Dummies Guide to Age of Decadence

talks about the games design, play, skills, and combat.

Intro: Explains Game, Gives Theory

This is a mini-guide to Age of Decadence[www.irontowerstudio.com] that will give you some basic insights into what the game is about, what it is like, information on skills and tiny bit on combat.

To start, this is a roleplay story game. The idea is to explore, read the dialogue, immerse, make decisions, etc. You can decide to be combat monster and have a lot of fun killing stuff in turn based combat as well if you like, or avoid it all together


The major temptation in this game (that I myself quickly fell into) is wanting to beat every skill challenge I came across. This simply is not possible, and was not meant to be. This game is like life. You can't be good at everything, and every choice you make means you can't make other choices. But do not despair.

The game is really in depth and had a lot of intertwining things going on.


[Feel free to skip this example on game depth]
I will give a spoiler free example using a Pizza Hut rather than in game stuff. Your Hut manager tells you to go to Papa Johns and talk employees into giving you secret sauce. You try with your streetwise skill but fail. Don't freak out. Even though your manager is not happy, this will actually unlock other avenues. I found that when I sucked at most persuasion/streetwise/lore/trading challenges it was because I spent in crafting or sneak and combat stuff, which was generally given as a another avenue in the game. The game tends to let you try to find a combat option or a non-combat option.
[end example]

Second, sit back and enjoy the ride. This is the most replayable game I have ever played. I have tried almost every class all the way to then of the first city. What is amazing, and again I will use pizza hut, is that each class you choose to play was actually a different npc in the story. When you play, lets say, a praetor you are the pizza delivery guy and you deal with a security guard. If you do a play through as a mercenary, you will actually be the security guard dealing with the pizza delivery guy!

Not every quest is available to each class. And some really cool quests require you to be combat oriented, or heavy lore or a loremaster. You can't do it all in one play through. Enjoy!

Important note: you can fail checks and somtimes even tasks and still get skill points, often the same amount as if you suceeded all checks. don't think you can't get skill points if you fail checks.

Skills! (& minor combat tips from an amateur)

First, pick skills that match your class. Don't generalize. Twos in everything will get you nowhere. Also, do not max out a single civil skill.

Civil skills

Lock-pick – Not very useful if not a thief but I found sometimes it could be used. Note: some epic loot can be found with it.

Sneak-- Can be helpful in different characters. Must for thieves and assassin. (especially thieves) can do some cool stuff with it.

Steal-- Unsure. Did find some uses. Necessary for thief. Duh.

Traps- Traps comes in very handy, especially if you are not good at combat. Like all skills the more you use it the more SP you get...so if you get traps (and you don't mind stealing stuff) be sure to look for chests and other things to disarm.

impersonate-- This can be very useful in later game with one quest. It can be useful in others. I found a lot of options fo disguise. It can be fun. Early in game you may think your disquise cannot possibly be high enough to get you past Dellar but I found that disguise was not the issue it was other hidden checks of other values. I was very surprised when I showed up with certain skills very high and I bluffed my way in.

Etiquette- If you kill ♥♥♥♥, you probably don't need this. If you don't, you will want it. Some quests require it. best for talking to people in power (and nice when they are mad at you).

Persuasion/Streetwise: These are your friends. Take streetwise if you are combat oriented (or not, this is just a suggestion) but get both if you are not. I put them together because if you are non-combatant you want both of these.

Alchemy-- I have not dabbled much. There is an alchemy demo trainer in inn. He gives you free ingredients. Go meet him. He is your friend. I have made healing potions. If you do combat, make sure you get enough to make healing pots whatever level that is. It can unlock dialogue (almost all skills do)

Crafting-- For non-combat, a few levels will let you do a few quests and get a few artifacts. I found that level 3 or 4 did it. 3 for most early stuff. For combat, experiment with it but here is the thing-- At higher levels you can MAKE BETTER ARMOR AND WEAPONS THAT IGNORE DR, HAVE LESS PENALTIES, AND SERVE COFFEE. Well they don't serve coffee but seriously my assassin bought this up like it was crack cocaine and I am happy he did. A steel dagger with lower AP and ignores 3Dr? I took a 3AP dagger and made it into a machine of death and pain. later in game it came in very very handy.

Lore-- Lore is cool. It is your friend. If you are a loremaster, lore it up. It is useful in various places. Especially related to artifacts Lots of cool little things happen with lore. Have I intrigued you? Lore. Lore. It is....mysterious. (but seriously, good for non-combatants, and fun)

Trading-- Dialogue options open up, helpful in challenges, lower cost to items. Very helpful to merchant/loremaster/grifter-- basically anybody that talks for a living.

Combat Skills:

The better you are at a combat skill, the higher your chance to hit or THC. That covers weapons.
Just kidding! (there is now a separate section on it by Developer Vince himself.)

Things I figured out lso, when raise a similar weapons (like sword for dagger or throwing for bow) you will slightly raise your THC chance in the like weapons. From my early inexperience, It is rarely worth it to spend points on a similar weapon simply to up another. But it is nice if you plan on using nets (you are planning on using them, trust me..not maybe often but once in awhile they are better than butter on hard opponents..nets and poison and running is how I beat Arena Champion) So yeah, I found that if you use a bow, it is good to get Throwing because those nets are awesome and they up your bow's THC. So far I never had enough points to buy two melee.

If you don't do combat, I suggest getting critical strike and carrying a dagger. it can be helpful. not gonna say why.

General Combat Skill Tips

Pick one melee weapon not multiple. Sometimes late in game you may have some combat points to spend and put them in related things, like dagger for your main swords, which will actually increase your Sword ability to hit by 3. but generally you can only afford one melee.

You might want to instead focus on ranged weapons they are really good in arena fights. Throwing gives you the option of nets. Which lower the abilities of the hostiles. You can also throw acid/bombs but I found that only assassin had the cash and access to buy them others may prove me wrong and play a merc who has funds/access.

If you buy dodge, then pay attention to how much your armor takes away from your dodge. It is silly to buy up dodge and then wear armor that takes away 40% of it.

Critical strike is nice, like I mentioned, always take 2 or 3 levels and carry a dagger because that opens up options to kill things instantly.

Don't buy up both dodge and block. You can't do both at once and that would be a lot of points. From my own experience, my assassin bought dodge, and my merc bought a tiny bit of dodge but a lot of block with a huge tower shield. Whereas my assassin got plunked real hard by arrows sometimes, my merc just laughed all the time as arrows bounced off. It was very satisfying.  

Using nets is good. Also try out the various different ways to hit people. Whirlwind rocks for dagger. Sometimes distance is your friend. If you have a good THC with dagger flurry rocks because if you hit the first time..you hit all of them. Often moving 2ap away from a baddie means he only gets one strike at you instead of two. That is literally life or death.

Always save before known combat.

Look at the THC rating of your strike. If you have the AP, and your hit rating for fast is really high, try regular or power and see if you still have a good THC.

again these are by an amateur player. let's hear from an expert.

How to get a good first experience in Age of Decadence (v1.2) (Matt's Content)

How to get a good first experience in Age of Decadence (v1.2)

This is from a pinned thread. in case you have not read it, here it is. added with permission by author of content.


1. What is this about?
As with any Early Access or Crowdfunded title, people are bound to get upset if they acquire a partial game/demo and find out it's not immediately enjoyable for them. That's somewhat natural, and it can make you feel the urge to take it out on the game (or, in our current day and age, the devevelopers). That can lead to valuable feedback, but at the same time, it's important to separate the chaff from the wheat.

Fortunately, we're all mature and civilized gamers, so there's a much more pragmatic alternative to being gumpy: figuring out how you can get enjoyment from the game, instead of fixating on what you might dislike. Mainstream/AAA/Publisher-attached titles are notorious for removing that "engagement" from the equation; the overall games, especially RPGs, usually suffer for it. Hopefully, you're here (partaking in indie gaming) because you too want real depth, challenge, novelty and diversity in your games.

Which brings us to this little checklist which, sincerely, I hope will help you tailor your AoD experience to your preferences. Think of it as any hobby; the more thought you put into it, the better you get at it and the more you will enjoy it. That's the very definition of a game "by gamers, for gamers".

2. First things to consider during character creation

AoD is set in a dangerous but authentic world. Regardless of your social standing, discretion or combat mastery, you *will* get in over your head at one point or another; c'est la vie.

Find out what each weapon type is good at, so that you have equipment suited to your character

if it comes down to combat. You can skim the help file in-game by pressing F1 whenever you need a reminder.

Get familiar with the terminology; some equipment is more defensive, some is more accurate. For example:

• -Axes/Hammers are about raw damage for high STR characters
  
• -Daggers allow for pinpoint strikes ideal for high DEX & PER
  
• - Spears favor a more defensive playstyle, best for balanced STR, DEX & CON
  
• -Ranged weapons are only as good as your PER and permit low CON

.

In general, equipment in AoD is designed to offer you choices adapted to your character's stats. So long as you allocate your points carefully, you should be able to find equipment that is best suited for you.

The 6 primary stats are somewhat simple, but each point you remove or add is far more meaningful than it might seem at first glance. Whatever you decide on, you should be able to notice within the first 15-25 minutes of Teron, if your chosen stats cripple how you like to play the game. If that happens, don't drag yourself through a whole playthrough you won't like; go ahead and restart with a new character. You'll be glad you did, and maybe you'll even find out why so many people enjoy that process.

Defense, Throwing and Critical Strike. How high you increase Dodge or Block really depends on how often you plan on getting attacked, and how many opponents you like to try to take on at once. A whole separate article could be dedicated to this, and there is already much written on the subject (see other stickies). A Thief or Assassin would rely on a moderate Dodge skill, while pure social characters wouldn't increase either Defense skill much (if at all).

Throwing is a good alternative to Bows/Crossbows if you have low AP per turn, but constantly restocking on throwing weapons can cost a lot of coin, not to mention the added weight of carrying them.

Critical is checked both through dialogue options and battle. It also protects from enemy critical strikes. Use of this skill often involves a battle either way, so don't leave your Dodge too far behind. Combined with Sneak, it might even give you a chance at infiltrating a guarded compound.

As Heavy Armors grant ample protection against critical hits, Critical tends to not be the best skill to level if you're planning on using those and/or a shield. You're better off investing in weapon skills with THC synergies to offset the accuracy penalties. Will work well with Daggers, Swords, Bows and Throwing. There used to be a bug with the Bleeding mechanic, which is now fixed.

3. Vital roleplay skills
Speaking from experience, upsets in games are generally a result of "losing" without knowing how you could've done any better... or facing a seemingly-impassable wall you did not see coming. Specializing in a non-combat skill or two are great ways to spare you those moments.

Sneaking is sometimes checked to avoid really bad situations (or death) during duty. Unless you plan to be an especially good talker/trickster or engage in armored combat often, this might be necessary. Keeping Traps ~3 points behind is generally safer, too.

Disguise may be costly for your coin purse, and requires additional micromanagement, but is it very useful. Best complemented with good Charisma & Etiquette. A character set up this way might discover interesting discussions & lore.

Streetwise is important for a good talker, as you will sometimes have to deal with thugs and other unsavory types. If Persuasion is your best weapon, then Streetwise is your best armor. Can offer nice dialogue alternatives regardless of what kind of character you play.

Crafting supports a combat-heavy style very well, but is a steep investment (points-wise). You'll want to reach a skill of 5 and then 7 as soon as you can, to make the best out of it. Note that the devs behind AoD plan on adding more items to shopkeepers, and many of those items will have some of the powerful bonuses which are only available to crafted items at the moment. So, this skill should become less essential as future Updates are released.

For characters who must sometime kill, but prefer roleplay alternatives when possible, Alchemy is a viable alternative (and less costly).

4. Last words
So that's it, good gaming to you and feel free to express yourself in the thread. A big thanks to Ironwood Tower for spending so much time with the community, and for their interesting, modern take on Turn-based RPGs!
-Mat

Changelog
1.2
-Updated Block/Dodge/Throwing & Crafting to account for Update#2
-Format & grammar corrections
1.1
-Added Disguise in 3. & edited the section a bit for more insight
-Added intros for 2. & 3.
-Revised 2. "Defense, Throwing & crit"
-Tweaked some parts to be more concise, others to account for different possibilities
-Minor format & grammar stuff

On Combat Difficulty-- (Content by Vince the Developer*)

*The Developer is not his real last name ;)

____________________________________________________________________________

Vince writes:
Let me start with a quote that was posted today on another forum:
"...the trickiest thing about the game (AoD) is that there comes a snap moment when you the player, or your particular character, 'gets it' and the difficulty suddenly changes from 'die 10 times to a fight or run from it' to 'oh, this is as hard as hardest difficulty on some other RPGs, but not much worse'.

Now, how to get to this moment faster? Here is how I see it (at leas that's how I play games):

- make a balanced build first, enter combat, see what happens.
- if almost beat your opponents (i.e. if you were very close), try again
- if not even close, change stats - see what you can do without. If a charismatic fighter can't win a fight, see if an ugly fighter can. If he can't, see if a dumb and ugly fighter can.
- simultaneously, start decreasing skills' spread. Start with a balanced distribution, see where it gets you. If nowhere, start decreasing. It's a trial-n-error style approach, but in 3 attempts you should have a very good idea of where you stand and what's required to beat the fight you're stuck on.
- so, eventually you should lock down the stats and skills and move to weapons and attack types.

If it sounds too complicated, it really isn't.

To win any fight you need to watch 3 factors:

- your THC (to hit chance); it determines what you can do in combat - different attack types and such;
- damage you deal, which can change from one fight to another (a lighter weapon might be sufficient against lightly armored opponents but would barely scratch heavy armored guys)

Usually, THC and damage are at the opposite ends of the scale, so it's hard to have both high THC and high damage. Sometimes, higher THC is better, sometimes even 40% THC will do the trick if you can kill the opponent in 2-3 hits.

- damage taken (includes both the frequency (how well you dodge) and amount (your armor and shield's DR))

So, step 1 - if your damage is low and your THC is low, your build doesn't work well and you won't get far.

How THC is determined?

- skill
- Perception bonus
- weapon type (lighter weapons often offer a THC bonus)
- attack type

For new players, I'd suggest to start with swords, axes, or hammers. Swords work great with Critical Strike, Axes do savage blows, and hammers work well against DR. Put 4 or 5 points there, don't be stingy.

If you want to fight a lot, pick 2 skills (weapon and dodge or block) and stick with them until you're comfortable. You'll know when the threshold is passed and when you can start adding more skills to your repertoire. First, you survive, then you grow.

Keep in mind that you are NOT expected to beat every fight you're offered. There is no shame in walking away if your character isn't a killing machine. Optional fights are usually the hardest, so don't jump at the first opportunity to be brutally murdered. The game isn't linear and it's not about killing people.

NOTE: Vince is not named as official contributor yet because you can only add friends. He gave me explicit persmission to add this. Thanks, Vince. LOVE GAME!!

Things to do in Denver when your Dead.* (Stuff to do in the game)

* http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0114660/?ref_=nv_sr_1 |my odd movie reference


This whole section is spoilers.

**************************************************************************************************************************


Things to do/people to talk to in Teron (other than the faction questlines):

- talk to Feng about the map
- deal with Cassius
- talk to Thessalos (if loremaster, it unlocks another conversation with Feng)
- the pickpocket gang
- the thief in the shanty town
- infiltration of the Daratan compound
- the refugees
- the preacher
- the smith house
- get the promissory note from Kaeso's house (available if you found out from guards about Flavius Debt)
- steal the goblet for Cado available if you want Cado to help ambush raiders
- Miltiades' ambush and all that follows
- Camilla (steal or con her out of her jewels)
- the cellar in the sqautters tower (there is a hidden artefact there)
- the undertaker and buried things at the cemetery
- the thugs

Things to do/people to talk to in Maadoran (other than the faction questlines):

- Kemnebi (quest 'Down on luck')
- Basil and Quintus (quest 'Problem solving')
- Abukar the Mad (loremaster, quest requires a location that's not in the demo)
- Healer (quest requires a location that's not in the demo)
- Erebus (Gaelius' loremaster; praetors only)
- Iola (the healing machine)
- Youth (quest 'The package')
- Miltiades (continues quest 'Fool me twice...')
- Amerius (quest 'The rightful owner')
- Praetor investigating Senna's murder (should you kill lord Senna in the first place)
- Domitius (continues quest 'The map')
- The crowd near one of the houses in the Arena district
- A man selling fake badges
- The local guide
- An old man near the Abyss
- various encounters in the Slums
- the beggar who served Antidas
- the gem qust
- explore an old well
- thugs near the gate
- Clemens the doctor and a trader in the slums

content organized and written by Vince. minor edits me.

Assassin Tips (content by Kamikaze Snark)

Good Skills for Assassin Build

Critical strike, Sneak, and Streetwise.

I have 4 points in critical strike and it has opened a lot of dialogue options to instantly kill NPCs without entering combat. 3 points in steetwise will help avoid getting sold on a lot of overpriced junk by Feng, and maybe give you the opportunity to pull a con on Antidas if you kill Cassius. I was also able to free the hostage from the raiders without entering combat or paying any gold just by passing a critical strike check, a streetwise check, and a persuasion check.

Tips:

Use all the tools at your disposal. You start with poison and nets in your inventory; use them! The Net is a very powerful weapon. I was getting killed over and over by the third spy in the second mission from Neleos, as he is a skilled knife fighter. However, once I started the fight by throwing a net at him, it became quite easy. You can dodge his attacks easily and land a lot of blows on him once he is trapped in the net, and for extra insurance you can put poison on your blade. To get more poison, talk to the alchemist at the inn and put one point into alchemy. To get more nets, talk to the weapons merchant inside the large building at the merchant's plaza.

You can get a quick armor upgrade by going to the front gate, talking to the refugees, and paying their entrance levy of 150 gold coins without asking for anything in return. Then, go to the merchant's plaza and talk to the new armor merchant. He will give you a suit of lightweight masterwork armor, DR 5, free of charge. That will make some of the fights much easier.


General Tip:

After you level up and get some skill points, save your game before you distribute them, and save often. Don't overwrite your saves, so you can go back to any point and re-play things to your liking. Now, if you're stuck on a particular quest you want to finish, distribute your points, do the quest, see how it turns out, and then re-load if you fail. Since you saved before you distributed points, you can try a different distribution and see how that works out.

[Silverio]

Thanks

[kelticpete]

thanks for comment. This was written so so long ago. if anyone wants to edit it, or add...ill do so.

[League of Legends]

Civil skills part could do with some work overall though nice guide

[kelticpete]

thanks! be sure to rate it.

[Giri Hachi Roku]

Nice Compilation, thanks for the Effort.

[Sverch]

Thanks a lot.

[kelticpete]

the healing machine is found by doing the quest line for thieves. you can't walk to it you get transported to it.

[Sverch]

Yeah, and where is it?

[kelticpete]

there is a healing machine. what part of faq should i mention it do you think?

[Sverch]

What about healing machine? I didn't know that it's in this build.