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I've been working for twice as long on v1.8.4 and there's only like 20% as many balance changes

Do you know there are expansions in this game? (This is an ECG, after all.)

It doesn't matter much, given that everything is free anyways, but expansions up to this point:

v1.0.0: Core set

v1.0.4: I like to charge it

v1.0.7: Freezing the world

v1.2.0: The awakening

v1.2.3: Throwing darts

v1.2.6: Artifacts of history

v1.2.7: Revised core set

v1.4.1: Your math party

v1.5.0: The art of runecraft

v1.5.1: Not called lifesteal

v1.5.6: New sources of power

That's the core set plus 10 more expansions, free! I wonder how much most game makers would sell all this content for.

Thanks for taking the time to do this, but I spotted an error in your solution.

In your third row, you have 3, 12, 3, 13, 3, 16, 7, 11.

First of all, each number can only appear in each row once; you have 3 3s in the row.

Secondly, you have some high numbers in your row; in sudoku, you can only use numbers from 1 to 9.

If you need a reminder of the rules, you can find them here: https://sudoku.com/sudoku-rules

Best of luck in your solving!

When discarding a card (to a 3), its annoying to click on a keypad when I'm trying to discard it.

Honestly I think 77 is just too good for what it does. 79 feels pretty balanced, but having immunity on top of that is just such a big deal. It kind of says something that you can make a negative stone up to 100, and -77 is the best choice. Perhaps it would be balanced as 91.

-77 completely ruins the game.

The moment I made it, I just kept it in my deck for the rest of the game and never had a challenge the whole game.

Right now, the effects of the composite numbers are extremely logical, but as a result, that means that a lot of gems are just bad (like 81).

I think that if the gem progression were made less rigid, then almost every gem could be made at least interesting. I think this would lead to more varied strategies, as well as add to the thrill of discovering exactly what every gem combination does.

Some ideas that I brainstormed earlier today, not saying this has to be the exact implementations, but just as an example of how less strict progression could go.

The theme of 2 is burning.

2. Fire a range-1 beam in 4 directions, blocked by stones and burning all things it passed over.

4. Fire a range-2 beam in 4 directions, blocked by stones and burning all things it passed over.

8. Fire a range-3 beam in 4 directions, blocked by stones and burning all things it passed over.

16. Fire a range-4 beam in 4 directions, blocked by stones and burning all things it passed over.

32. Fire a range-5 beam in 4 directions, blocked by stones and burning all things it passed over.

64. Fire a range-infinite beam in 4 directions, blocked by stones and burning all things it passed over.

The theme of 3 is card access. Since cards don't really combine very well with other effects, 3 also has a theme of amplification when combined with other effects.

3. Draw 1 card. Discard 1 card.

9. Draw 2 cards. Discard 2 cards.

27. Draw 1 Card.

81. Draw 3 Cards.

Here's a potential 11, and how it would combine with 2 and 3.

11. Diagonal is adjacent, but not orthogonal.

22. Diagonal is adjacent, but not orthogonal. Fire a range-2 beam in 4 diagonal directions, burning squares it passes over.

33. Diagonal is adjacent, in addition to orthogonal. Draw a card. Discard a card.

44. Diagonal is adjacent, but not orthogonal. Fire a range-4 beam in 4 diagonal directions, burning squares it passes over.

66. Diagonal is adjacent, in addition to orthogonal. Fire a range-3 beam in all 8 directions, burning squares it passes over. Draw a card. Discard a card.

88. Diagonal is adjacent, but not orthogonal. Fire a range-infinite beam in 4 diagonal directions, burning squares it passes over.

99. Place this stone anywhere on the board. Draw 2 cards. Discard 2 cards.

Bolded are the additional effects that wouldn't just be implied by the factoring. I think it would make these gems more interesting options.

It just pairs you against the next person who queues up.

There's a matchmaking server. The first person who joins is put into the queue, and then when the next player joins, both players are removed from the queue and put into the game.

The server also transmits moves between the players during the game. Nothing is done peer to peer.

When will pvp_main.exe exist?

Probably a few days. Maybe longer if I decide to add new cards first instead.

Why are you releasing this early then?

Aethermancer has a bit of a learning curve. I want people to have time to learn the game.

Do draws exist?

No.

What happens if both people's life total are reduced to 0 at the same time?

The person with the less negative life total wins.

What if they are the same?

The game continues until this is no longer the case.

Does the AI cheat?

Tricky and Visionary look at your cards. Other than that, no.

What do the AI levels do?

See the devlog: https://masn3.itch.io/aethermancer/devlog/895844/improving-the-ai-in-aethermance...

I keep losing to AI5. Is there a black advantage?

No. (Unlike Spectromancer!) The AI is just good, I only beat Visionary level AI two thirds of the time (at the time this was written, and the AI is constantly being improved), and I'm a pretty experienced player.

Then why does the Visionary AI always eval itself positive on turn 1?

It's an artifact of how the it prunes the search tree.

Can I play as black?

Not against AI. You're black 50% of the time in online multiplayer.

Will you ever let me play as black against AI?

No.

Did you seriously add X-bow to your game?

Yes.

Why?

Aether is whatever you think it is, and at least one person thought it meant summoning X-bows.