Roron0a's Guide to Efficient Gold Farming

I made this guide to help out all those TH9 players who are always complaining about bad loot. For a long time I've heard how farming at TH9 is terrible and it's the death of your game. Luckily since I'm a min/maxer it took me a while to get to TH9 and there are probably a lot more targets for us now. Now that I'm here however I gotta say it's not that bad :D In fact my personal looting records have all been at TH9 so far. My average Gold per 30 min is around 6-700k, regularly hitting 1m. I don't have the time to do a full hour much anymore but my best at TH9 is 2.25 mil so far. I never gem during farming.
These practices can also be applied to other TH levels very successfully.

I've broken down each section into a short summary for all the players that can't be bothered to read the mass of text :D


Using the Right Combo

Summary: Mathematically BAM (Barb, Arch, Minion) is the most efficient combo for farming once properly used.

Explanation: BAM is efficient because it gets 6 barracks working for you instead of 4. The barbs are necessary for a little tanking and the archers for buildings behind walls. A 50% increase in production capacity only means you can spend more time farming and less time waiting. While it's possible to get good farming results with other combos, over time BAM should produce better results just because you are making more troops faster.
Goblin usage may get similar results since you can skip buffer buildings and go straight for mines, but I haven't spent the time to do a comparison.


Picking the Right Base

Summary: Picking the right base is probably more important than what combo you use or how much gold is available for fast efficient farming. Learn the signs.

Explanation: This is the most important part of increasing your efficiency because picking the wrong base can set you back in time, cups and troops. When analyzing the defense, try to get used to thinking about how many troops you may need to use to get the gold easily. A 200k or less base that requires all my troops to get it all is an instant skip for me. Refer to the Math section for the GPU you want to target.

- Gold Available - obviously the first thing to look at while spamming next. I generally only start scanning a base if it's over 100k. This can give you some clues on how much is in pumps however. This is why I generally skip TH10s as a TH9 because even with 300k showing means most likely there is only 60k in the pumps. TH10 I'd need to see over 360k or if it was prem to considering going for it.
- Gold Storages - I do a quick scan to see if the gold storages are full. If they aren't empty I skip unless the loot is over 300k or the storages are easy to get to. The graphics for the gold storage are bugged however so an empty looking storage is not enough info to press go.
- Mine Positions - if the gold available is good I scan to see if the mines are on the outside or first wall layer. Some bad bases randomly sprinkle mines further into the core. I will probably skip these unless the loot available is high and worth the extra troops it will take to get there.
- Even Resource Amounts - Even numbers in the mines like 75000 or 150000 are a good sign they are maxed. [thx dahimi and siv75]
- Similar Res Amounts - Resources close together like 190k gold and 190k elixir. [thx dahimi]
- Elixir Pump Levels - I didn't know this got fixed, but they show graphically now whether they are full or not, a good indicator of possible mine levels too. [thx siv75]
- DE Pumps - once I've decided the mine positions are good I look for DE pumps. These are one of the few reliable ways to see if the base is abandoned. If the little square box on top is full it's a good chance so are the mines.
- Tombstones - if the DE pumps weren't conclusive I scan for tombstones to see if the base is inactive and has been raided. I often skip a base if I see no tombstones even if the other signs were looking good.
- Workers - Some bases can fool you having all the above look ok. But if you see multiple buildings being upgraded there's a good chance the loot was all in the storages and the player is purposely not collecting tombstones.

It takes some practice to run through all these but it will become second nature for a seasoned farmer.


Attacking Efficiently

Summary: Set a target GPH and keep it in the back of your mind. This will determine the amount of gold each unit should generate at a minimum to hit your target.

Explanation:

This takes a lot of practice to get down, but is necessary if you want to get all the loot with least troops used and therefore increase your farming efficiency.

- Single Mines - My default spam is 4 barbs followed by 4 archers. I drop these and just look away to the next mine. If I spy AOE or too much pt def nearby I may add a few more units. DON'T spam a free mine. Always use a single archer or minion where possible.
- Two or more Mines - If there's a row of Mines it can be more efficient to drop a line of barbs followed by a line of archers. You'll take down the mines with less troops than single mine spam.
- Mines and DE Pumps Only - If you're not planning to get 50%, don't bother getting the elixir.
- BK - My default spam for lvl1 BK is 3-4 minions with a couple barbs to keep him pinned. If you're quick you can lure BK to one side of the map and take out the mines while he is busy walking.
- CC - Generally the bases I hit will have an empty CC. But if you got unlucky and run into one, either try to take down the mines and avoid them or just Light them up. Don't even bother trying to take down a dragon the troop cost is terrible.
- Don't forget the Minions! - It's easy to forget to use minions and just take down an easy base with barbs and archers. But if you think about any raid it's about HP and DPS. Adding some minions to each attack means less barbs/arch expended and your army will be ready faster if you're relying on 6 rax going and not just 4.
- Troops Ready - don't bother waiting for your camps to fill all the way up. I usually am good to go if I have at least 30 barbs, 30 archers and 12 minions. You're probably thinking - O nos! What if I find the legendary 600k base?! There is an instinctive need for players to have to get every last drop of loot and for efficiency it's just totally wrong. On a 600k base that still means there's 400k in the mines! Get those mines and get on to the next battle! It's the same as skipping a 200k base you know is all in core storages.

- AQ - this goddess is all about skill and experience. Keeping her from taking damage can increase your efficiency a LOT, something I'm still really bad at. Use her to snipe mines but always make sure she's got tanks in front and use her towards the end of the battle so you don't forget about her and get her killed.
- BK - Really only good for taking down exposed TH quickly. If you use him on a charge into core, he will be out for a long time so save him for when you really need him.
- Spells - if you had to use a spell you probably failed in the base selection step :D Generally I will never use a spell unless I'm going for a core.


Queueing

Summary: Always keep your barracks working.

Explanation: While you're raiding all your barracks should be going non-stop. Always top off your barracks and readjust in between raids.
As stated above, to maximize efficiency I never wait for full army camps because it doesn't take much troops to lazy farm. If my cups are high in my range I will start searching as soon as I have about 30 barb, 30 arch, 12 minions. If my cups are low in my range I will wait for more troops to go for 50%. For BAM I like to have a bit more archers than barbs, so I run 3 rax on archers, 1 on barb and DE rax on minions. I will alternate 1 archer rax with some barbs.


Maintaining Cup Range

Summary: Go for 50% on weaker bases or guaranteed exposed THs to maintain cup range.

Explanation: If you are farming for extended periods of time you can't keep farming down these bases with minimum troops and dropping cups. Some tips to maintain cup range.

- Use a trophy base or hybrid base you know works well. The cups gained in your downtime can save you time having to gain them while farming.
- Add free TH to your scanning criteria when pressing next. You have to be 100% SURE before you go for it or you'll have wasted a bunch of troops taking down a TH covered by teslas for a few measly cups. I made this mistake in the video :D
- Go for 50% on weaker bases that you have pegged with exposed mines. I would stick with THs lower than yours to go for 50% since weaker def and less buildings means less troops wasted.


Suggested Farming Range

Summary: Depends on your TH level and time of day.

Explanation: For TH9 I have found 1500-1650s good. TH8s I've heard recently are good from 1400s-1500s. Ranges seem to shift all the time so ask your clannies for updates :)


Maths 'n Stuff

Summary: BAM is far and away the most efficient combo from a mathematical standpoint.

Explanation: Let's compare 2 popular farming setups.

BAM
I set a target of 1 million gold per hour. Using BAM, we can determine the max amount of troops able to be produced in 1 hour if all 6 barracks are building non-stop. 2 barb, 2 arch, 2 minion rax can produce 808 units in 1 hour. I usually prefer a bit more archers (78 arch, 70 barb, 36 minions) and so my hourly amounts to 791 units created, or 1264 gold per unit necessary to achieve 1 million GPH.

BAG
Compare this to a typical BAG combo (40 arch, 40 barb, 64 gobs, 8 wbs) which takes 19.5 min to complete. In one hour 468 units can be created. This amounts to 2137 gold needed to be gained per unit to hit 1 mil per hour.

Comparing the GPU for both combos it is easy to see that BAM must be more effective in the long run because each unit expended requires less gold to reach your target.


How to Practice All This and Have Some Fun

Summary: Set a goal and watch the clock!

Explanation: Have a goal and stick to it. Watch time elapsed like a hawk and compare that to your current gph. Pushing yourself against the clock will improve your farming drastically and can be a rush! Even better is to compete with a clannie. Thanks to Deathmarch for introducing the Gold Rush idea to our clan. :cool:


Examples

I recorded a full 30 minute gold rush session for my clannies. 1 mil gold as TH9 in 30 minutes. The goal was not to show them just the raids, but the types of bases I skipped while searching. Yes it's long. Yes it could use subtitles or a voiceover. Maybe I'll get around to that. :rolleyes: Probably I didn't follow some of my suggestions, but hey, I'm still learning too! :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YCKHDCvuLk

When I get some time I'll try to record another gold rush where I maintain cup range.

If you've got other tips, math or suggestions feel free to post away! :D

This 1 hour gold rush ended 30 minutes ago. Total 11 raids gaining 2,254,888 gold over 1hr 1min. No gemming at TH9.

http://i.imgur.com/qtROJu9.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/dT3mTNu.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/RoBBfRU.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/beybVK5.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/5kx6GoZ.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/CSgj9ip.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/BggNQBQ.jpg

This is a pretty good guide actually.

I'd add a few other bits of criteria for identifying abandoned bases though:

1. No league badge when it's a week into the season.
2. Not part of a clan.
3. Even resource amounts are a dead give way. For example 150,000 gold on offer instead 156,789.
4. Gold and Elixir amounts that are close together. For example 190k gold and 190k elixir as opposed to 190k gold and 10k elixir.

Quite a good guide. I was going to add some stuff, but dahimi beat be to it.

When I run bam I run one barracks with goblins (along with the one barb and two on archers), but I still call it bam because it's the same principles and who really needs more acronyms... The longer build time means I don't get a ton of them, but often there will be one or two mines behind other buildings. Sending a few barbs to shield and a couple goblins to grab the gold is a lot more efficient than using a bunch of archers and barbs to kill all the buildings. The higher dps compensates in part for their lower HP. Finally, I just like how they balance out the barracks. I never change what each barracks is building, just top off the queue each time I'm back. If a particular troop gets higher then I just use more of them, but I hate switching troops around in the barracks or messing with them more than needed.

Having said that, I think the build time increase negates any real benefit to using less troops, so I'm not convinced goblins should be used for bam. But that's just how I do it. :)

Thanks much for your guide roro, lots of good details!

Nice and detailed guide, thanks mate!
This is definitely the choice for th9 with massive cost of walls. I'll add a couple notes from a th8 farmer.
1. The thing with th8 is that you actually don't need that insane speed, there's nowhere to dump all that farmed gold, or you'll end up upgrading to th9 with a maxxed walls and less than a half of defenses :)
2. On a th sniping to mantain the range - my personal choice is to look for total gold and than on the first mine in sight, and hit next or zoom out for attack. I tried to look further on a TH location, but i feel it slows me down. I'm always going for 50 or a distant TH if i choose to attack instead, trading some farming speed for "1 star" practice :) But it's a matter of personal choice for sure.

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Originally Posted by Kiffster

When I run bam I run one barracks with goblins (along with the one barb and two on archers), but I still call it bam because it's the same principles and who really needs more acronyms... The longer build time means I don't get a ton of them, but often there will be one or two mines behind other buildings. Sending a few barbs to shield and a couple goblins to grab the gold is a lot more efficient than using a bunch of archers and barbs to kill all the buildings. The higher dps compensates in part for their lower HP. Finally, I just like how they balance out the barracks. I never change what each barracks is building, just top off the queue each time I'm back. If a particular troop gets higher then I just use more of them, but I hate switching troops around in the barracks or messing with them more than needed.

Having said that, I think the build time increase negates any real benefit to using less troops, so I'm not convinced goblins should be used for bam. But that's just how I do it. :)

Thanks much for your guide roro, lots of good details!

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I do the same thing with the goblins. I like that I can use a couple to target collectors that are in the middle of other useless buildings like barracks.

Pure BAM is not the most efficient.

I'm having a little difficulty with the idea of finding collector bases in the 1500-1650 range, I spent most of a week there when I first hit TH 9, and I don't think I saw five collector bases in that time (at least a couple thousand searches). I move around in trophies a lot looking for a good range, but it seems that only for a on hour or two every three to four days am I getting a chance to look at bases that at least a dozen farmers haven't already raided or rejected.

I have to wonder if living in different time zones or geographical areas makes a difference to what kind of targets are on offer.

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Originally Posted by wolfling

I have to wonder if living in different time zones or geographical areas makes a difference to what kind of targets are on offer.

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Me too actually.

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Originally Posted by Kiffster

When I run bam I run one barracks with goblins (along with the one barb and two on archers), but I still call it bam because it's the same principles and who really needs more acronyms...

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Why not just call it BAGM which kinda sounds like "Bag 'em" that way you're "bagging that gold". I'll gladly take credit for that one.

Great guide, definitely useful for those wanting to become more efficient farmers. Always great to learn new things.

Nice guide r0rona. I'm a decent farmer but picked up a few useful tweaks to my BAM. Cheers!

How do you measure your GPH? Gold grab achievement and attack log?
Well, at TH9 in the 1600 range, if you next 100 times to find a 200k collector base, and are deploying 12 minutes worth of troops, your attack log says you're making 200k every 12 minutes, so 1M per hour.
But you're really only making 125k per 12 minutes, so 625k per hour. Not as good.

Compare that to a more powerful 30 min army at 2k cups. Say 20 giants + 2 healers. You may make nearly as much gold per hour (5-6 nexts per battle), and much more DE per hour. And you may have more fun too.

PS: if you dont use minions, I'd recommend adding wb to your barch. Only use 1 wb + barbs when you need to break pink walls.

You had some really horrible luck. I've been at 1500-1650 since 9/1 when my th9 completed. It works.

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Originally Posted by wolfling

I'm having a little difficulty with the idea of finding collector bases in the 1500-1650 range, I spent most of a week there when I first hit TH 9, and I don't think I saw five collector bases in that time (at least a couple thousand searches). I move around in trophies a lot looking for a good range, but it seems that only for a on hour or two every three to four days am I getting a chance to look at bases that at least a dozen farmers haven't already raided or rejected.

I have to wonder if living in different time zones or geographical areas makes a difference to what kind of targets are on offer.

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Good guide roro, i just arrived at th9, the loot difference really isnt that noticable, still getting those 300k's occationally

Great guide!

I used BAM a lot at mid stages of TH9, and your strategy for base skipping is great - I will share this with clan mates
Im now at the end of TH9 - few air D, teslas left and no need for elixer anymore (apart from troops...)

So I want to finish off upgrades and at same time im upgrading BK and AQ (now both lvl 10)
Therefore its Barching (Barbs and archers with a few Wbs)
When you need to conserve and save oil then this seems the best method...

I avoided this thinking, not another farming guide, I was surprised though, you have a preferred method but provide a lot more reason beyond any rigid troop configuration.

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Originally Posted by dahimi

This is a pretty good guide actually.

I'd add a few other bits of criteria for identifying abandoned bases though:

1. No league badge when it's a week into the season.
2. Not part of a clan.
3. Even resource amounts are a dead give way. For example 150,000 gold on offer instead 156,789.
4. Gold and Elixir amounts that are close together. For example 190k gold and 190k elixir as opposed to 190k gold and 10k elixir.

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Thanks dahimi :D Good additions. I should add that I don't bother with league badge as an indicator because from experience there are a lot of players that just log in to collect loot and not raid.
No. 4 is a good one!

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Originally Posted by Kiffster

Having said that, I think the build time increase negates any real benefit to using less troops, so I'm not convinced goblins should be used for bam. But that's just how I do it. :)

Thanks much for your guide roro, lots of good details!

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Yup Kiff I think goblins in the mix could also be effective, I just haven't tried comparing GPH results yet over a long period.

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Originally Posted by Daelor

Nice and detailed guide, thanks mate!
This is definitely the choice for th9 with massive cost of walls. I'll add a couple notes from a th8 farmer.
1. The thing with th8 is that you actually don't need that insane speed, there's nowhere to dump all that farmed gold, or you'll end up upgrading to th9 with a maxxed walls and less than a half of defenses :)
2. On a th sniping to mantain the range - my personal choice is to look for total gold and than on the first mine in sight, and hit next or zoom out for attack. I tried to look further on a TH location, but i feel it slows me down. I'm always going for 50 or a distant TH if i choose to attack instead, trading some farming speed for "1 star" practice :) But it's a matter of personal choice for sure.

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Thanks Daelor! Very good point with TH8. Tbh I focus on efficiency because I have less time to play than before and gold costs at TH9 are exorbitant. I'm not recommending that people play this way all day every day, just that for farming GOLD it is the one of the fastest ways. I agree on TH sniping I feel it slows me down, but I added that for others as an option if they find maintaining cup range is difficult.

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Originally Posted by SSofJetlife

Pure BAM is not the most efficient.

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I state above that mathematically it is the most efficient. I checked out your guide (great guide!) and calculated your combo build time to be 29.3 minutes to create 152 units (20 wbs, 12 giants, 20 barb, 40 arch, 60 gobs). At 311 units created in an hour your target GPU would need to be 3215 or a 150% increase over a BAM setup which creates 791 units. A skilled and experienced player as yourself could probably achieve similar results over time with different combos with some luck, but I think for the average player mathematically BAM should provide better results over the long run. Have you recorded your avg GPH over time?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by wolfling

I'm having a little difficulty with the idea of finding collector bases in the 1500-1650 range, I spent most of a week there when I first hit TH 9, and I don't think I saw five collector bases in that time (at least a couple thousand searches). I move around in trophies a lot looking for a good range, but it seems that only for a on hour or two every three to four days am I getting a chance to look at bases that at least a dozen farmers haven't already raided or rejected.

I have to wonder if living in different time zones or geographical areas makes a difference to what kind of targets are on offer.

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I have found the time makes a big difference. Certainly there is a dropoff in loot for me when the US starts to wake up and also on the weekends loot is hard to find.

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Originally Posted by gentimouton

How do you measure your GPH? Gold grab achievement and attack log?
Well, at TH9 in the 1600 range, if you next 100 times to find a 200k collector base, and are deploying 12 minutes worth of troops, your attack log says you're making 200k every 12 minutes, so 1M per hour.
But you're really only making 125k per 12 minutes, so 625k per hour. Not as good.

Compare that to a more powerful 30 min army at 2k cups. Say 20 giants + 2 healers. You may make nearly as much gold per hour (5-6 nexts per battle), and much more DE per hour. And you may have more fun too.

PS: if you dont use minions, I'd recommend adding wb to your barch. Only use 1 wb + barbs when you need to break pink walls.

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I just add up my gold gained in the time period from my attack log. I am too lazy to do net profit :D But I will say I average 9-10 attacks in an hour. I very rarely search for more than 50 times as I often settle for a base with less loot. I try not to use spells much. As I said, my average for 30 minutes is about 700k. With a 30 minute army, even finding 2 bases at 400k gold each I can definitely say I make a lot more gold than that.

Yes I should note this guide is not about what is fun. That's subjective and could lead anywhere. This is about making GOLD and the fastest method to do so only. And actually when I put myself against the clock or another teammate I find the game very refreshing and challenging, something I thought lost at level 100. :o

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Originally Posted by Roron0a

I state above that mathematically it is the most efficient. I checked out your guide (great guide!) and calculated your combo build time to be 29.3 minutes to create 152 units (20 wbs, 12 giants, 20 barb, 40 arch, 60 gobs). At 311 units created in an hour your target GPU would need to be 3215 or a 150% increase over a BAM setup which creates 791 units. A skilled and experienced player as yourself could probably achieve similar results over time with different combos with some luck, but I think for the average player mathematically BAM should provide better results over the long run. Have you recorded your avg GPH over time?

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That guide doesn't include that I also use 20 minions now. So build time is vastly increased. I make approximately 11 million gold per day, I've been trying to be more relaxed since my walls will be done before my defenses. I also ALMOST NEVER use all of the army, I try to stick to 80-120 troops per attack. I also DO NOT use wallbreakers unless I absolutely have to. I can just cancel the cook making it 4-6 minutes faster if I end up not using them....so build time for the entire thing may be about 22 minutes with minions but really it's closer to 12-15 tops between attacks.

The advantage of my army over BAM is that, say an example of an attack I did yesterday, I came across a base with 540,000 gold 540,000 elixer and 3,900 dark elixer....yay, right?.....not if I had BAM. It was all in the collectors, which is good but....the collectors were behind level 8/9 walls covered by maxed splash(every single collector/mine). With BAM it would have been wrecked trying to crack open black walls under maxed splash but with giants and wallbreakers I was able to take all the gold, fill my elixer storages(I left some because I was close to 8million elixer) and take most of the dark elixer as well with only about 120-150 troops. Versatility is key.

Edit: Edited the guide to include minions.

Nice guide, very detailed. ;);)

Searches are shorter
Most raids use much fewer troops
Just taking the mines

Nice guide Roro.
in my opinion Bam is great way to get gold and elixir, you dont need to wait for wall breakers/giants and its good army for th8/9/10 cheap and fast army.
when i prefer saving dark i switch it to barch.

Bam is also good army for trop push, I've reached to 2370 trop with that army. ;)

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Originally Posted by Roikri

Nice guide Roro.
in my opinion Bam is great way to get gold and elixir, you dont need to wait for wall breakers/giants and its good army for th8/9/10 cheap and fast army.
when i prefer saving dark i switch it to barch.

Bam is also good army for trop push, I've reached to 2370 trop with that army. ;)

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BAM is not that good for pushing when you get higher.. The minions takes up to much space. You need everything you got! :) Barch ftw.

Bam is one of the best army comps tho. Just as you said roro! :)

But I do wonder.. If it wouldn't be more efficient to cary like 30 - 60 goblins.. You'll need a lot less troops to take out mines and pumps! The training time will be a bit longer.. But maybe its worth it.

I'll try it and come back with a report!

A excellent guide, will help me get those skulls!

;)

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Originally Posted by SSofJetlife

That guide doesn't include that I also use 20 minions now. So build time is vastly increased. I make approximately 11 million gold per day, I've been trying to be more relaxed since my walls will be done before my defenses. I also ALMOST NEVER use all of the army, I try to stick to 80-120 troops per attack. I also DO NOT use wallbreakers unless I absolutely have to. I can just cancel the cook making it 4-6 minutes faster if I end up not using them....so build time for the entire thing may be about 22 minutes with minions but really it's closer to 12-15 tops between attacks.

The advantage of my army over BAM is that, say an example of an attack I did yesterday, I came across a base with 540,000 gold 540,000 elixer and 3,900 dark elixer....yay, right?.....not if I had BAM. It was all in the collectors, which is good but....the collectors were behind level 8/9 walls covered by maxed splash(every single collector/mine). With BAM it would have been wrecked trying to crack open black walls under maxed splash but with giants and wallbreakers I was able to take all the gold, fill my elixer storages(I left some because I was close to 8million elixer) and take most of the dark elixer as well with only about 120-150 troops. Versatility is key.

Edit: Edited the guide to include minions.

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Hey Jet. The minions will definitely reduce your build time. The build time is reduced from 29.3 min to 24 min. Total units generated in one hour is 380. Averaging 100 units per attack gives 3.8 atks per hour. To hit 1 million GPH each attack must avg 260k gold. In my experience it's fairly difficult to consistently find such big loots throughout the day. How many hours are you online per day?

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Originally Posted by wolfling

I have to wonder if living in different time zones or geographical areas makes a difference to what kind of targets are on offer.

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Raiding at different times will prove this point, depending on what time players head of to sleep, in each country, is when players are with out a shield, I raid great first thing in the morning, when America is off to bed, and 12 hours later it picks up again, as shields start to wear off, daddy does the same, morning raids are always better.

I would challenge Number 1. Although BAM get all 6 barracks working at the same time, the problem is that BAM also opens up the firepower of enemy base's air defense, which means more fire power will be dropped on your troops, thus your troops will last shorter on the battle field, which could potentially decrease the amount of the loot you can get. Being a very quick cycle, even 10k or 20k difference can add up very quickly.
So, with one advantage and one disadvantage, you have not proven that mathematically speaking BAM method would be the most efficient.

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Originally Posted by Roron0a

I made this guide to help out all those TH9 players who are always complaining about bad loot. For a long time I've heard how farming at TH9 is terrible and it's the death of your game. Luckily since I'm a min/maxer it took me a while to get to TH9 and there are probably a lot more targets for us now. Now that I'm here however I gotta say it's not that bad :D In fact my personal looting records have all been at TH9 so far. My average Gold per 30 min is around 6-700k, regularly hitting 1m. I don't have the time to do a full hour much anymore but my best at TH9 is 1.8m so far. I never gem during farming.
These practices can also be applied to other TH levels very successfully.

I've broken down each section into a short summary for all the players that can't be bothered to read the mass of text :D


Using the Right Combo

Summary: Mathematically BAM (Barb, Arch, Minion) is the most efficient combo for farming once properly used.

Explanation: BAM is efficient because it gets 6 barracks working for you instead of 4. The barbs are necessary for a little tanking and the archers for buildings behind walls. A 50% increase in production capacity only means you can spend more time farming and less time waiting. While it's possible to get good farming results with other combos, over time BAM should produce better results just because you are making more troops faster.
Goblin usage may get similar results since you can skip buffer buildings and go straight for mines, but I haven't spent the time to do a comparison.


Picking the Right Base

Summary: Picking the right base is probably more important than what combo you use or how much gold is available for fast efficient farming. Learn the signs.

Explanation: This is the most important part of increasing your efficiency because picking the wrong base can set you back in time, cups and troops. When analyzing the defense, try to get used to thinking about how many troops you may need to use to get the gold easily. A 200k or less base that requires all my troops to get it all is an instant skip for me. Refer to the Math section for the GPU you want to target.

- Gold Available - obviously the first thing to look at while spamming next. I generally only start scanning a base if it's over 100k. This can give you some clues on how much is in pumps however. This is why I generally skip TH10s as a TH9 because even with 300k showing means most likely there is only 60k in the pumps. TH10 I'd need to see over 360k or if it was prem to considering going for it.
- Gold Storages - I do a quick scan to see if the gold storages are full. If they aren't empty I skip unless the loot is over 300k or the storages are easy to get to. The graphics for the gold storage are bugged however so an empty looking storage is not enough info to press go.
- Mine Positions - if the gold available is good I scan to see if the mines are on the outside or first wall layer. Some bad bases randomly sprinkle mines further into the core. I will probably skip these unless the loot available is high and worth the extra troops it will take to get there.
- DE Pumps - once I've decided the mine positions are good I look for DE pumps. These are one of the few reliable ways to see if the base is abandoned. If the little square box on top is full it's a good chance so are the mines.
- Tombstones - if the DE pumps weren't conclusive I scan for tombstones to see if the base is inactive and has been raided. I often skip a base if I see no tombstones even if the other signs were looking good.
- Workers - Some bases can fool you having all the above look ok. But if you see multiple buildings being upgraded there's a good chance the loot was all in the storages and the player is purposely not collecting tombstones.

It takes some practice to run through all these but it will become second nature for a seasoned farmer.


Attacking Efficiently

Summary: Set a target GPH and keep it in the back of your mind. This will determine the amount of gold each unit should generate at a minimum to hit your target.

Explanation:

This takes a lot of practice to get down, but is necessary if you want to get all the loot with least troops used and therefore increase your farming efficiency.

- Single Mines - My default spam is 4 barbs followed by 4 archers. I drop these and just look away to the next mine. If I spy AOE or too much pt def nearby I may add a few more units. DON'T spam a free mine. Always use a single archer or minion where possible.
- Two or more Mines - If there's a row of Mines it can be more efficient to drop a line of barbs followed by a line of archers. You'll take down the mines with less troops than single mine spam.
- Mines and DE Pumps Only - If you're not planning to get 50%, don't bother getting the elixir.
- BK - My default spam for lvl1 BK is 3-4 minions with a couple barbs to keep him pinned. If you're quick you can lure BK to one side of the map and take out the mines while he is busy walking.
- CC - Generally the bases I hit will have an empty CC. But if you got unlucky and run into one, either try to take down the mines and avoid them or just Light them up. Don't even bother trying to take down a dragon the troop cost is terrible.
- Don't forget the Minions! - It's easy to forget to use minions and just take down an easy base with barbs and archers. But if you think about any raid it's about HP and DPS. Adding some minions to each attack means less barbs/arch expended and your army will be ready faster if you're relying on 6 rax going and not just 4.
- Troops Ready - don't bother waiting for your camps to fill all the way up. I usually am good to go if I have at least 30 barbs, 30 archers and 12 minions. You're probably thinking - O nos! What if I find the legendary 600k base?! There is an instinctive need for players to have to get every last drop of loot and for efficiency it's just totally wrong. On a 600k base that still means there's 400k in the mines! Get those mines and get on to the next battle! It's the same as skipping a 200k base you know is all in core storages.

- AQ - this goddess is all about skill and experience. Keeping her from taking damage can increase your efficiency a LOT, something I'm still really bad at. Use her to snipe mines but always make sure she's got tanks in front and use her towards the end of the battle so you don't forget about her and get her killed.
- BK - Really only good for taking down exposed TH quickly. If you use him on a charge into core, he will be out for a long time so save him for when you really need him.
- Spells - if you had to use a spell you probably failed in the base selection step :D Generally I will never use a spell unless I'm going for a core.


Queueing

Summary: Always keep your barracks working.

Explanation: While you're raiding all your barracks should be going non-stop. Always top off your barracks and readjust in between raids.
As stated above, to maximize efficiency I never wait for full army camps because it doesn't take much troops to lazy farm. If my cups are high in my range I will start searching as soon as I have about 30 barb, 30 arch, 12 minions. If my cups are low in my range I will wait for more troops to go for 50%. For BAM I like to have a bit more archers than barbs, so I run 3 rax on archers, 1 on barb and DE rax on minions. I will alternate 1 archer rax with some barbs.


Maintaining Cup Range

Summary: Go for 50% on weaker bases or guaranteed exposed THs to maintain cup range.

Explanation: If you are farming for extended periods of time you can't keep farming down these bases with minimum troops and dropping cups. Some tips to maintain cup range.

- Use a trophy base or hybrid base you know works well. The cups gained in your downtime can save you time having to gain them while farming.
- Add free TH to your scanning criteria when pressing next. You have to be 100% SURE before you go for it or you'll have wasted a bunch of troops taking down a TH covered by teslas for a few measly cups. I made this mistake in the video :D
- Go for 50% on weaker bases that you have pegged with exposed mines. I would stick with THs lower than yours to go for 50% since weaker def and less buildings means less troops wasted.


Suggested Farming Range

Summary: Depends on your TH level and time of day.

Explanation: For TH9 I have found 1500-1650s good. TH8s I've heard recently are good from 1400s-1500s. Ranges seem to shift all the time so ask your clannies for updates :)


Maths 'n Stuff

Summary: BAM is far and away the most efficient combo from a mathematical standpoint.

Explanation: Let's compare 2 popular farming setups.

BAM
I set a target of 1 million gold per hour. Using BAM, we can determine the max amount of troops able to be produced in 1 hour if all 6 barracks are building non-stop. 2 barb, 2 arch, 2 minion rax can produce 808 units in 1 hour. I usually prefer a bit more archers (78 arch, 70 barb, 36 minions) and so my hourly amounts to 791 units created, or 1264 gold per unit necessary to achieve 1 million GPH.

BAG
Compare this to a typical BAG combo (40 arch, 40 barb, 64 gobs, 8 wbs) which takes 19.5 min to complete. In one hour 468 units can be created. This amounts to 2137 gold needed to be gained per unit to hit 1 mil per hour.

Comparing the GPU for both combos it is easy to see that BAM must be more effective in the long run because each unit expended requires less gold to reach your target.


How to Practice All This and Have Some Fun

Summary: Set a goal and watch the clock!

Explanation: Have a goal and stick to it. Watch time elapsed like a hawk and compare that to your current gph. Pushing yourself against the clock will improve your farming drastically and can be a rush! Even better is to compete with a clannie. Thanks to Deathmarch for introducing the Gold Rush idea to our clan. :cool:


Examples

I recorded a full 30 minute gold rush session for my clannies. 1 mil gold as TH9 in 30 minutes. The goal was not to show them just the raids, but the types of bases I skipped while searching. Yes it's long. Yes it could use subtitles or a voiceover. Maybe I'll get around to that. :rolleyes: Probably I didn't follow some of my suggestions, but hey, I'm still learning too! :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YCKHDCvuLk

When I get some time I'll try to record another gold rush where I maintain cup range.

If you've got other tips, math or suggestions feel free to post away! :D

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Wenyan

I would challenge Number 1. Although BAM get all 6 barracks working at the same time, the problem is that BAM also opens up the firepower of enemy base's air defense, which means more fire power will be dropped on your troops, thus your troops will last shorter on the battle field, which could potentially decrease the amount of the loot you can get. Being a very quick cycle, even 10k or 20k difference can add up very quickly.
So, with one advantage and one disadvantage, you have not proven that mathematically speaking BAM method would be the most efficient.

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First of all, don't quote the whole OP. It's rather annoying as you can imagine. Secondly, I think the OP states (as most BAMmers do) that you do not use minions very often. Let alone send them to their death on AA without the benefits outweighing the cost.

If you can prove mathematically that his math is flawed, go ahead and try.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Roron0a

Hey Jet. The minions will definitely reduce your build time. The build time is reduced from 29.3 min to 24 min. Total units generated in one hour is 380. Averaging 100 units per attack gives 3.8 atks per hour. To hit 1 million GPH each attack must avg 260k gold. In my experience it's fairly difficult to consistently find such big loots throughout the day. How many hours are you online per day?

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It's actually not that hard if you don't skip the ones BAM can't do. Also for all collector raids I tend to pick them off with like 50 troops.

On paper a pure BAM may be better but in real use...how many die on the walls? How many die because it takes them 2x longer to down a resource building? How many die clearing a path to the resources? How many times a day do you have trouble finding good collector bases?

Nice guide!

my only problem with BAM is that it is very difficult to get any meaningful amount of de. And you need a lot of de and gold at th9! Otherwise, your builders and lab will go idle. There just is not enough elixir upgrades at th9 for the lab. Either let it go idle or start upgrading de troops.

edit and collector raids are not really available 24/7. There are certain times of the day where there is very slim pickings for collector raids. Also around update time the collector raids dry up.

Exellent guide Roro! Keep up the good work.

My raiding skills improved significantly. Skipping bases and cooking troops the Kiffster way. I did yesterday a goldrush of 30 minutes and grabbed 790k gold, not a Nakama HoF record, but i was very pleased.

Great guide, thanks.

Really nice guide, thank you very much! :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Gulyas1

Raiding at different times will prove this point, depending on what time players head of to sleep, in each country, is when players are with out a shield, I raid great first thing in the morning, when America is off to bed, and 12 hours later it picks up again, as shields start to wear off, daddy does the same, morning raids are always better.

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I dunno. What you say is logical of course, but it is also statistically insignificant. There may also be some confirmation bias in play too.

Supercell certainly has enough data to work this out though.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dahimi

I dunno. What you say is logical of course, but it is also statistically insignificant. There may also be some confirmation bias in play too.

Supercell certainly has enough data to work this out though.

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There are defintely low loot periods for certain time zones. And it is defintely statistically significant. The biggest cost for collector raids is that next button. Hitting next just 20 times blows 15k in gold, hitting it 50 times blows 37k. If you are doing 5-6 raids in hour that next button can cost you a lot of gold! Almost 15-20 percent of your total gold.

Personally, i use BAM late at night. Always seems to be very lucky. During the afternoon, i use a more standard farming army.

Very good guide.

I generally farm with an all archer army.

Elixir storage usually fills up very quickly this way, and then I switch to mass dragon raids farming for gold, DE, and xbows.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Beancounter

There are defintely low loot periods for certain time zones. And it is defintely statistically significant. The biggest cost for collector raids is that next button. Hitting next just 20 times blows 15k in gold, hitting it 50 times blows 37k. If you are doing 5-6 raids in hour that next button can cost you a lot of gold! Almost 15-20 percent of your total gold.

Personally, i use BAM late at night. Always seems to be very lucky. During the afternoon, i use a more standard farming army.

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I'm not referring to how many times you have to hit next. The statistical significance I'm referring to is being able to use your own experience in order to make real determinations of general trends on whether or not loot is low at specific times of the day.

I don't think a single person can make that determination. It would require collecting data from a lot of different players so we could see actual loot availability trends at specific times.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by SSofJetlife

It's actually not that hard if you don't skip the ones BAM can't do. Also for all collector raids I tend to pick them off with like 50 troops.

On paper a pure BAM may be better but in real use...how many die on the walls? How many die because it takes them 2x longer to down a resource building? How many die clearing a path to the resources? How many times a day do you have trouble finding good collector bases?

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You are assuming there are many bases BAM can't do. I have never skipped a base with 200k+ in the mines and not gotten at least 80%. If you're referring to bases with gold in the storages, then yes I do skip 200k bases alot but mainly because of the low GPU needed. 300+ I'd go for mines and at least 1 or 2 storages. I used a combo similar to yours at TH8 for a long time (I think everyone does at some point) and while flexible there was too much downtime waiting for armies to regen. The minions are what give BAM it's flexibility. Jump spell works wonders now with the extended time.

How many hours does it take you to make 11 mil?

What's your highest GPH?

What's your average GPH?

If you have an axe to grind and want to prove your method is more efficient than BAM then post your numbers, not questions. :rolleyes:

Posted my highest GPH from today under the main post.

Great guide. A visual make-over with pictures and video examples of BAM, would help a lot players.

Quote:

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- Gold Storages - I do a quick scan to see if the gold storages are full. If they aren't empty I skip unless the loot is over 300k or the storages are easy to get to. The graphics for the gold storage are bugged however so an empty looking storage is not enough info to press go.

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its not bugged, its just the game needs 1 million of gold to offer you 200k and 1 million of gold across 4 storages looks "empty".

Also i like to queue a couple wbs somewhere in between. Usually i have around 6 in my camps just in case i need it to grab more gold.

I'll try this once I have my level 6 barbs and level 5 minions. Level 6 barbs is upgrading now, minions are level 4. Thanks

This was an interesting watch and read, thanks.

I'm glad the 'fun' aspect was mentioned in this thread, and the difference between at least TH8 and TH9s requirements and abilities for this method.

I saw a few things that made me think you were rushing a bit - would you say this was a typical session?

Examples:

At least 2 raids you called 'mistakes'
You donating archers to a clannie who requested flyers
Gemming a barracks (?)

What I'm trying to get at is, do you think BAM's pace might make such things more likely or whether doing a live feed made some difference to your performance (lag, pressure, whatever).

Cheers

i think what the guy with giants and wbs is trying to say is that you can still attack collector bases because you still have tanks and archers BUT you can also take developed bases.

From my experience it really depends on how you want to play it, most people cant play every time troops are ready so for example if i have 20 giants, wbs, archers, some minions and some barbs that means that i can take one collector base spending half of my barbs and archers, then take on developed base, then take on collector base again before spending all my troops and going idle. Its quite versatile and gives you DE as well.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ushuaia

Great guide. A visual make-over with pictures and video examples of BAM, would help a lot players.

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Thanks Ushuaia. I'm a bit lazy to do all that but we will see. ;)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lieto

its not bugged, its just the game needs 1 million of gold to offer you 200k and 1 million of gold across 4 storages looks "empty".

Also i like to queue a couple wbs somewhere in between. Usually i have around 6 in my camps just in case i need it to grab more gold.

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I had a really hard time adjusting to BAM in the beginning. I started with 10 wbs, then 8, 6, 4 until I weened myself off using them completely.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Golden119

This was an interesting watch and read, thanks.

I'm glad the 'fun' aspect was mentioned in this thread, and the difference between at least TH8 and TH9s requirements and abilities for this method.

I saw a few things that made me think you were rushing a bit - would you say this was a typical session?

Examples:

At least 2 raids you called 'mistakes'
You donating archers to a clannie who requested flyers
Gemming a barracks (?)

What I'm trying to get at is, do you think BAM's pace might make such things more likely or whether doing a live feed made some difference to your performance (lag, pressure, whatever).

Cheers

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As I said I don't have as much time to play these days, so giving myself the time pressure element has improved my farming as well as made it fun for me. When I'm racing the clock I get a little adrenaline sometimes, almost like playing CS back in the day.

I'm always making mistakes especially with AQ, so that's typical. ;) The clannie that wants flyers always accepts archers too after some time. I never gem barracks.

I think because BAM troops are ready so quickly I spend more time raiding. With other combos it's a bit more relaxing because there is downtime so you can go do other stuff. Again, this guide is about efficient raiding not anything else.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lieto

i think what the guy with giants and wbs is trying to say is that you can still attack collector bases because you still have tanks and archers BUT you can also take developed bases.

From my experience it really depends on how you want to play it, most people cant play every time troops are ready so for example if i have 20 giants, wbs, archers, some minions and some barbs that means that i can take one collector base spending half of my barbs and archers, then take on developed base, then take on collector base again before spending all my troops and going idle. Its quite versatile and gives you DE as well.

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I understand what you guys are saying about flexibility. But again what I'm saying is alot of those bases also can be raided by BAM. It's just not efficient in my opinion to do so. As above this guide is about the most efficient method to gain GOLD. DE is not factored into this.


I haven't had 1 complete hour to raid in a long time, but I just posted up a gold rush under the MAIN POST which ended an hour ago.

well ye when i think about it i guess you are right, there can be a maximum of 200k in storages and granted there are 4 of those all across the base its probably not worth it when you can get at least 100k with 1/3 of your army that takes like 8 minutes to build

Your post got me thinking and I set a timer last night to try rapid bam raids, not waiting for full troops, and got 750k gold in 30 minutes. I kept going and got 1.114 million in 1 hour. No record, but it was fun. It wasn't some random lucky streak, since I set the timer ahead of time, which I think is important when giving yourself a challenge to improve your gph.

Hmm... Anyone want to do a goldrush competition with me like, tomorrow?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Kiffster

Your post got me thinking and I set a timer last night to try rapid bam raids, not waiting for full troops, and got 750k gold in 30 minutes. I kept going and got 1.114 million in 1 hour. No record, but it was fun. It wasn't some random lucky streak, since I set the timer ahead of time, which I think is important when giving yourself a challenge to improve your gph.

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That's great Kiff! The next step is to find somebody to race ;)

- roro

Just to be clear this is a great guide. My point is that over the course of your farming career carrying some support troops will help more than it will hurt. Life isn't like calculations on paper.

Thanks for the post, im gonna see if i can get 1 million gold per hour at townhall 8. Lol

I just want to say thanks for the awesome guide. I tried your method of farming last night and got 900k in 30 minute and then 1.2million in 36 minutes this morning. I think the hardest part was adjusting to not farm bases that has storages in the center with lots of loot, maintaining trophies and DE was hard to come by. It's a shame I cant farm anymore till my TH finish upgrading. I'm looking forward to farming as a TH9, getting lvl9 walls won't be so bad now.

Great Guide :D

Great guide and I think Ill try to max TH8 with BAM, but I have one question. After each raid do you remove troops from your barracks queue so as to not get more/less than necessary of a troop? Because not using minions in a raid will cause your anount of barbs/archers to decrease and your minion number to increase if you don't remove from barracks.

the screenshots show a very big loss of trophies. of course if you pick mines you make lots, but you dont maintain your range.
for one hour of golden freefall, 2h of not so great loot. too bad :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Roron0a

I made this guide to help out all those TH9 players who are always complaining about bad loot. For a long time I've heard how farming at TH9 is terrible and it's the death of your game. Luckily since I'm a min/maxer it took me a while to get to TH9 and there are probably a lot more targets for us now. Now that I'm here however I gotta say it's not that bad :D In fact my personal looting records have all been at TH9 so far. My average Gold per 30 min is around 6-700k, regularly hitting 1m. I don't have the time to do a full hour much anymore but my best at TH9 is 2.25 mil so far. I never gem during farming.
These practices can also be applied to other TH levels very successfully.

I've broken down each section into a short summary for all the players that can't be bothered to read the mass of text :D


Using the Right Combo

Summary: Mathematically BAM (Barb, Arch, Minion) is the most efficient combo for farming once properly used.

Explanation: BAM is efficient because it gets 6 barracks working for you instead of 4. The barbs are necessary for a little tanking and the archers for buildings behind walls. A 50% increase in production capacity only means you can spend more time farming and less time waiting. While it's possible to get good farming results with other combos, over time BAM should produce better results just because you are making more troops faster.
Goblin usage may get similar results since you can skip buffer buildings and go straight for mines, but I haven't spent the time to do a comparison.


Picking the Right Base

Summary: Picking the right base is probably more important than what combo you use or how much gold is available for fast efficient farming. Learn the signs.

Explanation: This is the most important part of increasing your efficiency because picking the wrong base can set you back in time, cups and troops. When analyzing the defense, try to get used to thinking about how many troops you may need to use to get the gold easily. A 200k or less base that requires all my troops to get it all is an instant skip for me. Refer to the Math section for the GPU you want to target.

- Gold Available - obviously the first thing to look at while spamming next. I generally only start scanning a base if it's over 100k. This can give you some clues on how much is in pumps however. This is why I generally skip TH10s as a TH9 because even with 300k showing means most likely there is only 60k in the pumps. TH10 I'd need to see over 360k or if it was prem to considering going for it.
- Gold Storages - I do a quick scan to see if the gold storages are full. If they aren't empty I skip unless the loot is over 300k or the storages are easy to get to. The graphics for the gold storage are bugged however so an empty looking storage is not enough info to press go.
- Mine Positions - if the gold available is good I scan to see if the mines are on the outside or first wall layer. Some bad bases randomly sprinkle mines further into the core. I will probably skip these unless the loot available is high and worth the extra troops it will take to get there.
- DE Pumps - once I've decided the mine positions are good I look for DE pumps. These are one of the few reliable ways to see if the base is abandoned. If the little square box on top is full it's a good chance so are the mines.
- Tombstones - if the DE pumps weren't conclusive I scan for tombstones to see if the base is inactive and has been raided. I often skip a base if I see no tombstones even if the other signs were looking good.
- Workers - Some bases can fool you having all the above look ok. But if you see multiple buildings being upgraded there's a good chance the loot was all in the storages and the player is purposely not collecting tombstones.

It takes some practice to run through all these but it will become second nature for a seasoned farmer.


Attacking Efficiently

Summary: Set a target GPH and keep it in the back of your mind. This will determine the amount of gold each unit should generate at a minimum to hit your target.

Explanation:

This takes a lot of practice to get down, but is necessary if you want to get all the loot with least troops used and therefore increase your farming efficiency.

- Single Mines - My default spam is 4 barbs followed by 4 archers. I drop these and just look away to the next mine. If I spy AOE or too much pt def nearby I may add a few more units. DON'T spam a free mine. Always use a single archer or minion where possible.
- Two or more Mines - If there's a row of Mines it can be more efficient to drop a line of barbs followed by a line of archers. You'll take down the mines with less troops than single mine spam.
- Mines and DE Pumps Only - If you're not planning to get 50%, don't bother getting the elixir.
- BK - My default spam for lvl1 BK is 3-4 minions with a couple barbs to keep him pinned. If you're quick you can lure BK to one side of the map and take out the mines while he is busy walking.
- CC - Generally the bases I hit will have an empty CC. But if you got unlucky and run into one, either try to take down the mines and avoid them or just Light them up. Don't even bother trying to take down a dragon the troop cost is terrible.
- Don't forget the Minions! - It's easy to forget to use minions and just take down an easy base with barbs and archers. But if you think about any raid it's about HP and DPS. Adding some minions to each attack means less barbs/arch expended and your army will be ready faster if you're relying on 6 rax going and not just 4.
- Troops Ready - don't bother waiting for your camps to fill all the way up. I usually am good to go if I have at least 30 barbs, 30 archers and 12 minions. You're probably thinking - O nos! What if I find the legendary 600k base?! There is an instinctive need for players to have to get every last drop of loot and for efficiency it's just totally wrong. On a 600k base that still means there's 400k in the mines! Get those mines and get on to the next battle! It's the same as skipping a 200k base you know is all in core storages.

- AQ - this goddess is all about skill and experience. Keeping her from taking damage can increase your efficiency a LOT, something I'm still really bad at. Use her to snipe mines but always make sure she's got tanks in front and use her towards the end of the battle so you don't forget about her and get her killed.
- BK - Really only good for taking down exposed TH quickly. If you use him on a charge into core, he will be out for a long time so save him for when you really need him.
- Spells - if you had to use a spell you probably failed in the base selection step :D Generally I will never use a spell unless I'm going for a core.


Queueing

Summary: Always keep your barracks working.

Explanation: While you're raiding all your barracks should be going non-stop. Always top off your barracks and readjust in between raids.
As stated above, to maximize efficiency I never wait for full army camps because it doesn't take much troops to lazy farm. If my cups are high in my range I will start searching as soon as I have about 30 barb, 30 arch, 12 minions. If my cups are low in my range I will wait for more troops to go for 50%. For BAM I like to have a bit more archers than barbs, so I run 3 rax on archers, 1 on barb and DE rax on minions. I will alternate 1 archer rax with some barb[Y not goblins?]


Maintaining Cup Range

Summary: Go for 50% on weaker bases or guaranteed exposed THs to maintain cup range.

Explanation: If you are farming for extended periods of time you can't keep farming down these bases with minimum troops and dropping cups. Some tips to maintain cup range.

- Use a trophy base or hybrid base you know works well. The cups gained in your downtime can save you time having to gain them while farming.
- Add free TH to your scanning criteria when pressing next. You have to be 100% SURE before you go for it or you'll have wasted a bunch of troops taking down a TH covered by teslas for a few measly cups. I made this mistake in the video :D
- Go for 50% on weaker bases that you have pegged with exposed mines. I would stick with THs lower than yours to go for 50% since weaker def and less buildings means less troops wasted.


Suggested Farming Range

Summary: Depends on your TH level and time of day.

Explanation: For TH9 I have found 1500-1650s good. TH8s I've heard recently are good from 1400s-1500s. Ranges seem to shift all the time so ask your clannies for updates :)


Maths 'n Stuff

Summary: BAM is far and away the most efficient combo from a mathematical standpoint.

Explanation: Let's compare 2 popular farming setups.

BAM
I set a target of 1 million gold per hour. Using BAM, we can determine the max amount of troops able to be produced in 1 hour if all 6 barracks are building non-stop. 2 barb, 2 arch, 2 minion rax can produce 808 units in 1 hour. I usually prefer a bit more archers (78 arch, 70 barb, 36 minions) and so my hourly amounts to 791 units created, or 1264 gold per unit necessary to achieve 1 million GPH.

BAG
Compare this to a typical BAG combo (40 arch, 40 barb, 64 gobs, 8 wbs) which takes 19.5 min to complete. In one hour 468 units can be created. This amounts to 2137 gold needed to be gained per unit to hit 1 mil per hour.

Comparing the GPU for both combos it is easy to see that BAM must be more effective in the long run because each unit expended requires less gold to reach your target.


How to Practice All This and Have Some Fun

Summary: Set a goal and watch the clock!

Explanation: Have a goal and stick to it. Watch time elapsed like a hawk and compare that to your current gph. Pushing yourself against the clock will improve your farming drastically and can be a rush! Even better is to compete with a clannie. Thanks to Deathmarch for introducing the Gold Rush idea to our clan. :cool:


Examples

I recorded a full 30 minute gold rush session for my clannies. 1 mil gold as TH9 in 30 minutes. The goal was not to show them just the raids, but the types of bases I skipped while searching. Yes it's long. Yes it could use subtitles or a voiceover. Maybe I'll get around to that. :rolleyes: Probably I didn't follow some of my suggestions, but hey, I'm still learning too! :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YCKHDCvuLk

When I get some time I'll try to record another gold rush where I maintain cup range.

If you've got other tips, math or suggestions feel free to post away! :D

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thx a lot, I'm certainly gonna try this instead of my 60 arch 8 giants 8 wbs 84 goblins attack which can lead me to the middle easily, but needs 24 mins to train

Hey!
If you want you can also transfer your guide to the wiki we will be happy to have it there --> http://clashofclans.wikia.com/wiki/Strategy_Guides

At lower trophy levels like 1100-1300, how do you not suffer a large DE loss? Its amazing for gold though, filled my 6 million capacity gold storages today, waiting for my lv 2 dark barracks to be done.

Dear Roron0a, its a good guide. I'd like to add to what else you should look for in base selection:

1) loot figures appearing on wholesome numbers like 75,000 or 125,000
2) The elixir pumps (this bug has been fixed and actually show if they're full now)
3) the gold mine level (obviously you will find some TH8 with lvl 1 pumps, which turn out to be a waste of time)

Also in terms of efficiency, you suggested investing archers and barbs ... I just feel too many. Semi-protected mines only take 4 goblins to clean while being fired upon by a cannon or archer tower (most common case). You need much more archers and barb combos to achieve that.

Also I note you've been collecting elixir ... if you need it I guess thats ok. But I find me and most of my clannies who are at TH9 are overflowing with elixir with no use for it (at the end of TH9 upgrade cycle). Hence we only target gold allowing us to use half the units for half the time at half the cost. This helps with completing wall upgrades.

Lastly, I seem to spend more time searching for a qualified base at the 1500-1650 (it is still the best range) than actually raiding. So I may be able to find a few in a row, but have NEVER been lucky enough to find a string like you did in that hour. I think it could be your language selection and time zone.

Thanks for sharing. Cheers.

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Originally Posted by Roron0a

I made this guide to help out all those TH9 players who are always complaining about bad loot. For a long time I've heard how farming at TH9 is terrible and it's the death of your game. Luckily since I'm a min/maxer it took me a while to get to TH9 and there are probably a lot more targets for us now. Now that I'm here however I gotta say it's not that bad :D In fact my personal looting records have all been at TH9 so far. My average Gold per 30 min is around 6-700k, regularly hitting 1m. I don't have the time to do a full hour much anymore but my best at TH9 is 2.25 mil so far. I never gem during farming.
These practices can also be applied to other TH levels very successfully.

I've broken down each section into a short summary for all the players that can't be bothered to read the mass of text :D


Using the Right Combo

Summary: Mathematically BAM (Barb, Arch, Minion) is the most efficient combo for farming once properly used.

Explanation: BAM is efficient because it gets 6 barracks working for you instead of 4. The barbs are necessary for a little tanking and the archers for buildings behind walls. A 50% increase in production capacity only means you can spend more time farming and less time waiting. While it's possible to get good farming results with other combos, over time BAM should produce better results just because you are making more troops faster.
Goblin usage may get similar results since you can skip buffer buildings and go straight for mines, but I haven't spent the time to do a comparison.


Picking the Right Base

Summary: Picking the right base is probably more important than what combo you use or how much gold is available for fast efficient farming. Learn the signs.

Explanation: This is the most important part of increasing your efficiency because picking the wrong base can set you back in time, cups and troops. When analyzing the defense, try to get used to thinking about how many troops you may need to use to get the gold easily. A 200k or less base that requires all my troops to get it all is an instant skip for me. Refer to the Math section for the GPU you want to target.

- Gold Available - obviously the first thing to look at while spamming next. I generally only start scanning a base if it's over 100k. This can give you some clues on how much is in pumps however. This is why I generally skip TH10s as a TH9 because even with 300k showing means most likely there is only 60k in the pumps. TH10 I'd need to see over 360k or if it was prem to considering going for it.
- Gold Storages - I do a quick scan to see if the gold storages are full. If they aren't empty I skip unless the loot is over 300k or the storages are easy to get to. The graphics for the gold storage are bugged however so an empty looking storage is not enough info to press go.
- Mine Positions - if the gold available is good I scan to see if the mines are on the outside or first wall layer. Some bad bases randomly sprinkle mines further into the core. I will probably skip these unless the loot available is high and worth the extra troops it will take to get there.
- DE Pumps - once I've decided the mine positions are good I look for DE pumps. These are one of the few reliable ways to see if the base is abandoned. If the little square box on top is full it's a good chance so are the mines.
- Tombstones - if the DE pumps weren't conclusive I scan for tombstones to see if the base is inactive and has been raided. I often skip a base if I see no tombstones even if the other signs were looking good.
- Workers - Some bases can fool you having all the above look ok. But if you see multiple buildings being upgraded there's a good chance the loot was all in the storages and the player is purposely not collecting tombstones.

It takes some practice to run through all these but it will become second nature for a seasoned farmer.


Attacking Efficiently

Summary: Set a target GPH and keep it in the back of your mind. This will determine the amount of gold each unit should generate at a minimum to hit your target.

Explanation:

This takes a lot of practice to get down, but is necessary if you want to get all the loot with least troops used and therefore increase your farming efficiency.

- Single Mines - My default spam is 4 barbs followed by 4 archers. I drop these and just look away to the next mine. If I spy AOE or too much pt def nearby I may add a few more units. DON'T spam a free mine. Always use a single archer or minion where possible.
- Two or more Mines - If there's a row of Mines it can be more efficient to drop a line of barbs followed by a line of archers. You'll take down the mines with less troops than single mine spam.
- Mines and DE Pumps Only - If you're not planning to get 50%, don't bother getting the elixir.
- BK - My default spam for lvl1 BK is 3-4 minions with a couple barbs to keep him pinned. If you're quick you can lure BK to one side of the map and take out the mines while he is busy walking.
- CC - Generally the bases I hit will have an empty CC. But if you got unlucky and run into one, either try to take down the mines and avoid them or just Light them up. Don't even bother trying to take down a dragon the troop cost is terrible.
- Don't forget the Minions! - It's easy to forget to use minions and just take down an easy base with barbs and archers. But if you think about any raid it's about HP and DPS. Adding some minions to each attack means less barbs/arch expended and your army will be ready faster if you're relying on 6 rax going and not just 4.
- Troops Ready - don't bother waiting for your camps to fill all the way up. I usually am good to go if I have at least 30 barbs, 30 archers and 12 minions. You're probably thinking - O nos! What if I find the legendary 600k base?! There is an instinctive need for players to have to get every last drop of loot and for efficiency it's just totally wrong. On a 600k base that still means there's 400k in the mines! Get those mines and get on to the next battle! It's the same as skipping a 200k base you know is all in core storages.

- AQ - this goddess is all about skill and experience. Keeping her from taking damage can increase your efficiency a LOT, something I'm still really bad at. Use her to snipe mines but always make sure she's got tanks in front and use her towards the end of the battle so you don't forget about her and get her killed.
- BK - Really only good for taking down exposed TH quickly. If you use him on a charge into core, he will be out for a long time so save him for when you really need him.
- Spells - if you had to use a spell you probably failed in the base selection step :D Generally I will never use a spell unless I'm going for a core.


Queueing

Summary: Always keep your barracks working.

Explanation: While you're raiding all your barracks should be going non-stop. Always top off your barracks and readjust in between raids.
As stated above, to maximize efficiency I never wait for full army camps because it doesn't take much troops to lazy farm. If my cups are high in my range I will start searching as soon as I have about 30 barb, 30 arch, 12 minions. If my cups are low in my range I will wait for more troops to go for 50%. For BAM I like to have a bit more archers than barbs, so I run 3 rax on archers, 1 on barb and DE rax on minions. I will alternate 1 archer rax with some barbs.


Maintaining Cup Range

Summary: Go for 50% on weaker bases or guaranteed exposed THs to maintain cup range.

Explanation: If you are farming for extended periods of time you can't keep farming down these bases with minimum troops and dropping cups. Some tips to maintain cup range.

- Use a trophy base or hybrid base you know works well. The cups gained in your downtime can save you time having to gain them while farming.
- Add free TH to your scanning criteria when pressing next. You have to be 100% SURE before you go for it or you'll have wasted a bunch of troops taking down a TH covered by teslas for a few measly cups. I made this mistake in the video :D
- Go for 50% on weaker bases that you have pegged with exposed mines. I would stick with THs lower than yours to go for 50% since weaker def and less buildings means less troops wasted.


Suggested Farming Range

Summary: Depends on your TH level and time of day.

Explanation: For TH9 I have found 1500-1650s good. TH8s I've heard recently are good from 1400s-1500s. Ranges seem to shift all the time so ask your clannies for updates :)


Maths 'n Stuff

Summary: BAM is far and away the most efficient combo from a mathematical standpoint.

Explanation: Let's compare 2 popular farming setups.

BAM
I set a target of 1 million gold per hour. Using BAM, we can determine the max amount of troops able to be produced in 1 hour if all 6 barracks are building non-stop. 2 barb, 2 arch, 2 minion rax can produce 808 units in 1 hour. I usually prefer a bit more archers (78 arch, 70 barb, 36 minions) and so my hourly amounts to 791 units created, or 1264 gold per unit necessary to achieve 1 million GPH.

BAG
Compare this to a typical BAG combo (40 arch, 40 barb, 64 gobs, 8 wbs) which takes 19.5 min to complete. In one hour 468 units can be created. This amounts to 2137 gold needed to be gained per unit to hit 1 mil per hour.

Comparing the GPU for both combos it is easy to see that BAM must be more effective in the long run because each unit expended requires less gold to reach your target.


How to Practice All This and Have Some Fun

Summary: Set a goal and watch the clock!

Explanation: Have a goal and stick to it. Watch time elapsed like a hawk and compare that to your current gph. Pushing yourself against the clock will improve your farming drastically and can be a rush! Even better is to compete with a clannie. Thanks to Deathmarch for introducing the Gold Rush idea to our clan. :cool:


Examples

I recorded a full 30 minute gold rush session for my clannies. 1 mil gold as TH9 in 30 minutes. The goal was not to show them just the raids, but the types of bases I skipped while searching. Yes it's long. Yes it could use subtitles or a voiceover. Maybe I'll get around to that. :rolleyes: Probably I didn't follow some of my suggestions, but hey, I'm still learning too! :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YCKHDCvuLk

When I get some time I'll try to record another gold rush where I maintain cup range.

If you've got other tips, math or suggestions feel free to post away! :D

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Great write up Roro, thanks for taking the time to post it based on your busy schedules. 👍👍😄😄

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Originally Posted by SSofJetlife

Just to be clear this is a great guide. My point is that over the course of your farming career carrying some support troops will help more than it will hurt. Life isn't like calculations on paper.

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Thanks ss.. I saw someone post in the thread that mentioned he uses BAM during good loot times and longer build army for bad loot times. I think that may be a good solution.

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Originally Posted by Vandslaux

Great guide and I think Ill try to max TH8 with BAM, but I have one question. After each raid do you remove troops from your barracks queue so as to not get more/less than necessary of a troop? Because not using minions in a raid will cause your anount of barbs/archers to decrease and your minion number to increase if you don't remove from barracks.

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My number of each varies depending on how many troops I use per raid. As I mention in the post though, it's important to try to use minions here and there in place of barbs or arch because it can lower your rebuild time.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gentimouton

the screenshots show a very big loss of trophies. of course if you pick mines you make lots, but you dont maintain your range.
for one hour of golden freefall, 2h of not so great loot. too bad :)

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Yea this was farming turned into a gold rush when I realized loot was good. I dropped 99 cups. It is possible to maintain cups however and still farm over 1m per hour.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by GorillaMan

Hey!
If you want you can also transfer your guide to the wiki we will be happy to have it there --> http://clashofclans.wikia.com/wiki/Strategy_Guides

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Hey Gorilla, thanks for the offer! It looks like a lot of work though :P Do I have to reformat everything?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Vandslaux

At lower trophy levels like 1100-1300, how do you not suffer a large DE loss? Its amazing for gold though, filled my 6 million capacity gold storages today, waiting for my lv 2 dark barracks to be done.

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At TH9 I already have both DE pumps maxed. I make enough DE from those and raiding that it doesn't affect me and usually make 5-6K per day from raids.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Siv75

Dear Roron0a, its a good guide. I'd like to add to what else you should look for in base selection:

1) loot figures appearing on wholesome numbers like 75,000 or 125,000
2) The elixir pumps (this bug has been fixed and actually show if they're full now)
3) the gold mine level (obviously you will find some TH8 with lvl 1 pumps, which turn out to be a waste of time)

Also in terms of efficiency, you suggested investing archers and barbs ... I just feel too many. Semi-protected mines only take 4 goblins to clean while being fired upon by a cannon or archer tower (most common case). You need much more archers and barb combos to achieve that.

Also I note you've been collecting elixir ... if you need it I guess thats ok. But I find me and most of my clannies who are at TH9 are overflowing with elixir with no use for it (at the end of TH9 upgrade cycle). Hence we only target gold allowing us to use half the units for half the time at half the cost. This helps with completing wall upgrades.

Lastly, I seem to spend more time searching for a qualified base at the 1500-1650 (it is still the best range) than actually raiding. So I may be able to find a few in a row, but have NEVER been lucky enough to find a string like you did in that hour. I think it could be your language selection and time zone.

Thanks for sharing. Cheers.

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Good points siv, I will add and put your name at the bottom as a contributor :cool:
I have tried recently adding gobs to the mix. I didn't find it that helpful, but maybe I need to try longer. If I did carry gobs I would carry no more than 10-15 I think.
I never target elixir unless going for 50%.
Recently I have been on norsk setting, to uh, chat lol. My time zone is Asia. Yes I'm not saying you can farm 2.2m at any time of the day or consistently. But farming for me is like any game of gambling. You have to recognize when you have the 'luck' and be set up to capitalize on it. ;)

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Originally Posted by ng5151

Great write up Roro, thanks for taking the time to post it based on your busy schedules. 

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Just spreading some knowledge. :o

- roro

I posted earlier not knowing the full extent of this guide... But today I made 6 million gold and finally managed to get 1 million gold in an hour. I am pretty sure that this was the inspiration for such a rapid change of pace! You have allowed me to see farming from a different angle, so thanks :).

;)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by SSofJetlife

Just to be clear this is a great guide. My point is that over the course of your farming career carrying some support troops will help more than it will hurt. Life isn't like calculations on paper.

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Agree with this, picking the quickest way to fill your camp isn't neccesarily the best method.

I actually still use gobs, I find I can use less of them than I would if I was using BAM, therefore mitigating the extra few seconds taken to build them.

Having a flexible army is also more important to me than having my camps filled up a bit quicker, when farming I rarely use all troops so I have space in my troop composition to carry around some that can be used on the big scores.

I changed from Giants WB's gobs attack to BAM and following Roronoa's guide 3 days ago, since then have raided about 20mil of each :-). Winning!!!!
Only thing that has slowed it down is the update, there's just not as many abandoned bases now :-(. Give it a couple weeks should be back to normal.
Thanks for this guide Ror :-)

Awesome job especially on the BAM.

profiled.

can you post your average amount of searches for a good find?(do u usualy search over 10,or 20,or its often close to 50?etc.)