It's too slow to be playable.

I played Travian for six months -- eventually got bored once I had become the biggest player in my area. The real problem with the game is that no matter how powerful you are, plenty of players are more powerful, and as all battles are PvP, it's simply a case of "might makes right". If you start to get picked on by a bigger player, there's literally nothing you can usually do about it. I played on two servers with a bunch of friends online, and we eventually had to abandon one of them because a single player had made the game unplayable for us. It's a fun game, but six months later just feels like a treadmill. Play Urban Dead instead -- it's a lot more fun.

This looks like Settlers of Catan. Is this a clone?

Nope not like settlers just a similar layout of hexagons.

The screen shot above is your field layout.

As above good game until the server matures, at which point the big boys make life hard for the casual players. The only way round it is to join an "uber" guild and play the way they play.

But good fun for a few months.

Jarak

Oh man! soooo fun!!!

i've been looking for something exactly like this for quite some time :)

In what way does the game use AJAX? I can't find a single use of it.

Hi.I want to ask everybody why can't I get in the travian site from friday?Is the site stopped or it's from my internet?Or I have been banned?Please tell me if somebody knows the answer.

Fun and addicting. I'm actually not having too many problems (yet), even though I'm a Roman on Server 4 (one of the last to sign up on that server). By the way, the "Roman economic powerhouse" guide is a sham, and won't actually help you survive. This is mostly because 1. Attacking people is generally speaking far more profitable than simply playing sim-city alone, and 2. Sim-city is not so easy to play as a Roman when two out of three infantry types suck on defense and catapults are breaking your crannies to smithereens. Plus, troops and cavalry cost a lot both in time and materials, so you'll have a hard time keeping farmers away if they don't mind potentially catapulting you to death.

As for the site, http://www.travian.com works just fine. Not sure what the problem might have been.

You got picked on and leave after six months cause you just simply bad at it. You had to have allies to help you. You also need to keep going and try to compramise the player.

I play for 8 months and yet still playing cause I'm good at it and I'm on an alliance that is on the top 100. Well close to it until it got lower from rank 103 to 204.

Anyway, nobody picks on me cause of the allies I have. Plus I have a friend that conquers villiages. You can't expect to be advance in just 6 months. You had to be patient.

I played this since the day it was suggested on this site. I've finally given up because there is nothing in place to protect lower players. There's this one guy almost right next to my village that attacks me incessantly so I never have enough supplies to build up anything. Once he acquired a fire catapult and managed to destroy my lv.5 palisade, take my lv.10 main building to lv.6, destroy my market place, and at least one iron mine I had built up, (all in ONE DAY), I realized there was no hope.

He takes so many goods that I don't have enough to build stuff and now that I'm losing buildings at a rate 100x the speed that I'm gaining supplies, there's no point. My alliance has done nothing against him.

The game could easily implement a way to protect the people that can't defend themselves very well, like me in this case. All they'd have to do is set it so if one village has a population more than, say, 20 greater than another, they aren't able to commence battle with that village. Otherwise there's no point in playing if you randomly land in a spot near anyone the slightest bit stronger than you.

Any way, I wouldn't suggest this game to anyone unless you have months to spend doing something in one hour intervals every single hour of the day so you can build your village up to a point that no one can oppose you. If you don't have time to do this, seriously do not bother.

Personally, I much prefer Utopia. While it may not be a work of art, Utopia overshadows this game on a number of levels. Principally, Utopia provides much more diversity, both in terms of the types of races you can play and the types of buildings you have available. Furthermore, it corrects the problem seen in this game by making it less profitable for a large province to attack a much smaller one. Those that choose to do so get reduced spoils from their victories, and will quite often face retribution from the kingdom's larger provinces.

Also, in response to Linz's comment, games such as these are really not designed to be checked on continuosly. Utopia actually encourages players to only log on a few times a day, which usually works unless your kingdom (read alliance) is at war. I would update my travian village two or three times a day, when checking my email and other such things, without problems.

While this game does have a better UI, the novelty soon wears off; I truly appreciate not having to constantly flip through black, text filled screens, but this alone does not compensate for its weak gameplay structure.

I don't mean to seem as if i'm trying to sell Utopia I just want to point out that this is one of the poorer clones which I have encountered.

Actually Linz, theres already a mechanism in place to protect users. Theyre called 'crannies' and if you'd built a decent one or two, then your problems with the attacker taking so many resources that you cannot build anything would be gone (crannies protect x amount of resource).

Plus, you get a week of protection when you start - so it really looks like your problem is due to not knowing the game. If you'd protected yourself better with crannies etc then people will stop bothering you - who wants to attack someone when theres nothing you get out of it?

Actually, WiredEarp, Linz spoke of catapults - which destroy crannies. If you're just building and you're next to someone with catas, it's easy to destroy your buildings and your crannies and then just keep attacking until you can't build anything. I played Travian for about 6 months and hardly ever got attacked, but saw a friend's 6 villages destroyed by someone who just decided to harass him. I agree that smaller players need to be protected and that players should only be able to attack others of similar size.

KayStar, actually crannies cannot be targeted by catapults. They can still get a random hit, but that is not so likely, of course depending on the amount of buildings in your village. So the easiest defensive strategy is to just upgrade the cranny little by little. The attacker gets nothing - zero, zip, nada. The building costs are cheap compared to the amount of protected resources, so it doesn't even need hours of babysitting a fledgling village.

this is alright but i my self perfer tribal wars
www.tribalwars.net
its better more things more enimaes and u et to be in a tribe

I've been playing travian for several months now, and hav enjoyed it more than any other online game I've ever played. All of the criticisms of it mentioned above are true-- what's hard to understand is that these failings are actually strengths.

1) The game is merciless. The strong survive and the weak get crushed. This turns a lot of people off. However, it means that merely surviving is a challenge. It means that your average "lolz d00d" gamer quickly quits, and the people that are left are intelligent and polite. It means that the only mercy you get is that granted you by other people, which, surprisingly, happens an awful lot, once you remove most built-in protections.

2) The game is slow. It is. But this puts the casual gamer at more of an even footing with the hardcore gamer. It also refocuses activity from furious clicking to deliberation and communication-- which are really what this game is all about.

3) There's nothing to do except grow and raid and grow again. Yup. Only one alliance, out of tens of thousands of dedicated players, is going to "win." It's not going to be you. But see 1) above. The feeling of surviving and thriving, even in the midst of more powerful, fiercely aggressive players, is the challenge and joy of this game.

This is a brilliant game. It is well-balanced. Intricate gameplay arises from simple mechanisms. In the end, it is a game of information, much like poker-- but with tens of thousands of people, and lasting months. If you want to do well at this game, you need to be patient, adaptive, daring, and careful. You need to be able to communicate effectively with people who don't speak the same language as you. You need to be able to bluff and predict. You need to be adept socially, in order to get stronger players on your side, and to prevent grudges. It's not easy, and it's not for everyone. That's why it's awesome.

It is a great game and if you play come join R.O.M.E

i didn't know the game before i started playing.
but when i started playing i liked it more then an ommrpg.
and that is very unusual if you have played world of warcraft and lineage2. you will have to play it when you play it.
i am staying from school for it and even in school im playing in the libary... this is the best browser game ever. a lot better then mobstar and all the other stuff.

hey costaberling.. after all, it's just a game. you really shouldn't waste your time and leave your classes or your school for such a game. you are ruining your life with overplay of such game.

Now, I've warned you.. ;)

Playing game is fun BUT do not over-do it. you still have other real-than-fantasy world things to do or be responsible at.

take care n Bubbyeee...

This game is addictive. I've been playing this game for about 6 months and always afraid of being attacked while I'm off. If you would play it in your leisure time, you are probably a loser in this game. But I would rather be a loser. :)

I found a tool that would heats up the raiding in here:
http://ntony.info/travian/map/enmap.php

I am the most powerful here but I am also the most fearful. I have friends all over the place and there's loads of people by me! There's about 18! You can't attack anyone around my area and they are all in the same alliance!

I find it fun, but I like Ogame better. it starts quicker, is easier to play at the start, and is is fun in general. if you like travian, you'd probably like it to.
www.ogame.org

hey was thinking and i was not sure what should i do to get a lot of stuff?

Travian is a war game, head-on-head; thus, i think everyone has to be responsible for their property. If you let the others loot your stuff so frequently and have meaning to protect yourself then it's your own fault.
Everyone get started at the same point with the same rate. If your neighbor becomes bigger while you're getting smaller, it's because his skill is much better than you.
You want to survive? you need more practice but not whining.
Btw, travian is also a game of community. Dont ever think your kingdom is a separated world of peace and harmony, it's just so ridiculous.

I've been playing Travian for maybe 6 months now. I started with the com2 server, and joined the us1 server when it started. I agree with many of the comments above, even the ones that disagree ;)

Travian starts out as a nice little 'passive' game; you can survive quite nicely checking in once or twice a day. For the fist few days no one can attack you, and if you were smart enough to build crannies, then you're still protected after that. But after a couple of weeks you grow beyond the point where you can just hide behind your crannies; everyone has an army and is out raiding. You end up having to babysit your account constantly, or risk missing the incoming raid. I'll be the first to tell you there's nothing quite like the feeling of dodging an attack by five seconds and then sending your troops to ambush and massacre the attacking force, but if you can't always be at your computer to set that up, you'll suffer.

Once everyone joins an alliance, things slow down again. Alliances merge and join forces until the endgame looms, or some other random thing sets them off. Then the titans duke it out, who villages and players can be wiped off the map overnight, months of effort for naught. And then one alliance wins, while everyone else loses.

Diplomacy plays a key role in the game. Many players are happy to leave you alone and even help you out if you just send them a polite note. Once people start building catapults, you need a good alliance so you can protect each other. These are hard to find; some are allied in name only, others will fight to the death to help each other out.

After months of playing, the game does begin to become a grind, but I have a great group of people in my alliance, and I look forward to see what the next stage of the game will look like.

I have played travian for over a year now, and while I have never been a member of a 'winning' alliance, I have been in several highly ranked alliances.
Travian is certainly addictive, and many times I have thought I was spending way too much time on it. I am slowly pulling back from it. I remember the horror when I was first 'attacked' and compare it to the 'so what' I feel now when someone attacks me.
But the beauty of Travian is the way it so clearly mirrors real life: we are all at war with ourselves and others to a degree, and the way we play this silly game is a reflection of the way we lead our lives.
It's a great game.

lol i agree

Dude this is so fun and it works great for when im playin runescape/habbo

Travian is not that hard, you just need to know how to play and get off trouble while making trouble for others. I've been top 1 population and top1 attack in several servers but I've never been on top2500 defence...Why is that? Because attack is the best defence...

My alliance has been top 1 for a long, long time and we've got a pretty good chance at winning the server, as long as we keep going...Natars are about to be released and we've got some huge armies, that's for sure. I'm currently top 300 population...I've only been making troops, eheh

As for the merciless travian is...

I've attacked literally dwarves compared to me(people with more than 10000 population less than me) and when they ask politely, I've stopped and even helped them. I've sent over 15000 soldiers as reinforcements and I've sent about 50000 of each resource.

If they're rude...I catapult them until their villages are destroyed...

i need an alliance with someone because i need help

I'm new to this game, now I really enjoy it. Everthing than happens in this game mirror what actually happened to some people in history. Of course you may fall victim of a psychopath king that wipe you off (like the one that attacked a village who later sent huge amounts of resources, just because they asked politely).

Once i attacked a neighbour for resources, killed his army. I got plenty of resources, but to keep him from getting back at me, needed to keep on attacking incessantly, so I decided to offer him joining to my alliance to stop the "bloodshed". It worked fine.

this is just as good as runescape

I am new to the game and I was wondering once you have built the first few buildings eg. Embassy, Warehouse, Granary, Cranny, Palisade and Rally Point what do you do from then??

The game is really awesome! I have been playing this for 6 months now and I still love it. The only bad part about the game is that you have to wait hours for upgrades!

But I still love the game.

@ Sam: I might be able to help you here. Each building has its own purpose.

For example:
Embassy - With a Level 1 Embassy you can join other alliances! When you upgrade it up to Level 3, you can make your OWN alliance!

Warehouse - Helps increase the amount of total resources of lumber, clay and iron!

Granary - Like Warehouse, helps increase the amount of total resource capacity of Crop!

Cranny - When someone attacks you, the Cranny automatically hides your resources for you!

Rally Point - You only need a Level 1 Rally Point. When you get one, you unlock Barracks and then you can make Barracks and train your troops depending on your tribes!

hi how can you get population raised.

The best way to not get atttacked is to join an allliance

I am number one!

I agree it's not a game you sit and play for hours on end. But it is fun. I've been playing for about 3 monthes and i've grown a lot, without much of a military. You have to build up good defenses.

I love this game. I have been playing for nearly 2 months. I was plopped in the middle of a bunch of big players, and I have survived, and actually thrived, i'm already working on my second village. tere are ways to get around being raided and not lose your troops, but you have to be smart about it. Well, actually just use common sense. But that seems to be a problem for some people so they get frustriated and leave. Yes it is slow going but verry entertaining.

i love this game i go on it every day im on .co.uk check me out on it im carlos apa leader of the one and only apa

Best game ever.

I have ten villages and i am about to build another two in places where the natars will come.. my alliance will win this server!!!

played this game since around September. sure it starts off slow but it got to a point when I had 4-5 villages that juggling the resources became a grind.

1) wake up, spend resources
2) write down every villages completion time on their builds
3) baby sit my 15 crop village to make sure it always has enough stuff coming in from the marketplace
4) send out all raiding parties
5) send out main catapult force just because I can
6) repeat until I'm about to sleep and spend all resources

if this isn't done I over flow with good. When i started building lvl 20 warehouses and granaries it got worse since of fear from being attacked by larger alliance players. Sure I was in a big alliance but who cares. If one 10,000 population guy wants to see what my 2,000 population villages have you have to watch for incoming attacks.

It was fun defending a city as my crop production was more than -1,000/hr but it's stressful as you don't want to choke out your alliances troops reinforcements.

So after all of that I have officially quit cause it just required too much time. sure I miss it at work but for those who say it's too slow you just need to build up and see how much of a pain it is once you get bigger.

i'm looking at other games to see if they are more of a (2-3 visit type of game like how travian was in the beginning)

A game like this would be far more interesting if it was vastly more complex... The neg. etc all is great, but the real fun lies in a better actual game.
Right now it's like fixing up your home with nothing but Ikea - neat and functional but it's all the same...

I've been playing on server 5 since November. I used to play on the speed server and had to force myself to stop because I eat travian, I sleep travian and I breath travian. It's no good for me. So I deleted my account. Now, history is repeating itself and I'm doing it all over again. I have to stop this. :(

I'm now in an alliance which is in the top 100. I'm the most powerful in my alliance and I know that I can go on like this for months. I'm trying to cut myself off. I need to. If not my real life will suffer.

The game is taking up all my time. From the time I get up from bed till I sleep... sometimes, I sleep with my computer still not shut down yet cuz I just fell asleep while waiting for my resources to build up to lvl up a building...

Today, I decided to end it all. I have 6 villages and have over 100 gold in my plus account. I'm starting to send off my resources to active player cuz I know they can use it.

All in all, I'm glad I'm making this decision..

Hmmm.. my comment should start with something like... I'm a Travianoholic. lol :)

The creators of Travian are geniuses: The game has clearly been designed to maximize their income. The 'jungle law' approach gives the edge to very active and aggressive players. A small inferiority can quickly ruin your entire empire. It's thus largely unlikely to grow beyond a certain point without using the (lucrative) services of Travian Plus. You'll then pay to feel like a king, whipping the arse of those non-paying peasants.

Hi! I played many servers of travian. I'v also played the first international server! Now I think : If I could ever return in past, of course I'd be the best player in that server. That's jus because I gained a lot of experience during these years. I played the first servers with romans. It was a good choice because there were a lot of beginers. Then, I played with gauls, as I gained a little more xp. And now, I play eith teutons. I like RUSHING!
This is one of my favourite games. It's true, sometimes I was bored of this game, but when I said: "Hey, I want just to see how is Travian.. I will not play too much time, just 1-2 weeks..", but it wasn't really what I said. I started spending so much time at this game, so I deleted my account :) But then I started other servers just because I wanted to play more and more.. And now I'm playng only a few weeks with teutons to reack a good rank, I attack my neightbours, and then I delete my account to make another one on another servers.
But I have a point for those players who wanna win servers. You MUST start the game with a team that you already know, because that's the only way to be organized ;)(the best example: R.E.S.T. - RomanianEliteSTrikeTeam) And the better team is made of teutons, but, because thay haven't a good defence, a team made of romans & teutons is unstoppable! GOOD LUCK!

Best regards,
TBI

please invite me to an alliance... i want some help... im a new player...

This game is rather poorly designed. Perhaps if you happen to begin playing as soon as a server starts it would be alright, but otherwise you are merely placed at the mercy of those players that have already built up. A larger player can destroy your village on a whim, often doing so even when they have nothing to gain from it. Skill is of little importance, all that really matters is how long you've been playing and how much time you can dedicate to the game. And while there are a few exceptions, the Travian community is largely made up of indivuals who are rude, arrogant, and take the game far too seriously. So, if you have no life and and an overblown ego, this is the game for you. Otherwise I would suggest finding more enjoyable ways to spend your time, such as watching paint dry.

I think that travian is a bit slow,but it is a fun game.However if you play it all day it becomes boring..

GO GAULS

hi have been playing uk servers 1,3 and 4 for some months now, uk sever 5 has only just started so everyone is on an even keel so to speak i also play tribal wars, find them all very addictive inbetween waiting for resources/attacks/raids i play my ps3 or other games all under the same name so if you come across me say hi ok :)

I find that Travian is great as a game. I started there about two or three months ago and now I have an acount on two servers, and in both I'm in an alliance that is in the top 100. That is the best way to survive: join an alliance, or, if you are beside a very strong member you can try to become a vasal, you'll survive longer that way and even be under he protection of someone big.

If you do get into a good alliance it can be quite fun, the internal politics, meeting new people who share some of the same interests as you, it's all great fun.

Also, read the FAQ, it helps, it really does. Don't just go into the game thinking you'll figure it out as you go, do some reaserch, look through the top scores at least periodicaly to see how things are. Check out other people's posts about strategies.

Remember, the main thing here is to have fun while playing a war game, don't take it too seriously or you'll go insane. You keep getting attacked? so what? Delete the accoun and start a new one using everything you learned the last time.

if you are in the U.S., try travian.us. thats the us server. If you are on travian.com, you are most likely playing with a whole bunch of European geeks.

Dont bother playing this game

unless you plan to have a 3 man team

You may have sitters while you are still active.
You may be seeing a dual account though, meaning that multiple people share the same account. This is okay as long as none of those people have or play another account on the same server.

I other words your 1 player vs 3 for the top players in other words they build and raid 24/7

You already lost if you play this game out side of a team

also the gold is worthless to get it dont not count the advantage of the extra resource that is gained from 24/7 raiding

So even spending money on the game ends up pointless unless you play like this

You can confirm this is allowed with Taranis
Super Administrator on the games forums http://forum.travian.us/

Thank you for your wonderful comments about our game. I hope you enjoy your stay. If you haven't signed up already, use the link below.

http://www.travian.co.uk/?uc=ukx_14953

Hellfire

Im playing travian on the danish server 2.
The game is pretty simple when you find out what to do.
I normally use spies and then i find the cities weakness and attacks it.
but yes....Everyone is farming me tho' got a lot more soldiers than them...

GO GAULS

I play this and Tribalwars, I personally prefer Tribalwars But thats just my choice i feel tribalwars has been perfected better with easier access to things such as a one click button to take you to your tribes forums, i also think the layout is better with the mines all with in the village and everything upgraded from the Village HQ. Travain does constntly remind me of "The settlers of Catan"
It is quite a good game but i feel there are still some things to be perfected.
Try Tribalwars - www.tribalwars.net

One of my favorite games... By far better than Runescape, Habbo, Holywar, dragon fable(etc). I think its the best internet game ive played... But i could do without the waiting for the things to build.BORING ;-|

I cannot think of a game system that more easily creates the opportunity for, and caters to the "elite" gamer. You know the kind: arrogant, with nothing but contempt for new players. The Travian forums are filled with these folks. "Noob bashing" is commonplace.

Unfortunately the structure of this game allows for early elite domination of the servers, whereby a few hundred accounts can dominate the entire national / regional server. I say accounts, and not players, as in many cases the accounts are "dual" or "triple" accounts, where 2-3 players run a single account 24/7. The administrators of Travian have done nothing to counter this play style.

The players who play to win, play 24/7. They have discovered a major flaw in the system. New accounts that are created then abandoned by inactive / curious players continue to produce resources for 14 days. These "farms" are perpetually raided for resources, and for those who can put in the time, (24/7 raiding) village growth is 5 times that of someone who checks in twice a day for a minute or 2. If you play this way, you will not survive. All of the FAQ guides written by the elites emphasize the necessity of 2 things: Constant raiding on "inexperienced / ignorant" (ie new) players, and 24/7 activity. I believe that Travian "addiction" is actually a built in component of the game mechanics. One of the "best" guides on the US servers actually comments on how important it is to explain to your wife / children / boss, that for the next 8 months they will all take a back seat to Travian.

The structure of the game promotes a culture of indiscriminate raiding, as the rewards for this activity far outweigh any risks. It is a severe flaw and leads to critical imbalance. Once this exploit is developed in full, gross power and population imbalances will have been achieved by the "elite" players. Accounts that "sim city" or build up through internal resource development usually end up "0 poped" - essentially killed - by the "elite's." Players starting a server "late" - only 2-3 weeks after its start time for servers that last over 300 days, puts most players at such a severe disadvantage that successful village development will only occur if you "get lucky" in your spawn and are not placed anywhere near one of the "elite" players home bases, whose general practice is to eliminate all competition within their "21x21" or local area.

The preferred "elite" Tribe is Teuton, for 1 reason. Cheap, super raiders. Most player developed FAQ's focus on setting up a raiding structure within 3-4 hours of starting the server, using this Tribe. In general the leader boards consist of roughly 70-80% Teutons. Such a gross imbalance, one would think, should be addressed by the developers, but so far there has been little done to counter this design flaw.

It is a game in which the absence of mercy is a virtue, and is well rewarded.

The administrators of the game have created a fee system such that the speed at which your villages develop can be increased by sending them cash. As this is a crucial component of competition, people who don't use it will be at a disadvantage. So while "free", if you play to win, you will pay to win.

A poorly designed game, and a poor community of players. But then the Romans were the original Fascists after all.

I wonder why the game is described as "balanced". As already posted so i wont repeat new players have only one possibility to survive. Luck pure luck. No matter the skill or effort or lost time one of the coexisting vandals (many in that game i am afraid) can finish you overnight. The ridiculous thing is that in spite of the resonable effort of the game to attract players it offers some players the possibility to push others out of game.
Its kind of self destructive
I find Ikariam much more balanced and interesting game i personally erased all my Travian acounts lucky or unlucky ones
They dont deserve the time and effort
I play games for fun and only fun
Regards all

This might have changed since the game started, but I'd definitely have to say that a "plus" account gives players a chance to pay for "numerical benefits". 25% production improvements to resources? That's a slight numerical benefit if you ask me.

i started yesterday, how many quests does
the quest guy have?
also, know any cheats, any body?

Travian is by far the worst game I've played on-line in a long time. As many others have mentioned, once a server gets up and running (read as over 2 weeks old) there is no way for any casual gamer (read as someone not willing to pay for Gold) to have any fun. You get farmed from the get go (read as GRIEVED)! It was no fun whatsoever. I gave it a month of my time, playing casually every day, but using up all my resources and turns. Needless to say all I accomplished was giving other players things (not by choice) and having my crops destroyed and my army decimated. It is by far the worst game to play casually. Do not play Travian!

Those who are whining about Travian not being fair, will just go on to whine about some other game. They only like games where they can enter cheat codes and beat the game in one day. If you actually enjoy a challenge, and want to play against an intelligent opponent rather than a simple minded videogame computer, you might like Travian. And while starting early is an advantage, I'd like to mention that I have played a server and attained a top 400 rank,with a single player account, without gold, after starting 4 months late. So yes, it can be done, you just have to use your head and not expect everything to be given to you like a little baby.

I've been playing Travian for a couple of months...and I love the game, but I am more interested in just building my village. I'm not into building an army and waging war. I've been attacked mercilessly by three individuals who are members of a huge alliance. I built a Trapper and two crannies in response. They still attack but I am at a loss as to why...they get NOTHING from me as I use my resources as quickly as I get them and whatever I don't use is in my crannies. They LOSE troops to my traps...I always release prisoners when I return to my village because I don't want to feed the prisoners. I do enjoy the game...I'd just prefer to play a game where it's me against me and time, not me against thousands of people, who are mainly looking to "win" - which means destroying the guy that doesn't care about winning.
I'm not whining, simply stating a fact...if you don't want to build an army then Travian isn't for you.

The thing with travian is that game skills are rarely decisive. Each round is won by gold players in a powerful alliance who decide in advance to play together. They settle in the same quadrant, spend gold (bought with their CC or paypal), and this gives them higher resources production and 10% defence/attack. They end up with bigger armies and just kill everyone else. There is a meaningful contest between top alliances to build the World Wonder, timing your attacks and coordinating defence can be an interesting part of the game for these players.

But the challenge for a non-gold player (ie most players) is survival. There are some ways to achieve that, mainly by being online a lot and keeping your measly troops out of harms way, and also building crannies. However because the winning mentality is essentially that of a teenage gang you mustn't kid yourself that you will be successful indefinitely. Either you will be attacked with catas trying to destroy crannies, and this will randomly destroy everything in your village as crannies can't be targeted directly, or your non-capital villages will be mob-attacked and 'chiefed' (taken over). Then that will be that.

Still, seeing how far you can get can be interesting, and it's free. But it's not really a game of individual skill or imagination, and you can't say the best players win, just the players in the biggest gang. So, take it for what it is, expect it to be somewhat unfair, don't be tempted to spend gold imo cos the pain of defeat will be even worse, and just see how long you can last.

I love Travian played for 6 months now, and I have to agree that there were some great points made. Particularly to the inbalance, Teutons dominate. If you are not a Teuton, it is very hard to be in the top 100. Possible, but hard. It is impossible to be 1 no matter how much you get on or whether you use a dual or triple acct.

Raiding is the life blood of the game and while I don't think they should cater to the little. I hate democrats lol. If you're not raiding, you're not winning and like is stated, you need to devote a lot of time to that effort.

I can't upgrade anything but the only thing I can upgrade is a claypit. But there is a shortage of food and when I try to upgrade the wheatfield I can't because I don't have enough resources... I can't upgrade ANYTHING else... Help Me Please!!

Thank You

Celine XxX

here are some cheats

I have played through endgame and even held a World Wonder. While it is true that the top players spend ungodly amounts of time playing the game, it is equally true that most (if not all) of these top players engage in cheating. I know because I am one of them and my mates in my alliance do the same. How do they cheat?

I don't know what most people here are talking about. I was farmed for a while by someone with a population of 40 higher than me. I stopped him attacking by constantly using my resources and trained a small army of around 15 legionaires, and soon he got the message that the cost of rebuilding his army wasn't worth attacking my village. It's quite easy really

can we build each an every thing in travian ?

How much can you upgrade a building?

A lot of players cheat using multi accounts etc

A big problem is that if your village is near a very strong player or if a very strong player targets you , you can't do anything.

Crannies don't help when all your buildings can be destroyed very quickly without a problem.

Graphics wise, the game is not very appealing.

I started Travian about a month ago (on a server that had only restarted weeks before) and I will shortly be gone for good.

I landed near a player who is a gold user and a complete Rrr-Hole.
As for the comment about only the 'polite intelligent' people being left?
Nope.
This guy is a LOLZ clown.

Fact is that he has catapults. I would have had catapults in 2 or three days (maybe) but with the use of gold he simply out paced me in research and production - then he joined a huge alliance (that requires members use gold) and is pretty much untouchable.

So, in the last 48 hours he has knocked me back about a week in development - maybe more.
Crannies DO NOT protect me vs catapults (Catapults damage and ultimately destroy crannies)
So, not only can I no longer mount a defense - but he has destroyed my capacity to build troops (or buildings) to mount a defense.

I'm not alone.

Several other players formed an alliance with me in an attempt to defend ourselves. All that did was help him and his alliance mates locate active players to target.

It's not even that we are good farms.
I read the FAQ and he got nothing out of me up until now.
But now he is destroying crannies I cannot hide resources from him any more.

In case you are wondering too: I am a long time PvPer, strategy gamer (both on and off line) and a vet of Urban Dead, Pardus and Nexus War - so I know how to war game. But I refuse to BUY my victories.

Basically, Travian is designed as a research and development race. That's it. Be the first with the most.
And the way to do that is buy gold and have a Plus account.
So, if you want to win in Travian, there is your answer. $$$.

Don't waste your time (and really don't waste your money buying gold) on this game.

I've played for over a year, on two servers (one at .us and one at .com)

On us8 I was a member of an alliance that helped bring our confederate to win the game. I enjoyed my run there, so decided to start up another game on a different server. I ended up on .com8. COMPLETELY different game.

On the .com server there are people cheating openly, having multiple accounts, etc. When this is brought to the attention of those in charge of the game (called multihunters) it is ignored. Also, they don't even bother to follow their own rules about game dynamics, stated very clearly in THEIR FAQ. When pointed out, you are told "oh, well, we didn't mean it that way"

The game is essentially rigged for those who are willing to cheat.

With all the other "free" browser games out there, give TRAVIAN a pass :)

Tips for non-geeks playing Travian:

1. Play on a classic server.
2. When you are away, send your troops away on a long raid.
3. Get sitters who live in different time zones (1 from the USA and 1 from Europe is brilliant).
4. Do not play as a Teuton.
5. Join a good alliance rather than founding one.

I hope this helps the non-nerds to survive. I did it and I was part of a victorious confederation.

Hi. I would like to say that some of the early comments are wrong no offence travian is fun after 6 months. I am a 2 year veteran and the key is to start when the server starts and everyone has a fair chance. I would encourage all to try it and if you need help or a basic walk through please message me.

I've mastered the ground troops and cavalry for my Gaul village, but now have several pathfinders but haven't found how to use them other than to attack and defend. How does one use them as scouts? Whenever I send them on a raid, attack or reinforcement, I don't get any data from my intended victim. It would be nice to find out information on a new village before sending a raid.

Is there some guidance anywhere as to how to use these pathfinders?

Travian is an okay game, but their US forum is annoying, people keep toying with you the whole time.

how do i make allies???? I dont know how to

hi, i need help. how to strengthen city when every 2 days attacked by ram (teuton).
walls lv 10, 5 crannies (romans) thx

I have played this MMORPG for some time now. I feel that the new T4 has issues, but beyond that I would more like to discuss the poor administrators (also called Multihunters). I feel that the choice of such people is pathetic. I have recently run into an issue where such an administrator has decided to harass one of the females in my alliance. This is disturbing as they represent the MH's, and they do this. Great choice in people!

I also ran into an issue where a player has broken the rules, and nothing happened. Hmm, strange that one can do this...to find out this is a friend of the MH. so I guess it's not how you play, but who you know.

I will never recommend this game to anyone. stay away if you are looking for a good game....this one isn't it.

NECRO'ed!

Travian is for only the most hardened of gamers, those who can act like adults and not scream at others for plundering their village.

This game requires a lot of time and concentration and can take away a lot of your free time very quickly in order to succeed at it.

It doesn't take long to get used to the game though if it matches your schedule. As a 5-year long player coming back from a 2-year hiatus, I'm really liking the new T4 changes.

Also, I like that they still allow you to play the game on your phone, and that it runs especially well on Safari on my iPhone.

For the complainers out there, the POINT of the game is the game itself: it is a WAR GAME. Don't complain about it, if you don't like getting attacked for your resources all the time, then go play Sim City instead and see what happens. If you want to control your 21x21, you've got to be aggressive first-point in the game.

Sure, maintaining and growing your spawn village may be easy and boring at first, but once you get into settling new villages and building up 1:1 anvils in your supply villages after getting up to 10+ villages, it gets harder and harder, as well as much more fun, especially if you play on speed.

As a gamer, I believe everybody should give this game a chance and try to get into it. It's very addictive and can keep you up at night on your phone, just doing the simplest of tasks to maintain your villages and send out attacks on your farm list.

I think the game is very well-balanced. Teutons dominate in the early game as raiders, but Gauls dominate at mid-game because of their easy to make, cheap as dirt phalanx, as well as their double cranny which allows them more resource protection at half the cost of which Romans and Teutons buy them. In the end-game, Romans begin to dominate with their excellent military, which is well-funded by the resource fields they sought to build up throughout the server.

I don't understand why these people say it is not balanced. The game developers do very well to make sure that all 3 of the tribes are the same in benefits. The only thing that unbalances them is TIME. That's what people are MISSING. If you want to excel at the game, then devote your time to it. When you go to the bathroom, check your phone. When you get off work, check your phone. When you get home, check your computer. It's THAT easy to play the game. Just like for any new game you start to play, give it some TIME.

I have never had any confrontations with any MHs, and very little to do with them in any of the servers I've played. I think the wisest thing to do is to just avoid the MHs as much as possible and play along with the RULES. Play fair and honestly, DON'T CHEAT and don't use bots. Especially, don't ever create multiple accounts. You WILL get caught. Even if you do create them on different computers with different routers, you will still get caught.

Also, if someone attacks the oasis you just recently occupied, let their troops go on their way and before they attack you again, drop a POLITE and WELL-WORDED message with a CLEAR SUBJECT to them. They'll probably drop the oasis from their farm list, but if they don't, then you are free to reinforce the oasis and kill their raids to make sure they understand.

Just my two cents. I'll be getting to my dual roles now.