Characters / Dungeons

A list of characters from Dungeons and its sequels:

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Dungeons — Characters

Deimos the Dark Lord

One of the strongest and most dreaded lords of the land, he was betrayed by his concubine Kalypso and banished from his domain. With his loyal army of goblins he has to get his powers and fame back.

• Asskicking Leads to Leadership: He'll ascend to the top of the Netherworld again by kicking everybody's asses.
• The Comically Serious: In the Expansion, when he attempts to forge an artifact of power, obtaining ridiculous toys in the process.
• The Dreaded: Once known and feared as one of the toughest lords of the Netherworld, he loses this reputation due to being overthrown by Kalypso, falling all the way back down to the bottom of the Netherworld's hierarchy, and has to regain this status in the campaign.
• Elemental Powers
  • An Ice Person: The spells "Freeze" and "Ice Shield". Also, his domain in the Expansion's casual mode is the Frozen Dungeon.
  • Elemental Punch: "Fire Punch".
  • Playing with Fire: "Fire Ball".
  • Poisonous Person: "Poisonous Arrow".
  • Pure Energy: "Magic Missile".
• Evil Overlord: A very good description of his job.
• Flat Character: He doesn't get any development beyond his (former) relationship with Kalypso and that he's evil.
• Herd-Hitting Attack: The Roundhouse kick.
• Life Drain: One of his high-level powers.
• Magic Knight: Clad from head to toe in scary-looking armor, he's a force to be reckoned with in both magic and melee combat.
• Meaningful Name: After the Greek God of Terror, son of Ares.
• One-Man Army: If his Prestige is high enough he's virtually unstoppable in his domain.
• Orcus on His Throne: At the very beginning of the campaign. Your very first mission is to have him leave said throne and start his adventure proper.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Against Kalypso, for stealing his throne and kingdom.
• Soul Jar: The Dungeon Heart.
• The Speechless: He never says a word in the game, which is lampshaded by Calypso in the Expansion.
• The Starscream: After Kalypso betrays him, he falls from power and has to fight his way through the evil ranks again to get back to his old rank. Deimos does this by becoming the servant of other evil lords and eventually betraying them for their power.
• Tin Tyrant: Again, he wears a sinister armor that covers his entire body.
• Villain Protagonist: Except for the expansion, where he takes the role of the Big Bad instead.

The Advisor/Mr Sidekick

Your trusted goblin advisor, he explains the quests and game mechanics to you.

• Affably Evil: He'll celebrate your victory over your rivals with tea and biscuits.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: He's extremely competent, but is the same guy who tried to taste a green Slime Monster to see if it tasted like lemon.
• Deadpan Snarker: Most of his dialogue, even more so if other Dark Lords are mentioned.
• Enemy Mine: With Kalypso and the others when Deimos allegedly goes mad with power with the Other Ring.
• Evil Laugh: Gives a creepy one in the final cutscene as he leaves, carrying the imprisoned Kalypso with him.
• Evil Old Folks: A rather old goblin and a nasty piece of work.
• Hypercompetent Sidekick: Sidekick is actually his surname according to the Expansion.
• Medium Awareness: "Oooh, so much violence in this game!!"
• Mr. Exposition: To Deimos and, by extension, the player himself.
• Old Retainer: To Deimos, though he switched sides in the Expansion.
• Sycophantic Servant: Not so much in the Expansion, where he quits his master's service and sides with Kalypso.
• Zero-Effort Boss: As the Final Boss of the Expansion, after he's been corrupted by The Other Ring.

Kalypso

Deimos' former lover and a Succubus, she has dumped Deimos and took over the deepest pits of the Netherworld. She's the main playable character in the Expansion.

• Affably Evil: She's still very playful if insulting when you encounter her in the final part of the campaign.
• Big Bad: Of the vanilla game, being the one responsible for Deimos' loss of power and the Final Boss.
• Biting-the-Hand Humor: Kalypso is not named after the nymph in the Odyssey, she's named after the publisher of the game.
• Combat Pragmatist: Rather than waiting for Deimos in her Throne Room, like the Zombie King and Minos, she lures him and take over all the pentacles in Deimos' Dungeon while he's busy fighting her guards in the Throne Room. Even then, she forces him to fight a lot of monsters before fighting him personally.
• Cute Monster Girl: As a Succubus, this is a must.
• Damage-Sponge Boss: 9,999 health points.
• The Danza: Named after the publishers of the game, could also be a Biting-the-Hand Humor.
• Enemy Mine: In the expansion she's soon involved in a Teeth-Clenched Teamwork with Mr. Sidekick the Advisor, Minos and the Zombie King in order to destroy the Other Ring.
• Everything Sounds Sexier in French: During the Gates of Moria's parody, the magic words she suggests to open the portal are :"Voulez-vous coucher avec moi?"
• Final Boss: Of the main game, and also pretty tricky at that.
• Fire and Brimstone Hell: Her official dungeon in the Expansion.
• Fragile Speedster: As a playable character she's rather fast, but not as fit for melee as the other Dark Lords.
• Horned Humanoid: She sports horns.
• Jerkass: She's incredibly obnoxious, petulant and vain, and she doesn't even praise you when you appease her, unlike the Zombie King or Minos.
• Marathon Boss: While not as tricky as the Zombie King or powerful as Minos, she'll require a lot of time to bite the dust.
• Shock and Awe: Cast a volley of lightning as her automatic magical attack in the Expansion.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: In the final cutscene we see that Deimos shrank her to the size of a mouse and locked her in a red orb. She escapes in the Expansion though.
• Succubi and Incubi: She's a Succubus after all... She can bewitch heroes, seduced Marthas into changing sides and she tricks a Goblin into opening her cell door in the first level of the expansion.
• Weaksauce Weakness: She's very vulnerable to the Sword of Destiny, a weapon which defeated her in the past. subverted in that you don't actually use it to kill her.
• Winged Humanoid: She has a set of thin, dragonfly-like wings on her back.

The Zombie King

The most prominent Dark Lord in the Catacombs, he's an ancient undead king who rules his domain with hordes of undeads.

• Authority Equals Asskicking: Played straight in his level, subverted when compared to Minos or Kalypso.
• BFS: His giant sword.
• Cloud Cuckoo Lander: As a party member in the Expansion.
• The Dragon: To Minos.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: In one mission he asks you to water the flowers of his wife's tomb.
• Evil Is Visceral: His automatic magic in the expansion consist in him throwing his own intestines at his foes.
• One-Handed Zweihänder: How he wields his sword, though he drags it around.
• Puzzle Boss: You have to go for his Soul Jars first, all while fighting through the skeletons he summons.
• Soul Jar: Eight of them (literal jars) and of course the Heart.
• Spectacular Spinning: His spin attack.
• Stupid Evil: Even your trusted advisor constantly points out how stupid and worm-eaten he is.
• The Undead: Fittingly, his Dungeon in the Expansion is the Catacombs, though not all of his subjects are undead.
• Unexplained Recovery: Of course, considering that he is a zombie, not so much unexplained.
• You Shall Not Pass!: While chased by the Bull Frog in the Expansion, he literally tries to pull a Gandalf and stop the monster like in the book. And it utterly fails.
• Zombie Apocalypse: He can summon zombies and skeletons to fight.

Minos

A fierce, giant minotaur and ruler of the second level, the Sunken Temple.

• Annoying Arrows: Has several arrows jutting from his shoulder.
• The Brute: To Kalypso. In one mission he asks you to smash 30 of your prestige items to amuse him. He's also the Dark Lord with less magic in the Expansion, as all his attacks are mostly physical.
• Carry a Big Stick: In the Expansion he's armed with a wooden club.
• Chained by Fashion: When you first find him, he's chained to a wall. After freeing himself, he keeps the chains to his wrists and even uses them as flails.
• Deadly Lunge: His charge attack.
• Fate Worse than Death: He's kept alive and chained and has his horns severed. Subverted in the Expansion, where he's found drinking in an underground pub after having reattached his horns.
• Genius Bruiser: In the Expansion as a member of the Fellowship of the Other Ring.
• Meaningful Name: After the famous king whose wife birthed the Minotaur.
• Mighty Glacier: Can easily kill you with two or three attacks, but he's very slow. And chained to the wall for the first part of the fight. He's also wide open to attacks after wailing around wildly.
• Our Minotaurs Are Different: He's a minotaur.
• Shockwave Stomp: One of his main forms of attack.
• Turns Red: After his Dungeon Heart is destroyed he frees himself from the chains.
• Verbal Tic: A bullish grunt or snort at the end of his sentences... sgrunt!
• Wicked Cultured: Asks you to build up a library, so that monsters won't grow ignorant.
• With My Hands Tied: He's chained to a wall at the beginning of the Boss Battle.

Marthas

A paladin from the Neverwicked Mountain monastery. He's persuaded by Deimos to embrace the dark side and leave the light behind.

• Cool Helmet
• The Dragon: To Deimos.
• Escort Mission: There's a couple of missions where you have to escort him to the objective and don't let him die. He's however competent on his own and extremely resistant.
• Face–Heel Turn
  • Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: In the penultimate scenario he's seduced by Kalypso and turned against you.
• Fallen Hero: He turned to the Dark Side, but, as stated, he has no sons and won't change his name to Darth Whatever.
• Shoulders of Doom
• Shout-Out: Mmmh, a paladin who commits a Face–Heel Turn named MArthas??
• Unexplained Recovery: After being apparently killed by Deimos in the penultimate scenario of the original campaign, he's met again by Minos and the Zombie King fine and healthy, ruling over his own dungeon, which is currently besieged by a horde of heroes.

The Goblins

Your trusty, dimwitted servants, which can dig new rooms and keep things running. They can't fight however.

• Dirty Coward: They run away from any threat.
• Fat Idiot: Mentioned to have a scarce number of brain cells.
• Hypercompetent Sidekick: In spite of their idiocy, they can refill your gold stash, repair traps, activate pentagrams, take care of armories and so on.
• Mooks: Though a type of non combat mook, as they only take care of the Dungeon.
• Our Goblins Are Different: Small, dimwitted cowards fit only for the most basic works in the Dungeon.

Catacomb Monsters

The monsters inhabiting the Catacombs such as Vampire Bats, Slimes, Skeletons, Wererats and Beholders. The Dungeon's Guardian is the Undead Butcher.

• Blob Monster: The Slimes. And no, as your advisor found out, they do not taste of lemon.
• Defeat Means Friendship: You can hire an Undead Butcher after defeating the one summoned by the Wizard Magnus Pollenpicker.
• Dem Bones: Skeletons. They're highly resilient against magic.
• The Dreaded: Beholders are described as such.
• Eldritch Abomination: Beholders again.
• Elite Mook: Wererats, Skeletons and Slimes.
• Evil Is Visceral: The Beholders are vaguely humanoid things wrapped in a cape with a body seemingly made of intestines and with a giant eye in their torso.
• King Mook: The Undead Butcher and Beholders.
• Mighty Glacier: Slimes.
• Rodents of Unusual Size: Wererats.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Slime Monsters are weak to Magic damage, while Skeletons are weak to physical damage.

Temple Monsters

The monsters dwelling in the Temple such as Flying Snakes, Six-Legged Monsters, Giant Scorpions, Giant Frogs and Living Statues. The Dungeon's Guardian is the Colossus.

• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: The Colossi.
• Informed Ability: Flying Snakes are said to be extremely vicious, but they're actually pretty weak.
• King Mook: The Colossus to the Living Statues. According to the description, the latter think the former is their daddy.
• Living Statue: The Colossus and the Living Statues.
• Mayincatec: The style of the Living Statues and Colossus, which fits the look of the dungeon.
• Mighty Glacier: The above mentioned Colossus and statues.
• Mix-and-Match Critters: The Six-Legged monsters are part lion, part bull and have six legs. The Giant Frogs have a bit of anglerfish in them.
• Scary Scorpions: The Giant Scorpions, obviously.
• Unique Enemy: The Giant Amoeba in the second temple scenario is an oversized Jelly Monster who can split in smaller copies of himself when killed. And each copy can do the same.

Hell Monsters

The monsters residing in the Hell Level such as the Flying Skulls, Demonic Spiders, Imps, Hellhounds and Fire Wyrms. The Heart's Guardian is the Fire Angel.

• Creepy Centipedes: Fire Wyrms, as in the giant, fire-spitting maggots which fed on the entrails of a rotting dragons corpse.
• Dem Bones: Flying Skulls.
• Giant Spider: Demonic Spiders are this plus some humanoid parts.
• Hellhound: They only have one head though.
• In the Hood: The Fire Angel.
• Legions of Hell
• One Man Armies: The Fire Wyrms can keep heroes busy for a while and even kill them if necessary.
• Our Angels Are Different: Fire Angels, lost flaming creatures cast down from the heavens. Very undead judging from the look. Is not suggested to invite one of them to stay for dinner.
• Playing with Fire: Basically everything can spit flames.
• Unique Enemy: A Dragon in the Sword of Destiny Level. Is actually a gargantuan Fire Wyrm with tons of health points.

Expansion Monsters

The monsters inhabiting the Ice Cavern plus the special creatures seen in the Expansion. The common ones are simply ice-themed versions of already existing monsters from other levels. The Heart's Guardian is the Yeti.

• Advancing Boss of Doom: The Nosegul (based on the Beholder) and the Bull Frog (an oversized Giant Toad).
• An Ice Person: Almost all the monsters. The Yeti can summon ice spikes from the ground.
• Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti
• Blob Monster: The Ice Jellies.
• Shout-Out: The Nosegul and Bull Frog are clearly parodies of the Nazgul and Balrog.
• Underground Monkey: All the common enemies are azure-colored version of previously met foes.

Dungeons II — Characters

The Ultimate Evil / The Horde

The Ultimate Evil is the first playable entity of Dungeons II: leading the mighty Horde in battle, the Ultimate Evil was sealed away by the heroes of the Alliance, and now he seeks revenge. He commands the Horde, which is composed of Orcs, Goblins, Trolls and Naga, with Little Snots as workers.

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• All Trolls Are Different: Literally: basic Trolls are tall, lanky humanoids with clubs and oversized heads, hands and feet. Rockthrowers are muscular, two-headed blue trolls looking similar to those of World of Warcraft, while Juggernauts are massive, demonic trolls almost as fat as they're tall. They all work in the Forge of Chaos, making weapons, armors and improvements for the units.
• Annoying Arrows: Gob-o-bots are nearly immune to ranged weapons, except for catapults and cannonballs.
• Battle Cry: Orc Chieftains can raise the morale and strength of allied troops by bellowing.
• The Brute: Both Orcs and Trolls fit this category pretty well.
• Carry a Big Stick: Basic Trolls wield wooden clubs, while the Juggernauts use a massive cudgel seemingly forged from a huge fang.
• Combat Medic: Naga Queens can heal your troops, albeit slowly.
• A Commander Is You: Generalist/Brute. The Horde tends to be a little tougher than the other two Evils at the start, with early access to a healer unit encouraging an aggressive playstyle, but consequently lacking in support abilities and crowd-control in comparison to the other factions.
• Cute Monster Girl: Naga Queens, though averted with Naga and Medusa, who are much more serpent-like.
• Dishing Out Dirt: The Earthquake spell, avaible only at level 3.
• Drill Sergeant Nasty: Orcs will improve the efficiency of working minions by yelling furiously at them.
• Dual Wielding: Goblins fight with two knives, but will discard this fighting style if they evolve.
• The Evil Genius: Goblins provide the Dungeon with doors, traps and improvements for chambers and machineries. Also the Naga, who provide magical support and research spells.
• Expy: Of the Horde from Warcraft, seen also in the design of orcs and Trolls. The scenario where they first encounter the Demons is a Shout-Out to the fall of Grom Hellscream, having two heroes parodying Grom and Thrall.
  • The Ultimate Evil itself is an obvious parody of Sauron, being a mace-wielding Tin Tyrant who is defeated in the prologue, and spends the rest of the story fighting to regain his power and take over the world.
• Eye Beams: The Medusa's main attack method.
• Genius Bruiser: Trolls are tough fighters who also work in the Chaos Forge, doing research for you.
• Ignored Enemy: Goblins have the "Inconspicuous" trait, which means that enemies will attack them only if they're alone, giving the priority to other creatures and allowing the Goblins to attack them with impunity.
• Industrialized Evil: The Horde seems more practical and organized than the selfish Demons and the mindless Undead, with a far greater emphasis on technology to produce their weapons and armor.
• Indy Escape: One of the traps launches a spherical boulder down a corridor, squishing and pushing back all enemies caught in its wake. The upgraded version is stuffed with explosives and will detonate on impact.
• Kevlard: Troll Juggernauts are the most resilient units you can train, and are astoundingly fat.
• Mighty Glacier: Trolls, expecially the Juggernaut, are slow but extremely resilient. Orc Ironhides as well.
• Mini-Mecha: The Gob-o-bot, complete with improved armor against arrows and twin flamethrowers.
• Mooks: Little Snots (the Goblins in the first game) make a return as workers.
• Mundane Utility: Naga Medusae will employ telekinetical powers to lift beer barrels and drink from them.
• Non-Mammal Mammaries: Zigzagged with the Naga: basic Naga have small breasts, while the even more reptilian Medusa have none, but Queens, who are more human-like, sport more blatant breasts, which is better seen in the artwork.
• Our Goblins Are Different: The "Goblins" from Dungeons return as worker units known as Snotlings, the Goblins are small humanoids with large noses and ears and a talent for machinery and contraptions. They can either become warriors in a mecha suit or undetectable assassins.
• Our Orcs Are Different: Green, brutish, muscular... mark it as a no. They have the looks of Warcraft Orcs but the behaviour of Tolkienian Orcs.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: In the main Campaign, the story focuses on the Ultimate Evil's battle against the heroes who sealed him underground.
• Shock and Awe: The Lightning spell and the Lightning Orb trap.
• Snake People: Nagas fits the bill. They're also much more serpent-like than usual, with the Medusa sporting a cobra-like head rather then a reptilian feminine visage like the basic Naga.
• Spikes of Villainy: There's a ground trap with spikes and you can build a spiked door that damages the enemies as they attack it.
• Sticky Situation: Tar pits can be placed next to other traps to make them even more deadlier.
• Stuff Blowing Up: A few traps include explosives and are used to blow the intruders to kingdom come. For example, the very first trap you can build is a treasure chest filled to the brim with dynamite, which explodes when heroes kick it open.
• Steampunk: The Goblin Assassin's looks, complete with a spring-blade on his arm and googles.
• Taken for Granite: The Medusa has a gaze attack which slows down and damages a single enemy.
• Trademark Favourite Food: Beer. All the residents of the Horde enjoy a good, cool barrel of beer once in a while. It can be jarring to see the Naga Queens chug whole barrels just like the big, brutish trolls.
• Troll: Orc Ironhides, the mission Ironhide you get is named Trollolo.

The Chaotic Evil / The Fiery Legion

A fragment of the Absolute Evil, just like his Ultimate brother, the Chaotic Evil rules over the fiery legions of Demons, composed of Fright Demons, Shadow Demons, Lust Demons and Fire Demons. After being encountered as an opponent in the main campaign, the Chaotic Evil becomes playable for a few scenarios.

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• Action Bomb: Infected have huge, bloated sacks on their heads. If you research the right upgrade this sack will explode upon death, damaging all nearby enemies.
• All Webbed Up: There's a sticky web trap, best placed around a Big Tentacle, while Fear Demons can learn to cast one in combat.
• Anime Hair: Mistresses sports a "Bride of Frankenstein" hairstyle.
• Big Red Devil: Pit Fiends, except that in lieu of a pitchfork they have gigantic axes.
• Bloody Bowels of Hell: Much of the Chaotic Evil's dungeon looks quite organic, expecially the Throne Room. The Defensive Outpost is seemingly made of viscera, Spider Eggs are required and produced to make doors and traps, the doors themselves are made of interwined tentacles. The only two rooms that do not look organic are the Torture Chamber and the Shadow Chamber where Mana is mined.
• Casting a Shadow: Shadow Demons mine for Mana in the Shadow Temple and have powers based on darkness and shadow.
• Combat Medic: Succubi can kiss demons to restore their health. This works even with other Lust Demons or even themselves.
• Combat Tentacles: Averted with the doors, played straight with the Big Tentacle and Even Bigger Tentacle traps, which flails at the nearby enemies. Their description also invokes another trope. When fully powered, Abysmals can summon shadow tentacles from the ground.
• A Commander Is You: Technical/Elite. The demons require the most management, since their units are weak starting off and focus on abilities and magic. They won't have strong front-line fighters until later on and have to rely on ranged attacks and crowd-control early on. However, their magic and support abilities are extremely potent and they have very powerful traps.
• Dark Action Girl: Lust Demons, all of them, though only Mistresses are melee fighters.
• Eldritch Abomination: Implied to be the source of power of the Ritual Chamber: you can see masses of greenish flesh under the stonework, the resurrection pits are lined with fangs and tentacles and you activate the Pentacle by feeding a hapless Servant to a giant toothy mouth that lives beneath.
• Escape Rope: Subverted, one you your traps is a fake Town Portal that sends a single enemy to Hell.
• Evil Is Visceral: As mentioned above, some of the doors, rooms and traps have a rather organic look.
• Expy: Of the Burning Legion, again, from Warcraft. The second mission even involves fighting the Elves and destroying their Tree of Life (and taking a jab at Archimonde.) Also, though probably a coincidence, Servants bear a striking resemblance to the Mooks of Nox from Wakfu (both serve a dark lord, wear the same horned hoods, have the same eyes and speak in a high pitched voice).
• Fan Disservice: Brood Queens are naked, and also happen to be a disgustingly fat green demoness with horns with a giant spider for a lower body.
• Fed to the Beast: In order to activate the Pentacle and evolve your demons you have to sacrifice a Servants to the "thing" dwelling beneath the pentacle.
• The Fighting Narcissist: All your demons can fight, but rather than beer they only crave admiration; by building Podiums they can bask in the admiration of Servants and restore lost health, meaning their narcissism is actually required for them to remain healthy.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: Shadowlurkers are diminutive, chameleon-like demons who can turn invisible but are otherwise easily dispatched by the heroes. The two following evolutions, Mindflayer and Abysmals, are imposing creatures of darkness who can tear enemies apart before they can even come into range. The Fear Demons go through a similar route, with their basic form being weak and pathetic but growing stronger and with more powers as they power up.
• Gender Bender: Fright Demons are males, but their topmost evolved form, the Brood Queen, is obviously female.
• Glass Cannon: Mindflayers can annihilate whole groups of heroes from afar, but are not very resilient themselves.
• Hot as Hell: The Lust Demons, appropriately enough, though Mistresses are always angry rather than horny and Dark Empresses focus more on combat than seducing.
• How Do I Shot Web?: It takes a little training to teach Infected to explode into poisonous ichor upon death, or to teach Shadow Lurkers how to mend with the shadows and turn invisible, or to point out to Infernals that the fire they breath isn't just for show, or that Succubi can charm people... you get the idea.
• In the Hood: Servants and Mindflayers.
• Kicking Ass in All Her Finery: Dark Emperesses: contrasting her scantly-clad previous forms, she dons a voluminous folded skirt, a corset, High-Class Gloves and four inverted wings.
• Legions of Hell: The servants of the Chaotic Evil are this.
• Mighty Glacier: Infernals come into the dungeon as this and their first evolution, the Gargoyle, is not only tougher, but can also absorb any damage taken by his nearby allies.
• Mooks: Servants, the basic workers, seems to use magic to move and perform their work. You can also sacrifice them to evolve your demons.
• Mook Maker: Brood Queens can spawn small spiders in combat.
• Ms. Fanservice: The Lust Demons, especially the skimpy Succubus.
• Non-Indicative Name: Mindflayers don't look like the betentacled horrors from Dungeons & Dragons and do not possess mind-affecting attacks.
• Playing with Fire: You have two different fire-breathing traps, two different fire spells and two different fire-based demons.
• Poisonous Person: Fright demons attack by spitting poison at the foes.
• Spider People: Chaos Weavers and Brood Queens are this, the former sporting four legs and being able to lay webs, while the latter is more spide-like and can give birth to spiderlings in combat. Infected have four eyes, four arms and the bag-like sack on their heads from which they can vomit poison.
• Spider Swarm: The Spider Egg trap releases a swarm of spider that rushes the enemies.
• Stripperific: Mistresses do not wear much, but Succubi, as expected, wear a skimpy black leotard with is full of heart-shaped holes, along with a frilly belt-skirt thingy.
• Taking You with Me: Fear Demons can explode upon death, damaging nearby troops. Also the spell Demonic Sacrifice, which causes a gigantic explosion centered on one of your creatures, making the target Deader than Dead.
• Technicolor Fire: The fire from the Fireball spell and traps is purple.
• Technicolor Toxin: Both green poison, seen in the color scheme of Fright Demons and Spider Lairs and purple poison, as the one released by the Infected upon death or by Brood Queens with their Toxic Cloud skills.
• Top-Heavy Guy: Gargoyles and Abysmals, the latter resembling a more demonic-looking Voidwalker.
• Whip of Dominance: All of the Lust Demons can use their whips to "motivate" and command the workers. The Mistress, whose design is coded after a Dominatrix, uses her whip for actual combat.

The Corrupting Evil / The Mindless Army

Added in the A Game of Winter expansion set, the Corrupting Evil and his Mindless army of living dead is awakened by Barthas Snow and is ready to join the battle against his two brothers. This faction takes aspects from both the Horde and the Demons, and is composed of Skeletons, Zombies, Ghosts and Vampires, along with the Forgotten worker units.

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• Attack of the Monster Appendage: One of the traps is a massive skeletal arm anchored in the ground that flails wildly at intruders.
• Bow and Sword in Accord: Bone Warriors are equipped with swords, but an improvement allows them to switch freely with a crossbow, which makes them more useful in combat.
• Clockwork Creature: The Thing has a winding key in his back and other mechanical components.
• Cold Sniper: Deathbolts, the upgraded form of Bone Warriors, are this. Literally, as they're undead marksmen armed with a sniper rifle.
• A Commander Is You: Spammer/Ranger. The Undead don't lose units permanently (even when the Graveyard isn't built yet) and can thus afford to carelessly throw them at an enemy, since the Graveyard is unlocked early on. Their basic combat units, the Bloodsuckers and Bone Warriors, only cost one population point, and so can be massed early on. Later on, upgraded Undead units cost less population than their equivalent in other Evils' armies, and Bone Bolts are the best ranged units when massed together.
• Cuteness Proximity: Weaponized by the Grimlin, who's a Charm Person that makes enemies temporarily fight for him, captivated by his cuteness.
• Death Is Cheap: Once hired, none of your undead units can die for real, and as long as you have a Graveyard they can resurrect after they rest in the grave for a bit. The only way to dispose of your units is to throw them into the blood pool.
• Degraded Boss: The Skeleton King from the main campaign returns as the Skeleton General, summonable with a spell and much more expendable.
• Dem Bones: Skeletons, obviously, are amongst your troops.
• The Dog Was the Mastermind: The teddy bear of the Fright is actually sentient and evil, and tells her what to do.
• Early Game Hell: At Dungeon Level 1. While the Horde can use overall tough starting units that can heal while sleeping (Orcs), and Demons start with the healing Adoration Chamber in their possession, the Undead can only have cheap but weak creatures who won't disappear when defeated (which means you cannot train replacements unless you get rid of them first) and they have to research the Graveyard to resurrect defeated creatures. If you get attacked before you can get that room researched and ready, you're likely to have issues defending your territory. Once they get started though, all is well.
• Elaborate Equals Effective: A perfect example is given with the Ghosts' evolution line: they start with the Fright, a young and cute girl in a tattered gray dress carrying a knife, to the Banshee, a teenager with standing hair, a longer gray dress and a sickle... and finally the Black Death, a stunning gothic beauty with a gorgeous black dress, bone wings and a giant scythe. More noticeable as the base pattern (a ghostly girl with a weapon) is kept, but made progressively more powerful and elaborate.
• Evil Genius: Skeletons, working in the Alchemical Lab and doing research. Technically the Zombies, as they work in the Laboratory to discover how to improve undead units, making them Genius Bruiser types in spite of their decomposing brains.
• Evil Is Deathly Cold: Undead with lot of Ice-related powers, plus their Corrupted Overworld is covered in ice and snow.
• Evil Versus Evil: While the Horde and the Demons are rivals, they clash only once in the vanilla campaign when the Demons are forcibly summoned by the Alliance. The Corrupting Evil instead ends up fighting them both directly, which include having parties of the Horde/Demons invading his dungeon.
• Expy: One more time to Warcraft and the Scourge of the Lich King.
• Glacier Waif: The Thing and Black Death both have rather slow attacks that deal lots of damage. The same goes for the Deathbolt, whose weapon of choice is a sniper rifle.
• Glass Cannon: The Skeleton category of minions and Black Deaths can dish out the pain on their enemies, but they can quickly go down if overwhelmed.
• Girl with Psycho Weapon: Frights are small adorable girls hiding butcher knives behind their backs.
• Grim Reaper: Black Deaths are a female version of the Reaper, complete with black dress, scythe and hourglass. They have a special attack that can inflict massive damage on a single target.
• I Am a Humanitarian: Ghouls can heal by gorging themselves on the corpses of the fallen. In their description, Liches are implied to be child eaters.
• An Ice Person: Liches can attack with Ice spells, there are several ice traps that freezes the enemies and a couple of frost spells too.
• In-Universe Nickname: The Thing is sometimes called "Clockwork Potato" by the other monsters.
• Kicking Ass in All Her Finery: Black Deaths reap souls in an impressive black ballgown.
• Killer Rabbit: The initial forms of the Vampires are that of fluffy cute imps with bat wings and big eyes, but they're still dangerous. Subverted with the Nosferatu, who looks as dangerous as he appears.
• Life Drain: The Nosferatu can summon a swarm of bloody bats to attack all nearby units, damaging them as long as they have mana. It's surprisingly deadly.
• Make Me Wanna Shout: Banshees, unsurprisingly. What's more, their screams can damage multiple heroes in a go.
• Mighty Glacier: The Zombies in general as they're all slow but durable, the Thing in particular; the Zombies have three health upgrades and the latter can learn a technique that increase its defense.
• Mooks: The (literally) brainless Forgotten. Unlike Little Snots and Servants, they lack special upgrades beside "move faster" and "dig harder", but they cannot be killed by the heroes. Well, they can, but they won't stay dead.
• Mook Maker: Liches already know how to summon a handful of skeletons to fight for them. The same goes for the Skeleton General.
• Night of the Living Mooks: All your servants are undead of sorts.
• Nightmare Fuel: In-Universe, some of your traps and even doors can scare away the heroes, causing them to panic. Frights can spook heroes by using their haunted teddy bear to decrease their stats.
• Our Liches Are Different: The final form of the Skeletons, Liches attack with ice spells and have a vaguely egyptian look.
• Our Zombies Are Different: The so called Brain Biters, Zombies are rotting, lumbering oafs that can operate the Laboratory to do research on your creatures. In combat they're slow but resilient and can even rise from the grave instantly, ignoring their death.
  • Our Ghouls Are Creepier: The first evolution turns Zombies into Ghouls, which are larger, have Primal Stance and a paler skin, along with tusks and the ability to bullrush enemies and feed on corpses to heal themselves.
  • Frankenstein Monster: The second evolution turns Ghouls into The Thing, a massive mechanically powered brute who can emit steam to increase his defense.
• Plaguemaster: There's a poisonous trap that deals continuous damage to heroes, as well as two plague-related spells that can afflict your enemies. One has to be cast on your troops, who of course are immune to the plague due to being dead already.
• Poisonous Person: Again, there's a trap that releases toxic fumes above it, poisoning enemies.
• Schmuck Bait: The Box of Pandora, a low-level trap in the shape of a mysterious, shaking urn that explodes violently when attacked, damaging and scaring all nearby heroes. The Box does the most damage to the hero who opened it, naturally.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: The Corrupting Evil, until he's freed by Barthas, misguided by the Prophet.
• She's All Grown Up: The cute little Frights grow up into pale beauties as they evolve.
• Sinister Scythe: Black Deaths' weapon of choice, obviously enough.
• Stringy-Haired Ghost Girl: Frights, complete with eye-covering bangs, creepy teddy bear and huge knife.
• Telefrag: The Banshee's special ability invokes this, but they can only use it while invisible.
• Vampires Are Sex Gods: Averted, Bloodsuckers are small, impish furballs with wings, Grimlins are overly cute humanoid bats while Nosferatu are badass-looking vampires with a nasty face.
• We Have Reserves: Being undead, your servants cannot die for real, but you still need a Graveyard to reanimate them. On the other hand, their corpses will never vanish, not even from the Overworld. Contrasting the Horde and the Demons, whose units can be killed for good without the proper building to reanimate them.

Barthas Snow

Former leader of the Northwatch, while searching for his missing uncle Banjo in the northern wastes he stumbles on the Dungeon of the Corrupting Evil and awakens him, losing his life in the process and becoming his mindless undead general bent on exterminating the living.

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• Axe-Crazy: In Undeath.
• Black Swords Are Better: Wields a massive black sword surrounded by a greenish aura as an undead.
• Blood Knight: After being turned in an Undead General, he mostly thinks of "destroy the living."
• The Chosen One: In the final scenarios of the campaign, Barthas is designated to be the vessel for the return of the Absolute Evil. Eventually he turns into the Prime Evil, destroys what's left of the Alliance and gives birth to a kingdom of evil, uniting all three factions under one banner.
• Death Is Cheap: He's the only undead unit who can revive at will without needing a tomb in the Cemetery. He'll complain a lot about being killed, though.
• The Dragon: To the Corrupting Evil, though you can control him directly.
  • Dragon Ascendant: In the last two scenarios, he takes all the three Evils into himself and turns into the playable Prime Evil/Absolute Evil.
• 11th-Hour Superpower: His transformation into the Absolute Evil.
• Expy: Of Jon Snow when alive and of Arthas Menethil when Undead.
• Good Is Dumb: Back when he was alive. Though rotting hasn't helped his brain cells...
• Hero Unit: As a unique unit, he's notably more powerful than other controllable units.
• An Ice Person: At level 3 he can freeze all the surrounding enemies in ice.
• Manchild: Has shades of this, gradually getting sillier over time. At one point he reads The Narrator's lines, just to see what it's like. The Narrator is not amused.
• Real Men Wear Pink: When transforming into the Absolute Evil, he can list his wishes for the future very quickly. Among other things he wishes for a pony and lots and lots of cotton candy.
• Summon Magic: He can summon three skeletons to help him in battle.
• Too Dumb to Live: And let's just also say to Unlive as well: it takes only a few seconds for the Prophet to persuade Barthas to sacrifice himself to revive the Absolute Evil.
• Voice of the Legion: After becoming an undead knight.

Malakay the Prophet

A mysterious, wizened sorcerer who appears during the campaign, giving cryptic warnings to the Ultimate Evil. He plays a bigger role in the Expansion, A Game of Winter, where he helps the Corrupting Evil.

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• Ascended Extra: Plays a very minor role in the vanilla game, the Expansion fix that.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: The Absolute Evil ends Malakay's ambition with a single swing of his mace, and that's the end of it.
• Cutscene Boss: He’s ultimatly this. Despite his desire to become the Absolute Evil, he foolishly didn’t take into account its power compared to his own, and despite the Narrator hyping up a fight, he is killed without any player input.
• Didn't Think This Through: His secret plan: He orchestrated the whole thing, including the Ultimate Evil's defeat, to have the three Evils gather to create the Absolute Evil and then kill him and steal its powers, in order to become the Absolute Evil himself... too bad he's a scrawny 5 feet tall old man versus a massive armored giant with a big steel maul and dark powers. He's promptly crushed.
• Evil Chancellor: To Barthas and the Corrupting Evil.
• Evil Gloating: Gloats a lot as Barthas absorbs evil energy for the transformation into the Absolute Evil. Mostly because of his hidden agenda.
• Expy: Of Kel'Thuzad. During The Reveal he's one to Iznogoud.
• Greater-Scope Villain: He revealed to the Alliance the formula to imprison the Ultimate Evil, secretly made them grow in power and orchestrated the rise of the Corrupting Evil and the struggle with Meltysand in order to force the three Evils to awaken the Absolute Evil, so that he could kill him and become the Absolute Evil himself. Too bad he didn't take his own lack of strength in account...
• In the Hood: Wears a black hood pierced by his horns.
• The Reveal: He is the one responsible for the Ultimate Evil's first fall from power, and manipulated the Corrupting Evil and Barthas in order to have a chance at becoming the Absolute Evil himself.

The Alliance

The opponents of the three Evils, your everyday good fantasy kingdom of humans, fairies, elves and dwarves bent on waging war on Evil and thinking of dungeons as an easy way to level up. They're the antagonists of the game.

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• Action Girl: Warrior Princesses, 'natch. Including wearing armor and wielding scimitars in combat, they can be quite a pain to deal with. According to the artbook, Elves too are women.
• Barrier Warrior: Paladins can protect their companions with a blue barrier.
• Big Good: Technically the Alliance is supposed to be this...
  • Good Is Not Nice: Except that it's just implied that is ruled by and inhabitated by a bunch of jerkasses.
• Charm Person: Pixies can do this to your units, turning them against you.
• Dire Beast: In the Overworld, giant Foxes, Wolves and Bears will appear as enemies.
• Dual Wielding: The Warrior Princess wields two swords, which she can use to unleash a crowd-hitting attack.
• Elemental Powers: Mages battles you with lightning and fire.
• Expy: Warrior Princesses are a nod on Xena.
• Fairy Sexy: Pixies and Druidesses are females and good looking.
• Glass Cannon: Druidesses, Elves, Pixies and Mages can be damaging and annoying, but don't last long in combat.
• Hartman Hips: Druidesses' ones are blatant, but in the artbook it's shown that Elves and Warrior Princesses have them as well.
• Knight In Shining Armour: Paladins, one of the strongest enemies you can face in combat.
• Mighty Glacier: Dwarven Warriors and Paladins can take a lot of punishment before biting the dust.
• Mooks: Farmers, Spearmen and Crossbowmen are nothing more than armed peons, easy to dispatch. They barely become more threatening when they're with a Bard or a Dwarven Warrior.
• Ms. Fanservice: Druidesses, Pixies and Warrior Princesses qualifies for this.
• Nature Hero: Druidesses, Pixies and Elves: the first two attack with nature magic, the latter are stealthy archers.
• No-Sell: Bards can disable traps and doors for the other heroes, and they cannot be damaged by traps at all, which makes them incredibly annoying to deal with. On the other hand, is not uncommon to see a bard carefully lockpicking a door as your servants whale on him.
• Our Dwarves Are All the Same: Short, armored and carrying battleaxes... they can also strengthen heroes with their aura.
• Our Elves Are D Ifferent: They can turn invisible and shoot arrows, you'll need Naga/Spider Demons/Banshee to see them.
• Playing with Fire: In the expansion, Meltysand's cultists attack with fire-based weapons that do more damage.
• Stripperific: Druidesses have skimpy clothes made of leaves and don't leave much to the imagination.
• When Trees Attack: The Overworld-only Ents,

Krowtoes the Demigod

One of the Heroes of the Alliance, this majestic but pompous demigod is the strongest opponent for the Ultimate/Chaotic Evil.

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• Back from the Dead: He will resurrect his followers after a while to rebuild his shield. In A Game of Winter you have to desecrate his tomb and face his ghostly self.
• Barrier Warrior: He's protected by a fiery barrier that makes him invincible, forcing you to kill his warriors to dispel the shield.
• Early-Bird Boss: He's first encountered in the fourth scenario and flees upon being defeated.
• Expy: Name and quotewise, he's a parody of Kratos, while his looks makes him similar to the Avatar of Dungeon Keeper.
• Final Boss: Of the main campaign, and also in many random maps.
• Flaming Sword: His fearsome weapon of choice.
• I Shall Taunt You: Constantly taunts you in the Overworld, even before you engage him in combat.
• Plagiarism in Fiction: In the final scenario he quotes almost word by word the speech Aragorn gives in The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, which is lampshaded by the Lemony Narrator.
• Puzzle Boss: You have to kill his followers to remove his shield of invulnerability. He's tough enough to rise them from the dead at least twice.

Gandledore the Wizard

A powerful wizard and one of the Heroes who sealed away the Ultimate Evil, he's fought in a valley where he's summoning demons to stop the Ultimate Evil.

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• The Archmage: His role in the Alliance.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: His demons have turned the Troll tribes against you.
• Composite Character: Of Gandalf and Dumbledore.
• Face–Heel Turn: Went insane and decided to support the Chaotic Evil.
• Flunky Boss: As the battle progresses, he opens more and more demonic portals, each spawning Gargoyles to protect him.
• Summon Magic: The Legions of Hell, namely, which he sends to fight the Ultimate Evil.

Grumli the Dwarven King

King of the Dwarves, one of the last heroes to face the Evil at King's Ending, he's the first to attack.

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• Back from the Dead: In A Game of Winter you have to desecrate his tomb and fight his ghost.
• Boisterous Bruiser: He's the only hero to charge blindly into the dungeon of the Ultimate/Chaotic Evil after the fall of the outposts, which proves his undoing. Why fight him when the traps can do the work for you?
• Expy: Of Gimli, both namewise and quotewise. His appearance, however, is modeled after Belegar Ironhammer.
• King Mook: For the Dwarven Warriors.
• Large and in Charge: Ironically, he's larger than the usual Dwarves.
• I Shall Taunt You: In the Overworld maps where he's present.
• Shockwave Stomp: His main attack is this, and can damage all your units around him while sending them flying.

Guludruul the Mistress of the Elements

An Elven Sorceress who has mastered Ice Magic, which she uses with great skill. She's one of the last heroes fighting at King's Ending and defends the city.

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• The Archmage: A specialized one.
• Back from the Dead: In the main game, you have to destroy all the houses in King's Ending or she'll continuously respawn. In A Game of Winter you have to desecrate her tomb and fight her ghostly self.
• Flunky Boss: Always surrounded by Ice Elementals.
• An Ice Person: She has mastered Ice Magic and fights by freezing your soldiers, dropping ice meteors and summoning Ice Elementals.
• Rhymes on a Dime: The way she speaks.
• Teleport Spam: One of her techniques lets her teleport away from the battle and shower your troops with icy meteors as well.
• The Unpronounceable: The Narrator has some trouble getting her name right.
• Underground Monkey: Boss example, the Fanatic Fire Priestess Final Boss in A Song of Sand and Fire uses Guludruul's model but wields fire powers instead.

Smog the Dragon

A gigantic black Dragon Lizard, father of many reptilian children with a domain extended to humans and dwarves, he's the main villain and final boss of the three downloadable scenarios "A Chance of Dragons".

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• Big Bad: Of the A Chance of Dragons downloadable scenarios.
• Breath Weapon: He takes advantage of his position to breath a damaging stream of fire on your creatures as the battle opens.
• Enemy Mine: Implied, in the scenario where you face him he's supported by Gurmli and Krowtoes the Demigod.
• Elaborate Underground Base: One which include a catacomb, a twisting series of tunnels full of spiders and rats, a Dwarven mine/outpost, and Alliance outpost and finally his fiery, magma-adorned lair.
• Expy: Of Smaug the Magnificent, obviously.
• Final Boss: Of the third scenario, "Smog!". He's also a:
  • Flunky Boss: Due to having two invulnerable lairs spawning Dragon Lizards nearby.
  • Stationary Boss: Luckily he doesn't move from his nest. Not that he needs to...
• King Mook: Of the Dragon Lizard enemies.
• Orcus on His Throne: He never leaves his cavern.
• Our Dragons Are Different: He's a gigantic, black wingless Dragon with a round snout and spikes popping out of his back. He doesn't speak (though it's implied he can) but surely he breathes fire.

Meltysand the Red Priestess

Great Priestess of the Fire God, this Heroine gathered the Alliance under her protection after the second fall of King's Ending, and ends up fighting the Corrupting Evil and a revived Barthas, trying to use a magical altar to revive slain heroes.

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• Back from the Dead: Her altar can resurrect the forces of the Alliance at will. In the third scenario, Grave Matters, she plans to use the altar on the tombs of the three fallen heroes of King's Ending. Herself can resurrect at will, to the point that it finally feels sweet to kill her for good.
• Big Bad: Of the A Game of Winter and A Song of Sand and Fire expansion sets, though she doesn't appear directly in the latter.
• Captain Ersatz: Once again, another parody of a Game of Thrones character, specifically Melisandre.
• Damage-Sponge Boss: When she's enhanced by her God. This is also in the same mission where she, along with a legion of her followers, occupies a special spot and has to be killed in 12 minutes before she completes the ritual, making the whole ordeal quite difficult, as she can fight back. When you control the Prime Evil though, it's much easier.
• Due to the Dead: Subverted: while the previous three heroes (Krowtoes, Gulundruul and Gurmli) were eventually buried by the Alliance and all, Meltysand's corpse is quickly and messily devoured by an Orc and a Ghoul about a minute after her demise. Given the sheer number of times she resurrected herself...
• Early-Bird Boss: You have to fight and defeat her in the second scenario, but you spend the rest of the campaign trying to catch up with her. Subverted in the third scenario, where she flees as soon as you breach her base.
• Elemental Rivalry: She wields the powers of Fire against the ice-themed Undead.
• Fiery Redhead: A must, for a follower of the Fire God.
• Good Is Not Nice: Bossy, arrogant, demeaning and with a good old We Have Reserves attitude to boot.
• Hypocrite: She has nothing but contempt for Barthas' new undead state and the Corrupting Evil's necromancy... and her following plan to defeat them is to resurrect the deceased heroes to fight for her.
• Knight of Cerebus: She's not as funny as her previous colleagues, and is often more dangerous and difficult to face.
• Mundane Utility: She uses bonfires to kill her enemies, burn the corpses so that they won't be raised from the dead... and, of course, to toast some marshmallows.
• Playing with Fire: Well, duh... this also extend to her fanatical cultists. One of her attacks burns all surrounding units for massive damage.
• The Phoenix: Has this motif: the symbol of her cult is a pair of massive, golden wings, and she shoots miniature firebirds from her staff.
• Too Dumb to Live: Her last line of defense is a barrier so powerful not even the Absolute Evil can pierce it... too bad she says out loud that it's powered by the two Sacred Stones, which are outside the barrier, unprotected and vulnerable.
• We Have Reserves: Her powers allows her to bring soldiers back from the dead and fast, giving her this attitude.

Dungeons 3 — Characters

The Prime Evil and its Forces

The sum of the Ultimate, Chaotic and Corrupting Evil back in one piece, after the events of Dungeon 2, the Prime Evil has grown bored and sullen... until he learnt of a new continent in the east, unsullied by Evil and ready to be attacked. After realizing that his incompetent forces were unable to build a suitable fleet, the Prime Evil sends his own Shadow to possess Thalya, the Dark Elf, and start his reign of terror. In this game, the Prime Evil is served by Little Snots and can hire creatures from the Horde, Demons and Undead, in addition to Fallen Heroes.

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• The Alcoholic: The Horde creatures enjoy a good barrel of beer or two once in a while. This time they will produce it themselves if there's no Snots to handle the work, and you want them to because beer is required for Horde creatures to level up beyond level 3. In campaign mode, the Ogre consumes huge amounts of beers during the whole scenario from one action to the other. In the DLC Evil of the Caribbean the first scenario forces Thalya and her minions to protect expeditions of rum directed to his personal smuggling ship.
• Animate Dead: With a Graveyard and a Prison, you can raise defeated heroes as either a Zombie pack or a Skeletal Archers's pack. On the one hand, they're terribly weak, but on the other hand they do not influence the population limit and make some good Cannon Fodder.
• Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: The conclusion of Dungeons III and the addon Clash of Gods has him taking the throne of the now-defunct Goddess for himself.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: The Titan unit are visibly larger than any other monster of their own faction or the heroes themselves.
• Berserk Button: The Ogre doesn't appreciate those who criticize his (abysmal) music, and rampages in the well-fortified city of Lotsawinters after the heroes compare his music to a piano being ground between two millstones.
• Big Bad: The Prime Evil, which also combines Villain Protagonist (it's you after all) and Greater-Scope Villain, in a way, since this time he's not directly present in the Dungeon but acts through the Dungeonheart and Thalya.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: The Horde is Green, the Demons are Purple, the Undead are Blue and the Fallen Heroes are Red. This extend to their respective rooms, and the corridors leading to their rooms gets remodeled to match the scheme in question. Neutral Rooms are colored Yellow.
• Covert Pervert: In the introduction, it's seen that he has a wallpaper of a Succubus Cheerleader on the door of his super-secret Laboratory.
• Church Going Villain: The Undead's only necessity is a temple, which they visit to pray. It allows them to grow in level beyond the third. In the fourth game, the Temple is used to generate Blight that they can use to summon their own minions.
• Demonic Possession: The Living Shadow of the Prime Evil can do this to people for a little while, and does do semi-permanently to Thalya.
• Dreadful Musician: The Ogre in campaign mode. A plot point, since the heroes' reaction to it leads to his assault on Lotsawinter.
• Epic Fail: The Prime Evil's first and second attempts to invade the new continent via a fleet ends up disastrously, kinda like building a castle in a swamp.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Debatable, but even the Narrator seems surprised and disgusted by Tanos' incredibly fanatical Faith–Heel Turn.
• Evil Costume Switch: Fallen Heroes gain a chalk white complexion as well as a new, eviler looking set of armor and clothes.
• Evil Is Petty: It's mentioned that the Prime Evil is not above performing deadly pranks on his own Little Snots for shit and giggles.
• Evil Overlord: Just like in the previous two games.
• Fallen Hero: This time, he can hire heroes captured in the dungeon and tortured in the Torture Chamber. You can only have up to 3 of them around without further research, but they do not count towards your Population Limit.
• The Ghost: The Prime Evil doesn't make a direct appearence in the game, being stuck in his old, comfortable Underworld.
• God of Evil: After Thalya and her forces destroy the Goddess in Clash of Gods he gets to take over her Throne and pester the Overworld with Bolt of Divine Retribution.
• Heavily Armored Mook: Both Goblins and Orcs can receive a powerup where they start wearing heavy armor (the latter) or pilot a Mini-Mecha (the former).
• Hero Unit: Aside from Thalya each faction has a Titan unit, which is bigger, stronger and unique, costing a large amount of Evilness to research. Titans do not count towards your population point, but they cost a 1,000 gold, take up 16 spaces in their faction dwelling (as opposed to the typical 4) and do not work in your Dungeon. The Horde has the Ogre, the Demons have the Pit Fiend, while the Undead have the Grave Golem. Each has a unique attribute and powers.
• The Horde: The "starting" faction, as for the first game, they mostly provide the brawn and create Beer, traps and machines for the Dungeon. They need a Hideout to sleep and rest, as well as food, gold and beer.
  • Our Goblins Are Different: Small, big-nosed creatures wielding two daggers with a penchant for sneak attacks, they're ignored by the enemy if other creatures are present. They can drive a Mini-Mecha with the right upgrade.
  • Our Orcs Are Different: Like the Goblins, they're identical to the ones from the previous game, and provide the standard melee units. Can learn to wield steel armor to become Mighty Glacier types.
  • Snake People: The Naga this time are more snake-looking and provide the healing for your mortal troops, as well as fighting from afar.
  • Our Ogres Are Hungrier: Introduced in this game, Ogres are huge brutes who can take tons of punishment while dealing devastating damage to nearby foes and thus "lead" the Horde in combat. The scenario introducing the Ogre is even called "The Hungry, Hungry Ogre".
• Legions of Hell: The Demons can be summoned in the Vortex Room and manage the Mana and research in the Dungeons. If killed they can be revived in the Vortex Room, provided that there's enough space for their summoning circle and mana to heal them. Demons need food, gold and, and relaxation in the (literal) Mana pools. Except for their Titan unit, they're all long-ranged fighters.
  • The Imp: Imps are small, crawling demons who can attack from a long distance with fiery spit.
  • Spider People: Arachnids are spider-like demons who fight from afar by spitting globes of poisonous web, and are much more resilient in melee.
  • Succubi and Incubi: Succubae are back from the previous game, they can beguile heroes or fight from afar with magic missiles. They manage the Torture Chamber.
  • Big Red Devil: The massive Pit Fiend, the toughest demon you can summon, though he has a temper to match. He's still the less resilient Titan, though he can dish out the most damage out of the three.
• Minion with an F in Evil: The Orcs' quote. "Blood for the Blood God! Cookies for the Prime Evil!".
• Mooks: Little Snots are back as servants, doing all the menial but vital tasks in your dungeon. You can slap them to encourage them.
• Night of the Living Mooks: The Undead are back, and available from the get go. They offer the chance of obtaining magical structures, as well as the Prison and the Crypts, which allows you to imprison heroes and keep your deceased creatures to revive them later. They only need gold and a temple, and can revive at will as long as you have free tombs.
  • Our Vampires Are Different: This time they look more like a Classical Movie Vampire and are melee fighters who don't fear sunlight or garlic, healing themselves with every melee strike.
  • Our Banshees Are Louder: Banshees are back from the previous game, they can still attack and hurt multiple enemies with their screams.
  • Our Liches Are Different: Liches are robed skeletons with glowing crystals inserted in their bodies who mostly attack with Ice magic.
  • Improvised Golem: The Grave Golem is a Stone Wall monster made from tombstones, who can force nearby heroes to attack him while the other creatures do the rest of the work.
• Orcus on His Throne: The Prime Evil himself is still stuck in his comfortable Dungeon somewhere back in the lands beyond the sea, since he has no way to physically appear there himself, aside from a summoning ritual midway through the vanilla campaign.
• Pet the Dog: Campaign-only, when Thalya is captured by Tanos and tortured, the Prime Evil, while not present and possibly not giving a damn, still insist in saving her from Tanos.
• Resurrective Immortality: Demons will come back to life as long as there's enough space in the Vortex chamber for a pentacle and mana to heal them, while the Undead just need a Graveyard and enough space for their tombs. You can build a Crypt to revive any fallen Horde Creature or Fallen Hero, but the Crypt needs research to bring them back with full health. Thalya can also be revived from death by paying a bit of gold.
• Set Swords to "Stun": Having a working Prison or Torture Chamber in the Dungeon will mean that your creatures, from that moment on, will start "stunning" the heroes they fight inside the Dungeon rather than killing them outright, which allows the Little Snots to carry them to the Prison (where they slowly starve until they're turned to skeletons) or the Torture Chamber (where Succubi will chain them to torture implements and whip them until they either die or join your cause). As a matter of fact, traps never take prisoners.
• Summon Bigger Fish: The Temple, if large enough, can give your monsters the chance of summoning the Prime Evil himself to lay waste on the enemies. In campaign mode, a huge sacrificial altar is used to summon the Prime Evil to fight Tanos and his heroes from Valhalla.
• Summoning Ritual: When Thalya and her army is confronted by Tanos and his Gates of Valhalla, the Dark Elf has to sacrifice heroes to summon the Prime Evil himself, who proceeds to turn the enemy horde into a pile of corpses and eventually defeats Tanos himself in a long, animesque duel.
• Surrounded by Idiots: The Prime Evil has this reaction upon witnessing the second destruction of his invasion fleet... while it's still in sight of the starting beach.
• Taking the Bullet: The Grave Golem in "The Baptism of Fire" does this for Thalya.
• Thinking Up Portals: The Vortex room contains portals (automatically built by the Little Snots whenever there's a free slot and a creature) which summons back dead demons to revive them with Mana. Also, the Portal Spell is cast on the surface and allows you to move creatures from the Throne Room to it back and forth, but can be destroyed by heroes.
• Tin Tyrant: The Prime Evil, like in the previous game. It's mentioned that he makes loud clanking noises whenever he pats himself on the shoulder, or that no one shakes his hands due to the spiked barbs.
• Trap Door: The new way to dispose of rebellious or unneeded creatures, located within the Throne Room.
• Trademark Favourite Food: Horde and Demons have developed a taste for Gobblers, and the former also drinks beer. Unlike the previous game, they can still be hungry and/or thirsty on the surface.
• Villain: Exit, Stage Left: The Dungeonheart can teleport Thalya away whenever she's in a sticky situation.
• Villainous BSoD: After realizing that Victory Is Boring, the Prime Evil fell into deep depression and locked himself in his Super-secret Secret Laboratory for ages, before realizing that, this being a sequel, he could discover a new continent, ready to be invaded.
• Water Source Tampering: They poison the Not-So-Free Cities' wells in mission 13.
• Walking Wasteland: Conquering the Isle of Good will turn the landscape into a demonic wasteland which produces Evilness.
• Worker Unit: The Little Snots are responsible for doing all the gruntwork such as excavation, mining and building.
• You Have Researched Breathing: Subverted for once, unlocking a room or a new creature gives you everything it can do at once. The research provided by the Hall of Knowledge allows you to further improve the production, stockage or efficiency of a room or further improve a creature's already existing skills.
• You Require More Vespene Gas: Kinda like the first game of the series, the Prime Evil needs several resources, namely Gold (to pay for the structures and creatures, obtained through mining), Mana (Produced by the Demons or mining, needed to cast spell or attend to the Demons), Evilness (Obtained by Isles of Evil or prisoners, needed to make research), as well as Gobblers (for food), Toolboxes (for traps and doors), Magic Toolboxes (for magical traps and devices) and Beer (for the Horde).

Thalya

A Dark Elf sorceress, adopted by the good paladin Tanos and raised as a good soul who forgot her not-totally extinguished evil nature, she's chosen by the Prime Evil to be his lieutenant on this land, doing his bidding and leading its creatures to glory. During the course of the game she keeps struggling between her restored evil personality and her genuinely good personality.

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• 11th-Hour Superpower: Her training on Mount Destiny to gain enough power to defeat Tanos. Specifically, it grants her a Frost Nova that allows her to nullify Tanos' flaming shield.
• Action Girl: A powerful sorceress who's eager to fight and burn hordes of heroes to cinders.
• Arson Murder And Jay Walking: A Running Gag has her giving a series of three orders to her minions following this gag.
• Bad Boss: She rescues some imprisoned Ironhide Orcs... only to punish them for failing their mission and being captured. The narrator points this out as "ironic" with a not-so-subtle hint... later in the game she pursues a wounded Tanos, only to end up captured and tortured.
• Bag of Spilling: Every stage begins with Thalya back at Level 1 and requiring you to upgrade her once again.
• Benevolent Boss: Good!Thalya as the Avatar of the Goddess in Clash of Gods encourages her heroes and resurrects them on the Overworld. Too bad you must kill her.
• Bond One-Liner: She often delivers these when killing off an enemy.
• Calling the Old Man Out: She shouts back at Tanos several times during the course of the story, even, at one point, accusing him of raising her just to be his precious "good Dark Elf pet". Even her Good side calls out Tanos on his desperate, fanatical behaviour he's fallen into.
• Card-Carrying Villain: She turns into one upon being possessed. Her evil half at least. Ultimately she's a Villain Protagonist when Tanos has his Faith–Heel Turn.
• Creepy Souvenir: In response to Grimli's threat of making slippers out of her ears, she wished to make gloves out of his beard and skin. The Narrator called her out on how unhygienic this was.
• Cutscene Power to the Max: When she first fall into evil she destroys a whole building alone with a giant beam of energy. In gameplay, she starts off so weak she cannot take heroes alone.
• Daddy's Girl: Her good self was this to Tanos, her adoptive father. She loses this when Tanos goes insane.
• Damsel in Distress: In the second-to-last scenario, Thalya is captured by Tanos who tries to forcefully redeem her through torture. Fortunately, the Prime Evil and the Grave Golem still have enough resources and an hour of time to rescue her.
• Dragon-in-Chief: To the Prime Evil, directly acting on his behalf.
• Dumbass Has a Point: Good!Thalya in Clash of Gods affirms she could use her status as the Goddess' avatar to actually perform real good, not the "twisted" good Tanos did.
• Elemental Rivalry: Invoked in the penultimate scenario, where she obtains the power of Frost Nova to wield. When she asks why, the Narrator reminds her of Tanos' powers over fire, which means that her newly acquired powers are the perfect foil to his.
• Enemy Mine: When the Narrator mentions that the heroes of Burger's End are open-minded gourmands who consider Dark Elves' fingers a delicacy worth trying, even Good!Thalya decides, for once, to support her Evil half. After being freed from Tanos' conversion by severe torture, Good!Thalya claims that she's not going to forgive Tanos and will make him pay. It's probably the only time her Evil self wholeheartedly agrees with her.
• Enemy Without: The final boss of Clash of Gods is Thalya's good side finally given a body on her own and the chance to repay Evil!Thalya of all her insults and abuse.
• Evil Costume Switch: Subverted, her dress simply turns pitch-black upon falling to the dark side.
• Evil Feels Good: She's horrified when she sees the destruction she caused on Twistram, but soon enough she's enchanted by it...
• Evil Is Hammy: Her evil side is bombastic, loud and hammier than a bacon farm. Her good side is much more subdued and shy.
• Expy: She's a Drizzt parody, though not to the point of being another copycat (she has white hair and grey skin, but she's a sorceress, not a two-scimitar-wielding ranger).
• Face–Heel Turn: She was raised as a good person by Tanos, but the possession from the Prime Evil's shadow rekindled her buried Dark Side and made her evil once more.
• Fantastic Racism: She's eager to sacrifice those stinky pale-skinned Elves. Also, she's not too fond of Dwarves, and the feeling is mutual.
• Fearless Fool: In Clash of Gods, she's a tad too carefree and happy to go and fight the Goddess herself.
• Freudian Slip: When good, she occasionally praises/cheers on evil by mistake, and she does the opposite when evil.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Even when still Good she was apparently frequently subject to Fantastic Racism and is dismissed, ignored, or ridiculed by everyone other than Tanos. His friends and allies openly refer to her as a subhuman to her face and clearly expect her to turn feral at any point, and Tanos doesn't call them out on it ever. She lampshades this at the beginning of the second mission, adding that showing people she's not such a pushover feels great.
• Good Is Dumb: Her good self, to a ludicrous degree.
• Hartman Hips: Very noticeable. If you look closely at her model from behind, you'll see that her hips are so large that not even her Showgirl Skirt can completely cover them from behind.
• Hero Unit: Much like Barthas Snow from the last game, she is a unique unit who serves as the commander of your armies.
• Immortality Inducer: The Dungeonheart is this to her, allowing her to revive if killed in combat. In fact, in those campaign scenarios where she's out of the Dungeon, she can be Killed Off for Real.
• Magic Staff: Her only weapon of choice is a scepter tipped with a red crystal.
• Man of Kryptonite: Near the end of the main campaign she gains the ability to create a Frost Nova to directly counteract Tanos' powers over fire. In the final stage, this lets her not only put out fires blocking the way (and recruiting defecting Heroes about to be killed by Tanos) but also used to disable his shield.
• Ms. Fanservice: A tall, buxom woman whose clingy outfit shows a lot of legs. She wore said clothes even when she was good.
• My God, What Have I Done?: When she briefly comes back to her senses after destroying the Fatigueing Library. Her Good side keeps this up with each new atrocity.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Pursuing a defeated and unstable Tanos leads to her defeat and capture. Played for laughs in Clash of Gods, where her bickering with the Narrator leads to him worsening the situation every time out of spite, such as summoning more monsters or flooding the level with magma.
• No Fourth Wall: She frequently bickers with the Narrator, complaining about the situation, the previous game and other topics. At one point she even tries to steal his part, only for the narrator to summon some bears against her on the Overworld.
• Not So Above It All: After killing Yaina and contemplating turning her into an Undead, Good!Thalya admitted that the thought was funny indeed.
• Pet the Dog:
  • In "The Baptism of Fire", she unintentionally saves some heroes from Tanos' firestorm and mourns the Grave Golem after his Heroic Sacrifice.
  • At the end of the "Famous Last Words" DLC, upon learning that this is the final piece of content for the game she's taken back for a moment before telling the minions to give the player a proper sendoff.
• Playing with Fire: She mostly employs fire bombs to attack.
• Pyromaniac: After turning evil. There's a secondary mission in the first level which requires killing as many heroes as possible with her fire spells.
• Running Gag: Evil!Thalya ordering her creature to do "things" to the heroes with two bad things and a harmless one. In Clash of God we have Neutral!Thalya trying to suggest negotiations with the parties involved.
• Shout-Out: The narrator compares her split-personalities argument with Gollum and also the Voermann Twins. In Clash of Gods, upon learning that she's a chance to fight the Goddess she says she's going to kick her ass Krotas-style.
• Sitcom Archnemesis: She's constantly bickering with the narrator due to either complaining about the plot or trying to do the narration herself. The narrator typically responds with either snark or randomly spawning creatures to attack her. It comes to a head with the "Famous Last Words" DLC, where the narrator decides to become the main antagonist himself.
• Split Personality: After becoming Evil, her Good personality still shows up to pester her and beg her evil personality to stop. In Clash of Gods she's ultimately reduced to "Neutral Thalya", constantly suggesting peace negotiations with the Remnants or the Goddess. Said personality is later given her own body to serve as the Goddess' champion and destroyed, apparently for good.
• The Starscream: The very final part of the very final cutscene implies that the Goddess plans to turn her into her next champion to unleash against the Prime Evil. In the final level of Clash of Gods the Goddess separates Thalya's goodness from her evil self to make her her avatar, and even Evil!Thalya admitted that she thought she was going to kill the Goddess, take her powers and then turn against the Supreme Evil.
• Summon Magic: After growing in power she can summon some living shadows to fight for her.
• Talking to Themself: When she gets into arguments when herself.
• Villain Has a Point: She's right when she spits back into Tanos' face the fact that his allies and friends always distrusted her even when she was good, with Grimli even badmouthing her openly, and he never did a thing to stop them. Also, Tanos eventually admitted that he only cared for her because she was once living proof that he can make evil creatures good, though that may be the madness talking.
• You Call That a Wound?: If she dies she can be revived from the Dungeon after a brief period of time for a bit of Gold. When there isn't a Dungeon however then she'll die for good. In 4, when she dies it requires a lengthy ritual performed by your Little Snots, during which they won't be doing any work.

The Empire

The forces of goodness and justice in this new land, essentially the Alliance 2.0 for convenience's sake. Consists in an alliance of Dwarves, Elves and Humans.

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• Action Girl: Elves are all female in this game. They're also either archers or rogues.
• The Alliance: The antagonists of this title, just like the previous one.
• Anti-Hero: Like the Alliance from the previous game, they soon prove to be not exactly heroic at all. As Tanos mentions, Grimli is a racist, Yaina is a capitalist who would sell her mother for a handful of dollars, and Elric would kill a man to get a hand mirror if the mood struck him. Tanos himself devolves into a fanatical, fire-happy lunatic near the end.
• BFS: The Warrior's weapon. Of course, it's Compensating for Something.
• Big Eater: The heroes from Burger's End are incredibly tough but their weakness is the staggering amount of food they need to consume daily. At one point, the narrator mentions that they're not above adding Dark Elves to the menu. You must defeat them by cutting off their supply of food and starving them out.
• Captain Ersatz: They are a blatant parody of the Alliance as portrayed in Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos.
• Combat Medic: Novices can either use offensive spells or heal their allies. In this case, Shoot the Medic First applies.
• Dual Wielding: Elven Rogues and their evolution like wield massive blades.
• Elaborate Equals Effective: Each class has two further evolutions. Said upgrades are better-looking and stronger.
• The Empire: They're referred to as such at one point by the Narrator.
• Face–Heel Turn: Sometimes, tortured heroes will become evil and enter your service, becoming an Evil Counterpart of their former class. The final mission has several Empire forces about to be killed for questioning Tanos that will defect to Evil when rescued.
• Fantastic Racism: Deconstruct Elves vs. Dwarves with Thalya: because she's a Dark Elf, everyone, especially the Dwarves, expects her to be evil deep inside and thus unworthy of trust. The Prime Evil uses this feelings to persuade Thalya to embrace the dark side.
• Glass Cannon: Wizards and Priestesses are very powerful, but can be taken down quickly once in melee range.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Dwarven Guards are armed with shields big enough to conceal them.
• Our Dwarves Are All the Same: Pretty much yes: stocky, armored, gun-using and have a rivalry with elves.
• Stone Wall: Dwarven Guards are the sturdiest heroes you can fight.
• The Turretmaster: Dwarven Gunners can summon a small cannon to bombard their enemies from afar.
• White Magician Girl: Novices/Priestesses are the only human female heroes and can heal others with their staves.

Tanos the Paladin

The most respectable and noble member of the forces of Good, he's Thalya's foster father. When he discovered what happened to his daughter, he tries to save her from the Prime Evil's influence and later stop and kill her when he believes she's gone too far.

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• Archnemesis Dad: To his foster daughter Thalya.
• Back from the Dead: He gets revived in Dungeons 4.
• Bad Boss: Becomes one to his own men after turning insane. In the final scenario you even have the bonus objective of saving heroes about to be executed by him.
• Berserk Button: He becomes absolutely furious when Thalya murders his loyal companions, and his methods become harsher over time.
• Big Good: Technically he's this, opposed to you. He's also much more morally-decent than the Alliance from the previous game, compared to Krowtoes or Meltysand. He becomes a more classical Big Bad after his thorough defeat at the hands of the Prime Evil and goes insane.
• Break the Haughty: A losing battle against the Prime Evil tears his morale down into the ground, and causes him to snap from the shame.
• Carry a Big Stick: His weapon of choice is a large, flanged mace shaped like the winged symbol of his faction.
• Composite Character: He takes hints from the previous game's antagonists, Krowtoes and Meltysand, mixing and matching both status and powers (can summon a barrier that makes him impervious to damage and can control fire.]]
• Decapitation Presentation: Once he's killed, Thalya mounts his head on a pike on the tip of the Mountain of Destiny. In Clash of Gods said head is later used to play pinata.
• Deus ex Machina: Literally, when he's about to be killed by the Prime Evil, his Goddess grants him invincibility and allows him to teleport to safety.
• Drop-In Nemesis: His spirit will sometimes appear from nowhere to plead to Thalya, much to her (and the narrator's) frustration.
• Drunk on the Dark Side: In 4, the Gauntlet of Finitude makes him even more unhinged to the point that at one point he's competing with Thalya over harvesting Evilness via raiding villages.
• Expy: He's a parody of Uther Lightbringer of the Warcraft series. In 4, he becomes a Thanos parody due to not only becoming even more blatantly evil but also becoming bigger and purple.
• Failed a Spot Check: After the destruction of Lakeville, the narrator muses why Tanos is taking so long to track down the Prime Evil's army despite the massive destruction and havoc it's leaving behind, and even Good!Thalya admits that he's never been a good tracker.
• Foreshadowing: There's a subtle hint he's a dangerous zealot beneath his noble exterior in the very first mission when a still-Good Thalya mentions his name to a commoner. When told the Orphanage is 'important to him' and Tanos 'might be disappointed' if he doesn't go, the commoner reacts with terror. As later events would show, that reaction was entirely justified.
• He Who Fights Monsters: Thalya's evil acts and the deaths of his friends make him go insane and unleash hell on the Evil forces, Thalya and even his very own allies.
• Hero Antagonist: He's a paragon of virtue and a good foster father to Thalya, too bad you're the bad guy there... But then he has a glamorous Faith–Heel Turn and goes insane. Lampshaded by Evil!Thalya who's sure that, despite all that he's done, Tanos still believes to be the good guy.
• High-Pressure Emotion: He turns red and fumes with wrath in the cutscenese following the death of his allies.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Thalya, the Dark Elf he adopted so that she could become good and wholesome, turned against him and his allies.
• I Have No Daughter!: In Stombreeze, he admits to Thalya's face that no longer he considers her a daughter and that yes, he raised Thalya only to make a point that even a mangy, disgusting Dark Elf can be trained to be good.
• "I Know You Are in There Somewhere" Fight: He tries to encourage Thalya to fight back the influence of the Prime Evil, to no avail. Deconstructed in the scenario "Light and Shadow", where, after believing that Thalya still has a sliver of goodness within her, he becomes convinced that's his duty to purify her with inquisitorial methods.
• Kill It with Fire: After being fought in Stormbreeze he snaps and summons a gigantic firestorm that will purify the city, destroying everything in his path, only to kill Thalya. When her good self calls him out on this, he retorts that Stormbreeze would have fallen anyway.
• Knight in Shining Armor: He's a paladin. Also averts being a Knight Templar. Subverted when, after being defeated by the Prime Evil and forced to run away, he slips completely into madness and burns an entire city to the ground before resorting to torture Thalya to bring out her good side forcefully.
• Large Ham: Subdued most of the time, but anger does make him hammier and louder. After going insane and trying to kill and then torture Thalya to make her good forever, he screams with unnatural emphasis on every single word.
• Moral Myopia: While this becomes incredibly prominent after his breakdown and transformation into the "Evil-Who-Thinks-He's-Good", this trait of his personality is visible even when he was, supposedly, a hero for the Empire: he and his friends have many faults and no qualms about butchering "evil" races just because they were considered evil.
• Playing with Fire: Has power over fire and flames.
• Reminiscing About Your Victims: In a surprisingly dark example, given the more cheery, tongue-in-cheek context, Tanos remembers about that time when he and Grimli slaughtered the Dark Elves of Thalya's village and he decided to redeem the newborn elf rather than kill her, prying her from her mother's cold, dead hands.
• Sanity Slippage: He becomes more and more ruthless with each of his allies killed by Thalya. By the time Elric's dead, Tanos decides she must pay. After the following defeat at the hands of the Prime Evil and Thalya's assault he snaps and turns into a fanatical lunatic who burns the entire capital to the ground in his attempt to kill Thalya.
• Selective Obliviousness: One of his biggest flaws is his inability to register when his friends do anything wrong. When Thalya calls him out on his letting Grimli mock and threaten her, he claims it didn't happen even though it happened right in front of him just a few days ago.
• Stock Scream: Played for laughs, his Skyward Scream is actually the Wilhelm Scream.
• What the Hell, Hero?: The Lemony Narrator sarcastically calls him and his allies out on their decision to endure Thalya's threat by locking themselves in their fortresses and hoping for the best. Good!Thalya is horrified to see how low he fell upon going insane.

Grimli the Dwarven King

Dwarven King of the eastern lands and Tanos' best friend, he's a bigoted racist who never really trusted Thalya, and is quick to take arms against her. He's the first of Tanos' allies to be fought.

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• Authority Equals Asskicking: He's the king of the Dwarves, as well as the toughest one.
• Blood Knight: Encourages his men with the very same speech made by Theoden in battle... except that he claims they are doing it for Wrath, Ruin and a Red Dawn.^note Theoden actually says these lines, but during the final battle of The Two Towers.
• The Cavalry: Arrives in Twistram with a massive army of Dwarves that forces Thalya to flee to safety.
• Jerkass: He's rude and racist, and doesn't bother to trust his best friend's judgment of Thalya, preferring to believe his own bigoted prejudice.
• The Lancer: He's this to Tanos in the narration. His death makes the Paladin determined to not let Thalya get away.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: His racist comments to Thalya's face and clearly audible monologues on how she's a worthless waste of time didn't help his cause when the Prime Evil used them to persuade Thalya that she's better off evil.
• Politically Incorrect Hero: A heroic Dwarven King who happens to be an unlikeable, bumbling racist.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: In the Ashspring Swamplands he will fle-ehm, strategically withdraw to a safer location when half or more of his health is gone.
• Shout-Out: He's an Expy of Gimli who looks like a Troll Slayer.
• Starter Villain: He's the first of the heroes to be dealt with.
• Would Hurt a Child: Tanos revealed that Grimli almost killed a newborn Thalya for being a Dark Elf.
• You Shall Not Pass!: In Ashspring Swamplands, he defends the entrance to the camp personally. He does retreat if he's seriously wounded.

Yaina Overproud

Member of the Empire, she's one of Tanos' allies and rules over the Termite Island, where she faces the invading forces of Thalya and the Prime Evil.

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• Ambiguously Brown: She looks very tanned at least, despite being from the same empire as the other more Caucasian-looking heroes.
• Aside Glance: Her corpse does this to the camera in the cutscene describing her death, upon hearing the ridiculous description delivered by the narrator.
• Ax-Crazy: Though it doesn't show very often, her lines that aren't about protecting Dollaran from Evil falls into this.
• Beam-O-War: In the siege of Dollaran, she spends the entire combat firing out a spell at "Crowley" the Pit Fiend to keep him from advancing, while Thalya casts a counter-beam to keep Crowley advancing. To further complicate matters, her heroes will push Crowley back with their presence alone, which forces you to support him with your own creatures. Thankfully, Crowley can, once in a while and for a brief instant, ignore the beam and press forward on his own.
• By the Power of Grayskull!: She invokes the Thunderbolt (her spell) as well as the "Moonstone" and the Power of the Moon in combat.
• Calling Your Attacks: Being a parody of anime girls, she's prone to loudly announce her attacks.
• Capitalism Is Bad: Played for laughs, at one point even Tanos mentions that she would sell her mother for a handful of dollars.
• Captain Ersatz: She's a parody of Jaina Proudmore from the Warcraft series mixed with Sailor Moon.
• Cowardly Boss: Like Grimli, she first appears along with her soldiers on the Overworld, ready to face Thalya and her forces... but while Grimli places himself outside the camp to protect it efficiently and only flees when seriously wounded, Yaina doesn't do anything to directly stop Thalya other than sending wave after wave of heroes at the dungeon and flees like a coward when the Prime Evil's army approaches the fortified city. At the end of the second scenario, after spending all her forces to push back Crowley from her tower, she teleports to safety along with Crowley, though this time not after dueling the demon herself. She finally fights for real when cornered in the last scenario.
• Early-Bird Cameo: She appears in the cutscene after the Battle of Steelsmith along with the Elric.
• Fantastic Racism: One of her taunts has her express verbal contempt for Thalya, a Dark Elf.
• For Great Justice: Subverted, when her battle is for "Capitalism and Neo-liberalism!" rather than Justice.
• Girlish Pigtails: Her hairstyle, which fits her personality.
• Gory Discretion Shot: In the (identical) cutscene where Tanos lets out an intentionally narmy Skyward Scream over her corpse, we don't actually see her body, just a red smear and a crude drawing of her dead body on a wooden plank held by an Orc. Oddly, her head, at least, appears to be intact, based on one of the prior scenes.
• Granola Girl: Unlike Gulundruul from the previous game, she looks much younger and more perky. At one point she even invoke the "Goddess" protection.
• In the Name of the Moon: Routinely references the trope namer's speech.
• Magical Girl: She's a magician and her outfit looks straight out of an anime. Some of the cutscenes even show her with magical girl style titles and epithets.
• Purple Is Powerful: She dresses mostly in purple clothes, and she's the Empire's strongest Witch.
• The Power of the Void: In the final battle against her she summons her Arcane Tears, as in, micro black holes that inflicts an ocean of pain to the Dungeonheart and must be destroyed in time. One of her strongest attacks summons massive black orbs of Void that detonates after a handful of seconds, dealing heavy damage to everything around them.
• Shock and Awe: She mostly employs lighting magic in combat.
• Straw Feminist: Played for Laughs when she specifically instructs both her men and women to take action and even invokes the Goddess. That being said though, apparently the Goddess is actually the deity of choice of the Empire.
• Teleport Spam: She teleports around both in cutscenes and in combat, the latter of which is damaging for your troops.
• This Cannot Be!: Her last words upon being defeated by Thalya.
• Valley Girl: Has this speech pattern, and pretty much fits the description.
• Verbal Backspace: A Running Gag has her referring to another famous conflict between good and evil only to correct herself. In her defense, the Prime Evil does direct the Horde.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Claims that Good always triumphs over evil. After The Reveal, this becomes... true, in a fashion...

Elric the Pretty

A narcissistic Paladin who was tutored by Tanos himself and protects the Not-So-Free Cities of the Empire, he's the last of the three allies to be fought. The power of the Goddess makes him worth three normal paladins. And we mean literally...

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• Boss Banter: He engages in some lengthy threats with Thalya before fighting.
• By the Power of Grayskull!: His invokation: "By the power of the Goddess! Multiply me!"
• Expy: His looks as a noble, blond paladin and the situation he's in (being forced to kill his own subjects being turned into undead by a virus) calls to mind Arthas Menethil during the culling of Stratholme.
• The Fighting Narcissist: His introductory cutscene has him looking at himself in a mirror intently, while a disgusted Thalya facepalms in the foreground.
• The Ghost: Out of Tanos' companions, he's the one who gets the least screentime. Unlike them, he only appears in precisely one scenario, where he's killed.
• Jerkass: Despite being Tanos' disciple he's very haughty, arrogant and condescending, and doesn't move a finger to help the villages under attack from Thalya and the rising undead.
• Kick the Dog: He mercilessly kills one of his own infected subjects, despite the latter's pleas and claims of having a family.
• Lack of Empathy: Even Tanos admits with a straight face that Elric would gladly kill a man to get a mirror handy.
• Large Ham: He's extremely bombastic and loud, fitting his character.
• Orcus on His Throne: Claims that he monitored Thalya's advance to make sure she would be right there where he wanted, but she accuses him of actually being one of these, too lazy to move until confronted.
• Self-Duplication: His specialty is splitting into three clones: Elric the Stunning (possess a powerful, aoe stunning attack), Elric the Healer (helas his clones), Elric the Resurrector (revives his clones).
• Pun: From Elric the Pretty to Elric the Stunning... which in this case also refers to his stunning attack.
• This Cannot Be!: His last words upon being killed. All three of them.

The Fairy Godmother

Sickeningly sweet and good lady of the Fairyland and main antagonist of the Once Upon a Fairy Tale DLC, it's her job to make sure fairy tales run their course, as well as providing the heroes with magical potions produced from her factories.

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• Boss Banter: Once she becomes the boss, she starts to periodically sprouts threats from her seat. Being the Good Fairy, these are Poke the Poodle type threats.
• Captain Ersatz: She's a blatant one of the Fairy Godmother from Shrek 2, which the Narrator lampshades the DLC borrows a lot from.
• Co-Dragons: She's protected by the Seven Dwarves (seven increasingly more powerful Dwarven Guards), who you have to eliminate before getting to her (they're in the way in any case).
• Fairy Godmother: She rules over this land, and is so overwhelmingly sweet and nice the Absolute Evil cannot stand her.
• Forced Transformation: She's first introduced turning a rebellious hero into a toad, and her factories produces a fog which turns heroes into sheep. In the last scenario her domain is guarded by towers which turn your monsters into sheep.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: In the first scenario she has her cauldrons sent loads of potions to the heroes, while in the second one, her factories produce a fog which turns people into sheep. In the final scenario, the Devious Evil combines both resources to assault her fortress with a horde of dynamite-loaded sheep.
• Obliviously Evil: While she acts as if she's good, her factories in the Enchanted Forest periodically turns heroes into harmless sheep. That being said, it is also mentioned that her lawyers sue to the ground anyone who tries to confront her on that flaw.

King Arcturus

King of the Even-More-Eastern Kingdoms, set sail long ago to seek for the Holy Grail... only to return to find Stormbreeze reduced to a smoking ruin and the forces of the Absolute Evil crawling the place. He's the protagonist of the first scenario of the DLC Lord of the Kings and later the antagonist.

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• Decoy Protagonist: He's actually playable (alongside the heroes) in the first scenario of the dlc, but becomes the antagonist later on when the player controls Thalya.
• The Good King: Compared to Tanos and the other "heroes", Arcturus may not be a shining paragon of virtue, but he sounds reasonable enough.
• Healing Hands: With the Holy Grail he can heal surrounding units for a while. Alternatively, he can bless the soil to damage all evil creatures.
• Heroes Prefer Swords: He's the heroic king who wields a massive longsword in his right hand, holding the Grail in the other one.
• The Paladin: Fittingly, his abilities let him heal allies and deal damage to nearby enemies.
• Perspective Flip: The first scenario has you playing as him, hiring heroes from the camps to defeat the forces of evil and reclaim the Islands of Evil.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: While most of the Empire's heroes are a bunch of jerkasses with little care for their subjects, Arcturus is far more heroic and encouraging to his men, and actually forces the Absolute Evil to turn his attention towards him.
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: He actually builds his forces from scratch to retake Stormbreeze and the surroundings from the forces of the Absolute Evil.
• Yank the Dog's Chain: While he's sympathetic compared to the other heroes and initially playable, he's ultimately an obstacle Thalya has to crush.

The Forest Queen

Ruler of untamed wildlands and main antagonist of the An Unexpected DLC. In order to stop the latest hero infestation, Thalya and the Deforesting Evil have to fight their way through her gloomy, confusing domain and take her down for good.

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• Don't Go in the Woods: Her domain is within a massive forest and she can make your creatures regret their intrusion by summoning giant thrashing roots and ents to deal with them.
• Face Death with Dignity: When she finally dies, she accepts her demise, warning the Defiling Evil that Nature wont' die with her.
• Gaia's Vengeance: Promptly promises a harsh punishment to the Ultimate Evil for his defilement of nature and can actually act on that threat by summoning giant roots and Rootling troops into the Dungeon which, if not dealt with swiftly enough, will destroy your Dungeon Heart.
• "Get Back Here!" Boss: Once you whittle her health down to a certain point she'll teleport in one of the root masses at the corners of the map, where she gradually get healed. You must uncover the three hidden portal plates and use them to chase after her before she's fully healed.
• God Save Us from the Queen!: Granted, she's not the ruler of a proper monarchy but her power over the entire forest makes her incredibly dangerous.
• Green Thumb: She's a dryad-like creature capable of manipulating plants and natural features to attack, summoning Rootlings, Ents or giant tentacle-like roots.
• Healing Factor: Thanks to the root system in her domain she can teleport to a safe location and recover her health. You must follow her with the portal stone and destroy the roots before she's healed completely.
• Horned Humanoid: She has two branch-like sets of luminous antlers on her head, giving the impression of a crown.
• No-Nonsense Nemesis: Contrasting the other heroes, the Queen is rather serious in her threats and demeanor.
• Orcus on His Throne: She waits, immobile, in the middle of her forest, protected by a series of gates and countermeasures.

Admiral Overproud

Yaina's father, he leads the remnants of the Western Kingdoms against Thalya's forces in Clash of Gods in order to avenge his daughter, and serves as the antagonist for the first part of the campaign.

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• Ambiguously Brown: Has the very same complexion as his daughter Yaina.
• Anti-Hero: Pretty much implied to be this, just like the others.
• Avenging the Villain: He often swears to avenge his beloved daughter.
• Diagonal Cut: In his introductory cutscene he dispatches a distracted Succubus with one. Delayed Reaction and Oh, Crap! included.
• Disc-One Final Boss: He leads the remnants of the Empire against the forces of the Empire-Crushing Evil and is fought as a Final Boss of scenarios 1 and 3, but he's ultimately a pawn and, upon his demise, the Evil and Thalya set up to reach Godmount and defeat the entity behind him, the Goddess.
• Expy: Of Admiral Proudmore, Jaina's father who, like him, appeared as a villain in an expansion set.
• Evil Old Folks: While most of the heroes in both this and the previous game were healthy and in shape, the Admiral is the only one who's visibly old and yet is a powerful Master Swordsman boss rather than a wizard like Gandledore or Malakay.
• Face Death with Dignity: Surprisingly enough, given his Large Ham persona, he faces death with a quiet promise of revenge coming from the Goddess herself.
• An Ice Person: He can summon a wave of icy water to freeze nearby enemies.
• No Fourth Wall: In mission 3, he reacts whenever the Narrator mentions that a new Gate has been opened by ordering his men to invade, to the point that Thalya asks the Narrator if he's working with the enemy.
• Retired Badass: A tough and powerful hero who actually belonged to the previous generation than the current, he returned to lead the Remnants and doesn't disappoint as a boss, taking hints from both Grimli, Tanos and Yaina in combat.
• Sinister Scimitar: Fights with a large, glowing cutlass which is implied to be enchanted.
• Stuff Blowing Up: Aside from cannon fire he can, when cornered, summon the dreaded Mana Mines in the Dungeon: magic-powered mines who destroy every room and mechanism in their range. He can also summon them in combat with him, forcing you to move your troops around a lot.
• Talk Like a Pirate: Given the game's parodistic nature, it's to be expected.
• White Hair, Black Heart: Albeit due to age, he's still as vicious as the rest.

The Goddess

The deity of choice of the Eastern Kingdoms and the Empire, her symbol is a phoenix and she gave her powers to Tanos and his followers. Supposedly a force of Goodness and Fairness, her heroes of choice imply that she's no better than the Absolute Evil. She's frequently mentioned in the main campaign and actually becomes the main villain in the Clash of Gods DLC.

• Big Bad: The real villain of Clash of Gods, she was a Greater-Scope Villain in the vanilla campaign.
• Death from Above: She can defend her temples by bombarding the forces of the Prime Evil with holy fire.
• Gold and White Are Divine: She appears with long blonde hair, dressed in white clothes with golden trinkets and is the Goddess of the Empire.
• Gorn: When she dies in the cutscene she spasms for a while before suddenly turning the entire screen red with blood, with a couple of organs here and there.
• Hot Goddess: Said Goddess takes the form of a very attractive human woman.
• Jerkass God: While she's supposedly the good one opposing the Absolute Evil, her followers are a bunch of crude and flawed heroes who often commit atrocities, especially against races labelled as evil in their book, and her Church includes inquisitorial methods. That being said, her choosing Good!Thalya as her avatar would possibly make her a much better champion than all her previous heroes combined.
• Let's You and Him Fight: Rather than fight herself, she makes a body for Good!Thalya so that she can fight on her behalf.
• Light Is Not Good: She's associated with phoenixes, fire, light and goodness, but her followers can be as bad as the creatures of the Absolute Evil themselves.
• Navel-Deep Neckline: She has a glaring example, going nearly as far as her bellybutton.
• Orcus on His Throne: Justified, while Thalya must undergo a long and dangerous quest in order to get the only thing that will allow her to face the Goddess, all she has to do to counter the Dark Elf is to open up portals spawning Heroes of Valhalla and enjoy the show. Even in the final scenario she just floats there over the clouds, letting her hordes of respawning heroes and Good!Thalya do the work for her.
• Physical God: She's the patron Deity of the Empire and resides in her realm in Godmount. You'll need a special Artifact just to reach her.
• This Cannot Be!: She, through Thalya, reacts in utter disbelief as she dissolves into nothingness after the destruction of the final shrine.
• The Voiceless: Parodied, as the Narrator comments that they couldn't get Alanis to dub her, she won't say a thing.

Narratus the Narrator

Voiced by: Kevan Brighting

His limits pushed beyond normal by the latest DLC and egged on by Thalya, the Narrator has decided to give Thalya and Dungeons' players the final challenge they were expecting and create his own avatar, Narratus, to finally oppose the DLC-loving Evil.

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• Ascended Extra: Compared to the second game, he's even more intrusive and present in the third, acting even as a boss in his own campaign.
• Author Avatar: Narratus is the Narrator's in-game Avatar. However he's actually a separate entity from the Narrator, who's just some actor reading lines.
• Big Book Of Everything: His unit holds a gigantic book in front of him and can summon Pen-pushers (small, goblin-like creatures armed with oversized pens) spawned by a tent made of wrapped up book pages.
• Berserk Button: When Thalya tries to narrate the events herself without waiting for the narrator to do so, he summons a whole pack of bears to attack her.
• Continue Your Mission, Dammit!: If the player takes too long to progress with the story mission the Narrator will either mock you or yell at you to do something.
• Deadpan Snarker: He can rarely end a given sentence without adding some snarking remark.
• Expy: A snarky, lemony narrator voiced by Kevan Brighting. The only thing separating this guy from The Stanley Parable's Narrator is the fact that this one creates a vessel to fight you once he's had enough, while the former just invokes punishments by morphing the world around you (though this narrator does plenty of that).
• Giant Space Flea From No Where: Invoked, he's so annoyed at having to work in yet another DLC that he makes an avatar character and uses him as the True Final Boss of the story out of stress.
• Interactive Narrator: Since he can narrate what's going on, he can occasionally narrate something else which becomes true regardless of circumstances, such as Thalya being attacked by bears from nowhere or lava suddenly flooding the Dungeon. Unfortunately he's also immensely petty and has no problems impeding the player just because he's angry at Thalya.
• Large Ham: As Narratus, who appropriately enough sounds like an evil superhero.
• Lemony Narrator: His main appeal, alongside his complaining and witty sarcastic remarks.
• Mission Control: Aside from narrating the plot he's also the announcer of the game who tells you about what's happening.
• No Fourth Wall: He often argues with Thalya directly. He even becomes an In-Universe opponent!
• Self-Deprecation: He often makes negative comments on the game itself, the events and mechanics.
• Sitcom Archnemesis: He hates Thalya due to her tendency to try and take over narration as well as her arguments with herself taking time away from him.
• Surrounded by Idiots: Much to his chagrin, he'd give anything to work with professionals. Best seen when he reads out loud a rather ridiculous line after the death of Yaina Overproud (so ridicolous she revives just to give a disbelieving eyeroll) and then points out that this is bound to happen when you work with people using Google Translate.
• Troll: He often likes to mess with Thalya (and the player) during the game.

Dungeons 4 — Characters

Tristan

Thalya's never-before mentioned half-brother, who opposes her and wishes to avenge Tanos.

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• Double Weapon: His weapon of choice is a two-bladed sword a la Dungeons and Dragons.
• Enemy Mine: In the final mission he decides to side with Thalya against Tanos since he sees resurrecting the latter as a mistake he has to correct. In-game, this means that he can be called to help your army out in battle.
• Expy: An even more blatant one of Drizzt than Thalya. Tristan even wears green clothing and fights using a double-bladed sword in an obvious parallel to Drizzt's two scimitars.
• Hero Antagonist: Unlike other purportedly "Good" characters in the series, Tristan actually seems to have a proper sense of right or wrong and is extremely uncomfortable with the atrocities that his allies commits.
• Heroic Build: The Narrator describes him in "shining, handsome chest accentuating armor". And Tristan certainly looks the part in the cutscenes.
• Hypocrite: His attempts at rousing speech include the words "when the courage of true Heroes is extinguished, when we abandon our companions and all bonds of friendship are broken", usually followed by assurance that said day is not today. All this coming from the elf who spends the entire first half of the campaign fleeing from (and leaving the Heroes to die at the hands of) Thalya and the Evil Creatures or staying safe behind force fields – without ever trying to fight back.
• Remember the New Guy?: He's Thalya's half-brother, with both him and Thalya having no shortage of shared childhood memories. Despite this, he was never mentioned until this game.
• Rousing Speech: Parodied. He keeps spouting the exact same cliché speech or slightly altered variations of it, much to Thalya's annoyance.
• Sibling Rivalry: "Foster sibling rivalry" technically speaking, but he and Thalya have clearly been at each other's throats since childhood. Thalya in particular has fond memories of all the times she had Tristan on the receiving end of her humiliating pranks and bullying. And obviously one fights for Good, the other for Evil.

Brynnhild

The Dwarven Queen, who serves as the new recurring dwarven nemesis.

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• Girls with Moustaches: She's a dwarf, so she has a thick beard.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: She's this game's version of Grimmli, only unlike him she survives the entire game.
• Verbal Tic: She begins every sentence with "Oy!"
• Villain: Exit, Stage Left: Whenever she's defeated, she'll always manage to either retreat or get teleported away to safety.

Gorgu

A baby Little Snot that serves as the physical Vessel for the Dungeonlord

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• Expy: He's a parody of Grogu, being a cute green baby creature that happens to be super powerful.
• Goo-Goo-Godlike: He's an infant that can also transform into a powerful One-Man Army.
• Summon Bigger Fish: Specifically, he's the bigger fish. At Level 6, Thalya can toss him out to turn him into the Dungeonlord, who can easily destroy anything in his path for about 90 seconds.

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