As Camp Vengeance gets ready to celebrate Grand Revel, a lone Templar approaches the Champions. Her merchant friend's caravan is missing.

The investigation found only scattered supplies and wreckage along the trail. If there are any survivors, they seem to have been taken into the jungles of Chult...

Grand Revel 5 introduces Vi, the planes-walking, gun-toting, gnome artificer played by Jeremy Crawford on Acquisitions Incorporated. Grand Revel also brings back Hew Maan, a definitely human Champion and not three kobolds in a trench coat, and Havilar, the Tiefling Fighter (Battlemaster) and twin sister to Farideh. Players have until Monday, February 14th at 12 PM Pacific to complete their Grand Revel 5 unlocks and objectives.

I. Vi

Artificer, entrepreneur, and planeswalker, the gnome Vi hails from the world of Eberron. Seeking to atone for her part in creating devastating weapons for the Last War, she established the Fixers, a business dedicated to fixing problems others deem unfixable. Born with an aberrant dragonmark that allows her to travel from one plane of existence to another, she's brought her genius, warm heart, and love for a stiff drink to many worlds. The Fixers are headquartered in Sigil, the City of Doors, but Vi has established offices throughout the multiverse.

Vi is a Support, Speed and Gold Find Champion who wants to surround herself with good people, while encouraging those morally gray folks to use their resources for good causes. When you want to add her to your formation you can swap her with Arkhan in slot 12.

II. Vi's Stats

Race: Gnome	Alignment: Neutral Good
Class: Artificer	Gender: Female	Pronouns: She/Her
Age: 500
Affiliation: Acquisitions Incorporated

STR: 8	DEX: 12	CON: 16
INT: 18	WIS: 13	CHA: 12

Role: Support, Speed, Gold Find
Eligible for Patrons: Mirt, Vajra, Strahd
Slot: 12 (Arkhan)

III. Vi's Design

As the Principal Rules Designer for Dungeons & Dragons, Jeremy Crawford has helped craft much of the D&D content fans know and love, and as the Dungeon Master for Acquisitions Incorporated he's lead the liveplay games in moments that range from hilarious to touching. So it's no surprise that he has used his plethora of knowledge and experience to draw upon when creating characters filled with warmth, intelligence, and sass! He's played Vi in a variety of livestreamed games, and she's appeared offering information in Eberron: Rising From The Last War.

Vi does her best to assist people on various worlds learn to help themselves, and believes she can encourage others to use their talents and skills to fix problems throughout the multiverse. So she tries to set A Good Example by surrounding herself with other good Champions to help Neutral ones do more damage. If there are only a few enemies left, Vi will gain some Sass and decide I'm Too Old For This #*&!, impatiently waiting for her friends to finish the final creatures off. In a flourish of brilliant artificer engineering, Vi's Ultimate Attack is an Arcane Cannon in the shape of a massive metal Cockatrice!

For more information on Vi and her abilities, check out her Champion Spotlight!

Year Five Variants

• Adventure Variant 1: Timing is Everything — Vi starts in the formation. She can be moved to other slots, but she can't be removed from the formation. Vi's Arcane Cannon ultimate starts out unlocked. All Champion Base Attack cooldown speeds are increased by 8 seconds. If you activate Vi's second use of her Arcane Cannon ultimate in the last 5 seconds of the ultimate's duration, its cooldown is immediately reset.
  Complete Area 75.
Getting to know Vi: Vi's ultimate has a second stage that you might lose if you forget to activate it. Learn how to get the most out of it!


• Adventure Variant 2: Time For a Good Hug — Vi starts in the formation. She can't be moved or removed from the formation. You can only use Neutral (on the Good/Evil axis) and Evil Champions that have the DPS role, and you can only use Good Champions that have the Support role.
  Complete Area 125.
Getting to know Vi: Vi likes formations where you surround a neutral Champion with good ones. Figure out how to use it to your advantage!


• Adventure Variant 3: Double Our Efforts — Two Explorers join the formation. They deal no damage and can't be moved. Good Champions deal no damage with their base attacks. All non-boss area quest requirements are doubled, twice as many monsters spawn with each wave, and monsters drop half the amount of gold.
  Complete Area 175.

For information on previous years' variants, check out the Grand Revel 4 blog. And if you have feedback, let us know in a Community Q&A or Champion feedback post on the Idle Champions Subreddit, on the Steam forums, or on the Official Idle Champions Discord!

As Camp Vengeance gets ready to celebrate Grand Revel, a lone Templar approaches the Champions. Her merchant friend's caravan is missing.

The investigation found only scattered supplies and wreckage along the trail. If there are any survivors, they seem to have been taken into the jungles of Chult...

Grand Revel 4 introduces Hew Maan, a definitely human Champion and not three kobolds in a trench coat, and brings back Havilar, the Tiefling Fighter (Battlemaster) and twin sister to Farideh, and Paultin Seppa, the Vistani Bard. Players have until Monday, February 15th at 12PM Pacific to complete their Grand Revel unlocks and objectives.

For more information about Year 4 Events and how they work, please check out our Year 4 Events Dev Blog.

New Champion: Hew Maan

Zrang, his twin brother Kleeb, and their brood-sister Yassa began their Icewind Dale existence stealing gems and dreaming of being respected by the locals. Inspired by their mentor, Jarlaxle, they stand tall to form Hew Maan - who is totally a human and not on a nefarious mission to steal all the Champions' stuff.

Zrang, Kleeb, and Yassa team up and stack up to form Hew Maan, providing different buffs based on who's on top of the stack. Hew Maan is a Support champion, when you want to add them to your formation, you can swap them with Delina (Slot 8).

II. Hew Maan's Stats

Race: Kobold & "Human"	Alignment: Lawful Evil
Class: Rogue/Bard	Gender: Male & Female
Age: 67	Affiliation: none

STR: 11	DEX: 12	CON: 16
INT: 12	WIS: 8	CHA: 16

Role: Support
Eligible for Patrons: Mirt the Moneylender, Vajra Safahr
Slot: 8, (Delina)

Hew Maan's Abilities

Zrang and his siblings hide inside a trench coat and masquerade as a human, and their teamwork makes their dream work! Their buffs change based on where they are located in the formation. With Teamwork, they provide three different buffs that are useful in different situations. Place them near the front of the formation and they increase your rate of progression, place them in the center of the formation and they assist with killing bosses. Place them near the back of the formation and they greatly increase your damage against non-boss monsters. Hello, Fellow Humans, allows them to buff their fellow human Champions, but they can masquerade and buff another race through their specialization ability Did We Say Humans? We Meant....

For more information on Hew Maan and their abilities, check out their Champion Spotlight!

Year Four Variants

• Kobolds in Trench Coats! — Hew Maan starts in the front of the formation. They can't be moved or removed. Two of Hew Maan's "Human" friends have also joined the formation to see them in action! Quest requirements are doubled in non-boss areas.
  
  Getting to know Zrang — Because of their location in the formation, Zrang is on top of Hew Maan, meaning that enemies have a 25% chance to count double for quest progress (Teamwork). Kleeb and Yassa are not on top, which means that hits-based and armor-based enemies and blockers have a 50% chance of spawning with 25% of their hits already gone, and the base attack cooldown of Champions adjacent to Hew Maan are reduced by .5 seconds (Please Stand By)!
  Reach Area 75.

• More Dead Than Hew Maan — Hew Maan starts in one of the middle columns of the formation. They can't be moved or removed. Relentless Undead monsters spawn and attack your formation. When they are killed, they don't disappear. Instead, after 5 seconds, they get back up and resume their relentless attack.
  
  Getting to know Kleeb — Because of their location in the formation, Kleeb is on top of Hew Maan, meaning that Champion damage against bosses is increased and if that boss has hits-based or armor-based health, successful attacks destroy twice as many segments as they normally would (Teamwork), Yassa and Zrang are not on top, which means that boss enemies move 25% slower, and the base attack cooldowns of Champions adjacent to Hew Maan are reduced by .5 seconds (Please Stand By)!
  Reach Area 125.

• Hit 'em fast, Hit 'em hard — Hew Maan starts in the back of the formation. They can't be moved or removed. Armored abyssal chickens spawn in each area. These chickens drop no gold, nor do they count towards quest progress. Every 10 areas, the number of Abyssal Chickens that spawn per area increases by 1.
  
  Getting to know Yassa — Because of their location in the formation, Yassa is on top of Hew Maan, meaning that Champion damage is increased in the two columns in front of Hew Maan (Teamwork), Kleeb and Zrang are not on top, which means that hits-based and armor-based enemies and blockers have a 50% chance of spawning with 25% of their hits already gone, and bosses move 25% slower (Please Stand By)!
  Reach Area 175.

For information on previous years' variants, check out the Grand Revel 3 blog.

As Camp Vengeance gets ready to celebrate Grand Revel, a lone Templar approaches the Champions. Her merchant friend's caravan is missing.

The investigation found only scattered supplies and wreckage along the trail. If there are any survivors, they seem to have been taken into the jungles of Chult...

Grand Revel 3 introduces Havilar, the Tiefling Fighter (Battlemaster) sister of Farideh, and brings back Paultin Seppa, the Vistani Bard, and Birdsong, the Tabaxi Bard. Players have until Monday, February 10th at 12PM Pacific to complete their Grand Revel unlocks and objectives.

In addition to Grand Revel 3, our new Offline Progress feature discussed in the Idle Champions in 2020 Dev Blog goes live with this update!

Offline Progress

Offline Progress has arrived for all players! This new system simulates the time you spend offline, and will allow you to progress even while Idle Champions is closed. Supported mechanisms includes: area progress, Champion level-ups (if you have Familiars placed on them), and some minor farming support (ie. Zorbu farming). Overall, Offline Progress should dramatically enhance mobile and console play, as you will no longer need to leave the game open to make progress!

Note: We will be actively monitoring the results of Offline Progress throughout the next few days, and we may make tweaks to the adventures and/or Champions it will function with in the event that we discover harmful bugs or glitches.

Year 3 Champion: Havilar

Havilar's twin sister Farideh has always been 'the smart one' and 'the responsible one'—but that's all right, Havilar is definitely 'the tough one,' 'the funny one' and the 'pretty one' (despite being identical twins). Plus, Havilar has a hellhound! Even if it means she's a sort-of-but-not-quite Chosen of Asmodeus, too, not that anyone asked Havi about that. But he should know her glaive is as good as her right hand, and she can slice a devil just as well as an orc, a zombie, or any other villain!

Havilar is a Tank and Support Champion. She summons four different Imps to buff Champions in different ways. When battling fiends, her buffs grow stronger. When you want to add Havilar to your formation, you can swap her with Tyril (Slot 10).

For more information about Havilar, check out the Idle Champion Spotlight: Havilar dev blog!

Year 2 Champion: Paultin Seppa

Paultin and his "son" Simon (AKA Murderbot) have been adventuring as part of the Waffle Crew for many years. Paultin is a wise-cracking adventurer who is more at home at a tavern than anywhere else. He cares deeply for those he considers his friends and will leap into action if anyone hurts them.

Paultin Seppa is a Support Champion whose Muderbot son, Simon, rides atop his shoulders. Paultin increases Gold Find through his Lucky ability and increases the DPS of Champions who are not adjacent to him based upon the number of Champions who are with his Magical Secrets ability. Paultin doesn't always attack, choosing instead to drink from his wineskin or play his bagpipes while Simon shoots poison darts at enemies.

When you want to add Paultin to your formation, you can swap him with Jarlaxle (Slot 4). For more information, check out the Idle Champion Spotlight: Paultin dev blog!

Year 1 Champion: Birdsong

Birdsong, a cunning young Tabaxi bard, learned to defend herself while enslaved by the Yuan-Ti. Proficient in playing the lute, Birdsong discovered her potential as a bard when witnessing the effect of her songs had on other slaves. After her escape, she became one of the greatest minstels of Chult. She promised herself to, one day, get the revenge on the Yuan-Ti who destroyed her village.

Birdsong is a Support and DPS Champion. She buffs Champions within two spaces with her Song of Battle ability, and can greatly increasing the potency of Good, Evil, or Neutral Champions depending on which specialization she uses. When you want to add Birdsong to your party, you can swap her with Makos (Slot 9).

Year Three Variants

• Odd Ones Out — Only every second bench slot can be used.
  Reach Area 75.


• Diamonds Are Forever — Diamond Golems attack the formation at random in non-boss areas. They cannot be damaged and therefore must be tanked until the area is beaten.
  Reach Area 125.


• Nightmare Scenario — Havilar starts in the formation and cannot be swapped out, moved, or removed from the formation. Half of the non-boss monsters that spawn are replaced with random fiends that have 4x normal health and 2x move speed.
  Reach Area 175.

Year Two Variants

• Flower for Nanny Pu-pu — Magical floating crates of flowers take up four slots in the formation.
  Reach Area 75.


• Grand Revel Rock Band — Paultin begins the adventure in the formation. Only Bards with a Charisma (CHA) score of 15 or higher may be used.
  Reach Area 125.


• Love Hurts — Hordes of adoring fans attack the formation! Superfans, Infatuated Fans, Burly Fans, and Persistent Fans, spawn in each area and attack the formation, each with different abilities.
  Reach Area 175.

Year One Variants

• Three's a Crowd — Any Champion that is adjacent to more than 1 other Champion has their damage reduced to 0.
  Reach Area 75.


• Pair Up — Your ratio of women to men in your formation cannot be off by more than one (at all times you must have an equal number of men and women, or 1 more man than woman or vise-versa).
  Reach Area 125.


• Love Potion — Every 25 areas, two Champions drink a love potion and fall deeply in love. For those 25 areas, if those Champions are adjacent to each other in the formation they do bonus damage themselves (x4), and buff global damage as well (x3). The chosen Champion combos are fixed rather than random.
  Reach Area 175.

See the in-game FAQ for more information!

Grand Revel has returned to the Chult, and a day of dancing, music, and decadence has begun at Camp Vengeance.

As festivities begin the Champions begin a quest: to investigate a missing caravan on behalf of a Templar of the Order of the Gauntlet. Their friend, a local bard, has been missing for nearly a month...

Grand Revel 2 runs until Monday, February 18th, 2019 at 12:00pm PST, introduces the Vistani Bard from Dice, Camera, Action!, Paultin Seppa, and brings back Birdsong, the Tabaxi Bard from Chult!

New Champion: Paultin Seppa

Paultin and his "son" Simon (AKA Murderbot) have been adventuring as part of the Waffle Crew for many years. Paultin is a wise-cracking adventurer who is more at home at a tavern than anywhere else. He cares deeply for those he considers his friends and will leap into action if anyone hurts them.

Paultin Seppa is a Support Champion whose Muderbot son, Simon, rides atop his shoulders. Paultin increases Gold Find through his Lucky ability and increases the DPS of Champions who are not adjacent to him based upon the number of Champions who are with his Magical Secrets ability. Paultin doesn't always attack, choosing instead to drink from his wineskin or play his bagpipes while Simon shoots poison darts at enemies.

When you want to add Paultin to your formation, you can swap him with Jarlaxle (Slot 4). For more information about our latest Champion, check out the Idle Champion Spotlight: Paultin dev blog!

Returning Champion: Birdsong

Birdsong, a cunning young Tabaxi bard, learned to defend herself while enslaved by the Yuan-Ti. Proficient in playing the lute, Birdsong discovered her potential as a bard when witnessing the effect of her songs had on other slaves. After her escape, she became one of the greatest minstels of Chult. She promised herself to, one day, get the revenge on the Yuan-Ti who destroyed her village.

Birdsong is a Support and DPS Champion. She buffs Champions within two spaces with her Song of Battle ability, and can greatly increasing the potency of Good, Evil, or Neutral Champions depending on which specialization she uses. When you want to add Birdsong to your party, you can swap her with Makos (Slot 9).

Year Two Variants

• Flower for Nanny Pu-pu — Magical floating crates of flowers take up four slots in the formation.


• Grand Revel Rock Band — Paultin begins the adventure in the formation. Only Bards with a Charisma (CHA) score of 15 or higher may be used.


• Love Hurts — Hordes of adoring fans attack the formation! Superfans, Infatuated Fans, Burly Fans, and Persistent Fans, spawn in each area and attack the formation, each with different abilities.

Year One Variants

• Three's a Crowd — Any Champion that is adjacent to more than 1 other Champion has their damage reduced to 0.


• Pair Up — Your ratio of women to men in your formation cannot be off by more than one (at all times you must have an equal number of men and women, or 1 more man than woman or vise-versa).


• Love Potion — Every 25 areas, two Champions drink a love potion and fall deeply in love. For those 25 areas, if those Champions are adjacent to each other in the formation they do bonus damage themselves (x4), and buff global damage as well (x3). The chosen Champion combos are fixed rather than random.

See the in-game FAQ for more information!

A haunted Vistani Champion, the sole survivor of a massacre in Barovia who somehow escaped to Waterdeep, and 'The Bard Who Goes Hard': Paultin Seppa is coming to Idle Champions! Players will finally be able to include the entire Waffle Crew, including Simon the Murderbot, in their formations once Grand Revel begins.

Read on and learn more what this Champion can do...


Paultin runs out of wine. Photo taken by Tyler Curtis at the Steam of Many Eyes.

I. Who is Paultin Seppa?

Paultin and his "son" Simon (AKA Murderbot) have been adventuring as part of the Waffle Crew for many years. Paultin is a wise-cracking adventurer who is more at home at a tavern than anywhere else. He cares deeply for those he considers his friends and will leap into action if anyone hurts them.

Paultin Seppa is a Support Champion whose Murderbot son, Simon, rides atop his shoulders. Paultin increases Gold Find through his Lucky ability and increases the DPS of Champions who are not adjacent to him based upon the number of Champions who are with his Magical Secrets ability. Paultin doesn't always attack, choosing instead to drink from his wineskin or play his bagpipes while Simon shoots poison darts at enemies.

When you want to add Paultin to your formation, you can swap him with Jarlaxle (Slot 4).

II. Character Stats

Race: Human	Class: Bard	Alignment: Chaotic Neutral
STR: 14	DEX: 15	CON: 14
INT: 14	WIS: 12	CHA: 18

For more info, check out Paultin's Official D&D Beyond Character Sheet!

DCA fans may have noticed that our Paultin has lower stats than he does on the show. Like with Evelyn's release last year, we needed to dial Paultin down a bit for Idle Champions to allow design space for future Champions and abilities.

III. Art

Anyone who attended PAX West last August/September or PAX South earlier this month may have already seen the Dice, Camera, Action! poster created by one of our artists, Michelle, which included the first 'sneak peek' at Paultin in Idle Champions. When it came time to finish designing Paultin and complete his animations, one of our Senior Artists, Alexis Theroux, finalized the version of Paultin for the game.

Alexis took inspiration from Nate Sharp's cosplay of Paultin and some of the cast's favorite pieces of fan art to do the design. Nate gave us great feedback as we worked closely to bring 'The Bard Who Goes Hard' to life.

When it came time to Simon, we chatted with Chris Perkins and went back to the actual Curse of Strahd book and the art for Pidlwick II. Chris, Anna Prosser, and Nate had a few suggestions on how to tweak Simon's appearance, and that's how our Simon came to be!

IV. Design

Paultin proved to be an extremely tough nut to crack in terms of design. As fans of DCA, we definitely wanted to do him justice - but at the same time, Nate's portrayal of Paultin is not easy to emulate in our game. How do you represent a character who is essentially the Waffle Crew's version of Deadpool? Then there was the added complexity of just how many Bard Champions we already have in Idle Champions, with Paultin joining a roster that already includes Deekin Scalesinger, Calliope, Vlahnya Um'vairar, and Birdsong. Adding another Bard when Deekin (and his Troubadour Troupe ability) are already so popular while still doing something unique for Bards was a definite challenge.

Ultimately we looked at past episodes of Dice, Camera, Action and how Paultin/Nate reacted to events to find our inspiration. I knew that Thunderwave had to be an important part of Paultin's design, likely his Ultimate Ability based on how Paultin has used the spell at key moments throughout the series. I also knew that I wanted to include Simon, Paultin and Evelyn's adopted Murderbot son from their time in Barovia, to the design. It felt right to include him, and to have Simon shoot poison darts while Paultin sometimes chooses not to attack or engage enemies at all (opting instead to either drink from his wineskin or play the bagpipes) while at other times Paultin attacks multiple enemies at once.

With those starting points a design for Paultin started coming together. Playing off the Waffle Crew's dysfunctional party dynamic, we opted to have Paultin support the party based on how many allies are around him. We don't really have the kind of game where a lot of Paultin's signature spells like Counterspell and Crown of Madness really work, so we leaned into his College of Lore subclass to focus on increasing party damage through his mastery of Magical Secrets.

We didn't stop there with adjacency-based abilities — we also based Lucky, Paultin's Gold Find ability, off how many Champions are adjacent to him, with an ability called Edgy to increase the potency of Magical Secrets whenever Paultin is on the edge of a formation. Get it? Edgy?

Finally, we wanted to include another ability that represented the unity of the Waffle Crew in the form of Stronger Together, a buff to Strix, Diath, Evelyn, and Paultin that increases based on how many of them are in the formation.

Formation Abilities

• Lucky — Increases Gold Find by 20% for each Champion adjacent to Paultin in the formation. (stacks additively)


• Magical Secrets — Increases the damage of Champions not adjacent to Paultin by 50% for each Champion adjacent to Paultin. (stacks additively)


• Edgy — increases the effect of Magical Secrets by 100% when Paultin is on the edge of the formation.


• Stronger Together — Increases the damage of Waffle Crew team members by 100% for each member present in the formation. (stacks multiplicatively, THEN any buffs are applied)

V. Specializations

Specializations for Paultin Seppa are surprisingly straightforward: you can either go with Luck of the Vistani to further increase Paultin's Gold Find or you can go with Additional Magical Secrets to increase the effect of Magical Secrets. For those of you who love setting up your Gold Farming Formation overnight, it's hard to find a better ally than a lucky Vistani!

• Luck of the Vistani — Increases the effect of Lucky by 50%.


• Additional Magical Secrets — Increases the effect of Magical Secrets by 100%.

VII. Ultimate Attack

Paultin is so well known for his epic Thunderwave casts that we knew from the get-go that it had to be his Ultimate Ability.

Thunderwave — Paultin leaps to the front of the formation, drawing and swinging the Sunsword while a shockwave shoots out from the front of the formation, stunning enemies, dealing massive damage to them, and slowing their movement speed by 50% for five seconds. This spell deals bonus damage based on the current boss/enemy enrage multiplier.

VI. Equipment

Through our conversations with Nate and our viewing of Dice, Camera, Action! the shortlist of items for Paultin became clear early on in our design process:

• Bagpipes — Paultin Seppa's instrument of choice needs no introduction, though we do struggle to remember when the last time he played them was?


• Wineskin — Is there ever a time Paultin doesn't have a wineskin handy? This one in particular is even a part of Nate's Paultin Cosplay!


• Strahd von Chairovich — Animated by Paultin for the Chair Battle with Strix's 'Chair Richten' in Episode 101.


• Golden Cog & Marthain Signet Necklace — Just a plain ol' leather strap necklace with a pair of mementos Paultin keeps for no reason at all...


• The Sunsword — The sentient weapon, once wielded by Sergei von Zarovich, brother of Strahd von Zarovich, and given to Paultin by Ezmerelda in Episode 31.


• Mandolin — The magical mandolin Paultin stole from Jesper while in Barovia's past, which was eventually fed to a Dragon Turtle in Episode 92 along with Nit Luap/Evil Paultin.

VII. Final Thoughts

Paultin is the fifth(!) Bard to join Idle Champions, but possibly the most important as we finally complete the Waffle Crew. We are really happy with how Paultin's design came together, and feel like he plays differently enough from the other Bards to be unique and is a worthwhile swap in Slot 4. He supports the party while also increasing Gold Find and bringing a truly powerful ultimate to the table, possibly justifying a new kind of Champion formation since Slot 4 will now be a possible buffing/support slot to consider.

We're excited to see what Paultin brings to the meta! We hope you like him :)

Feel free to send us feedback on via the Idle Champions Subreddit, Steam forum, or the Idle Champions Discord!