How to be an effective raider

I have frequently raided over 500,000 resources in a week. My record is 780,000. I also sit for Brush Monkey, who is well over 1,000,000 for this week (he has the Teuton bonus, which really helps!). We both use the same approach, which is fairly simple, but very effective.

First, you need troops that can raid. Three factors affect raiding: speed, capacity and attack strength, and they are important in that order.

Second, you need to know where you can safely raid. For this, you have many sources of information. First and most important are scouts. Get them. Use them. Second, are the scouting reports and raids of others in your alliance. Check nearby villages and see if they have already been scouted. Check your alliance news page. Third, are tools like this one that enable you to check whether a particular village is growing. The more you raid, the better your idea of what is happening in your area. You know who are the farms, who are the threats, who are the noobs, who are the pros.

Once you have troops and targets, start sending out raids. If you are not sure whether a village might have built more troops since you last raided them, then scout. If they have a history of building units, then scout. Hitting a few units is painful. Most of your raider will need to bring back ten or more successful raids before they have paid themself off, so needless deaths are to be avoided. If someone has troops, either just keep scouting and hope someone else clears them, or send a clearing wave that is strong enough to kill them all without suffering much/any damage. I find swords/imps/axes are generally best for this, esp if the enemy has weak infantry defence (Legs, Phalanx, Spears). No point wasting your more expensive raiding units (TTs/paladins/EIs).

Once you are successfully getting some raids, you might start getting overwhelmed by how many villages there are to keep track of. The key is that I basically never open a scouting or battle report without doing something about it. If the troops came back full (a quick calculation and you can work this out in seconds), then I send the same amount or more. If they came back semi-full, then I send the same amount or less (depending on how close to full they were and how long it has been since the report). If they come back entirely empty, then I send a scout, or perhaps troops again. If they encountered opposition, then I either send a scout or enough troops to finish them off. If you are going to open a report, make sure you deal with it, even if it is just sending a scout. That way, farms don't drop off your list.

Happy raiding!

another thing to do is delete the report after sending a new wave, this way if a good farm returns nothing much due to being hit just before, you can wait a few hours before the next trip to allow for res regain. By only deleting after sending another wave you know what is in line to be hit.

also use troops based on distance, i raid everything from 0-2 hours with club/axes and then the further stuff with pal/tk. also aim for troop numbers so u get about 80% capacity. that way you never leave loot behind, but your also not wasting troops.

Best thing to use though is traviandope. most accurate inactive list out. find someone gone for a few days and raid away