How To Play Swarm

Quick Guide

Hankering to get the action started? Then let’s quickly run through the basics of Swarm.

• You control your character with WASD and can toggle auto-aim or cursor-aim by pressing C.

• Each character has a unique kit - a passive, two Abilities (E and R), and one Weapon that no other character can acquire.

• You can get up to four other weapons in each game, and three Passives - flat stat increases like increased Damage or Health. As you progress through the story, more Passive slots become available.

• Each Weapon has a Passive counterpart it needs to evolve - become a stronger version of itself. Prioritise selecting your favourite weapons and then taking the specific Passives you need to evolve them. For example, Jinx’s Meow Meow requires the “Ability Haste” Passive and Seraphine’s Sound Wave requires the “Projectile Count” Passive to evolve.

At the beginning, you can only play Jinx and Seraphine. Progress through the story, starting with the Story difficulty and the Warehouse District map, and complete Objectives (viewable in the lobby) to unlock new characters, weapons, maps, and more. Also in the lobby, you can purchase Upgrades using gold you make while playing. These are the key to success. Don’t be discouraged when you lose your first few runs - collect gold, Upgrade, and come back stronger!

Creating a Game

To create a game, simply press the big play button and select Swarm. You'll find yourself in a lobby where you can select your character, map, difficulty, and invite your friends. You can play the game alone or with three other people. The more people play, the more difficult the game. 

Playable Characters

Only two characters will be available from the outset - Battle Cat Jinx, and Battle Dove Seraphine. Jinx specialises in damage and mobility, while Seraphine can shield herself and her allies and apply area-of-effect crowd control and damage. Each character has two unique abilities and one unique weapon.

As the story progresses, and as you complete objectives, you'll be able to unlock the remaining characters:

• Battle Lion Leona - Unlocked by upgrading the Searing Shortbow weapon to level 2.

• Battle Bear Illaoi - Unlocked by upgrading the Radiant Field weapon to level 4.

• Primordian Briar - Unlocked by defeating the final boss of the second map, The Outskirts.

• Battle Wolf Yasuo - Unlocked by defeating the final boss of the third map,The Subterranean Lab.

• Battle Bunny Riven - Unlocked by defeating the final boss of the first map, The Warehouse District, in Hard Mode.

• Battle Bunny Aurora - Unlocked by defeating 25 mini-bosses in Hard Mode.

• Battle Bat Xayah - Unlocked by completing a total of 20 Bel'Veth Trials.

Map Select

Once you've selected your character, it's time to head over to the Map Select screen. Here, you'll be able to choose between five maps, though only the Warehouse District will be available at the start. Each map has unique terrain and a unique feature - an obelisk - that can help you win your match.

At the top of the screen, you'll also be able to select the difficulty, but you must finish the Story difficulty before playing Hard, and you must finish the Hard difficulty before going for an Extreme run.

Objectives

Upgrades

By using gold you earn during your runs, you can purchase permanent stat upgrades. These are key to ensuring success in your games, and your priority in the first few runs should be to collect as much gold as possible, to purchase more upgrades and start each game stronger than the last.

Gameplay Basics

Abilities

Each character has two unique abilities and a passive. By default the abilities are bound to E and R, with your E ability being the tactical and your R being your ultimate. As such, your R ability has a longer cooldown and far more devastating effects.

To illustrate, let’s have a look at Jinx’s kit. Her passive is Get Excited - this passive triggers whenever Jinx kills 75 enemies or a mini boss. When it triggers, she gains bonus movement speed and ability haste. Her abilities are Fishbones (E) and Super Mega Death Rocket! (R). Fishbones unleashes a cone of rockets that damage the first enemy hit, and has a cooldown of about 7 seconds. Super Mega Death Rocket! is a massive rocket that deals area-of-effect damage, increased based on missing Health. It has a cooldown of about 45 seconds.

Passives

Passives grant a stat bonus. At the beginning, players will have three Passive slots, but the limit can be increased to six by progressing the game. Each passive can be levelled up to five times, making it all the more potent.

Weapons

Each character has one unique weapon, and can select 4 more each match, out of 20 unique options. Only 5 weapons are available by default, but you can unlock new types of weapons by progressing through the game and completing objectives.

As there are nine possible characters, there are five unique weapons in the game. Jinx's unique weapon is Meow Meow. Meow Meow fires a barrage of bullets in the target direction. Meow Meow scales with Duration, Crit, Damage, and Projective Count, and is evolved by Ability Haste.

Weapon Evolution

What do we mean when we say “Meow Meow evolves by Ability Haste?” Basically, each Weapon has one Passive that they require in order to evolve. By hovering over the Weapon at the bottom of your screen, you'll be able to see which Passive you need to evolve which Weapon. Pressing TAB will also bring up a menu on the left side of your screen which shows you a list of all Weapons and their corresponding Evolution Passive.

If you have Meow Meow, you need to select the Duration Passive when it pops up in order to evolve the weapon. If you don’t get the Duration passive, you can still level up Meow Meow to level 5 and it’ll still be more potent, but an Evolution is required for max power.

You evolve a Weapon by reaching level 5 of the Weapon, having the correct Passive, and then picking up an Access Card - a special item that drops when you kill Mini Bosses. All three steps are required!

An Access Card in the wild.

Evolved Weapons are overall just stronger versions of the weapons. They might deal more damage, pierce through enemies instead of hitting only one, or otherwise have some new, improved effects. The key to winning is making sure that you match your Weapons and Passives to ensure you can evolve each and every one of your weapons over the duration of the game.

Enemies

As the name suggests, there's no end to enemies in Swarm! At the start of the game, the Primordians you face will be tiny and killed by one attack. As the game progresses, the enemies will become more and more numerous, tougher, and stronger.

Enemies drop Gold and Experience Orbs. Be diligent about collecting Experience Orbs in order to upgrade your Passives and Weapons so you're not caught off guard when the fights start getting tougher.

Elites

Every so often, you'll see a normal looking Primordian who is larger and has a glow. These are Elites. They'll be a lot tankier but have the expected behaviour of their teeny selves. Elites will drop Access Cards, which grant a randomised Passive or Weapon upgrade. If one of your Weapons is at rank 5, Access Cards will evolve that Weapon.

Mini Bosses

Unlike Elites, Mini Bosses are distinctive and large Primordians with Health Bars and unique attacks. The first Mini Boss you'll see is a large Primordian Malphite. His unique attack will trigger when you're close to him. The boss will start charging up an area-of-effect attack that deals massive damage and knocks you up. Like Elites, Mini Bosses drop Access Cards when they are slain.

The Big Boss

Each map has its own big boss. The first boss you'll face is Primordian Rek'Sai in the Warehouse District. As expected, these bosses are incredibly tough. They will spawn on the 15th minute mark and the game will last until you defeat them. When you do, your run will officially be a success, and you’ll unlock the next map.

The other bosses are:

- Primordian Briar - In the Outskirts

- Primordian Bel'Veth - In the Subterranean Lab

- Primordian Aatrox - At the Beachhead. Primordian Aatrox is a two-phase boss fight.

Map Features

Pods

In each map you'll see small grey containers called Pods. These can be destroyed in one hit and can contain Gold, Experience, a Health Orb (that heals you and your allies),  a Bomb (which destroys enemies nearby), or a Magnet (which vacuums all Experience orbs on the map).

Obelisks

Each map has a unique "Obelisk" - a distinctive feature that can significantly help you.

Warehouse District - Healing Fountain

In the Warehouse District, you’ll find the Healing Fountain close to where you spawn, in the middle of the map. When you or an ally step on the Healing Fountain, Miss Fortune will initiate a charging sequence and in a few seconds you and your allies will be healed to full. The fountain then takes a few minutes to recharge.

The Outskirts - Ion Cannon

In The Outskirts the Obelisk is a large Cannon found in the top part of the map. Every so often, a Fuel Cell will spawn on the map. You need to pick the Fuel Cell up and take it to the Cannon to charge it. When charged, the Cannon fires a potent laser blast dealing area-of-effect damage to enemies. When the juice runs out, a few minutes will pass before a new Fuel Cell will spawn on the map.

Subterranean Lab - Freeze Bomb

Two Freeze Bombs can be found in the Subterranean Lab, one in the top middle of the map and one on the bottom right. If you stand on the platform, a few moments will pass before a Freeze Bomb will explode, stunning all enemies in a large radius around a platform. After a few minutes, the Bomb will recharge and you'll be able to do it again.

The Beachhead - Admiral Battle Bunny

On this map, Admiral Battle Bunny Miss Fortune will skip about as an NPC, killing nearby enemies and occasionally unleashing a devastating Bullet Time-esque ultimate ability. Stick by Miss Fortune for some combat aid.

Spires

At random game times, one of three characters can announce a mission for the players and create a Spire somewhere on the map.

Battle Bunny Boon

Commander Fortune Boons simply require you or an ally to find and interact with the Spire. After a couple of moments, your team will be gifted a powerful, but temporary, boon. One such boon turns you and all of your allies invulnerable as you race across the map in Anima Squad cars and deal massive damage to all enemies hit.

To unlock Battle Bunny Boons, you must first survive on any map for 15 minutes.

Yuum.AI Assistant Quest

Yuum.AI's missions are a bit tricker. Once the Spire spawns, you must make your way across the map to interact with it and get one of several possible quests. For example, Yuumi.AI may ask you to break 15 nearby vases, race around the map, or collect cardboard boxes and bring them to an indicated platform.

To unlock Yuum.AI Quests, you must defeat 15.000 enemies in total (not in one match).

Once completed, all allies will gain a permanent combat modifier - an Augment - which sometimes features an advantage and a drawback. You can have four Augments in any given game, and they can be viewed in the bottom left corner of your screen by pressing TAB.

Bel’Veth Trial

Upon interacting with the Bel'Veth Trial Spire, you'll be given a combat challenge to complete. This can range from killing one large mini boss to staying still as a wave of enemies comes at you. If you succeed, you'll be granted a huge Experience and Gold reward.

To unlock the Bel’Veth Trial feature, you need to first complete all four maps in Story mode and then survive for 5 minutes on any map on Hard Difficulty.