Cosmo Clock 21
Banned
*50,000 Likes Event*
[Duration]: 9/26 (Thu), midnight - 10/3 (Thu), 11:59 PM (PDT)
The team would like to thank our fans (about 50,000 times!) for helping us reach this milestone. We've got lots of fun (and challenging) event Dungeons for both veteran and beginner players alike.
■①Daily Log-in Bonuses
1 Free Magic Stone [9/26 4:00 AM - 10/3]
※Magic Stone will be distributed as late as 3:59 AM (PDT) the following day.
■② 3-days of Poring POWER!!!
Everyone's favorite Skill Up buffet will be available from 9/28 12:00 AM - 9/30 11:59 PM (PDT)
■③ Special Event Dungeon Schedule:
9/26 - Dragon Guardian
9/27 - Heroes Descended!
9/28 - Hera-Ur Descended!
9/29 - Sword of Flames
9/30 - Zeus Descended!
10/1 - Scarlet Snake Princess
10/3 - The Goddess Descended!
■④ Awesome Daily Bonuses
2x King appearance rates for the Metal/Gold and Jewel Dragons
[We will also have a special visits from the Super King Dragons - (including an invasion from one of the Jeweled Super Kings)]
2x Drops for special daily Dungeons
2x Coins for the Weekend Tricolor Dungeon (normally just 1.5x)
2x Skill Up rate
King Metal/Jewel Dragons at the Pal Egg Machine
[Godfest info coming soon!]
*Events subject to change without notice or compensation - see event policy here http://tinyurl.com/cj7zu4t
1. Never spend your magic stones on anything aside from monster box expansions and rare pulls during Godfests (not carnivals)
2. Don't play a Special dungeon unless you are hunting for something specific in them. Otherwise you're just wasting what little stamina you have
3. This isn't quite like Bejeweled; you can move your selected gem anywhere on the board for a limited time. Try to match as much of the field as you can if possible. Link five or more of the same colored gem to unleash an AOE attack
4. Go to your Monster Box and FAV everything you don't want to accidently fuse away
5. Back your data up regularly on iTunes/iCloud/whatever. The game has no login system; your account credentials are stored in the app itself
Developer: Gung-Ho Online Entertainment
Website: http://www.gunghoonline.com/games/puzzle-dragons/
Requirements: iPod/iPhone/iPad with iOS 5.0+ or Android 2.3+
Download: iOS / Android (US) || iOS / Android / Kindle Fire (JP)
Price: Free! with IAP
Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCX-Tz8KpXE
Downloading from outside the US
(alternatively, downloading the JP version because you still want to play more crack dragons while your stamina recharges)
P&D is currently only available in Japan and the US for whatever reason. If you're outside these regions and want to play you can...
iOS: Make a US-region iTunes account without needing a credit card
Android: Use APK Downloader with Android and Google Chrome. The APK you are looking for is here.
Useful Links
English Wiki
US monsterbook, includes dungeon timers, stat calculators, and other stuff
Unofficial forum, has good guides
English Facebook group, lots of good FAQs and keeps times of Metal Dragon schedule
Panda - Events and Alarm, a nice helper app for dungeon schedules
i-FunBox, iOS backup/reroll app, jailbreak not required
Helium, Android backup app, root not required
Titanium backup, Android backup app, root required
The Japanese phenomenon, now in English! Puzzle & Dragons combines Pokemon, Bejeweled, hardcore dungeon crawler RPGs, social gaming, and crack cocaine into one app. In Japan, it's remained at the top of the iTunes charts for over six months, currently has over 15 million downloads, and even got its own TV commercial.
Assemble a team out of hundreds of monsters to wipe out everything that moves in the dungeons! Power up your critters by feeding them other monsters in a bizarre cannibalistic ritual! Spend your paycheck buying IAP so you can evolve literal Egyptian Gods* into anime lolis! Wait a second...
Seriously though, while PAD may look like yet another shitty Japanese iOS freemium cash-in, the game is surprisngly deep. We're talking 30+ hours of content just to reach the real "meat" of the game, and GungHo will continue to add more new dungeons and monsters over time. You know how people describe the "Tetris Effect" where they'll see falling blocks everywhere? This game will do that to you too.
The strategies needed to beat later dungeons could fill pages and pages of text (and in fact has, if you look at the number of pages in this thread). You'll need proper hardcore RPG planning before going into a dungeon if you don't want to get slaughtered instantly, and once in battle use pro puzzle gem moving skills to execute your plans. And if you're into that shitton of numbers going up always thing, this game has that too.
Here's a video showing the kinds of broken stuff you'll be able to pull off at endgame:
VS Hera Superplay
But I'm getting way ahead of myself. Let's start with the basics:
Combo Tips
* the Egyptian God update hadn't hit Global as of the time of first posting, but they're in the game now!
Screenshots
Magic Stones, The God Decision, And You
GungHo's strategy for sucking your wallets dry consists of selling Magic Stones to you. Unless you hand over your credit card info, they only come from special events, logging in for X number of total days, or from clearing an entire set of stages in a dungeon. These rocks can be spent to do one a number of things:
1. Expanding your friends list (don't do this)
2. Refilling your stamina to full (don't do this unless you absolutely MUST get in one last event dungeon run)
3. Revive when you die in a dungeon (don't do this unless you got some amazing egg drop from a mob)
4. Add 5 more slots to your monster box (do this only if you don't want to get rid of anything else)
5. Spend 5 to use the rare egg gachapon (do this especially during a rare egg special event)
You might notice that last one is the only bullet point I don't recommend against. Why? Because the rare egg machine has a slim chance of giving you a 5* monster, or even a fabled ~* God Monster *~. In the long run, getting a chance at an awesome monster far outweighs the benefits of being able to play slightly longer for the day. That's why the first egg pull is so important: the tutorial is the only time when the game dumps five stones on you and gives you a free shot at obtaining God. Some people will advise you to make a new account and replay the tutorial until you get one of a certain few monsters.
Later in the game, especially after beating the Castle of
I'm a strong proponent for rerolling, but the rest of GAF disagrees with me, because pretty much everything that comes out of the rare machine will be useful in some type of team. Plus you'll always have more chances to get rainbow stones over the course of your Puzzle & Dragons career. The decision is up to you.
S Tier: Archangel Lucifer > Horus > Isis
Congrats! You've acquired the cream of the crop - a monster that will take you all the way to endgame and then some.
A Tier: Ares, Hermes, Artemis, Haku, "Dark" Metatron > Freyr, Idunn&Idunna, Freyja, Leilan, Karin
These monsters are solid leaders that will carry you through the first month or so of content without breaking a sweat, but may run into trouble tackling the most difficult content the game has to offer.
B Tier: Valkyrie, Meimei, Loki > Baal, Bastet, "Blue" Odin, Uriel, Gabriel, Michael, "Light" Metatron > Shiva, Parvati, Persephone, Thor
These monsters have flaws that make them unsuitable as leaders for all lategame content, or are useful only in specific endgame dungeons, but may serve as a good sub on a different team.
I don't want to reroll anymore: Apollo, Lakshmi, "Green" Odin, Siegfried
Self-explanatory.
Savant Tier: Ra > Sakuya
Monsters that require prodigious puzzle skills or heavenly luck to be utilized to their full potential.
Rerolling an account
So how do you get a new account? There's no login system; the game simply stores your account information as app data, although actual data is serverside. This also makes it important to back up your data frequently. Anyways, there are two ways to get a new account for each smartphone platform. Choose whichever one works easiest for you.
iOS
- Delete the app and redownload it, or
- Jailbreak your phone or use a program like iFunBox and delete data048.bin. May be a little flaky. Remember to make a backup of your old files (data056.bin keeps your monster box, for future backup reference).
- Delete the app and redownload it, or
- ICS or later: under Settings, go to the app and choose "Clear Data" (I don't actually have an Android so I don’t know the exact steps). Otherwise root your device and delete data048.bin
Unlike Bejeweled, once you choose a gem you can move it anywhere on the board for a short duration of time. Use this opportunity to rack up some huuuuge combos (check out the cheevos for the game; they expect you to do this). Here are some common ways to "solve" a pattern of three orbs:
While you can get away with playing earlier dungeons by ear, in the later stages you'll be required to whip out 4+ combos on command to get out of tight situations. You aren't forced to move the orb as soon as your turn begins; take some time to identify clusters of orbs that can be matched quickly and plan out your route to success.
Monster Feeding
Monsters level up and become stronger by feeding other monsters to them. You can feed up to five monsters in one shot, and the stronger the monster, the more EXP it gives. You might even get lucky and get a x1.5 or even a x2.0 EXP boost during feeding!
Tips to get the most out of monster feeding:
- Feeding a monster using monsters of the same element increases the EXP recieved by 50%!
- During your travels you may find eggs marked with a + sign. This means the monster has an increase in one of its HP/ATK/RCV stats. Feeding one monster to another transfers all of its stat boosts! (also if you get an Amaterasu feed as much +RCV as you can to her)
- Feeding a monster to another with the same Active Skill has a small chance of granting a Skill Up! This probability does not increase with the number of monsters fed, so feeding five Marine Goblins to a Siren will have the same chance of a Skill Up happening as if you fed it one
The Chinese wiki has EXP Charts showing how much experience monsters need to level up (now also in English thanks to Jinko). I recommend attempting to feed a monster to max level as quickly as possible. Why? The amount of money you pay for a fusion scales with the base monster's current level. So you could either feed a monster to max level by feeding it five monsters one by one, which would be hella expensive, or from LV1 with all five of them at the same time, which would cost just cost 500 gold.
What exactly should you feed to a monster to minimize the money you need to spend? As it turns out, certain monsters give more EXP than others. At low levels, regular dungeon fodder will be adequate for leveling up. After about LV10, you should instead fuse those feeders to Carbuncles, then feed the Carbuncles to whatever you actually want to raise. You'll also occasionally come across Metal Dragons during the course of your travels, and King Metal Dragons will give a whopping 100k EXP to a monster of the same element!
Later in the game, you'll start finding "Evolve Material" called Pengdras, which at LV10 give 9000 EXP to a monster of the same element, or after evolving a cool 45000 EXP. Since feeding gets more expensive as the monster rises in level, using Metal Dragons or Pengdras to level up your monsters becomes the recommended way to go.
Monster Evolution
Many monsters have the ability to undergo evolution once they've reached max level. In exchange for some money, a few monsters, and a reset to Level 1, you get a sicker lookin dragon, better base stats, and even possibly new skills. You can check what monsters can evolve and what's necessary for evolution from the Evolve Fusion menu. Monsters which can evolve and have the required materials are completely displayed, monsters which can evolve but are missing the required materials are slightly transparent, and monsters that can't evolve at all are almost completely transparent.
Almost every evolution requires "Evolve Material" monsters. Here's where to farm for them:
Lits (aka Rubylit, Sapphlit, etc.): 1* elemental dungeons (Dungeon of Wood, Light, etc.), Friday Dungeon on Adept
Evolve Masks: 2* elemental dungeons
Demon Masks: 3* elemental dungeons
Keepers: Tuesday Dungeon. Fire/Water/Earth are the bosses of each dungeon, while the Light and Dark ones are random encounters within. Strategy
Dublits: Friday Dungeon on Expert
The following are used to evolve Dragon-type monsters and are all found in the Thursday Dungeon, but can be found less reliably in other locations:
Dragon Seed: Departure Tower
Dragon Plant: Tower of Trials
Dragon Flower: Tower of Giants
Dragon Fruit: Thursday Dungeon only!
~Special~ Evolve Materials:
Mythlit: Friday Dungeon boss on Adept
Mystic Mask: Wednesday Dungeon, Expert. Strategy
Keeper of Rainbow: Tuesday Dungeon
Dubmythlit: Friday Dungeon, Expert
Special Dungeons
You may have noticed a tab in the list of dungeons labeled "Special" which features a bunch of stamina-intensive dungeons. These dungeons contain very specialized mobs, such as large quantities of Evolution Materials or Metal Dragons, or certain gimmicks, like missing light/dark gems or recovery gems. You should only enter these dungeons if you have a very specific need to do so. If you're wondering if you might be able to survive a given special dungeon, some of them are labeled with difficulty levels that correspond roughly to the following:
Novice: 1-2* normal dungeons
Adept: 2-3* normal dungeons
Expert: post-Castle of Satan
Master: you are already dead
Additionally, some dungeons always appear on certain days of the week. Here's what they're good for farming:
Monday: no dungeon
Tuesday: Keepers
Wednesday: Masks
Thursday: Dragon Seed/Plant/Flower/Fruit
Friday: Lits and Dublits
Weekends: Cold hard cash. Tower of Giants - Dragons of the Tower also goes to half stamina and has one of the best EXP:stamina ratios in the game
The Facebook group's FAQ explains Metal Dragons and their Special Dungeon schedule in far greater detail than I'm willing to summarize, so I'm just going to link to it from here.
Team Building 101
So you're sitting there getting blown up by a dumb Flammie in one of the early dungeons and you're like "what the hell?" Well, with one look at your team roster, no wonder you're getting slammed! Early on, it's difficult to scrounge up a skeleton crew much less a super kickass army, but I did well cobbling the following team together:
Your starter dragon. There's a reason why they gave him to you for free, you know! Its leader skill also incentivizes you adding monsters of the same element to your team, so do that.
Your rare pull. Unless you got a super rare one and your team points are too low to equip it lol
An attack/technique monster: Gotta get that damage in! Try to have it match the element of your leader.
A healer. If you didn't get one of the five Healer girls from the rare machine, they also drop rarely as the bosses of some of the early dungeons. The 2* form of Carbuncles will also do in a pinch.
A slime/goblin. All of them have orb changing skills when evolved to 2*, and like Carbuncles, require relatively easy to acquire materials to evolve.
If you get something better out of the Pal or Rare machine, obviously swap those in where appropriate. Once you reach harder dungeons, you'll need to start specializing to deal with the specific hazards within. What strategy you want to prepare for those depends both on what monsters you currently own and what you're willing to put up with to fill holes in your team. Post your troubles in the thread and we'll try to help you out.
By adding a player to your friends list, not only do you get to add their leader to your party, but you also get the benefit of their leader skill! Fire dungeon doing too much damage to you? Bring a leader that cuts fire damage received by half! Love big numbers? Pair a friend's 2x watter attack with your own and do four times as much damage! You also get points to spend on the Pal Egg Machine, which can occasionally spit out some cool monsters.
GAF Friends Army
Venture forth, brave explorer, and team up with other GAF members! Add @GAF to the end of your nickname so fellow GAFers can find you out on the field:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AhOCApI3pSVRdC0wWHQ3X2F5MnB6LWNNQUJJWG9Tb0E#gid=3
You may have to go back to the title screen/restart the app for requests to appear.
LV20 Gift
When you reach level 20, the game gives you the opportunity to share a gift with somebody on your friendslist. Each gift gives both the sender and the recipient an opportunity to get another one of the three starter dragons, or the light/dark variant. By swapping gifts with someone else you get two tries at getting the light and dark ones! This is a one-time deal, so instead of wasting it on some random, post your friendcode up in this thread and swap with a GAFer! Again, if you don't receive the present immediately, go back to the title screen or restart the app.
Thanks to rocksteady1983 for the banner images!