My thoughts so far

[lazybum]

I realized that all of my comments on gameplay have given a one sided view of what I think of the game. Let me correct that. I am enjoying the game a lot. I like almost all of the parts of it. I enjoy the match 3 gameplay. The number of different symbols feels just about perfect. I enjoy the interaction between the game board and the spells. The sounds are well done and I like both the sound effects and the background music. I like how the army people (healer/scout/etc.) work and how they all have different roles (even though the rock roller guy is an idiot. He clearly would be sent back to basic training). I enjoy building up my town center and accessing new powers and items. It's a fun dynamic. I think the blacksmith items are another source of interesting gameplay and I hope to get more involved with them once I finish doing the other required upgrades.

My favorite game board so far was, I think, level 31. It was the board with the big square layout with all of the middle of the map locked down with chains. I felt it was really fun to work hard on unlocking the chains while trying to defend the tower at the same time. I think level 36 will play similarly to this once I have some powers to deal with the rapid freezing.

As far as game play balancing goes, I consider the elementalist too hard and the bouncy boss (level 30 I think) was too easy.

One more complication with the asynchronous gameplay is when you run into one of your gear check levels. I don't know for certain, but I believe that the elementalist boss and level 37 and 38 were designed to be gear checks. I don't think they are meant to be beatable unless you have certain spells or army guys. I tried level 37 with just a normal druid and not having level 4 spells. I couldn't keep the board unfrozen. I believe you have designed it for players to have the level 4 unfreeze spell and/or the high level druid. That's fine, but when I realized that I needed those spells/items I realized that I needed to collect a lot more lumber and then wait a long time for the spell to research. The spell research timers are very very long. I didn't put a stopwatch on it, but the basic result was that once I saw that timer I realized that I was not going to be able to play any more last night and I needed to keep my computer on all night so the spell would finish researching.

One more game play comment/question - On level 37 there are little glowy outlined squares. I have no idea what those squares are supposed to mean. I think that later on those squares become frozen, but I don't know what the initial glowy outline means. Am I supposed to know what that means? Was it explained somewhere and I missed it? Is it cureable?

Similar to the comment above where a player asked for help reminders about resources, I think it would be helpful to have some sort of pop up/reminder/help system to tell me what effect is on the game board. What I mean is, I don't know if the runes with chains on them are locked or frozen or corrupted or some other sort of bad effect that I am confusing with the other effects. The main reason why this is important is when I have to research a cure type spell, I really hope that I am picking the right one because if I picked incorrectly then I will have to spend another night waiting for the spell research for the correct spell type. Perhaps you could put on the spell research description a picture of the corrupted/locked/frozen rune that the spell is meant to cure. Is there a cure spell that corrects whatever the glowy outline effect is I mentioned in the previous paragraph?

Anyway, I am enjoying the game and I look forward to its continued refinement.

[lazybum]

Oh, and in regards to the previous comment about the quests - I like the idea of putting the reward for the quest right in the description. It also would be an interesting idea if you could win items like lumber or minerals as a quest reward. For those of us stuck on resources and are looking for a reason to play old levels again, going back and replaying levels while focusing on quests would be a fun dynamic.

[sonikku2008]

@lazybum:

When talking to support about the Cubicle bug, I received an e-mail back stating that that rapid freezing happening on levels 37 and 38 was a bug. They should be more manageable in updated builds. 36 may have been afflicted by the same bug, but unlike 37 and 38, that level is beatable in the state it was in. I did it first try.

Also, the glowing spaces on the board empower any rune that stops in that square. That rune remains empowered, and when used in a match, it will deal double damage to whoever it hits.

[ScrObot]

I completely agree about the spell research timers being huge. I can live with the Market for resources, but unless there's some way to use the Market to shorten the spell research time (and item research time), that's going to be the next big roadblock. (And paying for decreased time really rubs me the wrong way, but if it's the only alternative, I'll live with it.) e.g. You can temporarily hire scholars from another city to speed up your current research time (instant 100 second reduction per "unit" purchased).

Perhaps just the spell and item research could somehow be tied to beating levels as well or instead of the above idea. For example, each level you beat takes 50 seconds off of the timers, with a multiplier for each "tier" of 5 levels. (And maybe the first time you beat a level there is an additional multiplier increase.) This would allow people to play through the game in longer sessions without having to wait around.

I understand that the "idle while timers count down" is a valid playstyle that you wish to keep, and that's fine, but there should be an alternative for someone who has 2 hours to sit down and play, and doesn't want to twiddle their thumbs for half of that time or hit a wall because the next spell timer is too long for their play session.

but the basic result was that once I saw that timer I realized that I was not going to be able to play any more last night and I needed to keep my computer on all night so the spell would finish researching.

We really need to get away from this in my opinion. This isn't a valid mechanic for a PC game. There's no reason I should have to a) calculate out a timer to see if it's "worth" playing for another 20 minutes or not, or b) have to leave my computer on so a clock can tick down.

[Rosuav]

I completely agree about the spell research timers being huge. I can live with the Market for resources, but unless there's some way to use the Market to shorten the spell research time (and item research time), that's going to be the next big roadblock. (And paying for decreased time really rubs me the wrong way, but if it's the only alternative, I'll live with it.) e.g. You can temporarily hire scholars from another city to speed up your current research time (instant 100 second reduction per "unit" purchased).

Spell research is so unusual. Churning out materials, you need to do over and over and over. Spell research? Total of twenty spells in the entire game. Once you have it, that's it. I agree it seems a bit weird to permanently hire someone to speed up something that you're not doing most of the time. (My village has twenty lumberjacks and they're okay, though apparently that's the limit; I don't have any scholars or armsmasters. Even farmers and smelters aren't as important as lumberjacks - 5 and 4 respectively, though those will be increased when I have the resources to.)

So far, spell research time hasn't bothered me at all. I just fire-and-forget it. Oh hey, I got the resources to learn another spell. Okay, whatev's. Go ahead, do it. Oh right, that spell's done researching. Let's give it a try!

[ScrObot]

Well, tier 4 spells take 85.5 minutes each which is nearly 6 hours for all 4, and tier 5 spells are 228 minutes each, which is over 15 hours for all 4. I know these are the top tier ones, but over 20 REAL hours of research time (and only while the game is running, and you don't forget to queue another one up)... that hurts my head to think about.

I understand that having hard to reach things are good, especially with the end game mechanics, but time-locking these while having triad-based options for the other ones seems undesirable to me.

You guys have the best smiley selection.

[Rosuav]

Well, tier 4 spells take 85.5 minutes each which is nearly 6 hours for all 4, and tier 5 spells are 228 minutes each, which is over 15 hours for all 4. I know these are the top tier ones, but over 20 REAL hours of research time (and only while the game is running, and you don't forget to queue another one up)... that hurts my head to think about.

That's a lot, yes, but firing them off and then ignoring them means they'll eventually happen. If it takes you a week of playing to get it done, so be it. Meanwhile, you probably spend at least that much time wood-gathering (which is like wool-gathering, only the epiphanies hurt more).

[Gromgor]

My thoughts so far? The interface and tutorials are clunky. Also I'd like some info about some things on mouseover. As far as combat, it seems like the winning strategy is to just make matches as close to the bottom of the screen as possible to maximize the chance of getting a streak going. The I think to addd another element of strategy is to have a spell that changes the direction from which the elements "fall". Instead of from top to bottom for instance you cast the spell and they start falling from the bottom up. This would solve the only problem I've had so far which is no matches possible on the last couple of rows..

[ScrObot]

...I cannot continue the game beyond 40.

I'm also stuck here. I've beaten the cube twice (and lost ~6 times) and it just sits there, I eventually have to surrender. Is this expected with the current build?

FYI current stats on Normal difficulty:
Level 4 buildings: Lumber Mill, Academy
Level 3: Foundry, Town Hall, Farm, Armory
Level 2: Granary
Level 1: Blacksmith
All workers purchased
1 tier 4 spell researched (haven't used yet)
267k triads, 1070 population
74 achievements
I pretty much never use gear

[sonikku2008]

0.99.0 is no longer the current build. Go redownload the game from the e-mail you got when you bought it with the discount code, it should be updated to something a little more current.

Edit: Though even in the latest build (0.99.02_27_16) I just pulled, I still cannot complete the level.