Share your strategies

[Chedd]

Just creating a pinned post where players of Road Not Taken can share strategies with each other! (Suggestion: make use of the [spoiler] tag when revealing secrets and other things that your fellow players might prefer to discover on their own!)

Oh, and don't forget to check out our official intro/help guide[spryfox.com] here!

Additional resources:

* There is a community wiki for Road Not Taken[road-not-taken.wikia.com] that folks have started building up. Warning: lots of spoilers in here.

* Venturebeat posted an exhaustive recipe guide for Road Not Taken[venturebeat.com]. It is very well organized and covers every single secret in v1 of the game. Obviously, stay away if you want to discover things yourself; this is FULL of spoilers.

[holly]

My primary strategy so far:
Pay attention when you're moving red and white spirits around not to accidentally throw a red one at two white ones. If you don't pay attention to that you're gonna have a bad time. Similarly: Also take care what you throw near a rabbit.

Late edit: I realize now I had it backwards. It's two reds and a white to avoid.

[Salestax1]

In the easier levels leave one kid left while you go and hunt food items. In one of my runs I was able to farm up enough fires and moles to get to 400 stamina. (didn't help too too much later though) If you have a lot of trouble moving around in a room throw 2 pieces of wood in and light a fire then throw out everything you can into another room.

[Chedd]

My favorite strategy is to build a fire and then to enchant it with a potion of grip (crafted with an ancient mortar and a white spirit.) Then you can pick up and throw the fire without taking damage, so you can move it around with you from room to room. Not always worth it, but definitely useful in levels without enough trees and logs.

[Feenix]

Beware of Axes ruining necessary trees & shrubs for unlocks though.

Is it fair to ask here why Bear Statues sometimes move and sometimes do not? (no I am not picking up anything else that "locks" me.) Sometimes certain statues won't even lift, when others do. That feels very arbitrary unless I am missing something.

[holly]

Originally posted by fbomb30:

Nope, I just moved one that was touching both another statue AND a red spirit. Back to the drawing board!

Statues next to other statues or spirits remain movable in my experience. I guess because spirits are non-corporeal (you can walk right through them) and whatever force causes the statue material to "stick" doesn't work on itself.

[wenturner]

What does it mean to "ban" something in the basement of the house? I banned two things: bees and bears, but they still show up in the game. Also, do you automatically lose charms after each level?

[Beelzebozo]

I don't know how many charms there are, but the best one I've found is a large coffee that gives +200 energy per run!

[b3achy]

Thanks for the guide page, the tip on the fires (I'd have eventually gotten there, but hadn't thought about using the potion that way), the tip on saving the last kid until you have gathered all resources (I was thinking this might be helpful, but hadn't tried it yet), and the info on the banned items (sure appears like some are much less useful to ban given spawning issues).

I too have decided the checkpoints aren't very useful, since you lose everything except the level and the relationships. (I might still set some if I get into upper levels, and want to practice, but losing all your inventory and charms essentially hinders you so much for true progress, IMO - especially since thus far it seems to get more challenging to gain more charms the higher your relationships are, especially if you have little to no inventory to share) To me, it would be useful, if it reset everything back to a full state checkpoint (ie, you are starting over from that point with all that you have on you at the time - energy, inventory, charms, numbers of kids, relationship status, etc). I get that a full state checkpoint would make the game significantly easier, so maybe have separate stats boards for those without checkpoints and those who used them.

My biggest strategy thus far has been realizing that I don't need to save ALL the children to advance to the next level. Also, lots of selecting and throwing of objects, especially through passageways to conserve energy.

[b3achy]

Originally posted by holly:

Originally posted by fbomb30:

Nope, I just moved one that was touching both another statue AND a red spirit. Back to the drawing board!

Statues next to other statues or spirits remain movable in my experience. I guess because spirits are non-corporeal (you can walk right through them) and whatever force causes the statue material to "stick" doesn't work on itself.

In very general terms, it seems to me if the object touching the bear statue is can't move on its own, then the statue is typically stuck. If the item is moveable on its own or non-corporeal, then the statue doesn't get stuck...items that I've 'binned' as moveable on their own include all people, spirits, animals. Plants, tools, and structures like signs, shrines, and the mortar thing are things that can't move on their own, and seem to make the statues stick into place. The biggest exception to this 'rule' is the bear statute itself, so if it is touching another bear statue (even though they can't move on their own), the statue is still moveable.

[b3achy]

Originally posted by wenturner:

Also, do you automatically lose charms after each level?

I don't think you should be losing them at each level (though I'm still very new to the game). You will lose them if you die, even if you have a checkpoint set up.

[mikecheb]

If you teleport while in a corridor, whatever you're holding will jump to a (seemingly) random spot in the room. Not predictable and seems a bit exploit-y, but I've used it in a pinch.

[b3achy]

Strategy questions/recommendations/discussion:

Is it better to focus on building one relationship at a time, or spread them out equally?

I've been attempting to focus on one villager, while still maintain some level of relationships with the others, but was wondering if I should focus all my energy on just one at a time. Wondering what the pros/cons were of different strategies. I know if you only focused on one, you'd get less charms/secrets/etc from the others, so that would be a con to me.

What's a good balance of maintaining inventory vs. giving stuff away?

I also know I've been mostly depleting my inventory to appease the villagers at each level, and wondering if that is a reasonable/appropriate strategy or will I be needing that stuff while out finding the kids? Thus far, it doesn't seem like I need my inventory much but for shrines, but wondering if I should be stocking up (don't tell me on what, I can figure that out).

[~'(^ + ^)'~]

@b3achy, from what I have observed, the 4 townsfolk each have 1 preferred item so naturally it's best to spread out your items between them to gain the most advantage. They will usually give you items, secrets, monsters to ban when you gain a new heart level with them.

However, it seems that each pair of 1 guy and 1 girl "dislike" each other (should be easy to figure out) so when you spread out, sometimes getting close to 1 will cause the relationship with the person that dislikes him/her to worsen. It's not all bad though cos I have gotten "multiple" rewards for the "same heart level" with the same person (got reward the first time when I reached heart level 3 or 4 with this person, and the heart level dropped when I got closer to the person he/she dislikes, and then I improved my relationship back up to the same level again with this person and gotten a new set of reward again).

I would say spread out at the start, and then focus more on the person that you want to marry (and try not to get closer to the person he/she dislikes), then once you are married, you can continue to spread out. Just a personal opinion.

[b3achy]

Originally posted by ~'(^ + ^)'~:

@b3achy, from what I have observed, the 4 townsfolk each have 1 preferred item so naturally it's best to spread out your items between them to gain the most advantage. They will usually give you items, secrets, monsters to ban when you gain a new heart level with them.

However, it seems that each pair of 1 guy and 1 girl "dislike" each other (should be easy to figure out) so when you spread out, sometimes getting close to 1 will cause the relationship with the person that dislikes him/her to worsen. It's not all bad though cos I have gotten "multiple" rewards for the "same heart level" with the same person (got reward the first time when I reached heart level 3 or 4 with this person, and the heart level dropped when I got closer to the person he/she dislikes, and then I improved my relationship back up to the same level again with this person and gotten a new set of reward again).

I would say spread out at the start, and then focus more on the person that you want to marry (and try not to get closer to the person he/she dislikes), then once you are married, you can continue to spread out. Just a personal opinion.

Thanks for the response. Looks like what I was seeing as well, and pretty much is what my strategy has been too. Though I've not quite gotten to the point of marrying...hey the forest man is soooo my type, but I can't always get to him to give him bunnies and berries...lol. One of these days.

[luai.lashire]

I added a bit to the wiki but it is still very empty. It would be nice if other people could contribute some more!