Advanced Techniques

A few advanced techniques to help you Rise To Not-Ruins.

Introduction

Hello everyone! I recently finished my MegaCity project and decided to share a few advanced techniques that I learned throughout the process. This guide is not designed to help you learn the basics of the game, there are quite a few good guides that already do that, instead this guide will show you a few tricks for people who like to take advantage of every little mechanic in the game.

If this guide was useful to you, please rate it ^^

Motivate Land Resource Spreading

Did you ever wish a certain resource deposit was bigger or positioned in a different location? This technique allows you to solve this problem. For this technique you will use the Spell "Motivate Land":

Motivate Land - Motivate some natural resources to grow. Works best in the Spring and Autumn or when it's raining, very ineffective in the Winter.


The way it works is that when you cast Motivate Land on a certain resource (except Rock and Water), said resource will grow (if harvested) and has a chance to spread. That feature allows you to expand and/or move your resource deposit to a more desirable spot.

As is explained in the spell description, it works better in Spring, Autumn and when it's raining.

Example:

Zebra Resource Harvesting

This technique consists in harvesting a certain resource deposit in a Zebra pattern. What this does is that the unharvested resource will help the harvested resource to regrow faster. Keep in mind you must have a big enough resource deposit so the unharvested resource doesn't harm your economy.

Example:

God Wall Gate

Have you ever had problems using gates for your villagers to go outside your village but monsters kept attacking your gate instead of walking the path of death in your maze? Or perhaps even worse, your villagers keep wandering in dangerous areas. This technique rectifies that. For this technique you are will use the spells "God Wall" and "Dispel Structure" instead of building gates:

God Wall - Summons a magic wall that will help block all types of monsters, including specters, from crossing. Requires a portion of your maximum influence to maintain. Can be dispelled with the Dispell Structure spell.

Dispel Structure - Dispel a previously summoned structure to regain some of your maximum influence.


The way to utilize this technique is summoning God Walls instead of building a gate wherever you want to keep as passage for your villagers. Each God Wall tile requires 50 influence to maintin and dispelling them grants you that amount back instantly. You will then control the "gate" by:

Opening the "gate" - dispel your God Walls to regain range outside of your village.

Closing the "gate" - summon your God Walls to cut your exterior range, keeping villagers from wandering into underisable places.

Example:


The Red Arrows represent the monster path and the Blue Arrow represents the Gate mechanism, that will cut or gain range, depending on the existence or not of my God Walls. This allows me to regain range to my outer walls, in case I want to build something there.

Golem Boxing

This technique is about creating a box where you'll put all your RANGED Golems. This allows you to easily define where you want them to, put them out of danger or even level them up if you put them at the start of your maze and outside of Fire Elemental's attack range. For this technique you will use the spell "God Wall".

God Wall - Summons a magic wall that will help block all types of monsters, including specters, from crossing. Requires a portion of your maximum influence to maintain. Can be dispelled with the Dispell Structure spell.

The box must have AT LEAST 2 free tiles (so you can't create a 3x3 box, the minimum is 4x3)

I once had a level ~25 (if I recall correctly) Golem that was almost 50 days old. Beware that upgrading your Combobulator will reset your Golem's level. So if you plan to level a bunch of Golems to crazy levels, place your Combobulators in a permanent spot and upgrade it before doing so.

Example:

Meteor Farming

When playing this game long enough, you will certainly find yourself with a lack of iron. You could keep mining and hope for iron ores, but this could take some time and generate trash if your rock storage is full.

This technique allows you to solve this iron shortage with minimal disadvantages. For this technique you will use the spells "Meteor" and "Recall":

Meteor - Drop a flaming space rock on something! Careful though, sometimes it'll drop a Fire Elemental instead.


Recall - Teleport a large group of villagers and resources safely back to the village.



To apply this technique, find a spot OUTSIDE of your village, as close as possible to the corruption and start spamming the "Meteor" spell while casting "Recall" when it's avaiable. This will start to generate rocks and iron ores, and they will be teleported to your village. This may spawn Fire Elementals, so your defenses should be strong enough to handle a few more of these. You can easily generate 100+ iron ores within minutes.

Example:

Crystal Pathing

To use this technique, you are going to need to use the first technique (Motivate Land Resource Spreading). The goal here is to fill your maze's path with crystal. But why? As you'll be able to see below in the Example and its Movement Cost Data View, crystals have a slightly higher movement cost, thus they are slower to cross.

For this technique you will use the Spell "Motivate Land":

Motivate Land - Motivate some natural resources to grow. Works best in the Spring and Autumn or when it's raining, very ineffective in the Winter.


WARNING: Spectres do not walk on crystal, the same way Fire Elementals do not walk on water. So plan carefully. In my example, there's a inner layer of stone wall for Spectres to walk through, while all other monsters walk on the crystal path.

Originally posted by Tiberiumkyle:

Monster pathfinding is based on movement cost. When a monster decides on a route to take, the pathfinding portion of the AI looks at the movement cost of everything between the monster and where it wants to go. Base terrain has the default cost, paths and roads lower movement cost, resources like crystal raise it, as does water (fire elementals refuse to go into it as it harms them) and tar. Forest and mountains have quite high costs, and walls can as well. Gates don't have as high a cost as walls, so will get targeted over walls more often.

A newer addition to this is that each mob that's planned a path through a tile, whether they're actually in it or not, slightly raises the movement cost of that tile, causing them to spread out. You may find yourself needing to go with 2 or even 3 thick walls in some places, depending on all the variables.

Another newer addition is specters and ghosts ignoring non-crylithium walls, blocked by crystals, same as fire elementals and water. If they're fully blocked from the village they will make their own path, though.

Example:



Movement Cost Data View:

Animal Spawn Spots

Animals are crucial to your village's survival, since they are the only source of meat and you need plenty of meat to cook rations. Although I don't know the exact mechanics behind animal spawning, it is known that for animals to spawn they need a specific environment.

Originally posted by Tiberiumkyle:

Animal capturing requires there be locations on the map with unharvested wild food (holy potatoes count), water, and another unharvested resource all in the same general vicinity.
Without such spots, wild animals don't spawn, existing ones have nowhere to hangout, rangers won't capture them.
Your own actions, and the corruption, can wipe out such spots the map starts with. You can make your own if needed.

So what this means is that you need to have the correct environment in your world. Since the corruption will eventually destroy anything outside your village, you'll need to create "wildlife areas" inside your village. I have many scattered around.

For this technique you will use the spells "Holy Potatoes", "Holy Wood" and "Meteor":

Holy Potatoes - Sprouts magic potatoes from the ground, really hand if you've just completely run out of food or want to create a new patch elsewhere in the village!


Holy Wood - Sprouts large erections of wood from the ground, really handy if you've just completely run out of wood or want to create a new patch elsewhere in the village!


Meteor - Drop a flaming space rock on something! Careful though, sometimes it'll drop a Fire Elemental instead.


First you want to cast a few "Meteor" spells until you get a rock. The reason for this is because it may destroy the surrounding environment. Then you cast "Holy Potatoes" and "Holy Wood" carefully so they don't replace the rock. Lastly, you send your villagers to dig some holes when all the resources are in position.

Examples of "wildlife areas" in my MegaCity:

Beyond the Building Cap Cutting Range

This is probably the most significant technique in this guide, as it allows you to greatly surpass the amount of buildings one can have. For example, in my MegaCity I had over 500 buildings, even though my building cap was around 332. For this technique you'll use the spell "God Wall":

God Wall - Summons a magic wall that will help block all types of monsters, including specters, from crossing. Requires a portion of your maximum influence to maintain. Can be dispelled with the Dispell Structure spell.

The basic principle is that if you lose range to a certain building, that building will no longer be counted as one. Here is how it works:

Step 1 - Place your buildings in a way that you can "isolate" them later with God Walls (at least 1 space in each side)




Step 2 - Isolate a block of buildings with God Walls




Step 3 - Build new buildings



Step 4 - Remove the God walls to regain control over the buildings (WARNING: You must fill the job slots again as your villagers will have "quit" their jobs due to lack of range)

The Ultimate Defense Setup

There are many ways to defend yourself indefinitely, this was what worked best for me. It manages to defend my village without using a single spell, at day 150 and about 75% of the region conquered.

Requirement: at least +2 range for Static Tower perk.

Explanation

Why so many walls? If fewer layers of wall were used, the monster's AI pathfinding might find it is faster to destroy to walls to reach the village.

The first layer of walls (1 God Wall + 3 Crylithium Walls) is just to direct the monsters to the entrance of the maze. It doesn't need to be God Walls for the first layer, it could very well be another Crylithium Wall layer.

The second layer of walls (1 Stone Wall + 5 Crylithium Walls) protects the Static Towers from getting attacked by Fire Elementals. The Stone Walls serve as a path to the Spectres. The remaining Crylithium Walls are the exact amount to keep the towers protected.

Range 1 is considered the Fire Elemental itself.
Range 2 is the Stone Wall.
Range 3-7 are the Crylithium Walls.
Range 8 is the border of the Static Tower. HOWEVER, the Fire Elementals target the center of the tower (range 9), and thus cannot attack it for their range is 8.

The third layer of walls (5 Crylithium Walls + Stone Wall) is exactly the same as the previous one but mirrored.

The fourth layer of walls (6 Crylithium Walls) protects the Ice Bolt Towers from being attacked by the Fire Elementals. There is no need for a Stone Wall layer here because there is already a Stone Wall layer avaiable for Spectres to walk through thanks to the third layer of walls.

Static Towers act as an AoE-Cleaner, they kill and thus filter the monsters for the Ice Bolt Towers to finish whatever survives. The choice of the element Ice is due to the fact that no monster is strong against Ice plus the fact that Fire Elementals are weak to it, and they are the toughest monsters out there.

Additional useful information

Here I'll gather some additional useful information I found searching in the Discord/Steam Discussions.

Nomad data provided by user Veldrin on Steam Discussions.

Originally posted by Veldrin:

For those who struggle to read the code, you can increase the chance of a nomad spawn event with:
Up to 200 positive desirability points (negative desirability points are ignored)
Up to 100 unoccupied housing slots
Up to 70 more jobs than villagers
Up to 50 towers and combobulators (includes recombobulator and crystal motivator)
Up to 200 more food than villagers (each type of food is considered equal here)
Up 10,000 full water buckets (or 40,000 units of water)
Unlimited amount of villagers
Every 3 ticks during dawn, morning and midday on days you don't get nomads

However there are some things that decrease the chance of a nomad spawn event:
Up to 70 less jobs than villagers
Up to 200 less food than villagers
Unlimited amount of villagers more than total housing slots

Focus on ensuring there is enough housing slots, jobs and food for every villager first (the housing penalty is massive so prioritize that).

Day duration by user Tiberiumkyle on Discord:

Originally posted by Tiberiumkyle:

The game runs at 60 TPS, and a full day is a total of 132,000 ticks. So 132,000 / 60 / 60 = 36.66 minutes.

Resource storage priority by user Tiberiumkyle on Discord:

Originally posted by Tiberiumkyle:

resources are taken from lowest priority storage to highest priority, so ancillaries first, then general storage, then production buildings, generally.
opposite from the order they get stored in

Water production data provided by user Veldrin on Discord. Keep in mind that the Water Purifier won't work most of Winter days, the Well will. The Water Purifier has a better production/building value and the Well has a better production/area value.

Water Source	Production per sec	Production per day	Supplies
Makeshift Well	2 water / 5 sec	880 water / day	10 idle villagers
Well	3 water / 5 sec	1.320 water / day	15 idle villagers
Established Well	6 water / 5 sec	2.640 water / day	30 idle villagers
Makeshift Water Purifier	3 water / 2 sec	3.300 water / day	37 idle villagers
Water Purifier	4 water / 2 sec	4.400 water / day	50 idle villagers
Established Water Purifier	6 water / 2 sec	6.600 water / day	75 idle villagers

Food data provided by users Veldrin and Tiberiumkyle on Discord. Villagers take ~66 bites of food per day. Working villagers and pregnant females double that value. A working pregnant female would triple that value.

Food	Food Value
Ration	100
Cooked Meat	80
Boiled Egg	60
Raw Meat	50
Egg	40
Raw Vegetable	25

MegaCity

I'll just have this section so you can see my MegaCity at day 150 on Survival and how I applied these techniques.

Day: 150
Population: 1417
Housing Capacity: 1554
Building Count: 503
Monsters Spawned per night: 5.200 ~ 5.500
Monsters Killed per night: 3.500 ~ 4.000
Total Energy: 118.653
Total Influence: 49.760
Total Corruption: 16.228 tiles, between 24%~25% of the world
Owned Territory: between 75%~76% of the world
Total Towers: 144
Total Walls: 963
Essence Generated per night: 500.000 ~ 600.000
Essence Decayed per night: 200.000 ~ 300.000

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2571482072

[flemdawgheal]

Tried this April 15, 2025. And yeah... It doesn't quite work once you get to about 40% corruption. The monsters break through the walls to attack the static towers. Not to break to the base, but just to attack the towers themselves. Then will resume along the path to get to more towers if you try and block them. I think the strat is bust if you think it will last to infinity. I think the creator patched something, where it isn't just calculating distance to base, it will go after towers to improve the calculation of pathing to base effectively.

[Dethmold]

@goldeNspiriT sounds good, I'll share next time I do an attempt and show you how far I'm able to get before it gets real rough lol

[goldeNspiriT]

@Dethmold you can do it! share a screenshot of your village if you manage to push very far back xD I'm very curious to see what villages would look like in today's versions

[Dethmold]

@goldeNspiriT yeah there have definitely been some changes to balance since you wrote the guide so it won't apply perfectly to today's version of the game. I can definitely survive long enough to meet the requirements of having "won" that zone, I just would like to try and get to that point of pushing it back as far as you did. Will play around with it, it's still fun either way. Hope you get a chance to play it again, there have been some fun additions since your guide was published.

CPU boss is the final boss for sure :P

[goldeNspiriT]

@Dethmold unfortunately I haven't played recently, maybe it got a bit harder with some updates? I hope I get the chance to come back to this gem of a game, though xD

and indeed, fire elementals are the main nemesis of any endgame village! (also the CPU LOL)

[Dethmold]

Still playing in 2025 , I've been trying to recreate your epic base over many many attempts. Gotten about half way several times but then it all goes to hell and I get overwhelmed when the fire elementals get too strong. I won't give up though, will keep trying to recreate your base. Thanks for the great guide! Any additional tips? Have you played recently? @goldeNspiriT

[Kirilius]

And nephalim

[Kirilius]

What is God Dust?

[Pinkie Badger Honey Pie]

Oh man @goldeNspiriT The new faith system and the ability to color coat your jobs. I feel like a god. Which I guess is the whole point! Lol, take my word, things about to get real.

[goldeNspiriT]

@Dirty Shisno yeah, so I've heard xD haven't played yet though