DadaWars is a fantasy strategy game that fuses city building with real-time tactics. On a battlefield that's freshly generated every run, you start from empty ground, build up your own camp, then personally command your army to wipe out the enemy and complete your contract.

Building and fighting happen at the same time

Farms, lumber mills, taverns, barracks, archery ranges — what you build, and where you build it, decides what kind of army you can field this run.

The tavern is where you recruit — whoever you pull decides how this run plays out. The archery range and the fighting ring keep buffing all your ranged and melee troops, the barbecue camp periodically boosts the output of nearby tiles, and lakeside tiles come with a built-in adjacency bonus.

Your troops need to work together, too. For example: an ice mage lays down a sheet of ice under the enemy's feet, leaving anyone standing on it wet — then a bard's thunder-attuned performance hits the group and the whole crowd is instantly paralyzed. Who you squad up matters more than how strong any single unit is.

Every battlefield is different

Forests, rivers, base locations, monster spawns — every run is generated fresh. Not a single rock on the water is placed ahead of time. The opening strategy that worked last run might not work the next.

Roguelike Contracts

Difficulty runs six tiers (0–5), and clearing one unlocks the next. Difficulty isn't just tougher enemies — enemy unit tier caps, whether towers auto-upgrade, how tough the rally points are, and how many battles the contract throws at you all scale up too, with elite waves at the higher tiers. Lower tiers come with beginner protection.

Take a contract, then pick your own route on the node map. After each battle, choose one of three upgrades to carry into the next: level up an ability for a unit type, boost a resource's output, unlock a new recruit source, or swap in a different support package.

Before a fight, open the recon panel to see which enemies you're about to face and plan your lineup around it. Fight your way to the boss to clear the run; lose, and you restart with whatever DadaCoins you earned, permanently unlocking a new node on the hero ability tree.

Shape the terrain

An ice mage's ice orb lays down a sheet of ice on impact. Anyone who runs across it falls flat — a whole cavalry charge can be knocked down in one go by a single patch of ice.

Ice melts back into water, and that water can be frozen again by the next ice orb, growing into an even bigger ice sheet. Players who know what they're doing aren't just throwing ice orbs — they're building an ice rink.

Oil slicks slow down anyone who crosses them and leave them coated in oil. Hit an oiled enemy with a fire attack and they ignite, taking damage over time.

Everything on the map can be taken

The battlefield is scattered with neutral buildings and resource points — barracks, trading posts, mines, signposts. Some are unguarded, some are held by monsters — scout the guard strength first, then decide how many troops to send.

The trading post is the one place both sides will always fight over: whoever holds it gets more resources, and over time that gap only widens.

Contents

• 22 recruitable unit types, from Militia and Hunters to Templars and Bards, each with active skills and upgrades

• Multiple capturable neutral buildings and resource points

• Hostile factions — Undead, Demons, Orcs — each with their own units and skills

• A faith and doctrine system: bank Faith to unlock global doctrines, or summon a Templar directly

• Cards unlock across early, mid, and late game as your city develops — the bigger your city, the stronger what you can draw

Who this is for

If you like placing buildings and watching numbers click together, without getting wrecked by APM demands — or if you want a "lost this run, coming back stronger next time" loop — this game is for you.

About development

DadaWars is still in active development, and the demo is already free to download. Wishlist it, or jump into the demo and leave feedback — there's a button in-game that goes straight to our feedback form, and we really do read it.