Shuri2060
Strategos
An insight into what happened in Round 5 from MC's POV for those who are interested. I'm not one to usually share strategies, etc, on externals, but I think we managed to find an interesting approach to Olympus, and I'm unlikely to play it again for a while, so I'll share. If the endgame doesn't change much in the future, I think this strategy is something future smaller alliances might adopt - with a good portal setup, timing skill is emphasized more over size advantage unlike other game modes. There are counters to it I can think of, but imo they don't play against it much better than a mirror strategy.
The final lineup:
You can see that MC had to beat the 5 supports before their CS in order to land. Unfortunately for DV, only 1 of those were DLU and MC's attacks were all LS except 2 anchored half myths - Aldia Keep (Hobbie Q) and 005 (Shuri2060).
MC's planning
The odds looked like they were in DV's favor as they had won the previous 2 in a row. In the first few days after Round 4, we were at a loss for a new plan. Both sides had essentially shown all their cards at this point.
General Olympus planning info
Since supports cannot be launched until a Temple is clear, there are usually 2 stages to a standard Temple take. Part A - clear, Part B - main CS. The gap between the 2 needs to be the TT of what you want to be your furthest timed support. Assuming Olympus doesn't spawn in your ocean, then that is TT to portal + 1 hr. You can vary this standard plan, eg. if you let the enemy do Part A, allowing more cities to be timed to the main CS, but the concept is more or less the same.
Note that while support cannot be timed until Olympus is cleared, attacks can be timed the moment Olympus spawns, as long as you know when you want your main CS to be. With this in mind, if you follow the standard plan, you will want most of your cities closer than the furthest timed support to be DEF, especially if you have a pre-planned main CS time. OFF cities further out can be pre-timed, and the OFF cities close to portal would be used for clearing/sniping.
This was how MC had their portals set up for the first 4 rounds. While we didn't always have one pre-planned main CS time, we often had a few pre-planned chosen times for the main CS we lined up OFF to, and then after we saw the commands after clearing + landing a scout CS, we would decide which one we wanted to time support to. The great thing about sending through Portals is if you're not in the Portal ally when the command would go through the Portal, it returns instead. So if an earlier pre-planned time was chosen, the lineups for the later times can be made to bounce off Portals.
Previous Rounds
In Rounds 1 and 2, DV appeared unprepared and MC cleared and landed their main CS first, gaining sufficient time to stack before DV's attacks hit. In Round 3, MC messed up their clearing - it was ~15 mins later than planned. They only had ~45 mins portal TT worth of timed support as opposed to 1 hr and DV landed ~10 mins after their main CS in addition to that, so they easily wiped both land and naval and secured their siege. In Round 4, Olympus spawned in DV's core allowing them to have a much shorter gap between the clear and main CS (iirc it was ~1 hr). MC didn't take this into account so their main CS hit 1 hr after DV's, and by then it was too stacked for their timed attacks to break.
By now, we had a feel for timings - if we landed our main CS before DV, it had to be at least 20-30 mins early else it would likely be broken. Similarly, if we landed after, it could at most be ~15 mins or so late, otherwise we couldn't break.
The problem
Although the 'standard' plan above usually works great for ordinary temples, we found it to be lacking for Olympus in Rounds 3 and 4. The problem is - it's quite hard for this plan to be flexible. We always had the contingency plan of attempting to snipe + lock on top of the enemy main CS if we saw it in an early scout, but this backup plan requires quite a bit of luck. First, the later you first spot the enemy main CS, the less cities you have in range for locking, and the more support they've likely already locked onto it. Secondly, with our Portal setup, it had far too little close range OFF to reliably attempt both a snipe AND a CS lock right after. The first problem was realised in Round 3 - in this round, DV had a lot of small attacks to kill off our scouts, so we never saw the commands until it was far too late. The second happened in Round 4 - we saw their main CS 1 hr away from landing, so we certainly couldn't snipe it, and we didn't have enough immediate OFF to quickly break either. All we could do was attempt to spell their CS down (it actually got very close - Frog's 39 LS was spelled down to 1).
Since our city count was slightly inferior to DV's (especially at the ~1 hr LS Portal TT mark and above), we didn't stand much chance unless we either landed our main CS much earlier than theirs, or fluked a landing right after. We calculated it would take roughly 60 cities to clear the Round 5 neutral units (stack decreases by 20% on each spawn), so if we converted everything within ~20 mins Portal TT to OFF, we could clear very quickly and hope to land first with a large gap between our main CS and theirs. The problem was if DV decided to do the same, this plan would completely fail - and they had a slightly higher city count under 20 min Portal TT than we did (due to Portal geography --- both of their Portals neighbour close filled up islands, but only one of ours did).
The idea
A solution didn't occur to us until the 5th day after Round 4. Rather than going heavy DEF near, OFF far, what if we did the opposite? This doesn't sound great at first - you can barely time any DEF to your main CS unless it lands a long time after clearing. BUT, there is one scenario where you don't actually need timed DEF. What if you land on top of their main CS? By the time the enemy notice you've done this, it's likely too late to cancel their supports and send snipes. There would be a delay in them pulling supports and landing breaks (especially if they've already timed most close OFF for clearing or main CS) which gives enough time for your further supports to land first. And the previous issue with attempting to lock on top of their CS was the lack of OFF near portals to do this which is solved by this flipping of the setup.
There were a few other details to deal with - how to guarantee we spot their main CS the moment it clears and what if they have no main CS yet. We decided sacrificing ~60 cities under 20 min portal TT to clear was worth it in return for potentially increasing the gap between clear and enemy main CS time (giving us a wider range of OFF to snipe with) and giving us a much higher chance to spot their CS immediately. Although DV would probably still have scout killers early on, they would probably have less and we could have multiple scout CS landing minutes after clearing to increase our chances. This sacrifice does come at a cost - if their CS was under 1 hr 20 mins away from landing after clearing (ie. under 20 mins portal TT), we would have nothing to snipe with. But it wouldn't be too bad as we could still launch all OFF to land say 20 mins after it and a CS right after. Even if the LS fails to, myths in the 20-40 min Portal range should be able to beat their DLU in the 0-40 min Portal range, and spelling is still an option. We felt they were quite heavy OFF around portals as well, so breaking and landing was very possible. We expected DV to go with the standard plan of clearing + landing a pre-timed main CS themselves this round. This was because of the low clearing requirement for Round 5, and that we had almost tricked them with a late clearing time in Round 4 (had it not been for spawn location, I believe that had a decent chance to bait their OFF to land early before our main CS). If there really was no main CS spotted on our first scout, we could still expect to see it soon on subsequent scouts when they didn't see any from us either.
So what was previously our contingency plan became our main plan. This plan essentially forces a timing battle between the 2 sides once Olympus clears. DV need to lock as many supports on their main CS as possible while we need to lock as many attacks and CS before them. We also had the advantage of attacking - temple buffs greatly boost OFF, and 1 Myth lock can wipe 3-4 DLU locks and 1 LS lock can do the same to ~1.5-2 bir locks (the Battleships event also provided many attack buffs). If the siege breaks, then there are no academy and advisor buffs for defending a neutral temple, making it even easier to wipe several DEF nukes.
The final lineup:
MC's planning
General Olympus planning info
Since supports cannot be launched until a Temple is clear, there are usually 2 stages to a standard Temple take. Part A - clear, Part B - main CS. The gap between the 2 needs to be the TT of what you want to be your furthest timed support. Assuming Olympus doesn't spawn in your ocean, then that is TT to portal + 1 hr. You can vary this standard plan, eg. if you let the enemy do Part A, allowing more cities to be timed to the main CS, but the concept is more or less the same.
Note that while support cannot be timed until Olympus is cleared, attacks can be timed the moment Olympus spawns, as long as you know when you want your main CS to be. With this in mind, if you follow the standard plan, you will want most of your cities closer than the furthest timed support to be DEF, especially if you have a pre-planned main CS time. OFF cities further out can be pre-timed, and the OFF cities close to portal would be used for clearing/sniping.
This was how MC had their portals set up for the first 4 rounds. While we didn't always have one pre-planned main CS time, we often had a few pre-planned chosen times for the main CS we lined up OFF to, and then after we saw the commands after clearing + landing a scout CS, we would decide which one we wanted to time support to. The great thing about sending through Portals is if you're not in the Portal ally when the command would go through the Portal, it returns instead. So if an earlier pre-planned time was chosen, the lineups for the later times can be made to bounce off Portals.
Previous Rounds
In Rounds 1 and 2, DV appeared unprepared and MC cleared and landed their main CS first, gaining sufficient time to stack before DV's attacks hit. In Round 3, MC messed up their clearing - it was ~15 mins later than planned. They only had ~45 mins portal TT worth of timed support as opposed to 1 hr and DV landed ~10 mins after their main CS in addition to that, so they easily wiped both land and naval and secured their siege. In Round 4, Olympus spawned in DV's core allowing them to have a much shorter gap between the clear and main CS (iirc it was ~1 hr). MC didn't take this into account so their main CS hit 1 hr after DV's, and by then it was too stacked for their timed attacks to break.
By now, we had a feel for timings - if we landed our main CS before DV, it had to be at least 20-30 mins early else it would likely be broken. Similarly, if we landed after, it could at most be ~15 mins or so late, otherwise we couldn't break.
The problem
Although the 'standard' plan above usually works great for ordinary temples, we found it to be lacking for Olympus in Rounds 3 and 4. The problem is - it's quite hard for this plan to be flexible. We always had the contingency plan of attempting to snipe + lock on top of the enemy main CS if we saw it in an early scout, but this backup plan requires quite a bit of luck. First, the later you first spot the enemy main CS, the less cities you have in range for locking, and the more support they've likely already locked onto it. Secondly, with our Portal setup, it had far too little close range OFF to reliably attempt both a snipe AND a CS lock right after. The first problem was realised in Round 3 - in this round, DV had a lot of small attacks to kill off our scouts, so we never saw the commands until it was far too late. The second happened in Round 4 - we saw their main CS 1 hr away from landing, so we certainly couldn't snipe it, and we didn't have enough immediate OFF to quickly break either. All we could do was attempt to spell their CS down (it actually got very close - Frog's 39 LS was spelled down to 1).
Since our city count was slightly inferior to DV's (especially at the ~1 hr LS Portal TT mark and above), we didn't stand much chance unless we either landed our main CS much earlier than theirs, or fluked a landing right after. We calculated it would take roughly 60 cities to clear the Round 5 neutral units (stack decreases by 20% on each spawn), so if we converted everything within ~20 mins Portal TT to OFF, we could clear very quickly and hope to land first with a large gap between our main CS and theirs. The problem was if DV decided to do the same, this plan would completely fail - and they had a slightly higher city count under 20 min Portal TT than we did (due to Portal geography --- both of their Portals neighbour close filled up islands, but only one of ours did).
The idea
A solution didn't occur to us until the 5th day after Round 4. Rather than going heavy DEF near, OFF far, what if we did the opposite? This doesn't sound great at first - you can barely time any DEF to your main CS unless it lands a long time after clearing. BUT, there is one scenario where you don't actually need timed DEF. What if you land on top of their main CS? By the time the enemy notice you've done this, it's likely too late to cancel their supports and send snipes. There would be a delay in them pulling supports and landing breaks (especially if they've already timed most close OFF for clearing or main CS) which gives enough time for your further supports to land first. And the previous issue with attempting to lock on top of their CS was the lack of OFF near portals to do this which is solved by this flipping of the setup.
There were a few other details to deal with - how to guarantee we spot their main CS the moment it clears and what if they have no main CS yet. We decided sacrificing ~60 cities under 20 min portal TT to clear was worth it in return for potentially increasing the gap between clear and enemy main CS time (giving us a wider range of OFF to snipe with) and giving us a much higher chance to spot their CS immediately. Although DV would probably still have scout killers early on, they would probably have less and we could have multiple scout CS landing minutes after clearing to increase our chances. This sacrifice does come at a cost - if their CS was under 1 hr 20 mins away from landing after clearing (ie. under 20 mins portal TT), we would have nothing to snipe with. But it wouldn't be too bad as we could still launch all OFF to land say 20 mins after it and a CS right after. Even if the LS fails to, myths in the 20-40 min Portal range should be able to beat their DLU in the 0-40 min Portal range, and spelling is still an option. We felt they were quite heavy OFF around portals as well, so breaking and landing was very possible. We expected DV to go with the standard plan of clearing + landing a pre-timed main CS themselves this round. This was because of the low clearing requirement for Round 5, and that we had almost tricked them with a late clearing time in Round 4 (had it not been for spawn location, I believe that had a decent chance to bait their OFF to land early before our main CS). If there really was no main CS spotted on our first scout, we could still expect to see it soon on subsequent scouts when they didn't see any from us either.
So what was previously our contingency plan became our main plan. This plan essentially forces a timing battle between the 2 sides once Olympus clears. DV need to lock as many supports on their main CS as possible while we need to lock as many attacks and CS before them. We also had the advantage of attacking - temple buffs greatly boost OFF, and 1 Myth lock can wipe 3-4 DLU locks and 1 LS lock can do the same to ~1.5-2 bir locks (the Battleships event also provided many attack buffs). If the siege breaks, then there are no academy and advisor buffs for defending a neutral temple, making it even easier to wipe several DEF nukes.
Last edited:
