FAQ
Questions
- What is the object of the game?
- How long is each game? (and When does it start and end?)
- How and when does my population manage resources?
- Where do my people get all these resources? (and What exactly are roads for?)
- What exactly are walls for?
- Wait, players can share regions? How does that work?
- What do the descriptions of the regions mean? (and How do I know how many of each resource is left?)
- What makes some regions "holy ground", and how are they different?
- What bonuses are conferred by the Temple?
- I had enough food, but the daily report says that people died!
- Bats are birds?
- What can I do with my soldiers?
- What can I do with my scout?
- What are "jinns"?
- What do prophets do, and how do I get them?
- I think you have your prophets and miracles confused...
- How exactly does lightning work?
- How exactly do earthquakes work?
- How exactly does the Great Flood work?
- Your "Tablets of Law" look a bit odd...
Answers
What is the object of the game?
To have the highest score at the end of the game. Your score is determined primarily by the height of your Tower, but also by other factors.
Towers are built using the resources collected by your population every turn.
Players who participate in multiple games build up a record of scores which can be reviewed and compared by other players.
How long is each game? (and When does it start and end?)
Towers of Babel runs on a 13-month calendar where each month is exactly 4 weeks (28 days) long. One game takes place during each of these months, starting on the 1st and ending on the 28th.
The 28th of each month starts with a Great Flood. At this point the game is over and scores are tabulated. The rest of the day is a time of rest and relaxation during which no game-play takes place.
The last day of the year is outside any other month, and is a special holiday. On leap years, this holiday is two days long. No game-play takes place during these days.
How and when does my population manage resources?
Twice per day (every 12 hours) resources are collected, and people are born and die.
Your population's work is distributed between farming, lumberjacking, and brick-baking. You can manage the exact distribution from the City page.
At the same time that resources are collected, they are also expended:
- Every person eats 3 food, or dies if there is not enough.
- Each farmer uses 1 wood and produces 8 food.
- Each lumberjack collects 6 wood.
- Each brick-baker uses 1 wood and collects 4 clay.
Don't worry if your city does not appear to have enough food or wood at the moment - the collection is done simultaneously. For example, if you had a city of 1 Farmer and 1 Woodcutter, the farmer would collect 8 food, using 1 of the 6 wood collected by the woodcutter. The two of them would consume 6 food total. In the end, 2 food and 5 wood remain, added to your city's stores.
Where do my people get all these resources? (and What exactly are roads for?)
Your population automatically collects resources from all regions connected by road. Your starting region is always considered "connected".
Without a road, resources cannot be collected from the region. Once the road is built, however, you are set until the region is depleted.
While food can be grown infinitely (although it requires wood, as described), wood, clay and gold are depleted from regions you have access to, so it's important to scout out new regions, especially when clay and wood are running low. Also, while wood and clay are found in all regions in great abundance, gold appears in only about 20% of the regions, and is in much smaller quantities.
Resources are collected faster from closer regions than from more distant ones.
Every turn you are given the chance to send out one scout to find a new regions. He always finds a region, but it may not always be the kind of region you're looking for.
What exactly are walls for?
Walls prevent another player from building roads into that particular region, thus giving you exclusive access to the resources inside.
You cannot build walls unless you already have roads into the region, and you cannot build walls as long as any other player has roads into the region.
Walls are by no means invincible, however. They can be destroyed by soldiers (more on soldiers later).
Wait, players can share regions? How does that work?
When you go scouting, you do not necessarily discover a previously-undiscovered region - it's possible that you find a region someone else already found (it could even be their capital and tower-site).
In this case, it's quite possible that there are already roads and/or walls in place.
Even if there are already roads to a location (and assuming there aren't walls), you can still build roads of your own. In this case, both players will be harvesting resources from the region, and unless the region happens to be the same distance from both players, one of the two players is going to end up with more of the resources than the other.
A few other points about sharing regions:
- You can never build a road into another player's capital. Likewise, you cannot build walls in your own capital (since the only purpose of walls is to prevent other players from building roads, and they can't build roads into your capital anymore than you can build roads into theirs).
- Players are sent a message notifying them of activities performed by other players in shared regions. For example, if you build a road into a region explored by another player, that player will be notified (even if they haven't built a road there themselves).
- The names of regions are individual to each player. That is, two people are probably not using the same name for the same region. So if you rename the region, it doesn't change the name for anyone else, and vice-versa.
What do the descriptions of the regions mean? (and How do I know how many of each resource is left?)
The descriptions are generated based on the resources (wood, clay, and gold) remaining in the region.
As clay is used up, the terrain will become flat and dry. As wood is used up, trees will vanish. If a region has a mountain, it has gold.
For clay and gold, you will be notified when an area is running low (less than 500 remaining) or extremely low (less than 100) in that particular resource.
If many of your regions are looking low on resources, you should scout out new ones.
What makes some regions "holy ground", and how are they different?
Technically, regions are "holy ground" because they were randomly assigned to be. But it's better if you think of them as being sites described in holy text as being sacred.
In either case, holy ground provides no benefits during the course of the game, however, at the end of the game each player recieves points for each holy ground that they have connected to via roads.
Any number of players can be connected to a single holy site, however in this case the points will be divided among those players.
What bonuses are conferred by the Temple?
- stores up to 50 gold; Lets you build The Tower
- stores up to 70 gold; Lets you build Barracks (up to level 1)
- stores up to 100 gold; Development of medicine reduces the overall death rate
- stores up to 140 gold; Lets you build Barracks (up to level 2)
- stores up to 190 gold; Advancements in architecture makes the Aqueduct available
- stores up to 250 gold; Lets you build Barracks (up to level 3)
I had enough food, but the daily report says that people died!
People die naturally. If people were starving, you would have 0 food left in your city stores.
People can also die of over-exertion. If your total work rates are over 70%, death rates will increase. It can be hard to notice, since the exact number of deaths from turn to turn is slightly random, especially in the begining when populations are low (and rounding tends to work in your favor).
Bats are birds?
What can I do with my soldiers?
Soldiers can be used to tear down enemy walls and roads.
Visit the region with the walls or roads in question, and the options will appear. Each action costs 10 gold.
Your chances of success depend largely on the military might of the opponent. The distance between the region you are attacking and its owner's capital does play a part in determining success.
What can I do with my scout?
Your scout can take one of two actions each turn:
From the City page, you can order him to scout out a new, random region. This could be a hitherto unexplored region, or a region that another player has already explored.
From a region with another player's roads in it, you may send out your scout to follow those roads into all the other regions that that player has built roads into.
When a scout discovers the capital of another player, that player has been identified by you. They will appear in the Diplomacy page, and from there you can see other information about that player. Also, whenever you see their roads or walls in the future, you will recognize it as belonging to that player.
What are "jinns"?
In the Qur'an, Solomon (also of Bible fame) controls several jinns (jinni, genies, etc), which he uses to do everything from moving furniture to waging war.
In Towers of Babel, jinns are powerful military units that, unlike regular soldiers, do not consume food. They also do not count toward population limits (for example, houses required, or population required for mill upgrades).
The only way to get jinns is via the "Gather Army" miracle.
What do prophets do, and how do I get them?
Every turn there is a chance that a member of your city will become a prophet. Your chances are better with larger populations and a taller tower.
In game terms, prophets are completely removed from the population: they do not work, eat food, or require housing.
Every prophet gives you two things: an artifact to build, and a miracle to perform.
The miracle can be performed once, at any time, for free.
Artifacts must be built, and have high and varrying requirements. For example to build the Ark, you need to use 200 wood, while the Coat of Many Colors requires only that you have two prophets.
Every artifact you own at the end of the game is worth points.
I think you have your prophets and miracles confused...
When you receive a prophet, it is randomly assigned a name and miracle. It is, therefore, much more likely than not that the pairings will not match descriptions in the Bible, or anywhere else.
How exactly does lightning work?
The lightning disaster, when it strikes, hits a random level on your tower. That level, and all levels above it of the same size have their size reduced by 1.
Here are some examples:
How exactly do earthquakes work?
Earthquakes come in varying degrees of strength. If the level of an earthquake's strength exceeds the strength of a level on your tower, that level and all levels above it are completely destroyed.
The strength of each level of your tower is related to the size of that level and all levels above it, such that thin towers are weaker, while pyramid-shaped towers are extremely resilient.
How exactly does the Great Flood work?
The Great Flood is technically an earthquake of specific force that strikes every civilization simultaneously.
Your "Tablets of Law" look a bit odd...
According to traditional Judaism, the tablets are solid, perfect cubes of blue sapphire stone. The commandments are not merely ingraved on the surface, but bored fully through. Also worth note: though the words are bored straight through the stone, they are not reversed on the other side - they can be read normally on both sides.
It makes me wonder where the boring, rounded-corner, flat, grey stone imagery comes from.