You will start your first fight with 5 randomised characters.

It doesn't really matter who you get : even with a full team of Caberjacks, you can win without any problem as long as you make good use of the terrain to avoid the Lapse's ranged attacks.
Once the fight ends, you'll find yourself with a pool of enough fighters of each class to fit mosts playstyles.

The general map comes with 10 constructible regions.

Each region is independantly affected by the Corruption and can be fit with one of the following buildings :

• A Keep : you marry 2 of your heroes and produce children/trainees.
  
• A Crucible : stationning a hero here will provide daily XP for all heroes. The amount of XP depend on the hero's level. There's a chance of the hero's traits propagating to your other fighters.
  
• A Sagewright's Guild : hosting up to 3 heroes. This building accelerate researches, and its efficiency depends on the residents' intuition level.

Check out the text under each of the regions : some of them provides a bonus (fertility boost, XP boost, etc.). If one region provides a building speed boost, you'll want to start there.

You will definitely wants at least 3 keeps, one for each class, to have a minimal stable income of trainees. The children/trainees are born with the class of the Regent of that keep.

Traits and personalities of Regent & Partner tend to be passed to their offspring, so choose wisely ! It is better to have a Regent or Partner of a lower level than, say, a whole bloodline of caberjacks suffering from asthma and decreased HP.


This part depend on each player's style, so I'll only provide general tips :

• There tend to be a shortage of heroes in the early game (even without any losses in combat), so I recommend having at least 5 keeps before attempting a Sagewright Guild.
  
• You will not be able to research everything in a single game with a single Sagewright guild. However, you don't really need to. A single one provided me with every tech I needed and more.
  
• Likewise, a single Crucible allowed me to have a set of maxed heroes in time for the final fight, so you most probably don't need more. (Actually,I'm not sure you need one at all, XP-wise, but passing a good trait/personnality to the other heroes is a pretty good advantage)
  
• I recommend leaving one of the inner regions vacant. Bonus related to both the Sagewright Guild & Crucible seems to only appears in the outer regions, so you'll build them there... and there is a good chance of a few of your outer regions will be swallowed by corruption before you reach the time limit. You'll want a safe free spot to rebuild either if necessity arises.

TL;DR my typical build : 7 keeps, 1 crucible, 1 Sagewright's Guild, 1 vacant spot.
I finish the game with loooots of heroes, but better that than a shortage.

Caberjacks are the tanks, and only possesses melee attacks.


Weapons

The Ramcap Caber, once made available through research, is my favourite. It has both the high damage of a melee weapon, and the advantage of pushing away enemies on hit.
-This is especially useful against the Ruptures (pushing them out of harm range before they explode) and Lapses (who stuns nearby creatures when dying)
-You can also use it to push an opponent into another enemy (or an obstacle), allowing for additional damage and possibly stunning them.

This ability, in my eye, makes the Ramcap Caber more efficient and useful than any Caberjack relic I've seen so far.

Armor

My armor of choice is the standard armor (and refined/advanced once available). The evasion malus of the Boneshell Armor makes it problematic for me.

Item

The must-have item for any melee fighter is the Sponge Stone (I'd advise researching it as soon as possible), as it allows them to regain HP.


Tier 1 : Prime target
Forces an opponent to approaches you (and attack if in range). Useful to lure a single opponent away from a group that hasn't noticed you yet.

Tier 2 : Rebound, Fury
I recommend Rebound, as it makes your fighter more resistant. It also has a chance to stun the attacking enemy.

Tier 3 : Stun Slam, Charge
I don't use either, so meh, it's up to your fighting style.
-Stun Slam needs you to be just next to the enemy, at which point a proper attack is often better. If it allows you to stun multiple ennemies, it also means you've run your Caberjack up a whole group of opponents, which seems... strategically unwise
-Charge seems to make lower damage than a proper attack. I suppose it can be used to make your Caberjack run from one side of the battlefield to the other should an urgent need for reinforcement arise.


Tier 4 : Stand Ground, Fortify
Both have advantages so it depends on your fighting style. As I also put my Alchemists close to the front line I prefer Fortify.

Tier 5 : Kill Rage
Gives you another Action after each kills, which allows you to attack another enemy in walking range. Potentially allows for a big serie of kills in a cluster of seeds or weakened enemies.

Hunters are ranged-only attackers.
That is, they'll use their crossbow even if the opponent is at point blank.

Note : the following recommendation works if you use your Hunters for sniping and rear position.
If you instead use them as scouts, You'll want to check Thinkpadius' guide.


Weapons

My weapon of choice (once researched) is the Bone Barb Bow
-The arrows pierces through enemies, allowing to line 2 or more in a single shot
-its ability also allow arrows to go through destructible obstacles.

If you manage to get a relic that provide a critical hit chance, it can be a good tradeoff. I would recommend keeping at least one Bone Barb Bow user in your team.

The Blunderbow is a short-ranged weapon, so isn't fit for long-range sniping strategies.

Armor

My armor of choice is the standard armor (and refined/advanced once available). The Veil Armor has no point if you don't use Hunters for scouting.

Item

The must-have item is the Steady Hander, giving them an accuracy bonus.
You'll want to keep them far enough from the front line since they won't have any HP regain ability.


Tier 1 : Follow Up
If the first shot hits, your Hunter will fire a 2nd arrow for free at the same target/direction.
-The 2nd arrow won't necessary hit, and will do half the max damage.
-If you use the Bone Barb Bow, the 2nd arrow will also pierce throught ennemies and obsctacles

Tier 2 : Honed Hearing, Put It Down
Put It Down doubles (?) the damage an Hunter does to opponents under half health.
This skill is especially good when using Follow Up : provided your first hit remove more than 50% of the opponent's HP, the 2nd arrow will benefits from the skill and likely finish the enemy.

Honed Hearing is only interesting if you use them for scouting.

Tier 3 : Flarrow, Hobbling Shot
Flarrow allows to blind a large area of ennemies. This is strategically much more interesting then Hobbling Shot.

Tier 4 : Dead Eye, Shoot 'n Scoot
Definitly Dead Eye if you snipe 'em from afar.

Tier 5 : Chalk One Up
(currently) gives a 5% stackable bonus damage for each monster killed during the current fight.

Alchemists are versatile fighters that uses both melee and range attacks.


Weapons

My weapon of choice (once researched) is the Pillar Pitcher
-it allows to set destructible obstacles on the battlefield, and can be used strategically to block the path or the view of opponents.
-the drawback is that you can't shoot the vial directly on a target, as the pillar will spawn on an empty zone(the damage is the same everywhere in the Area of Effect, so aim at a spot next to the enemy)

If you manage to get a relic that provide a critical hit chance, it can be pratical to have both an Alchemist with a relic and another with a Pillar. Sometimes you really need to aim AT an enemy rather than beside it, especially when trying to destroy a group.

The Anarchy Slinger seems to have accuracy issues so I can't in good faith recommend using it.

Armor

My armor of choice is the standard armor (and refined/advanced once available).

The Unstable Carapace Armor might be a good alternative... as long as you don't keep allies nearby. Tho, you really don't want to let your fighters getting hit on purpose, so the refined/advanced armor's evasion bonus seems more interesting to me.

Item

As secondary melee fighters, my item of choice for the Alchemists is the Sponge Stone so they can regain HP.

Once the Alchemist reaches level 6, I put the Wünderpants in the 2nd item slot.
This allows you to use the Alchemists as temporary barrage against Lapses' ranged attacks, protecting your other troops from their XP loss attack effects. Also pratical against Wrinkles, tho ideally, of course, you'll shoot them before they can reach you.


Tier 1 : Free Throw
This skill is the base of the Alchemist attack strategies. It allows you to either :
-hit and run : use the first action point to move closer to target, then Free Throw, then use the 2nd action point to move away from the target.
-Solo kill : hit an enemy with 2 successive attacks (2 vials, or 1 vial + 1 follow-up melee attack)

Tier 2 : Eagle Eye, The Acid solution
Definitly The Acid Solution.
This skills gives all your attacks (vial or melee alike) a bonus damage which takes effect just before the affected enemies' next action. This can either give you :
-a one-shot kill if your attack power fall a bit short.
-an advantage on enemies with a lot of HP, and especially Bullwarks, as the acid damage will take effect after their armor wears off.

Eagle Eye's accuracy gain is negligible once your Alchemists reaches higher level, as the throw range is limited anyway.

Tier 3 : Throw Items, Extra Item Slot

Extra Item Slot allows you to equip the Wünderpants and use your alchemist as a safe wall against Wrinkles and Lapses.

Tier 4 : Bees in a bottle, Fertilizer Flash

Depends on your fight style. I personally enjoy Bees in a bottle.
It's especially effective against groups of enemies as it does damage over several turns AND over an expanding area. Bonus point if the enemies are stuck in the area of effect (when they're either blinded, haven't noticed you, or stuck on the other side of a large obstacle).

Just keep your fighters at a safe distance from the swarm :)

Tier 5 : Mad Bomber
Double the number of carried Flasks, and reduces the cooldown between Free Throws. This really transforms your Alchemist into a one-person-army in the late stages of the game.