Newbie guide

> ***In the beginning...***
>
>

Welcome to Merge Quest!

At the start of the game, a number of the features shown on the wiki will not be available, but as you progress along, more and more features will become unlocked after meeting particular requirements.

We strongly recommend that you join the Official Merge Quest Discord (https://discord.gg/pJS9NSPJ) and the Unofficial one (https://discord.gg/dF7wre77) to get live help with any questions you might have, report bugs, make suggestions, see guild recruitment announcements, and so on.

You can also ask questions in the comments on this page or others.

## **Basics**

Your battle party consists of 3 units:

* **Main Hero** - depicted in the image is the Berserker with a large axe.
* **Sidekick** - depicted in the image is an Orc Warrior riding a wolf.
* **Pet** - depicted in the image is a little flying pig.

The game starts with one Hero - Newbie. With time, you will be able to unlock new heroes by collecting hero shards. Visit the **Heroes** page for more details.

**Heroes** will help you in several ways:

* Strengthen your Main Hero by learning passive buffing and halo skills.
* Increase the droprate of coins and other resources.
* Explore Dungeons to obtain coins, upgrade materials, and other useful items.
* Unlock and improve Alchemy - which let's you fuse and upgrade your upgrade materials, chests, and chest keys.

## **Top Screen**

At the top of your screen you can see the ongoing battle, current coins and gems at the top left, and your current stage and stage progression in the top center. Each stage has 10 enemies, with the last being the boss.

There are several controls (numbered in the image, but not in the game). Follow the links for further details.

1. Use dropdown **Game Menu** that includes the Map, Friend Invite, Leaderboards, Sound Toggle, Equipment Gallery, Lucky Wheel, Mail, and Morphs features.
2. Manage your **Pets.**
3. **Transform** (Prestige function unlocked at Stage 100)
4. ***Auto-Merge Skill.*** Duration and cooldown times can be improved by particular artifacts.
5. ***Sword of Heaven Skill*** - single high-damage hit***.*** Damage can be improved by a particular artifact.
6. ***Fury Skill*** - temporary attack speed increase. Duration can be improved by particular artifacts.
7. Join or enter your **Guild** (unlocked at Stage 10), perform Guild tasks and collect Guild benefits.
8. Check/redeem rewards from **Daily Quests**.
9. Manage your language preferences and purchases, as well as find some other useful info under **Settings** button.

## **Bottom Screen**

    At the bottom of your screen there are 6 tabs (less in the beginning, but they will get get uncovered soon) that will take you to the different game features described below.

## **What to do**

**"What am I suppose to do here?" This is the most common beginner's question. Here is the answer.**

1. **Level-up and Improve your Heroes**

	* Open Heroes Tab, scroll through the list of all your heroes to see if you can evolve any. If any hero has an "Evolve" ribbon below their icon, click on them, then the [Evolve] button. It will not only make that hero stronger, but also buff all of your heroes passively.
	* Evolve your Main hero first.
	* Then Evolve  Merchant,  Alchemy,  Farmer,  Blacksmith and then all other heroes that you can Evolve.
	* Going from the top, review your heroes again. If you see a hero with a green [Upgrade] button to the right, Upgrade your hero. Every 100 levels you will be offered to learn one of 3 randomly selected skills from that hero's skill pool. Read the **Hero Skills Selection Guide** to choose skills wisely.
	* Level up your main Hero as long as you can afford it.
	* Level up all other Heroes as long as they are capable of learning new skills.
2. **Improve your Sidekick**
The Tab with a paw will show the list of all your sidekicks. The main Sidekick attribute is ***Growth***. Use the [Recruit] button to obtain more Sidekicks. If space for better sidekick is needed, select your lowest Sidekick and dismiss it. Deploy your strongest sidekick into battle and level it up. Leveling up other Sidekicks does not benefit you. Learn more about them on the **Sidekicks** page.
3. **Choose and improve your Pets**
You can claim one random Pet for free every 8 hours. You can also buy up to 3 pets, for 80 gems each, every 3 hours. Most players prefer to go use the  Pig most of the time and occasionally the  Hero to advance your current stage a little further just before Transforming. The Pig Pet buffs your *coin drop rate*, the Hero Pet buffs your Hero's Attack & Defense. Some players might have other preferences.
4. **Forge & Merge**
Upgrade your Weapon and Shield as much as you possibly can (after prioritizing your Hero upgrades) - Weapon first, then Shield. It will greatly improve your Main Hero's Attack & Defense, so you can progress your Stage further.
5. **Complete Missions**
Claim missions, including using the Refresh button, to get as many of them as you can (limited to 15 additional Missions per day). Here you will collect minerals, gemstones, and lumber, as well as get scrolls and other types of encounters, receive further buffs from Emblems, perform **Alchemy** and open material chests using keys. See the **Missions** page for more details.
6. **Go to the Shop Tab**

	* Open Daily Deals: Get 5 "Free" (you need to watch ads for these) chests per day and, if you'd like, some Hero Shards and upgrade materials for gems.
	* Spend your Gems on opening Chests: 10 weekly Hero chests, 10 weekly Unique Hero chests, and unlimited common chests - that's the best place to spend your Gems, particularly the first two.
	* Watch ads to speed up your battle. You will get 30 minutes of 2x attack speed boost for every ad watched. You can accumulate no more than 8 hours of Speed Boost.
	* Watch ads to get some additional coins (limited to 20 per day) - do it only when your Main Hero cannot progress any further. If you do it earlier, your coin output will be much lower since it is based on your current stage.
	* Spend real money to buy other resources and privileges. Up to you.
7. **Perform your Guild tasks**
After Stage 10 you can create or join a Guild. The stronger your Guild is, the bigger and better the Attack & Defense buff you will get. Also, fighting the Guild Boss, if it gets killed before the time limit expires, will provide you with a good amount of gems.
***How do you join a good Guild?*** Open the guild list and try to find the strongest Guild that you can join. Look for bigger numbers of current/max members. Please note that some strong guilds may have a minimum stage requirement that is higher than your current max stage. If needed, click the Back ( < ) button and open the guild list again - it will show you another 10 random guilds. Chose one and click Join. When you join a Guild, check the member list. Active players will have "Today" or "Yesterday" listed next to their names. If the Guild you joined is dead, it's ok - you can leave and join another guild as many times as you want, until you find a strong one with many active members.
***What do you do in the Guild?***
	* Socialize with other players to get/give help and advice on all aspects of the game.
	* Fight the Guild Boss up to several times a day.
	* Sign-in daily - it's free, and it helps to increase the guild's capacity and improve other guild aspects.
	* Exchange your Sidekicks in the Guild Shop.
8. **Transform**
When your Main Hero begins to struggle to progress your current stage any further, and you are out of gems to buy more chests, and are unable to keep up with Hero upgrade and forging costs, it's time to **Transform**. You need to reach Stage 100 to unlock this feature, but you can easily reach Stage 200 or even 300 before you need Transform the first time, but it's up to your preferences. The later you do it, the more Artifact Tokens you will get: your earned amount increases every 5 stages. You will need to:
	* Transform using the  Transform button
	* Go to the  Artifacts Tab and Forge as many new **Artifacts** as you can using the Points you've earned from Transforming
	* Upgrade all of your **Artifacts** evenly. See the **Transform** and **Artifacts** pages for more details.

That's all for now. Good luck with your game and have fun!