Dragon Age Legends Beginner’s Guide

Dragon Age Legends Beginner’s Guide by Moekelpoekel

This guide will mainly be tailored towards beginners, some information might be of interest for higher level players as well though.
Starting the game not knowing the basics can be pretty painful, so let’s try to get everything together in one spot.

If you spot mistakes or have additional information on specific topics, please let me know.

Basics
Gold and crowns
Those two are the currencies in the game.

• You earn gold by defeating your enemies. At the end of each battle is a chest that will either give you gold or an item which you can equip or sell if you don’t need it.
• You receive 20 gold each time a FB friend uses your character in battle and your character survives the final wave.
• You can build and upgrade your castle with gold.
• You can create consumables (potions, kits and bombs) for your hero with gold.

Crowns are more valuable and harder to obtain.
You can buy crowns for real money. Also you will find them at a slow rate in the game. Every area (10 to 20+ battles) has an “scroll encounter” that costs 10 energy to do. Those will award you with 10 crowns each.

You can use crowns to

• buy gold
• buy high quality items in the store
• Upgrade your hero’s room to increase your hero’s mana by 1
• Upgrade a production facility to add another crafting station (meaning 1 additional worker can work there)
• Upgrade either the tavern or furnace to increase its range by 1.

If you don’t want to invest any real money (or not a lot) into the game, chose wisely on how you spend crowns. Crowns are not refundable. Once spent, they are gone. Gathering 99 – 149 for an item you like is doable in my opinion (by playing through the areas and gathering 10 crowns at a time). After that it get’s really tempting to just spend them on something. ;)

If you want to play the game for free completely and you don’t know many people on Facebook playing it neither, I recommend taking a look at Casomyr80’s Guide:
Dragon Age Legends Guide to Finishing the Game

Promo pack
You play Dragon Age 2, Mass Effect 2 or Dead Space 2? Bioware would like thank you for that. Just link the game to your Bioware-Account and check the promo pack in the options menu. You will receive additional equipment which is very useful in the beginning and can also be sold for 1000 gold a piece.

Starting over and respeccing
If you are unhappy with your character or realized you made some mistakes along the way, you have two options.

• You can start over completely, losing everything but your amount of crowns. If you already spend your crowns on equipment, the item will be lost. You are free to pick another or the same class and start the game from scratch.
• You can also respec your hero. This option costs 1000 gold and will allow you to re-allocate your skill and attribute points. You will keep all your items, your castle and your progress. You should respec if you realise that you kinda messed up your character and want to give it another try.
• The Bioware guys were so nice to create a more in-depth respec FAQ:
  Dragon Age Legends Respec FAQ

Attributes
You got 5 of those:
ATK (Attack Power) – Increases your damage.
The system compares your ATK vs your opponents DEF, the ratio of those values determines your damage output (40 vs 20 will result in the same damage as 20 vs 10). Most creatures receive additional damage from either ranged, melee or spell damage.

DEF (Defense) – Decreases damage received.
Same thing as mentioned above, but the other way around. The more DEF you have, the more received damage is reduced. More interesting for melee characters or ranged classes that don’t have a melee protecting them in the front row.

STM (Stamina) – Increases your energy (2 / STM), every multiple of 5 total STM (10, 15, 20…) will increase your hitpoints by half a heart.
Important note: Stamina gear can only be obtained through crown items or promo pack gear.
You need energy to move around on the map. High energy is useful if you have a lot FB friends playing the game, for it allows you to play longer in one session. Energy regenerates over time with a rate for 1 energy / 5 minutes.

AGL (Agility) – Earlier / more turns in combat, decreases chance of getting hit.
When trying to hit you, the system compares the monster’s LCK value vs your AGL value. (Similar to ATK / DEF comparison, but here it checks if the attack actually hits and not how much damage a successful attack deals.)
High AGL allows you to avoid more damage or negative effects completely.
High AGL also allows you to act before opponents with lower AGL, giving you the chance to kill an opponent off, before he could even act.

LCK (Luck) – Increases your chance to hit and crit, you will find more gold.
As mentioned above a higher LCK value will allow you to hit and crit (double damage) enemies more often. The more AGL an opponent has, the less likely it is you will hit him.

Your castle
You start with a 3 by 3 castle and your hero’s room on top. You can add expansions to have more space for additional rooms for 200 gold a tile. Only start adding expansions after you used up all free 9 tiles. Expansions get more expensive if you don’t build on the ground floor or first sub-level.

1st floor: 400 gold
2nd floor: 800 gold
3rd floor: 1600 gold
4th floor: 3200 gold
5th floor: 6400 gold
Sub-level 2: 300 gold
Sub-level 3: 400 gold
Sub-level 4: 500 gold
Sub-level 5: 600 gol

• Rooms can be sold for 75% of their original prize (meaning you don’t get the gold back you invested in upgrades).
• The hero room cannot be sold.
• Build your castle in a clever way, having in mind how the different rooms interact with each other.
• Always safe 150-200 gold for creating consumables, when upgrading and improving on your castle. You can produce without gold but it takes a lot more time. You don’t want to be in a situation in which you need to be replenishing consumables quickly without gold.

Hero’s room

• Cannot be placed in any sub-level. (Your hero seems not to be a dungeon crawler.)
• Upgrade to increase the maximum level of your hero by 10 (current level cap is 40)
  If you don’t upgrade every 10 levels, your hero will be unable to level up past level 10, 20…
  First upgrade costs 1000 gold, 2nd 2000 gold, 3rd 4000 gold.
• Can be upgraded with crowns to increase your hero’s mana by 1.

Worker room

• You need workers to work in the Apothecary brewing potions, the Alchemy lab assembling bombs or the Infirmary creating kits.
• Worker rooms become more expensive the more worker rooms you already have.
• Worker happiness decreases the time they need to complete tasks.
• For every free space to either side (windows) the worker room gains 1 additional “happy face”. Underground they don’t receive a bonus (no windows to look out). If you build your worker rooms in towers early on, you can save worrying about a tavern as you get +2 overall castle happiness.
• An adjacent tavern increases the happiness as well.
• Build your worker rooms at the sides or on top of the castle to increase happiness.

Tavern

• Taverns increase the happines of adjacent worker rooms (the sides must touch, not the corners).
• Taverns can be upgraded to increase happiness by one.
• Taverns can be upgraded with crowns to increase range of happines increase by 1.
• Detailed information on how happiness affects build times by markov80:
  Dragon Age Legends Happiness Effects Guide

Furnace

• Increases the productivity of adjacent workshops (the sides must touch, not the corners).
• More productive workshops will increase the amount of consumables produced.
• Can be upgraded to further increase productivity of adjacent work shops.
• Can be upgraded with crowns to increase range of productivity increase by 1.
• Detailed information on how productivity affects amount of consumables by markov80:
  Dragon Age Legends Effect of Production Boosts Information

Note on Tavern vs Furnace: Early on it’s better to invest into a furnace over a tavern. The higher amount of consumables will outweigh the decreased build time. Check the links above to take a closer look.

Apothecary

• 2 worker stations.
• Used to brew potions for your hero to use in combat. (Can be used on the active character.)
• Higher level consumables can be unlocked by upgrading the workshop.
• Can be upgraded with crowns to add another work station.
• Can be upgraded to increase productivity.
• Higher level consumables take considerable longer to produce.

Alchemy Lab

• 2 worker stations.
• Used to craft bombs for your hero to use in combat. (Can be used on enemies.)
• Higher level consumables can be unlocked by upgrading the workshop.
• Can be upgraded with crowns to add another work station.
• Can be upgraded to increase productivity.
• Higher level consumables take considerable longer to produce.

Infirmary

• 1 worker station.
• Used to create kits for your hero to use in combat. (Can be used on other friendly characters.)
• Higher level consumables can be unlocked by upgrading the workshop.
• Can be upgraded with crowns to add another work station.
• Can be upgraded to increase productivity.
• Higher level consumables take considerable longer to produce.

Storehouse

• Increases your backpack size by 4.
• Must be underground.

If you carry too many items with you for some strange reason you might consider building this. So far it was not necessary for me to build one, selling all the items I don’t need.

Example for a castle at higher levels, making use of room synergies.
(Forum ate the formatting. Was Consolas once and everything was in order. Tips for proper display welcome.)

–   –   W  W   –   –   –
–  W  T   T   W   –   –
H A   A   W  T   T  W
–   I    F   A   A   –   –
–  A   A    F   I    –   –

• Worker rooms have windows and or are adjacent to two taverns.
• Taverns support as many worker rooms as possible.
• Furnaces should support as many workshops as you plan on having.
• The most important workshops should be adjacent to both furnaces.

If you wanto to go into castle building on a more detailed level, chances are this thread from Scooter Pirata will make you happy:
Dragon Age Legends Castle Building Guide

Battles
Combat in general

• There are two combat columns for each side, one ranged and one melee column. Melee attacks can only be made between the two melee columns or between melee and the opposite ranged column, if no opponent blocks the way in the melee column.
• Ranged attacks can be made from and to every column.
• Row position affects melee damage.
  “Every melee attack gets a +0.5 heart bonus when attacking an enemy in the same row (and a -0.5 heart penalty when attacking two rows away).”
• Damage, both incoming and outgoing, does not change between the front and back column.
• At the start of the first wave you can change your combat positions by clicking on the circle underneath the character, then clicking on the circle where you would  like to place that character. All characters move to the highest available position in a column and will move to the top if there are no other characters there.
• Your hero’s life is taken into the next battle, your mana will refresh. This means don’t hold back with your mana in the final battle, but try to leave it with little to no damage.
• Every time you succesfully complete a final wave, every Facebook friend of yours that participated in the battle and survived will receive 20 gold. (This is additional to the gold you receive, you don’t lose anything.)
• Keep your allies alive. If they die their respawn-timer will be a lot higher. Facebook friends also won’t get any gold if you let them die.
• Effects that last for a set amount of turns take everyones turns into account, not only the amount of turns done by the affected character. (If you freeze an enemy for 4 turns and he is not up during the next total of 4 turns (no matter who acts), the effect will have run out by the time the enemy acts.)
• Percentages are multiplicative, meaning an increase of 100% to crit will double your current crit chance and not add a flat 100% chance to crit. For example, if your current crit chance would be 10%, after drinking the crit potion it will be 20%, not 110%.

Combat strategies
There is probably tons of different builds and strategies out there. I would like to outline the most basic rules.

• The goal is to survive and make it through with as little consumables used as possible. Preferably with full health and living allies.
• Focus down one enemy quickly instead of spreading the damage out. The longer an enemy lives the longer he will be able to deal damage against you.
• You must use consumables to progress. Use the consumable that gives you the greatest benefit relatively to its cost. Don’t use a frost bomb on the last enemy if you have 5 more turns before he acts.
• Enemies need mana for their abilities as well. Without mana they can only use standard attacks, which are not as threatening.
• Kill off dangerous enemies or make sure they cannot act (e.g. spiders with poison, mages with cripple or aoe damage). Use fire bombs to destroy their mana, use frost bombs to freeze them, use abilites to cripple/freeze them, use shard bombs joined with a direct damage ability to kill them in one go.
• Mages can use summons to soak and deal damage, as well as siphoon mana to render enemy casters useless and support the group with healing spells.
• Healing through spells is more cost effective than using a healing potion or healing kit. (1 mana = 3 hearts healed or 1.5 / ally)
• The character that strikes the last killing blow during a wave will start first the next wave. Try to let the character with the lowest AGL value strike the killing blow, so that you have more characters acting before the enemies the coming turn.
• You can use the defend option (+5 DEF, +100% dodge) instead of an attack (you can still use potions beforehand). This can be useful to avoid damage or delay your turn so that another character can do the last killing blow in a wave.

Weapon choice

• Every character can equip 2 different sets of weapons. Those can be swapped in combat with the “toggle weapon” arrow key over your character’s or your opponent’s head.
• Warriors and rogues should equip melee as well as ranged weapons. Some enemies are weak to melee / ranged damage. Switching weapons might help you killing off enemies faster, especially if a warrior is able to pick off a half-a-life opponent in the opposing ranged column.
• Mages should consider using one staff with high AGL and another one with high ATK. Have the AGL one equipped to act sooner, switch to ATK staff if you are missing half a heart. Might give you the edge to kill opponents off faster.

Skills

• You have 4 talent trees in which you can put skill points.
• You can select a skill multiple times to gain additional benefits mentioned under “upgrades”.
• As a rule of thumb an upgrade is a lot weaker than the first point you put into the skill.
• Your skills cost mana. More potent skills will cost more mana.
• Some skills have a perquisites, e.g. you must be using a one-handed or two-handed weapon, a bow or a shield. If you don’t meet the prequisite you won’t be able to use the skill.
• Your character has access to up to 5 defensive and 5 offensive abilities in combat. Don’t get more skills in one of those categories than you can actually use.

Hits, crits, glancing blows
Don’t neglect your LCK (but if you are a mage going for a heavy summon / drain build). Though you can’t completely miss (you always deal at least half a heart damage), special effects and additional damage won’t occur (e.g. glancing blow when trying to freeze a target will result in not freezing it.)

• Hit: Normal damage
• Crit: Double damage
• Glancing: (At least) half a heart damage, no special effect

Consumables

• You can use one of those prior to every attack you do.
• You have access to 5 different potions/kits and 5 different kinds of bombs in a battle. Decide what combination works best for you.
• Consumables stack up to 20, don’t overproduce if you don’t want to run out of backspace soon.
• Bombs will always hit (no crits/glancing). Damage and effects will always occur.
• Try to use your consumables wisely, don’t spend a mana potion in the final fight if you are comfortable to win a round or two later without using mana.
• Don’t waste consumables on easy encounters. It takes a lot of gold and time to replenish frost or shock bombs for example. Shard bombs are replenished faster. If possible always use the easy to replace tier 1 items and save the higher ones for more challenging encounters.

List of consumables:
Higher tier consumables must be unlocked through workshop upgrades and will take longer to produce. Tier level by production time, not unlock path.

Alchemy Lab
Tier 1

• Shard bomb: Deals 1.5 hearts damage (Go to damage bomb)

Tier 2

• Fire bomb: Deals 1 heart damage, destroys 3 mana (Good vs casters with a lot of mana)
• Grease bomb: Deals 1/2 heart damage & -50% AGL to all enemies. (Reduced AGL does not delay enemy turns.)

Tier 3

• Frost bomb: Freezes enemy for 8 turns, 0.5 hearts damage (Good vs opponents with special abilities or high damage you don’t want to act)
• Time bomb: 2.5 hearts and 2 mana damage after 4 turns (Not 100% sure on the data. Commonly seen as a weaker Tier 3 bomb, never used it myself.)
• Shock bomb: Deals 1 heart damage to every opponent (Good for final waves to thin out the enemy lines. Three of those in a row can be a game winner, though very costly)
• Acid bomb: Deals 1/2 heart damage & -50% DEF to all enemies. (Good bomb to open combat with since all enemies will suffer more damage from following attacks.)
• Poison bomb: Deals 1/2 heart damage / turn until death.

Apothecary
Tier 1

• Health potion: Restores 2 hearts.
• Mana potion: Restores 2 mana.
• Power potion: +8 ATK. (Considering you have only 5 spots for support consumables, it does not seem worth it. I myself prefer heart/mana restoration.)
• Defense potion: +10 DEF. (Considering you have only 5 spots for support consumables, it does not seem worth it. I myself prefer heart/mana restoration.)
• Agility potion: +12 AGL. (Considering you have only 5 spots for support consumables, it does not seem worth it. I myself prefer heart/mana restoration.)
• Luck potion: +16 LCK. (Good for crit builds.)

Tier 2

• Greater health potion: Restores 3 hearts. (Only worth it if your party is 4-5 hearts in average.)
• Antidote potion: Cures “poison” effect and restores 2 hearts. (Nice to have when facing enemies with poison. You can still focus them down first though or use a frost bomb to prevent them from poisoning you.)
• Greater mana potion: Restores 3 mana. (Restores 1 additional mana, but since it takes longer to produce it depends on your playstyle if you can support production of those constantly.)

Tier 3

• Full health potion: Restores all hearts. (Only viable if you invest heavily into STM.)
• Concentration Potion: +100% crit. (Good for crit builds.)

Infirmary
Tier 1

• Injury kit: Restores 2 hearts to an ally.
• Mana salve: Restores 3 mana to an ally. (This one you should research as soon as possible)
• Battle Poultice: +6 ATK, +6 LCK to an ally. (In-game tooltip seems to be wrong. Considering you have only 5 spots for support consumables, it does not seem worth it. I myself prefer heart/mana restoration.)

Tier 2

• Greater injury kit: Restores 3 hearts to an ally. (Good upgrade if your party has more than 4 hearts. Otherwise just skip it and go directly to Team injury kits.)
• Antidote kit: Cures “poison” effect and restores 2 hearts to an ally. (Nice to have when facing enemies with poison. You can still focus them down first though or use a frost bomb to prevent them from poisoning you.)
• Greater mana salve: Restores 4 mana to an ally. (Restores 1 additional heart, but since it takes longer to produce it depends on your playstyle if you can support production of those constantly.)
• Team talent poultice: +6 DEF, +6 AGL to all allies. (Never used it. Considering you have only 5 spots for support consumables, it does not seem worth it. I myself prefer heart/mana restoration.)
• Team battle poultice: +6 ATK, +6 LCK to all allies. (Never used it. Considering you have only 5 spots for support consumables, it does not seem worth it. I myself prefer heart/mana restoration.)

Tier 3

• Team injury kit: Restores 2 hearts to all allies. (AoE heal ability. Very good later on, especially if you don’t have a mage with healing spells.)
• Bracing kit: Cures “crippled” effect and restores 3 hearts to an ally. (Very strong effect, especially with more crippling effects later in the game. Very costly to reach and time consuming to mass produce though.)
• Team mana salve: Restores 2 mana to all allies. (Very good later on. Go to mana restoration consumable.)

Comments or additons? Let me know below please!