wow, this game is really really fun and I've been thinking about it nonstop for the past few days.
i guess ill treat this as sort of as a general feedback thread, if puroseki doesn't mind:
found out that the "Summon Anything" spell from Nesting Bats seems to be a cause of desyncs. (i.e. user generates a Poison Storm, opponent sees 500 Points). I later took a deathblow by the "500 Points" doing a Poison Storm type of move which then proceeded to freeze the timer and the game, functionally.
i'm not great at normal chess either, and haven't played this game enough to really feel out a meta yet but just from immediate kneejerk reaction, united earth feels really, really strong: the artillery basically invalidates any non-center advances (except for some really wonky characters like Metonym who's capable of massive jumps anywhere), and to top it off they have a very formidable offense with FOUR battleships that are basically just queens but with +1 HP.
It's fair to say that other characters also have some seemingly "OP" or powerful setups but just to make one very similar comparison to show the power difference- Kristian Maria can struggle to protect her summoning circles for several waves with her somewhat mediocre pawns, which eventually will turn into 3 queen-like units that give her the edge to go on offense- compare this to UE starting off with an extremely fortified artillery defense and 4 tanky queen-like units at the very beginning of the match.
I've been taking a huge liking to Tokinko and probably play her the most (against CPUs mostly, because I only have a couple of friends I've showed this game to). She seems to really really lack mobility or even the capability to protect her own units.
- At the beginning you need to move the gold/silver stars forward right away to be able to fortify from any immediate center attacks. This is basically the only form of fortification I can think of that Tokinko has access to. Her bishop side is also a free kill spot because unlike the Rook, the Bishop can't immediately move to fortify the front line, it can only go for the early Dragon Horse (which as I'll say later is basically her only built in offense).
- The needles are never in a good position to do anything useful. At best they work as a game of chicken in a Tokinko mirror match but at that point you're just playing shogi anyways. They can't even really contest against a Piercing Sword which frankly seems like the only use I have for it. They do allow for the butterfly in front of them to advance a lot more dangerously but in general there's just not enough things in front of the needle for it to be useful.
- You basically only have a bishop and a rook for offense and if you lose them then you are just screwed to basically pawns and slightly better pawns. Which by the way, are difficult to actually upgrade into gold stars because they are easily the weakest pawns in the game with just 1 option for well, doing anything. They are much easier to get their upgrade state compared to Chess pawns, but frankly a gold star in a place the opponent has probably already yielded control over is not going to swing the game.
- Almost all the games I've won with Tokinko were carried by Nesting Bats or Gaia Bloom. She just doesn't have the mobility it takes to contest against faster, stronger units and her starting setup is full of really shallow holes that can be poked by anyone going on offense. I basically have to try to go full offense with my relic in order to make the game work. Sometimes I'm able to get a 2 turn Dragon Horse but frankly even that doesn't do much compared to say, a Gaia Head. The options I see myself having boil down to: attempt to get an early Dragon Horse, attempt to 3 turn win with Gaia Head, or "play normally" and probably get screwed by their offense. Both of the former options are extremely predictable since they are Tokinko's only offensive options, so against anyone who's played more than a few games against Tokinko she has no choice but to go on a rather miserable defense.
- The only time I'm able to play the game "normally" is against simpler chess-like characters such as Jupiter or King, but even King has twice as many rooks and bishops and Jupiter has tanky rooks able to slam right into your "fortified" defense without any form of counter. That's if I don't get 3-turned by a Gaia Head or a Poison Ghost or something.
- I need to play more games to see how I feel about Tokinko's summoning spells. They seem like they have the potential to be really powerful, but frankly the units are so lackluster that they can only really go up against units with blind spots right in front of them or other pawn-like units. They might be an option to fortify existing defenses but by the time you gather enough blood to use them, the enemy has probably already nabbed a bunch of your units in your blind spot. Not to mention, it seems that all spell summons either just don't upgrade at all, or they do so with a multiple turn delay. I've had a few Jupiter Waves just never transform into a Jupiter Star and get stuck at the top for the rest of the game, and the same happens with the Butterflies/Silver Stars I'm able to summon with Tokinko.
but uh yeah. sorry for the balance rant. i really love the game so far and it's so quirky and nice. definitely needs a "go back" button in places though.