Clash of Clans: How To Max Clan Games: Optimizing Clan Games Scores, Individually And As A Group
Limiting factors: player time, calendar time, available challenges.
TL;DR: - Finishing CG is a group effort. Every point adds up; don’t hate low contributors. - Divide the points you get by how much it uses of your limiting factor. Are you limited by # of attacks in a sitting? # of minutes you can play? That determines what challenges are best for you. - Are you going to get 4000 easily? Choose low value challenges throughout, and stop at 3900 so you can keep trashing low value challenges until the end. Your whole clan shares the choices, so keep it populated only with the best kinds for your people who can’t play as much. - Talk to your lowest contributors about what challenges they want available. Manipulate it so they get those.
Table of Contents
(i) Introduction (ii) Limiting Factors and 3 Types of Players (iii) Types of Challenges (iv) General principles of Challenge Rewards (v) Analyzing challenges for type II, considering TH level (vi) Analyzing challenges for type III, considering TH level (vii) Clan-Level Coordination to Optimize Clan Scores (viii) Conclusion
(i) Introduction
Clan Games is one of the most interesting events to me, from an economics perspective, because there are cumulative group rewards for completing challenges which are distributed in full to everybody who contributes even a single point.
It is impossible for a person to complete the games by themselves unless they possess and max out 12 and a half accounts. It’s easily feasible, but it takes a lot of player time, and you’d have to start a couple weeks in advance to get 12 accounts to TH6.
Anyway, realistically speaking, virtually nobody can complete the games alone, and will have to rely on other clan mates in order to receive the full rewards available. This is really cool to me, because it is “the tragedy of the commons” wherein each person could do the minimum and hope others carry them, but they all get less if they do this. It is important that everybody work together to max out their scores as much as possible to reach the 50k mark, even if it means carrying some of your clan mates! Groups that learn to cooperate selflessly are rewarded collectively.
(ii) Limiting Factors and Types of Players
So, let’s talk about the limiting factors. That is, what are the “resources” that are required for reaching 4,000 points.
- In order to reach 50,000 points, you and your clan must complete the available challenges, which are the same set for the whole clan.
- Completing most challenges requires that you use attacks, which takes time in real life, and
- Then completing the next challenge may take real life wait time for an army to build or in BH for an enemy to finish an attack.
Thus, there are three types of players (and of course hybrids between the three types).
Type I: Some players have enough player time that they will easily reach 4,000 points even if they are very inefficient at which games they choose.
Type II: Some other players have a lot of player time, but it’s clustered into one period of the day, so they are limited by how many troops it takes to complete a challenge and how long those troops take to replace.
Type III: Finally, some players have very little player time all-around, and it comes just a few minutes here and there throughout the day. They are limited by how much actual playing time the challenges take.
Most players struggle to get anywhere close to 4,000. This guide is not only about how individuals can play more efficiently approach 4k, but also how all players in a clan can cooperate collectively to improve each others’ scores, as well, by thinking about what challenges will be available for each other.
Okay, let’s start with the individual perspective. If you are type I, then you don’t actually need to optimize your own score. You need to focus instead on optimizing your clan mates’ scores by ensuring they have lots of high value challenges available!
If type II, you will want to look at each challenge by thinking of how much training time you would need for the army necessary to complete it, and divide the points it gives by that amount. You’ll find that some challenges can be completed with unscathed heroes, giving them effectively zero cost per point! Others will take several fully powered armies for just a few hundred points, whereas some will give a few hundred without even using a full army.
If you are type III, you will want to look at each challenge by thinking about how long you will have to play to complete it and dividing the points you’d get from it by that amount. Some challenges can easily be completed in a single fully powered attack. Some will require a lot of searching, other’s you’ll come across a suitable target immediately. Some will require multiple log ins through the day to complete. Compare the points you get to the time it takes and see what gives the best ratio.
(iii) Types of Challenges
There are many categories of challenges, most with several or many variations on a theme:
Besides resource/donation/TH level/Spell/Hero challenges, all the categories exist for builder hall as well. You can tell them apart by the dark blue, starry outline around the challenges!
(iv) General Principles of Challenge Rewards
(v) Analyzing Challenges For Player Type II, Considering TH Level
Remember, we are skipping type 1 because they are going to max out anyway. They should read this section and the next one to know how to help Type II and Type III to max out.
Also note, there are a lot more challenges than I am displaying icons of. I only saved so many screenshots last month to work with…
Type II players have large spans of time available at once, but only one sitting per day. Thus, they are limited by training time.
Remove obstacles is an ideal challenge for Type II, because it requires 0 training time. Donating troops wastes valuable training time, so that is a poor choice unless they have extra siege machines lying around to give.
Donating spells can be useful if you are spamming small troops to complete lots of events and don’t really need the spells.
This is highly variable, but there are two main principles at play: 1) how long it takes troops to train, and 2) what army composition it will take for them to get the three stars, and how long that takes to train.
Troops like golem require a large amount of support and take a long time to build, so they are a poor choice for type II. Barbarian and baby dragon are very fast to build and easily collect 1–2 stars on a dead base or an isolated TH, so may be worth the time.
Also, obviously, you’ll need to be high enough TH level to build the troops in order to do the challenge. Additionally, lower level troops more easily acquire 3 stars at lower TH levels.
For all of these, if you are low trophies for your level, it will be a lot easier. If you are a trophy pusher, clan games is much harder.
If you are low trophies, these can be great, because you can just snipe three undefended THs with goblins or barch or w/e. If you are high trophies for your level, these can be very challenging and a waste of training time.
The lower TH level you are, the easier these probably are to do.
These are often the highest value challenges for type II players. Rather than needing to destroy a whole base, you can simply keep pressing “next” until the buildings you are searching for are easily available on the edge. In many cases, just the archer queen alone can snipe what you need without you expending a single troop. This is a great way to pass the time while you train troops for another challenge later.
Obviously, that means that these are best for TH9 and above, when you have archer queen unlocked and level 10 at least.
For type II, these are definitely my favorite kind of challenge, just like above. In order to collect this loot, you can just keep pressing next sniping collectors or the occasional free storage and town hall with your heroes until you have acquired the requisite amount. You can save your army for a challenge that needs it.
If you are a trophy pusher, these challenges are terrible, because you’ll have to drop trophies to get the loot, or else wait the whole time to train an army to make sure you get at least one star.
Again, these challenges are best at TH9 and above, and the higher the better because the loot amounts get higher but the challenge stays stable.
The star and win challenges are great for type II as well, if you are not a trophy pusher. Once again, you can just snipe bases that look like this:
If you are a trophy pusher, however, you will not find these kinds of bases, and getting the stars will probably take you a lot more training time to build the army you’ll need.
The ones that require percentage are terrible, because either you need to use up a lot of army to defeat a whole base, or you need to snipe a million things with your heroes. It’s a bummer. Except, at lower TH levels, you can use troops that train quickly and your army capacity is smaller, so these aren’t actually that bad even for type II.
However, the base points per star vary dramatically between them. Check to see how much you are getting per star / percent / win to make sure you aren’t wasting time.
Just like the everything, these can be really great if you are not a trophy pusher and have an archer queen. Just keep pressing “next” until you find three bases that you are looking for!
Remember, you’ll mostly find bases your own level, a lot of bases 1 level off, a few bases 2 levels off, and very rarely a base 3 levels off.
Try to pick the ones that you’ll find very commonly.
Notice the one to defeat a base above you gives 33% more points! That’s literally impossible if you are TH13, and anyway it’s easier the lower level you are. Unless you can find a dead, rushed base…
These can be impossible for some players under some circumstances, and anyway they will require that you have full army power to complete in 1–2 attacks to make them worth it.
Probably not ideal for Type II players.
Terrrrrrrible. Don’t waste your time, type II.
These challenges are great! There is no training time anymore, and even before it used to be very low, so they are basically unlimited in how many you can do in one sitting, as long as you’re high enough level.
Note, some give better points than others, and things like firecracker are easier at higher level when the base has more firecrackers. Choose wisely what will give the most points per attack.
Same as above basically. You may be limited by what you have leveled up.
These usually give very few points per attack, but you are guaranteed to make progress no matter if you get any stars or not.
Same as above. This type, in my experience, offers the highest value for BH challenges per minute spent playing. Note that the “wins” one requires a higher percentage of skill, as you can make 0 progress with a failed attempt.
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Phew! Okay, that’s it for Type II. Just as a final reminder, always consider how much training time it is wasting for you to complete a challenge. Do the ones that take no training time while you wait for troops to train, and when you have them trained, then do the ones that give the highest points per training time expended.
Training potion is your best friend.
(vi) Analyzing Challenges For Player Type III, Considering TH Level
Type III players have a different limit, which is that they only play for a few minutes at a time, typically spaced far apart. This can be problematic for completing challenges that limit you to 1 or 8 hours if you do not finish them instantly.
Thus, it is often best for Type III to look for something that they can complete totally in a single 5–10 minute session.
Donating spells and troops will severely weaken your two armies, which is all you’ve got time to train. Don’t give those away unless you save the things to donate while clearing other challenges first, and it’s just leftovers that you didn’t need.
Clearing obstacles is great, though. The BH grass counts, by the way!
So, if you happen to have these troops already pre-made, then these are usually a great way to get 175–200 points in a single attack.
Obviously, these vary in how good they are in the meta game at each TH level, and some of them are only available at high levels, but in any case you can just look for a dead or rushed or lower level base and make sure you get it done in one go no matter what TH level you are.
These are another good way to pick up an easy 200 in a single attack. Once again, just look for a dead or rushed base.
“No Heroes” is especially good for Type III, because you will have two armies and if you use the heroes up in one, they won’t be available for the second anyway. This just gives you a reward for what you had to do, regardless!
Some of these are really great if you have a high level archer queen. In many cases, you can pick up a few hundred points in just a couple minutes without expending anything. They also often are a way to pick up 175–200 points in a single attack if you clear a whole base.
These are better at higher levels. Like, for instance, at TH8 there are only one bomb tower and three storages per base, so you need to defeat more bases to clear those challenges.
These are often some of the highest value challenges for Type III, as loot amounts vary tremendously between bases. Some of these have the weight in points of a challenge requiring two or more attacks, but if you are high level and find a really loaded target, you can sometimes do them in just one attack instead. I’ve gotten 800 points in a single attack when the DE one was doubled.
These ones have a “base” of about 100 per 3 stars, or 100 points per win, so they are lower value for type III than the more restrictive ones discussed earlier. However, if they have restrictions like “in 1 hour” or “in the first minute” or “in a row,” the added points often make them worth it.
If you are not a trophy pusher, “win battles” and “collect stars” can also be good if you’ve got a little time for archer queen sniping.
These are some of my favorite for Type III, because they are super easy to complete in under a minute and give 150 base points. All you need to do is pick a TH level one below your own and look for a dead or rushed base. Dump your whole army, easily overkill them, and force-close the program. If your search is quick, you can do these in a matter of seconds.
Don’t stray too far from your own TH level, or you will struggle to find a suitable target.
The “higher level base” one can be very good, as well, as it gives more points, and you can just find a rushed, dead base as your opponent.
If you are at this level as a type III, these will be your highest value challenges. 300 points per attack as a base is pretty awesome.
Like wins and percentages, these ones are kind of “meh.” They are flat amounts, so you don’t need to destroy as many bases to complete them the higher TH level you are. However, the base amount of points for these is pretty low compared with the other challenges, in terms of what you get per minute invested playing.
Generally speaking, builder hall challenges take a lot more player time per point earned compared with the multiplayer. That’s true for all builder hall stuff, not just this first type.
Most of these “destroy specific buildings” require three battles for 100 points (33 per battle), or about that rate. I don’t consider them worth it for Type III.
If you are skilled, you can pull these off in a single attack. If you are not skilled, it takes much longer. Type III players who are skilled will like these challenges.
These are usually possible to complete in 1–2 attacks, for 100 points. If you are skilled enough and high level enough to finish them in a single attack, then these are a decent choice.
If you are skilled or low trophy, some of these can be done in 1–2 attacks for a about 100 points per attack. Some of them require as many as 8 minimum. The “in the first minute” one can often be worth a base 250 for a single attack! If you don’t get above 50% wins, or don’t get 3 stars often, these are usually a terrible value for player time spent.
Lots of these take many attacks to complete. The longest one requires at least 8 three-star attacks. Sheesh. Type III does not have time for that.
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Okay, that’s it for Type III. As some final takeaways, Type III needs to focus on choosing challenges that provide a very high number of points per attack, because they probably are only going to do 2 normal attacks and 1–2 BH attacks.
If something is going to involve a lot of waiting while playing, or need you to keep logging in to do more attacks throughout a two day period, forget about it. Leave those for Type II players. Speaking of which, that brings us to the final topic.
(vii) Matching Player Type to Challenges to Optimize Clan Scores
There was one month where I used my own accounts to accumulate 40k points on my own in a single clan. It was a very time-consuming effort, but I was able to develop a lot of techniques to optimize my scores collectively by personally experiencing every time I hindered a clan member (myself) by acting inconsiderately with any account.
Although it is theoretically possible for most TH levels to complete most challenges, some TH levels have a distinct advantage at many of them. Furthermore, some games take a lot of player time and others take a lot of training time, making some suitable for type II players and others suitable for type III players. If your clan struggles to reach 50k, it is important to learn to optimize which games you choose individually and as a group, considering both the time requirements and TH advantages of each challenge. Type II and Type III players should think selfishly, and focus on optimizing their own personal scores. Type I players will focus on boosting the number of great challenges available for whichever types are in their clan, at whatever TH level they are.
Here’s an example:
Okay, so when type I looks at this, they will be choosing for themselves challenges that to the others are impossible or lowest value for their clan mates. If they reach 3900 points before the end, they should stop finishing challenges and just focus exclusively on trashing the bad ones every time they log in. That way, their clan mates who won’t get 4k can do the better ones and at least get closer to 4k with the same inputs.
In this example, that would probably mean trashing the “destroy walls” one and, depending on what TH level their clan mates are, perhaps the TH10 and Battle Blimp challenges, too. Or, if everyone is high level, perhaps the TH6 and TH8 challenges should be trashed! If you are type I and you want your clan to max out games, you’ll need to communicate with and study your allies to figure out what would help them the most.
Type II. The way I would approach this, limited by training time, is to start with the “battle blimp” challenge and use a full army (minus queen!) for an instant 200 points. Then, I would begin training barbarians and baby dragons in preparation for those next challenges. Meanwhile, I would complete the BH challenges in as long as it took (minimum 4 battles). When those were done, I would pick up the TH challenges that are in my range, and use the archer queen to snipe enough THs to finish those off. By this time, I should probably have enough barbarians ready to snipe more THs to complete that challenge, but I’ll still have my second pre-made army ready. I will use the pre-made army to clean up one more instant completion, and then use the barbarians to snipe more THs, and then use the baby dragons to snipe more THs. This will have cleared 7 challenges worth over 1000 points, and there will be more to choose from as you go along, so maybe this wouldn’t be the best path. But anyway, there will be more to choose from then, and you can continue the streak. Just do this three or four times in the week and you’ll be at 4k.
Type III is limited by time, so they want points as fast as possible using two multiplayer attacks and 1–2 BH attacks. That’s easy here, they should first do the “Higher TH challenge” and use their heroes up to make sure they get the 400 in one attack. Then they can do the BH night witch one, pick up another 350 in a single attack. Finally, they can do the “no heroes” challenge, and pick up yet another 400 points, for a total of 1150 points in three attacks. Maybe another single-attack BH challenge will appear, producing a possible 1500 in 4 attacks! Even if they aren’t all double value, that’s 750 points in 4 attacks, which can be done in about 5 minutes. Do this once each day and you’ll be at 4000 points by day 6.
(viii) Conclusion
Finishing Clan Games is a team effort. Not everyone on the team is going to get 4,000 points, and you need to be okay with that. Some people will be contributing more than others, but that’s also true for donations, clan wars, and clan total trophies, so whatever. Ask not what your clan can do for you; ask what you can do for your clan!
Also, remember, if somebody only adds 100 points, they still added 100 more than the ones whose names don’t show up on the list. Don’t be bitter about their small contribution; you don’t know what’s going on in their life. Be appreciative that they are contributing to the clan’s total! Every point from every member helps just the same, no matter how far they are from 4k. Also, your clan leader probably has two accounts and got 8000 points. Who are you to whine about anything?
If you want your clan to succeed, it’s not just about maxing out your own score. In fact, as soon as you get to 4000, you become useless because you can no longer trash the bad events. If you know you will max out, spend your efforts eliminating the worst challenges so your team has better ones left over. Ask them what they want you to clear away to help them out; it will also encourage them to participate.
If you’re not going to get to 4,000 at least make sure to get as much as you can with every attack! Let your team know what kinds of challenges are best for you so they can leave those available. Let them know what is worst for you, so they can trash those out of your way!
Work together and communicate and you will achieve much higher scores collectively than you would with everybody just doing their own thing!
I hope you found this article informative and entertaining! If you are interested in more of my analysis and theory regarding this game, check out and follow Mr. Way’s School of Clash!
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