Looking for a guide on how to play Wheels in Sea of Stars? Minigames like Wheels have started to become more common in video games, especially following the massive popularity of The Witcher 3‘s Gwent. Like Gwent, this minigame can be found at taverns around the game’s world.

The first time you come across it will be in the Port Town of Brisk, where you’ll get two options by interacting with the table: Casual game or Champion game. Unfortunately, both of these kind of throw the player into the game without much explanation. Luckily, we’ve got you covered with the rules to Wheels, as well as some basic strategies and a list of obtainable units.

How to Play Wheels in Sea of Stars

At its core, Wheels is a simple game. You and your opponent each start the game with 10 health. The goal is to use your units to get your opponent’s health to zero, while building up your bulwark (wall) to protect yourself. Each of your moves, too, are dictated by the game’s slots in the bottom middle of the board. You can spin these three times, while locking results you see as beneficial.

In practice, though, the Sea of Stars minigame Wheels can start a bit tough to get the hang of. Here’s what each symbol on the reels represents:

• Hammer: Builds up your bulwark, up to a max height of 5 units. Try to get this high at the beginning of the game to keep yourself protected.
• Square Energy: This represents your unit on the left. Matching three or more of these symbols puts down one notch on your “action rod.” Once the rod is fully down, your unit will attack the enemy.
• Diamond Energy: The same effect as Square Energy, but for your right hero.

All of these spins work in “3oak+” fashion. This means that a minimum of 3 matching symbols are required for a given symbol to take effect. For example, matching 3 hammers will create one layer of wall, 4=2, 5=3, etc.

How to Evolve Units

The other main mechanic in Sea of Stars‘ Wheels minigame is evolving your heroes. When your heroes’ XP (denoted by the notches below a figure. 4 highlighted blue “XP” can be seen in the picture above) reaches max, your hero will evolve into a higher version of itself. There are two ways to gain XP for heroes:

• Any energy with a blue background will give 1 XP to the hero of the matching symbol, ignoring the “3oak+” rule that other spins have. In the spin shown in the photo above, the bottom left warrior gained 2 XP.
• When a hero performs an action, it gains 2 XP.

Heroes can evolve twice, from bronze to silver, then silver to gold. Each evolution grants them higher damage & stronger secondary effects. If a hero reaches max XP while they’re already gold, it will create a bomb, which deals 2 damage to the opponent regardless of the Bulwark.

Note: the remainder of this guide contains minor spoilers about future locations

Where to Play Wheels in Sea of Stars: All Locations

• Port Town of Brisk (Sleeper Island)
• Town of Lucent (Wraith Island)
• Mooncradle (Evermist Island)
• Cloud Kingdom (Skylands)
• Mirth (Settlers Island)
  • Note that this inn requires the Inn Plans and talking to Edgar in the Town of Lucent to recruit an innkeeper
• Stonemasons’ Outpost (Sleeper Island)
• Repine (Cerulean Island)
  • Need to buy the self-deploying Wheels Table from the Watchmaker at the top floor of Clockwork Castle
• The Boat
  • Hold Left Bumper (or your console’s equivalent) on the world map to enter the boat and challenge Yolande at the Wheels table in the basement
• Clockwork Castle (Mesa Island)
  • You have to have beaten every other Wheels champion to play the game here

All Wheels Units & How to Get Them

There are six total units to obtain for the Wheels minigame in Sea of Stars. You will unlock them in the order listed here as you beat champions:

• Warrior: Starter unit. Deals heavy damage with a short action rod. Easily blocked by the Bulwark.
• Mage: Starter unit. Attacks with two fireballs. First fireball fires at ground level while the second flies at a height of six units, which guarantees a hit on the enemy no matter the height of their Bulwark.
• Archer: The archer has high damage against the crown, but low against walls. Luckily, its arrows fly at a height of 3 units, ignoring the bulwark when its height is at 2 units or less.
• Engineer: The engineer uses its action to build up your bulwark, while dealing damage that destroys the enemy bulwark. While dealing damage that destroys your enemy’s defenses can be powerful, there’s plenty of units that can ignore the wall, making your bulwark-bolstering effect a bit bankrupt. Can be good against certain matchups like a warrior or archer, but you’ll likely want to substitute this for something else.
• Priest: The priest’s action heals your crown, while also providing some extra energy to your other unit. Pairing this with a quick offensive powerhouse like the warrior can be a deadly combination.
• Assassin: Assassins are the most unique heroes in Wheels. Their action delays the opponent’s hero’s action, prioritizing the hero closest to acting. They also deal damage directly to the crown, ignoring the enemy bulwark.

In our experience, pairing the mage with a support unit like a priest or assassin is a powerful combination. Keep on winning Wheels throughout your journey and challenge the Watchmaker herself! And while you’re here, check out our guide on effective fishing in Sea of Stars!

In Sea of Stars, you’ll eventually be presented with a choice: should you return to Evermist Island, or travel to Watcher Island and take on another Dweller? Headmaster Moraine will give you the key to the Solstice Shrine back at your home of Evermist Island.

However, your purpose there is still a bit ambiguous. What do you gain from going to the Solstice Shrine? How long will it take? And, perhaps more importantly, should you go there before advancing the story? We’ve got you covered with everything you need to know about your second visit to your mysterious homeland.

Should You Go Back to Evermist Island in Sea of Stars?

The short answer is that yes, it is worth your while to go back to Evermist Island. The reward isn’t anything groundbreaking, but backtracking through the islands where you might have missed some things like rainbow conches is worthwhile as well.

How Do You Get Back to Evermist Island?

Going back to Evermist Island is a bit more of a chore than some may bargain for. If you sail to Evermist Island, you’ll see that there is nowhere to dock your boat. Instead, you should sail for Sleeper Island and scale the island until you get up to the giant that you’ll remember from the opening hours of the game. Approach him and give him the magic word just taught to your party by Moraine and he’ll throw you back to your home.

Once here, navigate south to find the purple door on the world map, which you can now open thanks to the key you’ve been given. In the shrine, you’ll have a pretty simple block puzzle to solve. Match the pattern shown on the door (or the picture above), and then you’ll see a mysterious purple seal get removed, and get access to a big purple chest.

Waiting inside this chest is the Soonrang combo skill for Zale and Valere. This is a great bouncing projectile that can help exploit weaknesses, especially Fleshmancer minions who are weak to your solstice magic. Costing two combo points is a bit much with the strong skills you likely already have, but a bouncing projectile with solar/lunar hybrid is quite powerful against certain enemies.

That’s our take on whether you should take on the Dweller or come back to Evermist Island! There’s no real wrong answer here, but this extra skill can be helpful. Check out our guide to the minigame Wheels to dominate the taverns of the world!

Sea of Stars has plenty of equipment, accessories, weapons, and defensive items to choose from, akin to most RPGs out there. You can give yourself the best chance of success throughout the game’s boss battles by equipping your party with the best early-game items.

However, you might not be familiar with which items are best for the early game. Luckily, we’ve got you covered with some great items to look out for as starter equipment.

Best Starter Equipment in Sea of Stars

The easiest way to unlock new equipment is through any of the game’s shops. Additionally, you will be able to find great items in chests at some locations early on. This early equipment can be a great boon against early boss fights like the Elder Mist.

For all characters, the Adventurer’s Vest is a perfect starting point. This will grant you five defensive points and five magic defense points. Any character can equip this item, so purchasing multiple for each of your party members is an ideal strategy. Next, the Green Leaf accessory. With this item, your character is granted 15 extra HP. Any extra HP is more than welcome, especially as you face off against bosses such as the Elder Mist.

Another great accessory is the Leaching Thorn. For each normal attack, you will heal for 15% of the damage done to your character. As for weapons, the first new weapons you can buy in the shop, the set including the Teal Amber Staff, are great for starter equipment. With each level up, your stats will increase, so you can expect damage and other stats to steadily increase throughout the early portions of the game regardless of any new equipment purchases.

If you’re still struggling even with these items, it might be worth it to look into utilizing a Relic or two. Equipment like this should bode well for you as you traverse through the story and world that Sea of Stars offers. Looking to play some Wheels in Sea of Stars? Check out our extensive guide on the minigame!

Bosslug is the very first boss you’ll face in Sea of Stars. If you’re not careful, it can be easy to die to this enemy.  You’ll need a good strategy and patience for this fight.

Sea of Stars has a very intuitive combat system that can be very powerful if utilized to its fullest capabilities. Here is everything you need to defeat the Bosslug.

How to Defeat Bosslug in Sea of Stars

First off, you’ll want to make sure you have some high quality starter equipment equipped. Additionally, it is imperative that you understand the different features of the Sea of Stars combat system. For example, interacting with ‘X’ or the corresponding interaction button on your platform of choice, right as your character attacks will boost your damage a good amount. You can use this to your advantage to make fights quicker and take less damage.

For the Bosslug in Sea of Stars, this is a game of patience. With only two characters in your party, this fight will naturally take longer than previous ones. The key here is to attack consistently each turn against the Bosslug. There is only one enemy to take care of, so you don’t need to worry about selecting a different object or enemy to balance the fight.

Utilize Zale’s Sunball ability and Valere’s Moonerang ability to deal the most damage to Bosslug. Since these will have to recharge, chip away between abilities with standard attacks. As you chip away at the health of this boss, you’ll want to keep an eye on your own health. You might need to use some food to remain in good spirits and not be knocked out. You shouldn’t get too low here, but it is something you should be actively checking and be aware of.

Once you conquer the Bosslug, you’ll soon face the next boss in the game. Be sure to check out our guide for how to beat the Elder Mist right here.

Looking for a guide to effectively fishing in Sea of Stars? We’ve got you covered with our helpful guide to catching fish in this new RPG! We’ll teach you the ins and outs of fishing to get new materials.

It’s very likely that your first time catching a fish for yourself will come after you defeat the first boss, the Bosslug. After you leave the area of this fight, you’ll come to a fork in the road. If you decide to go left toward Sunglow Lake, you’ll be greeted with a merchant and fishing pond to interact with. After you visit the merchant to get some improved weapons and new ingredients, it’s time to head over to the fishing pond and test your skills!

How to Fish in Sea of Stars

When you go fishing in Sea of Stars, the process is quite simple. Approach the dock and press A (or your controller’s equivalent confirmation button) when an arrow appears to begin the process. Press A again once you’re ready to cast your line. While casting, you can steer the casted line with the D-Pad or left stick, and press A again to stop the cast early.

Fish in Sea of Stars are pretty prone to bite the lure quickly, but if they don’t, try just reeling in a bit to jiggle the lure. Once you’ve got a bite, the reel-in process is fairly simple. Steer your line to keep the fish in the visible current towards you, and you’ll be able to reel in your catch no problem.

Should You Release or Filet Fish?

After you catch a fish in Sea of Stars, you’ll be given an option to filet or release it. There’s no benefit to releasing the fish other than being able to catch it again. So, unless you just really love fishing, you’re better off just fileting your catches.

That’s all you need to know about fishing in Sea of Stars! While you’re here, though, check out our advice on some of the best starter equipment in Sea of Stars.

The Elder Mist is one of the first major bosses you will face in Sea of Stars. If you’re not aware of everything within this boss fight, it’s quite easy to lose to the Elder Mist. It’s a fight that requires lots of strategy, as he has the capability to wipe your party out quickly. 

After completing the Elder Mist Trial and collecting all three artifacts, you will face off against the Elder Mist in the skies. This battle is much different than the first boss, the Bosslug. Here’s everything you need to know about defeating the Elder Mist.

How to Defeat the Elder Mist Boss

When you first enter the battle, it’s important you notice something. There are two enemies you can technically hit: the Elder Mist and his sword. You need to move over to his sword and attack it instead of his body.

The reason for this is by attacking the sword, you will prevent him from damaging you in large amounts. His sword has a special attack that deals massive damage to your party if left unchecked. His sword will lose energy after a certain amount of HP is hit, and then you will have a few turns where the Elder Mist is recharging. 

As the fight rages on, continue cycling heals. This can be done with the combo move between Zale and Valere, Healing Light, as well as by utilizing Garl’s healing ability Nourish. Additionally, utilizing food is also a fine way of healing. The strategy is to simply take out his sword each time it becomes active and then focus on the main body to slowly chip away at the Elder Mist’s overall HP. 

By following this strategy, you can take down the Elder Mist and head off into the vast world that awaits! Sea of Stars is available now across all major platforms. Be sure to check out our relics guide for items that can assist you in tough battles like these!