At last! Dragons, Heroes, and Dark Elixer. Town Hall 7 begins to get increasingly more difficult, though not too bad. During this level you'll find that less people are neglecting their bases and good loot becomes harder to find. Since you won't have a Dark Elixer drill getting the Barbarian King will take quite a while. That said, once you start upgrading your defenses you should be able to get into the Gold League quite easily and comfortably.
Below are several charts on the available buildings at Town Hall 7. They show some very valuable information. Please always double check thewikito make sure these values are up-to-date. The graphic I use to represent each building in my layout is also shown on the far right.
Defensive Buildings
Resource Buildings
Army Buildings
Other Buildings
Heroes
Layout / Base Perimeter
I designed this base for those that wanted to protect their Town Hall and their resources as much as possible. This was a hard one to design. I scrapped many failed attempts before settling on this layout. I've centralized the Town Hall as well as the Dark Elixer because you'll find that losing precious Dark Elixer without a drill can become incredibly frustrating. The Clan Castle and Barb King (once you get him) are also in the center of the base because they have the largest area of coverage and can best protect your base there.
Note: By now you should be have made it to 1250 trophies. If not you should push to get your third/fourth builder. I have four shown here because that's what I had during this stage of the game. If you still don't have this many you can remove them from the top port of the base as necessary. The two located at the bottom are there for strategic purposes.
UPDATE: So I've completed my Town Hall 7 career and have some more thoughts/feedback on this base. I have mixed feelings on this one. I used the Town Hall 7 Farming Base for the first half (until my defenses were upgraded) and then used this one while I finished my walls and maxed out my Barbarian King. The one thing I noticed is that Town Hall 7 does not fair well in Crystal league, where the Dark Elixer is the most abundant. I say that because this base was consistently defeated in that range. In the lower Gold ranges it did fairly well though so I wouldn't count it out completely.
I also played around with several arrangements of the Tesla, Giant Bomb, and Air Defense. Nothing really help significantly. Swapping the Air Defenses with the Clan Castle and Barbarian King probably helped the most against air raids.
FINAL THOUGHTS: After Clan Wars came out I designed another base just for the wars that actually works better than this one, in my opinion. I'm going to keep this one up but I would look into the other one first.
Trap Placement
Traps are pretty straight forward for this base. Since the Air Defense is close to the edge of the base there are Giant Bombs to destroy any Giant rushes to take it out. The Teslas are in their own compartment to whittle down any leftover troops still trying to take out the Air Defense. It also covers the outside Storages.
Finally I've placed a Funneling Channel of Spring Traps at the bottom for those wanting to attack there instead of at the Air Defenses.
Mortar Coverage
Triangular placement of your Mortars is always the best coverage for your base. Here I have mostly all of them covering the Town Hall. They also provide double coverage for your Wizard Towers. Most importantly, they provide triple coverage for the Dark Elixer Storage.
Wizard Tower Coverage
Normally, I try to cover both the Mortars and Storages to the full degree but once you place the Town Hall in the middle of the base this becomes more difficult to do. The placement is just off. So, as you'll see below, there is a bit of compromise. There is still full coverage on each of the Storages but the Mortars are only partially covered. The Dark Elixer, however, is covered by both Wizard Towers.
It's also important to note that the Wizard Towers are placed behind a wall so that they can provide splash damage to any Giant Rush on the Air Defense. Not that it will work all the time but this should help significantly.
Cannon Coverage
Cannons on this base do not make a nice circle around the base. Limitations on the amount of walls and the more needed protection of resources put them into this configuration. That said, the two up top are there to pick off troops before they can get to the Town Hall. They also provide double coverage for the Town Hall itself if attacked from the bottom. The Cannons on the bottom are mostly for distraction whenGiants are funneled to each one while other defenses eat at their health.
Archer Tower Coverage
Archer Tower placement is very similar to the Cannons. The ones up top provide coverage for the Town Hall, while the ones near the bottom provide funnel fodder for flinging Giants. Because they have longer range, though, I have placed them closer to the center so that they provide partial quadruple coverage on the Dark Elixer Storage.
Air Defense Coverage
Unfortunately, I could not fit the Air Defenses behind a second layer of walls. I've beefed up the Traps to try and accommodate that but it's not the best solution. The idea to place them in the center was intriguing, and could be tested if you would like, but ultimately I came to the conclusion that the Clan Castle and Barbarian King would be better suited there. The Air Defense does cover a good majority of the base, especially the center core that this layout is built to protect.
Clan Castle Reinforcements / Hero Defense
I believe this is the first of my designs that I've put the Clan Castle in the core of the base. Add to that there's a Barbarian King now and you have some good defensive troops right smack in the middle of your base. These have some of the largest coverage diameters too, which is nice. There's not much else to say other than to keep your Clan Castle filled so they can do their job! Having both of these in the middle will provide excellent protection.
