Greetings, Dwarf Lords and Battlemasters!

The mountains tremble and the forges roar as we unveil the Rise of Champions, a monumental expansion to your auto-battler RPG experience! This update brings a wealth of new features, enhancements, and surprises to deepen your strategic mastery and celebrate your dwarven legacy.

At the heart of this update are the mighty Champion Dwarves, legendary warriors who can be recruited after achieving 100 victories. These elite fighters come equipped with unique Champion Items, turning the tide of battle in ways never before seen.

But that’s not all! New secrets of the dwarven forges have been unveiled, allowing you to craft brand-new items by discovering rare recipes. Experiment with over 20 new items, artifacts and item sets to create the ultimate loadout for your dwarven armies.

Tacticians will rejoice with the addition of new Formations, offering fresh ways to outmaneuver your foes. Meanwhile, retiring a Dwarf Clan now grants additional gems, rewarding your loyalty and dedication like never before.

We’ve also polished the game with numerous Quality of Life improvements and squashed a host of bugs to ensure your experience is as smooth as a finely honed axe.

Welcome to the next chapter of our dwarven saga - let the battle commence!

Read on for the full details, and may your dwarves fight with unbreakable resolve!

Full Patch Notes:

*New Features*

- You now get a choice of 3 Champion Dwarves after 100 victories (similar to Artifact selection)
-- You can only chose 1 for the rest of your run
-- Each Champion Dwarf comes with a unique Passive and unique Champion Item Set
-- After selecting a Champion Dwarf, Champion Battles will be unlocked
-- Other Champion Items have a low chance to drop from Champion Battles (also on Eternal mode)
-- You can only have 1 of each Champion Item per Clan
- Added new functionality to Forge: Item Crafting
-- By placing the correct ingredients, you can now forge completely new Items!
-- Added 7 Forge Recipes:
--- Executioner Mask = Steel Helmet + Copper Helmet + Knight Helmet
--- Executioner Shoulders = Red Steel Shoulders, Copper Shoulders, Knight Shoulders
--- Starshard = Stormforge + Staff of Thunder + White Death
--- Stormshard = Stormforge + Staff of Thunder + White Demise
--- Stormblade = Starshard + Stormshard + Warblade
--- Lunar Crescent = Winter + Frostsinger + Solstice
--- Glacial Crescent = Winter + Frostsinger + Equinox
- Added 19 new Items:
-- Dragon Gaze: Helmet - All (Champion Item)
-- Dragon Wings: Shoulder - All - Passive: Call of Fire (Champion Item)
-- Skybreaker: Crossbow (2H) - Archer - Ultimate: Iron Storm (Champion Item)
-- Sky Visor: Helmet - All (Champion Item)
-- Sky Wings: Shoulders - All - Passive: Call of Thunder (Champion Item)
-- Umbra Visor: Helmet - All (Champion Item)
-- Umbra Wings: Shoulders - All - Passive: Call of Darkness (Champion Item)
-- Umbra Flail: Flail (1H) - Knight - Passive: Retaliation (Champion Item)
-- Umbra Sentinel: Shield - Knight - Ultimate: Black Hole (Champion Item)
-- Centurion Banner: Banner (2H) - Supporter - Ultimate: Command: Charge (Tier 5, Forest)
-- Centurion Helmet: Helmet - All (Tier 10, Forest)
-- Centurion Mantle: Shoulders - All (Tier 13, Forest)
-- Executioner Mask: Helmet - All (Craftable)
-- Executioner Shoulders: Shoulders - All (Craftable)
-- Starshard: Dagger (main-hand) - Thief - Ultimate: Thundering Shuriken (Craftable)
-- Stormshard: Dagger (off-hand) - Thief - Passive: Static Blade (Craftable)
-- Stormblade: Sword(2H) - Warrior- Ultimate: Thunderwave (Craftable)
-- Lunar Crescent: Twinblade (main-hand) - Thief - Ultimate: Nightfall (Craftable)
-- Glacial Crescent: Twinblade (off-hand) - Thief - Passive: Frost Blade (Craftable)
- Added 5 new Item Sets:
-- Executioner Set: Battle Axe + Executioner Mask + Executioner Shoulders
-- Centurion Set: Centurion Banner + Centurion Helmet + Centurion Mantle
-- Dragon Set: Dragon Staff + Dragon Gaze + Dragon Wings
-- Skybreaker Set: Skybreaker + Sky Visor + Sky Wings
-- Umbra Set: Umbra Sentinel + Umbra Flail + Umbra Visor + Umbra Wings
- Added 3 new Artifacts:
-- Hot Coal: Has a chance to burn attacker when hit in melee combat. Increases burn damage but decreases duration. (Battle 70+)
-- Tesla Coil: Has a chance to shock attacker when hit in melee combat. Increases damage when shocking. (Battle 80+)
-- Ice Armor: Has a chance to freeze attacker when hit in melee combat and increases weight. (Battle 90+)
- Added 2 new Formations:
-- Soldiers of Heaven: Shocked targets deal 20% less damage and receive 20% more damage.
-- Order of Frost: Adds a chance to Chill equal to the chance of Freezing
- Added an indicator for Artifact/Elite battles during card selection
- Added localization for Russian

*Changes and QoL*

- Retiring a clan will now grant additional gems proportional to the amount of victories
- Orc Reapers will now start appearing at battle 100 (down from 110) to match the appearance of Champions
- Reworked 'Guide' and 'Hints' sections of the game
- Effects that can remove debuffs will now only remove 1 stack instead of all stacks if applicable
- Damage over Time (DoT) can no longer apply itself or other effects
- 'Holy Block' of the Paladin now also has a visual effect
- Updated Rune selection UI
- Updated Advanced Shop UI
- 'Justice' (Paladin offhand) can now also be bought in the Advanced Shop
- Inventory Hall will now be named after your clan and also indicate the current victory amount
- Added an indicator to the item tooltip to count the amount of Set pieces on a dwarf
- Improved damage and healing number display on the battlefield
- Improved most melee attack animations and effects
- Screen shake should now occur less often if activated, especially in the later battles
- Added an option to close the current menu in the top right corner in most places
- Sprite for 'Battle Axe' has been updated
- Updated description and functionality of 'Execute' Ultimate:
-- Now states that it deals true damage and cannot be blocked or dodged (no functional changes)
-- Decreased bleed duration from 20 to 10 seconds
-- Fixed an issue where the execute effect would not be applied correctly below 25% health
- Affliction Runes had their chances to apply debuffs adjusted
- Removed Affliction Runes that were affecting all professions
- Cannoneers now need 10 (up from 5) seconds to reach their max attack speed (x4)
- Changes to Daily Quests:
-- Daily Quest rerolls have been increased from 10 to 15
-- Added 2 new categories of Daily Quests: 'Forging' and 'Crafting'
-- The Quest button will now indicate if there are Quests available or completed
- 'White Reavers Hood' moved from Shop Tier 10 to Tier 12
- Added a visual indicator for 'Rally' (Banner Basic Attack) on the battlefield
- Twinblade offhand now also has an attack animation
- Chance to apply a status effect from most passive effects has been lowered
- 'Meteor Strike' and 'Avatar of Fire' now both deal 120% of INT damage (instead Attack + INT)
- Changes to Mythril drops from Battles:
-- Increased chance to drop Mythril in the later levels for Card Battles
-- Mythril drop chance is now fixed for all levels in Eternal mode (overall a lower chance before battle 90, but higher after)
- Slightly adjusted stats of 'Void Sword' (only applies to new drops)
- 'Shatter' damage is now capped to a maximum of 4x attack damage
- Adjusted UI in the battle report

*Bug Fixes*

- Fixed some bugs with melee attack animations when the Ultimate would be cast multiple times in a row
- Fixed a bug where the total amount of gems acquired shown during Game Over was lower than the actual value
- Fixed a few issues for activating Burning Legion
- Fixed a few issues with displaying Status Effects in the Dwarf Details
- Fixed a bug where Blast (Cannoneer Basic Attack) could sometimes hit multiple enemies
- Fixed some issues with Attack Speed values not being displayed correctly (no functional changes)
- Fixed an issue with the Crusade Formation not showing any Basic Attack in the damage report
- Fixed a bug where some variation of Runes would not show up correctly
- Fixed an issue where the battle report could not be closed with the X button
- Fixed an issue where elements would increase the chance to apply a debuff by 10% (instead of 5%)
- Fixed an issue with the DPS meter when fighting the Forest Trolls
- Fixed an issue where melee impact force was sometimes influenced by INT instead of STR
- Fixed some issues where the boars of Beastmasters would not behave correctly
- Fixed an issue with animations in the Tavern Brawl