- the new concept of "gbg farming" - what is being seen now in the game is 2, 3, or more guilds working together in alliance to swap provinces back and forth (as described above) but not in competition.  These guilds are working together to just trade provinces so that everyone within the guilds can just farm rewards from fighting.  Typically, the commanders of these guild teams form communication threads and come up with a time schedule to swap.  Also, agreed is to keep Siege Towers in place and build new ones, again benefiting all.  This was probably not the original intentions of Innocences to have this take place but players are now making enormous gains in player points via this "farming" - truly showing that FoE is a fighting game - as the gain of these new points are beginning to reshape the established old player ranking...