0.7.30: Calvin, Emperor of the Floe, and cards cut from coloured card

20 October 2026 Version 0.7.30 21 min read

Four pictures in a two by two grid: the Bear Beneath holding the end of Calvin's last floe on open sea, Bill the Bull-Blooded's herd stampeding out of three bull-shaped holes in his backdrop card, the Pterodactyls and Sunset Duelist cards with their figures standing up over the top edge, and Calvin the polar bear on a pan of ice under a huge paper moon.

0.7.30 is out on Steam, itch.io and the demo. Act 3 has a third boss: Calvin, Emperor of the Floe, a polar bear whose ice breaks up under the fight until one floe is left rocking on open sea. Every card is cut from coloured card now, 99 enemy units have been drawn again from scratch, and the full-art cards stand their subject up out of the picture. Two lords break into their second phase in a new way, the Steel Legion and the Slime Swarm each get a new card from a player's ideas, and Uncle Jim throws squirrels. This post also covers 0.7.27 to 0.7.29, which went out without notes: the Mac version runs far faster, and the Android version starts again.

Calvin, Emperor of the Floe

Act 3's bosses were Rex Mortifer and the Avatar of Winter. Calvin is the third. He is a polar bear in a crown that is too small for him, with a herring speared on the end of his harpoon, and his whole army is penguins.

Calvin's back wall: a card taped to the kraft wall of the box shows the polar sea at night under green and pink aurora ribbons, a paper moon, an explorer's ship frozen into the ice, a terraced rookery packed with penguins, and his ice palace hung with navy banners

His fight is played on ice instead of cardboard. Five long floes of sea ice run from your berg to his over a navy wool blanket, and as he loses health the ice breaks up.

The opening of Calvin's fight: five long floes of snow-covered sea ice run from your warlord's berg to his on a navy wool blanket bordered with waves and penguins, with Calvin on the right holding his harpoon among his first penguins, and an igloo, a snow penguin, a fishing hole and a signal mast standing on the blanket

At 60% he brings a paw down and the desk under the board cracks. The cutting mat breaks off the edge of the table in shards and tips into the sea. There was water under the desk all along.

Breakup: a crack runs across the green cutting mat under the board, the edge of the desk breaks off in shards that tip into the sea, and water opens up all round the blanket while a giant penguin hangs over the field waiting to drop

From then on the ice calves. Every 6 seconds the edge piece carrying the most bodies breaks off, and his Ice Sawyers saw loose the piece they stand on every 8 seconds. An edge piece never takes more than part of a lane, so a path is always left and the lane bends round the gap. At 45%, 30% and 15% a whole side floe goes, outer floes first. The centre floe never breaks, so whatever you put in the middle lane lasts.

Every break is warned. The piece is outlined with a glowing crack and a paper countdown strip runs down over it: 3 seconds for an edge piece, 8 for a whole floe. The countdown runs in battle time, so it holds still while you plan your turn.

A whole floe goes: the top lane is ringed with a glowing yellow crack line and a paper countdown strip runs down above it, then the floe turns pale, breaks along the line and drifts off into the sea with what stood on it, while a smaller piece lower down is outlined with a countdown of its own

Anything standing on ice that breaks away is lost. It does not die, so On Death does not fire and nothing is left behind. Flying units lift off and settle on the nearest ice. Penguins dive off, swim, and climb back onto the ice 3 seconds later, because Calvin's power, Born Swimmers, is active from the start.

His host:

Waddlers come six to a card and are mostly there to be in the way.
Tobogganers belly-slide in with Charge 4.
Herring Hurlers stand at the back and throw fish that skip on to a second target (Chain 1).
Divers are Flankers. They surface deep in your half and go for your commander.
Ice Sawyers join once the ice starts breaking, with Armor 1 and Ice Saw.
Emperor's Guards are armoured Tanks with 24 health.
The Huddle is 52 health of penguins with Cleave, and six Waddlers come out of it when it dies.

Five of Calvin's penguin cards from his Compendium page: Waddlers, Tobogganers with Charge 4, Herring Hurlers with Chain 1, Divers with Flanker, and the Ice Sawyer with Armor 1 and Ice Saw

His spell is Belly Flop. A giant emperor penguin drops belly first out of the sky onto the biggest crowd for 6 damage and shoves everything outward. A unit shoved off the edge of the ice is lost to the sea like anything else. His crown volley, Fish Supper, throws four frozen herring at your commander for 3 each, and every defender standing near your commander blocks one.

Belly Flop: a giant emperor penguin drops belly first out of the sky onto a crowd in the middle lane, flippers out, and the units under it are thrown outward while chunks of ice break off the floe behind. The clip plays at two thirds speed

Calvin's rules with their cut-paper icons: Breakup, his arena; Born Swimmers, his power; Calve; Belly Flop; Fish Supper at your commander; and Heave, the Bear Beneath's spell, each with its line from the game

Each phase break brings more of his host. Breakup, at 60%, sends two Divers up deep in your half. Calving Season, at 30%, puts two Emperor's Guards in every lane and gives every unit he has +1 attack. Nothing in his kit slows, stuns or freezes, so the pressure in his fight is the ground shrinking under your army.

The Breakup phase card: Calvin, a round polar bear in a crown of ice spikes and a navy sash, stands on a cracking pan of ice with a herring speared on the end of his harpoon, under a huge low paper moon, with penguins on the broken floes round him

When you bring him down, the last side floe goes, his palace falls into the sea behind him and the ice gives way under his feet. He comes back up out of the water as the Bear Beneath: huge and hunched, with a mane of berg ice and a gold glow in his crown. He takes hold of the far end of the last floe with 21 health, hits your whole army for 3, and puts The Huddle in every lane.

The Last Floe: Calvin's palace crumbles into the sea behind him, his floe breaks under his feet and he goes under, then comes back up out of the water as the Bear Beneath, huge and hunched, with a mane of berg ice and a gold glow in his crown, and takes hold of the end of the last floe

From there the last floe rocks like a seesaw, one full rock every 5.2 seconds. Units walking downhill move up to 30% faster and units walking uphill up to 30% slower, so the fight surges back and forth along it. The Bear Beneath's spell, Heave, hauls his end under: the floe tips toward your end for 4 seconds and deals 3 damage to your units on it.

The last floe on open sea with the Bear Beneath holding the far end: the floe is tipped up on a pale ice cliff after his Heave and rocks back toward level, your army and his penguins fighting along it while an orca fin circles behind and a seal sits on its pan of ice below

Click open water and the sea ripples. Dolphins leap, and leap again if you click them, a narwhal surfaces, an orca fin circles, a beluga comes up for air, a seal sits on its pan of ice and a paper boat rides the ripples. Every piece of ice that falls in and every penguin that dives makes its own splash and wake.

The Last Floe up close: the floe tips on the swell with its high end standing on a pale ice cliff, the Bear Beneath leans on the far end, and the sea round it is full of toys: a beluga surfacing, a seal on a pan of ice, a paper boat, a bottle with a message, and a ring of foam where the water was clicked

He has his own song, "Ice All the Way Down", a waltz for a ball held on the ice. In co-op each player gets three floes of their own and keeps their own middle one.

Cards cut from coloured card

Every card is now two plies of coloured card. The picture and the rules sit behind holes cut in the top ply, with the lighter ply showing round the edge of each hole. The name is on a folded paper banner whose tails tuck in behind the card. Nothing is clipped onto the banner any more: rarity reads from the stones at the foot of the card and from the banner's tint.

The Dire Wolves card in 0.7.26 and in 0.7.30, side by side. On the left, the old face: a painted orange frame, the name on a flat wooden scroll with rods at both ends, and a row of small diamonds along the foot. On the right, the new one: a sheet of bright orange card with the picture and the rules set behind holes cut in it, a lighter ply showing round each hole, and the name on a folded paper banner whose tails fold back behind the card

The colours are brighter too: orange for a summon, blue for a spell, green for a power and violet for a curse.

Four cards of four types, Recruits, Fireball, Everything Burns and Decay, in 0.7.26 above and 0.7.30 below. The old row has muted painted frames and wooden name scrolls; the new row is cut from brighter coloured card, each with its name on a folded paper banner

A fanned hand of the new cards on the cardboard desk: Recruits, Archers, Fireball, Dire Wolves and Slow Burn

Full-art cards pop out

The game has 18 full-art cards, and until now 17 of them were flat paintings. Each of those has a newly drawn scene now, with its subject standing up out of it and over the top edge of the card. Uncle Jim's card already worked this way.

Four full-art cards in 0.7.26 above and 0.7.30 below: Pterodactyls, Quickening, Sunset Duelist and Mysterious Egg. The old cards were flat paintings of silhouettes; on the new ones the subject stands up out of the card's own scene, the pterodactyl's wings and the duelist's hat breaking over the top edge, a gold pocket watch in front of a storm of stopped arrows, and a cracked egg glowing in its nest

A summon's figure is the unit's own drawing from the field, so the card shows the unit you will get. Balor's card used to show a black devil that looked nothing like the little red one who came out. He has been redrawn as a pit lord, with bat wings thrown up, a crown of horns, a flaming greatsword and a burning whip, and his card shows that same figure climbing out of a fiery pit.

Balor in 0.7.26 and in 0.7.30. On the left, the old standee, a hunched little red devil with a sword, beside his old card, whose painting showed a different black devil. On the right, the new standee, a pit lord with bat wings thrown up, a crown of horns, a flaming greatsword and a burning whip, beside his new card, where that same figure stands up out of a fiery pit and over the top edge of the card

Twelve more full-art cards as they print in 0.7.30, each with its subject standing up out of its own scene: Volunteers, The Regicide, Liopleurodons, Kosmoceratops, Momentum, Promissory Note, Pocket Spark, Overdraft, Blood Debt, Mirror's Due, Haggle and Painful Letter

99 enemies drawn again

99 enemy units were still on drawings from August, and many of them were piles of small pieces that did not read at the size a unit stands on the field. Each one has been drawn again from scratch in flat paper, as one figure doing one clear thing. Four of the Brass Colossus's five works were variations on the same blocky brass robot. Now the Assembly Forge is a domed furnace with a crane arm, the Arc Coil a copper coil throwing sparks, and the Brass Sapper a goblin riding a bomb.

The Brass Colossus's works, 0.7.26 above and 0.7.30 below: the Assembly Forge becomes a domed brass furnace with a crane arm, the Arc Coil a tall copper coil throwing sparks, the Brass Sapper a goblin riding a round bomb, the Brass Juggernaut a hunched brass giant, and Forgeheart a slim knight with a glowing furnace chest and a red-hot sword

The Slime Lord's sump, 0.7.26 above and 0.7.30 below: the Bilge Flinger heaving a pail of sludge overhead instead of riding a catapult, the Tallow Cube as a lit candle block with a skull pressed into it, the Sump Slime grinning with a broken tooth, a sword sunk to the guard in the Sludge Glob, the Sump Tyrant waving a bottle, and a small round Sludgelet

Amanita's myconids and the Carrion Court, 0.7.26 above and 0.7.30 below: the Fungal Hulk raises a fist under a torn purple cap, the Sporeling hugs a glowing spore, the Myconid Slinger whirls a staff, the Carrion Crow spreads its wings, the Gravemaw is a hulking grey ghoul with an open jaw, and the Bonepicker is a hooded skeleton with a pick

Winter's raiders, 0.7.26 above and 0.7.30 below: the Frostling as a spiky ice imp lunging with its talons out, the Ice Golem a wall of ice shoulders raising a fist, the Rime Reaver a raider in a wolf pelt with an axe, Ball Lightning a crackling orb with a face, the Rime Harrow a hooded rider on a sled, and the Flurry a curling wave of snow

Two lords break differently

When Bill the Bull-Blooded reaches his second phase at half health, the camera pulls back to show the whole box. His war horn sounds, his backdrop card swells twice and bursts open in three bull-shaped holes, and 34 Gore Bulls and Blood Hounds pour out of them, across the mat, over the board and off the left of the table. Props standing in front of a hole are blown off the wall, and his card stays torn for the rest of the fight.

Bill the Bull-Blooded's phase break from above the whole box: three bull-shaped holes burst through the steppe printed on his backdrop card, and a herd of cut-paper Gore Bulls and Blood Hounds pours out of them in a rolling bank of dust, across the brown mat and the board past your commander, and off the left of the table

After the stampede: Bill's backdrop card, a yurt camp on a sunny steppe with a giant war horn, stays punched through with three ragged bull-shaped holes

When Amanita, the Sporecrown, bursts at half health, her cap-stalk comes up out of the board, pale threads run down every road, and toadstools grow up along both sides of every lane: fly agarics, blue inkcaps, orange chanterelles, pink buttons, puffballs, and teal and lime caps that glow. They stay all fight, rocking and breathing, and now and then one puffs out spores. None grow in the middle of a road or on a summoning spot, and the ones nearest the camera stay low so they never hide a unit.

Amanita, the Sporecrown's phase break: a giant violet cap-stalk shoots up out of the board where she stands, pale threads crackle off down the roads, and toadstools pop up along the verges in red, violet, blue, orange, pink, white and glowing teal and lime, and stay

Both changes are for show. Neither phase's rules changed.

Two new cards from a player's ideas

Both of these came from ideas a player sent in.

Ironscale is a new Uncommon summon for the Steel Legion: an armoured war-lizard for 2 energy, with 24 health, 5 attack and Armor 1. It has Pounce 4, and every time it lands, every enemy near where it lands is Stunned for 3 seconds. Upgraded, it leaps further (Pounce 6) and Stuns for 4. Where it comes down, the road cracks and flaps of card tear up and slap back down.

The Ironscale card and its upgrade: a green war-lizard in plate armour and a red-crested helmet in front of a legion camp, a 2-energy Melee Beast summon, "Armor 1. Pounce 4: Stun 3s nearby enemies", upgraded to Pounce 6 and Stun 4s, 5 attack and 24 health, "It waits. Then it lands."

An Ironscale leaps onto a Bloodhorn Berserker; where it lands the cardboard road splits, flaps of card tear up and slap back down, paper dust puffs out and yellow stars tumble as the Berserker is Stunned

Eater of Filth is a new Uncommon summon for the Slime Swarm: a slow, fat slime for 2 energy with 20 health and 3 attack, or 25 and 4 upgraded. Its Absorb Aura eats every stack of Poison and Contagion off the allies around it, your commander included, and it gains +1 attack and +1 max HP for each stack it eats, for the rest of the fight. There is no cap. In co-op it eats off your partner's units too.

The Eater of Filth card and its upgrade: a fat green slime with a fanged mouth and a lolling tongue, a 2-energy Melee Slime summon, "Absorb Aura: eats nearby allies' Poison and Contagion, gaining +1 attack and +1 max HP per stack", 3 attack and 20 health, upgraded to 4 and 25, "Every plague is a meal."

An Eater of Filth among four poisoned militiamen: a green tendril runs from one of them into the slime's mouth, it glows, and "+12 attack" and "+12 max HP" float up over it

Uncle Jim throws squirrels

Uncle Jim, the Legendary an event can give you, used to fight up close and breed squirrels. Now he stands at the back and throws them. Every 1.25 seconds a Squirrel flies down the lane and lands fighting, with 3 health, 3 attack and Pounce 3, and his squirrels' kills count as his. He talks now and then when one of them gets a kill, and usually has a last word when he falls.

Uncle Jim's card and its upgrade, a full-art Legendary: a grey-bearded man in a tee and cargo shorts with a huge squirrel tail behind him, in an autumn wood, "Launcher: Squirrel" (Squirrel+ when upgraded), 3 energy, 45 health, "He has had enough. The woods will answer."

Uncle Jim stands on his blue stand at the back of a lane and throws squirrels at three Bloodhorn Berserkers; a squirrel lands on one, it goes down, and Jim says "That one's for the acorn jar."

Pieces fall flat

A unit cut down in a fight tips back off its feet, twisting as it goes, and falls flat on its back across the table with a slap and a small bounce before it is taken away. Before, it tipped sideways inside its own picture. A piece that changes direction turns round on its stand instead of flipping in a single frame.

A Bloodhorn Berserker hit by a goblin archer's arrow tips back off its feet and falls flat on its back across its red stand, lies there a beat, and fades away

Lane fronts and lord powers

Some lords cast a front that sweeps down the lanes and hits a set number of units before it stops: Fire Front, Caustic Tide, Whiteout, The Roots Reach, The Tide Comes In, Stampede and Keening Wail. Point at one and its card shows with a cut-paper slip under it, the number of units it has left in big cut figures over a chain of paper dolls, one per charge. Each time it hits a unit, a doll folds flat and the number balls up and opens out as the next one down.

Caustic Tide rolling down two lanes as green paper waves; over the wave the pointer is on, the spell's card, and under it a cream slip with a green flag reading "Stops after 4 more units", the 4 cut from green paper, over a chain of six paper dolls, four standing and two folded flat

An enemy lord's power used to be a square cream box in the top right corner. Now it is a paper slip with the power's punched counter laid on the end, the same counter your own Powers wear. It folds away under the counter and pulls out when you point at it.

Top right of a fight against Gorehoof and the Boar Herd: the lord's power, Boar's Rage, is a cream paper slip on a red tab, its name in cut-paper letters, "The lord's units deal +2 attack damage." under it, and the power's punched counter, a horned helmet, laid on the slip's end

Pack commanders in the Compendium

Each pack's commander, the warlord built from that pack's own body parts, now stands in a card-sized cut-paper scene as the first card of the pack's shelf in the Compendium. Paper arrows at his sides turn him round on his base through his three looks, Battleworn, Gilded and Ascendant. A look you have not earned yet stands as a black cut-out with a padlock on it behind a sheet of vellum. Stepping onto a look you own wears it for your next draft.

In the Compendium, the Spectral Host's commander stands in a card-sized cut-paper scene as the first card of the pack's shelf, beside Spectral Call, and turns round on his base: Gilded, then Ascendant, a flat black cut-out with a padlock on its chest behind a sheet of vellum, then Battleworn

The galaxy, cut from paper

The galaxy at the far end of the long zoom is cut as layered paper now: each strip of an arm narrower and paler than the one under it, pink clouds along the arms where stars are being born, and a core of stacked hand-cut discs. The red map pin is gone. The sun is a small gold star that stays the same size on screen however far out you are.

The long zoom's galaxy: arms of layered paper strips in plum, navy, lilac and cream, little pink paper clouds along the arms, a core of stacked coral-to-cream discs, and a small gold eight-pointed star on an outer arm where the sun is

Mac

A Mac player came back after three months, found the game unplayable, and wrote in to say so. On an M4 MacBook Air the warlord muster ran at 3 to 5 frames a second and a first-floor fight at 6 to 9. 0.7.27 and 0.7.28 fixed it:

Macs draw without 2D edge smoothing (MSAA). On Metal it was costing nearly the whole frame: without it, the warlord muster went from 216 milliseconds a frame to 12.
On every computer, the game watches its own frame rate. If a scene stays slow, it switches off edge smoothing, then the desk lamp's lights, then the warlords' cast shadows, one at a time, and keeps a change only if it was what was slowing the frame. On that MacBook Air the menus now run at 60 and a fight at 50 to 60.
The game window sits below the menu bar and the camera notch. It had been losing its top edge under them, more than half the run header.
The Mac download from itch.io opens after you unzip it in Finder. Before, the app lost its permission to run on the way out of the zip. Steam and the itch app were never affected.
On a big screen, cards and pick screens can grow larger. On a 1920x1080 screen, a pick of three cards now fills about 62% of the width instead of 49%.

Android

The Android version of 0.7.26 to 0.7.28 closed on the loading screen every time it launched. 0.7.29 fixed that. Since then:

On a phone, every word in the interface is at least a readable size, and every button is big enough for a thumb. Uncle Jim's sheets and event pages take the full width of the screen.
The hand is dealt bigger and lower on a phone, with names readable while the cards sit there, and a tap lifts the card you can see under your finger.
End Turn, the speed controls and the Deck and Discard piles are thumb-sized.
Long sessions no longer run the phone out of memory. Before, every fight left a little more memory in use, until the phone closed the game.
If the game does crash on a phone, the next launch sends a report of where it stopped, so it can be found and fixed.
The long zoom out past the desk is a desktop feature for now.

A fight on a phone-shaped screen: five big cards dealt along the bottom edge, sunk so their pictures and names show, End Turn and the battle log on the right above a pause button and one speed chip, Deck and Discard as wide chips in the corners

Uncle Jim's Check-in on a phone: Jim stands on the left as a cut-paper squirrel in sunglasses and shorts, and his sheet takes the rest of the screen in big type, with three relics to choose from, Solar Battery, Smoked Lens and Eclipse Lens

The Old Battlefield event on a phone: its cut-paper picture of swords and a torn banner on the left, and the page on the right in big type with three wide option slips, Scavenge the shallow lines, Dig out the deep trench and Salt the earth

Two settings were reset

Auto-play cards is off for everyone, once, on every platform. It is meant to stay off unless you choose it, and it had been found on in settings where nobody remembered turning it on. If you had turned it on yourself, turn it back on in Settings.
Auto End Turn is back on for every profile (since 0.7.28). The switch to on by default in August only reached brand-new profiles. Anything you set from now on sticks.

Smaller changes

A quick double tap or click on a slow device could take a reward twice, such as two relics from one treasure room. Every screen that hands out a reward now answers one tap: the treasure room, the shop, the campfire, card picks, relic picks, event choices, Jim's Junk Drawer, the Eternal's shelves and the brazier.
Uncle Jim's tip over your hand: "Got it" now closes the tip instead of picking up the card under it.
The fire in the shop recommends burning one of your warlord's own opening cards before a pack's Starter.
Nobody pops up on the main menu's signpost until every board has been hung.

This post went out to players on Steam and itch.io on 20 October 2026, and is kept here. Comments and questions are read on either of those, in the Discord, or through the quill in game.