Blacksmithing

Avera · Narrow Forum Tart Joined: 26 Dec 2005 Posts: 92

Introduction to Blacksmithing (Piratical Metalwork 101)

After 2 sessions of smithing, and being stuck in a little cramped ironworking stall with 5 random people complaining about how they're getting crappy scores, I'm going to write some basic Avera-advice*. *May or may not be an oxymoron. Avera takes no responsibility for any injuries and/or death as result of taking the following advice.

* The aim is basically trying to clear all of the pieces off the board
* The number or symbol on the piece limits where you can hit after it
* You can only hit each block three times before it is forever shattered into a million tiny fragments which you cannot weld back together again no matter what.

People tend to get fixated on trying to make combos. I blame the game's tutorial (or how the score is calculated.)
* The focus of the game is not combos, it is how many blocks you have remaining before you run out of possible moves. The less blocks, the better, because it will mean that you are awesome and destroying things with a hammer, which is an essential skill for any ruffian.
* Trying to "save" your score by doing ten vegases until you run out of moves... doesn't work. In fact, after a few games, the strategy that helps me most is to ignore combos. Because it tends to mess up the variety of pieces you have left on the board, and it limits the opportunities you have to "move around" and smack the tiles.

There's also no time limit, so knock yourself out with the stalling.
In case you haven't noticed from the insane abundance of chess pieces, the puzzle is similar to chess in that each move has a chain of consequences, so you need to think ahead to figure your best move. But here your opponent is the limits in which you can move. Toward the end, I cut my losses by figuring out which moves cause dead ends (and hence cause the puzzle to "finish" {Thanks to blacksmithing, I now dread that word} And then I avoid those dead end moves and try to look for a different way which will get rid of more pieces. If you've reached that crazy masterpiece level, you probably think ahead enough to "choreograph" breaking of all the tiles before "finishing". I won't try to pretend I know anything about strategy for getting a masterpiece. I'm still a greenie at this. I'm no Teal, give me a break.

The moves of each symbol illustrated. (As if you needed them)
They're actually really simple once you get used to the game, but I like to illustrate things. Even when they are painfully, glaringly obvious. Because pain is fun, and I tend to do a lot of glaring.

Numbers: You can move to a spot #THIS many tiles away.
One: the most advanced of them all. Don't stress out too much if you don't get this.

Two: Oh my god it is like One but, like, doubled!!! I left out putting in "1" labels, because they made it look messy and frightening.

Three: No-one actually cares much for the this move. It is the middle one, so.. not important.
Four: This one is sometimes scary, I do not wants it.

Knight
Really hawt. Who doesn't love the horsey? Not only makes an awesome chess piece, it doubles as a super fun horse-head toy outside of chess! I used to put it on my Barbies' head and pretend she is a mutant superhero. But anyway.
Yeah, freaky childhood. Anyway.
Knights move in an L-shape. In all directions. I'll just steal the game's tute pic:

Also, works like this also. Flip!

Bishop And Rook: Which look annoyingly similar.
The Bishop has the diagonal swords and goes like this:

The Rook is fatter and goes like this:

Queen Is like.. the Bishop and Rook COMBINED!!! It's like a Bishrook! Or a Rooship! A Birooshipook!!!
Okay that information does not help anyone.

And rum bottle - I could put up a labelled diagram for that but... ..really.

The in-game documentation says some stuff about how the place of the different pieces/symbols is related to the degrees of movement that it allows. And now I am tired, therefore this tutorial-ish-block-of-spam is now concluded. I hope I have not confused everybody.

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Crewbies, feel free to post more detailed insights on smithing.
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Faeree · Posted: Wed Jul 18, 2007 10:55 am Post subject:

Yay! Thanks Avera! It makes more sense the way you say it Very Happy

Ziddan · Posted: Wed Jul 18, 2007 3:27 pm Post subject:

its like impossible for me to get incredibles but i can get consecutive Excelents

What i do is work from the inside out (due to the Rooks, Bishops, and Queens)
Thats the only thing that i have found that works the Avera didint alreadys.

It was very helpful by the way Smile

Elaria · Posted: Thu Jul 19, 2007 6:10 am Post subject:

I can hit incred most of the time now... Avera is on the right track.

Focus on clearing the board.

Start with the centre and clear out the rooks, queens, bishops, 4s. We start with the centre because many chess pieces can only move to the edge - so the edge is important.

Don't hit a tile 3 times too early on (especially on the edge!), keep your options open, try and spread your hits around the board - you shouldn't have any holes before you've at least hit every tile once.

Only divert from these tactics if you have a major combo opportunity and I mean a multiple vegas here. Even so, don't do that more than once or twice in a game, stick to optimal moves for board clearing.

When you start getting to the last level of pieces start thinking ahead - you have time to make sure any move you make isn't a dead end.

You should hit incred if you finish with something like less than 10 pieces remaining.

Carrol · Posted: Thu Jul 19, 2007 6:26 am Post subject:

Just want to add a few things...

I've finished several games with 6 or 7 cold pieces, and only received Excellent. You can't get Incredible without SOME combos or chains along the way. Although typically, you'll come across some in most games anyways.

Like Elaria said, going for 4's, rooks, bishops, and queens early is important. In particular, those pieces don't give you opportunities to stop in the middle of the board. So early on, grab some numbers that will let you hit pieces in the middle.

I tend to try and hit as evenly as I can. Once you get down to 2 or 3 hot pieces left, see if you can focus on getting those down in the fewest moves. That will lead to the next important piece: The rum jug.

In my opinion, the rum jug is key. You only get it once you hit difficulty 4. Once I get my first rum jug, I'll usually try and avoid it for as long as possible. I'll look at the jug and see what pieces can move to it, and then try and work backwards a bit. Hammer out as many warm pieces as I can with destroying as few as I can. When it looks like I can't avoid the rum jug anymore (or might not be able to get back to it if I don't take it now), I'll jump on it and take a break.

Once I hit the rum jug, I like to stop and plan. When you get this late in the game, it's much easier to plan your moves. Some pieces on the board will be dead ends. Remember them, and avoid them. I'll usually try and plan a path that will hammer out the warm pieces to get the second rum jug, and knock out a few more pieces. If I can take my time and work my way back to the second rum jug, then I'll stop and plan again.

I have yet to get a Masterpiece. I think the lowest I've gotten so far is 3 left.

But minimal pieces isn't enough for Incredible on it's own. You've gotta get some combos and chains in there somewhere.
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Lomky · Posted: Thu Jul 19, 2007 6:37 am Post subject:

I've just been playing around with it a bit, and I second getting those difficult pieces out first, seems to help.

So far I've finished with about 10 pieces all on the third stage, which grabs an excellent, and then I've gotten a few goods if I have any second stage ones.

Whoosy · Posted: Thu Jul 19, 2007 10:18 am Post subject:

Carrol · Posted: Thu Jul 19, 2007 12:51 pm Post subject:

The general idea with clearing out those pieces (4, rook, bishop, queen) is to try and do so in a manner that spreads out which edge pieces they're going to.

As an example, consider this board:

xxxxxx
xxxxxx
x4qrxx
xxxxxx
xxxbxx
xxxxxx

All 4 of those pieces could be moved into the exact same spot along the right border. Of course, after 3, there wouldn't be a pieces left there, but you get the idea. Instead, you could consider moving them each to different spots, kind of like this:

xxqxxx
bxxxxx
xxxxx4
xxxxxx
xxxxxx
xxxrxx

This solution for moving those pieces (assuming you used a few moves to get between them all) is very good. Not only did you only hit 1 edge per piece, they're also spread apart so that no two edge pieces hit are in the same row, column, or diagonal. So you've hit 4 middle pieces once each, and 4 edge pieces once each (as well as any intermediate moves).

As you mentioned, once you hit them, it's reasonable to think that another difficult piece (just under a 50% chance) will end up in it's spot. If that happens, then it's another piece you'll want to try and re-hit later.

The general idea, is in the early game...if you have a choice between the following:

4,r,b,q in middle
4,r,b,q on edge
1,2,3,k in middle
1,2,3,k on edge

I think I would choose the options in that order. So if you're in the bottom corner (3) early in the game like this:

xxxxxx
xxxxxx
xxrxxq
xxxxxx
xxxxxx
xx3xx3

Then I would most likely select the rook.

If it's later in the game, I might choose something different that may help me earn a combo, chain, or eliminate more squares.

I hope that helps a little.
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Sweetman2 · Posted: Thu Jul 19, 2007 11:05 pm Post subject: Re: Blacksmithing

Kharnor1 · Posted: Fri Jul 20, 2007 3:33 am Post subject:

Combos of the same piece over and over are pretty weak, but it is nice to get a little bonus for clearing out that bunch of birooshipooks that are choking up the board all at once. Razz

Don't even bother with them unless you have a serious excess of any one piece.

Alternating sets, however, give a huge bonus and it's well worth knocking out a few edge pieces to get them. Get a really big combo and you'll pretty much get incredible even if you still have half the board unfinished.

Alternating sets are when you get a set of all the chess pieces followed immediately by a set of all the numbers (and vice versa). These are like the crystal clears in distilling or the masterpieces in carp - each one you get in a row gets you more points (or at least thats how i think it works Razz

)

So, what's everyones' highest combo? Mine's "Great Cannonballs of Fire!" (6 sets) Very Happy

edit: Also, the rumjug can replace any other piece in a combo. So if you go 2-3-rum, you will get a combo if your next piece is a 1 or a 4.

Elaria · Posted: Fri Jul 20, 2007 12:32 pm Post subject:

andi_kan · Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2007 11:57 pm Post subject:

Also helps if you time it so that the rum jug is at the edge. And make sure you can access the rumjug.

Knights are super hawt, as avera put it. It's the only chess piece that allows you to continue on in the middle of the board.

Finally: combos are important, but second to board completion. If you finish with 7-10 pieces on the board but don't do combos, you can't incred (at least not on Hunter).
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Jezzibell · Broad Forum Tart Joined: 31 Dec 2005 Posts: 139

Rumjug?

I'm obviously really rubbish at this game if i've not come across it yet... I stuggle with the colours, all the yellows are too similar for me and I find it hard to tell what moves I have available... Sad

I'm going to shut up now and go back to just playing sailing... at least that game likes me (occasionally) Embarassed

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Lomky · Posted: Tue Jul 31, 2007 5:12 am Post subject:

I wonder if the highlight color for available move could be changed, like bilge was changed?

Edit: After sifting through the image folder for blacksmithing, I don't see any glow pictures, which leads me to think its an effect, rather than a picture change Sad

So much for my ideas.

Spacehog · Posted: Tue Jul 31, 2007 9:32 am Post subject: