Some cool features
It won't take you long to get used to how things work, but in the meantime, here are some features that may help you enjoy the game sooner!
Denari and Refer a Friend function
City notes
City Remarks and Notes
This lets you make notes about your city - for you to refer to (or a person substituting your account if you have one)
to remind you of what the city is working on.
Pathway: City Notes > Notes
In the 'Remarks' line you can set information about the city, eg 'Resources' or 'Vanquishers'. Only you can see the information, so you won't be giving anything away to spies.
In the 'Notes' box write your reminders or current aim eg 'Removing cabins' or 'Upgrade Training arenas'
City Lists
The groups function can be a way to easily find the cities you need and organise your empire. Early on this won't be a problem, but once your growth rockets, it may be very helpful.
Pathway: City Notes > City Name & Lists > Add to a List
In the 'Manage Lists' tab you can create and reorder your lists.
In the 'This City's Lists' tab you can add a city to one or more lists.
I personally use the city list function a lot, to check what I have and where it is. Along with the 'Remarks' note it can be easy to see which cities are on a particular continent, or identify all castles with senator capability for example.
A a city can be a member of as many lists as you like.
Everyone is different, however the groups I usually have by the end of the game are:
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One per continent (also one for defense and one for offense troops)
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Senators
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Refiners
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Scouts
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Temples
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Hubs
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Under construction
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NOTE: There is also a default 'Unassigned' list for all cities not yet in a list - very useful when you have new cities
Once you have your lists set up and cities assigned to relevant lists, you can 'filter' the cities you can see in your drop down list.
Use the filter arrow on the left of your current city name to choose which list you want to look at. So for example choosing 'Scouts' would then show me only my cities listed as scouts. If I wanted to mass refine a lot of resources for a Research, I could select 'Refiners' and scroll through them.
City layout planner
This feature will take you to an external website, where you can plan your city, optimise your resource production and decide where you want your buildings to be.
Pathway: City Notes > City Layout / Layout Planner
Basic Instructions:
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Copy the sharestring text in the City Layout tab (that is your current city)
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Paste it into the 'Import' section on www.cotgopt.com
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Delete resources, add buildings, move buildings to get the best layout for you
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For resource cities - increase the importance of the resource you want more of
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For military cities - look at the enlistment speed of your required troop
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Once you are happy with the design, Export your layout and paste it back into the 'Layout Planner' and apply the overlay
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The overlay tells you what to demolish, or what buildings to place in each spot.
NOTE - there are a lot of perfectly good layouts for military cities already out there. Ask around if you have a troop type in mind but don't know where to start.
Overviews
This button opens up a new tab, giving you an overview of your empire. The data can be downloaded as .csv files and then you can sort, filter etc in Excel or other spreadsheet programme.
The overviews available are:
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Your cities (resource production, carts and ships)
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Your troops (home, and totals)
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Where's my Senator (very useful later on, if you're settling or sieging from a number of cities)
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Your alliance members (score, rank city numbers)
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Alliance cities (continent, score, co-ordinates)
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Alliance incoming attacks (you can see what troops are present, and incoming)
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Alliance outgoing attacks
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Alliance blessed cities
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Build councillor (a summary of what she is up to)
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Trade councillor (a summary of her actions)
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Raid Reports (all your cavern raid reports can be found here)
Hotkeys for new buildings
You don't need to go through the click > select > build every time you place a new building, there are hotkeys built into the system for one click/one key placing of new buildings. The hotkeys are written in the building information, and are as below.
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Academy - Y
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Barracks - B
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Blacksmith - K
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Cabin - C
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Castle - X
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Farm Estate - A
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Forester Hut - F
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Forum - M
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Grain Mill - G
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Guardhouse - U
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Hideaway - Q
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Iron Mine - I
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Lumber Yard - L
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Masons Hut - H
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Port - O
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Shipyard - P
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Smelter - Z
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Sorcerers Tower - W
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Stables - E
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Stonemine - S
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Storehouse - R
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Training Arena - T
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Villa - V
Other Hotkeys
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To demolish a building by one level - D
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To fully demolish a building - Shift D
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To upgrade a building - U
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To upgrade to Level 10 (build slots are needed) - Shift U
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To upgrade to a certain level - click on it and type the number you want it to upgrade to
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To move a building - ` (next to the 1)
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To type in Alliance chat - /a
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To type in Officer chat (you must have rank officer or above) - /o
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To whisper a player - /w
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To rewhisper the same player - up arrow in the chat bar
Quick Build
Using this button can be very helpful if setting out a lot of buildings, eg Cabins.
Instructions:
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Click the 'Quick build' button
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Select the building you wish to build
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Click on the City view in each spot you want that building to appear in
NOTE: If you moveto a new city and click 'Quick Build' again, you will automatically be set up with the building from the last time.
Game Options
In this screen (access it bottom right of the game screen) you can adjust what information you receive. Have a look at some of the options and adjust things like
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the colour of your flag in region view, identifying which city you are currently active in
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whether to be told about city losses or captures in your alliance
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whether a new city pop up appears for you
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whether to receive a verbal notification if you're under attack
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if you want a confirmation of denari spends for items
Substitution
It is possible to allow one other person (at any time) to access your acccount when you are offline. You may access the accounts of other people.
This may be useful if you are under attack or have resources to send out while you are working, sleeping, in class etc. It can also be used for a more experienced player (or a GM) to help you sort out any problems if something is not behaving as you expect.
Pathway: Game Options > Substitution
To allow someone to substitute your account
IMPORTANT NOTE: only allow someone else to be your substitute if you trust them.
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Enter their name in the 'Player Name' box
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If you wish them to be able to spend any denari, or abandon your cities, tick the relevant box/es
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Then click 'Send request'
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They will receive an in game mail telling them you have requested they 'Sub' your account
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If that person enters your account, the next time you log in you will see a message asking you to cancel the Substitution - you will need to set them (or another player) as Substitute again
To enter another player's account
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That player will need to set you as a Substitute on their account
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You will receive a mail saying they have requested you Sub for them
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On the Substitution screen you will see they have requested you - accept the invitation
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Then you will have the option to Enter their account
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Once the player re-enters their account, your access will be cancelled until the other player requests you Sub for them again
NOTE: limitations as a substitute
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You may only have one player Substituting for you at one time.
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You may Substitute for many players at one time.
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Substitutes may only be used up to 40% of the time an account has been active
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You can only spend denari if they have allowed it
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You can only abandon cities if they have allowed it
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You may only ship resources between cities of that account (you may not send to yourself, for example)
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A substitute may not send attacks against another player
Denari and Refer a Friend function