These are all extremely good responses, thank you all for responding with such detailed information!

@krinid, for sure getting the Supercamp as quick as possible is the most valuable/worth decision since the earlier you get it the longer you get to use it! I wonder if it does became worse as you get stronger though, as Parsifal argues it may be better.

The Supercamp is definitely worth the $9.99 though, based on everything said so far.

finished silk roads earlier than expected.
here are the numbers (rounded for simplicity)
Total armies: 130B
Army camp production: 30B
Mercenaries: 45B
Caches: 30B
Drafts: 25B

The mercenaries play no role here, because I purchased them all at once at the end, when armies production didn't play any role any more.

so let's take the 85B.
It's difficult to calculate exactly how many armies came from the SuperCamp alone.

It took me 4 days to complete the level. let's assume I maxed it 2 days ago. So:
31K x 48h = ~5.3B armies which are 17% of army camps production, or 6% of all the armies received. Not bad for one camp!

I'm still tending towards my 10% efficiency calculation.
without the SCamp I don't know whether I'd be still playing that level. Bigger army generation means faster progress overall

Edited 6/20/2021 23:20:52

in my opinion, not as math based as others, i bought it. could do without it. too expensive to upgrade.

Agree w/fmwc.

well, math doesn't agree with you

LOL, was going to say the same to you actually, but decided to just let it go.

But since you mentioned it . . .

It took me 4 days to complete the level. let's assume I maxed it 2 days ago. So:
31K x 48h = ~5.3B armies which are 17% of army camps production, or 6% of all the armies received. Not bad for one camp!

I'm still tending towards my 10% efficiency calculation.
without the SCamp I don't know whether I'd be still playing that level. Bigger army generation means faster progress overall

6% of all armies produced = includes drafts, caches, mercs? And 17% of all armies produced were from the supercamp? Not sure about the first Q, but for the 2nd Q, assume 17% of all armies from army camps are from the supercamp, so how does 17% of something that contributes to 10-20% of clearing a level result in 10% level clearing speed?

The Math:
23% army camp contribution
19% drafts
23% caches
35% mercs

So then 17% of the 23% is from the supercamp = 3.9% of these armies are from the supercamp. So I'm confused as to how a 3.9% increase in armies leads to clearing levels 10% faster. Also keep in mind that in order to upgrade, you're spending large amounts of money and you also have to wait for the armies to accumulate. It doesn't help to just upgrade it, time has to pass for the armies to accumulate. Compared to spending that same in-game money on hospital upgrades & buying mercs which you can use right away to increase your money, find more army camps, etc.

“So I’m confused as to how a 3.9% increase in armies leads to clearing levels 10% faster”

Uh… this is highly believable. It’s not his fault you’re bad at math dude. Exponential growth is notoriously difficult to ballpark in your head.

@graemes
Exponential growth? Are we talking about the same thing? To have exponential growth there has to be an exponent. Supercamp is a straight linear rate, # of armies per sec * time.

Anyhow, let's assume that clearing a level 10% quicker means the Supercamp produces an additional 10% of the total army production required to clear the level. Total production = 130B, so 10% = 13B. His math showed that Supercamp produced 5.3B = 6% of all armies produced. So around 6% quicker clearing speed. (In reality, if the output was really 5.3B of a total 130B, then it's only 4% of all armies produced).

@Krinid

I don't understand why are you counting mercenaries as "produced armies". They aren't produced. there are just sitting there for you to purchase them. They don't have any impact on the early and middle stages of the game. So when I purchase my mercenaries it's the point where I don't rely on army camp production any more.
So the question should be how faster did the SuperCamp brought me to that point.
in my opinion that 6% accelerates the process to about 10% overall, because at every second with the AC you get more armies which means you can progress faster, which in it's turn lets you conquer other army camps faster.

But let me take your side for a moment. You are saying it's only 3.9%. fine with me: it's constant free armies in every level without any AP investment until the end of times. Can you put a price on it?
Or better, think about the AC as a permanent fourth slot artifact.
Better?

Edited 6/24/2021 08:09:46

Now about the SC being too pricey to upgrade:
https://imgur.com/a/DfDNXEQ

Upgrading Gislic for 6.48B to get a boost of 810 armies/sec
OR
Upgrading SCamp for 7.22B to get a boost of 4020 armies/sec

what would you chose?

@Parsifal

Why don't you use mercs in the early and middle stage of a level? Ofc they are more expensive at this point than at the later stage because you haven't unlocked some (or all) techs yet.

But early use of mercs allows to expand faster, which pays off in terms of faster income generation (from bonuses/territories), getting earlier access to hospitals, camps and caches.

I do. But only occasionally.

I'm working now on a new forum topic. It will be ready when I finish Europe Huge for the second time. Probably in the beginning of August. I'm preparing an easier way to compare numbers and strategies.

It's fascinating how different our playstyles are, army camp centric vs merc centric perhaps is the best way to sum up the difference, b/c I think we both have high hospital use in common (we're both making use of hospitals and maxing them out on each map). It's fair to say that my play strat is something I developed to minimize the dependency on army camps b/c I got tired of waiting for armies to accumulate, so I found ways of getting armies quicker or reducing the # of armies needed (hospitals). Maybe our strats are equally effective. Not sure.

Regarding terminology of "army production" and counting mercs in them: I was actually trying to adjust to your system which I thought including mercs b/c of the stats you posted (# armies from camps, mercs, drafts, caches; you left out JS, hospitals, so assumed that what you posted was what you calculate against). If that's not how your method works, then my bad & my misunderstanding, and just ignore what I wrote above regarding your calcs.

The calculations I actually work with are "armies required to clear a level" which includes army camps, caches, drafts, mercs, JS, hospitals. It's the sum of all of these which make up the total # of armies required to clear a map, and that's what I measure against. And I find maximizing Hospitals is the biggest benefit, so I prioritize that. Buffing hospitals is essentially a reduction of the # of armies required from all the other contributing factors--and most importantly reduces the amount required from army camps, b/c that is the biggest limiter b/c you have to wait to get the armies. JS is the same but it's a fixed value, so other than actually doing joint strikes to get the value from it, there's nothing more need be said about it. I evaluate decisions in this context, not just maximizing value within "army production" from camps, but on "total armies required to finish the current map" and maximizing what brings the highest gains in that context.

So to actually answer your question...

Now about the SC being too pricey to upgrade:
https://imgur.com/a/DfDNXEQ

Upgrading Gislic for 6.48B to get a boost of 810 armies/sec
OR
Upgrading SCamp for 7.22B to get a boost of 4020 armies/sec

what would you chose?

Tbh I'd likely choose neither. I tend to not upgrade army camps much beyond 1B cost (not a fixed figure, depends on the map). In general, if I have that much money, I spend it on hospitals, mercs and sometimes mines if I need specific ores to work towards profitable crafting (to get money to buy more hospital upgrades & mercs). By the time the army camp prices get >1B, I'm typically far enough into a map that upgrading camps doesn't make sense anymore b/c there's not enough time left on that map to get the value from it.

I align with Olja's comment - I prioritize mercs early and mid to get more territory = more money & more buildings (camps, mercs, hospitals, crafters) & caches, etc.

When choosing how to spend money, I estimate the length of time I have left on the level, then calculate the benefit an army camp upgrade will get me in that time vs spending the same money on a hospital upgrade or buying mercs, etc, and almost every time the result is that the benefit of the army camp isn't enough to justify the cost vs the other options b/c there's not enough time left in the level, especially now on my 2nd playthrough and I haven't taken more then 4 days to finish a level yet.

Example:
- Situation: Playing a map, estimate total 4 days to clear, 2 days left, 500 territories remaining.
- Next Supercamp upgrade is your example above, upgrading to 12.5K from 8.48K for 7.22B, so that's 4.02K increase * 3600*48=695M benefit.
- I would prioritize a hospital upgrade that would give me >695M benefit, so a hospital that gave a 'far territory benefit' of >=1.39M.
- I have 2 options to implement this decision: upgrade a hospital upgrade I already have, or use mercs to conquer a hospital I don't have yet. Especially useful when I've used an FB to reveal where the hospitals are, and I can estimate the benefit of the hospitals will bring based on the ones I already have (they increase in value).
- And almost always, hospitals give the better benefit, especially if you count the 'near territory benefits' which buffs the captures near the hospitals, and the "freebee point" where you can capture all territories under the min benefit of all hospitals at 0 cost of armies, which again gets more money from bonuses.

@Krinid,

I'm up to the challenge!
Could you name me your last 5 levels you've beaten and tell me exactly (or approximately) how long did it take you to finish each and every one of them?
(I don't care if it is 2d13h or 2d12h57m - you can round those up)

HAHA, it wasn't a challenge, but sure, I'll roll with it. Not sure exactly what this will prove without also measuring pure idle time (not doing anything) vs active clicking/tapping time + power usage, total AP spend vs dead time (time beyond idle limit where the game stops but physical time since level start continues - actually not sure if this is counted in the level time count stats at the end?), 1st vs 2nd playthrough, artifact choice, how many digs you got done + if finished the level with another dig going, map revision levels, etc, but it's an interesting comparison as a starting point for some ballpark comparisons at least.

All these are from my post Ascension 2nd playthroughs. I didn't track anything from Tutorial through KP-X, only started tracking from Feldmere; the early levels aren't likely worth comparing anyhow, they were all between ~2 mins (tutorial) & ~20 hrs or so (KP-X). I would have had one for Reconquest but I accidentally fat fingered a level ABORT on my mobile when I was half way through it.

Roads of Silk and Iron 3d20h
Far Land 1d21h
Breaking Green 2d6h
Geopolitics 1d4h
Copper Creek 1d17h
Sengoku 24h
Feldmere 23h

Would be interested in Master Jz's & Phoenix's times as well.

Edited 6/24/2021 20:29:22

I'd be up for the task but I don't know whether this would prove anything. Remember, I'm still on my first play through, I haven't ascended yet once. So, if you want the numbers, I could calculate them from my level statistics, but they won't be comparable to any of your numbers at all. Still, I feel honored that you thought of me.

I thought you had Ascended already ... so yes, won't prove anything yet (I could post my 1st playthrough stats ... but tbh lots of my 1st playthroughs were early early beta so the game was changing too much to be a worthwhile comparison, like finishing USA in 32 hours or something).

So track your stats post Ascension and we'll check back later. (:

All for the study of optimal strategies! lol

My times were similar to krinid's after my first ascension. Some were faster, some were slower. I don't think I picked up any powers during my second run. I used the powers from daily doors and that was about it.

Edit: I stop upgrading army camps about 10%-20% into the levels and focus on hospitals/mercs/crafters for the rest.

Edited 6/24/2021 22:16:38

@Krinid

of course you can't compare 1 to 1, but you can get some rough ideas.

the first 11 maps (tutorial excluded) are for me the early levels - my guess is that all strategies should work pretty much the same with them.
Were you skipping levels?

anyway here is the comparison


--------------------------- Krinid ---Parsifal
Roads of Silk and Iron---3d20h---- 3d23h
Far Land------------------1d21h----1d14h
Breaking Green------------2d6h-------13h
Geopolitics-----------------1d4h-----1d8h
Copper Creek-------------1d17h-----1d6h
Sengoku----------------------24h------17h
Feldmere---------------------23h------ 16h


I must admit it looks similar (I think differences within 10 hours are insignificant - those are probably our sleep times, or like you named it "dead time") - only exception is Breaking Green - I'm intrigued what could result those time differences....
What I do find interesting, is that I managed to catch you up (I'm not racing you) - you ascended a couple of weeks before me and now I'm in the middle of Orbis and played all the maps without skipping.


I don't think it's fair to compare pre-ascension playthroughs - the AP investment is not sufficient to imply any strategy to its full benefit.

Edited 6/25/2021 10:06:02

Agree, they're similar enough that we can say they're on par.

As for Breaking Green, not sure but this might be one of a bunch of days when I was busy and didn't play much, had some dead time (not sure if that factors into the clear time stats though) and if I did return within my idle time limit, all I did was reset idle time (no army camp upgrades, no hospital purchases, no smelting/crafting changes, no sales, no merc purchases, no techs, etc). Not sure if that aligns to when I was doing BG or not.

On my 2nd playthrough, I'm focusing on being more idle (go figure) so when I start a level, I put ACB, TMB, BMB on, activate auto-conquer and then just leave the game & check back every 4-6 hrs to buy camp upgrades (I buy them in early game), change up my smelting/crafting, buy mercs, hospital upgrades, etc ... until somewhere between 30-60% level progress (depends on sleep timing, other daily schedules, etc), then play more actively from that point on. No idea if this will help or hurt my level speed progress tbh ... but it definitely reduces my active WZI time. (Yea, active Idle time, lol). I find that WZI actually takes a lot of active time to play optimally, and I'm trying to reduce that.

Yes, I did skip a bunch of levels after ascending and finished a bunch of the later levels before coming back to do the earlier levels. Come to think of it, I did that on my first playthrough too.