Valor Badges are one of the resources that can quietly decide how fast your account pulls ahead in Last War: Survival Game. The easy mistake is to spread them between Mastery, Defense Fortification, and Siege to Siege because each tree gives an immediate combat boost. The problem is that these upgrades can slow down the research path that actually builds your badge income and gets your account toward T10 troops.
For most accounts, the better approach is to build your research economy first, turn Alliance Duel research into a steady Valor Badge engine, and then push through Special Forces with as little wasted research as possible. Only after the core path is established do the specialized trees become a serious investment. The exact timing can vary with spending and account progress, but the order of priorities stays remarkably consistent.
Start With Research That Costs No Valor Badges
Before spending any Valor Badges, keep the badge-free research moving. Development and Economy are the foundation because they improve the efficiency of everything that comes after them. Leaving these queues idle just because combat research looks more exciting creates a hidden cost that becomes harder to recover later.
Development deserves particular attention early on. Research such as Fast Builder reduces construction time across future upgrades, while Research Enhancement shortens later research projects. These bonuses keep paying back as your buildings and technology become more expensive and take longer to finish. Later upgrades such as the extra Barracks and hospital-related bonuses add more account-wide value rather than just a temporary increase in combat power.
Economy is less dramatic, but it solves a very real problem during progression: resources become a constant bottleneck. Better production and gathering speed make it easier to keep construction, research, and troop development moving. Since these technologies do not consume Valor Badges, there is little reason to let the queue sit empty.
Run the badge-free queues continuously whenever possible. Your first priority is not to show the biggest power number today; it is to make every future upgrade cheaper in time and resources.
Alliance Duel Research Builds Your Valor Badge Engine
Once the foundation is running, the first major Valor Badge investment should go into the Alliance Duel tech tree. Spending a badge here can feel less rewarding than buying a direct attack or defense increase, but the value comes from what the research unlocks later rather than the immediate power on your account.
Alliance Duel research improves your ability to earn points in the weekly event, which in turn gives you access to more reward chests. Research such as Advanced Reward and Super Reward opens higher chest tiers containing more Valor Badges along with Diamonds and other useful resources. That creates a feedback loop: badges fund the research, the research helps you score more effectively, and better rewards give you more badges for the next round of upgrades.
This is why spreading your early badges across several combat trees can be misleading. Mastery, Defense Fortification, and Siege to Siege can all make the account stronger, but Alliance Duel research can increase the flow of the same resource you need for those trees. Building that income first gives you more room to specialize later.
For lower-spending accounts, this part of the route matters even more because every wasted badge delays the next major research milestone. Higher spenders can move through the same process faster, but buying more resources does not make random badge spending efficient.
Use Your Other Research Queue to Build the Main Squad
While Alliance Duel research is working on your Valor Badge income, another research queue can focus on Hero Tech. For early and mid-game accounts, the main squad should get the priority because these upgrades directly improve hero performance and have a broader impact across PvE and PvP than spreading investment across multiple troop types.
If the main squad is Tanks, finish the Tank-focused path before trying to push several different squad types at once. Once the primary squad is in good shape, the next squad can become the target, whether that is Air or Missile. You do not need to fully complete every squad branch just to reach the lower part of the Hero Tech tree.
The important progression check is getting the required level-three technologies far enough to open the bottom section. The lower nodes provide broad bonuses to hero damage, Attack, Defense, and HP, so reaching that section can be more valuable than spending the same time trying to max every upper branch.
Some of these research projects can take more than 20 days. Before starting a long project, activate the Engineer skill Cooperative Research and make sure the Secretary of Science buff is active. Using those time reductions before the timer starts is a simple way to avoid wasting weeks of research time.
Special Forces Is the Main Route to T10
Once your badge income is established, the long-term target shifts to Special Forces. This is where the research plan stops being about efficiency alone and starts pushing toward the biggest combat milestone: T10 troops.
Special Forces contains direct combat upgrades along the way, but the real reason to prioritize the tree is the final research gate that leads to T10. A full march of T10 troops has a large raw-stat advantage over T9 troops, so delaying that milestone just to collect scattered bonuses can leave your account stuck in the middle of several unfinished paths.
The cost is substantial, which is exactly why the earlier Alliance Duel investment matters. You want a stronger badge income before entering a research path that consumes badges at a much faster rate.
Do not treat Special Forces like a collection of nodes that all need to be maxed before moving on. Follow the required research path, unlock the next row, and keep moving downward. Unnecessary side upgrades add research time and resource costs without helping you reach T10 faster.
Use the third research queue for your main squad
As another research queue becomes available, use it to keep improving the squad that carries your account. Squad-specific research does not require Valor Badges, so it is a useful way to gain additional strength while your badge-heavy research stays focused on the main progression route.
Pick the squad where your primary team is located and keep that investment focused. Splitting a free research queue between several teams can look balanced on paper, but it slows the squad that is doing most of your actual work.
Mastery, Defense Fortification, or Siege to Siege?
This is where many accounts lose the thread of the original plan. Mastery, Defense Fortification, and Siege to Siege are not useless research trees. They simply belong later because they solve more specific problems than the core progression path.
There are two important exceptions to that rule. Once your Special Forces progress is far enough along, you can unlock the fourth hospital through Defense Fortification and the fourth Drill Ground through Siege to Siege. These upgrades become available at roughly 40% Special Forces completion and improve your recovery and training capacity, making them much more useful than their position in the research tree might suggest.
Grab those unlocks when they become available before sinking a large amount of Valor Badges into Mastery.
Mastery should stay concentrated on one primary squad
Mastery is attractive because its bonuses directly strengthen a primary squad, but that same specialization makes splitting the investment inefficient. If the Tank squad is your strongest team, putting badges into its Mastery can produce a meaningful mid-game power increase.
The mistake is opening several Mastery trees at the same time. Pick the squad that matters most to your account and stay with it until the relevant tree is completed. A partially developed Mastery tree spread across Tanks, Air, and Missile gives you several incomplete upgrades instead of one finished specialization.
Defense Fortification becomes more useful after your offensive core
Defense Fortification focuses on survivability, base defense, and garrison strength. That makes it more attractive once your account already has a reliable offensive foundation and a stable supply of Valor Badges.
For most accounts, it makes more sense to finish a full Mastery path for the main squad before returning heavily to Defense Fortification. There is a practical reason for the order: your account gains more from winning events and offensive fights when its main team is already developed, while defensive research protects the power you have built afterward.
Save Siege to Siege for specialized PvP investment
Siege to Siege is the most situational of the three trees. Its bonuses are aimed at offensive actions against player bases and capital structures, so the value depends heavily on how much your account participates in major PvP attacks.
For the average player, that makes Siege the last major Valor Badge destination. Dedicated attackers can find a reason to move it up the list, but a general account usually gets more mileage from its main squad and defensive progression first.
F2P and Spender Accounts Follow the Same Road
The research order does not need to change just because your spending level changes. What changes is how quickly you can move through it. Free-to-play and low-spending accounts have less room for mistakes, so the early game should stay tightly focused on badge-free development, Economy, Alliance Duel research, and then Special Forces.
That means resisting the urge to buy small combat upgrades with Valor Badges simply because they are immediately visible. Build the badge engine first, unlock the important Alliance Duel reward tiers, and then commit to the long push toward T10. With a limited badge supply, consistency matters more than trying to win several research trees at once.
Mid- and high-spending players can accelerate the same route with additional resources and badge packs. The extra spending can also make it easier to start a Mastery path earlier or invest in Defense Fortification once the account becomes a larger target. Even then, the basic logic stays intact: improve income, secure the core power milestone, and specialize after the foundation is already paying for itself.
The Valor Badge Priority Order
For a typical account, the research path can be simplified into a small number of decisions. The key is not to treat every available combat tree as equally urgent.
- Keep Development and Economy research running without interruption.
- Use early Valor Badges on Alliance Duel research to improve your badge income.
- Focus Hero Tech on the main squad and reach the lower Hero Tech bonuses efficiently.
- Push Special Forces toward T10 without wasting badges on unnecessary side nodes.
- Unlock the fourth Hospital and fourth Drill Ground when their research requirements become available.
- Concentrate Mastery on one main squad, then consider Defense Fortification.
- Leave Siege to Siege for later or for accounts built around heavy offensive PvP.
The exact research speed will depend on your account, spending, and available resources, but the important part is the sequence. Valor Badges become much easier to manage when each major investment helps set up the next one rather than competing with it.
Last War Valor Badge Research FAQ
Should I spend Valor Badges on Mastery early?
Usually not. Early badges are better used to develop the Alliance Duel research that improves future badge income. Mastery becomes a stronger option once your main progression toward T10 is established, especially when you can keep the investment on one primary squad instead of splitting it.
When should I unlock the fourth Hospital and fourth Drill Ground?
Push Special Forces until those unlock requirements become available, which the guide places at roughly 40% Special Forces completion. Once they are accessible, the extra Hospital from Defense Fortification and extra Drill Ground from Siege to Siege are worth taking before making a large investment into Mastery.
Do I need to max every squad tech before pushing T10?
No. The recommended route is to prioritize the main squad, then work toward the lower Hero Tech bonuses and continue down Special Forces. Once the main squad is established, you can begin developing a second squad rather than delaying T10 to finish all three troop types equally.
Is Siege to Siege ever worth prioritizing?
Yes, but mainly for accounts that actively specialize in offensive PvP and attacks on player bases or capital structures. For a more general account, Mastery and Defense Fortification usually have broader value once the main T10 route is underway.
