Aethermancer is full of deep systems that intertwine — corruption, debuffs, shielding, perks, summons, events, and more. If you really want to get consistent victories and build strong monster teams, you need to understand how each of these mechanics works under the hood.
This Aethermancer Mechanics Guide breaks down everything clearly so you know exactly what’s happening during your runs.
Aethermancer Mechanics Guide – Corruption, Perks, Events
Corruption – The Run Killer
Corruption is one of the most important systems to master. It’s a punishment mechanic that stacks up over time and makes later battles harder.
How it works: Whenever an enemy attack gets through your shields and damages a monster, corruption is applied. Each point lowers that monster’s starting HP in future fights. Maximum HP doesn’t change, so you can heal above the reduced starting value during combat.
Corruption values by damage taken (after shields):
- 0–2 damage → No corruption
- 3–5 damage → 1 corruption
- 6–9 damage → 2 corruption
- 10–14 damage → 3 corruption
- 15–19 damage → 4 corruption
- 20+ damage → 5 corruption
Ways to cleanse corruption:
Water Aether Spring: removes 1 corruption every battle.
Hourglass of Undoing relic: removes 5 per use.
NPC rescues: -2 corruption.
Care Packages (after rescuing all NPCs): -3 corruption.
Blessed Pond: donate gold to remove corruption.
Rebirth (including forced rebirth): always resets corruption.
Garden Protector (Garden District): removes all corruption from one monster for 2 souls.
Perks, equipment, and traits can also provide cleansing after battles or once per fight.
Capturing & Rebirthing Monsters
Building your roster is all about staggering and capturing.
Capturing:
Break a monster’s poise to stagger it.
Use a Blank Memento on the staggered monster.
That monster is now added to your collection, available at shrines, and can later be soulbonded in town so you can start with it in future runs.
Rebirthing:
Costs 1 Soul (you start with 2, more can be found or bought).
Lets you bring monsters back during a run.
Once you’ve unlocked shifted forms, you can freely choose which form to rebirth.
You cannot duplicate monsters (regular + shifted counts as the same).
If your team is full, you must replace an existing monster to rebirth another.
Core Debuffs
Debuffs are powerful tools — and dangerous when used against you.
Poison: Deals Earth damage equal to stacks at the start of turn, then reduces stacks by 1.
Burn: Deals Fire damage whenever the monster uses ether, gets interrupted, staggered, or dies. Stacks do not decrease on damage.
Terror: First hit against the monster becomes Wild damage and deals +1 per stack. Then half the stacks are removed.
Weakness: Reduces each hit’s base damage by 3 (min 1) and removes a stack per hit.
Shielding
Shields are temporary HP that vanish at the start of your next turn.
Maximum shield = 50% of a monster’s max HP.
Damage blocked by shield does not cause corruption.
Only the damage that gets through applies corruption.
- Example: 10 damage vs 5 shield → only 5 counts toward corruption (1 point).
Summoning
Some monsters specialize in summoning minions to fight alongside you.
Each ally can have one minion.
Minions act whenever their host acts.
Summoning on your own slot triggers them instantly; summoning on another ally does not.
Minions consume Essence:
- 1 per action.
- 1 lost when the host takes 5+ damage.
- At 0 Essence, the minion disappears.
Reset Actions
When a monster recovers from stagger (or if their poise isn’t broken for three turns), they perform a reset action. These vary by enemy:
Burn → Apply 3 Burn to your team.
Sidekick → Gain 2 Sidekick.
Purge → Steal 1 of your Aether.
Weakness → Apply 1 Weakness to your team.
Poison → Apply 3 Poison to your team.
Power → Gain 1 Power.
Terror → Apply 3 Terror to your team.
Shield → Apply 6 Shield to all enemies.
Aether → Generate 2 Aether.
Summon → Create a Lance minion (element depends on monster).
Perks
Perks are permanent boosts you unlock via worthiness. They can completely change how your team plays.
Some highlights:
Aether/Wild Conversion: Extra ether at start of turn.
Corruption Cleanse: Remove 2 corruption at end of battle.
Damage/Defense: Flat boosts to offense or mitigation.
Crit Chance: Each perk stacks multiplicatively, increasing odds.
Crit Damage: Increases crit power after the base +50%.
Elemental Affinity: Basic attacks deal elemental damage and generate extra ether.
Generators: More ether from basics (Fire/Water/Wind/Earth/Wild).
Healing/Shielding boosts: Improve sustain effects.
Evasion: Chance to dodge each incoming hit.
Initial buffs: Start combat with shield, dodge, regen, etc.
Team buffs: Minion damage, debuff damage, terror application, etc.
Events & Rooms
Every stage contains NPCs or interactives that can change the course of a run.
Knight (Sir Tiberian): Equipment upgrades, trades, or free gear.
Witch (Lily): Reroll a trait/action or refuse for EXP.
Cook (Myrne): Grant EXP, perk, or worthiness (at corruption cost) — or refuse to cleanse corruption.
Envoy (Alioth): Relics: gain, upgrade, or trade.
Random NPC: Any of the above.
Aether Springs:
First:
- Wind: 25% chance for bonus EXP.
- Fire: 35% chance equipment is higher tier.
- Water: Cleanse 1 corruption per battle.
- Earth: Gain 2 gold per fight.
Second: Grants +1 ether per turn (choose element).
Third: Buffs based on previous springs:
- Double Wind: +5% crit & dodge.
- Double Fire: Power every 3 turns.
- Double Water: Heal 4 per turn.
- Double Earth: Shield 2 per turn.
Merchant: Sells relics, EXP, equipment, mementos. Quality scales by stage.
Loot Drop Rooms: Contain rare/epic drops with equipment, EXP, gold, mementos, or artifacts.
Loot Drop Tiers
Common: Basic equipment, 1 soul, 1 reroll, 5 gold + crystals, 1 memento.
Rare: Rare gear, EXP, rerolls, more gold/crystals, artifact.
Epic: Epic gear, 2 EXP, high gold/crystals, upgraded artifact.
Accessibility Options
In Settings → Accessibility:
Options to make runs easier.
Colorblind Aether mode adds text tags for element types.
The more you understand these mechanics, the more control you have over your runs.
- Corruption punishes mistakes but can be managed with the right blessings or perks.
- Shields and summons add tactical depth.
- Reset actions force you to think about stagger timing.
- Events and Aether Springs are some of the most powerful long-term boosts — choose carefully.
Master these systems and you’ll find your team not only surviving, but thriving deep into each run.