Every tower in Emberward carries one of six damage identities, and the identity is not cosmetic — each one has a status effect with its own rules, its own relic pool, and its own way of paying off in a maze. This page is the mechanical reference: what each element actually does, which towers belong to it, and the relics that change its behaviour.
Normal
Standard damage with no status effect and no interactions. Normal towers are the filler of every maze: cheap, predictable, and available before you have committed to anything.
Normal towers: Scrap Tower, Dice Tower (unless the Elemental Dice relic is in play), Cannon Tower, Giant Dice Tower, Golden Statue, and any tower whose element is conditional — Boulder, Chomp, Scrap Tank and Earthquake — while its element-shifting upgrade has not been bought.
Fire
Mechanic: every Fire hit has a 5% chance to apply Burn. Burn ticks for 1% of the monster's maximum health per second, capped at 100 damage per tick (against bosses the cap is 0.25 — a quarter of that).
Fire is the element you take when the enemy waves are chunky and slow. Percentage-based damage does not care how much health a monster has, only that it has a lot of it, so Burn scales into late waves where flat damage stops mattering.
Fire towers: Flamethrower, Lava, Fireball, Sniper, Missile (after the Red upgrade), Dice Tower (with Elemental Dice, rolling a 5), Starfall (with the Blue upgrade, damage type is random), Bomb (unless the Blue upgrade is bought), Scrap Tank and Earthquake (when their last enhancing tower was Fire).
Fire relics worth knowing:
| Relic | Effect |
|---|---|
| Phoenix Feather | Fire towers gain +5% critical hit chance, and their crits apply Burn for 5 seconds |
| Lava Bucket | Fire damage may leave magma puddles, dealing 4 damage per second to monsters standing on them |
| Frostfire | Fire tower attack speed drops 20%, but Fire damage now applies Chill |
| Spark Amplifier | Electric damage to a burning monster extends the Burn by 1 second, once per monster |
| Scrap Master's Boots | A destroyed Scrap Tower explodes and applies Burn to nearby monsters for 5 seconds |
Ice
Mechanic: Ice damage applies Chill, the control effect the whole game's maze-shaping advice leans on. A chilled monster stays in your kill zone longer, which is worth more than raw damage once your corridor is folded.
Ice is the support element. It rarely carries a run on its own, but it multiplies whatever else you built.
Ice towers and ice interaction: Frost Tower, Snowball Tower and Icicle Tower are the direct Ice family. Ice also shows up through relics that convert other elements (Frostfire on Fire, Frost Venom on Poison) and through the Frost Flame, which adds Ice damage to your Ember Spark and freezes blocks.
Ice-adjacent relics: Permafrost Gem, Black Ice Shard, Flash Freeze Device, Ice Storm, Cryo Conductor (a chilled monster hit by Electric damage consumes the Chill and accumulates double Charge).
Electric
Mechanic: Electric damage accumulates Charge on the monster. Charge thresholds are per-monster; when a monster reaches full Charge it is stunned for 0.5 seconds. Stuns are the answer to the specific problem of a fast monster walking past your damage, and they stack with the Weakspot Radar relic for guaranteed crits.
Electric towers: Drone, Laser, Lightning, Lightning Ball, Thunder, Missile (unless upgraded), Lasso (unless the Red upgrade is bought), Hammer (after the Blue upgrade), Dice Tower (rolling a 4 with Elemental Dice), Scrap Tank (enhanced from Electric).
Electric relics with real numbers:
| Relic | Effect |
|---|---|
| Lightning Conductor | 20% chance on an Electric attack to summon a lightning strike for 3 damage |
| Overcharged Battery | When Charge releases at 100%, chain lightning deals 3 Electric damage to up to 3 monsters |
| Static Shocker | On reaching 100% Charge, the monster also takes Electric damage equal to 10% of current HP (3% for bosses), once every 5 seconds |
| Weakspot Radar | 100% critical hit rate against stunned monsters |
Poison
Mechanic: Poison damage accumulates on the monster and then drains as damage over time, and the damage per tick increases with the amount accumulated. Poison is a snowball: the longer a monster lives with poison on it, the harder the poison hits, which makes it excellent against the tanky monsters that survive your kill box and terrible against things that die instantly.
Poison towers: Dart, Poison (unless the Red upgrade is bought), Chomp (Blue upgrade), Bomb (Blue upgrade), Decimate, Scrap Tank (enhanced from Poison), Dice Tower (rolling a 3).
Poison relics:
| Relic | Effect |
|---|---|
| Resonant Poison | +5% crit chance against poisoned monsters, and those crits deal 200% damage |
| Frost Venom | Poison also applies Chill |
| Volatile Poison | A poisoned monster taking Fire damage converts the poison into a 25% area explosion |
| Amplify Poison | A poisoned monster taking Electric damage doubles its poison tick rate for 3 seconds and accumulates Charge |
Arcane
Mechanic: Arcane damage always critically hits monsters above 80% health. That single rule defines the element: Arcane is a burst opener. It deletes the front of a wave and then does nothing special, which is why Arcane mazes are built around the first three tiles of the route.
Arcane towers: Arcane Missile, Axe, Magic Arrow, Boulder (Blue upgrade), Lasso (Red upgrade), Hammer (unless the Blue upgrade is bought), Landmine (unless the Blue upgrade is bought), Scrap Tank (enhanced from Arcane), Dice Tower (rolling a 6).
Arcane relics:
- Voodoo Doll — when any tower crits, deal 50% of that damage as Arcane damage to the highest-HP monster within 10 tiles.
- Scepter of the Elements — Arcane crits randomly apply Burning (3s), Chill (5s), Poison (30% damage) or Charge (50% damage).
- Unstable Mixture — a monster affected by Burn, Chill and at least 50% Charge consumes all three effects and takes Arcane damage equal to 15% of maximum health (3% for bosses). This is the game's combo payoff, and it is the reason mixed-element mazes exist.
The Elemental Dice and Elemental Blueprint rules
Two relics rewrite how elements work and are worth building around:
- Elemental Dice turns the Dice Tower into a random-element tower: 3 = Poison, 4 = Electric, 5 = Fire, 6 = Arcane. It is the only tower in the game that can cover four elements by itself.
- Elemental Blueprint grants +10% damage to every tower once all five damage elements (Fire, Ice, Electric, Poison, Arcane) are on the field at the same time. It is the single strongest argument for a five-element spread, and it directly contradicts the usual "commit to one element" advice — which is why it is a build-around, not a default.