It seems like Valve just can't stop publishing huge Dota Underlords patches every week. Just over seven days ago Arc Warden—a hero core to a powerful strategy—was hit with the nerf hammer, reshaping the meta. This week's update sees the game take a step away from its ancestor Dota Auto Chess: instead of fighting against 'shadow armies', clones of your oppents' lineups, players now fight in a direct 1v1.

While the change may seem small, it's a very welcome one in terms of gameplay experience. Previously it very often didn't feel as though you were playing against real opponents, given that everyone was sitting in their own dungeon fighting shadow armies. It wasn't rare for "dead rounds"  to occur, in which not a single player lost health as they all won their respective battles. Now, however, you'll know that everything is on the line.

20 heroes and their shiny new outfits

A step towards Dota Auto Chess was taken too. Aside from the stars floating above heroes' heads, heroes will don a new skin once upgraded. Partially because it looks really cool, but it also greatly helps to inform players about a board state.

Here are the new skins for all 20 heroes!

Full patch notes:

• Players are now paired off to fight directly against each other, and both take part in the same shared combat.
• When an odd number of players are present one of the players fights a clone of an actual player.
• Leaderboard now pairs off players when they're in head-to-head combat.

• Rank is now a number you can see that moves up and down in a predictable way.
• Rank change is based solely on where you finish in a Ranked match and does not depend on your opponents' Rank.
• Any time you reach the next minor Rank, we also grant bonus rank points.
• Just like before, once you obtain a major Rank, it's locked in and you cannot drop below it
• More details and breakdown of rank thresholds here.

New Casual Multiplayer Mode:

• Play multiplayer games without affecting your Rank.
• You will be matched against opponents of your same skill level.
• You can queue up solo or with friends.
• This is where you experiment with new builds, or complete those elusive challenges.
• Daily Challenges and Achievements can be earned in Casual Multiplayer matches.

Ranked Multiplayer Mode Updates:

• Your Rank (Enforcer I, Upstart III, etc) is used to find opponents.
• Play Ranked matches solo or in a party, see this blog post for details about party ranked.
• New players will need to unlock ranked mode by playing 5 casual games. (Don't worry, accounts with at least one Multiplayer game will be grandfathered in.)
• Daily Challenges and Achievements can be earned in Ranked Multiplayer matches.

• Complete achievements to earn Proto Pass XP
• Complete an entire tier of achievements to unlock equippable Banner Sigils (i.e. complete all three 1-star Economy achievements to unlock the piggy sigil)

Added 2-Star and 3-Star look upgrades to the following Heroes:

• Abaddon
• Arc Warden
• Anti-Mage
• Clockwerk
• Doom
• Dragon Knight
• Drow Ranger
• Gyrocopter
• Kunkka
• Lina
• Luna
• Medusa
• Mirana
• Phantom Assassin
• Queen of Pain
• Razor
• Templar Assassin
• Timbersaw
• Tiny
• Venomancer

• Round damage eliminated for rounds 4-9. Round Damage starts at round 11, at 2 damage, and proceeds as before from then on (3 starting at round 20, 4 at round 30, etc.).
• Whenever a player loses a round against another player, the loser gains a free reroll the next round. This reroll is not stackable, so use it or lose it.

• Fixed solo games / tutorial not ending (staying on an empty board screen) when you are not connected to Steam.
• Fixed Spirit Bear HP bar offset
• Fixed Defeat screen sometimes not showing correct units and damage
• Fixed healing-disabling items not applying in neutral waves
• Clarified some alliance text
• Fixed an issue where an incorrect message was sent when a Divine Rapier was stolen
• Fixed an issue with players being shown to have completed their rounds on the leaderboard before that was actually true
• Fixed Deadeye units not switching away from unselectable targets.
• Fixed Unstoppable (now Helm of the Undying) triggering too early.
• Fixed incorrect stun duration after Burrow Strike bump.
• Further particle effect optimizations across all platforms.
• Fixed crashes when resuming app on iOS
• Several optimizations for ARM Mali GPUs
• Added option (defaults to on) to automagically deploy units from your bench if you have room on the board and combat begins before you had time to do so yourself.

• Updated post-game screen with progress, stats, and scoreboard
• Improved mobile responsiveness to touch events (dragging, scrolling, etc.)
• General UI updates and polish

• Fixed playing the startup animation if you start spectating or reconnect to a game after the first round
• Spectators can now see the shop of players from the same party that they started the match with

Crystal Maiden:

• Maximum Health changed from (450, 900, 1800) to (550, 1100, 2000)
• Gold Cost changed from 2 to 3

Eidolon:

• Attack Damage Minimum changed from (40, 50) to (40, 80)
• Attack Damage Maximum changed from (60, 70) to (60, 120)
• Armor changed from 20 to (5, 10)
• Maximum Health changed from 300 to (300, 600)

Juggernaut:

• Juggernaut will only cast Blade Fury when he's surrounded by at least 2 enemies.

Lina:

• Gold Cost changed from 3 to 2

Ogre Magi:

• Bloodlust:
  
  • Self Bonus Attack Speed changed from (35, 55, 75) to (50, 90, 130)
  • Other Bonus Attack Speed changed from (30, 40, 50) to (30, 65, 100)

Shadow Fiend:

• Attack Range changed from 4 to 3
• Requiem of Souls:
  
  • Projectile Start Width changed from 125 to 128
  • Projectile End Width changed from 425 to 256

Venomancer:

• Plague Ward:
  
  • Number of Wards spawned changed from (1, 1, 3) to (1, 1, 1)
  • Maximum Health changed from (200, 200, 240) to (200, 220, 240)
  • Attack Damage Minimum changed from (50, 80, 120) to (50, 100, 150)
  • Attack Range changed from 6 to 8
  • Attack Damage Maximum changed from (55, 100, 140) to (55, 110, 170)

Witch Doctor:

• Paralyzing Cask:
  
  • Cooldown changed from 10 to 15

Alliance items have been disabled. Many of these effects have been migrated to Alliances or Equipment. The rest went back into the Underlords Vault.

New Items:

• Helm of the Undying: Tier 2 Defensive Equipment: "+5 Armor. Equipped hero survives for an extra 4 seconds after receiving a killing blow."
• Bracers of Desperation: Tier 3 Support Equipment: "Equipped hero resets their cooldown and gets full mana when below 30% health. Attack target's magic resistance is reduced by 30%."
• Poaching Knife: Tier 3 Offensive Equipment: "Equipped hero has a 30% chance of producing 1 gold when they kill an enemy. Attacks against units with less than 20% health crit for 200%."
• Dawning of Ristul: Tier 3 Global Item: "Healing for both crews is reduced by 50%."

Removed Items:

• Cloak
• Recruiter
• Vicious Intent
• Wicked Intent

Item Changes:

Big-Time Contract

• Changed from "Equipped unit is Blood-bound in addition to its other types." to "+250 Health. Equipped unit is Blood-bound in addition to its other types."

Brooch of the Martyr

• Changed from "+50% Mana gained from receiving damage." to "+50% Mana gained from receiving damage. +50% debuff resistance."

Chainmail

• Bonus Armor changed from +7 to +10

Claymore

• Attack Damage changed from +21 to +30

Gloves of Haste

• Attack Speed changed from +20 to +25

Hood of Defiance

• Tier changed from 3 to 1

Octarine Essence

• Tier changed from 2 to 3

Tranquil Boots

• Health Regen changed from +16 to +25

Force Staff

• Now pushes melee attackers away from the equipped hero when taking damage.

• Elusive: Level 3 Alliance (9 heroes) - changed from "Allied Elusive units gain +75% evasion" to "All units gain +75% evasion."
• Warlock: Healing Link duration changed from 3 seconds to 2 seconds
• Brawny: Changed from "All Brawny units have their Maximum HP increased by 200/500" to "All Brawny units gain +30/60 maximum HP for each kill they have."
• Savage: Changed from "Allies gain +10/25/45% Attack Damage" to "Allied Savage units apply a stackable 5/10/15 damage/s bleed on attack for 3s. Duration refreshes each attack."
• Shaman: Changed from "Enemies affected by Hexes, Silences or Stuns will generate -200% mana" to "Units attacking a Shaman have a 17% chance of being turned into a chicken and hop 4 cells in a random direction."
• Primordial: Changed from "Enemies attacking Primordial/Allied units have a 25% chance to have their attack speed slowed by 50% each attack. This effect is applied at the start of the attack and lasts for the duration of the attack." to "Allied Primordial units spawn a rank 1/2 Eidolon on death. Eidolons are ranged Primordial units that don't spawn Eidolons."
• Inventor: Changed from "Allied Inventors get 15/40 HP regen" to "Allied Inventors explode on death dealing 15/30% of their Max Health to all enemies 1 cell away"
• Demon Hunter: In addition to the existing bonuses both levels now also have "All Demon Hunters gain 30% Pure Damage for each unique allied Demon unit."
• Assassin: Level 3 Alliance (9 heroes) - In addition to the existing bonuses level 3 now also has "All Assassins also blind enemies 1 cell away from where they land for 2 seconds (50% miss chance and 50% less mana when attacked)"