The Arena and combat

What the Arena tab is for

The Arena is where the character you build by training gets tested. It is the fifth tab in StatBlockRPG. StatBlockPro keeps that slot for your profile and has no Arena at all, so everything on this page belongs to the game dashboard.

In the appArenaStatBlockRPG

The header shows your Rating in the top corner. Under it, a status strip carries your avatar, your Record, your Tickets (highlighted when you have none) and your Power. Tapping the strip opens your character sheet. Record counts wins and losses in ranked matches and rated duels; cleared dungeon floors are not counted there.

Scrolling down, you find:

• Two tiles, Dungeon (Climb floors) and Ranked (ELO duels). Each opens a short How it works explainer.
• The Training balance panel, which shows whether your strength work has earned the Harmonic Form bonus (below).
• The Dungeon card, where runs start, and the Ranked card, where you queue for a rated match.
• Under Know the field, the doors to the Bestiary (every enemy and what beats it), the Leaderboard and Floor 0 (a free practice bout). While your record is still empty, the practice bout is offered as a card above them instead, "See a fight first: floor 0".

What your training changes in a fight

Every fight reads your effective stats: each stat's level, plus what your worn gear adds, plus the 24-hour buffs from what you logged. A workout logged this morning makes this afternoon's fights stronger. The level shown beside your name in a fight is your highest single stat level. How stats, buffs and gear grow is in the character guide.

How Arena tickets work

A ticket is what a recorded fight costs. You never pay money for one: they arrive every day and can be bought with scrap.

The daily ticket arrives the first time you open the app on a new game day, which starts at 04:00 in your own time zone. It is one ticket per return, not one per missed day, so a week away still brings back one.

Buying a ticket

In the appArena›Dungeon›Buy a ticketStatBlockRPG

1. Run out first

   The Buy a ticket button appears on the Dungeon card only when you hold no tickets.

2. Tap it

   A dialog asks "Buy a ticket?" and reads "250 scrap for one Arena ticket. You also get one free every day."

3. Confirm

   Tap Spend 250. The scrap comes off your balance and the ticket is ready to use.

How dungeon runs and floors work

A dungeon run is a climb. You fight one floor at a time, every win takes you one floor deeper, and every floor you clear pays scrap and an item. The Dungeon card on the Arena tab is where runs start and where the one you have open lives.

In the appArena›DungeonStatBlockRPG

• One run at a time. Starting a run while one is open brings back the open one.
• Every run starts at floor 1. Every run starts at floor 1 and climbs while you keep winning. The climb is the content, and there is no floor to pick.
• Opening a run is free. Each fight inside it costs a ticket.
• The enemy is set by the floor. The sixteen enemies come in a fixed order, from Furnace Husk on floor 1 to Flood Warden on floor 16, then begin again on floor 17. The Bestiary lists them in that order.

Two ways to fight a floor

The card offers the same fight, on the same floor, for the same ticket, in two ways:

• Fight it yourself: you choose every move, turn by turn, with the d20 deciding each swing. This is the full fight described below.
• Enter the dungeon (it reads Fight floor N once a run is open, N being your floor): the fight resolves in one go and you can watch it back. This button stays locked ("Locked: fight one dungeon bout yourself first") until you have finished one bout yourself, win or lose.

What a floor pays, and how it scales

An enemy's level equals the floor number. Its stats come from a budget that grows with that level, spread by the creature's own emphasis (the Stat emphasis chart in the Bestiary), and monsters wear no gear. Clearing a floor pays scrap, drops one item whose item level equals the floor, and moves the run down one floor. It also counts toward the Deeper and Proving Ground daily quests when you have them.

The item's rarity is rolled on the published drop odds, nudged upward by your consistency streak. The odds and the loot system are covered in quests and loot.

Losing and leaving

• Lose a floor and the run ends there. The ticket is spent and your next run starts at floor 1 again. Scrap and items you took on the way are yours to keep.
• Leave the dungeon ends the run by choice and keeps everything already taken.
• Your recent fights are listed below the card under Recent fights. Tap one to watch it again.

The sixteen enemies and what beats them

Every technique deals one of six damage types, and every damage type is powered by one of your six stats. Every enemy takes extra damage from one type, less from others, and a few ignore a type almost entirely. That is what makes the Arena a reason to train more than one thing.

In the appArena›BestiaryStatBlockRPG

The roster, in floor order

The weak spot column is also the stat to train. The Bestiary shows it as a chip, for example Train INT on Furnace Husk. Each of the first eight shrugs off two damage types; each of the last eight shrugs off three.

Each enemy fights with four techniques drawn from its four strongest stats, named after the creature (the Rend, the Blight and so on). In the Bestiary, each row shows the floor where you first meet the enemy and the stat to train. Tap a row to open it: its flavour line, its weak spot and resistances as chips (an immunity is listed with the resistances), and a Stat emphasis chart of how its stats are weighted.

How to fight a dungeon floor yourself

Fight it yourself opens the live bout: a turn-based fight where you pick every move and a twenty-sided die decides each swing. Ranked matches and duels use the same screen and the same rules.

In the appArena›Dungeon›Fight it yourselfStatBlockRPG

1. Read the top panel

   Your row comes first, always: your name, your level, your health (green) and your energy (cyan). The enemy's row sits under it with its health in red.

2. Look at the stage

   It shows the round, whose move it is, your turn clock, the two fighters (the one waiting is dimmed) and the d20 with the last roll on it.

3. Choose

   Scroll to Your move and tap a technique, or pick a stance under Or hold a stance.

4. Watch the roll

   The die spins and lands. The line under it says what it needed and whether it hit, missed, landed a critical hit or fumbled, and the damage rises off the fighter who took it. Skip the animation cuts the animation short.

5. The enemy acts

   Then the round ends and both of you regain 12 energy.

6. Finish

   The bout ends when one side reaches zero health. The server replays your choices, records the result and, if you won, pays the floor.

Turn order

There is no initiative roll in a fight you play yourself. In a dungeon you act first in every round and the enemy answers.

9:41

Back

Arena

Live bout

Pick a technique. The die decides the rest.

Ines KadeLevel 30

Health284 / 374

Energy66 / 94

Vault SentinelLevel 21

Health516 / 638

Energy127 / 143

Round 3Your move

Your time12s

19

Needs 6 or betterHitVault Sentinel used Vault Sentinel Rend. 46 damage.2d8: 8 + 2

The die is the check, not decoration. A natural 1 always misses and a natural 20 always hits.

The d20 check

Every swing starts with your hit chance against that enemy: 75%, plus 1.5 points for every point of DEX you have over the defender (and minus 1.5 for every point you have under it), plus 0.5 points per point of your WIS, kept between 35% and 95%. The screen turns that into a target number: the hit chance divided by 5 and rounded to a whole number, taken away from 21. You see it as "Needs 6 or better".

• Natural 20: Critical hit. It always lands, cannot be dodged, and does 2 times the damage.
• Natural 1: Fumble. It always misses, and the attacker takes 15% of what the swing would have dealt (at least 1). Stances do not change a fumble.
• An ordinary hit can still be dodged: 3% plus 0.8 points per point of DEX the defender has over you (minus as much per point under), plus 0.3 per point of the defender's WIS, plus any dodge its gear adds, between 0% and 40%. A hit that is not dodged can also crit on its own roll: 5% plus 0.4 per point of CHA and 0.3 per point of WIS, plus any crit your gear adds (at most 60%), for 1.5 times plus 0.01 per point of CHA (at most 2.5 times).

The dice for each turn are set by the bout itself, so picking a different technique never changes the face the d20 lands on. What you choose decides what that face is worth.

How damage is worked out

A landed hit deals the technique's power, times the type modifier against this enemy, reduced by the enemy's armour, times a dice factor, times any critical multiplier. It is rounded, and a hit that lands always does at least 1.

A forced guard

You have 15 seconds to choose. In a dungeon the clock runs on your phone and only on your turn; when it reaches zero, your first equipped technique is played for you. If that technique is resting or you cannot afford it, the turn becomes a Guard instead, and the log says so: "Ines Kade could not use Piston Drop (still cooling down) and guarded instead." Keep a free or cheap technique in slot 1.

What the enemy does

1. Below 30% of its health it Braces, unless its last move was already a stance, so a badly hurt enemy alternates between bracing and swinging.
2. Otherwise it goes through its techniques in turn and uses the first one it can afford that is not resting.
3. If it can afford nothing, it Guards.

Its choices follow that order; it does not hunt for your weak spots. Enemy techniques are priced by damage type:

Round limit, and why there are no draws

The first fighter to reach zero health loses. If both still stand after 50 rounds, the one with more of its health left (as a share of its maximum) wins, then the one with more health. An exact tie against a dungeon enemy goes to the enemy, so holding out to the limit never wins a floor.

When the bout ends

Your phone plays each turn as you choose. When the bout ends it sends your list of choices, and the server replays them with the same dice and records its own result: "Recorded by the server, which replayed your choices." If its replay ever reached a different result, its answer is the one kept, and the screen says so.

Techniques and your loadout

Techniques are your moves. Each deals one damage type, draws its power from the stat behind that type, and is earned by doing a real activity, never bought.

• Your starter. Every account gets one free starter, chosen by your highest stat level (ties go STR, DEX, CON, INT, WIS, CHA in that order). Starters have rank 0.7, cost no energy, never grow and have no skill tree. While it is your only technique, the starter follows your best stat.
• Earned techniques. When a proficiency reaches level 10 or 30, its technique unlocks by itself and drops into an empty slot if you have one. It never replaces a technique you placed. Reaching level 10 in a proficiency takes 5,390 XP in it, and level 30 takes 102,120 in total.
• Rank grows with the proficiency. Every level adds to an earned technique's rank, so the activity that unlocked it keeps making it stronger.

Cycling, Cooking, Homekeeping, Sleep Hygiene, Mobility and Leisure unlock no technique. Which activities feed which proficiency is in the character guide.

Choosing what you carry

You carry up to four techniques into a fight. Order matters: slot 1 is what plays when your turn clock runs out, and the one-go resolve uses your techniques in slot order.

In the appHome›Character›TechniquesStatBlockRPG

1. Open your character sheet

   Tap your portrait or name at the top of Home, or the status strip on the Arena tab.

2. Tap Techniques

   Techniques reads "Choose what you carry into the Arena". The screen lists what you are carrying, then everything you have unlocked with its type, rank and cost.

3. Pick in order

   Tap a technique to add it to the next free slot; tap it again to take it out. To change which one sits in slot 1, take them out and add them back in the order you want.

4. Check your coverage

   Damage types covered: lists the damage types you carry. If everything deals one type, the screen warns you that anything resistant to it will be a wall.

5. Save

   Tap Save loadout. It reads Saved once stored.

Skill trees and the daily physical challenge

The 12 earned techniques each carry a small skill tree, 48 nodes in all: a root, two branches above it, and a capstone. A node is never bought. You unlock it by committing to a physical challenge and doing the work.

In the appHome›Character›Skill treesStatBlockRPG

Committing to a challenge

1. Open the skill trees

   On your character sheet, tap Skill trees ("Unlock node effects by doing the work"). Each earned technique on the loadout screen also has a Skill tree door, and Home shows today's Node challenge.

2. Tap an open node

   Nodes read Locked, Open, Unlocked or Committed today. A node opens once the one below it is unlocked.

3. Read the requirement

   The sheet says what kind of work it asks for and the range it will be sized in. "Today, and only today: one commitment per game day."

4. Commit

   Tap Commit to it. The exact target appears, sized from your recent days. Go log it takes you to where that work is logged.

5. Do the work

   Log it the same game day. When your logged work reaches the target, the node unlocks at once and its effect is in your next fight.

How the target is sized

Every challenge is physical: steps, hard sets, total volume, or a run, ride or swim. Each node has an authored range, and the target is taken from your own recent days on that kind of work (or picked inside the range when there is not enough history), rounded to a sensible step, kept inside the range and within what one log of that activity allows.

Practice bouts and calling a friend into a run

Floor 0: a free practice bout

A practice bout. Nothing is spent and nothing is won. It shows what a dungeon floor resolved in one go looks like, without costing a ticket, paying scrap, dropping an item or touching your rating.

In the appArena›Floor 0StatBlockRPG

• While your Record is still empty it appears on the Arena tab as the card "See a fight first: floor 0"; after that it is the Floor 0 door under Know the field.
• Under Start the bout, tap Fight. The bout resolves on its own and plays back like a recorded fight; the button then reads Fight again.
• Your side uses your own stats but fights at level 1 with Stock Strike alone, whatever you carry; the opponent is a level 1 Furnace Husk, the floor 1 enemy.
• You get three a day. The count is kept on your phone and resets at 04:00, and each bout rolls different dice.

Calling a friend into a dungeon run

A friend can brace you for one fight. Their character is snapshotted as it is right now and adds health, armour and a little critical and dodge chance to yours. They do not take turns and do not appear on the stage.

In the appArena›Dungeon›CompanyStatBlockRPG

1. Open a run

   The Company panel appears under the Dungeon card while a run is open.

2. Call

   Tap Call · 0/1 and pick a friend from the list that opens. They get a notification saying they were summoned.

3. Fight

   The support applies to the next dungeon fight you record, fought yourself or in one go, and is used up by it, win or lose. The panel's note says it lasts until the run ends, but it is spent by that one fight: after a win, the next floor starts without it unless you call again.

Ranked matches, ELO and the Arena Effigy

Ranked play is a rating ladder. Every account starts at 1,200, a win moves you up and a loss moves you down, and the amount depends on the gap between you and your opponent and on how high you already are.

In the appArena›Ranked›Queue for a ranked matchStatBlockRPG

1. Queue

   On the Ranked card, tap Queue for a ranked match. You need at least one ticket.

2. Wait for a match

   The search starts at ±60 rating and widens by 25 every 5 seconds. Both of you have to be inside each other's range, and your rating is fixed at the moment you join.

3. Or meet the Effigy

   After 30 seconds with nobody found (by then the search reaches ±210), the queue gives you an Arena Effigy, and the card reads "No one was queueing". It is a mirror of your own character, with your stats, techniques and gear, no resistances, and your rating. It is played turn by turn by the same logic as a dungeon enemy and is worth the full rating change.

4. Fight

   The bout uses the live bout screen and every rule above. A win or loss moves your rating; ranked play pays no scrap and no items.

Against another person

A matched human bout is live: you both choose on the same screen, one turn at a time, with a 15-second clock kept by the server. When a turn's time runs out, the server plays that player's first technique, or a Guard if it cannot be used. In a live match the same one of the pair always opens each round.

The leaderboard

In the appArena›LeaderboardStatBlockRPG

Switch between Global and Friends; Your standing shows your own rank even when you are not listed publicly. Two players on the same rating share a rank. A public adult account is listed by default; switch it off under Settings › Privacy, data and legal › Show on leaderboards, or by setting your profile to friends only or private.

Duels with friends

A duel is a fight between two friends, issued from a direct message. It costs no ticket and pays no scrap or items; what it can do is settle an argument, and a live one can move both ratings.

In the appSocial›Messages›Attach›Challenge to a duelStatBlockRPG

1. Open a conversation

   In Messages on the Social tab, open a thread with a friend, or tap Message beside them in your friends list.

2. Attach a duel

   Tap Attach, then Challenge to a duel, then choose Live duel, both online now or Async duel, fought against a snapshot.

3. Wait for an answer

   Your friend taps Accept or Decline; you can Withdraw while it waits. They have 48 hours to answer, and once accepted the duel has another 48 hours to be fought.

4. Fight

   Tap Fight on the card. The result is posted in the conversation.

Arena questions