Hey guys, I’ve just bough the game, did a couple normal runs, unlocked the endless mode. Then when I tried the endless mode, I killed 1 boss, then a second boss and I ended up with the “You have saved your City” screen… In other words, not at all endless…
Was I just not supposed to go complete the objective ??
I really like this so far, though I’m surprised the graphics look a little flat and raw in some places. I guess it’s hard to compete with Slay the Spire and Monster Train. I’m also concerned with how long each run takes.
What’s the general strategy, go for hard fights early and take risks to get better rewards, kind of like Slay the Spire?
I really like the way this looks, but I think the style itself could be less “busy” with it’s pointed corners and extra bits sticking out of things and the world map is a bit busy.
I mostly play this like an RPG, honestly, rather than a “rogue” type game. Part of why I don’t mind how long each run is, since you can save and quit whenever you want (and you can also pick/customize shorter runs). I think of it more like Wildermyth that way.
That’s how I do it; I like to fight the tough fights and get the cool/epic rewards, but also when I tackle a boss I am really glad I have said rewards and levels under my belt. I think the key to victory is using up every drop of resource you have to explore as much as you can before you take on the final battle of a scenario, which means careful conservation of resources leading into the section boss fights (some of which are harder than the big fights).
The runs are a little long if you compare it to Slay but I feel they’re perfect in length without dragging too much.
There’s really no general strategy imo. However, in the beginning, you should fight all normal encounters you come across. The first 2-3 encounters are generally really easy. As you progress though, the game is your oyster.
It basically boils down to how you want to handle the risk. Some questions you can ask yourself.
Do you think your party can handle it without much trouble? If not, is there a town nearby to heal?
Does this encounter (semi) counter your party’s strength? Or are they weak to your characters (ranged enemies vs. Shadowball).
Do you have time for a detour if you get too injured? Do you have extra healing herbs?
I’ve been playing this again for the past week and wow do I still love it. I also realized I hadn’t played much since the 1.0 release as things like the stealth rework were new to me. Still don’t think they ever quite figured out how to make the Assassin great, but that’s okay. The combat is still excellent, the progression pacing is great, and I really love how much choice you get in upgrades while still having to adapt to what the run is giving you.
That also meant trying out the Occultist for the first time. Classes based around hurting themselves to do damage or requiring low health to do more damage never appeal to me, but the Occultist actually was more enjoyable than I expected. Helps that you can prioritize skills that offload the status effects you’re giving yourself. Not sure I’d ever want to put it in harm’s way, but keeping it back behind cover and loading it up with utility/summoning skills worked really well.
It’s a shame that the game seemingly didn’t do well enough for the devs to do much with it after release. It’s really really excellent and deserved to do well.
Yeah, I absolutely love this game and have put a good bit of enjoyable time into it, I just wish that it could get to Switch (it was announced but nothing from the devs since) and that we could look forward to more content. Fingers crossed.
If they released an expansion or something for this I’d buy it in a heartbeat, if it really didn’t do that well that’s a tragedy. It’s a brilliant little game, though I do wish it was a bit less brown art-wise. Still, minor gripe for a fantastic strategy title.
I’m really over brown/grey post apocalypses. And totally agree, if they announced a DLC I’d buy it in a heartbeat.
It also occurred to me today that what lots of grid-based tactical combat games get wrong(see recent HoMM and Disciples 3) is that the combat maps are too big. This game gets the size exactly right. Big enough for maneuvering to matter, but small enough for tactically interesting obstacles and chokepoints.
Yeah, this is the only game relying heavily on card mechanics that I have ever enjoyed a lot. (Though I have been playing Gordian Quest in late EA, and it may possibly turn out to be the second.) Trials of Fire got a lot of things just right.
I think I’m the same. Slay the Spire was fun for a bit. Couldn’t get into Roguebook. I liked Inscryption but probably not really for the card game. Largely, I think because the decision-space for each card in this is so much more interesting without really being overwhelming. I think having a discarded card provide willpower or movement or defense is brilliant. The decision becomes so much more than just what cards you can afford to play that turn because of that. Of course having the tactical combat grid is vital for that too. It all ties together so well.
If you like the combat in Trials of Fire, you will probably also like this. It has the similarity of a deck of cards being used to maneuverer in a hex grid arena. I love it. It is a smaller, simpler, less fully developed game right now, but it has given me 10+ hours of challenge and fun already.
What the heck happened with this? The Steam page has only had two updates this year, both for discounts. Same story for Twitter.
I bought this ages ago, but only played for a couple of hours during EA until yesterday, and I’m having a blast with it. Some of the equipment is really cool (and in some cases, game changing to a degree). I really like the deck upgrade systems where you are offered a new card on level to replace an existing card.
There are TONS of tactical options at any one time without being overly complicated. And they managed to turn managing multiple character decks into a strength (I usually don’t like this in deckbuilders).
So much to like here and I’m just getting started.
Yeah, this is it exactly - incredible feedback and support during Early Access and then it got great reviews and was everything I wanted it to be, and more. I have nearly 40 hours with this and I cherished each one, and am eager to dive back in on the Switch since I game a lot more in the living room in hand held mode these days. I guess there is always the Steam Deck, which I’m track to get into my hot little hands sometime in 2024 at this rate.
My assumption is the game didn’t sell very well for them - which sucks because it’s just about the best game in this kind of genre (party based rogue turn-based RPG?) for my money.
EDIT: Poking around, I see their website has a small blurb at the very bottom of a very busy page that says “our next game is in development!” so it’s also possible they did everything they set out to do with Trails of Fire and are just focused on the next thing - which I’m going to be following with great interest, if that’s the case.
Did it make it to any of the consoles? It just feels like such a shame this got lost in the shuffle.
I just edited my post while you were typing - maybe they are working on their next game instead of more ToF content (which would be a bummer for sure, but maybe it’s Trials of Fire 2!) but no, sadly, we still are waiting console release. I just tweeted @ them to see if they will reply - I did that a few months back to the Wildermyth folks and they did tell me the Switch version is still planned for later this year, so maybe that will happen here.
Ah, ok, I didn’t see they were working on a new game. Hopefully that’s true, though there’s no listing on steam for a future title. And many devs will post about future titles on an existing game page, so fans know what they are working on.
Steamspy says 100k-200k owners. From the number of reviews, it’s probably on the lower end of that range. Doesn’t seem like it should be disappointing for a first release by a two person team, unless their expectations were totally unrealistic.
But despite decent sales, they didn’t manage to build a very sticky player base. Slay the Spire has a peak of 15k daily players on Steam, Monster Train 1.6k, Gordian Quest 1.9k, Dicey Dungeons 1k. Trials of Fire has… 95. It’s not that every game that sells well in this genre keeps getting played regularly (e.g. Roguebook and Griftlands are keeping Trials of Fire company in the basement), but a lack of an active player base probably makes it hard to justify further development.
I’ve got 72 hours in the game - less some idle time and I would buy DLC for this game for sure (if it is good). I’m sure there are things I can still do in the game, but I feel like I’ve seen a lot of what it does. Like others, I think the game was pretty great and it is still in my current group of games I’ll potentially revisit.
Uh, absolutely not! I friggin’ wish!!!
It did just have a mod that had been around a long time become a separate app on Steam.
Key words being “a separate app.” Any new adopters driven by the recent development are playing on a separate app and not counted among Slay the Spire players.
Which means there are even MORE Slay the Spire players than jsnell cited!!!
So, I’m finishing up a Water Gem run I started back in early access. I was feeling pretty cocky after beating the giant worm and might have made the mistake of waltzing back into the village without resting first.