Things you didnt know/helpful tips for early access runs

[Orcus187]

So the purpose that i was looking for in this thread is to help new and maybe veteran players with helpful tips that maybe you didnt know and certain strategies that you find useful for the current build. Since its early access and changes might or might not happen within the game the guides section is very limited and i dont expect any thorough guides til release, so i thought this could serve as a go to until that happens. Now since im a rookie myself i dont have much of value for input but i'll add my 2 cents in from what i learned along the way. I have yet to complete the 300yrs yet, my furthest has been up yr 136 (which is my current run, but i am still deciding on whether to stop or not since all my houses are producing alchemist at the moment due to some miscalculating on my part. Part of the fun is learning from these mistakes:)

1) My 1st tip is that in the beginning i did not know that a complete wipe out of the vanguard (your fighters) during battle did not end the game. When i came upon the 1st group of bulwarks around yr 40 or so and was about to get my ♥♥♥ handed to me, i just restarted for a new game. If i had known that the game continues i would of just let all the heroes die and try to recover.

2) Which also leads to my second thing i did not know since i finally just let that happen a couple of playthroughs ago. I did not know that the other way to gain relics is by having your heroes die in battle. I thought they only came from the events within the game. Did not know that the weapons the heroes use gain xp with each kill they do and with enough xp they get passed on as relics when the hero dies in battle. Is there a way to see the xp that the weapon has and how much is left for it to gain the relic value? Would it be a good strategy to keep an eye out for that and to just kill that hero early to gain the advantage of the relic if the bloodline and hero output is strong enough?

3) From what i seen and read (not going by my personal experience on this one) the upgraded weapons that you can research do not get turned into relics from tip number 2, only the starting weapons. If that is still correct or if that is incorrect now, please let me know.

4) So far my research habits have been almost the same. Wondering what others are doing to increase their odds or to change the pace of the game. Mine usually follow something like this:

• 1st-second keep
  
• 2nd- usually varies between a 3rd keep or recruitment depending on starting heroes
  
• 3rd-If i have a 3rd keep, i usually go with an item(health potion) or recruitment. If no 3rd keep then i go 3rd keep
  
• 4th- Depending on what happens with my 2nd or 3rd research, here is where i usually go crucible to start building up xp for my trainees
  
• 5th- I usually either go recruitment or crucible depending on what happened with my previous researches.

So basically my usual 1st five researches are 3 keeps, 1 crucible, recruitments if needed and the only item; the health potion. I never "waste" any research time on any of the weapons/armor that early in the game as i dont think its needed yet. I also dont "waste" any research time on any other item that early other than the health potion. Sometimes i dont even research the health item in the 1st five either. My main concern that early has always been keeps, crucible, and heroes. So far i dont see the need nor the advantage to change that other than changing the feel of the early game.

5) When choosing a regent i find it helpful to save before you make that choice since at the moment you do not know who the potential partners will be or how high the fertility rate will be with the partners. It would be awesome to see all that the moment you pick the regent, and then after all that knowledge make a confirmation box of whether or not you want that hero as the regent instead of confirming the regent and then seeing that info. So my work around that has always been to back out of the keep, save, go back into keep and pick who i think is the best regent. If i do not like the list of partners or have all low fertilities then i will just load my previous save and pick another regent.

When i come across more i shall continue to update, so sorry that i do not have more that i can add atm since like i said im still a rookie myself who is still learning as the game changes. Hopefully this will grow with many helpful tips and strategies so that the community as whole will continue to grow with the game as well. This community is one of the best that i have encountered, and looking forward to seeing all the help from everyone

[RockType]

There are, actually some pretty good guides (probably, I haven't read them :)) for the game in the "guides" section, but always nice to see this thread nonetheless.

2-3): Actually, it's only the relics that gain XP in battle. Regular weapons don't really level up, so it's insted the wielders who produce relics. Any hero who has a nickname will produce a relic upon death (to my knowledge), unless of course he/she has a relic already. Nicknames, on the other hand, are gained by racking up enough kills, although I don't know the precise ammount. You also gain a relic upon losing a battle, no matter who dies.

4) This is pretty much correct, there isn't really incentive to start innovating with the early game research. In the current game it's actually a minor problem that the time window for any special equipment to "matter" is relatively narrow. This is a shame, since many cadence weapons and armor can produce some interesting combos, and are *mostly* fun to use, but often come into play late in the game. Hopefully this will be improved with further balancing.

5) Another one of the more popular requests from avid players would be for the regent pair to be appointed from the same screen. Hopefully this can be squeezed in for the release, though I've heard nothing that would indicate that.

Lastly, it's nice to see that you like the "community", but hopefully you've taken a look at the DF forums as well. That would be where the big MC nerds hang out, and the more text-heavy peanut gallery is located.

Oh, and since this is a "Help" thread, I'm just going to paste this here:

The biggest challenge combat wise are Bulwarks around year 30-40. Having watched a lot of people play and struggle with them, I would say you need at least one of the following criteria to beat them:

-Have a well leveled/traited party. When you see bulwarks, you should know not to take more than one lvl1 soldier. Nervous, sickly people should be left home for this one.

-Have researched health vials. Well, vitalibands also work, but mostly it’s health vials

-Know how to utilize the caberjack’s knockback. you can hit the enemy hard and then knock it back to walls or other enemies to stun it/them for a turn, and take no damage. lvl4 and above characters can usually just one-shot bulwarks if they have the right bonuses and skills

-Know your positioning. No reckless scouting, dont move 2 steps at a time without stealth, take advantage of line of sight to approach without being attacked and don’t line your characters up for a 3-for-1 shot.

-I suppose advanced armors help, as long as you get to take advantage of them.

That’s about it. Every playthrough is different, so it's always a case of adapting yourself.

[Orcus187]

Thanks for the reply apexhawk. I did happen to go the DF forums just a little bit ago and i would agree that there is a lot of info in there and hopefully we can get some of that in the steam community dicussion boards as well. Oh an i hope the comment about the guide section wasnt read as a negetive, i only meant that since its early access we probably wont be getting fully fleshed out guides yet since there is usually a lot of changes in early access so writing a fully fleshed out guide now would probably need to be changed once full release comes. I have used the guides in there as a starting point for how to play and they are very helpful in that manner.

After my complete and utter fail with the bulwarks in my 1st playthrough i would definitely agree with that strategy also. Having units that can stun the bulwarks is huge for me in that fight. I always try to hit them hard with either a good melee or ranged attack and then try to stun them so that when the armor wears off i can just rinse and repeat that til they are dead in the early game. One of the many reasons why i love the Brewtalists class is cause i can use the aoe stun so effectively against them.

Ohh, so if i am reading that correctly then even a group of all lv 1 heroes with no nicknames were to loose the battle they would produce relics? If thats the case then if you have enough early game heroes wouldnt it be beneficial to let just a group of heroes loose a battle to gain some early relics? Also did not know that's how they gained their nicknames, always wondered that. Thanks for that info as well.

yeah i would love for you to be able to pick regent and partner at the same time as well, i dont mind if it comes either after or before the release. I just hope that they will be able to implement something like sometime into the game. Its not a pressing matter to me since i have a work around for it, but would love to see it though


v: ah so you dont get one a relic for each hero, just only 1 relic in general for loosing a battle. Then i could definitely see how that would not be beneficial to do that at all then. Thanks again for the replies :)

[RockType]

@relics: No, not really. You only gain 1 relic, gain corruption and lose people, which can be absolutely crippling especially in the early game. The only point in which losses become acceptable. is actually the late game, when successful builds start to have an over-abundance of heroes. The early game is easily the hardest part of the game.