=============================================================================== STEVEN UNIVERSE: ATTACK THE LIGHT (IOS) Game Mechanics FAQ by Slartifer (GameFAQs handle: Slartifer) v 0.8 July 13, 2015 =============================================================================== This FAQ covers game mechanics for the popular but little-documented iOS RPG, Steven Universe: Attack the Light. It's not quite complete, but it's the most information I've seen out there, so here it is. =============================================================================== TABLE OF CONTENTS =============================================================================== [1] Gem Stats [2] Ability Damage [3] Level-Up Bonuses [4] Miscellaneous [5] Acknowledgements & History =============================================================================== [1] GEM STATS =============================================================================== ATTACK: Provides the base damage for your attacks. This base damage is then multiplied by a factor that depends on what ability you use. Strong abilities have a high multiplier, and weak abilities have a low multiplier. After the multiplication, your target's Defense is subtracted from the result. However, having multiple hits, or a cheap star cost, can also multiply the impact of your Attack stat, and in almost exactly the same way (the impact of Defense is also mulitiplied). So Attack is important for any gem who will be attacking. * High-multiplier attacks, like Spear Throw or Rocket Punch, are efficient against enemies that have high Defense ratings. Later in the game, you can often use Alexandrite for this purpose. * Against enemies with average or lower Defense, the most efficient skill is Pearl's Quick Strike. Amethyst's Dual Whip is about as efficient, but is harder to chunk effectively (with its 4 star cost) and also has a harder action requirement (IMO). * For enemies with shields, you'll need to use Shield Breaker first. Since that also inflicts Defense Down status, you'll usually be fine with Quick Strike. Since most high defense enemies also have shields, this means that there are surprisingly few occasions when the other attacks are that great. * Amethyst's Crystal Whip is about as efficient as Quick Strike when used against 3 enemies. Since you can't concentrate your attack, it'll take longer to start picking them off. However, with 4 or more enemies, Crystal Whip is pretty efficient -- especially since large enemy formations are guaranteed to have mostly weak enemies, so you can pop a starfruit and take them out in the first round with multiple Crystal Whips. It is, of course, very inefficient against 1 or 2 enemies, so you can't rely on it as your only attack. LUCK: The devs have confirmed that Luck only affects the chance of landing a lucky hit (aka critical hit), and that Luck is the only thing responsible for that chance. Lucky hits deal approximately double damage. They are not defense piercing. It's not clear if the impact of Luck is linear or not. If you add just a few points to Luck early on, you'll notice a big increase in lucky hits. On the other hand, going from 11 to 21 later (via a badge) seems to make a more modest difference. There are also badges that will trigger sometimes on a lucky hit. These can be useful in the mid-game if your attacker also has decent Luck. HARMONY: Your HP total. Steven starts out healing 10 HP per action, but this can eventually reach 30, so it really is useful to boost your maximum Harmony in order to make the most of this healing. There are items and badges that will replenish all your Harmony, too. I'd shoot for about 50 for each gem, by the end of the game. DEFENSE: Each time you take damage, your Defense is subtracted first. If you block successfully, the damage is halved before your Defense is subtracted. In general, Defense is less useful than Harmony. Healing is easy and cheap in Attack the Light. In order for +1 Defense to beat +5 Harmony, you need to take more than 5 hits in between getting healed to max Harmony, which is not especially likely -- especially not when facing tough opponents, which is when you really care. Additionally, there are several badges that provide a very nice attack bonus, at the cost of a large percentile reduction to Defense. If you haven't upgraded your defense, the penalty is nearly nothing, and your Harmony will keep you going just fine. =============================================================================== [2] ABILITY DAMAGE =============================================================================== This table presents approximate (estimated) multipliers for each attack skill. As you can see, some skills are more efficient than others once you consider the number of hits, the targeting, and the star cost. There are a few gaps in this table for particular upgraded/non-upgraded skills. The level cap and lack of multiple save slots make these time-consuming to go back and test; if anyone would like to provide convincing data on these, I'll gladly update the table with credit to you. User Ability Mult x Hits Targ. Stars Action risk/skill -------- ----------------- ------------- ---- ------- ----------------- Garnet Gauntlet Punch 1.0 x 2 = 2.0 ST @ 2 stars 1/2 Easy Garnet Gauntlet Punch II Garnet Rocket Punch 2.0 x 2 = 4.0 VT @ 5 stars x/2 Harder Garnet Rocket Punch II Garnet 6 Hit Combo 1.0 x 6 = 6.0 ST @ 6 stars x/6 Moderate Pearl Quick Strike Pearl Quick Strike II 1.0 x 2 = 2.0 ST @ 1 star 1/2 Easy Pearl Spear Throw 3.0 x 1 = 3.0 Line @ 4 stars 0/1 Easy-ish Pearl Fireball 2.0 x 3 = 6.0 VT @ 5 stars x/3 Trivial Pearl Fireball II Amethyst Crystal Whip Amethyst Crystal Whip II 1.0 x 2 = 2.0 AE @ 3 stars 1/2 Easy Amethyst Dual Strike 0.5 x16 = 8.0 VT @ 4 stars x/16 Easy-ish Amethyst Spin Ball 3.0 x 1 = 3.0 ST @ 6 stars 0/1 Moderate Amethyst Spin Ball II Skills primarily used to inflict statuses (plusses indicate upgrades): Garnet Shield Breaker (3) Destroys shields, inflicts Defense Down, 1.0+ dmg Amethyst Purple Puma (4) Inflicts Attack Down, +destroys shields, 1.0+ dmg Pearl Holo-Pearl (4/3+) Inflicts Stun for 1-3 turns =============================================================================== [3] LEVEL UP BONUSES =============================================================================== There are three types of level up bonuses you can receive: (1) Learning a mandatory ability. You must learn the ability as your bonus and will not see any other options. These are shown in all caps in the table below. (2) Taking an optional upgrade. The upgrade will appear in one of your three choice slots. If you don't take it right away, it will continue to take up a choice slot at each level up until you do. These are shown in regular text in the table. (3) Default upgrade options. If you don't have a mandatory ability, you will have three choice slots; any that are not filled by unused optional upgrades will give you one of four options: +1 Attack +1 Defense +2 Luck +5 Harmony You'll always have three different options, but which options you get appears to be random and varies from game to game. For that reason, it may be wise to take stat upgrades you are prioritizing ahead of optional upgrades, which you can pick up later, when the stat upgrade options are less pleasing. This is not an especially punishing game, so there are all kinds of ways you can build your party. The simplest option is probably to prioritize Attack, avoid Defense, and take moderate amounts of Luck and Harmony (for everyone). Holo-Pearl (and items) are sufficient to control dangerous situations. But you might also enjoy a super-lucky character with Luck-based badges; or a set of high-Defense tanks with auto-recovery badges. (Be aware that enemies most often attack the person who attacked them, so a single low-offense tank may not do a great job of tanking.) Lv Garnet Pearl Amethyst ---- ------------------ ------------------ ------------------ 9001 GAUNTLET PUNCH QUICK STRIKE CRYSTAL WHIP 9002 SHIELD BREAKER DUAL STRIKE 9003 SPEAR THROW 9004 9005 HOLO-PEARL 9006 ROCKET PUNCH PURPLE PUMA 9007 9008 Shield Breaker II Holo-Pearl II Purple Puma II 9009 2nd Badge Slot 2nd Badge Slot 2nd Badge Slot 9010 Rocket Punch II FIREBALL 9011 6 HIT COMBO 9012 Fireball II SPIN BALL 9013 Gauntlet Punch II 9014 Crystal Whip II 9015 Quick Strike II 9016 Spin Ball II 9017 9018 9019 Shield Breaker III Holo-Pearl III Purple Puma III 9020+ (Maximum level: 9030) Lv Steven -- ------------------ 1 ENCOURAGE 2 BUBBLE SHIELD 3 Wallet Upgrade, Escape, Encourage II 4 Cure Song 5 Bubble Shield II 6 Rose's Tear Badge 7 Encourage III 8 Wallet Upgrade 9 Defense Song 10 Strength Song 11 Lucky Song 12 Encourage IV 13 Wallet Upgrade 14 Encourage V 15 BEEFY SONG 16 Level-Up Charm 17 Wallet Upgrade 18 Escape II (?) 19 Wallet Upgrade 20 Escape III 21 -- 22 -- (Maxmimum level: 22) =============================================================================== [4] MISCELLANEOUS =============================================================================== Early on, most badges are unimpressive. The XP badges will help you gain levels faster and are better than most early-to-mid badges. However, the game does have a level cap, which you'll likely reach around the time you finish the game content. For that reason, I recommend using Level-Up Charms when you acquire them. Might as well be stronger, sooner, rather than trying to squeeze extra XP out of them later. Items are incredibly plentiful, especially generic starfruit. I think I finished the game with more than 40 in stock. Don't be afraid to blow those on regular battles, even early on. Speeding things along is the most value they'll provide. Alexandrite (which you gain access to at the end of the third world) is also pretty strong. I suspect (but don't know) that she basically does seven 1.0 attacks with Attack and Luck scores that are the sum of your gems' scores. This would mean it's even more rewarding to prioritize Attack for all three gems. (That's 21 times the power of Crystal Whip, for 3 times the stars.) Super Starfruit, White Starfruit, and Everyone Breakfasts all provide easy ways to call on Alexandrite (which requires 9 stars, and all three gems at full health). While those are less plentiful than regular starfruit, I think I finished the game with 40-50 in stock between those three items, so you may not need to conserve those either. =============================================================================== [5] ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS & HISTORY =============================================================================== Acknowledgements: Thanks to the devs for communicating so much with fans. And thanks for making a fun little game with actual substance to it. History: 1.0 - July 2015 - Initial release