No thanks to the 6.66% base merc challenge. LOL

That is a disaster regardless of what approach you take to it.

I had plenty of mercs in the two hardened levels I beat so far, so I doubt it's changed much.

Which 2 did you beat in 1 day?

The first two; neither took very long. I've moved onto Scandinavia now because I'm guessing it gives a fourth artifact slot; I'm expecting it to take me 6 days based on the AP value, so hopefully I'll be able to report back then.

What do the hard level powerups give?

The hard level power ups give hard power ups that are very powerful that can then be used for other hard levels. Hope this helped

What i mean is that what does each hard powerup do? Can i claim it only once?

You can claim it once only. If you can repetitively get it, it would be too OP. Each hard powerup provides a powerup stronger than a normal leveled powerup.

There's rumor that Hardened Scandinavia gets you a 4th artifact slot.

It also looks like there are more achievments now, Timinator's profile now reads 90%

There are at least achievements for beating the hardened levels. I suspect there are for getting all the techs but it would have extended my play time a lot to try for those so I haven't bothered.

Edited 8/10/2021 02:45:18

One of the new achievements (listed in my un-completed queue) is "Unlock all Ore rewards from defeating levels fast."
That one's going to take awhile. I was at like 70% completion and now I'm back down to 68. At least I'll be 69% again soon.

I'm quite excited for the 30% ore rewards for beating levels quickly (as someone on Europe 1066, first Ascension). Assuming the difficulty of levels hasn't changed considerably with their regeneration, the target times almost all look beatable with reasonable strategy and advancement choices on first play-through. Thus, this adds an achievable baseline and also a better sense of value from completing levels.

Making late-game techs more powerful also seems like it will make the game more enjoyable - it always felt disappointing to be skipping a substantial portion of the later advancements since their costs were nowhere close to being worth the payoff.

I'm also happy to see the market price change since it will encourage better use of mines (something I personally found enjoyable) and more varied use of crafters.

Overall, looks like a solid set of changes (no comments on the ones targeted at long-time players)!

Edited 8/10/2021 04:23:00

No, I'm running Android, and my app is 5.13.0.2, even after I uninstalled & reinstalled it

Just checked, and there is no quick access list for unused mortars like there are for unclaimed powers and undug dig sites.

@Kcebnroh

The update for the android version hasn't been pushed by Google yet. Update 5.14 was released yesterday, but currently only the website and PC versions are up to date.

Edited 8/10/2021 05:50:17

Some data from the first market on Hardened Scandinavia in case anyone wants to try to figure out the formula. It's going to be slightly off because I bought a couple hundred zinc bars, but that shouldn't have moved anything much:
Tin bar: starting price 173, sell value 462, price after buying 5k 173, market price increase after buying 5k .01%, price after buying 100M worth 254, market price increase after buying 100M worth .16%
Iron bar: starting price 1.47k, sell value 3.93k, price after buying 5k 1.47k, market price increase after buying 5k .06%, price after buying 100M worth 1.69k, market price increase after buying 100M worth .74%
Zinc bar: starting price 12k, sell value 32, price after buying 5k 12k, market price increase after buying 5k .56%, price after buying 100M worth 12k, market price increase after buying 100M worth .91%
Nickle bar: starting price 38k, sell value 462, price after buying 5k 38k, market price increase after buying 5k 1.96%, price after buying 100M worth 38k, market price increase after buying 100M worth 1.02%

Changing sell value with an artifact doesn't seem to affect anything with buying. Rounding makes it difficult to get much info I'm afraid. The upside is that everything is very cheap at the start- it costs less to buy than the sell value. That changes eventually- if I were to buy 189k tin bars I'd be at the break even point based on what the slider is telling me- but it shouldn't be hard to fund quite a lot with market purchases, at least early on. I suspect a hybrid market/smelting strategy will do very well.

Peloponnesian war-->Multi Level

"There's rumor that Hardened Scandinavia gets you a 4th artifact slot."

Man, I'm finishing Scandinavia today... In the old version 😅

I have to start over when the update is in the play store

Peloponnesian war-->Multi Level

@here: what does that mean? Does Hardened Peloponnesian have another ML power?

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Man, I'm finishing Scandinavia today... In the old version 😅

@Leia: normal levels dont give special rewards (except for ore boost production), only the new Hardened levels do

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New image from Muli on discord:


I can only assume that this is for "Couch Potato" from Siege of Feldmere.

Edited 8/10/2021 06:43:36