Vanguard Monsters
DEMO VERSION, Standalone download below!
Vanguard Monsters Discord: https://discord.gg/Qs8Vb3AEdF
Vanguard Monsters is a Roguelite Autobattler where you raise a party of monsters, collect treasure, and do battle to fend off the invading forces of the Void. Battles happen automatically, with anywhere between 1 to 6 monsters on either side of the field. Each monster attacks or uses their ability when their respect charge meters fill, so you will need to choose the best formation at the start of the battle to tackle what unique challenges the enemies present each time. You move a monster in battle but theres a cooldown on this, so time it wisely to protect someone weak or concentrate damage on a big threat! When a monster reaches 0 hp it will be unable to fight for the rest of that battle and your party will accrue a wound. Gain too many wounds and your monsters will be unable to continue their quest.
As you complete battles and events you will find food, treasure and potions, feeding monsters permanently increases their stats, and each monster can wield 1 equipment. These items can have very powerful effects when used on the right monster but these items can only be used before battle begins. Potions are one exception, these provide temporary boosts to a specific monster and can be used at any time.
Throughout your journey you will come across Monster Nests and Aurite Crystals, both of which will greatly affect your party. Nests will provide you with an egg that can be hatched into new monster for your team. Aurite on the other hand is crystalized magic that will cause a monster to evolve into their next form, granting a new ability and increasing their stats. Every monster can evolve twice, but it will take more than just regular aurite to do so the second time.
Programming /Design / Art Me https://twitter.com/JaysGames -> https://bsky.app/profile/vanguardjay.bsky.social
Additional Items & Parrot & Dragon & Kaiju Monster Families done by https://twitter.com/ChrisMillerArt
Fonts by https://somepx.itch.io/ / https://twitter.com/somepx
Music by https://tallbeard.itch.io/three-red-hearts-prepare-to-dev
Download
Click download now to get access to the following files:
Development log
- Spring Bug FixesMay 08, 2023
- Spring FashionMay 02, 2023
- Bug fixesApr 16, 2023
- Some More FixesApr 13, 2023
- Shields Up-date!Apr 08, 2023
- Build A Buff UpdateFeb 03, 2023
- More Bugs FixedJan 06, 2023
- Holidays End and More Bug FixesJan 02, 2023
Comments
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How do you get Nessa? Please help.
thats pretty tough to find :D I hope the crown helped
My game froze and I don't want to reload the tab and lose my progress. What should I do?
nvm I figured it out
progress *shouldnt* be lost if you refresh (unless something happens to the browser cache/cookies or saving fails). It autosaves each time you select something on the map. In this version there is a bug with seras when fighting faceless that can freeze it, so for now just try to keep him from being targeted by their Start of Battle ability.
my team thats almost unbeatable my guys never ever faint
its probably the sunglasses, too cool to faint
I tried a little harder
💪
im die
tuskal is an absolute CHAMP
What's crazy is Tusk used to be even stronger xD glad to see they are still getting good useage
can you add a new discord link
here try this one https://discord.gg/yvubkKme
this one didn’t work either
hm thats strange, we still have new people joining regularly, Im not sure what would be causing that.
I tried my best
and you did great 👍
What does silence do
it means the affected monster wont be able to cast their active ability (and often times wont regenerate mana either)
how does the meditation garden work? I put a monster in it and started a new run, but none of the monsters had the synergy? I don't really get it.
oh nvm figured it out
a few of the village buildings work that way (giving an item at the start of run)
had a good run
dang 9 loops well done
🔥
will there be more updates?
or are you working on a diffrent project?
I am working on a new update but things have been busy here so it will still be a bit before it is done
ill just leave you guys to wonder how i got two nessas onto the same tile. (also join the discord server)
xD thats a pretty powerful note
thank you Ghostly Smith, very cool
Fun game! I finally beat it with only one monster. Might try the same challenge in hard mode but IDK.
wow thats a really tough challenge, well done, especially on the middle difficulty.
now thats some dedication (Urso is ofc the best for these kinda runs due to Gourmand)
really loved the game! It's very catchy, i'm waiting for the next update!
thank you :D
Awesome game! my second infinite run was pretty good.
nice, thank you, it's good to see you were using your supers too many people forget :D
yea, i use supers either for nuking bosses or attempting to save myself from enemies suddenly hitting the power ceiling before me d:
what build were you going for?
Fun game! I can still do a few things to optimize this team :)
One suggestion is to make checking stats and synergies on the village page. If that's already there, make it more intuitive.
that's a weird thing actually, you can't look at stats or synergies without starting a run, HOWEVER, you can just check by picking 2 random eggs and then forfeiting (although it's still kinda odd you can't do it in the village). also, how have you not gotten jumped by 6 adepts and died at this point, and without Bulky? that's an amazing run.
The constant stuns from the top row are a really big help in allowing my team to win with the other side barely getting off an attack. The crab is the surprise MVP as its attacks bypass defenses so it remains lethal at higher levels.
thank you, yea one of the planned points for the next update is improving the compendium, including adding more things besides like Synergies. Will take some overhauling to get there tho lol
so im going for full synergies via equipment fusion/synergy items
is there any way i can obtain more of the luck synergy or am i unable to
is it literally even possible to lose with with this build. unfortunately the only way to get yourself some more of that Lucky would be to use Freedom on 2 Chip's minimum, but since you're already late game (and knowing there aren't any items that give you lucky) i think this is all you can get :(
tizik speed buffing hyrdrim makes hydrim get everyone more mana
more mana means more healing and speed buffing + the added bulky/tizik defense bonus to make stuff way harder to kill
you can also pair it with bonebiter for constant max hp damage and just melt even the strongest enemies with max tactician synergy defense piercing
the things you can get away with by just having tizik in a build are insane 😭
tizik is the goat as always.
very powerful build lol, Did you win the coin flip event? Getting 3 winning flips in a row in that event gives 1 mon [Lucky] as well
now that's a cool detail
ive noticed and won all the flips in a row for the event a few times but it seems to have capped out at lucky II, it doesn’t bother giving me the synergy alongside the 400 aura anymore for some reason
it can only happen once! (Lucky actually improves the odds of events like that too so it would become very easy to keep stacking it that way lol)
I would like to see the Haunted group get a buff, the wound system really hampers building around them.
i find it rather silly that Haunted seems to be either a bad build carry or a Gheist nuking device. no in between.
so one way you can help maintain a haunted strat is using the Supportive super, it recovers 1 wound for each monster revived (meaning you actually heal 1 extra since the first was ignored from haunted)
pretty reliable until it isn't, mainly because since you'll be using the super to elongate the run rather than to save yourself from hard encounters, it's very likely that you get unlucky and just get squadwiped by 4 adepts anyways lol.
also jay, how is development going?
been pretty busy but, in the middle of a pretty important system
oooh, neat.
What does the 'freedom' buff do?
The greater blessing gives you an item that when used on a monster removes them from your team, giving 10% of their stats to the other monsters and dividing up their synergies to them as well. Also if you didn't have that monster in your village it sends their egg there too.
I love this game so much! I have spent hours playing and i'm still finding new things, great game. cant wait till the next patch.
im glad you are still having fun, there will be lots more to discover once its done :D
What level do stats max out at btw?
999 for everything besides hp and mana. hp is 99999 and mana is 15
so apparently my common sense stopped sensing for a good 5 minutes because i didn't even HAVE the thought that resetting my computer would wipe my save if i didn't make a backup one. you know what my smooth brain did do tho? backup the game, ONLY the game.
this is me rn
i'll replay when the new patch releases :')
oh no, restarting *shouldnt* clear the save, unless there is some automatic cookie/cache clearing going on
i think i misworded lol, i mean resetting in the way that i literally installed a new OS xd
oh ha yea that'd do it. Saves are located in AppData/LocalLow/JaysGames if you ever need to back them up in the future
ok thx dude
(This one is a switch-based team with Chip and Skimander as the core based on chip's multi-stun when switched + Krog handing out additional stuns. Also eliminates the pain of having to switch manually.)
Going all out on the switch build, love it. seras makes skim hit pretty hard too. Did you use a radiant aurite on krog?
Yup!
this would basically be a single-target permastun if you included Gora into the mix xd
I went Hydrim as opposed to Gora because Gora's main heal heals adjacently, which wouldn't really work on this team and at a certain point getting as much healing as possible is more valuable
smth that could also work is giving one of your monsters a Ring of Power (probably for Chip) to quickly accumulate Super and use the Supportive Move to nullify wounds, its a bit of a dangerous approach but could definitely do some wonders
Cast Cost? hardly know er'
Pretty much the "gain super faster" blessing run-ified, or just the average double Tizik experience. You really weren't lying when you said Tizik was the best for soloing, and i still don't get why Pyris or Chikia are even there (the true MVP of the run really was Haunted 1). And ofc we can't forget the ol' reliable beeg damage Scutter with a Mega Pulverizer (and a fused Harvester with smth else), a classic.
:hydrimtank:
I see you increased the difficulty too, even more impressive
yea :D
never had i ever thought that getting jumped by some scavengers of all things would end my almost 19 loop run huh, yet here we are (and yes, Urso DID become practically inmortal from like loop 6, thats Gourmand for y'all). "why does the Tuskal have an Iron Will" i figured that defensive synergy would fit better in a build where, you know, 80% of the team were guardians (and unfortunately his damage was nonexistent)
Poison can get pretty scary if you win fast, but its good to experiment with different builds :D poor urso tho :c
also, hydrim tear (if urso wanted to he could've taken the whole void army on his own but his team was holding him back :c)
aw lol I had seen the tear but didnt realize it was hydrim
xd
ring of power? it sure does have some (poor Urso sticking in with less than 1% of the damage). huh. who could have thinked that spamming an active that heals the entire team at once and stacks on top of itself would make you nigh inmortal, then there's also Scutter who almost deals half the damage on his own. i absolutely love this game
Teamwork is just as important as damage :D glad you are having fun, thats a great run
thank you for making this game, although i do have a lil nitpick: yknow how the game begins to give you rarer items the further you go into the loops right, well at one point the items begin to not actually be useful or outright worse (even if they are legendary) and are practically there only for free aura, not that it's bad i just think maybe there should be a way to get more advanced/evolved items apart from tempering; a good idea i think would be adding either rare or even legendary alts to common items like wind slicer for example (the only item that benefits parra's skill is also a low tier). even if it was just doubling the effect or smth like that it would make the progression so, SO much better in general (also tempering the effects of items should cap out at 5 in infinite runs and *maybe* letting the loops give you more blessings past 6, perhaps?)
even with all of that, this is an amazing game and i hope you continue working on it for some more time!
thanks, I always enjoy hearing feedback. Also I am currently working on the biggest patch to date! Still some time til its ready though
ain't no way bro, a new update?!?! this is gonna be the best game ever!
there are some teasers in the discord
This team is busted, i haven't had even remotely close to scare up to this point lol
now thats a bulky team
What do the different colored monsters do?
The alternate appearances for the player monsters you get from completing their quests? They are just fun little variations to mix it up a little
This game is cool. Wish i could more of this types of games.
thank you, me too :D
POV: 2 hydrim, 2 mamu, 2 mudgill, 10000 monsters dead
I abused the egg sense cheap and the nest. dunno if it is a bug but if you put mamu in the nest, there is a chance for 2 of them to spawn at the start of the game. anyways full nature synergy, full bulky synergy, full aquatic synergy, full tactician from spyglass. Also abused the feature where reloading a game reloads events, so guess who has eextremely overpowered legendary +10 equipment :). Basically unkillable.
Love the design and everything of the game. Will there be more updates coming?
thanks, and yea! Slowly but surely working on the biggest update so far. life has a way of getting in the way of things sometimes though.
I wish you the best man! I hope you get a chance to put some time into it and please hit me up closer to the release! I would love to cover it!
theindiebuffet@gmail.com
thanks, that would be awesome! In the mean time too, I post little previews in the discord and will definitely announce it there (and here) as well
Im glad you liked it, I definitely wanted to incorporate strategic decisions :D. Theres alot to figure out (and isnt explained very well lol) so dont worry about not picking up on everything right away. Many people dont even realize you can swap monsters mid battle (with a cool down). Gonna watch this over dinner!
I also didn't know it's possible to lose by allowing your monsters to get knocked-out, which also made me lose I think. Not that I created the strongest team comp; I think I understood only basics - and some abilities were annoying for me, because I wanted to hide a monster, when he is low, so he would be a bit safer, but some abilities swap places. I guess I just didn't find good synergies and created a random team comp lol.
So yea, thats "Wounds" system. When a mon gets KO'd you suffer 1 wound. If you reach the limit (2 times your team size on normal difficulty) it's game over. Some events, camping, and healing salves can heal/cause wounds too. Skimander's ability is the one that moves :D yea it can be really challenging if the team isnt built with it in mind. But thats just a learning experience!
why does it reset my village and monster progress yet still keep some of my stats? my aura earned is 9999999 and my food eaten is 9999. is there any way to fix this?
hmm that sounds like your stats file got corrupted, its hard to say what caused it though. If you are playing on browser it might have been interrupted during a save. Does it reset every time you try to play?
no, only now
nevermind, it fixed itself
i dont WANT any more miracoulous elixer. boss fight are easy right now
Incredibly well designed, reminds me of Pokemon with the collection and evolution mechanics but feeling a little bit more polished and refined. The synergies and monsters are simply so creative, and that's to consider the fact that I've only been able to play the browser version so far and beat it once. I'm incredibly excited to try out the full version. The only suggestion I would have is a tutorial, or an explanation of the stats through an in-game manual or, as said before, a tutorial. But all in all, a really great strategy monster-collecting game.
thank you for the very kind words!
question: when to use mirculous elixer
So elixir does all the potions, the 2 biggest effects you will probably notice from these is Invulnerability and Curing 2 Wounds. Try to use it on a mon that is low hp, and when youve already taking some wounds, or before a final boss uses their super to prevent the damage.
thanks