A Complete Question Based Guide To TH8

Hey guys,
My name is gambitflash and I am an almost maxed th8 who will be moving to th9 in a couple of weeks.I am here to answer all your general queries and alot of thought processes that go into my base making decisions.Keep in mind this thread is aimed generally towards starter th8's

About me
I have been playing this awesome game since 29th May 2014,which makes it 6 months of playtime.I consider this to be quite good since I had to learn alot and it was a new experience for me.As of now I am almost maxed th8 with all buildings maxed,lvl 7 BK,about a 100 purple walls (working on them atm),I will be upgrading my th soon.So enough about me let's begin with the questions

Q.When to upgrade to th8?

A. It depends on you,really.Personally I went to th8 with everything maxed and de upgrades completely ignored.I only had a BK lvl 1.I didn't even build a de barracks until I was a mid th8.It's just a hassle to get de on th7 and it's way faster at th8 with the drill.There were no issues at all without the de stuff at th7.

Q.What to upgrade first when you reach th8?

A. First and foremost is the lab.No questions.The lab time at th8 is insane and you want to get started on it right away.

Next is the Clan Castle.This is significant because there is no other way to increase your troop capacity at town hall 8 (no army camp upgrades).Offense comes before defense.

Third is the de drill,this is where my opinion differs from alot of other guys.You want to max that drill asap so that you can get maximum de production during your time as a th8 and get your king to 5 or whatever level you like.Maxing it at the end of th8 is a complete waste.

Fourth is the new buildings,you need every ounce of dps that you can get since th8 has to struggle alot against th9 people so build every new defense became available

Summary:
Lab>CC>De drill>New buildings

Q.Should I max out my th8 or not?

A.Alot of people here will say yes.I am also a town hall maxer.I just like to be a powerful th8 rather than a weak th9.But people who rush th aren't completely wrong.I also understand their side of argument.The main reason why people rush th is that they get bored and they are active so much that they don't need upgraded defenses plus you don't become invincible as a maxed th8 to the th9 attacks.

If you ask me,I would say yes,max it definately.Sooner or later you are going to realize that you need to upgrade your defenses.If you are in clan wars alot,you need maximum defense.It becomes way harder at th9 to raid and get resources and you cannot even keep it if you don't have at least some form of protection.Believe me,I have barched rushed th9 storages as a th8 for 300k loot and I can imagine their pain.

Q.Should I max walls or not (have a builder free for walls or not)

A.Yes,now the walls can be upgraded with elixir so its easier.If you don't it gets even more harder and more boring to max walls as a th9 so better get a start on it.

I will give you general advice on how to do that and not get bored.



· On holidays or when you have a lot of time to play keep a builder free and use it on maxing some walls




· When you are busy with work or something that won't let you play for a while keep all builders working on structures and time them (also known as builder staggering) so you get a builder free every 1-2 days and before he completes the upgrade,raid as much gold and eli as you can for your next upgrade and put the rest in walls (some people say it's more efficient but I am fine with either one)




· Don't think of walls as a huge obstacle.Break it down into smaller projects.Think of them as sections of your base and plan accordingly




· Example: If its weekend and I have alot of time to play I decide that I will get half of my base core with black skulls.Next day the other half will be done.

Or you can think of them as doing on a per day basis like e.g doing 3 walls per day



· Upgrade some walls between your buildings.Everyone leaves them for the end and it gets incredibly monotonous grinding for walls only

Q.Should I max teslas or not?

A. Absolutely,definately yes.Teslas are your highest dps structure.They are expensive but in the end they will pay out.They are amazing against giants,pekkas and heroes.Plus they play a great role in the intimidation factor of your base.Everyone gets scared when a golden level 6 tesla pops suddenly out of nowhere


Q.What is army used to raid gold and elixir at th8?

A. Barch.Any combination of barbs and archers.People who criticize this composition that it cannot do storage raids don't know how to use this composition.The only one thing that should scare you while using this army is centralized mortars and storages.Also using this army will make you overflow in elixir almost all of the time plus its the fastest army to cook (2nd to BAM but that requires de and I find it counter productive to raid de by using de).

Normally you will decimate a th7 using this composition smartly with a barb king at your disposal.90% of the time you will be doing collector raids because they will be in abundance and are the most efficient

In times of loot drought look for bases with off center storages, poor walls and poor mortar placement.Deploy in waves and you should get the loot along with 1 or 2 stars.Try to minimize your troop deployment and always put the next army to cook before you raid.

Q.What is the trophy range for raiding as a th8?

A.The weird thing about loot is that it changes constantly.At some days you will find mad loot,other days you will be starving.It's just how it is.It ebbs and flows like the tides at the sea

Stay in Silver 1- Gold 3 and you will get plenty loot.1250-1450 is the range you would want to be at with plenty of collector raids

Q.What army is used in clan wars at th8?

A. 9 drags,20 archs with a cc drag (preferably but anything works except giants) and 3 rage spells.This army is way too expensive but hear me out.At th8 you don't need elixir very much.All you need is some elixir early on to do some researches plus with the barch raiding army you will always have that pink thing with absolutely no use.So use the wars to convert it into gold and de. People like to make heal spells with drags but I personally think that heal spell doesn't have much of an effect on drags.Rage works better.

Q.How do you raid for DE as a th8?

A. I don't raid for it exclusively.I just remain at war constantly.So I get alot of DE from them and also from the drill and de drill sniping in every barch raid I do as I work for my other upgrades.

Once I come at a 5000 de difference with my required de upgrade only and only then I start looking for DE.I do this by putting my spell factory on boost and making 3 lightning spells.Then I go to 1500-1600 and th snipe the th9 and 10 along with zapping storages and sniping their de drills.It takes only 2-3 hours to get 5000 de and get my upgrade.

This is a controversial method,but I think if its in the game and programmed as such it's intentional and nothing should stop you from gaining benefits from it.Plus taking 1000 DE from a th9 is nothing when they can gain it back so easily.Using this simple method I have upgraded my BK to 7,maxed my minions and got my hogs to 2 which is sufficient enough for me.

Q.Should I upgrade BK or de troops?

A.Another common question,whenever you get the chance,upgrade the BK every single time.The reason being is that BK is like a permanent asset to your base.It has defense,offense and will always remain with you.The DE troops will get changed over time in usefulness.It's a better long term decision to keep upgrading BK.However minions are also important.Once you feel that your BK has a sufficient level turn to the DE troops.Max minions is a must so you can use balloonion at th9. Rest is situational (for me it was level 7 because of de cost,any higher than that I might as well get an AQ instead of working so hard to get another BK level)

Q.Which troops should I upgrade in the lab as a th8?

A.This is a really significant question.The lab at th8 is a bottleneck,meaning that your builders are going to be free maxing all the buildings before the lab finishes all the troops.The lab upgrade time is almost double as compared to the builder time.In order to be efficient with your builder time you will inevitably skip a few upgrades.I will tell you the general troops to upgrade and the reasoning behind skipping some of them.Keep in mind this is my personal list and you should upgrade the troops you use the most so feel free to change the order as you like

Archer>Barb>Wiz>Drags>Rage>Balloon>Wb>Giant>Healer >Minion (whenever you get the de)>Spells>Situational

In this order we skip
Hogs: The recent nerf to hogs,plus the frequency of anti hog bases and general luck based results in wars I don't find the appeal in hogs.Plus you need to level them to 4 if you want to see some work done by them.Level 4 hogs cost 40000 de.If I am getting this much de,its high time for me to get to th9 and get an AQ. I did get level 2 hogs for teh lulz.

Pekka: We need this for the GoWiPe attack in th9 and its highly recommended to do this in th8 but you can skip it if you find out you are running out of time at th8.They are expensive and need more training time.Plus if you really do require them at th9 nobody is stopping you upgrading them then

Valkyrie:Too expensive to upgrade and too less to gain

Gobs: I don't use them,simply.However if you get the time you should upgrade them,but with barch and all drag you don't need to

Golems: Also for the GoWiPe and GoWiWi attack at th9,but they are insanely expensive to upgrade.You are better off getting them upgraded with much better de production

Q.What should be my main priority as a th8? Gold,Elixir or DE?

A. Early th8 you should be aiming for gold and elixir solely.Mid th8 is gold only along with de if its really easy to get to.Otherwise don't stress on it too much.Late th8 your focus is primarily gold and an equal importance to DE.

Q.What is the best base design for a farming th8?

A.The short answer is none.There can be excellent bases and poor bases but there is literally nothing called as a perfect base that will withstand all types of attacks from a th9.The 4 spells and AQ plus 220 troops make short work of any base design you throw at them.
Regardless a base design is still important,alot of great base designs are available here on the forum and other websites.I love avernicus's base designs and I use "Three Doors" base designed by him.After you get your defenses upgraded it becomes amazing at withstanding attacks however occassionally a particular th9 who is frustrated at his life will come and destroy your base for no reason or sometimes greed.

Q.What is the best base design for a th8 in clan wars?

A.Once again the answer is none.There is nothing you can do to hold off a th9 attack.But let me put this in perspective,if your base is getting attacked by only th9's it means your base is doing its job by wasting their high leveled attack on such a lower level base.I am currently experimenting with my clan war base so I cannot give you a definite base.I used Old Greg's dirty uncle for quite a while but I got destroyed by mass dragon attacks so I can't really recommend it to you


Well that concludes my thread,sorry about the length but I had to be as detailed as possible so that my fellow clashers have a great time as a th8.

My final words to you are:

Even if you think its a boring life as a th8,getting hammered by th9 all the time but stick with it and put work into it.After all a great th8 base is foundation for an amazing th9 base.Cheers and enjoy th8 for what it is

Nice guide. I'm going TH8 soon and i get alot of advice from this. :)

Great thread, I am waiting on my TH7 to upgrade. 7 days! I like to use balloonion, I have used it very well at TH7. Would you say I should upgrade Barch, then go to Balloon before wizard/drag?

Like I said its completely upto you to upgrade in the order you like.Its your game and you should play in whatever way you feel is fun.You get to max out balloons/wiz/drags anyways so its a short term effect

Balloons in my opinion are only useful at level 6.At level 5 they don't have enough hp so it becomes 50/50 chance to use them and get 2 stars at best in clan wars.

Another very important addition I would like to add to my guide is the ABT rule.
That stands for Always Be Teslaing.You should always keep one builder on upgrading teslas.Maxing all teslas requires 72 days which is a hell of a time.
So by the time they all get maxed you would have maxed the rest of your base as well.If you leave them all at the end you will get insanely bored waiting for teslas to finish and might even skip them.

Nice i might find this handy in the future.

great guide. 4 thumbs up :)

This is a decent guide but the advice to skip hogs upgrades is way off if you are interested in CW. Hogs are very useful in TH8/TH9 clan wars.

Hogs like I said if you absolutely must have them get them to level 4 then to be really effective.Below that you are just going to get 2 stars on a base that you could have 3 starred by mass drags.Plus they are going to take way too long to upgrade that you would have maxed other stuff.
So if you are truly ambitious get them upgraded,no one is stopping you.

But its my duty to tell you guys that its not a really effective strategy like it was before.
You get better results from a mass drag,gowipe or a gowiwi attack.

before seeing your post i made one asking what to do first when upgrading to th 8 i rushed to 7 and have spent months catching up maxing it. Ill have my townhall 8 finished in 2 days at which time i had no idea what to do first seeing this gave me some good ideas thanks......

I am glad I could help you :)

I'm a borderline maxed TH8 and I thoroughly enjoyed your write-up here. I think that with out a doubt, many people can and will benefit from your suggestions. Nice job!

I upgraded my hogs to level 3 so far mostly because I like hogs, even despite the nerf. I never got to use hogs pre-nerf so I only read about how powerful they used to be. However, I still think hogs are a cool unit (and I still use them pretty successfully often times) so I upgraded them simply because doing so obviously makes them stronger at each new level than they were previously and it makes them more effective. You're certainly right that at level 4 they really start to be noticeably more effective and even furthermore at level 5, but you can only go up to level 4 hogs with TH8. Alas, upgrade them hogs as fast as you want, depending on whether you like them and/or want to use them. If you don't like spending your DE on DE troops and/or don't like hogs for whatever reason, don't worry about upgrading them (although it's always beneficial to upgrade anything that you can, as something upgraded is better than something not.)

Cheers, happy clashing!

@LordKaz
You are absolutely correct.Hogs are a worthwhile investment if you know how to use them and get them to higher levels.You can also do that at th9 when the upgrade costs are so high that you need some cheaper upgrade alternative to keep the lab busy...
I am of the opinion that upgrade order should be personally modified to accomodate your gameplay style.Everyone plays differently so you should max whatever you use or like the most.In the end,its a game and its for enjoyment as I mentioned in my original post

Very useful and detailed guide, will keep this in mind for future reference :)

Thank you for the appreciation :)

Thanks for the guide! I am going to become h 8 tomoorow night, and i got a lot of info from this guide. thanks agnd god bless!

I don't agree with some points.

You said it yourself, you can't upgrade offense (outside of lab upgrades and unlocking troops) at th8, so getting it to the BK to level 10 ASAP is a big thing.

Definitely upgrade Hogs, getting them to 4 makes them good enough that only double giant bombs or CC troops can ruin your raid, also with the new Hogs strategies made by Hulk (and me being in a War Clan) I can say it's even more important.

Upgrading Minions to level 4 is a must but having them at level 3 is good enough for most of TH8.

Upgrading Goblins>Upgrading Healers. Healers are pretty much useless after TH6, and even if they aren't for you, they are still not efficient. Many good farming strategies (especially DE farming) include goblins so upgrading them is more important than healers.

Still, a good guide.

i found this layout in foruns that is anti-hog and dragons cant three star. http://forum.supercell.net/showthrea...-Hog-Deception
i sometimes have lvl 5 hoggers having only one star (its not easy to know where are the bombs, you might think right, but problably will think wrong) and not that easy to three star with mass dragon, last war i got a two star th9 mass drag ( king 2 lvl bigger then mine, queen lvl 6, 1 more spell, 1 more dragon). Idk for how it is for beggining th8, but for late is preety kickass.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by zekrom3112

I don't agree with some points.

You said it yourself, you can't upgrade offense (outside of lab upgrades and unlocking troops) at th8, so getting it to the BK to level 10 ASAP is a big thing.

Definitely upgrade Hogs, getting them to 4 makes them good enough that only double giant bombs or CC troops can ruin your raid, also with the new Hogs strategies made by Hulk (and me being in a War Clan) I can say it's even more important.

Upgrading Minions to level 4 is a must but having them at level 3 is good enough for most of TH8.

Upgrading Goblins>Upgrading Healers. Healers are pretty much useless after TH6, and even if they aren't for you, they are still not efficient. Many good farming strategies (especially DE farming) include goblins so upgrading them is more important than healers.

Still, a good guide.

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I appreciate your criticism and I will provide my arguments
About your first point I have said it in my question about bk or de troops that you should upgrade king whenever you can.But its not possible for an average th8 to upgrade it as his first and foremost upgrade.My method is easier for a casual person.He doesn't need to worry about hardcore de raids and he will still get his required de upgrades till the end of th8.Its much more efficient that way

Second point,its your choice to upgrade hogs.Like I said many times before,what you use most should be upgraded first.You don't use healers fine don't upgrade them.Before giving my sequence I have told you to not follow it to the last word

Third point,you need it for balloonion combo at th9.But I didn't say you had to do it all at once.Upgrade them whenever the de becomes available naturally

Fourth point,I have said that if you get the time and you can.You should do them.Read my reasonings portion of the guide about every troop that I selected


Still thank you so much for all your raised points and I hope I have cleared them

Good luck :)

@lirineu
Thank you very much for the base suggestion.I will definately try it and tell you how it goes.

I am liking how this discussion is going,its a learning experience for all of us

Best of luck :)

Excellent guide!
I am mid TH8 working on defenses.
Almost all my troops are maxed except DE troops. I want to know how to get success with DE raids.
I do barch and gets a lot of elixir and gold but I suck at getting DE (my DE driller is maxed).

Good points all around. I was a near max 8 with max walls, elix upgrades and structures and bk 8.

Going that route helps me survive my new life as young 9.

Thank you everyone :)
Clash on :D

There's no loot where you said...There's no loot anywhere... Help!

This guide is awesome! It's about time someone came and helped us TH 8s out! I plan on staying TH 8 as long as I can and maxing every little thing whether I use it or not. Because as the loot situation is not very optimal, going to TH 9 needing to have done more simply isn't a option.

Well done OP.

I Use Dark Defendum as my farming base, And the TH 8 variation of Deception in war. I lost to a mass drag lev 3 before, but it has been solid all the other times.

Best of luck, keep rocking at guide making :cool:

Good writing.

@NITRONICO: Like I said in my question regarding loot.It changes constantly.For me today I am finding good loot at 1350-1400 its mostly storage raids today,but its manageable.Next day,who knows where it will be
I had terrible loot for 4 days straight at 1250 so I moved up a little.You just have to wait it out bro.Nothing else can be done.

@Izaiah: Thank you for the appreciation.Its my very first guide so that motivates me quite alot.I will try out some more guide writing. :) Those bases you use are really nice but dark defendum is for late th8 if I remember correctly

@kather
Thanks for the feedback.

I intend to keep this thread active and keep answering even more questions from the fellow th8's.I will be online one time daily.So you can keep posting questions

Clash on

I tried the deception war base in the past few days.It was owned by the max level giants and 4 heal spells by a th9 and I had everything maxed
Which is what I wanted to tell you guys that nothing can beat a th9.
All suggestions to improve my guide are welcome
Cheers and happy clashing

been a th8 for a week now used your advice in my upgrade order i use the bowser 8 layout for farming and war and i have to say its awesome........that said thanks for the guide working now on getting everything to max th7 before starting the 8 upgrades....also finding decent collector raids in silver 1 right around 1320 trophies

Firstly, I am a town hall rusher, although at the moment I am 100% maxed out on town hall 8, I got here with very rushed defenses, and I only maxed my wizards, barbs, arch, giants and wb, then I upgraded to TH8 with TH6 defenses, I DON'T regret it at all, I want to clear up some misunderstandings with TH rushing, firstly, if I use certain examples, people will fail to understand, so in simple terms, if you are a decent ways into your current town hall, (aside from TH10) with troops of your TH level have you ever struggled to raid a TH below you? I haven't, as a maxed TH8 I use my TH8 troops to pound maxed TH7s into the ground for 3 stars mostly using 1 spell or none at all, a good layout on a maxed TH7 has never stopped me either, so what did the TH7 gain by maxing their base? now as a maxed TH8 I often get 3 starred by TH9s with lv6 giants, I am 100% maxed out (lab too, all walls, barb king, all defenses) but TH9s can 3 star me with 2 spells, because that's how the game works, the best example I can say is TH7 barch vs TH6 bases, if you didn't know this, 200 spaces of lv4 barch will ALWAYS 3 star a fully maxed out TH6 without any spells or cc troops, all you need to do is draw multiple circles of barch around the TH6 base, their cc troops and layout make near 0 difference, so I GUARANTEE that if you think maxing your TH will stop defense losses or make you unbeatable in your zone, you are wrong, so why max out? let me show things from my perspective, if you upgrade only your farming troops and your key war troops at your current town hall, you start off with near the exact same farming capabilities as a guy who maxed out (heros being the small difference and spells) except you will achieve the higher town hall first, get stronger troops first and from there I see it like this, I was a town hall 8, with lv5 troops, smashing TH7s and maxing my storages out very easily because I was getting bigger TH8 loot, and paying for smaller cheaper TH7 defenses, which allowed me to in turn get my lv8 walls early and max TH8 in around 3 and a half months, 100% maxed, now I could have been a well upgraded TH9 had I rushed from TH8 too but I like TH8 so I'll enjoy it some more, the main point of this post though is to say not all rushers are ♥♥♥♥♥♥ed and as bad as people make them out to be, if you work it out mathematically the way I mentioned above is the fastest best way to play through the game, and I'd just like to point out that it's much easier this way untill town hall 9, where you'll have to max out because then you'll need to settle down and enjoy the game, as well as sort out slightly low heros, but at the end of the day it will benefit you more, if you are worried about defense it doesn't matter because it's stacked against you, the stronger you get the more you max out the stronger people will attack you(when you raid guys do you raid guys you can't beat? because I don't, but they do of course get raided, by stronger people, who crush them) you'll always lose so why waste time on trying to win? premmie bases actually win more defenses too for those who haven't noticed, congrats to anyone who read this whole post lol, enjoy the tips and don't be a hater

Quote:

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Originally Posted by NITRONICO

There's no loot where you said...There's no loot anywhere... Help!

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I got over 200mil of my gold grab from that trophy range, it's the best, use giants and goblins to take big storage raids, collector raids aren't a very reliable source of income because they take much longer to find, if the raid offers 200k of what you need, take it, if not, don't waste your troops GL farming:p

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jason5267

Firstly, I am a town hall rusher, although at the moment I am 100% maxed out on town hall 8, I got here with very rushed defenses, and I only maxed my wizards, barbs, arch, giants and wb, then I upgraded to TH8 with TH6 defenses, I DON'T regret it at all, I want to clear up some misunderstandings with TH rushing, firstly, if I use certain examples, people will fail to understand, so in simple terms, if you are a decent ways into your current town hall, (aside from TH10) with troops of your TH level have you ever struggled to raid a TH below you? I haven't, as a maxed TH8 I use my TH8 troops to pound maxed TH7s into the ground for 3 stars mostly using 1 spell or none at all, a good layout on a maxed TH7 has never stopped me either, so what did the TH7 gain by maxing their base? now as a maxed TH8 I often get 3 starred by TH9s with lv6 giants, I am 100% maxed out (lab too, all walls, barb king, all defenses) but TH9s can 3 star me with 2 spells, because that's how the game works, the best example I can say is TH7 barch vs TH6 bases, if you didn't know this, 200 spaces of lv4 barch will ALWAYS 3 star a fully maxed out TH6 without any spells or cc troops, all you need to do is draw multiple circles of barch around the TH6 base, their cc troops and layout make near 0 difference, so I GUARANTEE that if you think maxing your TH will stop defense losses or make you unbeatable in your zone, you are wrong, so why max out? let me show things from my perspective, if you upgrade only your farming troops and your key war troops at your current town hall, you start off with near the exact same farming capabilities as a guy who maxed out (heros being the small difference and spells) except you will achieve the higher town hall first, get stronger troops first and from there I see it like this, I was a town hall 8, with lv5 troops, smashing TH7s and maxing my storages out very easily because I was getting bigger TH8 loot, and paying for smaller cheaper TH7 defenses, which allowed me to in turn get my lv8 walls early and max TH8 in around 3 and a half months, 100% maxed, now I could have been a well upgraded TH9 had I rushed from TH8 too but I like TH8 so I'll enjoy it some more, the main point of this post though is to say not all rushers are ♥♥♥♥♥♥ed and as bad as people make them out to be, if you work it out mathematically the way I mentioned above is the fastest best way to play through the game, and I'd just like to point out that it's much easier this way untill town hall 9, where you'll have to max out because then you'll need to settle down and enjoy the game, as well as sort out slightly low heros, but at the end of the day it will benefit you more, if you are worried about defense it doesn't matter because it's stacked against you, the stronger you get the more you max out the stronger people will attack you(when you raid guys do you raid guys you can't beat? because I don't, but they do of course get raided, by stronger people, who crush them) you'll always lose so why waste time on trying to win? premmie bases actually win more defenses too for those who haven't noticed, congrats to anyone who read this whole post lol, enjoy the tips and don't be a hater

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I have read your post (quite detailed i might add,thanks for putting time into it).But it seems that you haven't read my answer to the question "should I max th8 or not?" where I have given arguments for both sides of playstyles.I don't hate th rushers...Please read my answer first completely.Like I have read your post.

To satisfy you further,to rush or not basically is an extension of the question "Do you remain active alot?" If so you can rush and its viable.But on the other side,if you max out your base.You can start building and upgrading the new toys early.

Forgot to answer the loot problem,yes well these days the 1250-1300 is empty.However I am finding good loot at 1450 trophies and higher.So try going there.

Clash on!
:)

Hey gambit, read the whole guide!

Really like it, but I'm trying to max TH7.
Link is here:

http://forum.supercell.net/showthrea...ith-Profile%29

Can you please reply, would appreciate your advice and wisdom.

Thanks in Advance.

Replied to your post,sorry for being late.
Maxing th7 is a great step to th8.It helps you alot at th8.
Enjoy your th7,its the best townhall for farming :)

I was a *mostly* maxed TH8 before I upgraded to TH9. I don't regret the early upgrade, though if I could do it again, I'd change some of my priorities:

Your initial (and fairly on-going) offensive priority for TH9 is elixer. You need...just...so much elixer. However, your DE income used to be more than 4 times higher passively than TH8. Now, it's only double, so I'll see how it changes the landscape of things once I get my mini up to TH8. With that in mind:

I made sure to upgrade balloons each stage of the game, however, if I had it back, I'd *probably* wait. Having a cheap elixer option to upgrade at TH9 would be nice. However, I'm not in a hardcore war clan, and most of my clan mates don't see the value in level 6 balloons in your CC, so I don't really get to donate them either.

Since you need a ton of elixer, I'd say that maxing Pekkas in TH8 is useful, once you've finished up the main elixer priorities. You already have 4.5M for barb 6, 6M for archer 6, 6M for giant 6, so adding yet another 6 million elixer cost is kinda...sad.

Also in that line of thought, even though I'm going to advise you to skip DE upgrades, upgrade your DE storage. Anything you can do to reduce your elixer requirements at TH9 will be helpful.

Following that train, skip DE lab upgrades. You just don't need them yet. That being said, pump any and all DE into your BK. Level 5 and level 10 BK is just awesome, and if you get him to level 10 in TH8, you can use him to farm while you're getting your AQ up to snuff.

Why skip DE? Well, using hogs is silly at TH8, as you can just use your overflowing elixer on mass dragon raids in Clan Wars. Done properly, you can 3 star literally any TH7, any TH8, and often 2 star TH9s (if they don't have max air defenses yet). Hogs are a usable for that as well, but it requires a good deal more skill, and a pretty hefty helping of luck. Plus, as we already mentioned, TH8 DE income is much lower than TH9, so unlocking level 4 hogs is a pretty big commitment for not a whole lot of pay off. That being said - if you enjoy hogs, then definitely upgrade them whenever you can.

Minions - I use them as a cheap DE dump if my lab is about to be open and I can't afford a hero upgrade. Even using loonion, the minion upgrades aren't *super* crucial. Skippable.

Valk - totally skippable.

Golem - Absolutely crucial for TH9 raids, but the thing is, as an early TH9, you can use dragons to 2-3 star other early TH9s (especially with the 4th spell). And as you develop into mid TH9, if you have max pekkas already, you can start using level 1 golems pretty effectively to 2 star mid to well developed TH9s. It's not until you are having to take on maxed or close to maxed TH9s that you really need the higher level golems, so you have a long time before you really need them. If you never clan war, then you never need golems.

Goblins - shrug. I maxed them every TH. I hardly ever use them. Skippable unless you really love goblins. I find that there are SOME bases where having some goblins would have helped me get into some storages. And other times, my goblins get ruined by 1 sneaky bomb or lucky mortar shot.

Healer - skip.

Wall breaker - required.


If you clan war, you can absolutely still rush your TH if you want. You have to remember that your current development level is taken into account when matching you against someone. So if you're a super premie TH9, but you have all your war troops leveled up, you'll get matched against highly developed TH7s and 8s (depending on your base). They might be able to 2 star you (maybe), but you will absolutely be able to 3 star them back. So, it all depends on your play style and what you find more fun.

TH8 - Mass drag = most consistent, easiest CW
TH9 - GoWiX - the only thing that's really going to get you 3 stars on well developed TH9s, or 2 stars on under developed TH10s. Dragons and Hogs are both kinda worthless here, so pick one of those two strats to work on in TH8, and then transition to GoWiX.
TH10 - LavaLoonion - best clan war attack. Might want to max loons and minions (and get level 2 lava) while in TH9 so you can start 3 starring TH10s as soon as you max out lava hounds.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gambitflash

Q.Should I max out my th8 or not?

A.Alot of people here will say yes.I am also a town hall maxer.I just like to be a powerful th8 rather than a weak th9.But people who rush th aren't completely wrong.I also understand their side of argument.The main reason why people rush th is that they get bored and they are active so much that they don't need upgraded defenses plus you don't become invincible as a maxed th8 to the th9 attacks.

If you ask me,I would say yes,max it definately.Sooner or later you are going to realize that you need to upgrade your defenses.If you are in clan wars alot,you need maximum defense.It becomes way harder at th9 to raid and get resources and you cannot even keep it if you don't have at least some form of protection.Believe me,I have barched rushed th9 storages as a th8 for 300k loot and I can imagine their pain.

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I would disagree with Maxing a TH8 and any TH8 max defense that thinks they can hold up to TH9 troops is sadly mistaken. I look at TH8's as Piggy banks ready for smashing. Occasionally on a rare circumstance does a TH8 hold up defensively. To that I offer this advice.

If you are TH7 that just moved to TH8 spend all your gold on air def, teslas, then walls in that order. Your elixir upgrades should be all your army camps, farming troops + dragons (Dragons are for Clan wars).

Once these upgrades are complete, save of your DE for Archer Queen and move to TH9 immediately. By doing this you will have much more effective farming troops and you will be able to grow into the TH9 very quickly. Save up for lvl 6 Barch/BAG and you should be able to farm TH8's very effectively.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by zerokelvin

I would disagree with Maxing a TH8 and any TH8 max defense that thinks they can hold up to TH9 troops is sadly mistaken. I look at TH8's as Piggy banks ready for smashing. Occasionally on a rare circumstance does a TH8 hold up defensively. To that I offer this advice.

If you are TH7 that just moved to TH8 spend all your gold on air def, teslas, then walls in that order. Your elixir upgrades should be all your army camps, farming troops + dragons (Dragons are for Clan wars).

Once these upgrades are complete, save of your DE for Archer Queen and move to TH9 immediately. By doing this you will have much more effective farming troops and you will be able to grow into the TH9 very quickly. Save up for lvl 6 Barch/BAG and you should be able to farm TH8's very effectively.

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Your argument is not wrong,I can see what you are trying to say but then again maxing your town hall is a great thing to do.You learn alot.You learn new attacks.You learn to appreciate each town hall's power and capabilities.
Another very big issue is that,even you don't do those upgrades right at this moment you will have to do them later in th9 when you have nothing else to work on.Its better to upgrade as much as you can at th8 so you can work on th9 stuff.I want to work on those badass dark purple wiz towers at once at th9,not wait for an upgrade that could have been done in th8 .
So why hurry just to get an xbow and a queen,just relax,enjoy and appreciate the game at this stage.

I am going to th9 in 2 days.I enjoyed every single aspect of th8.It made me learn builder management.Made me learn prioritizing,how to raid and when to raid.It made me learn to use mass dragon attack strategy.Its been a really helpful journey and it made me understand all the tiny things that will help me alot at th9

Cheers and clash on
:)

Another point I forgot is that you will do a disservice to your clan by not maxing your town hall.You will simply be a 3 star for your enemies.Yes you will get crushed by a th9 but it took a th9 attacker to take you down when they could have used their attack in a better place.
Plus your advice to the new th8 doesn't involve upgrading BK which is also very wrong.You need your BK to be atleast level 5 to get the ability.Also you didn't max point defenses which will make you food for giants 6 even when you go to th9.
You didn't get arch towers which are highly effective against single drag wandering through the base.

The point is not to win defenses.The point is to make the life of your enemies as hard as possible.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gambitflash

Another point I forgot is that you will do a disservice to your clan by not maxing your town hall.You will simply be a 3 star for your enemies.Yes you will get crushed by a th9 but it took a th9 attacker to take you down when they could have used their attack in a better place.
Plus your advice to the new th8 doesn't involve upgrading BK which is also very wrong.You need your BK to be atleast level 5 to get the ability.Also you didn't max point defenses which will make you food for giants 6 even when you go to th9.
You didn't get arch towers which are highly effective against single drag wandering through the base.

The point is not to win defenses.The point is to make the life of your enemies as hard as possible.

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As far a disservice to my clan for not maxing my TH8 (AKA The Piggy Bank)during clan war I say this. TH8's are pretty much guaranteed 3 stars even at max with lvl 3 drag with cc lvl 6 loons. It's a very basic attack and always does well on TH8's so I disagree with assessment that it would be a disservice to my clan mates.

As a farmer I don't really care about def. It sucks to lose loot but if you manage your upgrades timely you can minimize loss of resources and also keeping your TH outside surrounded by torches you usually pick up a easy TH snipe and get a free shield. That is my answer to you being worried about Giants.

My point of view is also looking back at TH8 as a TH9. I look back at what I could have done differently to make me move through the game more quickly. Archer Queen, 220 Camp space, 4 spells, and access to high level troops is much more important and FUN then making it inconvenient for attackers that will most likely take my resources anyway. Also Dual lvl 6 DE Drill and TH9 troops+AQ make far more easier to raid DE then at TH8. This might be different now that TH8's get 2 DE drills at lvl 3, time will tell.

I am sure the research on TH9 has told you that it will be a very long one to max. Which I am totally on board maxing a TH9 just not a TH8. So going to TH9 early with the correct offense I think you will have much more enjoyable experience in your long stay as a TH9.

Happy Clashing

Quote:

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Originally Posted by zerokelvin

As far a disservice to my clan for not maxing my TH8 (AKA The Piggy Bank)during clan war I say this. TH8's are pretty much guaranteed 3 stars even at max with lvl 3 drag with cc lvl 6 loons. It's a very basic attack and always does well on TH8's so I disagree with assessment that it would be a disservice to my clan mates.

As a farmer I don't really care about def. It sucks to lose loot but if you manage your upgrades timely you can minimize loss of resources and also keeping your TH outside surrounded by torches you usually pick up a easy TH snipe and get a free shield. That is my answer to you being worried about Giants.

My point of view is also looking back at TH8 as a TH9. I look back at what I could have done differently to make me move through the game more quickly. Archer Queen, 220 Camp space, 4 spells, and access to high level troops is much more important and FUN then making it inconvenient for attackers that will most likely take my resources anyway. Also Dual lvl 6 DE Drill and TH9 troops+AQ make far more easier to raid DE then at TH8. This might be different now that TH8's get 2 DE drills at lvl 3, time will tell.

I am sure the research on TH9 has told you that it will be a very long one to max. Which I am totally on board maxing a TH9 just not a TH8. So going to TH9 early with the correct offense I think you will have much more enjoyable experience in your long stay as a TH9.

Happy Clashing

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Both playstyles are correct.It is just the person's preference and level of activity.More active players don't have much to lose by not maxing their defense.Whereas the casual players who cannot remain online as long benefit more from maxing.By maxing I only mean the defenses.You can skip the lab upgrades.You can skip raiding DE.You can skip even upgrading to pekkas.So I suggest to max only my defensive structures and walls.All this takes 3 months with 4 builders and even shorter if you have 5 builders and skip collectors,mines etc.That is a reasonable enough time IMO

I think of this game as a marathon,not a sprint.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by zerokelvin

I would disagree with Maxing a TH8 and any TH8 max defense that thinks they can hold up to TH9 troops is sadly mistaken. I look at TH8's as Piggy banks ready for smashing. Occasionally on a rare circumstance does a TH8 hold up defensively. To that I offer this advice.

If you are TH7 that just moved to TH8 spend all your gold on air def, teslas, then walls in that order. Your elixir upgrades should be all your army camps, farming troops + dragons (Dragons are for Clan wars).

Once these upgrades are complete, save of your DE for Archer Queen and move to TH9 immediately. By doing this you will have much more effective farming troops and you will be able to grow into the TH9 very quickly. Save up for lvl 6 Barch/BAG and you should be able to farm TH8's very effectively.

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Being a maxed TH8 myself I wouldn't lie to anyone, your defense gets royally screwed by a TH9 with half a clue of what he is doing, this post is spot on

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gambitflash

Both playstyles are correct.It is just the person's preference and level of activity.More active players don't have much to lose by not maxing their defense.Whereas the casual players who cannot remain online as long benefit more from maxing.By maxing I only mean the defenses.You can skip the lab upgrades.You can skip raiding DE.You can skip even upgrading to pekkas.So I suggest to max only my defensive structures and walls.All this takes 3 months with 4 builders and even shorter if you have 5 builders and skip collectors,mines etc.That is a reasonable enough time IMO

I think of this game as a marathon,not a sprint.

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I made a thread and a video just to clear what up what I was saying, I got my facts together and screenshots and other proof and stuff that might lay things out clearly, nothing wrong with maxing at all, I still love my maxed TH8 account more than anything else, because I like the challenge of raiding TH9s and TH10s while I am TH8 but my premmie TH9 account is doing a lot better, my currently maxed TH8 account used to be a premmie account too, I only stopped at TH8 and have been fully maxed for quite a while already because I have most fun at TH8, but for anyone who wants to progress as fast and as efficient as possible it's like this: http://forum.supercell.net/showthrea...your-town-hall

While I agree on both sides as well.Its just a never ending discussion on whether to max or not.But this is a guide meant for newer players.Its just a safer way to play and alot of experienced people recommend it in their guides as well.Because if we guys tell them to rush they rush it incorrectly and then the loot penalty hits them in the face and they come to complain.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gambitflash

I think of this game as a marathon,not a sprint.

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I completely agree with this statement. Trust me TH9 is nothing but that and I am sure TH10 will even be more so.

Glad to see that we're on the same page. :)
Its just that my way is less punishing for the less experienced players to which this guide is aimed at.
I am really happy that my guide has helped both old and new players to learn about the intricacies of this game
I am going to th9 in a few hours,so I am planning my upgrades.And if all goes well you will soon see a question based guide to th9 as well

Happy clashing! :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by zerokelvin

I would disagree with Maxing a TH8 and any TH8 max defense that thinks they can hold up to TH9 troops is sadly mistaken. I look at TH8's as Piggy banks ready for smashing. Occasionally on a rare circumstance does a TH8 hold up defensively. To that I offer this advice.

If you are TH7 that just moved to TH8 spend all your gold on air def, teslas, then walls in that order. Your elixir upgrades should be all your army camps, farming troops + dragons (Dragons are for Clan wars).

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I was a rushed TH8 as of 8 months ago, but now I've maxed a bunch of things and am probably 80% done TH8. So I've lived through a lot of the ♥♥♥♥ that a rushed TH8 sees.

To the first statement, I agree. A TH9 with any clue at all eats TH9 alive. The only times I really defend well against a TH9 is when they're dumb. You can see it in the replay.

To the second statement, I would not advise upgrading AD first. I rarely see air attacks. Maybe one out of 20 attacks include an air troop. If you see a lot of them, go ahead and upgrade. Even L5 AD will do quite a lot to cut down on the damage that balloons and dragons do. Go to L6 and you might eliminate them to where attackers just hit "Next". I have all AD L4 (going to 5 now) and I rarely get air attacks. So I've been working on all my ground defenses, maxing the teslas, mortars, wizard towers first. The good thing about maxing the teslas is the attacker has no idea what level you have. He may know that you have them and may even know where they are (sometimes it's obvious) but he doesn't know if it's a L1 or L6 that going to pop up.

Additionally, I like the OP's guide. Well done, I agree with just about all of it.