Gladiators: Survival in Rome Beginner’s Guide: Tips, Tricks & Strategies to Build the Best Camp and Conquer the Roman Empire

Gladiators: Survival in Rome is Colossi Games’ first mobile game, a unique action RPG with survival and camp-building elements. Released less than a week at the time of this writing, Gladiators: Survival in Rome has already made it to top ten lists of games in several countries and maintains largely positive average user review ratings across both Android and iOS platform users.

The game takes you back to the first century as a fugitive of the roman army and a legionnaire who sets on a quest to help survivors rebuild a city of their own. Beyond the challenges of sustaining your own survival, by ensuring sustenance and arming yourself properly against various enemies, gathering resources and crafting different tools and materials will form part of your ongoing missions.

Gladiators: Survival in Rome offers a lot of liberty when it comes to how you choose to progress your adventure. Various quests become available simultaneously and there are plenty of activities to engage in outside of quests as well.

In addition to slaying enemies and looting them for gears and potions, gathering resources like stones and wood, running errands, and trading with merchants come as common engagements. As you save more survivors in your travels, they can help you as well with resource production and crafting, leading to your city’s growth and development.

Gladiators: Survival in Rome can appear overwhelming especially to complete beginners. The game throws you into the heart of the action as soon as you jump in with hardly any tutorials to guide you on your way. Despite that, however, the quick guides available to you at the start of every new activity and pointers make it easy enough to progress on your own.

The energy system limits some tasks you can perform in one session but you are sure to make progress regardless of how you play. If you have just started playing the game and you are looking for some tips, tricks and strategies to boost your progress, then be sure to check out our Gladiators: Survival in Rome beginner’s guide below!

1. Prioritize Progression On Story Quests

Gladiators: Survival in Rome actually throws you into a quest as soon as you start your adventure and you will soon come to the realization that its completion leads to another. The first quest, along with most quests you take on soon after, forms part of the story quest. You will be able to see quest objectives at the left side of your screen and a directional pointer will always present itself to lead you to the target’s fulfillment.

There is a huge open world waiting for you to be discovered within Gladiators: Survival in Rome and the key to fully exploring the land lies within the quests. You will start off with limited areas to uncover as well as only a handful of items to craft and build. As you complete quests, you will slowly unlock more areas to explore as well as build more structures inside your camp and create more items.

The current quest you see on the left side of your screen is just one of the numerous pending quests you may have. To check the list of available quests, you need to click on the scroll icon at the bottom of the screen. Quests have different categories and we feel that the ones at the top are the most important, and Story Quests are always at the top of the list. In addition to story quests, there are village quests, side quests, world quests, and also journey quests.

Story quests are naturally the main quests and immerse you further into the world of Gladiators: Survival in Rome. These quests give you a better understanding of the characters and the lore of the land as well as the reasons behind why your quests exist.

What makes it very important goes beyond that as fulfilling story quests grant you resources and the means to take on further quests. Prioritizing story quest completions will certainly lead to some road blocks along the way. That would be your cue to take on other quests in your list.

Village quests all relate to improving your camp through building new structures and upgrading some of them as well. A lot of these structures can help generate resources for you while others are basically workbenches that can craft different items from the same set of resources. Next to story quest progression, fulfillment of village quest objectives directly lead to progression you can easily feel.

New structures enable you to create more items and may also lead to fulfilling other quests. However, money and resources are always required for you to fulfill these quests. Just because you have available money or have a lot of energy to gather and craft materials should not necessarily mean that you should push forward with village quests. Some story quests may have the same requirements and you should only spend what you can afford to ensure that progression is not halted as a result of lacking money or energy.

Side quests, world quests, and journey quests all do not directly impact your progression through the main story. However, these quests can offer rewards that can make your journey moving forward a lot more convenient on top of the immediate rewards you can earn from completing them.

Considering everything, there is nothing wrong with pursuing any other quest type even if you can already move forward with the pending story quest. What you should avoid, in any case, is depleting your supply of gold or energy to continue pursuing the story quest.

2. Keep Your Village Tidy And Organized

The first village you discover in your adventures will soon stand as your very own camp. Considering the theme and period of time where your adventure takes, you cannot really expect much from it. There are dilapidated structures around as well as broken objects and there are rubbles that litter the place. It will take some time, patience, and effort to clean it all up but you should know that it will eventually become a home you can be proud of.

In pursuit of the story quests and village quests, you will be able to put up different structures within the village. You can interact with the post at the northeast side of your village to check available buildings for construction. There is another post on the southwest side as well where you can build tents for the villagers. Space may seem very limited initially, but more become available the further your adventure progresses.

In line with developing your camp it is best to make as much open space as possible before beginning construction of buildings. There are slabs and boulders you can break for stones and some of the structures considered as debris can be demolished if you have enough resources to do so. Keeping your village tidy by removing unwanted litter is one thing and keeping everything organized is another.

For starters, it will be easy to remember where everything is especially if you only have put up a few workbenches. Once various structures have been added to the growing community, it might become a little confusing to distinguish some structures for specific needs without going near them first. To prevent this predicament from even materializing, spend some time to make improvements to your village’s layout from time to time.

Clearing debris and rubble may consume energy so you will have limited allocations of stamina use for that purpose. However, when it comes to relocating structures, it does not require energy. As such, you will only need to spend a few minutes each time to do so and it is also advisable to spend idle time doing this, especially if you are waiting for your stamina to replenish.

To initiate location adjustments, head towards the post you interact with when building structures. On the bottom left side of the screen, hit the move button. A light pillar will appear on the map and you can move it towards any structure you wish to relocate. Hit the check button to pick up the item and again to drop it. You can also rotate each structure as you please.

When constructing structures, make sure to check what each one can do, especially if the activity is not in line with current quests. Among the priorities should be the storage near the village’s entrance, a hut for 1 or 2 villagers, and structures that generate materials for you over time. Note that you will not be able to relegate tasks to villager who have no home and structures that generate materials over time also requires villagers to work.

3. Learn To Manage Energy Consumption

Energy is the most valuable resource in Gladiators: Survival in Rome as you can have all other resources through its use and without energy, there will be hardly anything you can do and accomplish. As a beginner, it may take some time for you to realize the value of energy in your adventures, especially since almost every activity you engage in relative to the objective at hand will consume energy.

Every energy consumed earns you experience points so there really is no such thing as wasted energy. However, the limited supply of energy, even after considering various sources of it, can lead to stoppage of progression. It should be okay if it is time for you to take a break from your adventure anyway but if you are not yet close to that, then you should learn to manage every bit of energy you have.

Cooked meat and mushrooms ostensibly serves as your primary source of extra energy. These are consumables that are neither that common nor rare to come by but should be prudently managed just the same. You can cook 1 meat using 1 raw meat and 1 wood at the campfire.

Each cooked meat grants you 20 energy. Mushrooms can be collected across the land but each one only gives you one energy and cannot be cooked to provide more. Raw meat can be gathered from rabbits and other animals you encounter across the land, so be sure never to pass up on an opportunity to gather some in your adventures.

When your energy reaches 0, you will be presented with an option to earn an extra 20 more by playing a short video ad. As much as it sounds like a very generous offer on its own, you can only do this 5x per day. Be sure to expend these attempts before considering to consume your supply of meat and mushrooms.

After just a few story quests completed, a mini game will become available for you to play once per day. You can access this by tapping on the dice icon close to the entrance of the village. It is a simple-looking, yet very challenging merge-puzzle game where you combine similar dishes to unlock a next level one.

The levels of the dish you merge after all turns expire, or when the board is filled up and you have no possible moves, will determine the amount of energy you will get for free. Chances are that you will earn more than enough to completely fill up your energy so be sure to expend all your energy before playing this mini game.

Another feature of Gladiators: Survival in Rome you need to strategize around is levelling up, as each new level you reach will replenish your health and energy. There may not be exact numbers to rely on to determine exactly when you can reach a new level, but at the very least let the EXP bar at the bottom of your screen guide you.

If you are close to reaching a new level to fully replenish your supply of energy, then it is recommended to push for it before leaving your game. This is an example of a scenario where expending some mushrooms or even cooked meat will be worth it, knowing that the extra energy you obtain from consumable items will be invested in activities that will earn you enough EXP to reach a new level and receive max energy.

4. Make Sure To Delegate Tasks

As you venture across the huge world of Gladiators: Survival in Rome, you will come across areas with exclamation marks on them. Sometimes, these may be treasure chests that can earn you gold as well as other useful items and sometimes, these may be other survivors needing help. While we always recommend pursuing quests above all other activities, seeing people in need of assistance are an exception to that general rule.

Sometimes, all it takes are a few swings of your pickaxe to break the boulders between you and the reward you get out of it are trustworthy villagers that can make your life more convenient moving forward. Once you return to the village entrance, you will see the newly-recruited survivor head into the village. They will not be able to perform any functions until after you build a hut for them so be sure to allocate some funds and materials for its construction once you have recruited a new survivor.

Some structures in your village like the Hunting Cabin and the Lumberjack’s Hut can give you basic resources like raw meat and log from time to time. However, a villager will need to be assigned the task to fetch you your order. There are also some materials you can obtain through structures that cost gold. We recommend straying from them unless you are in dire need as nothing beats free items.

There are small structures you will need as well for processing basic materials like the Chopping Spot, the Sawhorse and the Stonecutter. You can interact with these structures and do the work yourself for faster turnover of the needed items but it will cost energy. Delegating processing activities to villagers may take a little longer but it does save you some valuable energy.

5. Upgrade And Repair Gears With Prudence

Equipment has always been a big contributor to the fun and excitement aspect of every RPG especially mixed in with variety and types that a character can equip, as well as mechanics like durability, repairs, and upgrades. Gladiators: Survival in Rome comes packed with all of the above as well as basic tools you need for gathering logs and stones.

Gears can be obtained from treasure chests as well as looted from corpses of bandits and other enemies you kill. Most equipment dropped are level 1 common types but better ones can be obtained the further you progress in your journey.

Given that every piece of equipment you wear have limited durability, as can indicated by a bar beneath their icon, you can expect each of them to naturally break after some use. Higher level gears will perform better and have more durability, but the rate at which their durability decreases will stay the same.

Gears can easily be repaired back in your village, on the Repair Table just north close to the village’s entrance. Basic tools like the axe and pickaxe typically only consume energy as you manually work on repairing them but higher level ones will cost materials to repair. Note that once you interact with the table, a full list of all equipment in your inventory will be shown, so do not be confused in repairing only the ones you will keep and use.

It is important to keep your tools and gears fully fixed before leaving on an adventure. A broken tool or equipment can always be repaired but having them break outside the village can be very inconvenient. Chopping off a tree or breaking down a boulder with a broken axe or pickaxe, respectively will require more strikes to complete. This means that you will consume twice as much energy to get the same results.

Likewise, a broken weapon is almost as good as using your fists to fight and broken armor pieces do not count towards your character’s defense stats, putting your survival at risk outside of the village. With enemies generating randomly outside the village, it is recommended to ensure that all your gears have max durability whenever you venture out, especially if you plan on travelling long distances.

As a backup plan, make it a habit to keep an extra piece of weapon and tool in your inventory as it is better to be ready even if none of your gears break than having them break and not have any spares. Having extra copies will take up storage space, which you do not have plenty of early on, bringing in the need for more inventory space as well as strategic inventory management.

Upgrading an equipment will initially cost gold but will require bigger amounts of gold the higher the item’s level goes. This can be done at any time, even when you are away from your village. You can simply tap on your backpack at the bottom of the screen to view your inventory, click the upgrade button to see the costs, and then the level up button to confirm the upgrade.

As cheap as the initial costs are, gold is not a currency you can spend lavishly. As such, it is very important for you to be very selective with the items you upgrade. For starters, you may want to ignore level 1 items as you will have a fairly good chance of obtaining a higher level one. Although most of the items you will obtain early on are common, some of them will make your life easier with even the slightest of upgrades.

6. Invest In Storage Space

In relation to our earlier discussion about carrying spare tools and weapons, inventory space is a very important aspect of the game that everyone needs to consistently and efficiently manage to reduce, if not completely avoid, wastage of existing items as well as procurement of new items. You have very limited item space at the start of your adventure and while it can be expanded later on, it will also consume resources as well as premium currency.

Your bag in Gladiators: Survival in Rome can only carry 8 different items at a time and while similar items will be stacked, it has a limit of 20 copies and still leaves you a very strict limit as far as variety is concerned. A few basic materials are all you need to fix the broken storage near the entrance of your village. We recommend considering it as among your priorities as you will most certainly need a lot more free space than what you can carry.

You can add 4 more slots to your bag by using gems, which are a premium currency. Although there are plenty of uses for this valuable currency, we consider inventory space as the most important one. The gems needed for subsequent bag upgrades will increase exponentially so you will only be able to upgrade twice and have 8 more slots for quite a while.

Once you have set up the storage in your village you can also upgrade it to the next level and have more free space. However, the materials needed will require more structures in your village to process materials, and tending to that may take a while longer considering the prioritization of other important quest targets.

Despite having more available inventory space, the end results will be the same with a lack of or absence of proper inventory management. To do this, we recommend basically prepping yourself for 2 sets of activities. These sets of activities will basically determine what you need to have in your bag and what to leave in your storage. With this, you will basically be switching items based on the task or sets of task at hand.

The first set of items relate to activities inside your village. This means that you need your bag space for raw materials as well as processed items that are required for the tasks on hand like flitches, wedges, stone bricks needed for building something or removing debris. It is best to avoid over production as much as possible as leftover materials will consume storage space that you do not have a lot of.

The other set of activities relate to any and all quest types that require you to venture outside the village. Whether it is a simple errand requiring some resources or travelling to a distant area expecting some battles along the way, you need to have your potions, energy sources, extra weapons, and tools in your bag.

Adhering to this simple principle and making a habit out of it will lead to a more efficient management of storage space. As a result, you will have more open slots for loots while outside the village, and you can process and use more materials within the camp.

Relative to this, most unwanted items in your bag after an adventure are likely extra gears you no longer need. Initially, you can highlight them in your inventory and click on the trash bin icon to get rid of them quickly and conveniently. After a few bits of progression back in your village, however, you can build a structure that can dismantle gears. Be sure to build this as soon as you can so you can dispose of unwanted gears and obtain some materials from them.

7. You Can Flee From Battle Easily

Gladiators: Survival in Rome is an action RPG and you can expect a lot of combat to take place from time to time. Whether it is a part of a story or a random instance in your exploration, there will always be groups of enemies to take on that you should always be ready for.

Battles will often involve multiple enemies, typically more than two and will have melee combatants as well as ranged fighters who have homing shots. As such, it is almost impossible to engage in battle and leave unscathed. Battles always tend to bring excitement and will earn you EXP for each kill as well as random drops like potions that replenish health and gears you can equip. With this in mind, it is very likely that you will be enticed to lunge into combat at every opportunity.

With each battle you engage in, however, your weapon and gears lose durability and while health may not be big issue if every piece of your armor still functions, the risk of breaking any of your equipment, especially your weapon, can lead to a loss. The only way to replenish health outside the village is through using potions, which are limited and are largely obtainable from slain enemies. Your health replenishes over time within the village and each new level reached replenishes it and increases it along with your overall stats.

While it seems difficult to lose a battle early on, the penalty for death can be very disheartening. Everything in your inventory, save equipped items and gears, will drop when you perish. You can still retrieve it by interacting with your corpse back at the exact area where you were slain. However, it will be a very difficult feat if the area is a spawning ground for enemies.

You can always outrun enemies and while they can chase you around all they want, they will not be able to pass borders that trigger loading screens, indicated by a bright light, just like the one outside your village. Another viable option is fast travel. You can instantly travel to different locations you have unlocked in Gladiators: Survival in Rome. This can be accessed via its icon at the bottom of your screen, and will consume a travel ticket. While limited, the tickets can be earned by watching video ads.

Gladiators: Survival in Rome potentially holds more secrets that we have uncovered but for now, this is where we end our beginner’s guide. We hope that the tips and strategies we shared will help propel your adventure to the next level and that you enjoyed reading it as well. If you have done a bit of exploration in the game and chanced upon some unique tricks of your own, do not hesitate to share them with us!