As a relatively new player (about three months old in FOE years), I fumbled around and screwed up a lot in the beginning, anything from setting off dynamites in the middle of nowhere to mistakenly using the Ferris wheel selection kit in the mystery box from the Spring Event for the base model instead of for upgrading once I get the Level 1 from the quest line. But eventually I think I managed to get the hang of it and managed to make the best of my early mess. Since I had two wheels at Level 1, I figured I might as well just for the "bicycle," which of course ended up costing quite a few diamonds (close to 10K, I think). The upside of this, though, is that I bought the diamonds on the 33,000 for $79.99 deal, which means I still have enough diamonds left to pretend that I got them at 22,000 for $79.99 and didn't use any
. And that 2 for 1 sale was the best deal on diamonds I had seen before, anyway.
For those diamonds and a lot of tedious hard work (like fighting that "very small army" about 500 times), I got myself a great wheel, a wonder wheel, an airship at Level 3, four wishing wells with the same number of shrinking kits (one of them I still can't find the space for in my crowded city), two royal marble gateways, two globe fountains, a carousel, a whole bunch of witch doctors, stranded boats and other, more conventional buildings, plus plenty of blueprints and forge points to help my great buildings along, and something like 15 drummers and 12 color guards, along with a few other military units. And along the way I also got to make some wonderful new friends (
https://forum.us.forgeofempires.com...new-friends-from-the-archaeology-event.41749/). So, all in all, a very happy camper here.
By the way, about the color guards and drummers, I have heard a lot of talks about them being totally useless beyond Iron Age, and I beg to differ. On the campaign map, when you attack a sector defended by a lot of artillery pieces and/or ranged units, they are great as decoys to let your cavalry swoop in unscathed and wipe out those menacing long-range fighters, since the AI just cannot resist taking a shot at them whenever it can. When it comes to taking one for the team, nobody does it better than the much-maligned color guards and drummers. So, I'm very thankful that I have so many of them sitting around in the barracks right now.