Best Leafcutter Setup (Front Line)

WaffleGuy

Colony
After trying to beat Front Line on insane with challenge mode in three days and failing miserably, I went into battle arena and tested some stuff. Here are the complete results:
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[15 Lvl 3 Taunt Majors + 15 Lvl 3 Leafcutter Mediae]: 588
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[45 Lvl 1 Taunt Majors + 45 Lvl 1 Leafcutter Mediae]: 588
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[45 Lvl 1 Taunt Majors + 15 Lvl 3 Leafcutter Mediae]: 462
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[15 Lvl 3 Taunt Majors + 45 Lvl 1 Leafcutter Mediae]: 780
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[15 Lvl 3 Stun Majors + 15 Lvl 3 Leafcutter Mediae]: 666
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[45 Lvl 1 Stun Majors + 45 Lvl 1 Leafcutter Mediae]: 486
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[45 Lvl 1 Stun Majors + 15 Lvl 3 Leafcutter Mediae]: 222
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[15 Lvl 3 Stun Majors + 45 Lvl 1 Leafcutter Mediae]: 768
Based on this, we can make out some useful information. Firstly, majors should be upgraded but mediae should not be. This makes sense as majors are really the ones taking all the damage, the mediae are just doing extra damage. And secondly, stun majors work more offensively while taunt majors work more defensively. And the weakness of both groups is upgraded mediae and non upgraded majors. The groups with this setup scored really low, as you can see.

And here are a few more tests:
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[23 Lvl 3 Taunt Majors]: 780
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[23 Lvl 3 Stun Majors]: 822
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[73 Lvl 1 Leafcutter Mediae]: 72
So yeah, majors alone are as strong as majors and mediae (with a ratio of 1-3), but mediae alone are complete garbage. The combination of both is better because of the higher gathering capabilities. And stun is stronger than taunt when alone, and that also makes sense since taunt's power is well, taunting, which only works with other ants to taunt enemies away from.

Hopefully this helped you beat Front Line on insane with challenge mode in just three days.
 
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I struggled a lot on this level the first time I played it. I revisited it last week and beat it within 4 hours. Once I got the methodology down correctly it was actually quite easy. My result was quite a bit different from yours though.

The first thing I did was take the 7 workers you start with and make 19 of them, while emptying the top right part of the map before they become infested. I used 3 workers in the base while using my 7 worker brood as added workforce once the base layout was established.

Then I took the 7 media and increased them to 19, and created another 19 media. While this was going on I was collecting leaves from the first two rises in front of the base, avoiding confrontation altogether if it could be helped. Once night came I emptied out the leaves in the far bottom right of the map, while clearing the infested area next to the base.

After that I just started clearing leaves based on which ones would next get infested. Media are perfectly capable of killing anything when grouped, and in a trail, with 38 you have plenty to hold off the second line of fire ants as you collect. Once those are level 3, I usually add 14 majors and start upgrading them.

The biggest thing I found on this level is to completely avoid the start and end of the day/night cycle, as continuing to harvest while that stream of insects is going back to the spawn sites loses you an insane amount of food and workers and time. I always turn aggression off and pull back to the nest entrance as soon as they start moving, to ensure that I don't have to fight anything that's not on the trail route.

Having a fairly large amount of minor workers is paramount, as you can put them on non-agression, and at level 3 they will speed about picking up leaves that the media and majors have dropped when they aggro something on the trail. This is huge because it means once they've finished killing soemthing they go right back to harvesting instead of having to do the whole trip.

I think it took me 5-6 days in all, and by the last 2 days I wasn't venturing outside to collect leaves at night, as there was barely any left and the critters were too numerous. It took me a day to actually empty the aggression bar because it's tricky to do so, so having a lot of leaves stockpiled (over 1k by the end) was very necessary too.
 

WaffleGuy

Colony
Coincidentally, I used these exact same strategies when I first beat the level on insane w/ challenge. I just didn't upgrade the minors. I'm pretty sure I beat it in five days too.
 
In my opinion, 3.1 is the harder level. Even if you manage to plug the enemy colony in the base, which I think is the best way to do it using majors, it's still a matter of managing the sheer quantity of major assaults correctly which doesn't pan out very well all the time. Once you reach a critical mass of media on frontline they can more or less look after themselves, whereas you don't really have the time to do that on 3.1.
 

WaffleGuy

Colony
For 3.1, I use a trick in non-challenge mode attempts where I leave some closer sections of leaves behind to harvest later. When the enemy starts sending out majors, I just spam the majors with non-defending workers and harvest enough leaves in time. I'm just too lazy to deal with the majors lol.
 

syrian dugong

Soldier
Ecosystem Beta Tester
After trying to beat Front Line on insane with challenge mode in three days and failing miserably, I went into battle arena and tested some stuff. Here are the complete results:
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[15 Lvl 3 Taunt Majors + 15 Lvl 3 Leafcutter Mediae]: 588
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[45 Lvl 1 Taunt Majors + 45 Lvl 1 Leafcutter Mediae]: 588
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[45 Lvl 1 Taunt Majors + 15 Lvl 3 Leafcutter Mediae]: 462
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[15 Lvl 3 Taunt Majors + 45 Lvl 1 Leafcutter Mediae]: 780
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[15 Lvl 3 Stun Majors + 15 Lvl 3 Leafcutter Mediae]: 666
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[45 Lvl 1 Stun Majors + 45 Lvl 1 Leafcutter Mediae]: 486
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[45 Lvl 1 Stun Majors + 15 Lvl 3 Leafcutter Mediae]: 222
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[15 Lvl 3 Stun Majors + 45 Lvl 1 Leafcutter Mediae]: 768
Based on this, we can make out some useful information. Firstly, majors should be upgraded but mediae should not be. This makes sense as majors are really the ones taking all the damage, the mediae are just doing extra damage. And secondly, stun majors work more offensively while taunt majors work more defensively. And the weakness of both groups is upgraded mediae and non upgraded majors. The groups with this setup scored really low, as you can see.

And here are a few more tests:
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[23 Lvl 3 Taunt Majors]: 780
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[23 Lvl 3 Stun Majors]: 822
  • [30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Mediae + 30 Lvl 2 Army Ant Majors]|[73 Lvl 1 Leafcutter Mediae]: 72
So yeah, majors alone are as strong as majors and mediae (with a ratio of 1-3), but mediae alone are complete garbage. The combination of both is better because of the higher gathering capabilities. And stun is stronger than taunt when alone, and that also makes sense since taunt's power is well, taunting, which only works with other ants to taunt enemies away from.

Hopefully this helped you beat Front Line on insane with challenge mode in just three days.
Very useful. Hope it can help me out beating 3.2 insane again.
 
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