Question Province Expansions

[Rhua]

I am only half way through the Fairies chapter however my latest Province Expansion is asking for Orcs as well as goods for negotiating.
How can I buy or manufacture Orcs. This seems like a way to get me to buy yet more diamonds.
Also there was no warning when I paid the massive amount of coin to scout this latest province.
Regards,
Rhua

 

[FieryArien]

No, it’s not about diamonds. It just means that you are way ahead in you number of provinces (probably fulfilling the requirement for several chapters ahead).

How can I buy or manufacture Orcs.

They are produced in the Armory once you upgrade them to “Breeding Grounds” in the Orcs chapter. In other words you have no way of negotiating these provinces until you enter Orcs chapter. Then there are several options:
- Research the Armory/Breeding Grounds technology and upgrade your armories to produce Orcs there.
- Craft the building in the Magic Academy, which produces Orcs. How is it called? Orcs Grounds? I can’t remember. Note that crafting it now won’t help you, because it doesn’t provide Orcs before Orcs chapter.
- Winning a daily special building in some event, if there is an event at that time and if it contains such a building.

 

[Stephen1]

The building that produces Orcs and is crafted in the Magic Academy is called the Orc Nest. As @FieryArien says crafting them before you reach the Orcs and Goblins chapter Orc Nests will not produce Orcs.

 

[Rhua]

No, it’s not about diamonds. It just means that you are way ahead in you number of provinces (probably fulfilling the requirement for several chapters ahead).

They are produced in the Armory once you upgrade them to “Breeding Grounds” in the Orcs chapter. In other words you have no way of negotiating these provinces until you enter Orcs chapter. Then there are several options:
- Research the Armory/Breeding Grounds technology and upgrade your armories to produce Orcs there.
- Craft the building in the Magic Academy, which produces Orcs. How is it called? Orcs Grounds? I can’t remember. Note that crafting it now won’t help you, because it doesn’t provide Orcs before Orcs chapter.
- Winning a daily special building in some event, if there is an event at that time and if it contains such a building.

Thanks Fiery, I guessed as much. It's just irritating that there was no info before I spent the large amount of coins to scout it.
Regards,
Rhua

 

[Rhua]

No, it’s not about diamonds. It just means that you are way ahead in you number of provinces (probably fulfilling the requirement for several chapters ahead).

They are produced in the Armory once you upgrade them to “Breeding Grounds” in the Orcs chapter. In other words you have no way of negotiating these provinces until you enter Orcs chapter. Then there are several options:
- Research the Armory/Breeding Grounds technology and upgrade your armories to produce Orcs there.
- Craft the building in the Magic Academy, which produces Orcs. How is it called? Orcs Grounds? I can’t remember. Note that crafting it now won’t help you, because it doesn’t provide Orcs before Orcs chapter.
- Winning a daily special building in some event, if there is an event at that time and if it contains such a building.

Sorry, I forgot to add you can buy the orcs to complete the province transaction for around 200 diamonds.
That's why I mentioned the diamonds. It takes 10 provinces to acquire a Province Expansion, so around 2000 diamonds.
About the same as the Premium Expansion. I am being a little sarcastic. You gain lots of other goodies along the way.
Regards

 

[FieryArien]

Sorry, I forgot to add you can buy the orcs to complete the province transaction for around 200 diamonds.
That's why I mentioned the diamonds. It takes 10 provinces to acquire a Province Expansion, so around 2000 diamonds.
About the same as the Premium Expansion. I am being a little sarcastic. You gain lots of other goodies along the way.
Regards

I see your frustration. Yes, the so called “Orc wall” sucks. I can only wish you fast and smooth sail into Orcs chapter.

Good news is there is no similar wall waiting for you in the future. *Subject to change whenever Inno Games pleases. After reaching Orcs you can scout and scout and scout.

 

[SkyRider99]

Someone told me in the forum that the more provinces you scout and solve, the harder the fights become in the tournament and spire. It seems that the enemy numbers increase if you have scouted too many provinces. I don't know what is 'too many' but I have way too much. I'd guess that the optimal number of provinces to scout is just that number that will allow you entry to the next research chapter.

 

[FieryArien]

Someone told me in the forum that the more provinces you scout and solve, the harder the fights become in the tournament and spire.

No, the number of provinces isn’t part of the Spire/tournament formula. However, I suppose that the player who told you that information also placed all the expansions which were gained by all the solved provinces. It weren’t the provinces what made the Spire/Tournament more costly. It were the expansions.

 

[Pauly7]

Someone told me in the forum that the more provinces you scout and solve, the harder the fights become in the tournament and spire.

Where was this quote in the forum?

 

[SkyRider99]

General Discussion --> Army Power
06/06/'21
The info I received was about total number of provinces scouted. It may have been assumed in that discussion that all city expansions thus opened were then placed. Which would seem to be in line with what @FieryArien is saying here.
And I have certainly placed all available expansions in my city. Which now appears to indicate that a bigger city has to fight bigger enemy troop sizes.
Is there any point where the numbers become even?

 

[Pauly7]

And I have certainly placed all available expansions in my city. Which now appears to indicate that a bigger city has to fight bigger enemy troop sizes.

This is certainly true. To my perception, putting the calculations aside, the numbers of expansions placed seems to have the biggest impact. In my Beta City, where the city is expanding and I play things much more fast and loose, there have been at least two occasions where I have laid down about 5 expansions together in preparation for a Fellowship Adventure and in the next tournament there has been a very noticeable increase in squad size which made things instantly much more difficult.

Of course the bigger your city gets then the impact of any one extra item makes a smaller and smaller percentage difference in impact.

 

[MinervaOz]

General Discussion --> Army Power
06/06/'21
Which now appears to indicate that a bigger city has to fight bigger enemy troop sizes.
Is there any point where the numbers become even?

Unless I'm misunderstanding you, you seem to be confusing a number of different things.

World map provinces and spire/tournament difficulty are completely different.

On the world map, enemy troop numbers are determined, at the time of scouting, by scouting costs. You can reduce costs, and therefore enemy troop numbers - squad size - before you scout by completing the Advanced Scouts research (I think this was the gist of @FarReach's reply to you in the other thread). Once scouted, they don't change. The only way to make fights easier (other than with boosts) is to increase your own squad size through research.

As @FieryArien and @Pauly7 say, expansions placed contribute to the formula by which your squad size is calculated in the tournament and spire. This makes the whole tournament more expensive because more troops are lost overall, which makes it more difficult to complete the same number of provinces. It does not affect the difficulty of individual battles. Nothing you do influences the ratio between your squad size and the enemy's because it's fixed. In the 1st round, the enemy squad size is 1/8 yours, they are equal by about province 6 (I think - someone can correct me here!) and around province 30 it's twice yours.

 

[Gargon667]

Someone told me in the forum that the more provinces you scout and solve, the harder the fights become in the tournament and spire. It seems that the enemy numbers increase if you have scouted too many provinces. I don't know what is 'too many' but I have way too much. I'd guess that the optimal number of provinces to scout is just that number that will allow you entry to the next research chapter.

No they did not, they said it makes MAP ENCOUNTERS more difficult. Not tourneys/spire.

 

[Gargon667]

This is certainly true. To my perception, putting the calculations aside, the numbers of expansions placed seems to have the biggest impact. In my Beta City, where the city is expanding and I play things much more fast and loose, there have been at least two occasions where I have laid down about 5 expansions together in preparation for a Fellowship Adventure and in the next tournament there has been a very noticeable increase in squad size which made things instantly much more difficult.

Of course the bigger your city gets then the impact of any one extra item makes a smaller and smaller percentage difference in impact.

That is definitely one effect right there

Just to make things a bit more complicated The formula contains fixed numbers as well, but the variables are AWs, expansions and techs

Imagine a case (completely hypothetical) where including all the fixed numbers gives you the following result:

techs contribute 10
Expansions contribute 100
AWs: contribute 1000

result: 10*100*1000=1 000 000

Adding 1 tech: 11*100*1000 = 1 100 000
Adding 1 expansion: 10*101*1000 = 1 010 000
Adding 1 AW: 10*100*1001 = 1 001 000

Even within the same city it always makes the biggest difference if you increase the smallest contributor, no matter which one the smallest one actually is. The above example could just as well be the reverse, in which case AWs would be the biggest problem, not the smallest. Of course more likely is that the 3 factors are more similar which would then make the difference smaller.

The number of techs is completely dependent on the chapter progress of course, so it is the same for everybody in the same place in the tree. Also expansions are rather closely correlated to chapter progress, although diamonds for premiums are also an influence here as well as the choice of placing gained expansions or not. So those two factors mainly depend on chapter. And that means early in the game adding to those 2 will have a bigger influence
AWs are the factor that depends much more on personal choice. One can have lots in low cahpters (by progressing slowly or not at all) or one can have few in high chapters by deleting detrimental ones.

How does this help? Not at all, no matter what you do, tourneys always get more expensive Just funny how math works...

 

[SkyRider99]

No they did not, they said it makes MAP ENCOUNTERS more difficult. Not tourneys/spire.

My bad. I didn't fully explain. I was assuming that readers would appreciate that the expansions won by scouting more provinces were subsequently placed into a player's city. I do this routinely to get more space for buildings etc. Because I have scouted so many provinces, and because I have won all the expansions, and because I placed those expansions into my city, it accounts for why I am seeing greater enemy troop numbers, in the tournament and spire. I understand the difference between MAP ENCOUNTERS and tournament/spire. I was curious why my tournament enemy numbers have increased.

As Pauly7 says,

...the numbers of expansions placed seems to have the biggest impact. In my Beta City, where the city is expanding and I play things much more fast and loose, there have been at least two occasions where I have laid down about 5 expansions together in preparation for a Fellowship Adventure and in the next tournament there has been a very noticeable increase in squad size which made things instantly much more difficult.


I've noticed that also.

@Gargon667 info re those three variable factors accounts for quite a bit too. I also agree "... no matter what you do, tourneys always get more expensive".

The discussion and points raised in this thread have been very helpful. Including the effect of AWs which I was unaware of.

 

[Pauly7]

As Pauly7 says,

We have noticed the same thing, but it's interesting what @Gargon667 says, which makes perfect sense - Whichever of the three things that you have the smallest number of is the thing which will make the pronounced difference, i.e. if you have 1,000 AW levels, but only 30 expansions, then placing one new expansion will have considerably more impact than upgrading one new AW.

 

[Gargon667]

We have noticed the same thing, but it's interesting what @Gargon667 says, which makes perfect sense - Whichever of the three things that you have the smallest number of is the thing which will make the pronounced difference, i.e. if you have 1,000 AW levels, but only 30 expansions, then placing one new expansion will have considerably more impact than upgrading one new AW.

If you really want to know @MinMax Gamer has the complete formula with all the constant factors somewhere, you could then calculate what real numbers would constitute "equal" contributions...

if you have 1000 AW levels you are living in a world of pain, ask @Far Reach etc about it . I guess it´s like sticking Needles into a third degree burn, does it still matter how deep you stick the needle in? I am not sure lol...

 

[Gargon667]

Because I have scouted so many provinces, and because I have won all the expansions, and because I placed those expansions into my city, it accounts for why I am seeing greater enemy troop numbers, in the tournament and spire. I understand the difference between MAP ENCOUNTERS and tournament/spire. I was curious why my tournament enemy numbers have increased.

It depends what timeframe you are talking about. if you recently experienced a big increase it most likely is not the province expansions, as I assume you have had them for a long time (except the 1 new one from the latest chapter)? The culprit in this case more likely is playing the new chapter: Both because of the tech number as well as the research expansions. AW upgrades would do the same if you for example added a few new AWs and upgraded them quickly through the first levels, but usually AW upgrades are more of a steady slow increase.

 

[Pauly7]

Yeah, I understand the formula and have used MinMax's spreadsheet, but I just hadn't sat down and thought about the maths in that way, in terms of increasing a smaller number affecting the multiplication more.

 

[Gargon667]

Yeah, I understand the formula and have used MinMax's spreadsheet, but I just hadn't sat down and thought about the maths in that way, in terms of increasing a smaller number affecting the multiplication more.

Same happens with seed production in the trader or anywhere else a multiplication happens You can use that same principle everywhere.

While we´re discussing theoretical maths now: It is actually a geometric thing rather than an algebraic one. The area of a square say (5*5=25) is bigger than the area of a rectangle (4*6=24) even though the combined length of the sides is equally long. If you multiply 2 numbers you always create a rectangle (or cube with 3 numbers etc). By increasing the smaller number you make the rectangle more square (bigger area), by increasing the bigger number you make the rectangle more long (smaller area).
Just for people that find graphics easier than numbers