Olden Era — After Strategy

HoMM Olden Era campaign walkthrough: every mission and route (2026 guide)

Sat, 07 Nov 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The campaign in Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era stops at Act I in Early Access: nine missions exist, but one run covers only seven. You go through Garner Hills, Into the Woods, Never-ending Conflict and Burning Hearts, then a two-mission Temple or Necropolis route, before the Alvar Diruil finale. One habit matters most: save before finishing Never-ending Conflict, because the choice between the two routes happens there.

This guide applies to version 0.82.06 of October 29, 2026, which changes the damage formula based on Attack and Defense and makes the AI noticeably stronger on the Global Map. Nearly all the difficulty advice quoted here predates that update, so enemy numbers and attack timing may have moved. This is not a play report: it cross-checks patch notes, three guides and player reports, which are labelled as such. Mission names come from the English patch notes.

Campaign mission order

The table uses the names from the Steam patch notes. The right-hand column gives the trap reported most often.

Order	Mission	Objective	Reported trap
1	Garner Hills	Cross the map with Gunnar, no town or recruiting	Losing every Minotaur
2	Into the Woods	Beat the Grove hero, then three armies guarding the roots	Entering the enemy castle too early
3 or 4	Never-ending Conflict	Capture four towns and defeat all enemy heroes	Recruiting slower than the AI
3 or 4	Burning Hearts	Keep Lafiur and Gunnar alive, find the energy source	Exploring north before south
5 and 6	Saving the Knight, Renegade	Temple route	Fixes missing from old saves
5 and 6	Deal with a Vampire, Corruption	Necropolis route	Barrier lifts after four wins
7	Alvar Diruil	Evacuate villages before the Dragonfly King attacks	Leaving too late

The middle of that order is unclear. VGTimes puts Never-ending Conflict third, while Commonsense Gamer puts Burning Hearts there. On Steam, one player says they started the Grove mission first, which suggests the order depends on the path taken across the campaign map. Both guides agree on the key point: the Temple or Necropolis branch is decided around Never-ending Conflict, and you see one chain per run.

On saves, Patch #8 added a Restart button and fixed artifact slots locked between missions. The September 30, 2026 update gives each campaign run its own save category. If you play on an old save, several October 29 fixes do not apply to a game saved inside a mission.

Garner Hills: the tutorial with no recruiting

Gunnar crosses the map with no town or recruiting, and building bonuses last only for this mission. Units marked with an exclamation point join you for free. Switch stance each round according to the stack’s job: attack, defense or magic.

Three things deserve your attention on this map.

The bridge. Repairing it costs 30 wood.
The rider. Beat the insects to receive the Last Coin artifact, then show it to the rider to pass without a fight. The October 29 notes fix an endless dialogue at this spot.
The Ariadne’s Mercy achievement. You must finish with at least one Minotaur alive, so save often.

On higher difficulty, players split Minotaurs into stacks of 1 and rotate wounded units. Morale swings hard in this tutorial, and a restart is nothing unusual.

Into the Woods: red crystals and a collapsing path

This mission gives you the first castle, with buildings locked at the start. Recruiting from outside dwellings unlocks construction options. You beat the Grove hero, then three armies guarding the roots.

What matters here is holding on to your red crystals, because they pay for two optional bonuses. Infernal Hydras cost 30 crystals, behind the orange portal at the bottom of the map. The five Kittenhorn squads need 55, meaning 15 for the first and 10 for each of the others, according to Destructoid. Recruit the first squad before the burning castle. Clear the left half of the map before entering the enemy castle too, because the path collapses behind you. Lafiur joins when the mission ends.

Never-ending Conflict: catching up with the AI

Gunnar sets out alone again, with buildings capped at tier 3. Reinforcements therefore come mostly from outside dwellings, while an enemy hero attacks your town every one to two weeks. The goal: take all four towns, two per faction, then defeat every enemy hero. Some patch notes call this map Eternal Conflict.

This is the most cited difficulty spike. In a May 2026 Steam thread, a player on Easy tops out at 150 upgraded creatures against huge enemy stacks. Here are the answers offered by players and VGTimes.

Take the second town early. It sits above the start on the Necropolis side and below it on the Temple side.
Bait the AI. One player led the enemy army around while recruiting, then beat it in the open with about 950 units.
Hold the walls. Another defends behind maxed walls, but the first player got only a costly win that way.
Chase gold. One player suggests giving up Astrology and Law points to earn more gold per day.
Fight manually. VGTimes says auto-battle wastes troops here.

The risk is that baiting works less well now that the AI spends resources better and flees lost fights. For achievements, Patience is a Virtue asks you to end a turn beside the Shard of Serenity, behind the purple portal, and collect it the next day. AcHiEvEmEnT!!! requires four battle wins, each with a different pixie scroll.

Burning Hearts: south first

On the Grove route you start with one town, Lafiur and Gunnar, and both must survive. The clearest advice comes from Steam: rush south to the dwellings and recruit as many Herbomancers as you can before exploring north. VGTimes backs this up, with the second Grove castle below the start and three Mushroom Huts to its left.

The Stargazer’s tower, about a day and a half away, asks four riddles and teaches Lafiur a summoning spell. VGTimes pairs Haste with Dove, Provocation with Knight, Doom with Dragon and Fury of Kshmilya with Kshmilya, names translated from Russian that you should check on screen. Since October 29, four correct answers reliably give a reward.

Next comes the central portal, then the druid in the left corner town once two enemy towns have fallen. A portal marked with a rhombus finally leads to the tree on the far right. If you play the Temple route, the pattern is mirrored, with two Grove towns to take before the druid.

Two achievements live here. It Fills You with Determination means chasing the warlock through two portals. Might over Right means refusing to help the Old Pilgrim, bottom left, then beating him before the main enemy faction.

Temple route: Saving the Knight and Renegade

In Saving the Knight, refuse to pledge to the Hive Waurm messenger for Once Tempted, Always Rebuked. For Something lingers, unfinished, accept the Troglodyte quest, keep one in the Remote Foothold and beat the Hydras before entering the portal. Valentina joins at the end. Patch #7 cleared critical bugs on this map, and the October 29 update gave the rightmost Twilight Bloom its artifact back.

In Renegade, amplifiers restore the fog of war. Destroy them by beating the undead guarding them to earn NecronomiNO!. Commonsense Gamer counts three, and promising Thant a favor spares you the first.

Necropolis route: Deal with a Vampire and Corruption

Facing the Dragonfly King’s herald, refuse the offer to earn A Fiery Negotiation in Deal with a Vampire. Lord Galthran then joins the party. A fix dated October 29 removed a blocker when placing a second hero at the dead knight’s new spawn.

In Corruption, four angel heroes serve a corrupted knight. Beat each one once to lift the barrier, then free the fifth angel for Guarding the Guardian. Valentina arrives at this point on this route.

Alvar Diruil: plan the evacuation before the fight

Commonsense Gamer puts the Dragonfly King’s attack at Month 1, Week 4, Day 7, which sets your deadline. Place your heroes in front of the villages before the final battle, since movement artifacts will not rescue a late start. One hero must stay behind: Destructoid recommends Gunnar, who saves the two bottom villages, and you evacuate the others yourself for Blessed be the Meek. A bug that let you attack the town with a remaining hero was fixed on October 29. Finishing this map unlocks the Act I achievement.

The Mirage is not a campaign mission

The search “olden era how to beat mirage” often sits next to the campaign, yet no mission guide lists it. According to players, you face a stronger version of your own hero, with the same units in larger numbers, the same artifacts and the same spells. Others tie it to the Grail, and the July 2026 notes do mention a battle for the Grail.

These threads date from October 2025 to January 2026, before Early Access. On paper, the most detailed method comes down to a few spells.

One ranged stack. Twilight, cast on the first turn, stops the enemy stack from shooting.
Healing and protection. Rewind Life restores losses, and Carapace absorbs one or two hits.
Sleep. One player counts four turns, or about three spells before the first hit lands.
Avoid this. The Temple’s Sacred Land law makes the enemy immune to negative effects, the same player says.

Going further

HoMM Olden Era 0.82: The New Attack/Defense Damage Formula Explained

Tue, 03 Nov 2026 00:00:00 GMT

In Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era, one extra point of Attack used to add 4.5% damage at the start of a game and less than 1% at the end. Unfrozen spells this out in the notes for update 0.82.06, which went live on the main branch on October 29, 2026. So the studio rewrote how damage is calculated, and the knock-on effects reach far beyond a single line in a changelog.

This analysis draws on the official patch notes, the October 15 beta announcement and press coverage. Nothing here comes from hands-on play: every figure is Unfrozen’s own.

What shipped on October 29

Unfrozen calls 0.82.06 the biggest balance update since the game entered Early Access. It first ran on a public beta branch opened on October 15, with saves kept separate from the main version. The studio, published by Hooded Horse, then layered in a batch of fixes based on beta feedback.

The update breaks down into five blocks: the damage formula, a rework of skills and artifacts, new alternative upgrades for creatures, a stronger map AI and two neutral creatures. Almost everything else flows from the first block. Once you understand the formula, you understand why Battle Magic and Battlecraft were cut down. It is also the biggest shake-up since the Necromancy rework that reshaped Necropolis.

Why the old formula faded out in the late game

Until now, the damage multiplier was (20 + ATK) / (20 + DEF). Hero stats are added on top of creature stats. The flaw is pure arithmetic: the more Attack and Defense a hero piles up, the bigger both sides of the fraction get, and the closer the ratio drifts toward 1.

Unfrozen shows this with a Troglodyte (Attack 2, Defense 3) facing a Waurm (Attack 20, Defense 20). With no hero bonuses, one extra point of Attack adds 4.5% to the Troglodyte’s hits. With 80 Attack and Defense on the hero side, that same point adds just 0.98%.

The second example lands harder for players. A thousand Troglodytes face 75 Waurms, roughly one week of growth for each. Early on, the Waurms deal 2.67 times more damage. With 60 points of hero stats, the gap shrinks to 1.24 times. The longer a game ran, the less reason high-tier creatures had to exist next to swarms of small units.

The new rule: only the gap matters

The 0.82 formula ignores absolute values and looks only at the gap between the attacker’s Attack and the defender’s Defense. The first point of difference is worth +4.00%, the second +3.96%, the third +3.92%. Each further point is worth 0.04% less. Past a gap of 100, stats stop affecting damage altogether.

If Attack is higher, damage is multiplied by that total. If Defense is higher, damage is divided by the same total. A gap of 17 is therefore worth 62.56%, and a gap of 18 is worth 65.88%.

The upshot is simple. Because the hero’s bonus is added to both sides in the same way, it no longer warps the balance of power. In the official example, Waurms deal 2.28 times more damage than Troglodytes, and that ratio holds for the whole game. A point of Attack is worth about 2%, on day one just as in month three.

What the formula changes in an actual game

The first winners are tier 6 and tier 7 creatures. An elite stack now keeps the edge its base stats give it, instead of watching it melt under hero bonuses. Building an army around a few heavy stacks becomes a defensible plan again.

The second winners are stat artifacts. Unfrozen admits they barely mattered late in a match. The update even adds twelve artifacts that combine two attributes, from the common Soldier’s Sword (+1 Attack and Spell Power) to the epic Archmage’s Hood (+3 Defense and Knowledge).

The losers are harder to spot. Tier 1 to 3 units get slightly stronger early on, but they no longer scale as much with the hero’s growth. The studio also lowered the stats of many creatures, since the same number now carries more weight than before.

Battle Magic, Battlecraft and First Aid

Since stats now matter more, the skills that handed them out for free were reined in. Battle Magic takes the biggest hit. Unfrozen notes that might heroes used it as much as magic heroes, which went against its original design. At max level, creatures now receive 60% of the hero’s Attack and 40% of their Spell Power, instead of 100% of the hero’s Attack.

For a magic hero, the trade is neutral or better. For a might hero who picked it by habit, it is a straight loss. Battlecraft follows the same logic: the stat bonus for waiting or skipping a turn drops from 20/30/40% to 10/15/20%.

The most visible addition is First Aid, a new skill open to every hero and every faction. After a won battle, surviving stacks recover 20, 30 or 40% of the creatures they lost. Its subskills add a cleanse for negative effects and a once-per-battle partial revival of a fallen stack. Julius, Leira and the Iron Master now start with it.

The Temple gets a new identity too. Its faction skill, Righteousness, no longer hinges on creatures dying or on a big stat bonus. Instead it grants three active prayers: Song of Wrath adds Pure Damage, Plea for Healing heals and can revive, and Hymn of Power extends positive effects. Their strength scales with the hero’s level.

An AI that retreats, and fewer absurd streaks

The second big project targets solo players. The map AI now has its main hero flee a battle that looks lost, then follow a dedicated plan to get back into the game. It learns high-level map magic at the Magic Observatory and uses the most useful map spells to get around. It also splits resources more sensibly between towns and recruitment, and picks artifacts and skills to fit each hero’s role.

Randomness gets a leash as well. A new mechanism prevents unusually long streaks of Morale and Luck, good or bad. Unfrozen’s example is a stack with 5 Morale that never gets a bonus action while an enemy on 1 Morale triggers one almost every turn. That situation should become “practically impossible”.

On the interface side, the initiative bar is easier to read and faction active skills now have their own panel. Favorite Spells lets you flag three combat spells for quick casting. Finally, two neutral creatures join the map: the Mummy at tier 5 and the Kitsune at tier 7.

What to watch next

On paper, 0.82 fixes a real design flaw: a stat system whose value quietly drained away without the player noticing. It also moves Olden Era toward a rule that is easy to read mid-battle. The risk lies in the transition. Tier lists and guides published before October 29, including After Strategy’s own, rest on the old formula, and their advice on low-tier creatures deserves a second look.

Three things are worth tracking. First, the new Battle Magic: will might heroes drop it or find another combination? Second, the Temple’s prayers in ranked play. Third, AI difficulty: an opponent that retreats and comes back could make some PvE maps noticeably longer. Unfrozen says further tuning will follow, based on data and player feedback.

Going further

HoMM: Olden Era — Alliances and the Advanced Random Map Generator Are Finally Here

Fri, 23 Oct 2026 00:00:00 GMT

On September 30, 2026, Unfrozen released what it calls the “Roadmap Patch” (v0.81.02) of Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era. It brings Alliances, the long-requested team play, and an advanced random map generator designed for matches against the AI. Here is what those two additions contain, their current limits, and what has happened since.

Alliances: playing together without waiting for your ally

Alliances let you team up with friends or family, against the AI as well as against other players. Unfrozen says the feature required major changes to the interface and the core mechanics. One of the most visible choices is that simultaneous turns are always on, so everyone plays in parallel instead of waiting for the other player’s turn to end.

Teammates can trade resources and request them from each other, a first for the series according to the studio. They can also pass armies between heroes, and artifacts. These exchanges are also possible through “Remote Footholds” and the “Pocket Dimension” spell. If just one player meets the map’s victory conditions, the whole team wins.

How to start an Alliance game

To play with friends, whether co-op against the AI or a team-versus-team format such as 2v2, you create a lobby in the Multiplayer menu and invite them. To play with an AI ally against other AI opponents, Quick Start offers five new templates preconfigured for Alliances. Custom Game opens more options: any existing template, or the “Broken Alliance” map.

That map is not new. Taken from Heroes 2 and Heroes 6, it shipped on September 3 with Patch #14 (v0.80.49), alongside the “Prisoners” scenario. The September 30 patch lets you take it on as an Alliance. Unfrozen says more scenarios, maps and templates will support Alliances over time, and that some existing maps will get an option to play as allies.

A random map generator built for PvE

Since Early Access began, the game has offered more than 50 random map templates. The system delivers variety, but each template imposes predefined rules, so it brings some predictability. The studio explains that many casual PvE players asked for the opposite: unpredictable exploration, even at the expense of balance.

The new generator answers that request. The player chooses:

The victory conditions.
The map size.
Free-for-all or Alliances mode.
The richness of the map.
How many heroes are commanded at once.
A symmetrical or asymmetrical map.

Once the map is configured, the game moves on to faction and hero selection, then the map is generated without drawing on the existing template pool. The template system remains available for those who prefer more predictable, balanced generation, and for PvP. Each template now shows a description and detailed information.

The rest of the patch

The patch is not limited to these two features. Unfrozen also adds:

Rebuilt save menus, split between Single Player and Multiplayer, with one category per campaign, per scenario and for challenges.
An expanded emoji wheel, now usable in combat as well.
A revised matchmaking system, with fairer calibration and losses that weigh more at higher ranks.
A leaderboard reset.

The studio also says the third-quarter roadmap goals are complete and that work on the features planned for the end of the year has begun.

Since the patch: a hotfix and a balance beta

A hotfix (v0.81.04) followed on October 2: tournaments, multiplayer lobby, localization and network stability, with four new emojis. On October 15, Unfrozen opened a public beta branch for the big balance update announced in the September patch: a reworked damage calculation, new creatures and a stronger Global Map AI. A second beta version came out on October 21. None of these changes is final, and the date of the main release has not been set.

For the detail of the balance changes already delivered, including the Necromancy rework, see our Patch #11 analysis.

What to watch

The real issue is not whether the features exist but how far they go. Two limits are worth keeping in mind. First, the advanced generator is only available in Quick Start and focuses on PvE, so it changes nothing for competitive play. Second, the value of Alliances depends on the number of compatible maps and templates: five Quick Start templates and a few existing maps are enough to discover the mode, not necessarily to make it stick.

The thing to follow is the next content announcement. Unfrozen promises new solo adventures, and the early September patch had already paved the way with two new PvE maps. For players who want a shared campaign-style experience, that is what matters most. If the studio extends Alliances to its next scenarios, the mode will gain in interest.

Going further

Sources: official patch announcement on Steam · Gamespace · GameGrin

HoMM Olden Era: two new maps in September, Alliances coming next

Fri, 11 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Patch v0.80.49 for Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era shipped on September 3, 2026 with two new custom maps, Prisoners and Broken Alliance. More important, Unfrozen used it to detail the Roadmap Patch due before the end of the month, which includes Alliances.

Update, October 26, 2026: the Roadmap Patch shipped on September 30. It brings Alliances in both PvE and PvP, an advanced random map generator for PvE, a rebuilt emoji wheel and a ranked reset, followed by a hotfix on October 2.

Prisoners and Broken Alliance, two maps

According to Unfrozen’s Steam notes, both maps were fine-tuned to give a fresher PvE experience. Broken Alliance is a classic map recreated by Papyjama, the creator of The Mysterious Island. You face your former allies while painting the map in your faction’s colors.

It is playable in custom games and hotseat, but not in Quick Game. It is the first new custom map available in custom lobbies. Prisoners is a more narrative scenario: you lead a search party looking for the missing commanders of an outpost near a forest. Extra heroes come from freeing them from their prisons, so exploring the forest matters as much as fighting. Unfrozen also says the pace of patches with PvE content will go up, so more maps and scenarios are expected.

The announced Roadmap Patch

The press relayed the list on September 4. The patch was due to bring Alliances, new options for the advanced random map generator, an improved emoji wheel, matchmaking and ranking changes, and a ranked reset.

A major balance patch was meant to follow in a beta branch. Unfrozen announced a rework of the Temple faction skill in the form of prayers, and a first answer to the abundance of percentage-based damage and defense modifiers. The next update also promised new units and a rework of how computer opponents behave.

What to watch at the time

On the date of this patch, the game did not yet offer team play. The question was how Alliances would share resources and armies between teammates, and whether the balance patch would really cut the stacking of percentage bonuses.

The risk was a schedule that slips: two maps do not make a major patch. Unfrozen kept its date, since the Roadmap Patch shipped on September 30.

Going further

Our Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era hub: every article on the game.
Alliances and the map generator in Olden Era: the Roadmap Patch in detail.
Patch 13: The Mysterious Island: Papyjama’s large solo map.

HoMM Olden Era Patch 13: The Mysterious Island brings a solo map and a new Arena

Mon, 24 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Patch 13 for Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era, released on August 20, 2026, adds The Mysterious Island, the game’s first large solo map, and overhauls Arena Mode. Unfrozen announced the map on June 15, together with the arrival of its author, Papyjama, as a level designer.

Update, October 26, 2026: Patch 14, on September 3, added two new custom maps, Prisoners and Broken Alliance, the latter playable in custom lobbies and hotseat. The Steam notes published through October 22 do not yet mention the underground level promised for The Mysterious Island.

The Mysterious Island, a six-faction solo map

According to the official patch notes, The Mysterious Island is a large-scale solo map with six playable factions and a narrative inspired by Jules Verne’s novel. It is the official remake of the map Papyjama created for Heroes III, rebuilt with Olden Era’s mechanics and atmosphere. The press covered it the same day.

The story is not complete. Unfrozen says it will grow in future updates, as mechanics such as the underground level are introduced. The June announcement already presented this map as the first of a series of creations by Papyjama.

Arena Mode: rerolls and starting bonuses

Arena Mode gets the most concrete changes in the patch. During the artifact, spell and creature drafts, each player can now refresh the choices offered. Players have 4 reroll points by default and gain one during each artifact and creature draft phase.

Three other rules frame the draft. Heroes who specialize in a creature guarantee that units of that tier appear for both players. Some very powerful spells no longer go above level 1 by default. Finally, some heroes get a starting bonus to their primary attributes, adjusted from their results in Arena.

The Shift+U hotkey to hide the interface is back. The patch also rebalances six factions: Temple, Necropolis, Grove, Schism, Hive and Dungeon. For example, Hive Parasites lose one point of speed and Scorpions gain initiative.

What to watch

The risk is waiting too long for the underground level: without it, the map is still presented as the start of a story. Patch 14 shows that Unfrozen wants to speed up the pace of PvE maps, with more frequent patches promised. The real lifespan of The Mysterious Island can only be judged from player feedback.

Going further

Our Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era hub: every article on the game.
The Mysterious Island and Papyjama announcement: the map’s background.
The Alvari Cup, first official tournament: the summer’s competitive scene.
September patch: two new maps and the upcoming Alliances

HoMM Olden Era Patch #11: The Necromancy Rework, and Does It Really Change Necropolis?

Fri, 14 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Patch #11 of Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era arrived on July 6, 2026, two months after the April 30 Early Access launch. It is not a routine fix. Unfrozen rewrites the logic of Necromancy, Necropolis’s faction skill, and along the way adjusts Schism, Hive and several hero skills. Three and a half months later, there is enough distance to judge what the rework changed, and what the October balance beta is putting back on the table.

Necromancy before Patch #11: why it felt stuck

Before July, Necromancy depended on the composition of the hero’s army. The patch notes describe a strict restriction that tied raising the dead to what the army already contained. In practice, a hero with no creature of a given tier could not raise units of that tier after a fight.

Unfrozen acknowledges the flaw in its patch notes: the previous version was powerful enough, but too complex to grasp. Players had to anticipate which creatures they could raise before even starting a battle. That hidden logic made the faction hard to read, especially for a newcomer discovering Necropolis.

What the rework actually changes

The core change is simple to state: after a victory, you can raise enemy units even if your army holds no creature of the matching tier. High-tier units become reachable without any special preparation.

These are the conversion rules set out by Unfrozen:

By default, fallen enemies come back in their base form: a tier 1 unit becomes a Skeleton, a tier 2 unit a Wight.
If the army already holds undead of the right tier, the raised version depends on its composition.
If only the upgraded version is present, that one is raised, at an extra energy cost.
If several upgrades coexist, the one with the larger stack in the army wins.

Map tooltips now show which creature will be raised. In the combat results window, the player can cancel the raise and recycle the fallen enemies into Necromantic Energy. The same window lets you switch between accumulating energy and turning creatures into undead of the same tier.

The choice therefore shifts from preparation to arbitration. Before the fight, there is no need to check the army’s composition. After the fight, you must decide between raising units right away and storing energy for later.

The price of flexibility: fewer units raised

Unfrozen did not hand out this freedom for free. According to Unfrozen, the starting and recovery energy values were adjusted, and that the total number of raised units dropped noticeably.

The published figures let us measure the gap. The hero’s base pool goes from 1000, 1250 and 1500 to 3000, 4000 and 5000 depending on level. But the raising cost is multiplied by four for tiers 1 to 7: 5 becomes 20 for a tier 1 unit, and 500 becomes 2000 for a tier 7. Tier 8 goes from 2000 to 7500.

A quick calculation from those values alone gives the order of magnitude. At the base level, a full pool could raise 200 tier 1 creatures before the patch, against 150 after. At the top level, it goes from 300 to 250. Volume therefore falls by roughly 17 to 25 percent for tiers 1 to 7, ignoring sub-skills and the energy gained by recycling the dead. The energy recovery values did not move, so against costs multiplied by four they weigh less.

Two adjustments soften that picture:

The elite class “Chronomancer” now refills the hero’s energy pool every day.
The “Death Herald” sub-skill doubles its maximum pool bonus, from 500 to 1000.

Conversely, “Eternal Service” restores less health, 50 HP instead of 80. The overall picture looks more like a rebuild of the faction’s economy than a simple removal of a constraint.

The other changes in the patch

Necromancy takes the headline, but the patch touches other faction mechanics. Here are the changes Unfrozen announced:

Schism: Abyssal Communion now applies to units from other factions. Its maximum level goes from 4/5/6 to 3/4/5 and the share of temporary creatures per level from 3% to 2.5%. Unfrozen explains the choice by below-par results in Classic mode, while the faction stayed very strong in Single Hero mode.
Hive: larvae have more health, 16 instead of 8, while other summoned stacks no longer count when calculating the number of larvae. The emphasis shifts to their explosive potential.
Battle Magic and Summon Avatar: after the nerfs to Might heroes, mages had gained the upper hand. Battle Magic returns to its original values, and the base version of Summon Avatar is weakened, with more options through its sub-skills.
Random maps: the Jebus Tournament and Outcast Tournament templates arrive with uninterrupted simultaneous turns, along with the hybrid templates Mix and Galaxy.
Fixes: an exploit that let Temple players gain unlimited resources on the adventure map is removed, as is a damage bug on the Dungeon dragons’ alternative attack.

Unfrozen also reminds players that deliberately exploiting bugs in competitive play can lead to a temporary or permanent ban.

What has happened since July

Patch #12, released on July 10, served as a follow-up fix. Unfrozen explains there that earlier adjustments had over-nerfed Magic heroes in Arena mode. The Magic Damage bonus of Sorcery goes from 10/20/30% to 20/30/40%, and its specialists gain 15% plus 5% per 3 hero levels.

The story since has been written around content: Patch #13 and The Mysterious Island, the September patch, then Alliances and the advanced map generator. On the competitive side, the Alvari Cup began on August 1 with 16 invited players.

In its September 30 announcement, Unfrozen also lists the Necromancy rework among the hero skill balancing work promised in its third-quarter roadmap, alongside the Schism and Grove adjustments.

On October 15, Unfrozen opened a public beta branch for what it calls the biggest balance update since Early Access began. It replaces the damage formula based on Attack and Defense, rebalances skills, artifacts and alternative upgrades, and makes the Global Map AI stronger. The undead are affected: the Skeleton gets 2 Defense and the Wight gains 1 point of health. Unfrozen stresses that none of these changes is final, and a second beta update followed on October 21.

What to watch now

For a Necropolis player, the thing to follow is how two workstreams interact. The Patch #11 rework changed how many units you raise, while the beta changes what those units are worth once raised. A sturdier Skeleton or a thicker Wight alters the value of a mass raise of low tiers.

The question is no longer just “is Necromancy readable?” but “what is a raised army worth under the new damage system?” The beta feedback, which the studio wants broken down by faction, template and game stage, should answer that before the main release. To place Necropolis against the other factions, the HoMM Olden Era 2026 tier list remains the site’s most complete reference.

Going further

Sources: official Patch #11 notes on Steam · Patch #12 on Steam · balance beta announcement · Gamespace on Patch #11

HoMM Olden Era: the Alvari Cup, first official tournament, has a €5,000 prize pool

Mon, 03 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The Alvari Cup, the first official tournament for Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era, started on August 1, 2026, three months after the game launched in early access. Sixteen invited players compete in single elimination, with best-of-three matches and a €5,000 prize pool. The question is what this event says about the competitive scene of a game that is still being built.

Update, October 26, 2026: the Alvari Cup ended on October 17, and Ritosux won it ahead of Lexiav, Roniu and Ordulops. The €5,000 prize pool was shared between the top four, according to the final release from Unfrozen and Hooded Horse.

Format and prize pool

According to Unfrozen’s Steam announcement, the tournament is run with Behemoth’s Lair, Ubisoft and Hooded Horse. The sixteen invited players face each other in single elimination, and every series is played as a best of three. Matches are streamed on Twitch and YouTube, and the end of the competition was announced several weeks after the start.

The Steam announcement gives no amount and promises to reveal the grand prize soon. GameDaily put the prize pool at €5,000. Some sites repeated it in dollars, but the final release confirms euros.

A game still on the move

Olden Era has been in early access since April 30, 2026 and passed one million copies sold on May 28, according to Unfrozen’s post. Patches keep coming at a steady pace: twelve numbered patches were out by mid-July, plus several quick fixes.

Two of them touch competitive play directly. Patch 8 rebuilt Summon Avatar into a purely magical ability: the avatar’s attack bonus now depends on the hero’s spell power, and the avatar survives a fixed number of hits, between two and four. Patch 10 saves the formation from the tactical phase, but only against neutral monsters, not against other players.

To compare factions before following the matches, our Olden Era faction tier list 2026 is a starting point. The May roadmap article covers the next steps, including the Teamplay mode planned for the third quarter of 2026.

What to watch

Unfrozen promises more official tournaments, including formats open to everyone. That is where the scene will really be tested: sixteen invitations make a showcase, but an open ladder will show whether balance holds up against hundreds of players.

The risk is that an invitational, even an official one, stays mostly a visibility event until the competitive roadmap ships. Matchmaking and an observer mode are announced for the fourth quarter, and the game has no release date for version 1.0.

Going further

Our Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era hub: every article on the game.
Olden Era faction tier list 2026: factions compared.
Olden Era: one million sold and the roadmap: the early access milestones.

HoMM Olden Era: Mysterious Island Coming, Papyjama Joins Unfrozen

Tue, 07 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The Mysterious Island is one of the most-played Heroes of Might and Magic III maps of the past two decades. Unfrozen has just announced it’s coming to Olden Era — and that its creator, Papyjama, is joining the studio.

Papyjama joins Unfrozen: what this hire actually means

In the Heroes III community, Papyjama needs no introduction. His version of the Mysterious Island — a scenario inspired by Jules Verne’s novel — became one of the definitive references for solo play. Unfrozen has hired him as Level Designer, with the recreation of that map as his first project.

This hire isn’t routine. Since launching in Early Access on April 30, 2026, Olden Era has focused heavily on competitive play: matchmaking, templates, PvP balance. Solo players have been waiting for a signal. That signal just arrived.

Papyjama will create additional maps and scenarios after the Mysterious Island. His role isn’t a one-off collaboration — it’s the foundation of a long-term PvE offering.

The Mysterious Island: Olden Era’s first giant PvE content

The map will be the first of “giant” size in the game, a category that didn’t previously exist in Olden Era. In Heroes III, a giant map fundamentally changed the scope of a session: between 10 and 15 hours of non-linear exploration, scripted events and interlinked objectives.

The announcement states the map is “in advanced stages of development.” No confirmed date, but the timeline suggests a release within the next major content patches.

What made the original Mysterious Island special was its chained quests, hidden bosses, and the way thorough exploration was rewarded. Recreating that in Olden Era’s engine — with its new hero mechanics, subskills, and reworked factions — is genuine design work, not a simple file import.

Patch #8: Summon Avatar reworked, competitive meta shifted

Patch #8, released late May/early June 2026, brought the most significant mechanical change since launch. The Summon Avatar has been completely redesigned: it moves from a hybrid skill to a purely magical one.

In practice, the Avatar no longer loses standard HP. Instead, it can absorb a fixed number of hits depending on the skill level: 2 hits at level 1, 3 at level 2, 4 at expert. Attack power is now tied to the hero’s Spell Power — not Attack. Expert Murmuring subskills have been rewritten to match this new logic.

The patch also closed several major exploits: the Alt+F4 disconnect abuse and the bug allowing free creature upgrades. Jebus Cross templates were enriched to make side zones more interesting. Sprint, Harmony, and Exodus were adjusted to speed up the pace of play.

Patch #10 and Early Access state in July 2026

The most recent Patch #10 focused on tactical ergonomics. Formations are now saved between battles: no more manually repositioning units before each engagement. The visual and audio display during the tactics phase has also been revised.

These changes are less dramatic than Patch #8, but they fix friction that regular players had flagged since the early weeks. The tactics phase was one of the few spots where Olden Era still felt rough around the edges.

Olden Era is currently available at 25% off on Steam. The game remains in Early Access with no confirmed 1.0 release date. Upcoming milestones from the roadmap revealed in early June 2026 include a Teamplay mode planned for Q3 2026 and a matchmaking overhaul for Q4. For a breakdown of the current faction standings, the updated tier list remains the reference.

What to watch now

The release date for the Mysterious Island is not yet confirmed. “Advanced stages of development” suggests weeks to months — but without a guarantee.

The real question: how does this solo content hold up against competitive modes that have benefited from ten patches of refinement? If the Mysterious Island delivers, Olden Era will finally have a strong argument for players who don’t want to spend their evenings in 1v1 ranked.

Also worth watching: whether other Heroes III community creators join the team after Papyjama. That would confirm PvE is a structural commitment, not a one-off PR move.

Sources

HoMM Olden Era faction tier list 2026 — which army should you pick?

Wed, 24 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Six factions, six combat philosophies

Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era crossed one million copies sold within its first month following Early Access launch on April 30, 2026 — a milestone that confirms the enduring appeal of the HoMM formula. But with six factions offering genuinely distinct mechanics developed by Unfrozen, choosing your starting army can be decisive, especially in multiplayer or on the most competitive random maps.

This tier list ranks all six factions across three axes: raw power in the current meta, accessibility for players new to the game, and versatility against both AI and human opponents.

S-Tier: Dungeon
A-Tier: Necropolis and Grove
B-Tier: Temple and Hive
C-Tier: Schism
Which faction suits your playstyle?
Faction Laws and morale: two rules you can’t ignore

S-Tier: Dungeon — the power of the Alvar Pact

Dungeon represents the Alvar Pact, an underground coalition of dark elves, minotaurs, medusae and dragons. It is the strongest faction in the current Early Access, and that dominance rests on a single defining principle: every unit can switch between two attack modes depending on the situation. This tactical flexibility — unique to Dungeon — lets you adapt in real time to enemy compositions, counter specific threats and maintain constant pressure across all stages of the game.

Onyx Dancers rank as the best starting units in the game according to most community tier lists: mobile, versatile, they let you set an aggressive pace from turn one. Their only weakness is low Initiative, which demands more forward planning when sequencing actions compared to other factions.

Mid-game, Dungeon deepens with high-damage units that benefit from faction synergies. A fully developed late-game army with dragons is simply overwhelming when the scaling goes to plan. Dungeon rewards players who want to dominate — and equally rewards mastery of its advanced mechanics.

A-Tier: Necropolis and Grove — powerful and more forgiving

Necropolis (Shadowspire) is the undead faction, ruled by Necromancers and Vampires. Its signature mechanic: units that fall in combat rise again after each battle as skeletons or undead, generating a continuous stream of passive reinforcements. This accumulation mechanic makes Necropolis especially threatening in long campaign games where every engagement strengthens rather than depletes the army.

Its weakness is a slow early game. Opening turns are less explosive than Dungeon’s, and impatient players may feel at a disadvantage before the snowball begins. In experienced hands on longer maps, however, Necropolis becomes very difficult to stop.

Grove (Murmurwoods) brings together the creatures of the forest — elemental spirits, fey folk and spellcasters. It is the most accessible faction for beginners without sacrificing competitive viability. Its early advantage comes from ranged damage spread across multiple unit tiers: Fauns, Faun Archers, Aqualotls and Herbomancers provide consistent backline output that teaches positioning and rear-line management naturally.

Grove also forgives early mistakes more than most factions, particularly positioning errors in the opening turns.

B-Tier: Temple and Hive — solid but more specialized

Temple represents humans guided by the High Inquisition. Its starting cavalry is strong, its economy scales stably and its buff mechanics are among the most intuitive in the game. For these reasons, Temple is the other faction recommended for beginners: it teaches HoMM fundamentals — frontline tanking, buffing key units, controlling resources — without throwing confusing mechanics at new players.

Its power ceiling is lower than Dungeon or Necropolis in advanced mid-game, however. Against experienced players, Temple lacks the flexibility to reverse unfavorable situations. A solid faction for learning the game, less ideal for pushing competitive ladders.

Hive plays on a swarm mentality: fast units, precise strikes, quantity over individual quality. The faction shines in aggressive early rushes and quick confrontations but struggles in long attrition games where the depth of other factions expresses itself fully. Its swarm interaction kit demands a learning curve that beginners may find counterintuitive.

C-Tier: Schism — promising, watch for patches

Schism is a splinter group of the Alvar Pact that awakened eldritch monsters from the Plane Between Planes. It is the most thematically original faction and the least optimized mechanically in the current Early Access state.

Its eldritch units have unpredictable behaviors that can catch opponents off guard — but can also backfire against their own army. This asymmetry is fascinating in theory and difficult to master in practice. Unfrozen has confirmed balance passes in its 2026 roadmap; Schism is worth reassessing after each major update.

Which faction suits your playstyle?

Playstyle	Recommended faction
Complete beginner	Grove or Temple
Aggressive, early tempo	Dungeon or Hive
Economy and long attrition	Necropolis
Map exploration, campaign	Necropolis or Grove
Advanced mastery, multiplayer	Dungeon
Experimentation, asymmetric play	Schism

Faction Laws and morale: two rules you can’t ignore

Faction Laws are chains of upgrades unique to each faction, unlocked through points accumulated during combat. These progressive bonuses define your army’s identity from mid-game onward. Two players running the same faction can produce very different results depending on their Law choices — this is one of the layers of depth that sets Olden Era apart from a classic HoMM game.

Army morale: units from different factions within the same army suffer a Morale penalty that reduces their stats in combat. Prefer single-faction compositions or split factions across two distinct heroes if you want to leverage cross-faction synergies without the morale hit.

With 90% positive reviews on Steam and one million copies sold, Olden Era is one of the most successful strategy releases of 2026. Our full Early Access review and the breakdown of the 1 million sold milestone and 2026 roadmap give you a complete picture of where the game stands today.

Sources

HoMM Olden Era: 1 Million Copies Sold and an Ambitious Early Access Roadmap

Sat, 06 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era Crosses 1 Million Copies and Reveals Its Early Access Roadmap

Released in Early Access on April 30, 2026, Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era — developed by Unfrozen, published by Hooded Horse — surpassed 500,000 copies sold in its first 72 hours. On May 28, 2026, the studio announced crossing the one million copies milestone in under a month, simultaneously releasing a detailed preliminary Early Access roadmap.

One million copies, concrete timelines, and structured stages: this revival of the legendary strategy franchise is built to last.

Where Is the Game Now?
Stage 1 — Q3 2026: Teamplay and Advanced Map Generator
Stage 2 — Q4 2026: Matchmaking, Subclasses, and Replays
Long-Term Goals: Underground, Roguelike, and Full Campaign
What This Means for the Franchise

Where Is the Game Now?

The Early Access already features six playable factions — Temple, Grove, Dungeon, Necropolis, Schism, and Hive — with customizable heroes, city development, and turn-based tactical battles on hexagonal battlefields. The game is priced at $39.99 on Steam and is also part of PC Game Pass since launch.

Since April, Unfrozen has shipped several patches: multiplayer UI improvements, turn-timer refinements for fairer online matches, crash fixes, and a new “Moderate” difficulty setting. For a full look at the game’s launch state, check out our HoMM: Olden Era Early Access review.

Stage 1 — Q3 2026: Teamplay and Advanced Map Generator

The community’s most requested feature leads the roadmap. Stage 1 (planned for Q3 2026) includes:

Teamplay Mode — team vs team (2v2, 3v3) against other players or AI. Unfrozen confirmed this is the single most-requested feature.
Advanced Random Map Generator — more customization options: density settings, zone types, and events for greater variety.
Hero Skills Rebalance — in-depth revision of the skill system to break rigid metas and encourage build diversity.
Emote Wheel Update — social experience improvements for online play.

Stage 2 — Q4 2026: Matchmaking, Subclasses, and Replays

Stage 2 (Q4 2026) focuses on competitive infrastructure and class depth:

Matchmaking System Rework — redesigned queue for more balanced games, especially in ranked modes.
Subclass System Rebalance — revising advanced class progression for more viable tournament diversity.
Observer Mode & Replays — watch live games or review your own battles; essential for competitive improvement.
Alternative Creature Upgrade Rebalance — upgrade choices should carry greater strategic weight.

Long-Term Goals: Underground, Roguelike, and Full Campaign

Beyond the two stages, the roadmap lists general Early Access objectives:

Feature	Details
Underground Layer	A simultaneous map level with unique terrain, objects, and music — a HoMM III hallmark
Thieves’ Guild	Return of the espionage institution from the classic series
Tier 8 Neutral Creatures	High-tier neutral creatures populating the maps
Map Editor Improvements	Enhanced editor and map-sharing between players
Ironman Mode	Permadeath for the solo campaign
Match Statistics	End-of-match data for performance analysis
New PvE Mode	An alternative co-op or solo mode in development
Roguelike Mode	Procedural runs — currently being explored
Complete Solo Campaign	Finalizing the game’s main story

The Underground Layer is particularly anticipated — it’s one of HoMM III’s defining mechanics, and its absence in the current build remains the clearest sign that the game is still under development.

What This Means for the Franchise

One million copies in under a month — for an Early Access title in a franchise that had been dormant for years — sends an unmistakable signal: the demand was real. Unfrozen delivered something solid enough to win over players well beyond nostalgic HoMM III fans.

The roadmap is clearly structured with concrete timelines, a sharp contrast with vague Early Access projects that keep milestones intentionally fuzzy. If Unfrozen delivers on the Q3/Q4 schedule, Olden Era could reach a very complete state before end of 2026, well ahead of a full 1.0 launch.

Whether you’re a HoMM III veteran or new to the franchise, this is a strong moment to jump in.

Sources

Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era — Early Access Analysis After the Million-Copy Milestone

Wed, 13 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

A Million Copies Settles the Credibility Question

On May 28, 2026, Unfrozen announced that Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era had passed one million copies sold. The milestone landed less than a month after its Early Access launch on April 30. Sales say nothing about the content itself, but they change the question. The franchise has already come back commercially. What does this Early Access build contain once the launch noise fades?

Ten years separate the quiet release of Heroes of Might & Magic VII in 2015 from this comeback, built by independent studio Unfrozen and distributed by Hooded Horse. In between, the franchise mostly survived through mobile spin-offs and re-releases, never through a genuine turn-based successor. This gap explains part of why the million-copy figure landed so hard in strategy circles.

This piece does not claim any hands-on time with Olden Era. It analyzes what the studio and the Steam listing confirm, faction by faction and system by system, without repeating the unverifiable numbers and impressions that circulated at launch.

An Early Access Build, Not a Finished Release

Worth stating plainly before going further: Olden Era is sold and presented as Early Access, not a full release. Every system described below should be read with that distinction in mind. A Faction Laws tree or a game mode confirmed today can still be adjusted, expanded, or rebalanced before version 1.0, and Unfrozen’s own communication doesn’t claim otherwise.

That structural caution shapes how the rest of this article should be read. Each section describes a system confirmed by Steam or by Unfrozen, not a verdict on its balance or its staying power over long sessions. Making that call needs playtime this article doesn’t claim to have.

Six Confirmed Factions at Early Access Launch

Early Access ships with six playable factions: Temple, Dungeon, Schism, Grove, Necropolis and Hive. No seventh faction has been confirmed at this stage by Unfrozen or by the Steam listing; any longer list circulating online is community speculation, not official information.

Each faction has its own Faction Laws tree and its own active abilities, two systems covered in more detail below. That architecture, more than the raw faction count, is what carries the real promise of the game: reviving the series’ turn-based formula instead of settling for a graphical reskin of Heroes III. Six factions at an Early Access launch is a solid number for this kind of release; whether that number grows is for version 1.0 to prove, not for this article to predict.

Judging that roster against a franchise entry’s full, post-expansion lineup would be an unfair comparison at this stage. Olden Era is a first Early Access build, not a finished product with years of content updates behind it. The fairer question is whether these six factions play differently enough from each other to justify the wait, and that’s a question only the Faction Laws system, detailed next, can really answer.

Faction Laws and Active Abilities: the Two Systems to Watch

Unfrozen presents the Faction Laws system as the mechanic that separates each side beyond its unit roster. In practice it’s a ruleset unique to each faction, unlocked over the course of a match, that reshapes how that faction is meant to be played. Without direct access to the game, there’s no way to judge real balance here. Only the structure of the system is confirmed by official sources, not how it feels across a full campaign.

Active abilities round out that system in combat: they trigger on command, unlike passive bonuses that apply automatically every round. Together, Faction Laws and active abilities form the customization layer Unfrozen points to as the justification for Early Access rather than an immediate full launch.

Every modular rule tree carries the same risk: if one Law clearly outperforms the rest, the entire tree collapses into a single optimal path and the promise of customization falls apart. That’s something only time and a community that has picked the system apart can verify — not launch-day marketing copy.

The opposite risk exists too. A tree that’s too flat can make every choice feel interchangeable, which kills strategic interest just as effectively as one Law that clearly outperforms the rest. Between those two traps, Unfrozen’s margin for error is narrow, and it’s exactly the kind of tuning an Early Access period is supposed to sharpen before a final release.

Solo Content: Tutorial, Campaign Act One, and Ready-Made Scenarios

Solo content in Early Access is deliberately limited: a tutorial, the first act of the narrative campaign, and a handful of ready-made scenarios playable independently of the main story. That reduced scope lines up with Early Access status — Unfrozen doesn’t promise a complete campaign at launch, and neither does the store listing.

A player who wants a full, complete narrative experience right now won’t find it in Early Access yet. But for anyone testing the core strategic loop — exploration, town management, tactical combat — before committing to version 1.0, this slice is already enough to get a feel for the game’s skeleton.

Classic, Single Hero and Arena: Three Modes, Solo and Multiplayer

Three modes ship with Early Access: Classic, the full formula of exploration, town management and combat, and Single Hero, a leaner variant built around a single commander. Arena rounds out the lineup, geared toward faster, more direct fighting. All three are playable both solo against the AI and in multiplayer, which gives Early Access several distinct entry points.

A player short on time can stick to Arena for quick matches, while a series veteran will likely head straight for Classic to find the franchise’s full loop. How these three modes balance against each other over the long run is a question only sustained community playtime, spread across months, can settle properly.

Multiplayer being available across all three modes from day one of Early Access is worth flagging on its own. Many strategy titles push that piece to a later update, precisely because it demands heavy synchronization and anti-cheat work. Shipping it at launch says more about where Unfrozen puts its priorities — competitive online play — than any marketing statement could.

The Million-Copy Milestone: What It Actually Changes

The May 28, 2026 announcement puts Olden Era among the fastest strategy Early Access titles to reach that threshold in recent years. For an independent studio like Unfrozen, that number most likely secures funding for the rest of this year’s promised roadmap — it doesn’t guarantee anything about the finished game’s quality.

The practical consequence for players is different. A title that has already hit this sales level statistically stands a better chance of getting real ongoing support than a niche Early Access release struggling to fund its own roadmap. That’s not a quality guarantee, but it’s an economic signal that would be dishonest to ignore when weighing the risk of buying into Early Access.

This signal should still be read for what it is: a sales figure, not a quality score. An Early Access title can sell a million copies on nostalgia for the license alone, then stall on content if the studio doesn’t follow through. Nothing in the May 28 announcement prejudges what comes next — it simply documents a strong commercial starting point, one to weigh against the update pace the community observes in the months ahead.

What to Watch Now

Top priority to track: how balance shakes out across the six factions once the community has fully theorycrafted the Faction Laws trees. A second priority is how quickly Unfrozen adds campaign content beyond the confirmed first act. What to avoid for now: buying purely on the promise of a complete campaign, since that content remains limited to its first act at this stage.

Anyone deciding whether to buy in now versus waiting for a later Early Access build should weigh two things separately. The first is whether the current strategic loop — exploration, town management, tactical combat across three modes — is already enough to hold interest. The second is whether they’re comfortable with systems that may still shift before 1.0. Those are two different risk tolerances, and conflating them is how buyers end up disappointed by a build that never claimed to be finished. For more on the game’s commercial trajectory, our post-million-copies roadmap recap covers the next steps the studio has announced.

Developer: Unfrozen.
Publisher: Hooded Horse.
Platform: PC (Steam).
Price: $39.99.
Status: Early Access since April 30, 2026.
Steam App ID: 3105440.

Olden Era — After Strategy

HoMM Olden Era campaign walkthrough: every mission and route (2026 guide)

Campaign mission order

Garner Hills: the tutorial with no recruiting

Into the Woods: red crystals and a collapsing path

Never-ending Conflict: catching up with the AI

Burning Hearts: south first

Temple route: Saving the Knight and Renegade

Necropolis route: Deal with a Vampire and Corruption

Alvar Diruil: plan the evacuation before the fight

The Mirage is not a campaign mission

Going further

HoMM Olden Era 0.82: The New Attack/Defense Damage Formula Explained

What shipped on October 29

Why the old formula faded out in the late game

The new rule: only the gap matters

What the formula changes in an actual game

Battle Magic, Battlecraft and First Aid

An AI that retreats, and fewer absurd streaks

What to watch next

Going further

HoMM: Olden Era — Alliances and the Advanced Random Map Generator Are Finally Here

Alliances: playing together without waiting for your ally

How to start an Alliance game

A random map generator built for PvE

The rest of the patch

Since the patch: a hotfix and a balance beta

What to watch

Going further

HoMM Olden Era: two new maps in September, Alliances coming next

Prisoners and Broken Alliance, two maps

The announced Roadmap Patch

What to watch at the time

Going further

HoMM Olden Era Patch 13: The Mysterious Island brings a solo map and a new Arena

The Mysterious Island, a six-faction solo map

Arena Mode: rerolls and starting bonuses

What to watch

Going further

HoMM Olden Era Patch #11: The Necromancy Rework, and Does It Really Change Necropolis?

Necromancy before Patch #11: why it felt stuck

What the rework actually changes

The price of flexibility: fewer units raised

The other changes in the patch

What has happened since July

What to watch now

Going further

HoMM Olden Era: the Alvari Cup, first official tournament, has a €5,000 prize pool

Format and prize pool

A game still on the move

What to watch

Going further

HoMM Olden Era: Mysterious Island Coming, Papyjama Joins Unfrozen

Papyjama joins Unfrozen: what this hire actually means

The Mysterious Island: Olden Era’s first giant PvE content

Patch #8: Summon Avatar reworked, competitive meta shifted

Patch #10 and Early Access state in July 2026

What to watch now

Sources

HoMM Olden Era faction tier list 2026 — which army should you pick?

Six factions, six combat philosophies

Table of contents

S-Tier: Dungeon — the power of the Alvar Pact

A-Tier: Necropolis and Grove — powerful and more forgiving

B-Tier: Temple and Hive — solid but more specialized

C-Tier: Schism — promising, watch for patches

Which faction suits your playstyle?

Faction Laws and morale: two rules you can’t ignore

Sources

HoMM Olden Era: 1 Million Copies Sold and an Ambitious Early Access Roadmap

Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era Crosses 1 Million Copies and Reveals Its Early Access Roadmap

Table of Contents

Where Is the Game Now?

Stage 1 — Q3 2026: Teamplay and Advanced Map Generator

Stage 2 — Q4 2026: Matchmaking, Subclasses, and Replays

Long-Term Goals: Underground, Roguelike, and Full Campaign

What This Means for the Franchise

Sources

Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era — Early Access Analysis After the Million-Copy Milestone

A Million Copies Settles the Credibility Question