This guide will teach you how to both play Adeptus Mechanicus and properly build your economy in the most optimal way possible. Everything you learn here will also be applicable to every other faction in the game. So even if you're not a fan of Adeptus Mechanicus I highly recommend all players of all factions to read this guide at least once to learn how to properly build your economy.

This guide was made for standard pace. All the data and spreadsheets in this guide was gathered from standard pace games.

If you have any questions or comments, post here: https://cs2bus.com/app/489630/discussions/0/4206994023677973022/

The main faction gimmicks of Adeptus Mechanicus's are these four things:
1. You can build 1 additional building on each tile than normal.
2. The same building in each tile gives a bonus where as different buildings in each tile gives a malus.
3. Adeptus Mechanicus has an active ability called Power Surge that gives a 35% bonus to all buildings in a tile for 6 turns.

Because of these 3 gimmicks, the Adeptus Mechanicus holds the title of strongest economy in the game by a considerable margin and as a result also holds the title of the strongest endgame faction in the game. I don't think it's an exaggeration to say the Adeptus Mechanicus's economy is literally twice the strength of a normal faction. From direct measuring, endgame Adeptus Mechanicus has about 40% more flat resource income and 40% more loyalty than other factions, resulting in a whopping 96% more resources than other factions. So if you like playing the strongest endgame faction in the game then you should definitely play Adeptus Mechanicus.

NOTE: The description for the Adjacency bonus is misleading so I will set the record straight here. Buildings not in the same hex have 0 impact on each other. So whether a building is surrounded by 0 or 24 buildings in surrounding hexes is completely irrelevant.

NOTE2: If you have 4 of the same building in the same tile the Adjacency Bonus is normally 1.2. So if you have four research buildings, you will have 6 + 6 + 6 + 6 + 1.2 + 1.2 + 1.2 + 1.2 = 28.8 research. The Lucian Specialization tech boosts this by 0.4 for a total of 1.6 and the techs that boost adjacency bonus for a specific resource boost it by a further 0.2-0.7 depending on the resource. (Food, Ore, Loyalty get +0.5, Research and Energy get +0.2, and Influence gets +0.7)

Another reason to play the Adeptus Mechanicus is the lore. At first I did not like the Adeptus Mechanicus because they excessively utilize lobotomized humans for everything, which is too cruel for me. But turns out they can also just vat-grow blank humans and program things into their brain from there. So no lobotomy here if they so choose. Their Skitarii similarly can be both lobotomized humans or vat grown blank humans.

In addition, if you listen to them talk, the Adeptus Mechanicus units are far more robotic than the other robot faction in the game: the Necrons, who act like a bunch of Egyptian warriors squabbling about honor, beasts, gods, and traditions and never about science, technology, or knowledge. Which means in my opinion, despite all the flesh, Adeptus Mechanicus is the true robot faction of Warhammer 40k. Which is something I really like.

There are also other minor things in lore. They possess the ability to convert any matter into any other matter. Their knights possess micro fabricators that can build bullets out of what seems to be thin air. Tech-priests will never die of old age, etc.

There's a lot more to the faction than what I described here. They have tons and tons of books dedicated to them. So if you like any of this then you should definitely play Adeptus Mechanicus.

Ultra Hard difficulty is the 2nd highest difficulty in the game.

Ultra Hard difficulty is the highest difficulty you can beat on full default settings.
I repeat. On full default settings where every map setting is set to "medium", Ultra Hard is the highest difficulty you can beat.

On Ultra Hard difficulty, once the AI spots you, the AI will bear its full stockpiled army on you and because the AI severely outnumbers you, you need to have your cities tank the majority of your opponent's attacks while healing it like crazy with your Tech-Priest Manipuluses.

However, unlike Impossible difficulty, you are not out-teched. You won't see a turn 59 Obelisk or Scythed Hierodule, making the fight winnable. And once you defeat the AI's stockpiled army, the AI is essentially defeated because it will now only send a trickle of units your way.

And once you clean up their cities, you win.

Word of warning however, if you are playing against more than 1 AI, the next AI to make contact with you will have an even bigger stockpile of units and it is just as dangerous as the AI you just defeated so you need to retreat back to your cities and have them tank the new stockpiled army just the same otherwise you will get wiped.

Impossible difficulty differs from Ultra Hard difficulty in 2 ways.

• 1. You are severely out teched. Impossible AI is gonna throw endgame units at you as early as turn 59 and in this game, there is not a chance in hell lower tier units can take out endgame units especially if they're also outnumbered.
  
• 2. After defeating the AI's stockpiled army, the waves and waves of units the AI throws at you afterwards is NOT a trickle. Unlike Ultra Hard difficulty, you have NOT essentially won after you defeat the stockpiled army. The pressure never relents.

Because the AI out techs you so severely, it is not possible to beat Impossible Difficulty on full default settings because there is not a chance in hell you can take out a turn 59 Obelisk. If you want to beat Impossible Difficulty you need to skew the map settings so that the AI leaves you alone for 80 turns and you spend those 80 turns getting to your endgame unit a.s.a.p. and maximize your economy to the point where you can afford to pump out your endgame units nonstop.

Wildlife Density is one of the best settings to delay contact with the AI. The Impossible AI's stockpiled army loves to wipe the map clean of all wildlife before bearing down on you so with Very High Wildlife Density, while you might fight the AI as early as turn 50 on a 1v1 Tiny map, the AI won't bear its full army on you until turn 80+.

Map Size is also one of the best settings to delay contact with the AI. Very High Wildlife on a Huge Map against 1 Impossible AI results in 0 contact even at turn 200 so the game is stupidly boring but this is how you cheese Impossible difficulty.

Wire Weed Density is also a great setting to delay contact with the AI. The AI does not remove Wire Weed so not only do they have to traverse a maze but they also can't really gang up on your units due to the immense amount of wire weed on the battlefield.

Landmass is just choke points. Lots of water means land units get bogged down severely meaning combat with Impossible AI will mostly involve air and floating units. Let me just say, it is possible to beat Impossible Difficutly on full default settings if you get really, really lucky with the map generation with medium Land mass. I once had a game where the cliffs and lakes were so obtrusive that I was in a penninsula and the AI failed to get 1 land unit to me until turn 120.

You get the point. If you want to beat Impossible difficulty, no combat for 80 turns.

Having said that, if you follow my guide, because Adeptus Mechanicus is so strong, you can beat any and all Impossible AIs 1v1 on a Tiny map with full default settings EXCEPT Wildlife Density. Very High Wildlife Density is the sole non-default setting you need to beat Impossible Difficulty AI 1v1 on a Tiny map as Adpetus Mechanicus if you follow this guide.

For 1v1 impossible, as someone who beat every faction 1v1 on a tiny map, I really can't say which faction is stronger or weaker. They all feel identical. Ungodly horde of lower tier units and a handful of ultimate units. All of which can't penetrate my band of Onager Dunecrawlers and Skorpius Disintegrators on city tiles being healed by a Tech-Priest Manipuluses and when I get my horde of Knight Crusaders out they all get chopped down right quick. That said, if I had to choose, I'd say Necrons are possibly the hardest because Obelisks are really, really tough and they hit really, really hard, and Space Marines are the weakest because them being restricted to a single city with no real ultimate unit really hurts them.

For Free for Alls, in my experience, the Ork AI is the strongest AI. In all the free for alls I've done, I'd say they won pretty much 90% of the time and they were always the endgame stockpiled army I had to face.

I'd say Astra Militarum AI is about 2nd strongest because when Orks didn't win the free for all, it's usually AM.

Conversely Eldar, Tau, and Tyranids are the weakest AIs in my experience. Eldar can't make new cities and the AI is very good at popping all the webway gates asap so they are always severely outclassed. Tau's utopia mechanic murders all economies in the game and AI Tau's economy is not spared from this fate making them one of the worst AI controlled factions in the game. Tyranids incompetence came as a surprise to me but the reason in my opinion is because of the terrible AI rather than the weakness of the faction. Last time I saw them they spammed an ungodly sea of malanthropes which don't do anything. Let me just say, I've seen an Impossible Tyranid AI lose to Ultra Hard AIs. AI Tyranids are very weak.

And the rest are all kinda the same. I haven't seen any of them win or lose more. Space marines to my surprise make it to the endgame most of the time despite being restricted to a single city but I'd still put them on the lower end of the spectrum because of it. For Necrons similarly I'd put them on the lower end of the spectrum because of the fact that they can't make multiple cities without cutting through hordes of wildlife or incurring the wrath of multiple AI.

The Tau has been chosen as the target dummy of this section because they have a healthy mix of all 4 unit types: Infantry, Vehicle, Monstrous Creature, and air, throughout their entire roster allowing you to see how well each unit does against low/high tier units of all unit types. The Tau has also been chosen because they house the strongest unit in the entire game: The KV128 Stormsurge.

The numbers indicate what percent of the unit's maximum health they would take out with an attack. So 100 means the unit will die in one hit and 5 means the unit will only lose 5% of its health.

The green parts of the spreadsheets indicate your unit's damage against the Tau units, and the red parts indicate the Tau unit's damage against your units. Some units have a second column of green indicating how much damage Adeptus Mechanicus units would deal against them when they have as many defensive battlesuit support systems as possible on them, and some units have multiple columns of red indication how much damage their abilities would do against your units.

All units used in the testing were at level 10 with max morale and with all techs researched.

Infantry v.s. Vehicle
Adeptus Mechanicus Infantry are glass cannon anti-units. As in each unit has extremely high damage against specific unit types, but extremely low damage against all other unit types and also suffers from very frail defenses.

Adeptus Mechanicus Vehicles are conversely tanky all-purpose units. As in each unit can take a lot of punishment but deals unimpressive damage against all unit types equally.

The main benefit of Adeptus Mechancius infantry builds is the Kataphron Destroyer timing. As no tier 1-6 unit in the Adeptus Mechanicus roster has even a remote chance in hell of taking down a high tier unit, getting the Kataphron Destroyer an entire tier earlier than the vehicle build's equivalent is tremendous because the time it takes to get from tier 7 to tier 8 is no joke. By the time vehicle builds get their first Skorpius Disintegrator out infantry builds would already have a full army of Kataphron Destroyers out. So if you plan on waging the earliest war possible against an Impossible AI you go Infantry. I think it is also important to note that not only does the Kataphron Destroyer do more damage than the Skorpius Disintegrator, but Kataphron Destroyers also benefit from the Benediction of Omniscience canticle, which increases their accuracy by a whopping 50%. So it's not an exaggeration to say that every 3 turns Kataphron Destroyers will do literally double the damage of Skorpius Disintegrators. And they're cheaper than Skorpius Disintegrators to boot. Kataphron Destroyers are literally the sole reason you ever go Adeptus Mechanicus Infantry.

The main benefit of Adeptus Mechanicus vehicle builds is its synergy with the Knight Crusader. The Knight Crusader is your strongest unit by far and once you research it there is literally 0 reason to build anything else even if you go an infantry build. The Knight Crusader uses ore for upkeep just like all other Adeptus Mechanicus vehicles so a vehicle build can just switch to pumping only Knight Crusaders out without any difficulty. Infantry builds on the other hand, cannot. Because of the way the Gladius economy works, infantry builds will be forced to build mostly Kataphron Destroyers even after the Knight Crusader is researched and will also be forced to produce a lot less Knight Crusaders compared to vehicle builds. The reason is the vast bulk of your economic growth is going to come from loyalty buildings which means if you have mostly food buildings, then the loyalty buildings are going to boost mostly food. Trying to make a ton more ore buildings instead of loyalty buildings in this situation will stall both your Kataphron Destroyer production which could be fatal, but also your economy as a whole as well. So if you go infantry, you are stuck utilizing Kataphron Destroyers until the end of the game, which might be worth it because getting anti-high tier units an entire tier earlier could be the difference between victory and defeat.

A second benefit of Adeptus Mechanicus vehicle builds is that vehicles can take hits without losing their damage output. As single model units, they could be at 0.1 hp and still deal their full damage every turn where as infantry, being multi-model units, will lose damage even after a scratch. So while the Knight Crusaders and Skorpius Disintegrators can stand their ground on the frontline until they're almost dead, Kataphron Destroyers will have to retreat after only taking 1 hit to heal up.

I would not recommend going both Infantry and Vehicles.

• First, you need more unit production buildings and early game, every resource building matters so just by building more unit production buildings you're hurting your economy.
  
• Second the units play very differently. Adeptus Mechanicus Vehicles like to reach a critical mass of units and focus fire units to death with their tremendous range where as Adeptus Mechanicus infantry like to go in, unleash their payload, and retreat to heal while a second infantry takes their place in the frontline. So if you mix the two up, you will not reach the critical mass of vehicles nor have the sufficient anti-units to replace retreating wounded ones.
  
• Lastly, the two unit types benefit from very different Research techs and Adeptus Mechanicus has too many things to research already.

Skitarii Vanguard
The bread and butter of all infantry builds. They are extremely cheap for their effectiveness. They are what makes Adeptus Mechanicus infantry builds viable. They are a serious contender for best low tier unit in the entire game and they remain useful even at tier 6. Spam them endlessly. Their Achilles Heel however is overwatch. As essentially melee units, running into an enemy army will result in their deaths so its better to play defense with them than offense.

Skitarii Ranger
They are worse than Vanguards against infantry but are better than Vanguards against monstrous creatures. They also have range 3 but at the same time they cost twice that of a Vanguard without being tankier. So only build Rangers once you have enough Vanguards to not only fill up the entire frontline, but also to replace wounded ones until they're healed up. It's important to note that despite using heavy weapons, they don't receive a penalty for moving thanks to their relentless trait.

Serberys Sulphurhounds
In my opinion this unit is useless. It's essentially melee like the vanguard, but costs more, deals less damage, and most importantly, requires research. Adeptus Mechanicus has so many techs they need researching to the point delaying all of them for anything is a huge cost that this unit fails to pay back. Skip.

Sicarian Infiltrators
A melee unit that costs twice that of a Vanguard yet is barely tankier and deals a minor amount more damage. Its main benefit is that it ignores overwatch but at the price of 2 Vanguards I'd rather just sacrifice a Vanguard and eat up several overwatch shots for my other Vanguards than use this unit. This unit however is a straight upgrade to the Vanguard so if you are swimming in resources, it's not the worst idea to start building this unit but in my opinion, because this unit's research contests 4 other mandatory techs, I'd recommend you skip.

Kataphron Breachers
Your first anti-vehicle unit. Does even more damage against vehicles than Onager Dunecrawlers. The envy of vehicle builds, having a healthy mix of Breachers, Rangers, and Vanguards will have all your bases covered. A mandatory unit because all your other infantry unit cannot scratch vehicles, not even the T6 Pteraxi Sterylizers.

Sicarian Ruststalkers
This is a weird unit. It's a straight upgrade to the Sktarii Vanguard in every way but not by much and it costs more than twice that of a single Vanguard, and it's even more expensive than the Pteraxii Sterylizors. As such if resources is the bottleneck this unit is worthless.

It does more damage to vehicles than most infantry including the Pteraxii Sterylizors but still does a lot less damage than a Kataphron Breacher so it's not an anti-tank unit. It is noticeably tankier than most other infantry. In fact it's slightly tankier than a Kataphron Destroyer but that's not saying much because I consider Kataphron Destroyers glass.

Its true niche seems to be being a true melee unit but that also means no overwatch.

I don't know. I think I would prefer it over the Pteraxii Sterylizors because of its tankiness so it can keep my Rangers alive but only if I'm swimming in resources. Personally I'd skip as there's too many techs to research at T5 already.

Pteraxii Sterylizors
Your jump infantry. A straight upgrade to the vanguard yet a wholly unimpressive unit. It's not tankier than the Vanguard, eats up overwatch shots just the same, and costs twice as much as a Vanguard, but they do do about twice as much damage as one. So only build if you're swimming in resources because 2 vanguards are always better than 1 Pteraxii Sterylizors until you run out of room on the front line.

Kataphron Destroyers
The true envy of vehicle builds, this unit is the reason why you go Infantry builds. He is the earliest unit you have that can kill high tier units and as an anti-everything unit, there is literally no reason to build any other infantry than this one once you research it. Fragile as hell though so always keep a Tech-Priest Manipulus next to it at all times to keep it healthy and shooting at full power 24/7.

It's important to note that Benediction of Omniscience gives Kataphron Destroyers a 50% accuracy increase, which essentially lets each Kataphron Destroyer deal double the damage of Skorpius Disintegrator every 3 turns. So if going infantry as Adeptus Mechanicus, always research Benediction of Omniscience.

Ironstrider Ballistaurius
This unit is a contender for strongest tier 1 unit in the game. It has range 3, excellent movement, tanky, single model, and no penalties for moving and shooting on the same turn. On a flat map where all your Ironstrider Ballistauriuses can focus fire on the same target they become impregnable. Don't be afraid of making too many of them because they are pretty much just as cost effective as Onager Dunecrawlers, sometimes even more cost effective.

On the other hand, on maps where they can't shoot anything further than what's directly in front of them, their effectiveness takes a nosedive.

Skorpius Dunerider
Your transport unit. Transport units aren't really used to transport infantry. They're used to keep wounded ones from dying or impeding the rest of your healthy infantry from reaching the frontlines. Against Ultra Hard and Impossible AI you are not going to go on the offensive until you have a critical mass of Knight Crusaders so I recommend you skip this unit against them.

As assault vehicles, stored infantry can take their full move action and attack on the same turn they exit the vehicle so you can keep the Duneriders a fair bit behind the front lines out of harms way.

Kastelan Robot
Just as or more cost effective than Ironstrider Ballistauriuses for defense, but does the same damage as one against everything except low tier infantry. Personally I'd just grab two Ironstrider Ballistauriuses than ever build a single Kastelan Robot.

The main thing that kills the effectiveness of this unit is its requirement of energy to purchase and use of energy as upkeep. No other vehicle unit does this so growing your energy income instead of your ore income just for this unit is terrible. In addition, it is extremely difficult to grow your energy income early game as your first round of Hab Fanes and additional Artisan Constructorums will make you struggle to stay above 0 energy well into the mid game.

The only reason I'd ever build Kastelan Robots is either because I want to because I like robots, or because I intend to win the game with the Archaeopter Stratoraptors as they also use energy as upkeep. The latter never happens so my recommendation is to skip this unit.

Sydonian Dragoon
The main anti-armor unit of Vehicle Admech. Having said that it's not actually an anti-armor unit. It's just a melee unit that happens to deal the most damage against vehicles out of all the early game Admech vehicles. It does twice the damage of Ironstrider Ballistauriuses against vehicles despite being only 33% more expensive but it does less damage than an Onager Dunecrawler so build only if you're going low research. Otherwise skip and grab Onager Dunecrawlers a.s.a.p.

Onager Dunecrawler
Straight upgrade to the Ironstrider Ballistaurius and a great anti-air unit. They are just as cost effective if not more so than Ironstrider Ballistauriuses against land units and they're so great against air units that I bring them along with my Knight Crusaders when I go for the endgame push so start building these instead of Ironstrider Ballistauriuses the moment you research it. Can't handle high tier units so keep that in mind.

Skorpius Disintegrator
Your first unit that can kill high tier units. He comes out a little too late however, and Knight Crusaders are just around the corner. Still though, you will be switching production to this unit the moment you research it because you really, really, really need something that can handle high tier units right now.

This unit is a straight upgrade to the Onager Dunecrawler and is more cost effective than the Onager Dunecrawler in both tankiness and damage except against air units so there is literally 0 reason to build any other unit than this unit once you research it.

Knight Crusader
The ultimate unit of the Adeptus Mechanicus. While it's not the strongest endgame unit in the game, it is backed by the strongest economy in the game allowing you to outnumber all other endgame units in the game by at least a factor of 2. Effective against all with no weaknesses, once you research it spam only it. I'd like to point out that its stomp is much stronger than the KV128 Stormsurge's stomp.

Cybernetica Datasmith
Your city builder, your tile clearer, and your non-hero healing unit. Personally if I go the vehicle build I spend 100% of my excess food on these guys. I mainly use these guys to clear a highway to the enemy base instead of as healers. Their healing on Knight Crusaders is not really noticeable until you have like 6 of them, which doesn't happen until the ultra-late game.

Fulgurite Electro-Priests
Absolutely worthless unit in every way imaginable. Never research. Never build. Not even to help you get the Adeptus Monotonous achievement. I got mine without building a single one of these so forget this unit exists and never ever I mean ever research or build them.

Archaeopter Transvector
Completely inferior to the Kastelan Robot in combat while costing the same, and at tier 7 you should be spamming Kataphron Destroyers which are too bulky to be worth using in transports so I would skip.

Archaeopter Stratoraptor
Decent unit, but it suffers from the fact that it's on the same tier as Skorpius Disintegrators, the fact that its upkeep is energy instead of ore or food, and the fact that it requires its own separate production building. The Skorpius Disintegrator costs the same as this unit and outperforms it in everyway except against air units and doesn't have any of the drawbacks so whether you go infantry or vehicle, there is no reason to build this unit over the Skorpius Disintegrator.

I will say I see myself building this unit if all my cities are building 1 Knight Crusader every turn. Rather than build a new city for more Knight Crusaders I'd probably start building this unit. However, if I'm building 1 Knight Crusader from every city every turn then I've pretty much won the game so out of sheer laziness I'd probably just not do anything.

Skitarii Marshal
This unit increases damage of all nearby infantry by 17%, and can increase damage of a single infantry by 75%~125% every 2 turns. However, as a hero, he has a hefty influence cost and as Adeptus Mechanicus, you really don't want to be building even 1 influence building. I'd rather get a second Tech-Priest Manipulus than this unit especially since I don't think that extra 17% damage aura will allow Skitarii Vanguards to 1 shot what normally takes 2 shots to take down, or 2 shot what normally takes 3 shots to take down.

Tech-Priest Manipulus
The best hero in the Adeptus Mechanicus roster. I spend 100% of my influence on this guy. Its 24hp a turn heal is absolutely game changing to the point this is the only hero I ever make no matter their skyrocketing cost to build. If my influence income is 13 I build a Tech-Priest Manipulus and knock it back down to 7.

Tech-Priest Dominus
This is a very interesting unit. It increases your vehicles' damage by a decent 25-35% but the range is only 1 tile so you need to move this unit around every turn to buff enough vehicles to be worth it. And it also removes 33% of the enemy's ranged damage reduction upon meleeing it, increasing the damage of your ranged vehicles against it even further. And once this unit hits level 6 it pays for itself. You get 12 research and 12 influence per turn and this unit costs 4 food and 8 influence a turn. So this unit's cost is really an opportunity cost.

Personally I'd skip though. Combat heroes get roflstomped by endgame units, at the difficulty I play at (Ultra Hard and impossible) endgame units arrive too quickly, the buff in damage this guy gives is less than a 2nd Knight Crusader, I don't like building Influence buildings, a 2nd Tech-Priest Manipulus will do way more than this unit ever could and costs only 80 more influence, and by the time I can afford a 3rd hero I'm already at Knight Crusaders at which point it's still better to make more Tech-Priest Manipuluses.

Also i rather research Sydonian Dragoon or Adjacency Integration than this guy.

The bottleneck for all economies in Gladius is population growth speed. Meaning neither building construction time nor cost of each building matters. The most optimal way of building your economy is making sure each building you build results in the most amount of gain to ensure we get the most out of each and every pop because population growth speed is the bottleneck of your economy.

So lets say each resource building increases your income by 6 and decreases it by 1 (upkeep) and 1% (pop loyalty). And each additional loyalty building increases your income by 6% and decreases it by 2 (upkeep) and 1% (pop loyalty). When is it better to build a resource building and when is it better to build a loyalty building?

To find the answer first we model the problem as an equation with only two variables

If you noticed I merged all the food, ore, and energy buildings into one. I tried to separate them at first but the resulting equation was so long and complicated I had to simplifiy it this way. On the plus side, you can use these equations for all the factions including Tyranids.

Influence is not included because I find myself never caring about influence, but if you want to include Influence you can. Just treat x as food+ore+energy+influence instead of just food+ore+energy. It doesn't matter. Influence gives 6 resource and runs on energy just like every other resource building.



We then use Excel to brute force the results and highlight the most optimal growth.

If you notice, from 15 resources buildings and 4 loyalty buildings onward, the most optimal growth falls into a repeating pattern of 5 resource buildings to 7 loyalty buildings. In other words, after building 15 resource buildings and 4 loyalty buildings, the most optimal way to grow your economy is to keep all newly built resource and loyalty buildings at a 5:7 ratio. So with 20 resource buildings you should have 11 loyalty buildings. With 25 resource buildings you should have 18 loyalty buildings. And at 30 resource buildings you should have 25 loyalty buildings.

Now, it's important to note that at the start of the spreadsheet each resource building gives about 7 resource per building but by the time you're about 50 buildings in each building gives 20 resource per building. This is the difference between just keeping your loyatly above 0 and following the optimal ratio. Your economy will literally more than triple.

But wait! What about multiple cities? What about multiple Manufactorum Cyberneticas and Genetor Caropraediums? What about multiple Sub-Cloisters? What about less than 4 research buildings?

Rather than make a separate spreadsheet for each and every scenario I made a calculator. I'll share it with you. Here are my upgraded formulas
On your choice of Excel program, recreate the following image identically

And on that highlighted tile B8, input this equation EXACTLY

=IF((((1+IF((4-6*$B$1-$B$3-$B$2-$A8+5*($B7+2)+$B$5*($B7+2))>0,1,2)*(4-6*$B$1-$B$3-$B$2-$A8+5*($B7+2)+$B$5*($B7+2))/100)*(78+6*$B$3+18*$A8+3*$B$4*$A8)-20-10*$B$3-7*$B$2-7*$A8-10*($B7+2))/3)>(((1+IF((4-6*$B$1-$B$3-$B$2-($A8+1)+5*($B7+1)+$B$5*($B7+1))>0,1,2)*(4-6*$B$1-$B$3-$B$2-($A8+1)+5*($B7+1)+$B$5*($B7+1))/100)*(78+6*$B$3+18*($A8+1)+3*$B$4*($A8+1))-20-10*$B$3-7*$B$2-7*($A8+1)-10*($B7+1))/3),$B7+2,IF((((1+IF((4-6*$B$1-$B$3-$B$2-$A8+5*($B7+1)+$B$5*($B7+1))>0,1,2)*(4-6*$B$1-$B$3-$B$2-$A8+5*($B7+1)+$B$5*($B7+1))/100)*(78+6*$B$3+18*$A8+3*$B$4*$A8)-20-10*$B$3-7*$B$2-7*$A8-10*($B7+1))/3)>(((1+IF((4-6*$B$1-$B$3-$B$2-($A8+1)+5*$B7+$B$5*$B7)>0,1,2)*(4-6*$B$1-$B$3-$B$2-($A8+1)+5*$B7+$B$5*$B7)/100)*(78+6*$B$3+18*($A8+1)+3*$B$4*($A8+1))-20-10*$B$3-7*$B$2-7*($A8+1)-10*$B7)/3),$B7+1,$B7))

For those of you who don't own an Excel program I'll give you the most relevant tables in my experience in the next section. I won't give you every possible table because that's just excessive.

Just in case there's any confusion

• The calculator calculates the optimal number of resource and loyalty buildings you should have in ONE CITY ONLY. So if you have multiple cities then you have to run the calculator for each city.
  
• Additional Cities: 0 if you have only one city, 1 if you have two cities, and 2 if you have three cities.
  
• Research: Number of Research buildings you have in the city.
  
• Manufactorum Cybernetica: How many unit production buildings you have. So if you have 2 Genetor Caropraediums and 2 Manufactorum Cyberneticas in the city you are calculating, you would input 4 here.
  
• Resource Adjacency Bonus:
  For non-admech factions it's 0.
  For Admech it's 1.2 by default.
  After you research Lucian Specialization it's 1.6.
  And after you research Soylens Acquisition Teams/Triplex Necessity/Solar Reflector, it's... complicated. Food and Ore get +0.5 but energy only gets 0.2.
  I just put 2.1 here because while the difference between 0.2 and 0.5 seems huge, if we look at the total resource output of the resource building, it's 7.8 energy v.s. 8.1 food/ore. Only a 3.7% difference which is negligible. And that difference is reduced even further because the majority of your buildings are gonna be Ore. And there's no need to run a precision operation here. Close enough is more than good enough.
  
• Loyalty Adjacency Bonus: For non-admech factions it's 0. For Admech it's 1.2 by default. After you research Lucian Specialization it's 1.6. And after you research Icons of the Omnissiah it's 2.1
  
• Resource: The sum total of Food, Ore, and Energy buildings you have in the city. So if you have 4 food, 8 energy, and 4 ore buildings, you have 16 resource buildings so go look at the 16 entry and see how many Loyalty Buildings you should have.
  
• Loyalty: number of loyalty buildings you should have in the city when you have x amount of resource buildings.

I'd just like to point out loyalty buildings don't actually cost more than resource buildings. Resource buildings cost 30 and take 2 turns to build. Loyalty buildings cost 50 and take 3 turns to build. Because population growth speed is the bottleneck, the extra turn to construct the loyalty is irrelevant, and 50/3 = 16.7 ore per turn and 30/2 = 15 ore per turn, meaning there really isn't an increased strain on your economy. Both buildings consume only 15-ish ore per turn. So in other words, loyalty buildings aren't really more expensive than resource buildings in practice.

In my experience, these are the most useful tables.

0 Research
0 Manufactorum Cyberneticas
This table is what all your 2nd and 3rd cities are gonna follow until your economy exceeds +165 ore per turn.

0 Research
4 Manufactorum Cyberneticas
This table is what all of your cities are gonna follow at the end. Once you got all your key researches you should shutdown your 4 research buildings in your 1st city and once you exceed +165 ore per turn you should build 4 Cybernetica Manufactorums in your additional cities.

1-4 Research
2 Manufactorum Cyberneticas
Only my first city has research and I initially build all my Cybernetica Manufactorums only in my first city to make looking up these tables easier.
I am at 2 Manufactorum Cyberneticas for the entirety of my early game and I don't build more until I am at 4 research.

4 Research
4 Manufactorum Cyberneticas
What your first city will be following until all the techs you need are researched, which is not until endgame.

Just a quick reminder, the Resource entry is the sum of all Ore, Energy, and Food buildings you have. Influence too if you want. So add up all the Ore, Energy, and Food buildings you have for a single city and look up the corresponding table to know how many Loyalty buildings you should have in that city. And do this for each city you have.

These tables are for Non-Admech factions. Note the 0 Adjacency Bonuses.
Single City Tables
Two Cities Tables
Three Cities Tables

I will repeat again that all of these tables work for all the factions and not just Adeptus Mechanicus.



Rather than give you tables of every single possible combination of Adjacency Bonuses, I just provided tables with Adjacency Bonuses I think you'd have at that point in the game based on my personal experiences. If you follow my build order you're not gonna research Lucian Specialization until after you get 4 research buildings, and you're not gonna build 4 Manufactorum Cyberneticas until after you research Lucian Specialization.

If you follow my build order you get Triplex Necessity quite early but not Soylens Acquisition Teams or Solar Reflectors but... whatever. You don't need to be that precise in this game. Close enough is more than good enough.

Single City Tables
Two Cities Tables
Three Cities Tables

Tips on making looking up these tables easier

• 1. Only have one city with energy and food. The other cities are pure Ore only.
  
• 2. Follow the table as closely as you can until you build 15 resource buildings but from then on don't build 1 building at a time but instead 1 hex at a time. So if you need 1 more loyalty building, build 4 instead. And if you need 1 more resource building, build 4 instead. There is no need to run a precision operation here. Close enough is more than good enough.
  
• 3. Make a build order and write down how many loyalty buildings you need at each part of your build order.
  
• 4. Print the tables out and have them next to your monitor while you play.
  
• 5. Just decide that you're just gonna start at 15 resource, 7 loyalty, and just keep resources at multiples of 5 and loyalty in multiples of 7. Might help to memorize the following pairs of numbers.
  15:7
  20:14
  25:21
  30:28
  35:35
  40:42
  This isn't exactly right but it's close enough.

This section gives the build order for the Admech VEHICLE build. If you want to use Infantry builds, adapt accordingly.

1st City
1. Build research (3) first.
2. Build additional cities
3. Build Artisan Constructorum to double your building speed.
4. Stabilize your economy.
You need to build a shelter because you've probably hit your pop cap by now, and then you need to build a 2nd shelter because if you have less that 5 empty pop space your pop growth speed takes a hit and since pop growth speed is the bottleneck of your growth it's very important you keep it maxed out. And all of these require a LOT of energy so you need to build a lot of those as well.
And doing all of this takes a WHILE. Like 40 turns to get to this point.

5. Build 2 Manufactorum Cyberneticas. If you plan on fighting really early then build these 2 Manufactorum Cyberneticas at step 1 in lieu of 2 research buildings. Otherwise expect your first combat unit to come out at around turn 50.
6. Grow your economy so you can build buildings from each city nonstop AND produce units from these 2 Manufactorum Cyberneticas nonstop.
7. Once you finally have an Ore surplus build research buildings until you have 4 total.
8. Then build until you have 4 Manufactorum Cyberneticas.
9. And then that's it. Endlessly grow your economy using the charts from the previous section and pump out Knight Crusaders nonstop.

2nd & 3rd Cities
1. Build Artisan Constructorum to double your building speed.
2. Stabilize your economy
3. Just keep pumping out resource and loyalty building nonstop.
The SOLE purpose of your 2nd and 3rd cities is just resources and absolutely nothing else.



***You are only building 5 buildings before step 7. Subcloister does not count as it provides its own pop cap and loyalty and will be shutdown when not in use.
1. 1 research (2 if going more than one city)
2. 1 ore (2 if going 3 cities)
3. Subcloister if I'm going more than 1 city. Important to shut this down when it's not producing anything. Do NOT build in the same tile as your Artisan Constructorum. Build it in a empty tile and fill it up with Shelters later.
4. 0-3 more research depending on what I'm trying to do.
5. 0-2 Manufactorum Cyberneticas if I can
6. Shelter or Energy. Shelter if I can get away with it otherwise Energy. If going more than 1 city I always go Shelter.
***Total buidlings built at this point should be 5. As in the population part of my city should read "6 required" unless you built a Shelter at step 6, at which point it should be "5 required" . If going 4 research I might have to break this rule though. Sub-Cloister does not count.

7. 1 Artisan Constructorum
8. Shelter and Energy to stabilize my economy
9. Build until I have 2 Manufactorum Cyberneticas
10. Shelter to get my pop cap to 18
11. Grow my economy until I can support 2 Manufactorum Cyberneticas building Onager Dunecrawlers without pause. Requires 20 ore per turn + 15 for every city I have. So +35 for single city, +50 for two cities, and +65 for three cities.
12. Build up to 4 Research
13. Endlessly grow my economy.
14. Build up to 4 Manufactorum Cyberneticas.
15. Continue to endlessly grow my economy
16. Build up to 4 Manufactorum in my 2nd and 3rd cities
17. Continue to endlessly grow my economy

*1. 1 Artisan Constructoroum. If I can't afford one I stall my unit production to save up and move onto step 2. I never stall my building production for anything.
2. 3 resource buildings
3. Shelter
4. 2 more buildings
5. Shelter
6. Endlessly grow my economy.

1. 4 Ore
2. 4 Loyalty
3. 3 Ore
4. 3 Loyalty
5. 2 Ore
6. 1 Artisan Constructorum
***If you're struggling with Energy, Power Surge Energy until you get it under control.
Economy is your bottleneck so we don't Power Surge your research buildings unless specifically skipping everything to rush Knight Crusaders.

T1:Thermo-Exchange Efficiency
T1:Manufactorum Cybernetica
T2:Sub-Cloister
T2:Hab Fane
***T3:Adjacency Integration
T3:Protoservitor Cradle
T4:Artisan Constructorium
T4:Mavoraforming
T5:Onager Dunecrawler
T2:Tech-Priest Manipulus
T5:Triplex Necessity
T6:Cognis Heavy Stubber
T6:Hammer of Wrath
T7:Reclamator Protocols
T7:Agripinaan Ablation
T8:Skorpius Disintegrator
T4:Lucian Specialization
T8:Solar Reflectors
T9:Knight Crusader
T9:Hive World Approval
T10:Twin-Linked Icarus Autocannon
T10:Blessed Conduits
T10:Icons of the Omnissiah
T4:Soylens Acquisition Teams
T8:Skriptorum Ordinatus
T4:Dogma Metalica
T9:Optate Restrictions
T10:Terran Generalism
T6:Fidorum Voss Prime

***replace with Sydonian Dragoon if going a low research/early fight build.

The bottleneck is economy not research. My 4 research buildings outpace my economy just fine so we power surge ore instead of research and we skip Stygian Enlightenment in favor of Triplex Necessity. I think researching Stygian Enlightenment in addition to Triplex Necessity will negate any gains Stygian Enlightenment gives.

Lucian Specialization is researched after Skorpius Disintegrators because we really need Skorpius Disintegrators out asap and Lucian Specialization only gives +1-3 early game so there's no real point in grabbing it so early. In addition, your economy can't support nonstop Knight Crusaders just yet and Skorpius Disintegrators are good enough for now so we grab Lucian Specialization at this time.

Here's a quick table for how much adjacency bonus each of the adjacency bonuses boosting techs give. By default all resource buildings get +1.2 per building in the same tile once you have 4. Also all Adjacency bonuses are additive so each food building after researching both Soylens Acquisition Teams and Lucian Specialization will get +2.1.

So as you can see, some +adjacency bonus techs are much better than others.

I'd like to point out that later in the game, when your loyalty skyrockets your construction speed out of control, all your cities will be severely underpopulated. Like you will be behind like 20 pops for each city. But that doesn't matter at all. At that point in the game you will still accelerate your economy even when severely underpopulated so just go right ahead and build buildings as fast as you can. Underpopulation doesn't matter.

When i follow my algorithm, the size of my army is detailed in the tables below.
Please note the following numbers assumes a WORST CASE SCENARIO. I intentionally built my cities on grass terrain as it's the worst terrain for the vehicle build, and I intentionally avoided utilizing any outposts. I did however utilize all the rock terrains near me. Your numbers and timings should always be better than what I have here. For example, when I start next to a Ruins of Vaul, I always get my first Knight Crusader out by turn 80.

Also note that the First Turn column is not when I first research the unit, but when I actually produce the unit. The reason for this delay is because of my struggling economy.

So as you can see, how many research buildings you choose to build at step 4 of my algorithm has the biggest impact on the game. So if you want an early army build less research buildings at step 4 and if you want earlier endgame units build more research buildings at step 4.

I'd also like to direct your attention to the acceleration of the Knight Crusader construction speed for all the builds. If you just try to keep your loyalty above 0, it's gonna take you at a minimum 4 turns to build 1 Knight Crusader and it will never get faster. But when following the optimal ratio of resource and loyalty buildings, even a single city can produce 7 Knight Crusaders every 10 turns, more if they're on volcanic terrain. That's like triple increase in production speed! So once again, always follow the optimal ratio of resource buildings to loyalty buildings I have detailed in the above section.

So yeah, pick a build, set the map up so you engage the AI when your chosen build is at its strongest, and have fun. Personally I only go 2 cities because single city can't afford a Tech-Priest Manipulus and also suffers a severe economic stall when you have to build an Artisan Constructorum and a Hab Fane back to back, and also because 3 cities is too much management, lacks an early game army, and 100 Knight Crusaders is just excessive overkill.

This is my go to build order for 1v1 Impossible and Ultra Hard games on a tiny sized map. I've beaten every single faction 1v1 on Impossible Difficulty on a Tiny map with full default settings EXCEPT Wild Life with this build order so i figured I'd share it as a sample build order so you have a better idea on how to use the charts from the previous section to craft your own build orders.

Unfortunately, I play really boringly.

• I setup my cities 1 space away from the literal edge of the map so the AI doesn't find me until turn 80
  
• I then go really, really hard on my economy for 50 turns
  
• I then start producing an army around turn 50
  
• War with the AI starts around turn 80. At this time I usually have a Skorpius Disintegrator out with a lot of Onager Dunecrawlers and 1 Tech-Priest Manipulus.
  
• I turtle until I get a sizeable Knight Crusader army
  
• I then push with my Knight Crusaders and win.
  
• Average win turn is about turn 120.

It doesn't matter whether the AI is at Ultra Hard or Impossible Difficulty. The sole difference between the two is that Ultra Hard AI doesn't reach my cities until turn 80 with full default settings, and Impossible AI needs Wild Life setting to be at Very High to not make contact with my cities until turn 80. That's it. Having said that, when the fighting actually starts, Impossible AI is absolutely INTENSE to fight where as Ultra Hard I often never see their ultimate unit despite being at turn 100+.

If you want to fight early with low tier units, I say add more AI so combat starts earlier and don't go 3 research at the start. Go 1 research and 2 Manufactorum Cyberneticas.



Anyways, without further ado, here's the sample build order.
I had the best possible start: Volcanic terrain + Ruins of Vaul. So obviously adapt this build order depending on what terrain you start on.
I'd say all Loyalty Buildings and non-resource buildings are set in stone so only change the type of resource building you build. For example, if you start on desert terrain, your 2nd City probably would build way more Ore buildings and much less Energy buildings.

1st city only builds Ore buildings to make looking up charts much easier, especially since you can set your resource adjacency bonus to 2.1 as soon as you research Triplex Necessity + Lucian Specialization.

2nd city has all the Energy and Food buildings.

1. Research1
2. Ore1
3. Sub-Cloister1 - build 2 Datasmiths. One for your 2nd city, one to clear tiles. Then build a Tech-Priest Manipulus but TURN OFF the Subcloister with 1 TURN LEFT before completion. Heroes built at later turns start at a higher level and Heroes have a lot of upkeep which really hurts early game so there's literally no reason to bring out your Hero until the fighting actually starts.
4. Research2
5. Research3
6. Shelter1
7. Artisan Constructorum2
8. Manufactorum Cybernetica1
9. Manufactorum Cybernetica2
10. Shelter2
11. Ore2
12. Ore3
13. Loyalty1
14. Shelter3
15. Ore4
16. Loyalty2
18. Ore5
19. Ore6
20. Ore7
21. Ore8
22. Research4
23. Manufactorum Cybernetica3
24. Manufactorum Cybernetica4
25. Shelter4
26. Loyalty3
27. Ore9
28. Ore10
29. Loyalty4
30. Shelter5
31. Ore11
32. Ore12
33. Loyalty5
34. Loyalty6
35. Ore13
36. Loyalty7
37. Loyalty8

1. Energy1
2. Artisan Constructorum2
3. Energy2
4. Shelter1
5. Energy3
6. Food1
7. Loyalty1
8. Shelter2
9. Energy4
10. Energy5
11. Ore1
12. Loyalty2
13. Ore2
14. Ore3
15. Ore4
16. Shelter3
17. Energy 6
18. Loyalty 3
19. Food2
20. Food3
21. Loyalty4
22. Loyalty5
23. Shelter4
24. Energy7
25. Loyalty6
26. Energy8
27. Loyalty7
28. Ore5
29. Loyalty8
30. Loyalty9
31. Shelter5
32. Ore6
33. Loyalty10
34. Loyalty11

Adeptus Mechanicus Quest
I play with Quests off because the AI doesn't go for quest victories themselves, and I want to fight the AI factions rather than an ungodly horde of random grey mobs. The defend missions are the worst because you can't end it early and have to endure the grind for so many turns.

Anyways, if you follow my guide the quest should be a complete cakewalk.

Adeptus Monotonous Achievement
This is what worked for me. Don't know how reliable it is. This strategy is pretty much a copy and paste of the other guides here so full credit goes to them.

This was my World Seed: 1636967983

Map Settings
1. 1v1 Craftworld Eldar on a tiny map
2. Very High Wildlife
3. Very High Wire Weed
4. Very Low Webway Gates
5. Very Low land mass.
6. Game Pace: Very Slow <--- VERY IMPORTANT.

Build Order
1. Research
2. Influence
3. Sub-Cloister
4. Sub-Cloister
5. Energy
6. Food

Strategy
1. I saved very often.
2. I used Debug Console to remove fog of war
3. I memorized the AI's position
4. I memorize all the Kastelan Robot locations
5. I memorize all the Enslaver locations. AVOID AT ALL COSTS.
6. I reloaded an earlier save. I did this very often to see what the AI was doing.
7. I had my 2 Skitarii Vanguards slowly cut a path to the Kastelan Robots. I made sure I never lost one to the neuts.
8. I built 1 Cybernetica Datasmith for each Kastelan Robot in the game. For my world seed it was 2.
9. As soon as my first Cybernetica Datasmith popped out I immediately grabbed a Kastelan. Same with my 2nd Cybernetica Datasmith. Make sure the neutral Cybernetica Datasmith is dead otherwise they'll steal it right back.
10. Once Tech-Priest Dominus and Fulgurite Electro Priests were researched I shutdown my research building. Next time however I'm researching Litany of the Electromancer instead of any of the T3 techs and then shutting it down since I won without building any of the T3 units so no point in researching them next time.
11. I then immediately rushed all my units to the Eldar's only webway gate
12. I had all units bash on the Webway Gate nonstop with the Cybernetica Datasmiths healing them. For my game I ignored all the Eldar Troops. Most of them were on the otherside of the map and the few that returned home were very injured.
13. Once my Tech-Priest Manipulus popped out I sent him to the Webway Gate as well. At this time I just completely shutdown my base. I'm not getting anywhere near enough influence for a tech-priest dominus, all my energy and food income are at 0 or negative so building new buildings and saving up for Fulgurite Electro Priests was gonna take too long, and the Eldar Webway Gate was at half hp.
14. Victory was achieved at turn 72

And that's it. Adeptus Monotonous achieved. For my world seed, Eldar base was NW, my base was SE, and the map was a tiny ring. At the NE corner was the only other Webway Gate and had 2 Kastelans near it.

For me, the Eldar went south from their position and approached my base counter clockwise from the west. I on the other hand went north and approached their base counter clockwise from the east.

As soon as I grabbed the Kastelans I went for their base which was completely empty because their military was south. I then started bashing on their webway gate. Eventually few Eldar infantry arrived but they couldn't stop me and I won. Turning off Fog of War I saw that they had 8 infantry total and 5 of them were approaching my base which made them too far to defend their Webway gate.

I guess if the Eldar moved toward NE towards both the Kastelans and the 2nd Webway gate I would've lost so I guess it's a matter of trying until you get the exact same scenario I did.



I hope you enjoyed my guide. Thanks for reading.