Ways of Alchemy News

[p]Hi everyone! We’re back with the sixth devlog for Ways of Alchemy. This time, we’re talking about a serious, complex topic of in-game economy, plus discussing the trading reputation and how it affects the gameplay. [/p][p]🚀 A demo, which is still available, is going to be updated with additional new content soon, so be sure to try it out – we will even have a tutorial soon! As usual, your feedback is everything![/p][p][dynamiclink][/dynamiclink][/p][h2]Balancing Gold and Gameplay: Designing an Economy That Feels Alive[/h2][p]Doesn’t get shinier than that. How are you going to spend it, though – is a different question.[/p][p]As the in-game economy is developed, developers are often challenged in a similar way to those of real-world monetary policy: money must hold value, but not become more valuable than everything else. This balance is especially important in Ways of Alchemy, where trade and economic relationships between the Alchemist and buyers play a central role in the gameplay.[/p][p][/p][h2]Buyers and Bargains: Building Reputation One Potion at a Time[/h2][p]Some buyers just want something useful, while others have genuinely curious requests…[/p][p]Buyers are the backbone of the in-game economy. As soon as you start playing, they’ll begin approaching the Alchemist, requesting various potions, ingredients, and materials. Some buyers know exactly what they want, while others are open to suggestions — you can offer them a similar potion instead. However, if you provide exactly what they're asking for, they'll always pay a bit more. Each successful deal boosts the Alchemist’s trade reputation. Such word of mouth functions as a game mechanic, attracting wealthier customers who are looking for rarer and more expensive potions.[/p][p][/p][h2]Why Word of Mouth Matters For Alchemists?[/h2][p]Luckily, there are no five-star reviews on TripAdvisor in Ways of Alchemy. In fact, no trip advisors at all – and several expeditions to attend.[/p][p]Trade reputation is a pretty significant metric in the game – sometimes it makes sense to take orders that are not really profitable so that you can get a boost in trade rep. For example, some tricky buyers prefer to avoid the high prices at the market and will happily purchase building materials from you at a discount.. Not a good deal at all, but the word-of-mouth you gain is invaluable. Originally, the game even featured a “non-finished order” counter that affected the trade reputation, but that didn’t feel right at all, so it’s been cut.[/p][p][/p][h2]No Buyers? No Problem: Sending Your Adventurer to Search for Customers[/h2][p]Brass-statue face attracts customers; they want the same cool looking one! Just kidding, of course, its power simply makes it easier to persuade people.[/p][p]Buyers come to you randomly. While randomness adds excitement and unpredictability to gameplay, our philosophy is that it feels better when the player has some agency, especially when luck turns a bit too cruel. If, by the D20’s will, there’s no dice (pun intended) and no buyers show up at all, you’re not powerless. You can increase the Mirror pillar of your adventurer (by equipping an item that boosts this stat) and send them out to the streets of your town, where they’ll happily promote your shop and attract new customers.[/p][p][/p][h2]Low Risk, Low Reward: How the Pharmacy Keeps You Alive[/h2][p]Where do they spend their profit money they make while dealing with you? We’ll never know.[/p][p]But wait, isn’t it based on cruel randomness, too? You may ask. And you’ll be right! And that’s why we added a pharmacy to the game, to help you get money quickly and efficiently. Sisters of Three-Bodied God have a pharmacy and will gladly purchase your potions. The catch is that it will be the lowest price ever. Low risk, low rewards. For being a mediator, these nuns will take a great amount of their cut. They will pay a single (!) coin for the Coagulation potion. Let the three-bodied God be the judge.[/p][p][/p][h2]Why It's Important To Teach the Alchemist How To Work Hard[/h2][p]Hard labour is something you have to learn. It may seem a bit too strange to do it as an Alchemist, but it’s generally pretty rewarding, just like in early life.[/p][p]With all that, they are ready to teach the Alchemist or any Adventurers the skill of labour for a large amount of money. The higher the rank of this labour, the more expensive it will be.[/p][p]We wanted to provide players wil options to improve their character for money, but not connect it to alchemy. After all, the forbidden knowledge can’t be bought. Basic things, like hard labour, can be taught for money though. [/p][p][/p][h2]Earning the Trust of Adventurers, One Safe Expedition at a Time[/h2][p]Nobody wants to go on suicide missions. Prove your good intentions and they will want to work with you.[/p][p]An important part of your budgeting plan involves hiring adventurers. These individuals are essential, as they gather the rare materials needed for your alchemic deeds, making them invaluable. First, you'll need to provide living space for each adventurer you hire. Second, you can't simply throw money at the problem and expect to hire a royal guard. At the start, only the most reckless and affordable adventurers will agree to join you. Gaining the respect and trust of more experienced adventurers will take some time and successfully finished expeditions. With each expedition that went safe and sound, your guild’s reputation will grow, attracting stronger adventurers.[/p][p][/p][h2]Why the Market Exists, And Why It’s Overpriced[/h2][p]If only there could be a way to find materials and food without going to crowded, expensive places like this…[/p][p]And of course, there’s a market. This is where you can buy plant seeds, building materials and some food. Except for seeds, it will be cheaper to get things somewhere else, but the presence of a market is important so that you can actually spend your money comfortably. High-level materials will cost a fortune here… and yet, purchasing them will allow you not to wait for eternity as you make them by yourself.[/p][p]There’s another way to earn money at the market — once your trade reputation reaches a certain level, you can open your own small shop to sell potions directly, without having to worry about finding buyers. However, the Adventurers’ Guild frowns upon market sellers and will look down on you if you choose this path.[/p][p][/p][h2]Medieval Landlords, Land Prices and the Cost of Your Growth[/h2][p]Land has tons of opportunities, so it’s essential to possess it. But just like in real life, not even being an Alchemist makes it easy to own it.[/p][p]Another crucial aspect of the economic balance is land price. It ties together various parts of your farm's development: you need land to grow ingredients, provide housing for workers and expand operations. While you can obtain all of these things, you’ll have to choose between acquiring a little of everything or focusing on a few elements in greater quantity. Keep in mind that land prices will continue to rise drastically over time.[/p][p][/p][h2]Economy is Everywhere & Everything[/h2][p]Everything revolves around the economy, especially going to sinister places like Extinct Hamlets of the Halflings to seek out rewards.[/p][p]The in-game economy is also affected by other systems – the tax collector, royal orders and adventures. We have already touched upon some of these topics in previous devlogs and will talk more about others later on. If you have already played our demo, how did you feel about the economic balance? Did you manage to get rich not knowing where else you could potentially splurge or did you make every bronze denier count?[/p][p][/p][p][dynamiclink][/dynamiclink]
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Welcome to the fifth devlog of Ways of Alchemy! This time, we are talking about the in-game friction points – Inquisition and Tax inspection. As the old saying goes, no one cares more about your well-being than the people who tax you.

🚀 Don’t forget: a free demo is available if you haven’t tried it yet! Soon it’s going to be updated with some extra tweaks and a new tutorial, so don’t miss out on it!

King’s servants in the flesh. Perhaps you should be kind to them – they’re just doing their jobs.

[h2]How We’re Using Law and Order to Spice Up The Game[/h2]
One of the key elements of our game is the King’s servants – the Inquisitor and the Tax Collector.
They present quite a challenging obstacle for players, but also serve some other functions. They “notice” what players are doing and how they play and represent a “point of view” on what happens in the players’ shack.

As you design videogames, it’s very important that players’ actions can be seen by the world they’re interacting with – and for that, we have the inculpation and exculpation systems. Let’s look into it.

A pretty simple morality system that blends with other gameplay mechanics – pretty happy with how it all turned out!

We deliberately divided this system in half to show that people remember both good and bad deeds, which turn into something in the middle with the passage of time. This system enhances the players’ actions very well – the king’s orders and treating illnesses will eventually not only make you richer but also allow you to be indulged. Surely you don’t want to punish a person who helps others, even if he previously did something bad, right?

[h2]Inquisitor and The Dillemma: Clean Hands or Cuffed Wrists?[/h2]
Yes, salvia powder is considered an illegal ingredient. You may want to hide it away from the Inquisitor.

Inquisitor comes to a player to search for illegal potions or traces of other crimes, threatening imprisonment for the player.

• If he discovers poisons, points of inculpation will be scored.
  
• But if something even more illegal is discovered, he will also, in addition to scoring, take it as evidence.
  

This leads to the necessity for a player to avoid this process, which makes gameplay a bit spicier and sharper.

[h2]Bad Reputation: How It Affects Your Interaction with the Inquisitor[/h2]

You can hide your dark secrets from the Inquisitor if you don’t have too many of them. There are solutions, even if you have a human corpse on your patch yard. But you can’t hide everything, some evidence can’t be hidden. And a bad reputation is even worse. If your neighbors noticed you went to the forest with someone and came back alone, with a shovel on your shoulder, they start gossiping and only a big amount of time can wash away a smear like this…

No one wants to live near a place that reeks of death, right? Even in harsh medieval times.

It’s pretty dire when you have tons of forbidden items on your patch and people don’t look you in the eye and whispering around and spreading rumors – persuading the Inquisitor that everything is okay will be pretty difficult. A king’s order that says you can do anything could be pretty convenient in a situation like this, but if you don’t have it, you can rely on shiny coins and brutal murders. Let’s talk about these!

Bad reputation, sadly, doesn’t really provide you with cool-looking horns on your head, so you’d better avoid it at all costs.

The Inquisitor can be bribed to be quiet. But inevitably, he will want more and more. Sooner or later, it may become a burden. Sure, you can try to bribe a greedy servant again, this time with a one-way ticket to Heaven, and whether you succeed or not, it will be considered as one of the worst crimes. And even if you manage to do that, an Inquisitor’s successor will come by and try to investigate what happened to his former colleague. It’s a never-ending situation: the authorities will keep getting stronger.

[h2]Tax Collector and The Dilemma: To Pay or Not To Pay?[/h2]
Tax Collector is a simple mind – all that glitters is gold, no additional questions asked.

Tax Collector is not as dangerous as the Inquisitor, but he’s definitely more methodical:

• He comes to your area, knowing exactly what you are and what you’re worth.
  
• He wants a tenth of your money as a “tax fee”, but he can’t take it unless you give it to him.
  
• Pay him – and he will be eternally grateful.
  
• Give him a few more coins and score some exculpation points.
  
• Or don’t pay at all! It will result in a crime card appearing, which will inevitably attract the Inquisitor.
  

That’s what makes a Tax Collector different from the Inquisitor, he’s like a light version that you can “work together” with and only leads to more obstacles if you choose not to.

[h2]Conclusion: Inculpation & Exculpation Bind Gameplay Together[/h2]
As you can see, these inculpation and exculpation systems are interconnected and overall glue together other things that happen in the game, such as scars from being imprisoned, which we covered in devlog #3. In addition, it makes you consider things that make gameplay more challenging – there are some obstacles that won’t let you breathe too easily!

How do you feel – aren’t the king’s servants a bit too aggressive for a relaxing vibe we’re striving for? Let us know what you think.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3519740/Ways_of_Alchemy_Demo/

Hi, and welcome to the fourth devlog! Today’s topic is Adventures: we talk about expanding our world’s borders with simple names of the places and how thoughtful preparation, along with a properly picked potion, helps you to save the lives of your hired hands.

🚀 Don’t forget: a free demo is available if you haven’t tried it yet! As we’re putting the final touches on the game and preparing for the release, we’d love to hear our players’ feedback to ensure we won’t miss anything significant!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3519740/Ways_of_Alchemy_Demo/

[h2]⚔️ How Adventures Affected Our Game: Enhancing Potion Mechanics and Expanding the Game’s World[/h2]
Adventure is the lifeblood of fantasy games – hardly anyone is going to argue with that! But what do adventures have to do with alchemy? And why did we make a big part of the game out of it?

Adventures allowed us to achieve several things: first is to add a practical layer of meaning to potions you brew. Now, you don’t just sell them – you use them while your hired hands go on adventures, to help them overcome monsters who secure the treasure cave!

And the second thing is… a bit more complex than that. Let’s talk about it in detail.

There are many places you can go to, and some of them sound so tempting and alluring. What will await you in Singing Valleys? Will these songs be deadly?

[h2]🌍 How We Enhanced Worldbuilding With Intriguing Adventures’ Names And Made Singing Valleys Truly Sing In Your Head[/h2]
Adventures also helped us to expand the game’s world and make it wider and richer with details. As soon as you hear about the “Singing Valleys”, you start thinking about this place and its location, expanding the gaming realm in your head. A magical place where you can find people with canine heads – located beyond the forest, beyond the hills and mountains.

In this context, our Alchemist stops being your friendly local witch doctor and turns into a mysterious sage, possessing knowledge of lands far away, breaking the ancient seals, gaining forbidden knowledge not only from the human psyche but also from old sanctuaries.

Will it be enough for an adventure? Probably, but an extra potion to use when a challenge comes won’t hurt!

[h2]🧪 Two Ways Of Using Potions: Drinking and Throwing[/h2]
Since Adventures originated with the alchemic decisions in mind, potions ended up having not one, but two usages. We liked the idea of “a power-up” for the adventurer: picture him drinking a potion, his pupils expanding, and him coming to deal with the monster in the cave! But we also liked that a potion can be thrown at the monster. Both of these are ways of dealing with dangers in the style of alchemy.

A drinking potion will enhance the adventurer’s abilities. Potion of Rage may sound scary, but it will make your adventurer incredibly powerful.


[h2]🎯 Two Paths to Success: Preparing or Taking Risks[/h2]
As a result, at the beginning of the adventure, we show our players what kind of pillars they will require so that they can prepare adventurers by giving them a potion to “power up” and equipping them with artifacts. And then, in the process of ongoing adventure, players will have the option to use a different potion for the additional bonus in dealing with challenges.

• The first method is pretty effective: you spend one potion per adventure and “brute force” the adventures – either you get lucky or don’t, depending on the difficulty of the challenge.
  
• The second method requires more potions for each new challenge (up to four in each adventure! – quite a lot), but guarantees the successful results, even if you send a weak peasant to deal with the most cursed temples of them all. This also shows the power of the Alchemist quite well: if he takes preparation seriously, he becomes unstoppable.
  

As you prepare to go on an adventure, you can choose whatever may work and help. Approach it with careful thought!

[h2]☠️ The Price of Careless Preparation: Extra Cost & Scars[/h2]
This preparation mechanic turned out to be the most demanding in the whole game. It’s not too complex, yet it has a lot of negative consequences. A wrong recipe doesn’t lead to wasting ingredients – you simply cannot do it. But wrong, mindless preparation for adventures spends your coins, food and even scars the adventurer (we wrote a post about it recently – check it out).

We think we managed to create dangerous and risky adventures exactly how they should be – well, risky and dangerous. And yet, we still worry a lot about getting this aspect of our game right.

First scar after one of the adventures that went wrong. One more scar – and you start playing with death.

[h2]Risk Or Safety – It’s Up To You! Choose Between High Stakes and Thoughtful Preparations[/h2]
What do you think? Is it fun and engaging for you, the players, to risk as you venture towards the adventures? Or perhaps the fool-proof (you can start the expedition only if your preparation is strong enough) method would work better? Your ideas are more than welcome! And if you haven’t tried the demo, give it a go!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3519740/Ways_of_Alchemy_Demo/

Hello everyone! We’re back with our third devlog, in which we are going to speak about Ways of Alchemy’s survival mechanics and how we figured out how to make it more interesting during the development.

Bear in mind that Ways of Alchemy demo is still here for you to try out if you haven’t already – your feedback and impressions are greatly appreciated as we work on finishing the game!


To make our game and its story feel more vital — and to avoid it becoming just a puzzle game about matching potions and recipes — we decided to introduce survival elements that could lead to death. After all, there’s no better way to highlight the weight of your actions than by making the characters mortal. We settled on three core survival mechanics: Hunger, Energy and Scars.


[h2]Energy Won’t Break You[/h2]
The most lenient mechanic is Energy – it simply slows you down by increasing the amount of time required to complete certain tasks. You have to be extremely tired to actually feel its pressure - penalties only begin once you reach 5 fatigue points. We didn't want our players to constantly need rest after performing basic chores!

[h2]Hunger Kills[/h2]


Originally, the harshest mechanic used to be the Hunger – in early versions, when it reached zero, a character would die. If it were the Alchemist himself, that would be a game over screen.
Early internal playtest indicated that this is too hardcore for many players – we needed a more complicated system that punishes players not as harshly for their missteps. We found the solution in Scars mechanics.

[h2]Ways of Getting Scarred[/h2]


Originally we made Scars for Adventurers to indicate how their failures affect them physically but possess a valuable experience for them:

• With every scar received during the unsuccessful adventure, an associated Pillar would grow for them, meaning they would have more chance to survive it in future adventures.
  
• However, the more scars they have, the higher the chance for them to die – every scar after a second scar poses the risk of death. Their survival would be a question of luck for them.
  

We implemented the same Scars mechanic into the existing Hunger mechanic – regular “fasting” will now lead to Veil Fresh Trauma for characters and inevitably kill them if they frequently starve. If your alchemist is so busy with alchemic life that he’s getting fourth trauma for Starvation, perhaps it will be better to start anew…

Alchemist doesn't go on deadly adventures and won't get scars from beasts and storms – adventurers will do the dirty work for him... And yet, he's not safe even from everyday misfortunes – home accidents are inevitable if you send him (instead of a hired hand) to deal with chores or unfinished business – beware of squirrels!

We wanted to provide Alchemist with an option to deal with troubles on his own, with the help of potions. And that’s how we came up with traumas.

[h2]Traumas And How To Heal Them[/h2]


After the in-game failure, a character can now get traumatized. Luckily, in a short period, you can heal it with a potion. If it’s not healed quickly, a scar will appear.

Here’s how it works:

• All traumas and potions are based on five in-game pillars and you need to create a potion that belongs to a pillar that is the opposite of the trauma’s pillar. For example, Song Potion will heal the Veil Trauma.
  
• This potion’s level must be higher than the level of trauma a character received.
  

However, there’s always a place for improvement: we received feedback from players showing that they want to be able to treat scars as well as traumas: after all, it takes a particularly prepared alchemist with potions for all possible occasions to react to traumas quickly and avoid scarring.

And yet, we don’t want to make it too easy and consequence-free, to completely remove the importance of human lives from the game – we feel as if people will put their alchemist in danger too often, making a lot of challenging game aspects (like meeting the Inquisitor) too trivial…

Let us know what you think about this dilemma: how do you feel about the difficulty and scars mechanics in Ways of Alchemy?

Alchemists, a week ago, Steam Next Fest, for which we released our new demo, was finished. Now, we’d like to share its results with you. But first, we'd like to remind you that the demo remains accessible until March 31, so if you haven’t played yet – do so!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3519740/Ways_of_Alchemy_Demo/?utm_source=steam&utm_medium=hub&utm_campaign=alchemist&utm_content=demo-results

[h2]🎮 New Players and Video Coverage[/h2]
We’re immensely happy to see new players giving our alchemic sim a shot! Feedback on Steam, Reddit and Discord was also very helpful in bug squashing and issue resolving.
Two big videos were made by SplatterCat and InterndotGIF. Not only did it attract some new attention to the game (for which we’re grateful!), but we also had a lot of fun watching them play the game and hearing their thoughts – this will help to shape things up for the release!

[h2]💬 What We Need to Improve[/h2]
First of all, we’re happy to receive a lot of positive feedback and some criticism towards the UI, spelling and QoL aspects, such as stacking issues, as well. These were heard and will be resolved in the future! There were other minor hiccups and bugs that we’re currently resolving/have already resolved. Thank you for staying vigilant and letting us know about these!

[h2]💡 Some Interesting Suggestions[/h2]
We also held a survey and asked you about your suggestions and what kind of feature you would like to improve in the game. As a result, the most voted options for the game’s expansion were making new magical mechanics and improving the world depth with more characters and their stories. This is also taken into consideration! Take a look at the results over here.


🚀 The demo will still be available until March 31, so if you haven’t played yet – do so! We’d love to hear what you think of it. Wishlist us on Steam!