My thoughts so far

[moviesign]

I'm playing on the Normal difficulty setting.

I agree with lazybum's points #3 and #4. I've maxed out the lumberjacks and smelter-helpers and it still takes forever to produce enough wood and ore to upgrade something. I hesitate to buy anything from the blacksmith because it takes precious wood and ore. So my strategy is to go for new magic spells. But I have long since won the gold flag on every level, up to but not including the boss battle at level 15 (I think), just grinding for triads while I wait for ore and wood to cycle. The food production rate is tolerable and I have gotten to 500 population so I can hire spell researchers.

On a related note, I feel the cost of lumberjacks and smelter-helpers is way too high for a 1% decrease in production time--it's almost not noticeable. I would like to see that doubled to 2% and keep the max at 20 each.

I like all the different tower layouts, Each presents a different challenge and needs a good strategy to effectively use it to defend the tower. They can be frustrating, but that breeds innovation

lazybum, your point #6: You can set the horizontal part of the ignite on the bottom row and get three points of damage. The bottom tip of the cross will just not be used.

[lazybum]

I am playing on normal difficulty.

I was thinking about possible solutions to the problems I see now.

The problems
No one is currently enjoying the way lumber and minerals are currently collected.
Few players are using combat items made from the blacksmith so a big part of the game design is unused.
You don't want players to have level 5 buildings when they are on encounter 20-30.
Boss fights are hard to tune for difficulty because players can have a wide range of spells and combat items depending on building upgrades.

My suggestion has 2 parts
1) - get rid of the timers on the lumber mill and foundry. Instead, you collect one batch of each resource for each combat you complete. This way players spend their time playing the game instead of staring at a countdown clock. Now, how do you prevent players from farming level 1 combats and building each building up to level 5 too early in the game? That's part 2.
2) You make each building upgrade blocked until you clear a certain level. You can either show it specifically on the upgrade screen where you tell players that building level 2 is locked until the clear level 10 or perhaps one ingredient for town center level 2 is dropped by the level 10 boss. This way players won't stockpile lumber for lumber mill level 4 and instead they would use it on the game play parts they currently aren't doing, like combat items from the blacksmith. This also would help you tune the difficulty level on each boss because you would know exactly what spells and combat items each player will have access to.

[summersheep]

I'm really good at match 3's. I got up to level 37 easily but then I got totally stuck. Even with the "destroy half ice blocks" and the druid etc I can't win the level. I saw someone on here saying it was "all about gear" but I've got such an extreme case of wood and ore shortage I don't want to sacrifice the preciousness of them for gear. Also it seems bad that the only way to win those levels might be to not make matches (as I seem to get to the point where I can't make any more matches by the second wave). It takes ages to learn any new spells (about an hour I think I calculated it to be), so I've got all this gold and nothing to do with it. (Maybe you should be able to spend goal to speed up resources?).

[Aristotle]

I'm really good at match 3's. I got up to level 37 easily but then I got totally stuck. Even with the "destroy half ice blocks" and the druid etc I can't win the level.

I think level 37 and 38 are much too hard. The two narrow columns that are only 2 spots wide combined with freezing runes is too nasty of a combination. We are going to rework that board shape.

Every play through I have done I get massively stuck on those levels as well.

[sonikku2008]

I'm really good at match 3's. I got up to level 37 easily but then I got totally stuck. Even with the "destroy half ice blocks" and the druid etc I can't win the level.

It's doable. I BARELY managed to pull it off with a Mega Stoner + Druid combo, every fire spell, the row clear, and the column clear. I ran out of matches with exactly 2 enemies left on the last wave, though. Mega Stoner cleared out 1, the Bone Sword I had saved up from I don't know when killed the other. That's about the only time ever gear has helped me.

(Maybe you should be able to spend goal to speed up resources?).

In my thread, Aristotle mentioned they're working on a trade market where you can purchase resources with your triads.

[Aristotle]

No one is currently enjoying the way lumber and minerals are currently collected.

No one?

• Over 200 people are currently playing
  
  
• Of those 200, perhaps 10 are posting here currently.
  
  
• Of those posting, only a few have expressed problems with resources. And those are only people who are playing the game in a specific way: what I call the "blast through the game" method (which is a perfectly legit way to play, but it is only one way).

So be careful with sweeping generalizations .

People who like queuing up their city while they are working and doing other stuff love the way it works. They can build up massive amounts of resources while only checking on the game for a few minutes here and there. And then later when they have a lot of time, they can go crush a bunch of battles.

The asynchronous gameplay element is actually a lot of fun. Remembering to check on your buildings throughout the day adds a whole extra layer of depth to the game.

I probably check on my city 10 or 15 times throughout the day, and then actually play battles at night. Some people play at various times throughout the day, but between play sessions check on their city a few times to build up resources.

That's why I call "asynchronous gameplay." A lot of people do that, and for them the resource situation is fine.

I think a trade/market will help the people who play the "power grinding" way.

1) - get rid of the timers on the lumber mill and foundry.

...

Instead, you collect one batch of each resource for each combat you complete.

...

You make each building upgrade blocked until you clear a certain level.

First, that is a completely different game that we didn't set out to make.

Second, that doesn't sound fun to me at all. That is a completely, 100% linear game where nothing matters but grinding the battles.

1) There is no choice in how you want to build your city.

2) There is no reason, fun, and excitement for checking on my city 10 times throughout the day to make sure I have all my buildings working.

For the few people having trouble, I would suggest:

1) Start a new city on EASY.

2) Check on your city throughout the day (in windowed mode!) to queue up your buildings and gather more resources.

3) Wait for us to add the MARKET/Trade system so you can use all your triads on bolstering your resources. I think that will be a significant change.

[lazybum]

I guess I assume that most people are like me and they either go to school or an office where they can't check on their city during the day. Checking in 10 times a day isn't possible for me (and I would assume a significant portion of players).

Perhaps the trade system will solve the problems of the players who can't interact all day long. I hope it does.

[Aristotle]

I guess I assume that most people are like me and they either go to school or an office where they can't check on their city during the day. Checking in 10 times a day isn't possible for me (and I would assume a significant portion of players).

I check on mine when I wake up, and then again before I leave home for work. Then when I get home I check it again. Then we make dinner. When dinner is ready I check it again. We have dinner and relax a bit. Then I check it again and go put kids to bed. Then after that I might sit down and play. I get 5 resource queue-ups just checking on it these few times at home and the play "for real" at night.

At work, I check it throughout the day and build up massive resources. But that's my "work city" on my work PC.

[summersheep]

I just worked it out, it's going to take about 2 hours for me to get enough wood to up grade the lumbar a level. Why would I want to "play" a game when it just requires me to have a window open in the background while I'm doing other things. I don't really count that as game play. Also, if you want a realistic generalisation, no one is on here saying what an amazing thing you've created where you have to wait hours for resources to be able to upgrade the stations the resources come from to be able to get more resources. Maybe if you got more resources by playing older levels it would be more fun, seeing as the game play is really in the conquests.

[sonikku2008]

Okay, now I understand your thought process behind your game design. That makes me feel a little better about it. And yeah, it probably is a good idea to build your resources throughout the day. But my machine has a small problem with running several memory intensive processes at once, so if I want to play another game, I unfortunately kinda have to close down the game, which means my buildings aren't working. Can't build 'em up throughout the day either, because I have class from 9 AM to 5 PM 6 days out of the week, and playing games during class hurts my grade.