Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About CP Runs
Conquest points only come from fighting players, and at the top end you need trillions of them. So clans stopped waiting for real fights and started building them: one player takes the whole clan's army, and somebody else agrees to lose.
Part 1 · The Runs
- A CP run is arranged, not fought. The other side is paid in silver to hand you an army to kill. It looks like a battle between clans and it's a transaction between them.
- The power player is two jobs, not one. A host supplies the army you get to farm. A tank or carrier holds your clan's reinforcements. Most of the confusion about CP runs is these two being called the same thing.
- Health decides it, not damage. Runs don't fail because nobody hit hard enough. They fail because the wrong army took the hit.
Reinforcements can count as a clan march, and some kingdoms ban clan marches during Clash for the Throne. One creator was warned and made to pay compensation for exactly this. Read your kingdom's Rules of Engagement first. Real Battles covers it.
Why anyone bothers
Conquest points gate your specialist troop tiers, army modernisation and monster boosts. Valour covers the other tracks and is easy enough to come by. Conquest points aren't, because they only come from fighting other players. The one exception is the Shadow Invasion.
By late game the upgrades want trillions, and hunting real opponents can't keep pace. So the community manufactures the fight. One side trains an enormous, deliberately fragile army and agrees to lose it. The other side farms it and settles up in silver afterwards.
Spend the points on army modernisation first. It raises the per-unit strength and health that decide how much the next run pays, so it compounds. One creator calls it the screen most players never open, and puts his surprise losses against weaker-looking armies down to opponents who did.
It's a gated ladder, so you can't rush the part you want: army strength opens army health, which opens the per-class strengths, which open siege, which opens fortifications. Ten levels each.
The two power players
The host
The heavyweight who brings the punching bag. Sits in a different clan from the people farming, so they can reinforce a neutral city. Trains one durable unit type in bulk: one verified battle report shows 741,000 tier-nine units, and a host on camera trains 112,000 in a sitting.
Everything they own is tuned for health. Health captains, health gems, health enchantments, health artifacts. Their reasoning is worth keeping: the healthier the birds, the longer they survive, and the more conquest points the attacker walks away with. A host is being paid by the point.
Treat it as a service. One host runs three clans a day and charges above the going rate because he burns speedups replacing what he loses, which he frames as fairness rather than a markup.
The tank, or carrier
The clan member everybody reinforces. This is the one people mean when they talk about the clan's power player.
- Picked for leadership, not might. Leadership caps how big an army you can hold, so the highest-leadership member fields the most stacks and lets everyone else send more.
- Might isn't the real rule though. A smaller player can tank, as long as their lowest-tier stack is tougher than the highest-tier stack any participant sends. That's the actual constraint. Might is just a shortcut for guessing it.
- Has to stay for the whole run, supplying stacks until the host's army is finally dead.
- Goes without a shield. Reinforcements can't enter a shielded city, so tanking means sitting exposed.
- Pays for it. Every source says tanking is expensive. Timing the run to Ruthless Slaughter is how everyone softens that.
- Doesn't pay upkeep on the borrowed army, though. Allied reinforcements sitting in your city don't add to your upkeep. The troops cost their owners, not you.
Three runs, not one
Every guide draws one diagram and calls it the CP run. There are at least three arrangements in circulation and they differ on the only question that decides how you set up: whose army is supposed to die.
A. The tank absorbs
The canonical diagram, and the one with a verified battle report behind it. The host reinforces a neutral CP city that's been emptied and left with damaged walls. Your tank carries the clan's reinforcements and attacks it. The host's army swings back at the tank every round, which is the design: the tank's troops are meant to die so everyone else can keep hitting in safety. That run paid out 388 billion points across the clan, and the host earned almost nothing.
B. The carrier attacks
Two dozen players reinforce one clan leader, who marches the lot into a rival clan's territory and hits a city a heavyweight over there has deliberately stocked with flying troops. One recorded run went 317 rounds, and the player filming it banked 6.54 billion points from that single run. This is the one that genuinely looks like clan warfare. It's still arranged, and still paid for.
C. One on one
No reinforcements at all. One attacker, one paid host, a single unit type each. The attacker brings Guan Yu, lands the first blow and wipes the host's stack before it can answer. This pays the most: 36.5 billion a hit, about 365 billion for a set of ten. Done properly you lose nothing at all.
His feature reads: with equal initiative and no allies in the fight, you land the first blow. Bring reinforcements, a group march or a second unit type and it stops applying. One creator recorded his first solo run without him and lost troops on every single attack, which is what that clause costs.
Your job on the day
If you're sending troops
- Turn your bonuses on before the march leaves. Conquest points and experience both. A bonus switched on after your troops have gone doesn't count.
- Then stop worrying about the clock. The timer is spent the moment you send. A one-hour bonus still applies to a fight three hours later, and only lapses when your troops come home.
- Your food pays for it. Reinforcements eat the sender's food, not the tank's, for as long as they're parked. Check your production before you commit an army to somebody else's city for an afternoon.
- Send the exact numbers you were given. Type the figure rather than dragging the slider, which snaps to the maximum. Overshoot and you break the durability ladder, and the tank stops absorbing properly.
- Bring Dustan. He carries the conquest-points bonus, half a percent per level. Bring the reinforcement captain too, the one whose bonus only fires on group marches, reinforcements and raids. Third slot goes to raw strength.
- Leave out catapults, spies and mercenaries, and any captain who doesn't fight. Carter gets sent instead of Dustan constantly.
If you're tanking
- Size it with the calculator, using its CP-runs tab. Round your own health bonus down and the participants' permitted bonus up. One tank pads that ceiling by 200 points on purpose, because being wrong in that direction is the failure that ruins the run.
- Publish round numbers. Set the significant digits so people get 3,500 rather than 3,546.
- Audit before you start. Your consulate screen lists everyone who reinforced you and what they brought. Read it, message the mistakes, and send back anyone who ignored you.
- Test on yourself first, before you hand numbers to 25 people.
- Number the runs in chat, and stop at ten.
- Send everybody home at the end, so nobody is left parked in an exposed city.
Expect the first run with a new clan to be a teaching exercise. One organiser spent an hour messaging people to swap captains out before a practice run, and says patience is the only thing that works.
The numbers
| Reported | Read it as | |
|---|---|---|
| Attacks before the points collapse | 10 | Hard wall. Eleven is pushing it |
| A clan run, whole clan | 388bn | One verified report |
| A clan run, one participant | 6.5bn | Varies wildly by your own kit |
| A single one-on-one hit | 36.5bn to 89bn | The best rate in the game |
| A set of ten, one on one | ~365bn | One player, one afternoon |
| Host's army | 741,000 | Tier nine, one unit type |
| Sent per run by the host | 18,000 to 30,000 | Tuned to what the attacker one-shots |
| A tank's holding | ~45,000 | Single source |
| Silver owed | 1m to 2m per bn | Clan convention, not a rule |
| Leadership per tier-nine flyer | 20 | What caps the whole thing |
| A defender's permanent loss | 25% | Three quarters revive |
What it costs
Lose troops defending and you revive them with silver. Lose them attacking and it's gold. During Ruthless Slaughter, attackers revive with silver too, and that single fact is why every source tells you to schedule runs into that tournament. It's the difference between a cheap afternoon and an expensive one. It comes round every five days.
Troops killed attacking epic monsters still revive with gold or Sacred Potions, Ruthless Slaughter or not. It's the temple revivals that also score you tournament points, and higher tiers score more, so a tank taking losses all afternoon is climbing that board while they do it. First place carries the Gladiator title: +10% leadership, which is the one stat deciding how big a tank can go.
A host's own worked example: 18,000 flyers killed, 13,500 back, 4,500 gone for good, 1.82 million silver to revive. His framing is the useful one. The silver is nothing. The troops are the bill.
Settling up
Nobody pays the host directly. The clan names a bank city, everyone pays in proportion to what they earned, and the host collects once. Two ways to hand it over:
- Both drop shields and the host attacks the bank.
- Or nobody drops anything. This is the citadel trick, and the wiki has never seen it patched. Both accounts have to be in different clans. Find a level 10 Elven Citadel, outside enemy clan territory so a portal can go there. The bank opens its silver packages first, to make the haul worth one trip, then attacks the citadel and does not speed up. The host attacks the same citadel and also waits. Only then does the bank speed up, kill it, and drop a portal on the tile. The bank moves its troops out to a fort, the capital or somebody else's city, and the host speeds up into the portal and leaves with the silver. Both keep their shields, and it sidesteps the 20 percent transfer tax.
- Load the collecting army for carrying, not for fighting. Highest-level captains, Zeus Lightning and the Mythril Pickaxe, and as many tier-one spearmen as the army holds: they carry the most per head and are the cheapest thing you own. Stror is the captain the creators send, for the same reason.
Every participant earns a different amount and therefore owes a different amount. Clans that run this properly keep a chart. One creator's advice, from experience: not everybody settles.
If the bank is a spare account, the wiki's recipe is worth following: turn every building but one into Mansions at the highest level you can, teleport onto a 90 percent silver tile (sand dunes or hills), point your talents at silver production, tile bonus and gathering speed, and wear high-level Honored Ruler equipment. Then build villages and mine them constantly with a high-level Carter. A retired Seasonal Kingdom account is the obvious candidate.
If nobody will partner with you
- Shadow Invasion. The only epic monster squad that pays conquest points, and it accepts reinforcements. So the same funnel works entirely inside your own clan: drop your shield, take everyone's troops, hit the shadow city.
- Your own alts. The game is built for multiple accounts, and self-hosted runs against your own are normal. One creator argues every leader should found a second clan purely to park alts and farms in, so the clan never has to ask a favour to get points.
- Cross-kingdom raiding, using the hero who can march into other kingdoms outside event windows. Pays less than a coordinated run, and invites the return visit.
Part 2 · Real Battles
What actually carries over
Kingdom chat framed this as a way to fight other clans, so it's worth being straight about it. CP runs aren't that. Even the one that marches into rival territory is a paid arrangement between friendly clans, and nothing in the sweep describes a run as a way to win a war.
The structure does carry over, though. Two ways, and the first one is the real answer to the question.
Stack one defender
Five or six players reinforcing a single defender will beat attackers of far greater might. Reinforcements multiply the number of stacks that defender fields, and stack count is the strongest thing in the game for beating a bigger army. This is the power-player play, and it's defensive.
Bait with one
A creator scouting during Clash for the Throne found a soft-looking city reinforced by a heavyweight alt running Beowulf at +208% army health and +208% army strength, on Emperor's Wrath gear, with bonuses specifically against other players. His read was that it had been left there on purpose. One power player turns a weak target into a kill zone.
The rule that stops it
During Clash for the Throne in Kingdom 56, the same creator was formally warned and had to pay compensation, because reinforcements are classed as a clan march and clan marches were prohibited under that kingdom's Rules of Engagement.
Total Battle PvP is largely self-governed by agreements between players, including inter-kingdom ones that follow you when you travel. So stacking a defender might be ordinary practice in your kingdom, banned for the length of a tournament, or banned outright. Ask before you find out.
- Save your battle reports. They're the evidence if a compensation claim lands on you.
- Hitting back forfeits your claim. The creator's own complainant lost the right to compensation by retaliating twice.
Surviving somebody else's
The pocket fort
Attacked forts burn for 40 hours. The clan capital's emergency shield lasts 20. So four developed forts hit at once outlast the shield, and the capital is standing there uncovered when it drops.
Deploy three forts and keep the fourth in your pocket. When the shield is about to expire, build it, use it to recharge the capital's shield, then demolish it. Repeat as needed. Keep resource chests back so you can rebuild.
Be a poor target
- Keep silver and gold ingots low, and ship ingots several times a day. If you haven't got what they want, there's no reason to come.
- Consider not repairing your walls. A damaged city reads as already looted.
- Leave the captain who carries conquest points at home, so a win pays them less.
- Split your troops up. Some in a fort, some mining, some out on runs. One click sends the whole army into a clan fort with your hero and captains for the night.
- Alrick buys you reaction time, and his feature still covers a city while he isn't standing in it. Scout reports show him as present.
Misdirection
- Send one troop at an enemy portal and watch who panics to close it.
- A portal that looks weak might be hiding a full army. Or be empty. Both are useful.
- Open a decoy portal to pull defenders one way, then hit somewhere else.
- Send a single slow march at a target you don't want, and note who reinforces it.
Move your city and an incoming attack simply evaporates. A superior can also pull an offline member out of clan territory to save them.
Part 3 · The Register
What the sources won't settle
Five disagreements, recorded rather than resolved. Four of them touch a number a reader would otherwise act on. They're here because a page that quietly picks a side is worse than one that says nobody knows.
Still open
Whose consulate boosts reinforcements, the sender's or the receiver's? Six witnesses now, and the documentation is split against itself. One creator states flatly that it's your own and pre-empts the opposite belief, quoting +72% on his own troops. A host demonstrates a health bonus climbing from +4,751.5% to +4,838.5% on arrival and puts it down to the receiving city. The same creator as the first, in a different video, tells you to max your own consulate to help troops sent to you. The game's own channel is on the receiver side. The wiki opens "used to receive reinforcements from your allies" and then labels its own stat table only "Str./Health of rfmts.", whose is not stated. The help centre says the bonus goes to reinforcements "that you send to allies". So the split isn't the community being careless, it's in the source material. Nobody should be giving advice on this yet.
Should participants strip their gear? One says remove equipment and artifacts, to avoid health spikes pulling damage off the tank and to save durability. One says drop the equipment but keep the artifacts. One lists the artifacts to bring by name. Some of this is a role mix-up, since the health argument only applies to participants. The artifacts question looks like genuine clan convention.
What resets the ten-attack cap? Three incompatible answers: the daily reset, something described as "plus seven", and losing an attack on purpose. The sources don't even agree on scope, whether the cap counts per player or per player, city and army together.
Who loses troops in a clan run? One account has participants hitting in complete safety. Another warns them they will lose troops and says the carrier loses most. Probably a difference between topology A and B rather than a real contradiction, but the advice is published without saying which one it assumes.
What is a run actually worth in silver? One million per billion, two million per billion, a host-set rate between the two, or a flat 200 million a run. This isn't a game rule at all, it's local custom, so treat any single figure you're quoted as your kingdom's rather than the game's.
What each claim stands on
The Atlas ships a claim on two independent sources or one official one. Most of what this sweep turned up is still on one witness, which makes it recorded and usable rather than load-bearing. The last group cleared the bar.
CP runs
A tank's standard holding is around 45,000 flying guardsmen.
Tier nine on both sides maximises everyone's yield, because points scale with tier. Consistent with the 1.8125 tier ratio already in the ledger.
"5v1" is a named third format. No other source uses the term and a dedicated search found nothing.
Your dragon's level affects the points you earn.
Coordination apps exist for PC clients. Unnamed.
Equipment
A complete set of any one equipment family multiplies that hero's set stats by 1.5 times in battle. Tier and colour don't matter, only completeness. Read off the in-game text on camera.
Equipment loses one durability per strike, so ten attacks cost ten points. Two sources, and the reason both give for leaving it at home.
Events
Lava Seals may replace conquest points in the reworked Lava Fountain. Explicitly speculation on camera, not a finding. Worth rechecking, because letting players attack you there used to be a real farm.
From the wiki and help centre
Ruthless Slaughter recurs every five days and allows silver revivals, except for troops killed attacking epic monsters, which still cost gold or Sacred Potions. Tournament points come from temple revivals and scale with troop tier; rank one carries the Gladiator title, +10% leadership.
The citadel trick, step by step: different clans, a level 10 Elven Citadel outside enemy clan territory, neither side speeding up until the defender kills it, a portal placed on the tile, and tier-one spearmen with Zeus Lightning and the Mythril Pickaxe for carrying capacity. Documented as never patched.
Army modernisation is a Conquest research chain, gated in order: army strength, then army health, then the per-class strengths, then siege engines, then fortifications. Ten levels per node.
The silver-city build: all buildings but one turned to max-level Mansions, teleported onto a 90% silver tile, talents into silver production, tile bonus and gathering speed, Honored Ruler equipment, and villages mined constantly with a high-level Carter.
Reinforcements consume the sender's food, and allied reinforcements hosted in a city do not add to the host's army upkeep. The same two sources are the ones that disagree about whose consulate the strength and health bonus comes from.
Corroborated elsewhere
The 20 percent tax on player-to-player sends, which the citadel-portal trick avoids. Backs the existing ledger row.
Defenders revive with silver, attackers with gold, and both with silver during Ruthless Slaughter. Three sources, and consistent with the official 90 and 75 percent revival rates.
Guan Yu's first-blow clause, and that it lapses the moment allies join. Now three witnesses, two of them reading the in-game text.
Names the captions mangled
Auto-captions are the only transcript most of these videos have, and they garble proper nouns badly. Resolved against the master ledger:
| Heard as | Actually |
|---|---|
| Gu, GU, Guanu, Guy | Guan Yu |
| Dustin, Dust, Destan | Dustan |
| 80, Aday, aay, iay | Aydae |
| Ramsay II | Ramses II |
| w etm, Woo | Wu Zetian |
| Tangle | Tengel |
| PR scope, Proscope | Procopius |
| Bay Wolf, Bewolf, Bearwolf | Beowulf |
| straw | Stror |
| orick, oric, Ori, all Rick | Alrick |
| suo, SUV, super | silver |
Still open, and kept as heard rather than guessed at:
"a manator", "Amanator", "animator", "Amur"
The reinforcement captain, whose health and strength bonus only fires on group marches, reinforcements and raids. She's in five of the transcripts and she's central to every run, so this is the one worth settling from a screenshot. Note the warning that comes with her: on a solo march her bonus does nothing, so never bring her when you're marching alone.
"Cororax", "Corax 2", "CarX", "Korax"
The tier-nine flying guardsman at the centre of nearly every run. Almost certainly Corvorax II.
"Smiffer 2", "Smither 2"
The tier-nine unit in the one fully verified battle report.
"Aaron", "Ain", "Aerin", "Irene"
The hero who walks on water, which is how you march into another kingdom outside an event window.
Gear sets: "Honoured Ruler", "Swift Wayfarer", "Great Skybreaker"
A host's three working sets: production while training, carrying capacity for collecting silver, and a complete set of anything to trigger the full-set multiplier.
"Emperor's Raph", "Emperor's WFT", "Emperor's WRA"
Emperor's Wrath, the PvP equipment. Its material comes from Conqueror's Revival during Clash for the Throne, which means you have to revive troops to unlock it.
Others heard once each
"Zatan", "Zarang", "Minamoto", "Bernard", "Logos", "Nectarius", "Legitimus", "Purifiers", "Dead shots".
Where this came from
38 transcripts, harvested across 14 search angles, plus six reference pages. Two video candidates had no caption track and were dropped. The flagship guide is also published in eight other languages by its own creator, which adds nothing, so those aren't counted.
The five that carry the article are first, and the reference pages are last. Army Stacking and Before the Gates Open share several of these channels.
TBFALEX / TBEALEX is the strongest on the theory of why runs pay what they pay. XULQIMOON records real runs including his own failures, which is rarer and more useful than it sounds. Both are new to the Atlas's source list. BattleBites and [LOS] Legion of Shadows are the ones to send a new participant.
A short video answering this exact question describes runs roughly correctly but calls clans "alliances" and cites "arena battles", which is Rise of Kingdoms vocabulary. It's derivative content about a different game's mechanics. Nothing here rests on it.