Every round begins with a fresh set of champions available for purchase in your shop. You'll see five random options, each with a specific cost. To hire one, simply click on it. The champion will then appear on your bench, a waiting area at the bottom of your screen.

Your bench has limited space, but your board is where the action happens. To deploy a champion, just drag them from your bench onto one of the hexagonal tiles on your side of the arena. Any champion on your board when the round starts will fight for you.

Keep an eye on your unit limit, displayed near your character's icon. You can only have a certain number of champions on the board at once. This number increases as you level up, so you can't field your entire collection right away. If you try to place more units than your limit allows, the last one you placed will be sent back to the bench.

Where you place your champions is just as important as who you choose. This is called positioning. A good setup can be the difference between a crushing victory and a narrow defeat.

The most basic strategy is to create a frontline and a backline. Your frontline should consist of tough, durable champions who can take a lot of damage. Their job is to protect your more fragile units. Place them in the first two rows.

Your backline is for your damage dealers. These champions often have powerful attacks but can't take many hits. By placing them in the back rows, behind your frontline tanks, you give them the time and safety they need to defeat the enemy army.

As the battle starts, the enemy team will usually attack the closest units first, which will be your frontline. This buys precious seconds for your backline to do its job.

A game of TFT is broken into stages, and each stage is made of several rounds. Most rounds are Player versus Player (PvP), where your army faces off against a copy of another player's army from your lobby. If you win, nothing happens. If you lose, your character takes damage based on how many enemy units survived.

However, some rounds are Player versus Environment (PvE). In these rounds, you'll fight neutral monsters instead of other players. These rounds are a great opportunity to get bonus rewards, like items and gold. The monsters get stronger as the game progresses, so make sure your team is ready.

The game generally follows a pattern: a few PvP rounds, then a PvE round, then more PvP rounds, and so on. This cycle repeats, with each stage featuring tougher opponents.

A single champion is a 1-star unit. While useful early on, you'll need to upgrade them to keep up with the competition. You can do this by combining duplicates.

When you own three copies of the same 1-star champion, they will automatically merge into a single, more powerful 2-star version of that champion. A 2-star unit has more health and deals more damage than its 1-star counterpart.

The process doesn't stop there. If you can collect three copies of the same 2-star champion, they will combine into an ultimate 3-star version. A 3-star champion is a true powerhouse on the board. This means you need nine total copies of a 1-star champion to create one 3-star unit.

Upgrading your champions is one of the most important ways to increase your army's strength throughout the game.

Now, let's test what you've learned about these core mechanics.

Mastering these basics of buying, placing, and upgrading champions is the first step to becoming a skilled tactician.