You've finally built up a solid wall. Your archers are hitting their shots, the Greed are banging their heads against the stone, and you’re feeling like a true monarch. Then you see it—the stone chest sitting across the river, glowing with that distinct, frustratingly beautiful purple light. You spend your gold, the chest pops, and out come the Kingdom Two Crowns gems. They aren't coins. You can’t use them to hire more beggars or buy a scythe. In fact, if you’re not careful, a single Greedling will snatch them off the ground and jump into a portal, and they are gone. Forever.
Gems are the literal bottleneck of your progression. While gold makes your kingdom run day-to-day, gems are what actually move the needle on your technology and power. They are a finite resource, which is a terrifying thought in a game that loves to punish your mistakes. If you waste them on a crappy mount or an unnecessary hermit, you might find yourself unable to unlock the Forge later on. That’s a run-killer. Honestly, the way the game handles these purple stones is a bit of a stress test for your decision-making.
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The Brutal Reality of Gem Management
Unlike gold, which you can farm by cutting grass or selling literal pig-poop with the right setup, gems are finite per island. You find them in those heavy stone chests hidden in the woods. Once a chest is opened, those gems are in play. If you don't have room in your bag, they sit on the floor. If a Greedling touches them? Bye. They're heading back to the portal.
It's worth mentioning that in the "Dead Lands" or "Shogun" DLCs, the mechanics don't really change, even if the aesthetics do. You’re still hunting for that purple glow. The biggest mistake rookies make is opening every chest they see the moment they arrive on a new island. Don't do that. Your bag has limited space, and gems are heavy. They take up the same slots as your gold. If your bag is full of gems, you can't carry the tax money you need to fix your walls. It’s a delicate, annoying balance.
Actually, there is a way to get them back, but it's a massive pain. You have to wait until you can mount an assault on the Cliff Portal. If you blow up the heart of the Greed on an island where you lost gems, you'll get them back. But that's end-game stuff. For the first twenty hours of your play, once a gem is gone, it’s gone. You need to treat them like gold-pressed ruins.
Where to Spend Your Gems First
Prioritization is everything. If you spend three gems on the Great Bear mount because it looks cool, but you haven't unlocked the Stone Mine yet, you've effectively capped your kingdom's defense for a vanity project. It sucks, but the bear isn't even that good in the long run.
The Statues (The Non-Negotiables)
You need the Archer Statue. Period. It's usually on the first or second island and it makes your archers actually hit their targets with literal 100% accuracy and increased damage. Without it, late-game waves will melt your walls because your guys are basically firing blindfolded. The Worker Statue is a close second. It makes your walls stronger. In a game where "not dying" is the primary goal, these are the smartest investments you can make.
Mounts and Why Most of Them Are Traps
Look, the Griffin is the goat. It’s on the first island, it can graze anywhere (even in winter!), and it has a pushback blast that saves lives. It costs gems. Buy it. On the other hand, the Lizard is cool because it breathes fire, but it’s slow. If you’re caught out at night, you’re dead. Most players get distracted by the variety of mounts. Stay focused. If it doesn't help you survive the winter or clear portals faster, it’s a luxury you can't afford yet.
The Hermits
Hermits are those weird little people who live in shacks and hitch a ride on your mount. They allow you to upgrade your buildings into special structures. The Horn Hermit and the Bakery Hermit are the heavy hitters here. The Baker allows you to buy bread, which attracts beggars from across the map directly to your kingdom. It turns the recruitment process from a chore into an automated system. That's worth every single gem.
The Gem Keeper: Your Only Safety Net
The Gem Keeper is a relatively newer addition to the Kingdom series, and honestly, it's a godsend. Once you build the Stone Castle (Tier 4), a little pier appears with a safe. You can give your gems to the Keeper, and he’ll store them for a small gold fee.
Why is this important? Because when you travel between islands, you carry your bag with you. If you crash your boat or get attacked upon landing, you lose everything in your bag. By storing gems with the Keeper, you can "withdraw" them on any island where you’ve built a safe. It’s basically a cross-island ATM for your most precious resource.
- Safety: They can't be stolen by Greed while in the vault.
- Portability: Access them on Island 1 even if you found them on Island 5.
- Economy: It keeps your bag clear for gold, which you need for daily operations.
Common Misconceptions About Gem Spawns
I see people online all the time saying that gems respawn. They don't. Once you’ve cleared the chests on all five islands, that is the total pool of gems for that entire save file. If you’re playing Norse Lands, the rules shift slightly with the puzzle elements, but the "finite" rule generally holds true across the board.
Some players think you need to hoard gems until the very end. This is also a mistake. The game gets exponentially harder the longer you play (the "decay" and "scaling" mechanics). If you hold onto 10 gems instead of spending them on the Archer Statue, you're making the game harder for yourself for no reason. Use them as soon as you have a specific goal in mind.
Solving the "Lost Gem" Crisis
If you find yourself in a position where you've lost so many gems that you can't progress—say, you can't unlock the Iron Mine—you have two choices.
- The Long Way: Bomb the Cliff Portal on the island where you lost them. This requires a bomb (gold), a full squad of knights, and a lot of patience. When the portal explodes, all stolen gems pop out of the wreckage.
- The Hard Way: Start over. Honestly, if you lose your gems on Island 1 or 2 and you're already struggling, it's often faster to restart the campaign with the knowledge you have now than to try and recover from a gem bankruptcy.
Survival Insights for the Long Term
The best way to manage gems is to act like a miser. Don't open a chest until you are standing right next to it with a mostly empty bag. Immediately run that gem back to the Gem Keeper or the upgrade you want. Never, ever go into the forest at night with gems in your pocket. The Greed will target those over gold every single time because they know it hurts more.
Tactical Next Steps
To maximize your current run, follow these specific actions:
- Identify the Archer Statue on your current map and prioritize its activation over any mount.
- Build the Stone Castle as fast as possible to unlock the Gem Keeper's vault.
- If you're playing co-op, designate one person as the "banker" who only carries gems while the other handles the gold for building.
- In the winter, do not spend gems. Save them. Your gold income will drop, and you’ll need that bag space for every single coin your foragers can find.
- Prioritize the Griffin mount above all others for its utility in both exploration and defense.
By treating gems as a strategic tech tree rather than just another currency, you'll stop hitting those "walls" where the Greed feel impossible to beat. Focus on the statues, grab the Baker, and keep your vault full.