Difference between revisions of "A Players Guide to Utopia"

Revision as of 05:22, 1 January 2021

By Dan4GS. October 26, 2014 (Age 63 Changes included) Originally published in Forums: http://forums.utopia-game.com/showthread.php?626895-A-Players-Guide-to-Utopia Updated by Icebuckle for Age 89.

Section I) What is the purpose of this guide?

This guide has been written for those that are new to Utopia, specifically for those in my kingdom. Although the official Utopian Guide presents a lot of great info, I have found its organization somewhat lacking and its clarity on topics difficult for new players to understand. Hopefully, this guide will be a little more straightforward in helping new players to understand the game and how to play it effectively.

Also, keep in mind that this guide is purposefully simplistic. It is only an introduction to Utopia, not an advanced concepts guide. Please treat it as such. This is not a replacement for the official guide, but should be used as a supplement.

Section II) What is Utopia and how do I get started?

Utopia is a turn based game, with turns progressing once every hour. In between the turns progressing, you can perform many actions, such as attacking, casting spells, or stealing resources from other provinces. Exploring new lands, building buildings, training your military, and researching books of science can all be ordered at any time and take differing lengths of time to complete, with the countdown to those resources becoming available processing every hour on the hour. These turns are known in game as "Ticks".

Utopia is a Medieval land divided into 40 different "Islands" consisting of 8 Kingdoms on each Island. Each Kingdom is composed of provinces, such as yours, coming together for the common good of the Kingdom. Kingdom's consist of anywhere from 1-25 provinces. The game is configured to automatically place new provinces in those kingdoms with less than 20 provinces so that all kingdoms have as close to 20 provinces as possible. Kingdoms can get to 25 by inviting other provinces to join their kingdom.

Utopia is played in "Ages" which last approximately three months each. At the end of the age, the scores are recorded and then all the provinces get reset so everyone starts all over again, and those that joined midway through the last round are given a chance to start on even footing.

Each kingdom chooses how to play the game as they see fit, as does each province. Generally, Kingdoms will pursue one of three things: Land (the total land of all the provinces in your kingdom), Honor (won by successful thief and mage ops, as well as successful attacks), or war wins.

Provinces will choose similar objectives for their own province depending on what they wish to accomplish. Generally speaking, provinces will try to either gain a high networth, gain Titles through honor, or seek to help their kingdom in whatever way possible. There are different ways of accomplishing these objectives, with three basic play styles and combinations of the three. Those three are: Attacker, Thief, and Mage.

Attackers rely upon a strong military to invade the lands of others to capture more land, to destroy their target's population or raze their buildings, or to plunder the wealth or knowledge of the province they are invading.

Thieves keep a strong enough military to prevent most invasions but focus on training sinister agents to do their bidding. Thieves are useful at gathering intelligence on enemy provinces, sabotaging the enemies magic effectiveness or destroying their buildings, and stealing resources, among other things.

Mages are similar to thieves in some ways, but focus on the dark magics. Mages can cast numerous beneficial spells on their own province to help with military protection, food production, or magical defense, among other things. They can also hurl large fireballs at enemies to massacre their peasants, send tornadoes through enemy provinces to destroy their buildings, or illuminate the thieves in another province to hamper their effectiveness, among many other abilities.

Most provinces will chose one primary function to focus on and one secondary function to help their kingdom with, while trying to keep enough balance in the third area so as not to make it a major weakness. For example, someone who wants to play as an attacker but also wants to dabble in black magic would be known as an A/m, with the first letter being capitalized to be the symbol of the main function of the province, while the second letter is lower case to show that the province is "minoring" in that function. An A/m would want a strong military for attack and defense and want to have enough mages to be able to successfully cast spells on most other provinces.

One popular combination is that of a T/m or M/t, since both tend to have more similar playstles than attackers and try to maximize the efficiency of the acres they do possess. You may choose any of the three functions as your focus, or you may try to focus on all...but be warned, being effective at all three functions requires a very skilled player and is close to impossible to succeed at!

There are certain races than lend themselves to specific functions, although it is theoretically possible to pursue any function as any race. For maximum efficiency, I'd recommend choosing a race that suits what you want to do in the game.

Here is a short breakdown of the races and their preferred functions:

Avians: Good at attacking, choosing to attack more often for lesser gains than less often for larger gains. Because Avians fly into combat, they cannot build stables. Primary role: Attacker; Secondary role: Thief

Dwarfs: Also good at attacking, with a strong military unit to compliment free buildings and extra building efficiency to make the most of what they have. The downside to free buildings is that they cannot be rushed; also, Dwarfs eat twice as much as other races. Primary role: Attacker; Secondary role: Mage

Elves: Elves specialize in the black arts, and are thus able to cast spells more efficiently with the mages they possess. Their military is average at both offense and defense, but they suffer fewer losses on defense. Elves have no drawbacks to their race, being one of two races with only positive modifiers. Primary role: Mage; Secondary role: Thief or attacker

Faery: Faery's are a race with good defensive capabilities and bonuses to increase the effects of both their mage and thief operations. Faery's are also the only race with access to every Racial spell in the game. Faery's are the second race with no negative modifiers. Primary role: Mage or Thief; Secondary role: Thief or Mage

Humans: Humans are an aggressive race, with an elite unit good at both offense and defense. While they gain bonuses to attacking and to their magical damage, their army is more expensive to train and science costs are increased. Primary role: Attacker; Secondary role: Mage

Orcs: The most aggressive race, Orcs are bred for attack. Their military is focused on producing the most efficient attackers possible. Orcs gain more from every attack they make than other races do and inflict higher casualties due to their savagery. Lastly, Orcs draft soldiers for free. Big and strong, Orcs are also dumb and their potential in scientific discoveries are more limited than other races. Primary role: Attacker; Secondary role: None

Undead: Being undead certainly has its advantages, as this race loses less troops when attacking and also does not require food for sustenance, allowing would be farms to be converted into other buildings. Since undead brains are rotted, they have lost the ability to train elite troops. Instead, their offensive units gain experience and get promoted to elite units with each successful land attack. Further, the Undead are the only race that actively spreads the plague, and are also the only ones immune to it. Undead are also limited to only intelligence gathering thievery, limiting them to two roles. Primary role: Attacker; Secondary role: Mage.

After you have chosen which race you would like to play, you will also need to choose a personality to give you additional benefits. Here is a quick breakdown of personalities:

Merchant: Merchants have the ability to cast Tree of Gold, a spell generating a small amount of gold coins with each cast. The merchant also gains more credits for military training and structure building from successful attacks. This personality can help any race as all races need money, and lots of it.

Sage: Sage's like to study the sciences and research some science books for free. The sage is also more skilled at applying these books to making their province more efficient. These "Books" of science can then be allocated into several different categories, thus increasing the efficiency of whatever the sage needs at the time. Like the merchant, the sage can help any and all roles, as science is a nice benefit to every play style.

Rogue: The rogue focuses on thievery and ops and grants the ability to conduct more thievery ops than one otherwise would be able to. Rogues also are granted the ability to a few thief operations only available to rogues: Greater Arson, Assassinate Wizards, and Propaganda. The rogue is a good choice for anyone wishing to play thief as their primary play style.

Mystic: Similar to the rogue, but for those that wish to play as mages. Mystics are the only personality with access to the spell Meteor Showers and the guilds are doubly effective. The mystic is a good choice for anyone wishing to play a mage as their primary play style.

Warrior: The warrior benefits from an increase in offensive efficiency. While out of war, they also benefit from a more efficient "Conquest" style attack. Lastly, the warrior has one extra general, giving their offense a boost or allowing them to attack more. The warrior is a good choice for those wishing to attack often, especially for warring kingdoms that can take advantage of the bonus during wartime. Those not wishing to attack should look elsewhere.

Tactician: The tactician benefits from faster attack times, and during war is able to get accurate intel with a small number of thieves. The tactician is a nice pairing with Avian attackers for very quick attacks (add barracks for even more advantage to attack times) or any other dedicated attacker. This is not a great choice for those that do not plan to attack often.

Cleric: The cleric is able to heal their troops during combat, resulting in 50% fewer casualties. Generally this personality should not be chosen by those who do not attack, as you'll be wasting a good part of the bonus.

War Hero: The War Hero is multi-functional. The war hero benefits more from honor than other personalities. Also, the War Hero is experienced in war and thus ignores the effects of dragons and benefit from immunity to the plague upon their provinces. Since dragons are frequent in war time, this is a nice choice for kingdoms looking to war frequently. This can theoretically be useful for all types of provinces that wish to war frequently (thus gaining honor), but is more often chosen by attackers.

For more numbers on each race and personality, see these links:

http://wiki.utopia-game.com/index.php?title=Personality

Now that you know the basic function of each race and personality, begin by deciding what play style you want to play, then choose races and personalities that you believe make the best combination for your chosen play style. After that, create your province and see what kingdom you joined!