indubitablement

Hello Skylords and Skyladies,
Another month, another PvE Contest!
This time it is something special, because we are going to play community maps!
The Map
The map this contest is held on is called "King's Ridge". It is a community map made by Spitzkopf and polished by Emmaerzeh.
In order to play the map, you have to go to the community maps section at the very bottom right of the world map and select King's Ridge from the menu.
Emmaerzeh also made a video, in which he shows the map and plays it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcXKP6QsG9o
What?
We are having a Speedrun contest on the community map King's Ridge with extra rules.
The contest is split into two different challenges:
1. The silver challenge:
The silver challenge is the easier version of the contest. In order to compete in the silver challenge, you have to beat King's Ridge on Advanced difficulty without the use of Amii Monument and Enlightenment.
Send me the replay of your fastest attempt via discord or here on the forums. You can find the replays under Documents=>battleforge=>replays.
2. The gold challenge:
The gold challenge is the hard mode of the contest for those of you, who seek a more difficult challenge! In order to compete in the gold challenge, you have to beat King's Ridge on Expert difficulty without the use of Amii Monument with a pure deck. You are allowed to use Enlightenment in a pure nature deck, but only to cast nature T4 cards.
There will be separate prices for each pure faction, so you are allowed to compete in all of them at once!
Send me the replay of your fastest attempt via discord or here on the forums. You can find the replays under Documents=>battleforge=>replays.
 
Until when?
The challenge will be held through the entire month of May. Send me your replay(s) via Discord or the forum until Monday, 31st of May 2021 23:59 (11:59 pm). Please only send your quickest and last replay you want to submit for each category.
Please, also send me your current best time (just the time, not the replay) by Sunday, 23rd of May 2021. This is not obligatory in order to submit a final time. I will post these times annonymously, so that everyone can check, how well they are doing up to that point.
 
Prize pool!
Gold challenge:
1st place pure fire  - Batariel (R) + 1 fire booster
2nd place pure fire - Choice between Batariel (P) or Moloch + 1 fire booster
3rd place pure fire - Brannoc + 1 fire booster
4th place pure fire - 1 fire booster
1st place pure shadow  - Shadow Worm + 1 shadow booster
2nd place pure shadow - Grim Bahir (G) + 1 shadow booster
3rd place pure shadow - Moon + 1 shadow booster
4th place pure shadow - 1 shadow booster
1st place pure frost  - Dreadnought + 1 frost booster
2nd place pure frost - Battleship + 1 frost booster
3rd place pure frost - Rogan Kayle + 1 frost booster
4th place pure frost - 1 frost booster
1st place pure nature  - Forest Elder (G) + 1 nature booster
2nd place pure nature - Forest Elder (P) + 1 nature booster
3rd place pure nature - Viridya + 1 nature booster
4th place pure nature - 1 nature booster
Silver challenge:
1st place - 2000 BfP
2nd place - 1000 BfP
3rd place - 750 BfP
4th-6th place - 350 BfP
7th-10th place - 250 BfP
Final Standings
 
FAQ
Can I compete in both the silver and gold challenge?
Yes, you can! In fact, you can submit up to five replays - One for the silver challenge and one for each faction in the gold challenge.
Are neutral cards allowed in the gold challenge?
Yes, neutral cards, such as Rogan Kayle, Viridya and Earth Crystal are allowed. The only banned neutral card is the Amii Monument.
What version of the map is this challenge on?
Version 0.8
Where can I find the winning replays?
The replay files are attached to this post. Also, you can watch the VOD on my twitch.
The winning replays can all be found in this playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLOGMzVQue-AZ492AxuxAuqeHufqGkhHUm
The winning replays will also be streamed on my twitch channel on Friday, June 4th!
 
Big thanks to @Emmaerzeh and @Toggy for helping me with designing this challenge and to the devs for sponsoring the price pool!
I hope you enjoy this challenge and I am looking forward to several cool replays!
If you have any questions, feel free to ask them either here or per PM to me.
Greetings,
Metagross31
Community Challenge Nr3 replays.zip

Patch #400028
Greetings Skylords, Skyladies, and Skyfolks,

This update contains our second balance patch for the game alonside some minor changes, enjoy! Feedback to these changes can be given on the balancing discord. When you give feedback make sure to properly support your reasoning by including replays or video footage, otherwise it is not very helpful.

General fixes
Fixed a russian translation in the achievements filter. General changes
Changed default achievement filter from "All" to "Not Completed". Fix Easter Egg achievement using wrong year to calculate Easter Sunday. Card changes
A detailed list of all balancing changes can be found on the wiki: https://skylords-reborn.fandom.com/wiki/Patches#Patch_.23400028

I am against removing. To get a deck like that, you would need to farm for hundreds of hours. Maybe you can argue about reducing the upgrade level to T2, as most cards will still stay viable, while also giving a higher motivation for grind. Or a checkbox for the queue, allow free PvP Decks or not, kind of like optional Crossplay.
But asking for removing, I am sorry. There was once a time where you could spend 1000 hours in games like these, WoW etc. But for me, that time is over, I don't want to be a level 1 thug for hundreds of hours, until I can be a mafia boss lvl 30 with a Mountaineer lvl 3. I still have to work, playing all the other games on my pile of shame, and I think that many players have developed some kind of aversion against mandatory grind.

I would love if everyone got the same quest everyday. For example: win Blight expert (100 bfp). That way it incentivise playing different map and we can find people to play these maps even with our smallish community.

I like amii getting nerf, but I wish you did more. Look how superior amii is on nightmare's end for example.

You're player 1 and just finished taking over the bottom base to secure t3 which you now have to defend along with your t1. After that fight, your t2 army is in pretty bad shape. You have two options to get t4:
1: Make a t3 army and take over the top base. Build your t4 monument and defend it. T3 army cost 500-800 power with spells (90% refunded) and 2-3 deck slots. Monument is 300 power. Defence is 300-500 binded power. Totaling about 800 lost power, 2 deck slots and a whole lot of time.
2: Put down amii monument. Totaling 325 binded power, 1 deck slot and 30 seconds.
Now I know there are many way to do this map better. You could take your teammate's t2 and go straight to t4, you could defend your monument and the power shrine with one defence, etc. The example above is what an average joe would do.
I don't think amii should cost 800 power. Maybe it should do something else entirely. An idea I saw on discord was to make amii t4 and cheaper, so it could be used as a 5th orb and orb swapping, opening many new possibilities.

Hello Skylords and Skyladies! Today I want to announce the next big Battleforge PvP Tournament!
Who is going to be the new Master of the Forge to show the world, that he mastered his decks and strategies to beat them all for fame, glory and obviously tons of bfp? Time to find out! 
 
 
Who can participate?
Everyone! I will be thankful for every single participant! Even if you're not that confident at reaching grand finals to get a shot for winning the whole thing, there will be lots of opportunities to win prices and I would like to stream and review as many games as possiblle through all skillbrackets! It would be great to see a large variety of decks and playstyles! 
SIGN UP TO THE TOURNAMENT: https://challonge.com/tournaments/signup/aUNkP0atnG#/signup/205xjl4u7pp
If you end up having problems with the registration talk to me! 
 
Format
It will be a 1vs1 Double Elimination best of 3 tournament, the grand final will be best of 5 (one match, no reset). Winner and losers finals will be all played on stream (the basic Toggy-format).
 
Prize Pool 
1st place: 5000 Bfp + Promo Construct
2nd place: 3000 Bfp + Wheel of Gifts
3rd place: 2000 Bfp + Juggernaut
4th place: 1500 Bfp
Every other participant, that shows up and plays his matches gets 1 Booster!! You don't have to reach top 4 to win something in this tournament!
 
Awards
There will be special awards for special and entertaining plays during the tournament. Everyone, who sends me the replays at the end of the tournament gets a shot at winning!! 
 
-> Best match of the Tournament: By that I mean the closest and most instense games! Perfect mechanical execution isn't necessary to win this award, it just has to be super exciting! The 3 best games will be rewarded with 500bfp for each player who took place in one of the matches. 
-> Creative Player Award: Make a creative deck or non meta strategy work in this tournament! The 3 most impressive strategies will be rewarded with 500bfp each. 
-> There will be even more hidden awards like the Toggy Award, so stay tuned! In total I will use up more than 5.000 bfp (I might even increase that number) to reward special plays and matches regardless on how high you placed in the tournament. UPDATE: We got another 10.000bfp donation for awards!
 
To be considered for the award ceremony you have to send me your replays! You can upload them in this forum thread or send them to me via discord (RadicalX#0952)! Please consider, that I had to change my discord account, so don't send your replays to the old one! I want to upload as many tournament replays on my youtube channel as possible!
 
When?
On 11.07.20 starting at 2pm CEST (Berlin time), the stream will start about 30 minutes in advance! 
 
How to watch?
There will be a livestream during the tournament: https://www.twitch.tv/radicalx5 
I also want to cast alot of replays on my youtube channel and also announce the award winners: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3rZG7pzo3GYO0wR3Jx9F7w
Will be thankful for every viewer! 
 
Rules 
Disconnection during a game results in a default loss. If both sides agree it is possible to have a remake!
Not showing up to your match within 15 minutes results in a default loss. The plan is to play a round of matches every ~30 mins.
After your match go to Challonge and insert the result. That is done by clicking on your match and selecting the winner/stats. The brackets will be updated automatically.
The Map Pool is: Haladur, Simai, Wazhai, Elyon, Lajesh, Yrmia and Uro (same pool as in ranked duel). The first match of the round will be played on Haladur, then it is losers choice. Second round will start with Simai, third one... you get the drill.
The brackets for the tournament will be shuffled before the tournament starts.
Please save your replays by renaming them after you game or selecting the safe all replays option and send them to me unless your game were played on stream! 
Internal rules like "no wall agreements" have to be agreed on in text form to be an official ruling and if any of those internal agreements are violated it counts as a default loss
No insulting! 
BANNED CARDS: CURSE WELL; MORTAR TOWER; PHASETOWER - using one of these cards results in a default loss. If both sides agree it is possible to have a remake! 
 
 
 
 
Reply in this thread, if you have any questions! Big shoutouts to Yuah & MephistoRoss for donating huge amounts of bfp to make this large price pool possible! 
Quick reminder, that we have a discord tutoring server. If anyone wants to prepare for the tourney, feel free to join here: https://discord.gg/dZzKexQ
All I can do at this point is quoting Toggy: "I would love to see this community grow again and the competitive scene develop aswell. Because BF is fun!" 
Looking forward to a great tournament!  
 
Best regards,
RadicalX 

Very offensive name with swear words in it. The admins are well aware of this sky lord but are refusing to address the situation....

So my name used to be BigTits but it got changed because its going against community guidelines, But "TITS" isn't even a real word. BUT you got Dj_BlyatMan over here who didn't get his name changed. BLYAT is a Russian SWEAR WORD. AND HE DIDNT GET HIS NAME CHANGED AND ITS A SWEAR WORD. BUT MY NAME GETS CHANGED AND ITS NOT EVEN A REAL WORD?!?!?!?

That comes down to people not understanding HOW to break maps with that card.
There is a reason why Amii Monument is used for basically every single speedrun record except 2 and 4 player rPvE 10 and Siege of Hope
There is literally ways to abuse the card to allow for some insane strategy that speeds up the game by so much. The card is not only broken in solo play but allows you to play around a massive shortcut on all of those maps. And sure some are more obvious and insane than others - Soultree <-> Encounters with Twilight. On most of those maps Amii Monument is the card that even allows you to play that strategy: Convoy, Slavemaster, PtD, Nightmares Shard, Nightmares End, King of the Giants, Bad Harvest, Soultree, Oracle, Ocean, Insane God, Dwarven Riddle, Mo, Crusade Treasure Fleet, Behind Enemy Lines. Probably missed a couple as well.
In Nightmares Shard one player even gives up his last monument just so the other guy can use Amii Monument. Now tell me that doesn't change the way you play the game. Amii Monument is the single most used card across all speedrun strategies with maybe the exception of regrowth and that is because it is so often a massive shortcut if you know how to abuse it. Just because most players don't know how to abuse it, doesn't mean its not worth fixing. If there is a bug in your game but 99% of players dont know how to abuse it, doesn't mean you just leave it be. And Amii Monument basically is just that.
Otherwise we probably just leave all PvE cards as is and only balance PvP relevant cards.

it's not like we even argue Amii Monument is the only stupid card there is - because there is a couple more - just none to the insane level, that they literally change how you can play most maps.
LSS; Shadow Phoenix, Shrine of War, Furnace of Flesh + CM -the list goes on. This thread however was about Amii Monument.

Hello fellow Skylords!
After a long Summbreak it is time to step into the arena again and prove your battle prowess to all the fellow skylords! Who will win the Stress Test Open#12?
 
Format?
It will be a 1vs1 Double Elimination best of 3 tournament, the grand final will be best of 5 (one match, no reset). Winner and losers finals will be all played on stream.
 
Prize Pool! (The more people participate, the bigger it will get)
1st place  - 1000 BFP + Netherwarp (g)
2nd place - 750 BFP + Colossus
3rd place - 500 BFP + Lost Spirit Ship
4th place - 300 BFP + Juggernaut
5th-last place - 100 BFP
 
 
When?
On 20.10.19  starting on 4pm CEST(Berlin time), the stream will start about 30 minutes in advance.
 
Where?
In the Sparring grounds, get the community observer maps to enable observers/streaming.
=>LINK<=
Extract the folder to Documents/Battleforge/
Important: Due to problems with other observer versions of these maps please clear you mapfolder before extracting the observermaps.
 
Organisation?
The tournament brackets will be on Challonge, so register and join the tournament there. Please use your in game account name to make communication and finding your enemy easier.
=>LINK TO CHALLONGE<=
The streaming channel that will be covering the tournament is DasToggy on twitch.tv .
In case of problems contact me or one of my mods via Discord or Battleforge.
A list of tournament mods and organizers: DasToggy, Karlmann
 
Rules!
-No bugabuse, cheating or insulting the other players. Penalties may vary from a warning to default loss.
-Disconnection during a game results in a default loss. If both sides agree it is possible to have a remake.
-Not showing up to your match with after 15 minutes results in a default loss. The plan is to play a round of matches every ~30 mins.
-After your match go to Challonge and insert the result. That is done by clicking on your match and selecting the winner/stats . The brackets will be updated automatically.
-The Map Pool is: Haladur, Simai, Wazhai, Elyon, Lajesh and Uro (same pool as in ranked duel). The first match of the round will be played on Haladur, then it is losers choice. Second round will start with Simai, third one... you get the drill.
-The brackets for the tournament will be shuffled before the tournament starts.
-As an experiment, no T1 Towers will be allowed in this tournament (Mortar, Phase, Ice shield, Primal Defender). Other supportive stuctures (like Ice barrier) are free to use.
 
 
Reply in this thread if you have questions, I will check it out later.
I would love to see this community grow again and the competitive scene develop aswell.
 
Best regards,
DasToggy

nice

Majority of the speed run uses amii, Not once have i not seen amii not being used in the majority of the video of speed run. If all the above you said was valid the player would reconsidered a bit on it.
for pvp this is not an issue, i never saw it yet, still looking.
for pve there are alot of things.. one the speedrunner needs it.. almost everysingle one of them needs it. [take for example soultree,which with it you can jsut skip last camp and win the game]
for regular pve, it depends on what the player find fun. im sure the one using it is having a blast. but there are other technicalities, 
1. it makes the game extremely easy but i guess that what people want.
2. i have gotten in a run in dwarf riddle with 2 style.  
     - one the player uses amii and doesnt help the other get the orb, even though the player who doesnt get the orb helped him get his.. thus he sits waiting forever defending in base while he finish the game
   - two the player who got the amii pushes the game to fast even for the other side to prepare a defense since they are slower than the amii guy...
 
both occasion always depends on the player....
 
sadly as i said above the only nerf they can possibly hit is the cost.. if not for that,than i guess just leave it alone and let the game run it's course. 
 
EDIT
I RETRACT MY COMMENT , could careless now for the sake of anything, im done defending it, bunch of matches of people forcing amii in
 
https://ibb.co/Gt57Z5L
https://ibb.co/cJdmY2s
not even enough time to prepare a defense, Nerf it, couldnt care the how high the cost, couldn't care if you take it out of the game, sorry but dont care anymore. nerf it

Howdy!
 
As some of you may or may not know, I have recently gotten my wife to play BattleForge with me. So far she's sticking to rPvE and she's having a lot of fun refining and mastering decks.
 
Since I'm observing the NPE first-hand, I thought I could offer a few suggestions and points.
1. She was not interested in the game until she started getting boosters. Specifically, when she got soulshatter in like her 7th booster. Until then, I had to convince her to play.
SUGGESTION: implement rewards earlier-on. I know we're trying to prevent multi-accounting, but imo we could take a slower approach. For example, we can keep the 2.5 hour requirement to get boosters, but allow bfp daily quests to start at hour 0 and provide specific cards earlier-on via achievements. We could give an extra copy of MA, SS, forsaken, and WW for the first time a player tries campaign, pvp, rpve, and upgrades something. If possible, I'd like an achievement for players to choose a rare card (or some good uncommons with similar price) to add to their deck. These cards should be powerful and feel good to play: I'd recommend soulshatter, mind control, inferno/earthshaker, ice tornado. Players should get to choose which 1 of the 4 cards they get after they do something like buy a card on the AH.
I really want to emphasize this feeling of uniqueness. I think I was lucky that my wife became interested in the game and it was because she got a nice "feel good" card early on and decided to start building her deck around it. 
 
2. She has not been interested in trying new game modes like campaign and pvp.
SUGGESTION: First, more achievements. For instance, that "feel good" free card could happen when you clear 5 campaign maps for the first time. I think there should be a general increase in achievements to boost players trying different aspects of the game at least once.
Second, seasons. I don't have a better term for this. Basically a week/monthy quest for all players to play a certain map/game mode. New players are not encouraged to play pvp because basically everyone who plays regularly is an expert. When there's 4 people in the queue and they're all in the top 20, a new player is not encouraged to join. I think there should be "seasons" (either 1 day per week or 1 week per month) where a particular 4 player map or pvp is given emphasis. So for instance, on Saturdays  (maybe even a 2-hour block on Saturday) there will be a standing PvP quest where players get an extra large bonus (maybe a full booster) for playing PvP. This would encourage all the new players to enter the queue at once, and most would play another new player.
 
TL;DR
Create more specific achievements with useful cards as rewards (probably a choice of 4 cards so one doesn't get its price reduced) and have time blocks where specific game modes are promoted, especially pvp as a way for new players to feel like they are playing other new players instead of a pro.
 

I've always been a strong proponent for rebalancing the game before release, and now that Kubik seems to be behind the idea and there is community support for it I've decided to start working on my balance proposal.
First a little bit about me and whether you can trust me with regard to game balance: 
I was very active in Battleforge from 2009 to 2011, and I played on and off from 2012 until the shutdown.  I've played on all of the (non-beta) balance patches and have watched the game's balance change and improve over the years. I've played over 3000 PvP matches in total. In 2011 I was ranked #1 for several weeks in 1v1 with my shadow/frost deck and a couple months later I held the #1 rank for a couple of weeks with my pure nature deck.  This was during a time when Obesity, DeChris, MaranV, and Freemka were active. I achieved a #1 2v2 rank with two partners (IdleAltruism and Tyderianek) using nature/frost, pure nature, and pure fire decks. I owned every card with the exception of a few PvE cards and played every deck extensively except pure frost.  My main decks were pure nature, shadow/frost, nature/frost, pure shadow, and pure fire. I've played my share of PvE, as you had to back in the days before battle tokens since that was the only way to upgrade cards.  I could consistently beat rPvE level 10. I make strategy games as a hobby and have studied and deconstructed the balance design of Battleforge (as well as with other card games and RTS) to help me balance my own games. Some thoughts on the rebalancing process:
Focus on what's being said, not on who's saying it - analyze and criticize ideas, not people.  Let's not make this a popularity contest. Being good at the game doesn't necessarily mean you really understand the game.  I've seen really good players make some really silly balance suggestions over the years.  That said, high level players tend to have a much better understanding of the game's nuances. Being bad at the game doesn't mean your input isn't be valuable.  It's possible to have a good understanding of game balance and the math behind it without having the skill or time to play at a high level (case in point, most game developers). This balance proposal will consist of two stages: 
Stage 1 involves solving major problems that currently exist in the game's balance; specifically bad matchups, overpowered cards, and bandits being weak overall.  This stage doesn't involve that many changes, but a lot of reworks are necessary in order to fix these problems which unfortunately means that these changes are more complicated to implement.
Stage 2 involves buffing and reworking weak/useless cards in order to increase the pool of useful cards and thereby increase choice and card diversity.  This involves a large list of (mostly) simple changes.
Note:
Orbs will be denoted by color:
P = Purple (shadow) R = Red (fire) G = Green (nature) B = Blue (frost) N = Neutral (any element) All changes are relative to a card's U3 stats.
Stage 1:  Solving Problems
Note to the devs: I realize that many of these changes are more involved than just changing a few numbers, but more complicated changes really are necessary to fix the few egregious problems that still remain in the game.  With the exception of Amii Monument (which I know is a longshot), I've used only mechanics and abilities that currently exist in the game.  My hope is that you can find ways to use certain cards as templates (or perhaps copy/paste data) with which to implement these changes.  Please let me know what currently is and isn't possible so that we can find alternative or compromises.
Phase Tower
The Problem:  Phase tower is simply too versatile.  It functions very well as a defensive tower, however its ability to be used for offense or to be moved to defend another location removes most of the counterplay against towers, which involves attacking another location while your opponent binds power in the towers.
The Solution:  There are perhaps some more elegant ways to rework this card, but I think a simple solution will work just fine here.  We can simply increase the card's cost in order to increase the amount of power it binds and reduce its overall cost effectiveness.  Reducing the range by 5m also eliminates a design oversight that allows it to outrange things like Mark of the Keeper.
Decrease attack range by 5m. Increase cost by 10. Treespirit (Green)
The Problem:  Treespirit is really the last remaining blatantly OP card in PvP.  It's stats are simply too high for its cost and the fact that it's an M counter creates massive problems for most T1 colors due to hurricane limiting the usage of S units.
The Solution:  By reworking the card, we can both bring down its overall power level while also re-purposing it to fill some roles that nature T1 really needs filled.  By changing the green affinity to red and giving it siege, we give nature a good counter to towers (especially phase tower) and a way to rush down instant T2 (currently many decks can rush T2 with impunity vs nature).  A reduction to the unit's HP brings its stats down to be more in line with its cost.
Change affinity to red. Change damage type from M to special. Change ability “Gifted Thorns” to “Infused Thorns”: Every 10 seconds, unit fires thorns in all directions that deal 120 damage to enemies within a 35m radius around it, up to 180 in total. Add ability “Siege”: Deals 100% more damage against structures. Reduce HP from 880 to 670. Increase (melee) damage from 400 to 500. Treespirit (Purple)
By increasing the shadow affinity's max AoE damage while decreasing its single target damage (something that would normally be a nerf since it makes it only effective vs spam) and giving it a damage bonus vs humans, we can mitigate its weakness to ice barriers and give nature a good tool to help them deal with frost mage spam.  The total damage the unit can deal is reduced, however the amount of damage that will end up hitting frost mages instead of ice barriers is significantly increased (unless the frost player spams ice barriers, in which case the nature player can just retreat and re-engage in another location).  The fact that the poison damage doesn't stack also deincentivizes spamming just treespirits.
Change damage type from M to special. Change ability “Tainted Thorns”: Every 10 seconds, unit fires thorns in all directions that deal 20 damage to enemies within a 35m radius around it, up to 120 in total (damage, including poison, hits up to 6 targets). The thorns are extremely toxic poisoning every enemy they come in touch with. The affected entity will then take 10 damage every second for 5 seconds. Add ability “Tainted Fury”: Deals 50% more damage against humans. Reduce HP from 880 to 670. Increase (melee) damage from 400 to 500. Nox Trooper
The Problem:  Nox Trooper is fine as it is, but making purple treespirit do 50% more damage to humans breaks the otherwise good shadow vs nature balance.
The Solution:  The solution is to change the Nox Trooper's type.
Change type from human to undead. Firedancer
The Problem:  The ability to shoot over cliffs and walls makes Firedancer far too difficult to deal with and gives pure fire an unfair advantage on certain maps.
The Solution:  While the ideal solution would involve checking whether the firedancer is shooting over a cliff or a wall, I'm pretty sure there's no easy way to implement this check (correct me if I'm wrong).  So alternatively, we can use a mechanic that already exists with Mortar Tower and make it so that the firedancer can only do full damage if there is a friendly unit or building near the target. 
A normal pure fire attack usually has enforcers, scythe fiends, or a rallying banner near the base that's being assaulted, so this change won't affect normal pure fire play very much.  Cheesing with cliffs and walls, on the other hand, will become much harder to pull off and can be countered by killing any units near the building that's being attacked.
This change makes firedancer about as effective as firestalker when using its regular attack.  When using it's new ability, it does a little more damage than the old firedancer.  Unit cost has been reduced slightly to compensate for the extra micro that will be needed to use it effectively and the fact that its ability can be interrupted once any nearby enemy forces have been destroyed.  Changing the damage type to S and removing the (mostly detrimental) buggy knockback gives pure fire a semi-decent alternative S counter.
Reduce cost to 60. Reduce attack damage from 100 to 70. Increase attack speed from once every 4 seconds to once every 3 seconds. Remove siege. Change damage type from special to S. Remove S knockback. Add ability “Bombard”: Activate to target an enemy structure. While attacking the targeted structure, this unit attacks three times as quickly (every second). Lasts until interrupted. Can only be used if there is a friendly unit or building near the target. (No cooldown). Magma Hurler
The Problem:  Pure fire has no good way to deal with the War Eagle + Skyelf Templar combo and also struggles against other L threats.
The Solution:  Make Magma Hurler a tier 2 pure fire unit.  This gives pure fire a reliable L counter that can also hit air units.  Magma Hurler at tier 3 doesn't fulfill its role very well since archers are generally not very useful at tier 3 (siege units and units that can quickly deal with threats are much preferred).
Change orb requirements from NNR to RR. Increase cost to 150. Remove M knockback. Bandit Sorceress (Blue)
The Problem:  Bandits have little to no defensive capabilities, which makes them helpless against most attacks.
The Solution:  Repurpose Bandit Sorceress to make her a purely defensive unit that can protect or repair power wells and monuments.
Increase cost to 80. Increase attack damage from 48 to 60. Increase HP from 520 to 660. Can now enter any friendly building, including power wells and monuments. Change “Blessed Installation”: Activate to send the unit into a friendly building. While inside the building, the unit will reduce all damage done to the building by 75%. Lasts for 30 seconds, after which the unit will exit the building with her life points restored and all buffs and debuffs removed. Costs 15. Bandit Sorceress (Red)
Change affinity to green. Increase cost to 80. Increase attack damage from 48 to 60. Increase HP from 520 to 660. Can now enter any friendly building, including power wells and monuments. Change “Infused Installation” to “Gifted Installation”: Activate to send the unit into a friendly building. While inside the building, the unit will cause the building to regenerate 40 life points every second. Lasts for 30 seconds, after which the unit will exit the building with her life points restored and all buffs and debuffs removed. Costs 15. Rioter's Retreat (Blue)
The Problem:  Same as above, bandits lack defensive options.
The Solution:  Make Rioter's Retreat a better defensive tower by giving it S and M knockback and allowing it to protect or repair buildings.
Reduce attack speed to once every 5 seconds. Add small and medium knockback. Change “Blessed Retreat”: Friendly units and buildings within a 25m radius around the tower take 20% less damage. Rioter's Retreat (Green)
Reduce attack speed to once every 5 seconds. Add small and medium knockback. Change “Gifted Retreat”: Friendly units and buildings within a 25m radius around the tower regenerate 15 life points every second. Windhunter (both affinities)
The Problem:  Windhunter's ability makes it eruption fodder.
The Solution:  Reduce self-damage.
Reduce Gifted/Tainted Sobering self damage from 300 to 250. Icefang Raptor (both affinities)
The Problem:  While frost's lack of swift units is a deliberate design choice, it can be unfair on certain maps where frost sometimes can't even reach their first power well before the opponent blocks it.
The Solution:  Give frost a semi-swift unit by making Icefang Raptor tier 1.  This should help frost to secure their first power wells and should also help them deal with mortar tower.
Change orb requirements from NB to B. Reduce damage from 820 to 650. Reduce HP from 895 to 715. Timeless One
The Problem:  Timeless One is cheap enough to be very spammable, allowing players to easily lock down any number of locations.
The Solution:  Increasing the cost of the unit and removing the ability cost forces players to both spend more power immediately for the first freeze (80, up from 65) and also forces them to bind more power into combat-weak units, making spamming Timeless Ones hurt a lot more.  This change will reward making fewer Timeless Ones and keeping them alive so that they can use their now free ability many times.
Increase cost to 80. Decrease ability cost to 0. Increase damage from 55 to 70. Stormsinger (both affinities)
The Problem:  Stormsinger's stats are simply too high for a tier 2 splashable ranged M unit.
The Solution:  Reduce Stormsinger's HP to put it more in line with other T2 ranged M units.
Reduce HP from 750 to 690. Spikeroot
The Problem:  Pure nature lacks good ways to deal with M units - especially Burrower.
The Solution:  Increase Spikeroot's damage to allow nature to kill M threats more quickly and to increase Spikeroot's usage as an M counter where Deep One is often used instead.
Increase spike damage from 100 to 110. Increase (melee) damage from 1200 to 1320. Creeping Paralysis
The Problem:  Pure nature lacks defensive capabilities and needs ways to extend their CC.
The Solution:  Decrease the cost of Creeping Paralysis so that it can be more effectively used to lock down attacking units in early T2 where pure nature struggles the most to stay alive.
Reduce cost from 60 to 50. Increase charges from 2 to 4. Deep One (both affinities)
The Problem:  Deep One's stats are too high for its cost, even for a pure unit.  This causes Deep One to often be used in place of proper counters (like Spikeroot and Ghostspears) because of its exceptionally high overall power level.
The Solution:  Reduce Deep One's HP.  Damage should be left intact because pure nature needs Deep One's damage to deal with threats quickly enough.
Reduce HP from 1650 to 1450. Enlightenment
The Problem:  Enlightenment was one of the most heavily nerfed cards in the history of the game, having its power cost increased by 90.  For PvE, the card is still very useful, and actually single-handedly makes pure decks inferior in PvE, since you can just go double nature and play any cards you want with enlightenment.  For PvP, on the other hand, the card is too expensive to be realistically used in most high level matches (even in 2v2).
The Solution:  Make enlightenment a pure nature card and reduce its cost back down to 150.  This means that you actually have to make sacrifices in PvE to use this (extremely powerful) card and this creates a good reason to play pure nature in PvE.  For PvP, the card is made viable again and pure nature T3 becomes a serious contender in 2v2.
Change orb requirements from NGG to GGG. Reduce cost to 150. Earthshaker
The Problem:  A single Earthshaker can destroy three monuments.  In combination with the above Enlightenment change, that means that pure nature can use this two card combo to destroy an entire base for 250 power, and this can be done every 30 seconds.  This can only be countered by frost spells, and the only way all losses can be prevented is through the use of either Ward of the North, or the combination of Shield Building, Glacier Shell, and Kobold trick.  Enlightenment + Earthshaker is thus almost twice as efficient as Curse Well and it has the ability to kill orbs.  This makes earthshaker unhealthy for the meta because a frost orb is always required to counter it (similar to the old wildfire, though much less egregious as a T3 two card pure combo).
The Solution:  Reduce earthshaker's damage so that it can no longer kill wells on its own and decrease the card's cost.
Reduce quake damage from 605 to 330. Reduce cost from 100 to 40. Increase charges from 2 to 5. Amii Monument
The Problem:  Amii Monument is basically cheating in PvE.  It allows players to outright skip boss fights and other parts of PvE maps that really shouldn't be skippable (at least not via OP cards).
The Solution:  Change Amii Monument so that it is a tier 1 card that no longer advances the player to the next tier, but still provides access to the selected orb's element.  For example, fire T1 could build Amii Monument to give them access to roots and hurricane, which could be combo'd with Mine and other things.  Similarly, pure shadow could build this in tier 2 to allow them to play disenchant on their harvester.  This opens up a lot of interesting possibilities and combos in both PvE and PvP, but the 100 bound power still represents a significant sacrifice that has to be made in order to build it.  A lower activation cost allows players to switch between different orbs without too much cost.  If this is not currently feasible to implement, the only other alternative I see is to make Amii Monument tier 4 and reduce its cost.
No longer functions as a regular orb, but rather provides access to the selected orb's element without advancing tier. Change orb requirements from NNN to N. Reduce cost to 100. Reduce ability cost to 50. Reduce HP to 800. Stage 2:  Buffing Weak Cards
WIP

I think that the card will still be useless after receiving a buff like this.  If we look at other T3 units with CC abilities, those abilities are always very aggressively costed when compared to spells, due to their more restrictive nature (in terms of positioning and bound power).  Examples being Fathom Lord, which has excellent stats, and a cheap paralyze (the strongest kind of CC); Swamp Drake, which has solid stats for a flying unit and what is essentially Oink for 30 power (with 2 fewer seconds to hit the affected unit without reverting CC); and Timeless One which is cheap and has a dirt cheap ability.
Twilight Hag, on the other hand, has abysmal combat stats, and even at 50 power, the ability is still worse than Oink in most cases.  A few things to consider:
You have to bind 75 power in order to use Twilight Hag's ability. The unit is occupied for the full duration of the ability, meaning that she doesn't do damage or knockback while using it. The ability only takes effect around the unit, unlike Swamp Drake and Timeless One where you have a decent bit of range to place the CC optimally.  Combined with her low HP, this makes getting her into position very difficult. If the Hag is CC'ed or teleported the ability is cancelled.  This means that the ability is completely countered by several spells that don't cost that much more (even after your proposed change) and are very likely to get more value by hitting other enemies. As a non-squad M unit, she can be completely locked down by knockback. The ability radius is actually much smaller than the aura would suggest (small enough for ranged units to hit her, charge units to charge at her, and Grigori to disintegrate her), so there is room to increase the AoE. The ability doesn't affect female enemies, as well as many beasts and some other units (mostly anything that doesn't have a male voice).  This may not be very significant right now, but as weak cards are buffed, many of those unused cards will be used and this downside will become more apparent. As far as the unit's combat abilities go, it's not even cost effective against units it should counter (e.g. Fathom Lord, Virtuoso, or even Fallen Skyelf). And the upsides:
She can't be knocked back while using her ability. Her damage buff/healing is nice, but only really does much if you have a lot of units around her (which makes her even more vulnerable to CC). Her knockback radius is pretty big, making her good for locking down M and S units. I can understand wanting to be conservative with buffs in order to not break things, but I think that if we're going to make much progress we can't be afraid to be more aggressive with our buffs.  We should be putting units into a state that puts them on par with other good units; then if they end up being too strong, we can always dial them back after testing them on the test server.  A common and effective methodology for pre-release balance (which this is) is to push the unit to what you see as the reasonable limit (some designers would argue even beyond that limit) in order to find the unit's strengths and to get a good feel for its interactions, and then dial it back if necessary.
My proposal:
I think that buffing the ability and increasing the unit's HP for more survivability is the right approach, it just needs a LOT more:
Increase HP from 785 to 1350. Decrease ability cost to 15. Increase ability radius by 5m. If CC hits more than 1 unit, it's still generally a cost effective way to counter the Hag's ability.  Pure fire has Wildfire, which easily kills her even at 1350 HP unless you cancel the ability and move her (and pure fire doesn't need any help in T3 anyway).  This is a huge HP buff, but it still doesn't put her in a normal stat per cost range for a T3 unit (Silverwinds have nearly double her current stats).
A better alternative would be to give her damage resistance and CC immunity while using her ability, along with a moderate HP boost and ability cost reduction; but that would probably be a lot harder to implement - the above solution should suffice.

I have this proposal:
+ Amii now grant 4 of every orb, instead of a single orb.
+ Amii can be played on t1, instead of t3.
Make amii give 4 of every orbs on t1 for the ultimate enriched experience. It will create loads of options for possible decks and strategies that would straight up not exist without this change. It can be argued that it overshadows alternatives, but it does not remove a single one. Strictly speaking it would be a purely enriching change as far as possibilities go.
What are we waiting for?
Edit: The flaw in this reasoning is that overshadowing alternatives (even if it doesn't remove them) does matter. We can't balance anything without reference.

NAME: Updater Fail Under Wine
SEVERITY: 1
LOCATION: SkylordsRebornUpdater.exe
REPRODUCIBILITY: ALWAYS
DESCRIPTION: When I run 'SkylordsRebornUpdater.exe' in Wine on Linux, the application crashes.
After clicking "OK", the application remains hung and I have to manually break out of it.
SCREENSHOT: No screenshot needed. Error message output included below.
Linux Kernel 4.18
Wine 3.15
Dotnet 4.0
    ^netfx_Core_x64.msi
      netfx_Extended_x64.msi
      RGB9RAST_x64.msi
Dotnet 4.7.2
    ^netfx_Full_x64.msi
netfx_setupverifier.exe verifies both dotnet installations work.
$ sudo -u <username> env HOME=/home/<username> USER=<username> USERNAME=<username> LOGNAME=<username> WINEDEBUG=fixme-sys
tem,fixme-hlsl_parser,-d3dcompiler,fixme-dbghelp,fixme-msacm,fixme-msvcp wine '/home/<username>/.wine/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/BattleForge/SkylordsRebornUpdater.exe'
 
You can submit a simple test .NET program for me test in Wine if you aren't sure to the exact cause of the rendering error in the launcher.
I will understand it if this must be put on the back-burner while the server side of things is in dire need of fixing.
 
EDIT0:
SkylordsRebornUpdater.exe md5 58bfd81eadfc9cf8772463a06133f789 (just in case someone gets the "bright idea" that I should "redownload" like the error message suggests)

I like amii getting nerf, but I wish you did more. Look how superior amii is on nightmare's end for example.

You're player 1 and just finished taking over the bottom base to secure t3 which you now have to defend along with your t1. After that fight, your t2 army is in pretty bad shape. You have two options to get t4:
1: Make a t3 army and take over the top base. Build your t4 monument and defend it. T3 army cost 500-800 power with spells (90% refunded) and 2-3 deck slots. Monument is 300 power. Defence is 300-500 binded power. Totaling about 800 lost power, 2 deck slots and a whole lot of time.
2: Put down amii monument. Totaling 325 binded power, 1 deck slot and 30 seconds.
Now I know there are many way to do this map better. You could take your teammate's t2 and go straight to t4, you could defend your monument and the power shrine with one defence, etc. The example above is what an average joe would do.
I don't think amii should cost 800 power. Maybe it should do something else entirely. An idea I saw on discord was to make amii t4 and cheaper, so it could be used as a 5th orb and orb swapping, opening many new possibilities.

I would love if everyone got the same quest everyday. For example: win Blight expert (100 bfp). That way it incentivise playing different map and we can find people to play these maps even with our smallish community.

That's not exactly the case with aggressor. It's not conseidered too weak in higher rankings, it's more of a unit with a special task wich can also be done by other units (countering L units). It is used as L counter wich is costly but therefor perma CCs things that could otherwise get annoying for stonekin like skyfire drakes, war eagles, mounties...
Anyway imo the main reason why balancing is impossible for lowranks is that there is no meta. A pure fire deck in higher rankings is mostly the same except 2 or 3 cards. That's just the deckcomposition endless players found out to be the strongest in endless games. Now pure fire in low ranks might be something totally crazy and unefficent, maybe it has T4, maybe it has no spells at all, just 20 units...how are you gonna balance THAT? Players in these ranks don't know about hte countersystem, voidpower, how losing a well or an orb makes you lose power permanently. Once they learn those things they normally move to higher ranks.

I think a set of balancing changes would be able to influence both PvP and PvE in a positive way.
PvE casual: 
From my perspective the casual player benefits from changes because it would open up more variety and playable decks. Splash decks are able to do everything (and even more) compared to pure and faction based decks making them underwhelming to play. Also by having all core advantages that factions provide (Crowd Control, Void Manipulation, Charge Manipulation, damage reductions and healing combined with a mobile high dps unit composition) you don't have to play as a team in order to suceed. I think every faction should get more unique strengths. In addition to that some dead abilities could be fixed by small changes to make them more useful and units more interactive. Right now you usually lose tempo and dps in most fights as abilities are expensive with a high cast time and low to medium effects. 
 
PvE Speedrunning: 
I think the only negative aspect regarding balaning would be within the PvE speedrun setting. They want to have a fair competition and with constant changes around cards this aspect is not given anymore for cPvE alltime records. Certain nerfs may weaken current strategies and certain buffs may open up new superior ones. 
By looking at the games history I think nerfs regarding PvE were justified and made the game a little bit healthier overall. Lost Spirit Ship, Second Chance, FoF+ embalmer + Splicer void manipulation fixes were good first steps. Overall I think some changes do make speedrunning more interesting as it forces people to create new strategies and not play current ones to perfection to get extra seconds. I'd clearly like to see the new T4 strategies without Batariel & LSS being super dominant. That may just be my opinion though. 
In the case where changes are applied they should be brought up in a way that allows speedrunners to have a fair competition: 
-> If changes are applied please do it at the start of the month to allow a fair competition. If there is some big nerf applied in the middle of a month records aren't comparable anymore. 
 
PvP 
I think there is a crystal clear consenous, that PvP players want changes. But we need to be very cautious about who is in charge of those changes. I don't think being at the top of the ladder directly qualifies a person to work on healthy balancing ideas. I've seen very questionable balancing ideas from people, that are reasonably high in the ladder. Majority votes also lead to some terrible decisions by EA back then. Alot of things need to be discussed in order to find the correct cards that need to be changed and also find healthy changes. 
 
I think the forum is the best place to discuss changes to have an open discussion due to better visibility of older posts. 

Relatively. in 2013 it was better than 2009, but only because it was made better step by step.
Sometimes the Greeks are 95 % of players, then we should consider making 5% a little less happy for the greater good. This is how it was always done in the history of Battleforge balancing.
Me, too. But not necessarily topplayer by rank, but moreso by rank and the ability to explain things and have a balance discussion. Some topplayers views on balance are straight simpleminded.
So if we nerf cursewell for example every tactic for speedruns is useless? You're dramatising. Some tactics would become useless, some would be created. But the overlap between speedrun - and pvp cards isn't as big as you want ot make it seem.
Historically balancing in BF was always done regarding toplevel play, wich makes sense cause this is where games are decided mostly by deckstrength and not bad decisions, micro mistakes and missing knowledge. It would also be impossible to balance cards for all skilllevels. It's literally easier to learn how to build the right deck, watch replays of topplayers and train then to have every card balanced to your skillevel.

I would love if everyone got the same quest everyday. For example: win Blight expert (100 bfp). That way it incentivise playing different map and we can find people to play these maps even with our smallish community.

I'd argue there are a good amount of cards, that don't even have a niche use due to really poor design. 
EA didn't really understand alot of game concepts. An example would be the importance of bound power which led to very poor balancing choices between buildings, spells and units. Like Amii Monument wouldn't be as overpowered by costing 390 bound power with 0 abiliy cost compared to the current 250 bound +140 toggle, which even returns the full amount of the ability power into the void (which means it's completely free in any void manipulation deck anyways). 
This is the thread I once made to talk about some cards, that could be buffed without touching the balancing by alot (I improved the list by now, so the thread isn't fully up to date though). Also there were alot of dead abilities that could be statbuffed or even reworked (Colossus has probably the worst ability design, because some people simply expected PvP would go to T4 back in 2009). 
In terms of PvP the major problem lies within some cards being overpowered, especially T1 towers like Mortar and Phasetower. Frost T1 got a hard hit by a questionable homesoil nerf, that was aimed to shut down Frostsplashes in higher tiers without getting a healthy compensation buff for the weakened T1 in return. I made a threat, that revolves around that topic, aswell. 
To add something for the nature T1 part, I do think that the faction gets shut downed, because you lose early fights and split engagements without the proper ability to trade in return as base trade threats get shut downed by turrets. I also do believe, that Thugs do have an unhealthy ability especially for extended trading in Fire mirrors, but that is something else. 
In T2 there are also factions that are overperforming (like pure Fire for instance) or underperforming (like Bandits for instance).
 
PvE:
Splash decks just overperform here and pure decks are completely dead in a competitive environment. Only a few cards are really worth to play and usually end up being used in splash decks with Enlighment. This eliminates the need of synergy between teamplayers to play the most powerful combos like having one pure fire player for Batariel and a Shadow Nature player to support it. Right now everyone can do everything on his own. Almost every speedrun strategy nowadays revolves around Enlightment -> Batariel -> Buffs or oneshotting specific bosses with something like selfstacked Mutating Frenzy. Voidmanipulation and power funneling are additional problems in that regard. 
 
If anyone likes to discuss balancing in any way, feel free to hit me up on discord, the forums or ingame. I'm looking to find overall balancing issues and work on potential solutions. Having many opinions about certain cards may help me to get a bigger picture as I would like to see how different type of players do experience the game. I'd like to present a full set of ideas once we get to a stage where balancing changes may be a possibility. Any help would be great here!

Hello Skylords,
we all know that Yrmia & Wazhai are not the best balanced map and EA didnt put it out without a reason. (Pure Fire, scorched earth overall mapcontroll, cliff orb -> orb)
So instead of asking me -> start voting for a yrmia or wazhai & ranked random generated maps.
If there are "enough" votes, yrmia or wazhai will delete from the ranked pool or random generated maps can be added to the pool.
 
Hope we see generated maps again very soon !
 
Best regards,
xHighTech
 
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#AddMultipleChoice