Aegean Battleships

Aegean Battleships is one of Grepolis's games within the game. It runs for 14 days. The game in its main feature is based on the children's game Battleships. The original game version allows one player to name a grid to take a shot at, then the opponent takes a shot in turn. In this game, it is only the Grepolis player shooting. In a second part to the Aegean battleships, the player uses certain points to move a ship to a destination.

The first step in the game is choosing a grid by moving your mouse curser on it. By clicking, the player sends a shot to that grid. If it shows a grey cloud, a ship  was hit. If it stays blue showing ripples, it was a miss. The ripples guarantee that the player doesn't shoot into the same grid twice. 

The shots cost 10 shot points; the available shot points are shown top right in the game window. The + icon is for players who want to spend gold. The row of ten shot slots to the left shows how many times you earned 10 points that day by building, researching and battling.

Both the hits and the misses give the player a spell to use in any of his cities. These spells automatically move into storage that is located inside Aegean Battleships and is shown at the bottom of the game window. The in game storage has space for six spells. If the storage is full, no further shots can be shot at the grid. To allow further shooting, at least one spell has to be used, moved to the main spell inventory, or discarded. The list of all spells available in the grid can be looked at by clicking on the round i icon above the storage. Once a spell has been awarded to the player, it shows up with a tick in the list.

In addition to the reward per shot system, if a ship is sunk completely, the player receives a further spell. This spell is displayed in a pop up window and must be used, moved to the main inventory, or discarded before the shooting can continue. The nature of the spells on offer per ship are displayed on the right hand side of the game window in the sink reward list. 

When a ship is hit showing the grey cloud in the grid map, an X appears in the Sink reward section on the right hand side. Each hit on one ship or the hydra adds another X until complete to get the reward. The list shows how many ships there are, and how many grids each of them occupy. Ships can be placed horizontally and vertically. Ships can touch each other grid to grid. The hydra uses up four grid spaces that form a quadrangle. 

One of the spells awarded by shooting into the grids is a telescope. This in game spell is stored to the right of the storage and can be used to look at two grids to determine what kind of spell they might bring up. Click on the telescope to use it as if you were shooting to activate it. The two grid views have to be taken together. The other in game spell is a doubling spell. The next spell from the grid that is rewarded is awarded twice. You can't choose when you want to use this spell, it automatically goes to the next reward. It works on grid awards only, none of the other rewards is affected.

Top right in the game window the Daily Special spell reward is displayed. This reward is hidden anywhere in the grid on a ship or in water. It is available once per attack wave; any new attack wave will have the spell hidden in it again. This spell appears in a pop up window and has to be moved to the main inventory, used, or discarded before continuing shooting. 

Once a player has sunk all ships, the button over the in game spell storage for a New wave changes from 25 shot points to free. It does what it says. Instead of costing 25 shot points, the new wave can be ordered up for free. Before you do that, check the i icon on the right for the list of remaining spells in the water to prevent you from missing out. The clock above the grid gives the time remaining for the current wave; the change happens at midnight London time every day. 

In addition to receiving a spell per shot, the player is also rewarded with a piece of map. The number of available map pieces is shown top right of the game window, with all those lovely cannonballs. The map pieces are needed to navigate the map on the left hand side of the screen. To use the map pieces, click on the button below the map. A pop up window with a wheel of fortune will award you 1, 2, or 3 steps on the map journey. There is no way to influence that wheel. 

At the end of the journey through the map, the Grand Price spell is awarded. The next award is the large spell icon over the map; the smaller spell icons show what is coming up. There is no possibility to influence the order of spells coming up and they don't change over night either. It is worth noting that one of the awards is the mask symbolizing one culture point!

Finally, the game has a good memory. The shooting points are carried over to the next day; the map pieces are carried over to the next day; the ship in the map holds its position from day to day. And if your last shot of the day hit either the telescope or the double spell, they are carried over as well. Only the attacking wave is erased when the new wave comes in at midnight London time.