Back in the day we added Zoryana's quests to guide new players into an alliance. We have now added some motivation for alliance leaders to take newbies into their alliances.

We added a special daily Alliance Package - a gift that the alliance leader can receive on a daily basis -depending on how many members the alliance has and how old they are.

Here are the key facts about it:

• Alliance leader can receive it as often as once per 20 hours.
• Alliance leader can either consume the package himself or pass it to any member of his alliance.
• Recruitment of any player into the alliance drops the package wait counter back to 20 hours.
• Package expires after 20 hours if not consumed or given.
• There are 10 different package levels with different value.
• The total value of items inside the package is calculated on members worth. You can see members worth contribution to the package in the members list.
• New heroes' worth is significantly more. A young hero can contribute 10x-30x more worth into the package than a seasoned player. The contribution decreases with the hero's age.
• Key info about the alliance package is displayed on Alliance Tab

Alliance leaders and recruiters now have a special tab which shows all young heroes who have their alliance building built but have not yet joined an alliance. They are sorted by their potential worth to the alliance. This should help find young players to join your alliance.

Hopefully, this will motivate seasoned players to take a step toward the newbies - to help them integrate into the game and its community. Let us know what you think about it.

We did a survey and it appeared that dungeons were one of the most favorite quest locations and most people are beating them all the time. Therefre we have decided to add 3 more dungeons into the game.

We have added:

• Dark Dungeon
• Devastated Dungeon
• Uncharted Dungeon

We have added a building which is aimed to address early game problem when Stone Age (and to a lesser extent Classical Age) does not have enough huts to compensate for population growth.

Limited number of huts in Stone Age makes building times go up handicaping progress. To address that we have added a special type of hut called Cabin - it is unlocked in the end of Stone Age and locked when you research Town Hall in Medieval. This building reduces building time just like regular Hut but more significantly.

Let us know if it becomes easier with your new heroes to progress at early ages.

We have added a new type of puzzle which you can find in your towns, called railroad. Even multiple ones in the same town can be found.

This puzzle will also be reset some time after solving so you will be able to solve and gather rewards multiple times.

In addition by popular demand we have redesigned existing puzzles to allow multiple plays. Now all puzzles start with first level and after solving some time later they are upgraded and you can solve them again, therefore now regular puzzles can be solved 6 times each instead on just 1 before the update. This will be working only for new towns though.

Let us know what you think about it.

Today we have released completely new items panel into the game. It's been a demanded feature for a long time and finally we have managed to implement it. It might be a little bit unusual at first, but you will love it eventually.

But this is just one of the features.

We have also added a selector for Places of Interest, thus you no longer need to scroll the map to find that one particular place - you can do it with just a couple of clicks.

Another major change is the ability to enter a quest location you have previously visited without actually bringing your hero! You won't be able to interact with anything unless you bring your hero - no clicking on anything, etc. However, this will allow you to check monster dens to see if the monsters are respawned already, review previously missed locations to recall what have you missed there, etc.

Also now player info screen has medals, prestige points and prestige levels, so those players who hunt for achievements and victories can be recognized.

Today after years of Alpha Test we are moving to Beta Test with Beta 1. The new version of the game not only has some new stuff like with every new launch, but also has some significant changes underneath.

We have announced some of them earlier, but let's go into details about everything.

Thornsville

After a long wait the story continues with addition of new quest location - Thornsville. Mysterious Mr. Thorn awaits you there. You will have to figure out who he truly is - an unexpected ally or someone who has his own goals in mind.

Random Mines

The Dungeons were highly praised addition to the game so we decided to add something similar due to popular demand. The Random Mines are a set of 9 side quest locations with randomized content - you will find new types of puzzles and activities in them. You will be able to return to them to mine purified ores and crystals just like you return to monster dens for experience. This is the first real work of our new level-designer so he will be very delighted to hear your feedback about mines.

Cataclysm

Instead of global wipes of Alpha stages, in Beta wipes are individual so it is not punishing anymore to start later after launch, because you will have the same amount of time whenever you start. After start you will have 5 months of playtime in order to expand your country, reach significant place in the world, and reach one of the Victories. Otherwise, something evil, dangerous and seemingly unstoppable will come after you and destroy your whole country. You can learn more about cataclysm in the previous news post.

Apocalyptic Prophecy

All items that were purchased with Enkord Cash consumed from the 1st of February 2018 until the wipe will be returned at Beta 1 launch, regardless of when the launch actually happens.

So far we do not have an exact date for Beta 1 deployment, but it is getting closer and closer. So we would like to encourage players to be more active and have more fun with this items return.

Some details about upcoming Beta 1 were given in previous news post.

Next version of the game we are planning to launch will introduce some fundamental changes into the game so it is worth explaining it in advance.

Totem Tribe II: Jotun is reaching a more stable phase and we are going from Alpha 8 to Beta 1 with the next wipe. Exact wipe will be announced at least a week in advance, but you have at least 1 month from this moment until it will be launched.

There will be both new features and some deep underlying changes which may affect the way you play the game, so let's talk about our plans with a little bit more detail

New Content

We have plans to add the following next content for Beta 1:

• Thornsville - new quest location which moves the main storyline forward. You will meet mysterious Mr. Thorn and will spend a night in his legendary mansion wondering who he is and what his true goals are.
• New set of dungeon-like randomized locations with a quest which unites them - the dungeons received high acclaim from our users so we decided to add something similar. The monster dens were well-regarded for the fact that you can return to them multiple times so these locations will have something that you can return to later even if you have beaten the location.
• New minigame - now the quest won't have an associated character so you don't have to talk to anyone - let us know if it is a good decision or a bad one. Did you like minigame characters like the Gardener, Tesla, Steve Perfectionisto, and Billy Bonkas or you would rather have minigames without them?
• Movement Surprises - have to keep it secret, just going to tell you that World Map will become even more exciting.
• Zoryana's Diplomatic Advisor Quests - she will teach you how to get along with other players and eventually join an alliance. This should be helpful to those players who are not very aware of the multiplayer side of the game.

Changes

The global game sessions in Beta 1 will be different from what it was in Alphas:

• No longer are there going to be regular global wipes, the game would play like it has been planned initially - players will have their individual timers of around 5 month since the time they started their hero/kingdom
• This will put all players in fair condition, because right now when someone joins close to the wipe he is having less time to play versus those players who started in the beginning of the alpha. This is especially hurtful to attracting new players as it made no sense to do that right before the wipe. Hopefully it will allow the game to grow more.
• Close to the wipe time the particular player will start getting warnings at least 1 month in advance to urge him to reach one of the victory types or he will be destroyed by the cataclysm.
• The warnings and the individual wipe would be scripted like a coming doomsday with mad prophets preaching and other signs showing in your towns so it will be fun to experience story-wise in case you didn't make it.
• All items purchased with Enkord Cash and spent a month before the cataclysm will be returned if you decide to start anew to make your rush towards victory in front of impending doomsday less hurtful in case you fail to make it in time - you will use those items again in your fresh new start. That's in addition to all your unspent purchased items and Enkord Cash.
• To make it even better, you will be getting those items purchased with Enkord Cash back if you spent them a month before any kind of defeat, not just the one caused by cataclysm. Specifically in cases when you were wiped by other players.
• All those refunded items are in addition to the normal Second Wind and Loyalty packages you are usually getting.
• The positive outcome of this is after Beta 1 launch it won't be so crowded anymore like with each new alpha start.

Since the beginning of this alpha you have been hoarding treasure map pieces from floating bottles and some other places. They haven't been working... until now!

With today's update several treasure map pieces can be combined into treasure map which will show you the spot of the treasure chest. Visit the spot with your hero to dig up the chest with some valuable treasures, including so needed blueprints and figurines of enlightment!

Today we have unlocked some planes for the Information Age, notably - the Jet Fighter and the Stealth Fighter.

Jet Fighter - improved version of the Biplane from the Industrial Age, carries more load, does more damage, a little bit tougher to destroy.

Stealth Fighter - this is the ultimate aerial unit to do unexpected damage to catch your enemies unprepared. When you send attacks with these planes only, they are invisible on the world map until they actually hit the target town.

Stealth Bomber - not yet unlocked as we want to gather your feedback about Stealth Fighter first. This unit will allow to drop bombs unexpectedly (including Atom Bombs!) which means serious damage all of a sudden. So please go ahead, try out the Stealth Fighter and let us know, so we will be able to tweak and unlock Stealth Bomber accordingly.

Long time coming, but we have finally unlocked nuclear warfare in Information Age. Nuclear warfare consists of the Atom Bomb, Nuclear Missile, and Mutual-Annihilatioin Defense. Let's take a look at each one respectively.

• Atom Bomb - built in Pyrotechnics Facility and loaded into bomber planes just like regular bomb, except it requires Uranium to be attached to your town in order to build. Also, only one bomb per plane can be loaded.
• Nuclear Missile - unlike the bomb, it delivers the damage on its own and there is no way you can stop it once it is launched. However, you can see it right after it was launched. It is the ultimate weapon, but it also costs a lot to use it, both in terms of resources, and also in terms of penalties received when you launch it.
• Mutual Annifilation Defense - if you have a Nuclear Silo built, you can also build this one to automatically launch a missile back at someone who launches a Nuclear Missile at you. It will fly faster than the attacker's and you will suffer no penalties with this automated defensive launch.

Nuclear warfare has some special effects:

• Nuclear Pollution - nuclear explosions reduce resource production down at target town for a limited time.
• Low Morale - people in your country will be depressed that you are starting a nuclear holocaust, therefore your overall culture and construction speed will be reduced for a limited time.

Nuclear weapons are too powerful, so we have added serious penalties so they will be a last resort weapon, not something you should throw back and forth just for fun.

In today's update we have made some early game changes to make the beginning of new hero and country more dynamic and fun.

There were reports that Classical Age in the game is a bit stale and the game slows down at some point after tutorial and catches pace around Medieval Age. Considering that a large part of the Classical Age players play with Stone Age units and structures, we decided to tweak the Stone Age:

1. Hunter, Nomad, and Caveman now have a serious bonus attack against monsters - this will allow players to enjoy fighting monsters, clearing monster dens, and leveling up their heroes earlier. This will also make Stone Age units more useful (especially Caveman which is almost never picked instead of Witchdoctor).
2. We have reduced population in some of the Stone Age buildings. Because of limited amount of huts and their low overall level, even with maxed huts, construction time is well over 100% until you research houses. This tweak is aimed at reducing this slowdown.
3. You can also unlock some monster dens earlier - Dendrog's Lair and Feral Tribe can be unlocked in Opposition Hideout so you can begin exploring, fighting monsters, and gaining experience faster.
4. Free settlers - if you haven't settled your second town yet for a significant time (i.e. because you are blocked with other player and domain is small), some extra settlers may join your country for free to allow you to reach this first major milestone.

I would also like to ask for contributions from players. Can you recall moments in the game when there is not much to do and all you are really doing is waiting for progress? When does it happen and why? We are looking forward to locating these boring episodes in the game and fixing them. Your opinions and experience will help a lot.

While everyone is playing Alpha 8 in Medieval Age - or maybe Renaissance at most - let me show you what goodies are waiting for you in the Information Age - if you choose to pursue this hard road. Let's take a look at buildings.

These are Thermal Power Station and Stadium. The first one will generate the sixth and final basic resource - energy. The second will boost the culture of your towns.

Now these are Datacenter and Nuclear Silo. The first will increase the production of science points unconditionally, while the second will allow you to build the ultimate weapon of this game - Nuclear Missiles

Two changes are being implemented in today's update. First, changes are being made to some Stratagem items, most importantly - the Scent of Freedom. Second, we are making life a bit easier for those players who decide to switch politics.

The Scent of Freedom and the Clockwork:

• Now you can pre-apply the Scent of Freedom on your army or a friendly army even if that army has no negative effects that need to be removed. When pre-applied, any negative effects (like Clockwork) will be immediately removed when applied to your army.
• You can pre-apply multiple Scents of Freedom on the same army to stack them.
• Clockwork duration and clockwork cool-down have both been adjusted and are now 30 minutes (was 60/120).
• Clockwork price is reduced from 3000 to 2000 to compensate for reduced duration and stimulate more active usage.
• Scent of Freedom price is increased from 1000 to 3000, as it is now significantly easier and more convenient to use. Increased price should make players put more thought into when to pre-apply it and when to use manually.

Politics Change:

• To make the game friendlier to newbies and players who like to experiment, we have removed the penalty on politics that removes one level from all buildings if you change politics for the first time. In this way newbies who picked Despotism can switch to Collectivism more gracefully. This will also stimulate players to try new politics that are unlocked later in the game.

World Map Changes:

• World Resource acquisition has been rebalanced. Acquiring each world resource now has a unique price which is more in line with a player's current development level. Special world buildings like Pasture and Mine are removed, so you no longer need them to acquire a world resource and attach it to your town. You will instead acquire it via a single button.
• Older roads now become obsolete for construction once you acquire more advanced roads.

In another attempt to make battles more interesting and fair, today we revised the Rage mechanics and added several new concepts.

1. Crusade ability added - from now on players will accumulate rage only after they unlock this ability in Medieval Age.
2. Guerrilla - a new attack type unlocked in Classical Age allows an attack on enraged players totally anonymously! No one will be able to detect it was you, even your allies. It is also possible to do group guerrilla attack, but no one will know who actually participated, even the person who started it. When you are using Guerrilla attack:
   • your armies are not visible to anyone else - even your allies - when they move
   • you do not gain rage so others won't see it increase when you attack
   • your hero is displayed as generic while he/she marches - and in the reports
   • Guerrilla attack replays do not show damage and health so players will not figure out it was you by checking attack multipliers
   • you do not increase attack and plunder in rankings
   • you can attack anyone who has rage, despite diplomatic relations, except your own alliance members
   • not all players can attack enraged players - only those who are close, but the higher rage is, the bigger distance of possible attackers is with 100% rage allowing roughly whole continent to attack the target.
3. Heroic Onslaught does not increase rage, so you will not be afraid of retaliation in the form of Guerrilla if you are hunting for stripes.
4. Pirates' anonymity is now improved similar to Guerrilla.

An important thing to note: because you begin to gain rage after you unlock Crusade in Medieval Age, it becomes more beneficial to fight earlier in Classical Age because rage will not increase and you will not face possible retaliation in form of Guerrilla.

Today we launched Alpha Test Stage 8. This new version of the game features the addition of a new Culture Victory, a whole new Information Age, totally new world map exploration mechanic, new minigame and a lot of smaller additions.

Let's go into detail about everything step by step.

Culture Victory

Up until this Alpha only War Victory and Wealth Victory had been implemented - only two victories out of a total of six. Now we are presenting a third victory type - Culture Victory. In order to achieve this you will need to build the Pantheon (unlocked in Medieval Age) and then fulfill special tasks that will increase your country cultural prominence. When you do so, special characters will begin to appear in your town. These characters are of cultural professions and have their own troubles and doubts which you will need to dispose of so they could join your country in Pantheon to boost it's culural greatness - and eventually reach the Victory.

Information Age

As always, the new Age adds a whole lot of new buildings, units, technologies, upgrades, and so on. We had previewed some of the stuff earlier, but I will describe the key ones:

1. Energy! Information Age adds a sixth and final basic resource - energy. Energy is required by a number of things in Information Age. Oil still plays a significant role in this age, but energy is taking over as well. It also requires a power grid to transfer it between towns.
2. Atom bombs and Nukes! Now it's time for some serious destruction if you can reach this far. Beware though - your own people won't be too happy about it. You will also need a global resource Uranium, which is extremely rare.
3. Helicopters - better delivery and exploration.
4. Stealth Fighters and Bombers - now you can deliver some powerful ambush attacks!
5. Aircraft Carriers - allow your planes to reach further.
6. Highways - even better than railroads!

Places of Interest on the World Map

Apart from regular quest locations, global resources, and towns of other players now you will find some new places of interest on the world map. These places of interest do not require your hero, but do require some action on your side in order to claim a reward. For example, there is a desloate mine where you can send traders and they will salvage some resources. Furthermore, you can find multiple places of interest of the same kind so they are basically endless - you will be finding more and more of them as long as you keep exploring, unlike the quest locations which are limited.

Alpha 8 is getting closer and we are going to revise things a little bit. If you want to purchase a unique appearance for your hero, you had better do it now. When Alpha 8 is launched we will be removing these items from the Cash Shop.

No worries about losing them after the wipe, as items with the Enkord Cash sign will not be wiped.

We are removing these items from the Cash Shop to make the overall image of the game a little bit more fair, following the guideline that everything that can be purchased in the Cash Shop should also be available for free through in-game means.

It is possible that at some point we will re-introduce those removed items, as quest or other in-game rewards, but for now they will be gone for good.

All Enkord Cash spent from the 1st of June, 2017 until the wipe will be returned at Alpha 8 launch, regardless of when the launch actually happens.

So far we do not have an exact date for Alpha 8 deployment, but it is getting closer and closer. So we would like to encourage players to be more active and have more fun with this refund.

The major milestone of Alpha 8 will be a whole new Information Age and the numerous tech, buildings, and units it will contain, including some unique ones like Energy (6th basic resource), Uranium (global resource which unlocks Atom Bombs and Nukes), Aircraft Carriers, and many more other interesting things. Another major improvement will be new plaсes of interest on world map, so world exploration will be much more exciting. There will be other smaller new things as well - a new minigame to say the least.

The Information Age is just around the corner and we feel it is a perfect time to tease you just a little bit with things that will be released with this new age and Alpha 8 launch.

Like always, this will be a bunch of pictures. Below you can see several Information Age hero outfits, along with some buildings and units.

Today we reduced construction time of all buildings by 30% - 45%. Higher ages received bigger reductions, but even in Stone Age time reduction is significant.

Half a year ago we did an experimental update increasing unit speed by 2 times - and it improved the game dynamics quite well. Therefore, we decided not to revert the experiment, but instead to make it permanent. This time we have decided to review building construction speed. There was an issue in the game where players researched more advanced buildings before they had a chance to properly build earlier equivalents - which means research outpaces construction. Hopefully, with today's update, it will be more balanced.

I know today's update might undercut our income. Shorter build time means less manuals used, and manuals are our #1 income generator. However, I hope this change will make the game faster, will improve its dynamic, and therefore the game will be more fun in general. Making the game more fun is always good as it will make players happier - and happy players donate better (hopefully) :)

That being said - the update is very sensitive, so please do post about your experience, how much faster the construction became, how significant this change was, how it affected your manuals usage, and so on. Your feedback will determine if this update will be kept as permanent or reverted later. Thanks in advance!