The Spark's Guide to Tiny Godhood

☀️ 1. The Divine Core Loop

You are the Spark, the last warm light in a world swallowed by the Gloom. Your tiny round Dots awaken around a modest campfire in the mist. As their god, you watch over them, provide for their basic needs, and shape their civilization across five historical ages: Stone, Bronze, Iron, Classical, and Star.

Each day and night cycle brings unique challenges. During daylight, Dots harvest berries, fell timber, and quarry stone. When darkness settles, warmth gathers at the central campfire where Dots share food, tell tales, and pray. If the night grows cold or raiders approach, your divine presence keeps their spirits resilient.

✋ 2. The Divine Hand & Direct Control

Introduced in recent updates, the Divine Hand grants you immediate tactile control over your tiny subjects. You can play either in Divine Hand mode (direct guidance) or Free Will mode (autonomous Dots with macro job quotas).

• Pick Up & Place: Tap and hold (or click and drag) any Dot to lift them into the air. Place them anywhere on dry land to relocate them safely away from danger or closer to a task.
• Contextual "Do" Bar: Dropping a Dot near a forest prompts a prompt to chop wood; near a mountain, to quarry stone; near water, to fish; near wheat, to farm.
• Work Crews: Double-tap or drag-select near multiple adult Dots to rally an instant crew. Direct them to raise a building blueprint or harvest an urgent resource together.
• Lift & Save: Caught in the path of a wild beast or a creeping Shade? Lift your endangered Dot straight into the clouds until safety is restored!

❤️ 3. The Life of a Dot: Needs, Families & Genetics

Dots are not nameless units — each Dot possesses unique genetics, a distinct personality, a chosen name, and a family tree.

As generations pass, Dots fall in love, marry at the village altar, and rear children who learn trades from their elders. Old elders record their history in the Great Library before passing peacefully into the celestial realm.

🔨 4. The 12 Specialized Village Professions

Open the Workforce panel from the town center to allocate Dots into 12 distinct professions. Balanced allocation keeps food silos full, defenses fortified, and technologies advancing.

🏛️ 5. Towns, Planned Roads & River Bridges

In Update 2.5, civilization growth has evolved into a complete urban planning simulation:

• Hamlet to Metropolis: Settlements begin as solitary hearths. As housing capacity and monuments expand, settlements organically upgrade from Hamlets to Villages, Towns, and grand walled Cities.
• Planned Roads: Dirt tracks turn into paved stone thoroughfares. Dots moving along paved roads travel up to 70% faster, dramatically reducing hauling times between mines, farms, and storage silos.
• River Bridges: Build arched timber and stone bridges over rivers and chasm channels so your Dots no longer need to make treacherous mountain detours.
• Lot Renovations: Upgrade modest thatch huts into spacious timber longhouses and multi-family stone manors without tearing down foundations.
• Granaries & Silos: Position food storage hubs near farm clusters to prevent perishables from spoiling during harsh winters.

⚔️ 6. Military Campaigns, Field Camps & Gloom Defense

Beyond the warm boundary of your village fires lurks the Gloom, guided by Murk. Within the thick grey mist, corrupted Shade camps muster raiders that seek to snuff out your hearth fires.

Defensive Tactics:

• Earthwork Trenches: Dig trenches around your crop perimeters to slow down invading hordes.
• Palisade & Rampart Walls: Surround settlements with concentric rings of wooden palisades, upgrading to dressed stone ramparts as your masonry unlocks.
• Forward Field Camps: When venturing far to awaken an ancient wonder, establish an outpost field camp with temporary tents and supply caches so your marching soldiers stay provisioned.
• Thunder & Meteors: When your troops are outnumbered, summon divine lightning to blast enemy captains or call down meteors on fortified Shade spires!

✨ 7. The 25 Miracles & Divine Powers Catalog

Arranged in an accessible divine radial grid, your 25 miracles allow you to mold terrain, control weather, bless your people, or crush adversaries.

📖 8. The 10 Chronicle Chapters with Pip

Your celestial companion Pip the Fallen Star chronicles your journey across 10 epic narrative chapters:

1. Chapter I: The First Spark — Kindling the lonely campfire in the gloom and guiding the first three Dots.
2. Chapter II: Shelter in the Mist — Building the first thatch huts and organizing foragers and woodcutters.
3. Chapter III: Songs by the Water — Reaching the sea, launching fishing skiffs, and discovering ancient standing stones.
4. Chapter IV: Veins in the Deep — Excavating the mountains, discovering bronze, and forging resilient tools.
5. Chapter V: The Whispering Gloom — First skirmishes with Murk's shadow raiders and erecting palisade walls.
6. Chapter VI: Roads Across the Realm — Connecting outlying settlements with paved stone highways and bridges.
7. Chapter VII: The Iron March — Mustering organized squads of ten to reclaim occupied wonder sites.
8. Chapter VIII: Shrines of the Ancients — Restoring the 8 wonders and channeling divine energy into dormant relics.
9. Chapter IX: The Storm Gathers — Repelling the great shadow offensive as Murk makes a desperate stand.
10. Chapter X: Relight the Sky — Assembling the seven fallen stars to dispel the Gloom forever and reignite the heavens!

⭐ 9. The 8 Ancient Wonders & 7 Fallen Stars

Scattered across the procedurally generated worlds lie eight magnificent monuments from before the Long Night. Restoring them requires dedicated builders, stone, timber, and divine faith:

• The Celestial Observatory: Gazes beyond the clouds, revealing distant constellations and increasing Scholar speed.
• The Sunken Sea Shrine: Blesses coastal waters with legendary golden fish that never deplete.
• The Great Monolith: Radiates protective warmth, warding off frostbite in sub-zero realms.
• The Whispering Elder Tree: Increases forest regrowths and heals wounded Dots who rest in its boughs.
• The Titan's Forge: Allows artisans to temper iron into indestructible masterwork equipment.
• The Shimmering Crystal Cavern: Yields recurring stardust crystals for recharging god powers.
• The Spire of the Wind: Blows away creeping fog banks and guarantees clear sailing.
• The Starfall Crucible: The sanctuary where the Seven Fallen Stars are reunited to reignite the night sky!

👑 10. Constellations, Star Perks & Collectible Hats

Whenever your god level advances, you receive Star Points to invest into three major constellation perk trees:

• The Hearth (Fertility & Growth): Increases birth rates, boosts crop yields, improves home comfort, and lengthens Dot lifespans.
• The Owl (Wisdom & Speed): Accelerates scholar research, boosts movement speed on roads, and expands scout vision in the mist.
• The Storm (Wrath & Miracles): Reduces faith costs for miracles, quickens miracle recharges, and increases thunder damage against enemy camps.

14 Collectible Hats: Unlock adorable cosmetic hats for your Dots, including bunny ears, flower wreaths, wizard caps, royal crowns, and radiant star halos!

💻 11. macOS & Desktop Controls

Playing on Mac (via the Mac App Store / Apple Silicon & Intel) or PC offers dedicated keyboard shortcuts and fluid mouse navigation:

☁️ 12. Multi-Device Play & The Cloud Shelf

Dotties features a polite, non-destructive Cloud Shelf architecture:

• Every World Kept: Up to 8 local worlds are stored on your device. Starting or loading a new world keeps your previous worlds intact on your shelf.
• Cross-Device Freedom: Sign in with Apple or Google on your Mac, iPhone, iPad, or Android phone. Your account backs up your saves, levels, and unlocks.
• No Destructive Overwrites: When you open the game on a second device (like your Mac after playing on your phone), the game shows both local and account worlds side-by-side, allowing you to choose which world to download or play.
• Offline-First: Play anywhere without an internet connection. Once your device reconnects, your progress synchronizes safely to your account.