Crafting and recipes in Among the Trolls
Crafting is the progression track. Open the backpack in the world, drag materials into the crafting space, and take recipes from Anna's journal as they unlock.
Crafting is the progression system in Among the Trolls. It is not a side activity for base builders: the weapons, arrows, tools, buildings, shelters, ammunition and potions that carry you through the story all come out of the crafting loop, and that loop lives inside Anna's backpack.
Where crafting happens
The backpack opens in the world rather than in a separate menu, with the same dynamic lighting and weather around Anna. Inside it you manage your resources and drag the necessary items into the crafting space to make tools, weapons and materials. Recipes come from Anna's journal, and crafting sites in the world flag something new with a small marker when a recipe has just unlocked.
Two consequences follow from that design:
- Crafting has a place and a moment. You are standing in the world while you do it, so craft somewhere you are willing to be interrupted.
- The journal is the source of truth. If a recipe is not in the journal, it is not available yet. Reading the journal after picking up new pages is how you find out what just became possible.
The crafting tree, as the game describes it
| What you craft | What it is for |
|---|---|
| Weapons and ammunition | Hunting, defence, dungeon combat |
| Tools | Chopping, gathering, cutting a path |
| Buildings and shelter | Cold nights, storage, a base |
| Bridges | Crossing to islands and repairing broken crossings |
| Magical potions | Dungeons, enemies and the effects of bad Lykky |
| Cooking | Turning hunted and foraged food into real meals |
The developer description of progression is explicit: crafting is the key to advancing, and it is the player's way to fight back in an archipelago full of monsters that want you dead. Ammunition, potions and shelters are all the same system seen from different angles.
The bow is the clearest example
Anna begins with the bow's handle in her pack. Like all weapons the bow is subject to breaking, but the handle never disappears from the inventory: you keep it and rebuild it from resources found in the world. That one design decision explains the whole economy — weapon progression is tied to exploration and scavenging rather than to a shop, so gathering is never wasted time.
Bridges show how crafting gates the story
Bridges are crafted from gathered wood, and they come in two variants: normal bridges and magic bridges. Magic bridges are needed to repair some crossings that were broken for reasons the story explains. The bridge is also how the game doles out the map: one bridge, one island, one piece of the story at a time.
A crafting routine that works
- Pick up sticks and stone on every journey; quantities matter more than variety early.
- Check the journal before a trip to know what a recipe needs.
- Craft arrows to a buffer, not to a number; two quivers is a habit, twenty is a haul.
- Brew potions the moment the recipe is available, and carry them into the first portal.
- Rebuild broken tools immediately. Waiting until later means walking back.
- Dismantle what you no longer use to recover materials.
Sources
- Devlog #12 (crafting as progression, potions, bridges) and Devlog #8 (the bow that never leaves your pack): Steam news archive
- Devlog #7 (the 3D backpack and crafting space): Steam news archive
- Store page: Among the Trolls on Steam
Game imagery on this page is official promotional material, used for reference.
