Emberward elements: all six damage types explained

Updated September 23, 2026 — Emberward 1.0

Emberward has six damage elements — Normal, Fire, Ice, Electric, Poison and Arcane — and five status effects that make or break late waves. Element choice isn't cosmetic: boost tiles buff matching towers, several relics only trigger on specific elements, and the Elemental Blueprint relic pays +10% damage to every tower once you have one of each of the five active elements on the field.

Element status effects at a glance

Fire

Burn DoT 5% proc per hit → 1%/s max-HP damage (cap 100; 0.25 vs bosses).

Fire towers: Flamethrower, Lava, Fireball, Sniper; Missile (after red upgrade); Earthquake (after red upgrade); Bomb (default); Dice on a 5 with Elemental Dice; Scrap Tank inheriting Fire; Starfall (random, blue); Chomp/Boulder stay Normal until upgraded.

Key Fire relics:

• Phoenix Feather — +5% crit for all Fire towers; Fire crits apply Burn for 5s.
• Wildfire Sigil — burning kills spread Burn to monsters within 3 tiles.
• Lava Bucket — Fire hits may leave magma puddles (4 DPS).
• Volatile Poison — Fire hitting a poisoned monster converts the poison into a 25% damage area explosion.
• Frostfire — trade: Fire attack speed −20%, but Fire damage now Chills.
• Spark Amplifier — Electric hits on burning targets extend the Burn (cross-element).

Ice

Chill −25% speed applied by chill-capable Ice towers; Ice has no inherent proc.

Ice towers: Frost, Icicle; Snowball; Fan (after blue); Missile (after blue); Landmine (after blue); Dice on 1–2 with Elemental Dice; Scrap Tank inheriting Ice.

Key Ice relics:

• Permafrost Gem — Chill lasts twice as long.
• Ice Storm — Chilled deaths spread Chill to nearby monsters.
• Black Ice Shard — Ice hit on a Chilled target consumes Chill to guarantee the next hit crits.
• Ring of Shattered Ice — Arcane hits on Chilled targets deal +30% Ice damage split around them.
• Frost Venom — Poison also Chills (cross-element).

Electric

Charge → 0.5s stun Charge scales with damage dealt; full Charge stuns (per-monster threshold).

Electric towers: Laser, Lightning, Lightning Ball, Drone, Thunder; Missile (default); Lasso (default); Hammer (after blue); Dice on 4 with Elemental Dice; Scrap Tank inheriting Electric.

Key Electric relics:

• Lightning Conductor — 20% chance on Electric hit to call a 3-damage lightning strike.
• Overcharged Battery — 100% Charge release chains lightning (3 damage, up to 3 monsters).
• Static Shocker — stun release also deals 10% of the monster's current HP as Electric (3% vs bosses, 5s cooldown).
• Weakspot Radar — 100% crit rate against stunned monsters.
• Cryo Conductor — Electric hit consumes Chill to accumulate double Charge.
• Amplify Poison — Electric hits on poisoned targets double poison tick rate for 3s and accumulate Charge.

Also noted: killing a Large Monster fills 50% Charge on all monsters within 6 tiles.

Poison

Stacking DoT Accumulated poison ticks for damage scaling with the stack until consumed.

Poison towers: Poison Tower (default; red upgrade may retype), Dart, Decimate; Chomp (after blue); Bomb (after blue); Dice on 3 with Elemental Dice; Scrap Tank inheriting Poison.

Key Poison relics:

• Resonant Poison — +5% crit vs poisoned monsters, and those crits deal 200%.
• Volatile Poison — poison + Fire = 25% AoE explosion.
• Frost Venom — poison also Chills.
• Amplify Poison — Electric doubles tick rate.
• Also: monsters under Poison take +10% damage (general amplify effect).

Arcane

Auto-crit above 80% HP — perfect for opening damage on full-HP waves and bosses.

Arcane towers: Arcane Missile, Axe, Magic Arrow, Hammer (default); Boulder (after blue); Lasso (after red); Landmine (default); Dice on 6 with Elemental Dice; Scrap Tank inheriting Arcane.

Key Arcane relics:

• Magic Dust — monsters hit by Arcane take +20% Arcane on the next hit.
• Voodoo Doll — any tower crit splashes 50% of that damage as Arcane to the highest-HP monster within 10 tiles.
• Forbidden Grimoire — flips the auto-crit threshold: crits below 40% HP instead of above 80%.
• Ring of Shattered Ice — Arcane + Chill combos for +30% Ice split damage.
• Scepter of the Elements — Arcane crits randomly inflict Burn, Chill, Poison or Charge.
• Unstable Mixture — the fusion relic: if a monster has Burn + Chill + ≥50% Charge, consume all three for Arcane damage equal to 15% max HP (3% vs bosses).

Normal

No status effect — but Normal towers are the backbone of early defense: Basic, Cannon, Scrap, Giant Dice, Boulder/Chomp/Earthquake before upgrades, and Drill (which has no element at all). Normal matters indirectly through Scrap Tank: feeding it Normal towers grants flat +4 damage.

The cross-element synergy list

These relics work only when elements overlap — they're the reason mixed boards beat mono boards: