If you enjoy fantasy RPG games and you’re looking for something new to check out, then you may want to take a peek at Grimguard Tactics: Fantasy RPG which was just released on Android and iOS mobile devices at the end of last month. I’ve been spending some time with it to check out the game and it’s been quite the fun experience so far. After looking the game over in the Play Store, I suspected I would probably enjoy it since I grew up with RPGs and Tactical RPGs.
While not incredibly challenging to the point that you’ll die over and over, Tactical RPG games do provide a level of challenge that prevents every level or stage from being a pushover. And that’s what I’ve found with Grimguard Tactics in the time I’ve spent playing it thus far. All of that being said, Grimguard Tactics comes with more than a few complexities, and I felt it was worth putting together this Everything You Need To Know guide for the game.
That way if you’re looking to dive into its rich world yourself, you’ll have all the knowledge you need about how the game works, what features it offers, and more. So, let’s go ahead and dive in.
What is Grimguard Tactics?
Grimguard Tactics is a tactical fantasy RPG that plunges you into the world of Terenos. You play a mercenary who has set out on a mission to rid the world of newfound hellish enemies known as Primorva. Grimguard Tactics is also a hero collector, which means you will be able to collect all kinds of heroes to fill your team up with.
As you play, you can unlock more heroes with varying abilities and stats, then swap those heroes out to meet the needs of the mission you’re currently on. The game features a dark (grim) tone and it’s the perfect setting for people who like gritty-esque themes.
Does Grimguard Tactics cost money to download?
No. Grimguard Tactics is a free-to-play game so you can install it and check it out for literally nothing. There are no ads, either, and you won’t be missing a chunk of the game’s story by not buying it. The entire game is free, at least in the sense that you can play it from beginning to end when it comes to the story without having to pay for anything.
Are there any microtransactions?
There are most certainly microtransactions in this game. It is a free-to-play game after all. The developers have to make money somehow and since there are no ads and you don’t have to pay for the game upfront, the money comes from in-app purchases.
The good news, at least so it appears, is that it doesn’t look like the microtransactions are too heavy-handed. I have played the game for several hours at this point and am almost to the beginning of Act 2 and I haven’t had to purchase a single thing. Some things to keep in mind, though. You may find yourself in a situation where you personally get stuck and can’t progress. In this instance, one way to potentially help yourself is to spend a little money on the currency needed to recruit new heroes.
There are also hero bundles in the store for just a flat $9.99 that come with a few extra items. This is in addition to the bundles of rubies you can buy, which is the game’s premium currency. Now there is nothing wrong with doing this if this is how you want to spend some of your money. If you find value in it, do it. It will likely make the game more fun for you.
I also want to reiterate though that spending money is not necessary. You will be able to recruit new heroes by acquiring some of the recruit currency, which is called Contracts and Star Oracle Contracts. You will get contracts just by playing. So you can play through some missions and save these up, then recruit new heroes and hope to get something more useful. Star Oracle Contracts are much more rare and you won’t get many of these. So save them up until you REALLY need them. At least, that’s my recommendation.
What is the gameplay like?
As stated above this is a tactical RPG. So the main chunk of gameplay is going to be the combat missions. Missions are set up in an arena where you have three waves to go through. Each wave is associated with a room, and that room will have a certain number of enemies in it. You will both take turns choosing your actions. However, you will also go through all of your actions before the enemies take their turn, at which point each enemy in the room will do something.
There’s also a sort of builder element to the game, although this is very sparse and not a huge portion of the gameplay. Mainly this comes up as you move through the first bits of the story and you’ll build different types of structures to do different things.
For example, you’ll get to a point where you can build a forge. You can then use the forge to upgrade your hero weapons and make them stronger. You’ll also build barracks, which is where you can recruit new heroes and manage your existing ones. You will also be able to upgrade these structures to do more with them.
What kinds of modes does Grimguard Tactics have?
Grimguard Tactics features a few different modes of play at the moment. Although not all of them will be available immediately.
The main story
There’s the main story, or the campaign if you prefer to call it that. This is where you go through and play the missions with the associated story and dialogue solo. Key points of this mode will have a visual novel-style dialogue between the characters. There’s also a dungeon mode you can play through.
Dungeons
Dungeons are meant to be harder content for players who have leveled up a bit and have a stronger hero roster. You can try out the dungeons pretty early on, but I wouldn’t recommend jumping in right away. That’s not to say it wouldn’t be possible to complete the dungeons at the early stage of the game. It is likely possible to do. However, Dungeons are more challenging and you run the risk of losing heroes who die in the dungeon.
Not forever, but at least until they can be restored through the hospital mechanic. Any heroes you take into a dungeon also can’t be used for other mission types or modes until that dungeon is complete. These dungeons are essentially expeditions and your heroes will be unusable until the expedition is finished.
So if you’re going to partake in the dungeon, it’s strongly recommended to either level up your heroes first or choose heroes you don’t mind not using for a bit.
PvP/Arena
If you like PvP in your games then you’ll want to check out the Arena. The Arena is the PvP mode in Grimguard Tactics and this allows you to face off against another player’s heroes. This doesn’t unlock until you’re partway through Act 2 though. So you won’t be able to check it out for a little while. This could take you several hours or you could have it done in under an hour depending on how quickly you play through each mission.
I’ve found that it’s taken me several hours just to get most of the way through Act 1. So if you don’t rush it, you’ll get quite a bit of game content out of this game.
How many heroes are there?
This is something I’m not quite sure of at the moment. However, I can confidently say there are probably over 100 different heroes. And there are likely to be more as time goes on. That is almost a guarantee. It’s also important to pay attention to the hero types. As this will come into play with combat and it can make a very big difference. It can also be a huge factor in whether you win or lose. Especially at higher difficulties.
How does combat work?
I briefly touched on this above but the combat is tactical RPG combat so you’ll take turns completing actions. However, that’s just the main part of combat you need to think about.
Each hero and enemy will also have an “Alignment” associated with them. Certain alignments are stronger or weaker against others. So you will want to pay attention to these so you know which heroes will be best suited to fight against the enemy in a given mission or battle. For example, the ‘Order’ Alignment, which is blue, is strong against the Chaos alignment, which is red. In this case, you want to play your Order alignment heroes against the Chaos alignment enemies.
As you will have a better chance to knock them down in one or two hits. There are some factors that can negate the alignments a bit. Such as the hero’s abilities. Each hero will have a unique ability that is a pretty strong attack. Even if you’re facing off against an enemy with a stronger alignment than your hero, you can sometimes still take them down in a single hit. This can be due to you being well above the enemy’s level or because you had a hero team member buff you.
It’s also important to note that each time your hero uses the special ability, it will have a cooldown for a certain number of turns. This will be visible over the ability icon after its use. So keep that in mind when deciding when to play it. In some battles, you might want to use it right away, but you might be better off saving it for the final room of a mission. Also worth considering is using it for your very first turn in a mission so it comes up again before you reach the final room.
Make sure to level up your heroes
As you play you will get a currency called Insight. This will be used to level up your heroes. Each level you go up will make it so that it costs more insight to go up to the next level. So try and space this out to all of your heroes if possible. Sometimes you may have a really strong hero that you want to level up a ton. This can be fine, but it can also hurt your ability to move forward if your other heroes are dying or getting severely injured too quickly. So use your best judgment here.
Heroes can also “Ascend” to a higher tier which also makes them stronger. Ascend materials/currency is harder to come by though. So you won’t be able to do this as often.
Resting heroes
There will be times when you go through a mission and one of the heroes dies. If this happens, that hero is not gone forever. They will, however, not be playable again until you rest them at the hospital. Resting also has a currency associated with it called Bandages. With this in mind, it’s always a good idea to have some backup heroes available if you need to fill a spot on the team.
Resting heroes takes time, although you can speed it up with another type of currency. This isn’t necessary either, but if you have an excess of it, it doesn’t hurt to spend it if the hero that died is a particularly strong one you like to use often. You will also only be able to rest one hero at a time in the early stages of the game. You can upgrade the hospital to allow for more room to rest more heroes at once. Just like with upgrading the forge, this won’t be doable right away as you’ll need to gather the materials needed first. And that won’t happen until you play through some of the main story.
Don’t forget to check out the daily login rewards
Just like every other free-to-play game out there, there are daily login rewards for Grimguard Tactics. These can be anything from Contracts to recruit more heroes, to Insight for leveling up. There are tons of rewards for each day in the month so even if you don’t have time to play on a given day, it’s worth booting the game up just to get your daily login rewards. Some of them are much better than others, but the best ones will come at the end of the 30 days. For example, the day 30 reward right now is a legendary barbarian hero. You’ll need to make sure and hit all daily rewards to get this.
Managing your rations
Rations are what you will use to play missions. This is the energy currency I mentioned briefly earlier in this guide. You recover rations over time. So if you play for several hours at a time it can be easy to blow through these. Keep an eye on the rations to make sure you always have some up. Otherwise you’ll get to the end of your ration supply and you won’t be able to do any more missions until they replenish.
I have yet to run out of rations so I’m not sure if you can buy them outright as an in-app purchase. There is currently a bundle available (at the time of writing) that has 30 rations in it though. This also appears to currently be the only way to get more rations. Other than waiting for them to come back. Keep an eye on these and your playtime with Grimguard Tactics will go much smoother.
Is there anything else I should know?
The game has pretty good voice acting. Which I personally feel adds an element of quality to the game. Sit back and enjoy the voice acting because it’s not often that the voice acting in a game is this good. Especially when it’s a free-to-play game. Other than that, just spend some time with it and enjoy the gameplay. If you like tactical RPGs, and you like free games, you can’t go wrong with Grimguard Tactics.
