How to play
AUTO ARENA is an auto-battler painted in ink and watercolour. Each round has two halves. In the shop you spend gold on little fighters and arrange them on your half of the arena, taking as long as you like. Then you press Space or FIGHT! and the battle plays itself out: your units walk to the nearest foe, attack on their own and cast their ability when their mana bar fills.
Win a fight and you earn a trophy. Lose one and you lose a heart. A draw does nothing. Collect 10 trophies before your 6 hearts run out to win the run, which usually takes 10 to 16 rounds, about 10 to 15 minutes.
Click a shop card to buy it, drag units between the board and the 8-slot bench, and drag a unit back onto the shop to sell it. Right-click or E also sells. D rerolls the shop for 1 gold, F buys 4 XP for 4 gold, and L locks the shop so the same cards wait for you next round. Click anything to read what it does. During a fight Space changes the speed (x1, x2, x4), and on the results screen Space starts a new run.
Tips and strategy
Three of a kind is the big jump. Three copies of the same unit merge into a two-star unit with 1.8 times the stats and a 1.6 times stronger ability. Three two-stars make a three-star, at 3.24 times the stats. Buying the third copy works even when your bench is full.
Front row tanks, back row shoots. The board is two rows of five. Put Knights and big Beasts in front and Rangers and Mages behind them. Watch out for Rogues: they leap straight over your front line to the back.
Build around traits. Every unit has one origin and one class, and traits switch on when you field 2 or 4 different units that share one (6 for some traits). Two Knights start every fight with a shield, Rangers attack faster, Undead get back up once, and Gloom units hit much harder on foes under half health.
Sit on gold when you can. Every round pays 5 gold, plus 1 interest for every 10 you hold (up to 5), plus 1 for a win, plus a bonus for a winning or losing streak of two or more. Spending down to zero every round leaves you poorer by the middle of the run.
Scout before you fight. While you shop, the next rival's board shows faded in the top half of the arena. Each of the seven rivals has a plan, so you can see their Rogues or their big Mage line coming and set up to answer it.
Fights cannot stall. After 30 seconds an ink storm hurts everyone; at 50 seconds it is a draw.
What's in it
34 units costing 1 to 5 gold, each with its own ability: shields, chain lightning, arrow volleys, meteors, freezes, summoned skeletons and more. Higher levels let you field more units (up to 9) and make rarer cards show up in the shop, drawn from a shared pool so copies can run out.
10 traits: Knight, Mage, Beast, Undead, Ranger, Rogue, Sylvan, Ember, Tide and Gloom. 10 items are offered as a pick-one-of-three treasure on rounds 2, 5, 8, 11, 14 and 17: drag one onto a unit, up to three each. Items come back when you sell the unit and stay on when it merges.
Seven rivals with their own plans, such as Lady Gauntlet's Shieldwall, Old Fang's Pack and Banker Crane's Greed. They are real computer players who run the same economy, shop, level and merge that you do. A ranked ladder starts you at 1000 rating and climbs from Paper through Charcoal, Sepia, Indigo, Vermilion and Gold Leaf to Masterwork, and higher tiers give the rivals more gold. The Daily run uses the same shops and rivals for everyone that day and does not touch your rating.
Questions
Do I need an account? No. Your rating, best results, sound setting and any run in progress are saved in your browser, so you can close the tab and press CONTINUE later.
Can I play against friends? Not online. The rivals are computer players, but everyone gets the same Daily run, so you can compare results.
Is it violent? Cartoon animals and monsters bump, shoot and cast spells at each other. Beaten units burst into an ink splat. There is no blood.