Thea: The Awakening

[Agesilaus]

Okay, based on the reviews here I just purchased it and am downloading it now. I'm not going to play it today, though; perhaps later this week. Spent too much time playing CoE4, feel like a bit of manchild at this point; better get back to working my way through Demosthenes.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Oh, I do have one major gripe with the game actually: it seems unwilling to actually finish you off. Even after getting your entire party killed, throwing away all your food, etc. the game continues on and just spawns a bunch of replacement characters. The thing is, these characters will be too fucking weak to make any real progress, so you get caught in this awful limbo of sending people out to die hopelessly. To actually end the game you need to look at your score and choose to quit.

 

[Angthoron]

So far seems like a pretty good game. My gripes are the somewhat clunky UI (though it might've been fixed - last played it about a month ago) and occasional WTF difficulty spikes. Not sure what I think about card game combat, but it's ehhhh different? And I guess better than Civ 5? And you still have the autoresolve button...

Otherwise, it's been pretty fun, wish I had more time to spend on it.

 

[Markman]

Been playing a bit more. Compared to that LP its been like a night and day in how I'm playing.
I choose warriors at start so I got 5 warriors and a healer that are incapable to gather stuff.
So Ive been going full offence on anything I encountered till I got some kids grow up and made em into gatherers and switched em out from main expedition.
Found some sweet spots for gathering, but random encounters fucked me up, almost lost my whole party to a goblin king and my bestest warrior died from wounds. Sadness.
Interesting that not all groups are hostile and dont attack on sight.
I got bunch of quests just by running around but its not going as fast I would like with only 1 party.
Was thinking to make another one but dunno how smart is it to leave the town with only 2 ppl in it.

When it comes to fights, now I autoresolve anything with 1 skull while 2 are even and 3 skulls parties will kick my ass.

Alt-F4 works if you fuck up. Start the game again and it will load the latest save at start of the turn.

Its fun besides crafting, but otoh I was never a fan of wasting alot of time in inventory screens.

 

[Galdred]

Can't you just reload the latest autosave from menu when you fuck up?
I don't know whether it is an exploit or a feature, but it sure does not autosave whenever something nasty happens.
I have gone warrior too, and find it pretty hard to set up a second gathering group :
I have built lots of cabbage fields and farms or whatever they are called to get more population, but even with 22 (6 in village, 10 in main group, 6 in gathering party), my gathering party is too weak to survive a lot of random events and encounter.
I have built gathering items for all my warriors so they are way more efficient at picking cherries now, as they don't have to break camp and run away from any group they see.
How do you make up for the medic being a dead weight in combat? I play with the option to get a mulligan, but even if he is in support he does virtually nothing. At least, he is harder to kill from there.

 

[ArchAngel]

So is it something Fallen enchantress wanted to be?

Fallen Enchantress wanted to be many things and failed at it all. I even got it and the expansion for free for being one of the idiots that bought the previous game in that series. FE was at least playable if not much fun.

 

[Markman]

Dunno what to say about Fallen Enchantress. Gave it a shot twice and it just oozes boring for me. Wonder if the Sorcerer King is better. We'll see at the Steam xmas sale.

About Medic, I reroll if he's not in the support group or just use him as fodder.
If the game is right he's more useful after the combat, helping warriors heal their wounds. Plus he's useful in other types of 'combat' with his stats.

 

[anus_pounder]

Dunno what to say about Fallen Enchantress. Gave it a shot twice and it just oozes boring for me. Wonder if the Sorcerer King is better. We'll see at the Steam xmas sale.

About Medic, I reroll if he's not in the support group or just use him as fodder.
If the game is right he's more useful after the combat, helping warriors heal their wounds. Plus he's useful in other types of 'combat' with his stats.

It had more potential to be something interesting, lets put it that way. Unfortunately it seems the devs are done with it - while still leaving many things incomplete, like minor race AI - and whats there is interesting for a single playthrough, if even that much.

 

[SerratedBiz]

How do you make up for the medic being a dead weight in combat? I play with the option to get a mulligan, but even if he is in support he does virtually nothing. At least, he is harder to kill from there.

You should look into crafting items with support stats for combat. Easy ones to make are shields and ranged weapons since the first give you Shield Ally for however much Shielding the character has (you transfer the extra health to the last character in the initiative queue) and the latter allow you to Support Ally for however much Ranged Damage the character has (adding extra damage to the last character in the init). Both are really cheap and easy to make and can help you get through fights with ease, especially in the early game.

The problem with Medics is that they only have like 100 weight allowance so you'll have to choose between one of these two options plus probably gathering tools and maybe a edic jewelry (made from rubystones).

I only have a single 500 turn playthrough under my belt, which is when the AI started regularly pumping out 4-5 skull challenges which my people were not ready for. I lost most of my warriors in an expedition gone Donner Party wrong and, as mentioned before, the game is not keen on ending you outright but will weaken you to the point where you're unable to progress anymore. So end game, lesson learned.

Number one thing I've come across is that it's probably best to expand (ie, gather rare resources) early in the game so you don't fall behind in equipment quality regarding the shit around you.

 

[Dickie]

I bought this game over the weekend, since it's on sale for 20% off. I'm really enjoying it so far. I'm on my third try now, and things are going much better than the first couple attempts. It's wise to leave at least couple soldiers in town.

Now, I'm a couple hundred turns in and three-skull enemies are starting to be fairly common. I'm able to auto-resolve all one-skull and most two-skull challenges. Auto-resolve seems to really fuck up when fighting undead. I've lost five people auto-resolving against two skeletons and a zombie, whereas I could beat a group like that manually only taking a few damage.

I think this is the first game where I've ever given bandits what they want instead of just killing them. The risks of combat are just too high if you don't know what you're up against. This is definitely a plus for this game.

What weapons do you guys prefer? I really like the differences between weapon types.

Early in the game, I really like spears for the free damage, as I can often take out 1-2 enemies with my two spear guys before the fight even starts. The big problem there is that you don't get any shield points. I'm also really liking the one-handed club/shield combo, especially if I can get the clubber in first and have somebody with a bow back up that person for extra damage. Swords, of course, make it so you don't take any damage, so that's helpful when your guys have like 10 HP.

None of these seem very effective in the three-skull challenges. It's hard to take out an enemy with 40 HP + shields, so the follow-up damage from the bludgeoning tends to be pointless. My spear guys do about 10 damage when they engage, which is OK, I guess, since a few low-HP monsters are still mixed in. I just worry that this will become completely useless as time goes on. Maybe axes are good, since they can actually kill stuff. They seem like the worst weapon type at the beginning since they're complete overkill (dealing 20 dmg to an enemy with 7 HP is worse than dealing 7 dmg and getting some bonus effect).

I'm currently sticking with a mix of weapon types, but it just seems like the club, especially, isn't as good as it used to be and might just be worse than a sword or an axe. The enemies at this point are also much more adept at fucking up your plans with tactics, instead of just throwing them in confused. This makes getting the club guys in the right spot even more tricky.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Some tips now that I've gotten far enough to finish a god quest at least:

Crossbows are awesome. They weigh very little, and it doesn't take really great materials to get 8+ damage on one, spider silk gets you most of the way there and it's really common. Having everyone in your support group able to add big chunks of damage to your attackers helps a ton. Spears are great too, with enough spears and high dex characters you can crush most battles before the enemies even get to attack. They are rather costly in terms of material though, getting a 20 damage spear ain't easy. And lack of shielding sucks. Shielding is nice to have whether you're in battle or support section, so I might re-evaluate this after trying out shield crafting. It seems shields can use gems, thereby gaining random bonuses, so they should have good potential.

Warriors are overrated. Their lack of jewelry slots bites, and their strength is generally overkill. Gatherers are good enough for some light armour and weapons. While I find combat to be pretty reliable and it gives nice rewards once you have good gear, social battles almost always seem to offer really nice rewards. For this reason, craftsmen are probably the best of the basic 3 types. Medics are indeed pretty awful, but it's a rare skill so they're worth keeping around. Having extra options in the various scenarios is always a good thing.

You can get much better characters than the basic 3 types + medic and hunter. Don't want to say more and spoil stuff, but don't overvalue your guys just because they've got some levels in them, and don't fret over getting a million babies (though extra fodder always helps, even if it's just to let you throw out more of the useful cards early on.)

It's a pain in the ass, but cooking gives you a lot of benefits by way of having more varied food. Even though meat + meat and meat + bird meat have the same icon, for example. they count as 2 different types of food. Between the basic types and the permutations, you can get 6 food types just out of those 2 ingredients. Cooking also basically converts wood into food, which is nice for the rare ingredients you need to harvest afield.

High class materials are totally worth spending research points for. The top end stuff gives huge bonuses. Just don't do it before you can trek out that far. Things get more dangerous further from home, and they take a lot of harvesting skill to gather quickly. I'd aim to get a top tier resource of some sort as a ~6-7th unlock. Most of the buildings aren't really needed, they're all decent if you get like 9 of them.

 

[Markman]

They made a linux version for free, minimal support tho
https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/3tgn47/thea_the_awakening_free_for_linux/
Wasnt Ulminati a linux fag? Try it out and check if it works.

 

[Ulminati]

Uses unity but wants to be run through WINE? What is this madness!?

 

[Dim]

So is it something Fallen enchantress wanted to be?

yes setting wise.
Economy wise it reminds me of colonization. Combats have depth but the easiest solution is just more people. Every time the whole screen changes I have to close my eyes. Can't be bothered to manage equips beyond a characters main stat.

 

[Markman]

Steam says I played it for 8 hours.
Turn 230 or so.
Have 2 teams now, 8 man stronk warrior stack with a witch and hunter and a 7 dudes noob gatherer stack that I derp around searching for gud stuff and easier encounters. Left city with only 4 dudes and 7 children, if its attacked I'm fucked.
Events are really random with no rules whatsoever, I had 4 events once on the same expedition during a single enemy turn.
Even some events where I go into a cave, meet something nasty, get raped and in reload I get some different event.

Roaming bandits are fucking hard, easier to "talk" my way out instead of fight. Using "social" option on auto-resolve I get some chance to win and even losing they only take some of my food while leaving my party unharmed.

I win pretty much any 2 skull challenge on auto-resolve, 3 skull can be a pain in the ass while 4 and 5 skulls are gtfo challenges.
Like these

Spoiler

Divine quest is 5 skull, no way to beat it without some serious equipment or level boost. That will wait for another 200 turns atleast.

Shame there's no map view, just to see how much I've explored.
Dunno what to think about global experience share, it simplfies alot but I dont mind it that much.
Still liking it, love the text adventure parts, seems to be alot of em cause I didnt see much repetition.

 

[Dickie]

Events are really random with no rules whatsoever, I had 4 events once on the same expedition during a single enemy turn.

Still liking it, love the text adventure parts, seems to be alot of em cause I didnt see much repetition.

About this part, it seems like in each of the three games I've played, there was one event that would pop up over and over. It's different for each game. For my first game, I think it was related to spiders and I'd get spidersilk. For my second game, it was this event where I'd find herbs and I think some string or something. For my current game, it's these dwarves who give me 7-9 mithril and a blessing of health if I pass a social test. I'll get the same event maybe every 5-10 turns (never counted, but it's fairly common) if I hang around my village. Is this the experience anybody else is having?

Shame there's no map view, just to see how much I've explored.

A world map would be really handy. I really hope they plan to add one. The world is big enough that panning all around to see where a quest is can be a pain.

Dunno what to think about global experience share, it simplfies alot but I dont mind it that much.

I really like the experience share. It removes the tedium of swapping guys around constantly. I'm still not brave enough to make a second party to wander around. I "lost" my first two games by my town getting jumped.

This game is really fun, so far, but it doesn't seem too popular even here. I had never even heard of the game nor the company before. Steam recommended the game to me, so I decided to check it out. How did you guys find out about it?

 

[Markman]

Yay, won a 5 skull challenge. In auto-resolve, bit it counts anyway. Killed half of my party. Totally worth it.
I am not really in a mood to fight anything in a card game that got more than 8 people in it.

Also, ze Hunter girl turned out to be a greatest asset of the team for winning bunch of fights without risking my party getting wasted. And the Witch can sense evul magics and opens more options during random events. Just got a medic join in the town so I'll be putting him in my main party soon.

Figured out now the thing with spears, didnt even research em yet and only got the hunter girl using it. Maybe with some more upgraded gear guess I could try to wreck those 5 skull bandit camps that popped up everywhere.

Notes for the next game(and for this one):
-Rush spears in early game (OP)
-Diverse party of 10 (to open up more options during events)
-Build stuff in town to attract more people and beasts
-Make another gathering party faster
-More focus on right equipment on right people
-Better research focus now that I have an idea on what to do

Also, about weapons. I crafted like 5 of em and those were bows. I usually get way better items during the events.
Just got a 24 damage axe, its way better than anything I was able to build.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Current game I have a supply of motherfucking diamonds pretty near my town. Unlocked swords, shields, and artifacts for crafting. Tech tree is exploding with access to gems, they give a ton of research points. You can make some /really/ awesome jewelry and artifacts with access to diamonds. Hell even with rubies I managed to make a bit of armour that added like 11 ranged attack. Disgusting. Diamond ring giving +7 to 2 different equivalents of poison for a total of 4 different challenges made nearly trivial? Fuck yes please. Warriors need not apply.

Party is kinda weak this time around though. I got a witch but her magic hasn't increased at all, stuck at 1. Guess I'll need to make something to do that for her. OTOH one of my craftsman started out with 2 magic for no apparent reason. Teh lulz.

Re. first tier weapons: Clubs are probably pretty useful in the endgame, since shields are so nice and later on you don't need all your attack power to come from the weapon, you just want a nice damage type like blunt/pierce. Sword + shield is pretty solid though if you get a nice material to make them with like nice gems or mithril or whatever.

 

[Markman]

Finished at 288 turns, took 12 hours with some reloading. Didnt even thought it would end this soon, just followed the quest line and boom, you won screen.
Had 26 ppl and 6 kids at the end. Leveled a god up to lv3.

Fun game, will derp again.

 

[SirSingAlot]

yeah, main quest line was over pretty soon. i enjoyed my endgame (and still continue to play)

-i kinda disliked the auto-gathering of loot after combat later on, because it just caused so much micro managing to dump unneeded ressources like the millionst bar of iron

-you accumulate so much stuff you NEVER use. at all.

-trying different recipes on crafting is actually fun
(and at the end, at least. was able to forge some REALLY need stuff with moonstones, dragon leather, mythril, enchanted bones ect)

-the overall research progression, however, didnt do it for me. no specialization needed, not much depth, everything very foreseable

-building 10 buidlings in your town without any further upgrades on it was not enough for me

-razing your own building to rebuild them with better materials was fun (spoiler: the effects are different in numbers and some nice stuff can be added)

-the Quests and Events were top notch!

-combat is refreshingly different and i liked it (althought i auto resolved a lot later on due to time issues)

-one expedition task force was enough, a second for gathering useful. my hometown didnt play much of a role at all later on




after all, still much INLCLINE
will definately replay
its the best 4X game there is, but if you already played those until you are burned out, i am not sure if this one offers enough to make you enjoy it longer.

 

[Markman]

Can anyone here explain how resource unlocks work?

When you research it, it will appear on map so you can gather it.
Otherwise you're limited to Wishing Well randomness and stuff you collect during events.

 

[Markman]

Its random, I think. No way of telling what will appear on what spot unless I missed something.

 

[Damned Registrations]

I mean, it's not that bad if you do it in large batches. 60 mushroom split into 3 batches = 3 x 80 = 240 food. Do the same thing with two other ingredients and you have 720 food split between 9 types. Throw in whatever you can harvest at your home (If you're lucky you can get multiple types farmed at home) and you're good for 100+ turns easy after just ~10 crafts.

Equipment is way more obnoxious.

Anyways, I've discovered a new thing that is fucking awesome.

Spoiler

Using large amounts of valuable materials in buildings gives you chances to recruit things like dwarves, elves, demons, etc. instead of humans.

Newfound respect for high quality construction. Next game I'm going to have the most brokenly OP team yet.

Also starting to get a feel for which stats are most valuable for various things.

 

[SirSingAlot]

Any strategy involved to picking resources for research? As in what to pick with the 1st point, how likely is it to be near your village..

tbh early on it doesnt really matter at all.
unlocking the resources is most important to craft the high end gear.
some ressources you will find more often than others (like the more rare wood types, which are useful, but plentyful, i also found enough gold and rubys/topazes).
personally, i unlocked Dragon Leather, Mythrill and now i am thinking about unlocking Enchanted Bones/ Dragon Bones and Moonstones (VERY good for forging).

i guess most high end ressources are located far away, but i liked that, made forming an expedition more meaningful.

i also obtained plenty of ressources by disenchanting gear i found and didnt use.


on buildings:

after finishing my current game, i now rebuild all my buildings from the scratch for value...and extra benefits.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Some resources seem more versatile than others. It'd depend on what other things you're researching too obviously; gems are more useful if you're making swords, shields, jewelry and artifacts. The wicker/straw stuff isn't in most recipes, so I'd probably avoid it. The materials grant different properties too. Like dark wood adds poison to things, while mithril tends to add perception. There's also weight to consider; bones and stone are rather heavy, while high quality leather or gems are super light.

System overall is quite well balanced and deep, considering how simple your options are on the face of things.