Build
Raise twenty buildings from bare plots to marble halls, each through twenty-five levels. Your Town Center Hall sets the pace.
25levels per building
Island strategy · Free private playtest
Raise a city on the water’s edge. Command armies and war fleets. Carve out a kingdom across a shared sea of islands.
- Windows
- Android (playtest APK)
- 20buildings, 25 levels each
- 22unit types on land and sea
- 359University research projects
- 10coastal villages per island
- 4kinds of world encounter
A kingdom in four acts
Every empire begins at the water’s edge.
Kings By Dawn is a persistent online strategy game set on the islands of an ancient sea. Your city keeps working while you’re away — the decisions are what make it yours.
Command
Train infantry, archers, cavalry and siege engines, then outfit them as Veteran and Elite troops.
40improved unit variants
Sail
Raise a Port, a Navy and a Ship Command Station. Trade by sea, hunt pirates and meet fleet with fleet.
5classes of warship
Ally
Swear to an alliance of up to fifty rulers, plan together and climb the building standings.
50rulers per alliance
A shared sea of islands
Every island has ten seats at the table.
The world is a map of islands, each with exactly ten coastal village slots. Your neighbors are real players: empty slots go to newly arriving rulers, or to anyone who sends a Prince to claim them.
- Coastal by designEvery village sits on a beach with room for a Port, a Navy and a Ship Command Station.
- Expand with a PrinceClaim an empty slot with a Prince and an escort to found another city.
- Trade across the waterMarketplace offers open at Port level 3, for buyers within 20 map coordinates.
- Never lose your wayPermanent X/Y coordinates for every island make it easy to meet — or hunt — anyone.
Ten seats on the shore
Each island has exactly ten stable village slots. Your Town Center Hall, Walls and harbor buildings grow here — the Port, Navy and Ship Command Station stand by the water.
NeighborsReal rulers, real plots
Every other slot is held by a player or waits empty — no filler villages. Scout before you strike: a report reveals buildings, troops and stores.
Pirate watersNaval encounters
Sail combat ships against pirate fleets that grow with every victory. The fleet advisor suggests a winning ship type before you commit.
Barbarian campsYour own land campaign
Barbarian villages are personal encounters on each island. They rebuild after defeat, come back stronger, and are the only raids that pay out Crystals.
Trade routesCargo across the sea
Every trading ship carries 5,000 resources. From Port level 3 you can post escrowed marketplace offers to buyers within 20 map coordinates.
New landsFound another city
Send a Prince with an escort to an empty coastal slot to claim it. University research and Gems belong to your account, so every city benefits.
NavigationA world with coordinates
X runs east and Y runs north. Islands keep their coordinates for good, so sharing a location — island and slot — takes a single code.
Tap the markers to explore the chart.
Twenty buildings · Twenty-five levels
From shoreline plots to marble halls.
The Town Center Hall gates every upgrade. Producers fill the Warehouse, industry multiplies their output, and the yards and ranges turn stone into strength.
Civic
Town Center Hall
Every city starts with this building at level 1. Its village overview also shows production, storage, defense health, support bonuses, and effective training reductions.
- At level 1
- Allows other buildings to level 1
- At level 25
- Allows other buildings to level 25
- Final upgrade
- 22h 4m base
Artwork shows each building at its completed level-25 appearance. Times are base values before bonuses.
Six resources
An economy that never sleeps.
Construction, training and research finish while you’re offline, and production keeps flowing until a storehouse fills. Plan around the cap, not the clock.
Wood
Lumber Camp · boosted by SawmillsThe backbone of construction and shipbuilding.
Food
Farm · boosted by TavernThe main cost of every soldier you train.
Stone
Quarry · boosted by MasonryThe second pillar of every building order.
Metal
Iron Mine · boosted by BlacksmithNeeded for construction from level 10, for most troops and for every ship.
Crystals
Crystal MineFund permanent University research. Scouts can see them; raiders can’t take them.
Gems
Account-wideEarned from activity rewards and Kraken podiums; spent on speed-ups, packs and monuments.
Producer curve
From 120 to 15,000 an hour.
Each of the four basic producers climbs the same curve. Support buildings add up to +40% on top, and an active island monument can raise it further — but a full Warehouse stops collection cold.
How production and storage workFarm level 25Base output 15,000 Food/hUpgrade time 22h 4m
Two theaters of war
Every army has an answer.
Land and sea run on separate counter systems, and a land army can’t join a war fleet in a player attack — only the Kraken takes both. Read the wheel, then build the force that breaks your rival’s.
Read the wheel
Arrows point from the attacker to the troop type it punishes. Select a node to see what it beats — and what beats it.
The muster roll
22 units. Every one has a job.
InfantryInfantry Militia
Cheap general infantry
InfantryInfantry Spearman
Anti-cavalry: ×1.5 damage
InfantryInfantry Swordsman
Anti-infantry: ×1.3 damage
InfantryInfantry Pikeman
Anti-cavalry: ×2 damage
InfantryInfantry Heavy Guard
Durable frontline
CommanderPrince
Royal commander: targeted last; survives victories. A winning player land attack reduces morale by 25 points; capture consumes one Prince.
RangedLight Archer
×1.5 damage against infantry
RangedComposite Bowman
×1.5 damage against infantry
RangedCrossbowman
Ignores 50% armor; ×1.5 damage against infantry
RangedLongbowman
×1.75 damage against infantry
CavalryLight Cavalry
Light cavalry; ×1.5 damage against ranged
CavalryCavalry Lancer
Anti-ranged: ×1.5 damage
CavalryCavalry Heavy
Assault cavalry; ×1.3 against ranged
ScoutScout
Spy missions only; no combat or cargo
SiegeRam
Durable wall breaker; ×3 vs Walls, ×0.25 vs troops
SiegeCatapult
General siege damage; ×3 vs Walls, ×0.25 vs troops
SiegeTrebuchet
Powerful, vulnerable wall siege; ×3 vs Walls, ×0.25 vs troops
NavyLight Galley
Fast swarm: ×1.5 damage against Heavy Warships.
NavyBireme
Anti-light escort: ×1.5 damage against Light Galleys.
NavyTrireme
Line breaker: ×1.5 damage against Biremes.
NavyHeavy Warship
Heavy combat: ×1.5 damage against Triremes.
NavySiege Galley
Naval siege: ×3 damage to Ship Command Station; 25% damage to ships. Needs escorts.
Base statistics before research. Bars compare units within the same theater. Compare every unit or plan an army.
Legends of the deep
The sea has teeth.
Rival rulers aren’t the only danger. Four kinds of encounter reward the bold — and punish the careless.
World event · every 6 hours
The Kraken
A sea monster surfaces in inhabited waters four times a day. Hit it hard, earn resources for every blow, and climb the damage rankings.
- Land troops and warships may sail together — only here
- Lossless: every unit you send comes home
- Gem prizes for the top of the damage podium
Daily boss · 12-hour window
The Cyclops
A Cyclopes Island rises every day at 12:00 UTC, and the fight runs from 13:00 to midnight. Bring a land army and expect losses.
- Land armies only — and troops can fall
- One victory per account per daily cycle
- Resources and speed-ups; overflow waits in your mail
Naval encounters
Pirate fleets
Pirate fleets hold the open water between islands, each level tougher than the last, with no level cap.
- A fleet advisor suggests a winning ship type
- Rewards in Wood, Food, Stone and Metal
- Raiding pirates never breaks your shield
Personal land encounters
Barbarian villages
Every island hides your own Barbarian campaign. Win, and the village rebuilds a little stronger.
- Progress tracked for you on each island
- Walls appear at higher encounter levels
- The only raids that pay out Crystals
Straight from the game
See your kingdom take shape.
Real captures from the current playtest client — no mock-ups.
Never rule alone
Allies, rivals and long memories.
The world is shared and persistent. Who you trade with, who you raid and who you stand beside will follow you across every island you touch.
Alliances
Up to fifty rulers under one banner, with five ranks from Rookie to Leader and permissions the leader controls.
Chat & mail
Talk strategy with your alliance and the wider world, and collect event rewards from your private mail.
Standings
Public building leaderboards for rulers and alliances, with daily history kept for thirty-five days.
Starter quests
Twenty-two one-time objectives lead you from your first Farm to your first fleet — each with its own reward.
The University
359 research projects unlock troops and raise Health, Armor and Damage — permanently, in every city you own.
Battle reports
Every fight is written down: rounds, contributors, damage dealt, casualties, survivors and why it ended.
Your first days
A gentle shore, then the open sea.
Starter quests walk you through the essentials one reward at a time, so your first evening ends with a working city — not a wall of menus.
Lay the foundations
Build the five basic buildings. Your first Farm, Quarry, Lumber Camp and Warehouse are free.
Muster a company
Complete your first training at the Barracks, and learn which troops counter which.
Draw first blood
Send a raid against your island’s Barbarian village. PvE raids never cost you your shield.
Choose your road
Economy, Research & Army, and Sea objectives branch from there — twenty-two starter quests in all.
Look past the horizon
Raise a Port, scout your neighbors, and decide who to trade with — and who to raid.
Latest updates
Fresh from the shipyard.
The playtest is updated often. Here’s what landed most recently.
Resumable downloads, live alerts and loss estimates
Windows and Android updates can now pause and resume without starting over, the game reacts immediately when your orders finish, and battle reports estimate what it would cost to rebuild lost troops at the same rank.
Smaller Windows patches
Windows update patches now reuse game content that only moved inside the package, so updates like that download far less (one measured patch fell from 368 MB to under 1 MB). Updates that change artwork can still be large.
Shared monument activation and easier Town Center Hall upgrades
Island residents can pool 1.5 million Wood, Food, Stone and Metal to light their monument for 3 days, and Gem activations now come in 1, 3 or 7-day options. Town Center Hall upgrades need fewer producer levels, scouting reports are more compact, saved logins survive being signed in elsewhere, and harbor ships now sail the right way.
Dawn is coming. Claim your shore.
Free to download and free to play during the private playtest — your host shares the server address. Your progress lives on the game server, so your kingdom is waiting wherever you sign in.