Farm research priorities

Two Academy trees matter on a farm — Growth (for march slots) and Economy (for gathering speed). The order to clear them, why combat research is wasted on a farm, and the trap of output research.

The Academy on a farm is narrow. Two trees matter — Growth (for the march-slot research line) and Economy (for the gathering speed nodes). Everything else is either irrelevant (combat, defense) or actively harmful (output research, which boosts passive building production but doesn’t help map gathering).

The full research roadmap is short and predictable: clear three Growth nodes for marches, then loop through the four resource gathering chains in Economy. That’s the entire farm research book.

TL;DR

• Two trees only: Growth → Command Tactics I/II/III for march slots, and Economy → Gathering speed nodes for throughput
• Command Tactics III (Academy 18) is the final research-based march unlock — get there
• Inside Economy: clear gathering nodes for Stone and Iron first if those are your main’s bottleneck, otherwise loop all four resources evenly
• Skip output research entirely — it boosts passive building output, which is the farm’s smallest income source
• Skip every combat-tree node — military research has zero effect on gathering throughput
• Use alliance research help (free clasped-hands icon) on every farm queue — speeds up research at no cost

The order, end-to-end

1. Command Tactics I (Academy 2) — earliest march unlock; do it before anything else
2. Early Economy gathering nodes for whichever resource your main is short on (typically Stone or Iron)
3. Command Tactics II (Academy 13) — second march unlock as soon as Academy 13 is built
4. Mid Economy gathering nodes — continue the gathering chains across all four resources
5. Command Tactics III (Academy 18) — final march unlock once Academy 18 is built
6. Late Economy gathering nodes — clear the higher tiers as Academy levels open them up

This order optimizes for getting the farm to its target march count (4 marches at TC 18 + CT III) as fast as possible, then maximizing what each march produces.

The Growth tree: just the march line

On a main, the Growth tree has dozens of nodes worth chasing. On a farm, the entire tree reduces to three nodes:

That’s it. Other Growth nodes (construction speed, training speed, march speed) provide marginal benefit on a farm but cost research time you’d rather spend on Economy. Skip them.

The 5th march slot doesn’t come from research — it requires VIP 6 (~90,000 cumulative VIP XP). That arrives naturally over time from free daily VIP points; you don’t need to chase it.

The Economy tree: gathering nodes only

The Economy tree has two categories of nodes:

• Output nodes — boost passive resource production from your farm’s buildings (Farms, Sawmills, Quarries, Iron Mines)
• Gathering nodes — boost the speed of map-tile gathering

Only gathering nodes matter. Output nodes look tempting because they boost the secured resource trickle from your farm’s buildings, but on a farm at TC 18 with all resource buildings at base levels, that trickle is tiny — maybe 5–10% of the farm’s total income. The other 90%+ comes from map gathering, which output research does nothing for.

Each resource type (Bread, Wood, Stone, Iron) has its own gathering speed research chain — typically 6 tiers per resource, gated at progressive Academy levels. Lower tiers (early Academy levels) are quick and cheap; higher tiers (Academy 27–30) take days each.

Which resource to research first

Match research to gathering priority. From Daily farm routine, the default farm gathering priorities are Stone and Iron (the resources mains tend to be short on at higher TC) — so the research priority follows the same logic:

1. Stone gathering tier 1 + Iron gathering tier 1 first
2. Then Bread and Wood gathering tier 1 — even if your main has plenty, you want the option later
3. Then loop through tier 2, tier 3, etc. on all four resources

If your main is upgrading specific buildings constantly that need a specific resource, weight the research toward that resource. Otherwise, the loop-through-all-four pattern is fine.

What to skip, explicitly

These research areas appear in the Academy and look like they might help. They don’t, on a farm:

• Output research (Economy) — boosts passive building production. Tiny fraction of farm income. Skip.
• All combat research (Battle / Military tree) — your farm doesn’t fight. Skip.
• All defensive research — your farm wants to be plundered (by your main). Defensive bonuses are anti-progress. Skip.
• March speed (Growth tree) — marginal benefit on a gathering farm; not worth the research time
• Construction speed (Growth tree) — the farm only builds for the first 1–2 weeks. Won’t pay back.
• Troop training speed (Growth tree) — by the time you research it, you’ve already AFK-trained enough T5 troops for the farm’s lifetime

Alliance help speeds research, free

Every time you queue a research, your alliance members can tap the clasped-hands icon in alliance help to instantly knock minutes off your timer at no cost to anyone. Active alliances do this passively for each other all day.

The reciprocal habit: tap alliance help yourself when you log in. It costs nothing and accelerates every farm in your alliance.

Where to go next

• Farm heroes — the gathering heroes that pair with the research bonuses
• Farm build order — the building targets that gate Academy levels
• Daily farm routine — how to run the farm while the research book fills out