Top 10 Tips

Save your Gems

Gems are hard to come by, and while you do start the game with a lot, you should really save them specifically for Builders Huts. These allow you to take on more projects at once, and if you spend all of your Gems on rushing production times, then you will find yourself further crippled because although you won't be waiting, you won't have any builders to actually build you anything!

Use some of the other tips in this guide about time management so that you are not always waiting around for things to complete.

Plan your time carefully

Clash of Clans, like most freemium games, has been built in such a way that people who are willing to pay are able to advance in the game much quicker than those who are not. You can buy Gems and then use them to rush production and upgrade times. For everyone else, the best way to go about Clash of Clans is to leave things to upgrade overnight, or while you are at work.

Attacking enemies and taking part in quick tasks should be what you are engaged in when you have time to play - try to leave anything that will take a long time for when you are away from the game. The more Builders Huts that you have, the more things you can have going on.

Choose your enemies wisely

Matchmaking against human players is decided based on trophy counts. This is a good idea, in theory, but problems emerge when you learn that some players deliberately lose trophies by attacking enemies with just a single unit. This allows their trophy count to drop and in return means they get matched against lower-level players in the future.

There isn't a clear way to tell who you are up against, and you may even choose to alter your trophy count to copy these players - but it is worth being aware of the strategy all the same. You should also bear in mind that if a player is a much lower level than you (in Town Hall terms) then you will get a much smaller share of the rewards if you defeat them.

Make the most of Shields

When your Town Hall is destroyed or if 40% of your base is lost, you will get a 12 hour shield. This is to allow you to rebuild and to learn from your mistakes - strengthening defenses in the meantime. Should you lost 90% of your base, you will receive a 16 hour shield. To make the most of this time, in which you cannot be attacked, you should concentrate on upgrading towers, as they are useless against enemies when being upgraded, regain any lost resources, and work out where the enemy got in.

Note that some players deliberately leave their Town Hall vulnerable to get these shields when they are destroyed, but their use is only really paramount when you are constantly being attacked.

Choose your units carefully

It is often useful to take a variety of units into each battle, but it does really depend on what you are hoping to achieve from the bout. Most players will be seeking a three-star victory, but against harder players, that can be quite tough. So, you may choose to attack just the Town Hall, or just resource collectors. In these cases, you need to make sure you pick the right units.

Barbarians will just run at the nearest thing and try to attack it - and remember, you can't order units around once they are in battle. You can pick certain units, such as Wall Breakers, to target specific things - check out our Unit Targets section of this guide for more info on that.

Keep Elixir safe in your Barracks

A good tactic that not many players know is that you can effectively keep Elixir safe from enemy attack by queuing lots of units in the Barracks. You are able to cancel these queued units at now penalty, and get the Elixir spent on them, back. Use Wall Breakers as the highest costing Elixir unit to queue before you leave the game, then, when you come back online you can just get all the Elixir back from the queue. If you have been attacked, the same applies - you can just cancel the queue.

Learn from your mistakes (and your victories)

Use the replay that you have available when your base is attacked. This lets you see precisely where enemies are getting into your base, where your weakspots are, and allows you to hopefully change that for the next time. It can be hard to plan for human nature, you will never know exactly what people will do until your base is open to real people, but watching and learning from your mistakes is key to having a really effective base.

It is also useful for coming up with new and interesting strategies - funnelling enemies into a kill zone, for example, is made much easier when you study what the majority of players are doing when they attack your base. It is just as important not to meddle with things that are working!

Walls are your friend

Compared to Cannons, Walls can seem a bit boring. However, the best defensive strategies involve putting as many walls as possible between the center of your base, with the most important buildings, and the outside. You need to make sure enemies cannot spawn inside the walls, and fill any space with defensive structures, or more walls, to force them to spawn as far away as possible.

A common strategy is to have each building inside a separate set of walls, so that to destroy more than one thing is very difficult indeed. Keep your best defenses right in the middle, so that when the enemy's health is at their lowest, they can be easily picked off. Walls are a pain to deal with as an attacker, but are a real godsend for defenders.

Take part in a Clan

Clans add another layer of depth to Clash of Clans - and clans themselves range from the ultra-hardcore, where the very best players in the game congregate, to more casual affairs. It is important to pick one that is right for you, and remember, some may require you to be active on internet message boards and contribute in that way.

Once you are in a clan you can begin to score some serious points through raiding. Once you are in a clan, you can request assistance should you find yourself in difficult, and you will also be asked to contribute your own soldiers to help with raids. Some will want you to take part in competitive play, which is fun, but requires a big time commitment.

Get revenge while you can

If your base is attacked while you are away, you have the unique opportunity to revenge attack the culprit. The advantage of this is that you are able to preview their base before committing to the attack. Based on the defensive structures that they have, you can train up a whole army specifically chosen to annihilate your opposition. Beware, enemies can obviously do this to you too, but there is little you can do, short of employing a shield, to prevent it.