Hungry Spider Level Achievement + Extra levels guide!

Overview

Hello and welcome to the monthly extra level guide! This guide will help you win the hungry spider level, so that your appetite for achievements will be sated! Additionally, this guide has an insane difficulty walkthrough of the extra levels, and the provided tips, strategies, and video footage will be helpful for anyone struggling with them. This guide will also be updated to cover extra levels as they are released, so come back every month!

Hungry Spider Level

Ability Overview
Bite: This ability is good against small enemies, like tiny baby wolf spiders and ants, but it can be useful against hermit crabs as well to negate their healing ability. As a big bonus, leveling up your bite ability will increase your maximum health, making it important. You’d rather put spare points into bite over devour, for this reason.

Venom Pool: This ability is your primary damage dealer. It is your second-best ability, and it should take second priority, behind crippling venom, when putting in upgrade points. As you level it up, it does more damage and its size becomes larger.

Crippling Venom: Hands down the best ability. No matter what strategy you are going for, whether it be bite focused or venom pool focused, getting this very high level is an absolute must. Fighting ubers means taking their health apart, retreating to heal, and then returning to take more of their health. First of all, you have to actually be able to outrun the ubers, in order to do this.

Even though it may not seem good at low levels, crippling venom is so powerful at level 13 that it slows down the uber wolf spider to the speed of a wood louse. As a huge bonus, enemies take x% more venom pool damage when they are affected by crippling venom (% of venom pool weakness increases as you upgrade the skill). Additionally, as you upgrade crippling venom, its range of effect increases.

Devour: You only have to get this ability up to level 4. Healing is certainly important, but you’re never going to run out of food, since ant queens drop 400 food each, ubers drop 3000 food each, and there are a ton of other enemies you will kill that you can eat (so always go into battle with full health, don’t try to conserve food).

Note: When you level up, your spider model becomes bigger, and you also get some additional health, regardless if you put points into bite.

Tips and Mechanics
Tip: If you go to options, graphics, and select windowed fullscreen, you can easily switch between this guide on steam and your game, as you play the level.

Tip #2: I recommend using WASD for movement rather than using the mouse to click around.

Tip #3: Your wolf spider does an idle animation periodically like actual idle AI wolf spiders in the game. This can (or make it seem like) your abilities are less responsive and slower at times, due to the idle animation starting to play, and getting cancelled every time you move or use an ability. In my experience, when this happens, it’s best to just retreat and let your wolf spider do his thing, and then continue fighting enemies.

Tip #4: Keep enemies slowed! The moment your crippling venom ability cool down is over, hit them with it again. Being faster than enemy = control in this level.

Mechanic #1: If an enemy starts chasing you, and you manage to get a piece of dirt (like a corner) between you and the enemy, they will immediately stop chasing you. However, the best way to escape an enemy is to just hit them with a crippling venom (this may mean that they will get a hit on you), which allows you to outrun them.

I’ve split this video into sections, (it looks like the sections only appear if you view it on youtube, rather than from this steam guide) so you can easily see any part of the level you struggle with, or how to deal with certain enemies. This video also illustrates the main strategy that you should use to kill enemies, which is crippling venom to slow the enemy, and then venom pool.

Order of Enemies

Enemies at spawn, including mole cricket to the north
Black ant colony and queens
Wood ant colony and queens
All hermit crabs, excluding uber
All devils coach horse beetles and larvae, excluding uber
Some small tiger beetles, possibly an adult as well, to get to level 23
Uber hermit crab
adult tiger beetles until crippling venom is level 10
Uber devils coach horse
Finish off all tiger beetles
Uber tiger beetle
Wolf spiders
Uber wolf spider

This strategy works well because you can kill all enemies from range. There is much less risk to getting stunned by devils coach horses and tiger beetles. It is more consistent than a high level bite strategy.

The max level is 36, and your skill distribution should look like: bite level 7, venom pool level 12, crippling venom level 13, and devour level 4. After killing your initial enemies in the spawn area, get your bite and devour to level 4, and from there focus on venom pool and crippling venom. Toward the end game, you sometimes will only have the option to level either bite or devour, since they will be falling behind in terms of levels, so put those points into bite for more health.

The uber wolf spider is terrifying and should not be underestimated! Make sure that you are very accurate in venom pool placement, and make sure you do not get into her range at all, or she will one shot you with her venom bite ability! Be patient and wear her down. Good luck!

Christmas Spider Level

Extra Level 1 Aggrandise

This section will cover Aggrandise on insane difficulty. I would strongly recommend completing the entire campaign on at least medium before attempting this level. Aggrandise requires patience and will take about 100 minutes on insane (shorter on lower difficulties). On higher difficulties, enemies drop less food.

My insane strategy involves building a few trap jaws at the very beginning (about 6), and then building only additional workers and mortars in a 1:1 ratio, and this is for a reason. By the late game, you’ll have 29 mortars, 36 workers, and you’ll start building trap jaws again until you have 19. Bank about 800 food, and win!

Helpful tip: go to options, graphics, and select windowed full screen to switch between your game and this guide on steam.

Important note: Due to the recent balance changes on hard and insane difficulty:

Enemies drop 10% more food than they used to.
The fish also gives 100 more food on hard, and 50 more food on insane. You should be able to afford a bigger army than mine.
The wood lice and wood worm wandering is fixed! They’ll stick near your queen.
You can follow this guide up to this point. However, you should have more food now due to these balance changes than I had in the video. Because of this, spend extra food only trap jaw ants, while keeping a reserve of about 800 food.
You’ll need this bigger army for a reason now, because one you attack any of the huge whip spider and its body guards, all of them will actually come for your queen. You’ll have to fight them all at once now, so make sure you build a bigger army and have more reserves.

Before any engagement:

Have fresh brood placed
Don’t just rush in, be tactical and take your time
Avoid taking on an entire chamber all at once, pick enemies off slowly
Have an appropriate amount of food banked (amount varies depending on army size)
Turn all of your ant’s food gathering off
When facing very high damage enemies, (wolf spider, mantis, funnel spider, BTBL), send workers a little ahead of trap jaws and mortars. When facing other enemies, send trap jaws and workers in together as a melee line.

Order of Enemies to Kill: How Many Ants You Should Have
(worker number includes queen’s starting workers)
Part 1:

3 Devils coach horse larvae in a chamber full of seeds > 7 workers, 2 trap jaws
Small hermit crab in south west corner > 8 workers, 4 trap jaws, 1 mortar
Tiny wolf spider babies in south west corner > 9 workers, 5 trap jaws, 1 mortar
3 Small bush crickets > 9 workers, 6 trap jaws, 2 mortars
2 Small mantis > 9 workers, 6 trap jaws, 2 mortars
3 Rove beetle larvae to the south > 9 workers, 6 trap jaws, 3 mortars
9 Devils coach horse larvae in a chamber full of seeds > 9 workers, 6 trap jaws, 3 mortars
Small beach tiger beetles > 12 workers, 6 trap jaws, 6 mortars
1 Adult devils coach horse + 3 DCH larvae > 14 workers, 6 trap jaws, 9 mortars
7 Rove beetle larvae > 16 workers, 6 trap jaws, 9 mortars
Harvestmen > 16 workers, 6 trap jaws, 10 mortars
Green rove beetle group > 16 workers, 6 trap jaws, 10 mortars
Blue rove beetle group > 16 workers, 6 trap jaws, 11 mortars
Jumping spiders > 17 workers, 6 trap jaws, 12 mortars

Part 2:

Adult beach tiger beetles > 17 workers, 6 trap jaws, 12 mortars
Adult hermit crabs > 17 workers, 6 trap jaws, 12 mortars
Beach tiger beetle larvae around fish > 24 workers, 6 trap jaws, 15 mortars
3 Adult mantis > 28 workers, 8 trap jaws, 24 mortars (big increase in units after fish)
Army ants > 34 workers, 8 trap jaws, 25 mortars
1 adult BTB, 1 adult DCH, 1 adult bush-cricket > 36 workers, 8 trap jaws, 27 mortars
7 Funnel web spiders > 36 workers, 8 trap jaws, 28 mortars
Mole crickets > 36 workers, 10 trap jaws, 28 mortars
Wood ants > 36 workers, 14 trap jaws, 28 mortars
5 medium wolf spiders > 36 workers, 16 trap jaws, 28 mortars
Adult DHCs > 36 workers, 16 trap jaws, 29 mortars
Medium bush crickets > 36 workers, 19 trap jaws, 29 mortars
Huge whip-spider > See important note at the top of this section!

Beginning Tips

Wood louse, which are placed in as free starting food, annoyingly love to wander into chambers full of enemies, becoming unreachable. On insane, it’s important that you get all of them, so be quick in slaughtering them as the game starts.
As usual, try to single out enemies or a portion of enemies in a chamber in order to kill them and loose as little food as possible.
Building a few starting trap jaws is important (about 6), since they will add damage and survivability to your melee line. The reason why you should build so many wood ants is obvious: they do a ton of damage and are cost effective with melee support.
Building workers over trap jaws or black ants as the main melee line has a few advantages. Of course, they are much weaker (and much cheaper), but they’re not meant to do damage, that’s the wood ant’s job. They are good against mantises or wolf spiders because they will cost less to re-spawn, but weak to splash damage. Casualties are inevitable when facing the 7 funnel webs or BTBL around the fish, so it is best to lose workers rather than a more than twice/thrice as expensive black ant or trap jaw ant force.

Mid Game tips

Pretty much follow the same strategy of singling out enemies when possible, to conserve food. Always try to make profits from killing insects.
The hard part of this is fighting the adult hermit crabs and adult beach tiger beetles. This can easily cost the run if you attack at the wrong time and get unlucky. Be very patient at this part, and see what I do at 58:28 in the video.

Late Game tips

After killing the funnel webs and a few surrounding chambers, you should have 36 total workers, 29 total mortars, and 19 total trap jaws. Your army is big enough to kill the huge whip spider, but you’ll need optimally 800 food in the bank, but it is possible with a couple hundred less. First you should be able to store all that food.
(Note, the following tips are a big obsolete now due to balance changes that give the player more food, but also make the player fight all the whip spiders at once, since they now head for the player’s queen.) Once your army is at the mentioned size, all the enemies you take down should be harvested and banked in your food stores. Don’t go after the two large whip spiders like I did in that video, I didn’t profit food and was only experimenting. Don’t go after the adult wolf spiders either. Not sure about the adult mole crickets, but they are risky.
At a bare minimum have 400-500 food in the bank, and then go after the huge whip spider. Observe what I do at the end of the video to take him down. Simply use your 7 queen workers to lure him away from the other two whip spiders in his chamber, and once he is close to you, send your army at him until he dies. You may need to retreat to replenish brood, and then single him out again and finish him.
If you lure one of the large whip spiders closer to you instead, simply kill him and harvest a free 130 food. Good method to do if you don’t have enough food (less than 400) to take down the huge whip spider. But don’t lure and fight two large whip spiders at once, only one at a time.

Extra Level 2 Babysitting

This section will cover Babysitting on insane difficulty. I would strongly recommend completing the entire formicarium tier 2 before attempting this. Babysitting requires quick micro and is essentially the opposite of the slow paced Aggrandise. It will take about 35-40 minutes on insane, and about the same amount of time on all difficulties. On higher difficulties, there are more enemies, but enemy food drops are normal.

My insane strategy involves building a combination of workers and mortars, but no melee ants. To start, you will need quick micro to develop an army to save your ally from camping wolf spiders, and from there you will cycle from above ground to help your ally, and underground, to clear out enemies and gather food with a harvesting worker group.

Helpful tip: Go to options, graphics, and select windowed full screen to switch between your game and this guide on steam.

Helpful tip #2: If you hover your mouse over your ally’s food stores, you can see how much food they have. Try to keep this above 200. This will mean turn your ant’s gather off and let them harvest from enemies, while you harvest from other sources, like the insects in your nest underground.

Fun fact: If you click “play more” or wait long enough before completing the objective, an uber hermit crab will spawn. He spawns about 36-38 minutes in the level. You don’t have to kill him to win, though, even if he spawns before you kill all the required enemies.

The first thing you should understand is how enemies attack in this level: enemies attack whichever colony attacks them first. Once you attack an enemy group, all the enemies in that group will go for your queen. If your ally attacks an enemy in a group, all the enemies in that group will go for the ally queen.

Order of Enemies Your Ally Targets > Optimal # of Ants to Fight Them on Insane
(note: the number of ants is ONLY your army group! You should have additional workers in your nest and harvesting groups.)

3 small wolf spiders camping ally nest > 10 workers, 5 mortars
3 small tiger beetles attacking your nest > 10 workers, 5 mortars
a few DHC larvae in their underground > you don’t need to help them (unless they have 0 food)
Group of small hermit crabs to the west > 14 workers, 8 mortars
Funnel web spiders in their underground > 15 workers, 12 mortars
5 Small tiger beetles above their nest > 22 workers, 13 mortars
6 Adult hermit crabs below their nest > 24 workers, 14 mortars
Adult DHCs in ally underground > 24 workers, 14 mortars
BTBL > you don’t need to help them (unless they’re in very bad shape)
4 Adult TBs > 25 workers, 19 mortars (5 level 2, see late game details!)
2 Adult wolf spiders > 25 workers, 19 mortars (5 level 2, see late game details!)
3 Adult hermit crabs > 29 workers, 19 mortars (with upgrades)
5 Adult TBs > 29 workers, 19 mortars (with more upgrades)
3 medium wolf spiders > easy win
group of varied adult enemies > 29 workers, 19 mortars (with more upgrades)

Early Game Details
I recommend watching the beginning of the video to get a good idea of the early game micro. If you’re like me, and not the best at being quick, here are a few tips:

Build your food storages like I did. You don’t have time to dig out a neat chamber.
Build 3 mortars at the start and send them to kill the wood louse.
Plan out where you will dig while your ants are gathering.
Make use of the free food right outside the nest.
Take out one chamber of insects underground.
Build 3 workers to operate the nest group (turn attack and gather off). Your 7 queen workers are best used for harvesting. You can switch them later on when you have more time and resources.
Build 2 more mortars so you have 5, and build an additional chamber of 10 workers. Now send your queen workers, your chamber of 10 workers, and 5 mortars to help the ally. Try to help before they run out of food. Don’t fight all the spiders at once, and if all three of them group up, it’s back luck.
A tricky part is when the ally digs out funnel web spiders. Make sure you position your ants inside their nest before they actually dig the funnel webs out, so you can prevent them from losing all their food.

Tip: If you fail a couple of attempts, don’t be discouraged. In this level, being a bit quicker or having slightly better micro can make all the difference between failing and dominating. Momentum counts for a lot in this level, and the level doesn’t wait for you. If you dominate the first fight, you’ll continue to dominate unless you make a mistake, and if you struggle in the first fight, you’ll continue to struggle throughout the level.

The Trick (to deal with the difficult part)

This part is especially notable on hard and insane difficulty, but can cost you on medium as well. Essentially, what will happen is after your ally finishes with the beach tiger beetle larvae, they will go after the 4 adult tiger beetles right next to their nest. You might have time to give them a wave of help, but it won’t be enough. But, before more of your own ants can reinforce the ally, 2 adult wolf spiders attack your nest, cutting you off. Bad situation, right….

What you can do:

By the time the ally goes after the BTBL, you optimally should have 19 mortars (possibly a 2-4 upgraded to level 2), 10 workers in a harvesting group, 29 workers in a battle group, and 7 workers in the nest group. Additionally, you should have 300 + food stores, but as much as possible.
Combine your harvesting group with your battle group UNLESS you are very low on food and behind in the level. In that case, try to harvest stuff with your harvest group, but know that the level will be close (on hard/insane). No matter what, you must kill the wolf spiders, so you don’t have to deal with them when the adult tiger beetles attack.
Attack them with your army, and let your army die, doing all the damage they can. Have them regroup right outside your nest as they re-spawn, and finish the wolf spiders. You may have to retreat a third time underground to finish them.
Immediately after the wolf spiders drop dead, send your entire army after the adult beach tiger beetles. You must try to engage them BEFORE your ally engages them. This way, they’ll come after your queen rather than your ally’s. You’ll have to regroup outside your nest and do as much damage as possible, and then regroup a third time underground to finish them.
If you have low food, make sure to harvest from the wolf spiders once you kill them, so you have enough for the fight against the adult tiger beetles.
From here on, there’s not really a difficult part to the level except for the five adult tiger beetles that can be tricky. Try to fight them alongside your ally.

Extra Level 3 Extremis

This section will cover Extremis on insane difficulty. I would strongly recommend beating the entire game, especially formicarium challenge 3 on higher difficulties, before attempting this on insane. Extremis requires very good knowledge of gene-thief units and their abilities, which is why I recommend getting a max level formicarium and getting to know all the abilities in formicarium challenge 3 or free play. It will take about 39 minutes on insane, with lower difficulties taking longer (medium takes about 55 minutes). On higher difficulties, there is less time in between waves, chambers of food have slightly stronger enemies, and certain waves have more enemies. On insane, there are 70 seconds between waves.

My insane strategy for this level involves building leaf cutter stun majors and wood ant mortars. To start, you will need to be quick to get a few foundations: food stores, as well as starting to build a major chamber and mortar chamber. Additionally, build a gathering group of workers early on so that while your army is fighting, you are constantly gathering food for respawns or expansion.

Helpful tip: Go to options, graphics, and select windowed full screen to switch between your game and this guide on steam.

Helpful tip #2: Firstly, let me go over how Extremis works, because it is quite different from any other level. You’ll start off with only workers and black ants, and you probably won’t get far. However, every time your queen dies, you are rewarded royal jelly based on how many waves you survived.

You’re going to need majors and wood ants to beat this level, even on medium (the level is beatable on easy with just majors).
In order to get as much royal jelly as you can, unlock trap jaws asap and play easy a couple times, while only building trap jaws.
Unlock majors next. They are the best ant in the game for their price, so spam them until you unlock wood ants.
With majors and wood ants unlocked, keep playing easy until you manage to beat it. Get all the royal jelly upgrades for majors and wood ants.

Note: There is absolutely no reason to unlock melee wood ants or leaf cutter media, so only unlock them for fun once you have unlocked everything else.

Helpful tip #3: Your unit option choices are NOT permanent, nor are the royal jelly upgrades you choose for them. There’s no switching fee either. Experiment!

Below is a list of all the enemies in each wave.
Order of Enemies

1 DHC larva North spawner
7 black ants from North spawner
12 black ants from East spawner
4 wood ant melee and 9 level 1 wood ant mortars from East spawner
4 small harvestmen from North spawner
5 mole crickets from East spawner
4 adult harvestmen from North spawner
6 small hermit crabs from East spawner
3 adult DHC from North spawner
6 small bush crickets from North spawner
13 level 3 black ants and 13 level 3 rapid fires from East spawner
About 10 jumping spiders from North spawner
6 medium wolf spiders from North spawner
About 24 level 1 black ants from West spawner
13 small beach tiger beetles from West spawner
About 20 small mantises from North spawner
20 adult hermit crabs from East spawner
About 24 adult blue rove beetles from West spawner
Large army of level 3 trap jaws from North spawner
At least 25 adult green rove beetles from East spawner
Large army of level 1 army ant media and level 1 army ant majors from North spawner
About 27 level 1 black ants from each of the three spawners
About 10 adult BTBs from East spawner and a large army of mainly level 2 leaf cutters from West spawner
About 13 adult bush crickets from North spawner
5 adult wolf spiders from North spawner, about 30 small bush crickets from East spawner, and about 30 jumping spiders from West spawner
7 large whip spiders from North spawner
Massive army of level 3 leaf cutter majors and level 3 rapid fires from West spawner
About 27 adult mantises from North spawner
6 adult wolf spiders and about 8 adult BTBs from East spawner, 6 adult bush crickets and about 10 adult mantises from West spawner, and about 8 adult green rove beetles and 7 large whip spiders from North spawner
Massive army of level 3 leaf cutter majors and media from North spawner, massive army of level 3 army ant majors and media from East spawner, and massive army of level 3 black ants and rapid fires from West spawner

Upgrades you should have for insane difficulty

Stun leaf cutter majors with shockproof, do you don’t lose all your food to wolf spiders/mantises, and the resilient aura. Stun majors by default aren’t as tanky as taunt majors, but their stun ability is very useful, so in order to boost their tankiness, chose resilient.
Mortar wood ants. There is no question, the level is impossible without their splash damage (at least on hard/insane). Mortar ants with corrosive and weakening will maximize venom damage. With wood ants, a venom damage build overall does more damage than a physical damage build, and it’s better against massive armies of high health insects.

The Start

As you can see in the video, make use of your starting workers to gather food, and start building majors and wood ants in a 1:1 ratio.
Eventually you’ll want to put your queen workers back in the nest group and have a dedicated chamber of 14 workers for gathering.
Make sure to harvest from dead enemies as well as open up new chambers of food.

The Middle

Make sure you are expanding as quick as you can, so that you don’t fall behind and get overwhelmed. You need to not only be able to survive but kill the waves quickly, so you have time to get food and grow.
Once you have a chamber of 13 level 1 majors and 19 level 1 mortars, upgrade all of your mortars to level 3.
Once that is done, build another 9 level 1 majors (over time, of course), and start building another chamber of 19 mortars. This is for a second army, since you will have to defend on multiple fronts.

The Late Game

By the very end, you should have 14 total workers in the nest group, 14 workers in the gathering group, 2 chambers of 19 level 3 mortars, one chamber of 13 majors (with one level 3 and a few level 2), and one chamber of 10 level one majors.
The last few waves will come quick, so make sure that you are firstly always in position to fight them, with one army above and below your queen, and gather what you can from insect corpses for food.
I strongly recommend watching the final few waves in the video above to see how to deal with them.

Extra Level 4 The Other Foot

This section will cover The Other Foot on insane difficulty. Beating the third formicarium challenge is a must before attempting. The Other Foot is extremely fast, and requires micro and a touch of parmesan cheese at the end. The time can seriously vary on multiple play throughs, even on the same difficulty, because it depends on how quickly you can kill the enemy colony. For me, it took 68 minutes on insane, but it can go much longer, like a tug of war. On higher difficulties, there are more enemies, far less seeds are dropped, the sustained flow of workers bar goes down significantly faster, the scientist smashes the enemy colony’s ants with his finger less, and the enemy colony is significantly stronger.

My insane strategy involves spamming army ant medias for the first half, since they are cheap and cost only 3 to hatch. By the later waves, the strat calls for a chamber of army ant majors to deal with the enemy colony.

Helpful tip: go to options, graphics, and select windowed full screen to switch between your game and this guide on steam.

Helpful tip #2: When upgraded, workers count for more than one working towards the tube/sustained flow. A level 3 worker, for example, counts as 3 workers. DO NOT do this on insane, though.[/b]
Beginning Sequence

The level starts when you dig to the surface, so dig out all the chambers that you will need before tunneling. Keep the front of the nest very open for fighting big insects.
Take your time when you can, like for the section where you need to get a specific worker amount to the tube. Obviously, you can’t do this during wave sequences and sustained flows.
Inconvenient as it is, you’ll have to know exactly what’s coming next to beat this on insane. I suggest practicing to get medium and hard down, of course, so you can get familiar with the level. It may take many attempts at insane.
Build 2 chambers of army ant media to surround enemies better and kill them quicker with micro. One chamber of 19, the other chamber of about 13 or as many as you can. Make sure to bank food, though.
While your army is still small, it is best to fight with your workers alongside your media, so that you can kill things fast enough to not be overwhelmed.
When the “survive the incoming attacks” begins, retreat all your soldiers underground, to kill the ant armies quickly as soon as they enter the nest. (Watch from 18:00-22:00 in the video).
To minimize food loss, use your royal guard to kill the waves of devils coach horse, tiger beetles, and wolf spiders that come very quickly one after the other.

Middle Sequence Watch from 30:40 in the video!

After the end of the above beginning sequence, you can take your time to gather food and build tiles. Be cautious of him dropping idle whip spiders into your formicarium though, you don’t want to lose food to them spawning on top of your ants.
Before killing these whip spiders, upgrade both of your chambers of army ant media to level 3. Use micro to surround the whip spiders for clean kills.
Make sure your army is in place to kill the bush crickets one by one the moment that they are dropped in, so you can race your workers to the tube. Watch the positioning of my pheromone markers in the video before the tiger beetles are dropped.
Once this sustained flow is completed, the extremely hard and fast part of the level begins.
Gather quickly. You’re probably going to be stuck on this part for a bit if you’re trying to beat this level on insane.

Last Sequence (aka hard part) Watch from 34:00 in the vid!

tip:You’ll have to gather with your workers, defend using your army with good micro, and upgrade/build tiles all at the same time.
Pheromone placement is key to split up, surround, and kill the enemy waves quickly, so they don’t stack.
After trap jaws, immediately retreat your two groups of 19 level 3 media underground, to kill the mole crickets. Keep your bigger group of 39 level 3 media above ground, to deal with the harvestmen that are going to be dropped. Prevent them from entering the nest and disrupting your worker’s gathering.
Immediately after the mole crickets are dealt with, put your ants in position to split the leafcutter wave into two and kill them quickly. Your gathering group of workers with combat toggled off is a great distraction to help split the leafcutters up.
You have to kill this wave quickly or it’s over. The next wave is even worse, an army of adult rove beetles, and an army of jumping spiders. You have to split them up and deal damage where you can. Try your best to not let them into the nest.
For the army ant wave, engage them above ground if possible, and then retreat underground to surround and kill them as they enter your nest.
Build exactly 9 army ant majors as soon as they unlock.
Keep your workers gathering from the food to the right of your nest., using the back two holes of your nest entrance. This can help split up the incoming final waves as well, and distracting a few of the big insects is necessary.
Be ready for the mantis wave above ground. Once you kill them, engage the whip spider wave above ground too, but then retreat underground to kill them as they enter.
Remain underground and swarm the molecrickets as they enter, and try to distract a few with workers above ground, so all of them do not run in at once.

Colony vs Colony 48:30 in vid

You should bank about 2000 food before you begin this battle.
My final ant numbers: 36 workers in nest group, 38 workers in gathering group, 24 army ant majors (19 of them level 3) + 39 level 3 army ant medias in group 2, 19 level 3 army ant medias in group 3, 19 level 3 army ant medias in group 4, and 10 level 3 workers in group 5 (these workers are crucial).
The enemy colony has: far more food, far more numbers, far better units, and in all regards is superior to you on insane, other than brains!
To start, try to use micro and workers as a distraction to make engagements as profitable for you: start getting their food numbers down.
At the very beginning, the food drops from controlling the middle are very minor, but they get much bigger as time passes. It’s totally fine to lose control of the middle during the beginning, but crucial that you get control of it towards the end.
After battling with the enemy for a while, your food stores will start to be depleted. Once you have only about 400-500 food left, it’s time for the cheese.
With your group of 10 level 3 workers, go to the enemy colony side of the map and run in circles around their formicarium. This will give you control of the middle, and you will be able to get as much food as you need (for upgrades, building, or banking). Restock your food stores up to 2000 again.
Once you are able to get steady food income using this, upgrade your majors to level 3. This way, they won’t get torn up by wood ant mortars like paper.
Now you have two options. You can deplete their food stores completely and slug it out to kill all their remaining ants. Or, like I do in the video (faster method), distract their entire army with your 10 workers, then assassinate their queen with your army ants while their army is not guarding their nest entrance.

Extra Level 5 Excavators

This section will cover Excavators on insane difficulty. This level plays a lot like Extremis, but there are a few differences that set it apart. In Excavators, rather than waiting for waves, the idea if that you try to weaken the waves by taking out chambers before the mole-cricket reaches them. The completion time can vary, even when playing on the same difficulty, but usually insane is from 35-45 minutes, while lower difficulties usually take longer to complete. On higher difficulties, there are more enemies and the mole-crickets spawn and dig much faster.

My insane strategy uses army ant majors as tanks with wood ant mortars firing splash damage from behind. Lots of workers are also key to place larvae and gather enough food to expand quickly. The level requires speed, but not as much as other levels on insane.

Helpful tip: go to options, graphics, and select windowed full screen to switch between your game and this guide on steam.

Helpful tip #2: You will heavily rely on wood ant mortars at level 3, rather than army ant majors, to deal damage. There isn’t enough time on insane to get enough food to build an expensive army of army ant majors, so rely on them primarily for tanking. This means that you should have more wood ants and prioritize upgrading wood ants.

Helpful tip #3: Leaf-cutter media can potentially be used instead of army ant majors, as they have recieved a recent buff to their stats. I personally think that the army ant major’s enrage ability gives them an edge over media. Upgrading army ant majors to give them more health is important, rather than going completely for numbers.

Helpful tip #4 Gathering Efficiently: As you can see from the video, I build little chambers of 7 upgraded food tiles in many different spots, to drastically shorten walking times to food stores. Make sure to upgrade them fully (6 tiles level 2, tile in the center level 3). Also, dig shortcuts from food to food stores when possible.

Helpful tip #4: Practice your insane strategy on hard difficulty!
Beginning Strategy Watch up to 12:20 in the video!

Have a quick and practiced start, as seen in the video, so that you don’t fall behind.
Use workers as tanks until you buy your first army ant major, which should be after the first mole-cricket wave.
Make sure to build about 16 workers to gather with, so that you can gather all of the food that is uncovered.
After you deal with the first mole-cricket and gather food from the chambers it openned, go after the devil’s coach horse larvae to the west for quick food.
Now go after the baby whip spiders to the northwest, because if you don’t, there will be a mass wave of them that you can’t stop.
Have 16 workers, 7 mortars, and 2-3 majors to deal with them.
Note: Be on the look out for molecrickets that are about to dig out an attack wave, but do not feel like you have to always try to weaken the waves. Only three specific areas MUST be weakened, the first being the small whip spider area. The second is the bush-cricket area to the north, and the third is the area of mixed insects.

Dealing with Bush-cricket Wave Watch from 12:20 (preparation for wave) until 26:40 in the vid!

Your next goal is to be able to survive the bush-cricket wave from the north. To do this, you need 19 level 3 mortars, 7 army ant majors with some level 2, 26 workers gathering, and 12 workers in the nest group.
To expand rapidly to meet this requirement, go after the hermit crabs just south of where the first molecricket spawns. Make sure to have at least 4 army ant majors and 7-10 mortars before attacking them, or it will take too long.
Once your army meets the mentioned strength, try to take out a chamber of mole-crickets beforehand to weaken the wave, but you may not get the time to. In the video, I was not able to, and barely survived.
Once you defeat this wave, recover quickly by enabling gather on all of your ants while using workers to gather from the uncovered food.

Dealing with Many Insect Attacks in Succession Watch from 26:40 to 36:00.

Next, there is a massive area of mixed insects to the north, directly to the west of the bushcrickets, that will all spawn in one wave if you do not weaken the area. This gets tricky because other waves will come at you while you are trying to weaken the area.
To deal with all of this, after the bush-crickets are defeated, begin a worker expansion. Build from 26 gathering workers to about 44 gathering workers, and go from 12 workers in the nest to 20 workers in the nest.
Expand your wood ants by about 10 and upgrade all to level 3.
Expand majors to 10 total, with most being level 2.
Uncover areas that you want to weaken and allow them to come to you, so you can defend from possibly different directions at the same time. This also means that dead bodies will be right next to your food stores.
Always be gathering with workers. Make sure you do not toggle their gather off accidentally.
Slowly uncover one chamber at a time from the dangerous mentioned area.

Finishing off the Level and Uber Mole-Cricket Watch from 36:40 until the end.

If you survived this far, you pretty much have the level in the bag, unless you mess up big.
Start going after tiger beetle chambers to the south. They should not be a problem at all.
Don’t let yourself get surprise attacked by the uber molecricket, and remember that it exists! Killing it should not be an issue as long as you have level 3 mortars and at least a few level 3 army ant majors, as well as a good stock of food.
Finishing off the remaining tiger beetle chambers and surviving weaker attacks is self-explainatory. As I said, if you made it this far, you’ll be fine, and there is no way that the tiger beetle waves should be able to defeat you unless you run out of food (but you should have TONS of food lying all over, so that won’t happen).

Extra Level 6 Tug of War

This section will cover Tug of War on insane difficulty. This level is pretty straightforward compared to ther levels, and doesn’t require much prior experience. The time this level takes varies tremendously, from 25 minutes to over an hour, depending on what sort of army composition the enemy colony builds. On higher difficulties, the enemy colony gets a larger initial income boost.

My insane strategy involves building only trap jaw ants. Make sure to build more units the moment you recieve more food, and you should be good.

Helpful tip: Go to options, graphics, and select windowed full screen to switch between your game and this guide on steam.

Helpful tip #2: In tug of war, you have no control over your units; the only thing you have under your control is what unit you build.

Helpful tip #3: The enemy colony randomly selects from a range of pre-designed armies. They can go for an army ant media rush, or tanks and ranged, or army ant majors, for instance. These armies are not equally strong, and some are much easier to beat than others. The enemy colony’s nest is fully prebuilt, and once they have built everything that they have been coded to build, they will not build anything more.

Due to their incredible sustainability, trap jaw ants are your best bet to catch up with the enemy colony’s higher income quickly. Other strategies may work in some cases, but it will likely take much longer. Just keep up with your placing of units, and you will eventually win.

Extra Level 7 Occupation

This section will cover Occupation on insane difficulty. This level is just like 1.1 A New Home, except with wood ants and tougher enemies. The completion time is about one hour on insane. On higher difficulties, enemies are more numerous and stronger.

My insane strategy uses level 3 wood ant mortars for splash damage, with mass workers for an effective front line. Lost of workers are also key to place larvae, as your worker frontline will die quicker than a melee frontline. Because big enemies like the final tiger beetles will one shot both workers and wood ant melees, it’s better to use the workers because you can build much more workers due to their cheap cost, and they respawn for much cheaper.

Helpful tip: This level will likely require trial and error unless you follow a youtube video step by step. Otherwise, it is near impossible to get the order of enemies right, as you have no way of telling which enemies will be easy to kill and which will completely demolish you. It is guesswork and can be annoying and frustrating.

Helpful tip #2: That being said, this level has no time pressure, like 1.1. or Aggrandise. You can take as long as you can to prepare, hatch ants, position your army, etc. Make sure you store some food before fights and being patient will help you do better.

Helpful tip #3: There are 2 hidden food sources that you can dig out. The only way to find them is to be playing close attention to the mini-map, where you can see the brown dots indicating food. Look at 26:00 in the video to see exactly where they are.

Helpful tip #4: Fight the funnel web spiders smart. Don’t go after them the “long route” and lose tons of ants because your mortars are too slow to shoot them. Dig out the dirt closest to the spider’s little web lair, so you can corner them and trap them quickly. Look at 17:36 and 23:30 in the video.

Helpful tip #5: If you want your workers to place larvae on a specific chamber, take them out of the nest group and into a pheromone group, then place the pheromone on the brood chamber that you want them to restock. This is useful for the final fight, which is most likely going to be prolonged and will require a stream of reinforcement ants. Remember to keep these nest workers attack/gather toggled off.

The Ant Waves
There are two ant waves that can be tough, one slavemaker wave, and one black ant wave. These ants are buffed far beyond their normal stats. They will cut through your workers quickly, which is why using chokepoints to make your mortar’s splash damage more effective is important. Your biggest concern is getting these ants killed with your mortars before they can do the damage of breaking past your front line and killing your mortars. Watch at 27:10 in the video to see how I deal with these two waves.

Final Tiger Beetle Fight
These final four tiger beetles seem to be buffed beyond their normal size and strength as well. Watch from 31:00 and see how I try to split them up initially with workers. I make a mistake in the video, as I successfully split them up, but then forget to remove the pheromone marker. This results in the tiger beetles stacking up again, and I have to face all four of them at once. If this happens, the results can be heavily influenced by rng, as it depends if your ranged ants decide to focus fire a single tiger beetle or spread out the damage. Make sure you have a steady supply of larvae being placed to keep up the fight, with nest worker’s attack/gather toggled off. Good luck!

Extra Level 8 Cramped

Extra Level 9 Enemy of My Enemy

Conclusion/Feedback

Let me know if there is something missing, a helpful tip, or feedback to make this guide clearer and more helpful!

Please check back in from time to time, as this guide will be updated as new levels are released!

Thanks for reading, and cya 🙂

Empires of the Undergrowth Guide

Overview