Archive for the ‘ strategy ’ Category

Crusader Kings II

If you liked my Crusader King 2 review back in 2016 and you want to play it for peanuts with a good DLC (the old gods to boot, the best CK2 dlc) and want an extra 7 with it (6 if you pay just above the average) this bundle is for you.

For a mere $1 you get Cities in Motion, Magicka 2, and the Majesty 2 Collection.

Paying more than the average adds the marvelous Crusader Kings 2 with The Old Gods DLC to the package,  Pillars of Eternity, Europa Universalis 3 Complete Edition, and the Hearts of Iron 3 Collection.

Ok Europa Universalis & Hearts of Iron are at their 4th installment and the bundle only give the 3rd which make it a little disappointing since I really wanted the 4th edition of Hearts of Iron. But, hey, you pay like 1,50$ for each game so don’t has for too much. Considering I’’ve poured 50$ in DLC for Europa Universalis IV and Crusader king 2 each this bundle is a bargain.

And if you pay 12$ you get the one most recent game of the list (2016) Stellaris with a staggering 8 major update. If you like strategy game in space that one is for you.

It’s a really cool bundle even though some of the game are really old.

Give it a try by checking the The Humble Paradox Bundle 2018 on the humble bundle site.

I don’t even get commission so trust me on the one. I’ve referred so much humble bundle maybe I should check if they have affiliate link or something.

Bird of Prey

Destroy a ship at full health during a single cloak in the Stealth Cruiser.

The Stealth Cruiser: Bird of Prey Achievement 

To earn this achievement, the ship must remain cloaked from the start of the volley until the battle is over and the after-battle text pops up.

This achievement is easier to get done in the first two sectors on the easy difficulty with a level 2 cloak (that is due to the 5-hull points drones only appearing on this difficulty). Charge the weapon, cloak and fire lasers and align the beam to cross the pilot room (and the ones beside it). When I managed to do it I had the Weapon  pre-igniter, Pegasus missile, flask and dual laser. Cloak when starting the fight, launch the Pegasus on the shield and then aim the pilot with dual laser and flask (or a large room with the flask). Level three cloak should enable the dual laser to charge again before the cloaking end. You can probably do the same thing I did with the glaive beam remember if it did not work it’s maybe that the cloak finished before the after-battle text pops up.

Note: Anti-Ship drones can be used to help unlock this achievement too. 

Phase Shift

In the Stealth Cruiser, avoid 9 points of damage during a single cloak.

The Stealth Cruiser: Tactical Approach Achievement

You can manage to get this achievement can be while fighting the Rebel Flagship’s third form.  Simply cloak during the Power Surge attack, which should deal out more than nine damage.

It is also possible to unlock in an asteroid field, if you can stay cloaked long enough.

Tactical Approach

In the Stealth Cruiser, get to sector 8 without jumping to a beacon with an environmental danger.

The Stealth Cruiser: Phase shift Achievement

This achievement is the third but is actually the easiest to earn as long you keep the Long-Range Scanners augmentation and are a bit lucky. Note that Neither Rebel-Controlled beacons nor Nebulae nor Anti-Ship Batteries count as environmental hazards, but Plasma Storms, Asteroid Fields, Red-Giant Stars and Pulsars do.

Sometimes due to beacon placement you will be force to go to an environmental hazard if there is no alternate route.

We are doing a series of posts on FTL and  we hope you like them. If you want us to do more of this let us know in the comment or by mail at jack at onlinesgamestips.com

The stealth cruiser is a pretty fun ship to play with. While it lack shield its start with cloaking to compensate and if you manage it well it can have devastating effect. You can always buy the shield at a shop for 125 scrap.

Layout A

The Stealth Cruiser

Unlock:

Defeat the right rebel in the Engi Fleet Discussion random event and head to the final quest marker and defeat the Mantis ship. The engi will deliver you the tech to build a new ship and unlock the stealth cruiser. For more info see the Engi Fleet Discussion random event.

Alternatively, if you defeat The Rebel Flagship with the Rock Cruiser that ship will be unlock.

I had a hard time figuring out this ship when I started. When you look closely this ship is all about timing. The lack of shield force you to be imaginative with your cloak and you weapon shots must be timed to maximum efficiency. When encountering a enemies. Either cloak right away to let your weapon charge or wait for him to shoot and at that exact moment cloak to dodge the shoot. With the dual beam take down the shield and let you mini beam either disable the weapon or drone. Upgrade you should try to get are the shield (sold in some stores for 125 scrap), a weapon to take down shield/weapon (bomb or missile) and upgrade cloak.

Layout B

The Stealth Cruiser

Unlock:  Unlock that ship by earning two of the three stealth cruiser achievements.

This layout is super hard at the beginning, no shield, probably the best weapon in the game but it takes 25 second to charge and if your weapon system is hit it will completely discharges leaving you completely vulnerable (you basically have to run or you’re dead at that point). Drone are specially a problem, the beam drone is the worst it will tear your ship apart while you are try to charge your beam. Once the Glaive Beam is charge you will probably tear down most ship in the first 3-4 sector. It can do 9-15 damage (3 damage per room × 3-5 rooms) in a single shot (depending on the enemy ship layout) and has a good chance of lighting enemy rooms on fire. For the first few sector here what I did: first avoid asteroid field and probably ion storm too. When fighting other ship, hopefully they don’t have any anti-ship or beam drone, these can really be problematic. If they have boarder or drone (with anti-ship only) or hacking, it’s probably better to cloak right away. If they don’t have any of the 3 systems mention, wait for the first volley to be launch and cloak that should give enough time for the Glaive Beam to be completely charged and tear them apart.  Hacking can be very useful to drain the shield, if you can get the weapon pre-igniter do it , it will give you an insane advantage and probably help you stream through the game without much worry for the first sector.

Layout C

The Stealth Cruiser

Unlock: Get to sector 8 with layout B.

That layout is actually really weird, there no shield likes the other Stealth Cruiser but there no cloak too. So what the point of this layout ? It as amore power efficient version of the Shield Overcharger, it’s also the only non-engi ship to possess a 3 space drone bay, giving greater versatility for Drones to be used, either defensively or offensively and finally it has a slightly improved version of the Laser Charger (S).

With this specialized Shield Overcharger and 2 Defense Drones Mark II (for a total of 6 power – the max) you could almost render a normal shield system useless – granting near-invulnerability to hacking, (non event) boarding, and a large number of projectiles, provided your drones are up as soon as battle starts and enemy weapon systems are targeted first. I would still try to grab the shield sub system since it’s doesn’t discharge when they attack you with beam weapon.

Cloaking it a great asset too, it can give you the time to put you drone up, let the Shield Overcharger  build up the super shield and let the Laser charger to charge.

As this build is so drone-heavy, acquire a Drone Recovery Arm – and your defences become free! It can easily be swapped out towards the end of the game (Sector 6+) when you should have stockpiled a large number of drones.

Engi cruiser  is the easiest ship to get, you just need to get to sector 5 and you’ll get it. Is achievement are easier than the Kestrel, so you will probably end up unlocking the type B with the Engi cruiser before the Kestrel. Finishing the game with it unlock the Federation Cruiser.

Layout A: The Torus

The Engi Cruiser 

Unlock: Reaching the fifth sector with any Kestrel layout will unlocks the Engi Cruiser.

The Torus can be hard at first to play and you will rely mostly on your anti-ship drone to do damage to enemies ship at the beginning. The Ion Blast II is one of the great weapon of the game it’s fast recharge rate make it perfect to take down most shield with constant firing. Combine with laser & beam later your ship will be a force to recon with and will minimize your drone part usage.

Another key addition to this ship are bomb-type weapons. Ion Bombs are great later in the game against enemies with more than 2 shields, including the Rebel Flagship. The Ion blast and bombs can keep the shields down while your drones and lasers work on the hull. A Small Bomb or other type of launcher can help too, you can selectively take out systems as needed. This ship is one of the ship where the Drone Recovery Arm augment work great, it will allows you to use your drones without the fear of missing drone part. If you can grab extra anti-ship drone ship, specially a mark II, you will witness how powerful multiple attack drones can be has they tear down ship with more than 2 shield. You can get even 3 anti-ship drone and watch them go through even the most powerful shield and let your weapon finish the job

Upgrade:

Doors are probably a necessary upgrade on this ship because of the Engi weakness in hand-to-hand combat unless you have the opportunity to get Rock or Mantis crew, do so. Mind control can be a nice system to add to compensate Engi weakness in combat.

Hacking could be a nice addition but it unfortunately use drone part too unless you have Drone Recovery Arm augment.

The Teleporter is not advised on this ship, unless you are getting the system for blue storyline options.

Cloaking is always a great add, since it help dodge those nasty final attack of the Rebel flagship.

Side Note from the Wiki:

The Wiki have an interesting side note about how to level up the skill of your crew on this ship. In the first few sector you will probably encounter ship that can’t do anything to your ship so you can take advantage of that and level up your weapon, shield, piloting and engine since the ion blast is a non-lethal weapon.  Having these skill max will be huge later and will make it easier for you to spend your scrap on other systems.

Layout B: The Vortex

The Engi Cruiser 

Unlock : Earning two of the three Engi Cruiser achievements will unlock Layout B.

I have to be honest with you, I really have a hard time with this ship. It’s decent enough to cover you base the first 2 sector, but it has a lot of flaw. Heavy IonHeavy Laser I combo cover you base until you hit a ship with 2 shield, even before that the Heavy Ion is so slow to fill that the enemy might be able to hit your weapon before you even fire. Upgrade to a better ion weapon quickly or complement it with bomb/missile since it won’t do it for ship with heavy shield.

Starting with only one crew is one of them, it’s make you pretty vulnerable to boarding and event that might kill your only crew. Once you upgrade the doors the Anti-Personnel Drone can handle the hostile boarders on the ship while you empty the oxygen out of every room except the medbay and helm. The initial drone and augment will get useless pretty quickly since you probably want to fill this ship with anti-ship drone and defense drone instead of repair drone, and have a crew instead of just one lonely guy.

The only thing I can say that good about this ship is that the layout is somewhat good, easy to go around and system that go well together are next to each other like the teleporter and medbay which might make it a decent boarding ship if you get the right crew. There not much empty room though, so each hit will probably damage something important.

If you want a challenge that ship is for you, you can do a decent job if you get lucky but I get real hard fast if you don’t get lucky with your drops and shops.

Layout C: Tetragon

The Engi Cruiser 

Unlock: Reaching Sector 8 with the Engi Cruiser Layout B and Advanced Mode enabled unlocks layout C.

The ship layout is pretty neat but the main problem of this ship its is constant use of drone part by the hacking system and Beam Drone. If you can get your hand on the drone recovery arm you might save a lot on drone part there.

Later, this ship will mostly relies on it’s hacking and massive drone army to destroy the enemy ship. The Defense Scrambler will takes care of those nasty Anti-Combat drones and defense drone so you shouldn’t have problem deploying offensive drone and you could add missile weapon to be able to target specific systems that are causing you trouble. Drones destroy Zoltan shields pretty easily so that not an issue here. Mind Control, Teleportation can be nice addition to this ship too since your Lanius is a pretty good boarder specially if you can get another Lanius crew.

The Engi Cruiser

Robotic Warfare – With the Engi Cruiser, have 3 drones functioning at the same time.

The Engi Cruiser first Achievement

Probably the easiest achievement of the game to obtain. Obtain three drones and activate all three of them to unlock this achievement. Repair drone and anti-drone drone work best since they only need one power.

I hardly lifted a finger – With the Engi Cruiser, destroy an enemy ship using only drones.

The Engi Cruiser second Achievement

This achievement can be done pretty quickly with the Torus in sector one if you encounter AI ship with no shield. Just let the “Anti-Ship Drone I” loose and he will get the job done for you.

If you’re not lucky enough to get a AI ship in the first few sectors, you can complete this achievement against a 1 shield ship in a asteroid field.

According to the wiki, you can use a boarding ship on a AI ship with doors connecting to every room. Since the ship will lose 1 hull each time a system is destroy, wait destroyed systems become activated again so you boarding drone take care of them. This might take awhile but will give you this achievement too.

The guns… They’ve stopped – Have 4 enemy systems or subsystems ionized at the same time while using the Engi Cruiser.

The Engi Cruiser third Achievement

This achievement can be easily complete when visiting a pulsar since system ionized by the pulsar count toward that achievement. Systems that have cool down periods such as cloaking, hacking, mind control and teleporters also count towards this achievement. So ionizing the missing system while these are recharging will get you this achievement.

If you are going to to it the hard way, which is only going with weapon, the Ion Blast II cannons with a  Ion Bomb or/and a Ion Blast I will get the job done to. You have to quickly switch between system while the shield are down, and you will get that achievement.

The Kestrel first layout

Achievement :

The United Federation – Have six unique aliens on the Kestrel Cruiser simultaneously.

Kestrel first achievement

I though that this would be the easiest one to get but I never manage to get more than 5 different aliens. Your human count has one and you need to get 5 other from the eight different species in the game.

The Slug and the Crystal alien are the hardest to get. Slug can be recruited in store only in the slug home nebula or with particular event like Slocknog. Getting the cristal are even harder, you can only get them by receive the stasis pod from the Empty Ship in Asteroids quest, and then have the pod activated in the Zoltan Research Facility quest. You can get the achievement without these two race though. Here how to get other race:

Engi : They can be found through event, by defeating slaver ship or paying for a slave from a slaver ship. The can be hired in shop, mostly in engi control sector/homeoworld, zoltan sector/homeworld and even in the mantis sector/homeworld.

Zoltan: Like the Engi they can be found through some event like by defeating slaver ship or paying for a slave from a slaver ship. The can be hired in shop, mostly in engi control sector/homeoworld, zoltan sector/homeworld but less frequently elsewhere.

Mantis: Like the Engi they can be found through some event like by defeating slaver ship or paying for a slave from a slaver ship. you can get one in some occasion if you side with the mantis crew in a event in a engi controlled/homeworld sector The can be hired in shop, mostly in engi control sector/homeoworld, mantis sector/homeworld but rarely elsewhere.

Rock: They can be found too through the slaver and various event. They can be found in store too but mostly rock sector/homeworld but rarely elsewhere.

Lanius: You can get one when you encounter the “do you want our translator device ” event. It’s an event in abandoned sector that usually have Lanius there. You will encounter a Lanius ship that wants to trade scrap for fuel or drone or missile. There will be an option to inquire about their translator. Once you select it they will offer you 40 scrap for the “device” the device will end up being a Lanius name translator.
honestly I haven’t had the chance to find one except with that event or on the new Lanius ship or on a type C layout that sometime include Lanius crew member. However the wiki state that they can be found in store.

Note that This achievement is easier to complete using the Layout B (Red-Tail), as the starting crew includes three of the six required races.

Full Arsenal – Have every system and subsystem installed on the Kestrel Cruiser at one time.

Kestrel second achievement

This was the first achievement I manage to get on this ship and probably the easiest to accomplish of the three. You simply need to have all the system installed on the ship for the standard edition or 3 out of the 5 missing system in the advance edition. The missing system are : Teleporter, Drone Control,Cloaking, Hacking, and Mind Control, costing respectively 75, 85 (or 75, depending on which free drone it comes with), 150, 80, and 75 scrap. For the standard edition you need Teleporter, Drone Control,Cloaking.

The cheapest you can get this achievement in the advance edition is to get the Teleporter, Drone Control (if it 75) and Mind Control. Note your need the Battery subsystem too in the advance edition to get this achievement.

Tough Little Ship – As the Kestrel Cruiser, repair back to full health when it only has 1 HP remaining.

Kestrel third achievement

Probably one of the hardest achievement to pull off but here how you can do it.

Note (from the wiki): For the game to recognize this achievement as earned, the player must have the Kestrel Cruiser down to one hull point before jumping to a store beacon, and then the ship must be fully repaired all at once. If the ship is not repaired all at once or if the Hull Repair drone is used instead of a store, the achievement will not be earned.

I’ve added the note so you know that the Hull Repair drone won’t cut it and that you need to have 1 hp before going to a store.

They are several way to do this achievement but you probably know that having 1 hull is never a good situation to be and the risk of receiving more that 1 hull damage while fighting might throw off you calculation to get to  hull while fighting. And there always the problem that you need scrap to heal you ship full (usually 58 or 87 scrap).

There actually 2 somewhat safe way to do that achievement:

1- The first way is to find a asteroid field near a store, fight any hostile ship that are there. Once they are taken care of, power down your ship shield and watch it to go down to 1 hull while you repair any system or subsystem hit. Then warp to the store and repair it full.

2- You can use a weapon that can target your ship like the fire bomb. you need to have enough missile though (around 1 per point, note you can always lets the fire propagate). When you are near a store and you have enough scrap and missile, target your ship with the bomb until your at 1 hull point then extinguish the fire and jump to the store to repair your ship.

We are doing a series of posts on FTL and  we hope you like them. If you want us to do more of this let us know in the comment or by mail at jack at onlinesgamestips.com

The Kestrel Cruiser is the starting ship of the game. It’s a pretty well balance ship that start with very powerful weapon. The burst laser II with 3 laser will take care of the early sector and the Artemis missile will help you remove those nasty shield. The burst laser II is so good that I never had to sell it or get rid of it in all my gameplay with this ship.

Layout A: The Kestrel Cruiser

The Kestrel first layout

Unlock: Unlocked by default

Starting weapons of that ship are some of the best in the game, you’ll probably will likely keep one or even both for the whole game. Burst Laser II is simply amazing, it’s only 2 power for 3 laser shot making it probably one of the best damage output for that amount of power. If you manage your way well this weapon should be to cruise through the early sector where enemy ship usually have 1 or no shield. The Artemis will help you to take out those shield, 1 power for 2 damage it’s quite good the only other missile using 1 power is the leto and it does only 1 damage.

One tactic with this ship is to add beam weapons, due to this ship’s high shield removal capabilities. Pike beam or halberd Beam will fit quite well on this ship. Another amazing setup I managed to get was to get two extra Burst Laser II (one found the other bought) and I cruised through the game with them. Weapon pre-igniter fit well on this ship, specially if you manage to get beam weapon, extra burst laser or better missile (Pegasu, etc)

Layout B: Red Tail

The Kestrel second layout

Unlock: Unlock that ship by earning two of the three Kestrel achievements.

The Basic Laser isn’t really good alone but four of them can make significant damage and will be very effective for early and even mid game. They are pretty good at leveling up your crewmember weapon skill. You will need replace these lasers with better lasers or support (bombs, missiles, beams). Already having a mantis might make it worthwhile to by a crew teleporter earlier than usual.

Layout C: The Swallow

The Kestrel Third layout

Unlock: Unlock that ship by surviving up to sector 8 with the Red tail (the kestrel layout B)

  • Default name: The Swallow
  • Starting Crew: 2 Human , 1 Lanius
  • Starting Weapons:
  • Starting Resources:
  • Slots: 4 Weapon, 2 Drone (requires system)

I haven’t had the chance to try this ship yet but it’s hacking system combine with the ion stunner make a good combo to prevent enemies from repairing their systems specially their shield, add the hacking stun augment and they won’t repair anything. It can be use to take down the Med bay or oxygen and prevent them from repairing them. I really like its layout, the oxygen system can be drain out of oxygen surrounding it forcing them to move elsewhere.

 

If you don’t have FTL: Faster Than Light on iPad click here and to buy it.

Source : The FTL Wiki Kestrel Page, The Wiki Ship Strategies and my tear and sweat trying to unlock those damn ship.

Official Strategy: Werewolf’s Last Sprint

For better management of werewolf, Ancient Summoner official site offers the strategy of werewolf cards. As a bloodthirsty race, the instinct wildness and agility lead werewolf to the most horrible killer in the continent. Fenris the Butcher, the most powerful one of halfblood, needs a detailed description indeed.

2-918-as

Fenris the Butcher(Epic)has a relatively high initial attack value-5. His 13 HP is also outstanding, and with its 3 CD, it is surely a rare card. Sprint, the shared attribute of halfblood, endorsed it good mobility. And the attribute “Rage” makes it terrific when injured. But what fair is that it also has weakness—when you summoned it, the attribute “Blood Price” caused you 3 damages.

Add the attribute of “sanctuary” or those that can recover HP to Fenris the Butcher to ensure it won’t die when injured, thus it can become the nightmare of opponents. It’s fair to say that priest and Fenris the Butcher is the perfect pair.

When you’re facing Fenris the Butcher, the strategies for players is as following:

1. Kill it with units or skills of high attack as the activation of the attribute “rage” is counted by attack turns and it increases 1 attack every time after you attack it.

So if you use the card that has only 1 attack value, Fenris the Butcher will become very horrible.

2. Use a card that can fly over it to avoid frontal confrontation.

3. Use a wall to block it. The fourth is to use the Mage’s attribute of petrify.

4. Add the skill of “sanctuary” to his target and let him reap the consequences, when you are a priest.

The introduction of death knight entry into Ancient Summoner is about to come in the next stage. What’ll happen when death knights lands in the fantasy? Interested and expected? Let’s wait passionately until it is unveiled!

For more info about Ancient Summoner, please check the previous entries:

“Ancient Summoner” a new Fantasy Card Game from Gamebox

Werewolf Invasion: Big Thing Happening to Ancient Summoner?

Ancient Summoner new server, Three kingdoms online merge and much more

Gang of the Halfblood Ancient Summoner’s & new chrome and firefox extension

New Server: Ancient Summoner Death Knight & General War:Memories

Managing your food supply is probably the most important thing you have to do in most war game.

These apply mostly to Three kingdom online since it’s the game I played the most but can probably be applied to travian to since both games are almost the same.

They two main thing to think about to manage your troop food

1- Maintaining a high food output

2- Storing your surplus & reducing your consumption without reducing your troop.

Today article is about what are the primaries source of food.

1- Farmland

farmland

Farmland are the primary source of food in the game so it’s very important to upgrade them.

Later in the game you can try to switch you main to spot that have more farmland that the average six farmland spot.

You can increase your output through oasis too, three +50% oasis double your farmland output (and almost triple it if you have a decent hero with the farm skill.)

More of that in my city placement guide and in one entry from the koram forum on how to build a great city.

2- Plunder

plunder-trophy

Aggressive player (called wolf) heavily depend on farming other city, this his essential to keep a healthy amount of food in your storage when your cities have a negative output.

At the end of beginner protection, your output is probably somewhere between 400 and 800 per hours, plundering completely a 0 pop population give you 800 of each resources in about 15 minute for a city besides you. That mean plundering a city give you 1 hours ahead of someone who don’t so those who plunder quickly get ahead of those who don’t.

At some point plundering will be your primary source of food (specially if your shu)

3- Trading

transport

Since player usually get more food than the other resource from farming and that unit and building cost more of the other resources than food, food than to sell at 1.5 for 1 on the market. Than mean you can get 15000 food for the price of 10000 of the other resources. (note that note always the case, on server 14 most user I was farming were wei and I tend to get more iron than other resources so sometime I had hard time selling my iron for food, probably because the players on our server were in the same situations.)

When you’re not trading between your cities it can be a good idea to trade on the market your excess resources for food.

4- Heroes

Heroes

Governor with high politic can increase significantly your resources output. You can add the farm skill to your heroes and increase you food output.

Epic heroes can have special unique skill that give them a better food output, like Pang Tong 25% food bonus, note that these bonus stack.

Finally they are items that can be equipped to your the heroes to increase your food output.

5- Other sources:  Item, tax, quest

quest

There more way to get food most of them are already in my checklist

There are other item that worth mentioning that are not in the checklist :

  • The tax license (uptained in the King of the hill event)
    Good old emperor order and dragon bowl (a extra 25%)
  • Rotation order (Actually reduce your food consumption and is very expensive)
  • Alchemy table (expensive, don’t increase food that much but last forever and you get your gold back)

More in part 2 – Storing your food and way to reduce your consumption

Link on this page :

The three kingdoms online checklist

In my previous post I’ve wrote about how to create a lobbyist train.
But some of my leaguemate seem to have problems with how to build them and how to use them.

First if your completely new to lobbyists you can check koramgame TKO forum thread about them here.
I’ll summarize it for you and add some of my trick in the process.

1- How to build them

That part is easy, you need Mansion or Annexe Level 10, Drill Ground Level 20 and Command Center Level 10 to research a lobbyist. Like the pioneer you con recruit a lobbyist when the Mansion at level 10, 15 and 20, for the annexe it’s on level 10 and 20 only. Once your have all the requirement, you have to research the lobbyist in the drill ground. From my experience, if you decided that your city will recruit lobbyist it better to dedicate your city to lobbyist, so you will have to research it only once to recruit two (or 3 if it’s a mansion) lobbyist.

Note that your first cities should probably be built with pioneer instead of lobbying someone else city. Why ? Because it’s take a boatload of resources to get you city to recruit them and it takes much more time that the simple three pioneer, on top of that it’s easier to create subs that are near your main and you can chose the arrangement of your resource fields if you want to specialized your city.

2- How they work

The lobbyist reduces the loyalty of the attacking city only if it’s not the main and there no annexe in it. They typically reduce the loyalty by 20% (25% for wei), you can increase their effectiveness with a hero that have a scroll of rumors.

Note that you can only lobby a sub city and the annex must be destroyed in order to reduce the loyalty of the city.

3- How attack a city with them

Lobbying a city is three step process, first you need to clear the city from its troops, after you need to destroy the annexe (see using demo with lobbyist) and then you can send your lobbyist. Like explained in my previous article on how to create a lobbyist train it’s better to have more than one to save you from many roundtrip to the city you want to lobby.
Be careful when you attack an active player, he might rebuild troop and hide them just to kill your lobbyist. They can use the curfew command or just rebuild an annexe to prevent the lost of loyalty too.

For more tip on attack tactic here more info from my previous article :
The anatomy of a attack and other offense tactic
Using demo with lobbyist