Break out your flip flops and sunscreen, War Mages. The Steam Summer Sale is here, and there are deals on all Orcs Must Die! games, DLC, and bundles!

Now is the perfect time to pick up an Orcs Must Die! Unchained Hero Bundle or Starter Pack at 50% off. The classic games are also on sale at 67% off, and you can get the entire franchise bundle for a deep discount as well to complete your collection.

We’ll see YOU at the rift!

Chaos Trials are a new and exciting way to play Survival. Players will occasionally discover "Chaos Keys" when playing matches in Survival, Sabotage, Endless, and Weekly Challenges (they have a random chance to be acquired after a match). Each time a team (1-3 players) defeats a chaos trial tier, their chaos key will be upgraded, adding additional modifiers into the mix. However, be careful, each chaos key only has three lives!

Chaos Trials are the most rewarding way to play OMD!U. They offer a chest after every victory including increasing number of skulls based on how far you get. Furthermore, Chaos Trials feature a leaderboard to track your best performance relative to other players.

Read more about Chaos Trials.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4w-R3a-wBQ
We've heard from many players that the game needs a full screen dashboard. You asked and we listened. This first iteration of the full screen dashboard will make everything scale to fit your screen, however, future iterations will actually begin redesigning the dashboard for a dedicated full-screen experience.

We have also revamped the play screen to make it easier to discover the modes that OMD!U has to offer. 

The iMage is an enemy that splits into multiple variations: Arcane, Fire, Frost, and Lightning. Each variation fires a unique ranged attack. However, only one of these illusions is the real mercenary and it must be slain to defeat the iMage. 

• Academy Sewers is now available in Sabotage.
• Polymorph Chicken: select one enemy hero and turn him or her into a chicken.
• Immolation Staff: places a staff on the enemy team’s battleground that damages barricades, decoys, and summoner trap retainers.
• Armored Giants: Summons a medium-sized army of armored giants.

Click below to read the detailed patch notes and give us your feedback!

 Patch Notes & Feedback
 

• Stay up to date on the development of OMDU by following on Twitter and Facebook.
• Get a behind-the-scenes look at Robot life by following on Twitter and Facebook.
• Join the community on the official OMDU forums, /r/OrcsMustDie, and the community Discord server!

It's all ice, ice baby! All the enemies on this level deal frost damage, and so do all the heroes and traps. Do you have what it takes to thaw this challenge out?

Can you defeat this weekly challenge with Hogarth, Tundra, and Zoey?

Chaos Trials are a new and exciting way to play Survival. Players will occasionally discover "Chaos Keys" when playing matches in Survival, Sabotage, Endless, and Weekly Challenges (they have a random chance to be acquired after a match). These keys will have an associated challenge level (Apprentice, War Mage, Master, and Rift Lord) as well as random additional modifiers for playing a map within those difficulties.

Each time a team (1-3 players) defeats a chaos trial tier, their chaos key will be upgraded, adding additional modifiers into the mix. However, be careful, each chaos key only has three lives!

Chaos Trials are the most rewarding way to play OMD!U. They offer a chest after every victory including increasing number of skulls based on how far you get. Furthermore, Chaos Trials feature a leaderboard to track your best performance relative to other players.

Chaos Keys can be randomly discovered through playing other modes, by completing certain achievements, through daily login rewards, or via the Premium Shoppe and store.

Read more about Chaos Trials.




The iMage is an enemy that splits into multiple variations: Arcane, Fire, Frost, and Lightning. Each variation fires a unique ranged attack. However, only one of these illusions is the real mercenary and it must be slain to defeat the iMage.




We've heard from many players that the game needs a full screen dashboard. You asked and we listened. This first iteration of the full screen dashboard will make everything scale to fit your screen, however, future iterations will actually begin redesigning the dashboard for a dedicated full-screen experience.

We have also revamped the play screen to make it easier to discover the modes that OMD!U has to offer. Check it out below!

• Academy Sewers is now available in Sabotage!
• Polymorph Chicken: select one enemy hero and turn him or her into a chicken.
• Immolation Staff: places a staff on the enemy team’s battleground that damages barricades, decoys, and summoner trap retainers.
• Armored Giants: Summons a medium-sized army of armored giants.

• Guardian Potion
• Minion Stealth
• Satyrs
• Pride Hunters

• Dragon Tamer Ivy
• Dragon Ward Hogarth

• Pressing Alt-K to kill your hero now requires a 5-second cast.
• The survival experience quest has been changed to: Win 5 Survival Matchmade Games. Reward: Chest.

• Sabotage matchmaking will now pick easier battlegrounds when there is a high skill separation between players.
• Players will now lose rank for leaving/disconnecting from a game.
• Sabotage matchmaking will now more aggressively try to create games with:
• Similar account level
• Similar skill level
• Similar party size

Developer Comment: We have been hearing lots of complaints surrounding matchmaking. These changes should make matches fairer, however, they could potentially increase queue times, so we will be monitoring the status of matchmaking closely.

• We have added new visual indicators during the match which highlight the players that have taken the most damage, dealt the most trap damage, or dealt the most hero damage. These badges will update in real time during the game.
• 4 new titles have been added to the game, available to everyone.
• We have increased the maximum number of loadouts to 14 (from 8).
• Player rating on the tab screen and post-game stats have been removed.
• Players can now enable a game/par timer to be visible at all times via the options menu.
• Receiving a party invite will now provide a toast notification, rather than a pop-up. This is designed to reduce interruptions in the dashboard.
• When deleting and adding friends, the friends list will now remain open. This makes it less tedious to make multiple modifications.
• We have updated minion consumable card backs to have more information regarding minion keywords/skills.
• Enemy team stats are no longer displayed in Sabotage. These stats were providing the wrong impression because higher level teams face minions with greater health.
• An alpha slider has been added to chat. Chat is now more transparent by default.
• Party chat will now automatically open when joining a party.
• Guardian text during the loadout phase of pre-game now shows abilities.
• Minion portals will now appear red during go-breaks if they will spawn immediately after the go-break.
• The game is now available in Russian and Spanish!

• In-game music has been updated with more tracks. Existing tracks have been rock-ified. Additional changes are coming in the future.
• The visuals for all staffs in Sabotage have been updated.
• Fireling death effects are now much clearer.

• Sabotage now requires players to be account level 5. If you group with other players who are higher level, we ignore this restriction.
• The countdown timer during hero select has been reduced by 30 seconds.
• The countdown timer during the first go-break has been reduced by 30 seconds in Sabotage only.
• The go-break timer between waves has been increased to 45 seconds (from 30) for apprentice maps.
• Many Sabotage consumable achievements have been made easier to complete.
• Sudden death now provides increasing control resistance to minions.
• Most minion consumables have had their minion count increased by 25 to 50%, with the exception of base set kobolds, mages, and gnolls.
• Powerful consumables are now less likely to appear during the early game.
• Throne Room has been made significantly more challenging in Sabotage.
• Banquet Hall sudden death has been made more challenging in high difficulties.
• "The Bomb" spell timer has been reduced to 4 seconds, from 5.
• "More Aggro" spell now increases aggro by an additional 50%.
• "Coin Drain Aura" now drains twice as much coin each second. However, its duration has been reduced to 10 seconds, from 20.
• Spell consumables that deal damage now deal damage as percent health.
• Many waves have been updated. In general, early waves are easier, while later waves are harder.

Developer Comment: These changes are designed to do a few things:

• Reduce the number of games that end on wave 1 or 2.
• Create more comebacks. We know it stinks to lose a few rift points early and feel unable to score later in the match.
• Make consumables feel more impactful. We know it can feel unimpactful to use many spells/minions, so we targeted a series of changes to improve them.

• Now provides increasing control resistance to minions every wave after wave 25.
• The score bonus for completing a wave has been decreased to 5%, from 15%. As a result of this change, we are wiping Endless leaderboards with patch 2.2.

• Reduced the difficulty of wave 3 on Banquet Hall (Apprentice), wave 5 of Highlands (Apprentice), wave 3 of Restricted Section (War Mage), and wave 7 of Temple Graveyard (War Mage).
• The first go-break is now properly twice as long in solo games.
• Orcrila pathing has been updated.
• Several par times have been made easier.
• Several maps in Apprentice have been made more challenging for 2 and 3 player parties.

• Teacup Gnolls no longer mini-stun their target for 0.1 seconds on attack.

Bloodspike

• Increased the attack width of his primary attack by 25%.
• Mana increased to 200 (from 185).
• Delicious Meals now restore 3x as much health and now also reduce Bloodspike's cooldowns by 5% when consumed.
• Fixed a bug that caused Bloodspike to receive less than the intended amount of max health when collecting delicious meals with the corresponding weaver upgrade.

Developer Comment: Bloodspike's Delicious Meals have been nearly unnoticeable for quite a while. These changes will help them become far more relevant. In addition, the wider attack width should help with some surrounding criticisms regarding his primary attack's difficulty of use.

Hogarth

• Lowered the range of Hogarth's leap by a large amount. This is intended to buff the usability of his skill to hit minions, rather than act as a nerf.
• Hogarth's shield now slows nearby enemies by 25% for its duration.
• Hogarth's first weaver upgrade now causes his shield to slow fast minions by twice as much.
• Fixed a bug that was causing Hogarth's aggro bonus weaver upgrade to not apply the full 40% bonus.

Developer Comment: We want Hogarth to be a tank and control king. However, he is still lacking in this area, so we have buffed his baseline utility in these areas.

Ivy

• All upgrades associated with Ivy's "Life Current" ability will now apply to Ivy IN ADDITION to allies, rather than only allies.
• Nature's Swiftness now increases allied movement speed by 30% (up from 15%).
• Warden's Tutelage now decreases the mana cost of Penetrating Shot by -20 (from -15).
• Life Current now restores +50% more health per second.
• Life Current radius increased by 100%.
• Reach of Roots cooldown increased to 14 seconds (from 12).
• Reach of Roots now reduces enemy armor by -50 (improved from -40).
• The Natural Knack upgrade now reduces the cooldown of Reach of Roots by 15% (down from 25%).
Developer Comment: Ivy is currently acting as a "one trick pony" oriented around Reach of Roots. These changes are designed to open up more build options for Ivy without changing her overall power level.
• Ivy's passive no longer triggers when she is low on health. Instead, it now provides her with a movement speed bonus when she spawns or re-spawns.
• Ivy passive cooldown removed.
Developer Comment: The lack of control over Ivy's passive has been a subject of criticism for some time. It often triggers at unexpected times, making it hard to utilize its benefit. This change is designed to allow Ivy to get greater use of her passive.

Oziel

• Increased all damage by 12%.

Smolder

• Reduced the cooldown of "From The Ashes" passive to 90 seconds (from 150).
Developer Comment: This change allows Smolder to play more aggressively without constant fear of dying. Furthermore, this improves weaver builds oriented around Smolder's passive.

Decoy

• Cost reduced to 300 coin (from 700).

Summoner Trap

• Cost reduced to 2000 coin (from 3000).

Power Generator

• Cooldown now resets at the start of a wave, rather than after 50 seconds.

Unchained Resonator Part

• Increased by 300%.

Vanity Plating

• Experience gain increased by 40%.

Revenge Rune Part

• Now deals 75% of minion health (from 100%).

Reflective Armor Part

• Now reflects 200% of damage (from 50%).

Mana Siphon Part

• Now restores half as much mana.

Health Siphon Part

• Now restores half as much health.

Ice Resonator Part

• Increases damage by 90% (from 70%).

Fire Resonator Part

• Increases damage by 30% (from 35%).

Control Resonator Part

• Increases damage by 30% (from 35%).

Bounty Generator Part

• Increases bounty by 2% (from 1%).
• Cap changed to 20% (from 50%).

• Fixed an issue where clicking "Buy Now" under "How to Obtain" caused the dashboard to become stuck.
• Fixed an issue where base set consumables would show up as owned during loadout select.
• Fixed several issues with minion clipping on Orcri-la.
• Fixed an issue where opening chat before receiving messages could cause scrolling to behave improperly.
• Fixed an issue where consumables had a larger area than displayed.
• Fixed an issue where changing whisper targets while the dashboard is loading could cause the player drop-down to disappear.
• Fixed an issue where trap projections could persist forever.
• Fixed a bug that caused Tundra's defeat animation to play incorrectly when using the War Chief skin.
• Fixed a bug that caused Ivy's defeat animation to play incorrectly when using the Valkyrie skin.
• Fixed an issue that could cause heroes to flash during their defeat animation.
• Fixed an issue where your cursor could remain on screen during Sabotage.
• Fixed a bug where Wall Building PhD would not provide the full amount of health regeneration.
• Fixed a bug where party chat was not cleared upon leaving a party.
• Fixed several bugs related to minion card back information for sabotage consumables.
• Fixed a bug where barricade destroying minions would occasionally not target barricades when they should.
• Fixed many tooltips associated with tier upgrades.

We’re pleased to announce that the next Orcs Must Die! Unchained update will introduce a brand new, survival-based game mode called Chaos Trials!

Chaos Trials bring the chaos and dynamic play of Sabotage mode and the problem-solving of Weekly Challenges to Survival gameplay. Available to teams of 1-3 players, Chaos Trials offer lucrative rewards for conquering a series of increasingly difficult challenges. Though each trial begins simply they increase in complexity and difficulty with every victory. Put yourself to the ultimate orc-slaying test!



Chaos Trials are accessed with Chaos Keys that are occasionally discovered while playing matches in all other game modes, or earned as a daily login reward. Each key has an associated challenge level from Apprentice through Rift Lord, and players are likely to encounter keys of all challenge levels up to their current progression.

Each Chaos Key will select one map as well as random, additional rules to comprise the challenge for that Chaos Trial. Each time a challenge is defeated the Chaos Key will upgrade by selecting a new map, increasing in difficulty, and adding additional rules into the mix. Each time a challenge is failed, one of three Chaos Key lives will be lost. After three failures or twelve successes, the Chaos Trial ends.

Bring your questions and join Harmonia and Shade this afternoon for a special episode of Insider Access on Chaos Trials at 3:00 p.m. Central, only on OrcsMustDie.tv.

Get more details on this exciting new game mode in the full blog post.

Start at battle level 3 equipped with only coin and mostly non-damage-dealing traps in this weekly challenge. Minions are exceptionally lethal and come from unstable rifts at every angle. Don't let this challenge burn you out!

Can you defeat this weekly challenge with Hogarth, Ivy, and Zoey?

Your hero will have to stay Unchained to tackle all the heavy units and bosses this challenge throws at you. Luckily, some Unchained drops will help you along the way. Make sure to pick them up and keep your Unchained meer glowing and going.

Can you defeat this weekly challenge with Oziel, Cygnus, and Bloodspike?

We have a new feature for our most dedicated of players: the Premium Shoppe! This shop is available to players once they have received duplicate trap cards after reaching Tier 7. When this occurs, these duplicates will be converted to Gibs. Gibs can be spent in the Premium Shoppe on chests that have better odds for rare cards, exclusive vanity items, and more!

Players can now customize their in-game avatar and new background art to personalize the dashboard appearance. This can be done by clicking the account background in the top right corner of the dashboard and selecting from the available options. Additional avatars and backgrounds are available in the Premium Shoppe.

This mercenary breeds teacup gnolls and trains them to attack heroes. Kill him quickly or he will keep releasing his teacup gnolls!

Players can now expand the base deck of consumables by completing achievements or purchasing them in the store. Additional base deck consumables are not stronger than other consumables, but they do have unlimited charges like other base deck consumables. They have updated card art, and minions and bosses also have updated in-game skins. We've made a special effort to make both the cards and skins look as cool as possible

• Falling Folly is now available in Sabotage.
  
• Ability Disable Spell: disables a random enemy hero's abilities.
  
• Drain Unchained Spell: drain the enemy teams' Unchained meters over time.
  
• Crogon Hatchlings: summons a large army of small crogon hatchlings that spit health-draining and slowing poison at heroes that can stack up to 8x.

Read the full patch notes here then log in and give the new update a try for yourself. See you at the rift, War Mages!

We have a new feature for our most dedicated of players: the Premium Shoppe! This shop is available to players once they have received duplicate trap cards after reaching Tier 7. When this occurs, these duplicates will be converted to Gibs. Gibs can be spent in the Premium Shoppe on chests that have better odds for rare cards, exclusive vanity items, and more!

Players can now customize their in-game avatar and new background art to personalize the dashboard appearance. This can be done by clicking the account background in the top right corner of the dashboard and selecting from the available options. Additional avatars and backgrounds are available in the Premium Shoppe.

This mercenary breeds teacup gnolls and trains them to attack heroes. Kill him quickly or he will keep releasing his teacup gnolls!



Falling Folly is now available in Sabotage.

• Ability Disable Spell: disables a random enemy hero's abilities.
  
• Drain Unchained Spell: drain the enemy teams' Unchained meters over time.
  
• Crogon Hatchlings: summons a large army of small crogon hatchlings that spit health-draining and slowing poison at heroes that can stack up to 8x.

Players can now expand the base deck of consumables by completing achievements or purchasing them in the store. Additional base deck consumables are not stronger than other consumables, but they do have unlimited charges like other base deck consumables. They have updated card art, and minions and bosses also have updated in-game skins. We've made a special effort to make both the cards and skins look as cool as possible.

• Scroll of the Unchained – Obtained by using Scroll of the Unchained 200x.
  
• Summon Tubifore – Obtained by using Summon Tubifore 100x.
  
• Summon Swiftyhooves - Obtained by using Summon Swiftyhooves 150x.
  
• The Bomb Spell – Obtained by using The Bomb Spell 50x.
  
• Unstable Rift Spell - Obtained by using Unstable Rift Spell 75x.
  
• Kobold Pups - Obtained by using Kobold Pups 25x.
  
• Mercenary for Hire Spell - Obtained by using the Mercenary for Hire Spell 125x.
  
• Bulgod – Purchased in the Store.
  
• Mountain Trolls – Purchased in the Store.
  
• Ogre Spudge Spell – Purchased in the Store.

• In solo games, players have twice as much time during go-breaks.
  
• Minions now have 10% less health in solo play and 5% less health in duo play.
  
• Restricted Section (war mage), Crogon Keep (war mage), Stables of
• Eventide (war mage and master), and Falling Folly (master) have been made easier.
  
• Throne Room (apprentice and war mage) has been made slightly more challenging.
  
• Par times have been made significantly easier in apprentice and war mage difficulties.
  
• Most apprentice maps have been made more challenging for 3 players.
  
• Cliffside Clash (master) has been made easier for solo and duo players.
  
• Some Weavers have been streamlined to be shorter and easier to read. No balance changes have been made.
  
• Mercenaries' difficulty now scales with map level.
  
• Mercenary health and damage lowered by 30%.
  
• Players can now cancel their daily Sabotage quest for a quest that requires Survival games instead. This alternative quest will reward 75 experience.

• Heroes will now play defeat animations upon losing in Sabotage.
  
• When heroes use their dance animation, they will now dance until stopped, rather than only playing their animation once.
  
• The orcs have learned many new vocal reactions.

• Sabotage game rewards have been increased. Players will receive more XP and skulls per match.
  
• Sabotage will no longer re-balance when players leave. Unfortunately, this is a better alternative than having players intentionally leave matches to gain a competitive advantage.
  
• "Summon Kobolds" now summons 12 kobolds (down from 16).
  
• Early waves have been made easier on Restricted Section and Banquet Hall in Sabotage.
  
• Later waves have been made more difficult on Throne Room, Orcri-La, and Baths in Sabotage.
  
• Sabotage matchmaking will now pick easier maps than before.
  
• The ranking system has been updated for Sabotage. Players will need to replay their placement matches. However, their previous progress will not be lost. In general, this will result in a higher rank than before.

• Difficulty now scales with player count.
  
• Now spawns Mercs in the repeating waves.

Developer Comment: Previously, we intentionally encouraged group play by making Endless not scale with player count. However, the majority of players play Endless solo anyway, so we have decided to re-evaluate this decision. Sabotage has opened up additional avenues for group play making non-scaling not as important.

• Video playback now loads much more quickly in the launcher.
  
• Unit keywords have been added to the card backs of all Sabotage minion consumables.
  
• The leaderboard score calculation is now broken down on the post-game screen.
  
• Some Weavers have been streamlined to be shorter and easier to read. No balance changes have been made.
  
• The tactical map in Sabotage now shows the area of staves your team has placed.

Bionka:

• Damage reduced significantly.
  
• Make Dem Stop weaver upgrade now slows by 40%, rather than stunning.

Bloodspike:

• Increased Brutal Axe's damage by 16%.
  
• Increased Maiming Blow's damage by 10%.
  
• Increased Health by 8%.

Developer Comment: We are considering larger-scale changes for the future, but in the meantime, we want to make sure that Bloodspike is dealing enough damage and is hardly enough in battle.

Dobbin:

• Rich Vein Weaver upgrade to coin bags lowered to 1.5x coin (from 2x).

Developer Comment: This weaver upgrade is mandatory and by far the best option as it stands.

Cygnus:

• Damage increased by 12%.
  
• Rift Shard cooldown decreased to 30 seconds (from 35).

Developer Comment: Cygnus has fallen behind in damage, win rate, and play numbers. We think a buff is warranted here.

Hogarth:

• Reduced the mana cost of all of his abilities by 15%.

Midnight:

• Prowl now costs 15 mana to activate.
  
• Prowl mana cost per second reduced to 10 (from 13).
  
• Prolonged Prowl Weaver upgrade now removes the activation cost, rather than reducing the sustained mana cost.

Developer Comment: We didn't wish to change how powerful Midnight is, but we did want playing Midnight to require a little more thought as far as when to use Prowl.

Oziel:

• Damage increased by 10%.

Ivy:

• Modified "Natural Knack" weaver to provide 25% cooldown reduction, rather than 4 seconds of cooldown reduction. This results in a small nerf to up-time during normal play and a large nerf to up-time when stacking cooldown reduction.

Tundra:

• Modified "Freezer Burn" weaver to provide 3% cooldown reduction per projectile hit, rather than 2 seconds.

Dynamite Archers:

• Increased the collision area of the dynamite, making them easier to detonate by shooting them. This does not affect their radius for hitting heroes.

Boulder Chute and Icicle Impaler:

• Damage no longer scales with distance.
  
• Now deals significantly more base damage.

Developer Comment: The requirement to manually fire the trap is what makes this trap unique. However, this trap also needs to be placed on high ceilings to be effective. This makes them too conditional to use. We are okay if these traps remain fairly niche for those that enjoy a power boost from manually firing the traps, but we felt there should be more incentive to use them.

Ice Vent:

• Number of charges increased by 25%.

Developer Comment: This trap should be a core part of ice killboxes, but its performance is currently underwhelming, hence the change.

Cursed Ground:

• Now ticks 12% faster

Developer Comment: Ever since we increased minion speed, this trap has fallen behind in usage. This should help this trap gain an extra hit on enemies.

• Now have a damage cap for rare, high-damage situations.

• Fixed a bug where Hunters could attack players from further away than intended.
  
• Fixed a bug where minions could be knocked through the wall using triggered maces on Throne Room.
  
• Kinetic Reclaimer and Heat Activated Trigger's internal cooldowns behave properly.
  
• The trigger volume for Overload Trap has been corrected.
  
• Temple Alarm Gong is now properly resisted by Earth Elementals.
  
• Fixed several issues with melee attacks missing or feeling unresponsive.
  
• Many achievement bugs have been resolved.
  
• Fixed a bug where dancing was not dispelled by Freedom Trinket.
  
• Fixed many minions' vocal reactions.
  
• Fixed an issue where too many minions would spawn in Sabotage sudden death.
  
• Mercs will no longer die when spawning.
  
• Mercs now have anti-stuck behavior when they spawn.
  
• Fixed an issue that prevented receiving Stinkeye's Tears of Oasis on barricades.
  
• Several descriptions have been updated for consistency and clarity, without any functional changes.
  
• Guardians now display their unique skills rather than their at home benefits.
  
• Added a pop-up dialogue when players fail to connect to the post game stats screen.

Use the Great Wall Barricade and little else but your hero's abilities to keep enemies out of your rift in this challenge. Luckily, your hero will regenerate mana 10x faster. Don't forget to use your gear!

Can you defeat this challenge with the available heroes -- Smolder, Midnight, or Oziel?