The main purpose of the game is to develop your Castle, to join a strong League, to defeat enemies, and to fight for Resources and dominance.

Quests. You receive a lot of quests.

 First of all, we suggest that you complete the Tutorial ones. 

These quests will teach you how to play: who to raid, how to build and upgrade your Units, etc. Moreover, they will unlock more game features and give you good rewards that you can use to progress in the game. After completing the Tutorial, you can choose the quests with bigger rewards.

Units. They protect your Castle, invade other Castles, and help your Friends when they need it. Research Lost Arts and construct new Buildings to unlock new, more powerful Units.

There are two kinds of Units: Offensive and Defensive. Click on the Unit when purchasing it to see detailed stats.

Defensive Units are essentially useless when attacking but highly effective at protecting a Castle or a Settlement. Conversely, Offensive Units are designed to be used for attacks but have a low defense value. If your Castle has tons of Offense and no Defense - don't be surprised when you get Invaded.

There are 4 types of Units: Infantry, Cavalry, Occult, and Bestiary. Units of each type can be trained in a designated queue. 

Note that each Unit has its own statistics against other types of Units. 

Upgrade Lost Arts to improve your Units and to enhance their statistics by up to 40%. 

You can choose either an Offensive or a Defensive strategy in the game. That, in turn, will determine the order in which you upgrade your Units.

League. League and its members play an important role in every player’s life: your Leaguemates can give you useful tips and help you in difficult situations. You may request Resources, Scrolls, and Reinforcements, as well simply chat with them and have fun.

Don't forget to help other members of your League. Moreover, always remember to follow orders of your League Leader.

Do not join a random League. It can be weak and/or inactive. Open the list of the Top Leagues and choose the ones ranked 200 through 300. Send requests and messages to those recruiting new members. Indicate why you think you are a good candidate for this particular League and wait for the response. Starting out in a big League will help you learn more about the game features and get the protection every new player needs.

Bear in mind that Top Leagues are unlikely to accept you since you do not have enough experience and Units to be able to keep up with their activities in the game. Once you gain more experience, you can try your luck with the Top Leagues.

Buildings. There are several types of Buildings in the game, and each is associated with a different sphere of your Castle's life. They fall under the following categories: Military, Command, Resources, Castle Defense, and Black Market.

Constructing and upgrading Buildings will unlock new game features, give you more Resources, etc. Building are necessary for you to be able to perform basic actions such as trade, exchange Resources and Scrolls, declare wars, etc.  

Resource Buildings. The more  Resource Buildings you have and the higher their level, the more Resources you can produce. You need Resources to develop your Castle and to train Units.

Remember that you do not need to upgrade all Buildings at the same time. Some of them are more important than others when you first start playing. For example, the Catacombs is a place where you can secure Units and Resources to protect them from other players, so make sure to upgrade it. Also, it would make sense to upgrade your Farms and Mines/Townhoouses before upgrading Barns and Warehouses so that you actually have something to store.

To erect a Building, you need to access the Construction menu: 

Military Buildings. Here you can house, manage, and develop all of your Units. Each Unit or a set of Units has its own Building, and you will find that you are required to construct certain Buildings before you can research certain military Lost Arts or erect more advanced military Buildings.

Defensive Buildings. Defenses improve the defensive capability of all Units within your Castle.

Infirmary. Here you can restore the Units you lost while defending your Castle. Additionally, you can revive a certain percentage of the fallen Units for free, while the rest of them will require Sapphires to revive. 

The Level 1 Infirmary will let you revive 5% of your Units for FREE. Upgrading your Infirmary will increase the number of Units you can recover with each Level.

Remember: reviving Units is cheaper and quicker than training a new army!

Infirmary. It is a tab in your Black Market where you can recover a certain percentage of any Units you’ve lost in combat within the last 7 days. You will need Sapphires to recover them.

Please note that there is sometimes an additional discount (e.g. 75%) in the game that allows you to revive your Units at a much lower cost.  

Lost Arts. You are required to develop new Lost Arts in order to access new types of Buildings and Units. Construct the House of Scrolls to begin researching new Lost Arts.The more you upgrade the House of Scrolls, the faster you complete research of new Lost Arts.

Researching each Lost Art costs Gold, Iron, and Meat. The more advanced the Lost Art, the more expensive it is to research and upgrade. The cost of upgrading a given Lost Art also becomes progressively higher with each new level.

After a certain point, you will find that you need to acquire a set number of Scrolls to unlock research of a certain new Lost Art. You will get a new Scroll from your Scribe every day, but you must have all the Lost Art-specific Scrolls for a given Lost Art before you can initiate Research. You can exchange Scrolls with other players to get the ones you need.

Lost Arts can be found here: 

Battlegrounds. Battlegrounds are locations in Darkshine that have been occupied by Balur or temporarily held by friendly forces conducting Darkshine operations. Raid them wisely. Send defensive Units to Defensive Battleground and vise versa. Don’t spend all your Units on them, or you will have none to fight with your rivals.

You can check the forum for some useful tips on how to clear Battlegrounds successfully.

Hamlets. Each Hamlet is dedicated to producing one of the three main types of Resources - Gold, Iron, or Meat - along with Sapphires and Maranian Amulets 

The amount of Resources you can gather from a Hamlet depends on the overall carrying capacity of the Defensive Units you have stationed there.

You will need BOTH Offensive and Defensive Units to Capture a Hamlet, but Defensive Units will NOT engage in the battle. All surviving Offensive Units will be automatically returned to your Catacombs. If you successfully Capture a Hamlet, Defensive Units will start gathering Resources. The number of Resources that they can gather depends on your Units’ carrying capacity. The more Defensive Units you send, and the bigger their carrying capacity, the more Resources you can collect!

Hamlets can be found in your Eagle's Nest.

Using Resources. Don’t log out of the game when you have more Resources than your Catacombs can store - other players may be tempted to raid you. 

Always use up your Resources to upgrade Buildings, train Units, or research Lost Arts.

Spending Sapphires. Don’t spend them at low levels since you don’t actually need them. Keep playing and you will find the best way to spend them: to revive Units, to hire new Craftsmen, to acquire Items, etc.

Raid. Go to the Map 

choose a Castle 

and send off Units 

To get Resources from Castles you raid, send Units with higher carrying capacity 

Try to attack abandoned Castles if you don’t want to be hit back. Abandoned bases are good since they do not have a League to protect them, and they have weak defenses which means your Raids are more likely to be successful.

Always recon the Castles you wish to raid before sending Units. If your Raid was successful and you were not hit back, save the coordinates of that Castle in the Bookmarks and come back to it later.

Recon. It is better to use 1 Spy at a time. If you send them all and the attempt is unsuccessful, you will have to train new ones and will have to wait until you can start raiding again.  

Global events (Missions). When you developed your Castle a little, you may start fighting for rewards in the Global Quests (Events). Bear in mind that you can earn points in some Global Quests by simply performing your usual actions such as upgrading Buildings, researching Lost Arts, raiding Castles, etc. Remember that this is a good opportunity to develop your Castle and receive additional rewards.

You can always decide whether you want to participate in Global Quests or not. But you should remember that there are also League Global Quests and your reputation in theLeague may depend on your performance in League Global Quests.

Resources and Items you receive for completing game quests will be stored in the appropriate tabs at the Black Market. Activate your Resources only when you are sure that you need them that very moment.

There are Special Missions that may also help you receive rewards for usual gameplay. You may be asked to raid Castles, clear Battlegrounds, collect Resources from other Castles, etc. Don't forget to check this tab as these rewards will help you in developing your Castle.

Happy hunting! We hope these tips will help you dominate the Darkshine!