Dicevaders Beginner Guide: 12 Tips for Your First Runs

By Kestrel Abernethy · Updated October 1, 2026

Dicevaders looks busy for the first ten minutes. Underneath, a turn is simple: buy, place, roll, launch. These tips are drawn from the developer’s own answers on the Steam forum and from what the game shows in 1.0 runs.

How a turn works

1. Roll. You throw three Base Dice each turn (some commanders add more). A die lands in the column that matches its face, 1 to 6.
2. Adjust. Spend Budge to move a die one face up or down, which shifts it to the neighbouring column, or Chrono to reroll.
3. Launch. Each die scores the units in its column. Two dice in the same column make a pair: the units there trigger twice and the column’s artifact triggers too.
4. Beat the target. Your Total Attack (STR times Mult) has to reach the Target Defense within the turns shown.

The glossary explains every term on the screen.

12 tips for your first runs

1. Do the tutorial. Almost everyone does (97.8% have the achievement). The pairs and triples rules are taught there; the Quick Guide skips them.
2. Put a unit in every column early. A die only scores the units in its own column, so an empty column wastes most of that roll. Early fights reward consistency over one huge column.
3. Spend your $3 every turn. You get $3 per turn and money does not carry over. If you leave the shop with spare money the game hands you temporary dice instead, but buying something is usually better.
4. Feed artifacts with spare dollars. In 1.0 you can spend $1 to give an artifact +10 XP.
5. Rarity beats levels. The developer’s advice: Rare and Legendary artifacts scale much faster than Commons, so switching to one catches up quickly even from a lower level. The scaling per level is shown in the corner of each tooltip.
6. Prefer % scaling to flat bonuses. Another direct developer tip; flat STR falls off in later acts.
7. Hold some Budge. Budge is how you turn a near-miss into a pair. You can stockpile up to 10, and The Captain gets one free every turn.
8. Freeze what you want to keep. Frozen dice are not rerolled, and frozen shop items stay for the next shop. If units stop appearing in the shop, unfreeze: frozen items can block new units.
9. Chrono never runs dry. If you have none, the shop is guaranteed to offer Chrono.
10. Skipping turns has a price. Skipping the remaining turns of a fight makes later shops stronger, but you give up the $3 for each turn skipped.
11. A lost Heart is not the end. Losing a fight costs a Heart but gives you an extra shop and turn to scale, and beating the act pilot gives the Heart back. Warped units, the rare powerful ones, cost a Heart to take.
12. Use Rewind to learn. The pause menu has a Rewind button that replays the turn with the same seed, handy for seeing what a different column would have scored.

What changes in later chapters

From Chapter 2 some artifact slots start locked; score a triple in that column to open it. Each chapter is a difficulty step, and pilots get nastier: Roxy cracks your dice, Noel freezes them. See the pilot list and the chapter clear rates.

Which commander to start with

All three starters work for a first win:

• The Captain gives a free Budge each turn, the most forgiving way to make pairs.
• Blob Girl floods the board with Mini-Dice, great fun once you have artifacts that care about them.
• The Core adds a blue Kraken die that levels the artifact in its column.

The full kits, and how the other seven unlock, are on the commander page and in how to unlock every commander.