Gonna be the first one to do the TH8.5 in my clan; help me please:)

[Jellal1473]

I just finished 8.5 a few days ago, yes, I built my xbows after 3.5 months hitting TH9.

As an 8.5 myself (previously and recently), I think my advice will be pretty relevant. First things first, I'm in a serious war clan, and yes we do have other 8.5s as well. Our members took the 8.5 route initially so that we can get 'easier matchups', but soon we realised that we're bringing in TH9s with xbows, not additional TH8s. Matchups were never in the 8.5's favour.

Even though we never got what we expected, 8.5 had a hidden benefit that we didn't realise.

1. By not building defenses, that means our 4 or 5 builders are all dedicated to elixir upgrades, traps and heroes. What good are defenses anyway? Protect the farming base? I call bull. You will be permanently low on ALL resources. Excess gold and elixir to walls, DE for heroes. Aside from the essential Spell Fac/Lab/Camps for elixir upgrades, you shouldn't neglect dark barracks/drills/storage. You may not understand this at first, but in the long term it helps. Traps too. Small bombs will now kill a Lv 5 wb. Black mines deal a ton of extra damage. Build them before building defenses.

2. By delaying defenses and staying low on the roster, you are not expected to hit higher level bases. This gives you time to learn TH9 strategies, get your troops up, while still hitting low TH9s or cleanup TH8s. Trust me, I've seen people getting their defenses up so quickly, 8.75 style, and they can't attack for god's sake. And they get kicked. 8.5 is a time to learn during the transition to TH9. Attack strats, base building, whatever.

So when do you start building defenses? When your elixir upgrades and traps are fully done, and when you have fully mastered GoHo at least (Lv 4 golems, Lv 2 jump, max hogs) and are able to consistently 3 star TH9s.

Wow that's nice advice I will do it the way you said and wait so u don't build the new defenses at all? Just the current existing ones is it? The walls too?

[tyler4]

My solution is only build tesla and ad until you catch your offense up (220, spell factory, death loons, level 5 hogs.. then you can build the rest of the defenses. You can think about your xbows when your queen hits level 10)

If you don't build the ad and tesla, you're far too easy to 3 star with a straight loonion. At least make them put effort into 3ing you for a tiny bit more war weight.

[Jellal1473]

My solution is only build tesla and ad until you catch your offense up (220, spell factory, death loons, level 5 hogs.. then you can build the rest of the defenses. You can think about your xbows when your queen hits level 10)

If you don't build the ad and tesla, you're far too easy to 3 star with a straight loonion. At least make them put effort into 3ing you for a tiny bit more war weight.

Ok

[OnyxDS]

2. By delaying defenses and staying low on the roster, you are not expected to hit higher level bases. This gives you time to learn TH9 strategies, get your troops up, while still hitting low TH9s or cleanup TH8s. Trust me, I've seen people getting their defenses up so quickly, 8.75 style, and they can't attack for god's sake. And they get kicked. 8.5 is a time to learn during the transition to TH9. Attack strats, base building, whatever.

So when do you start building defenses? When your elixir upgrades and traps are fully done, and when you have fully mastered GoHo at least (Lv 4 golems, Lv 2 jump, max hogs) and are able to consistently 3 star TH9s.

This is the key. My clan has about 20 TH9s now, most of whom upgraded to TH9 within the clan. Of the guys who went the normal route - mostly some time ago, only a couple really have mastered full TH9 attacks, and a couple more can pick off very bad bases. Some gave up on the game. Some still gowipe. The guys who have gone 8.5, mostly more recently, are a pretty vicious bunch - pentalavas, gohogs, golaloons.

[OmgItsJunior]

So what do I do with all the gold I get if not invested in defenses? Can I upgrade walls?? Plus the new th9 walls?

[TheMan131505]

If you are the only guy doing it in your clan then there won't be much of an impact on the opponents you are getting but if you are doing it to stay low on the war map then what I did was:
camps, SF, lab, CC first
drills, traps, dark storage second
new storages and dark spell factory were one of the last things I did

That's all you really upgrade as an 8.5 on the defensive side. For troops I did:
Hogs -> loons -> hounds -> jump -> heal -> golem -> witch -> poison -> giants
then I'd do whatever you'd like since those are the main war troops

Obviously get the walls upgrading and keep a hero down at all times. You don't need both to hit high town hall 8's since the fourth heal spell is too much for all 8's.

[MikeyP1]

Do it!!!! Don't build any new defenses there is plenty of things to upgrade with elixir, drills, queen, camps, dark barracks, lab, and spells. It really makes a big difference I have a higher firepower compared to someone in my clan who upgraded to 9 about a month before me and we both still get 3 starred yet I can take down most solid 9s it's definitely worth it. Then you can build the new defenses!

[tyler4]

Do it!!!! Don't build any new defenses there is plenty of things to upgrade with elixir, drills, queen, camps, dark barracks, lab, and spells. It really makes a big difference I have a higher firepower compared to someone in my clan who upgraded to 9 about a month before me and we both still get 3 starred yet I can take down most solid 9s it's definitely worth it. Then you can build the new defenses!

If you just built the AD and tesla, you'd be FAR harder to three star for very much more war weight.. still definitely focus on offense though.

[Jellal1473]

Do it!!!! Don't build any new defenses there is plenty of things to upgrade with elixir, drills, queen, camps, dark barracks, lab, and spells. It really makes a big difference I have a higher firepower compared to someone in my clan who upgraded to 9 about a month before me and we both still get 3 starred yet I can take down most solid 9s it's definitely worth it. Then you can build the new defenses!

Yeah I guess I won't build and of the defenses then; not ADs or Tesla; once my elixer upgrades are done maybe I'll take them, until then all gold will be dumped to walls hope I'll be able to take on big th9s too

[Asmothedictator]

So I recently maxed out th8 and I'm currently upgrading to th9 so I have a few days left. I'm gonna be the first person to implement the Th8.5 in my clan, hopefully there are others to follow; around 2-4 more will join. And my clan has around 3 th10s who constantly be in war, and around 8-10 th9s (not all of them war always) and we have around 5 th8s( not in all wars) and 2 th7s. I have some doubts and when I read the 8.5 posts, they don't really emphasize on that

so first off; do u build the new defenses that come along with th9? That is the new AT, WT,etc. I know that I'm not supposed to build the X-Bows right at this point.

secondly; would I be able to upgrade my current defenses beyond th8 level? And if I get the new defenses, would I be able to upgrade them to th8 level as well?

lastly; Can I keep doing the walls and the heroes? Do my new walls to level8? And then onwards take them up to lvl9/10? And keep upgrading my AQ and BK beyond lvl10?

Thanks
Cheers.

My thread, in general, called "what happened?" May be of some assistance to you lol