Forums → Game Walkthroughs → gemcraft: chasing shadows: guide for low-levels.
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This is not a guide for grade-100 gems.
Welcome to chasing shadows, where a LOT of stuff is going on.
In order of difficulty and complexity: "gemcraft"( chapter one), gemcraft chapter 0, gemcraft labyrinth, gemcraft chapter 2: chasing shadows.
It is advised to play at least chapter 1, in order to familiarize yourself with the fundamental concepts of gemcraft.
"so what color do I use?"
The best colors at low levels are red, yellow, and to a lesser extent, black.
Pure orange becomes usefull once beam is unlocked. white may be substituted for black if only white is available.
Poison and cyan are only usefull below wiz level 10, or on very specific maps (like the one where you can only build traps).
Blue and purple are moderately usefull support colors
"what grade do I use, and how many gems should I have?"
rule of thumb: any gem meant to do actual damage should have 2 to 4 times as much MINIMUM damage as the ARMOR level of the reavers. (reaver=normal monster.). Untill you get amps, 3-4 killgems is typical. after amps, you'll usually use 1 killgem-a tower surrounded by 8 amps, with maybe a few anti-swarmling towers attached to the sides.
"but what about rain, snow..."
IGNORE IT.
and now for the most important strategy of all: anger management.
[since "anger management" sounds much cooler than "enraging properly", we shall use the older term "to anger"]
To anger a wave, simply toss a gem-bomb on the wavestone. This means more monsters in that wave, which means more mana from that wave!
...provided you anger with the correct grade.
look at the managain per monster of the target wave. You may multiply the managain out if you wish.
below 15: do not anger. (happens with swarms)
15-45: anger with grade 1's. g1
45-72: g2's
72-120: g3's
120-240: g4's
240+: g5's.
DISCLAIMER:
This table is calibrated for normal reavers. it does not apply to giants, swarms*, or altered reavers. (possesed?) For these, either use delta(sumoned) over delta(gem cost), or use some common sense.
*it may be used for swarms if you really want to, as you won't outright lose mana. You won't max your managain either.
Great! now you'll maximize the net managain per anger!
so. "how many times do I anger", you say?
if you are relying on multiple gems to do damage, look at your second-strongest gem. If you have only one killgem, look at it.
look at the gem's minimum damage.
Half that.
Half it again if you're nervous, or multiply by 1.5 to throw caution to the wind.
Anger till the armor excceeds the number.
"but what about hp?"
using this rule of thumb causes the hp to magically fall into line
If you find yourself struggling because, say, you don't have red or yellow on a level, simply drop to a slightly lower angering grade and a slightly smaller number of angers.
by the time you get to levels with a starting hp of 180+, you'll be comfortable enough with the rules of angering to adjust your strategy accordingly.
coming soon: skillpoint management, or "don't spend all your skillpoints!"
- 29 Replies
Disagree, I find poison invaluable on my non premium account. One or two high grade in trap, set swarms, with bolt, kills all swarmlings and weakens reavers significantly. Also helps to remove shields from monsters.
At the low levels talked about the guide you cannot have black and you may have red, but only if you have the pouch. Because of other things you do not have, orange is not at all useful at low levels, the extremely low mana reward is not worth the damage sacrifice.
At low levels, blue is the most damaging gem you will get, and it is also one of the fastest because of how it slows down monsters. Purple is the next most valuable because of the amount it increases all of your damage by. Yellow becomes useful later once you get out of the lower levels and actually enter medium levels. Poison is variably useful (most useful in traps)
There are also some serious issues with those specific angering numbers. I've tested it, and you actually lose mana bombing at the numbers you are talking about above because the mana spent creating the gems to get them to the point you discuss is often less more than the amount you gain. So for low levels, those numbers need serious readjustment.
here's the redone table:
g1: 15-45
g2: 45-72
g3: 72-186
g4: 186-240
g5: 240+
p.s. if you have a level with both white and black available, use white: black only becomes more powerful past grade 30.
oh, and poison now works a bit better than it used to, since a version update (1.7?) made it scale better.
Wrong table???
With 0 fusion-
Table-
15-60 - G1 - G1 cost 60. 60/4 = 15.
60-150 - G2 - G2 cost 240, 240/4 = 60
150 - 330 - G3 - G3 cost 600, 600/4 = 150
330 - 690 - G4 - G4 cost 1320, 1320/4 = 330
690+ - G5 - G5 cost 2760, 2760/4 = 690.
Where did you get those weird statistics from???
45 -
thunderrider's table seems closer to helpful for low level players. I was trying these values that are reported the same all over the forums, but found that I was generally losing mana in many instances. Is it really just based off of how many levels of fusion you have? It makes me wonder if the angering values noted above and in every other forum thread are only for high level players with max skills why a scaled table hasn't been presented to help out low to medium level players.
fractalman, again I have to point out that this is a low level guide. Low levels do not have grade 30 gems and generally do not have black gems.
Low levels are like levels 1-100, and many of the people referred to this guide have been less than level 70-80. Even at level 200 I have never gotten beyond grade 12 on a gem - grade 30 is very for very high level players!
oh shoot, my table relied on the fact that G2-G5 also only add 4 monsters...waaah gotta fix....later. lol.
Erilie, the only reason I mention g30 at all is to point out that white is better than black at low levels
@thunder:
You're using cost/delta summoned, which is incorrect. the correct formula to generate additional entries is:
delta cost/ delta summoned.
(although, you can always switch to a lower grade if you're currently short on mana.)
And the table above is incorrect as well. After early waves at low levels, you spend more mana to make the angering gems than you get in return.
my revised table is correct. here's the proof:
delta cost, with NO LEVELS IN FORGE:
g1: 60.
g2: 240-60=180.
g3: 600-240=360
g4: 1320-600=720
g5: 2760-1320=1440
delta summoned:
g1: 4
g2: 4
g3: 5
g4: 6
g5: 6
so: delta cost/delta summoned, or the mana gain needed to use that grade:
g1: 60/4=15
g2:180/4=45
g3: 360/5=72
g4: 720/6=120
g5: 1440/6=240
USING THE TABLE:
Say the mana gain is 10 per monster. this is less than 15, so I don't anger at all.
say there's 20 mana gain per monster. this is between 15 and 45, so I anger with grade 1's.
say the'res 300 mana gain per monster. then I anger with grade 5's.
say there's 120 mana gain per monster; I can use grade 4's if I want to for more exp, or grade 3's for an easier wave/don't have the mana to invest; the net mana gain per wave is the same either way.
Now do you get it? If you're loosing mana, you're using the table incorrectly.
-the OP has been updated. I did not realize you could edit an OP at any time.
I told you before that I understand perfectly and talking down to me is not constructive.
It would be best if you limited the responses to one of the two threads instead of spread out in multiple places. This is the better thread for the discussion, not the guide thread for which the comments I made were not specifically about the angering values.
I did that exactly dozens of times, and as I told you, you lose mana on many waves. Maybe its because normal reavers only make up 10-20% of the waves and most reavers are not normal reavers. Maybe its because in other sources, people say to use it for all monsters. Either way, more specific information would be an improvement.
About anger Management: It also depends on Skills and Pool Level. If you have some excel skills, make a spreadsheet.
Assume you have 1.36 Skill factor and 1.2 Pool factor and Fusion Skill 6. These are my numbers for reavers (x4 for giants, /1.5 for swarmlings)
G1: at 8.12 base mana/monster (bm/m): Your gem costs exactly the amount you will gain.
G2: 25.43 or more bm/m
G3: 40.69 or more bm/m
G4: 67.81 or more bm/m
G5: 135.62 or more bm/m
Being at Level 47 I had so far nothing that I would throw more than G5 at. Also a armor tearing (purple) "farm" helps a lot to reduce monster's armor and to be able to call more of them.
I apologize for talking down to you.
But unless one of the following is happening, it is mathematically impossible for you to lose mana while following my guide:
1. You are angering giant waves with the reaver table, or reavers with the (unwritten) swarm table. (angering Reavers with the giant table, or swarms with the reaver table, is fine...just sub-optimal).
2. You are letting monsters leak. derp?
3. I made a mathematical mistake when typing up the table, one which I am instinctively correcting whenever I go to apply my table.
Just a FYI ...
At low gem grades, White is vastly superior to Black. Of course, they would both have to be available for the difference to matter, which doesn't exactly happen a lot without the pouch.
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