0.7.32: the lord who beats you finishes the job

22 October 2026 Version 0.7.32 29 min read

Four pictures in a two by two grid: Wally shaking the queen's hand while his shadow stands up behind them as a wolf, Calvin's Breakup banner tearing in two down a floe line, Verdy B. Queen's honeycomb risen out of her mat's border with paper flowers at its foot, and a Pillar of Fire pouring down onto a crowd on a cardboard road.

0.7.32 is out on Steam, the itch.io downloads, the browser version and the demo. Lose a run now and the lord who beat you walks over and finishes your warlord in a way all their own, and every lord has one. Boss banners tear in two on the way out, every boss break changes the arena, and the smaller breaks no longer pull the camera away from the fight. There are nine new cards and a reworked one, a new event where you draw the roads you fight on, and a long list of places where the game used to stutter and doesn't now.

The browser version on itch.io is up to date again. 0.7.31 came out slightly too big for it and stayed on 0.7.30; 0.7.32 fits, so playing in the browser you get everything from both posts.

The lord who beats you finishes the job

When your last warlord falls, the fight used to just end. Now the camera dives in on the two of them, and the nearest lord still standing walks over and finishes the job their own way. There are 45 of these: one for every lord, one each for both Twins, and one for Wally's werewolf form. Your warlord's body stays on the table for the defeat screen, so a run that ends with you in a jar ends with the jar on the table.

Simple Ton grows back anything you cut off him. The warlord lops off his arm, it pops back, and three thumps of his log drive the warlord into the board like a tent peg.

A green paper troll with a log club walks up to the player's queen on a cardboard board. She cuts off one of his arms and it lies on the board, then he swings the log down on her head three times and she sinks into a round hole until only her head and arms stick out

Wally strolls over waving and offers a handshake. While they shake, his shadow stands up behind him as a wolf and bites, and Wally is mortified.

A friendly man in a yellow raincoat with a watering can walks up waving to the queen. They shake hands while his flat black shadow rises off the board behind them into a tall wolf shape that leans over her. She falls flat on her back at his feet and he waves

Silvertongue brings a snake-charmer's basket and plays the pungi until the warlord dances into it. The lid goes on, a little ajar on the crown.

A purple paper snake in a top hat and monocle pushes a wicker basket up beside the queen and flips the lid off. Musical notes float up as he plays a pipe, she raises her arms over her head smiling and swaying, then sinks down into the basket and the lid drops back on top

Brother Clang counts to four. Every toll of his handbell rocks the warlord, and on four the great bell comes down over him. When it lifts he stands there ringing, then falls.

A bald, bearded monk in a brown habit steps toward the queen ringing a small brass bell, and she reels with stars around her head. A huge gold bell drops on a rope over her with gold sound lines around it, lifts away, and she sways and falls flat at the monk's feet

The Frost Yeti builds a snowman out of the warlord, carrot nose and all, flicks its head off, and the frozen warlord topples into the heap.

A shaggy white yeti with ice crystals on its back leaps up beside the queen and slaps three balls of snow onto her until she is a snowman, then pokes in a carrot nose. It flicks the snowman's head off and she tips over backwards, frozen stiff, into the pile of snow

Calvin, Emperor of the Floe goes ice fishing. He thumps his sceptre until the floe gives under the warlord, hooks him out of the water, freezes him stiff and tosses him over his shoulder. If he has already woken as the Bear Beneath when he beats you, the bear bursts up through the ice instead.

A polar bear emperor with a fish-topped sceptre waddles across white ice to the queen. A ring of cracks opens around her and she drops into dark water up to her waist. He hooks her out on the sceptre, holds her up frozen pale blue, and flings her behind him onto the ice

The Broodmother drops in on a thread with a rolled-up newspaper and swats the warlord flat, like a bug.

A big purple paper spider lowers herself on a silk thread to face the queen, holding a rolled newspaper in one leg. She swings it down and the queen is squashed flat on the board with her arms and legs spread, then the spider climbs back up out of the picture

The Fire Devil kept the snuffer from his own finisher. He lights the warlord like a candle, lets him burn down, and puts him out.

A small red devil carrying a huge iron candle snuffer runs a ring of flames around the queen and flicks a flame onto her head. She melts down shorter and shorter like a candle, the snuffer comes down over her, and when it lifts there is only a smoking black stub

Never cut the Slime Lord. The warlord does, gets two of him, and they merge with the warlord inside. He comes back out of the top, slimed green.

A green slime blob wearing a gold crown stands beside the queen, who slashes through it with her sword. It splits into two crowned blobs, one on each side of her, and they flop together over her into one. Then she is spat out of the top and lands on her back in a green puddle

Nine more of them: Rex Mortifer corks your soul in a jar, Grix the Goblin shakes you down by the ankles for your gold, Vitrix fires and glazes you until the top of you breaks off, The Lost Witch reads your ending out of her book, Hew, the Blade cuts once and your crown falls off in two halves, the Magma Magnate leaves you slag, Gorehoof's charge snaps your boar spear, The Mimic starts leading and you follow until you go down silver, and The Brass Colossus shovels you into its firebox.

A three by three grid of game frames on a dark brown background, each captioned in gold. Rex Mortifer, a crowned skeleton, holds the queen by the throat as a pale ghost of her floats up toward his glass jar. Grix the Goblin holds her upside down by the ankles beside a pile of gold coins. Vitrix, the Kilnmaiden stands beside the queen glazed green and cracked down the middle. The Lost Witch reads from a floating book while lightning from a storm cloud strikes the queen. Hew, the Blade stands behind the queen after a white sword line cuts across the frame. Magma Magnate, a stone figure crowned with candle flames, stands beside the queen turned to grey cracked slag. Gorehoof and the Boar Herd: a crowned boar charges as the queen flies backward and a snapped spear spins away. The Mimic, a silver copy of the queen, stands over her as she lies cracked and silver. The Brass Colossus, a brass boiler robot, shovels the queen toward its open firebox

Your fallen warlord also lies still now. The low-health shake used to keep going on the body after the last blow.

Banners tear in two

When a lord's banner has said its piece, it now tears in two down the middle, between the words and the lord, and the halves drop away out of the bottom of the frame with the fight already there behind them. Each lord's sheet comes apart its own way: Calvin's cracks along a floe line and the halves sink like ice, the Brass Colossus's shears like metal plate, the Elder Treant's splits like bark, Rex Mortifer's crumbles, Verdy B. Queen's parts along a scalloped edge, and the Magma Magnate's chars.

Six tall panels in a three by two grid, each labelled with a boss name. In each, a dark phase banner is split by a jagged vertical tear and the game board shows through the gap. Calvin, Emperor of the Floe: the tear jogs in square steps with white ice edges. The Brass Colossus: a straight tear with a sharp kink and a thin bright metal edge. The Elder Treant: a splintered tear with pale wood along both edges. Rex Mortifer: a ragged tear with pale crumbling edges above a row of skulls. Verdy B. Queen: a wavy scalloped tear beside honeycomb and paper flowers. Magma Magnate: a tear with a dark scorched edge and an orange glow

A night banner reading Breakup shows a white polar bear with a spear on an ice floe under a full moon. A crack with white ice edges opens down the middle in square jogs, and the two halves tip and sink out of the bottom of the frame. Behind them is the game board: a white ice mat with a blue patterned border on a green desk. The tear is slowed to a quarter speed

Every banner now hangs an opaque backcloth first, unrolled down from the top in a fraction of a second, so the board, the road and the nameplates never show through a painted sky. Rex's crypt and Winter's glacier used to let the road show through them for the whole banner.

The game board, a long road on a dark blue velvet mat, is covered from the top by a plain dark sheet that rolls down over it. A row of gravestones rises along the bottom, then Rex Mortifer, a crowned skeleton king in a purple robe holding a jewelled staff, rises into frame under a ribcage arch. The title The Dead Rise lands on a torn banner and a row of skulls and bony hands comes up along the ground. The first part is slowed to a quarter speed

The sets also answer the boss's blow when he slams. Wally's moon swells nearer with a ring of cold light round it, and every pair of shutters on his street bangs shut, house after house out from where he stands. Ton's sleeping troll-stones wake and glare, the Magma Magnate's volcano blows, the Twins' camps put up hedges of spears, and the Great Bloom bursts open with a puff of pollen off every flower.

A night village of cut paper: a church tower, cottages with lit yellow windows, bunting on a maypole and a big pale moon. Wally, a smiling man in a yellow cardigan holding a green watering can, rises into frame and waves. The moon grows and a jagged pale ring stands out round it, every window in the street goes dark, and the title The Moon Answers lands on a torn purple banner

Every break changes the arena

In 0.7.31 every lord with a phase break changed his arena at least once. The bosses have several breaks, though, and some of those still left the box alone. Now every break changes it, and the change stays for the rest of the fight. These are the new ones.

The Elder Treant ("The Forest Answers"): a crack runs out from his end along the mat's border, and wherever it reaches a root, the border splits and a great arch of bark rears up over the frame and comes down on the desk beyond. Saplings come up beside each tear. Each root comes up through a real tear in the felt: the cloth tents up, cuts run out from the middle in a star, it bursts, and each wedge flips back on its own hinge.

A wide view of a green felt mat with a long cardboard road on a dark green desk under a painted forest backdrop. A crack runs along the mat's brown border, and one after another, brown bark roots burst up out of it, arch over the frame's edge and come down onto the desk beyond, their tips curling. Small green saplings sprout beside them

A close view of the edge of a green felt mat with a brown border band next to a dark green desk. A wavy crack runs along the border, the felt bulges and bursts open in pointed green wedges, and a thick brown paper root rises out of the hole and arches over the edge onto the desk, ending in a spray of twigs

Verdy B. Queen ("The Great Bloom") empties her hive into the box. A ribbon of bees loops the mat's border and comes down at her end, where sheets of honeycomb rise one after another out of the border, the cells fill and cap course by course, and honey runs down over the edge. Her paper flowers burst open at its foot.

A close view of the Queen's end of a pale sand-coloured mat with pastel hexagon tiles along its green border. A thick ribbon of cartoon bees streams in along the bottom edge and up the right side, swarms into a cloud, and a tall stack of golden honeycomb rises out of the border in rounded tiers. Pink and purple paper flowers open at its foot, and a few bees stay working them

Rex Mortifer ("The Dead Rise"): a bony hand the size of a man grips the edge of his pall. His grave-light runs off both ways round the border, the graves give up their dead as it passes, and where the two lights meet, a mausoleum unfolds on the desk like a page of a pop-up book.

A wide view of a dark blue velvet mat with a gold-trimmed border and a cardboard road, on a green desk. A giant skeletal hand grips the right edge of the mat. A pale green glow runs along the border in both directions, and small gravestones, a cross and an open grave pop up along the border as it passes. On the desk off the left side of the mat, a small white mausoleum unfolds like a pop-up book page and its doors swing open on a light inside

The Avatar of Winter ("Whiteout"): cracks run out from under him across the whole felt mat, and it freezes behind them plate by plate into pale teal ice, with ice spires rising in the margins.

A wide view of a teal felt mat with a cardboard road and white snow drifts, on a green desk under a frosted backdrop. Dark cracks spread out from the right end of the board across the whole mat, and the felt behind them turns into a mosaic of pale blue-white ice plates with long dark splits, from right to left, until the whole mat is ice. Snow falls over the desk

The Magma Magnate ("The Field Ignites"): two long tears race round both sides of the board through his felt, with fire deep inside them and their torn lips raised. A few fires stay standing in them for the rest of the fight. At his last stand, "The Kiln Opens" now burns the mat down into the pit in cut-paper flame, where it used to be a speckled wall of fire that lapped over the roads.

A close view of the Magma Magnate's end of a grey slate-tiled mat with a yellow brick border and a cardboard road. Glowing orange tears split open in the felt beside him and race away along the border and round the bottom of the board, each a ragged dark crack lit orange inside. Paper flames stand up out of the tears

A wide view of the Magma Magnate's mat with glowing tears already in the felt, under a painted dusk of a palace, a volcano and a factory. Fire runs across the backdrop card and burns it away to a black kiln wall with a glowing furnace mouth. Then the mat burns away from the Magnate's end, leaving a deep pit of cracked orange lava under the cardboard road, with cut paper flames standing along its edge

The Brass Colossus ("Pressure Release") brings his plant up through the blueprint. Hatch lids blow off, and a tall riser, a boiler with a shrieking safety valve, a twin manifold on your flank and low vents punch up into the margins, gauges past the red and steam blowing. At "Foundry Override" a raised conveyor stands up beside him and runs his yard's cargo into a hopper.

A blue blueprint mat with a big cardboard board shaped like three humps, the player's queen on the left and a brass robot on the right. A brass ram swings away, then pipes and valves in brass and red pop up out of hatches in the blue margins round the board: a tall pipe with a red wheel and a gauge beside the robot, a twin set of pipes on the left, and low vents along the bottom. White steam clouds blast out along the floor and drift away

A close view of the Brass Colossus's corner of a blue blueprint mat, beside a column of small unit cards and a tall brass pipe with a red wheel. Lightning crackles over the board. Steel legs rise from the floor, a long belt with yellow and black hazard edges runs out along them, amber beacons light at both ends, and small brass parts ride the belt along

Wally ("The Moon Answers") shuts his street round the box: a white picket fence clacks up round his knitted throw, picket by picket, with a gate in every run. It stays for the fight. By day its gates stand open, and at every moonrise they slam. At "The Blood Moon" the fence turns out to have been his all along: every other picket stretches into a curved fang, the ones between sink into a red gum, the corner posts thrust up as canines, and the whole jaw clenches once.

A wide view of Wally's village mat at night, a dark blue knitted throw with a cardboard road, red-lit cottages and black bare trees on the desk, under a painted village with a big red moon. Round the border of the throw, a fence of pale pink fangs stands in a red gum along the far edge and down the sides, with taller curved fangs at the corners. The near side is left open in the middle

The smaller breaks don't pull the camera away

Most phase breaks change the arena in a small way: Ton's ruck, the Carrion Court's gallery, the Cursemonger's hex. Those used to pull the camera back and hold the fight while you watched. Now they play wherever your camera already is, with no pull-back and no wait of their own. The break itself still pauses for its stomp and its cards. The big changes, like the Foundry standing up or the board rising into the sky, still pull back and pause so you can watch them.

A top-down view of a cardboard battle board on a dark felt mat, with the player's card hand along the bottom. A flock of paper vultures and crows wheels over the board, a green power card titled Full Bellies appears on the left, and then small paper soldiers start marching along the tan roads while birds settle along the edges of the mat

Several of them also got something new.

Simple Ton's stamp reaches the wall now. The tape on one side of his backdrop card lets go and flutters down to the desk, and the card hangs crooked for the rest of the fight.

A paper backdrop card of a rainy hillside with a rainbow, taped to a cardboard wall above a blue felt mat with an orange border. The felt rucks up into folds, the card tips down on its right end, and a small strip of tape drops onto the green desk below the right corner. The card stays hanging at a slight angle

The Cursemonger's hex used to be drawn in chalk. It runs in wet ink now, a bead at the head of each line and a pool where it stops, before the whole figure catches a sickly green light from the wax seals.

A close view of a green felt blanket with a purple border printed with keys, beside a tan cardboard road. Dark purple-black ink lines run across the felt in arcs and straight strokes, tally marks fill in between them, a red wax seal is pressed onto the border, and the lines light up bright green, then settle to a faint green glow

The Dread Court's fog of torn tissue has corpse-lights under it, glowing up through the layers like a bulb under tissue paper, and the room goes cold as it rolls in.

The left side of a maroon blanket and a cardboard road, seen from above, with a paper commander figure. A bank of pale blue torn tissue paper rolls in over the green mat beside the blanket, and blotchy green lights glow up through it in several places. A pair of pale eyes opens in the fog along the top edge

Wynken's dark seeps out from under his blanket as the crib mobile turns to its nightmare side, in three layers of cut paper with fingers curling out across the mat. Once the moon comes round, gold eyes open in it.

A pink felt blanket with a cardboard road on a green cutting mat, under a paper backdrop of a night sky with a moon and sheep. A crib mobile hangs over the far edge of the blanket and its pieces turn to show their dark backs. A purple-black cut paper shadow spreads out from under the blanket on all three sides, curling finger shapes reach out across the mat, and pairs of yellow eyes open in the shadow

The Twins' camps pop up like a pop-up book before their volley: his red ridge tents in a row down the far margin, her blue pup tents scattered round her drum.

A green felt blanket with a red and blue border and a forked cardboard road. A row of red tents with shields pops up along the far edge next to a red drum, small blue tents pop up scattered across the near side, and then red and blue paper arrows rain down and stick into the mat and the desk all around the blanket

The Iron Wardens ("Close Ranks"): once Haldric's drawbridge is down, a column of his Shieldbearers marches out of the castle under the portcullis, over the bridge and across the felt, and halts as one in a wall of shields at his end.

A blue felt blanket with a red and yellow checked border and a cardboard road in a loop, below a paper backdrop of a sand-coloured castle. A drawbridge drops from the castle gate, a line of small red shield-bearing paper soldiers marches down it and across the felt past a commander figure, and they stop in a curved line of red shields beside the road at the right

Calvin's ice calves from the outside in. When a floe is marked to go, the mat round it breaks away into the sea first, and then the floe itself cracks into slabs that drift apart and sink one by one.

A white ice board of parallel lanes on a dark blue sea, edged by a blue patterned mat, under a backdrop of an ice palace and penguins. The mat pieces along the far edge tilt and slide into the water, then the far lane of ice cracks into five pale blue slabs that drift apart and sink, leaving open water

At Heartwood Unbound, the Elder Treant's last stand, the cloud used to be drawn over the board. Now the board climbs up into the cloud deck and breaks out of the top. His backdrop card falls with the wall at first, until the lifting branches catch it and haul it up after the board.

An autumn-coloured board on an orange felt mat below a paper forest backdrop. The board tears up out of the mat on a thick brown trunk, the box and desk drop away to show blue sky, branches reach up round the backdrop card and lift it, then layers of pale yellow and pink paper cloud rise past and cover everything, and the board comes out above the clouds in a crown of orange and red paper leaves with the card held above it

Nine new cards and a reworked one

Executioner (Behind You!): two headsmen for 2 energy, with Free Deploy and Backstab. Every strike that leaves an enemy under 20 health has a 10% chance to execute it (15% upgraded), and an executed piece is cut clean through and slides apart. Lords can't be executed.
Money Gun (Behind You!): a Money Gunner for 1 energy who hits harder than a 1-energy shooter usually does, and pays for it with 1 gold out of your purse for every 10 shots (15 upgraded).
Body Snatcher (Behind You!): every unit it kills, it becomes. It sheds its old form like a torn page and stands up as a full-health copy of its victim on your side, still a Body Snatcher.
Gatling Gun (Siege Works): a free-deploy machine gun with 45 health that winds up with Frenzy, up to six times its starting damage, and pays 1 health for every shot.
Goblins in a Trenchcoat (Steel Legion): 1 health and Invulnerable 2. Every hit that reaches the coat lets a Coat Goblin out, even a hit Invulnerable cancels.
Hat Collector (Final Rites): every ally that falls leaves it a hat, which goes on top of the ones it already wears. Each hat is +1 attack, and every point of damage knocks one off before it lands.
Hungry Giant (Giantkind): an X card that eats every point of energy you have left and grows 50% bigger, in size and stats, for each one.
Vampire Spawn (Bloodletting): two 1-health fledglings with Lifesteal 100% and Overheal, so they drink themselves bigger. At Unlock 12, each one splits in two at half health, and each half feeds and splits again.
Pillar of Fire (Pyromancy): a beam of fire from the sky that burns whatever stands under it for 10 seconds. When its mark dies, it walks slowly to the nearest enemy and scorches a trail into the card behind it. Upgraded, it drops three.
Engulfers (Slime Swarm) is reworked: three acid slimes for 2 energy with 12 health and no attack, Acid Aura 2, Pounce 4 and Ethereal. It used to be one big ooze for 4. Devouring Mass, its Pack Path card, is now the same three slimes, each bursting into two Slimelings when it dies.

Five cardboard card faces on a dark background, three on top and two below. Top row: Executioners, a red-hooded headsman leaning on a sword, cost 2; Money Gun, a paymaster holding a gold blunderbuss, cost 1; Gatling Gun, a six-barrel gun on a wheeled carriage, cost 2. Bottom row: Goblins in a Trenchcoat, a tall belted trenchcoat with a goblin face in the collar, cost 2; Hat Collectors, a figure in a tall top hat, cost 2

Five cardboard card faces on a dark background, three on top and two below. Top row: Hungry Giant, a pot-bellied giant dangling a pig over his mouth, with an X in the cost seal; Vampire Spawn, a pale lilac bat-eared fledgling, cost 1; Pillar of Fire, a blue spell card showing a column of fire pouring onto a scorched ring, cost 2. Bottom row: Engulfers, a huge green slime with a knight suspended inside it, cost 2; Devouring Mass, a green slime with many eyes, cost 2

The Executioner's cut, filmed with the chance turned up so that both strikes land it:

On a sandy road, a red-hooded executioner on a blue base strikes a big lumberjack in a red check shirt. A pale line cuts straight across him, the word Executed! floats up in steel blue, and his top half slides off and drops. The executioner walks on to a blue-uniformed watchman with a lantern, and the same cut splits him too

A purple hooded figure with a knife fights a lumberjack on a sandy road. The lumberjack falls, the hooded figure tears in two like paper, the halves fall away, and a lumberjack in a red check shirt stands on a blue base where the figure was

Two small figures in top hats stand behind a row of soldiers fighting a big troll on a sandy road. As soldiers fall, hats fly up off them and land on the collectors' heads, building two tall wobbling towers of different hats that bend as the collectors walk

A tall belted trenchcoat with a goblin face in the collar and a helmet on top stands on a blue base with a shield badge reading 2 over it. Bees and flowers attack it. Each hit pops the word Invulnerable and a green goblin springs out of the coat, until three goblins stand in a pile where the coat was

A tall red, orange and yellow column of paper fire pours down onto a crowd of townsfolk on a sandy road, with a ring of flame tongues at its foot. Burn numbers float up. Blue-shielded soldiers march in from the left as the crowd falls, and the column slides along the road, leaving a dark scorched trail behind it

The Crayon Roads

A new event, from floor 3. A sheet of card as wide as a field lies across the road with toys standing on it, and a crayon the length of a lance. Pick up the crayon and you draw the fight's three roads yourself, from your flag to the lord's, round the toys and over the gold coins lying on the sheet, with only so much wax for each road. A road can double back on itself or go round in a loop. Then a knife cuts the sheet along your roads, the waste falls away, and you fight on what you drew. It works at a co-op table too.

A sheet of corrugated card seen from above with toys, gold coins, a blue flag on the left and a purple flag on the right. A blue crayon line is drawn across it, then a second with a loop in the middle, then a third. The lights dim, a red craft knife traces round the roads, and the card outside them drops away, leaving the roads standing as a cut-out board

A cardboard battlefield shaped like the cut-out roads, with a queen commander on the left and toy props on grass around it. Blue crayon lines run along three raised card roads, one of which loops back on itself. Small blue-shielded soldiers march along the roads and round the loop while two boars come the other way

The enemy's purse reads true

The enemy's energy now matches what it says. His purse tops out at the number the Compendium prints for him, a play he was handed for free prints 0 (and Exhaust, if he only gets it once a fight), and whatever he has left at the end of his turn he spends on units he can still afford. Simple Ton's hidden "every other round" rule is gone. His new power, Patient Lad, keeps his unspent energy for his next turn, so you can watch his purse climb past its usual 4 before he pays 6 for the Hulking Troll.

Top: a green power card titled Patient Lad, cost 0, showing a burlap sack with blue gems bursting from its mouth, reading Simple Ton keeps his unspent energy for his next turn. On the right a troll commander with a club stands beside an energy seal reading 3/4, under a speech bubble saying You bring snacks? Good. Bottom left: the troll's seal reads 7/4 with a +4 tag. Bottom right: the seal reads 1/4 with a -6 tag as a smaller troll steps onto the road

The Compendium

The Enemies section is laid out as a spread round the book's crease: the roster on the left page, each lord as an icon and a nameplate filed under Act 1, 2 or 3, the open lord's portrait beside it, and how they fight on the right page. In Cards, every pack is headed by its own nameplate and crest, and the folded packs are dealt two to a row across both pages.

An open red book. On the left page, a list headed Act 1 of lord nameplates with small portraits, Grix the Goblin marked with a red ribbon, then an Elite heading with Simple Ton and others. Beside it, a large portrait of Grix the Goblin, a crowned green goblin holding a bone, with 14 HP and 3 energy a round. The right page has a Strategy heading with a paragraph and a Commander heading with Grix's commander card

An open red book with a search box and Filters button at the top left, and Expand all, Collapse all and View upgrades at the top right. Below, pack nameplates with crests and level tags fill both pages: Spectral Host, Bug Hive, Draw and Order, Wild Pack, Primordial Growth and Forbidden Lore on the left; Slime Swarm, Giantkind, Mutagenesis, Final Rites, Siege Works and Pandemonium on the right

Effects cut from card

Most of the effects that were still soft light are now cut from card like everything else on the board. The Siege Mortar's shell is a hand-cut iron disc instead of a drawn cannonball. Explosions throw cut smoke clouds, popping stars and confetti and leave a ragged scorch, instead of an airbrushed smudge. When a unit gains something, it gets a cut rosette and a sheet of tinted tracing paper instead of a glowing pool. The same goes for status auras, chain and live-wire arcs, the lords' salvos, spell families, storms, dice, telegraphs and finishers.

On a sandy road two jagged red, orange and yellow paper starbursts go off beside a watchman, with the number 12 popping up. Grey cut-paper smoke clouds rise and drift, scraps of coloured paper scatter, and two ragged brown scorch marks are left on the ground as townsfolk tumble

Less lag

A lot of this version went into the places where the game stuttered. Almost all of it draws exactly the same picture as before; it just stops doing work it didn't need to, or does it before you get there.

Clicking into a fight no longer freezes the screen. The fight used to be built all at once when you clicked, so the map's photograph sat frozen for 280 to 410 ms. Now it is built a piece at a time behind that photograph, and the frame you click on takes about 22 ms. The shop, events, the campfire and the treasure room are built the same way.
Your turn is smoother. The aiming lines for spells kept redrawing parts that weren't moving; now they only redraw what moves. On a busy turn against the Blood Hunt, a typical frame went from 17 ms to 10 ms. Pointing at a unit no longer hitches while its card is built, and the first moments of a turn with enemy spell warnings no longer stutter.
Phase breaks are smoother. The worst were Verdy B. Queen's meadow, which held one frame for up to 197 ms, and the Brass Colossus's yard, whose heartbeat stalled the game every six to eight seconds for the rest of the fight. Both are fixed. Calvin's and Winter's banners, Bill's stampede, the Treant's autumn and Rex's descent are all much smoother, and the pictures for a boss's next form are prepared before his break comes.
Moving between screens is quicker. Going from the spoils back to the map took up to 0.4 seconds and now takes a tenth. The Choose Your Warlord screen builds in a third of the time, and the game starts a little faster.
The first fights on a new install. The graphics driver prepares each new kind of effect the first time it is drawn, which on a fresh install could catch a fight mid-turn. The desktop versions now do that while the map's photograph is still on screen, as the phone and browser versions already did.
Spell lines no longer flicker. A lightning bolt bent at a sharp kink, or a charm, acid or dirge band on a short wobbly line, could lose a panel or its whole fill for a frame. Those pieces are now drawn in full every frame.
On phones, several picture caches that kept everything for the whole session now let go of what they no longer need.

Smaller changes

Devouring Mass is built from the new Engulfers (see above). Blade Master and Nightblade now field 3 units and Siren Sovereign 2, matching the cards they come from.
Pyre Bats lose Flanker, so they go for the nearest foe instead of the farthest.
From Ascension 7, the enemy card Waste Not's preview showed its Wasteland Psycho with 6 health when it actually arrives with 7. The preview now matches.
In the browser version, the cut-out pictures on event pages are stored at the size they are drawn. They look the same in the itch.io window and in fullscreen on most screens, and a little softer in fullscreen on a 4K monitor.

This post went out to players on Steam and itch.io on 22 October 2026, and is kept here. Comments and questions are read on either of those, in the Discord, or through the quill in game.