now thats alot of posts! i started with the goal of reading it all, but after 4-5 pages i just skipped to the end. now as i see it its all about time frame and competition. lets be honest 2-4 days into the set, there is no way you can defend yourself. thats just not enough time to get enough defensive units to be of any use in any category.
now around the 7th day of the set 1st place is usually decided. sometimes earlier sometimes latter. this is the case in 9 out of 10 sets normally, there are some rare occasions where the battle for 1st carries weeks into set. when that happens the 1st person to put his money and turns into upgrading usually drops off, it kind of depends on the state though. as a casher in a tight race its harder to get upgraded, were talking about 35 turns not getting that 75% bonus, that's 6 hours worth of turns for each upgrade, plus the extra money to upgrade. as an industrial state, in a smaller player base where you can't grab 100% of your turns already its usually not as big of a hit.
i really feel the small player base favors cashers, since industrials and farmers will both be forced to expand. if your not competing for 1st place (usually only 3-4 people actually in the running), there is really no reason not to build defenses. if you have a state battling for 1st place in your nation and he's running nearly wide open then he's really vulnerable, your goal should be to protect him/her.
really the goal of every top state should be to build up defenses as quickly as possible without jeopardizing their position. thats the top top state, if your even in the top 10 you won't lose much by building defenses, everyone has to eventually. otherwise your just tempting a lot of people to war you. i've actually lost 1st place as a casher state because i upgraded too quickly and 2nd place did not and pulled even with me again.
but really skill is the most important factor, if your a good player you will gain a lead faster and be able to build your defenses faster because of it. the old gnorfer jump strat, 1st place by day 3 fully upgraded by day 4-5. and that was with thousands of players. it was quite simple, if you didn't defend yourself quickly, someone out of those 2000+ players was going to have some fun on your state. i remember just casually holding onto 20million jets as i netted back then waiting to help the nation should conflict arise.
now i've gone off topic, and i don't know if that really contributes anything to the argument here, but that's my 2 cents!
my old "balanced state" which will gave me more than enough defenses runs a production like this 6% spies 80% infantry 4% sams/jets 10% ships, making the large majority of sales on on infantry which usually is about 20-30% or more if your stocking. that puts you with decent defenses in all areas. even when competing for 1st place you'll find that little lost power in infantry usually doesn't decide who wins. its all about grabs people.
Last edited by BeeNo; 02-23-2012 at 01:38.
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