Wintershield sees a celebration of maps in the Realms, symbolizing our paths through the new year. As part of this year's tradition, the Champions have purchased a map from a Waterdeep street vendor. Then it started talking...

December 21st, 2022 is the beginning of both Wintershield 6 and Season 2: The Flayer Hunters! Wintershield 6 introduces Imoen, a rogue/wizard and member of the Heroes of Baldur's Gate, and brings back two of her fellow Baldur's Gate heroes: Viconia DeVir, Drow Cleric of Shar, and Baeloth the Entertainer, Drow Sorcerer and proprietor of The Black Pits! Players have until Monday, January 2nd, 2023 at 12 PM Pacific to complete their Wintershield 6 unlocks and objectives.

Season 2: The Flayer Hunters

This is also the launch of Season 2, featuring five of the Heroes of Baldur's Gate, specifically Nerys, Shandie, Krydle, Jaheira, and Viconia. For our Season 2 skins, we were very excited to collaborate with Max Dunbar to create The Flayer Hunters! All of these Champions have received updates and buffs, and you can see an overview of the changes we have made in the video below and in the game.



Aside from the Champion balance updates, we've been listening to your feedback about the quests and rewards. The quests for this season have been tweaked to reduce some of the grind players experienced in Season 1. We outright removed some of the most disliked quests and added new ones in their place.

On the rewards side, we've added an entirely new reward slot for non-season pass players, providing ten more items to that reward track. Some of these items will even increase the Season Champions' item level. For tier 11, we've removed the requirement that you must purchase all the items from tiers 1-10. Instead, tier 11 now has the same unlock requirement for both season pass and non-season pass players: simply purchase 40 items from tiers 1-10 and you're good to go! We have made some other adjustments to tier 11, removing several items, adding two new ones, and tweaking the costs and reward counts for the remaining items.

A lot of these changes were in response to player feedback, so please keep that feedback coming on the Idle Champions Subreddit, on the Steam forums, or on the Official Idle Champions Discord!

Imoen's Design

Imoen is a surprisingly cheerful young woman, considering she eventually discovered that she was the child of a deadly murder god. As an orphan, she moved to Candlekeep at the age of 10 with her adoptive father and innkeeper, Winthrop. Soon she traveled to Baldur's Gate with a childhood friend, where she joined forces with powerful Champions like Minsc and Jaheria.

Imoen is a Support and Healing Champion who complements her thieving abilities with spells! She boosts her party's damage whenever a Favored Foe is defeated, and while not primarily a spellcaster, she doesn't mind stepping in with an occasional Polymorph or Stoneskin spell. Once unlocked, you can find this Human Rogue/Wizard in Slot 11 opposite Jamilah. You can find out more in Imoen's Full Champion Spotlight.

Year Six Variants

• Adventure Variant 1: Heya! It's me, Imoen! - Help a poor map find its way home for the holidays with Imoen! Imoen joins the formation, and can't be moved or removed. Only Imoen and Champions next to her can deal damage.
  Complete Area 75.


• Adventure Variant 2: Mutton Mongering Riff Raff - Help a poor map find its way home for the holidays fighting against a menagerie of beasts. Imoen joins the formation, and can't be moved or removed. 1-2 Beasts spawn with every wave, who don't drop gold nor count towards quest progress.
  Complete Area 125.


• Adventure Variant 3: Gotta Go Fast To Cast Fast - Help a poor map find its way home while blasting monstrosities as quickly as you can. Imoen joins the formation and can be moved, but not removed. You may only use Champions with an INT of 12+ and/or Champions from the Heroes of Baldur's Gate affiliation. Imoen's base attack cooldown is reduced by 0.5 seconds for each Champion next to her. 1-2 Monstrosities spawn with every wave, but they don't drop gold nor count toward quest progress.
  Complete Area 175.

Remember that if you have feedback, let us know in a Community Q&A or Champion feedback post on the Idle Champions Subreddit, on the Steam forums, or on the Official Idle Champions Discord!

"So, you ready to go? I'd prefer to travel with you, if I could."

With a lighthearted outlook and a care-free disposition, Imoen has managed to remain cheerful even in the face of deadly enemies and startling revelations. With her thieves tools in one hand and powerful magic in the other, she is ready to deal with any challenge the formation encounters when she joins the Champions during Wintershield!

I. Imoen

Imoen is a surprisingly cheerful young woman considering she eventually discovered that she was the child of a deadly murder god. As an orphan, she moved to Candlekeep at the age of 10 with her adoptive father and innkeeper, Winthrop. Soon she traveled to Baldur's Gate with a childhood friend, where she joined forces with powerful Champions like Minsc and Jaheria.

Imoen is a Support and Healing Champion who complements her thieving abilities with spells! She boosts her party's damage whenever a Favored Foe is defeated, and while not primarily a spellcaster, she doesn't mind stepping in with an occasional Polymorph or Stoneskin spell. Once unlocked, you can find this Human Rogue/Wizard in Slot 11 opposite Jamilah.

II. Imoen's Stats

Race: Human	Alignment: Neutral Good
Class: Rogue/Wizard	Gender: Female	Pronouns: She/Her
Age: 20	Affiliation: Heroes of Baldur's Gate

STR: 9	DEX: 18	CON: 16
INT: 17	WIS: 11	CHA: 16

Role: Support, Healing
Eligible for Patrons: Mirt, Vajra, and Strahd
Slot: 11 (Jamilah)

III. Imoen's Design

As a recurring character in the Baldur's Gate series of video games, Imoen has proven herself as a valuable party member to join you on your quests. She also appears in several Baldur's Gate novels and even appears on a Magic: the Gathering card! When things are bleak, Imoen will be there with a joke to try and lighten spirits, and is excited to use her unique mixture of roguish and wizarding talents for good uses.

Imoen is focused on supporting the formation against her Favored Foe. She helps keep Optimism high by increasing the damage of adjacent Champions. With Perseverance she'll increase Optimism's damage boost every time any Champion's Favored Foe either appears or is defeated. For monsters that are not on her special list, Imoen can magically Polymorph them into an enemy that is the same type as her Favored Foe. Since the front-most column of the formation takes the brunt of attacks, she'll help them out by casting Stoneskin to give them a temporary hit point boost.

There are four Specializations that Imoen can choose from, making her regular attack do more damage against a specific type of enemy. She can focus on beasts, dragons, monstrosities, or aberrations, making them her Favored Foe and turning her ammo into Slaying Arrows for that specific type of creature. Usually Imoen attacks at range with her Short Bow, but if it's time to get up close and personal with her Ultimate, she'll pull out her short sword and lockpicks to leap into the fray! She'll Disarm Traps and strike multiple times dealing extra damage against hits-based enemies, proving as deadly with thieves' tools as she is with a weapon.

IV. Imoen's Abilities

Basic Attack

• Short Bow - Imoen makes a ranged attack against a random enemy, dealing one hit. Once her specialization is unlocked, Imoen prioritizes attacking Favored Foes, and she deals an additional 5 seconds of BUD-based damage with every hit to these enemies.

Formation Abilities

• Optimism - Imoen increases the damage of adjacent Champions by 100%.

• Perseverance - Any time any Champion's Favored Foe appears or is defeated, Imoen increases the effect of Optimism by 50%, stacking multiplicatively and then applying multiplicatively. Stacks up to 50 times. Stacks are reset each time the Champions change areas.

• Polymorph - Before every third attack, Imoen polymorphs a random non-boss non-static enemy into a monster with the same type as her Favored Foe, but only 10% of its original health. She can not polymorph enemies that are already polymorphed by this ability a second time.

• Stoneskin - Before every eighth attack, or upon entering a new area, Imoen casts Stoneskin on all Champions in the front-most column of the formation, granting them 300 temporary hit points. The amount is increased by 5% (additively) for each Favored Foe that is alive.

Specializations

• Beast Slaying Arrows - Beast enemies become Imoen's Favored Foe. Her Short Bow attacks against Beast enemies deal an additional BUD-based damage with each hit.

• Dragon Slaying Arrows - Dragon enemies become Imoen's Favored Foe. Her Short Bow attacks against Dragon enemies deal an additional BUD-based damage with each hit.

• Monstrosity Slaying Arrows - Monstrosity enemies become Imoen's Favored Foe. Her Short Bow attacks against Monstrosity enemies deal an additional BUD-based damage with each hit.

• Aberration Slaying Arrows - Aberration enemies become Imoen's Favored Foe. Her Short Bow attacks against Aberration enemies deal an additional BUD-based damage with each hit.

Ultimate Ability

• Disarm Traps - Imoen leaps out into the fray, attacking five enemies in sequence with her short sword in one hand and her lockpicks in the other. She prioritizes enemies with hits-based health and deals 5 hits per attack. If no hits-based enemies are available she deals normal ultimate damage to enemies she attacks.

V. Imoen's Epic Equipment

Slot 1: Global DPS	Slot 2: Optimism	Slot 3: Perseverance
Slot 4: Stoneskin	Slot 5: Ultimate Attack Damage	Slot 6: Ultimate Attack Cooldown

VI. Conclusion

The Heroes of Baldur's Gate have gained another ally! Let us know how much you enjoy Imoen in your formations in a Community Q&A or Champion feedback post on the Idle Champions Subreddit, on the Steam forums, or on the Official Idle Champions Discord!

Wintershield sees a celebration of maps in the Realms, symbolizing our paths through the new year. As part of this year's tradition, the Champions have purchased a map from a Waterdeep street vendor. And then it started talking...

Wintershield 5 introduces Viconia DeVir, Drow Cleric of Shar from Baldur's Gate and Siege of Dragonspear. Wintershield also brings back Baeloth the Entertainer, Drow Sorcerer, and proprietor of The Black Pits also hailing from the Baldur's Gate games, and Artemis Entreri, the Human Assassin who first appeared in RA Salvatore's 1988 novel The Crystal Shard. Players have until Monday, January 3rd at 12 PM Pacific to complete their Wintershield 5 unlocks and objectives.

I. Viconia DeVir

Viconia DeVir is a devout cleric of Shar, the goddess of darkness and loss. But don't mistake her cleric powers as a sign of her working for good. She may not approve of how the Champions operate, but if the quest and the payout are worthwhile, she's here and ready to assist.

Viconia is an evil alignment buffer who can reanimate dead enemies and turn them against their former friends. She also heals, but only if you get damaged enough to make it worth her time. Once unlocked, you can find this displaced drow in Slot 5 (Calliope)

II. Viconia's Stats

Race: Elf (Drow)	Alignment: Neutral Evil
Gender: Female	Pronouns: She/Her
Class: Cleric	Age: 270
Affiliation: Heroes of Baldur's Gate

STR: 10	DEX: 19	CON: 8
INT: 16	WIS: 18	CHA: 14

Role: Support, Healing

Eligible for Patrons: Mirt, Strahd, Zariel

Slot: 5, (Calliope)

III. Viconia's Design

Viconia DeVir is a character from the original Baldur's Gate video game, as well as Baldur's Gate II and Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear. Many of her powers, abilities, and personality were drawn from those games. We're excited to have another evil Champion joining the roster, as well as another member of the Heroes of Baldur's Gate! She may begrudgingly call Baeloth and Minsc 'friends', but the rest of the Champions are just allies that can help her accomplish her goals and earn some coin. She'll offer the other Heroes of Baldur's Gate buffs with her Cleric of Shar ability, and heal those Champions who are in dire need with Cure Medium Wounds. But her main focus during battle is seizing control of the lifeless bodies of their enemies and using Animate Dead to send them back against their former allies!

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

Year Five Variants

• Adventure Variant 1: Wandering Patrols — Help a poor map find its way home with Viconia. Viconia joins the formation. She can be moved but not removed from the formation. Each wave spawns 1-3 Flaming Fist Soldiers. They don't drop gold, nor do they count towards quest progress. Gold Find is reduced by 99%.
  Complete Area 75.


• Adventure Variant 2: Think About It — Only Champions with INT 13 or higher can be used. Each wave spawns 1-3 Drow Rangers that fire their ranged attack at a random Champion. These attacks also stun any non-elf Champion for 2 seconds due to sleep poison.
  Complete Area 125.


• Adventure Variant 3: Snarky Map — Help a poor map find its way home with Champions that aren't very nice. Only Evil Champions and other Heroes of Baldur's Gate Champions can deal damage. Enemies move 200% faster and deal 500% additional damage.
  Complete Area 175.

Getting to know Viconia: Viconia buffs both evil Champions and other Heroes of Baldur's Gate. Use these types of Champions to get the most out of her support abilities!

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

Wintershield sees a celebration of maps in the Realms, symbolizing our paths through the new year. As part of this year's tradition, the Champions have purchased a map from a Waterdeep street vendor. And then it started talking...

Wintershield 4 introduces Baeloth the Entertainer, Drow Sorcerer, and proprietor of The Black Pits. Wintershield also brings back Artemis Entreri, the Human Assassin who first appeared in RA Salvatore's 1988 novel The Crystal Shard, and Nerys Kathon, Human Cleric of Kelemvor, and Hero of Baldur's Gate. Players have until Monday, January 4th at 12PM Pacific to complete their Wintershield 4 unlocks and objectives.

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

New Champion: Baeloth the Entertainer

Baeloth Barrityl is the master of The Black Pits, the combat arena he claims is 'the best show in all the realms'. Baeloth captures hapless adventurers to fight to the death all for the sake of entertainment! When he's not commanding the attention of anyone near him, he's doing whatever he can to reinforce that he's one of the top five spellcasters in all the realms.

Baeloth is a Gold Find and Support champion, lightening the pockets of his enemies as he kills them. Despite his alignment, Baeloth is quite the team player buffing and exuberantly encouraging his fellow Champions, delighting in their triumphs on the field, and providing a swift resurrection from his indentured servant, the Djinn Najimm! When you want to add Baeloth to your formation, you can swap him with Jarlaxle (Slot 4).

II. Baeloth's Stats

Race: Elf (Drow)	Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Class: Sorcerer	Gender: Male
Age: 222	Affiliation: none

STR: 12	DEX: 14	CON: 16
INT: 19	WIS: 12	CHA: 16

Role: Gold Find, Support
Eligible for Patrons: Vajra Safahr, Mirt the Moneylender, Strahd von Zarovich
Slot: 4, (Jarlaxle)

Baeloth's Abilities

Baeloth's design has three parts, his gold-find taking the entrance fee to the Black Pits, his buff as his excitement for his allies' success grows, and his swift rescue of teammates who have fallen. With Chain Lightning enemies Baeloth drop extra gold when killed, and if enemies are killed by a Champion in the row ahead of or behind him, he feeds on this excitement triggering Cause For Celebration, and they explode in a shower of magical confetti, damaging and slowing enemies near them. His excitement level grows as more and more death and destruction occur around him, which increases his buffs to nearby Champions through building stacks of Morbid Excitement.

Finally, since he's a team player, with Generous Djinn he has commanded Najim, his indentured Djinn to keep everyone alive, which means anyone who dies gets resurrected and protected for a short period of time.

For more information on Baeloth and his abilities, check out his Champion Spotlight!

Year Four Variants

• Watchful Eyes — Only Champions with INT and WIS scores of 11 or higher can be used. Baeloth starts in the formation but he can be moved or benched.
  Reach Area 75.


• Rat Problems — The streets of Waterdeep have been overrun by deadly giant rats from Avernus! All beast enemies in the adventure have been replaced by Abyssal Rats throughout the adventure. Additional Abyssal Rats spawn in each area. Abyssal Rats start out by dealing 100% additional damage, but each time an Abyssal Rat attacks a Champion, the damage of all Enemies increases by 10% (multiplicative).
  Reach Area 125.


• The More the Merrier! — Baeloth starts in the formation and cannot be moved. An Ogre, a Shambling Mound and a Fire Elemental walk into a tavern appear in each area, while they are alive, they each grant a unique buff to the enemies.
  • Ogre — Enemies can only be damaged by Champions with Magical or Ranged base attacks.
  • Shambling Mound — Enemies deal 100% additional damage.
  • Fire Elemental — Enemies move 100% faster.
    
  This adventure has unique dialogue.
  Reach Area 175.

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

Are you not entertained?! Prime spellcaster and the proprietor of the Black Pits, the premier fighting pit of the Underdark, and co-host of Improvised Champions. Maybe you played one of the most acclaimed Dungeons & Dragons video games of all time and recruited Baeloth into your party? Baeloth Barrityl is delighted to meet your acquaintance and is keen to get the back up of the benched champions to build another brilliant Black Pits to keep their skills sharp and allowing him to charge a modest fee for the masses' entertainment!

If you'd like to learn more about Baeloth the Entertainer, read on...

I. Baeloth the Entertainer

Baeloth Barrityl is the master of The Black Pits, the combat arena he claims is 'the best show in all the realms'. Baeloth captures hapless adventurers to fight to the death all for the sake of entertainment! When he's not commanding the attention of anyone near him, he's doing whatever he can to reinforce that he's one of the top five spellcasters in all the realms.

Baeloth is a Gold Find and Support champion, lightening the pockets of his enemies as he kills them. Despite his alignment, Baeloth is quite the team player buffing and exuberantly encouraging his fellow Champions, delighting in their triumphs on the field, and providing a swift resurrection from his indentured servant, the Djinn Najimm! When you want to add Baeloth to your formation, you can swap him with Jarlaxle (Slot 4).

II. Baeloth's Stats

Race: Elf (Drow)	Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Class: Sorcerer	Gender: Male
Age: 222	Affiliation: none

STR: 12	DEX: 14	CON: 16
INT: 19	WIS: 12	CHA: 16

Role: Gold Find, Support
Eligible for Patrons: Vajra Safahr, Mirt the Moneylender, Strahd von Zarovich
Slot: 4, (Jarlaxle)

III. Baeloth's Design

The design of Baeloth was a fun conversation with Mark Meer, talented actor and co-host of our very own Improvised Champions, a play-by-play commentary of Idle Champions, airing Mondays at 1PM Pacific on our Twitch Channel.

Baeloth's design has three parts, his gold-find taking the entrance fee to the Black Pits, his buff as his excitement for his allies' success grows, and his swift rescue of teammates who have fallen. Enemies Baeloth damages with his Chain Lightning drop extra gold when killed, and if enemies are killed by a Champion in the row ahead of or behind him, he feeds on this excitement triggering Cause For Celebration, and they explode in a shower of magical confetti, damaging and slowing enemies near them. His excitement level grows as more and more death and destruction occur around him, which increases his buffs to nearby Champions through building stacks of Morbid Excitement.

Finally, since he's a team player, with Generous Djinn he has commanded Najim, his indentured Djinn to keep everyone alive, which means anyone who dies gets resurrected and protected for a short period of time.

IV. Baeloth's Abilities

Basic Attack

• Chain Lightning — Baeloth fires a bolt of lightning at a random enemy, which deals damage and arcs to another random enemy within a medium area of effect. Each time the lightning arcs it deals 20% less damage. Can arc up to 4 times total per attack, cannot arc to the same enemy twice.

Formation Abilities

• Paid Partially with Pain — Enemies affected by Baeloth's Chain Lightning drop 25% more gold when killed. Enemies can only be affected once.

• Cause For Celebration — Enemies killed by Champions in the column ahead of or behind Baeloth explode into magical paper confetti, dealing damage and slowing enemies near them by 50% for 10 seconds. The damage done ignores debuffs and is either half of the hit that killed them or one-quarter of their max health, whichever is higher. This effect can chain if the explosion kills an enemy, with the damage the chained explosions do being based on the damage from the previous explosion.

• Morbid Excitement — Baeloth is excited when the battle is going well. He buffs the Champions in the column in front of and behind him by 10% for each stack of excitement he has, stacking additively. He gains stacks in the following ways:
  • An enemy drops extra gold due to Paid Partially with Pain: +1 stack.
  • An enemy explodes in confetti due to Cause for Celebration: +2 stacks per explosion.
  • A chain reaction occurs due to Cause for Celebration: +3 stacks per chain-explosion.
  • A Champion in any column in front of Baeloth takes damage: +5 stacks per hit.
  • A Champion dies: +100 stacks.
  Stacks are reduced by 10% every 10 seconds. Max stacks start at 20 but can be increased with a specialization choice.

• Generous Djinn — Baeloth's Djinn servant, Najim, will bring any Champion that dies back to life at 1HP and make them immune to all damage for 20 seconds. For as long as the resurrected Champion lives, the party's damage is increased by 300%. This ability has a 60-second cooldown and if multiple resurrected Champions are alive the damage bonus stacks multiplicatively, with buffs applying to the post-stack value.

Specializations

• Baeloth's Birthday Party — The Morbid Excitement stack increases related to Cause For Celebration are doubled and the damage bonus of Morbid Excitement is increased by 100%./li>

• Over Excited — Increase the max stacks of Morbid Excitement by 200%.

• The Show Must Go On — Increase the duration of Generous Djinn's immunity by 10 seconds and increase the pre-stack damage bonus by 100% (to 600% per stack).

Ultimate Ability

• Now That's An Entrance — Najim streaks across the field, dealing massive damage to all enemies, pushing ones that survive back slightly, but more importantly increasing Baeloth's excitement stacks to max.

V. Baeloth's Legendary Equipment

Slot 1: Global DPS	Slot 2: Global DPS	Slot 3: Paid Partially with Pain
Slot 4: Morbid Excitement Damage	Slot 5: Morbid Excitement Stacks	Slot 6: Generous Djinn Post-stack Buffs

VI. Conclusion

What do you think about Baeloth? If you have feedback, let us know in a Community Q&A or Champion feedback post on the Idle Champions Subreddit, on the Steam forums, or on the Official Idle Champions Discord!