Gameplay

You aim every spell yourself, and nothing fires on its own. Each enemy attack is announced on the floor before it lands, and each one has a move that answers it.

Aim, cast, move

Your health is top left, a boss's health along the top. Everyone has 100 health, and it refills at the start of every scenery. The ring under your hero is your seat's colour.

Your spells

• Two to start. Every hero begins with a tap spell (press Cast) and a channel (hold Cast). A channel roots you while you hold it, so let go before you need to move.
• Charges. Tap spells spend charges that come back one at a time; the Codex shows each spell's count and timer (for example "3 charges, one back every 8 s"). A channel drains a pool while held.
• Two-press spells. Some spells (Halt and Drop shapes) take two presses: the first launches, the second sets where it lands.
• Switching. Your spells sit in a ring; next and previous spell step around it. You can reorder the ring between sceneries.
• Melee is a short swing for anything already in your face.

Answering attacks

Every enemy attack names its answer in the Codex bestiary, and there are five:

• Walk out of marked ground before it closes.
• Strafe: step sideways off a line; running back along it does not help.
• Jump over a low attack that travels along the floor. Jump only clears low attacks; it is not for climbing.
• Blink: an instant step. It is the only dodge with a cooldown.
• Kite: keep moving away from something that chases or swings at close range.

Together, and alone

• Friendly fire is on from Normal up: your spells hurt your allies, so do not aim through them.
• Going down. A downed hero is revived by an ally standing beside them; walking away keeps the progress made. If everyone is down, the fight is lost and can be retried. Alone, going down ends the fight.
• Nightmare has no pause at all.

Growing stronger

• A talent point after every scenery cleared. Each hero has three trees; a deeper row opens at 5, 10 and 15 points in that tree, and each tree's ultimate at 20. See Talents.
• A spell draft after every boss: four cards, take one. The first card is always one of your hero's own spells. A card for a spell you already hold ranks it up instead of adding a copy. So you meet the last of the fifteen bosses holding sixteen spells: your two starting spells and one from each of the fourteen bosses before it.