I just changed to Raider, and I notice a weird phenomenon -- my troops consume significantly (almost..

Out of the 3 classes there is Farm, Raider, and Trader. Each one does different things to help you be more unique with pros and cons.

Farmer : Pros - increase resource production, Bountiful harvest from production center, protect a certain amount of resources from plundering, harvest speed +50%, when harvesting troop payload +100%.

Farmer : Cons - When sieging troop damage -30%, troop defense -30%, troop marching speed -30%.

Raider : Pros - trap house provides new apc class to plunder money from others, when sieging troop payload +150%, 40% casualties become wounded, wounded healing speed +100%.

Raider : Cons - Fuel, food, Lumber and iron production -30%, When harvesting troop payload -50%, money production -30%.

Trader : Pros - market exclusive building enables resource support to alliance members and can purchase merchandise with money, money production +50%, troops food consumption -30%, resource sales price at commercial hub +50%.

Trade : Cons - When raided lose 100% extra resources, wounded healing speed -50%.

What this means is since you changed classes and all your buffs are different, when you have troops leave your base, they also have buffs that change. so if you have troops consuming fuel which would be vehicles, when you send them out from your base, they wont consume anything till they return. class changes can hurt sometimes, depending how far along you are and what you're used to. but those perks i mentioned above can have a huge impact on resources. I only really suggest becoming a raider till after your base level is 20+ since getting resources after that point takes forever and you need alt accounts to farm from and or attacking other alliances in svs.