How to play

Your shelter, heat and cold

You start in the village at the centre of the map, with some common materials, a common tool of each kind and your first hero, Mara Pell. You can stay in the village as long as you like. To build a shelter, walk past the village edge and settle: settling costs common wood and stone and gives you a Hearth.

Heat keeps a shelter alive. It comes only from real activity (see the next section), and you spend it on refining, expedition trips, relic rerolls and the highest building levels. Heat can't be bought.

The world updates every Arc hour from real Arc data: heat comes in, mine rates and builder districts change, creatures appear and cold attacks are decided. Each day also brings a few small tasks, such as chopping trees or sending an expedition, that pay materials.

A cold attack comes in an hour when the Arc builder index falls more than usual, which means a quiet hour on Arc. It damages every building in every live shelter; ruins, the village and the mines are never hit. A badly damaged building stops working until you repair it with its own materials, but the Hearth always keeps working. A Wall, a higher Hearth, Keeper and Warden heroes, defender creatures and a working Emberkin all soften cold attacks.

In the codex: Hearth, Wall, Mara Pell

What keeps a shelter warm

Heat comes from playing and from real USDC activity on Arc.

• Plant shifts: the Plant in the village takes short shifts, a few a day, free for anyone, with or without a wallet. Each shift adds heat that follows the Arc base layer's usage against its recent average, and keeps your shelter active.
• Your wallets: link your Arc wallets with a sign-in signature, never a transaction. USDC transfers in the last day add heat: more transfers and more volume give more, up to a daily cap. A transfer counts if it goes to or from someone else; transfers between your own wallets, payments to the game and very small amounts don't count.
• Builder districts: a shelter inside a builder district shares heat from that builder's real usage each hour.

An Ember fox at work adds heat too, only in hours your wallet earns heat. Heroes never create heat.

In the codex: Hearth, Ember fox

Ruins

A shelter's heat doesn't decay while you are active. After a long stretch with no Plant shift and no counted transfer, its heat starts to decay every hour; a higher Hearth and a working Emberkin slow this. Below a floor, the shelter becomes a ruin.

A ruin is frozen, not deleted. It drops off the boards, gets no district heat, takes no lodgers, and neighbours can't repair it; its buildings and materials stay. A Plant shift or a counted transfer thaws it at the next hourly update.

With event emails on, you get a warning before your shelter becomes a ruin.

In the codex: Hearth, Emberkin

Materials, mines, digging and expeditions

Materials come in four families: wood, stone, metal and crystal, each from common to legendary. Integration mines each hold one family; the Registrai mine just outside the village gives all of them. A mine's rare, epic and legendary rates follow its integration's real usage on Arc against its own recent average.

• Digging by hand: walk to a mine and dig, one piece at a time, up to a daily limit. Hold the tool that matches the mine: it sets the rarest piece you can dig there, and a rarer tool digs faster.
• Chopping: chop trees in the forest for Pine. A chopped tree grows back after a day.
• Expeditions: send miners to any mine. From a shelter the trip costs heat by distance; the miners come back after a while, and a crowded mine pays each player less. A higher Mining camp, Prospector and Quartermaster heroes and a Snow hare companion bring back more.
• Event veins: when a new integration joins, an epic vein opens at its mine, and a big hour on Arc opens a legendary vein in the wild. Each player can take one piece from a vein before it closes.

Your shelter holds a limited amount of each family; a higher Storehouse holds more.

In the codex: Materials, Gear, Mining camp, Storehouse, Snow hare

Building, upgrades and the Forge

Each building costs two material families, and each upgrade raises it one level. Higher levels cost rarer materials: common pieces first, then uncommon, rare, epic and legendary. An upgrade takes time, and your builder works on one at a time. A building's capacity grows up to a level cap; past it, upgrades also cost heat and only add hit points. A Mason hero makes upgrades cheaper.

At the Forge you can:

• refine four pieces into one piece of the next rarity, for a little heat;
• upgrade a tool or weapon with pieces of the next rarity from its family;
• make runes, nets and traps.

Forge jobs take time and wait in a short queue. A higher Forge unlocks rarer work and works faster. A lodger can use their host's Forge.

In the codex: Buildings, Forge, Storehouse, Gear, Runes

The village, lodging and districts

The village at the centre is shared and always safe. Everyone starts there and anyone can stay; it is a heat source, cold attacks never reach it, and the Plant stands there.

Without a shelter of your own you can lodge at a shelter with a working Beacon; a higher Beacon takes more lodgers. A lodger gets part of the host's district heat and can use the host's Forge, and creatures come around the host's shelter. The host earns a help each day for each lodger.

Each Arc builder is a district on the map, sized by its index points. A verified project's district shows its name; the others have neutral names. Walk into a district to discover it. Shelters inside a district share its heat, and a shelter where districts overlap belongs to the nearest centre.

In the codex: Beacon

Contested land

Each shelter projects a territory that grows with its heat; a working Watchtower and Warden heroes widen it. Where two territories overlap, the land is contested. The warmer shelter holds it, and a challenger needs clearly more heat to take it over, so control doesn't flip back and forth.

Holding contested land counts toward unlocking Bram Okafor and gives a working Warden hero XP. Nothing is destroyed or taken.

In the codex: Watchtower, Bram Okafor

Heroes

Heroes give your shelter specialty bonuses. You start with Mara Pell; the others unlock as you play, each through its own milestone (see the codex).

Active heroes give their bonus: the main specialty in full and the minor one at a smaller share. Several heroes with the same specialty stack, each adding less than the one before. How many heroes can be active at once depends on your Archive level.

Active heroes gain XP by doing their specialty, up to a daily limit. At set levels a hero can be promoted one rarity, for pieces of the next rarity from its main specialty's families, and each promotion strengthens its bonus. An Agent stores Pine once a day. Heroes never create heat.

In the codex: Heroes, Archive, Mara Pell

Energy and health

Energy refills inside a heat source: the village, your shelter (or your host's, if you lodge) and the range of any shelter's working Beacon. Outside them it drains, faster the farther out you are.

At zero energy you can't dig, chop, hit, catch, set or collect traps, take vein pieces, discover districts, send expeditions, repair for others, lodge or settle until it refills. Walking, building and the Forge still work. A working Emberkin slows the drain.

Only bandits hurt you. Outside a fight your health refills over time, and eating a meal from your feeder restores some at once; during a fight neither works. At zero health the bandits win (see Bandit camps).

In the codex: Beacon, Emberkin

Creatures, hunting, nets, traps and jobs

If you played in the last day, each hour brings creatures that only you can see around your home (your shelter, your host's or the village): by mines, in the forest and in builder districts, near home for a while after a cold attack, and rare ones by a newly opened mine. Each stays a few hours. The Registrai mine has the species of the stone, metal and crystal mines.

To catch one, hit it to lower its HP, then throw a net. Weapons hit hardest, a Crossbow hits from farther away, and a tool or bare hands do little; a hit never finishes a creature. The lower its HP, the better your catch chance. A Strong net is better than a Net, and the Binding rune helps. Each try uses a net, a failed try heals it a little, and after a few failed tries it runs away. You get a few nets to start; the Forge makes more.

Traps: forge them and set them outside the village, clear of mines, shelters and trees. Come back later: a trap may hold a creature of that place.

Give a caught creature a job:

• Companion: one walks with you and helps you dig, chop, hit, spot veins or carry.
• Worker: brings pieces to your store or adds heat. A higher Mining camp gives more worker slots.
• Defender: cuts cold damage. A higher Wall gives more defender slots.

Each species is best at one job; in another job it gives that job's basic bonus, weaker. Creatures level up by working, and their bonus grows. Creatures on a job eat once a day: cook meals at your Hearth from Pine and Rubble. A hungry creature gives no bonus and no XP.

The collection book keeps some species secret until you meet one. The codex lists only the species the book shows from the start.

In the codex: Creatures, Nets and traps, Trap, Binding

Gear and runes

Gear is yours and goes with you. Tools: Axe (wood), Pickaxe (stone), Drill (metal), Chisel (crystal). You start with each at common. Hold the tool that matches a mine's family: it sets the rarest piece you can dig there and digs faster. Weapons: the Spear and the Crossbow, forged at the Forge, the first one at common. Upgrade any item at the Forge with pieces of the next rarity from its family, as far as your Forge allows.

Runes put an enchantment with a number of charges on one item: tool runes on tools, weapon runes on weapons. Each dig, chop or hit the enchantment helps uses one charge, and at zero it fades. Make runes at the Forge from crystal with a working Archive (stronger runes need a higher one). They are also sold in the game for Embers, and by the Wanderer.

In the codex: Gear, Runes

Relics and the season

Epic and legendary pieces from event veins, expeditions and the Forge sometimes come out as relics, each with one property. With a working Archive, set a relic in a building it fits; it gives its bonus while that building works:

• Swift (Forge): faster Forge jobs.
• Far-sighted (Watchtower or Beacon): more range.
• Insulated (Hearth or Wall): less cold damage.
• Deep-veined (Mining camp): expeditions bring back more.
• Roomy (Storehouse): more storage.

With a higher Archive you can reroll a relic's property for heat.

The world runs in seasons of a few weeks. Nothing resets between seasons: you keep your shelter, heroes, gear and creatures. Each season's worst cold attack is recorded in the world's history.

In the codex: Archive

Mystics

Emberkin and Veinseer are rare creatures that come now and then and stay for a while. Only you can see yours: Emberkin near your home, Veinseer by a crystal mine. You get a notice when one is near.

Catching one is a fight:

• Your first hit starts a short fight on a clock.
• Once it has lost half its health, a net can catch it. The lower its health, the better your catch chance, and a Strong net is better than a Net.
• A failed net may let it escape. It also escapes when the clock runs out or when you walk too far away, and at zero health it dies.
• After a loss, another one comes the next day, the next hour you are active.

A catch gives its egg. Hatching is free and you choose its look. Feed a mystic materials from storage to level it up; its power grows with its level. A spare egg of a kind you already have can be fed to that mystic instead of hatched. Only your working mystic's power counts, and you can change which one works once a day.

In the codex: Mystics, Emberkin, Veinseer, Nets and traps

Bandit camps

Now and then bandits camp 15–35 tiles from your home, outside every heat source, and stay 6 hours. Only you see your camp, and you can see how strong it is before you engage. The farther out, the higher the tier: more bandits with more health in total, and better loot.

Your first hit starts the fight. From then on every bandit still standing hits you on a steady beat, from any distance. Walking 12 tiles away ends the fight with no loss, and the bandits heal. Hitting needs energy, so a fight far from heat is a risk.

• Win: drive them all off for materials of one family, rarer at higher tiers, and sometimes a tool or weapon.
• Lose: at zero health they take 20 percent of each material stack you hold (a working Storehouse protects part of it), and you wake at home. The camp stays. Tools, weapons, Embers and mystics are never taken.

In the codex: Bandit camps, Storehouse, Gear

The Wanderer

If you played in the last day, the Wanderer, a travelling merchant, camps near your home about every 3 days and stays 6 hours. Only you see him.

He sells a few items at fixed prices in Embers: rarer materials, runes, tool upgrades and looks you can't get elsewhere (clothes, frames and colour sets for your mystics). Walk up to him to buy. Materials go to your storage, runes and tools to your gear, and looks to your closet.

In the codex: Materials, Runes, Gear

Event emails and sound

Event emails are opt-in. Add and confirm an address in the game, then tick the events you want:

• the Wanderer has camped near you;
• a mystic is near;
• a cold attack hit your shelter;
• your shelter is about to become a ruin.

You get at most 4 emails a day; more are dropped, not queued. Every email has a link that turns them all off.

The game plays short sounds for hits, nets, digging, chopping, catches, builds, level-ups and alerts, with a soft wind behind them. Sound starts on your first key press or tap. The Sound button turns it on or off; it sits with Sign out and Feedback in the Wallets dialog, which the wallet button at the top opens. Your browser remembers the choice.