Master Difficulty Early Game

[DuizhangLu]

Hey folks,

Got this game recently and am absolutely LOVING it. Beat it on all the difficulties up to hard but am really struggling in the early game on master difficulty. For context, I have been focusing on aggressive strategies like Tauron hellhounds > chimeras, Freya sprite > gorgons, shadow demons, and white + green slingers. I typically create an army asap and start clearing as many encounters as possible (I have the # of encounter zones set to highest). However, I inevitable run into some which I think are probably unrealistic to beat early game (2 great drakes and friends), and then have been getting pasted by rampaging monsters those zones spawn when my army is far afield clearing more zones by turn 25. I admittedly do space my two cities a bit far apart because typically there's no particularly optimal spot to settle as close as possible to my first settlement. What could be done so I survive the early game? Less aggression (and keeping my army closer to home)? That "feels" wrong because it's stunting my growth curve. Same with getting more defenders out, I've barely gotten anything built by turn 25, how am I also supposed to get normal units out? And the fantastic units seem a bit too expensive to be using as guards early