Does factory renders blacksmith useless

[atom3]

So i am rushing though ages (rushing is a strong word since it takes 5 days for gunpowder age) without leveling anything but the most necessary like the army and store houses, so in gunpowder age i will unlock factory so can i skip upgrading blacksmith to level 5 and doing all the troop updates there and the updates for those troops in the library ?

 

[firedancer]

You only get stronger troops when you upgrade your Blacksmith and conduct the research i.e you Horsemen will become Cataphract, Knights, Lancer, Cuirassier and ultimately... Tank. For your factory if you don't upgrade your Armory, you will only be able to use troops like Guerilla and not Saboteur.

 

[Brown Bear]

Rushing is just a way to get picked on. I'll stop by at 5 today and pick up your juicy loot. For your information, factory is just like barracks, so you actually have to upgrade barracks. Sorry!

 

[Brown Bear]

Oh. And your upgrade factory troops through blacksmith. Outta luck.

 

[dbukalski]

Ur decision to upgrade only offense + support(trade good, resource storage etc) is smart. Rush the ages max out ur offense then later turn around and catch up the defense. Ull attack 100× a day for millions of loot a day. Even with no walls and no defense structures u can only lose defense 3x per day at 350k a pop if ur industrial age. An average player can make 12 mil gold in 3 hours in industrial. Ull lose 1 mil gold max if u have zero defense.....if upgrade ur defense equally with ur offense it will take u twice as long to make big gold in industrial. Or u can do what u said ur doing and rush to max offense industrial. I recomend u rush

 

[Jane Monroe]

You're in for a big surprise if you think you unlock the Factory in Gunpowder Age

 

[DestroyerArcher]

Factory is in fact not usually used with training blessing. Even if you do you still need barracks and blacksmith to make good use of the factory.

 

[Eddie F1]

Interesting use of the word 'average'

 

[Eddie F1]

So far in EA the factory has been a waste of space

 

[DestroyerArcher]

So far the factory is an extra 10% road bonus for me.

 

[Denquin]

I don't think that's true...

 

[Denquin]

Yo! Not gunpowder! Enlightenment age!

 

[firedancer]

All buildings... whether worthless or not, are welcomed to contribute to road bonus!

 

[Eddie F1]

I go for the road bonus too, but at some point you have to chop 4m+ worth of forest down to make space for these buildings.

Like the poor return on caravans above L8, has anybody done the economics of buildings + roads Vs deforestation?