Small ideas with huge consequences

Feature Requests and Game feedback
1

Recently I’ve been thinking about all the changes that have happened and are going to happen with Gems of War, and it got me further thinking about all the things that presumably could happen, but never will, because of the huge ramifications. Think of something that you could change in Gems of War, but never would be changed, because although it would be the same game, the way we play would be completely different. Here are some things I’ve thought of…

  • Teams of more than 4 troops
  • Increase board size past 8x8 (9x9 is a mere 17 extra gems)
  • Allow multiple weapons per team

This thought experiment is a way to push the creative boundaries of the game, because although the above things will never happen, things similar to it could happen. For instance, although we’ll never see an actual team of 5 troops (5 troop portraits all lined up, each with turns, etc.), what if teams had “sideline” troops that came in when one was defeated? What if that was part of an enemy team? When you defeat one troop, another comes in to replace it immediately? That’s essentially what happens with troops that summon other troops when they die.

Changing the size of the board will never happen, because hundreds of troops are balanced around the 64 gems (that’s why most troops and weapons create a mix of up to 24 gems – if you changed the size of the board, that percentage would increase/decrease).

However… we have seen one slight “change” to the board with delves, when they introduced blocks that are essentially non-gem areas and remain until destroyed. Now consider if an entire row or column was made up of these blocks. That would effectively make the board smaller. A larger board? Not sure that’s possible, given the UI restrictions. But smaller? Absolutely.

1 Like
2

Different board shapes - a la galactrix.

2 Likes
3

Oooh, what if the hero had a sidekick? A minor hero that comes in with a different weapon when the first hero falls in battle. Oooh, they could make us level up the classes all over again for the sidekick!

1 Like
4

A spell effect that causes an opponent to fire his/her spell on his/her allies, if offensive, or onto your team, if defensive/healing. Much like charm, but for spells.

The ability to add to teams a 5th or even a 6th troop as passive members: they never come into actual play, but their traits affect the game (they can still be stunned).

2 Likes
5

Blindness - all gems appear to be the same color for opponent’s next turn.

6

Small ideas with huge consequences

hmm…

Multiple Empowered Gem Converters…

oh wait

4 Likes
7

How would that work though? If all the gems faux appeared to be the same color, how would you resolve faux matches?

  • Allow faux matches (destroy the gems), but not award the actual mana unless the match was valid?

  • Allow PQ1/Galactrix “illegal moves” to occur and cause loss of turn when one is made?

  • Force the player to stumble through the board until they find a valid match?

8

There’s definitely a :eggplant: joke somewhere from the title.

9

Option 1 or 2, I’d say.

Question really is, how do you ensure the AI is also constrained as such?

10

The AI would have to simulate making bad moves by dice rolls, which would probably be modified by the game’s dynamic difficulty modifiers.

11

Change of gravity - gems fall upwards, or sideways.

Allow matching gems from one side to the other, like moving a gem at the bottom of the board downwards to match with 2 gems at the top.

5 Likes
12

Add another gem color.

Require material components to cast all spells - e.g., you need to spend an Orb of Power each time you want to cast Life & Death.

Gamble resources on battle outcomes for extra goodies (I’m sure that wouldn’t result in additional complaints about AI cheating).

13

warlord can dual wield weapon. we called the new trait Colossus Handholding.

14

Make it where all troops who can target a troop can actually target any troop. Whether it be your own or your opponents. Also a troop that can hit an entire team you can choose either team.

15

Allow certain weapons to deal skull damage to the second troop … Polearms or pikes or something.

1 Like
16

Hell no. Board is too small for this.

17

I’ve often thought this game would be much more interesting with teams of 5 rather than 4. Team building always feels limited and very basic with only 4 troops, even with various traits and medals considered, after playing something like MTG. Teams of 5 would so dramatically increase the number of possibilities that you might actually see a little diversity in teams.

And it’s not like 5 troops wouldn’t fit easily… move the attack stat over to the other side above armor and life, slide them up a bit, chop off 20% of the image height, compress, insert the 5th tile, done… Not that I’ve thought about this much at all.

But I digress, because like you said, this is impossible for several reasons. Just something to daydream about…

1 Like
18

No extra turn mode.

2 Likes
19

A status effect where matching gems drains mana rather than earns it. Positive version drains opponents, negative version affects your own afflicted troop(s)

1 Like
20

That’s the point of this thread :wink: