Songs of Conquest News

What a week it’s been! We’ve just launched Song of Conquest on consoles, which feels massive—but there’s no rest for us yet. As the Swedish winter approaches, so does our next big release, the Vanir DLC!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3260210/Songs_of_Conquest__Vanir/Wishlist today, it's cool, just like the Vanir.

This Devlog is filled to the pixelated brim with updates on our Viking-inspired expansion. We’ve been hard at work developing new unit abilities, adding Wielders, figuring out the balancing, and of course, adding lots of new art.

It's like a school picture, Vanir, class of 2024



Last Devlog, we introduced you to the Huscarl and Korphan, two of the earlier units available to Vanir Wielders. Today, we’re diving deeper into the faction lineup with some new faces (or snouts). Meet the Swine and its fearsome upgrade, the Serimnaan!

The Swine is your standard armored hog, known for its ferocity and—let’s be honest—its delicious taste. But infuse it with the wild magic of the Vildra, and it transforms into the Serimnaan, an eternal beast inspired by Särimner, the mythical pig that is reborn again after each slaughter. If the Serimnaan falls in battle, it doesn’t truly die—it simply returns to your recruitment pool, ready to charge into battle once more. And with the Bull Rush ability, it’s perfect for closing in on enemy ranged units and forcing them into melee combat.

Get in there and die, 'cause we're achin’ for some bacon!



Now, let’s explore a darker corner of Nordic folklore: the Bacahorse. This eerie creature, inspired by legends of a horse that lures children to a watery grave, brings a haunting presence to the battlefield. Internally, we call it the “Scary Pony,” but in-game, it’s known as the Bacahorse and its upgraded form, Hunger.

These undead, magic-infused horses are designed to reflect their terrifying origins. Like the Knights of Arleon, they are powerful chargers, gaining increased melee offense with every step they take. To stay true to their mystical nature, we’ve given them 50% magic immunity—making them a real threat on the battlefield.

But we wanted Hunger to have something extra, so we introduced a new kind of ability: an AoE attack called Feed, that siphons life from enemies, healing itself in the process.

Use the Feed ability and these gruesome steeds will stay in the fight longer than you’d expect!



Of course, you might be wondering how the Vanir can hold their own against the fire-breathing dragons of Rana or the Hellroar Cannons of Barya. The answer lies in their Chieftains and the mighty Jormr!

The leaders of Vanir society are known as Chieftains. They boost units close to them with their Inspire trait and lead from the front, using their large axes to cut down foes in a sweeping attack.

The Jormr is the upgraded version of the Chieftans. All Vanir leaders seek greatness, to be remembered in deeds and tales. Some of them are ambitious enough to turn to the dangerous Vildra to achieve this goal. When the Vanir infuse themselves with the Vildra magic they can turn into something truly wicked and magnificent. The Chieftans become strong behemoths that can stand up to the most dangerous of enemies. Because of their strength and size, we gave them the intimidating trait, debuffing anyone standing within one hex of the unit. It also felt kind of weak for a giant to only attack a single enemy, and since they are wielding a literal tree, they have access to a Slam attack.

See that big guy over there? Yeah, don’t mess with him. Why? Just don’t.



Song of Conquest isn’t called Songs for nothing—music plays an important role in the game, with each faction having its own musicians. Some, like the Bards of Arleon, sing to inspire their comrades, while others, like the drum-beating, spider-riding frogs of Rana, strike fear into their enemies, lowering their initiative and defense.

So, what does the Vanir bring to this musical battlefield?
Meet the Lykt and their upgraded form, the Lyktvaan. The name "Lykta" means lantern in Swedish, and these eerie, lantern-carrying creatures are as mysterious as they are menacing. Shedding an otherworldly green light, they are known to dwell around Vanir farms, spreading trickery and disharmony while fiercely protecting their territory.

In combat, the Lykt inspire their allies through haunting fiddle music, boosting both melee and ranged offense, as well as providing a small amount of spell damage resistance. These enigmatic musicians are more than just a support unit—they wield their instruments in melee when cornered.

He might bear a resemblance to Santa, but trust us, this guy keeps everyone on the “naughty” list.

We hope you liked this slightly deeper dive into the cold, dark, and murky waters that is the Vanir faction of the Bleak East. There are still a few troops and abilities that we haven’t talked much about yet, but we’d like to leave some for you to explore and discover on your own!

Expect us to return soon with more information about the release date and the Wielders of the Vanir. Until then, don’t forget to do what 15,000 other Wielders already did (wishlist the DLC!) and please drop us a comment below! What unit are you looking forward to trying? Do you have any suggestions for improvements? We’d love to hear it!

/Anders and Team Lavapotion

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The wait is over—Song of Conquest has officially landed on consoles! You can now dive into the world of Aerbor on both PS5 and Xbox Series S/X. Whether you’re team PlayStation or Xbox, we’ve put our heart into the experience, no matter your console of choice.

The development has been a journey years in the making, and we’re very proud to share it with you at last! If you enjoy multiplayer you’ll be happy to know that the console versions are fully cross-play compatible! So regardless if you are playing on a console, PC, or Mac, you can face off in glorious turn-based battles.

Look at their smiles and natural poses. Playing SoC on consoles will do that for you as well!

For us, as a small indie team, there’s something special about seeing Song of Conquest coming alive on living room TV screens. It’s the same pixelated tactics game we all know, but it feels like its own thing on console. Plus, playing on consoles is perfect for Hot-seat mode. Just pass the controller to your friend for that classic, shared gaming experience. We highly recommend it for family game nights. Remember: your kids are never too young to get defeated by your aggressive frog army.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3260210/Songs_of_Conquest__Vanir/As a side note: Winter is still coming. So don’t forget to wishlist Vanir!

We’ve said it before, but it’s worth repeating: we couldn’t have reached this milestone without all of our players! Having a dedicated audience has helped us convince our amazing publisher that it was worth the cost and effort to expand the game to consoles. Thanks for sticking with us this far. Next year will see more exciting releases and news to share.

So, grab your controllers, rally your armies, and let the conquest begin!

/Everyone here at Lavapotion

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We know many of you have been eagerly waiting for the day Songs of Conquest will make its way to consoles, and we're excited to announce that the wait is almost over!

On November 12th, Songs of Conquest will be available on both PS5 and Xbox Series S/X, bringing our turn-based strategy game to even more players across these platforms. And of course, it's crossplay, making sure that those who prefer the PC can still face their couch-playing friends.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
This milestone wouldn’t have been possible without our partners at Bitwave, who have been vital in adapting the game for consoles. Thanks to their expertise, we’re confident that playing Songs of Conquest from the comfort of your couch will be a great experience for both new and returning players.

Explore the lands and face your enemies, we believe in you!

And what about the Switch? The Switch presents a unique set of challenges compared to other consoles, which makes development more complex. While we’d love to see Songs of Conquest on the Switch, we can’t make any promises at this stage. We're continuing to explore the possibility, but we don’t have any further updates for now. We’ll keep you posted as things develop.
We can’t wait for our little game to take the next step and we hope you’ll join us for the adventure!

/Everyone at Lavapotion

As the days grow shorter and darker, our work on the new Vanir faction continues. We promised behind-the-scenes updates, and we’re happy to deliver! This is the first of our monthly devlogs about Vanir, where we’ll keep you updated on our progress.

Now is also the perfect time to ask for your support by wishlisting the Vanir DLC. Wishlists are crucial for smaller studios like ours, making us more visible to Valve and helping us along the way.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3260210/Songs_of_Conquest__Vanir/?beta=0The pixel Vikings want you to wishlist!

Creating a new faction is no small task. It’s not just about slapping new pixels onto existing units—it takes a long time to produce for our small team, and that is if we focus entirely on it, but we are really enjoying it! Vanir will feature 9 new Wielders, each with unique full-body sketches, pixel art for the adventure map, and detailed portraits that convey their individual stories.

Which one is your favorite?

Ensuring that Vanir feels fresh and distinct from our existing factions is important for us. So for the Vanir faction, one key element is the dynamic between the Vanir and the Vildra. The Vanir are the human raiders and traders of the Bleak East, descended from Indebted Baryans and Arleon peasants who fled the oppressive rule of barons.

Some say that the Vildra were created by the Roots and some that they sprung from the land itself, but what everyone knows is that they are dangerous and often wicked beings of the land. They are the dark folk-lore creatures, the trolls that live under the bridges, the witches of the bogs, and the evil spirits that lure children into the icy lakes of the Bleak East. They are sometimes cruel, sometimes wicked, and every one of them in their own way magical.

Our new faction is all of this and more, so that has to be seen and felt in their design, on all levels. Take the Huscarl, for instance. As an un-upgraded human unit, they’re a capable warrior with a shield, sword, and a single ranged attack with their spear. But when upgraded and transformed with Vildra magic, they become something completely different.

See what happens when you let evil spirits in?

When upgraded the Huscarl turns into Korphan, a raven-like creature armed with double daggers. Not only do they look visually distinct from the Huscarl, but they also channel chaos instead of destruction essence and have a "leap" ability. We want the upgrades to feel different with Vanir, sometimes offering something else than “just” stronger versions of base troops.

Another big part of creating a unique faction is their biome, both on the battlefield and on what we call the adventure map. We want our map-makers to have new tools to work with when they create their maps. This means both internal and external work from our art department (if you can call two people a department). We are creating new map assets, new blockers, and of course the biome itself, with a variety of mud, misery, and snow. All things that come naturally for us Swedes!

Ferns, dark forests, mud, and the occasional runestone, it's like hiking in our local woods!

There’s a lot more happening behind the scenes, but we’ll save some details for next time. In our next update, we’ll delve into buildings, settlements, and the magic of the Vildra, along with more insights into the Wielders themselves.

Creating this faction, so heavily inspired by Nordic folklore, is an exciting journey, and we can’t wait to share more with you. Internal playtesting has already started, and I have to admit, throwing stones with the trolls is a personal highlight!

Stay tuned—there’s plenty more to come.

/Anders and everyone at Lavapotion

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Greetings Wielders,

For years, the most requested feature has been the introduction of more factions! And we get you, we really do. The trouble is that developing new factions is both very costly and time-consuming. So we intended to offset the slow pace of faction releases with smaller DLCs that could include things like new Wielders or mini-campaigns.

We recently asked you for feedback regarding the Rise Eternal DLC and its price point. Surprisingly, most were willing to pay more than we had thought. It was of course encouraging, but at the same time we saw many comments about “what I really want is more factions!”. That gave us a lot to think about!

Over 10,000 people replied to the Rise Eternal pricing poll, thank you for that! (By the way: There’s a Swedish word in the image above, can you find it?)

Originally, our plan was to release Bleak East next spring, a grand expansion featuring two new factions and a sweeping campaign exploring their role in Aerbor’s story. However, as development progressed, and the addition of Rise Eternal took some of our well-needed focus, we realized that the timeline wouldn’t be realistic. We faced the tough decision of whether to delay or pivot.

We chose to listen to you.

Rather than making you wait for new factions, we’ve postponed the release of Rise Eternal and split Bleak East up into two separate DLCs. This means you will get the first faction released earlier than we had planned for! This winter, you’ll be getting Vanir, our first DLC. It means you won’t have to wait long to experience brand-new units, fresh Wielders, and beautifully harsh winter biomes. Inspired by Viking and Scandinavian folklore, the Vanir raiders will bring some interesting new twists to Songs of Conquest!

Click the image above to enhance it!

But the speed of development comes with a trade-off. We had originally envisioned Vanir to be presented in a combined campaign with the Roots. But we have chosen to step down from that ambition and focus on providing new gameplay features and conquest maps. Campaigns are incredibly time-consuming to create for our small studio, and they demand considerable resources—particularly when it comes to level design, cut scenes, writing dialogue (and translating all that dialogue to 13 languages!), rigorous playtesting, and setting the difficulty levels just right. It’s not a decision we took lightly, but we believe this is the best way to continue delivering quality content for you at the pace we think you’ll prefer!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3260210/Songs_of_Conquest__Vanir/

Now, on to the exciting part! We’re thrilled because this shift in development priorities lets us focus on what you’ve been asking for—new factions, new units, and new gameplay—at a faster pace.

So, who exactly are the Vanir? What will this DLC include? It won't include a campaign but, it will have everything that our normal factions have: 8 Unique units, each with their own upgrade. Complete settlements with buildings, research, and tactical choices. A new biome with its own style and blockers that come with it, all designed to be able to merge it with what is already there in the map editor, just like with our “old” ones.

As a Swedish development team, we can appreciate this homage to our mild summers.

A lot of the artwork is done already and we are deep into working on abilities and all those little things that make a faction unique. Like all the VFX that comes with a unit that can turn into a flock of birds and attack you from across the battlefield!

Winter can’t come soon enough and we hope you share our excitement and enthusiasm. In the coming months, we will share blog posts, telling you how the work is progressing.

If you want to be among the first to beta test Vanir, or win an key for the DLC, sign up for our newsletter right here! You’ll also get access to some exclusive giveaways that are only available for email subscribers!

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As always, we’ll try our best to keep a transparent and respectful dialogue going between us as developers and you, our players. We know some will miss the addition of new campaigns, but we intend to offset that with lots of new maps and fun gameplay additions. We are also not ruling out the possibility of creating a final mega campaign when we reach the end goal of eight factions released!

/Team Lavapotion