Hey guys! ,
With the amount of town hall 7 and 8s in our clan, and with a lot of members just leveling up their barracks to level 9, it is time I chimed in with an attack that I have been using and perfecting ever since I got to town hall 7- Mass Dragons. It is one of the few sure fire 3 star attacks that are available to town hall 7 and 8s, and with this guide, you can add dragon raids to your arsenal when contemplating which base to attack.
o But it’s all dragons, how hard can it be? Well, the big difference between a 1 star raid and a 3 star raid is all in deployment technique, spell selection, and spell placement.
Advantages
o No DE cost
o Beast health which can tank anything but high level air defences and seeking air mines
o Absolutely crushes all bases with lower level air def
o Pretty decent damage
o Level 2 dragon accessible at th7!
Disadvantages
o Very slow without rage spells
o Hogs and wizards have way more dps
o Still susceptible to high level air defenses
o Costs a massive amount of elixir
o Takes a long time to train, especially with one barracks.
Here's the breakdown:
As many Dragons as your camps can hold*
*Notice: There really is no good reason to deviate from this. There are a few fringe strategies which are exceptions to this, such as DragonRider and Dragoonian, but those are separate articles that I will be writing another day.
Spells: RAGE!!!! (3 Rage Spells, 2 Rage 1 Heal, 2 Rage 1 Lightning, or 3 Lightning) each selection will have its own associated strategy.
The Goal: Total Annihilation, 3 Stars, and a win in the war.
Tactics:
Step 1. Scouting the opponent’s base
Key things to take into consideration when scouting out your opponents bases are whether the air defenses are clustered or close to the edge (Both are what you want to see) and how easy it is for you to lure the enemy's clan castle (This is if your army isn’t an even multiple of 20, and you can spare bringing in some extra archers to help deal with clan troops. You don’t want to do this over having another dragon).
You generally want to kill the air defenses as quickly as possible to minimize the damage taken to each dragon. Usually, the other air attacking defenses, wizard and archer towers take way too long to kill your dragons to be considered, so focus down the air defenses. For air defenses close to edge of the base, they're easier to kill and you should consider attacking from that angle. Now this may be a little challenging due to buildings blocking the way. Later in the article, I will show how to handle this and avoid your dragons from fanning out.
This is an example of a clustered ad. As you can see, two of the AD are on the top right, and as such if we put down some raged dragons, we can kill those two relatively easily before taking too much damage. This is an example of ad that are spread out. It will be a bit harder to kill all the ad before taking damage, so it'll be harder to dragon this base and I'd recommend against trying if you are relatively new to mass dragons, and I’d recommend looking at josurr’s Giants guide.
Step 2. Your army composition, dealing with CC, and spells
If you are th7/8, you “should” have 200 camp space. Now I know this isn’t all too realistic for some, so you should fill with as many Drags as possible, then you should fill whatever are not dragons with archers and possibly a single giant (for luring out the cc, as it will go deeper into the base if needed) . Since we are using mass dragons, we want to cram as many dragons in our army as possible.
In my CC I will normally have 1 dragon and/or archers/wizards (and sometimes, I use this to clear the obstacles in the way of an air defense before I deploy my first wave of dragons). For spells I will almost always take all rage, this is because dragons are slow and the speed boost from rage will really really help. I recommend against taking heal spells as dragons can take so much damage, heals are usually ineffective, especially compared with rage. You can use 1 lightning to help kill the cc or triple lightning to kill 1 ad + CC, however, I recommend to take all rage if you are just starting to use dragons to maximize your chances of success. If you get to the point where you have a fourth slot for spells, or your dragons are much higher leveled compared to the base (ie: me bringing in Lvl 3 Drags on a TH7, level 4 on TH8) then combining some of these (3 rage and one lightning is most common) can take place.
Th7, however, has only 2 Ad and hence using 3 lightning’s to destroy one of them can be a cheap and reliable alternative to 3 rage spells. Personally I have never used this, however from my research into it, it is possible to do. To execute this, simply take out the most central air defense with the spells, and then drop the dragons on the side near the more exposed air defense. There is a variation of this, called DragonRider, which uses this as a core concept, but in addition uses hog riders to take out another very exposed air defense, allowing your dragons to run wild and deal with the potential third air defense. This tactic is complex and will be addressed in another guide.
Step 3. Deployment
Proper deployment should be to spread a very small number of dragons along one side of a base and allow the dragons to destroy outer buildings to the left and right. This is your first wave, as shown in the picture below
With the amount of town hall 7 and 8s in our clan, and with a lot of members just leveling up their barracks to level 9, it is time I chimed in with an attack that I have been using and perfecting ever since I got to town hall 7- Mass Dragons. It is one of the few sure fire 3 star attacks that are available to town hall 7 and 8s, and with this guide, you can add dragon raids to your arsenal when contemplating which base to attack.
o But it’s all dragons, how hard can it be? Well, the big difference between a 1 star raid and a 3 star raid is all in deployment technique, spell selection, and spell placement.
Advantages
o No DE cost
o Beast health which can tank anything but high level air defences and seeking air mines
o Absolutely crushes all bases with lower level air def
o Pretty decent damage
o Level 2 dragon accessible at th7!
Disadvantages
o Very slow without rage spells
o Hogs and wizards have way more dps
o Still susceptible to high level air defenses
o Costs a massive amount of elixir
o Takes a long time to train, especially with one barracks.
Here's the breakdown:
As many Dragons as your camps can hold*
*Notice: There really is no good reason to deviate from this. There are a few fringe strategies which are exceptions to this, such as DragonRider and Dragoonian, but those are separate articles that I will be writing another day.
Spells: RAGE!!!! (3 Rage Spells, 2 Rage 1 Heal, 2 Rage 1 Lightning, or 3 Lightning) each selection will have its own associated strategy.
The Goal: Total Annihilation, 3 Stars, and a win in the war.
Tactics:
Step 1. Scouting the opponent’s base
Key things to take into consideration when scouting out your opponents bases are whether the air defenses are clustered or close to the edge (Both are what you want to see) and how easy it is for you to lure the enemy's clan castle (This is if your army isn’t an even multiple of 20, and you can spare bringing in some extra archers to help deal with clan troops. You don’t want to do this over having another dragon).
You generally want to kill the air defenses as quickly as possible to minimize the damage taken to each dragon. Usually, the other air attacking defenses, wizard and archer towers take way too long to kill your dragons to be considered, so focus down the air defenses. For air defenses close to edge of the base, they're easier to kill and you should consider attacking from that angle. Now this may be a little challenging due to buildings blocking the way. Later in the article, I will show how to handle this and avoid your dragons from fanning out.
This is an example of a clustered ad. As you can see, two of the AD are on the top right, and as such if we put down some raged dragons, we can kill those two relatively easily before taking too much damage. This is an example of ad that are spread out. It will be a bit harder to kill all the ad before taking damage, so it'll be harder to dragon this base and I'd recommend against trying if you are relatively new to mass dragons, and I’d recommend looking at josurr’s Giants guide.
Step 2. Your army composition, dealing with CC, and spells
If you are th7/8, you “should” have 200 camp space. Now I know this isn’t all too realistic for some, so you should fill with as many Drags as possible, then you should fill whatever are not dragons with archers and possibly a single giant (for luring out the cc, as it will go deeper into the base if needed) . Since we are using mass dragons, we want to cram as many dragons in our army as possible.
In my CC I will normally have 1 dragon and/or archers/wizards (and sometimes, I use this to clear the obstacles in the way of an air defense before I deploy my first wave of dragons). For spells I will almost always take all rage, this is because dragons are slow and the speed boost from rage will really really help. I recommend against taking heal spells as dragons can take so much damage, heals are usually ineffective, especially compared with rage. You can use 1 lightning to help kill the cc or triple lightning to kill 1 ad + CC, however, I recommend to take all rage if you are just starting to use dragons to maximize your chances of success. If you get to the point where you have a fourth slot for spells, or your dragons are much higher leveled compared to the base (ie: me bringing in Lvl 3 Drags on a TH7, level 4 on TH8) then combining some of these (3 rage and one lightning is most common) can take place.
Th7, however, has only 2 Ad and hence using 3 lightning’s to destroy one of them can be a cheap and reliable alternative to 3 rage spells. Personally I have never used this, however from my research into it, it is possible to do. To execute this, simply take out the most central air defense with the spells, and then drop the dragons on the side near the more exposed air defense. There is a variation of this, called DragonRider, which uses this as a core concept, but in addition uses hog riders to take out another very exposed air defense, allowing your dragons to run wild and deal with the potential third air defense. This tactic is complex and will be addressed in another guide.
Step 3. Deployment
Proper deployment should be to spread a very small number of dragons along one side of a base and allow the dragons to destroy outer buildings to the left and right. This is your first wave, as shown in the picture below
The reason you don’t just drop them all at once is due to the fact that they will then ALL spread out, thus not attacking the middle, and costing the clan two stars. You will notice this player used 4 Dragons. This is a lot, and sometimes overkill. Normally 2-3 will get the job done. I normally use my CC dragon for this.
Once a path to the inner portion if the base was cleared his remaining dragons were unleashed and they went directly for the core of the base as was their intention. If the player had done as previous pictures showed and deployed all dragons at once it would have resulted in 1 star rather than than the 3 star it ended as.
Step 4. Spells
Your goal with rage spells is to just cover the air defense and maximize the area closest to your dragons like this. The left rage spell was perfect as it maximized the time the dragons spent in the rage while also ensuring the dragons will be raged when attacking the air defense. The right one was not as effective as the dragons won't be raged while attacking the air defense. Rage spell placement is key, and takes some getting used to, as it is mostly a feel thing. Remember, it speeds up your dragons, and you want them taking as little hits from the air defense as possible.
Step 5. Wrapping it up
Here is where you sit back, open up a cold one, and watch your dragons bring you that sweet sweet war bonus and the satisfaction of 3 stars (hopefully this update makes dragons more financially feasible for war with higher war bonuses!)
If you have any questions, comments or concerns, please feel free to ask me questions. A lot of this information was gathered from other sources, and if interested I will gladly share! More write ups on other various aerial assaults will be coming your way. To all you town hall 7’s, please consider using this in war, as it is a very strong and consistent attack!
See you all in war!
-bboy
Step 4. Spells
Your goal with rage spells is to just cover the air defense and maximize the area closest to your dragons like this. The left rage spell was perfect as it maximized the time the dragons spent in the rage while also ensuring the dragons will be raged when attacking the air defense. The right one was not as effective as the dragons won't be raged while attacking the air defense. Rage spell placement is key, and takes some getting used to, as it is mostly a feel thing. Remember, it speeds up your dragons, and you want them taking as little hits from the air defense as possible.
Step 5. Wrapping it up
Here is where you sit back, open up a cold one, and watch your dragons bring you that sweet sweet war bonus and the satisfaction of 3 stars (hopefully this update makes dragons more financially feasible for war with higher war bonuses!)
If you have any questions, comments or concerns, please feel free to ask me questions. A lot of this information was gathered from other sources, and if interested I will gladly share! More write ups on other various aerial assaults will be coming your way. To all you town hall 7’s, please consider using this in war, as it is a very strong and consistent attack!
See you all in war!
-bboy