The White Style

[Gomorrah]

This is guide comes from Maerlyn and posted in the reincarnation UBB
I hope this guide will help you in better playing of white.
Enjoy reading   

I played white for a very very long time now. I always been a rankwhore, and most of the time I been rather succesful with it (as long as there was no block beating the ***** out of me)
however, because of countless online BBQs I am done with ranking (hopefully forever).

quite often i been asked by other players about some tipps for white, but never posted any guide on the UBB. well, looks like its time.

the main reason for me to get here were all this dom-geld-mages who usually play white. my style differs a lot. i never ever cast doms, and usually i dont buy heroes. and yes, i play white.

i m not giving you any certain stacking to follow, because it all depends a lot on your land size, the numbers of attacks you get by different colors, your rank, and the time of the reset. so if something i suggest doesnt work well, try another thing. analyse your battles and eliminate the reason why you lost land (if you did)

your topstack should always and under any cicurmstances be AA. (except if you are kickstarting, then I`d suggest SW top for the first 2-2,5 weeks of the reset, but thats a whole different chapter)
AAs will also be your only flier stack for two reasons. phoenix and devils.
in case someone attacks (counters) you with a short stacking and heavy either one of em you ll loose your other flier stack (be it doms, angels or whatsoever) to the burst/counter.

top ground are two possibilities: SW or Unicorn.
usually at the beginning you ll like SWs there, cause you ll get more green attacks, later on you ll like unis because the nethers will become a problem. however, as soon as you can afford to defend with carpet, get unis top ground.

3rd and 4th you want the other one of the two (SW/Uni) and KTs. but this doesnt mean that KTs will always be 4th. experiment with em. in the beginning I'd rather go SW, KTs, Unis, later in the reset Unis, KTs, SWs.

now your stacking is becoming more difficult.
the most save but most likely too expensive version would be to get MRs here. but werebears are doing nice too. you can also get medusas and knights 5th. knights mainly in the beginning of the reset when they come cheap with gate, werebears later. medusas are very nice units, but can be countered hard. so if you use em, CHANGE THEIR POSITION, after every run.
once you use carpet in defense you can have knights higher, because of their large shield.
early on crusaders might do nice too because they are cheap and come in big numbers. and large shield is a good abbility. I dont recommend using paladins, as we will use THL very much anyway. all over because of the new THL I prefer melee type attacks.

as soon as you can afford them titans do REALLY nice in offense. however, they are really expensive to cast, and especially to upkeep. titans should be the last thing you cast (before the THL) and right after attacking you need to disband them. dont forget this or you ll be in income troubles. if you use carpet in defense they can be stacked 5th, if not I would recommend stacking them lower. but most likely once you got enough land to afford the titans you can also affort the carpets.

below this melee stacks you ll need some ranged ones, to counter the pure wraith attackers by fatigueing them (no clue how to spell that) MRs are perfect here. nymphs are nice too (try to get them from the market too) as are SS and PW. just dont stack SS or PW higher than 8, better 9&10, they can easily loose you the battle.
I also like highpriests now, because THL doesnt give holy to ranged anymore, and they got holy all the time. I dont like catapults anymore. they are very expensive and without the holy attack type they dont really work for me.

stack very close. this is important for two tricks you gonna use later on. this means your AAs should be between 9%-11% of your power, your last stack should have between 6%-8% of your power.


as you see it depends a lot on your current position, so i ll advice you on how to get into a good one wink

start the reset with a fast research. (if you dunno how to do a fast one get someone to tell you) you should be done with research somewhere between 1230 and 1400 turns.
then rebuild your country by using lottsa workshops and building farms last. build barrs up to 30-50% protection and get an army. for the beginning gate plus KTs plus HPs and SS and damage items will do well.
defend with BF/satchel.

now try to make as much land as possible. you need to get to 3,5k to 4k fast in order to participate in the top early on. (Edit: and you need to get to the top early on, because there are the most tasty nethers to feed on) for the first run you can attack whoever you want. either start with pure frogs and go for targets with no army, or go for mages with high land/little power ratio and use damage items and the gate army mentioend above.

after you finished your first run get L&P and keep it running ALL THE TIME. recast it 10 turns before it runs out. i start with 44,99% nodes and lower them with the time. i also keep ~10% workshops, depending on how many attacks you can do.
spend all your money on items and in the hatchery. get a few satchels for defense first. and get offensive items like potion o.V., flask of holy water, and if you use MRs, nymphs, SS and stuff use monkey brains. missile shields are good if you loose lottsa battles due to more damage dealt to you.
get some nymphs and MRs in the hatchery, cast the rest.

once you managed to get above 4k land start collecting carpets and build your barrs to max. once you've reached max barrs defend with carpets/BF or carpets/SoL depending if either green or black is the bigger threat. set carpets at 90% because you wont use em when you get devilled. from this moment on you shouldnt loose any land besides to BBQs or lucky online hits.

how to spend your turns:
wait till you got full turns. if you didnt manage to cast THL before you logged of cast it as soon as you can and wait for full turns again.

plan all steps carefully and open all windows, including charging, build, and all casting windows. you need to be very very fast. the higher you are the more people are watching you.
set carpet/bf on defense 50% before you start your run.

plan your attack run carefully. save all battlereps on black mages you get. the best would be if you do this together with your guild (HM always had a collection of stackings of ~90% of the top 200 mages)
I attack only black, and I siege most of the time.
in the first month you ll attack lottsa new mages, later on you will nearly always know what he is stacking.
attack new nether mages (meaning those you dont know the stacking) at the end of your run, because they might end the run sooner than you want. try to increase your breps collection stadily though.
and DONT attack the same mage in two following runs. he might get angry and nethers can do nasty things to you wink

because you stacked close you can now easily attapt your stacking to your targets. you dont want his URs to hit ANYTHING besides your Unis. you never ever want his lichs/efreeti hit your medusas (but you want your medusas to hit them)
you want your units with large shield (KTs, Knights...) be hit by ranged stacks. you want your SWs be hit by units with high primary/low secondary and stuff. and so on and so on. check out your units, check out his units. read BReps and learn.
if you dont know his stacking go for reg (except for the starting run) if you know his stacking, or feel good, go for a siege. your titans got siege anyway, and THL should win you the battle.

doing this you can attack people down to 50% of your usual power, or even lower, and still win.
if you see this tasty all skels/zombies nether 200k below your 80%, disband a few SS or stuff to get there before you need to try this UR/carpet/DoS guy.

done carefully you ll make 300-400 acres per run in the beginning, and once you know your targets, 500-700 acres.

I use web of the spider woman plus one of the mentioned items in attack. web because it is very cheap, nethers tend to use lottsa barrs, white spells are useless due to shroud, and a succesful web can prevent lottsa nether stacks from hitting at all. (Edit: additional nice spells if you need em or know he aint got full barrs are CH and RA)
if you know for sure that he runs no barrs, go for a siege and use carpet. you will win for sure and mostly dont take any damage at all. i love this kinda targets.

you can succefully beat EVERY nether mage who doesnt run full barrs/carpet. some of them need just a little more preparation and a reg instead of a siege.

once you are done dispell THL (forget this once and you are toasted) disband your titans and maybe some other units.
build (nodes first)
manacharge till there are 40-60 (+nr. of barrs to build) turns left (depends on your land size) dont forget to recast L&P if necessary.
build barrs.
cast your units, starting with simple/offcolor first, ending with SWs, gate, titans.
cast THL once you are finished. you can do this with the next 10 turns you get though if needed.
rechange your assignment. to carpets at 90% (you dont want your carpet to be triggered by a devil counter or you ll loose half your army if the nether runs a short stacking)

the next 24hours you are gonna leave your comp running. stay in IRC and let your guild mates/allies have an eye on you to highlight you if you been devilled, because you ll be devilled a lot.
BUT because you stacked so close and run THL you wont loose any land. be careful though to recast your AAs as soon as you been devilled because you might not block the second devil, and will very very likely loose the third one.
this is no big mouth talking. i block 80% of the devil attacks i receive. and once you get the hang on it it makes you thrilled wink

remember, once you passed 5k land its getting dangerous, and once you passed 6k land you ll be devilled after every run.
the most dangerous are the last hours before your counters expire, so stay online then, do some work on the computer, check the BM, and refesh your mage every ten minits wink.

dont overtarget any nether. write nice arrows. if someone feels pissed let him go for a week. you got enough targets. and if he starts multidevilling you and can do three devil attacks you are toasted, because after him all the other counters will come, and whoops, say goodbye to 1k land.

however, if this ever happens, dont give up. you can make a Loooooooot of land with this strat. and i lost lottsa lands to mass-devil-counter-BBQs.

sometimes, when you made too much land in too little time, and pissed of every nether in the top 100 twice in a row, make a break. do one turn-cycle of manacharging. fill your storage. get more MRs and stuff. doesnt hurt once in a while. dont be too greedy.

once youre in the top 10 (and given there is no block who prevents you from doing so you ll be there faster than you can imagine) be very careful. everyone will watch you from now on. so as long as possible i'd suggest you stay at rank ~12. but once its neccesary get up to the top three if possible. you wont receive any randoms there. but you ll receive lottsa online hits. so plan your runs very very exact. do like 2-3 sieges to targets you know and summon up again fast. up there a well done siege will earn you ~150-200 acres, so 2-3 are enough. dont even dare do be greedy, you ll get online BBQed and then countered like hell. everybody likes to jump on the fat top whitey.

now if you really managed to get up there you will have ***** of money (due to your landsize and L&P) dont bother gelding (except for the last 2 weeks before geddon) since L&P wont help then, and you ll have ***** of money anyway. a high lvl alchemist might be good now too, as you got enough mana also.

what you do now depends on your guild. if your guild has got a few gelders/hero heavy mages you should keep bouncing on all those fat nethers that noone else besides you will hit. try to get your hands on a good unique, and maybe some spells now. i dont ever buy MCs because I wanna be a battle mage and wanna help my guild. but buying MCs might be wise here too.

if however you are alone up there, get some heroes. because without the help of your gelding guild members suddenly a hero heavy white will arive and beat the ***** out of you. in this case you are going to get an alchemist first, and then the white heros that wont command your top stack. then a priestess and the rest (warlord, amazon...)
stop attacking nethers then and feet on whatever is tasty. your guild should provide you with sufficant breps about targets you can feed on. every color can be beaten by white (even green) however, if you dont manage to get carpets through his barrs do regs now. adapt your stacking to your new threats/targets/your heros.
be VERY careful if you are alone. do very few attacks, and dont touch the dominating block, or you ll be BBQed faster than you can imagine.


for arma get ~2mrd geld. i am not going into a detailed hall strat now (pretty similar for all colors) but white can lay his hands on many cheap units with much power. SS being great here, and crusaders come in masses for the last recruiting. you should end arma with no pop (because fully recruited) and no geld, little mana left, so plan carefully.

hope this helps and hope you have fun
M(aerlyn)

[bagheera]

an excellent guide thx

[Gomorrah]

yeah, its a very nice guide  <_< and its worth reading for.
I've learned alot from this guide.