Beneath The Six: How To Play

Combat Test

This page currently only describes the Combat Test, which is a small fragment of Beneath The Six which, in turn, is just a small part of what will become the dNo ecosystem.

Controls

Please visit the Controls page to discover all the commands you will need to play the game.

Tutorial

The Combat Test features a very basic tutorial to introduce players to the essentials of the game. Once you've completed the tutorial you'll be able to access the Arena, where a new dungeon is unveiled each day.

Objective

The objective in the Combat Test is simply to kill all the enemies on a level. Once you've done that, a portal will open up. Enter the portal to descend to the next level. Whoever reaches the highest wave, with the fewest actions, will be the winner!

Basic Movement

Left Click on a Tile to move to it. Right Click and Hold, while moving the mouse, to move the camera. You can rotate the camera as well as zooming in and out.

Inscription Tiles

The tutorial features Inscription Tiles. These glow, and have a magnifying glass over them. Move your character onto an Inscription Tile, and see an instruction panel pop up. Follow the instructions on each Inscription Tile to complete the tutorial.

Action Points

Beneath The Six is a turn-based game. Each turn, you have a number of Action Points to use up (typically two action points per turn, but this can change).

Action Points can be used to move to another tile, or to attack.

Moving

You can only move a certain number of tiles per action point. Hovering over an empty tile shows how many action points are needed to move there (1AP, 2AP etc). The Action Point Indicator at the top middle of the screen also highlights how many Action Points are required.

Moving to this tile takes one Action Point

Moving to this tile takes two Action Points

Attacking

Left Click on a tile with an enemy to attack. Some player characters can attack from a distance, others need to be on a tile next to the enemy to attack. Hovering over your character indicates which tiles your attacks can reach, and also shows your character's information in the Info Panel.

The blue highlighted tiles indicate your attack range

Enemy Attacks

Once you've used up your Action Points, the enemies will move and attack if in range.

You can see an enemy's attack range by hovering over the enemy's tile. Tiles highlighted in red can be targeted by that enemy on their turn.

Red tiles show the enemy's attack range. Standing on a red tile is dangerous as enemies could attack you next turn.

Note also the Info Panel shows the enemy's stats.

Shards

When an enemy dies, it releases a Shard. Collect the shards - they represent your score and can also be used in the shop to buy new equipment.

User Interface

See here for more details on the Beneath The Six:User Interface

Skills

Each character starts with two Beneath The Six:Skills. Left click on one of the Skills icons at the bottom middle of the screen to activate a Skill. Most skills act on a specific tile - once you've activated the Skill, left click on one of the highlighted tiles to use the Skill.

Selecting which tile to attack with a Volcanic Blast skill

Volcanic Blast in action - tiles have turned to lava.

Once used, a Skill takes a number of turns to 'cool down' and become usable again.

Status Effects

Status effects modify a character or enemy's stats - which may be positive or negative. Hovering over the player or an enemy shows their Info Panel, which shows any Status Effects currently in play.

Inventory

The inventory shows your items (weapons, clothing, potions). Clothing and weapons on the left hand side of the inventory is currently equipped. Right click on an item to use/equip/unequip.

Character Choice

Before each game, you are invited to select from a range of pre-made characters. In the final game, you will be able to design your own characters by combining different dNo Dice. The characters will take on the traits of the dice - affecting their stats, skills, clothing and weapons, as well as their physical appearance. The full character creation system is still in development, so is not included in the Combat Test - right now there are only a small number of character and clothing models in the game, so there isn't much variety in how they look - although there is a wider variation in what the characters can do.

You can hover over the dice used to create the characters to see how they have affected that character's abilities and equipment.

One of the objectives of the Combat Test is to help us understand what characters people like, how differently they play, which characters work well against which enemies, and so on. Please do experiment with different characters - what works well one day might not the next!

Levelling Up

Completing levels with a character gives the XP. Collect enough XP and you can level up.

As you level up you'll unlock more skills.