Dragonfire Troop Affinity: Bonuses, Penalties and Troop Counters

Troop counter reference

These relationships are from the official dragon guide. A favourable counter does not guarantee victory or remove a dragon's negative affinity.

What affinity tells you

The official dragon guide explains affinity as a pairing with Cavalry, Shieldbearers, Archers, Spearmen or Siege. Its positive, neutral and negative effects are summarised above. This is about your dragon and troop pairing; check the enemy separately when considering troop counters.

Wyrmwise's reviewed catalogue stores positive, neutral, negative or unknown values. These are categorical records, not a published numerical combat formula. This guide does not assign an invented damage bonus to a positive value or a penalty percentage to a negative one.

Keep the source definition and the tool's selection rule separate. The official glossary alone does not establish that every viable army must share three positive affinities or quantify the benefit of doing so.

How Wyrmwise uses affinity

The current optimiser groups dragons by positive recorded affinity. A trio enters its recommendation comparison only when all three share a positive value for the selected troop type. It then evaluates supported mechanics and placement, and allocates dragons without duplicates.

This filter is a conservative product policy, not a claim that the game forbids mixed-affinity formations. It can leave out an army a player has used successfully. An omission should prompt you to check the reason, rather than conclude that the dragon is weak.

Affinity and troop counters answer different questions

Affinity is recorded per dragon and troop type. Troop-type advantage concerns the opposing troops: for example, the official glossary lists Cavalry as having an advantage over Shieldbearers. A shared-affinity result does not by itself tell you that the recommended army counters your next opponent.

The official counter sequence is Cavalry over Shieldbearers, Shieldbearers over Archers, Archers over Spearmen, and Spearmen over Cavalry. Siege is disadvantaged against all four but deals extra Durability damage.

Check your available troops and the battle context before fielding a recommendation. Wyrmwise's supported roster comparison is not a battle simulator, and this guide does not turn its troop selection into a guaranteed matchup win.

Some abilities also have their own troop conditions. In the reviewed community mechanics, Arrax's Adaptive Guard protection is gated to Archers or Shieldbearers and Star Rank 6. That particular condition cannot be generalised to every protective Habit, nor does it make every Arrax trio suitable.

What happens when affinity is unknown?

The current Wyrmwise evidence set deliberately leaves these values unresolved:

• Sunfyre: Archers, Shieldbearers and Siege.
• Tairax: Archers and Spearmen.

These are gaps in Wyrmwise's reviewed data, not a new “unknown” mechanic in the game. The optimiser does not silently turn them into neutral or positive values. An unknown can exclude a candidate; it cannot add a benefit to one.

If your in-game description supplies clearer evidence, use Wyrmwise support to report the dragon, troop type and relevant game version or screenshot. A factual update needs review before it changes the evidence set.

Use affinity as one check in the formation decision

After finding a shared positive affinity, ask what the dragons do for one another. Do their active abilities connect? Does protection reach the intended ally? Is a useful effect still locked? Does taking this trio leave enough suitable dragons for your other armies?

A raw-power ranking cannot answer those questions. Neither can an affinity table on its own. Follow the formation-building process to connect the checks, then use the placement guide to arrange the selected dragons.