Below is a set of tips and explanations on what steps should be taken every match. Later I will go through each map individually for additional steps.

Your biggest threat in this will be Shale. The other Underlords are more manageable but Shales speed makes her tough to fend off.

• Play at 50% game speed. The computer has inhuman apm but uses it poorly. To keep up don't play at full speed. Turn up the speed later when you're safe if you want.
  
  
• Save frequently, especially in the early game. The AI can be very nasty, but also very dumb. A simple change in your actions can make a big difference in the AIs actions, so full restarts are rarely necessary.
  
  
• If you are not already familiar with the map layouts, do nothing except unlock Prophecy and scout the map. Look for routes to objectives and enemies, and make note of each pathway that can be used to destroy you, and junctions for control. Once you're familiar restart the map. If you do not start moving immediately the AI will claim too much territory and make everything much harder, or impossible.
  
  
• Hold shift and left click unit portraits to pick up 5 of them at once, this works on workers as well. Furthermore, holding shift+right click and dragging will rapidly drop anything held by your hand of evil. Holding shift+ left click while dragging will let you rapidly grab anything your hand (or the beam) goes over. Doing this with a spell selected will cast the spell rapidly at any viable targets the hand passes over. Use these to cut down on action time greatly.
  
  
• Start every match by dropping nearly all your mana into workers, save some capacity for Conduits. Use previous tip to rapidly create your workers.
  
  
• Build conduits in the early game. They make a huge difference in the speed at which you'll be able to dig out and claim areas and gold. Sell them as you progress to keep costs lower and retain mana capacity.
  
  
• Control your expansion. Workers are generally dumb and easily distracted, and you will lose a lot of expansion time if you don't periodically grab and drop a few where you need them.
  
  
• DO NOT rely on your workers to build your defenses. Even left to their own devices with no other tasks they won't build fast enough. Your defenses are not only your defenses, but your weapons as well. Rapid deployment is critical to survival and victory for Volta. If there's one skill you'll get a lot of practice with here it will be rapidly grabbing and dropping defense parts.
  
  
• The AI will make heavy use of Spirit Workers, not only to expand their dungeon, steal your gold, and rescue their minions, but to prevent your workers from claiming their territory. There are 2 main ways to counter this;
  
  • Do not attempt to push through a bottleneck. Not only will your defenses fail to push at any decent rate, but it's far easier for spirit workers to counter you. Instead invade through multiple tiles or paths to give the spirit workers reason to move around.
    
  • Work-a-lot potions and conduits will help your workers claim far faster. A level 10 worker under a work-a-lot potion can out claim a spirit worker in 3 seconds flat.
  
  
• Do not build too many defenses. Your progress will slow immensely if you cap out all of your mana, and you shouldn't be capped until the late game if ever. As you push sell excess defenses, and consolidate junctions as you can.
  
  
• Never use your minions for combat unless you need them to keep a junction from being lost. Volta has the weakest army in the undergames. You will focus almost entirely on traps and spells and keep your units busy at work. Dont worry, you'll have plenty to do for a while.
  
  
• Do not destroy any brimstone unless you know what it will open and you're ready for that opening. Some maps have short cuts that can be blown open but for Volta that usually means more junctions to defend and more locked mana.

• Use Unclaim on your walls to speed up your workers progress, it may not seem like much but it can save them a decent handful of seconds at the start and those may be the additional seconds you need to beat the AI to the objective.
  
  
• Holding Shift+right click and dragging with an empty hand will slap every creature you pass.
  
  
• Worker rally can help keep your workers on task, I found it useful to put rallys on the objectives. Make sure to get rid of them later however, or your workers will be distracted by any possible task in that area.
  
  
• In some maps I will suggest rushing spirit workers, as I did the same, but I won most of the maps without rushing spirit workers, and I may have been able to win the others without it too. Up to you.
  
  
• Each map is loaded with artifacts, but when you use them depends on the artifact:
  
  • Gold Artifacts you should use when you have lots of space in your vault. The best time would be to boost early building progress, just make sure you don't waste any gold from it or Avarice by not having enough treasury space.
    
  • Construction Artifacts I believe are nearly worthless for Volta. In Map 2 you could theoretically use it to get Democorns, with outposts at the left and right middle of the map, but I dont think you'll find any of these artifacts in that map. Use it for whatever.
    
  • XP Artifacts are tricky. Some maps have an excess of them, in which case using a couple here and there is ok, to boost your working minions efficiency, but be cautious with them. You may find yourself struggling to gain gold while paying high wages since voltas gold generation methods are quite limited. Otherwise I would save them until you have a decent number of minions to empower. Having most of your minions around level 4 is a good balance between effectiveness and cost.
    
  • Mana, Sin, and Spirit Worker Artifacts should be used immediately. Use the mana cap early on for more workers, and later for Avarice and defenses. Permanent spirit workers are particularly useful because besides being much faster workers, they are also far better at recovering fallen minions from battlefields and enemy dungeons.
    
  • Alchemy Artifacts are slightly more useful than construction artifacts. If you actually manage to get one early you could do a mad spirit worker rush, but I've never done that. Generally the best you can expect from it is a rapid fill of your potion stores in the mid or late game.
    
  • Assembly Artifacts are like super weapons for Volta. They are relatively uncommon but with a store of gold and an assembly artifact, you can expand a position nearly instantly. Best use would be to drop an ambush on an AI army in an attempt to decimate them in the early-mid game. Other uses are rapid pushing, expansion, and reinforcement. Most situations the assembly ritual is good enough though.
    
  • Ritual and Mood at your discretion.
  
  
• You can supplement your gold gain by sacrificing prisoners. They often have money they'll drop for you.
  
  
• The Annex spell can actually be quite useful. You can use it to claim a pathway quickly to grab artifacts or shrines, and you can use it to dig out blocks. Annexing a path deep in and dropping a handful of spirit workers is a great way to impede enemy progress.
  
  
• If you're concerned about enemy workers digging out your walls use Wells of Souls, as they can kill workers through walls.
  
  
• When a defense is first placed its not destructible, however it becomes destructible upon receiving a part. Use this knowledge to avoid having a defense be destroyed prematurely. Start construction only if it can be completed quickly, or set it up so multiple defenses can be completed at the same time:
  
  • Storm Vortex and Well of Souls requires 6 parts.
    
  • Gargoyle and Bonechiller require 3 parts
    
  • Ramparts require 8 parts
  
  
• Use Obey to speed up specific tasks, especially workers that are working near danger, they're far less likely to run under the influence of Obey making pushing easier.

1. After dropping your workers immediately begin digging out some space near your core, and towards the nether shrines or underhills. While the underhills are critical for victory in king of the underhill, nether shrines are too dangerous to leave for the AI, especially since the banshees like to crash against ramparts. They also add a great distraction for the AI to deal with, often forcing it to lock up mana or minions.
   
   • As soon as your workers have dug out enough space, build your starting rooms. (dependant on map) Do not worry about a lair or slaughterpen yet. You will want a library pretty quickly regardless, at least 2 shelves to start, but more as you have spare gold. This is because every undergames map is loaded with artifacts, and they will give you a huge boost to your progress and power. As you uncover more try to drop them at the library to prevent the AIs from claiming them, and unlock them when you can.
     
   • As your workers expand your dungeon build vaults along the path to store gold quicker. In master and hard difficulty gold veins will not last long, as the computer will send spirit workers to mine every block, even inside your dungeon. Expansion to the objectives is priority 1, taking and spending/storing as much gold as you can is priority 2. You can sell the extra vaults later.
     
   • In most situations you should be able to grab most of the shrines near you. If not then decide if you want to cut your losses, reload a save, or push to claim it. If you do not claim most objectives I'd recommend trying again rather than slogging through the fight to claim them.
   
   
2. Regardless of what your first room will be you should have a foundry and library relatively soon after that. You want to start drawing in Chunders and Cultists asap. I would suggest a foundry eventually 7x5 to maintain part flow. Unlock Storm Vortex and Garrison as soon as you can, and when you have a chance, foundry upgrade. Foundry upgrade claims to just increase storage space but it seems to have a noticeable effect on part crafting rate as well, perhaps cause minions don't need to stop using stations when they're full anymore.
   
   
3. Once you've reached the objectives you want to start building defenses. Make sure you have storm vortex unlocked by now. Start sacrificing workers for extra mana capacity, and start building a few storm vortexes at each objective, and then critical junction(in some cases pushing farther early can make it easier to cut the AI off with fewer junctions). NOTE: MAKE SURE THAT YOU HAVE A SOURCE OF GOLD, OR SOME LEFT IN STORAGE FOR STEP 5.
   
   
4. Build a garrison at every defense cluster asap, ideally at the same time as your first defenses and if necessary drop the augur onto them as soon as he appears. Garrisons make a massive difference in your defenses power and survivability, and should never be neglected. That said, it's best if they can be built back a bit, as augers have a tendency to run to their deaths while patrolling if there's a battle going on.
   
   
5. Build a Sanctuary before you run out of gold, but after you have a few defenses out. You'll want to find the sweet point to do it as the sanctuary will cost a lot of gold, but you'll also get more out of it the fewer defenses you have. This is one of the trickier parts of some maps. Unlock Avarice and immediately begin casting it. At this point you will have far less use for your workers, so when it's ready purge all except 5 of them to maximize the gold gained. You can continue to shuffle workers and Avarice like this for maximum income, just don't forget to keep casting it. Storm vortexes are expensive even for Volta and the income will be critical to maintain an offensive. I would suggest a sanctuary at least 5x5.
   Also the AI seems to like to attack during the Avarice ritual, so be careful about your mana during these times.
   
   
6. At some point build a Training Room, to improve your crafters and researchers and also to draw in some sacrificial gnarlings. This isn't necessary to win, but it will speed your progress.
   
   
7. As soon as the AI attacks you will want to unlock Shockwave. As the game suggests in the main campaign, shockwave combined with defenses is incredibly powerful. It can and should be used to;
   
   • Disperse groups of enemy minions so they can't group up against your defenses properly.
     
   • Throw long range minions (particularly Shales Screechers) out of range so they have to reposition, often leaving combat or dying
     
   • Launch strong or high level minions into the back lines of your defenses, preventing them from being recovered by the AI.
     
   • Force enemies into debuff traps.
   Proper use of shockwave and foundry parts should be able to deal with most attacks, and wittle your enemies army to nothing.
   
   
   
8. As you build your defenses up don't be afraid to mix bonechillers in with the storm vortexes, and gargoyles with ramparts for narrow pathways. While the storm vortex is strong, the synergy with those 2 defenses make them very worth using. You'll also want to start placing ramparts intelligently, ideally on front most defenses and never blocking, so enemies can be shockwaved back and workers can move through. Ramparts are also much more efficient to heal than defenses, allowing you to hold off attacks with parts, or in an emergency the forge spell, easier. They will make or break your defenses against large attacks.
   
   
9. When it's affordable, or when you notice a number of high level enemy minions, build a prison. The enemy will constantly recover their forces with spirit workers unless you imprison them, particularly Vampires, which can be easily killed through imprisonment. Exploiting shockwave can make dealing with a strong AI army a cinch.
   
   
10. At some point the enemy will attack you. Some attacks are small skirmishes, but sooner or later they will throw a large force at you. Your objective will be to use all the parts you need to to rapidly reinforce that position, avoid losing any more defenses than necessary, and attempt to cull their strongest forces. If a defense (storm vortexs in particular) is going to die sell it for half its cost back rather than losing it.
    
    
11. I would suggest getting Eternal after you've unlocked all the other necessities. You don't need him early on, and the sin cost is too heavy to afford unless you get a lot of sin artifacts early. Once you're established, build one to support a position or to push.
    
    
12. Because the AI is programmed to spend gold and expand recklessly, if you manage to cull enough of the AI forces, and your defenses are well established, you will find that the game becomes incredibly easy. The AI will attempt to take any path it can to get around your defenses, and failing that it will start to feebly throw its forces against you. At this point you can take your time. If this is Underhill then you may win before this, but in the other modes you will need to begin pushing towards their core(s). This will likely take a long time, though if you follow my tips about countering spirit workers and continue to move up storm vortexes you should be able to shorten the time.
    
    
13. At some point you should build reinforced walls for your rooms. When I expand I don't bother with structure, I just cleave sections and then build the rooms, trying to separate them. The early game is so tight there's no time for planned construction. However once you have the chance it's worth reinforcing the rooms, especially the foundry. Cast Fortify if you can.
    
    
14. If you find you're really struggling to push with your workers feed them some wisdom juice. High level workers are far more efficient than low level ones. They're also harder to kill and at level 10 can teleport. Keep in mind however that if left to their own devices they will definitely get killed eventually, so it's not worth doing unless you want them immediately.
    Another option is undermining their walls to blow open more tiles to claim from.

You're pitted against Shale to the west, and Draven to the north west. This map should not be too much of a problem as in my experience Shale and Draven tend to spend a lot of effort fighting each other

A reminder to save frequently early on and that small changes can have big effects on AI behavior. (Even something as small as selling a wooden bridge can delay then for a decent amount of time)

Also defenses can be built on stone bridges, both natural and built.

Following the general expansion tips, here you'll want to build a foundry and a library asap, while your workers dig and claim towards the western and northern nether shrines. Make your best efforts to claim around the shrines, and ideally past them towards the AI base. If you cannot push past, just make sure to claim them and place storm vortexes to prevent them from being claimed by AIs.

At this point build garrisons behind the defenses and establish them further while unlocking your sanctuary. If the enemy makes moves against your defenses push them around with shockwave, or end them with storm. To this purpose it's a good idea to leave claimed tiles empty in front of your defensive lines. It makes it far easier to shockwave enemies in any direction you want, and hit attackers with lightning.

Eventually you'll become too much trouble and they'll change focus to each other. You'll want to invest in defenses at the brimstone blocking the central pathways, to deter the enemy from invading there later. Alternatively you could attempt to rush and claim the central nether shrine, but I doubt you'll have the time and resources to get it before one of the AIs and set up defenses. It will also be a weaker point since no garrison can be built there.

In my opinion a defensive line is close enough to unbreakable when it has 12 defenses and at least 4 ramparts, backed up by an active Garrison. Fewer than 10 and the enemy could punch through with a strong enough force, unless it's a bottleneck with a gargoyle. Any more than 12 is overkill and a waste of locked mana.

Shale might be annoying at the beginning but just shove her screechers around and everything will be fine, thankfully they don't do much damage and will get distracted if pushed away. Draven will not do much for a while as it takes him longer to build up his forces. By the time he can attack you should be able to fend him off easily.

Sooner or later banshees will come towards you through the middle if the path is open, but they won't get past your defenses.

Once one of the AIs loses their core shard to the other, push their last one. You can use Eternal and Gnarling backup to push any established defenses if necessary, though if the target is Draven he will only use Wells of Souls, and they can easily be out ranged by storm vortexes. Once it's dead, establish a defensive line inside the door so the surviving AI can't get through. Now you should be able to sell the nearby defenses around the nether shrine and only worry about covering the central pathways.

Break the nearby core shard of the survivor and seal off the area with defenses. Now the ai has to push through the middle or the 2 doorways you're blocking.

Push to the central nether shrine, using stone bridges to create more space to push through, and load the area with defenses. Now you can sell all the other defensive lines except the ones at the other 2 dungeons.
IMPORTANT: Utilize this consolidation of junctions in every map to retain mana capacity. Most won't be as convenient as this one, but you should never run out of spare mana capacity. At my most extended I still had 700, and that should only happen in one or two maps. If pushing a path forces you to have to defend multiple new junctions see if there's a better way to go. Usually you can find one, even if you have to push another front to make it work in the long run.

You should now have a flow of banshees, that in my experience love to get stuck on corners. You can shockwave them to free them, since each shrine can only have 3 living banshees tied to it at a time, but you don't really need them.

From here you can either push through the dead AIs base, or through the middle pathways to the final core shard. Banshee backup can also make things go much quicker if they dont get stuck. GG


This map, while relatively easy, is good practice for defense pushing and a sense of how long some of them will take. Also because of the layout and the way the AI likes to play, its great for getting a sense of at what range and angles your defenses can attack other defenses.

Keep in mind that a Volta storm vortex with a rampart can easily defeat any enemy defense. The enemy will use their parts and mana to repair their defenses but if you keep laying down storm vortexes, and keeping the ramparts repaired, you will easily wear out their parts before they wear out yours. Pushing enemy defenses is best done with Eternal support however, otherwise it will be a slow and arduous process. The Eternal will not be able to break defensive lines alone, but it can focus enemy fire long enough for workers to claim within their range. Once there, before the eternal dies, build more rampart guarded storm vortexes. From here, provided you still have 3 or 4 vortexes alive, they can easily clear out the defenses, as long as you keep them repaired. You also should be able to instantly start rebuilding your eternal, assuming you didn't waste sins on things you don't need.

Now for what I and many others consider the most difficult of the 7 maps. Once again you're up against Shale, but this time there's noone to distract her, so her full force will be focused on you. Thankfully, while dealing with Shale is a pain, this was also one of the shortest of all my matches, ignoring the reloads it took to successfully fend her biggest attacks off.

Shale makes liberal use of large groups of beasts, arenas, ember demons, and thunderling potions. As such her army is quick to build and difficult to repel in the early game. Also since ember demons and behemoths do highly increased damage to defenses she is effectively Voltas counter. Unfortunately for her it also means her power cap isn't as high as other underlords who use stronger minions, and since most of her growth comes from beasts it's easier to deplete her stronger minions as she cannot recover them.

She will also usually summon her Behemoth relatively quickly and use it aggressively. Make sure to shockwave it behind your lines if it tries to escape (good tactic for every titan) AIs are less likely to attack without the support of their titan.

Her final annoyances are her Screechers, empowered Bafus. They are able to outrange defenses, which can be problematic if ignored. Thankfully they deal low damage, so a singular or even small group of low level screechers will take a long time to break through a rampart. They are however problems in the early game when your defenses are few. They can drain valuable parts or mana on repairs, and can even destroy unprotected defenses. Best avoided in this map, do not ignore them. If you get the opportunity blast them to death with lightning.

Same strategy as usual, however this time I used spirit worker rush. I immediately unlocked alchemy lab, spirit worker potion, and Conduit, made space for the alchemy lab and built it, 3x5 or 3x7. Start creating spirit worker potions asap while you continue to spread towards the underhills.

As you progress make sure that clearing the gold is left for later, as you need to expand as far as possible as fast as possible.

This map has rivers, but instead of slowly working across them, build large swaths of wooden bridge. The cost is much higher but the time saved is crucial, and they can be built into the darkness all the way to the underhills.

As soon as your spirit worker potions are ready use them near a place you want quickly claimed or mined, ideally somewhere they can make quick progress to the underhills, and start new ones. Do this until you're out of gold to mine and space to claim. If you do it correctly you should be able to beat Shale to all 3 underhills.

You may even be able to claim some land and gold on her side of the river (the left side is the easiest to invade being a large dirt river bank). Build a wide bridge and send the spirit workers in to work. Sell the bridge asap or shale will attempt to use it to attack the underhill. Then youll want to clear out all the gold remaining on your side of the river before shale sends spirit workers for it.

This is where it gets tricky. Your biggest problem in this map will be resource management. Shale will attack quickly, likely before you have the sins you want unlocked, so you'll have to pick a strategy to use and hope for the best. You also likely won't have a strong flow of defense parts or extra resources to build a lot of them, and you will likely run out of gold quickly and will need a sanctuary and Avarice to continue holding out, when you can find a moment to invest in them.

To the north east of the eastern most underhill there is a large path of dirt. If left undefended Shale will dig around and come in from behind the underhill. She will also attempt to make bridge pathways if they can get her a better vantage point for an attack, so keep an eye on that. Provided she can't find an easier route she will attempt to viciously attack what she considers the weakest point, so now your objective is to hold her off until victory.

As Shale has the defense locking spell it may be wise to build a number of bombards mixed with your storm vortexes. This will prevent Shale from locking all your defenses early on when you can't afford many vortexes. I believe doing this made a difference for me. Shale will lock a lot of mana with ember demons, so her free mana will be limited.

Also, since ember demons take drastically increased cold damage, don't neglect bonechiller support. Activating a chiller when ember demons are nearby is very effective, and can potentially stave off an attack. They also chill through walls, so they can be safely hidden around corners or in alcoves.

Once her behemoth is up you can expect a large attack, often consisting of said behemoth, ember demons, and her creatures. If you can fend them off without losing too much gold in the exchanges you will win. Your best bet would be to make sure their main target has a rampart, kept repaired with parts, adding new storm vortexes behind or beside if the parts are available, and shockwaving the enemy strategically. Not only will shockwave spread her army out, ideally mostly away from your defenses, it will stun every enemy hit for a couple seconds, giving your defenses precious time to wittle them down. If everything goes well, and if possible, stop the behemoth from fleeing and make sure it drops. If it dies you've won. If it doesn't, she may have a chance for a second wave.

Provided you don't lose an underhill the game will end quickly. If you do lose a hill, try to consolidate your defenses at the other 2. If near victory, only worry about them, otherwise make sure to keep her from invading your base.

As stated, I had to reload saves many times and try different strategies, but the core concept is the same as usual. If she's being particularly problematic try doing semi random actions like building/selling bridges, or digging out a new clump of dirt, or even just dropping your minions near the defenses you expect her to attack in an attempt to change how she "weighs" that target. I managed to delay her attack for about 30 seconds by claiming and selling her bridge. In fact computer AI can change plans so drastically that I had one match against Draven where he claimed one underhill, I reloaded, and he went for the opposite underhill instead, even though it was just a 2 minute ish difference.

Personally I never tried to do this but one possible strategy for dealing with Shales attacks could be Quick Freeze Potions. While I've never actually tested it, they're supposed to instantly destroy ember demons. Since it's hard to tell exactly what shales army composition is, it's hard to judge if it would be worth the cost to unlock and craft.

In the third round we're up against Draven. He uses undead creatures like Lamash, and honestly is pretty weak. I dont think I used spirit workers for this one but I cant recall for sure. If you find your expansion too slow without them reset and try again with them. Either way, same idea as the last 2, spread towards the underhills asap.

In this one Draven beat me to the northern underhill. It was easy enough to seal it off after claiming the central and southern one. After reinforcing my underhills I built a defense all along the water way so he couldn't get through. He tried to bridge his way past the defenses but it didn't work in the long run. Simply focus on defending your underhills and locking down all paths and you'll win without much trouble.

Here you're against Draven, Shale, and Mira. Mira apparently has a randomized load out, and tends to play better than your competitors so far.

You shouldn't need spirit worker potions for this one, start with Conduit, Underminer, and Foundry. You want to move to the center asap and detonate every brimstone in your way, except the ones leading to Shales dungeon west of you. You should be able to claim and dig in at 3 of the nether shrines with no issues, but Shale will likely have claimed the 4th. Leave the brimstone wall separating her shrine from the others, and prepare defenses in case she decides to break the wall north of her shrine. Ideally having Shale blocked off is a best case scenario for you, as she's by far the biggest threat in the early game.

Build 2 storm vortexes directly north of your core to fend off the banshees. Also make sure to quickly build defenses at the brimstone rocks in the north east of your dungeon, before the AI blows them open, which will happen sooner or later.

This map will be long but relatively easy. Chances are one of the AIs will die without you doing anything, 2 of them if you're lucky. Just push through their bases to finish. You could try to push from the middle but that will be difficult with their spirit workers blocking you. It is easier to push through the sides of your dungeon when you're ready. The hardest part will probably be taking and keeping the nether shrine from Shale. After that just push through whatever path you choose, as long as you don't overextend yourself. The banshees will help finish the last opponent as well.

The central area of this map also has 4 Assembly artifacts behind brimstone passages. In my experience the AI never bothers with them, so sooner or later all 4 will be yours to do as you please with.

This will be arguably the easiest of all the maps. You have Mira as an ally here, versus Shale and Draven.

Focus all your efforts into reaching the western and central underhills. In both Hard and Master Mira beat the AI to the eastern underhill and held it with no problems.

Focus your resources on fortifying the central and western underhills, as well as preventing the AI from bridging around the western waterways. The game should be quick and relatively painless, with Shale putting up some struggle. To the far middle west is an incantation shrine which should help a bit.

The only reason Map 5 is arguably the easiest is because of this map. This map adds a hero fort and waves to the mix. It also brings in a lot of lava. Here it's just you and Mira.

Both times I did this map Mira was disappointingly stupid, or at least chose poor strategies. She seems to take a long time to unlock Stone Bridge, essentially allowing you to claim every island quickly and collect all the gold and artifacts. Also she spends all of her effort attacking the hero fort.

Truth be told I don't know how long it would take to win this map if you actually tried to end it quickly. I built way more defenses than I think I needed before I tried to destroy Miras shards, considering she can't easily break through the fort walls.

This is the map that has loads of xp artifacts, so use them carefully unless you want to struggle to maintain gold stores. There's also Mandalf the Marooned locked behind a gate to the north of the fort. You can easily reach it with a stone bridge, at which point you can use your minions or some defenses to break through the nearby bombards and the gate.
NOTE: Mandalf can actually be mildly irritating to have around. As he wanders your dungeon conjuring pigs you may find yourself grabbing pigs more often than you'd like.

As Volta attempting to push the hero fort is likely a waste of effort. It serves far better keeping Mira from being a threat. Just make sure to set up defenses at your northern core shard so the hero groups don't get it.

To win simply use defenses on stone bridges to destroy the southern core shard from the lava, and then bridge your way around the bottom right of the hero fort. The AI will always leave a large chunk of dirt undug just below the pathway between her shard and the hero fort. Dig that out, place defenses and garrison, then blow the walls with underminers. You'll be pretty close to the core shard and it's an easy push to finish her.

Mira may have a few high level necromancers and/or vampires, but you should also have some spirit workers if you explored around first. Use them to imprison her forces and stop her from sending them back at you to make your attack even easier.

Feel free to screw around in this map, it seems to be the hardest to lose, though I don't know what happens if you don't expand towards Mira and block the lava bank at the start.

This map is probably the most challenging in regards to early multitasking, and it's likely to stretch your mana thin. You will want to scan and know the map well before starting.

If you've made it this far Congratulations! It takes a lot of patience to win undergames with Volta, and some degree of skill. You're now up against Kasita and Oberon (supposedly the winners of the other brackets).

Kasita will attack with pretty much exclusively Sentinels, which if you can kill will help provide you with a great deal of extra gold.

Oberon has the best AI in the undergames. He operates quickly and dangerously. He tends towards dangerous and powerful units, has access to storm vortex, and jumps on opportunities with little hesitation. Interestingly to me, Oberon was the only underlord in my Hard run that fully exploited Spirit Workers, indicating he's a level above the others in difficulty. I'm not sure if or how this applies to Master however.

This map has the potential to be very easy or very difficult. If you want to keep it easy you should rush spirit workers here. Oberon will spread unreasonably quickly, with kasita not far behind. Spirit workers will help you head them off and stop them from claiming all the good things. There are also a number of magma weavers scattered about that you can claim faster.

To start with unlock underminer, alchemy lab, and Conduit. Once sins are available get spirit worker, then foundry, then storm vortex, then garrison. Your defenses will take a little longer to start but that shouldn't matter if you expand quick enough. Neither Oberon nor Kasita are likely to rush you that quickly.

In the center of the map are 3 nether shrines, and a moongate. I would suggest at least claiming the moongate to reduce enemy movements. If they claim it they will use it to launch assaults, and since there's nowhere to build Garrisons there it's easier for them to break through. I tend to blow the brimstone to the southwest of my dungeon core to head off Oberon, as he will dig around the long way instead. Just beware of the AI trying to bridge the nether shrines to pincer the moongate.

Sooner rather than later you will also want to place defenses at the brimstone junction between yours and Oberons base. If he survives he will blow the walls to attack you. Assume that every brimstone blockade will be opened unless you control all detonatable ends and prepare accordingly. If you forget they will take advantage of it.

However the most important things in this map are located to the northern edge, and the south western corner. Past some brimstone In those locations and the south eastern corner there are level 10 Boss Hero Spirits. These units are powerful, and can make or break the game, for all the underlords. If you can beat Oberon and kasita to the ones near you the game is pretty much over. They'll keep you alive long enough to build up and let you push much more easily.

Once you've collected them you'll need to build defenses near the entrances you broke through, unless you can somehow safely push through and build it on the AIs side. You will also need defenses to cover the junctions just next to the rock caverns the heros were in. These defenses will be expensive, though if Kasita doesn't die first she may feed you some gold.

They will also lock a lot of mana which means avarice will be less effective. If you can quickly push farther into the enemy dungeons through the north and southwest you could reduce 2 lines to 1 on the left side, and possibly claim the incantation shrine near kasita. With your own that would make forge viable for combat use, and allow you to keep your ghost heroes alive far more easily.

Note that if you push Kasita into her base she will likely blow her brimstone wall to attempt to attack the nether shrines. She may do this anyway, so even in the best case scenario, if you've pushed into the edges of their dungeons, you will need 4 solid defenses, but if you can't push you will likely need 6. On top of this, the central area has no space for garrisons. You will need to use your defending skills to maximum potential until you can claim past the eastern nether shrine. Gargoyle will be mvp until then, but that will be 5-7 defensive emplacements to cover all possible points of ingress.

If it's a 6-7 scenario you can cut down on adjacent defenses, since you'll be able to use shockwave to distribute attackers between them if necessary. You can also get away with lighter defenses if you make sure to add your hero spirits to fights.

During the time it will take to shore up your borders the AIs will attack your weakest points, so of course reinforce points under attack immediately, and kill as many attackers as possible, on your territory so you can retrieve the spoils. Once the defenses are done however you will be able to push. First step is to push the edges of the AI dungeons so you can consolidate your outermost defenses and free up some mana. From there it's just using the pushing skills you've already practiced in the other maps.

To be clear I can't predict what Oberon might do in Master. In Hard each of us got one of the heroes and there was a balance. Oberon was more dangerous than Kasita, but eventually he ran out of resources and wound up having a vampire rebellion kill his army. However in master I got both hero spirits near me and kasita got the third. I imagine she used it since she defeated Oberon rather quickly. After that it was just a matter of destroying her sentinel army and it was gg. It's possible that the match would be more difficult if Oberon survived instead of Kasita.

Even if Oberon is tougher in Master as long as you get 2 of the spirits you'll be fine. It's easy enough to capture the third and convert it as well. That said, if you've made it this far it's probably unnecessary. The only thing I'd say about Oberon is that he may fill part of his dungeon with storm vortexs. These will be more difficult to push against than other traps so far, and it would be faster to avoid them if possible.

A lot of people will suggest using Vampires. If you can keep them in combat and prevent them from being captured they can definitely help push, and distract the AI, but I've also heard that they're much weaker than they used to be, and if you can't keep them fed they will start killing your necessary minions. I didn't use them but feel free if you can handle juggling them with everything else.

To this point you can also create larger attack forces by converting prisoners. This can help push quicker as well, but will increase pay day wages, so may not be worth it, especially for example in the case of Necromancers, since you can't build crypts. It also means they could be recaptured and converted by the enemy, whereas normally Volta offers very few prisoners or corpses. Vampires can also be converted. Ignoring these means youre giving the AI nothing to throw back at you.

Another suggestion people have is using Outposts to claim the objectives quicker, as you only need to dig to them instead of claim the path there. I never tried this myself, but it could be a good alternative to using conduits, or if you want to shuffle another sin, it could shorten the objective claiming time greatly to use both. However you would be unlikely to be ready to build any defenses when you reach the objective if you needed to use underminers or spirit workers, so you would want to claim far into the enemy territory to delay them, giving you more time to unlock and build defenses. This delay however could be used to get a library going quick to start identifying artifacts while waiting for more sins.

If by the time you have your sanctuary active and all sins you need unlocked you haven't maximized your mana to 2000 through shrines and artifacts, fill the difference with Mana Vaults.
I wouldnt recommend making them in the early game as they cost far too much gold that you're better off using building your foundry, garrisons, defenses, and sanctuary with. I also dont think there's a single map where you can't maximize your mana by using what's in your reachable area, just make sure to collect and identify artifacts as you go, and don't hoard them so that new ones can be identified. If they're not very useful artifacts, and you dont want to build more library space, use them immediately. Similarly make use of gold and ritual artifacts sooner rather than later. The only ones worth holding for long term are the assembly and xp artifacts. Once you've found enough shrines and/or artifacts to cover the remaining difference sell the mana vaults. Your mana will not lower and they will net you 2500 gold back each.

The Avarice Ritual will use up to 1500 mana, converting it at a rate of 100 mana to 1500 gold. Maximum potential gain off a single ritual is 22500 gold.

If you have parts to spare, and it won't block passage, put ramparts on all your bonechillers and gargoyles, and Wells of Souls if you have them. These traps are higher priority targets to AI and will die very easily without the extra protection. Also make all efforts to have at least 1 storm vortex, ideally also with a rampart, in front of them. With a defending turret, and a rampart, they will be much harder to destroy, and any enemies that try will likely just suffer their effects.

The Eternal can be a great help in pushing, however because of its flight and slow movement it may find itself stuck fighting banshees or something. In some maps you're better off pathing it manually once it appears. If it does get stuck just SLOWLY slap it, or shockwave it, in the direction you want (slowly so you don't despawn it accidentally)

The game has bugs, and they can stack up in particularly long maps. The most common bug I see is an inexplicable inability to place traps or ramparts on certain squares (obviously with no other reason they shouldnt be able to be). I've also seen immortal minions that look knocked out, and don't seem to be harmful, but move and take focus fire from your defenses without ever "dying". If you notice these and want to fix them simply save and reload your game.

Spells can actually be cast 1 tile away from your territory, as long as the tiles are neutral. Use this to aim shockwaves more effectively and lightning snipe lone flyers.

Lastly, in case anyone needs this clarified, you do eventually need a lair, slaughterpen, and tavern. As minions become less satisfied they'll become less efficient, so dont leave them for too long. In most situations you should have a lair before a sanctuary, slaughterpen before or shortly after, and tavern after that at some point. The tavern will also add a small income boost. If you never build them your minions will rebel. Build your lairs somewhere no other functional room could be built to save good space for better rooms and walls.


I hope this guide helps people get the Master achievements! If you have any opinions, questions, or additional tips feel free to comment.

Special thanks to the assorted posters in different threads that gave me useful information to win with.

Thanks for reading and good luck Underlord.