There's a video tutorial on the home page if you'd like to try that one out.

Frogboy is the CEO, Brad Wardell.

P.S. Please move your topic out of the Demigod Journal section.

*Chortle*

Since release I've noticed a trend for people to post things in the forums along the lines of "From my 2 hours and 16 minutes of play I have graduated from Knee Jerk university and for all my learning I do not understand this aspect of Demigod... which is an outrage!"

Then a slightly confused mob gathers with pitchforks and torches and hurls abuse at the gates of Stardock Castle while Dr "Frogboy" Frankenstein speaks from the battlements "No no... you do not understand ze nature of zer work I am doing..."

Its crazy. No this game does not need a tutorial. Or a campaign. Or a DotA makeover. Or DRM. Or a cluttered UI spewing information directly into your visual cortex faster than you can process. Stop!

Instead of logging into the forums with the beginnings of a bile fueled manifesto straining to be released from its cerebral hate cage why not... ask for help? ask why something is the way it is? Since when was inexperience with a new product such an assault upon the ego that people feel compelled to establish their "knowledge" through a derisive and damaging tirade?

Does a father issue his son with a 600 page manual and a comprehensive step by step tutorial of advanced theory... or does he just give him a ball and let him kick it around for a while and figure things out himself?

Which is more fun?

In my extensive experience of computer games the manual is that thing you read on the crapper to see if you missed anything after you blow your weekend playing the actual game. (I still do this with the Dread Lords manual despite it being horribly out of date)

I would say the primary function of the AI in this game is to educate a player on the basics before they move onto live opponents. This provides the perfect arena in which to learn about the game, experiement with different ideas and after you close the program none of the AI will remember how well you played - but you will remember what you learned.

edit: I forgot to say that I think Frogboy is a saint for always coming back into the forums to speak reason. What a Sysiphean task.

I to was disapointed with the lack of tutorial. However I played 2 rounds of the parathon/campagin single player and started picking things up fairly quickly just by relying on standard RTS and RPG knowldge. However, I would like a way to pause the game in single player while I am decideing what skills to level up or what items to buy, at least untill I learn them.

The bigest suprise for me was when I started the parathon/campagin I thought it would be a one on one fight not a all out good vs evil. I assume this is unique to the campagin and you can chose 1v1 1v2 etc when you go online or play scenarios.

You can pause by using F10 to open up the menu. Early in the beta the pause key worked, but for some inexplicable reason they took out that keybind so now you have to open the menu.

Unfortunately, you won't be able to actually look at any skills while the menu is open.

There are 3 different online modes: Custom, Skirmish, and Pantheon. Custom lets you set maps, teams, victory conditions, and other settings (starting gold, tower hp, creep strength, etc). Skirmish is a basic auto-matcher by player rankings, you don't get to set up anything. Pantheon is also an auto-matcher for the persistant MP Tournament of Light vs Dark.

Despite libertarian, Republican drivel like this, I read manuals and appreciate it when given a good one. I don't appreciate it when I am expected to figure out games by myself. I'm on  the fence concerning Demigod and came on this board seeking information. Learning that the manual is poor (no surprise, Stardock manuals are invariably poor), that there is no turorial, no campaign (I wanted one in Sins also), and you cannot pause the game to ponder decisions (I really, really hate this) have pretty much pushed me off the fence  and I will probably give the game a pass.

I love a good manual too but only as a resource of information for things that I may have missed after spending at least several hours playing.

Due the high frequency of patches Stardock manuals are rendered obsolete very quickly. Stardock know this and produce manuals that touch on the broader ideas that are less likely to change. Give it a couple of months and I'm willing to bet something that is in the manual will be flat wrong despite the efforts to avoid it.

Even the day 0 patch would have rendered an extensively detailed manual useless.

Btw I'm Australian so accusing me to be a Republican is silly. Why bring up politics anyway? Libertarian is something I'll look on as a compliment instead of an epithet.

If you want to know what irritates me it is people full of piss and vinegar who come on these forums and spew bile about a game they have never played and try to influence people not to buy it.

Having a pause key while in single player so you can take your time to read EQ, skill powers, etc would be really really nice.

Along with if you're dead, being able to still pull up the skill tree so you can plan/research what you'll get next.

Hopefully those things will be included in a patch soonish.

Exactly, in the end you're just complaining about nothing. I personally hate tutorials. They treat you like an idiot and offer next to nothing about _actual_ gameplay. The only useful stuff are things you find out RIGHT away like clicking moves your character.

It's very simple. Open up a skirmish, open up options and take a look at all the hotkeys. Pull up the shop, go through each item. Pull up your skills, go through each skill. Bam, you're done. Now go play to memorize the items\skills over time. The only other things a tutorial would of covered would be things I honestly hope you do not need help with, like moving and targeting.

And as I said, a tutorial wouldn't help you with the important things. No tutorial would go through each item one by one or through a list of builds that might work for you. The actual content of the game you'd have to figure out yourself. Just like nearly every game, go figure.

Demigod is one of those easy to learn difficult to master games, the only way you're going to get better is by playing. a tutorial would of been a waste of time, in my humble opinion.

Meh.

I like the SP game.

Cerulean_Shaman,

 I think youre dismissing the complexities of a game like this! Its not like players can look at the shop, citadel, "secret" shop items ang go bam! i get it all. Plus youre ignoring the fact that if im playing as Oak, I dont know what Regulus' skills are.. No sir, This game requires some diligent studying of skills and items, and then it requires thought about how to combine the skills and items into a proficient build.. All the items and skills couldve equaled a great fucking manual. .. or at least we should have all that info consolidated unto a web site... which will probably happen, but i dont see it yet...

You can get nearly in-game pause by hitting the numpad - key down to -10 speed if you want to look through skill trees, shops, etc. in single player.  Also handy is hitting plus a bunch of times to get through the respawn timer and * with 1 second to go to jump back to normal speed.

I can honestly say I was initially surprised that DG didn't have a tutorial. I thought to myself, "A RTS with no tutorial? This is madness!!" After playing for about 30 minutes I started to realize, "This is Sparta!!!!" DG doesn't play like a conventional RTS from what I have seen and it really isn't hard to pick up and play.

I would suggest spending time playing against the computer A.I. Even at the default difficulty, you have time to learn about items/armor, favor, and upgrading the fortress. Admittedly, I haven't played against any human opponents yet, but I am sure I will be in no time at all.