Minion Masters: Forced Flavored Clash Royale, but 2v2 Desktop

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Minion Masters: Forced Flavored Clash Royale, but 2v2 Desktop

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

Minion Masters is a �fast-paced, easy to learn and hard to master strategy-brawler� with a ladder/rewards system comparable to Hearthstone but gameplay more like Clash Royale.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1hyVHrdqCI

Play is 1v1 or 2v2 realtime multiplayer, with each player selecting a hero and a deck of 10 cards. Players summon minions on their side of the field, who then attack the nearest enemy minion and, when no enemies are near, move towards the enemy hero. Two bridges divide the sides; control of a bridge awards experience for your hero, unlocking 3 special powers.

The final level is �mana frenzy�, where further experience is turned into mana allowing you to end the game quickly with rapidly played cards. This is the game�s natural time limit - about 10% of my games go to mana frenzy. Games last from 1 1/2 to 8 minutes.

Mana ticks up continuously, at the rate of 1 per second with a cap of 10. You have a 4 card hand; each card played goes to the bottom of the deck.

Basic play consists of counters and tradeoffs. Once minions aggro onto something they will attack it until it�s dead or goes out of range. You can use cheap flying minions to kill a more expensive melee minion. You can back up your tanky melee minion with ranged minions to shoot flyers. You can wait for a group of advancing minions to attack your face so your summoned minions kill them without being harmed.

Higher mana cost minions can be more efficient, but dumping too much mana into one card or pile leaves you more vulnerable to counters or counterplay; some cards have AOE, or a player can retake bridges with cheap cards after your expensive minions walk past them.

There is a lot of finesse into where exactly you place minions and when and where you choose to start battles; fighting on your side of the map may leave bridges in your opponents hand, but your hero can contribute damage. Backplaying minions delays taking the bridge, but lets you build up a bigger wave. Fighting on the bridges prevents them from going to your opponent, but your opponent may have better cards to reinforce the fight than you.

You may recognize some of the art assets from Forced: Showdown (a roguelike/twin stick shooter/deck builder) or Forced (a coop gauntlet with puzzle and boss battle elements). All three games play completely different, and the original Forced has a much more serious tone.

Beginner Tips:

The starter cards and free cards from the first few levels are pretty great and can get you very far
Play through the challenges (vs AI) to get a basic sense of the game
The free hero (Stormbringer) is perfectly legitimate all the way up to grandmaster league
Play both 1v1 and 2v2 to decide what you like more. The ranks are entirely separate
Use QWER to play your cards. You can either Q+Click or Q+Q
It is ok to say GG just before the game is over (the game won't send emotes after a player is dead)

Intermediate Tips:

If you place a multiple minion card along the center line you can take both bridges in one card
A 3x minion card can be used to claim a bridge even if they run backwards to attack opponents who have already crossed it
Play for value: kill your opponents minions with cheaper cards, take empty bridges with cheap cards
If you hold both bridges, you have no pressing need to spend mana
Consider �backplaying� expensive tanky minions, by the time they reach the fight you can reinforce them with ranged units
It�s rarely worth reinforcing minions on your opponent�s side of the board; save your mana for handling their counterattack
Use spells to counter healers or big packs of enemies.
Try draft mode at some point

Expert Tips:

If you time your plays correctly, your minions will be fighting on the bridge while your opponents are standing just to the side of it
In 2v2, look at your teammate�s hand -- if you�re the only one holding an anti-air minion, you may need to play that while your teammate does something else
Maximize use of your hero�s auto attack by engaging enemies within range of it
Don�t overdeploy just to avoid taking a bit of damage

Grandmaster Tips:

Use the wave emote instead of GLHF vs other grandmasters
If you cast Beam of Doom on your own face just before winning, the animation will play during the victory screen, making it the �BM of Doom�
Blocking the victory camera with a flying minion is also acceptable

Loot System:

The loot system is basically Hearthstone, except you need dramatically fewer cards to build out a deck. I regularly get to Grandmaster with all common/rare cards, and you can build whatever deck using free resources within a few hours of play. You can view the top 20 players' decks in all game modes by clicking the leaderboard button; most decks have 1-3 legendaries, and some have none.

You can have 3 copies of any card, but rarely need more than one, and rarer cards aren't systematically better. Additional copies become �glory�, which unlock cosmetic upgrades and increase the rate you level the battlepass. This is where most of your in-game resources/currency go. The first 3 wins of the day are worth 10x the glory. Battlepass rewards are mostly additional cosmetics and �season tokens�, which become a random card from the newest set.

The game is free to play on Steam, Discord, and XBox. All pools of players play together.

There is various paid "DLC" but it just amounts to more currency, gameplay is the same no matter how much money you spend.

ShadowHawk fucked around with this message at 05:07 on Aug 21, 2019

# ¿ Oct 18, 2018 11:24

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# ¿ May 17, 2024 15:10

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

Loot Tips:

When you're just starting out, just play a few games of whatever. The default deck and hero are completely fine, and the starting hero (Stormbringer) is very common in high level play.

You do not need to rely on getting cards randomly -- you can craft whatever you want by hitting the "recruiting" button in the deck builder. Commons and rares are really cheap.

Every power token also gives you shards, which can be used to craft additional copies of any card. The newest season cards cost 3x shards until you finish the battlepass for that season.

The best use of rubies is the season battle pass, which gives you more glory rewards.
Save your gems for unlocking the battle pass. Don�t buy battle pass tiers.
If an expedition is available, you can finish it by just playing games how you normally do and taking the �win� objective; that plus the shrines is enough to complete the 3 AI bosses.
First, spend your shards on whatever cards and masters you want to play with.
Next, spend your shards to level your favorite cards and get glory points faster. Commons level the most efficiently.
You can store up to 3 glory chests and 3 daily quests. Winning 9 games once every 3 days if you like.
Spend your gold on power tokens and the occasional daily offer (the best of which is cheaper power tokens)

ShadowHawk fucked around with this message at 23:04 on May 25, 2019

# ¿ Oct 18, 2018 11:24

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

Flayer posted:

Any plans for an Android version?

No, but there are plans for an XBox version.

edit: and now it's out

ShadowHawk fucked around with this message at 05:07 on Aug 21, 2019

# ¿ Oct 18, 2018 12:11

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

Game is now free to play on both Steam and Discord :toot:

# ¿ Jan 10, 2019 08:39

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

~~For the next few days there's an entire free pack of stuff (100% discount on steam): https://store.steampowered.com/app/1033840/Minion_Masters__Voidborne_Onslaught/~~ "DLC" in this game just means cosmetics and ingame currency, all cards are available to everyone.

I'm having a lot of fun playing my "cheap cards" deck all the way to Grandmaster 2v2s, as in 6 common and 4 rare cards. You can build a deck like that in like the first hour of play of this game if you want.

Note you can craft any card (even ones you don't already have) by using the Recruiting button, I found a player in chat who didn't know that and he was level 45.

ShadowHawk fucked around with this message at 05:19 on Aug 21, 2019

# ¿ Mar 10, 2019 08:37

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

Quaint Quail Quilt posted:

Feel like making a guild op?

I have one! It's called the Harry Kim Fan Club

Just submit a request in-game and I'll confirm it.

ShadowHawk fucked around with this message at 05:20 on Aug 21, 2019

# ¿ Mar 10, 2019 08:39

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

Game is now out of early access and the latest "DLC" is 100% discounted for the week!

# ¿ May 25, 2019 22:15

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

I love the first of the month. Good players play such random nonsense on their way back up the ladder. Sometimes you run into eachother and it's like a weird battle of underdogs.

edit: apparently the ranks haven't reset yet, hmm...

ShadowHawk fucked around with this message at 23:40 on Jun 1, 2019

# ¿ Jun 1, 2019 23:28

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

bobvonunheil posted:

looking forward to talking up/about our man Harry Kim

He was a very important character.

quote:

Are the first few tiers (Wood, Stone and Bronze) populated by trash-tier bots or are these actual humans I am murdering indiscriminately?

It's mostly trash tier players, but there do seem to be a few bots running around, I saw someone advertising one once. From what I can tell the bots are really stupid, playing essentially random cards in the same place over and over.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2019 00:05

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

Duck and Cover posted:

I like these types of games but dislike that they tend to be free to play garbage. Three currencies? Check. Terrible emotes. Check. Gamble boxes? Check. Dailies? Check. Store that refreshes daily? Rotating heroes? Check. Battle passes? Yep a doodle.

Yeah this is all understandable. Time spent simply opening tokens can be a bit frustrating in this game.

On the flipside, getting the deck you want to play with requires dramatically less interaction with all that free to play stuff. And the main competitor (clash royale) is blatant pay to win trash.

The game used to cost money (I have a few gift copies of it in my steam inventory). But there's way more players now, so presumably the change has worked.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2019 00:08

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

Zaodai posted:

The Battlepass seems high enough that I don't know I could ever afford it off of free to play ruby acquisition, but I also don't feel super obligated to pick it up even if it would be nice to have.

The Battlepass itself will reward half its ruby cost if you play through it.

Not counting free spins, if you can get to diamond you can go infinite. You 6x150 rubies for reaching bronze/diamond rank in each league (1v1, 2v2, 2v2 premade). So far the battlepasses have gone across 2 ranked seasons.

# ¿ Jun 4, 2019 07:07

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

Zaodai posted:

I like that the snake guy is the king of value land, but his second perk feels like a bit of a let down (because the tower itself is so easy to kill and seems to always get targeted first no matter where I put it) and I don't fully understand how to utilize him. I almost want to just make an all cheap-o deck so I can cycle cards as quickly as possible to get the free cards to come up as frequently as possible?

You can place minions/buildings in the "pocket" on the far edge of the screen just above/below the master tower, and in general creatures won't aggro onto them (they'll attack your master tower instead). Apep's level 2 lets him survive to level 3, where he becomes the king of Value town. And you're right, he's often combined with fast cycle strategies, such as 5 very low-cost bridge taking cards.

quote:

For 2v2s we've just been playing fire guy and Stormbringer and that seems like a really strong combo, because they cover each other's weaknesses, they both do some chip damage to the enemy tower, and you get to share both fire guy's perk 3 and Stormbringer's perk 2 across the team. Plus my friend's random legendary card was that druid who roots everything and spams moonfire which seems like a nutty card. I got Colossus, which I don't even use in a deck right now because 9 mana seems like a lot to ask and basically a dead card early in matchups, but I dunno. I just run Harbinger as my hammer card at 7 mana instead.

Both Colossus and Bahra see high level play. Colossus is a bit easier to use in teams as you can back it up with priest or ranged to deal with flyers.

# ¿ Jun 4, 2019 21:58

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

bobvonunheil posted:

What's a good way of dealing with super tanky damage absorbers like the Troubadour backed up with some big damage dealers?

That and the Shadow Whelp. These two absolutely wreck me if my opponent has one.

Magma storm (and beam of doom) are great for big piles of tank+dps. They don't always kill the tanky guy but they usually get their value.

Magma storm in particular counters a lot of high value things that can otherwise wreck you if unchecked - Harbinger, crossbow guild, Stormy, anything+priest, tank+dps, even Styxi.

# ¿ Jun 6, 2019 22:06

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

This new balance patch is really good. Nerfs to everything that was getting a bit degenerate (Stormy, Xiao Long, Shield Golem...), a few buffs to some bad cards, and a big buff to the big scary (formerly terrible) dragon.

# ¿ Jun 25, 2019 07:14

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

New Patch, everything more better :siren:

For this weekend you can also get 100% off the "paid" DLC:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1137440/Minion_Masters__Might_of_the_Slither_Lords/

They seem to be doing this every time there's a new patch.

You can also put this code into the store for some free stuff (from the newsletter): 4K2-KEY-S81

# ¿ Aug 17, 2019 04:36

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

Wow, guild grew by 10 people past few days.

# ¿ Aug 21, 2019 04:26

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

THE BAR posted:

Any tips on what I should burn my gold on? Tokens? Drafts? What gives the most cards?

If you like draft play draft, otherwise gold is best spent on tokens (and the occasional discount token).

Gems are best spent on battlepass or the single player adventures

# ¿ Mar 11, 2020 09:55

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# ¿ May 17, 2024 15:10

ShadowHawk: Jun 25, 2000; CERTIFIED PRE OWNED TESLA OWNER

crazystray posted:

Can I get a guild invite for this if it's still active?

Yeah just send a join request and I'll approve when I log in

# ¿ Mar 20, 2020 07:23

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Minion Masters: Forced Flavored Clash Royale, but 2v2 Desktop