Clash of Clans layouts - the base design fundamentals in CoC

When you first step into the tutorial and a very helpful lady guides you through your village, you have no idea where to put your buildings. You place them randomly in a spot that, in your opinion, is the best. In the first levels, it doesn’t matter all that much. However, later on, stepping into the game without a proper layout can be very costly. Let's learn about Clash of Clans Layouts.

Being able to tell the difference between an organized and disorganized layout will also help you a lot with farming later on. 

What is Clash of Clans base layout?

It is the way that your base buildings are placed. Depending on the goal you want to achieve, there are three types of layouts with one quasi-type on top of that. You will have a farming base, trophy base, war base, and a hybrid one.

“Why different layout for different purposes?” - you’d ask. “Isn’t there any layout in Clash of Clans good for everything?”

Sadly, there isn’t. With such an array of buildings, their traits and features, space taken, and functionality, it’s impossible to have an all-rounded village. You can’t protect your resources, trophies, and deny stars in a war at the same time. With a farming base, you want your storage in the hardest place to get. In trophy base, you are going to deny the enemies high trophy gains on you. During the war, you wish to avoid a three-star attack on you. It is why there are different types of layouts.

Farming layout

We have already talked about the farming base in our CoC Farming Guide, but now we’ll attempt to go a little more in-depth.

In theory, the farming base should be your go-to layout up until the very end of the game. Until you have everything maxed out, you will constantly need resources, thus farming. The general premise of the farming layout is clear-cut - keep resources in a range of defenses, sacrifice other buildings.

At Town Hall, level 7 things change. You have Dark Elixir now and your first hero - the Barbarian King. It means that you will need a ton of Dark Elixir in the nearest future. To gather it quickly, you have to not only farm it well but also protect it. It is why there are many bases focused strictly on preventing their precious DE from being stolen. 

The best strategy to farm Dark Elixir up to Town Hall 11-ish is the Goblin Knife. The strategy revolves around taking few Giants, Wall Breakers, Heal and Jump spell, and filling the composition with Goblins. Later on, you can swap Giants for Golems, as the latter ones will hold aggro on themselves much longer.

An ultimate counter to Goblin Knife is AoE damage. It is why you want your Wizard Towers and Bomb Towers guarding the Storages. You can’t rely on Mortars, as sometimes Goblins will simply outrun their shots. Also, placing Bombs and Giant Bombs around resources buildings can prove successful. Some players even go as far as to placing other resources buildings in the open for Goblins to delay them. 

But then again, a smart attacker will not deploy all Goblins at the same time, and he will send them in packs. When collecting DE for heroes upgrades, you will not avoid attacks. To be fair, you will never be 100% immune to those. Your best bet is to farm more than you lose.

The key to farming is an activity. You don’t have to sit in the game 24/7 and grind like for Classic WoW High Warlord title. Logging in a couple of times a day, collecting your resources, and sending few attacks is, most of the time, just enough. Especially collecting resources from mines is essential. Storages and Town Hall can give the attacker only a portion of your goods. Meanwhile, Collectors, Mines, and Drills can be cleared entirely. 

Trophy layout

Trophies are what determines the players overall strength and skill in Clash of Clans

The general premise of this base, especially in higher levels, is - protect core buildings, sacrifice resources. 

When trophy pushing, you will not collect as many resources as during farming stages. On the bright side, you will use your valuables only to train the army for climbing.

As for the layout, first of all, you should take a note from nature. Big animals and predators seem scary, and others avoid them. Smaller ones pretend to be a predator, sending a message: “Look how tough I am, you better watch yourself, buddy.” It is precisely what your village needs. The whole layout has to be screaming to all of your potential opponents: “You will meet your demise here.” 

Every player clicking: “NEXT” button will first evaluate the target. When he visits your village, you need to make him think: “Naa, Imma pass on that one,” and press “NEXT” again. Gaining trophies is one thing, but not losing them is almost the same. 

Second of all, if there is an assault on your base, it has to give the very best of it to your enemy. Make sure your Clan Castle is centralized, filled with defensive troops all the time, and defenses are not easy to take down. At different levels of play, you want your Town Hall protected, or serving as bait for your enemy. 

Also, if you see any ads yelling at you: “Look! The best base for every Town Hall level! Anti-Dragon, anti-Witch, anti-Goblin, anti-everything! 100k trophies in one week!”, it’s probably a scam. You may want to ignore it. As you can see in the Clash of Clans World Championship matches - every base is doable. It’s just a matter of execution.

War base

Now Clan Wars have their own rights. Whoever gather more stars in attacks, becomes the winner. Each star matters. You can get one star for:

- 50% total destruction,

- taking down Town Hall,

- 100% destruction.

The last one is the automatic three-star per se. You can see that the goal of the war attack is different from a casual trophy pushing. Winning is not enough. You have to obliterate the enemy village, roll over it, leave nothing but ashes on your trail.

War loot is so tempting that players may greed for higher bounty. However, a common strategy is to attack a tiny bit lower than your true level. Most clans will attack their designated opponents, which is decreasing your overall chances for multiple three-stars.

Clash of Clans Base design flaws and mistakes

Inexperienced COC players will have thousands of questions in their minds. “Where to place my buildings?”. “Is my village well protected?”. “What is this gap between Walls for?”. “Why would I listen to anyone?”. 

To be fair, if you knew everything right now, you wouldn’t be here. You want to learn. You want to know “why?” “how?” “where?”. You seek something more than just a link. And we’re right here to deliver.

Basic mistakes

Multi-layered Walls

If you came to a conclusion, that not one, but two, or even three-layered of Walls will protect you better, you’re wrong. Most of the things that can damage Walls have splash damage - Wall Breakers, Stone Slammer, Earthquake spell, etc. For good players, Walls are barely an obstacle. They will use flying troops, quad-quake (4 Earthquake spells always break the Walls), or Jump spell. And for bad players… well, you don’t have to be scared of them.

Stacking defenses

Placing key defensive buildings close to one another is a huge mistake. The premise is good, “I put it all here for more firepower.” But every half-thinking opponent will destroy them in one blow, either with Zap-quake (Earthquake + Lightning) or with correct troops. Air Defenses and Mortars can’t do much about melee assaults, and all the ground-only defenses will not stand against flying units. If you place them close to one another, they will be easy picking. 

Lopsiding

Sometimes you may miss it at first glance, but some bases tend to have ground defenses in one side of the base, with the rest on the other side. It is obviously a mistake, as there are countless strategies to crush such villages. You can easily clear ground-only defenses with Balloons, to wipe the rest of the base with Valkyries or Bowlers. The same thing goes for air shooting structures - a bunch of Hog Riders will tear them down in no time and clear the path for Dragons, for instance. 

Open drop spots

We shouldn’t be mentioning this one, as there shouldn’t be players making this mistake. Keeping your base compact forces any opponents to deploy the troops further away, giving your defenses more time to deal damage. Also, it forces the attacker to deal with the Walls, either with Wall Breakers, spells, or Hog Riders/Flying units. If you leave an open spot within your base, most enemies will take it. Such a flaw is like an invitation, “Come, take my resources.” It should never happen.

Sure, troll bases can leave such a spot purposely. However, a good player will read the trick, and deploy a single Barbarian or Goblin to trigger the Tesla or the Bomb, and then follow with his army.

Too big compartments

Depending on your Town Hall level, you will have a certain number of Wall pieces. Use them wisely. Surrounding your village with Walls and stuffing all buildings inside is not a good idea. Single Wall is not an obstacle for a good player. Even a bad player can deal with it. A single layer of Walls when destroyed opens up the whole base. If you designed your base like this, you must have never seen a pack of Valkyries in action.

Empty defenses

X-Bows, Inferno’s, and Eagle Artillery have to be reloaded. It’s enough to log in. It doesn’t take a lot of time to perform three clicks on your smartphone, and still, some people forget.

Decorations

It’s not really a mistake, more like a waste of resources. We’ve seen a bunch of bases with flags, flowers, or the P.E.K.K.A. statue, which each cost some money. A Gold that could have been spent on Walls, for example. Remember, Walls will cost you a heck ton of Gold. 

Advanced mistakes

There are a couple of base design flaws that will determine the outcome of an attack even in the high level of play.

Not preventing Bowler bounce

It happens at TH10 and onwards. Don’t place your trash buildings in place, where Bowlers can bounce off of them and hit vital defenses. Also, don’t place defenses, where they can be Bowler-bounced.

Eagle Artillery close to Clan Castle

To make it hard for your enemy to three-star on your base, you don’t want to keep these two together. Giving your enemy the possibility to damage both at the same time, or quickly transitioning from one to another is a costly mistake. Eagle Artillery is one of the most dominant defenses in the whole game, and the attacker will always have to think, how to approach it. 

Clan Castle troops have to slow down the assault. If the enemy manages to take them down with Lightning Spell, that hits the Eagle at the same time, it’s a win for him.

Buildings touching Walls

You don’t want your fundamental defensive structures taken down for free by a simple Queen Walk. Always keep in mind the proper distance from the Walls to force the enemy to either use a Jump, Wall Breakers or walk around. Do not give anything for free. Make him work hard for it, and who knows? Maybe the pressure will get to him? It’s always worth a shot.

Leaving Archer Queen exposed

The Queen is a very potent defensive powerhouse. Many raids are failed because of the inability to take out the Queen. You don’t want her as the first line of defense. For that purpose, there are Cannons and Archer Towers - the cheapest and theoretically the weakest defensive buildings. You want your Archer Queen altar placed close to Clan Castle. The dream scenario is when tanky CC troops are taking attackers damage, while Archer Queen is shooting at them.

Placing King and Queen close to each other

It is not going to end well. Barbarian King’s defensive potential is limited, as he is a ground-only troop. However, he has to be taken under advisement in Hog Rider attacks. Heroes are strong defensive units, and the best bet for you is to spread them out so that they do not overlap each other’s territory. It would be a waste of resources.

Anti-Queen Walk

Keep your critical defenses in place, where they can’t be Queen Walked. At TH9, it would be the X-Bows, at TH10 Inferno Tower, at TH11 the Eagle Artillery. You want to have them inside the base so that you force your enemy to Queen Charge or change the strategy. The longer these robust structures remain shooting, the more value you get. Giving them away for free is an enormous mistake.

Bad Tesla Farms

Placing a couple of Tesla’s in one spot might take your enemy by surprise. However, you shouldn’t put them right next to each other. Leave at least one tile between them, where you can fit a trap or two tiles for Giant Bomb. You never want them touching each other, as Balloons can take out multiple Teslas in one drop. 

Setting your traps randomly

Low priority of traps in the upgrade queue doesn’t mean that they have to be neglected. One Spring Trap can get rid of three Hogs. One Bomb can kill a few Wall Breakers and ruin the attack. Always place one-tile traps in between defenses, so that they hit multiple units. Leave your Bombs two tiles away from Walls, where the Wall Breakers will most likely come from. Use your Black Air Mines next to Air Defenses for better protection. And most of all - don’t place them in random spots. There must be a logic behind it.

Download bases

Obviously, the easiest way to fetch yourself a base layout is to google it, download it, and apply immediately. But it does not relieve you from thinking and having your own reason. As a player, you can’t accept something uncritically. You’ve got to have a tiny bit of skepticism.

The higher you are, the more you know about the game. You can recognize the base flaws in one glance, and abuse them to its fullest. Why would you download a base that has such flaws? For example, you googled: “Best Town Hall level 10 farming base”, and among propositions, you see a base with all resources buildings exposed. How is that best farming base? Say, you’re looking for trophy base, and you see a design that you would 3-star even without Clan Castle aid. Would you download it and set it as active?

Obtaining a base layout from a link is convenient and faster than placing all these buildings manually (a minute of silence for everyone, who did that). However, you should always first evaluate if the layout suits you. 

Aside from it, the same thing goes for Builder Base, where the base layout is even more critical. You should check our Builder Base guide for more information.

What is the best layout for Clash of Clans?

There is no “the best layout for everything.” Don’t believe what they say. No layout can protect you from everything. You can only prevent yourself from the specific type of attack, like Dragons, LavaLoon, or Mass Hogs. Keep in mind that buildings your base to protect you from one kind of raid will automatically leave you exposed to another one. For example, grouping anti-air troops defenses around the Town Hall has a chance of withstanding the Mass Dragon attack, but it will suffer against Hogs and Valkyries. Keeping buildings spread out will work well against Bowlers and Valkyries, but Skeletons summoned by Witches will thrive. One advantage forces another disadvantage. Thus, a good all-rounder, the well-organized layout is one thing, but it’s the attacks that make the impactful difference.

The only thing you can do (we’re probably repeating ourselves here) is to build your base in a way that the opponent will find it unattractive and not worth attacking. Many players, while pushing for trophies, will smash the “NEXT” button in search for a suitable target. The key here is to make your base not suitable for them. Let them go elsewhere.

On the other hand, in Clan Wars, you will be attacked either way. Again, you can specify your design against a particular type of attack, and you will be exposed to another. For you, there is hope that the opponent will make a mistake. 

Recognizing the most popular trophy pushing strategy in your trophy bracket and designing the base to counter it, might become handy. For example, at TH10 - TH11 range, you will be attacked with Electro Dragons a ton. E-Drags are powerful, yet slow units. Stalling them will ruin the whole raid, and Air Sweepers play a crucial part here. While designing the base layouts, you should ask yourself: “Where will he drop the E-Drags most likely?” and play towards it. It is also a good idea to have a Lava Hound in CC since its high HP will keep the E-Drags busy for a while.

Or maybe you keep getting three-starred by a LavaLoon? Well, there is a simple solution to it. Keep you CC and the Archer Queen apart. Whoever wants to do a LavaLoon, has to eliminate the Queen and CC troops first. Otherwise, one will fail. As simple as that. 

If you want to download some base layouts, please visit our TH7 - TH12 CoC guide.

Summary

In Clash of Clans, attacking is only half of the game. The other half is defending. Your base design is what will help you push trophies, secure loot, or win a Clan War. Having a well-designed base with traps placed carefully can make a difference between succeeding and losing. We’re not talking about pre-TH10 levels, where you will get crushed anyway. The true base layouts designed begins at TH12+. As you go there, you will need something more than a downloaded base.

We have a ton of Clash of Clans content prepared for you on every stage of your journey to TH13. Make sure to read these guides. If you get anything useful from them, we’ll be insanely happy.

Keep in mind that MMOAuctions is an auctioneer platform above all. You can place your buy or sell offer here not only from Clash of Clans but other most popular games as well. We’d like to host you here for a while in between reading the news and guides. Have fun, clasher!

FAQ

What’s the best layout for Clash of Clans?

There is no such thing. Every layout has its strengths and weaknesses. 

How do you organize your base in CoC?

You have to manage your defenses to make up for one another weaknesses. Protect Air Defenses with ground-only structures. Cover blind spots. Keep essential buildings within the range of the most substantial buildings.

After Town Hall level 5, you will have access to the Village layout menu, where you can design your base effortlessly.

What is a Clash of Clans trophy base?

It is a base designed to lose the least amount of trophies possible during the attack. It will have Town Hall and Clan Castle centralized, with the most potent defenses guarding it, and the weaker ones placed in the outskirts.

What is a farming base in CoC?

It is a layout focused around protecting the resources. It will have Storages in the middle of the base protected by splash damage defenses, with other defenses being a little closer to the edge.

How to build a hybrid base?

A hybrid base revolves around protecting trophies and resources at the same time. However, we do not recommend it since it’s not specialized in any type of defense.

What is Clash of Clans Builder Base?

It is a game mode where you build up a smaller base with different buildings and troops, competing against other players in versus battles.