Friday, December 21, 2012

Duels - Fight Back!

Now, my advice if you're getting attacked all the time, and you just can't stand to see all those alerts that you lost a duel? You can do two things: Sit and whine about it in the discussion forums and pray that the developer changes the dueling part of the game. Or you can be proactive and do something about it.

Don't put yourself in the position to be a victim. Having hundreds of order members will scare some wannabes from attacking you. So if you don't mind strangers on your Facebook friends list, go on and use some of the Mass Add lists or Add Me threads in the discussion forums.

But the beauty is only skin deep. You can still loose a duel to someone with a smaller order than you if you don't have enough items/magic/creatures for your 3,000 members order.

So it definitely helps to know how duels work. The player who has both the highest Total Attack Points and Total Defense Points will always win. If you can't win on both counts, it becomes a flip of a coin. Sometimes you'll win, sometimes you'll loose.

There are three components that will ultimate increase or decrease your Total Attack Points (TAP) and Total Defense Points (TDP).

1. In a duel you attack once and you defend once. Every order member gets to duel with 1 item, 1 magic and 1 creature. Every time you duel, the computer will automatically assign the best items (one of each) for attack and the best items for defense from the most powerful item, to the least powerful item (descending order).

2. Then there's your Individual Attack Points (IAP) and Individual Defense points (IDP), the ones that can be increased using skill points, but I advise against because they add very little to your total.

3. Finally there's character's strengths and weaknesses that are directly tied with 2 specific dueling modifiers: Attack and Defense. For example, Raven-Haired has high defense, and bookworm has high attack but low defense. Broken-Wand's characteristics do not emphasize neither. (For all formulas, click here)

For example, you start the game with 10 IAP and 10 IDP. If you only have one order member, and your items are 1 Lightsaber Wand (A.30 D.20), 1 Robe (A.1 D.1), 1 Fancy Robe(A.10 D.5), 2 Alohomora (A.8 D.13), 1 Phoenix (A.10 D.2), 1 Owl (A.6 D.10). Note that you have 3 items, 2 magics and 2 creatures.

When your one member order attack, you'll use 1 Lightsaber Wand, 1 Alohomora, 1 Phoenix. If you add the  attack points from items plus your IAP you'll get 30+8+10+10 = 58

When you defend you'll use 1 Lightsaber Wand, 1 Alohomora, 1 Owl. Again if add all the defense points from items plus your IDP, you'll have 20+13+10+10 = 53 this will be your Total Defense Points.



Now the third step is tricky since it depends on which character you have. If you have Broken-Wand, the numbers above will be your TAP and TDP.







If you have Raven-Haired, your modifier is that you are high in defense. So your TAP remains the same, 58 but your Total Defense Points can be calculated using this formula:

TDP = (Defense Points from Items + Individual Defense Points) * 1.1

So your actual Total Attack Points will be 58. Basically a 10% bonus.




If you have Bookworm, your modifier is that you are high in attack BUT low in defense. Your formulas are:

TAP = (Attack Points from Items + Individual Attack Points) * 1.1
TDP = (Defense Points from Items + Individual Defense Points) * 0.9

So Bookworm has 10% bonus on attack, and 10% penalty on defense. Using the numbers from the example above, Bookworm will have 64 TAP and 48 TDP.




Now if you have 3 members in your order:

Attack:
1 Lightsaber Wand, 1 Fancy Robe, 1 Robe, 2 Alohomora, 1 Phoenix, 1 Owl, plus 10 IAP
TAP = 30+10+1+16+10+6+10 = 83

Defense:
1 Lightsaber Wand, 1 Fancy Robe, 1 Robe, 2 Alohomora, 1 Owl, 1 Phoenix, plus 10 IDP.
TDP = 20+5+1+26+10+2+10 = 74

Note that 1 member of your order doesn't have any Creature nor Magic. You should get him one of each ASAP if you like to duel.

3rd Step Calculations:



Broken-Wand (no modifiers, numbers above will be your stats):

TAP = 83
TDP = 74







Raven-Haired (high defense)
TAP = 83
TDP = (Defense Points from Items + Individual Defense Points) * 1.1
TDP = (74) * 1.1 = 81

Basically a 10% bonus.




Bookworm (high attack, low defense):

TAP = (Attack Points from Items + Individual Attack Points) * 1.1
TAP = (83) * 1.1 = 91

TDP = (Defense Points from Items + Individual Defense Points) * 0.9
TDP = (74) * 0.9 = 67

10% bonus attack, and 10% penalty defense




If you have 4, 5, 10, 100 order members but still have the same amount of items, nothing will change, you'll still have the same Total Attack and Total Defense Points you had when you only had 3 order members.

So it's a combination of order member + item + creature + magic + character that gives your order power. Your Individual Attack/Defense Points helps little. It's better to get an extra order member, better items, creatures and magic than to boost you Attack or Defense with valuable skill points.

So at the beginning (levels below 15, I believe) if you see a another order with 50 members, same stats as you, 10 attack, 10 defense, click on them, and see how many items they have. If they only have 1 robe, and your 3 members order has 3 robes, go ahead and attack him/her, I guarantee you will win.

There's also a link that tells you your attack and defense points. The first time I saw the link it was first posted in a discussion forum by Katz von D. I'm just copying it here. http://apps.facebook.com/wizard_/items. Click on the link and hit Ctrl+A so that you can read the page.

If you don't want to add strangers to your Facebook account and you're getting attacked by someone about your level, about same amount of order members as you, make sure everyone in your order has an item/creature/magic. If you click on the link above, it will tell you how many order members are missing items/magic/creatures.

Now that you know how it works, buy better items for your members if necessary, boost your Attack and Defense points by begging you real friends to install the application so that your order can grow, they don't have to play the game, it's the headcounts that matters to you. Bide your time to strengthen you order and remember, revenge is a dish best served cold.

P.S. If you play with premium characters, and you would like to help out with their bonuses information, please feel free to drop me a line here. TDP/TAP formula is courtesy of Sougata Som, thank you.

43 comments:

  1. That's a really nice and complete explanation, thanks! I read bits and pieces of it on the forum, but never found all the information in one place like this. The link with the tool to check your attack & defense points is really useful!

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  2. You're welcome. Glad I could help someone.

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  3. Gr8 post! Thanks. I understand the way order size and the items/magic/creatures you have works. however, I still don't get what role the individual attack and defense points (that can be incresed using profile points) have to play. Are they completely meaningless? If not, how do they help? In which situations?

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  4. Honestly, I'm not sure. I know that individual defense points eventually adds up to your total defense points. So if you total defense points from items is 200 and you have 11 individual defense points you'll have 211 total defense points. Now my attack points are much higher in the total attack than on my items attack - but I haven't figured out the formula the developer used to calculate the total.

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  5. That's very interesting because after I checked my own attack and defense points, I found that in my case, the following holds true:
    For attack, total = individual + items
    But for defense, total = individual + items + X
    So, it's just the reverse of what's true in your case. This leads me to believe that it depends on the character. I'm using Raven Haired (supposed to be high on Defense) and I guess you're using Bookworm (high on Attack).
    Now my next finding is even more interesting. When I first checked, total defense points was 76 more than (individual + items) defense points. I was on level 46 then. When I reached level 47, total became 77 more than (individual + items).
    So, my guess is for Raven Haired, the formula goes like this:
    Attack points:
    Total = Individual + Items
    Defense points:
    Total = Individual + Items + (30 + CurrentLevel)

    You can check whether the formula is similar for Bookworm and other characters.

    Best wishes,
    Sougata Som

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  6. Unfortunately, the formula I proposed earlier isn't correct. After I reached level 48, the total defense points is still 77 more than individual + items defense points. It didn't increase.

    - Sougata Som

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  7. Ok. Here's the correct formula relating individual, items and total attack/defense points for Raven Haired:

    Attack:
    Total = Individual + Items

    Defense:
    Total = 1.1 x (Individual + Items)

    That is, as Raven Haired has High Defense, he gets 10% extra defense points. The same should be the case with Blonde Girl (also High Defense).

    My guess is that Bookworm, Blond Kid and Crossed Arm Guy (High Attack) get extra attack points (should be 10% extra) and Big Blond Guy (Ultra Attack) should get even more extra attack points (more than 10%).

    I hope you'll be able to confirm the same with actual data for the other characters.

    Cheers,
    Sougata Som

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  8. Sougata Som, you are completely right. Your last formula works with the three main characters. Blonde Kid's seems to have more than 1.1 multiplier on his attack. The only thing left is to figure out is the percentage for the premium characters. I'm updating this page with the stats for the first three. Thank you very much for cracking the code and letting me know.

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  9. The more than 1.1 multiplier in the attack for Blond Kid is probably due to the fact that I received more than 20 Conjunctivitis this week. Will wait for the week to end before I check my numbers again.

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  10. You're welcome. I'm glad that I could contribute.

    - Sougata Som

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  11. I'm new to the game and I was attacked multiple times while not even logged on- is this normal? I can't seem to find that information anywhere.

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  12. Yes, it's normal for you to be attacked when you are not playing. Just make sure you always bank all your gold so you won't have anything to loose by being attacked repeatedly. If you want to fight back, you'll have to build up your order by recruiting new people and become stronger by purchasing item/creatures and gifting magic/items. You can also do lessons to find magic.

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  13. Too bad i haven's seen this page before! I didn't know about the Items page and i had made a big excel page to calculate my points! :p

    Well OK... i can still use it to calculate opponent points if needed :p

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  14. You're right, it's actually very helpful to know your opponent's TAP/TDP. Good thing your work is not wasted.

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  15. There should be a limit to the number of times one wizard can attack another. Thirty-seven plus times in one duel is WAY too much. Cap that.

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  16. I am not the developer. You are telling this to the wrong person. But if you thing 37 times is too much, you should be grateful you weren't the one being attacked more than 5000 times a day.

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  17. so how does TAP and TDP determine how much dmg each person takes? suppose person A has 1000 TAP and 10 TDP while person B has 505 TAP and 505 TDP, who has the higher chance of winning?

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  18. Do you have any idea what the random factor in the duels is? If I attack the same person more than once I get slightly different damage numbers. Also, yesterday someone with 12 more people in their order attacked me about 10 times -mostly winning 8 to 3 or 7 to 4, but somehow I won once 6 to 5. Do you have any idea how that could happen?

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  19. @Anonymous - Since I don't have access to my opponents TAP/TDP numbers, I can't really do an experiment and report the results. But I've said before, if you can't win on BOTH counts of TDP/TAP, it becomes a flip of a coin - sometimes you'll win, sometimes you'll loose.

    @Neil - If it's random, there shouldn't be a pattern... or at least that's my definition of random. Like I said, to ALWAYS win a duel, one MUST beat the opponents in BOTH TDP/TAP totals, so your opponent was probably not higher than you in one of those two stats. That's why the damage points are somewhat close to each other until it flipped around and you won the duel.

    An outright win damage count should be 10 to 1, in favor of the winner, of course. That's when one knows for sure that one is better than the opponent in BOTH counts.

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  20. "The player who has both the highest Total Attack Points and Total Defense Points will always win."

    I have found this to not be accurate in the least. I have only 2 members in my order, however, we are both over 30th level my base attack and defense are both at 35. We each have plenty of items yet I am continually losing to a person of a lower level with base stats that are more than 10 points below mine, it doesn't seem to add up that the other person's 5 members more should make that significant of a difference. According to the way you have described the duels I should not be losing to people of a significantly lower rank.

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  21. Your level does NOT factor in the TAP/TDP at all, so I don't know why you are bringing it up.

    You have 2 order member, while he has 5. He has 3 order members more than you, this means that he can easily have 150% higher TAP/TDP than you.

    Base stats count very little towards your TAP/TDP, that's why I don't encourage people to spend their skill points on it.

    With only 5 order members it's easy to calculate your opponent's TAP/TDP and compare it to yours (you can easily check yours by using the link described in the post).

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  22. Where do I go to complain that I lost my hall passes???? I only have 93 and I had 663 earlier.
    :(((((

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  23. http://schoolofwizardry.blogspot.com/2009/11/contact-developer.html

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  24. I am relatively new to SOW...how can I tell when someone has dueled me, and whether I lost or won? I have used all the tips I have seen on the blog but can't find an answer to that one.

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  25. @BHofUM- Here's how I do it...If you go to the button with the little house on it (the first tab before lessons) and click on it, it will bring you to your homepage for SOW. Now scroll down until you see the heading "What (your character name) has been doing. If you scroll through that section you will see if anyone has challenged you and whether or not you won. But this section only goes so far back so if you don't check it every couple of days you may miss some things. Sometimes if facebook doesn't filter it then you'll get a facebook notification that you've won a duel. Also, before I log out I always put my money in the bank but sometimes I'll log in and find that I have some money due to the fact that someone challenged me while I was away and I won the duel.

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  26. Individual Attack Points and Individual Defense Points are most useful when starting out when you have a small order. It provides a boost to win duels against slightly larger orders. If you expand your order size and level, the IAPs and IDPs lose their value. Early on, each 15 IAPs or IDPs will put you competitive with an order sized 1 larger than yours. As you get to higher levels, it takes 60 or so IAPs or IDPs. More useful is to increase your order size.

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  27. The biggest factor in winning duels is Order Size - given that you have acquired at least as many Creatures, Magics, and Items as you have Order Members. You are generally duelling opponents at the same level as you, so it is likely that they will have similar Creatures, Magics, and Items at that point in the game. The one with the larger Order Size has the potential to have a larger quantity of them - and that is the difference maker. If you are well armed, you should generally win against a smaller Order.

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  28. *** The player who has both the highest Total Attack Points and Total Defense Points will always win.

    I just lost 3 duels in a row where I had the more than my opponent in every aspect. according to this post I should have won, but instead I lost my head in 2 duels. THis is not working at all..

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  29. How come when I dueled It only used not even half of my items I own It used only like 5 and I have like 12 or so different items I don't get that

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  30. Great summary! Thanks for spelling it all out!

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  31. To jamsmem90:
    Your stuff is separated into 3 categories: Items, Creatures, and Magic. When you duel, you can only bring along 1 thing of each category for each Order Member you have. So if you have an Order size of 1, you bring 1 Item, 1 Creature, and 1 Magic to a duel - even if you have 50 of each available. Based on your comment, you probably have an Order size of 2 (or 5 if by items you mean things in the category entitled Items).

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  32. Yea thx so much I have an order of 3 and thats what it seems to be doing again thx so much

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  33. Is there any reason NOT to duel against members of your order? You mentioned somewhere if you want to duel someone at a lower level, get someone in your order to send you a link. But why not just duel that order member who is at the lower level? I know they're supposed to be your teammate, but if you're both protected (or if its someone you bullied into joining and doesn't care anyway!!! lol), why not?
    p.s. I'm on level 14 now, yet my duel page ALWAYS shows people at level 1 still- am I lucky/is this a glitch/ or is this just how it is?

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  34. Okay well i am a level 14 and still stuck dueling the same people i did at level one- only they havent advanced or anything..i win but its boring, and i dont get much XP or money..whats up with that?

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  35. Waagoshens and Lindy, I am level 17 and still dueling level 1 also..Is this a known bug that needs to be fixed?? Devs???

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  36. it didn't take long after my post to figure it out. not until you reach level 19 will it start showing people at your level on the duel page. At first, I thought it was cool- I could beat everyone on my list! but then I realized really how to duel, and it sucked. So anyway after lvl 19, it will start showing your level. Then it gets more challenging. And also hard to find people with money to take. Look on the FB page, people post links of players with money (though they are usually at the higher levels). I got in the habit of bookmarking pages of people who don't bank.

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  37. Do I have to duel?
    I like just lesson's and buying stuff.
    So far, I keep my money in the bank and no one attacks me.
    Am I safe?

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  38. Now that SOW has started posting standings, I find members with high levels and low order size to duel with by browsing profiles on the Global Leaderboard. Obviously, you want to avoid the category "Most Duels Won", but the rest are fair game.

    Tonight for example I found a member at level 263 with order size 14, and attack/defense 43/46. I am level 127, order size 52, and attack/defense 45/45 so I can beat him handily (do 10 damage, sustain 1). Since his level is so much higher than mine, I get 4 or 5 experience points for each win.

    I now get 2/3 of my experience points from dueling. My record is 10,987-330.

    I still duel those on my duel list if they have enough money laying around. Last week I hit the jackpot and caught someone with over $40,000,000 in gold, and got it all -- enough to buy my remaining four castles. Was that a rush! I kept a second tab open for the bank, and kept pocketing away the money periodically so someone wouldn't do the same to me.

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  39. Is there any other way (besides getting more peopl in your order) to get more attack and defense points? How does SOW choose with objects to duel with? I've been at 10 attack and 11 defense the whole time I've been playing it.

    And how would I be able to find and duel members that aren't the highest leaders on the global leader board??

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  40. can anyone tell me where i can find players that tend to leave lots of money out there for anybody to just aquire lol, don't know why everyone keeps complaining on all the diff pages, about getting robbed, if you don't wanna get robbed then don't leave your gold laying around for me, i do how ever know what its like about the dueling people beneath your level till level 19 i thought i was the best at it, but then i got robbed of 60,000 ye it annoyed me but, then made me rob every dosey moron that left cash, out and now i love the feeling of taking 20 or 30 million off someone even if they are few and far between guess ive been lucky up till now but i havent had a big pay out for a while now, cos just taking a few hundred grand off someone just dosent have the same effect on me, plus iss got stuff to buy, what do people expect me to earn this gold fair and square. lol that was just taking the micky so dont bite my head off cos i will cry and then set my bf on you lol only kidding. love you all so much o and add me to yor order if yo like heres the link. http://apps.facebook.com/wizard_/linkinvite

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  41. Hmm... I think the previous poster counts as 'troll'. Please remove his (and this) post. It doesn't really have any added value.

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  42. i have read these posts and am still unsure of one thing i have 2,000 dragons and 700 dragon eggs
    do the dragon eggs serve a purpose in duels, as they never show? or should i sell the eggs? same scenario goes for wands brooms etc. is it best to sell the lesser item and invest the cash in the higher value item.

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  43. I have attacked opponent with large quantity of gold and won but received none of opponent's gold. How are they protecting their gold out side of their vault?

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