3492

Muhaha! Fool! I purchased it while it was in “EA” on itch.io. :-)

3493

Thanks! Looks right up my alley. gonna grab this.

3494

Same, but haven’t played in ages.

3495

Hey, back to Erannorth. I did a playthrough on Casual. Quite easy, even though many things were still unclear. Particularly when my card had no effect, but not because the enemy had immunity, but rather something to do with levels.

But now I am ready to start another playthrough, so I went to do a run on Normal and it says “It’s recommended to have at least 30 Mastery with your chosen race and class to better enjoy their deck-building options.”

Huh? I know that in Casual, you can supposedly earn 20 Tokens and Mastery. And I know that these can unlock other classes and races. But

  1. I see how many tokens I have, but not how many mastery. Where is that?
  2. What does this have to do with my ability to build a deck?
  3. Is this implying that I should be playing repeatedly on Casual, sticking to a race and class, if I want to have a decent chance at playing that same race and class on Normal? (I hope not, this sounds very grindy.)

Separate from that
4) What is the shuffle option during the game? The one time i used it, it simply cost me my turn, I did not get new cards. So obviously I was doing it wrong.
5) What’s the deal with the cards still in your hand at the end of a fight? Sometimes they remain for my next fight, sometimes not. Especially if something comes in between, like finding a grimoire.
6) I never noticed any level ups, but saw I was no longer on level one later in the runthrough. I assume I missed something here?

3496

  1. Mastery is gained by playing a class or race I think, and tokens can unlock them in the first place. I’m not sure where exactly it is, but it should be somewhere in the initial select screen.

  2. Gaining mastery in a class unlocks more cards to choose for it.

  3. Maybe, except I don’t really think you need to do that? I had fun playing on Normal from the start pretty much. I didn’t end up feeling it was grindy, as I was enjoying myself.

  4. I believe shuffle puts your discard into your deck. Gives you a shot at getting something you just put in, or something you want to play that you just used.

  5. Some cards have a trait that will have them discard if you do like anything else. I don’t recall what that is off the top of my head, but it’s there. The initial Mercenary’s block is an example of this I think… Reaction, maybe?

  6. Yes. Level ups are a big deal as they give you access to more deckbuilding options and perks. You earn PP through leveling which can be spent on perks, and they do a LOT of different cool things for you, ranging from joining a secret organization to a employing a seneschal to mastering summoning- lots of stuff. Watch your XP bar, it will also give you a message when you level. You can also get ability points when you level up. Agility, I’m looking at you!

If anyone cares, my favorite class is the Witch, and race is the Ifrit.

3497

  1. You can look at your mastery level for race & class on the character stat screen when you create a new character. It’ll say something like “Naga (+25) Warlock (+137)” That’s your mastery level. You can also see it in the character screen during the game, but I can’t remember where. I agree the ui is not great.

  2. The higher your mastery level, the more cards you unlock for that race and class. Happens as you play, you dont spend tokens on it. You can see the locked/ unlocked cards in the deck builder at any time.

  3. You never have to play Casual, and as soon as you learn the mechanics of the game, I suggest you dont, ever. You earn way more tokens and experience by completing a Normal run.

Cards belong to a Race or Class. They are gated by level, and you unlock them by getting that race or class to that level / mastery. Once you get to there, if you are that race or class you can just go to the inventory and give yourself a set of that card. When you start a new Normal run as a Human (+30) Hunter (+60), as soon as game starts you have access to the cards of a +30 mastery level Human and a +60 level Hunter.

3498

I assume you’re the dev! Great game you made here, you have a fan in me. I’ve bought each DLC, and really appreciate your frequent updates, too!

3499
  1. It’s in the Character screen. Near the class and and name. Press “C” to go to it.
  2. As mentioned it unlocks the cards you get but it also gives you stat points in the beginning when you create you character
  3. No, I wouldn’t play casual more than once. Normal isn’t much harder but I think it’s more fun since the routes are longer. I would pick the race you have experience in and play with a new mastery. This way you have a nice selection of cards and won’t be overwhelmed.
  4. IIRC, shuffle takes the cards in your hand and shuffles it with your discards. It resets your draw.
  5. Certain cards do not stay after the end of the turn. Turn on “Verbose” in the options this will let you learn the game more organically.
  6. Bottom right of the screen you will see levels up beside your character. It’s easy to miss.
    Make sure you turn on verbose mode. It will help with lots of questions you might have.
3500

@Hereafter @Mark_L @CD_305865 Thank you all for the answers. Especially for the “Verbose” option. I’m very poor at noticing things for myself in an interface, but willing to read explanations, as long as I have access to definitions of terms I don’t know. The only thing that I do not understand in your explanations is why, when I used the draw button to replace a horrible set of cards, I ended up with any empty hand and had to end my turn, but maybe Verbose mode will explain that. I’ll see when I get a chance to play some more later today.

I am very relieved that grinding on low level is not required. Given my tastes, I am pretty sure that I need to get to the Adventure level to really enjoy it.

I wonder whether this game ought to have its own thread? I’d be the wrong one to start it, being a beginner and having almost no experience in the genre.

3501

. . . feeling almost ashamed not to have contributed a full hearted recommendation for Trials of Fire previously given I have about 50 hours+ played and freaking love it.

The core gameplay consists of turn-based tactical battles with a party of three using decks of cards built up through character development and equipment. In a very cool and unusual twist cards are both your actions and your action points. So if you have 4 cards that cost 1 action point each you will need to discard 2 of them to play the other 2.

My turn-based tactics experience dates back to gold box RPGs from the 80s. I have rarely been more impressed with a system. It can play out quick but you can also sit for 10 minutes figuring out what the best set and sequence of actions is in any given battle. There are also some very impactful environmental features such as sun storms that hurt any character that is not adjacent to an obstacle (for shade) that really change up the tactics you need to employ.

The tactical battles occur within a wrapper of questing and overland adventure. This is punctuated with simple events offering “choose your own adventure” style options. Setting is a very bleak, desolate, post-apocalyptic low fantasy world.

If you read Steam reviews/forum posts you will see some objections to a food mechanic that is used to create urgency and push the party toward their quest goal. Getting the ‘just right goldilocks’ balance of tension is something the very active dev is fully engaged with and he is very welcoming of the dialogue around it.

3502

Not much to add here on Trials of Fire except to say that I absolutely loved it, and shelved it not because I was sick of playing, but because the proof of concept was a win for me and I want to play the full version so I tucked it away in my EA Gems folder…

3503

Pretty much the same here. Really liked the tactical battle system, felt like the world map portion was not nearly done. So I shelved it til later, figuring it will eventually be a lot of fun.

3504

I keep getting Trials of Fire and Deck of ashes confused in my head. Trials looks much less like a dozen other games.

Appears this was completely overhauled a few weeks ago.

@Lykurgos so is the game broken up into discrete quests rather than one long campaign?

3505

Affirmative. Each ‘run’ within Trials of Fire means selecting a quest such as the Water Gem quest. That quest is then split into several discrete stages with a specific end-goal and big boss fight.

It has a bit of a rogue-like-lite-ish structure since you do gain progress toward character card unlocks through failed runs.

The two quests I have played to completion, multiple times, take maybe 3-4 hours and 5-6 hours respectively. There appear to be more quests in development.

3506

The Shuffle command is likely only there because of how you are allowed to redo your deck on the fly. Say you’ve got a 25 card deck with 6 in your hand. You go into the deck builder and completely change the contents of your deck, moving out some of the cards that have already been drawn. Now there are 19 cards. You can hit shuffle to reset your deck and draw the new cards. That wont end your turn, but you only draw new cards at the start of each turn. Alternatively, you can (and probably should) just play the cards in your hand out, and the next draw will be from your adjusted deck. You are thinking of it more like a mulligan. I usually swap out cards and shuffle during non combat nodes to avoid losing a turn, especially since that’s where youd be getting new cards anyway.

Also, I’m not the dev, just a big fan of this game. I got it a ways back and bounced off it pretty hard. Then after a bit I decided to just learn the mechanics, confusing at first but makes perfect sense after a couple hours. Now Im hooked, really fun and unique game.

3507

So, your characters don’t retain progress between quests, then, like in terms of levels, but they unlock options?

3508

That is correct. The between quest ‘meta progression’ is in the form of unlocking new cards that can become part of their decks. There are also characters to unlock, including an Assassin I still do not have. To the game! :-)

3509

Top-down survival horror game with a clever Inception-like premise.

eXplorminate impressions of Pax Nova which left early access.

3510

For Erannoth, the Dev (Raven) is pretty activate in the discord channel. I just post this thread there.

3511

Yes and no?

Once you finish a quest you can go to the Hall of Fame and restart with your character on a higher level of difficulty.