Haptics
Haptics are short vibrations you can play on the player's phone — the same kind of tactile feedback that phones use for button presses, notifications, and toggles. They're a great way to make an action feel more satisfying: a tap when a button is pressed, a buzz when the player takes damage, or a celebratory pulse when they win.
There are two ways to trigger haptics from a deck:
Both play the same set of vibration styles.
The "Vibrate the device" response
Add a Response to any Rule and choose Vibrate the device (in the Device section). It has a single setting:
- style — which vibration to play. Defaults to Medium.
For example, a rule like "When this actor is tapped → Vibrate the device with style Light" gives a button a satisfying little tap.
Vibration styles
There are seven styles to choose from, grouped into three kinds of feedback:
| Style | Feel |
|---|---|
| Light | A soft, subtle tap |
| Medium | A standard tap (the default) |
| Heavy | A strong, heavy thud |
| Selection | A tiny "tick", like scrolling through a picker |
| Success | A positive, upbeat notification pattern |
| Warning | A cautionary notification pattern |
| Error | A negative "something went wrong" pattern |
Light, Medium, and Heavy are single taps of increasing strength — use them for impacts, hits, and button presses. Success, Warning, and Error are short multi-tap patterns — use them to signal an outcome, like winning, losing, or an invalid move. Selection is a very light tick for scrolling or cycling through options.
Using haptics in scripts
If you're writing a script, call castle.haptic() with the name of a style:
-- play a strong tap
castle.haptic("heavy")
-- signal a win
castle.haptic("success")
-- no argument defaults to "medium"
castle.haptic()
The style names are the lowercase versions of the styles above: "light", "medium", "heavy", "selection", "success", "warning", and "error".
Things to keep in mind
- Not every device vibrates. Haptics play on iPhones and most Android phones. They do nothing on the web player and on iPads, which don't have haptic hardware — so never rely on a vibration as the only feedback for something important. Pair it with a visual or sound change too.
- Don't overdo it. Rapid-fire vibrations feel unpleasant and drain the battery. Castle automatically rate-limits haptics that fire too quickly in a row, so a burst of vibrations may get thinned out. Reserve haptics for moments that matter.
- Players can mute them. Just like sound, players can turn haptics off, in which case your vibrations won't play during their session.