In-Depth Defense Strategy Guide and Ratings (Medieval Age)

Hello heroes!

You are about to read the MOST comprehensive defense guide out there! I will give details about buildings, ranking them by important to most important. I also will explain what to keep in mind when creating your perfect base. I am currently in the medieval age so I am not qualified to explain the later defenses or how the current ones fare at higher levels. I am going to work on getting a post-medieval age guide out as fast as possible!

Rating System:

1 star = Completely useless on defense. You don't need to protect them.

2 stars = Possibly useless on defense. You may try to protect them since they probably hold resources.

3 stars = Likely a defense with some unqiue function. You should try to protect them.

4 stars = This is the rating for a useful defense or resource storage. In a perfect world, these buildings won't be destroyed in an attack.

5 stars = These are the MOST important buildings. They are are likely a super important defense for thwarting an enemy attack. Build your whole base design around protecting and utilizing these buildings.

A few notes! Soldiers = infantry, archers = ranged attackers, knights = heavy cavalry, raiders = horse raiders. Since the units change name as they upgrade, I will use these general terms to describe them. Keep in mind that these ratings are subjective! What I say isn't a guaranteed fact, but I find that the final consensus can give you a good idea as to why my rating is correct.

Defenses

Tower: 2 and 1/2 stars

What does it do? The tower shoots a weak projectile at all enemies once they enter into its attack radius.

Pros: The tower is first defense you get. It does a pretty good job taking out soldiers and will pick off archers quickly. It is relatively cheap.

Cons: Towers don't have great range and do very little to knights which are most commonly used in lower ages. Doesn't specialize in any one area.

Final consensus: Towers just aren't that special. Since they are a defense, they are still important to level up. Put them in places where they cover a lot of area. Don't try too hard to protect them because other defenses are much more valuable. For me personally, it is the only defense I don't have behind walls since you never get too many walls.

Garrison: 4 stars

What does it do? The garrison produces soldiers that attack enemy troops.

Pros: The soliders do an excellent job of slowing down enemies. They quickly destroy soldiers since attacking soldiers have a damage penalty against infantry.

Cons: The soldiers are destroyed easily by archers who do quadruple damage against them. They do not dish out much damage. Also, there is a while to wait (20-30 seconds depending on level and world wonders) between waves of soldiers.

Final consensus: If your base is planned well, garrisons are an integral part. They will slow down enemy troops and allow catapults and ballista towers to deal continuos damage. If paired up with the Acropolis, the units are stronger and appear more often! Even with all its awesomeness, they are basically useless if enemy archers have easy access to them.

Catapult: 3 and 1/2 stars

What does it do? The catapult is a ranged weapon that delivers splash damage.

Pros: The catapult is terrific for taking out large groups of soldiers or archers. It has a long range so it can cover a lot resources. You can have 3 catapults as early as the medieval age which allows for excellent protection.

Cons: Enemies using a supply cart can heal their troops as fast as the catapult can deal damage. Catapults don't pose any threat for knights and will likely be taken out by them.

Final consensus: The catapult is another useful defense. Specializing at destroying low hit point troops, spread them apart from each other so that they cannot be simultaneously frozen by the sabotage tactic. Additionally, try to keep at least one catapult near the center of your base to maximize spaces it can attack.

Ballista Tower: 5 stars

What does it do? The ballista tower fires slow, extermely powerful projectiles

Pros: Ballista shots are considerably stronger than anything else your medieval defenses can fire. The only good defense against attacking knights. Will one shot wall miners trying to break through walls.

Cons: The ballista is slow firing and has a limited range.

Final consensus: The ballista tower is (in my opinion) the best defense you will have up through the medieval age. You will be attacked by people using only or almost only knights. This attack strategy works beautifully for bases without ballistae. However, a ballista tucked safely behind walls with spike traps nearby can take down all knight attacks. When designing your base, make sure that your ballista tower(s) are not easy to get to and defend some of your storages. While they are expensive, try to build them as quickly as possible!

Stable: 3 and 1/2 stars

What does it do? Produces cavalry to defend your city

Pros: Stables' defenders will slow down the advancing enemy. The knights have lots of health. Level 3 stables release two knights instead of one.

Cons: The knights cannot aggro (cause enemy troop to stop what it's doing and attack the knight instead) more than one troop at a time by attacking. The knights are weak against soldiers.

Final consensus: While the stables are not nearly as beneficial as garrisons, they serve the same purpose. Combine this with the Acropolis for stronger knights that spawn faster! Try to get stables behind walls, but don't center your base around them.

Castle: 3 stars

What does it do? Produces a general to defend your city and fires projectiles at incoming enemies

Pros: The castle has higher Damage Per Second (DPS) than a tower. The general(s) it produces can harass enemies, destroying troops or seriously slowing down armies.

Cons: The castle is a larger building than other defenses. Requires more walls to defend it and can mess up the symmetry of your base.

Final consensus: The castle is a really great defense since it functions like a stable and tower combined. (With both parts being stronger than the stable or tower) The problem is its size. It can be very difficult to effectively plan your base with a well defended castle unless you want to place multiple defenses outside your walls. If you plan on protecting your town center, it just becomes harder to place your castle.

Resource Buildings

Mill and Market: 4 stars

What does it do? The mill and market are your primary resource buildings. They hold most of your food and gold respectively.

Final consensus: These are the most important non-defensive buildings you have! All upgrades in the game require one of these two resources, but these buildings lose your resources if an enemy attacks it. As a result, you want these to be well defended. One big tip is to not place all your storages in the same compartment. If you do this, then an enemy can rally his/her troops to that area and grab all your resources without breaking through too many walls.

Farms and Caravans: 1 and 1/2 stars

What does it do? These resource buildings produce food and gold for you to collect throughout the day. They can store up to a certain amount at each level.

Final consensus: While they do hold some amount of loot that can be stolen, it is always significantly less than what your mills and markets can hold. Don't wory about trying to place these buildings behind walls. The only time lots of loot can be stolen from farms and caravans is if you haven't been on to collect for 3+ days. And if that's the case, you probably stopped playing DomiNations anyway.

Roads: 2 stars (wait, really??)

What does it do? Roads accumulate gold by conecting the town center to any other buildings.

Final consensus: The gold is actually stored in the town center! So you don't have to worry about placement of roads in that respect. However, you have to strike a balance between having your roads connect as many buildings as possible and having a smart, defensive base. I recommend having your wall compartments to have one extra space to thread in a road. (For instance, the compartment should be 7 tiles long so 2 defenses can be place with a road splitting them.)

Houses: 1 star

What does it do? Houses technically hold a small amount of food and gold. Their main purpose is to give you citizens with which to build or improve buildings.

Final consensus: Don't worry about protecting houses. Find places to squeeze houses in so that way more buildings are connected to your road.

Storehouse: 2 stars

What does it do? The storehouse holds your tradegoods.

Final consensus: When your storehouse is attacked, youi risk losing trade goods. Trade goods are definitely a valuable resource, but you can lose them in many different ways during a battle. Don't worry about protecting a storehouse!

Other Buildings

Town Center: 1 or 5 stars!

What does it do? Your town center produces defenders, holds gold and food, and awards your enemy a victory if destroyed.

Final consensus: It's hard to explain quickly what I think about the the town center. There are two main shcools of thought, leave it on the outside, unprotected or protect it as much as possible. Benefits of not protecting it means that you can better protect your resources and will sometimes have players attack your town center and then leave. (Effectively giving you a free shield) The benefits of protecting your town center are not offering an easy star to attackers and you are less likely to be attacked so you can raid for longer. My opinion, in short, is to keep the town center on the outside. At lower trophy ranges, (and even higher ones) you can win a lot more trophies by attacking then you lose by having an easy base to 1 star. Since this nullifies the main benefit of protecting your town center, I recommend a "farming" style, unprotected town center approach.

Blacksmith,Army and Mercenary Camps, Temple, War Academy, Library, etc: 1 star

What does it do? These buildings don't serve any purpose defensively and don't cause you to lose resources. These things will all be discussed in other posts!

Final consensus: Leave these buildings for last when building your base. They can be the furthest away from defenses and walls.

Wonders: varies

What does it do? There are too many wonders to discuss here. I recommend you read the blurbs that DomiNations provides you.

Final consensus: If the wonder does something on defense think about placing it somewhere where it will affect the most troops or buildings. Otherwise, place the wonder anywhere since there is no penalty to it being destroyed!

Final notes

I have a lot more of this game to play and learn from so I will release a new version of this in a few months as I progress in DomiNations. If you are Medieval Age or below, I think you will find everything I say to be accurate! Hopefully you find what I say helpful... Leave your comments donw below!

"It is from their foes, not their friends, that cities learn the lesson of building high walls."

-Aristophanes

It is from their foes, not their friends, that cities learn the lesson of building high walls."

- Aristophanes

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