SWARMCORE FIELD GUIDE · MODES & REWARDS

Which Swarmcore mode should you play?

Compare Live, Endless, Daily challenge, Practice, private rooms and Solo Lab, including human players, AI opponents and Core Shard eligibility.

By DESIGAME · Checked against the game build · Updated 6 September 2026

Choose the mode for the job

Live multiplayerSeven-minute ranked arena, up to 12 participants. Real players and clearly labelled AI fill. Eligible server-verified results earn Core Shards.
EndlessNo match timer, up to 60 real players, no AI fill. Five lives and uncapped swarm growth. No ranked Core Shard rewards.
Daily challengeSolo against AI on the day’s shared arena. Useful for repeated score attempts, not earning ranked Core Shards.
Practice vs AISeven-minute practice against 11 computer rivals. Learn combat without joining a live room. No ranked Core Shard rewards.
Private roomInvite friends using a room link. The host chooses the arena and AI fill. Custom rooms are unranked.
Solo LabNo rivals and no rewards. Try controls, cosmetics and mutation behaviour.

What counts as an earned reward?

The wallet accepts an eligible, signed result from ranked Live multiplayer, not a score reported by the browser. The current reward calculation uses survival time, score, eliminations and placement, with a maximum of 24 Core Shards per eligible match. A run shorter than 45 seconds does not qualify. Re-sending the same result cannot award it twice.

This distinction matters when practising: a good Practice score does not turn into spendable shards. Choose Live when you want to progress the earned wallet, and let the completed result finish saving before leaving. A brief visit or an unfinished connection is not a guaranteed reward.

Core layers and Endless lives are different

Standard Live matches use core layers. Losing the final layer ends your run and produces a result even if the room’s seven-minute timer has not finished. Endless instead tracks a five-life run and ends when those lives are exhausted. Read the layer or life display rather than judging survival from the number of swarm particles alone.

The red zone is dangerous in both situations. If you are almost empty, charging or firing is not a substitute for moving back towards safety. A rival’s nearby Repulse can turn poor boundary positioning into a lost life.

Invite a friend without confusing the modes

Use Private game with friends to create a room, choose its options and share the generated room link. Anyone with a still-valid link can reach that lobby, so send it directly if you do not want strangers joining. The room is controlled by the realtime server even though it is unranked.

For normal Live play, the AI label means a computer-controlled rival. It is not a player pretending to be a bot. Endless does not add bots, so a quiet Endless arena can genuinely contain only a few people.

A short learning sequence

Start in Solo Lab until you can fire, recover a shot and use both movement abilities. Move to Practice to learn aiming against moving cores. Then try a full Live match; judge the attempt by safe positioning and successful returns, not just the final place. Use Endless when you want an open-ended run with a clear life budget.