Updated 07 Sept 2019
Ideally, you’ll want to be here without maxing either TH7 or TH8. The earlier you come into TH9, the better. The hero grind takes so long that almost any maxer will inevitably have maxed defenses, idle builders before even halfway done with heroes. Look into global and see most TH9s, you’ll find that they have maxed TH9 defenses yet not even lvl15 heroes. That is an example of a bad player and a liability in war, despite their maxed defenses they’re weak and bad examples. These are the players you want to laugh at, not the player with 15/15 heroes with TH5 defenses.
This TH marks the start of heavy DE grinding. The problem here is your income isn’t too much and it easily doubles at TH10. No point maxing TH9 either because TH10 loot is far better.
It took me 30 days to reach TH9 and another 30 days to reach TH10, this is a reasonable guideline and speed for a new player. However if it is your mini account, feel free to rush faster. While your TH8 is upgrading, save up at least 62.5k DE and as much gold/elixir as possible (6/6mil is good)
First priority upgrades:
- Archer queen, Archer queen, Archer queen. She’s so important that I need to repeat myself thrice. Unlock her and keep her upgrading. If you follow my TH9 journals, you know that AQ requires 25k DE/day up till lvl40. So grind hard for her, or just use her to farm for herself initially. 40k is just to buy half of your AQ, you need lvl5 before you get the full deal, so get her up asap. Check out my TH9 farming guide if you’re having difficulties. NEVER STOP UPGRADING AQ, SHE SHOULD BE YOUR FIRST AND ULTIMATE PRIORITY UNTIL SHE IS MAXED.
- Lab. You’ll want lvl6 barch upgraded immediately, they’re the only thing you need to farm with. Barch only takes 8 days to max, after 2 days of lab upgrade. You will be able to farm at full TH9 speed within the first 10 days of TH9, capitalize on that.
- Build 50 new walls, new lvl1 archer tower, lvl1 mortar, lvl1 wizard tower, lvl1 air defense, lvl1 hidden tesla, lvl1 gold and elixir storage, lvl1-2 gold and elixir collector, lvl1 bomb, lvl1 giant bomb and lvl1 seeking air mine.
- Dump excess gold into walls. If you have at least 4 builders, leave 4mil gold to upgrade your clan castle.
- Scroll down to the bottom of this page, there is a base design there, copy that manually. Its called “the crows TH8.5 version”
- Spell factory. Get it up and out of the way, its tough but you’ll need to endure. You shouldn’t need to use spells for farming anyway
- Clan castle. Having 5 additional troops for offense and defense always help. The extra 5 spaces will allow you to have 1 electro dragon in your defensive cc which is one of the best clan castle troops for offense and defense. This one troop can actually stop enemy attacks and allows you to defend loot with lvl1/2 defenses.
- If you have the 5th builder, build your new air sweeper then farm 2.25mil elixir while waiting for the air sweeper. Don’t forget to farm dark elixir at all times for AQ. Once air sweeper is done, upgrade your first army camp.
Second priority upgrades: (start these after lab and sf are done)
- Don’t forget to keep archer queen upgrading as much as possible
- Before lab completes, try to farm up to around 6mil elixir. Then, upgrade barbs to lvl6 then archers to lvl6 in lab. I prefer barbs first because their hp increase is more significant. Tried archers first for once and didn’t feel it was worth it
- Since you used all your elixir into lab, you’ll need to farm more elixir. Upgrade your storages to spread your loot around more.
- While upgrading storages, once you attain 2.25mil elixir, start upgrading your army camps regardless of storage levels.
- Advanced consideration: if this is your second account, having 200 troops isn’t that bad. It may be more efficient to upgrade DE drills here instead of army camps
- Once spell factory is done, spend another 2.25mil elixir on army camp.
- This will be your clan castle builder coming free after doing both army camps. Upgrade your DE storage because 80k really isn’t enough for decent AQ levels.
- After your army camps are done, upgrade army camps again because 220 space is a big improvement from 200.
- If your AQ isn’t upgrading, better keep her going. If your DE is overflowing even with AQ upgrading, upgrade your BK as well.
- Advanced consideration: if this is not your first time playing, you can consider going to TH10 now. If so, prepare your xbows and upgrade TH. Then upgrade your DE + gold/elixir storages while waiting for the upgrade.
In short:
- Builder 1: AQ1 > AQ2 > AQ3 > … > AQ65
- Builder 2: lab > storages > army camp > army camp
- Builder 3: New buildings/walls/storage/traps > spell factory > (if no builder 4, upgrade clan castle here) > army camp > army camp
- Builder 4: Clan castle > DE storage lvl5 > DE drill to max
- If available, builder 5: air sweeper > Army camp > army camp > army camp > army camp (then builder 2 and 3 should be working on DE drills instead)
- Lab: barb 6 > arch 6 > wallbreakers 5 > balloons 6
Third priority upgrades:
- DE drill. Start one builder on the drill and let him upgrade until all drills are maxed. Drills have better bang for buck at lower levels, so upgrade them evenly. Once army camps are done, use a second builder here. They should be at lvl3 right now, so upgrade them one by one to lvl4 then lvl5 then lvl6. This should take 18 days in total if you only use 1 builder or 9 days with 2 builders.
- Gold and elixir storage. Use one or two builders here to bring your new gold and elixir storage to max. Having 8mil/8mil is good because you can store more loot between upgrades.
- Xbows. These are the cornerstone of your TH9 defense and at level 1, they give more dps and hp than all TH8 defense upgrades. I like to set them on ground because it gives you a chance to stop ground attacks. If you set them on air, you would likely be crushed by both air and ground. Do not upgrade them past level 1 for now.
- Dark barracks. Likewise, after army camps are done, upgrade dark barracks. If you want to unlock troops, get one to lvl6 first so that you unlock lvl1 lava hounds. With lvl1 hounds, lvl6 balloons and proper cc support (maxed TH12 electro/hound), you can do well in CWL. The second dark barracks is optional.
- DE storage. Max it out to store 190k DE when you have time to farm excess. This will allow you to store DE for double hero upgrades
- Dark spell factory. Just stick one builder here and upgrade both levels.
- Barracks. Upgrade one barracks all the way to lvl11, neglecting the rest even if they are lvl2. Once you unlock baby dragons, you can use the same builder to upgrade
- I strongly recommend you to jump to TH10 as soon as you reach here, there is no point in staying in TH9 anymore, go straight to TH10 regardless of AQ level. She will be upgrading 24/7 anyways so having lvl30 or lvl1 doesn’t matter because upgrading AQ = lvl0 AQ
- While upgrading to TH10, you may work on your second dark barracks, remaining barracks (I recommend upgrading the second barracks to max before working on the third one) or gold/elixir collectors
4th priority upgrades: (do these as fillers and if you cannot to afford necessary higher priority upgrades, do not overstay TH9 for these upgrades)
- Traps. Skeleton traps, giant bombs and seeking air mines give good value and they’re probably low leveled if you rushed previously.
- Collectors. Stick some builders into your rushed collectors so that you can farm enough for more important upgrades.
Walls:
Notice how almost every upgrade costs elixir. While farming, dump all excess gold into walls and bring them to lvl8 and excess elixir to upgrade those lvl8 to lvl9 elixirs. The above upgrades combined cost around 60-90mil elixir, so you can easily finish all lvl8 walls with the excess gold. This is why I say its dumb to stay in TH8 working on walls while you’re supposed to be in TH9 working on offenses. End result of TH8 grinding skulls? Maxed walls, 200 army space, 10/0 heroes. End result of rushed TH9? Maxed walls, 220 army space, 15/15 heroes.
You need 11mil gold to bring your new walls to lvl8. After that, you will need 375mil of either gold and elixir to max your walls. Don’t worry if you cannot max it before TH10. Just upgrade your walls as much as possible.
Lab:
For lab, it should be: barb > arch. Upgrade wallbreakers to lvl5. Then upgrade balloons till lvl6. You can upgrade giants/goblins after that but not necessary really. Barch lvl7-8 easily trumps both of them
Overall: barb 6 > arch 6 > wb 6 > loon 6 > open-ended
War troops: lava hound, hog riders, healers
Farming:
Recommended stay time: 10-30 days ideally. This is the time it takes to get your AQ to lvl10-15 while finishing all first to third priority upgrades. If your builders have completed all first to third priority upgrades (regardless of AQ level), you should just upgrade to TH10 because there is much more DE.
LOL. I loved your opening paragraph. I resemble that remark. TH9 – Maxed Def, Maxed troops, but only halfway to lego walls, with 15/15 heroes. I just followed the advice of the people who said max everything before you level your TH.
I would love to see some of your attack replays, to see how I can improve on BARCH attacks, as I just can’t seem to find the ripe collector bases and if I do, they are too strong for a BARCH. I am working on getting Goblin knife to work for me, even though it works better at TH10 than 9, due to one more elixir spell.
Where do you have a your TH9 parked now? I would love to visit and say hi.
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Yeap, that’s my experience with many maxers as well. But rushers who are guided well will usually have much higher heroes and are able to farm much more efficiently.
Yeap, writing out the farming guide right now, but you can still look at my TH9 attack log (which is far less impressive than my TH10 one). My account currently in nightmareguild2, a FWAL clan
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I’ve been reading your guide with great interest, having started and got to TH8 by maxing I decided with my alt account to rush instead. Well, my little alt is TH7 now and my TH8 made the brave decision to go up to TH9 on the back of these guides too!
Hopefully by the time I get to TH10 my team mates will cotton on to the benefits of rushing 🙂
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Good luck! Just follow the guides and the journals, I outline most of the things I do and the rationale behind the upgrades and priority
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New CC costs 5m gold btw, not 3m
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Ah, yes. Forgotten. I written the draft earlier and forgotten to change that mistaake. Thanks!
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CC is 4mil now not 5 mil
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Noted, thanks
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Hi Sin !
Was having a few questions regarding th9
My mini is now 60 days old, currently th8, planning on beginning my th9 upgrade in 8 days, so that’s gonna be quite a bit more than what you did on your own account… I guess you were always using all the builders, while I had 1 constantly left for walls.
So I’m gonna end up with all 6 barracks up to max, and all skulls walls done ( prob gonna finish those in the the next few days 🙂
In the meantime I’ve also planned to upgrade loons up to 5, rage and minions for a bit. Only having king 7 tho
There come my few questions 😀
– I’m having a lot of trouble with getting more than 40k DE, as each time I leave coc, i’m getting raided for almost 2.5k. Farming in the 700-900 trophies range hardly makes it for those huge losses. Would you recommend me to get higher in trophies and maybe start attacking with pekkas or stuff?
– As for the th9 part, I think I’ll upgrade loons 6, then barch 6, do you think that I’ll be ok doing that?
I’m currently farming with laloonion on my main account, so I think I’ll do the same on the mini, super effective for both gold/eli and DE farming imo.
– Lastly, you did rush to th10 with 20/20 heroes? Was that harder than going 30/30 or it’s like kind of the same? (considering i’m just rushing, not interested by wars at all )
Thanks in advance and good luck for your semester 😀
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The plan looks ok, I wouldn’t stress about walls until mid TH9 onwards because your farming capacity is really low before that.
Definitely go higher because TH9 has been DE a little higher (G3 upwards). Do not worry about DE for now, once you are at TH9 and better league then DE will be much easier.
Yup, no problems starting with loons first. C2-3 is good if you like using loons, target >3k DE per raid if you want to farm DE. However, elixir will be very slow so begin with barching to complete all your necessary elixir upgrades.
I rushed with 22/25 heroes, but they were upgrading from day 3 of TH10 onwards so they were effectively 0/0 all the time. Hero levels do not matter for farming because dead bases do not need heroes.
Try joining FWA if you are no interested with wars, decent loot bonus would cut down on your farming
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Alright 🙂
Finished my walls yesterday so i’m done with all that extreme farming for a while. Feels good :p
I’ve been able to get up to 65k DE with that drag event so for the end of my th8 journey I guess I’ll just have to farm a little bit to make up for the losses
Do you think the th9 value pack is worth it ?
( Archer Queen, X-Bow Level 2, 2500 Gems ($19.99)
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If you can afford it then sure it is good. But the TH10 and TH11 ones are even better, if you only want 1-2 get those instead. If you can spend then no problem getting all 3
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Great guide, TH9 upgrade gonna complete on Wednesday, this is going to help me a lot.
You said to upgrade to TH10 by the time your heroes are level 15. Why 15 though? Since TH10 loot is better, why wait for your heroes to get just slightly better stats? Just wondering.
Cheers.
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Its really a screening tool, people who can do 15/15 heroes in TH9 are more likely to excel in the beginning phase of TH10. An experienced player would not need such a requirement
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BTW, CC to level 5 is 4mil now, not 5 mil (why does it keep changing)?
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Because new stuff gets introduced and old stuff gets cheaper. Another advantage of rushing I guess, my rushed TH11 is having fun doing everything for less compared to my other accounts
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If i put a troop research just before i upgrade the lab, will the research keep on going?
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I actually made a post about this before:
https://clashguideswithdusk.wordpress.com/2016/11/23/lab-upgrade-and-troop-upgrades-run-concurrently/
But yes, it will keep going
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hey! I wanted to know how many times a day you need to attack If you are rushing. I usually do 6-8 raids a day will that be enough in TH9 to keep your lab going
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It depends on the quality of raids you do. 6-8 raids is enough if every raid is 300/300/2.5k with barch. I do recommend doing more raids, almost 20 per day for the first few days of TH9 because it will seem tough initially
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Hey. I’m a near maxed th8 with a lvl 10 barb king and nearly all troops upgraded in lab. Should I go to th9 now?
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Should’ve upgraded a long time ago
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Im going to go to th10 hopefully in 2 months of th9. I’m in a really good clan rn, should I wait longer or go sooner?
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Just go, TH10 is so good
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Ty dude 🙂
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hi man, so I followed your guides and about to be done all second priority upgrade. only storages to go. I’m planning on 3rd priority upgrade but I don’t know if I should wait to max barracks + Dark barracks + Dark SF before getting to TH 10? current stage: 3 level 8 barracks, 1 level 9 barracks, 2 level 3 Dark Barracks, Dark SF is level 2.
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Just upgrade TH and upgrade dark sf at the same time
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Hey dude, just wondering if you do any wars at all while you do your strategic rushing? Especially at TH9. I’m brand new to TH9 and like you said, your AQ is going to be down for the majority of the time so is it worth it to go to war or just keep farming like a mad man? Thanks 🙂
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If you rushed correctly (weak defenses) and have not dropped xbows yet, you can easily war without AQ as a TH9.
I generally find that its too much hassle and too little reward to participate in wars. Many maxers reach this same Catch 22, they can’t war without heroes and can’t progress without upgrading heroes.
So many players choose instant gratification and war first while neglecting heroes. Then afterwards they are “maxed TH9”, except having lvl10/10 heroes.
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I think this guide could be updated. All one needs to be ready for TH10 is maxed barch. I remember you even said that spending 5 weeks at TH9 was a waste and that you should’ve moved up after 2 weeks.
1. Maxed barch
2. Maxed storages (can store 8mil/8mil/190k)
3. Maxed dark drills
4. Maxed offenses (lab, sf, cc, army camps)
5. Built all defenses
All of these can and should just be done at TH10 except maxed barch and building all defenses (which is now required).
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Yeah, time for an update, after I finish writing my thesis
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Hi! So I think I’m too low in trophies for farming good DE (I’m in silver 1). What would you recommend for getting up in trophies quickly? I feel barch doesn’t really do the job and I find myself distracted by good gold/elixir dead bases to ever focus enough on pushing up in trophies.
Thanks for your awesome guides. Helped me change my perspective on clash and have a lot more fun with it.
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TH9? Don’t worry about it, just barch and try to find bases with good DE drills. Once you’re TH10, you’ll easily get to gold 1/crystal 3 and find good bases
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is mass bdrags a good strat for cwl? I have lv7 bk and i wont use aq probably, and will have all camps, cc and sf done for next cwl.
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Good if you can use them to 2 star maxed TH12s
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lol thats too op. So i should bring just all bdrags or other troops such as loons too?
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Just find some 10v12 attacks on youtube. You need to find TH12s with exposed THs and just snipe the rest of the buildings
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and can u 3 star other th9s with bdrags?
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Nope, they are a purely 1-2 star army
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and what about laloon? Can laloon get 3 stars frequently (i have hounds llv1, loons going to lv6)
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Yup, laloon is decent, just need to get some practice. Even easier is just to use lvl1 miners and own TH9s without a brain
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but im a th9 so i cant use miners. Although if it werent for the drills that are going to lv5 still i would upgrade soon. Also can I go to th10 with de storage lv5?
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Upgrade to TH10, then upgrade the drills and storages while waiting for the town hall?
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yeah thats what im doing now im 4 days away from th10, left dark sf at lv2 but ill probably catch up on th10/11
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No worries, I rarely use my dark sf at all
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Hey Sin! I’ve recently come up to th9 following the basis of your guide, and am now struggling to withhold trophies while farming with barch. I end up having to use 1 barch army and then 1 normal army to regain trophies so that I stay in crystal 3, and i feel like loot isn’t coming in as efficiently as i’d like. Are there any tips you can give that can help me barch better and actually gain some trophies so i can stay in c3? thanks!
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Just continue barching and you’ll float around g2 comfortably. Don’t care about trophies for now. Get to TH10 asap and barch gets strong enough to float in c2-3
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Hey dusk I’m kind of new to this whole world of “rushing is the best strat for coc”. If my end goal for this game is to completely max out th13, are these guides the best way to accomplish that?
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Definitely. If you do not rush, you would likely play this game for 3-4 years and never max out. I am maxing out my TH13 in less than 2 years
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Dusk, I love your guides! One quick question: I am consistently getting less than 1k DE per raid. Can you give me tips on how to get more? (I use barch!)
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Upgrade to TH10/11
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While you’re stuck at th9, you could at least try to get to crystal III, dark is good there
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Dusk, love your guides! Got bored so started a mini on Apr 1 — I’m 2-3 days from upgrading to TH9 now. For comparison, my main just got to TH9 a few days ago (I took a break for a few years as I got bored of maxing)!
Now that TH9 gets a 3rd DE drill, where would you put that on the priority list? First priority, or build/max the drill before maxing the rest? Thanks!
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I’d put it after offense but before xbows. At the same place as DE drill upgrades except that you build the 3rd drill before upgrading them all
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Thanks a bunch! Appreciate all the hard work you put into these guides.
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Wassup dude. I love the guide. Where should I add the new bomb tower? Also, is there an updated base for when I get all new buildings?
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Add the new bomb tower after xbows. No base link unfortunately
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Hi there, nice guide, I couldn’t find the th 8.5 base layout
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There’s no point in having a 8.5 layout, you’ll get your xbows within the first week of TH9
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Hi so I’ve been doing my mini account for about 26 days exact and I’m about to go to TH10, where would you say I should start upgrading defenses? I do see what you mean about them not really helping much at all and it does speed up the upgrading process to focus on the elixir upgrades and whatnot, but I also see that you did upgrade defenses just for the journey. I’m definitely taking note of not doing it, but wondering when should it start?
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The thing I loved it upgrade priority guide, But I preferred to upgrade the balloon to lvl.6 rather than Barch. Because balloons are at most important for A Lava-loon strategy. THIS WAS MY PREFERENCE, BUT IF SOMEONE IS USING TH8 ATTCK STRATEGIES THEN U SHOULD HAVE UPGRADED THE TROOPS RELATED TO THOSE ONLY. AND IF SOMETHING MORE TOUGH, WHENEVER USING THE QUEENWALK, HEALER IS THE MOST USEFUL. And Thx for ur guidance Sin.
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