“Two/third of normal landgain on standard grabs”

thats the restriction on ravens.

keep in mind you can watch someone till they send their army out, and hit them 4 times without retribution. 4x standard grabs will give you more than they can get from you at a 4 turn attack interval. especially if you build weaps.

~aqua

how is 2/3 less than 100 till 1.5k acres?

Walls decrease your gains, weaps increase them. If you find your gains too low, try hitting targets with less walls or build more weaps.
Or just hit more often :P

<== no, u can't do it. the raven army losses is suck. u can't do that 4x, never, except for some stupid suicideder. and yes, build weaponries is better for being land fat but the effect only for land grab not for enemy army or ciz killed.

I don't know about recently, but when I played a raven (back around age 22) I almost always HAD to send 90% of my military (that means defense too) on standard attacks. and I hit every tick I was awake, either for land, or raids. raids prove to be a huge chunk of your income at smaller sizes, assuming appropriate raid targets are available.

it sounds crazy, but the trick to it is not letting anyone know you are online. plan your attacks more than an hour ahead of time, find out what you need to send, then have an attack screen open with the troops already entered and all that good stuff, and wait, at X:59:45-58 (depending on your connection) hit attack and viola... no one saw that you were online that tick until the tick was over, so, theoretically, no one will bother hunting you, unless you made a mistake and allowed yourself to be predicted.

other tricks are -

- Keep your self buffs at low durations remaining. as in, don't buff them up to 20+ hours, if they are fresh people may see that and expect you to be attacking that tick.

- Vary your land grab attack times, (these are the attacks you have to put yourself at the most risk). Don't get into the habit of doing it every couple days after school or work or whatever, that becomes predictable, especially to people watching fly-overs. try to do it when you get up one day, then a couple days later when its time to hit again, do it after work instead, or on a lunch break or something if optional.

- Hunt other ravens, if possible. believe it or not, thats your best choice. this is one of the reasons ravens died in popularity. As a raven, it's pretty much your only option if you don't plan on suiciding at all. problem is, as ravens decline in population, the remaining few die off, or at least struggle, and ravens disappear. regardless, if you have the option to hunt a raven, do as much intel as you can, and find their flaws. once you know their pattern, or at least know when to expect a particular attack, take advantage of it.

- avoid hitting without FoR on, avoid hitting rept hai, and avoid hitting most immortal races, if possible. your losses are difficult enough as it is, no need to increase them needlessly, especially against foes who will lose considerably less than you, and be able to strike back. a back and forth fight with another tribe will ultimately lead to your military declining much quicker than your opponents, which will only serve as a detriment to your efforts.

lastly, I suggest using 20% weaps whenever attacking if available, I know this may lead to someone predicting your attack, but its worth it to maximize the value of each hit done, while reducing the amount of military required (thus reducing losses). this may seem basic, but its surprising how often ravens don't do this.

please excuse the wall of text, just wanted to share my thoughts :P

~aqua

Edit - i also see that ravens are having some positive changes with this age, if they aren't in effect yet. that should prove useful as well :)

ravens can also do raids every single hour

Don't grab the pumping HE though XD

I can remember a certain Raven in a non-stop grabwar with Kelvin... I think Kelvin liked it.. he was gaining military like crazy in a nicely safe way :P

ravens in a grabwar with a High Elf is a nightmare... sure they will eventually get ahead in land, but they will also eventually pummel their own military into nothingness, while increasing their foe's military every time..

but if you can hit a HE and dont get hit back, sure not a bad idea, most wont even hold a grudge since they effectively gain from it, but just make sure they wont be hitting YOU back afterward.

~aqua

edit -
on a side note, if you do get into a grabwar with a highelf, and keep pumping their military everytime they hit you, without letting them keep the gained land (taking it back while their military is out), you could make them quite troopfat in time, and kill them off with ally T/M support... :P

i thougt we are talking about raven retal not what is raven can do ??
yes, raven can raids every tick and other possible attack including being hunted by 'targetless' hunter .
and my answers is raven can't not do retals 4x to same target who attacking him except the hunter is did stupid suicide action or he is just small hunter lucky grab from very big raven that out for big purpose, ex war. peace

Ravens have always been a subpar race even in classic, sure they shined in the first 48 hours OOP but thats about it, their role is to be quick and fun. Not to be a serious threat.

+1 military losses suck. i dare not attack a rept hai for fear of losing 2k military below 1k acres. horror.

Everyone has that, viks included, it's meant to be that way :P

even with FoR on at that size? i dont think so. unless maybe you are owl or brit or something

They were designed to be inefficient (6 def at the spec) but a gambler because hitting them would be costly. Imo they've been made too effective so their costliness to attack seems unbalanced now.

Hint: Joe's talking about rept hai.

And I agree to the extent that the reason for it is that rept hai now have the notorious elite+spec option.

Lol I was about to say “wtf is Joe talking about”. But I agree, Rept hai is awesome right now, and would be imo the best attacker class if it weren't for the insane heritage of dragons/balrogs :)