Seven workhorse elements
Once you know the basics, the fastest way to get better is to learn which elements keep coming back. Across our 179 recipe guides, a handful of intermediates do most of the work: Plant appears in 92 guides, Dust in 83, Steam in 74, Lake in 38, Planet in 36, Mountain in 35 and Engine in 34. If you know what each of them leads to, most recipes stop looking random.
Plant
Earth + Water. Plant + Earth gives Tree, Plant + Wind gives Dandelion, Plant + Water gives Swamp, and Plant + Steam gives Tea. Dandelion is a small hub of its own: with Wind it becomes Seed, with Water it becomes Wine, with Earth a Flower, and with an Engine a Helicopter. Swamp is the way to dragons, since Fire + Swamp = Dragon.
Dust
Earth + Wind, and the most common first step in our guides. Dust + Earth makes Planet, Dust + Wind makes Sandstorm and Dust + Fire makes Ash. Later on it combines with bigger things too: Dust + Tree = Wood, and Dust + Engine = Vacuum, which is one step away from a Black Hole.
Steam
Fire + Water. Add Fire again for Engine, Earth for Mud, or Wind for Cloud. Mud + Fire becomes Brick, the base for House, Castle and Temple. Cloud + Fire becomes Lightning, which leads on to Thor, the Light Bulb and the Hulk.
Lake
Water + Water. Lake + Water = Ocean, and Ocean + Water = Fish, the way to Whale, Sushi and Shark. Lake + Volcano = Island, Lake + Mountain = Fjord and Lake + Plant = Lily. Fjord is a surprisingly useful element: it leads to Troll, Lego, Thor and, through Iceland, to Elsa.
Planet
Dust + Earth. This is the door to space. Earth + Planet = Moon, Planet + Planet = Star, Fire + Planet = Sun and Cloud + Planet = Sky. Moon in particular feeds a long list of guides, from the Astronaut to everything built on the Werewolf.
Mountain
Earth + Earth. Mountain + Wind = Avalanche, and Avalanche + Wind = Snow, which leads to the Yeti and, with a Tree, to Christmas. Mountain + Mountain = Mountain Range, Mountain + Sand = Pyramid, and Fjord + Mountain = Norway, which turns into a Viking with one more Fire.
Engine
Fire + Steam, just two steps from the start. Earth + Engine = Tractor, Engine + Wind = Windmill, Engine + Plant = Car, Engine + Planet = Saturn and Engine + Ocean = Submarine. Most of the vehicles and machines in our guides pass through an Engine somewhere.
Plan backwards from the target
When you want something specific, don't start from Water and Fire and hope. Start from the target and ask which two elements would make it, then repeat the question for each of those two until you reach things you already have. Take Zeus:
Titan is Earth + Saturn. Saturn is Engine + Planet. Engine is Fire + Steam, and Planet is Dust + Earth. Written down like that, the whole thing is a small tree with seven combinations, and you can build the leaves first: Steam, Engine, Dust and Planet, then Saturn, Titan and finally Zeus. The recipe search is made for this kind of work, because it shows how any element is made. Our Zeus guide has the finished path.
One branch, several targets
Many guides share most of their steps, and noticing that saves a lot of time. The clearest example is Mario. Smoke, Fog, Plant, Mushroom, Dust and Planet lead to Mushroom + Planet = Mario in seven combinations, and three of our guides grow out of it:
| Target | Steps in the guide | After Mario |
|---|---|---|
| Luigi | 9 | Fire + Water = Steam, then Mario + Steam = Luigi |
| Bowser | 9 | Earth + Mario = Yoshi, then Fire + Yoshi = Bowser |
| Zelda | 13 | Steam, Mud, Brick, Incense, then Brick + Incense = Temple and Mario + Temple = Zelda |
Followed one by one, the three guides add up to 31 combinations. Made in one session, keeping Mario and Steam on the board, they take 16. The same trick works with the Moon: Moon + Wind = Werewolf, and Werewolf is shared by Wolf, Bigfoot, Minotaur and several others. And once you have a Black Hole, the Big Bang is a single extra step: Black Hole + Fire.
How pop-culture targets are reached
Characters from films, books and games rarely come from obvious ingredients. Instead they come from a bridge element, something the game links to the story. Iron Man is a good illustration. It needs a Robot and a Marsh, and the Robot comes from Steampunk:
- Earth + Water = Plant
- Plant + Water = Swamp
- Swamp + Water = Marsh
- Earth + Wind = Dust
- Dust + Earth = Planet
- Fire + Water = Steam
- Planet + Steam = Steampunk
- Earth + Steampunk = Robot
- Marsh + Robot = Iron Man
Other characters follow the same logic. Hogwarts is House + Wizard; the Wizard is Water + Witch, and the Witch is a Broom with Fire. SpongeBob is Lake + Sponge, and the Sponge is Vacuum + Water. Mickey Mouse goes through Steamboat Willie. When you are stuck on a character, think about what the story is known for, then look for an element that matches it.
Search and sort with a long list
After a few hundred discoveries, scrolling through your list becomes the slowest part of the game. Get into the habit of typing in the search box instead: a few letters of the name are enough. The sort button next to it changes the order of the list, which helps when you are browsing for ideas rather than looking for one element. Searching by name also avoids a common mistake, because several early elements share an emoji. Lake and Wave look alike, so do Steam and Smoke, and so do Volcano and Lava.
The longest chains
Our three longest guides are Fortnite with 15 combinations, and Zelda and Kirby with 13 each. They look intimidating, but each of them is really two shorter recipes joined at the end:
- Fortnite is Castle + Internet. Castle is Brick + Cloud, five steps from the start. Internet is Computer + Tsunami, and the Computer comes from Fire + System, with System built from Planet and Solar.
- Zelda is Mario + Temple, so the Mario branch above does half the work.
- Kirby is Dustbuster + Flying Starfish. The Dustbuster comes from Dust + Pop, where Pop is a Balloon with Fire; the Flying Starfish is a Starfish with Wind.
Build one half, then clear the board. The finished piece stays in your list, so you can drag it back out when the second half is ready. Breaking a long recipe up like this also makes it easier to spot where something went wrong.
When to use the recipe search
The guides cover 179 targets that we have checked step by step. For everything else, use the recipe search. It indexes about 196,000 elements and 3.4 million known recipes, and for each element it shows how to make it and what it combines into. It is also the right tool when you have just discovered something strange and want to know where it can go next.