Forums → Games → Gemcraft CS : can one finish the game without the magician pouch ?

@fractalman

Thank you for letting me know to use lower gems on giants since you get less mana reward for that.

I will try the angering with more battle traits, I thought earlier you had said not to use battle traits for it lol.

I don't generally use red because I never get the chain length high enough for it to work. I also don't use traps a ton since they have such a low hit rate.

I am currently 79 (max 12 skills) with Masonry (9), Mana Stream (12), Fusion (12), Bolt (9), Beam (12), Freeze (9), Curse (9), Orange, Green, Blue (6), Purple (6), Amplifiers, Ignition, Demolition, Traps.

Ah, yes, that would be an important distinction, though if you got 25k without any traits at all, then you're on the right track.

I recommend level 1-2 mana lock, level 1-2 faster waves, and level 5-7 in the others.

...ignition? what does that do?

If that's the one that enhances the effects of angering, get level 6-9 in it. you'll get even better results than I do.

You really should have true colors, though...

Pull all points out of: bolt, freeze, curse, blue, purple.
pull most points out of: masonry, beam. (while beam+orange is a nice mana supplement, the effect per level is rather limited at this stage)

put 3-6 levels into orange if you want.

use an orange tower+beam as a low-level mana farm. (g 3-7 works pretty well, g8 works ok, beyond that starts to take too long to pay itself off.)

TRUST me: chain hit WORKS. even at 1.1-1.3, it works. You might not see the actual chain-hit visual effect apply, but you may see two monsters die with one hit.

So what do I put points into to be able to kill things? Remember, the only problem I have is killing high wave reavers and giants. Having slightly more mana doesn't seem to help with that.

(Ignition controls gem wasps)

Ah. Then don't put points into ignition, it's useless.
but like I said: if you got 25k on no-traits, you're getting the hang of the angering strategy. late-game waves on maps with red AND yellow will NOT be a problem, trust me.

you can put points back into purple for other levels if you really, really want to.

besides, by having more starting mana, you can open with a higher grade gem(s), meaning more angering is permitted, meaning more mana throughout.

plus you can build an orange beam tower sooner. (don't amp it, though having it mooch off your killgem's amps is fine.)

For the 40-odd waves of E7 with the settings required to get a 5.8 multiplier, you should be able to anger right up to the end. in fact, you should be angering the very last wave with 4-6 g3's.

...try placing one tower right in the middle of the map, and a second tower close to the entrance on the left. That will reduce the delay between angering a wave and getting your investment back.

oh, and "weave" the gem. make a g2 dual, duplicate it, combine one copy with a g2 pure yellow, the other with a g2 pure red, combine. rinse and repeat.

...did I mention that, at your level, a 3-amp 2-tower strategy may be more usefull than a 1-tower 8-amp fortress due to the sheer firerate boost from having 2 seperate attack gems?

Second attempt, editing on the first attempt editing bugged out on me.

I already do the gem "weaving" as you refer to it.

Currently, there is no reduction in skills that gives me any benefit. I already start with 3000 mana and thus a grade 5 gem, I would need 8000 mana at the start to get a grade 6, which is impossible at my level. Like I said, I have zero problems with low or medium waves, I only have problems with high and have been stuck on the same fields for 20 levels, probably because of continued bugs with field M1.

1 tower with 8 amps is not possible at my level. That costs ~15,000 mana without the gems. I consider the multi-amp strategies for low levels a huge waste of mana. 3 amps also costs thousands of mana if you count the gems you put into them. I find that if I don't upgrade my best tower gem right away when I can, I normally don't survive the next wave or two - or in other words, if I build multiple amplifiers I find I often die (and single amplifiers are of very little efficiency).

Without that skill which people say is of key importance, that might explain why I can't kill things, its a lack of appropriate skills. I don't know if I want to lose the hundreds of hours invested in the game just to start over or whether its worth spending hundreds of more hours just grinding levels hundreds of more times just to make continued minor progress, you know? There's a point at which games shouldn't be released publicly until they are beyond a beta version, and this game in the end may not have made it.

I found, for the wizard levels you are talking about, that having two towers each boosted by 4 amps to be very cost effective.

[A][T][A]
[A][T][A]

Obviously, you can do that vertically, as well.

The benefits of such an arrangement are that each tower is boosted by all 4 amps, and so you are not using mana upgrading one amp that only boosts one tower.

I understand the benefit of the amps like that, but I cannot afford that yet. That costs minimum 6K mana, which maybe I could afford in the last round. Maybe with the pouch its easier to buy stuff like that, but not without.

buildings get cheaper with masonry skill, I build at least 8 amps for free with maxed.

Yes, lol, but not at these levels.

No, its not easier to afford that "with the pouch" ... it is something that you build up to.

Start off with The Two Towers, then proceed to the Return of the ... sorry, wrong setting.

Start off with the two towers, maybe with an amp by them, when you can afford it. Place your gems. When you can afford to, add a second amp, a gem for it, and upgrade your gems. Continue to build up until you have the 4 amps each boosting your two towers.

Masonry helps, but at those levels is not a panacea. Maybe I'm getting the wrong impression, I don't know, but it sounds as though you are trying to build everything first, and then during the stage, only upgrade gems. That does not work until you are much higher in level. Instead, you have to start small - two towers and an amplifier or two, and gems. Add the other amps and upgrade gems as mana allows. The only benefit that the MP would provide here, really, is the Chain Hit skill, which can only benefit here by increasing kill rate and thus the rate at which you gain mana from those kills. This has nothing to do with not having the MP, and everything to do with your build order and skills.

doing something that requires allot of work with angering (micromanagement and time) for 100k is not worth it

go with my method and get 120-160k easily without much micro management on most maps below 50 and 60 waves (you should play the earliest ones, that you did not replay yet, not just random maps), no angering needed and you won't get overwhelmet because you angered to much

Glaring difficulty with banishment, faster waves and beacon traits set to 7 (sometimes you have to reduce the faster wave trait a bit if you get overwhelmed at later waves) is an good and easy way to farm the early maps, as it gives more XP than looming with full traits by a factor of about 2,25, and costs as much in shadow cores, and you don't need to enrage anything unless you see that you start lacking some mana in later waves

you can just play on x9 speed on most maps most of the time with some breaks to upgrade or cast spells, it's important to keep upgrading gems (or sometimes only 1 of the 9 gems so you can kill higher armor creatures easiyl)

I normally go with 9 mana leech/armor shred dual gems, sometimes with 1 or 5 traps with slowing gems of grade 4 if needed, because they increase the damage the shooting

you can spare the enrage till later wizard levels when you want to get higher scores and replay earlier maps

I did this since about lvl 40-60 (I have 32*7 achievements thought, giving me a few extra "levels&quot

I was going with looming and max traits and enraging earlier but just going with 9x speed through a level without having to deal with super giants and even getting more xp is much easier

you can always go achievement hunting for some easier ones, on older maps if you need some extra skill points (remember that 7 achievements are already as good as 1 wizard level)

http://gemcraft.wikia.com/wiki/Achievements_(GC2)

my skillpoints are

9,12,15 (the best divisible by 3 you can go) into "true colors" (the extra damage basically makes your gems twice as valuable because 1 grade higher gives 60% more damage)

up to 17 into "masonry" (because this makes up for the lost mana directly at the start) unless you have a map with plenty of preset towers that can be used for a cheap formation of:
tower=t amplifier=a
t- t- t
a-a-a
t- t- t

or

t-a-t
t-a-t
t-a-t

9 or 12 into gemcrafting skill (because the combine cost is the domination factor at that level and in the early game)

maximum into mana gain from monster kills, because it just pays of

all in all

9,12,15 into gem damage and specials for dual gem damage (true colors)
max masonry until 17 because it pays of directly
9 or 12 into gemcrafting skill (9 if not enogh starting mana)

only if you have enough starting mana:
6 into mana gem mastery
6 into armor shred mastery
6 into slow gem mastery
6 into amplifier mastery

and 6,9 or 12 for the spells needed in tome levels

@Astroshak

I was just referring to the increase in mana that people get with the pouch. The extra skill points you get give a huge advantage in lower levels, giving significantly more mana or more skills.

@rangedfighter

I think you've made mistakes about what you get by certain levels lol.

You probably didn't have glaring even available at level 40 and I doubt anyone could complete glaring with 21 battle traits at level 40 to 60 - for a 50 wave field, that would be 106 waves with tons of indestructible beacons everywhere.

It is impossible to obtain anything like the skills you are talking about at these levels. The skill cap for the levels you mention is between 5 and 9. Even at level 80 with more achievements that you stated, I still could maybe do 1/4 to 1/3 of the skills you mentioned. And doing that would leave zero mana to start the level.

This may work at higher levels, but definitely not levels 40, 60, 80.

In the end, the only issue I had was the broken/missing True Colors Skill. I did something to get it recognized finally after many attempts.

Now that I get 36-40% more damage to everything, the entire game is first-level easy again.

Thanks

I doubt anyone could complete glaring with 21 battle traits at level 40 to 60

Erile, I beat k4 at level 30 non premium.