Treim

Ingame Name: Treim Card Name: Darkelf Dryad Tier & Orbs: T2, Shadow Shadow Type of Card: Unit Power Cost: 65 Size: M Attack-Type: Ranged Deathbolt - Similar to Dryads attack animation. Counter-Type: M Active Abilities: Petrification - Cost 50 Power -Activate to paralyze up to 7 enemies at a target location within a 15 meter radius for 15 seconds. After the effect wears off, targets are immune against Paralyze for a while. Darkelf Dryad dies after activation. Explanation of idea behind the card: Since the Netherwarp healing bug was fixed and therefor Shadow Mage being significantly weaker, shadow really does not have a great option for prolonged engagements in (r)PvE besides Shadow Phoenix (which to be honest is a bit boring) in addition to never really having any cc options. T1 Shadow is already the hardest faction to play in t1 and usually takes longest to clear t2. I would like to give Shadow a usefull alternative to Shadow Phoenix. Other factions have access to mutliple strong viable options like Stormsinger, Gladiatrix, Amii-Phantom, Lost Dancer, Deep One just to name a few. Usually those factions also have access to either strong damage, sustain or cc options (Mine, Eruption, Bandit Minefield, Ensnaring Roots, Coldsnap, Curse of Oink, Creeping Paralysis, Lavafield, Wildfire, Surge of Light, Area Ice Shield) basically all of which have use cases that work in higher tiers as well - either due to damage still being relevant for t4 clear or for defending incomes, and cc is always usefull, even SoL or Area Ice Shield can work as a stopgap in low energy situations. Shadow has Aura of Corruption - in theory usefull with Corpse Explosion but not really. Both are not really usefull for other situations either and Undead army which is actually helpful but can't really be your only option for damage mitigation at t2 and even more so as target for blood healing in later stages. Motivate is a staple t1 card and works great with spammable units, sadly none of which are great in Shadow t2. In short Shadow t2 feels kind of stiff. While all other factions are somewhat flexible - shadow just isn't at this stage. Darkelf Dryad is supposed to change that somewhat by being a spammable t2 ranged unit with constistant dps that allows shadow players to react to changing conditions for t3 clears by offering a cc option. Due to the long animation and short radius placement will be critical and planning ahead vital. Sacrificing a unit for a potentailly strong effect seems in line with Shadows identity of risk. In order to keep the card balanced for PvP a high cost for the ability and death of the unit after activation in addition to a fairly short efffect radius and a long activation time seems fair.In terms of effect I would propose a modified Creeping Paralysis - slower animation with shadow aesthetics. Note: If you are not experienced in numbers like power cost, just estimate from existing cards - your idea will not fail if the numbers are a little off. Also, if the template doesn't fit to your idea, just ignore the parts that are not applicable.

On Soultree you can always bring Suppression to deal with Hatecasters and Willzappers as well as Dryad Green to get immunity from the Twilight Whisperer Blinds. I used 2 Mortar tower to deal with the big wave

I did it on Crusade, Soultree and Encounters with Twilight, though I know that Behind Enemy Lines and Nightmare Shard are also possible. I assume King of the Giants, Defending Hope, Siege of Hope and Mo are doable as well - though some are probably quite tedious S2_Challenge5.3_Crusade T1.pmv S2_Challenge5.3_Encounters T1.pmv S2_Challenge5.3_Soultree T1.pmv

Duo should be harder. You have 7 minutes more but the camps have the same strenghts so the unit limit and card cooldowns work against you here - probably doable though. Some of the general mechanics are explained here (especially spawn mechanics). I haven't updated the guide in a decade (holy crap it's been a while), so most of the meta strategies have changed. The general stuff should still be correct though. Maybe you have to have a glance or two in the text to find more specific stuff. I probably mentioned the logic for where t2 monuments are located somewhere. I had illustrations for some of the stuff I explained but they stopped working sometime during forum changes and the like. There is a dropbox link at the end of the post however with the full .pdf document. I did mention that - just more briefly:

Here's the a run we played a couple days ago for that challenge on difficulty 8. We reset a couple times for a bandit map to give a bit more leeway. And we did fail a couple camps with semi wipes. Usually the best way for this to work is for players taking roles: 2 tank players (strikers/Rageclaw --> if out of charges Burning spears), 1 building nuker (fire dancer --> if out of charges Skyfire Drake /Gladiatrix), 1 dd (gladiatrix--> if out of charges Skyfire drake). Fire dancer focuses buildings. If spawners are too far back everyone erupts. Gladiatrix targets high priority units. Tanks tank. Fire Force blue is really usefull. Tank players preferably start Strikers as they are useable all the way to the end. Suppression the artillery always --> Determine 1 player who has that job before the match. You can heal between some camps at rallying banner or other fast construction buildings if necassary --> you cant do that after every camp as you will run out of time that way. Try to plot your path in advance by scouting the layout through fog of war (the outline is visible even without vision). Try to plot a path that avoids the harder camps for later to have the opportunity to build up an army while simultaneously minimizing incomes so you need to bind less power and attention for defense at your wells. Always move as four. Voice comms make this a lot easier so you can communicate the important bits (erupt spawner, need to heal at building before next camp, need help defending incomes, I am out of charges and build X going forward, etc.). 2025-08-19_23-27-59_RPvEFourPlayers_diff8_s63715_Treim_Wanky_[GM]LEBOVIN_[GM]Gam3over_time_0_19_52.0_v273.pmv

I personally enjoyed the very specific challenges (e.g. Ravens End/Empire with fire + only t2+ neutral units only or rpve with only t2) way more than the "play 10 maps with/without ...." I felt like the latter type of quests mostly lead me to just complete them quickly on the ever same quick and easy maps (Encounters, Crusade, Sunbridge, Insane God, Soultree, KotG,..). I admit that is partly my own fault aswelll though. >> Do you already know what type of quests you want to add more/less in future seasons? Do you have any data on what was popular and whats not? Are there any plans for a "play the whole campaign with specific deck restrictions type quests" (maybe for Nightmare?) in the future?

DESCRIPTION: I played a rPvE match earlier today where the charges for Abomination were put to 0 after using twilight transformation on my Twilight Creeper to spawn the Abomination. There was no cooldown and the card stayed unplayable for the remainder of the match (see screenshot) REPRODUCIBILITY: - SCREENSHOT/VIDEO: LOG: - File too big to attach here - https://www.file-upload.net/download-15518083/_log_proxy_latest.log.html ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: At around 8:28 in the replay my Twilight Creeper was paralyzed and I tried to trigger the transformation multiple times during the paralysis effect. 2025-07-25_16-14-35_RPvEFourPlayers_diff7_s17212_Treim_Kapo_BRO_D4rkblue_time_0_15_50.5_v272.pmv

That is true, would especially open up deck versatility for t2-t4 though. If we just talk about diversity in t1, I still think the biggest problem is that 3 factions can get somewhat reliably in situations that are completely unplayable and fire also has a really hard time (at least in random matches). A secondary effect my proposed change on the game could have though, is that non fire starts are still slower than fire and with increased occurence of these in single matches a slight increase in game time might become necassary to further enable the viability of these changes anyway, especially if the assumption is that at least some more varitey in t2-t4 strategies is valued. For Motm's I agree. I just think (and as you mentioned already) if those are basically unplayable in random play you have a problem entirely. I guess the question is what you want to balance 10's around - random play or motm play. Personally I think random play is the way to go. If even the best teams have insane fail rates, you either have a massive player skill issue (wouldn't assume that) or a balancing issue imo. Also just removing Vigils, only really trivialize things for mostly fire t1. Especially Shadow and Frost and to a lesser extent nature will still have a really hard time if it's just twilight brains + 3 Treefiends/Mana beasts + Lost Dancers + Shields. It is just going from blatantly unplayable to extremely difficult. Obviously teamplay is still advised in those situations as well, it's just not strictly mandatory. I think the key questions in terms of balance philosophy to be answered are: Balance around motm's or random play. Is a broadening of viable strategies for Motm 10 wanted, if yes in which stage of a match (t1, t2-3, post t4) and by how much (also for each individual stage). --> TL;DR increasing t1 viability by removing vigils and further incentivizing deck viability by minor time limit changes is probably the most efficient way forward for random play imo. If only argued from a t1 perspective I'd probably still say that Vigils are the single biggest hindrance. If you prioritize Motm you probably can do nothing for t1 realistically besides rebalancing t1 of nature, frost, shadow (would also solve the t1 issue in random play). Overall deck variability would still increase by increasing the time limit. Increased timer or higher starting energy basically is the same change, though starting energy only really makes sense up to a certain point Always glad to derail a thread Also that's all I have to say on this, so I'll just go back into my retirement home. See ya in another year or until I randomly stumble upon the forums again and see an interesting thread

And it will stay that way which is fine. I think the biggest detractor of versatility in a game(mode) is when there is somewhat regularly occuring scenarios where no matter how good you play options(in this case factions) become unplayable or rely heavily on support (of especially meta solutions) which further incentivizes the meta solution. That doesn't even mention that it is also less fun to know that basically every 10th or so map there is basically nothing you can do yourself and need help from others. Allowing every faction to at least be (more or less) solo playable against "normal" scenarios in game is probably the best thing you can do to enhance playrates of those factions. That won't make them the most popular faction by a longshot but at least you open up the possibility of playing these in random groups without frustrating everyone from the getgo. I think in a secondary step you could introduce changes to Shadow, Nature and frost to make them more viable in 10's but those will also have to be considered in other scenarios. The "quick and dirty" solution to the problem described above and my last post is to just remove vigils as a possibility at t2 which from what i remember the code structure of rPvE maps to be, is fairly easy. (correct me if I'm wrong as I am not really involved in this stuff anymore for at least 2 years or so)

Can only really speak to the original 4 factions in rpve 10, but in my experience the only real scenario where Nature, Frost and Shadow are basically unplayable in random maps is against Lost Vigils at t2 In every other scenario you can build robust t1 card combinations to reliably clear t2 (and I did so). That might entail 1 or at most 2 extra deckslots compared to fire starts and those factions are still slower, but they are viable if you know what you're doing. Without any other changes the viability of those other t1's already drastically increases. I think they will still have a harder time in certain scenarios (close/double camps, treefiend/mana biest incomes at pos1/4) but that is all manageable imo.

though it is late, I added the 2 player solo run on level 9 from last month's Motm - only did 3 runs on the map. Further improvements were possible.

For rPvE 9: Support: "Standard" t4 decks: T3 decks: Weird stuff: For rPvE 10:

Even though the event isn't over yet - I'd like to bring my first point of feedback already. I feel like the event runtime is way too long. Imo 3 weeks+ just feels like it is stretching on forever. Especially considering the ruleset is relatively simple and straightforward. For events like the Guns of Lyr one where the ruleset was way more expansive I can understand a longer event runtime, even then 3 weeks might be a tad too long. Personally I would prefer a event runtime of 10-14 days for the "simple" competitions and maybe a couple days extra for something thats more complex.

you can view them ingame --> be in the Forge --> Book icon on the top -->Profile --> Replay icon on the right side --> names will be as they are named in the replay folder but you can see the finish times of the replay selected, so as long as you know what your replay time is you should be fine. The replays are ordered based on recency, so if you know a date you can skip quite a few as well. Also you can change the names of replays outside the game by changing the name in the following folder: C:\User\Battleforge\replays