The game
Send a hero across a fogged, living map: seasons change, rain and snow move in, evening light falls over the towns. Open treasure chests, capture mines, walk into ruins and shrines, cross water by boat — and fight the battle yourself.
Watchfires — humans, keepers of the fire · Lanterns — people of the water · Knells — the undead. Each has its own buildings, creatures, heroes, town and mount (an armoured warhorse, a water-elemental steed, a bone wyrm).
18 named captains, six per people — or build your own in 3D: face, build, hair, beard, headgear, cloak, an outfit cut for your people, and the colours. Your captain rides the map and the battlefield exactly like that, and one key lets you look around through their own eyes.
Turn-based tactical battles on a 12 × 10 grid: spells, war machines, morale and luck, retaliation, retreat or surrender for gold. Or hand it to the computer (Shift+A) and read the result.
Build, recruit, upgrade your stacks, station a garrison. Every finished building gets a small ceremony; towns hand out quests, and mines and holdings bring in resources every week.
The town workshop turns six kinds of material and gold into items: 30 recipes, common, rare and unique. Rare ones need a hero level or a trait, and a unique piece carries the name of the captain who had it forged and a line from their chronicle.
Draw your banner: 10 field divisions, 30 emblems, 20 colours, with a colour-blindness check. A banner, a whole custom captain or an entire world can be shared with friends as one short code.
Three campaigns of eight missions each: The Horn Line, The Long Ebb and The Silent Procession. Your captain carries their level, skills, spells and a few artifacts from mission to mission. Alongside them: 15 ready-made maps and a tutorial.
Four map sizes — Skirmish, Classic, Large and the wrap-around Full Globe —, 1–8 players, teams, a day limit or a stronghold rule. Four AI difficulties: Easy, Normal, Hard, Brutal. In the editor you can draw a map of your own and share it as a file.
Every empire has a name, a crest and a character, and remembers what you did to it. At the council table an envoy lays out what it offers and what it wants: a truce, trade, tribute, a joint war or a cease-fire.
Up to eight people at one computer, with a hand-over screen — or over the internet: a six-character code into the waiting room, with chat, pausing and resuming later. There is a local-network mode too. Online play is available in the browser version.
These are not in the game yet — the owner has approved them and they are being made. The latest state is in the changelog.
The last lit tower is waiting
Three peoples, an ancient crown, and a captain you shape yourself. Playable in your browser right now.
