Messages

1

Skyward Collapse / Re: Question about on-demand mechanic

« on: Today at 10:38:40 AM »

I think the problem is that people are looking at, say, rock, and cut-stone, and seeing TWO seperate piles:   The basic rocks, and seperately, rocks that have already been converted to cut-stone.

This though, is not how it works.

It's better to think of it as:  The first number is the amount of actual rocks you have, and the second is the amount of POTENTIAL cut-stone that you can use based on how many rocks you have.   So, with the mason's 3:1 ratio, if you were to have exactly 3 rocks... no more, no less.... the game would list your cut-stone amount as being exactly 1, because that's the amount of cutstone you can make with the 3 rocks.


If you're having trouble getting enough of a resource like that, be it the cutstone or lumber or whatever, you dont need to do anything funky with the mason or the carpenter or whatever; simply work towards getting more of the basic resource, because that's the number that counts.  Placing down more masons or whatever wont do anything at all.  There's no per-turn conversion speed or anything. 


....and the other problem is that the concept is just kinda screwy to explain.   I keep trying to think of a really good way to explain it, and I keep not managing to actually do so.   One way or another though, it seems to be a constant source of confusion among new players, that's for sure.    I remember the first time I played it, I was baffled by it as well.

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Skyward Collapse / Re: Skyward Collapse 1.002 "Hunting Through Rubble" Released!

« on: Today at 08:38:51 AM »

Out of curiosity, what is the deal with the "gods"? I thought that the player got to choose the god for each race on the 20th turn or whatever. It looks like they are instead assigned randomly?

Yep. 

Adds a bit more chaos, and keeps things interesting, rather than players just picking the "best" ones every time or something like that.

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Skyward Collapse / Re: Suggestions from Steam users

« on: Today at 04:41:00 AM »

From steam user: Trisdino

I love the concept of this game, and for the most part its pretty well executed. The ai is pretty good, the artwork is pretty, and the game itself is deep. But it has one major problem, an exploit. If you wanna win a game, just wall your town in with mountains. 50 turns later some thingy will spawn and destroy your town, but by then you can just place another town at the other side of the map, and before new enemies can spawn, the game is over. It doesent even have to be that extreme, you can just devide the two factions with a huge wall of mountains, and then they will be perfectly safe from each other. This does ruin the game, and i really hope you fix it somehow

Honestly, this will make the town immune to most units. Perhaps an idea to give the barbarians more mountain crossers or to require at least one chokepoint.

I saw this topic as well, and already answered it.

The mountains thing only works on the lower difficulties.  On "hard" or higher, you're not allowed to place mountains or lakes ever;  they're removed from the land-tile selection.

If you intend to later on play at a higher difficulty like that, it's best to learn to NOT use mountains/lakes too much, and instead find other solutions.

4

Skyward Collapse / Re: Question about on-demand mechanic

« on: Yesterday at 11:38:02 PM »

Oh, no kidding?
So if you needed to place something for a town that cost bacon, you could do so even if that town didn't cost a butcher? It's the fact that the particular town itself is spending the bacon directly on things within that town.

Basically, if it's something you place directly yourself... regardless of WHAT it is.... it doesnt matter where you put it, and if you should happen to set it in a city, that city doesnt need the required building... the building just needs to be SOMEWHERE on the map.

Units produced by military buildings, however, simply wont come out unless the production building they require is IN the city that the military building is in.


It's definitely a very confusing concept at first, despite the fact that it's a good gameplay mechanic.   It seems like a better explanation in the tutorial should be a priority after the weekend.

5

Skyward Collapse / Re: 1.0 out for alpha testers. Edit: 1.001 now

« on: Yesterday at 11:34:54 PM »

My vote for the first expansion goes to a new faction. To me, the Egyptians would be the most logical choice.  For one thing, they are quite honestly the only other culture I can think of with "household-name-mythology." Just like everyone(qualifier:in western society) has heard of Zeus and Thor, a lot of people have heard of Odin, Loki, Athena, and Ares, almost as many people have heard of Ra and Osiris. Also, Egyptian architecture and desert tiles would add an exotic flair to the game.

Aye, this.


Even just a single new faction would add even more replay value to the game, as you'd suddenly have matchups that arent just involving Norse and Greek all the time.

Having an Egyptian faction would be pretty great.

6

Skyward Collapse / Re: Extremely-detailed wall-o-text first impressions by a long time Arcen player

« on: Yesterday at 11:32:39 PM »

You guys too?

Latest public service announcement from the Master: "Labyrinth Token Considered Harmful" 

That one does seem pretty hard to use, even with the minotaurs nerfed so that they're not all Godzilla-like.

Labyrinth has a very interesting effect, but it's one of those things that I'm not really sure how to use at all, strategically....

Experimentation is needed!

7

Skyward Collapse / Re: Skyward Collapse 1.002 "Hunting Through Rubble" Released!

« on: Yesterday at 07:37:44 PM »

Which brings me to an interesting point, really: the fact that the Minotaurs were OP before wasn't really causing game-breaking easy strategies.  In fact, kind of the opposite -- players would play a Labyrinth (which spawns minotaurs) and it would soon be game over if they weren't careful.  Not to say that Minotaurs weren't also an occasional \"get out of jail free\" card, but it's just interesting how the balance concerns here are the opposite of most games -- our goal is actually to unbalance the game, not balance it.  But it always has to be in a fun way, where it's not frustrating trying to bring balance to their own games.  Bit of a different design challenge from, say, AI War -- which is a fun change of pace.

Yep, that's pretty much why I pushed the Minotaur thing so hard.... they were unbalanced, sure, but not in quite the right way.  Unlike, say the Ice Giants, who are also pretty crazy but not in a "throw keyboard at wall" sort of way.   Particularly if the bandits were to get these guys, with their previous balance, they might be a bit TOO much from bandits in general, in a frustrating sort of way.

.....also they were making Labyrinth basically impossible to use.   It's one thing to cause lots of chaos with a big effect, but it's a whole other thing to cause so much chaos at once that the thing suddenly has no sensible usage.   It's alot more sane now!   Sort of.   

That, and the Greek already have super-strong siege units that eat buildings, but that guy kinda made them obsolete.


That thing with the rubble though should be a huge help!  That one, I think, is appreciated      That suggestion originally came from the Steam forums.


Looks like a good update overall!

8

Skyward Collapse / Re: Question about on-demand mechanic

« on: Yesterday at 09:14:08 AM »

I would like to start build towers to protect the capital of the norse (being their troops sucks)

So I manage to get a nice amount of rocks, but the Mason won't convert them in cutstones.

Is there a way to tell him "Produce cutstones, I have to build towers!"
How can I make him produce cutstones?

This particular mechanic, I think, needs to be explained a bit better.

I'm going to copy-paste the explanation for this that I gave over at the Steam forums:

The cut-stone value isnt like, stone that's ALREADY been converted to cut-stone. It simply shows how much is AVAILABLE. With 22 stone, you CAN make 7 cut-stone, but it wont actually happen until some unit or effect needs it. It doesnt mean "Ok, you have 22 stone, and then you ALSO have 7 cut-stone over here that I already prepared for you", it's more like "Ok, you have 22 stone, so you have 7 potential cut-stone".

So in your situation, you need to first make sure you have a Stone Mason somewhere;  if you already have one, then all you need is more actual rock.  Get some more of that, and you'll have your cut stone.

Hope that helps.   But yeah, it needs to be cleared up in the tutorial.   It's a good mechanic but confusing to new players.

9

Skyward Collapse / Re: 1.0 out for alpha testers. Edit: 1.001 now

« on: Yesterday at 07:02:24 AM »

How do minos stand up to giants?

To elaborate, if the giant kicks its ... then the mino should be fine

The only real advantage the giants have over these guys is their large amount of HP.  The minotaurs though still have alot of health themselves as well (AND a high auto-heal). 

But it's the part where a Minotaur can destroy up to 10 buildings in a single turn that really caught me, lol, as far as this goes.  Not to mention what they do against units of pretty much any type.

There's just too many things wrong with these guys right now, really.   I saw the complaint about them originally on the Steam forums, and decided to test them out myself in various situations.... and so came to this.

Maybe bring them down to troll levels? Trolls are fairly nasty too.

Greeks have the best military units.  It would stand to be that their siege weapons would be better too.  It's a pain you bring on yourself

Aye, bringing them down to a level closer to trolls would be good.   Trolls can be strong, but they're nowhere near being "unstoppable" or unmanageable.   And the Greek arent supposed to have mythological units that are quite on the same level as the Norse ones anyway;  the devs can correct me if I'm wrong on that one, but I'm pretty darn sure that's the design idea for them.  Stronger military units, weaker mythologicals.

10

Skyward Collapse / Re: 1.0 out for alpha testers. Edit: 1.001 now

« on: Yesterday at 06:09:22 AM »

How do minos stand up to giants?

To elaborate, if the giant kicks its ... then the mino should be fine

The only real advantage the giants have over these guys is their large amount of HP.  The minotaurs though still have alot of health themselves as well (AND a high auto-heal). 

But it's the part where a Minotaur can destroy up to 10 buildings in a single turn that really caught me, lol, as far as this goes.  Not to mention what they do against units of pretty much any type.

There's just too many things wrong with these guys right now, really.   I saw the complaint about them originally on the Steam forums, and decided to test them out myself in various situations.... and so came to this.

11

Skyward Collapse / Re: 1.0 out for alpha testers. Edit: 1.001 now

« on: Yesterday at 04:48:51 AM »

Question: do people have any particular use for  this kind of leaflet? If not, I won't work on it.

I had a look at that:  that type of thing actually might be good to put up on the site to help new players.   A good idea.



And on the note of balance and such:

http://www.arcengames.com/mantisbt/view.php?id=11658

Minotaurs.  Holy crap.   These guys.   They need a nerf.  Badly.   Currently they're just a tad of an overpowered mess.

12

Skyward Collapse / Re: What is considered to be the "balanced" turn-per-round limit?

« on: Yesterday at 04:42:17 AM »

Guys, I'm sure that has been discussed elsewhere but I have not been following. Could you please kindly tell me where the idea to base the score on the lowest score of the two factions was abandoned and why?

I understand that tutorial is an easy mode and not indicative because of this. I was taken by surprise non the less, when around turn 45 I got required 12000 score I started just pressing "End turn, end turn, end" in succession just to see how it ends if I don't interfere. Sure enough one faction was almost completely wiped out. The had just 1 town and a handful of units. Still it was a victory and the final score was around 90000, because another 20000 were scored while one faction was getting obliterated.

I clearly remember that at early stages the game was meant to maintain balance and score by the weakest faction in the end. It sounded sane. What happened to that?

It's worth keeping in mind that the score system as it is now was one of the last things to be added;  it's definitely got some balance issues currently, but the core mechanics are quite sound.   I personally never liked the "go by the lowest faction score" idea, as it always sounded kind of confusing and unnecessarily complicated.

The score on some things is still a bit off, and the actual score gate numbers probably need further tweaking and testing before they'll be quite right. 

The whole thing will get better balanced over time.

13

Skyward Collapse Strategy Discussion / Re: Building resource dependency list

« on: Yesterday at 04:35:48 AM »

This is pretty neat, actually.   I've seen a similar thing lately, which was for Anno 2070, and I found that very helpful in keeping track of the complicated resource production trees in that game, so something like this might be quite helpful for some players with this game.

Could definitely do with labels.

14

Skyward Collapse / Re: Tips from an Alpha Player

« on: Yesterday at 03:01:14 AM »

Ok, I have more here!

Over on the Steam forums, a user was asking for help in using the Norse VS the Greek, finding that the Greek tended to be more powerful, and that he was having trouble making good use of the Norse myth units.  Which is a problem, since for the Norse, their myth units are very important!  So, I wrote up a horrible blob of text giving advice about those units, and tactics on using them to their fullest extent, as well as some other general tips for the Norse.   Gonna copy/paste the whole thing here, since I ended up putting a ton of tips in here.

If any of this isnt clear or there's questions on it, feel free to ask.   Keep in mind:  These are strategies/tactics/tips that *I* came up with on my own, during my own games... they sure as heck are NOT the only way to use these units or approach the game!  If you've got other tactics that you find work best for you, then by all means, use them!  The game gives you ALOT of options when it comes to approaching different situations, and these tips are only one of many different ways to use things.



And with that, here we go, horrible text blobs coming up:



As a rule, I've found that for the most part, the balance ideas are MOSTLY correct.  But it's not always so easy to use different units to their fullest strengths!

The Light Elves, for instance:   These guys are MUCH better than I originally thought.  They're able to get off multiple shots at a distance for some pretty decent damage, they cause additional healing in nearby human units, and they have enough HP to withstand some hits.  Best of all though is that they have a low cost for a myth unit... you can use lots of these guys!  They're very efficient for their cost.

Ice Giants are stupid powerful.  Seriously, these guys can have more health than the gods can, once they're leveled up.   These guys are one of the best ways to deal with a Greek army that's getting a bit out of hand;  a couple of Ice Giants dropped in among the human units can do monstrous damage.  The key with these guys is WHERE you drop them;  they cannot move very fast, after all!  Preferrably, drop them adjacent to the units you'd like them to attack.  These guys can also be used as siege units, but again, be careful with them.  Out of control ice giants can be hard to stop!

Trolls are very similar to Ice Giants, but they have one additional trait:  Splash damage.  A couple of trolls dropped among an enemy horde can do a ton.  I do think that they need the AP cost of their attack reduced though, so I might submit that suggestion to the devs.

Valkyries arent the easiest one to use, but they have a couple of good points to them.  Firstly, they have a huge AP pool available to them, allowing them to move super far and get in many potential hits.   They also totally thwart enemy auto healing, turning it into damage instead.


When using mythological units in general, it's important to keep in mind that there ARE limits to what they can do.  Ice Giants are powerful, but if you drop a single giant in among a horde of 20 enemy units, well, that's a bit too much for just one giant!   Even just by themselves, Norse myth units really are strong, but they're best used if you drop multiples of them.... just like with human units.   The key is learning how many to drop, and where to drop them.  Experiment a bit to figure this one out.

Also, the Norse have a very powerful ability you can use to enhance this, which is Norns.  Use this, and for 5 turns, myth units become entirely free.  This is a very, very powerful thing, allowing you to get out huge hordes of these guys if you need them.   Be careful with this though!  Go too far with it, and you could screw yourself over pretty bad;  the Greek units may be strong, but multiple rampaging Ice Giants can do tons of damage before they're stopped!

And yes, the "Eldhrimner", or the purple pot, can help here as well, bringing these guys (and the humans) back as soon as they die.

Also, if you have Heimdall around, he can make your Norse myth units stronger as well, by increasing their health max (though it affects the Greek ones as well).  His horse thing can give them more AP to spend, but it also does this to EVERY currently existing unit.  Timing is very important with that one, but if used right you can boost up the power of Norse units without boosting the Greeks too much.  It's not the easiest to use ability.   Heimdall overall is a very powerful and useful god, so it's a lucky thing if you get him.  He's a minor god, so he'll appear during the Age of Monsters.


Greek myth units arent actually as strong overall;  they're more expensive as a rule and harder to use because of it.  The Chimera, for instance, costs a rather nasty amount of Jewelery (a full 6!).  The Minotaur requires steel, and the Centuar needs not only horses (which can be a pain to get) but also a rather absurd amount of incense; he's SO expensive you probably wont be seeing him much.   And the one that doesnt cost much, Cerberus.... cannot move.  Or attack.  He's for defending chokepoints, and can ONLY do damage by counterattacks (on the plus side though, he cannot be hit from a range, and the counter damage is a full 4000 at level 1.  He's EXTREMELY situational though).   Greek myth units tend to not have as much versatility as the Norse ones, and typically they are NOT efficient for their cost, unlike the Norse ones.

I agree that the Minotaur needs a nerf, that's a point I'll mention to the devs, likely he'll get a change of some sort very soon here. 


As for human units, one thing that can help the Norse out is Singasteinn, one of their myth tokens.  It works on the first 5 human units to touch it, and it does 3 things:  1, it makes it so that their AP cost for attacking is only 1 point (which means LOTS more attacks per turn, particularly for ranged units), it gives them immunity to ranged attacks, and it gives immunity to counterattacks.  And the best part is:  It doesnt need jewelery or incense or something like that to be used, it only costs bacon.  And has a cooldown of only 6 turns.    Just be careful where you place it, as with all tokens of this type, the other side can grab it too if you're not careful!   The chair thing can help them too, the one with the name I cant possibly pronounce or remember how to spell.    Eldhrimner can help them as well.


If you're having trouble, one other idea is to use a School to increase the level of produced Norse units, without using one on the other side; this can be helpful for shifting balance, but you have to be careful with it.  Also, with the Greek, pay attention to the requirements for each type of unit;  by being selective of the buildings in each city, you can control what units are produced.

And finally, the Unit Up direct action is your friend.  It can be a very helpful thing.  It's usable on all units except gods.


So there, some basic advice, which I've taken from my own strategies that I use when I play it.  I hope that helps a bit!

15

Skyward Collapse / Re: Tips from an Alpha Player

« on: Yesterday at 12:10:19 AM »

One more small tip that's related to my earlier post:

If you've unlocked the Artist's Studio (found in the Other Buildings tab), use it!  It has a high lumber cost (50), but it's very worth it!  It doubles the production of both clay and incense in any town that it is placed in (can only place one artist per town).   Both clay and incense are very important if you're going to be using the stuff in the mythological tab, so this can be a huge help!  Building up some extra wood early on is a very good idea, in order to make it easier to place this particular building.