TH 9 Farming Base Introduction - The Balance Beam

TH 9 Farming Base Introduction - The Balance Beam

I am the type of player that always tries to correct flaws found in my base when players attack me. My bases are more so adaptations that happen over time rather than a single base that is perfect immediately. After a great number of tries, I feel as though I am as close to I can come to having a perfectly balanced TH 9 farming base. It is for this reason that I gave this base the name of, "The Balance Beam".

I have tried a number of variations of this base, but I have found that this variation to be the most successful at accomplishing exactly what I am looking for in a base. It has protected me well in high gold while farming and low crystal. I have not used this to push any further although a trip up to masters is not too far in the future.

I created this base with the following goals in mind

1. Makes defensive targeting troops (Golem, Hogs, Giants, balloons) circle around the outside of the base avoiding the core and hitting the maximum amount of traps
2. Limits the amount of resources lost as it is quite rare to lose more than a few stores in one attack
3. Protect DE incredibly well
4. Prevents both 2 and 3 star attacks so trophies do not drop too much when one can't constantly raid
5. Intimidates raiders into town hall sniping and providing a free shield
6. Establishes a strong enough core to fight off strong troops if they do manage to hit the center of the base
7. Fights off melee troops like BARCH incredibly effectively
8. Handles witches quite well with splash damage Wiz towers covered by Morts in the corners
9. Redirects balloons to fly around the outside of the base targeting defensive towers leaving minions to get ripped up by central AD and XBows
10. Although AD on the sides of base are vulnerable, the two in the center have proved to be very effective against air attacks including mass dragon attacks
11. Is flexible enough to still stand up while upgrading any one of the towers
12. Provides very good coverage with splash damage towers
13. Each Wiz tower is within range of two stores as well as all four morts in range of the DE store

The vulnerabilities that have been exposed on rare occasion are as follows:

1. Version 1 & 2 can have defenses cleared by a strong hog heal spell attack backed up by witches, wiz and heroes
2. There are no double bombs in version 1 and 2 to help against mass hog attacks
3. The base can be targeted by HoLo and attackers that know what they are doing can do quite well against this base if they clear out a side before releasing hogs into the core
4. A full on Valk/Wiz attack can get to the core on this base since it ignores the defensive towers and will instead move straight through the base and has taken my DE before.
5. The CC is not perfectly centered and can be lured out, although it is not very easy it is not impossible. The tesla placed on the north east side is used to compensate against this to help kill wall breakers and giants as that is the typical entry point.
6. The base can be wiped out by a solid LavaLoonion attack if the AD on the sides are taken out by loons first and lava hounds for center ADs.
7. Heroes not centralized

Without further ado, I present to you... The Balance Beam


Version 1.0

http://i.imgur.com/CMIsMw8.jpg

Version 2.0

Attachment 76885

Version 3.0

http://i.imgur.com/IPO5CLc.jpg

Comments, critique and suggestions are encouraged and welcomed. You are free to use this base as it will do an excellent job at protecting your hard earned loot. Tell me if the base is great, blows or whatever else you think could improve it.

Thx,

~~ Ponch

Once I figure out how to capture video and post on here, I will try to do so... but in the meantime, here are some screen shots of defense logs. I am only including strong army compositions that attacked me and the results as screen shots as it takes too much time to screen shot, crop and post all of them.

These are logs for version 2 of the balance beam.

I was saving for witch 2 upgrade and xbow 3 upgrades during this time so my stores were very full. I have also had no builders free to lower loot on walls before logging out for the past three days as I am upgrading 3 teslas, dark barracks and an xbow. My available gold / elix to steal was typically at 200-364 k and DE is typically 1,400-2800.

I have been mainly raiding with Balloonions, so time between raids is typically 45 minutes at the earliest as I don't boost unless I find gems in shrubs.

Past 40 attacks, 33 have been town hall snipes and 7 have been full attacks on my base. Here are all 7 attacks with results.

1. BARCH 1 - This base stands up best to BARCH at all levels
131x lvl 7 barbs, 83x lvl 6 arch, 8x lvl 5 wb, lvl 10 BK, lvl 9 AQ, lvl 4 rage, CC minions
43%, 121 k gold, 11 k elix, 40 DE

2. Giant Archer - Giants used to be a problem in the past, but are no longer an issue at all for me
20x lvl 5 giant, 10x lvl4 wb, 85x lvl5 arch, lvl 4 BK, 2x lvl 4 heal spell, CC drag
39%, 54 k gold, 13 k elix, 0 DE

3. Hog Wiz Witch - I tweaked the base since this attack and have yet to be tested by hogs since this time
39x max hogs, 2x lvl6 arch, 9x lvl6 barb, 5x lvl5 wiz, lvl 15 AQ, 4x lvl6 heal spell, CC 2 max witches
100%, 209 k gold, 57 k elix, 2376 DE
Attachment 76894

4. Giant Archer Gob -
13x lvl 6 giant, 130x lvl 6 arch, 10x lvl 6 barbs, 25x lvl 5 gobs, 1x lvl 5 wb, lvl 12 AQ, CC barbs/arches
39%, 178k gold, 30k elix

5. Pekka, Wiz, Healer
3x lvl 2 pekka, 24x lvl 5 wiz, 2x lvl3 healer, 1x lvl5 arch, lvl 5 BK, lvl 1 AQ, 3x lvl 4 heal spells, 1x lvl 3 rage spell
50%, 121 k gold, 23k elix, 18 DE
Attachment 76896

6. Straight BARCH
56x lvl 5 archers, 50x lvl 5 barbs
21%, 2 k gold, 2 k elix... they gave up half way through battle

7. Valk Wiz
17x lvl 1 Valks, 20x lvl 5 wiz, 4x lvl 5 arch, 1x lvl 6 BK, 3x lvl 5 heal spells
62%, 297k gold, 176k elix, 1,725 DE
Attachment 76897

I really like the look of this base. I will be at TH9 in about 3 days, and I think I will use this design

I replied to your other post, so I'll just move it here
First off, nice description of your bases pros and cons. I also have been working to improve my farming base, and I like that mine has several similarities to yours in design that I've noticed is effective in farming bases- namely, spread storages and wall pathing to cause unpredictable giant movement. My main concern with your base is what happens if an Archer queen gets into your core with a few Giants- core would be cleared, but then the queen can take out virtually all the storages. Wondering if this has happened to you? I love farming bases with large cores when I have my archer queen, as she seems to sweep the storages from the inside with her long range.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Karmaslap

I replied to your other post, so I'll just move it here
First off, nice description of your bases pros and cons. I also have been working to improve my farming base, and I like that mine has several similarities to yours in design that I've noticed is effective in farming bases- namely, spread storages and wall pathing to cause unpredictable giant movement. My main concern with your base is what happens if an Archer queen gets into your core with a few Giants- core would be cleared, but then the queen can take out virtually all the storages. Wondering if this has happened to you? I love farming bases with large cores when I have my archer queen, as she seems to sweep the storages from the inside with her long range.

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When I first started out with this basic design, I didn't have any teslas in the center and the AQ was a huge problem with tank troops. I chose to max out my teslas ahead of my splash troops to further help with this exact problem. The XBows don't do much to tank troops, but they do rip apart the AQ very quickly. The central morts do an excellent job of clearing out lvl 1 troops so the XBows and Teslas can do their work on the tank troops and AQ. I have adjusted the base many times to make sure the closest defensive tower is around the outside circle of the base where my traps are laid out.

The only troop that seems to sometimes ignore this are hogs even when most follow the outside circle. Even with just 6 or 7 hogs in the core with well placed heal spells can cause the base to get 3 starred as I showed above. Giants always go towards the tower on the corner of the bases if they hit the wizard tower first. If the attack comes from the corner where my archer towers are and the 1 tesla tower, they have always gone to the closest defensive tower where the spring trap is and follow the outside of the base. If a user was smart, they would do two waves of giants to clear out the towers on the outside and then use wall breakers to go into the center of the base but I have yet to have anyone do that yet. This has been done with HoLo before by a skilled user who used loons to clear out towers on a side of my base and reached the core, but my teslas went to town on the giants and AQ and fought off the attack without 3 stars but they did get significant loot and my DE.

I also used to have heroes in the center of the base and double bombs where the heroes were located, but that created too much of a space so defensive targeting troops would make it to the core and wreak havoc. The goal of the base is to cut down the number of defensive targeting troops by hitting traps so if they do make it to the center, they are weakened and there are less numbers of them.

Before I did my constant tweaks and had a spring trap between where the hero troops were and a space, the closest tower was the air defense and they did reach the center of the base. The core of the base with strong teslas and xbows did an excellent job of keeping the giants at bay and the archer queen. I also used to have the DE store one more space to the north east so it was more centralized, but once there the DE store was in range of the AQ without being in range of the XBow not upgrading if it was pointed up. To fix this problem, I point my XBow down and move the DE store one space to the south west while upgrading the XBows 1 at a time.

I might tray again over time to incorporate double bombs to fight against hogs on the corners of the map where my archer towers are and wiz towers, but for now this base is not so focused on hogs that it does a good job defending all attacks I face and not just the piggies.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dleach

I really like the look of this base. I will be at TH9 in about 3 days, and I think I will use this design

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When I started out with this base design originally and my XBows were being built, I put all four teslas in the center of the base and it really helped to protect my DE store after getting it stolen a number of times by the AQ. I like to always be upgrading the AD beside the XBow not upgrading in the picture while that XBow is pointed up with the other XBow pointed to ground to maximize base coverage.

If an XBow is upgrading, it puts you at a disadvantage to have an AD upgrading at the same time. To overcome this, place the DE store right beside the XBow and move CC more central so the AQ can't sneak in from the northeast. It is also a good time to set your skeleton traps for air during this time and have them by the upgrading AD and move extra air bombs to that weak spot in the base.

I hope that helps you save your hard earned loot and fight off those nasty maxed out giants.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Karmaslap

I replied to your other post, so I'll just move it here
First off, nice description of your bases pros and cons. I also have been working to improve my farming base, and I like that mine has several similarities to yours in design that I've noticed is effective in farming bases- namely, spread storages and wall pathing to cause unpredictable giant movement. My main concern with your base is what happens if an Archer queen gets into your core with a few Giants- core would be cleared, but then the queen can take out virtually all the storages. Wondering if this has happened to you? I love farming bases with large cores when I have my archer queen, as she seems to sweep the storages from the inside with her long range.

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I also forgot to mention that the old design of my base had a huge plus sign in it without a big open space in the core. My morts were touching the gold and elix stores in the corners. This made the mort the closest defensive towers after giants, hogs and loons hit the wiz tower and they were not moving along the outside of the base and penetrating the center. I made a compromise as I don't tend to like wide open spaces in the center of my base, but I felt as though this design allowed defensive targeting troops to circle the outside of the base more effectively. After making that compromise, I added in the double walls to make it harder for wall breakers to break into the core.

Lots of text that I didn't read... but looking at the picture I'd say the following:

DE + 4 storages look pretty susceptible to Loonion from SW.

4 storages and maybe DE look susceptible to GiBarch provided they have their queen available (again, from SW). Looks like giants would be able to get through the first line of walls nearly unscathed.

i'am no base expert but this looks pretty good! after all no base is anti-everything

Quote:

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Originally Posted by perkunas

Lots of text that I didn't read... but looking at the picture I'd say the following:

DE + 4 storages look pretty susceptible to Loonion from SW.

4 storages and maybe DE look susceptible to GiBarch provided they have their queen available (again, from SW). Looks like giants would be able to get through the first line of walls nearly unscathed.

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I appreciate your feedback. The stores do look susceptible to giants, but with the path around the outside of the base laden with traps GiBarch has never destroyed more than 4 stores and has never reached my DE. I designed this base with giants in mind as the most frequent attack on my base and it is the strong point.

I know the post was very wordy, but I did point out that this base is vulnerable to balloon attacks from both the southwest and north east with specific focus on HoLo & LavaLoonion that can 3 star the base. It is also a coin flip if hogs will 3 star the base or 1 star it depending on their path.

In general when loons do attack, they follow the path of the towers on the outside of the base while the XBows and inside AD go to work on them. I have not had a balloonion attack on this base in the past couple of weeks, so I have not been tested with it since I changed so much. Since it is infrequent in gold 1 and low crystal to be attacked by loons, it was a compromise that I was ok with.