Defensive building priority?

[kgaskell01]

Would like the forum's collective opinion on which defensive building is the most powerful. Aside from updating at least one garrison and one tank depot after advancing an age, which building type (Mortar, Machine Gun, Tower, Tank Depot, Garrison, Anti-Tank, Air Defense, Sniper Tower, Missle Silo) should be the priority to upgrade?

 

[~Kratos~]

My opinions-


Early ages, until around end of Enlightenment (in this order):

Stronghold
one Stable to max
one Garrison to max
Mortars
Ballista Towers
Stables
Garrisons
Towers
Command Post
Redoubts


From Industrial onwards:

one Tank Depot (Stable) to max
one Garrison to max
Anti-tank Guns (Ballista Tower)
Towers
Air Defense
Bunkers
Tank Depots
Garrisons
Stronghold
Mortars
Machine Guns (Redoubt)
Sniper Towers

Silo and Rocket Arsenal both entering the list as top defense priority to build as soon as you get them available (obviously).


Some notes:

My order is based on what I experienced to be most popular attack styles in the early and later periods of the game. Early game, mass infantry/mass ranged siege and infantry attacks are common, so the splash damage buildings are important defense. From Industrial or Global onwards, your priority should be your defense vs planes and vs high HP units (Heavy Tanks in particular), thus Anti-tank guns and towers/air defense become most important.

Whenever having advanced ages and having new buildings available, I suggest building those first, as those only take a couple of days (or only hours, for Towers/Stables/Garrisons), adding some defense power + more map area to cover for your attacker in short time.
However, you should always first focus on maxing your age's offense before doing pretty much any defense. Better army = easier raiding = more resources.

Additionally, I prioritize several traps over defensive buildings: after or while you're doing Towers and Air Defense, focus on SAM batteries, these are absolute beasts once they reach atomic level and higher.

 

[AbbyVille]

Before you max out you citizens doing building upgrade check out university research first. It increases hitpoints and damage up to 30%, upgrading troops usually boost 3-5%if you are lucky. Do them research when you can.

Offensive units like stables, bunkers and garrisons gets priority because when you move up, you are usually way underpowered so get this out if the way first. Then preparing your base for attacks this is my priority;

Tower is my number 1 pick. It takes care of both ground and air action.

The next one would be the sniper tower it doesn’t do much but the psychological effect of getting shot usually nudge people to make stupid mistakes.

next is a toss between mortars and redoubts if you are getting increase troop space then the stronghold.

next air defenses

anti-tank usually put in the rotation because of low citizens needed to upgrade.

Find your minimum operating number of citizens, it varies from one person to another depending on the style, my bare minimum would be 2 but usually I need 4.


At the end of the day it’s what fits your style and base layout you may need to upgrade an entirely different line up because of the pattern of people who attack you.

 

[pckrn]

which is most powerful? traps, and then antiair and towers.

which would i upgrade? whichever gives the most xp per workertime in order to meet xp requirement for cwa or sa sooner. which would be traps, and then least upgraded buildings. if already sa, then whichever fits worker schedule best as to minimize waste of workertime

 

[ThunderD]

Alot of people are against upgrading mortars because heavy tanks but bazookas are the dominant offensive unit now and strong mortars will smash them if they’re not protected with decoys.

 

[AbbyVille]

You should always be upgrading any of the traps at all time until the are done they are cheap citizens wise only one for most except for air defenses. When the “spikes “are available to upgrade for space age I did them all at once. Traps are annoying and can easily ruin anyone’s day if you place them on the right places.

 

[kilgore_trout]

Mortars are steaming garbage. My eyes completely pass over them when im accessing a base. I always look first at things that can damage my planes like towers and antiair, than fort and then antitank/HT depot.

I think kratos is spot on with his post industrial assessment apart from antitank being above air defense.