Bravest Master Tacticians!
The Phalanx salutes you amid our journey across The Witness Kingdoms. This year we’ve proudly expanded Echoes of Cryptalia to two different game-modes currently available for players: the community’s delight, Trials of Kü, & the most recent yet equally celebrated adventure, Harmonies. While most navigated these modes either with an acute gamer intuition or following the lead of our ever-present Founders, in this massive arrival of new players, as a team we felt that a written piece untangling foundations & mechanics for both game-modes was a necessity. Here you’ll learn about lore, gameplay, characters, stats, gear and its management, as well as rewards for Trials of Kü & Harmonies. Get comfortable, grab a cup of your preferred beverage and sit next to the bonfire while we map the upcoming journey for you!
Step into the Trials of Kü!
First game-mode is Trials of Kü, a quest to recover fractured Cryptalia from evil forces dwelling in them. While the journey might seem long, as you must battle in three available Cryptalia – Agonitas, Zandemyr and Hilare – leading your team to Mountain of Kü, most players complete a run within an hour. When finished, the game resets itself, yet players get to keep their final rewards.
Trials of Kü is a roguelite game in which the player assumes the role of Master Tactician, commanding a team of four Heroes: Tsydora, Luro, Okh-Ur and Yaelie, each one with its own characteristic lore and stats. It consists of nine levels, three per Cryptalys, & their respective enemies. These creatures have been randomized from a pool of threats, so every playthrough is unrepeatable!
To kill a shrieked-bird
Although a Master Tactician’s team consists of four heroes, prior to battle they must pick three warriors and sort them to face a level — therefore, every battle is a sequential three versus environment won by the team that defeats all three opponents first.
Combat is turn-based and at the beginning of a turn both characters roll a dice that, in calculation with their Initiative stat, determine who goes first in a round. Then, a character gets two actions per turn. Player must choose between these six:
- Move up to 2 squares, back or forth.
- Push, if the Hero is adjacent to its enemy.
- Attack — which is different depending on the Hero.
- Rest, which recovers HP, Grit and Resonance — more on those later!
- Chant — which also changes between Heroes.
- Player might also decide to Pass their turn after one or none action.
Turns go by until a character is defeated. When this happens, following one takes its place and surviving character goes back to its beginning position.
In Cryptalia we all sing
In the world of Echoes of Cryptalia, magic becomes reality through music. Actually, magic warps reality through music. Characters are capable of performing Chants – yes, this means both Phalanx and its foes – depending on what they are and what they know.
In battle, a Chant is a powerful move that can only be used once per turn. And since they are so remarkable, performing one has a cost in Grit and Resonance, meaning Grit goes down and Resonance goes up after a character sings its Chant — and when those points surpass their Resonance Limit, Hero is coupled and starts taking damage for performing the move. That’s why Rest is important, since it recovers Grit points and when Grit is surpassed, Resonance starts to lower.
How to train your Hero
To choose three out of four Heroes to represent a Master Tactician’s team in battle is a hard task — yet not a random one! Each Hero has its own set of sixteen basal stats that determine their performance in combat. These stats are divided into three categories:
- Body (Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Presence & Finesse)
- Mind (Intelligence, Charisma, Clarity, Wisdom & Focus)
- Will (Volume, Tuning, Stoicism, Conduction & Insight)
- Luck
Information about Hero stats is underlined in the Hero Detail Section and can be clicked to display explanations. Those basal stats are calculated into in battle stats:
- Health Points
- Attack Index
- Defense Index
- Resistances
- Initiative
- Grit
- Critical Factor
- Dodge Level
- Performance
- Resonance Limit
All this work and what did it get me?
Since these are trials and players as Master Tacticians are proving their skills for the Phalanx, they deserve to be rewarded for their work defending The Witness Kingdoms. These is what Echoes of Cryptalia has waiting for you:
- A daily amount of $ECHO, our to-be-generated token, for the first three levels surpassed.
- A daily NFT Chest for a completed run, containing items for the upcoming game — because this is not the actual game!
Worth noting that Trials of Kü keeps track of every completed run, and as the community reaches determined milestones, chances of getting additional or better chests improves for everyone!
We’re all in this together: Harmonies
Latest game-mode is Harmonies, in which Phalanx battles together against bigger threats for The Witness Kingdoms: gargantuan creatures known as Shrieks. Since these monsters are much bigger and powerful, campaigns in this game-mode last up to two months requiring a constant, collective effort to be completed. Worry not, player, since the Phalanx doesn’t expect for you to be sitting in front of your computer for such a long time!
To be clear, Harmonies is a raid-like, idle combat game in which the player too assumes the role of Master Tactician guiding a squad of four Heroes: Kammis, Golien, Ubh Al and Ozh Zyr, each one with different lore and stats. Player chooses one to face a Shriek and the game calculates damage per minute from the Hero stats — a very similar formula to Trials of Kü, that can be checked on detail in the Squad tab. Once an enemy is defeated, every player receives a reward.
It’s the remix part two Electric Boogaloo — gear fusion!
In Harmonies, not only every Hero carries a six-slot bag for items, but the whole squad has a shared pool consisting of ten slots. That pool works like a queue: only its first item can be grabbed and equipped by a Hero — so gear administration becomes a crucial, strategic part of this game-mode.
Another feature included in Harmonies is gear upgrading. When the Hero has equipped a type-matching item to the first one in queue, or two adjacent items belonging to the same typing, player can combine both to upgrade them — raising their level through grading the resulting item with more stars and, of course, improving it combat-wise. This fusion can’t be undone, so player must do it wisely.
There’s a reward for everybody!
For such long, exhausting campaigns, your Heroes might deserve an award — but since we aren’t handing those, at least not for now, Phalanx is serving a steaming plate of rewards for those who complete a raid in Harmonies.
Whenever a Shriek is defeated, Master Tactician receives Merit in a proportional amount to damage inflicted by their Hero — Merit is a honour unit, like experience points, to celebrate players for their commitment to the Phalanx. In the future, these points will be used for granting access to special content and rewards. They also get Phonite, our in-game currency, in a random amount between one unit and a maximum determined too by damage done.
That’s not all! Every participant will receive a Chest containing game items and other surprises. Phalanx is caringly rewarding its top players — those 15% inflicting the most damage to a Shriek — with an improved Chest with better prizes overall. And just so no one gets jealous, a random 15% amongst regular players will get an improved Chest as well.
And stay seated! Because when a Harmonies campaign is completed after two months, all players will be rewarded with $ECHO according to their place in the ranking ladder. Echoes of Cryptalia is giving away one million $ECHO for this purpose!
Time flies when you’re battling evil
Every week that passes is pushing us closer to our TGE, scheduled just a couple of months from now. You’re still in time to be first in line for the Phalanx as a player and as a holder — that is, if you get a GENESIS Unbreakable Oath from our store. That’s our main asset NFT promised to become a Hero when TGE happens and once they’re out of stock, we’re never selling such GENESIS NFT again. Through our social media we’ve announced upcoming NFT collections such as our take in lands and PFP. You want to be ready when those come in stock!
minter.cryptalia.quest
In the meantime, dearest MT, we count on you to resist the wickedness that’s corrupting The Witness Kingdoms, whether you’re doing so on Trials of Kü or Harmonies… or both! Since their teams are different, you can play both game-modes simultaneously. We’re expecting you on the battlefield!
