Tears or Themis is an excellent detective/courtroom drama game by miHoYo. Step into the shoes of a rookie attorney to solve complex cases. With the help of her detective friend Luke, she will investigate crime scenes, interrogate suspects and find clues to get to the truth. The action takes place in the courtroom, where you will have to help her present the correct evidence before the court and get into intense “debates” with the suspects and their attorney to defeat them.
Tears of Themis also has Otome elements. You will get to interact with your crushes, be it your handsome boss Artem or your childhood friend Luke and even go on a date with them.
- Check out the limited-time Romantic Getaway Event in Tears of Themis.
The main story is divided into episodes, where you will stumble upon new characters, find new cases, search for evidence and win verbal battles. Our beginner-level Tears of Themis tips, tricks, and strategies will help you win debates, acquire cards and build a powerful deck.
But before reading our guide, check out the gameplay video to know more about cards, debates and upgrades:
Getting Started: Debate Mechanics
Debates are nothing but verbal battles between two characters. You will have to win a debate by using the right cards to reduce your opponent’s HP to zero. Arguments in stylized text format will appear on the screen and you will have to counter these arguments with the right cards to defeat your opponent.
In Tears of Themis, you will get into a debate that might be related or completely unrelated to the main story. In such levels, it could be a verbal battle with the suspect or with someone who has no connection to the story, such as the rude pizza delivery guy, a shady shopkeeper, or a nagging salesman. You will receive S-chips as the first clear reward if you win a debate on your first attempt.
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The most important debate will begin at a Trial level of an episode. This is when you will get into a verbal debate with the suspect or his/her attorney.
How to spot a debate level? Well, when you tap on a level from X-Note > Episode, you will see certain signs that point to a debate with your opponent. The opponent’s card (as shown in the screenshot below) will provide important details. The first sign would be the name of your opponent or a description of him/her.
The debate level info page
The second sign would be a tiny color-coded symbol on the left of your opponent’s name. This colored symbol is the dominant attribute of the character. And the third sign would be the “recommended” power. Your deck must have higher power than the recommended power to increase the chances of winning a debate.
Under clear rewards, you will receive S-chips, Stellin (in-game currency), and oracles of justice, once you win a debate level. S-chips are the first clear rewards. You will get them when you clear the level for the first time. You won’t get them again if you replay the same level.
Spend energy to start a debate level. Tap on “proceed” to begin a debate.
You will then be taken to the deck creation screen, where you will have to select the most powerful cards to get an upper hand in a verbal battle. In Tears of Themis, cards are known as visions and you will need them to win a debate.
In the beginning, you don’t need to select cards manually to create a deck. Let the AI do all the hard work. In the deck creation screen, tap on “auto-build”. Next, tap on “Optimize” so that the computer chooses only those cards that are equal to or stronger than the opponent’s “attribute”. Press the confirm button and then the start button to begin the fight!
However, in later episodes, you might have to choose the strongest cards to win comfortably. Also, note down the opponent’s dominant attribute in the level info screen and choose cards that are stronger than his argument’s attribute.
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Here’s how to select cards:
After tapping on the “proceed” button, tap on a card under “Primary Deck”.
Now choose high-grade, high-attribute cards by tapping on their icons. Keep in mind the dominant attribute of the boss opponent and the recommended power during selection. Press the confirm button and then press “Start Debate”.
You can filter cards based on rarity (SSR to R or vice versa) or category, based on attributes, to make the selection procedure simpler.
You can add more cards to your deck if you reach player level 7. You can also have a support deck once you reach level 10. Play all main story levels to gain XP and level up. Keep leveling up to reach level 7 and then level 10. Also, play story-based debates under Visit and Anomaly levels to level up. Anomaly unlocks when you reach Episode 02, Level 28.
Make sure you enhance cards from time to time to increase your deck power as the power requirement will increase in later episodes.
When the debate starts, it will display two opponents, the game’s protagonist (your character) on the lower left and her opponent on the upper right:
In the above screenshot, you will see the HP bar beside the protagonist and also beside the opponent. Your opponent will lose if his/her HP bar is reduced to zero. HP stands for “Heart Points” in this game and reducing it to zero will help you win a verbal battle. However, you will lose if your opponent reduces your character’s HP to zero.
Debates are turn-based. You will need to defeat your opponent before the total turn count hits zero.
Every debate has a turn limit. The number of turns left is shown just beside your character’s HP. Please note that if you fail to defeat your opponent before the turn count reaches 0, you will lose.
When a debate starts, your opponent will present his arguments. The arguments will be in the form of text blocks displayed in the middle of the screen. Your deck of cards is the only way of attack to break your opponent’s argument blocks.
After your opponent presents argument blocks, it’s time to choose the right card to counter or “break” his/her argument. Each opponent will have one or more argument blocks on the screen. Destroy their argument blocks with cards to reduce their HP to 0.
After winning a debate level, all cards in your deck gain XP. The XP gained will allow your cards to level up. Leveling up increases their stats and power.
Note: The 5 cards displayed on the bottom of the screen during the debate are chosen randomly by the AI. Make sure you choose the strongest cards whose attributes are higher than the opponent’s to increase the chances of having strong randomly selected cards on the bottom deck.
Attributes
Before deploying cards, you should know a bit about attributes. Knowing the strengths and weaknesses of attributes will help you win debates:
Arguments are categorized into 4 color-coded attributes – General (Grey), Intuition (Green), Logic (Blue), and Empathy (Red).
Attributes have symbols – Empathy has a heart symbol, Logic has a diamond symbol and Intuition has a triangle symbol.
Each attribute is stronger than the other – Empathy > Intuition, Intuition > Logic, Logic > Empathy.
In simple terms: Red > Green, Green > Blue, Blue > Red.
Your deck of cards on the bottom of the screen also has these attribute symbols/colors and so do those argument blocks presented by the opponent.
Check the border color and symbol on an argument block. Cards on the bottom also have such symbols.
Pay attention to the symbol and the border color of the argument text block. If it’s green with a triangle symbol, it suggests that the argument has an attribute to Intuition. Attack this argument with an empathy card (heart symbol card).
You will have to deploy a card that has an attribute stronger than the argument’s attribute. Note the symbol/color on the card before unleashing it at an argument.
Selecting a stronger attribute card will deal more damage to his argument and will speed up destroying the argument block.
When your card attacks your opponent’s argument, his/her HP bar reduces, plus his argument block also gets weaker. Keep attacking his argument with stronger attribute cards when your turn comes to deal maximum damage. This will help you break or destroy their argument blocks faster. Note that destroyed arguments will be replaced by new arguments.
You will use a turn after using a card to attack. If you cannot defeat or break that argument completely with your card when your turn comes, the same undefeated argument will attack your opponent in the next round when your opponent’s turn comes. Of course, you can then use another strong card to break it.
When a debate begins, your deck on the bottom of the screen will have five cards. Don’t worry if you use all of them during a verbal battle. You can replenish your cards. You will lose one turn when you draw cards again.
Your opponent attacks when the cloud callout above their face fills up. Keep an eye on the cloud callout when engaging in a debate level. When they attack, your character’s HP bar reduces. To avoid being attacked, you must destroy their argument blocks with stronger cards.
Basic Deck Building Tips You Should Know
In Tears of Themis, having a deck of powerful cards will help you win debates faster. You should first enhance and upgrade your cards before adding them to your deck. Enhancing cards increases their power. Your deck’s total power is the summation of all cards in your deck.
Before pressing the proceed button on a debate level of the main story, read the level info screen. It will be something like this:
Beside the name of the opponent is his/her dominant attribute. This means that most of the argument blocks presented by them will belong to that attribute. If the dominant attribute is green with a triangle symbol (aka Intuition), it means that most of the arguments presented by the opponent will be intuition-based. If it’s red, then his arguments will be based on empathy.
Build your deck keeping the opponent’s dominant attribute in mind. So if your opponent’s dominant attribute is green (intuition), your deck should have powerful Empathy (Red) cards because Empathy trumps Intuition in this game. You will deal greater damage to the enemy’s intuition-based arguments with empathy cards.
You should also have intuition cards in your deck since they will act as a backup if you have used up all empathy cards, then you can use the intuition cards against his intuition-based arguments. Having the same-colored attribute card is better than having cards whose attribute is weaker than the opponent’s arguments.
Don’t forget to have SR and SSR cards in your deck. The highest rarity is SSR and the lowest is R. SR and SSR grade cards have better stats than R grade cards. You can obtain them through Vision draws.
Deck Strength Should be higher than the Recommended Power
The recommended power will also be shown on the level info screen. At debate levels, power plays an important role. Your deck’s total power should be more than the recommended power if you want to comfortably win a verbal battle.
To know the power of a card, tap on “Cards” at the bottom of the home screen. Now, tap on a card. On the info screen of the card, power is displayed in the top-left corner.
Power provides a reference to the overall strength of the card, in numbers. The total power of all cards in your deck is the total strength of your deck. Your goal is to build a deck with a total strength (power) higher than the recommended power displayed on the level info screen.
How to Increase a Card’s Power and Stats
You can view a card’s details by visiting home > cards. Tap on a card to view its current level and stats. Power is the summary of its level and stats. Higher-level/rarity/stats of a card have higher power than other cards.
Like a said earlier, your deck’s total power (i.e. the total power value of all cards in your deck), should be more than a debate’s recommended power level if you want to increase your chances to win a debate.
Here are a few ways to increase your card’s power:
Enhance a Card: The best way to increase its power. You will need oracles of justice to enhance a card. It increases your card’s level and stats, which ultimately boosts its power.
Tap on “Cards” and then tap on a card to open it. The Enhance section can be found at the bottom of the card info screen:
Tap on an oracle of justice icon to use it. You can use multiple oracles of justice to increase stats and power. The higher the level of an oracle of justice, the higher the stats/power increase. You will also need stellin (in-game virtual currency) to enhance a card.
Oracles of justice chips are leveled 1-5. A single level 5 purple oracle of justice will improve a card much better than multiple level 1 bronze oracles. If you want your cards to reach higher levels faster, then use higher-level oracles.
You can obtain oracles of justice from main story levels, daily sign-in rewards, limited-time official release campaign, rookie sign-in and rookie tasks gift boxes (complete a certain number of tasks to open gift boxes), and events.
Evolve a Card: Nice way to drastically increase its power. Your card needs to reach the max level cap and only then you can evolve it.
In Tears of Themis, evolving a card raises the level cap, and unlocks new skills and card faces. When your card reaches the max level, you will need certain materials and stellin to evolve it. These materials are attribute-linked chips and special chips that can be only used to evolve a particular vision.
Example: To evolve the Artem card, enhance and upgrade it until it reaches level 40. This card’s attribute is “Empathy”, so you will need 6 Empathy I chips and 6 Empathy II chips. But you will also need a special “Equalization” chip that is used only to evolve Artem cards. Now you will get Artem cards of different moods, so the equalization chips can be used on other Artem cards as well.
If you want to obtain chips to evolve a card in Tears of Themis, you will need to know their locations:
– Tap on “Cards” and then tap on a card. Go to the “Evolve” section of the card info screen on the bottom.
– Tap on the empty chip icon to know where to find it. You will get a list of locations under “How to Obtain”.
So if you need Empathy chips to evolve Artem, follow the above steps. These chips can be obtained by clearing study levels, exchanging friendship badges, and from the temple of trials. You don’t have to search for them: Just tap on a location under “How to Obtain”. If you can’t reach that location, it’s because it’s locked and you will need to complete a level to unlock it.
Upgrade a Card: Do this to raise its stars and increase power. Open a card and tap on the “+” symbol next to the stars. You will need a certain amount of fragments and a card upgrade material to level up. Fragments can be extracted from duplicate cards.
To know where to find fragments and upgrade materials, tap on their icons on the upgrade page. This page appears when you tap on the “+” sign next to 5 stars on the card info page.
Use any Card against General Arguments
An argument block with a general attribute has a grey outline. Since this is a neutral attribute, you can use cards of any color/attribute to counter and destroy it.
Choose an Argument before Deploying Cards
During a debate, when your opponent presents multiple argument blocks on the screen, you can tap to target a particular argument. Choosing arguments will help you to use your cards better and lets you unleash a card with stronger attributes on a weaker argument first before you can go for other arguments.
Your goal is to get rid of arguments as soon as possible to decrease your opponent’s HP fast.
How to Get Cards and Tears
Go to “Home” > Visions on the bottom of the screen. Visions are cards that are needed to win debates.
In Tears of Themis, you will need tears, and a bluish/purple gem to obtain cards. To draw a card, you will need at least 1 tear.
You can draw cards anytime you want under “Permanent Shadow of Themis”. This is the first thing you will see when you tap on “Visions”.
There are three vision grades – SSR, SR, and R. You will get guaranteed SR cards within 8 draws and a guaranteed SSR within 28 draws from the shadow of Themis.
There is also another limited-time event-exclusive card draw. You can access them by tapping on the arrow signs on the left and right sides of the screen in the Visions section.
The game will provide 10 tears for free to obtain 10 cards. Here are other ways to get tears for free:
Rookie Tasks: In the home screen, tap on rookie tasks on the upper-right hand side of the screen. Under “rookie sign-in”, you will obtain tears if you log in on certain days. I received two tears when I opened the app on day 2.
Under the rookie tasks tab, complete tasks to unlock gift boxes. Each day, you will receive 10 tasks. Complete them all to open gift boxes and receive bonus rewards. Each time you complete 14 tasks, you will unlock gift boxes that contain Stellin (in-game currency), oracles to enhance cards, chips to evolve cards, and S-chips to purchase more tears. If you complete all 70 tasks, you will unlock the last gift box which contains 6 tears.
Events: Certain events, such as the current “Official Release Campaign” grant tears. Please note events are for a limited time and you will have to finish them before they are gone to obtain maximum rewards. The events tab is on the left side of the home screen, just below quests.
The official release campaign grants tears on certain days – days 5, 7, 9 and 10.
Episode Rewards: Solve a case and complete an episode to earn rewards. You can access episode rewards on the lower-right corner of the level selection screen of an episode. You can obtain tears, stellin, and oracles of justice. In some episodes, you will also obtain a card.
Use S-Chips to Get Tears
The best way to obtain tears is by exchanging S-chips with them. This hexagonal chip has an “S” embedded in it. You can get S-chips for free.
To purchase tears using S-chips, tap on “Visions” on the bottom of the home screen.
Tap on “+” next to the total number of tears on the upper-right corner of the screen.
A converter will be displayed on the screen. You will need 180 S-chips to obtain 1 Tear of Themis. Tap on the “+” button to increase the number of tears you need. The number of S-chips required to get tears will also increase. So if you want 2 tears, you will have to shell out 360 S-Chips.
How to get S-Chips
Here are some ways to obtain free S-Chips in Tears of Themis:
Login to play the game every day to obtain daily sign-in rewards. You will receive S-chips on certain days. The sign-in rewards schedule changes every month, so always pay attention to the dates and claim your rewards.
Complete all levels in the main story to get S-chips as the first clear rewards. Certain levels, such as debate levels, and the all-important trial level grants these as rewards.
Finish daily and story “quests” to obtain s-chips. Complete quests in the daily section to open gift boxes, which may contain s-chips. Finish certain story quests to get s-chips as rewards.
Complete rookie sign-in tasks.
Interact with New Characters to Obtain S-Chips
On the home screen, tap on “Visit” to interact with male characters who met you in the main story. “Chat” with them to earn affection. Tap on a character or play games with him to earn hearts, which help your raise your affection level.
The story button is just above the “chat” button. New stories will be available once you raise the level of affection. To raise affection levels, you will need to chat with the character or play games with him.
The story mode in the Visit section allows you to earn S-chips. It will also have debate levels that will allow you to earn s-chips as the first clear rewards. Make sure you don’t lose the debate in the first attempt, or you might lose any chance of obtaining them.
