In Dreamlords, you progress by building a city, building by building, and researching various technologies. These technologies can help you grow your city and expand your army with stronger and better units and special abilities for your troops, and increase the effectiveness of most aspects of your Patria. Technologies also unlock trait points that can be spent in the many trait trees to enhance both your Dreamlord and your people. Certain technologies even let you craft new equipment for your troops, or enhancements to existing items.
First, you need to be logged in to the Patria Manager on the web, and navigate to the Management screen (second button from the left in the lower row of buttons).
Now, it all depends on what you want to do; there are several buildings in Dreamlords that do different things, and each building has its own technology tree. You may need to construct a new building (by clicking an empty building slot and selecting one of the buildings in the list that appears) or you can concentrate on research in your current buildings. Bring up a building's control panel by clicking its icon. To the right, you'll see a couple of tabs all dealing with the building you've selected.
First, there is the “Information” tab which is an important first step in researching, because it's here that you can hire more workers to the building. Workers are needed to perform any research in the building at all. Note that there is a “Ideal” amount of workers for each building. Hiring more workers than the ideal amount will increase the output of the building, but not much. You can increase the ideal amount of workers by upgrading the building. Hire a few workers if you need to.
Then head over to the second tab, the “Research” tab. This will show you the entire tech tree for this building, and as implied, technologies are organized in a “tree” structure. This means that you need to research the roots first (the top of the tech tree) before you can research techs on the branches.
Click a technology to bring up its information window. From here, you can click “research” to instantly make your workers start researching the technology which takes various amount of time based on the difficulty of the technology and the effectiveness of your workers. Once you've researched a main technology, there might even be one or more mini-techs inside that you can start researching. Note that there is no drawback in production efficiency from performing research!
Expedition size is the limit of how many squads you're allowed to take with you on Patria (PvE) missions. Every unit type take different amounts of space in an expedition. Say for example that one of your units has an expedition cost of 30, and another unit has an expedition size of 50. This means that if you want to dispatch two of the first unit type and one of the second type, you'd need an expedition size of at least 110 (30 + 30 + 50).
You increase your expedition size mainly through increasing the production output of your Training Grounds (Warfare) building. To put it simple; hire more workers to the building, upgrade it and equip it with orbs and scrolls to increase its output. There are also certain traits that help you increase your expedition size.
The first thing every army needs is a Training Grounds (Warfare) building. If you've just started playing, one have already been built for you. This building will let you research the basic units you need and then improve them with abilities and upgrades, as well as increasing their proficiency in wearing more advanced equipment. Make sure you have workers in the building, and research some unit types. This should take only a few minutes with the first units.
Once complete, you will be able to train squads of these units. But how? To train squads, you need to log into the game client software, and head over to the Army Headquarters screen (middle navigation button in the top left corner). At the top of this screen, you'll see a list of all unit types available for your race, as well as your Dreamlord itself. Researched units will have their portraits lit up. Click one of the researched units to bring up its information section. In this section, you can click “Train squad” to train a squad of that unit type.
Note however that training squads cost two different resources. First, you need unemployed followers. Yes, workers of your Training Grounds building cannot be trained to work in your army unless you fire them first (turning them into unemployed followers after their rehabilitation). Second, you need Military Supplies, and the only way to gain such supplies is through the Training Grounds building. Military Supplies is constantly produced by the building automatically as long as you have workers there. The cost of training a squad will be shown to you when you hover the “Train squad” button with your mouse, as well as information about how many unemployed followers and supplies you currently have.
There are a few different levels in Dreamlords, and it's good to know how these work and what they mean.
Your Dreamlord rank is based on the total amount of followers (with homes) that you've had through all eras. Maxing out your followers during one Era will cause you to gain approximately 2 ranks. Advancing in Dreamlord Rank will give you a new title, as well as an increase in Dreamlord Gear level. This means that you will be able to wear new and more powerful Dreamlord gear.
Army gear level is increased by researching certain technologies in the Training Grounds (Warfare) building. A higher gear level will allow your troops to equip more powerful items.
Your PvP level determines on which PvP islands you're allowed to do battle, and you increase this level by increasing the power of your army. Any technology that increases the potential of your army's power (such as new special abilities, new units and new army gear levels) will count when determining your PvP level. What perticular gear and tomes you choose to equip do not count, however.
Monsters on your Patria range from level 1 to 50, and possibly even higher. This is simply a measurement of how strong they are, and it's really up to you to try for yourself what level of monsters you are comfortable with. The higher the level of the monster, the tougher they are, and the better the loot they drop.
First, take a deep breath and relax. Second, log into the game client and talk to people. If you find a support crew or one of the developers online in the chat, don't hesitate to send us a question. Ask questions, and don't be afraid of not knowing things - because trust us; everyone was confused at the start of their Dreamlords experience. Why not try to find and join a friendly convergence that might give you some advice and pointers! Third, take your time and experiment. Remember that Dreamlords The Reawakening is free to play, and that you decide your pace yourself.
The Patria is where you and your people live. It's a floating island, and you are the very soul of it, and it's your purpose to vanquish the evils threatening your world and to protect your people.
Dreamlords The Reawakening uses an Era system, which means that the game world runs for aproximately 2 months and is then reset. Your Patria along with buildings, followers and resources vanish and everyone starts again anew with the dawn of a new Era. But – by the hand of Cael, the Cynos of Time, your Dreamlord, Dreamlord gear and traits remain untouched by the reversal of time. What benefits are there to this Era system then?
Gnosis is the attention of the Dreamer, the creator of the world of Elysion. Everything in Elysion consists of gnosis. The more gnosis something consists of, the more focused the attention of the Dreamer will become, and the more powerful that subject will become. For a Dreamlord, gnosis means hope for the people of the Patria – hope for a brighter future, free from struggle and suffering – and therefore, by increasing your gnosis you will attract more people to you, and their presence in turn will make you stronger. As a Dreamlord, you can dissolve items and soul shards into gnosis via the Stockpile interface in either the Patria Manager or Army Headquarters.
The top row of buttons are only activated once you've cleared the first two starter quests. The first quest is The Awakening which should launch automatically upon creation of your account, and the second quest is The Masters of the City that can be reached by launching an attack on the Swamp Grunt that is assaulting your home town. Once these quests are finished, all the buttons on the top row of the client will be unlocked.
Upgrading your buildings is done in two steps. First, you must research the upgrade technology via the building's technology tree. Once that is done, you will have to click “Upgrade” in the building's control interface. The actual upgrade will cost various amounts of resources. Remember that you -have- to click the “Upgrade” button in order to actually upgrade the building! Researching the upgrade tech is not enough.
In the city overview, where you see all the building icons, you can see stars in the upper left corner of every building icon. The lit stars show you what level that building has, and the unlit stars show how many levels of upgrade you have researched for the building. Having, for example, one lit star and two unlit stars means that you've researched three upgrades for the building but haven't actually upgraded the building more than once.
Building slots are used to construct production buildings, such as Training Grounds, Gatherer's Garden, Hunter's Cabin, and so forth. In order to get more building slots, you need to research that perticular technology in your Ministry Building's tech tree. Unless you've removed it manually from your city, you should already have a Ministry Building prepared for you on your Patria.
First of all you need more gnosis, which you get by dissolving items and soul shards into gnosis. The gnosis converts various scattered pockets of lost people on the Patria into useful followers for you. You can watch the process if you hover the follower-symbol in the upper-right corner of the Management page of the Patria Manager web interface. The conversion can take some time (but can be instantaneous if you pay Tribute to the Cynoses). When they are fully converted, they will be either homeless (if you don't have enough housing - then you have to build some), or unemployed. If you have unemployed followers, simply press the "Hire worker"-button in a Building to make it a worker, or use the unemployed followers later to train new troops.
Soul shards are concentrated physical shards of gnosis. They are used to build the basic buildings on your Patria, and are used as a currency on the player market. A dreamlord can dissolve items into soul shards via the Stockpile interface in either the Patria Manager or Army Headquarters. Note that by dissolving an item into soul shards causes some gnosis to spill out in the process.
Dissolving an item directly into gnosis will always yield more gnosis than if you were to dissolve the item into soul shards first and then into gnosis. Gnosis can never be turned into soul shards, however.
When an item such as a weapon or equipment is used for the first time, the item will become bound to you. This means they cannot be traded to other Dreamlords in any way or sold on the market, but they can still be dissolved into soul shards or gnosis. Some items are soulbound from the start, such as Dreamlord gear and Divine Interventions purchased through the Altar of Cynos.
If you equip more than one of a perticular item on a unit or the Dreamlord, you will only get the benefits from one of them. Two identical items will not stack, even though you technically can equip the two items at the same time.
There are several ways to get resources. The main way is to create resource buildings, like the Lumber Mill (for wood), Stone Quarry (for stone) and Ore Mine (for metal). These produce the basic resources, as well as more rare versions of the various resources through research.
Then there are your Patria territories. By killing monsters and nightmares on your Patria, you have a chance to get both items, soul shards and resources.
You can also, if you are loaded with soul shards, take a trip to the market (via the Patria Management on the web site) and see if you can trade some soul shards for the resources you need.
If you're a member of a convergence, you might want to make deals with other members of the convergence to trade resources for items or other favors.
(Not to be confused with the Dreamlord)
Heroes are researched via the Temple of Conquest (War Strategy) building. These are powerful units that can only be used in PvP (Player versus Player combat). They have their own gear and abilities based on their research level. They have three levels, just like all unit types. They don't need to be trained. Once you've researched them, they'll always be available in PvP for dispatch from the Stronghold like all the other units.
The Army Headquarters is reached via the RTS game client, by clicking the third button from the left at the top of the screen. This is where you train and disband troops, equip weapons, armor, equipment and tomes to your army and yourself. You can also purchase items via the Altar of Cynos here, and repair/renew damaged gear.
The Dreamlord can't permanently die, but the materialized form may be destroyed.
If the Dreamlord's physical form dies in PvE (quests and patria missions) the mission fails. Your troops needs your strength to find courage and power to fight the tainted monsters and nightmares on the Patria.
If the Dreamlord dies in PvP (player versus player battle) you will not lose, but you will have to wait a little while in order to materialize again. During that time, your troops are on their own.
You will get the chance to resurrect any fallen squad after the conclusion of a battle. To resurrect a squad you need a Hospital (Medical) building with workers. Hospitals have two different outputs that determine how many squads that you can resurrect at the end of every battle.
A convergence, or “CV”, is a collection of Patrias with Dreamlords that have decided to work together. You can compare it to the concept of clans or guilds in other games.
You can either join an existing convergence or create a new one through the Recruitment Hall in the Patria Manager web page. Ask in the chat in-game for an invite into an existing convergence, or use the recruitment system on the website to find an opening that suits your needs.
Creating a convergence is done in two steps. First, you create the convergence, but cannot get the full potential of the convergence before you've recruited enough members. Once the required member count is reached, you will be able to finally activate the convergence via the Convergence controls reached via the Patria Manager web page.
Ordinary players have names in white in the chat list, and yellow in the chat itself. Support always have a green color, and developers are always in a blue color in both the player list and chat. The support staff are there to help you.
Tribute is your personal standing towards the Cynoses, the gods of the Dreamlords world. With Tribute, you can purchase items and gear for both your Dreamlord and your army in the Altar of Cynos (reached via the game client and the Army Headquarters screen). You can also speed up the process of turning depressed followers into useful workers, and turn non-followers into followers instantly, by paying Tribute to various Cynoses.
Once you've created a new account, you will be given a bunch of free Tribute to play around with. Other than that, you can aquire small amounts of Tribute by holding many territories on the PvP islands, for example. The main way of aquiring more Tribute is, however, to purchase it through our online shop using real-world currency.
We currently use ClickandBuy for payment. ClickandBuy is one of the leading payment systems on the internet, with merchants such as Apple iTunes, Steam (Valve), Skype, Electronic Arts (EA), Nero, AOL, Codemasters, and many more.
We are looking around for additional payment methods as well, but there is sadly no guarantee that your favorite payment method will be one of them.
No, Tribute is your personal standing towards the Cynoses, and it cannot be traded.
While using Tribute in the Altar of Cynos (the in-game item shop) will give you an advantage - not to mention a cool and customized appearence - it doesn't mean that you will be able to buy yourself to ultimate victory. Success in Dreamlords The Reawakening heavily relies on your personal skill and the decisions you make. Also, there are limits to how much Tribute can do for you. Better quality Dreamlord gear and Divine Intervention powers require you to spend your trait points in various traits in order to unlock the ability to purchase and/or use certain items, and trait points require research. This means that you can't expect to become unstoppable just because you have a lot of Tribute, but it will still help you a lot in the game.
If you're encountering crashes within the Dreamlords The Reawakening game client, you will usually get a small window asking you to fill in details about what you did just before the crash. Be as descriptive as possible when explaining what happened, and then click submit to submit your report along with the memory dump file that was automatically created by the crash report tool. If you're using a firewall, then don't forget to allow the crash reporter access to the internet, or it won't be able to send the report to us.
In some cases though, the crash report tool isn't started. In these cases, you can either look around the forums for similar problems, or contact us via our support. Various ways of contact can be found here; http://www.dreamlords.com/home.action?type=contact
For more information about how to file a more useful support ticket, read this forum post;
http://www.dreamlords.com/posts/list/5769.page
Even though we work hard to avoid all and any sort of exploits, we're only human, and from time to time there might be gaps in the system that we didn't predict which may give a player an unfair advantage over other players. If you find one of these exploits or find anyone knowingly using one of these exploits, don't hesitate to report it via the support tool or via our support e-mail address.
Chances are that other players have discovered it as well, and chances are that we know about the problem and are working on it. Rest asured that we're completely against any kind of cheating and the use of exploits that give one player an unfair advantage over other players, and if we find out that anyone is using cheats or exploits we will see it as a very serious offense and act accordingly.
We at Lockpick Entertainment want the Dreamlords The Reawakening experience to be equally fun and rewarding for all players, but we're not superhuman and we need you to help us help you.
If another player is harassing you, then please refrain from entering an argument with that person as it may likely just make things worse. Contact any support staff or developer that is online in the game client chat in private and explain what has happened, or contact us using our support tool or support e-mail on the website. Don't forget to state the name of the Dreamlords that were part of the harassment, and the time of the incident, to make it easier for us to understand what was going on.
Note however that constantly attacking someone over and over again in PvP is not considered harassment. It's a part of the PvP system – anyone within the valid level range can attack anyone else on the PvP islands. Using vulgar or offensive language towards another player is however not Ok.
