Tip 1: Use the right hero
When sending a march to a resource tile, you have the option to choose which hero(es) you select to lead the march. Don’t stick with the default heroes selected by the game–choose the hero based on what type of resource you are gathering. There are four heroes in the game that give a boost to gathering a specific resource, 1 hero per type of resource: Chef, Ghost, Rusty, and Mike. To increase the resource gathering boosts from these heroes, increase their hero rank using fragments.
If you forget which hero to use for a specific resource, you can check the military stats of the hero for the resource gathering speed buff. This can be tedious, so it’s best to try to memorize which hero matches to each resource. Something that can be helpful is thinking about how Chef needs Wood to start his cooking fire, Ghost needs Gas for his spray-paint cans, Rusty is what Metal is like in the infected world, and Mike (a former police officer) stereotypically eats donuts (Food). That last one is a stretch, but if it helps you remember who to send to gather food, then it works!
After selecting the right hero, the other two heroes leading the march don’t matter for gathering. You can either choose two additional heroes at random, or just leave your march to one hero.
Tip 2: Focus on higher level resources
The higher the level of the resource tile, the more resources you can collect from the tile in a shorter amount of time. Resource tiles go from level 1 to 8, and the closer you get to the center of the map, the higher the level of resources available. Try to target gathering from the highest level resource tiles that are available to you. You’ll save time by not having to resend marches as often, and you’ll be able to gather more resources in the long run.
Tip 3: Increase your march slots
The more march slots you have, the more resources you can gather concurrently. There are two ways you can increase the number of marches you can send out at once: 1) research the Leadership technologies in the development tree of your Research Lab (there’s 4 total Leadership technologies you can invest in, each adds one additional march), and 2) activate VIP 8. For more information on the VIP levels, see here.
Tip 4: Fully gather resources from tiles
If you have enough troops to send in a march to gather all the resources from a tile, be sure to send them all. Chances are you and your alliance are gathering from the same area, so you don’t want to leave some tiles with a small amount of resources left that someone else will have to clean up after you. You’ll also want to clear the tile to make room for other resources to spawn in that area of the map. Resource tile spawning blocked by unfinished tiles isn’t as aggressive as it is in games like Rise of Kingdoms, but it’s good practice to fully gather the resource from the tile to make room for more.
Tip 5: Use a Gathering Boost settlement buff
By going to the Development section of Settlement Buffs (after clicking on your Headquarters), you can purchase different Gathering Boosts. These cost biocaps, but they are absolutely worth it. For 600 biocaps, you can increase your gathering speed by 100% for 24 hours. When you reach a point where building upgrades use hundreds of millions in resources, you’ll be glad you can cut your gathering speed in half to get the resources you need. Consider always having one of these Gathering Boosts active before you send marches out to gather.
