Daily Diamond Challenge 22 May 9, 2021 - Empires and Puzzles

Yesterday's Empires and Puzzles Daily Diamond Challenge problem: 

My solution: 

You could do these moves in a different order, and so long as a tile doesn't cascade and ruin the board, it would still work. I started by making the blue match toward the right-hand bottom corner, then make the purple match toward the top. Boom, there's your red diamond. 

Today's problem: See if you can spot the diamond below. There may be more than one, but there is definitely at least one that is currently on the board.

Solution tomorrow. 

Daily Diamond Challenge 21 May 8, 2021 - Empires and Puzzles

Yesterday's Empires and Puzzles Daily Diamond Challenge problem: 

My solution: 

There are actually two possible diamonds (at least). The one I didn't make is a green diamond. Match the greens toward the right side; don't just pop the green dragon bomb, or else it won't work—you have to make a three-match of the greens below the top row. That sets up a blue match, then after the blue match, you can make the yellow dragon bomb to set up the green diamond. 

I made the simpler diamond. Make the green match in the top row, and you're perfectly set up for a yellow diamond. 

Remember, this is an exercise is seeing the board. Just because I made one diamond doesn't mean the other one is a bad move. I just happened to need the yellow diamond instead of the green one. 

Not only those two, but the game gave me a bonus diamond after making the yellow one! 

Today's problem: See if you can spot the diamond below. There may be more than one, but there is definitely at least one that is currently on the board.

Solution tomorrow. 

Daily Diamond Challenge 20 May 7, 2021 - Empires and Puzzles

Yesterday's Empires and Puzzles Daily Diamond Challenge problem: 

My solution: 

There are two ways to go with this board. The solution not pictured here involves making the purple match in the fifth column to bring the red tile to the top of the board. That sets up a nice L-shaped red diamond. 

I opted for the purple diamond instead. Make the red dragon bomb up the center of the board, and that sets up a purple L-shaped diamond. There's no screenshot of the purple diamond though because . . . I forgot to take one. 

Today's problem: See if you can spot the diamond below. There may be more than one, but there is definitely at least one that is currently on the board.

Solution tomorrow.

Daily Diamond Challenge 19 May 6, 2021 - Empires and Puzzles

Yesterday's Empires and Puzzles Daily Diamond Challenge problem: 

My solution: 

Relatively simple puzzle compared to recent ones, in my opinion. Match the reds in the middle of the board, and you are set up for a nice green T-shaped diamond. 

Today's problem: See if you can spot the diamond below. There may be more than one, but there is definitely at least one that is currently on the board.

Solution tomorrow. 

Daily Diamond Challenge 18 May 5, 2021 - Empires and Puzzles

Yesterday's Empires and Puzzles Daily Diamond Challenge problem: 

My solution: 

A reminder that I set up these exercises so that the "problem" shows a screenshot of the moment I spotted the diamond. You look at the first screenshot, and I don't blame you if you think there isn't a diamond, but I promise you there is one, and you can learn to spot it when the tiles are in this position. 

Make the green match to bring up the red tile. Then bring down the yellow tile to make the dragon bomb, and there's your red diamond! The game felt generous, so it rewarded me with a second cascaded purple diamond as a bonus.

Today's problem: See if you can spot the diamond below. There may be more than one, but there is definitely at least one that is currently on the board.

Solution tomorrow. 

Daily Diamond Challenge 17 May 4, 2021 - Empires and Puzzles

Yesterday's Empires and Puzzles Daily Diamond Challenge problem: 

My solution: 

Make the blue match toward the top right of the board. That makes a nice T-shaped green diamond. 

There is another diamond possibility in the first image of the solution. If you had a yellow stack and needed that diamond, you could forgo the green diamond by moving the purple tile in the second-most righthand column down. Bring that purple tile down one more time to match and cascade the red tile up, then you can make that red match across the middle of the board, and voilà! It will cascade into a yellow diamond.

Today's problem: See if you can spot the diamond below. There may be more than one, but there is definitely at least one that is currently on the board.

Solution tomorrow. 

Daily Diamond Challenge 16 May 3, 2021 - Empires and Puzzles

Yesterday's Empires and Puzzles Daily Diamond Challenge problem: 

My solution: 

There are at least two solutions here. The first is the one I didn't make: Make the red match where the purple diamond is, and that sets up a green diamond. 

I opted for the yellow diamond: Make the green match up top to cascade the yellow tiles into line. I forget exactly what happened that prevented me from taking the screenshot with the diamond. Perhaps I just forgot? 

Today's problem: See if you can spot the diamond below. There may be more than one, but there is definitely at least one that is currently on the board.

Solution tomorrow. 

Daily Diamond Challenge 15 May 2, 2021 - Empires and Puzzles

Yesterday's Empires and Puzzles Daily Diamond Challenge problem: 

My solution: 

Make the blue match toward the top of the board above the green tiles. Luckily for me, the cascade produced a separate red diamond, but unluckily for me, the actual solution was to form a green diamond. The green diamond nearly became impossible because the red diamond that cascaded formed in the exact spot I needed the greens to cascade. 

Luckily for me, there was a convenient purple match that line up so I could do what I had planned all along. Unluckily for me, I did manage to form the green diamond, but the resulting cascade brought more greens up that popped the diamond and prevented me from being able to screenshot the full solution. 

The game giveth, the game taketh away. 

Today's problem: See if you can spot the diamond below. There may be more than one, but there is definitely at least one that is currently on the board.

Solution tomorrow. 

Why do you play this game? - Empires and Puzzles

I first encountered Empires and Puzzles off an ad from Words with Friends. (Zynga games advertising on other Zynga games.) I remember Sha Ji and Melendor being two of the heroes in the sample map stage against a dragon. I would only play if I could make matches on my own as opposed to being forced to make matches. 

I didn't fully grasp the mechanics from playing that little sample, but it was enough to intrigue me. I didn't want to spend more time playing games though, so I didn't look into it. 

The ad kept coming. I kept enjoying the little samples these ads were giving me. I don't know what finally prompted me to do so, but I finally downloaded it just to see what it was all about. 

Honestly, I almost quit the game before the end of the tutorial. So. Many. Forced. Moves. 

But I stuck with it and eventually got some freedom from the arrows pointing to the only thing I could click on the screen. I was enthralled. Base building. Resource management. Hero art. Map stages. Raids were tough for a while, but I was getting better pretty quickly. 

Then I quit. 

What? Why? 

I was spending too much time on the game. I didn't tie my account to Game Center, so all that data was lost. I honestly also thought I broke the game because I stuck a bunch of resources into whatever training camp level gives you 1* or 2* heroes in three hours. I put two days worth of heroes. Two days! Simpler times. 

I don't know what prompted me to pick the game back up again. The first time I tried it, it must have been January of 2020, and I quit for something like six weeks or so. I really missed it, but again, I don't know what the catalyst was that made me re-download the game and want to pick it back up again. Yes, I had to start over from the tutorial, and yes, it was still frustrating to have to go through all that again. 

But here I am now. Sixty-six levels later, several seasons of map stages, many new heroes, and new link to Game Center, and what does the future have in store? 

I'm really close to finishing the base. That was one of my favorite parts of the game early on when buildings were finished pretty quickly. Trying to decide what building to upgrade next was a fun exercise, and it became even more fun when I first got VIP about six months or so in. 

I really enjoy playing the game with my alliance. I don't know how I ended up where I did in the first place, but they accepted me, welcomed me, offered me a bunch of help. I went with a bunch of them to a new alliance, and we basically merged together, and now a bunch of us are in Ace Nation. We're currently full as of this writing, but if you think you'd like to join, drop me a comment below or hit me up on Line (see my Line ID in the blog header). 

I do understand the fatigue some players feel at the sheer number and scale of events in the game. I like the events though. Challenge Events, Ninja Tower, Mythic Titan. I talked about how the Mythic Titan is my favorite event in the game now. The game does sometimes feel like a chore, but everything I've ever enjoyed in life reached that point for me. There are still things I enjoy about it, and there are a lot more days when it doesn't feel like a chore than not. 

I haven't gotten any of the new Season 4 or League of Villains or other recently released heroes yet, but I just love using some of the heroes I have on my roster. They're just so much fun to play around with, experiment with, and see come to life after summoning and leveling them up. 

I enjoy the strategy of the resource management. Like I said, I'm so close to finishing building the base—which really means that I'm super far away from that point because it takes forever to finish advanced buildings—but I've cheated a bit by siphoning some iron away to craft weapons for the Challenge Events and Ninja Tower. I've placed top 5000 in the last two Ninja Towers, and I hope I can at least get that high again because this might be the last or second-to-last Ninja Tower I'll be going into underpowered in terms of items. I've managed though because I've discovered just how powerful using Wu Kong can be when combining him with the Titan Banner. I've crafted a bunch of those, so even though my Hunter's Lodge isn't maxed yet, I have my way of getting around not having a bunch of Hurricanes and Scrolls of Alteration. Having Norns in my roster is a HUGE help. 

I'm enjoying being a part of the online community. I've met some great players who've joined Ace Nation from Reddit and Discord. I talk every day with wonderful people on the Discord where we share a bunch of stuff related to the game. Leilow has graciously opened a channel in that Discord server where I can just post the Daily Diamond Challenge posts. I'm especially enjoying getting to meet all the top players that Empires and Puzzles Books on Youtube has been interviewing for that series. 

I'm probably spending too much time on this game, but it's so much fun, and it's not getting in the way of other things in my life, so why not keep going?

Why do you play this game?

Daily Diamond Challenge 14 May 1, 2021 - Empires and Puzzles

Yesterday's Empires and Puzzles Daily Diamond Challenge problem: 

My solution: 

Make the combo between the blues and the yellows in the third column, and that will create the purple diamond in one move. 

Today's problem: See if you can spot the diamond below. There may be more than one, but there is definitely at least one that is currently on the board.

Solution tomorrow. 

What's that? It's the same picture as today's solution? That is correct! The diamonds kept coming on this board.