Multiplayer Guide - Trophies, Leagues, and Matchmaking

     I have noticed that many players commonly struggle with finding good opponents to attack.  Either they cannot seem to find anyone with high enough loot to be worth attacking, or when they find someone worth attacking they are much too difficult to be able to attack successfully.  This is a super common problem in Clash of Clans.  In this post, we are going to look at some of the biggest reasons this happens, and take a look at some convenient ways to avoid this situation. 


Trophies and Leagues

     The best place to start when looking to improve your multiplayer experience is to learn more about how the trophy and league system works, and how to use it to your advantage.  When you begin the game, you start out with 0 trophies and have to work your way up the ranks from there.  As your village grows, you will have no trouble gaining trophies and can quickly get up to Bronze I and even Silver leagues, but is this the best way to go?  Should you try to climb to as high a league as you can as early as you can?  Let's breakdown how trophies and leagues work in Clash of Clans, then come back to these questions. 

Trophies:

Trophies are part of each player's statistics in the game; they are awarded to a player when they win a battle, and are lost when a player is unable to get any stars in a battle.  The amount of trophies that can be won or lost in any particular battle are determined by several factors.  These factors include the TH levels of both the attacking and defending players, the amount of total trophies each player has, the league each player is in, the amount of stars the attacker is able to get in the attack, and of course whether or not the player even wins the fight in the first place.

The amount of trophies shown when you are looking at a possible base to raid is the number of trophies you will win if you 3-star their base.  If you win the battle, but only get 1 or 2 stars, you will get a much smaller amount of trophies, usually around half or less of what is displayed before starting the attack.  So, if you are looking for as many trophies as possible, you will want to always give it your all and use strategies that are aimed at 3-starring bases.  The amount also changes depending on the difference in trophies between you and your target.  If you both have an identical amount of trophies, a win will get you 30 trophies while a loss will cost you 20.  If there is a really large number of trophies between you and your target (for example, say they have around 600 more trophies than you), you will only lose 1 trophy if you don't get any stars while winning will net you up to around 60 trophies!

The amount of trophies you earn with each battle decreases each time you go to a higher league.  This amount is also affected by your current TH level.  If you are a low level TH and are in a higher league, you will get more trophies than someone in the same league that is a higher TH level.  For farming or when you are at a lower TH level, it is highly suggested that you stay in the lower leagues like bronze and silver to farm your resources.  We will talk more about which league is right for you later in the league section.

Leagues:

Leagues are groupings of players with similar trophy counts.  These leagues have seasons that last for one month, after which they reset and start over.  The seasons seem to reset the first Monday of each month at midnight EST (US - Eastern Standard Time).  According to how many trophies you have (provided you have over 400), you will be placed in a league upon your first attack of each new league season regardless of whether you won or lost the attack. 

Each league has 3 tiers, for example, there is a Bronze I, II, and III, with III being the lowest trophy group and I being the highest.  The new Legend League only has one tier, and at the end of each season all it's members have their trophies reset to 5000, although they do receive Legend Trophies for how many trophies over 5000 they had when the reset occurs.  Legend trophies are a prestige thing; they are placed on your profile permanently for everyone to see, and simply show that you consistently excel in Legend League. 

The members of each league will be grouped into smaller sub-groups of 100.  The league is still called by the same name, but just remember that the group you see when you check your league standing is simply a random 100 people you are grouped with when you joined that league, it does not represent the entire group of people in that league, and the rank it shows for you is just your rank within that group of 100.  If you are promoted or demoted into another league, you will be matched with a completely different set of people.  If you were to be promoted/demoted, and found your way back to your original trophy league, you would be placed in a completely different group of 100, not the same one you were with originally. 

The sub-leagues were always somewhat of a disappointment to me.  I always wished they had found some way to make it more interesting, like always grouping you with players that were within 100-200 miles of you or something like that, or group players by state or province, anything to make it more interesting by turning it into your local league somehow. 

While you are in any sub-league, the game will track your offensive and defensive wins, which will show up on your profile and by your name in the league screen.  Keep in mind that there are bonuses for winning attacks while in a league.  To get the full league loot bonus, you must get at least 70% destruction.  You get 80% of the league loot bonus with 50% destruction.  League loot bonus is not awarded if you lose; its also not awarded for revenge attacks, defensive wins, or single player missions.  The league bonuses have been improved since the TH-11 update, but they are still no comparison to the amount of loot you can get from attacking, therefore don't join a league because of the bonus, find the league that has good opponents for your TH level and skill, and stick to that league.

Each league and each tier in that league has a trophy requirement to join.  As soon as you reach the trophy requirement you are promoted to that league.  To be demoted, you have to drop over 100 trophies below the limit required to join that league.  The first 2 Bronze Leagues have a trophy range of 100, while the leagues from Bronze I to Master I have a range of 200 trophies, and any league higher than that (Champion League onward up to Legend which is the highest possible league) has a trophy range of 300.  Here is a table with the breakdown for each specific league including the league loot bonuses for each separate league tier, and the amount of trophies you must reach for promotion and demotion to the next league.

League	Trophy Range	Demotion at or Below	Promotion at or Below	Gold Bonus	Elixir Bonus	Dark Elixir Bonus
Bronze III	400-499	300	500	0	0	0
Bronze II	500-599	450	600	1,000	1,000	0
Bronze I	600-799	550	800	1,300	1,300	0
Silver III	800-999	700	1,000	2,600	2,600	0
Silver II	1,000-1,199	900	1,200	3,700	3,700	0
Silver I	1,200-1,399	1,100	1,400	4,800	4,800	0
Gold III	1,400-1,599	1,300	1,600	10,000	10,000	0
Gold II	1,600-1,799	1,500	1,800	13,500	13,500	0
Gold I	1,800-1,999	1,700	2,000	15,000	15,000	0
Crystal III	2,000-2,199	1,900	2,200	40,000	40,000	120
Crystal II	2,200-2,399	2,100	2,400	55,000	55,000	220
Crystal I	2,400-2,599	2,300	2,600	70,000	70,000	320
Master III	2,600-2,799	2,500	2,800	110,000	110,000	560
Master II	2,800-2,999	2,700	3,000	135,000	135,000	740
Master I	3,000-3,199	2,900	3,200	160,000	160,000	920
Champion III	3,200-3,499	3,100	3,500	200,000	200,000	1,220
Champion II	3,500-3,799	3,400	3,800	225,000	225,000	1,400
Champion I	3,800-4,099	3,700	4,100	250,000	250,000	1,580
Titan III	4,100-4,399	4,000	4,400	280,000	280,000	1,880
Titan II	4,400-4,699	4,300	4,700	300,000	300,000	2,060
Titan I	4,700-4,999	4,600	5,000	320,000	320,000	2,240
Legend	5,000+	4,900	No Limit	340,000	340,000	2,400

Bronze League

Silver League

Gold League

Crystal League

Master League

                                                                                  

Champion League

Titan League

Legend League

* As you can see, the loot bonus gets very significant in later leagues, but I wouldn't suggest trying to enter anything above Crystal until you are TH-9 or above, otherwise you will have a really tough time hanging on to any of your resources.  After you get to TH-9 and get your base mostly maxed out, you should be able to hold your own in the upper leagues for the most part, if you are a skilled attacker, actively play the game, and have a difficult base layout to defeat.

Also, note that there are achievements for reaching certain leagues.  These achievements yield a great deal of gems for reaching the higher leagues like Crystal, Master, and Champion.  We will discuss this in greater detail in the post on Achievements which will be released soon.  I only mention it now to let you know that it may be worthwhile at some point during your play through the game to farm trophies in order to get into these leagues.  You don't have to stay in them, only to reach them, so you can immediately drop your trophies again by intentionally losing attacks (by dropping a single cheap troop then quitting the battle).  It can be well worthwhile when you really need some gems to get the 3rd, 4th or 5th builder.

Matchmaking

To take advantage of the matchmaking system, you need to first know how it works.  For all leagues below Champion III, the matches you get when searching bases to attack are determined by both your trophies and your TH level.  Once you get to Champion III and beyond, it only matters how many trophies you have and your TH is not factored in at all, so you may face any strength of opponent as long as they are near you in trophies. 

If you have already read my post on Loot Calculation, you will know that there is a loot penalty for attacking a town hall that is lower than your own town hall level, but if you haven't read it yet, click the following link to learn more about loot calculation (http://soyouwannaclash.blogspot.com/2016/01/loot-calculation.html).  This loot penalty is meant to keep higher level THs from picking on lower level THs, because they won't get nearly as much loot for it, making lower THs much less appealing targets.  The most important thing to remember is that the penalty makes a huge jump when attacking players with THs that are 2 or more levels below yours.  It jumps from 90% of total loot at 1 TH level below yours to 50% loot at 2 TH levels below you!

You will typically be matched with players that are within 2 TH levels of you.  You will also typically be matched with players that are within + or - 200 trophies of you.  Since a player at any TH level can be placed in any league and have any amount of trophies, there is no set area you can find a certain strength of player at.  You will find some low level players in the higher leagues, and there are definitely higher level players in the lower leagues.  In general, however, the competition will become tougher as you go up in leagues, so try to find the league that fits you; find the one that you find the most players that are near your strength but you can also raid successfully and get loot from. 

For example, my TH-8 alternate account usually hangs around between Silver II and Gold II, and this seems to suit him pretty well for farming.  Generally the leagues I have found the most beneficial to different TH level players are:

TH-1-5 = Bronze I, II, III
TH-6    = Bronze II to Silver I
TH-7    = Bronze I to Gold III
TH-8    = Silver III to Gold II
TH-9    = Silver I to Crystal I
TH-10  = Gold I to Master I
TH-11  = Master III and up

* Bear in mind these figures are based on my experience and not in any way meant to be set in stone or thought of as the only, or even best, way to do it.  Also note that I was a little generous on the higher league figure in each of the THs, just because I wanted to emphasize that there is a wide range that can work for different players of different skill levels.  If you are a skilled player, it would likely benefit you more to move into the higher figures shown above.  But if you find that you struggle with attacking and want to get into a league that will allow you to farm good loot but also get in practice attacking easier opponents, try going for one of the lower league figures above.

Spell Factory and Dark Spell Factory - Upgrade Priorities

     Your spell factory is where you create the spells you will take to battle.  Elixir and dark elixir spells can change the tide of any battle, and will become an integral part of your attack strategy.  In most cases, you should wait to upgrade spells until you get the troops that you use the most upgraded.  This post will focus on where your spell factories and laboratory fit into your overall upgrade priorities, as well as which spells should be upgraded first and why.


Spell Factory and Dark Spell Factory



Spell Factory

Dark Spell Factory

Upgrade Priority:

     The spell factory should be upgraded as soon as possible each time you upgrade your TH.  Once you initially get your spell factory, you will be able to upgrade it once each time you upgrade your TH level. 

Why you should upgrade them ASAP:

     The reason you want to upgrade it ASAP is because each time you upgrade your spell factory, you gain a new kind of spell.  Each new spell brings a whole new set of strategies you can use once you have acquired it.  For example, when you hit TH-9 you can upgrade your spell factory to get the jump spell, and the dark factory for the haste spell.  With the jump spell, you can now start using all the variations of GoWiPe attacks with much more success than you would have at TH-8.  With the haste spell, you gain a huge boost to the speed of your balloons in Lavaloonion and Balloonion attacks, making them much more effective.
     They are fairly expensive and time-consuming to upgrade, but it is well worth it to get such a big improvement to your current attacks, while also getting the chance to use new attacks that were impossible to succeed with before. 


Laboratory and Spell Upgrades

Laboratory

Lab Upgrade Priority:

     Your lab should also be upgraded as soon as you can afford it each time you upgrade your TH level.  Once you initially get the laboratory, you will be able to upgrade it once each time you level up your TH.  Each upgrade will give you access to upgrades for new troops and spells, as well as higher level upgrades for your old troops and spells.  It is highly recommended that you always complete all the available upgrades for all your troops and spells before moving on to a new TH level, because you will get way behind if not. 
     Remember that the game is designed to only make it worth while to attack players with the same TH as you or 1 TH level lower.  At 1 TH lower, you can still get 90% of the total loot from that player, but at 2 TH levels below you, you can only get up to 50% of the total loot for that opponent.  This is made as a balancing measure so that higher THs don't always pick on the smaller THs.  So each time you upgrade your TH, you have to attack higher THs than before to get good loot, and higher level THs will be able to get more loot from you.  So it is extremely important to have everything in your village (including troops and spell, as well as defenses and other structures) upgraded as much as possible before upgrading the TH in order to avoid being an easy target for stronger players.

Why you Should Upgrade it ASAP:

     The reason you should upgrade your lab ASAP is because until you do, you will not be able to begin working on new upgrades for you troops and spells.  If you make sure to upgrade each troop/spell to max before upgrading your TH (like you should be doing), you will have to upgrade the lab to start being able to begin doing upgrades again, and since it is so expensive and time consuming to upgrade everything available to you in your laboratory, you will want to get started right away and try to keep it going all the time without letting it sit idle for very long. 
     By performing all the possible upgrades at each TH level, you will really boost the ability of your troops to deal damage and survive longer.  It will also allow your spells to last longer and have more potent effects.  You will need both of these advantages when you are facing the more difficult opponents that will you will be matched with at each new TH level.  This applies to both war and farming, since you will have to face tougher opponents in both forms of gameplay when you upgrade your TH. 
     Upgrading your troops will also help your entire clan out, because you will be able to give them better donation troops.  The combination of increasing your attack strength as well as increasing the strength of your clan mate's CC troops means that your upgrades can make significant differences in how tough your clan thinks you are as well as how useful they think you are.  Trust me when I say, I know of no clans that like to see members upgrade too early and never upgrade their troops.  In all likelihood, most clans will eventually ask you to either start working on your upgrades and threaten to kick you from wars or from the clan itself if you do not start them.

Upgrading Elixir Spells:

     When upgrading spells, there isn't one sure way to do it right.  It is really up to you how to prioritize your spell upgrades, but do keep in mind that in most cases it will be more beneficial to upgrade your troops first since you can only upgrade one thing at a time.  I recommend that you upgrade the spells that you use most often, but I will list some benefits to having each spell upgraded for convenience.

Lightning Spell

     The lightning spell is useful when upgraded because it does increased damage.  This is the biggest help with destroying air defenses, as in some dragon and balloonion/lavaloonion strategies.  It usually takes 3 of these spells to take out an air defense if they are upgraded, 4 if not so it will save you a whole spell once you have it upgraded.  Since the lightning spell no longer does any damage to any storages, the lightning spell has lost much of it's utility unfortunately, so it will likely be low on the list of spells you want to upgrade.

Healing Spell

     The healing spell obviously heals more when upgraded, which is always useful.  This spell can be used in a multitude of attacks, so it is definitely recommended that you upgrade it when you can.  It is also a little cheaper than the rage and jump spell upgrades, so it can be more tempting to want to upgrade this spell first because you will be able to afford it sooner. 

Rage Spell

     The rage spell is also useful in many different attack styles.  It also affects more than one statistic, so it is sometimes thought of as a more useful spell in that regard.  Upgrading this spell will boost the damage and speed increases the spell provides, so troops affected by the spell move faster and hit harder the higher the spell level is.

Jump Spell

     The jump spell is a critical part of GoWiPe style attacks and variations of it.  It allows you to jump right over walls without having to destroy them, and good placement in conjunction with wallbreakers can allow you to almost instantly gain access to the heart of an enemy base.  Upgrading this spell is critical and should be done as soon as possible because it gains a significant boost to it's duration with each level.  This allows your troops more time to get to and use the jump spell, and can allow your troops to use it multiple times as they clear out different enclosures if it has an upgraded duration and lasts long enough.  The first upgrade actually doubles the amount of time the spell will last, giving it a huge boost to it's effectiveness.

Freeze Spell

     Similar to upgrading the jump spell, upgrading the freeze spell will increase the amount of time the spells effects last.  This makes a huge difference in higher TH battles, when heavy defenses like infernos and x-bows can quickly wipe out large portions of an attacking army if not stopped.  This spell is especially effective against inferno towers, since it can break the inferno tower's build-up damage and force it to start over with decreased damage once in un-freezes.  This will allow your troops more time to get to the infernos and destroy them before they are able to take out all of your tanking units and dash any hopes of a 3-star victory.  The freeze spell should also be upgraded as soon as you can afford it, for reasons stated above.
    
Upgrading Dark Elixir Spells:

     The dark elixir spells are a relatively new addition to the game, and they have impacted almost every facet of how we wage war, pull CCs, and farm.  These dark spells cost only 1 spell space as opposed to the 2 spaces taken by regular elixir spells.  They also don't take as long as the elixir spells, usually taking around only 15 minutes to make.  These spells are extremely specialized, and their uses are not quite as wide as a heal or rage spell, but they offer huge advantages in their area of use.  As with the elixir spells, upgrades on the dark spells can be done more or less by which ones you tend to use most often, since those will be the most useful to you.  Many people have questioned whether it is even important enough to bother upgrading some of these spells, and my recommendation is to do so, and I will explain why.


Poison Spell

     The poison spell is the first dark spell you will get, it comes with the dark spell factory when you first build it.  When the poison spell was first introduced, it did a moderate amount of damage per second that remained the same throughout the course of the spell.  It would quickly kill off smaller troops, even wizards and some moderate troops like giants, hogs, and balloons, but was not very effective against tougher troops like dragons, lava hounds, and PEKKAs.  Now it has been altered so that when it does greater damage the longer a troop stands inside it's radius.  It starts out for a few seconds doing very little damage, but after that the DPS quickly builds up to massive amounts before the spell dissipates.  It makes it take longer to kill the smaller troops, but it also allows it to do much more damage to the larger troops.  Dragons will now lose between 1/2 and 3/4 of their life depending on the level of the dragon and the spell.  Upgrading the poison spell is helpful because it increases the maximum DPS it can produce as well as the amount it slows attack speed.  This allows the spell to kill smaller troops faster and do more damage to the larger troops.

Earthquake Spell

 

     The earthquake spell has 2 main uses; it can be used to destroy walls, and it can be used to weaken high hit point buildings to make them easier for your troops to destroy.  The quake spell does damage differently to walls than it does to buildings, and storages are immune to it's effects.  The reason it is so useful against high hit point structures is that is deals damage according to the hit points of the things it hits, taking a certain percentage of it's life away rather than just taking a certain number of hit points.  For buildings, using consecutive spells causes less and less damage, but for walls, it has the opposite effect and does more damage with each consecutive spell dropped on the same walls.  4 earthquake spells on the same wall, no matter the level or the spell or the wall, will destroy the wall.  Upgrading the quake spell increases the percentage of hit points that it takes, which doesn't affect how many it will take to destroy walls, leading some to question why it is worth upgrading.  The biggest reason you should still upgrade the quake spell is that it will cause more damage to buildings like the CC and TH if you use it on them, or air defenses if you use the strategy of 2 lightning spells and a quake to take down an air defense.  Sometimes this spell can save a raid by finishing off the TH if your troops are able to take more than 85% (if the quake is lvl 1), if it is the first time the TH has been hit with a quake during the raid.  All in all, the quake spell won't be the first on your list of dark spell upgrades, but it should definitely be on the list somewhere. 

Haste Spell

     The haste spell is similar to the elixir rage spell, it speeds up the movement speed of troops a great deal.  However, the haste spell does not affect the attack damage of troops, only the movement speed.  Because of this, it is best used in air attacks with very slow troops like balloons and dragons, since they don't really need much of a damage boost anyway.  Haste spells can really improve your dragon, dragoon, balloonion, lavaloonion and mass balloon attacks, because the achilles heel of balloons are their extremely slow movement speed.  With the haste spell, balloons and dragons can quickly move from target to target, and the fact that it only takes up 1 spell space allows you to take several into battle with you, so you can cover a huge chunk of the base with haste spells.  Upgrading the haste spell allows it to speed up your troops even more, making it even more effective.  If you use a lot of air attacks, especially balloons, this spell should definitely be a priority.