Whether it's to become better at the game, or whether it's to be entertained, Twitch and YouTube channels are great for any Rivals fan. But which are the best channels to check out and follow? This is the definitive list. Please follow / subscribe to these channels to get notified of their content / streams!
The best Rivals Twitch streams
13lade Twitch channel — one of the best Rivals players, who streams 5-6 days a week for a couple hours, usually starting @ @ 9h PST / 12h EST / 18h CEST. Streams high-level play, fun strategies and weekly tournaments. Interview with 13lade.
Sasteek Twitch channel— Strong Russian player, streams in Russian language, sometimes casts tournaments
The best Rivals YouTube channels
13lade YouTube channel— very active and diverse, high-level gameplay, fun specials, tournament casting and intelligent analysis of Rivals units and metagame
BikeRush YouTube channel— videos with tournament games casted by Bikerush. Also great content on other Command & Conquer games.
AliciaDestiny is the most successful Rivals player. We interviewed here already on this blog (see here). In this article, we compile some of her advice for new Rivals players who want to get better at the game. The advice comes from AliciaDestiny's Reddit posts and is published here with her consent. Make sure to follow her on YouTube and Twitch.
AliciaDestiny and her famous tank micro
Watch the replays of good players. Watching C&C TV replays won't do anything as the criteria for making there just depends on whether or not the game was close. I would suggest to watch gameplay and streams from the best of the best and study what they do that you do not do and adapt it into your play.
Improve your micro. Anyone's unit micro management skills can use a boost. Even I don't have perfect micro management all the time. Always retreat your units that are in unfavorable matchups and make sure to get 2v1 or 3v1 scenarios as it'll minimize damage taken on your units. That's why you see my using tricks like the "tank shotgun" which I stack 3 predator/scorpion tanks together and have them move into enemy territory.
Spend your diamonds efficiently. The #1 best way to spend diamonds is Rivals Champions premium run while also going 15-0 in it. Unfortunately, this is no easy feat and only a handful of people can do it consistently. Typically, the "premium rewards" in the limited time events are the best value. The crate event is the best as long as you can do reasonably well as it gives you a huge spread of everything. The resource challenge is great due to the cloning labs and I'd recommend that if you want to just level up 1 specific unit.
Don't play the game in a pissed off mood. I see many people do this (and even myself). When we're angry we usually make superficial moves based upon emotion and not based around any tactics or strategy. It's fine because we all get angry (I'd be lying if I said I didn't). The game can be frustrating to play at times so take a small break and come back later.
Watch your own replays. So many people ask me to watch their replays for me to tell them what they did wrong. Quite honestly... to me... they're extremely painful to watch. First of all, no one is perfect and you don't need to be a brain surgeon to spot out what you did wrong. One example I can give is I always spot that many people leave their units idle. Never leave your units idle if there are battles going on all across the map... especially Raider units!!
Drink a caffeinated beverage. I always play better with more energy in me. I always feel like I'm just naturally better at everything and I'm sure most people are the same way. If you're tired, don't play the game? You know common sense isn't common sense to everyone. If you've watched your own replays and couldn't improve that way then watch high ranked streamers. You need to see what they are doing differently than you are and try to make sense of it. Most streamers here will talk to you if you talk to them in the twitch chat so don't be afraid to ask questions. I recommend watching a streamer who is very consistent with a 90%+ winrate so you can analyse how they play.
Join an alliance if you aren't in one. You may ask how does this make me play better? well it doesn't, but it gives you good vibes as it gives you the sense that you're not alone and fighting for a separate cause, the guild rankings! Also, donating and requesting cards can really help you level up certain cards. I got my level 15 predator tanks purely due to requesting them in my guild for 3 months straight every day.
Beyond these tips from AliciaDestiny, here's some recommended beginner content on this blog:
If you're new to Rivals, you might struggle with a lot of the terminology used by other players on Reddit, Discord or in the Alliance chat in the Rivals app. Here's some terms you might encounter:
Rivals glossary:
Aggro = Decks without "Tech" and usually a number of cheap units that try to win the game early
Base Kill = Winning not with launching two of the Nuclear Missiles, but with killing the opponent's base with units or commander abilities (e.g. Jade Catalyst missile)
Bikes = Attack Bikes
Blocking = Keeping an opponent from moving onto a specific hex (often a pad) by moving a unit in the way. With clever control, a single unit can block access to two or even three pads.
Borca = Orca Bomber
Break Point = A unit interaction that significantly changes once a unit has higher levels (each level gives +10% hitpoints and +10% damage). E.g. a full salvo killing or not killing a unit, or a unit needing 2 or 3 shots to kill something.
Broken = Term used to describe units or decks that supposedly are too strong, also see "OP"
Charging = Charging the pads
Chems = Chem Troopers
Chuggy = Chem Buggy
Customs = Playing games in the "Custom" game mode that's avaibable in the settings section of the app. You can play games at equal level here, which is used for tournaments or training matches
Coliseum = Weekly & Monthly tournament series run by prolific streamer 13lade
Dancing = Moving a unit in and out of a hex that the opponent wants to enter so that they can't enter it, but also can't easily attack the blocking unit (special form of "Blocking")
Fortress = Decks that try to get a specific defensive setup on a strategic position on the map, usually centered around a 2- or 3-range unit (usually MLRS, Giga Cannon, Artillery)
Flip = Winning control of the majority of controlled pads shortly before the missile/nuke fires (i.e. "flipping control of the pads")
Ladder = Ranked games, i.e. the main game type that people play next to "Customs"
LD = Laser Drones
Meta = The typical units, decks and play styles currently being seen in the ladder or tournaments
Micro = controlling your units to make the best of them, e.g. retreating at the right moment, switching unit positions, baiting opponent shots on the wong units rtc.
Mid range = Decks with some slightly more powerful units compared to "Aggro" decks, but still no "Tech". Often has advantages in the late game against "Aggro" decks due to the Tiberium acceleration throughout the game making cheap units relatively worse as the game goes on. Examples would be decks build around "Borca" or Inferno
MG = Machine Gun Squad
OP = Overpowered, used to describe units that are supposedly too strong
Pop cap = The mechanic of Rivals that you can't build as many units as you have Tiberium. There is a cooldown to build units, and it becomes slower the more units you have on the field.
Pop capping = The technique to conciously make the opponent have so many units (e.g. of a certain type, or half-dead units like single riflemen) that they cannot build a necessary counter at a critical time due to the Pop cap mechanic
Rifle War = Situation occurring in the early game if both players open Rifles (or Militants), trying to win pad control, trade profitably and force the opponent to switch into a different infantry counter that then can be countered (example: One player switching into Talon, the other then into Pitbulls -- the Pitbull player will usually win the first missile)
Scrim = Competitive training match done in the "Customs" mode
Stalling = Keeping the pads from charging, i.e. ensuring that both parties both control the same number of pads (0 or 1)
Stank = Stealth Tank
Scorp = Scorpion Tank
Tank = Scorpion and Predator Tanks
Tech = Units (or decks incorporating them) that come from the "Temple of Nod" or "GDI Tech Lab" buildings. Most players in lower leagues play Tech. Learn how to beat tech players.
Tech Splash = a deck with a single tech unit that is not critical to winning the game. If the single unit is a "super unit" (Avatar or Mammoth), it's usually not called Tech Splash. Tech Splash decks e.g. utilize Sandstorm, Zone Troopers, Basilisk for the late game and/or as options/counters against specific decks/units.
Thick Tank = Tick Tanks for their ability to withstand tons of damage once burrowed
Tib = Tiberium
Deck nicknames:
Air Mammoth = Jackson - Rifle, Missile - Droneswarm, Mohawk (or Orca), Hammerhead - Mammoth
Suzaku APC = Strongarm - Rifle, Missile - Pitbull, APC - Droneswarm, Orca (invented and popularized by top player Suzaku)
As a new player, your selection of units is limited. At the very start, you can even only play GDI. As you level up, you unlock new units, and at Level 8, you unlock the Nod faction.
If you're an ambitious player, what decks should you play? The criteria by which I select my recommendations are:
Strength: You want strong decks so that you have success.
Long-term value: You want decks with units that are relevant also later down the road when you unlock more units. Because you want to level up the units you play, but not spend too nany credits (in-game currency) to level up units that you might not play later. I'm assuming here that you either spend no money on the game, or want to use the money you spend most efficiently. This means that if you upgrade too many units in parallel, you will be credit starved due to how much it costs to level up units.
Learning curve: You want decks that help you have a strong learning curve, i.e. that help you practice the skills that are relevant to become better at Rivals.
Build a Rifleman to scout and start charging the pads.
React to what your opponents are doing.
Get Riflemen against Missile Troopers or Laser Troopers
Get Shock Troopers for Missile Troopers, Laser Troopers, Cyborgs, Zone Troopers
Get Missle Troopers against Orca, Banshee, Nod Bikes, Pitbulls, Predator Tanks, Scorpion Tanks, MLRS, Titan, Sandstorm
Get Pitbull for Rhino, Buggy, Chem Buggy, Cyber Wheels, War Dogs, Talon, Venom, Wolverine, Widowmaker (and if you get 2 Pitbulls, you can use them against Orca and Banshee)
Get Predator for Pitbulls, Nod Bikes, Wolverines, Widowmakers (and Harvesters)
Get Orca for Giga Cannon, MLRS, Scorpion Tanks, Predator Tanks. Rock Worm, Titan (and Harvesters)
Your goal is to beat tech by making the game so fast that the opponent's Tech units don't play a role. To learn how to do this, here is a separate guide on beating Tech decks.
Use your commander ability (Strongarm Turret) to block the path to a key pad, and/or give you some additional damage in a key fight. Rule of thumb: Using the commander ability shortly before a Nuke goes off is often ideal, especially if you can use it to block an important path to a pad.
Variants:
You can switch out the Shock Troopers for Talon. This makes your anti-infantry options more versatile, but more expensive, as you first need to build the air building. The Talon gives you more options against air units such as the Orca. But you might struggle against Zone Troopers and Cyborgs without Shock Troopers.
Another option is to replace the Predator Tank with Talon. That gives you more anti-infantry power. The role of Predator can usually be taken by Pitbull or Orca, but against enemy superior numbers in Pitbulls or Bikes, you might need Missile Troopers.
Which units to level up: Every day, you can use a cloning chamber to get more cards for a certain unit. For this deck, I would recommend to focus on Riflemen and Pitbulls. Having them on high levels can help you especially in the early game, and the units are very relevant even for top players who play since a year. Missile Troopers are also a decent choice.
The best beginner deck for Nod
The deck components:
Commander: Seth
Infantry: Militants, Laser Troopers
Vehicles: Bikes, Scorpion Tank
Air: Venom, Banshee (unlocked at level 10 and 11, before you can replace with Flame Troopers and Buggy)
Rough Game plan:
Build a single harvester and a Barracks for Infantry.
Build a Militant to scout and start charging the pads.
React to what your opponents are doing.
Get Militants against Missile Troopers and Laser Troopers
Get Laser Troopers against Orca, Banshee, Nod Bikes, Pitbulls, Predator Tanks, Scorpion Tanks, MLRS, Titan, Sandstorm
Get Bikes against Rhino, Buggy, Chem Buggy, Cyber Wheels, War Dogs, Talon, Wolverine, Widowmaker
Get Scorpion Tank for Pitbulls, Nod Bikes, Wolverines, Widowmakers (and Harvesters)
Get Talon for Flame Troopers, Shock Troopers
Get Banshee for Giga Cannon, MLRS, Scorpion Tanks, Predator Tanks, Rock Worm, Titan
Your goal is to beat tech by making the game so fast that the opponent's Tech units don't play a role. To learn how to do this, here is a separate guide on beating Tech decks.
Use your commander ability (Seth Drill Pod) to get additional anti-infantry power where/when needed, or use it shortly before a nuke goes off to quickly get on a pad that you might otherwise not reach/control/contest.
Variants: Instead of the Venom, you can play Flame Troopers or the Buggy. Venom tends to be better, but needs micro.
Which units to level up: Every day, you can use a cloning chamber to get more cards for a certain unit. For this deck, I would recommend to focus on Militants, Bikes and Scorpion Tank.
Criteria #2 and #3 (see above) mean that you want to minimize playing Tech units (expensive units from the "GDI Tech Lab" and "Temple of Nod" buildings. This might seem surprising, as more than 90% of players in lower leagues do play Tech units, usually even 2-3 different ones in the same deck.
So why do I recommend not to play Tech? Let's go along the above criteria.
Strength: Because most Tech decks actually are not strong, at least when you meet capable opponents. Especially as a new player, you will often meet opponents with higher-levelled units. Your best chance to beat them is to always have hard counters and to make the game fast.
Long-term value: Later on, as a more experienced player, you will play in Masters league and against many capable opponents. You likely will not play much Tech, then. So if you spend your limited credits on levelling up Tech units now, you will have too few credits to level up your other units.
Learning curve: If you play with a range of hard counters from different buildings, and if your goal is to make the game fast, you are practicing key skills at Rivals:
Tactical decisions: Chosing the right unit at the right time.
Scouting: Being able to identify what your opponent does / builds to identify the right response
Micro: Moving your units around in such a way that their strenghts and weaknesses are applied in the best way against the opponent's unit.
Timings: By making the game fast (to beat tech), you learn to pace the game, charge the pads, and have an eye for the timer/clock.
The majority of players in the lower leagues play a lot of "Tech" units, i.e. decks often look like this:
These decks are not good. But that doesn't mean that it's easy to beat them. Actually, it needs quite some experience, precision and good decks to beat such decks. That's why most new players at some point usually chose to play Tech themselves, and then stick with it. That's how we end up at 90%+ tech in lower leagues. This guide is supposed to help you deal with such Tech decks.
(Note: This doesn't mean all Tech decks are bad. There's actually very good Tech decks, and very competent Tech players. But they usually have 1 or max 2 Tech units, and playing against good decks still follows the same principles outlined below.)
First, some terminology:
Playing "Tech" means to include any unit from the GDI Tech Lab or Temple of Nod in your deck
"Tech Splash" refers to decks that have a single Tech unit next to 5 cheaper units. Often, this is Mammoth Tank or Avatar, but can also be e.g. Artillery or Sandstorm
"Aggro" means a Tech-free deck that relies on a set of cheap units that can win the game early, relying on a single (or sometimes even no) harvester. If you never played "Aggro" so far, I highly recommend to stop playing Tech at least for a while and try the other side of the game. At the very least it will be good for your learning curve as a player. Here's a guide on how to build Aggro decks.
"Pop cap" refers to the mechanic of Rivals that you cannot build as many units as you have money for, but that the more units you have on the map, and the earlier the game progress is, the longer you have to wait between building units. As harvesters count as units, this means the key downside of having 2 harvesters is to have fewer units on the field. Abusing this downside of 2 harvesters is critical to beat Tech decks.
"Charge the pads" means to ensure that someone charges the pads. Often it's you, but it can also be the opponent. If your opponent can safely enter a pad, and you occupy one other pad, you can move off the pad to keep the pads charging overall (and get control back a bit later).
I'll structure this article into three parts:
Scenario 1a: You play "Aggro" and the opponent goes double harvester very early
Scenario 1b: You play "Aggro" and the opponent plays the first nuke with a single harvester and then builds a second
Scenario 2: You play Tech yourself
Scenario 1a: You play "Aggro" and the opponent goes double harvester very early
This is the standard scenario if you play Aggro in lower leagues. Most Tech players in lower leagues will get their double harvester immediately, or after building 1-2 units.
In this scenario, the most important thing is: Always charge the pads! To do that, some things to keep in mind:
Have a 10 Tiberium unit in your deck (Riflemen, Militants, Cyber Wheels, Dogs) to build before or after your first harvester. This means you can start to charge the pads very early. Laser Troops for 20 Tiberium are a second-best choice, but they come a bit later, are slower on the pads, and get countered if your opponent builds a single rifleman.
Scouting is key. You need to see what your opponent is doing. Actually, only this even allows you to discern between scenarios 1a and 1b, as you need to scout if/when they build the second harvester. And it allows you to see what your opponent builds and where he moves it, so you can counter this and keep the pads charging. This is another reason for a 10 Tib unit, as they all have 3 vision range, compared to most units' 2 vision range!
Never prioritize harassing their two harvesters over charging the pads. Yes, harvester pressure can work. But it can also often be defended -- and even if you kill a harvester, this gives you 80 Tiberium, but doesn't slow down your opponent as much. So losing 10 seconds on the Nuke is usually not good even if you kill a harvester for it. If you have problems beating Tech, I recommend to switch to a "no harvester harass in the early game" rule for some time. This helps you focus on your core task, charging the pads.
A good rule of thumb of "when to engage harvesters" is "directly after the first nuke goes off" (or a bit earlier if you have it 100% secure). This often makes your opponent spend more Tiberium on defence than they otherwise might, which can bring some valuable seconds even if your attack doesn't yield a harvester kill.
Don't let your opponent delay the game. If they can enter the pad, step off them yourself. Try to position your units that the opponent cannot easily start fights during which the pads would not charge.
If your opponent builds two harvesters immediately, they have the fewer units on the field for now (see "Pop cap" explanation above). This means with your early scout and more units, your opponent should not be able to keep you from continue to charge the pads and easily win the first nuke. The typical threats to this are:
You built Rifles or Militants, and the opponent gets Shocks or Flames to overwhelm you. To deal with this, you can either ...
Defensively set up 2 Rifles to fight the Flame/Shock trooper, beating it and not allowing it to enter the pad
Build a unit such as Dogs, Cyber Wheels, Talon, Venom, Chem Troopers that is a good counter against the Flames/Shocks. In this case, you can move your Rifle back to a different pad to save it and keep charging the pads (e.g. your Rifle charges the back pad and the opponent Flame/Shock Troopers and your counter to them fight on the central pad)
Now you won first nuke. If things go smooth, your opponent spends enough Tiberium to (unsuccessfully) delay you so you can as easily win the second nuke. But more often than not, some Tech unit will get you, at least shortly before the second nuke. Now, it's key to keep calm and have a plan:
Don't panic. Keep your head cool and play your game. You might be able to either kill the Tech unit, or win the game without killing.
You don't have to necessarily kill the opponent's tech unit. It's enough if you either block it from entering the pad, or to contest the pad against it. Contesting a pad against a tech unit is easiest if it does no or low damage against your unit, e.g. Sandstorm takes ages to kill infantry, and an Avatar can't shoot up.
Have this pattern in mind: You control one pad, the others are neutral. This is how you often can win the last nuke the easiest. Remember, you have more units than the opponent. So you should be able to safely control one pad (e.g. your back pad). If you now can contest the other pads in the moment that the second nuke goes off, you win it. Good to keep in mind here:
Have Seth as commander? Can your flame pod help control/contest a pad?
Have Liang as commander? Can you use the healing drone to contest a pad? (Must not have air defence on it, as the drone dies fast)
Have fast air units? Can you contest pads with them for long enough?
React to the opponent's tech unit. Some examples: Wolverine / Widowmaker? Just build some Bikes or Pitbulls to attack & block it -- but expect a 2nd Tech unit soon (often Zone Troopers). Mammoth Tank? Dogs and Wheels can be efficient to block, as the Mammoth needs two full salvos to kill the Squads. Sandstorm? Try to quicklybring in infantry quickly to block it from the pad. Avatar? Build some Laser Drones or Orca if you have them to kill the Avatar, or contest a pad against it.
Anticipate the opponent's tech unit. This is hard in lower leagues, which often field a random assortment of 3 or 4 tech units. But against good opponents, you can develop a sense. E.g. does the opponent build cheap infantry and air units? Probably, a Mammoth is coming out!
Have a plan in your pocket. Think about how your deck wants to engage certain Tech units in a typical situation. Outside of the game, you often get to a solution that is hard to find in the heat of the moment. Example: You play Jade and Chem Warriors. The opponent gets out a Mammoth Tank or Avatar, what do you do?
Mammoth Tank: As it can (and usually will try to) run over the Chems, a good default plan is to throw a Catalyst missile on your own Chem. This then ideally hits the Mammoth with a big explosion, heavily damaging it.
Avatar: Avatar on the other hand can't run over your Chems, and needs a bit to kill them. So it will usually move around your Chems somehow while shooting it. In this case, nuke the field that the Avatar will engage your Chems from. They will throw a cloud on it, and if the Avatar moves left or right "along" your Chem, it will be hit by two cloud explosions (see screenshot)
Scenario 1b: You don't play Tech yourself and the opponent plays the first nuke with a single harvester and then builds a second
In principle, your goal is the same here: Always charge the pads! And to do that, you still should have a 10 Tiberium unit in your deck (Riflemen, Militants, Cyber Wheels, Dogs) and scout well to react accordingly.
But it's a bit trickier to play this if your opponent delays their 2nd harvester. Because they can now build just as many cheap units in the early game as you, which can help them "neutralize" the pads.
A typical deck that works like this is the "Air Mammoth" deck. It usually fields:
This deck can compete for the first nuke on a single harvester. Even if your opponent doesn't win the first nuke, a significant delay can easily be worth delaying the second harvester. Why is that the case? Here, it's key to understand one of the more "hidden" gameplay concepts of Rivals: Tiberium income accelerates throughout the game. Details are behind this link, but the short version is that in the first 30 seconds, a harvester gathers 90 Tiberium/minute, whilst from 2:30 to 3:00 minutes, a harvester yields 240 Tiberium/minute, i.e. more than 2.5x! So delaying the game by 20 seconds can be worth having your harvester 40 seconds later.
As said, most of the tipps & tricks of scenario 1a (above) still apply, but with the complication that the first nuke isn't as easy to get, and there's usually at the very least some delay. Beyond just playing well and minimizing delay, there's some more things to keep in mind here:
Keep scouting. Seeing the exact 2nd harvester timing (or guessing it from an interruption in enemy unit production) helps you see when you need to switch gears from "fight head on" to "speed things up and prepare for the tech".
Identify and explore the weakness. The Tech unit(s) are not available in the early phase, still. So the opponent deck must have some leaks. Example: The Air Mammoth deck above is weak to Talons (as Hammerhead is quite expensive) and especially Slingshot (as it counters all the air, so only Rifle/Missile are left to fight with). Every tech deck has such a weakness. If you don't know what the weakness is, or how to exploit it, I recommend you to go to the offical Rivals Subreddit and ask your questions there!
Scenario 2: You play Tech yourself
In Tech vs Tech, the better Tech wins. This means that if you play Tech, ensure that you either don't need the tech always, or that your tech beats other tech units. I.e. there's mostly two options:
You have a deck that can beat other Tech decks, especially Avatar & Mammoth
You don't need your tech, i.e. you start with a single harvester and can apply the above principles against Tech decks with potentially "better" Tech units
So, the recommendation here is to basically play a good Tech deck, e.g.:
Air Mammoth -- Dr. Liang - Riflemen, Missile Troopers - Droneswarm, Mohawk, Hammerhead - Mammoth Tank
Other tech decks: Have a clear answer against Mammoth & Avatar in your deck, e.g. some form of Air unit that is strong against vehicles
And if there's one thing to take away from this guide: Play 0, 1 or 2 Tech units. 3 or more is just a bad deck, and will limit your success and your learning curve.
And finally, a not-so-serious Rivals video I recommend to watch for entertainment value. It's 13lade playing a series of games with GDI, without using the same unit twice. I.e. he has to construct "mutually exclusive" decks. This also means he's playing some Techs, which he usually doesn't do much.
As a new player in Rivals, you will quickly get so-called "Challenge Matches" on ladder. How do they work, and why do they exist?
What are the advantages of a Challenge Match?
You cannot lose medals in the game
You get extra experience points for the game, which accelerates your progress
What are the downsides of a Challenge Match?
The downside is that as a new player, you will play a ton of Challenge Matches
Medal-wise, each Challenge Match is a "freeroll", i.e. you cannot lose matches
That's why you will climb the ladder up even if you have just 10% winrate in Challenge Matches
This means that the system can mean that you actually get ever harder opponents because you get so many Challenge Matches, which can make the experience even more frustrating
A good change would in my view be to keep XP bonus for Challenge Matches (maybe increase it), but to remove the medal impact of them
What triggers a Challenge Match?
One of the following conditions have to be met:
The opponent has a unit or commander in their deck that you have not unlocked yet. As a new player, you need to gradually unlock all units by levelling up to level 60. This takes some time, but costs no money. Until then, you will meet players that have units in their deck that you don't have unlocked, yet. This is hard for you because you often don't understand the unit well.
The opponent has more than 200 medals more than you, and you're not yet in Tiberium league. Medals are the ranking points of the Rivals "ranked" ladder. If a player is much higher than you, he likely is stronger (which is a compound of their skill and their potentially higher unit levels).
The opponent's average deck level is at least 1.5 levels above your deck's average level. This is actually a bit complicated and causes most confusion, so some more details here:
Average deck is calculated by summing up the levels of the 6 units and the commander, and dividing by 7. The "training" upgrades next to the levels do not count.
There are actually two conditions that have to be met:
The level difference must be 1.5 or higher
The lower-levelled players' deck must be within 4 levels of the league cap (e.g. 13 for Masters -> you only get Challenge Matches if you're level 9 or higher)
In the example below, the level difference is >1.5, and s9a7d4 is within 4 levels of the league cap (which is 15 for Tiberium), so the match is a challenge match.
This article is directed at beginners, who often have trouble dealing with Scarabs. This Nod infantry was recently nerfed and since costs 40 Tiberium instead of 30. Many good players were surprised by the nerf, because the Scarab is basically not used at all at the top of the ladder. The reason for the nerf is that it was "too strong" for many normal players to deal with. (If you prefer watching videos, this video from CaptainBenzie is a good alternative to this article.)
Scarab characteristics
Cost: 40 Tiberium
Average move speed
Low hitpoints
Once it stops, it needs a short "charging period", after which it automatically targets and shoots units on adjacent pads, for which it has two chargest
Most units die with a single scarab charge, harvesters and high-HP tech units need two charges
A scarab explosion leaves behind a burning hex for some seconds, which damages ground units (esp. Squad based units as it's area-of-effect damage)
Scarab weaknesses
It has low HP, so it cannot approach any anti-infantry unit as long as the defending unit targets it
It needs to move next to a target, so 2-range units like Giga and Sniper hard-counter it
It costs 40 Tiberium, so trades ineffcieintly against units that cost 10 (or against half-dead units that suicide into them)
How are Scarabs usually used?
Defensively, e.g. built after the first harvester to protect a second one.
General counterplay: This is no real big problem as long as you can either efficiently remove them or (usually even better) just win the game by quickly charging the pads and preventing the Scarabs to effectively move onto a pad. With 2 harvesters and a defensive Scarab, the opponent has basically no units left to fight for the pads until they get their tech out.
Cheesy rush, i.e. trying to kill your first harvester quickly with Scarab hits.
General counterplay: Scout early enough to prevent this. See below.
Delayed / optional, e.g. playing a normal opening of other units, and then, depending on the situation, moving Scarabs in from behind to protect certain pads, or bolster the frontline. This can be the most efficient way to use Scarabs.
General counterplay: Depends on the situation, so the whole range of approaches below can help.
This list of weaknesses already shows us how to best deal with them:
Opening with a 10-cost unit (Rifle, Wardogs, Militant, Cyber Wheels) hardcounters Scarabs in multiple ways:
As these units all have 4 vision, it scouts them, whether they defend a dual harvester build or whether they try to sneak to your harvester. That allows you to react properly.
It counters them defensively 100%. You can position your unit in the path / on the pad, and the much-more expensive Scarab can't advance
You can suicide your cheap unit into the Scarab and make a cost-efficient trade. Note that this is often not even needed -- only relevant if you need to dislodge the Scarab from a certain position (e.g. controlling a pad).
Flying with a cheap air unit directly onto them. You can move both GDI and Nod Drones (20 Tiberium each) over the Scarabs to trigger them, and make the exploding Scarab destroy the other charge. To do that, you move-click to the hex directly behind the Scarab, seen from the position from your unit.
Fight them with 2-range. Especially Snipers, but also other 2-range units are useful against them.
Defensively, fight them with any anti-infantry option. Whether it's Venom, Buggy, Rhino, Talon, APC, Flame Troopers .. -- Scarabs's can't approach them. Key: You need to manually target the Scarabs if the opponent sends in first another unit, then shortly after the Scarabs. As your defensive unit will auto-target the first opponent unit in range.
Suicide half-dead units into the scarabs. E.g. a bike squad with a single bike left. That is not only cost-efficient, but even allows you to get rid of unwanted units that prevent you from building more units due to the "pop cap" limitation that makes the unit production cooldown slower the more units you have on the field.
What does this mean for deck construction?
It's great to have a 10-cost unit in your deck. It's cost-efficient not just against Scarabs
Especially if you don't, you need at least a 20 cost opener (e.g. Laser or Missile Troopers) or Snipers
The reason that many newer players struggle against Scarabs is because they don't follow this simple advice -- on this, I also recommend this article on how to build effective Rivals decks
There's also two advanced options to deal with Scarabs:
2v1 them. If you move in at the same time with two anti-infantry units, they can only kill one, as they die faster than they recharge. This is challenging, as the recharge is quite fast, so your units really must move at the same time. The easiest way to achieve this is (see illustration below):
have unit A be a bit further away from the Scarab
move unit B into a distance of two of the Scarab
attack-move unit A onto the Scarab
have the second unit move-command to the tile next to Scarabs at the exact moment that unit A (while moving) is 2 hexes away from the Scarabs (so they both arrive at the same time)
Pull Scarabs into opponent units. This depends on the circumstances, but can be quite powerful. The idea is to use an air unit to turn the Scarab explosion against your opponent.
By move-clicking past an enemy unit A, move an air unit B in such a manner that it will be above A in the moment that the Scarabs trigger
Scarabs will target your air unit and explode above their own unit A
If you enjoyed this article, maybe check our more content on my blog. Some recommendations for beginners:
And if you're in the mood to watch some Rivals action, here's a video recommendation: Top player 13lade follows the orders of his Twitch chat: He has to build the unit that his chat tells him to next. How does he deal with being forced to build the wrong unit at the wrong time? Very entertaining!
A recurring question from new Rivals players is: "What should I do to maximize my progress in levelling up units?"
What you should do:
Log in daily. There is a daily reward for this, and you get get hundreds of free Diamonds each month if you don't break your streak of daily logins.
Do your bounties every day. This gives you thousands of credits each day, and you can often get your bounties done within just 10 games. You can spend fuel (a free resource gained from playing) to "reroll" your bounties (small arrow next to the open bounties). This ensures that you can do the bounties while playing your favorite decks rather than being forced.
Use your daily free "Cloning Chambler". To ensure the Cloning Lab is maxed, you need to play 12 games per day (less than an hour) so that it's free again once the 24h-timer resets. Further down, some tipps on what units you should use your Cloning Lab for.
Join an alliance to request donations. You can request donations 3 times a day, and the donator gets credits and experience for donating cards. If you don't have an alliance, look for an active one on the Rivals Subreddit or on the official Rivals Discord.
Request your Crates and rush them with fuel. In theory, you can do this every 3 hours. But don't spend Diamonds to rush them faster.
Use your Diamonds wisely. You get hundreds of Diamonds for free each month. Ideally, spend your Diamonds only on Events if and when you reach a good result. More on this further down.
Click image to enlarge
What you should not do:
Don't buy the promo offers. If you want to spend money, buy Diamonds at a the best rate in the shop, and spend them wisely on Events.
Don't spend Diamonds to rush chests, open the vault, buy crates. Spend them efficiently for the right events.
How to best use the free daily Cloning Chamber:
It's most efficient to use it on Common Cards
So use it on core common cards you believe will play regularly in a number of different decks
If you don't know what to use it on, I recommend Riflemen or Wardogs, Militants or Cyberwheel, Scorpion Tank. But ensure that you actually use the unit(s).
It can be prudent to focus on one key unit. If you always play Scoprion Tank and Militants with Nod, you might want to focus on them a lot. If you play a lot of different units, maybe use the Cloning Lab to speed up levelling up the next unit you currently use.
How to spend your Diamonds:
As mentioned above, spending Diamonds on Events is most efficient.
Your rewards will depend on the Event and on your Result.
Basically all Events will be better than spending your money on something else, even if you manage only a 5-5 or 6-4 score in the event. But of course, it might be worth to wait for a good score on a good event before you spend your Diamonds. Especially as you can spend your Diamonds multiple times on the same event. So if you get a great run at a great event, you can spend up to 6,000 Diamonds at once.
Among the best events are the Resource Event premium track. Crate Event standard track (i.e. rerunning this event if/when you get a 10-0 run), Champions premium track and Showdown premium track. The latter has the upside that you can rerun the event for credits, so you can rerun often until you get a good result.
The one arguable alternative to spending Diamonds on is Cloning Chambers in the shop. This can make sense if you cannot get decent results in Events
In Rivals, the Tiberium income increases over time during a game. Experienced players will have noticed that, but few really understand how it works. Especially as it's not documented by the devs.
In the interview with Omeleet and StrikerVX, I added a graphics that reflected Omeleet's best understanding of this acceleration back then. When I re-used that graphics in my latest post on the basic principles of deck building, Omeleet wrote me that he today has a better understanding of this concept.
TheCopyCatTV (follow him on Twitch) and Omeleet (follow him on Twitch) measured this increase more precisely and thankfully shared the data with me. Here it is:
Base income starts at 2 Tiberium per Second (T/s) and accelerates by +0.2 T/s every 30 seconds up to a max of 3 T/s
Income per harvester (that is actually harvesting) increases from 1.5 T/s at the start of the game to a max of 4 T/s at 150 seconds, an increase of 0.7 T/s every 30 seconds
We can also display this differently as a table and summarizing the Base Income and Harvester Income:
Tiberium income over the course of the time
Observations:
Base income accelerates only by +50% over the course of the game
Harvester income accelerates by +166% over the course of the game
This means that the income gap of 0 vs 1 vs 2 harvesters grows over the course of the game
A harvester that you build at the start of the game amortizes after 37 seconds plus the time before it starts harvesting, so about 40 seconds
A harvester that you build at 60 seconds amortizes after 21 seconds
A harvester that you build at 120 seconds amortizes after just 14 seconds
What can we learn from this?
A zero harvester player has no total Tiberium downside for the first nuke if he manages to continously charge the nuke. Combined with the increased pop cap, a zero harv deck has a strong early game advantage. But For the second nuke, it's at just half the income already!
In a close game, and with a deck that can work on 1 or 2 harvesters, it can be an option to build a second harvester even after the second nuke. It amorizes quickly enough to have an impact. Of course, there's the trade-off between pop cap and Tiberium, so it depends on the deck and situaiton
Generally, it might be an underused idea to fight for the first nuke on a single harvester and then, when the opportunity arises (e.g. after the first nuke), build a second harvester.
Many tech decks do have some cheap units to contest the first nuke, and the additional pop cap of not building the 2nd harv early might come in handy.
The Tiberium income lost from not having the 2nd harvester for the first 60 seconds is below 100 Tiberium (considering you can't build it immediately at 0 seconds). This compares against an income of this second harvester of 150 Tiberium during the second minute and nearly 240 Tiberium in the third minute.
Even if you don't win the first nuke by delaying the 2nd harvester, it can still be worth it. If you manage to stall it for an additional 30 seconds, you will have 30 seconds more of the higher income tiers. The 30 seconds more after 120 seconds would mean +130 Tberium, which is more than the <100 Tiberium the 2nd harvester would net you in the first minute of the game.
I believe that the more this concept is understood, the more we will see decks that start with a single harvester and build the 2nd harvester opportunistically and situationally. This can already be seen if you watch strong players play Tech decks or Tech splash decks, they usually don't start with 2 harvester straight away.
Of course this only makes sense if you can realistically contest the first nuke. If you delay the 2nd harvester to about the 60 second mark, you need to delay the first nuke by at least 20-25 seconds on average to make it worthwhile. That's why it's probably still rational for players with limited micro skills to build the second harvester instantly, orimmediately after scouting for a hard rush.
Newer players, or experiences players who want a change, often ask for new deck ideas, or what the current "meta deck" is. In this article, I want to cover deck construction rather than to tell you what "the best deck" for Nod or GDI is. The reason for that is that through balance changes, and shifts in the meta, the answer for "the best deck" is not a singular one and will change over time.
Fundamental principles about deck construction are:
You need at least one counter for each unit type (infantry, vehicle, air)
Ideally, you want multiple counters for the same unit type from different armor types. For example, you want an infantry unit that is good against infantry, and a vehicle unit that is good against infantry. Reasons for this:
Being able to hard-counter. Opponent has Flame Troopers? Your own Flame Troopers can counter them (they are a soft counter), but not too effectively (especially in offense). Your Cyber Wheels on the other hand are a hard counter: They deal most damage against infantry, and are a vehicle, which takes little damage from Flame Troopers.
Being able to react to what the opponent has on the field. Say your opponent has a Chem Buggy and 2 Laser Squads on the field. You can build Militants against this, but the Chem Buggy can kill them quickly. If you can build Venoms, which can't be attacked by Chem Buggies, you have a potentially better option.
Ideally, you want counters at different price points. Say you have two units for a generally similar purpose, it's good if one is cheaper and one is more expensive. This has two reasons:
General flexibility. If every opponent's Rifleman always forces you to build Flame Troopers, you spend 40 to counter 10. If you also have Wheels in the deck, you can counter the Rifles for 10 Tiberium of your own.
Accelerating Tiberium Income. Throughout the game, Tiberium income accelerates. That means it's useful to have cheap units especially for the early game. And it's useful to have some way to spend your money on more powerful units later in the game. Yes, you can always counter a Flame Trooper with 2 Rifles cost-efficiently (40 vs 20 Tiberium), but usually the Pop Cap (limit to units on the field at the same time)
You need to understand the pace and goal of your deck. What is your win condition, especially against very different decks?
Do you need to win the first two nukes against a Tech deck? Then you need a lot of flexibility with cheap units to dominate the early game. This can speak for taking in both Militants and Cyber Wheels into your deck as cheap 10 Tiberium infantry counters.
Or does your deck (need to) allow you to fight for a third Nuke against strong units the opponent might have? That is a reason to include a strong enough counter for late game units, e.g. you might struggles against Zone Troopers and Cyborgs if your only anti-infantry options are Militants and Cyber Wheels.
Or do you even want to prolong the game because you believe you have the better end-game composition? That might mean that your endgame unit is a great counter against even multiple unit types, such as Mammoth Tanks against vehicles and infantry. And it might mean that you outside of this unit want to be able to defend and stall with cheap units to save up for your Mammoth.
You need to understand what good & bad units (and commanders) are. Yes, generally, the developers try to balance the game to make every unit useful. But this will never be perfect for a number of reasons:
Balance changes like the most recent one (this post is from July 2019) can make units stronger or weaker every month.
Certain units might be strong against inexperienced players. This often means that they are bad against strong players, because they need to be balanced for all players. An example would be Scarabs, which can feel scary for new players, but are generally seen as one of the worst units in the game at high-level play.
To get an idea for weaker or stronger units (and maybe get inspiration for specific deck ideas), you can check my monthly Top 50 reports, where I analyze the decks of the Top 50 players in the ladder, and which units they play how frequently. You can find the July 2019 versions here: Nod, GDI. You can find the latest version in the side bar.
A key aspect of "good" is "maneuverability", which can be broken down to:
Speed: Allows you to quickly capture / contest pads. It allows you to quickly disengage from an unfavorable matchup (e.g. Scorpion Tank running away from Missile Troopers). It allows you to quickly reposition units (e.g. swap two adjacent units) to let them deal with the right opponent units (e.g. you switch your Bikes and Missile Squad to allow the Bikes to attack the opponent Chem Buggy whilst protecting your Missile Squad from it)
Attack Type: Most units need to stop to fire. Some units like the Pitbull and Tanks can fire while moving. This ability is called "Raider". It allows you to maneuver more without losing your shots (if you maneuver a lot with, say, Flame Troopers, they won't make much damage).
Air/Hover: Can the unit hover over lakes, fly over rocks?
An illustration of the accelerating Tiberium income throughout a match, in Tiberium / second
Let's apply these principles in practice to a Nod deck!
We want two good counters against Infantry, Vehicles and Air.
Our opening buildings (Infantry & Vehicles) ideally contain a counter against each, so we can counter early all game threats. This automatically means we also have counters to all unit types from two different buildings.
The counters should be at different price points, but all be rather not that expensive, as we want to play with a single harvester.
This gives us:
Infantry: Laser Troopers (20 Tiberium, good against Air and Vehicles), Flame Troopers (40 Tiberium, strong against Infantry)
Vehicles: Cyber Wheels (10 Tiberium, good against Infantry and much cheaper than Flame Troopers), Bikes (30 Tiberium, good against Air and Vehicles), Scorpion Tank (70 Tiberium, strong against Vehicles)
Air: Banshee (50 Tiberium, good against Air and Vehicles).
Commander: Seth or Oxanna. Seth is considered better here generally, allowing you situational infantry counter and the option to take over / contest pads "remotely". Oxanna can be used well especially on the Scorpion Tank, and the Banshee.
Strengths:
This gives you a good set of mostly cheap and mostly fast counters to all unit types.
It allows you to deal with all situations in the early- and mid-game.
It still has reasonable counters against all units as long as they appear independently (e.g. you can counter Kodiaks with Banshees and Lasers, you can counter Zone Troopers with Flame Troopers etc.)
Weaknesses and how to play around them:
You will not be strong against a good setup around a key unit like Giga, MLRS or Artillery. This means you need to keep map control (vision of most of the map to see what the opponent is building when) and to strike quickly if the opponent tries to build such a setup.
You will not be strong against a good late game composition (say, Zone/Disruptor). So you need to make the game fast, and try to always keep the pads charging so the game ends as quickly as possible (remember, Tiberium income accelerates throughout the game, so the player with strong late-game units will benefit from the game taking longer).
How to build variants of this deck:
You can replace Flame Troopers with Militants. This gives you a bit more control and options in the opening moments of the game, and you save some Tiberium to e.g. get a Tank out quicker. If you do this, you have even more reason to play Seth over Oxanna, as it gives you additional anti-infantry power. This variant is popular since many months and highly viable.
You can replace Laser Troopers with Scavengers. They are more expensive, but a bit faster and can earn you money back. The extra money isn't critical for this deck, as it has few ways to spend a lot of money. So usually this is not done, and such a replacement makes more sense in decks with more expensive units (say Inferno/Phantom or Tech)
You can replace Cyber Wheels with Buggy. This is in today's balance not recommended. The buggy has less vision, and costs 30 instead of 10. It dies quickly against tanks and still dies vs anti-vehicle air (like Mohawk, Laser Drones).
You can replace Banshee with Phantom. This means you have less options aginst e.g. Giga Cannon, MLRS, Artillery (but often, Banshee anyways doesn't cut it against them, set up and protected properly). And you might miss the Banshee in situations where the opponent builds many Tanks. On the upside, you get an air superiority unit that is better against e.g. Inferno or Orca Bomber.
You can replace Militants with Fanatics. The idea is to have Fanatics die next to other units, especially Scorpion Tanks, which gives them a boost. This is then often combined with also replacing Banshee with Phantom and Seth with Oxanna. Before I get into the logic of that, better watch this video where top Rivals player 13lade explains these options in detail:
Now, your homework is to think about the same logic for GDI. What would be a good default deck that covers all bases? How could you make variants within it?
This is just a starting point for newer players. There's way more options and nuances in deck building. Just to mention some that are not covered in this post:
Building deck around other key ideas like Air decks with 2-3 air units, e.g. the Nod Inferno/Phantom deck variants.
Building decks around key anchor units like Artillery or Giga Cannon. You can watch this video on the "Airtillery" deck as an example.
Building decks around super units like Avatar or Mammoth (they kind of become your "win condition").
Different Harvester builds. This post focuses on classic "single harvester" decks. You can build two harvesters, or "situational single or dual harvester" decks. And even "zero harvester" decks are an option.
Impact of maps on decks, i.e. which maps are more or less suitable for certain decks. This becomes important in Tournament Play, where you know in advance which map you will play next.
If you have any feedback or questions, let me know!
There's an ongoing debate in Rivals on whether the "pay to win" aspect is too strong – or if you can actually compete without paying at all.
First things first: To win tournaments and to be considered the best player in the world, you don't need to invest a single cent. Why?
Because tournaments are played at "equal levels"
Because you can train with other players at "equal levels" in custom matches
Of course, ladder play is a bit different. In practice, you need to play ladder to train comfortably, as custom matches are a bit painful to organize and set up. At least getting the training value in the ladder is also certainly possible without paying a single cent:
Within 3 months, you can get to L10 units without paying at all.
With L10 units, you can get to the Tiberium league and play against strong opponents (often even at a handicap because most opponents will have higher levels), thus getting you the training value you need.
But still, this can be frustrating. So let's ask a narrower question: How long, or how much money, does it take you to get to unit levels that allow you to compete on equal footing in the Top100?
For the purpose of this article, I'm simplifying a bit, also to keep calculations easy and the text short. My assumptions will be:
Without paying any money: You can get to L10 within ca 3 months. Which roughly means that you'd be at full L11 after ca. 5 months and L12 after ca. 8 months. This is not precise, and depends on playing volume, event results etc. – but it's close enough for a high-level analysis. See this article to see the actual costs for upgrading your units to a certain level. I assume a slight acceleration of your progress after the first 3 months as you're now at maximum level, as you get a bit better in the events (assuming you run 8-2 in the Blitz events), and as you get the full Tiberium rewards each season.
You are at this L10 right now. And you play about 30 games a day (~2 hours).
You think L12 would be great right now to fairly compete against the vast majority of the Tiberium players. And you don't like waiting another 2.5 or even 7.5 months to get to L11/L12 respectively, because whilst you're getting to the Top400 each season, you have too many frustrating matches.
I calculate only with Rare cards for simplicity. This is not a vast error, as the progress on different units isn't that different, especially if you use cloning vats (more on that below).
You want to upgrade at least 9 cards per faction to L12 for some diversity of play, and adjusting to the meta.
So, what level of spending would get you to L12 within a month?
Without paying, you'd need ca. 5 months to get the 900 cards (plus credits) to get
20% of the progress within this month is free, so you need 720 additional cards
5 cloning vats (which can be run in parallel in addition to your free one that is part of the above-mentioned free progress) will yield 150 rare cards
So you need 24 cloning vats to accelerate the progress of L10 to L12 within this month.
As you want 9 cards per faction, you need 18 x 24 = 432 cloning vats. This would cost you 54,000 Diamonds in the store.
At my German store prices, this would be €400
To use the cloning vats, you'd need to play 86 days with your 30 games a day, so you'd need more than this month – or significantly increase your activity
So, this is of course wildly simplistic, as I only used cloning vats, and ignored credits. The lacking credits, if you buy them in the store, would cost you another ca. €200. So you spend €600 after a total playing time of 4 months to be very competitive not just in tournaments, but also in the ladder.
But, as a good ambitious player, you're of course using more efficient ways of spending than just the cloning vats and credits in the store! As an example for this, let's take the currently ongoing "RESOURCE CHALLENGE". For an 8-2 run, this gives you (turning the chests into cards – big thanks to Omeleet for help with the calculations):
6 cloning vats (e.g. for 180 Rare cards)
21,850 credits
1,401 common cards
257 rare cards
27 epic cards
42 diamonds
And this at a cost of 875 Diamonds (Premium Track plus Rerun Cost), i.e. a net cost of 833 Diamonds. This is much better than buying cloning vats at and credits in the store, as the following table shows:
To compare this, I calculate the Event rewards as "Rare Card" equivalents, for which I assume 3 common cards = 1 rare card and 6 rare cards = 1 epic card. See here why I chose these factors.
So at face value, the event would be 6x more efficient. Of course, cloning vats have a huge advantage compared to random cards (as you will not need many of the random cards). I assume a discount factor of 2-3 is fair to account for this. This still means that the "RESOURCE CHALLENGE" is 2-6x more cost efficient than buying cloning vats and credits in the store, depending on how you look at it.
So, in my example above, we ended up at a cost of €600 to have L12 decks after 4 months of playing with "stupid spending" (ok, real stupid spending would be buying epic chests, so let's maybe rather call it "unskilled spending".
But as rerunning events as the current "RESOURCE CHALLENGE" is much more efficient spending, you could get there with €200-300, which is €50-66 per month.
What's in those chests, actually? Thanks, Omeleet!
So, you can be very competitive in the Rivals ladder for ca. €50 per month. Is that too much?
In my view, it's about fair. How do I get to that conclusion?
It's not mandatory spending. You can play for free and still get to the Top100, as many good GDI and Nod players show. And you can still play and win all tournaments.
The €50 per month equate to less than €1 per hour. That's not a lot of money if you compare it to other types of entertainment. Maybe Netflix is cheaper if you binge watch a lot. But Cinema, Bars, Restaurants, .. – all of this is more expensive.
Even if you compare it to full price games from back in the days: Be honest, how many hours did you get in average out of €1 spent on full-price games?
This type of spending could even be considered more fair than charging €30 as a one-time payment. Because even players who ditch the game after a couple hours would pay the full €30. For example, millions of buyers of the original Starcraft payed a ton of money so that a few hardcore players like me got to play thousands of hours on the Battle.net.
Yes, it would be nice if you'd need to pay less or nothing at all. Yes, it would be nice if the rewards for non-paying players would be a bit better, still. Yes, there are players who cannot afford even €20 a month on this game. Yes, there is the risk to spend more than you can afford through the addictive, gambling-like "chest opening" and the abstraction layer of Diamonds between your money and the in-game purchases.
All this criticism is true for Rivals and most F2P games – I just want to point out that it does not actually cost thousands of Dollars or Euros to compete, and that there's a reasonable middle ground between "not spending at all" and "wasting money".
My recommendation to a new player would be:
Play the game fully for free for 2-4 weeks.
If you really like it, start spending about €1-2 a day, ideally by buying larger (i.e. more efficient) Diamond packages.
But never, ever start spending aimlessly. Track your spending meticulously to ensure you're not overspending. If you catch yourself doing it, stop! If you overspend twice, delete the app.
Use these Diamonds to rerun the best events, and maybe level up key units through Cloning Vats.
With this spending, you will progress quickly, and catch up over time to the vast majority of players even in Tiberium league.
Yes, some whales and dolphins might still be 1-2 levels ahead of you, but 80%+ of the games you play (plus all tournaments and custom games) will be very fair (or you having the advantage).
Video recommendation of the day
AliciaDestiny is one of the best Rivals players out there. Her micro is absolutely insane at times. This is a very recent video of her playing ladder. Also check out this interview with AliciaDestiny!
