Lyonspyre Survivor¶
A solo arena run. You go in alone, foes pour in for eight minutes, and every level you earn hands you a card that makes you stronger. Nothing you own comes in with you and nothing you earn in there is lost when you come out.
Open it from a Survivor stone, or type [vigil.
Getting in¶
The lobby asks you two things before the doors open.
Your companion. A cat or a dog. It is an appearance, not a real pet: it cannot be harmed, it cannot be lost, and it flees to safety the moment the run ends. If you have a tame cat or dog of your own, it will look like yours.
Your opening weapon. One of two, and it sets the shape of the whole run:
| Weapon | How it fights |
|---|---|
| Arcane Bolt | Darts at the nearest foe on its own. You never aim it. |
| Thrown Spear | Flies the way you are facing and skewers the whole lane. You aim it with your feet. |
Both pick up the same cards later. The bolt is the easier opening, the spear rewards you for moving.
There are three arenas. If all three are busy you go on the queue and get told where you sit; you are pulled in automatically the moment one frees up.
The run¶
Eight minutes. Three ward-hearts. A foe that reaches you takes one heart, and losing your last one ends the run.
Foes drop essence. Essence fills the bar at the top of your screen, and a full bar is a level. Every level stops the clock and offers you three cards. You have thirty seconds to choose; if you run the clock out, one of the three is taken for you at random.
The arena gets harder on a fixed schedule, not on how well you are doing:
- 0 to 3 minutes. Up to twenty five foes at once. Health climbs gently.
- 3 minutes on. The crowd cap climbs the rest of the way to forty by the horn, and health starts climbing faster and faster. By the eight minute mark a small foe has roughly double the health it had at three.
- Champions. Bigger, named foes turn up as the run goes on. One of them arrives around four minutes.
Champions and their chests¶
A champion that dies leaves a chest on the tile it fell on. Walk onto it. It waits there for you; it does not pay itself out and vanish while you are fighting your way over.
Opening one grants a full rank in an ability, immediately, wherever you sit on the essence bar. It is the only reward in the run that ignores your level.
Cards¶
Every level offers three. Weapons max at rank 5, passives at rank 2 or 3.
Weapons¶
| Weapon | What ranks buy |
|---|---|
| Arcane Bolt | +2 damage a rank. Rank 3 splits to a second target; ranks 2 and 4 add reach. |
| Thrown Spear | +2 damage a rank. A second spear at rank 3, a third at rank 5. |
| Ember Orb | +2 damage a rank. At rank 3 the blast widens to a 5x5. |
| Chain Lightning | +2 damage and one more jump a rank: 3 foes at rank 1, 7 at rank 5. |
| Frost Bell | Freezes everything it catches, then leaves them crawling. +2 damage and a longer freeze a rank; ranks 2 and 4 widen it. |
| Whirling Axes | Blades scythe out around you. +2 damage and a faster throw a rank; rank 4 widens the ring by a tile. |
| Caltrops | Lays a trap behind you that bites whatever stands on it. +2 damage and +0.6s of linger a rank. |
Passives¶
| Passive | Ranks | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Swift Cast | 3 | Every weapon fires 8% faster a rank, 24% at rank 3. |
| Wide Arc | 3 | Every area weapon covers a tile more each rank, to its own limit. |
| Keen Edge | 2 | Flat +2 damage a rank on every shot, nova and caltrop tick. |
| Split Count | 2 | Arcane Bolt, Chain Lightning and Thrown Spear each strike one more foe a rank. |
| Magnet Ward | 3 | Essence flies to you from a tile further each rank: 5 tiles bare, 8 at rank 3. |
| Essence Bloom | 3 | Every mote of essence is worth 10% more, each rank. |
| Ward Mend | 2 | Restores one ward-heart. |
| Aegis Veil | 3 | A hit leaves you untouchable for 3 seconds, and half a second longer each rank. |
| Ward Aegis | 2 | A visible bubble absorbs one hit, then re-forms after 30 seconds (20 at rank 2). |
Evolutions¶
Take a weapon to rank 5 and then take the passive that matches it, and the weapon becomes something else. Swift Cast rank 2 awakens a maxed Whirling Axes or Frost Bell; Wide Arc rank 2 awakens a maxed Ember Orb or Caltrops; Split Count rank 2 awakens a maxed Arcane Bolt, Chain Lightning or Thrown Spear.
What you bring, and what you leave with¶
Nothing follows you in. Pets, summons, hired help and escorts all stay in the world on the exact tile you left them on, and pick up following again the moment you are returned. You dismount at the door and are put straight back on your mount when the run ends. You cannot mount up inside.
Nothing of yours is at risk. The arena is swept clean between runs, and the sweep can only ever touch things the arena itself created.
Standings¶
Every run is recorded, not just your best. The board shows the time you lasted, the foes you felled, the hearts you had left and the pet you took in with you.