WindHunter

The SR Team recently discussed changes to PvE campaign maps. The goal of these changes would be to maintain the identity of the map as closely as possible while improving aspects such as major exploits, unused sections of maps, and problem areas where players feel forced to "break" the map to play it. It is important to note that all of these changes are proposals, none of them are guaranteed to be implemented. We do not want to make changes to something as fundamental as campaign maps without input from the community about what they think and what they want to see or not see change-wise. Please discuss what you think of the proposed changes and how you would modify the proposes yourself. You can find all of the proposed changes in the attached PDF: Proposed Upcoming PvE Map Changes.pdf There are individual threads to discuss each map. Ascension Bad Harvest Blight Convoy Crusade Defending Hope Empire Encounters with Twilight King of the Giants Nightmare Shard Nightmare's End Ocean Oracle Passage to Darkness Siege of Hope Slavemaster Sunbridge The Dwarven Riddle The Guns of Lyr The Insane God The Soultree The Treasure Fleet Titans

@Xanatoss There are a two reasons why I think the current system of making units like Sunderer and Harvester pay for their inherent knockback is better than just adding a point or two to their respective sizes for their tiers. Flying units do not inherently have knockback on their attacks. Any increase to complexity cost based on size would thus add to the complexity of flying units of that size inappropriately. You can see this with Skyfire and s-knockback in T2, which Skyfire does not possess. Right now all ground-based L and XL-units have knockback inherently but that does not mean they always will. For example, I personally want to remove walking knockback from all floating head type units such as Wrathgazer, Deepfang, Magma Fiend, Lost Horror, etc. The model of the floating units quite literally flies over most s-units and several M-units, so why are these units being knocked back? A future L-sized Magma Fiend in T2 (hypothetical) would thus not pay the S-knockback "tax" in the current system but would if we increased L-size complexity cost to compensate for not calculating the s-knockback cost. In terms of things like flying in T1. These are very difficult to calculate. The only flying unit in T1 is Mana Wing which has an active advanced ability +3, but is rare. So where does the rest of the cost fit in? By making Flying in T1 cost +4, it means any future flying T1 unit, even the most simple kind like Skyfire, is automatically uncommon. If we were to add anything but a simple passive it would also be rare. Notably this means we cannot add anything more than an active advanced ability to any future flying T1 unit, because T1 UR cards do not exist and there are no plans to add them.

I'm glad you like it overall. In terms of units like Sunderer and Harvester receiving "extra" points for their size's inherent knockback: One of the hardest parts of developing this system was putting aside what we wanted to be true and focusing entirely on what leads to the highest success rate in terms of explaining rarity. I did not want to commit the equivalent of double jeopardy for these units but the numbers required it. Our focus here was not "what we think rarity should be" but "what was rarity to the original devs" so that we could do the best job of explaining the existing system and providing ourselves a template which would result in design consistency moving forward.

I've been ruminating a bit on Lifestream recently. One of the primary issues is that Lifestream directly competes with Revenge which is a top-tier support spell which requires only 1 Nature orb. Lifestream binds a substantial amount of power, self-damages, and has a large cooldown. Overall it's hard to see how it can compete directly with Revenge in it's current state without massive number buffs, and the guess becomes how would you balance the ability to absorb huge amounts of damage? Nature armies already have phenomenal sustain and while I think Nature should have the best sustain, the current level of sustain hampers our ability to buff the faction in other areas. Two directions I think we could go here: 1. The card absorbs huge amounts of damage in exchange for massively damaging itself. This would need to be mitigated by something like Kobold Engineer or we could allow it to connect to the root network where it could be healed via root nexus or Forest Vim. 2. Lifestream stores X% of damage absorbed which it can then unleash on an area on recast. This makes Lifestream join the ranks of the other T4 superweapons while giving Nature a method of dealing damage to buildings which fits the faction identity. Feel free to offer other suggestions.

I agree it can come off a bit misleading, but this document is also meant to be convey our long term thinking on Pure Frost and in only a few weeks it will be on the live server anyway. I will think about the idea of giving Winter Witch the ability as well.

As mentioned above, Skylords work by turning the dreams and wishes of mortals into the various cards the player uses. This both explains why the cards you use and the campaign versions are not identical (you get all of them second-hand and can't just create the real version) and why it's appropriate to use any deck you want for any mission. If you were to attempt something like this though, it's important to note that outside of perhaps the two Nightmare maps and Passage to Darkness you wouldn't be able to use Shadow cards given they are typically evil.

We are going to remove the initial cooldown for Lifestream and Comet Catcher next patch. After that it would be good to consider what we could do to help the card.

Unity is a T3 support spell. The spell has been discussed at length in our balancing discord: Beginning of Unity Discussion. The spell description is included below: "Installs a magical bond between up to 8 friendly units within a 25m radius. The affected units will then mutually share their life points with each other as long as they are positioned within a 25m radius towards one another. All incoming damage will be equally spread among all members relative to each units current life points. None of the members can die as long as the group still has more than one life point left." On the live server Unity is currently usable on both own and allied units. Recently, after several requests, it was changed on our test server to affect only own units. This proposed change has led to a lot of discussion on the subject. We as a Faction Design team have decided that, given both sides have good arguments for why it should affect only own units or both allied and own units, we will decide the issue via a public poll asking the community's opinion on the subject. Any change would affect both affinities.

Hey kYw, thanks for the comments and I am glad you enjoyed reading it. We had a lot more we wanted to say but didn't want to continue expanding an already long document. In the future, we are looking to put out individual documents for each faction (4 pure + 5 hybrid) describing our thematic vision for them and how we think that can translate into designing their gameplay.

We like this suggestion and are currently looking into implementing something similar in the near future.

This caused the infinite loading screen bug if one of the solo-queuing players canceled his search.

It took me about twice my normal Solo run time but after a few attempts I was able to win. Its not pretty. Apparently my second circled area doesn't spawn an orb in solo; I'm too used to using Amii Monument (which if you have makes this easy). I had to push into the square area for my t4 but I didn't have a real t3 so I had to walk a razorleaf, a move that might have saved me (see below). I could in a second attempt cut at least 10 minute off this run, likely more. The first wave of Urzach Guardians is terrifying but spammed Spikeroots seem to do the trick (warning its fairly micro intensive). Waiting for t4 charges was the major issue after I almost lost my center base to not paying attention (was focusing up north when 2 twilight dragon waves spawned). You will notice waves stop spawning in the top left. This is because one squad was left alive attacking my root nexus. It gives me the idea that if you could figure out a way to trap other waves it would make defense rather trivial, especially if you can stop spawns from the south from whence come the twilight dragons. I hope this helps. It should at least help you get to t3 and you should be able to improve on my strategy. Pure Nature, Insane God Solo.pmv

I'll see what I can do, I usually run it with Shadow/Frost. A major part of the defense I just suggested is the Twilight Horror you steal. He can tank and then kite the Guardians for you. Another tip on tower placement is that you need to place one about 2 tower spaces below the temple. This will ensure the enemies aggro onto your tower and not the temple. Then if you tower dies they should aggro your other towers or wells. To help this, you can bait and kite units coming from the northeast with your grove spirit priestess. PS: Are you wanting to run it as Pure Nature? Just want to make sure I duplicate it correctly.

Once you reach the center, you can spawn a parasite swarm and steal the Twilight Horror at the 3 well/ 1 orb cluster directly north of the Position 1's second well on the way to the center. If you send a swiftclaw with the parasite swarm and kill the spawn hut right there you can build the 3 wells and orb safely (You don't even need to kill the Hatecaster tower). Nothing will attack that position as long as you don't leave any units or buildings next to the cluster itself. The same strategy works with the well/orb cluster directly north of Position 2's northern walls. You can steal the Vileblood with Parasite swarm then with aid clear the surrounding buildings. Again, you can build the well/orb cluster and it will be safe from any attacks as long as you don't leave any units/buildings nearby. In terms of defense, the primary goal is to defend the first wave of Urzach's Guardians, this is an existential moment. I'd recommend not building more than 1 well + t2 orb in the center and 1 well at the top-right cluster before this. Wells take 200 seconds (3.33 minutes) to pay off and this happens around the ~7=8 min mark. Its more efficient to just spam towers, then build the wells afterward. Spamming Living Towers around your center well cluster should work. Literally just spawn them in a circle around your orb, with a root nexus (b) to make them more tanky. After this your next major issue is the Twilight Dragon that spawns around 13:30-14:00 from the southwest. A second spawns around ~18min I believe, again from the southwest. You should ignore the priests as a mechanic when soloing the map. Grab the well/orb clusters I mentioned/circled, then proceed to the square I outlined. From there you can clear to Urzach. 7-8 Giant Wyrms are sufficient to focus Urzach down from the cliff below him with spell support, but you can also clear normally with help of Grimvine/Forest Elder, just watch out for the seemingly infinitely spawning Twilight Dragons that appear when you start attacking Urzach.

If we could create a damage amp that stacked additively that would be wonderful, but the same isn't needed for damage reduction. As it stands now "reduced" and "increased" make sense to not stack because they actually reduce and increase the damage directly (absorption also does not stack, ice shields function as 100% absorption with a visible limit. Ward of the North is 50% with a hidden limit). For example (and for anyone who doesn't know how this works): All stonekin have 15% reduced damage. That means if a stonekin unit receives 100 damage it actually only receives 85 damage. If lifeweaving is applied, 50% less damage is dealt to the stonekin while the other 50% is distributed to the unit's surroundings. This means the stonekin unit would receive only 42.5 (43) damage if it had lifeweaving. Now if you also apply ward of the north (absorption) the damage works like this: Only 50% of the damage ever passes through to the stonekin, the other 50% is absorbed. This 50 damage is then reduced by 15% due to the damage reduction and becomes 42.5. Lifeweaving now further lessens this by 50% and the stonekin unit receives a mere 21.25 (21) damage. Lifeweaving as a "less" effect can be stacked with other "less effects" (dryad, unholy power) in the following formula: Y = X * (1 - A) * (1 - D) * (1 - C) The issue with damage stacking is that it all happens as either an "increase", 100 becomes 120, or as "more" in the following formula: 'Y = X * (1 + A) * (1 + D)* (1 + C). This means Lyrish Knight when near buildings attacking XL units adds damage as follows 400 * (1+1) * (1+.5) = 1200 damage. If there is homesoil, it becomes 400 * (1+1) * (1+.5) * (1+.5) = 1800 damage. It would be nice if we could create an additive multiplier which functioned off the base damage so you don't get exponentially scaling damage. Something like 400+ 400(1) + 400(.5) + 400(.5) = 1200 damage. Additive multipliers can stack infinitely without becoming an issue because they stack off base damage. "Increased" damage would thus make more sense because it would increase the base damage on which the additive multipliers stack instead of just functioning as a bad "more" multiplier which can't stack with other "increase" modifiers. One issue with my idea is that changing current multiplicative stacking bonuses to additive would affect game balance substantially and would require a massive overhaul in card strength. If we did change it, I'd recommend leaving the Counter-modifier multiplicative so it only affects buff stacking.

There are a few different mechanics at work. We are looking to give more clarity to this by clarifying keywords. For damage multipliers we will be using "increased" and "more". "Increased" takes the highest multiplier, "more" functions multiplicatively with itself and with the highest "increased" multiplier. Once we have them sorted out and clarified it might be a good idea to go back through and change some of them where it makes sense. For damage reduction multipliers there are actually three, "less", "reduced", and absorbed/blocked. These are also poorly clarified and it is something a few of us are working on as part of our card description overhaul project.

I've watched several and find them easy to follow. I ran your spikeroot strategy in Crusade (with some variation) and quite enjoyed it. One improvement I would suggest is to include your deck list in the video. When I was watching the Crusade one and decided I would imitate it I had to go back through and make a note of every card. A picture of the decklist at the end would make this easier for someone looking to copy you.

This is correct, but it is only ensnaring roots. Deep One's gifted catch, which is a single-target teleport + 15 second root is affected by the diminishing returns and halves in duration accordingly.

This game as an unexplained mechanic where crowd control (CC) spells have diminishing returns. I see that the Harvester was previously effected by Oink and ensnaring roots. The oink was full duration, but the ensnaring roots is only half duration if cast while oink immunity is still present on the unit. Your creeping paralysis was cast while the unit still had its root immunity, which was affected by the oink immunity. This means your creeping paralysis had only 1/4th of its normal duration. Rogan Kayle's "It's the shoes!" ability bypasses this restriction because the CC-immunity is applied as a separate effect from the CC itself. Another effect that bypasses the CC diminishing returns is Knight of Chaos's ability, but this only affects 2v2s. To recap you need to allow the current CC immunity to expire otherwise any subsequent CCs will follow this time formula. Normal duration -> 1/2 duration -> 1/4 duration -> 1/8 duration. PS: A good thing to do as Pure Nature is to root far out, then let the Harvester get to your well/orb. Once there the root immunity should expire and you can use Deep One's gifted catch to teleport the Harvester off your well and re-root him to the ground. Rinse and repeat. FYI root effects block nether warp.

As pointed out in the other thread by @Dallarian, a /deutsch chat (if possible) would help alleviate this problem by having a place where Germans can, without judgement, speak German to each other. Anyone who doesn't want to speak it can simply /leave the chat like I do with trade. To make this even better it would be great if there was a command to permanently leave a chat group. Right now I have to /leave trade every time log-in and it would be the same for a /deutsch chat. For context. the old Battleforge had an entirely German server there were so many Germans, so a single chat seems acceptable without threatening to fracture the community.

You need to download it separately.

It would be nice if they could implement an inactivity check instead of kicking you. As in, if you are AFK for more than 5 consecutive minutes, you forfeit any achievement or BFP rewards but retain your gold/upgrade rewards as well as level progression.

I'm looking forward to people uploading a replay of whenever they happen to beat @RadicalX, even if they only won because he disconnected. Even a "Replays" forum section, where we can make megathreads for each PvE map and for 1v1, 2v2, and 3v3 PvP would be good.

Do we currently have an active site for posting PvP replays like old bfreplays.info? Watching high-level play through replays was the primary way I improved in the original game. If not would we be able to make a connected site to the forum or potentially even in-game?

Free PvP decks is a boon for the gamemode. Handicapping the PvP scene at the beginning by removing the free decks would kill the game mode long-term, and removing it later would make the barrier to entry incredibly high. I play Pure Shadow, the most expensive deck in the game bfp and gold-wise. I don't want to grind rPvE for weeks to be able to play my deck, if that's what it turns into I will quit. Only change that is appropriate is locking the free decks into their own card pool like the old tome decks. This way you could mix-and-match between the two weekly decks but otherwise be locked-in. If you want a fully custom deck you would need to level-up cards from your own collection.