Inspired by this outdated text-only list by Flaminghair and motivated/invigorated by the game's wonderful artwork I had a somewhat crazy idea: Take loads of screenshots, write a script to take care of the tedious work (extracting + combining relevant parts), and finally create an
Image-based collection of most THINGS
Warning
Some of the in-game descriptions are a bit vague and/or misleading. Very few are actually wrong.
Some descriptions differ between preparation phase and battle phase. (Here mostly preparation phase is used.)
General notes
The two stats attack and health of units are capped at 99, so temporary and permanent buffs can not increase them further. However, damage can be higher … Hint: Blessing!
Constructive feedback is welcome! (See comment below.)
Spells
ERROR: Bat Curse lvl 3 gives "Curse!" not "Curse", i.e. deals (3) damage for 3 steps.
Bone Book:
The summoned entity can be placed on any empty spot that is not behind enemy lines.
It can also be placed on the spot of another (friendly) unit as long as there is a free spot somewhere behind (i.e. left of) that unit. This will move the unit 1 step back – and all remaining units on the way to the next free spot, too.
ERROR: Blessing lvl 3 gives "Blessing!" not "Blessing", i.e. protection and Double Damage once.
All lvl 3 spells sell for 5 coins while nothing else does. This might be a bug.
Buildings
"on buy"
Lvl 1 buildings apply their effect immediately on initial placement.
Placing a lvl 1 copy directly from shop onto an already placed building results in the lvl 2 effect (instead of the lvl 1 effect) being applied immediately.
Combining two already placed buildings does not apply an effect immediately.
"end turn"
This means after the battle phase, i.e. right before the next preparation phase.
The "end turn" buff from Blacksmith/Farmer will not be triggered at the moment you click "To Battle!".
Blacksmith and Farmer apply their buff only to a unit on the spot directly behind them. So placement "on buy" matters. And on "end turn" any unit can be buffed by at most one building.
Buffs and items in shop
Milk and Jumbo Milk are permanent buffs.
Bone and Shield create corresponding equipped items when placed.
Equipped items
Every unit can have at most one item equipped.
This means a new item will replace the current one!
Exception: Rocker's blessing ability will not replace items on newly summoned entities, but those entities will not get the blessing either:
Skull summoned by Skull lvl 2/3 (with item)
Devil Imps (with Shield) summoned by Summoner lvl 3.
I have only tried Skulls + Bone and Summoner lvl 3.
TODO: test Skulls + Shield and Skulls + different Blessing lvl
Curses are actually items "equipped" by the enemy.
Shield reduces 2 damage of every (incoming) attack, but the minimal damage is still 1 per (incoming) attack.
Summoned entities
Every summoned entity deals only 1 damage to the castle – even the Skulls (2)(2) summoned by a Skull lvl 3.
TODO: Recheck this observation.
Some of the summoned entities have different names from what the summoning unit claims to summon.
Skull (1)(1) summoned by a Skull lvl 2: The description is completely wrong. (Note: The normal version has the same incorrect description during the battle phase.)
Ratling: Their health can not be buffed, but they can be protected with blessing.
TODO:
Try to get less crowded screenshots.
Add Idiot summoned by charmed Snitch?
Tier 1 units
Milkman: Their health can not be buffed, but they can be protected with blessing.
Skeleton: Placing a lvl 1 copy directly from shop onto an already placed Skeleton will give 2 coins instead of 1 – combining them later will not. (Similar to buildings!)
Tier 2 units
Assasin: To trigger their ability the ally has to be directly in front of them and use the default (melee) attack – attacking with abilities does not count.
Nurse:
To trigger their ability the ally does not have to be directly in front of them, but attacking with abilities does still not count. The ally also needs to survive their attack … No Resurrection!
They can not heal themselves, but one can heal another.
Overheal: Healing can increase a unit's health over their starting health for the duration of the battle.
Tier 3 units
Excalibur:
Here only the base stats are shown.
You should apply attack buffs preferably before level up!
Wizard:
Magic is an equipped item, so "on spell" it will replace the Wizard's previously equipped item if there was one. This implies: Only one "charge" of magic per Wizard per step.
Using a Blessing spell on a Wizard will not give this particular wizard magic … but the blessing.
Tier 4 units
Kobold:
Their ability targets only enemies on the same lane.
They shoot on their first step, i.e. they start the battle with step count at 1. (Pigman starts at 0.)
Rocker:
Their ability targets summoned allies on any lane.
Lvl 3 gives allies "Blessing!" – "Blessing!!!" does not exist.
Succubus:
Prince and King are immune to direct "on hit" charm.
Prince and King die instantly when hit by the "bounced" charm (only Succubus lvl 3).
When enemies are charmed, they respawn with their starting stats, equipped items and no curses … and now facing your enemy.
When a charmed Snitch/APC dies, the resulting Idiots/Guards still fight for your team.
TODO: Recheck whether they count as summoned allies regarding Bard/Rocker. IIRC they do.
Enemies
Every enemy can deal 1 damage to you if they reach your side of the battlefield.
Exception: The King will take all your remaining health and you lose.
TODO: Add Archer and try to get less crowded screenshots.
If you find content-related mistakes or serious grammar/spelling errors, please leave them in a comment.
If you think of good reasons why certain images (or text) should be rearranged, share them. It should only take minor effort on my part. Hopefully …
Hmm… now there is much more text then originally planned and the beautiful artwork was a bit marginalised. :-(
EDIT: I changed the composed images from 9 sub-images per row to 6 – itch scales images to fill the horizontal space. IMO this looks better and the in-picture text is easier to read.
82 days since last update T^T I know you're working on the new deck so it'll probably take a while. Can't wait for that to come out! I'd rather have a good update that takes a while to come out rather than a bad one that comes out immediately. Take your time, don't rush it :D
First of all: This game is already great and one of the best (of the smaller ones) I stumbled upon in recent years. (And this account was just created to make the following comments. So this seems to be important to me.)
The art is reallysuper cute while not being too distracting. Great work!
Request for two QoL features:
Full-screen mode in browser version. Please!
Tampering with zoom and scrolling is a a real hassle … (At least I assume this would be easier than an build for all the OS that aren't Windows …)
Better Spy usability
When fine tuning the units' placement after spying on a large enemy army I have to go back and forth between the two screens a lot since my brain's memory can't handle frequently overwritten values very well. And those "values" (enemy units) change every round …
So instead of seeing only the enemy units on the spy screen it would help me tremendously being able to see the battlefield in its entirety while still being able to move units around (and going back to the shop).
I suppose seeing both shop and the entire battlefield at the same time would need to much horizontal space. But since the shop contains much less "values" that would be much less of a problem.
EDIT: Never mind this presumed restriction!
According to the full-screen image in this comment by Stopsignal the full-screen version has ample horizontal space. It should suffice for both the shop and the complete battlefield.
This small visual comparison shows there should be enough space for at least the spy results being visible in the preparation screen – in case the (preferred) version shop + complete battlefield would be too much work.
Before using the spy option this still modifiable battlefield view could simply hide the right 5 columns behind fog of war (or smoke or darkness – or disgusting light).
Furthermore the king's stats are shown briefly every round regardless of spying, so you could simply add them to this new battlefield view.
Related balance issue: Spying is really powerful in long runs which tend to involve a better income via (multiple) Mausoleum lvl 2+, so 2 coins every round might be a bit cheap. Maybe increase the cost every few roundsuses?
The basic gameplay is explained well enough for someone with prior auto battler experience. (I can't really comment on the point of view of an absolut beginner.)
However, there are also some issues (not really bugs).
A lot of the initial difficulty of the game seems to be caused by important information being hidden or given in a somewhat misleading/inconsistent way.
Regarding the hidden part of the problem:
IMO most important for planning ahead would be the various lvl 2 or lvl 3 unit descriptions. It takes quite a few (or maybe a lot) runs to get every unit to lvl 3 at least once. I assume the "Choose Deck" menu (Coming Soon) is going to solve this is in a more suitable way.
EDIT: Actually, there is a list of most unit/book descriptions on one of the past pages of comments, but it seems to be partially out-of-date.
Regarding the misleading/inconsistent part of the problem, i.e. mostly description issues:
The fast forward button has the tool tip "Move units to last space, ignore special effects". I would assume this includes movement-based effects like Bat Curse and ranged attacks. But they are not ignored. Is the description simply out-of-date? If not, what special effects are ignored?
It seems Blacksmith + Farmer can not buff the same ally at the same time. :-( So "give ally directly behind" might make it clearer.
A few unit/book descriptions differ between preparation phase and battle phase. Examples:
Blessing book lvl 3 in preparation screen is missing the "Double Damage!" part … which is kind of important.
Bone book lvl 3 in battle sreen is missing the "ironic" … which isn't nearly as important. ;-)
Shield claims to "Reduce 2 damage.", but it neglects to mention that minimal damage is still 1.
Ratfolk claims to summon Ratling(1)(1), but it is Ratling (1)(Red Skull – dies on hit), so buffing summon health is pointless here. Also " " is missing.
The target area of unit's abilities should be consistently stated like "first", "on lane", "random", "any", "directly in front", "directly behind". E.g. Kobold targets weakest enemy on lane while Rocker targets any summoned ally. Both are missing these important details. Related: It is unclear what "weakest" means. Lowest enemy tier? Or most damaged?
When several units buff the same unit (e.g. 2 bards on a summon or Nurse(s) + self-buffing unit) the animations are a bit misleading. If I am not mistaken the accumulated buffs are applied at once, but the visuals do not match. This can lead to the (hopefully wrong) conclusion that at least one buffer failed to do its work.
And then there are a few undocumented and somewhat surprising game mechanics.
Summon overflow: Units that summon more than one unit on death might not summon all of them if there is not enough space directly behind them or at the end of their line where they could push their allies to – IIRC they never push towards the enemy. This seems to be more of a feature you have to plan for than a bug (you can summon a Skeleton (1)(2) directly in front of a Snitch to take it and the sole Idiot out — or it could in turn cripple your summoner strategy) – so this mechanic should be explained somewhere. "On Death – Summon up to X Things if there is space" in the description might help make this clearer. And/or an additional page of the "?" regarding summons.
Succubus' issue with the royals: Prince and King are immune to the direct charm (succubus lvl 1–3). But the bounced charm (only lvl 3) seems to deal 99 damage to the unlucky 2nd enemy (any type). This kills the enemy before replacing it with a converted copy – except for the royals … they just die. (As pointed out by Isaac 576.) This makes some kind of sense, but is a bit surprising.
Related: The enemies max health during battle seems to be hard-coded to 99 even if the king has already grown to 100+ health outside of battle. (See future comment below.) EDIT: A few of the older screen shots on previous pages already cover this. And apparently all stats are capped at 99.
It took me some time to figure out that the (non-boss) enemy difficulty grows with number of rounds and damage dealt to castle. But if you can avoid dealing too much damage to the castle, a lot is possible. Like having to sell lvl 3 Things to make space. Or stacking several rows of coins each round. To reduce dependence on luck you basically have to spy every round (3 x free, then 2 coins per round) for quite some time. 2 lvl 3 Bat Curse books can take out 6 units which is really helpful. But then there are rounds with 7 (or 8?) archers, so a third book was nice to have. Even if they don't die right away, replacing their bows is great for planning. Also keeping different books inactive behind the front line can be beneficial for adapting to current enemies every round. It feels a bit weird to rearrange the units every time to maximize your own casualties – e.g. supporter in front, but it can be done … even if it costs some of your own health during the first few rounds. Using multiplying summons makes the planning rather difficult – as do random ranged attacks –, so most of them loose their use soon. For this delaying strategy it is very useful that lvl 3 units only deal the same 2 damage to the castle as lvl 2 units, so you don't have to delay the upgrade too much.
I could have probably squeezed out a few more rounds if I had sold the succubi … but they are simply too cute <3. EDIT: … And a whole lot more when focusing on only 3 units … as several older comments on previous pages point out. Why didn't I check there before? Now I feel a bit dumb. But this was still quite fun for a first try of a delay approach.
also got ideas for new skeletons, first of a tier 4 skeleton cow that gives the friend behind 1/1 stats after it attacks (like big bone) also a tier 2 zombie that when it kills an enemy it summons a 1/1 copy of itself, a tier 1 skeleton dog that if an enemy in it's lane has 1 health it deals one damage to it. Works 3 times. A tier 3 a bat king/bat swarm/vampire idk but what it would do is every 2 steps it gives the backmost enemy bat curse. i would personally love this added and for other bosses ideas you should have to fight your angry dad. (he is also a necromancer).
love this game, im super excited for that level and deck update. Great diificulty level, cool character design and the necromancer is kinda bad ngl, anyone got her snap.
I found an ending where you kill the king but get killed in the same round. Awesome that this is a thing and not just a bad end, another reason I love this game
i genuinely keep returning to this bc it's so fun!! i think this is a gem in a way, there's something fun about both the three-lane combat and it being pve (although im not that familiar with autobattlers so i can't say if it's been done before) that allows for so many cool combos, and trial and error doesn't feel frustrating since it's both pve and it does not take a while to return to your previous powerlevel once you've lost
i think as a full game with more levels (and maybe pvp? idk though i love the pve just fine) this would be even more fire than it is now (but ofc this is just my opinion and im not demanding anything from the dev haha)
it is very hard. i think it requires a dose of luck to make a good deck like bard-summoners with some heavy hitters like kobold. and the green book is a must-have - i didn't even expect that level 3 makes summoners instead of skeletons
curious if there are other strategies for successful rush and if turn 7 is theoretically possible ;[
...
and turn 13 ! :) trying to delay the victory is tricky too
i feel like im going crazy here, all the other comments are acting like this game is fairly easy and doable. but ive been at this wasting my life away for the past 5 hours and i still cant beat this fucking game. it was fun at first, but now it just feels like a frustrating drag. i feel like there's some way that everyone else is playing that im not. ive tried so many different strategies at this point. this just feels awful. 5 hours. and im probably going to waste more hours away because i really want to see the ending. im gonna be having nightmares of this game's damage sound.
UPDATE: now it's been 6 hours, i think im finally going to stop playing this. but im really disappointed i didnt get to see the ending
UPDATE 2: i lied, it's been 7 hours now. ive finally made it to the king but im stuck on him
Hahahahah, please don't play it if it brings stress and unhappiness! The idea is to have fun after all, hahahah
I'd recommend checking which combos work best for you, trying to not roll too much or spy too much to not waste excess money! Also get as many level three things as you can!
i finally did it! very charming game. tho it slowly became progressively less charming the more frustrated i got, and the music and sound effects eventually became a bit annoying. i think it took me 8 hours or something. cant believe ive sat here for 8 whole hours playing this game.
i will admit, i slowly began to dislike this game the more i played it. however, now that ive beaten it i can think a bit clearer. and it's a charming game, really. i like the story, however simple it is. i like how the protagonist looks. the art style is nice, and the music... well um, it's got a unique style that's for sure. i mean, i like the music, but i think hearing it for 8 hours has done things to me.
in terms of the difficulty, honestly, to me personally it feels like you may have done the thing where the game feels reasonably challenging to you because you coded it and know how everything works, but to the average person it's different. but, i guess no other comments mention the difficulty, so maybe im an outlier here. maybe it was just the specific way i was playing. i mean, i never once even used the freezing mechanic. i kind of just forgot it existed most of the time. maybe that was it. now i wonder how much better id have played if i had used it.
even still, i feel like something's wrong with the difficulty, but im not sure what.it could just be the way the game is explained.
i really feel like some things should've been better explained. i found myself getting better as i went along, but i really feel like a lot of me getting better was just me figuring out how the game works. which i mean, is in fact how most games are played, but it feels like some sort of strategy or better explanation of mechanics was in need, more than what that question mark provided. like, some of the descriptions feel a little ambiguous. especially before understanding how stuff works. in the beginning i thought "summoned allies" meant all allies, since they were technically summoned by you, and was using the bard on regular old enemies thinking they were buffing them.
idk, maybe it was really just me. but ive never struggled this much with a game in a long time.
the game could also use some more mechanics. but im sure you're already working on that, this is only a small game after all, it'd be unreasonable to ask too much. but i still want to give some recommendations.
i like the synergies this game has. with how different allies and items play off of each other. i personally want to see more of that. my favourite is how giving the funny bone to a level 2 or 3 annoying skull will have it splitting like crazy. every time it and its summons die they summon a funny bone. and when paired with a high level bard it feels like it can get through almost anything. which i think might work differently for the other summons, but im not 100% sure on that.
i just like synergies, they feel good. and if enough things got added there might be some unintended synergies, too. i personally also like it when an otherwise weak item or something can become powerful under specific circumstances. and you get to feel real powerful from that. but that's just a personal taste.
also the mechanic of having to use up every coin before going to battle is a bit weird. it's not bad, it works. but it doesn't feel perfect. maybe i just feel like there should be more to it. im not sure how. maybe another item or building related to it. or some kind of savings.
idk, im just kind of throwing out random suggestions at this point. i guess i just wanted to give my personal opinion on things since i liked this game overall and im assuming you're still working on it since it says choosing deck and level will be coming soon.
as an overall review, it's a good game. and you're pretty talented for doing both the art and coding yourself. the gameplay is fun, but it does feel like you'd need to work on it quite a bit if this were to ever become a full game by any chance. i like the story, however simple. and the main character is relatable to say the least. you made a good game. i unfortunately spent most of my time with it frustrated, and it kept me up all night too. but that was on me. and it's nevertheless a good game. good job on this!
there is a minor confusion with Assasin's description, saying that it attacks when an ally "in front attacks". first, it was unclear if this meant the ally in the front of the line or directly in front of the Assasin, and second there are units that can "attack" from any rank like Bowie and Stoner, but they don't trigger Assasin's attack unless they engage in melee combat. so i think it'd be better if Assasin attacked together with the unit in front of it, no matter which rank they are in
overall, such a high quality game, although very small. gives major plants vs zombies vibes and can be a huge success if you make an extended 40-60 min version
Absolutely incredible game! The balance is really great -- at the beginning I was pretty overwhelmed by how many Snitches appear so quickly but got the hang of it after a bit. It took me like 5 or so tries to win -- lvl 3 Pigman + lvl 3 Immunity spell did 30 damage to the king at once, it felt great.
The spell mechanic is a great addition to make the Autobattler formula feel less idle-y, I especially love the mechanic of having to strategically space out your spells so that the Wizards can keep attacking.
One thing I'd suggest is having a clearer distinction between the speed-up button and the pause button -- for some reason I keep accidentally clicking on speed-up when I really mean to pause, maybe because there's no border between the two? But that's really a minor gripe. You've really got something phenomenal here. I'd vote against adding a PvP, if you're considering it, because the game is balanced around fighting the AI, so you'd have to spend a lot of energy readjusting the mechanics on something that I personally wouldn't play.
Hi StopSignal! I created an itch.io account to tell you how much I enjoyed playing this game. I've never tried an auto-battler before, but I really enjoy strategy games, so this is a great mixture of the two.
If you're still looking for new monster ideas from the development log thread, one of the things that crushed me in earlier runs was Archers sniping crucial allies (like Bards and Healers) before the forces met in the center to begin melee combat. A Slime monster that aggros arrows to it -acting like a damage sponge- could diversify strategy, allowing players to use enemy resources against them. Level 2 Slimes could absorb arrows and spit them back out at enemies every handful of steps, and Level 3 Slimes could shorten the cooldown time and increase damage at enemies. I feel this would be a higher tier unit- maybe tier 2 so players have the chance to place them on the board before archers start appearing. Speaking as a player, I feel this could offset my need to fill the board with as many Summoners, Rattlers, or units with duplication abilities as possible to survive the initial enemy barrages, and let me focus on building a few very strong units with immense staying power earlier without them being sniped out.
Otherwise, I'm sure you're immensely busy working on the game, and I hope you're taking care of yourself and otherwise in high spirits! You've done great work to be sure, and I wish you nothing but the best!
Took me forever but got a no hit run. I wish I could go back to show the configuration I used. Used Big bones + nurses and immunity spell book to take down the King.
It's possible to defeat the King with 1 alpha-unit with lots of supports, like nurses, and assassins. But as for me, Bard-Rocker-Something respawnable is much better.
IMO, the best strategy is as MANY things as possible, like as many things as you can(I'm talking about rats, spells, the summoner, things that make things are the best for any strategy)
(I also almost beat the king without taking DMG like 3 times, also beat the king a lot)
Hopefully when I get enough free time (and inspiration, I'm kinda burnt out this days, specially on this project) to continue!! I got some stuff done, but it still needs quite a bunch of work!
It will be done, however, I got plans for this game, I want it on steam and phones as a full experience!
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please just release the update... please
Anyone beaten the king? I'm starting to continuisly getting to him, but he just have to much health to deal with.
And just because i said that i just beat him. Golem with healer and shield did the trick.
is this ever going to be expanded on
It is, soon, i promise, hahaha
been working on it behind the scenesss
SOON! GUYS, STOPSIGNAL SAID SOON! YIPPEE :D
Thank you so much!
Inspired by this outdated text-only list by Flaminghair and motivated/invigorated by the game's wonderful artwork I had a somewhat crazy idea: Take loads of screenshots, write a script to take care of the tedious work (extracting + combining relevant parts), and finally create an
Image-based collection of most THINGS
Warning
General notes
Spells
Buildings
Buffs and items in shop
Equipped items
Summoned entities
Tier 1 units
Tier 2 units
Tier 3 units
Tier 4 units
Enemies
As noted: Constructive feedback is welcome!
Hmm… now there is much more text then originally planned
and the beautiful artwork was a bit marginalised. :-(Spoiler tags for the sections of the collection would be nice, but this feature does not seem to be available.
Further idea: Overview table
messyinteresting)Shield is best card in the game lowkey. if enemies scaled past 3/4 attack eventually it wouldn't be as broken
or if there was a better deathrattle/spawning enemy in late game
Agree the shield is like mewing, it makes you so strong and sigma it should get nerfed so units who have it don't looksmaxx inmediatly
destabilizing the economy
They should add a sigma skeleton, his ability is he mogs a random enemy that has less stats than him. if you get mogged you lose your ability.
82 days since last update T^T
I know you're working on the new deck so it'll probably take a while. Can't wait for that to come out! I'd rather have a good update that takes a while to come out rather than a bad one that comes out immediately. Take your time, don't rush it :D
Agree you are very sigma you could mog anyone who edges. Im gonna start mewing so i can be an alpha like you
Idk if its just me but some of the kings guys should be nerfed just a little bit
also nerf sucumbus and monestary plz
stopsignal u gyatt to tell us when the skibidi update will realesed. plz
First of all:
This game is already great and one of the best (of the smaller ones) I stumbled upon in recent years.
(And this account was just created to make the following comments. So this seems to be important to me.)
The art is
reallysuper cute while not being too distracting. Great work!Request for two QoL features:
Full-screen mode in browser version. Please!
Tampering with zoom and scrolling is a a real hassle …
(At least I assume this would be easier than an build for all the OS that aren't Windows …)
Better Spy usability
I suppose seeing both shop and the entire battlefield at the same time would need to much horizontal space. But since the shop contains much less "values" that would be much less of a problem.Related balance issue:
Spying is really powerful in long runs which tend to involve a better income via (multiple) Mausoleum lvl 2+, so 2 coins every round might be a bit cheap. Maybe increase the cost every few
roundsuses?The basic gameplay is explained well enough for someone with prior auto battler experience. (I can't really comment on the point of view of an absolut beginner.)
However, there are also some issues (not really bugs).
A lot of the initial difficulty of the game seems to be caused by important information being hidden or given in a somewhat misleading/inconsistent way.
Regarding the hidden part of the problem:
IMO most important for planning ahead would be the various lvl 2 or lvl 3 unit descriptions. It takes quite a few (or maybe a lot) runs to get every unit to lvl 3 at least once.
I assume the "Choose Deck" menu (Coming Soon) is going to solve this is in a more suitable way.
EDIT: Actually, there is a list of most unit/book descriptions on one of the past pages of comments, but it seems to be partially out-of-date.
Regarding the misleading/inconsistent part of the problem, i.e. mostly description issues:
The fast forward button has the tool tip "Move units to last space, ignore special effects".
I would assume this includes movement-based effects like Bat Curse and ranged attacks. But they are not ignored.
Is the description simply out-of-date?
If not, what special effects are ignored?
It seems Blacksmith + Farmer can not buff the same ally at the same time. :-( So "give ally directly behind" might make it clearer.
A few unit/book descriptions differ between preparation phase and battle phase.
Examples:
Shield claims to "Reduce 2 damage.", but it neglects to mention that minimal damage is still 1.
Ratfolk claims to summon Ratling(1)(1), but it is Ratling (1)(Red Skull – dies on hit), so buffing summon health is pointless here. Also " " is missing.
The target area of unit's abilities should be consistently stated like "first", "on lane", "random", "any", "directly in front", "directly behind".
E.g. Kobold targets weakest enemy on lane while Rocker targets any summoned ally. Both are missing these important details.
Related: It is unclear what "weakest" means. Lowest enemy tier? Or most damaged?
When several units buff the same unit (e.g. 2 bards on a summon or Nurse(s) + self-buffing unit) the animations are a bit misleading. If I am not mistaken the accumulated buffs are applied at once, but the visuals do not match. This can lead to the (hopefully wrong) conclusion that at least one buffer failed to do its work.
And then there are a few undocumented and somewhat surprising game mechanics.
Summon overflow:
Units that summon more than one unit on death might not summon all of them if there is not enough space directly behind them or at the end of their line where they could push their allies to – IIRC they never push towards the enemy.
This seems to be more of a feature you have to plan for than a bug (you can summon a Skeleton (1)(2) directly in front of a Snitch to take it and the sole Idiot out — or it could in turn cripple your summoner strategy) – so this mechanic should be explained somewhere. "On Death – Summon up to X Things if there is space" in the description might help make this clearer. And/or an additional page of the "?" regarding summons.
Succubus' issue with the royals:
Prince and King are immune to the direct charm (succubus lvl 1–3).
But the bounced charm (only lvl 3) seems to deal 99 damage to the unlucky 2nd enemy (any type). This kills the enemy before replacing it with a converted copy – except for the royals … they just die. (As pointed out by Isaac 576.)
This makes some kind of sense, but is a bit surprising.
Related:
The enemies max health during battle seems to be hard-coded to 99 even if the king has already grown to 100+ health outside of battle. (See future comment below.)
EDIT: A few of the older screen shots on previous pages already cover this. And apparently all stats are capped at 99.
Now for a "fun" experiment.
It took me some time to figure out that the (non-boss) enemy difficulty grows with number of rounds and damage dealt to castle. But if you can avoid dealing too much damage to the castle, a lot is possible. Like having to sell lvl 3 Things to make space. Or stacking several rows of coins each round.
To reduce dependence on luck you basically have to spy every round (3 x free, then 2 coins per round) for quite some time.
2 lvl 3 Bat Curse books can take out 6 units which is really helpful. But then there are rounds with 7 (or 8?) archers, so a third book was nice to have. Even if they don't die right away, replacing their bows is great for planning.
Also keeping different books inactive behind the front line can be beneficial for adapting to current enemies every round.
It feels a bit weird to rearrange the units every time to maximize your own casualties – e.g. supporter in front, but it can be done … even if it costs some of your own health during the first few rounds.
Using multiplying summons makes the planning rather difficult – as do random ranged attacks –, so most of them loose their use soon.
For this delaying strategy it is very useful that lvl 3 units only deal the same 2 damage to the castle as lvl 2 units, so you don't have to delay the upgrade too much.
I could have probably squeezed out a few more rounds if I had sold the succubi … but they are simply too cute <3.
EDIT: … And a whole lot more when focusing on only 3 units … as several older comments on previous pages point out. Why didn't I check there before? Now I feel a bit dumb. But this was still quite fun for a first try of a delay approach.
can u pls add the ideas below if you do baby gronk will rizz up livy dune in ohio in front of your gyatt edging to skibidi toilet
also got ideas for new skeletons, first of a tier 4 skeleton cow that gives the friend behind 1/1 stats after it attacks (like big bone) also a tier 2 zombie that when it kills an enemy it summons a 1/1 copy of itself, a tier 1 skeleton dog that if an enemy in it's lane has 1 health it deals one damage to it. Works 3 times. A tier 3 a bat king/bat swarm/vampire idk but what it would do is every 2 steps it gives the backmost enemy bat curse. i would personally love this added and for other bosses ideas you should have to fight your angry dad. (he is also a necromancer).
love this game, im super excited for that level and deck update. Great diificulty level, cool character design and the necromancer is kinda bad ngl, anyone got her snap.
I FINALLY BEAT IT WOO. it took me like a month but I finally did it!!
I found an ending where you kill the king but get killed in the same round. Awesome that this is a thing and not just a bad end, another reason I love this game
awesome game! still haven't beat it but having lots of fun trying to
i beat it! great game, nice difficulty level and cool mechanics
PLEASE UPDATE
i genuinely keep returning to this bc it's so fun!! i think this is a gem in a way, there's something fun about both the three-lane combat and it being pve (although im not that familiar with autobattlers so i can't say if it's been done before) that allows for so many cool combos, and trial and error doesn't feel frustrating since it's both pve and it does not take a while to return to your previous powerlevel once you've lost
i think as a full game with more levels (and maybe pvp? idk though i love the pve just fine) this would be even more fire than it is now (but ofc this is just my opinion and im not demanding anything from the dev haha)
only took me like 2 hours crying emoji skull emoji
excellent game, loved it!!
excellent game!!
finally ! turn 8 win !
it is very hard. i think it requires a dose of luck to make a good deck like bard-summoners with some heavy hitters like kobold. and the green book is a must-have - i didn't even expect that level 3 makes summoners instead of skeletons
curious if there are other strategies for successful rush and if turn 7 is theoretically possible ;[
...
and turn 13 ! :) trying to delay the victory is tricky too
this game is very fun !
i feel like im going crazy here, all the other comments are acting like this game is fairly easy and doable. but ive been at this wasting my life away for the past 5 hours and i still cant beat this fucking game. it was fun at first, but now it just feels like a frustrating drag. i feel like there's some way that everyone else is playing that im not. ive tried so many different strategies at this point. this just feels awful. 5 hours. and im probably going to waste more hours away because i really want to see the ending. im gonna be having nightmares of this game's damage sound.
UPDATE: now it's been 6 hours, i think im finally going to stop playing this. but im really disappointed i didnt get to see the ending
UPDATE 2: i lied, it's been 7 hours now. ive finally made it to the king but im stuck on him
Hahahahah, please don't play it if it brings stress and unhappiness! The idea is to have fun after all, hahahah
I'd recommend checking which combos work best for you, trying to not roll too much or spy too much to not waste excess money! Also get as many level three things as you can!
i finally did it! very charming game. tho it slowly became progressively less charming the more frustrated i got, and the music and sound effects eventually became a bit annoying. i think it took me 8 hours or something. cant believe ive sat here for 8 whole hours playing this game.
i will admit, i slowly began to dislike this game the more i played it. however, now that ive beaten it i can think a bit clearer. and it's a charming game, really. i like the story, however simple it is. i like how the protagonist looks. the art style is nice, and the music... well um, it's got a unique style that's for sure. i mean, i like the music, but i think hearing it for 8 hours has done things to me.
in terms of the difficulty, honestly, to me personally it feels like you may have done the thing where the game feels reasonably challenging to you because you coded it and know how everything works, but to the average person it's different. but, i guess no other comments mention the difficulty, so maybe im an outlier here. maybe it was just the specific way i was playing. i mean, i never once even used the freezing mechanic. i kind of just forgot it existed most of the time. maybe that was it. now i wonder how much better id have played if i had used it.
even still, i feel like something's wrong with the difficulty, but im not sure what.it could just be the way the game is explained.
i really feel like some things should've been better explained. i found myself getting better as i went along, but i really feel like a lot of me getting better was just me figuring out how the game works. which i mean, is in fact how most games are played, but it feels like some sort of strategy or better explanation of mechanics was in need, more than what that question mark provided. like, some of the descriptions feel a little ambiguous. especially before understanding how stuff works. in the beginning i thought "summoned allies" meant all allies, since they were technically summoned by you, and was using the bard on regular old enemies thinking they were buffing them.
idk, maybe it was really just me. but ive never struggled this much with a game in a long time.
the game could also use some more mechanics. but im sure you're already working on that, this is only a small game after all, it'd be unreasonable to ask too much. but i still want to give some recommendations.
i like the synergies this game has. with how different allies and items play off of each other. i personally want to see more of that. my favourite is how giving the funny bone to a level 2 or 3 annoying skull will have it splitting like crazy. every time it and its summons die they summon a funny bone. and when paired with a high level bard it feels like it can get through almost anything. which i think might work differently for the other summons, but im not 100% sure on that.
i just like synergies, they feel good. and if enough things got added there might be some unintended synergies, too. i personally also like it when an otherwise weak item or something can become powerful under specific circumstances. and you get to feel real powerful from that. but that's just a personal taste.
also the mechanic of having to use up every coin before going to battle is a bit weird. it's not bad, it works. but it doesn't feel perfect. maybe i just feel like there should be more to it. im not sure how. maybe another item or building related to it. or some kind of savings.
idk, im just kind of throwing out random suggestions at this point. i guess i just wanted to give my personal opinion on things since i liked this game overall and im assuming you're still working on it since it says choosing deck and level will be coming soon.
as an overall review, it's a good game. and you're pretty talented for doing both the art and coding yourself. the gameplay is fun, but it does feel like you'd need to work on it quite a bit if this were to ever become a full game by any chance. i like the story, however simple. and the main character is relatable to say the least. you made a good game. i unfortunately spent most of my time with it frustrated, and it kept me up all night too. but that was on me. and it's nevertheless a good game. good job on this!
cool game, thank you!
there is a minor confusion with Assasin's description, saying that it attacks when an ally "in front attacks". first, it was unclear if this meant the ally in the front of the line or directly in front of the Assasin, and second there are units that can "attack" from any rank like Bowie and Stoner, but they don't trigger Assasin's attack unless they engage in melee combat. so i think it'd be better if Assasin attacked together with the unit in front of it, no matter which rank they are in
overall, such a high quality game, although very small. gives major plants vs zombies vibes and can be a huge success if you make an extended 40-60 min version
Absolutely incredible game! The balance is really great -- at the beginning I was pretty overwhelmed by how many Snitches appear so quickly but got the hang of it after a bit. It took me like 5 or so tries to win -- lvl 3 Pigman + lvl 3 Immunity spell did 30 damage to the king at once, it felt great.
The spell mechanic is a great addition to make the Autobattler formula feel less idle-y, I especially love the mechanic of having to strategically space out your spells so that the Wizards can keep attacking.
One thing I'd suggest is having a clearer distinction between the speed-up button and the pause button -- for some reason I keep accidentally clicking on speed-up when I really mean to pause, maybe because there's no border between the two? But that's really a minor gripe. You've really got something phenomenal here. I'd vote against adding a PvP, if you're considering it, because the game is balanced around fighting the AI, so you'd have to spend a lot of energy readjusting the mechanics on something that I personally wouldn't play.
Row 1: shielded & buffed Succubus
Row 2: Lv3 Bard + Lv3 Bone Book
Row 3: Nurse + shielded Big Boned
when you give a unit the bone item and they die
the entity that spawns is called "boner"
why is mine different
I got this too. It is because both the witch and the king died in the last round.
oh
i also got the king and the witch to die too in the last round
Hi StopSignal! I created an itch.io account to tell you how much I enjoyed playing this game. I've never tried an auto-battler before, but I really enjoy strategy games, so this is a great mixture of the two.
If you're still looking for new monster ideas from the development log thread, one of the things that crushed me in earlier runs was Archers sniping crucial allies (like Bards and Healers) before the forces met in the center to begin melee combat. A Slime monster that aggros arrows to it -acting like a damage sponge- could diversify strategy, allowing players to use enemy resources against them. Level 2 Slimes could absorb arrows and spit them back out at enemies every handful of steps, and Level 3 Slimes could shorten the cooldown time and increase damage at enemies. I feel this would be a higher tier unit- maybe tier 2 so players have the chance to place them on the board before archers start appearing. Speaking as a player, I feel this could offset my need to fill the board with as many Summoners, Rattlers, or units with duplication abilities as possible to survive the initial enemy barrages, and let me focus on building a few very strong units with immense staying power earlier without them being sniped out.
Otherwise, I'm sure you're immensely busy working on the game, and I hope you're taking care of yourself and otherwise in high spirits! You've done great work to be sure, and I wish you nothing but the best!
Took me forever but got a no hit run. I wish I could go back to show the configuration I used. Used Big bones + nurses and immunity spell book to take down the King.
I have done no-hit runs 10 times or even more.
It's possible to defeat the King with 1 alpha-unit with lots of supports, like nurses, and assassins. But as for me, Bard-Rocker-Something respawnable is much better.
That's the last run start of the boss fight:
Found a major bug, when the max level succubus bounces their charm to the king it instantly kills them.
"The Witch Won?"
Well I'll take it.
Ive killed the king at least 20 times by now. This game is extremely fun and id pay upwards of 45+ for a 4-8 hour playtime full release. add pvp also.
>add pvp also
please, don't do it!!!
the game is so cool now, PvP will suck all the pleasure from it
Finally got a perfect run. Zero damage one hit king. Excalibur plus a good blacksmith is obscene.
it's pretty good
IMO, the best strategy is as MANY things as possible, like as many things as you can(I'm talking about rats, spells, the summoner, things that make things are the best for any strategy)
(I also almost beat the king without taking DMG like 3 times, also beat the king a lot)
This game is genius. I am trying now to beat the king with another combo but the obvious summon/bard synergy.
i recommend a beef cake/succubus build
Thanks for the hint, but what is the beef cake?
Great single combo I found was the golem guy that gains attack when attacking, with shield item and healer.
stacking stats on a single character
Quick question it says coming soon and i downloaded it when will those possible be coming
Hopefully when I get enough free time (and inspiration, I'm kinda burnt out this days, specially on this project) to continue!! I got some stuff done, but it still needs quite a bunch of work!
It will be done, however, I got plans for this game, I want it on steam and phones as a full experience!
that sounds awesome, sorry about the burnout take as long as you need!!
Necrothief