I have been compiling a small list of quirks and other things that took me a while to figure out. Some of them are explained in game, but most of them are things I have just noticed while playing. Maybe some of these will be of help.
Servers Believe it or not, there are a handfull of servers available. Everyone starts on the Ambrose server, which means the other servers are quite empty. You can change servers by pressing the button on your menu that looks like a big ball and a small ball. This is very usefull if your computer has a hard time dealing with lots of people or you just don't like other people randomly joining your fights.
A trick I use with the server switch is getting mana. Since the servers other than Ambrose are usually barren, that means there are TONS of blue wisps floating around the city just waiting to replenish your mana.
Areas On the same page as the server selection is an "Area" selection. The game keeps the population from being too high in a zone by having many different versions of a zone going at once on the same server. The different copies of the same zone are called areas. If you are supposed to meet someone somewhere and you cannot see them, they are probably in a different "Area".
Try switching around areas if you need help with an instanced quest. If nobody in your area is waiting to go into an instance you need to do just cycle through the areas one at a time and you might find someone else who wants to do the instace fight too!
Magic Schools Most of the school opposites are obvious. But it took me forever to find out that Storm is weak to Myth and visa-versa.
The extra damage "Boost" from opposing school attacks (a fire spell on an ice elemental monster for example) seems to go up in % the higher rank an enemy is. You seem to get no bonus casting a damage spell of opposing school on a rank 1 monster, a 10% bonus on a rank 2 and a 20% on a rank 3.
There IS a death and balance school. You will find them by following the basic quest lines. Trust me, when you are the right level you can't miss them.
Items and Equipment You are not restricted to your own magic school type of damaging wand. If you have lots of +damage items for your school it makes sense to use a wand that gives you that type of damage spell. Try using wands of other elements to easily add variety to your lineup.
Necklaces tend to give you an extra spell. This spell will be "enhanced" like a treasure card, which usually means it will do more damage than if it were normaly cast. It is worth considering using items with spells you already know because they will be more powerful than normal and you can use power pips to cast them.
Some wands give different numbers of the spell they provide.
If you are struggling getting the cards you want in your hand, try fighting without a wand. That makes it alot easier to get the ones you need since you will have about seven less cards in your deck.
Spells you get from items will have a blue border in your hand.
If you have more than one "deck" item and switch between them, the game will remember what cards you had set up in each one. Use this to quickly change between decks.
You can keep extra items in your dorm, which is attatched to Ravenwood.
You cannot trade items with other players, only treasure cards.
Treasure Cards To use a treasure card, equip it in your deck building screen. Then in combat right click a card in your hand to discard it and then press the "Draw" button.
You cannot discard treasure cards you have drawn that turn, but may discard them and then even "redraw" them on another turn.
You can make your own treasure cards by combining them with a Tough or Keen Eyes card bought from the library. This way you can give friends spells that are not sold anywhere!
Combat There is no way to keep strangers from joining your fights. If this bothers you try changing servers as suggested above.
If you join a fight mid-turn you don't get to cast a spell even if people are still picking what spells to choose.
If you join a fight in progress but have to wait untill a new round starts, you can still change around equipment and cards in your deck or use a potion.
When combat starts and your character starts "running" into their spot in a fight you can still use a potion.
Mana is deducted from your mana pool as soon as the round starts. It doesn't matter if your spell fizzles or is cancelled because someone else killed the target before you, the mana is still spent.
The turn ends when all enemies who were "active" at the begining of that turn die. Even if another enemy joins the fight halfway through the turn, as soon as all monsters who are not "grayed out" are defeated, the turn will end and all spells that would have been cast (even if they target players, like buffs or heals) are cancelled. This is confusing because the battle does not end since there is now at least one new opponent to deal with.
If you use spells that take pips equal or less to the rank of the monster you are fighting you will get extra experience points. It doesn't matter if someone else in the fight casts a 4 pip spell on a rank 2 monster, it matters what YOU do. It only matters what you cast ON enemies, so higher rank heal spells will not change how much exp you get.
You can discard cards in your hand by right clicking on them. This means you will draw more cards next turn. Be carefull because you can run out of spells to cast.
The only way to draw cards you have discarded, cast, or fizzled back into your hand is with the "Reshuffle" spell. It is a level 20 balance spell and costs 4 pips.
If you fizzle or discard a treasure card it becomes available again by pressing the DRAW button the next turn.
Charms and Wards with the same name do not stack. If you cast Fireblade (+35% fire damage) on yourself twice, it will effect the next two fire spells you cast by +35%, one at a time. However if they have different names, like Fireblade and Dragonblade (+30% damage from any school) they will go off at the same time. (For a total of +65% damage in the fireblade/dragonblade example)
The person who starts the fight will always go to the "Sun" location. Monsters will focus their attacks there unless otherwise provoked.
You can tell who will start the next turn by where the triangle with the circle is pointing.
Misc. Other people can have the same name as you.
You can see what level/class people are by clicking on them and pressing the small red arrow at the bottom of the screen that pops up. You can then see what items they are using by pressing the big red arrow on the side of that new screen.
If someone has a text bubble next to their name with a red X over it, that means they cannot read open chat.
Text bubbles with a second black border are things people have said with the preset chat options. Bubbles without borders are from open chat.
You get so many random friend requests not only because people like you but because they can teleport to you at any time. If you are high level this means they might be trying to get to higher level zones faster, or they may want a free ticket back to the zone if they have to go into town to turn in a quest.
You get 1 training point every 4 levels, and then every 5 levels after level 20. They can also be gained from quests.
You can fight other players in the arena next to Diego in Unicorn Way.
Thats it for now! I know most of you will already know most of what I posted, but I hope you learned something! -Tarlac Sandweaver
Many balance foes take boost damage from Life, Death and Myth. The idea is Balance is the school of elements and is weak to spirit (Life, Death and Myth).
.... Items and Equipment You are not restricted to your own magic school type of damaging wand. .... Try using wands of other elements to easily add variety to your lineup.
Necklaces tend to give you an extra spell. This spell will be "enhanced" like a treasure card, which usually means it will do more damage than if it were normaly cast. It is worth considering using items with spells you already know because they will be more powerful than normal and you can use power pips to cast them.
Some wands give different numbers of the spell they provide.
If you are struggling getting the cards you want in your hand, try fighting without a wand. That makes it alot easier to get the ones you need since you will have about seven less cards in your deck.
...
If you have more than one "deck" item and switch between them, the game will remember what cards you had set up in each one. Use this to quickly change between decks.
My suggestion would be that if you are having trouble getting the spells you want in your hand change wand and/or change deck. In this game - bigger is not always better. As this is a card game it is the mix of cards and the respective ratios which are more important. For the mathematically inclined, it is possible to calculate odds of drawing the cards you want based on a known deck composition.
Do NOT equip a large deck just so you can include all the spells you know. Use a smaller deck with many copies of the spells you use most often - and once you have "reshuffle" you have the ability to effectively double the size of that deck anyway.
Treasure Cards ... You can make your own treasure cards by combining them with a Tough or Keen Eyes card bought from the library. This way you can give friends spells that are not sold anywhere! .... -Tarlac Sandweaver This is important to read and re-read. Did I hear you say "crafting"? ;)
Excellent post! I still have questions about this:[Try switching around areas if you need help with an instanced quest. If nobody in your area is waiting to go into an instance you need to do just cycle through the areas one at a time and you might find someone else who wants to do the instace fight too! ] How do i get to go in with a friend with to an instance fight? Ie wheres the "team" or "group" bar? Or isnt there one? thanks for all the help!
I am at level 18 and did the magic quest for my school and a card came up that said "summon a minion" but I didn't get a card in my deck or anything else...so what is a minion and how do I find it?
Very nice summary up there. Some more basic concepts and thoughts I'd like to add to that while I'm inspired:
'Blade' spells (Damage Buffs cast on you) affect all ticks of a Damage Over Time spell (such as the Fire Elf). 'Trap' spells (Damage Buffs cast on enemies) only affect the first tick.
'Trap' spells also have a complicated interaction with 'Prism' spells (spells that change the Damage Type of a spell). The 'Prism' is usually applied first and a 'Trap' might not be eligible to affect it anymore afterwards.
Regarding getting extra spells from Necklaces, I've found the 'Gobbler Necklaces' (Gobblestone's Pendant, Rotunda's Torc, Greebly's Gemstone) to be invaluable, especially on a non-elemntal wizard. Each of these necklaces will get you three 'Shield' spells, with each necklace doing so for a different element. Rather than blowing Training Points on extra 'Shield' spells, you can just get all three (as drops from the three Gobbler Bosses they're named for or from the Krokotopia Amulet Store) and rotate them as you need them.
Later in the game, I've also found it invaluable to make my own Treasure Cards from my own school's spells as outlined above (by adding a Tough or Keen Eyesight Buff). Why? Because that way, I can put them in my Sideboard, even with increased Accuracy (or Damage, but I prefer the former) and when I REALLY NEED that spell, I know it's only a click away. For my Death wizard, having a Ghoul or Vampire with 95% Accuracy ready at all times can make a huge difference when things get tough. The other option for stacking your Sideboard is of course to get a third Damage Type against which the enemies you currently face are weak.
On the topic of Staves, I'm actually very much in favour of not picking the same Damage Type as your main school is because that way it won't trigger 'Blade' or 'Trap' spells which you usually want to reserve for bigger attacks. That alone makes managing my various spells a lot easier.
I am at level 18 and did the magic quest for my school and a card came up that said "summon a minion" but I didn't get a card in my deck or anything else...so what is a minion and how do I find it?
You should definitely have gotten a spell card for that one. Minions are spells that summon creatures to help you. Myth gets several of them, Storm gets a Water Elemental, Death gets a spell that summons various forms of Undead. They all have one thing in common: The extra creature takes up a spot in the combat formation and acts as a computer-controlled ally for this fight, at least until it dies. There is even a whole slew of spells just for additional stuff to do with your Minions (such as sacrificing them to heal yourself).
Treasure Cards ... You can make your own treasure cards by combining them with a Tough or Keen Eyes card bought from the library. This way you can give friends spells that are not sold anywhere! .... -Tarlac Sandweaver This is important to read and re-read. Did I hear you say "crafting"?
Indeed. This can be especially useful if you do it with your School-exclusive spells!
For example ... do you regularly play with a particular friend or two (or with yoru kids/parents/siblings/etc) ...? Have the Life mage(s) of the group throw some "Keen Eyes" or "Tough" cards at their Unicorn spell, and distribute those new Treasure Cards around. That way, in a pinch during a boss battle, ANYone with sufficient pips can haul out a group-heal spell.
I still have questions about this:[Try switching around areas if you need help with an instanced quest. If nobody in your area is waiting to go into an instance you need to do just cycle through the areas one at a time and you might find someone else who wants to do the instace fight too! ] How do i get to go in with a friend with to an instance fight? Ie wheres the "team" or "group" bar? Or isnt there one? thanks for all the help!
There is no 'group' function or bar... (I wish there was one)
What I mean by finding your friend's area is that the game makes a new copy of a zone once a certain number of people are in it. So lets say you are in Unicorn Way and there are 50 people there, and another 50 zone in. The game might decide 100 people is too much for one zone and split it into 2 areas. Everyone is in Unicorn Way, but people in Zone A cannot see people in Zone B.
What I was refering to in terms of finding a friend is that if you are in one area, they may be in the other and thusly you would not be able to see eachother. And in terms of an instance, there may be people in another area waiting outside the instance, but none waiting in yours! I hope that helps.
So how do you build Treasure Cards? I have got some 'Strong' Cards but can find no way to combine them with other cards
Tough and Keen Eyes are the two I know (+75 Damage and +10% Accuracy, respectively).
Once you're in a fight, and have Drawn the treasure card you want to use (Tough or Keen Eyes) ...? Click on it, then, click on another card in yoru hand. That other card cannot be in yoru deck due to Equipment, nor can it be a Treasure Card already.
hey.i have seen my sister with a very cool trasure card.mutae fire cat into strom cat.i have never seen it in action but it looks cool.(find that trasure card when battilng eneimies in Marleybone.)
