Starting TBH: Task Bar Hero with a single Hero feels fine for the first few minutes, but the game opens up dramatically once you add a second and third character to your party. More Heroes means more attacks landing simultaneously, more equipment slots contributing to your stats, and a much better shot at surviving the stages that start punishing solo runs. The catch is that expanding your party requires navigating the Runes tree, and the path there is not immediately obvious.
How does the Runes system work?
The Runes menu stays locked until your first Hero hits Level 3, which typically takes around five minutes of play. Once that threshold is crossed, the Runes symbol at the bottom of the Hero menu lights up and becomes clickable.
Inside the Runes menu, you spend gold to permanently unlock nodes arranged in a branching tree. These nodes cover a wide range of upgrades: combat stats, gold income, experience gains, chest drop rates, offline rewards, and inventory capacity. Two specific nodes in that tree are called Runes of Command, and those are the ones that expand your party size.
Runes tree upgrade menu
How to unlock the second Hero Slot
To reach the first Rune of Command node, you need to purchase two prerequisite nodes first:
- Rune of War: 100 gold
- Rune of Growth (one level): 200 gold
After spending 300 gold total, the first Rune of Command becomes available. Unlocking it lets you deploy a second Hero from the Formation menu. This should be your top priority when you first open the Runes tree. A second Hero on the battlefield contributes more value than any small stat upgrade you could buy at that stage.
Once the node is purchased, open the Formation tab in the Hero menu, select the class you want to deploy, pay the gold cost to unlock that character, then click Deploy and assign them to an open slot. Keep your tankiest Hero at the front.
TBH: Task Bar Hero Guide: How to Unlock More Hero Slots
How to unlock the third Hero Slot
The third slot costs significantly more: 150,000 gold for the final Rune of Command node. Before you can even see that node, you need to unlock two Rune of Expansion nodes that branch off from the first Hero Slot unlock.
That 150,000 gold figure looks steep early on, and it is. The mistake most players make is treating it as a pure savings goal and ignoring every other Rune until they hit the number. That approach is slower than it sounds. Picking up cheap economy upgrades along the way accelerates your gold income and gets you to 150,000 faster than hoarding would.
Unlocking a new class does not automatically give you an extra Hero Slot. You can have multiple classes available but still only be able to deploy one Hero if you have not purchased a Rune of Command node. These are separate systems.
What economy Runes are worth buying before the third slot?
Once your two-Hero party is running, there are several cheap Runes worth grabbing before you commit to the 150,000 gold grind:
Formation menu deploy screen
The stage-boss Rune of Wealth is particularly efficient. Spending 1,000 gold total across its three levels nets you +30 gold per boss kill, which pays for itself after roughly 34 boss rewards. The flat gold-per-kill Rune at 1,000 gold breaks even after 1,000 kills. Both are worth grabbing before you lock into saving for the big slot.
For economy Runes, target anything that costs 1,000 gold or less. Anything more expensive than that should generally wait until after you have the third Hero Slot.
Rune of Repose is only worth buying if you close the game regularly. If you leave it running in the background, the offline reward benefit does not apply.
What is the best party once all three slots are open?
With three Heroes deployed, the most reliable general-purpose party is Knight, Ranger, and Priest. Knight absorbs damage at the front, Ranger deals consistent output, and Priest provides healing and support to keep the other two alive through harder stages. Testing showed this combination farms efficiently while still surviving the stages where solo or two-Hero parties start falling apart.
For two-Hero parties before the third slot, any of these combinations work well: Knight + Ranger, Knight + Priest, or Priest + Ranger. The right pick depends on which classes you have available and what gear has dropped for you.
If you have purchased DLC Heroes like Hunter or Slayer, they can fit into a three-Hero party, but test them before swapping out a proven setup. The Knight-Ranger-Priest core is hard to beat for general farming.
Why can't you add more Heroes even after spending gold?
The most common source of confusion here is mixing up class unlocks with Hero Slot unlocks. Buying or claiming a new class gives you access to that character, but the game will not let you deploy them until you have purchased the corresponding Rune of Command node. Check these four things if the Formation menu is not cooperating:
- Level 3 has been reached and the Runes menu is accessible
- A Rune of Command node has been purchased
- The specific Hero has been unlocked through the Formation tab
- The Hero has been assigned to an open slot via the Deploy button
All four need to be true before a second or third Hero appears on the battlefield.
For more strategies on building out your party and managing your gold efficiently, the TBH: Task Bar Hero strategy guides collection covers the systems in more depth. TBH sits comfortably in the casual games category but has more mechanical depth than its desktop-idler presentation suggests, and the Runes tree is where most of that depth lives.