May Update Preview: Tile Effects

This is I M GAME.

Master of Piece will be updated on May 4th for the Deckbuilding Fest!🎉

Update

• Enjoy 20% discount during the Deckbuilding Fest (May 4–11)

• Tile Effects: Special terrain effects will appear on neutral tiles across the battlefield

• ??? (To be revealed next week!)

• New Mercenaries & Traits

• New Relics

• New Items

Experience Master of Piece with a whole new layer of strategy at our highest discount yet.

We’ll be revealing more update details through upcoming developer notes, so stay tuned.

Today, we’d like to introduce one of the key features of this update: Tile Effects.

Random Tile Effects in the Battlefield

Tile Effects are special tiles that are randomly generated on neutral tiles at the start of battle.

Each region features different Tile Effects, and units standing on these tiles will gain various effects.

Carefully reading the battlefield and making the most of these Tile Effects will be key to optimizing your strategy.

In this developer note, we’ll introduce just one Tile Effect per region. Be sure to discover the rest in-game after the update.

Hill of Sunshine: Bush

The piece on this tile gains Dodge. This tile effect will be removed once the piece on this tile gets attacked. The tile effect will be respawned after 2 rounds.

This allows for the kind of “bush play” that many players enjoy in other games to be used in Master of Piece as well. Although the effect itself is simple, it grants the powerful benefit of dodge, so claiming it quickly before the enemy can make use of it will likely be very important.

Blazing Sands: Tunnel

At the end of each round, the piece on this tile moves to the other side of the tunnel. If there is a piece on the other side, pieces will swap places.

This can be used to reposition allies when Action Points are limited, or as a way to escape dangerous enemies. Since the effect applies to both allies and enemies, it also opens up opportunities to disrupt enemy positioning and turn the tide of battle.

Duskwind Plains: Fissure

After 2 rounds, the tile collapses and the piece on the tile is executed. Then this tile effect will respawn on a random tile.

As the name suggests, the ground gives way beneath the unit, causing it to fall and be eliminated.

Starting from the third region, more hazardous tile effects begin to appear. Avoid putting your units at risk, while guiding enemies into these tiles to gain an advantage.

Ember Chasm: Volcanic Crater

Erupts after 3 rounds and executes 3 pieces on 3 random tiles. Then this tile effect will be respawned on a random tile.

This Tile Effect erupts at a fixed timing. You will need to pay close attention to both deployment timing and positioning so that your strongest pieces do not get taken out by an eruption before they have a chance to shine.

From Unpredictable RNG to Strategic Control

As we mentioned before when talking about the earlier history of Master of Piece, Tile Effects also existed in past versions of the game.

For example, the GIF above shows the old Mist Tile Effect from the Hill of Sunshine, which reduced the Speed of the piece standing on that tile to 0.

Like the current version, the old Tile Effects were meant to add variety to battles and keep combat from feeling repetitive. However, most of them were designed in ways that affected the player negatively. Whether they would trigger, when they would trigger, and even which tile they would move to were all random, so players often had to deal with frustrating situations where mist would suddenly appear on a tile occupied by an allied piece in the middle of battle and inflict an unavoidable penalty.

At that time, there was also no Action Point system, and allied pieces could not be moved. If a piece got caught in the mist, there was no way to save it, and players simply had to sit there helplessly and watch it get slaughtered by enemies.

RNG elements have many strengths when it comes to adding variety and freshness to gameplay, but this was also the moment we realized that RNG the player has no control over can easily create a sense of helplessness.

That is why, when reworking the Tile Effect system this time, our top priority was to make sure players could check these random effects in advance and prepare for them.

Instead of having Tile Effects suddenly rise up in the middle of battle, we changed the system so that the information is provided from the very start of combat. We also made sure that their major effects do not trigger right at the beginning of battle, but only several turns later, so that players have room to anticipate and respond.

In other words, we wanted Tile Effects to become more than just disruptive elements in battle. Our goal was for them to serve as a new strategic layer that players can plan around, manage, and turn to their advantage.

Of course, we do not think the system is perfect yet. How it feels in actual gameplay, and which kinds of Tile Effects create the most interesting decisions, are things that will become clearer through your feedback.

Once the update is live, we hope you’ll try out the new Tile Effects for yourselves and let us know what you think, whether it’s a clever use you enjoyed or something that felt lacking. Your feedback will be a huge help as we continue refining and improving the system.

We’ll continue introducing the rest of the update content one by one through future developer notes, so please look forward to it.

See you on the battlefield on May 5.