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The Underlords
Mendechaus
The god of all that is evil. He summons forth the various Underlords under his control to conquer the world and destroy the gods of light.
- God of Evil: He wears the title proudly.
Oberon
The player character. An Underlord who has been brought back from the void by Mendechaus to be his right-hand man.
- Jack of All Stats: Has no particular specialization when it comes to how he operates.
- Silent Protagonist: The only Underlord who doesn't speak often, if at all.
- Super Mode: In the final two levels of the game, Oberon uses the power of the Kenos to boost his mana reserves and how fast they recharge, double his default Worker population, and disrupt the mana pools of other Underlords.
- Technicolor Fire: His dungeons are themed around green hellfire, with a rocky heart as his cores.
Marcus
An Underlord who betrayed Mendechaus, guarding the caverns he and his Underlords were sealed within in return for amnesty.
- Defector from Decadence: Turned his back on the Underlords before they were sealed away.
- Defiant to the End: Even after his core is destroyed, he merely pities Oberon's inability to see what Mendechaus has planned.
- Heel–Face Turn: At least, as far as objective alignment is concerned.
Rhaskos
An Underlord who has been pushed back to his own Realm by the dwarven clans assaulting him. Oberon is sent to protect him.
- Evil Is Visceral: His dungeons are fleshy and red, and his core is a mass of tentacles.
- Villainous BSoD: Spends a lot of his time undergoing this, as his only core left is severely weakened. He also claims to remember another life where he was nowhere near as heinous as he is now, and is not taking it well.
Mira
An Underlord that is assigned to help Oberon take an evil artifact known as the Kenos from the Empire.
- Drunk with Power: After stealing the Kenos for herself, she whisks it away to her home realm and attempts to attune with it, allowing the power to go to her metaphysical head.
- Hold the Line: She attempts to stall for time by building a majority of her structures between you and her core.
- Sinister Geometry: Mira's dungeons are a cyan color full of perfect right angles, and her core is an ever-shifting cube.
- The Starscream: The crossover with Wicked Ones states that she dreams of supplanting Mendachus.
Korvek
An Underlord who spends as much time fighting himself as he does his enemies.
- Dual Boss: Aside from being part of a four-lord free-for-all, his dungeon is unique in that he has two separate cores controlled by his divided consciousness.
- Fatal Flaw: Korvek's self-sabotage means that while he has powerful minions and a fortified position, he rarely spares the time to branch out or press his advantage.
- Literal Split Personality: His mind is so fragmented that each core he sets up is controlled by separate parts of himself that torment him constantly, to the point where his core is a circle of incomplete statues.
- Stone Wall: His methods are very defense-oriented, entrenching himself in a singular area, and making no effort to move until there's no other option. By then, however, he's usually trained his monsters close to the max level.
Kasita
An Underlord preoccupying herself with hoarding as many trophies, coins and monsters as she can manage. She's the player character of the Heart of Gold expansion.
- Bling of War: Her dungeons are lavishly-decorated, with her core being a giant diamond orbited by gold rings.
- Collector of the Strange: She's dedicated herself to having as vast and wide a collection as she can.
- Conspicuous Consumption: She's just as eager to throw her money around as she is to gain it, and typically has large amounts of Gold Sentinels on hand, alongside choosing the gold-focused Colossus as her first Titan the moment she's able to.
- Fatal Flaw: Her need to have everything to herself presses her to attack other Keepers in a Mêlée à Trois to try and have their resources. As a result, however, she tends to spread herself and her minions thin, and it can be easy to starve her out since all of her resources are fueled by gold.
- Lava Pit: More specifically, moats of molten gold.
- Zerg Rush: Has a lot of monsters under her thumb, and will utilize them at a moment's notice.
Draven
An Underlord who makes a point of trying to steal the spotlight for himself whenever possible.
- The Caligula: During the story mission he appears in, you can overhear him slapping an imp to death and valuing it as more important than any actual strategy. He likes to talk a lot about conquest and bloodshed in general, in fact.
- Evil Gloating: Will do so whenever given the chance, and sometimes when he hasn't been.
- Fatal Flaw: His reliance on quantity over quality, combined with his penchant for attacking the first outcropping of your dungeon he can find, means that he can be manipulated into a trap.
- Leeroy Jenkins: Is often the first to attack when it comes to a battle.
- Our Liches Are Different: Primarily specializes in undead, with a core that looks like four skulls fused at the backs of their heads, and a penchant for lining his defenses with Wells of Souls and Bone Chillers.
Underlord Minions
Underlord Minions in general
- Army of Thieves and Whores: They're all manner of depraved demons and sadistic creatures.
- Ragtag Bunch of Misfits
Augre
The Augre
The Augres are descended from an ancient sect of Ogres who revered the unparalleled Dwarven mastery over metalwork so much that they began to worship Torag, Dwarven God of the forge. They then began to reshape their lives around metallurgy and the creation of intricately designed machines. After some time, these creatures became so enamored with expertly crafted metalwork that they began to augment themselves with their creations by physically grafting metal and machines to their bodies to improve their skills in battle and at the forges where they work.
Augres are huge creatures who have infused pieces of metal and machinery into their bodies, giving them great skill at hammering the anvils in the Foundry, or bashing in the heads of invaders.
- Artificial Limbs: Replaced one of its hands with a crude hammer.
- Body Horror: They graft chunks of metal to their skin as body armor.
- Meaningful Name: The species name is a portmanteau based on "ogre" and "auger".
- Mighty Glacier: At 2000 HP, Augres are one of your toughest minions, but their movement speed is low.
- Our Ogres Are Hungrier
- Percussive Maintenance
- What Could Have Been: They were originally designed with tails. The game's lore addresses this by stating Augres once possessed tails, but lost them due to natural selection.
Bafu
The Bafu
The wicked Bafu is a creature of unimaginable horror the hails from a dark and evil place. Within the unlit depths that it calls home it has learned to hunt without eyes, and uses sound to pinpoint its victim’s location before impaling them with a vicious spines launched from its tail.
- Ballistic Bone: Fires these from its tail
- Fun with Acronyms: Badass Flying Unit.
- Glass Cannon: One of the most fragile Underlord Minions at 700 HP, but its spikes pack a punch.
- Make Me Wanna Shout: Its "Screech" ability, which lowers enemy movement speed
- More Teeth than the Osmond Family: The Bafu's face is almost entirely made up of its sharp-toothed grin.
- Spike Shooter: As its basic attack.
Beastmaster
- The Beastmaster
- Carnivore Confusion: Beastmaster has no problem eating micro-piglets. Lampshaded by one of the loading screen pictures, which shows a Beastmaster looking at a micro-piglet with a distressed expression.
- Combat Medic: Can heal beasts while having respectable combat stats himself.
- Pig Man: Of the boar variety
- Status Buff: He grants a movement speed buff to Beasts, and his level 5 ability increases the attack speed of all nearby Beasts.
- Support Party Member: He serves as this for beast minions by buffing and healing beasts in combat, and training beasts in the arena.
Chunder
- Big Eater: Chunders can eat micro-piglets raw from the slaughterpen without suffering a happiness penalty like other intelligent minions.
- Fartillery: Its level 5 ability "Chunderstorm" unleashes a fart powerful enough to stun and damage enemy minions.
- Gasshole
- Our Monsters Are Weird: Chunders are asexual creatures, and they reproduce by vomiting out their young.
- Percussive Maintenance
- Toilet Humour: Uses Fartillery in combat, makes bodily noises with all its actions, and even has a toilet throne as a lair.
- Use Your Head: The Chunder builds defenses and attacks enemies with its Hammer-shaped head.
- Visible Odor: Its farts and belches produce green mist, and brown gas can be seen rising from the Chunder's lair.
Crackpot
- Abnormal Ammo: Crackpots throw potions at enemy minions in combat.
- Addled Addict: The Crackpots are clearly missing a few screws and are a bit too fond of scarfing down their own potions.
- Alchemy Is Magic: The Crackpot can brew potions with fantastical effects in your alchemy lab, such as summoning ice monsters, teleporting minions to your Dungeon Core, or creating artificial gold.
- Descent into Addiction: Lorewise, the Crackpots were originally Gnarlings who got addicted to magical drugs.
- Fantastic Drug: The potions that they produce.
- Mad Scientist: Their wild feathered headgear evokes this atheistic by resembling Einstein Hair, and they work in a Alchemical Laboratory.
- Messy Hair: They have a feathered headgear that gives them the appearance of this.
- Professor Guinea Pig: They primarily test their new potions on themselves, which hasn't done wonders for their sanity.
- Squishy Wizard
Cultist
- Combat Medic: They can dish out a respectable amount of damage while healing your minions
- Damage-Increasing Debuff: The Cultist's level 5 ability "Desecration" applies this.
- Evil Sorcerer
- Forgets to Eat: Lampshaded and implied by their personal musings."I never get hungry in here, for some reason..."
- Injured Vulnerability: The cultist's basic attack deals more damage based on how much health the target minion has lost.
- In the Hood
- Religion of Evil: They worship their respective Underlord as a deity.
- Ritual Magic: Can perform this in the Sanctuary.
- Squishy Wizard
- Support Party Member: Can heal friendly minions and cripple enemies with debuffs.
Ember Demon
- Death Is Cheap: After death, Ember demons will just respawn at their Ember Rift.
- Defeat Equals Explosion: Ember Demon's "Ember Spirit" ability causes them to explode on death, which is particularly effective at taking out defenses.
- Elemental Embodiment: Lore places them as minor demons drawn from an elemental plane of fire.
- Incendiary Exponent: Ember Demons set all enemy units near them on fire with their attacks.
- Kill It with Ice: Quick Freeze Potions are extremely effective at shutting them down.
- Playing with Fire
- Weaksauce Weakness: Quick Freeze Potions, which One-Hit Kill them and prevent their Defeat Equals Explosion from going off. Destroying Ember Rifts will prevent the Demons from respawning.
- Wreathed in Flames
Frost Weaver
- An Ice Person: It slows nearby units speed with its presence and creates an icy explosion on death.
- Awesome, but Temporary: This creature has a huge hitpoint pool, but its hitpoints constantly drain, giving it a 1.5 minute lifespan.
- Defeat Equals Explosion: The Frost Weaver creates an icy explosion on death, stunning nearby units.
- Elemental Embodiment: They are minor demons from a plane of ice.
- Stone Wall: The Frost Weaver is excellent at defending with its slowing aura and immense hitpoint pool, but it has low damage and speed.
Ghoul
- Our Ghouls Are Creepier
- The Undead: Raised by a Necromancer from souls stored in the Crypt.
- We Have Reserves: These are minions meant to serve as Cannon Fodder for their respective Necromancer.
Gnarling
- Boring, but Practical: An army of Gnarlings isn't very exciting but is very effective, due to their well-rounded stats, and focus on training, it means that they often have a level advantage over other minions.
- Cool Helmet
- Dual Wielding: Armed with twin blades.
- Experience Booster: After getting the Barracks upgrade, Gnarlings can train other minions by working in the Barracks.
- Meaningful Name: Gnarling means "to twist into a knotted or distorted form".
- Our Goblins Are Different
- Spin Attack: The Gnarling's level 5 ability is one.
- Throwing Your Sword Always Works: Gnarlings can throw a shiv at enemy minions to reduce their movement speed.
Imp
- Colour-Coded for Your Convenience
- Death Is Cheap: Can always be respawned with the "Spawn Imp" spell.
- Evil Minions
- Happiness in Slavery: No matter what, they are always happy to serve their Underlord.
- We Have Reserves
- Worker Unit: A manifestation of an Underlord's will.
Necromancer
- Animate Dead: The Necromancer can naturally summon a ghoul from a Soul Pyre in the Crypt room(s). His level 5 ability is raising the recently slain, either from friendly or enemy units, as his temporary minions called revenants. Whenever the Necromancer gains a level, he will be able to summon two more minions. At level 10, he will have a legion of 20 ghouls at his command.
- Keystone Army: Ghouls are technically separate minions who are kept happy only by the presence of their Necromancer. Killing a necromancer without killing the ghouls first will cause those ghouls to blindly attack anything they see regardless of allegiance.
- Life Drain: the Necromancer heals himself and his remaining ghouls with 10% of their maximum health when one of his ghouls dies, or by draining the corpse of a fallen minion.
- Necromancer: He can spawn ghouls and revenants: the former are permanent, while the latter are temporary.
- Our Liches Are Different: The necromancer's undead appearance is reminiscent of one.
- The Undead
- Sickly Green Glow: Emits from several parts of the Necromancer's armor and created by his spells.
- Vampiric Draining: The Necromancer can drain health from corpses to heal himself and his ghouls, and he will also gain health whenever his ghouls die.
- Zerg Rush: A Necromancer can have two ghouls per level, allowing a Necromancer to have up to twenty ghouls.
Sentinel
- And I Must Scream: The Sentinels are animated by the souls of fallen Empire heroes, forced to fight against their brethren against their will.
- Awesome, but Impractical: The Sentinel is a powerful, well-rounded front-line unit, but it demands high wages in exchange for its service.
- Bling of War: Golden armour and sword.
- Living Statue: Made 100% out of Gold.
Shadow
- Back Stab: Shadows deal bonus damage when attacking a unit from invisibility.
- Blade Below the Shoulder: Their natural hands are sharpened blades.
- Casting a Shadow: They apperar to be composed of shadows, and use darkness to stun minions, Teleport Spam, and become invisible.
- Lightning Bruiser: Shadows can deal serious damage to enemy units, cover a lot of ground with Teleport Spam, and have above average hitpoints.
- Invisible Monsters: Shadows are naturally hidden from enemy sight until they attack. Conveniently, you can see your own Shadow creatures when they have turned invisible.
- Shadow Walker: Implied by their blink ability.
- Teleport Spam: They have a short-range blink ability they use liberally to transverse your dungeon.
- Visible Invisibility: The position of shadows can still be seen when they are invisible, thanks to the telltale cloud of darkness that surrounds them.
Skarg
- Boring, but Practical: They don't anything flashy in combat, but are quite effective as a meat shield for your more fragile beasts.
- Deadly Lunge: which also slows down their target's movement speed.
- Giant Spider
- Gradual Regeneration: Skargs slowly regenerate health outside of combat.
- Status Effects: Their leap ability slows units.
Succubus
- Barbie Doll Anatomy: Appears naked, but without any private parts or nipples showing.
- Charm Person: The Succubus can temporarily seduce a single enemy with her magic, rendering that unit helpless to her attacks.
- Horned Humanoid: Has a pair of horns sticking out of her head.
- Life Drain: Gains health by killing enemy units
- Percent Damage Attack: The Succubus can deal 25% of a target's current health as with her level five ability.
- Succubi and Incubi: Of the non-winged and tailless variety.
- Torture Technician: Works in the torture chamber to convert captured minions to your side.
- Vampiric Draining: After beguiling a victim, the Succubus can take 10% of the unit's health to heal herself.
Oculus
- Eldritch Abomination: Lore suggests that the Oculus are are part of an invasion of one from a Dream Land.
- Eye Beams: It's basic attack is one of these.
- Eyes Do Not Belong There
- Fragile Speedster: The oculus is fragile and has a weak attack, but is one of the fastest units in the game.
- Mind Rape: The Oculus's stun ability is implied to do this.
- Oculothorax
- Status Effects: It can stun minions in combat.
- Support Party Member: The oculus has low base stats but contributes to combat with a powerful stun.
- Telepathy
- The Speechless: unlike most other minions, the Oculus has no audio cues, and only produces sound in combat.
Vampire
- Achilles' Heel: The Empire's Huntress will instantly kill the Vampire if he is rendered unconscious.
- Armor-Piercing Attack: The Vampire deals True Damage with its active abilities.
- Awesome, but Impractical: In order to summon a Vampire, you must sacrifice three Intelligent minions (either your own or prisoners) in a Vampire Ritual. After that, the Vampire must be given a supply of prisoners to feed on, otherwise he will start to kill friendly units to sate his thirst.
- Life Drain
- Our Vampires Are Different: Of the Count Orlok variety.
- Resurrective Immortality: As long as a Huntress does not find his fallen body or if the Vampire is not captured, the Vampire will always resurrect at his lair.
- Teleport Spam
- The Undead
- Vampiric Draining
Witch Doctor
- Back from the Dead: Can also resurrect fallen units, but only one at a time on a lengthy cooldown.
- Combat Medic: can use their magic to hurt enemy minions, though they aren't very good at it
- Dispel Magic: Their 'Detox' ability causes debuffs to be dispelled from any unit the Witch doctor heals or buffs.
- Experience Booster: In the Spirit Chamber, the Witch Doctor can gradually increase a minion's level for a hefty gold cost.
- Soul Power: Can use spiritual power to buff minions combat or gift minions with the spirit's knowledge in the form of EXP.
- Support Party Member: Their primary role in combat is to buff and heal your other minions.
- Status Buff: Can give bonus movement speed and damage to a single minion with their 'Invigorate' ability.
- Witch Doctor
The Titans:
Four ancient, very powerful creatures that don't require food, sleep, or pay. The downside is that they require a Summon Stone building that costs five Sins to create, five minutes to be summoned, and any damage the summon stone takes is transferred to the Titan. Behemoth
- Anti-Structure: The Behemoth is especially good at destroying defensive structures.
- Expy: Of the Horned Reaper from Dungeon Keeper, being a large, red-horned demon that thrives in melee combat, and is even said to be descended from a race of "Red Reapers". Thankfully, it hasn't inherited the Horned Reaper's nuclear-grade temper.
Archon
- Herd-Hitting Attack: The Archon's abilities lend itself to taking out large hordes of minions very quickly.
Eternal
- Taking the Bullet: The Eternal has the ability to reduce damage done to a dungeon core by splitting damage done between the Core and itself.
Colossus
- Gradual Grinder: If any kind of gold is near it that isn't in its summoner's vault - whether it's in the earth, on the ground, or in the enemy vaults - it will siphon it off and deposit it into the summoner's vault whenever it's able. Not as immediately bad as attacking a Core or killing minions, but just as likely a death sentence in the long run on maps with limited gold reserves.
The Empire
Emperor Lucius
The current emperor of the kingdom. He assigns his men to watch over the various seals and contingencies made to keep the forces of evil in check.
Kira
The holy goddess aiding the Empire in keeping the forces of Mendechaus at bay.
Empire Minions
Empire Minions in general
- God of Good: They worship Kira, a goddess of light.
- Good Is Dumb: The heroes were meant to be naive and goofy.
- The Emperor: When the Underlords were repulsed out of the mortal realm of Kairos, the reigning Emperor was Uther. His son, Lucius, took the throne after Uther's death.
- The Empire: Subverted, as it is supposed to be comprised of order-keeping heroes of different creeds and races.
- Light Is Good: The units tend to wear White and Gold in their attires. If they are tortured into becoming servants of the Underlord, their outfits will look charred and ruined.
- Religion is Magic
Arcanist
Bard
- The Bard
- Improbable Weapon User: Wields a lute, which has a jagged blade attached to its frame.
- Instrument of Murder
- Magic Music
- Super-Reflexes: When utilizing his level 5 ability, Lute-Fu, the Bard is temporarily able to dodge all enemy attacks while using his Lute as a melee weapon.
- Support Party Member: Passively makes any allied unit happier with his music, as well as making them stronger in combat.
Disciple
- Cavalry of the Dead: Made up of fallen Empire soldiers who have returned to battle at the beckoning of a Matriarch.
Dwarven Worker
Firebreather
- Breath Weapon
- Of the Booze Flamethrower variety
- Cool Helmet: Wears a skull as a helmet.
Highguard
- Bling of War: Decked out in a golden suit of armour and brandishes a golden sword.
- Elite Mook
Huntress
- Arch-Enemy: Of anything Undead
- Automatic Crossbows: Wields one on her wrist.
- Badass Cape
- Fragile Speedster
- Glass Cannon
- Hunter of Monsters
Inquisitor
Juggernaut
- Heavily Armored Mook
- The Juggernaut
- Mighty Glacier
- Percussive Maintenance: He can use his huge hammer to build defense parts in the Foundry or enable Garrison's Bastion Aura.
Priestess
- Back from the Dead: Can resurrect one allied unit at a long cool-down.
- Church Militant
- Elective Mute
- Oddly enough, Priestesses can still talk during gameplay, despite the fact they are supposed to be 100% silent.
- Healing Hands
- The Medic
- White Magician Girl
Matriarch
- Cavalry of the Dead: She can summon a legion of fallen Empire soldiers to aid her in combat.
- Church Militant
- High Priest
- Power Floats
- White Magic
Templar
Temple Guard
Vanguard
Warden
