Main Guide

Personalize Your Lord

Personalize your lord

• Name - Be creative with your name.

• Portrait - Upload your own square shaped (i.e. 512x512) picture, or select an pre-existing avatar.  Non-square shaped photos will be stretched or distorted if uploaded as your profile picture.

• Tag - Set a brief phrase (up to 25 characters).  This could include language preference (i.e. [EN] for English) so people know how to communicate with you.

Stronghold Resource Requirements

Plan your upgrades, understand how much resources you need, and how much you may need to transfer from your farm accounts.  Any resources transferred from your farm account remain on your resource bar on the top of the game screen.  These resource are susceptible to poachers who may decide to attack you in the middle of your upgrade.  If you have a lot of resources and plan to upgrade a number of buildings and suspect that some may want to hinder your lofty ambitions, consider activating your peace shield.  Use your Sea Master Statue's Protection ability (Sea Master Armor) which grants you a Peace Shield for a period of time OR you can use peace shield scrolls from your inventory or store.

Troops Attributes

The table below show attributes of each troop type and the percentage (%) increase of the attribute between sequential levels.

Notice: An update of StormShot in December 2023 has changed the speed of Artillery to match that of Infantry and Distance troops.  

Sanctuary and Resurrecting Troops

At some point in the game your main or farm account will be attacked, and you may suffer casualties.  Heal all the troops in your Hospital first, before heading to the Sanctuary.  The holy water used to resurrect your troops will gather slowly if you have troops waiting to be healed in your hospitals.  Revive your troops for free using accumulated holy water.  Repeat after a few hours until all your troops are revived.

• Recommendation: Resurrect troops every 6-8 hours for free

Consumption Events

Consumption events are great opportunities to upgrade your estate buildings, troops, and research capabilities.  There are two types of consumption events:

• Resource-based Consumption Event

• Speedup-based Consumption Event

The fastest way to level up your player is to save as much as possible for events like consumption, alliance crunch, etc. that provide valuable rewards as you unlock higher tiers of the reward. 

Resource Consumption Event

Highest Tier Reward Requirements

• Gold Category : Consume 1.2M Gold

• Grain Category : Consume 2B Grain

• Obsidian Category: Consume 2B Obsidian

• Stone Category: Consume 400M Stone

• Silver Category: Consume 100M Silver

Notice the ratio between Grain / Obsidian / Stone / Silver is 20 / 20 / 4 / 1.  This ratio is consistent across the game.

To calculate the requirements for each tier of Obsidian, Stone, or Silver consumption reward, apply the ratio.

Tiers per Resource Type

• Grain / Obsidian - 2.5M / 7.5M / 15M / 40M / 75M / 250M / 500M / 1.25B / 2B

• Stone - 500K / 1.5M / 3M / 8M / 15M / 50M / 100M / 250M / 400M

• Silver - 125K / 375K / 750K / 2M / 3.75M / 12.5M / 25M / 62.5M / 100M

This can be translated to resources obtained from Aristocrat Chests as follows:

• Chests - 1 / 3 / 6 / 16 / 30 / 100 / 200 / 500 / 800

Obtaining the highest tier reward in any resource category is equivalent to consuming 800 Aristocrat chests.

Speedup Consumption Event

The speedup consumption event is similar to the resource consumption event.  However the consumption categories are:

• Gold

• General Speedup

• Construction Speedup

• Training Speedup

• Research Speedup

Tiers for Speedups (in minutes)

• All Types - 270 / 810 / 1.62K / 4.32K / 8.1K / 27K / 54K / 135K / 216K

This can be translated to resources obtained from Aristocrat Chests as follows:

• Chests - 2 / 4 / 7 / 18 / 34 / 112 / 225 / 563 / 900

Obtaining the highest tier reward in any resource category is equivalent to consuming 900 Aristocrat chests.

Lord Talent

Your lord can specialize in three (3) types of talents, or mix across these three areas.

• War - Focuses on troop strength, defense, and marches.

• Economy - Focuses on construction, research, and gathering speed.

• Balance - A balance between war and economy.

There are no restrictions on how much talent points are distributed across each category.  If your goal is competitive play and want to focus on troop marches and rallies against players and threats (i.e. Oracle Reef, War of Waters, Threats, etc.) then focus primarily on War and maybe parts of Economy and Balance.

Warrior Talent Strategy

If you are interested in optimizing your experience as a warrior, consider the following talents

• War Track - Focus on cavalry and distance, and attack and defense skills.

• Economy - Max "Construction I" and "Research I" to reduce time to level stronghold and academy skills

Lord Gears

Always equip your lord with gear and enhance them, it provides bonuses to all your troops and may significant turn the tide to your advantage against players at your tier level.  Gears can be crafted and dismantle with 100% return in materials used, so there is no reason to wait until you have enough material for crafting a higher level gear.  Raise your gear type and enhancement incrementally.

See Mob Guide to determine which mob provides the best loot for gathering material for crafting your lord's gear.

Hero Skills and Attributes

There are are large number of heroes in the game.  Type S (gold) heroes provide the best benefits, also more difficult acquire.  Either you are lucky in the tavern, or you have to pay to acquire and enhance them.

Review and Upgrade Skills of Hero

Hereos have special skills that improve your troops bonuses in combat.  Review each heroes skills to determine which hero best supports your troop selection or formation.  Skills have to be unlocked and enhanced to provide benefit.  See example below of Peggy's Infantry Defense skill that provides 10% bonus to infantry defense at level 5.  Raise these skills as high as possible for maximum benefit.

Review and Enhance Attributes of Hero

Often overlooked, Hero's attributes can be enhanced to improve it's skill efficiency or potency.

Equip Gears on Hero

Each hero can wear or wield 6 equipments.  Make sure to craft equipments or gears for your heroes.

Crafting Hero Gears

A lot of Tier D material is required to build gears for your heroes.  If you can run 3 marches, and only have 1 or 2 heroes with gears, then your other marches are not benefiting from hero gears, and thus not performing optimally.

Hero gears and materials used to be created in your tavern (for whatever reason that defies logic).  Recent updates may have changed this back to the Forge.

Synthesize materials to upgrade to a higher Tier -- depending on what is required for your gears.

Forge Hero Equipment once you have enough materials

Forge and Star Up your Hero Equipment

If you are lacking materials to craft a gear, you can dismantle excess scrolls from the Forge Materials option in the Tavern.  Once you dismantle, you will receive Hero Equipment Material that you can open to receive material of the same tier.

Hero Entrustment

Heroes can be entrusted to different military and development buildings to provide additional bonuses.

• Development

  • Stronghold - Construction speed

  • Academy - Research speed

  • Hospital - Healing speed

  • Warehouse - Resource gathering speed

• Military

  • Drill Grounds - Extra march capacity

  • Hall of War - Rally capacity

  • Embassy - Reinforcement capacity

  • Barracks - Infantry training speed & Infantry training capacity

  • Stables - Cavalry training speed & Cavaltry training capacity

  • Shooting Range - Distance training speed & Distance training capacity

  • Artillery Foundry - Artillery training speed & Artillery training capacity

Just-in-time Hero Entrustment (optimization)

If you have a high tier hero (stars + intelligence) for entrustment, you can move the hero to the building before performing an action on the building to receive the bonus.

Example:

• If you plan to upgrade a building since the duration of upgrade is very long, and you want to minimize the amount of speedups you want to consume, move your highest tier hero to Stronghold to get the best construction speed bonus.  Perform the upgrade with speedups, and then switch the hero back to which ever building you need it the most.

• If you plan to upgrade a skill in your Academy.  Move the highest tier hero to Academy and then perform the skill upgrade to receive the best research skill bonus.

The following heroes achiever high tier (i.e. Tier 3) for entrustment easier than other heroes.

• Peggy

• Westley

• Francetta

If you are having difficulty upgrading your hero to a higher tier for entrustment, you can exchange grain and obsidian for Master Recruitment Banners in the Market Stall.

Drill Grounds and Troop Formations

Your Drill Grounds allows you to set troop formations for marches and rallies.  You should have a formation setup for each type (below) to save time.  Strong players have a lot of flexibility in what formations they decide to setup and use, however aspiring players should be prepared for different situations and needs.

Type 1: Speed Formation

Setup a formation containing Infantry, Cavalry, and Distance with optimal power.  This formation may be used in most rallies.  Your formation should have all troops at the same level, and more heavy on either Cavalry or Distance depending on their respective bonuses.

Notice: An update of StormShot in December 2023 has changed the speed of Artillery to match that of Infantry and Distance.  Therefore the fastest formation now consists of only cavalry.

Type 2: Damage Formation

Setup a formation containing Infantry, Cavalry, Distance and Artillery with optimal power.  This formation may be used in events where you need to deliver extra damage.  Your formation should have all troops at the same level, and more heavy on either Cavalry or Distance depending on their respective bonuses.

Recommended optimal damage formation:

• 1/8 Infantry

• 3/8 Cavalry

• 3/8 Distance

• 1/8 Artillery

Use the following guidelines for march capacity

• 100K -> 12.5K infantry, 37.5K cavalry, 37.5K distance, 12.5K artillery.

• 200K -> 25K infantry, 75K cavalry, 75K distance, 25K artillery.

• 300K -> 37.5K infantry, 112.5K cavalry, 112.5K distance, 37.5K artillery.

DISCLAIMER: Skills of heroes, war master (Airship, Iron Kong, Dragon), gears may add variabilities that may impact the optimal formation.  Adjustment should be made as necessary.

Type 3: Stamina Formation

Setup formation with one or two PVE heroes that grant "stamina points consumed" bonus.  There are three such heroes: Peggy, Ariane, and Ching Shih.  You can save 25% or more in stamina in marches and rallies.

Assuming a 25% bonus:

• If you attack a mob that cost 95 stamina, you will only consume 71 stamina. 

  • With 500 stamina you can run 5 marches w/o bonus, and 7 w/ bonus.

• If you attack a mob that cost 150 stamina, you will only consume 112 stamina.

  • With 500 stamina you can run 3 marches w/o bonus, and 4 w/ bonus.

With other skills and bonuses you may be able to achieve stamina consumption savings of 33% or higher.

Type 4: Garrison Formation

This formation should have troops consisting of all four types.  Artilleries are required to take down defenses (walls) of an estate.  Maximize your troop capacity and power in this formation.

Type 5: Mixed-Tiered Formation

The StormShot combat algorithms define the order in which troops are attacked as:

1. Infantry (from low level to high level)

2. Cavalry (from low to high level)

3. Distance (from low to high level)

4. Artillery (from low to high level)

Hence having low level troops along with high level troops adds extra layers in troop formation that may provide additional damage benefits.  However, this is still being investigated.

In initial testing with distance troops only, the follow damage report was generated.

The report suggests that having 80% of troops at Tier N and 20% of troops at Tier N-1 provides an increase in damage by ~28%.

However, having 60% of troops at Tier N, 20% at Tier N-1, and 20% at Tier N-2 provides an increase in damage by ~28.6% -- a marginal improvement over just having 2 Tiers.  

When setting up a formation with mixed tiers, it is important to run solo marches against very strong mobs that you are not able to kill.  The damage reports will allow you to assess which mixed-tier formation gives the best results.  In StormShot, you do not lose stamina when a march or rally against an event mob fails.  The stamina consumed is returned upon the return of the march.

Bonding heroes in formation

Every march consists of two (2) heroes.  These heroes have special bonding abilities that are activated when they are selected together in a match.  See bonding requirements of a hero to determine which other hero can be paired together to unlock the special ability in either one or both heroes.

• A formation without bonding

• A formation with single bond

• A formation with two (2) bonds

Academy Research

Combat and Defense

StormShot uses a simple layer-based combat algorithm.  When your troops attack, they have to defeat each layer in sequence.  The layers are arranged as follows:

• First Layer - Infantry (low level to high level).  

  • Infantry has highest HP and Defense, and research should raise these attributes as much as possible.  This will help absorb as much damage as possible from the opponent, allowing your high damage troops (Cavalry and Distance) to attack in more rounds.

• Second Layer - Cavalry (low level to high level).

  • Cavalry and Distance have the highest Attack, and research should raise these attributes as much as possible.  This will help deliver as much damage to the opponent.  The quicker you are able to defeat the opponent's infantry, the quicker you are likely to win the match since other troop types have much lower health and defense.

• Third Layer - Distance (low level to high level)

  • See details above for Cavalry.  Since Distance troops are protected by two layers, and have the same attack attributes as cavalry, prioritize improving attack attributes for distance over cavalry troops.  

• Forth Layer - Artillery (low level to high level)

  • Artillery is the last layer to be attacked, and thus should focus on attack.

Summary of prioritizing enhancement of attributes in order of troop type:

• Attack: Distance → Cavalry → Artillery → Infantry

• Defense: Infantry → Cavalry → Distance → Artillery

• Health: Infantry → Cavalry → Distance → Artillery

These recommendations apply for both combat and defense research skills.  Make sure you have sufficient troops for each layer.  The recommended ratio between each troop type is as follows:

• Infantry (1) / Cavalry (3) / Distance (3) / Artillery (1)

If you have total troops of:

• 400K Troops: 50K Infantry, 150K Cavalry, 150K Distance, 50K Artillery

• 800K Troops: 100K Infantry, 300K Cavalry, 300K Distance, 100K Artillery

• ...

It never hurts to have a lot of infantry guarding your estate.

Disclaimer: Adventurer, Heroes skills and other bonuses may impact the optimal mix.

Development

The development stream focuses on improving building and training speed, stamina recovery, and battlefield treatment.

Creation

The creation research stream aids the creation in achieving higher levels that in turn help raise troop health, defense, and attack abilities.  

Economy

The economy stream focuses on resource production and gathering speed.  This is the least important stream if you have 2 or 4 farms and employing the farming strategy in this guide.  Consider raising troop load skill in development stream to aid in transferring more resources from your farm to your main per attack.

Training & Upgrading Troops

Keep all your troops upgraded to the highest level.  It is cheaper to upgrade existing troops than to recruit new troops.  To upgrade your troops, select the  up arrow (^) in your troop training building.

Press [ LEVEL UP ] to upgrade your existing troops.  Your troops must be back in the estate in order to upgrade them.  If they are in a march, rally, hospital, sanctuary, or out gathering resources, you will not be able to upgrade them until they return.

Rally Practices

Your rally practices should evolve as you develop and level up your estate.  For younger player trying to grow their estate, it's best to send troops into rallies based on pre-defined formations and not auto-selected by the game.  The game mechanics does not look at how your heroes are skilled or equipped, or what combinations of heroes and troops provide the best results.  Rather it looks at raw attributes (i.e. power or load), these are far from optimal.

You also may have different objectives when joining a rally.  

• If you know a rally will succeed given it's current participants, then you may want to send your stamina-saving formation into the rally.  

• If you know  a rally may have a chance to fail, then you may want to send your damage formation into the rally.  

• If you know a rally will succeed but are pressed for time, then you may want to send your speed formation into the rally.

Rally Capacity

Rally capacity matters!  If your Hall of War level is low, you rally capacity is low, and few players and troops can join your rally.  Thus increasing the risks of a failed rally against strong mobs or players.  Yield rallies to players that are stronger and/or have higher rally capacity.  Otherwise increase the level of your Embassy and Hall of War.

Tap to Join vs Quick Join

When joining a existing rally you have the option to "Tap to Join" or "Quick Join".

• "Tap to Join"

  • Allows you to select your heroes and troops (i.e. formation)

  • Recommended for most scenarios.

• "Quick Join"

  • The game selects the heroes and troops that will participate

  • Non-optimal configuration

  • Recommended only when desperate to get into a rally, and willing to risk other players screaming at your auto-troop selection.  This is where drama in the game begins.  If you don't have sufficient number of total troops for the auto-troop selection to send the right combination, then you are likely going to upset someone either running or in the rally.

"Quick Join" for Strong Players

A strong player with sufficient or excess number of infantry, cavalry and distance troops will not have any issues with using "Quick Join" as the game will select distance, cavalry, infantry troops first before artillery.  See sample screenshot below:

Market Stall

The market stall is a great place to get a lot of free or cheap items by exchanging resources (i.e. grain and obsidian) for other resources at a discount, master recruitment banners, speedups, VIP points, equipment material, etc.  If you have your farm accounts feeding you resources for upgrades, you have probably accumulated enough resources in your main's inventory to expand your purchase selection from the market stall.

Avoid paying gold for items in market stall, instead use only gain and obsidian to perform the exchange.  Use gold to perform refreshes of items in the market stall.

Items to exchange for resources and their value (in priority order):

1. Discounted grain, obsidian, stone, silver -- Always exchange with existing grain and obsidian

2. Master recruitment banners -- Exchange with existing grain and obsidian, and use in recruitment challenge in Alliance Crunch.  Helps with raising your S heroes star level, and hence overall power.

3. VIP points - Exchange and use in VIP challenge in Alliance Crunch.  Helps raise VIP level which gives various boosts (ie. troop attrack/defense/health bonuses, march bonuses, etc.)

4. Adventure EXP - Exchange and use in Adventure EXP challenge in Alliance Crunch.  Helps raise lord's level and provide talent points to enhance talent skills.

5. Speedups - Exchange and save for consumption events.  Speedups are essential for raising power level quickly.  As you upgrade your buildings, research skills, and troops, it will take longer and longer to upgrade.  Have enough speedups to upgrade quickly and raise all your key buildings to same level as your stronghold, and max out your research skills.  Speedups are also needed to quickly upgrade your troops from a prior level to the current troop level.

Abyssal Mines

In the abysmal mines, if you find yourself being attacked and your mining activities rudely disrupted and your troops lounging around instead of working on the mines, just enter a very high room number (i.e. 10000) and mine in an empty room.  You will find plenty of empty if not all empty mining spots.

Descending Mine Level

If you want to descend deeper into the mines, you MUST reset back to level zero (0) in the mines and start again so the game will use your Lord's current (or new) power level and skill bonuses.  It is best to do this when your have Fury, Protection, and any other boosts are activated giving you additional attack and defense bonuses.  Protection ability has two phases -- peace shield and defense boost -- so timing is important, and read your protection skill's description very carefully for when defense boost is active. 

If you want to skip battle simulation, because one is just too long, click or tap outside the simulation window.  The battle will be over.  This will allow you to save time while descending into the Abyss.  Level 19 is the lowest level (as of November 2023).

Once you are at level 19, you can jump to a safe area by entering a number in the field.

Keep mining in the Abyssmal Mines to collect crystals.  You can leave the mine and enter it again to reset the mining duration.  Each mining activity is roughly 8 hours, so restart mining activity before you sleep.  

Abyssmal Shop

Mined Crystals can be used in the store to purchase items such as Speedups, Ether Crystal (for Lord's gear enhancement), VIP points or Aristocrat chests.

Recommended priority for purchases:

1. Speedups - required to expedite construction, research, and training.  You do not want to wait for days to level up, and you can never have enough speedups.

2. Ether Crystal - required for Lord gear enhancement

3. VIP Points - required for key boosts to troops, marches, etc. and Alliance Crunch challenges

4. Small Adventurer EXP - required for Lord talent points

5. Aristocrat Badge DIY Pack - required for high level players for upgrading buildings.   Level 5 event mobs provide these for cheaper.

6. Steel & Scroll - required for upgrading lord gear.  Chest crabs provide these for much much cheaper.

War Masters

A march or rally can have one war master assigned.  These war masters provide troop bonuses that improve combat or gathering efficiency.  While setting up formations, select the appropriate war master to augment the formation with extra fire power.

Airship

The airship is a jack-of-all-trade war master that provides boosts to all troop types.  

• Cannon - Troop Attack

• Envelope - Troop Health

• Hull - Troop Defense

• Engine - Extra March Capacity

To upgrade the airship, focus on the following sources for material for upgrade.

• Mobs

  • Lost Revenants (Horsemen) - may be subject to change w/ game updates

• Chests / Scrolls

  • Discount DIY Pack

  • Airship DIY Pack

  • Elite DIY Pack

  • Refinement Scroll Chest

  • Sealed Airship Ability Design Fragment

• Building

  • Airship Dock - provides free upgrade material as you upgrade the dock

DO NOT USE Rapid Growth DIY Packs for Airship parts.  The stamina pack is far more valuable and will offer you more chances to attack mobs that will give you much more airship upgrade material.

Iron Kong

The Iron Kong provides bonuses that favor distance troop type and march speed.  It has a bonus advantage over the airship in combat.

To upgrade the Iron Kong, focus on the following sources for material for upgrade

• Events

  • Oracle Reef

  • Lord of Tides (Lord of Tides Store and Wager Store)

• Chests / Scrolls

  • Elite DIY Pack

Dragon

The dragon is a jack-of-all-trade war master that provides boosts to all troop types.  The dragon has a bonus advantage over Iron Kong in combat.  There are two types of dragons:

• Dark Ember Dragon - Only the top 160 players in the Lord of Tides (Match of Champions) receive this dragon

• Sky Breaker - All semifinalists in the Lord of Tides (Match of Champions) receive this dragon

To upgrade the Dragon, focus on the following sources for material for upgrade

• Events

  • Lord of Tides

• Chests / Scrolls

  • Elite DIY Pack

If you receive a dragon, you are already doing something right and really don't need a guide.