Beginner’s Guide

Mobile games usually follow the similar recurring concepts and mechanics that makes it easier for veteran players to get accustomed to the game immediately. The Eminence in Shadow makes it easy for veteran mobage/gacha players to fill right in while maintaining a welcoming and enjoyable environment for newbies. In our Beginner’s Guide, we will provide some newbie-friendly tips so that they can start enjoying the game early.

The Eminence in Shadow is the mobile game adaptation of a popular isekai light novel where players take the reins of Cid, a modern-day teenager who gets transported to a dark fantasy world after death. Players have to collect various iterations and rarities of the established heroines in the game to form their ideal combat parties and proceed through the story.

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Gameplay

The Eminence in Shadow follows a standard JRPG game format where you have to navigate through various options in the main menu, and clear battles in various chapters or stages to earn resources. You can select main story quests, resource-farming stages, and sidequests. The main story quests, as you may know, is the main campaign of the game and progressing through it will unlock new features for you. There are other stages that can be repeatedly farmed for various resources like materials and equipment.

The actual combat system is simple and straightforward. The combatants will attack in turns, and each attack they land, the shared combo gauge and their individual special gauges will slowly fill up. Once the SP gauge is filled, they’ll be able to unleash their special attack. Special attacks vary per character and will usually go along with their character class (e.g. a tank character’s SP skill might be an all-party defensive buff or shield application)

On the other hand, once the party’s cumulative combo gauge on the lower-left corner of the screen has enough charage, the party can perform a strike combo. The order of the characters you’ll select will multiply the final value of the skill of the third character. For example, if you have selected a tank as your third character in the combo order, she’ll be able to apply a defensive buff with higher multiplier; if you have selected a healer on the last order, you’ll have a higher healing amount. Finally, selecting a DPS on the last order will allow him/her to inflict higher damage.

Gacha System

If you’re playing other mobile games with gacha mechanics, then you’re already familiar with how this system works. For newcomers, think of it as a lottery or loot box system where you have to spend premium currency or special tickets/vouchers for a chance to get something from the prize pool of possible prizes/items/characters. In this game, it’s quite simplified; you can use 300 Gems for a single summon attempt or 2800 gems for 10 attempts in one batch. The latter is more bang for the buck especially if you’re an F2P (free-to-play player) who doesn’t plan on spending anything on the game. Since you can only get a finite amount of gems through normal means, you should only consider pulling for characters that you want. We will cover more details about the game’s gacha system in a separate page within this guide.

Elemental Weaknesses

The game’s elements are not the usual “fire, wind, water, earth” format; instead, they made it easier by associating the elements with color. There are five elemental colors in the game: red, green, yellow, blue, and white. The first four colors are part of a rock-paper-scissors system where one color is weak to the other. The fifth element (white) is an independent element and will not deal or receive bonus damage. You can refer to the diagram below to see which color deals and receives bonus damage from another color, as directed by the arrows.

Normally, you would like a team with different colors for normal quests. However, if you’re facing a boss that you can’t seem to beat, consider switching your party to an element that the boss is weak against. That way, you can deal higher damage while also receiving lesser damage in return.

Party Management

You can set up up to five different party formations that will help you to easily swap characters and their corresponding magic gears. There’s also an Auto-Party option that will automatically pick the strongest characters in your roster for you. You can also manually pick your party members by tapping the “Edit Party” option.

Additionally, your party’s overall combat power is displayed between the “Magic Gear” and “Auto-Party” buttons. You can compare that value to the enemy’s combat power located in the lower-left corner of the screen. The enemies’ weakness(es) are also displayed there. If you haven’t memorized the elemental weaknesses chart, you can just tap the square exclamation point button. Once you’re ready, tap the Start Battle button.

Stamina System

Mobile games are normally not meant for hours and hours of gameplay in one sitting so the game has a limiter called Stamina. Most activities like quests and stages will require a certain amount of stamina. Once your stamina is spent, you’re practically limited on what you can do, so prolonged gameplay sessions become tedious.

One Stamina is recovered automatically every 10 minutes, and will continue getting recovered until the maximum stamina amount is reached. Alternatively, you can also use items like sandwiches or even gems to recover a set amount of stamina instantly. More details about the stamina system will be covered on a dedicated page within this guide.

Player (Account) Level

Your account level will act as a natural level cap to your characters. That means that your characters won’t be able to level up too far ahead of your player level. That said, you can still consider leveling up your characters as high as you possibly can to ensure that the party’s overall combat power is updated regularly. Aside from the account level, the character’s rarity will also affect the level cap, as listed below:

Character Management

Just like any other RPG, you’ll be able to manage your characters in various means to improve their individual combat power, and in turn, the party’s overall combat power. This can be done by the usual methods like leveling up and providing them with equipment. Other methods like increasing their Ranks, Rarity, and Awakening can be used to improve your characters. Since resources and materials can become hard to come by eventually, it’s highly recommended to choose your favorite characters and focus on leveling them up first.

Quests or Stories

The game has several quest stages or stories. The cutscenes of these stories can be reviewed from the “Story” menu in the home screen. Main Quests will be tied to your story progression and will be necessary to unlock more features in the game. As you progress through the main quests, new stories will be unlocked at the same time.

One-on-One Mode

While in the Home Screen, you can select the active character and have an intimate “1-on-1 time” with the active character. This will allow you to converse with the character through various dialogue options. As you interact with the chosen character, their Bond Level increases as well, unlocking new scenes, character stories, and even increase the character’s stats, skill levels. You can also obtain free Phantasm Gems as reward. The number of times you can chat with the character is limited per day, and this is restored as part of the game’s scheduled daily content reset at 4:00 AM local time.

Rewards and Freebies

Don’t forget to claim your free daily gems from the Shop! Also if there are ongoing events or promotions, don’t forget to participate to receive even better rewards. If there are available redemption codes, you can also use them to get additional freebies.

The game isn’t necessarily hard in particular and you won’t be overwhelmed with a ton of various options, resources, modes, etc. However, with all these tips in mind, you’ll be able to enjoy the game in no time!

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That concludes our Beginner’s Guide in The Eminence in Shadow. Please check out our online guide for the game and other articles for more The Eminence in Shadow content!