Economy & ascension
One currency, earned one way: walking. And one long-game decision: ascension.
Gold rules
- Gold comes from victory rewards only — normal enemies, bosses and Elder biome bosses (see curves).
- It is spent on hero upgrade tiers, endless hero levels and cosmetic outfits. That’s the whole economy; there is no second currency, no premium tier, no real-money path.
- Every purchase shows its cost and exact effect before a two-tap confirm (small repeatable level buys skip the confirm).
- Balances saturate at 4·1018 and can never go negative — a huge offline walk can never be refused for overflow.
- Rest is safe: no decay, no streak to lose, no missed-day penalty of any kind.
Cosmetics
Outfits are pure looks — bought at the town Outfitter with play-earned gold, previewed on the hero before buying. They never change combat, step credit, actions or rewards, and an ascension never takes them away. Cosmetic IDs are deliberately separate from gameplay hero IDs.
Trailblazer
Cap, staff and pack · free starter look
Ranger
Hood, bow, quiver · 100 gold · area 2
Trail Knight
Helmet, sword, shield · 250 gold · area 3
Pathfinder Mage
Wizard hat, wand, robes · 500 gold · area 4
Ascension & renown
Ascension is the voluntary long-game reset: give up the current run for permanent renown that makes every future step hit harder. It is opt-in — waiting loses nothing, and the game tells you exactly what a reset does before you confirm it.
Current rules (v3)
| Opens at | Area 50 of the current run. |
| Renown formula | A run reaching area a is worth ⌊(a − 10)² ÷ 10⌋ renown in total — area 50: 160, area 60: 250, area 90: 640. |
| Banking | Renown is held from your deepest run. An ascension adds only the part above the renown you already hold — a shallower repeat earns nothing until you beat your record. The Ascension page names the area to beat. |
| Effect | Each renown point adds +25% of base per-step damage (rounded up). It never grants attacks, steps, gold or areas. |
What a reset takes — and keeps
Reset by ascension
- Current area, enemy progress, this run’s boss record
- Gold on hand
- All owned hero upgrades and hero levels
- Selected hero (back to Wanderer)
- Focus/surge attack streak
Always preserved
- Lifetime approved steps and used actions
- Every earned badge (records never reset)
- Renown rank and ascension count
- Best-area and best-damage records
- Lifetime gold-earned tally
- Recruited heroes, owned/equipped cosmetics
- The whole Active Trial (depth, clears, bonus)
The reset, its rank increment and its sync operation commit in one database transaction — a crash can neither lose the rank nor reset twice.
History
v1 paid 1 renown (+10% each) from area 11. v2 paid area − 10 renown (+25% each) from area 11 — until simulations showed daily resets beat walking deeper, which v3 fixed with the Area 50 gate and deepest-run banking. Existing profiles converted forward with their value kept.