Bestiary
Quick answers
- Is Iron Realms free to play?
- Yes. Iron Realms is free to play in any browser with no download and no account required. Every building, troop tier and Seat of Power is reachable without spending money — purchases buy speed and cosmetics, never a higher ceiling.
- Does spending money make you stronger in Iron Realms?
- No. Nothing purchasable raises your power ceiling. A charter audit runs on every build and fails it if any offer would sell power. Spending compresses time: the summit takes about 24 months free, or 18 months with the $9.99 monthly Charter held throughout.
- How long does it take to max a keep in Iron Realms?
- About 24 months of free play at roughly half an hour a day, or 18 months with the $9.99 Warden's Charter. Keeps cap at level 45 and troops at tier 13 — the same summit for everyone.
The world between the keeps is full of foes. There are 400 creature camps on the map at any moment, plus rebel holdfasts, feral raids and a boss that wanders. Here is what stalks the wilds, what it drops, and what it costs you to take it.
Energy — the only thing that limits your hunting
Attacking a camp costs energy. You hold up to 100, and it regenerates at 1 per minute — a full bar every hour and forty minutes, and a full bar overnight regardless. This is the game's one soft daily cap, and it is why hunting rewards showing up twice a day rather than one long session.
The ladder of foes
Camps are level-banded, and the wilder the country the higher the band. Each creature leans toward a troop type, which is the whole tactical content of hunting — send the counter, not your biggest stack.
| Level | Foe | Leans |
|---|---|---|
| 3 | 🧟 Wight Horde — the restless dead, shambling south | Infantry |
| 6 | 🐺 Direwolf Pack — great wolves, big as ponies | Cavalry |
| 10 | 🗿 Free Folk Giant — hurling boulders and uprooted trees | Ranged |
| 14 | 🦅 Warg Raiders — skinchangers riding the minds of beasts | Cavalry |
| 20 | ❄️ A cold shadow that flings lances of pale blue ice | Ranged |
| 30 | 💀 The first of the Others, commanding a dead host | Infantry |
Camps respawn ten minutes after they are cleared, so a well-worked stretch of country is a renewable resource rather than a race.
Why the deep camps matter
Level 20 and above is where the named blades come from — twelve of them exist, none can be forged or bought, and felling the great beasts is one of only two ways they enter the world. The deep camps are also the source of the creature gear sets: the Direwolf Ward, the Giant's Warband and the Frozen Legion, each forged from a beast's signature drop and each paying a set bonus at three pieces.
Rebel holdfasts
Keep-shaped enemies with real walls and a garrison lean to counter-pick — the bridge between hunting camps and assaulting a Seat of Power. They drop resource-heavy loot and, sometimes, a blade. Scout before you storm; see the Combat Guide.
The wilds push back
This is the mechanic most lords learn the hard way. Leave a region unhunted and it escalates: one level every 24 hours, to a maximum of six. At escalation 4 the country turns feral and starts sending raids at you, on an eight-hour cycle.
So the wilds are not scenery you may ignore. An unpruned map is an actively hostile one, and the cheapest defense in the game is a lord who spends his energy rather than banking it.
The migrating world boss
A great beast wanders the map — a rogue wyrm gone feral, a leviathan dragged ashore by a black storm, a raptor bigger than a sept. Rally to it for a heavy shared payout. Beyond the Wall, a separate weekly boss waits for your whole alliance: see North of the Wall.