Volin

Greetings fellow Skyfolk,
Now that the Community Decks Database has reached a passable state with the most recent updates, I wanted to create a separate post specifically for this feature.
 
You can find the Community Decks Database here:
https://smj.cards/community/decks  
It is currently possible to:
Look up decks other users created (filter for different settings, like map and orbs order) Copy the deck code and import the deck directly ingame with the command " /importdeck [code] " Vote on decks that you liked or disliked (make it easier for new players to find enjoyable decks) See if the creator is a veteran or if veterans liked the deck Create your own decks directly on the website or import it from the code you got when using the " /exportdeck " command ingame Share your decks and set specific maps and other options that apply for the deck (even featured community maps can be selected) Set the complexity of the deck to show if they are beginner friendly or for veterans only, as well as other additional tags NEW: Add a short description of up to 500 characters (some characters are not allowed, to prevent abuse) Add a forum link to a post to explain in detail how the deck works, what to note when using the deck, or which cards can be swapped for others NEW: Edit your deck, change the maps it is intended for or update the tags Verify your account with your ingame name to show who created the decks Request to become a veteran player NEW: Veteran players are able to flag decks for inappropriate descriptions, this will cause the deck to not be able to be updated or deleted anymore until the issue has been reviewed and resolved with appropriate actions  
Veteran Players are able to take some actions to flag a deck, the actions include:
Flag a deck as "Outdated", for example when it's no longer playable due to orb requirement changes to the used cards.
("Outdated" tag is displayed if at least 3 veterans flagged the deck as such.) Remove the "Updated" tag from decks that were edited, if the deck still fits the rating, to prevent abusing the editing feature.
("Updated" tag is removed if at least 3 veterans flagged the tag for removal.) NEW: Flag a deck for "Inappropriate Description", this includes everything that is also not allowed on the forum. Once flagged this way, you are not able to remove your flag and the description will not be displayed for non-veterans anymore.
("Inappropriate Description" tag is added if at least 1 veteran flagged the deck as such.)  
Please note:
If you want to vote on decks or create and share your own decks, you will need to login with your discord account If you want to have your ingame name displayed for the decks you created, you can verify your account and your ingame name will be added If you want to become a veteran, the community and other veterans will need to agree, after which you will be added as a veteran  
IMPORTANT: Deck descriptions have been a feature that has repeatedly been requested by multiple people, so please behave in what you write in the free text area or the feature will have to be rethought/removed again, if it is being abused too much. I am relying on your best behavior with this. 🙂
 
You could also use this topic to reply with a comment to provide additional information for your deck, like YouTube links to videos that show your deck in action and don't want to create a separate topic just for your deck, to then add the link to your comment to the deck when adding it to the database. 🙂
 
I hope you like it and I would like to hear your opinion and receive feedback, as it is still work in progress and there is room for improvements. 🙂
Thanks and enjoy 😉
 

 

update:
- updated orb requirements and affinities of changed cards (all other card values haven't been updated yet)
- added outdated indicator to median/mean/min/max prices to be able to immediately see if the values are outdated (if they were last updated more than 24h ago) as the script that updates the notable prices hasn't been automated yet
- added option to add a short description to the community decks with specific parameters and a related veteran action:
descriptions can be up to 500 characters long for now, the only allowed characters aside from letters and numbers are: _ - + > ' , ; . : ! ? ( ) and new line character (if you need a specific additional character for your description, feel free to suggest it) IMPORTANT FOR VETERANS: veterans have a new action that allows them to flag a deck for having an inappropriate description which is then reviewed. these flags are not reversible by veterans and will result in appropriate actions being taken for the deck creator and for false flagging. decks that have been flagged by at least 1 veteran this way can't be edited or deleted until they have been reviewed and the problem resolved.  
Deck descriptions have been a repeatedly requested feature by multiple people, so please behave in what you write in the free text area or the feature will have to be rethought/removed again, if it is being abused too much. I am relying on your best behavior. 🙂
 

update:
- added deck complexity to the community deck creation
- added new additional deck tags, currently only "Creative/Fun" (feel free to suggest more additional deck tags)
- added functionality to edit decks (you can edit and delete your decks here: https://smj.cards/account/community/decks)
- added actions that veterans can take for decks, those include: (suggest more, if think others are necessary)
flag deck as "Outdated", for example when it's not playable anymore due to orb requirement changes to cards
("Outdated" flag is displayed if at least 3 veterans flagged the deck as such.) remove "Updated" flags from decks that were edited, if the deck still fits the rating, to prevent editing abuse
("Updated" flag is removed if at least 3 veterans flagged the tag for removal.)  
         

 

It is a quite weird composition that I can't remember either to have that seen before. Tho I've seen even easier T2 where it was the named combo but a shaman instead of a spellbreaker.

I know that usually only 2 things should have changed here, as mentioned by Metagross, but also share the feeling that some of the usual T2 composisions have changed a bit. But can't say for sure

Hey yo,
As your local nature Skylord, and with the Mana Wing achievement in mind, I have uploaded many of my pure nature cPvE decks. Also, some pure colour rPVE decks as a baseline how such decks should look like.
If some other veterans heavily disagree on something, I would love to hear some feedback. In general, it would be good if some veterans would register and start voting on stuff, so we get a baseline of decks that beginners may use.
Sidenote: Downvoting the Invincible Deck is frowned upon! It's the best deck ever created.

Maybe Toggy can voice Warlock 🤔

We fired Rogan as he never listens, especially Encounters with Twilight. 

Greetings Skylords!
A new month; a new Community Update! It's time to bring you up to speed with everything going on in Skylords Reborn!

• Patch Overview Video
Our latest patch, Nature's Awakening, has released! We have made a short overview video to celebrate the occasion, highlighting some of the changes we have made to the game. We hope you enjoy it, and be sure to share it with your friends!

If you want to read the full patch notes, you can find them here. 
 
• Patch Feedback Thread
As always, we highly value your feedback on the changes implemented in our latest patch. To facilitate this, we have once again created a dedicated feedback thread where you can express your thoughts about what you liked, disliked, and any other suggestions you may have.
We kindly request that you provide constructive feedback regarding aspects you would like to see improved, while also sharing the elements you enjoyed. Your input is invaluable to us!
 
• Voice Acting – Apply Now! 
Back in October 2021 we initiated the search for voice actors to enhance the game with new voice lines. The new cards Amii Paladin and Banzai Lord were voiced by community members, bringing these characters to life. At that time, we had plans to expand the range of voice lines in the game further. Unfortunately, due to the absence of an audio editor, we faced limitations in what we could achieve, resulting in the regrettable need to even reject fully recorded lines. Consequently, voice-acting was temporarily put on hold.
However, we are delighted to announce that we now have an Audio Editor on our team, and with our current focus on creating new campaign maps, we are once again actively seeking individuals who are interested in contributing their voices to Skylords Reborn!
We are looking for a variety of voices (both male and female), and encourage everyone who is interested (and has a decent microphone!) to apply. You are also welcome to apply if you did so in the original application round in 2021! 
To apply, fill in a brief survey to provide us with some information about yourself and select which characters you are interested in. We will be in touch with you for a trial script, and select our favourites from the provided recordings.  
 

 
Don't miss your chance to make a lasting impact on Skylords Reborn! Apply today and maybe your voice will be heard in the game!
 

 
• Art Spotlight – Bedrock
In our Stonekin Deep Dive, we previously mentioned our plans for a new tier 4 Stonekin unit based on the Moloch model. Today, we are excited to offer you a sneak peek of this unit by unveiling the artwork we have created for it. Additionally, we would like to share some insights into the process our artist, Spirit Alpha, went through to achieve the final result.
 
Sketch and Early Draft
Spirit Alpha initiates his artwork by creating a sketch or draft, outlining the general ideas to establish the artwork's direction. For this particular piece, we aimed to capture the essence of a formidable Stonekin creature emerging from the water.

It is important to consider the card frame when creating artwork. As you can see, while the left piece looks impressive on its own, the head partially falls off when placed within the card frame. This issue becomes even more apparent when displaying the creature type and charges in the game. This is why working with sketches and exploring various compositions is crucial before settling on a final design in Skylords Reborn.

Settling on a Design
Spirit Alpha explored several other options, some of which are highlighted below, while receiving feedback and suggestions from our art critiques along the way.

The design on the right showcased the most potential, and work continued with that version. 

Finalizing the Design
Although we were fond of the design, feedback indicated that the head of the creature should be tilted to the right instead of the left.

Throughout the process, Spirit Alpha also experimented with various designs for the creature's belly, ranging from a nearly fully closed appearance to a more open one.

Colour Scheme
Ultimately, we opted to retain a more closed design, and significant effort was invested in ensuring that the card followed the Stonekin colour scheme, preventing it from potentially resembling a Frost unit.


Final Adjustments
Spirit Alpha submitted his final design, and our lead artist, Tweeto, made some last minor adjustments to produce the final artwork. One of the modifications involved tilting the "volcano" slightly to ensure it remained within the card frame. Can you identify the other changes? 


Here are Tweeto's final adjustments: 
We are extremely pleased with the final outcome of Bedrock and sincerely hope that you can appreciate the dedication and effort that went into its creation. A heartfelt appreciation goes out to Spirit Alpha for his hard work!
 
• Tournaments and Events
In between our monthly Community Updates, we host various events and tournaments, so be sure to keep a close eye on the in-game event tab and the forum calendar to stay informed and not miss out on any exciting events!
 
• NEW - Community Run Event: Old School Efficiency
Fancy a challenge? Complete Encounters with Twilight on standard using as little power as you can! Please check in tomorrow for more information.
 
 • COMING UP - Official Event #9: Who Dares Wins! - June 17th until June 25th
Look out for our next official event later this month. Do you have what it takes to aid Rogan?
 

• COMING UP - Crappy Community Contest #11 - June 26th until July 3rd
The next CCC will be a creative contest held on the forum. Look out for the forum post on June 26th!



• Host your own tournament / event
Want to host a tournament or event yourself? Please reach out to our Event Organizers, @Metagross31, @Minashigo Hiko or @nukie! We can help you out with various topics and are glad to discuss potential ideas. We can also sponsor the prize pool for your event. If you have a cool idea for a PvE event, or want to host a PvP tournament, please don't hesitate to reach out to us, we will gladly assist you.
 
• Team Changes
We are thrilled to announce that the creators behind the maps used in the previous community event Through Ice and Flames have officially joined our team as Map Designers! With the addition of both Damo and Hrdina Impéria, our team's focus on creating new campaign maps has been further strengthened, and we can't wait to release some exciting content in the future. Welcome both, and thank you for your contribution! 
More than a year after the position was first listed, we have found an Audio Editor in Discoheart! He will be able to help us out with the needed editing for adding new voice lines into the game, both for cards and upcoming campaign maps. We are glad to have him, and excited to continue adding new voice lines into the game. 
 
• Contribute
Interested in joining the team yourself? Skylords Reborn is a community-driven project fuelled by the passion and dedication of over 30 volunteers. We are always on the lookout for like-minded individuals. If you have a passion for gaming, programming, design, or marketing, we invite you to have a look at our open positions!
 

 
• In Conclusion
That's all for this Community Update! We appreciate you taking the time to read through it.
As is tradition, we're including a scratch code as a small token of our appreciation for your support.
The code will reward you with a General booster: APPL-YFOR-VOIC-ENOW
The code is valid until July 1st, when we will bring you another Community Update. 
We're always looking for ways to improve and value your feedback. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, please don't hesitate to share them with us. We'll be back next month with more updates on our ongoing projects and upcoming features. You can also sign up to our e-mail newsletter here. 

Archive
• Skylords Reborn Documents (Deep Dives, Behind the Scenes, PvP Guide)  
• Overview Community Updates
• Community Update May 2023

I love pretty much all of the patch, and I apreciate all of the work a lot, but right now I want to share my opinion about the nature Rpve.
I had some 4 player runs on diff 9 that were very fun, probably more challenging then most other factions, but still balanced to fit in the difficulty. Especially the post t4 Camp with bosses, and the motk's in later rows can really hurt some strategys, but I think that is a cool thing, because the meta spelldecks also get some weaknesses with this.
I was never a huge Rpve Player before, but this month I actually played quite a lot and enjoyed it a lot, also the singleplayer maps.
I also played quite a lot of 10s and started to feel quite confident with most maps and the generell mechanics of it.
But I have to say in singleplayer, also the 9s of nature felt much harder then most 10s I played of other factions (exept maybe LS). That was also affected by pretty unlucky and hard map-layouts I got on nature maps, but it took me like 5 rounds to beat one of them, and there I was already so frustrated that I even played Amii-Monument 😶
And even with pure Frost T4 with 2 Dreadnoughts, 4 Ironclads, shields of 3 Winterwitches and spell support I lost most of the army in the later camps.
That felt realy unreasonable to be honest, I would describe myself as a pretty solid frost player, and I think frost T4 is fairly strong, but the singleplayer nature maps are in my opinion way to hard, uncompareble to other factions on 9 in my opinion.
If you compare a random singleplayer 9 on nature with the Bandit Motm 10, the nature map will challenge you so much more, probably with any possible map layout. 

Hello everyone, it has been 10 days since the last patch and it is time for our next feedback thread. You can discuss it both here and on our balancing discord: https://discord.gg/jrGEBG9NT5
What did you like, what did you not like? Do you want to see more of some things and less of others? Below are some topics to help begin the discussion:
Thoughts on the many quality of life features released with the patch? New card feedback How does Nature rPvE feel? June MotMs will be set to Nature if you have not been able to play it much yet.  Opinions on balance changes? We tried to add several improvements to T1 & T2 through both buffs/reworks and reducing card orb requirements Current balance between the various void return methods How does Stonekin feel post-patch? Do towers feel like they are in a good place (minus the still-pending changes announced months ago)

You can discuss details, but the general idea is not bad and would be an improvement

Why not just put the 10s booster achievement behind the 10s time achievement...? You can only do the booster achievement when you have done BG10 under 12 minutes. 

Aaaaw🤗
 
seening Wheels not any higher then C makes an old man happy

@KserSke
This is what we came up with in the stream
Again after the tier definition:
S - Absolute powercreeps that you can almost not pick if playing pure shadow (or sometimes mix related)
A - Obvious picks in their decks and strong first choices
B - More niche, but very good cards that are usefull in many situations
C - Alternative picks that are weaker as B+ but still viable sometimes + halfway viable Fun-tier
D - Either cards that are rarely playable or that have very, very few niche use-cases
F - just plain useless (in pve)



 
The VoD can be found here:
 

The community map achievement could have been announced better. The issue is that there are not enough community maps of sufficient quality with completed advanced and standard modes. We decided to treat the Forge skin as equivalent to a new promo card and therefore placed it behind a veteran level achievement. We might make adjustments based on the data with get in the next month or so. The next Forge skin will release differently. 

Map & NPC Changes

[ NPC Balance Changes ]
 Lost Reaver:
1. Reclassify Lost Reaver as a melee-unit instead of a ranged-unit.
Players are likely familiar with the fact that a Lost Reaver will spawn its Lost Crawlers and then stand off to the side while it and its allies are slaughtered. This has now been fixed. Lost Reaver will use its ability and move towards and engage enemies in melee combat. This should constitute a slight buff to the unit's strength as an enemy.
 Lost Wanderer (shield variant):
1. Ice Shield duration: Infinite ➜ 20 seconds
2. Targets: All available targets in a 20m radius ➜ 5 closest units in a 20m radius
3. New passive effect: The duration of friendly Ice Shields is extended indefinitely within a 20m radius around Lost Wanderer.
These changes aim to make the unit more fair through changing Lost Wanderer's Ice Shields to only be conditionally permanent and to have an upper limit on the number of allies that can be shielded at a time. This should enable more counter play on the player's end, as a player can now focus on Lost Wanderers to give the Ice Shields the possibility of wearing off.
 Twilight Evil Eye:
1. Remove passive Pain Link damage reflection ability
Twilight Evil Eye possessed the same Pain Link ability as the player version of Wrathgazer. Pain Link is only supposed to work on Evil Eye's allies, but there is a common bug with the ability which causes it to frequently enemies as well. This would lead to situations where a player would kill their own units by killing an Evil Eye, an issue which disproportionally affected melee unit compositions due to Pain Link's small radius. While this therefore constitutes a buff to players in niche situations, the removal of Pain Link will also make late game Twilight camps more durable by no longer distributing additional damage to Evil Eye's allies.
 Twilight Leech (Siege of Hope Mini-boss):
1. Enemies affected by the unit's teleport ability now have a 10-second immunity to further teleports to prevent infinite teleport ping-ponging of units around camps.
 Twilight Minions:
1. New passive ability: Increase damage of Twilight Minions by +20% for each friendly Twilight Minion nearby.
While Twilight Minions currently claim they deal more damage based on nearby allies, this is not actually true. We are therefore adding such an ability which scales based only on other nearby friendly Twilight Minions. The current numbers and effect are relatively small as we want to ensure we do not potentially over buff the unit in early campaign scenarios.
 Twilight Willsapper:
1. Rework Willsapper's auto-cast paralyze substantially.
   A. Every 4 seconds, up to 2 hostile units within a 40m radius will be paralyzed for 11 seconds upon inhaling it. After the effect wears off, targets are immune against Paralyze for a short time.
   B. Recast timer: 4 seconds
   C. Targets: Closest 2 hostile units not currently paralyzed or immune.
   D. Duration: 11 seconds
   E. Range: 40m
   F. Immunity: 5 seconds
Up to 6 units can now be paralyzed by Willzapper at once, each for 11 seconds. They then have a very short (5 second) immunity period. The effect targets the closest non-paralyzed hostile units because otherwise it would permanently target the 2 closest units and be ineffective. Willsapper should no longer paralyze enemies after its death, and enemies will now have a short window to respond before being re-paralyzed. This is in contrast to the previous implementation, which allowed Willsapper to permanently paralyze up to 5 enemy units at once. We hope these changes will make this iconic enemy building more fair while still providing a substantial challenge when facing the Twilight faction.
 The Red King (Empire Boss):
1. Now casts an Amok ability periodically, causing enemies to attack each other in a large radius around him.
 Bandit Lord (rPvE Boss):
1. Change Name: Bandit Lord ➜ Banzai Lord
2. Add boss immunity
3. Life points: 7000 ➜ 20000
4. New ability, "Bird Calling":
   A. Spawns Banzai Birds, identical to U3 player tainted affinity.
   B. Casts every 10 seconds
5. Add “Flesh Feast” ability from Overlord to description
It is well known that Bandits are the easiest enemies in rPvE by a good margin. One contributing factor to this is that the Bandit Lord enemy is counted as a boss when generating rPvE matches, despite being no more than a slightly beefier and reskinned Overlord. We have decided to change this mini-boss into a real boss, akin to the player and campaign versions of Banzai Lord. This boss will both regenerate life points based on nearby corpses and spawn powerful Banzai Birds to destroy the armies of players. We hope players enjoy this first step towards making Bandits a more fearsome and interesting faction to fight in rPvE. 
 Lost Crawler (Lost Souls rPvE)
1. The non-shielding variants of Lost Wanderer have been replaced by Lost Crawlers in the Lost Souls preset in random PvE.
These are M-sized units that explode on death, which many players have seen before in our Halloween event map Spooky Encounters. This should present a slight increase in the difficulty of early game Lost Souls compared to similar situations prior to the patch. 

[ Systematic Changes ]
Spring Forge has been added to the game. Available via an achievement to win several featured community maps. Random PvE factions have had their probabilities redistributed to account for the addition of Nature rPvE [ General Fixes]
Removed a broken variant of Portal Nexus from the map editor. Battlegrounds: Fixed a typo in the lobby setup screen in English. The Treasure Fleet: Improved localization of the goals to be more consistent: Properly translate "first" to "erste" rather than "nächste" in German. Always lowercase "chariot" in French. Always end goals with a period in Russian. The Guns of Lyr: Fixed a typo in the goal (F) description to find and slay all remaining enemies in English. Slave Master / Mo: Capitalized the gameplay term "Health" for usage in the goal "Mo's Health" for consistency.
[ Campaign Map Changes ]
 Behind Enemy Lines:
1. Auto-destroy top left wall if 50% of barrier modules are already destroyed.
2. Added a Flightblocking / Vision Block to the top left base to prevent the Twilight Dragon from aggroing onto units at the player's T2/T3 location.
3. Line of Sight improvements along the bottom middle Twilight Disciple path.
Blight:
1. Fixed a line of sight issue at the top right starting position, which prevented ranged units from attacking enemies without closing to almost melee range.
2. Added two new bridges connecting the left and right sections of the map on both the top and the bottom.
3. Updated minimap to reflect changes and to be more accurate in general.

 
 Convoy:
1. Command Walker spawn frequency (delay between the spawns of two Walkers) on expert difficulty: 120 seconds ➜ 180 seconds
2. Amii Spell Device effects:
   A. "Area Freeze" (Coldsnap):
      - Maximum number of targets: 7 ➜ 12
      - Fixed description to display correct info, improved the spell preview, and displayed maximum spell range while selecting target area.
   B. "Healing Radiance" (Ray of Light) maximum healing: 3600 ➜ 4400 life points
   C. "Meteor Shower" (Inferno)
      - Scatter radius of meteor impact area: 20 ➜ 15m radius
      - Fixed description to display correct info, improved the spell preview, and displayed maximum spell range while selecting target area.
Convoy on expert difficulty has an 18% successful completion rate, the lowest of any campaign map in the game by far. Part of this is the map's seemingly infinite scaling potential, where attack waves progressively get harder and harder, even very late into the game. Part of this is the unique mechanics of the map, which often confuse players. And part of this is that success or failure on this map, when not cheesing it with Rifle Cultists, Voodoo Shack, or Enlightenment, is RNG. A player can do identical actions from one game to the next, with one playthrough succeeding and the next failing. It all depends on how many units the Command Walker gets attacked by on its way north and how many of these units it fails to kill due to poor target selection. In several test runs, we found that the number of units which congregate to attack the Command Walker, while it itself is attacking the Power Shrine, can range from 7 to 13 without any player intervention. Enemy groups at the lower end of the range are beatable using only the map's mechanics, while enemy groups at the upper end of the range more can kill the Walker, which often led to failure even when the players executed perfectly.
Winning or losing a map due to the target selection of an AI controlled unit is not acceptable. If two players execute well, they should not lose because the map's core mechanic is poorly designed and poorly balanced. To fix this issue, we are increasing the time between Command Walker spawns by 30 seconds. This will increase the total available time for players to prepare by approximately a minute without effecting other portions of the map. We are also strongly buffing the spell effects available to the player when they capture nodes and gather Stonekin spell charges. The Coldsnap effect has had its target count increased to 12, allowing it to freeze all enemies around the Walker in the vast majority of cases, even if the Command Walker has the worst possible target selection. The Ray of Light effect has been buffed by 22%, while the Inferno effect's tightened scatter radius will allow the player to pick off priority targets with increased reliability. Overall, the goal is that a team which has captured and successfully defended 2 nodes, while also having gathered 20 Stonekin charges by the time the 3rd Walker reaches the Power Shrine, should be able to win the Command Walker mini-game with 100% reliability as long as they use the Amii Spell Device somewhat competently. 
 Nightmare Shard:
1. Replace the Twilight Deathglider spawned at the "Shadow Camp" on expert difficulty with Twilight Mindbenders.
Most veteran players approach this map by immediately rushing the spawn buildings of the Shadow Camps on both sides with either Nomad + Eruption or Mana Wings. They do this because it prevents the spawn of several camp defenders, the most notable of which is the Twilight Deathglider. Twilight Deathgliders have an AoE knockback of S and M-units. Additionally, the pathway into the Shadow Camp is incredibly narrow, meaning that a single Twilight Deathglider can, and often does, permanently CC an infinite amount of player units on this map. By changing this singular unit, we allow players to play the map in the normal way without facing an enemy that single-handedly counters every non-Fire faction at T1. At the same time, we do nothing to change the map for veterans and speedrunners.
Nightmare's End:
1. Decreased the pond size at the starting location on the left side of the map (see minimap image), allowing for enough space to build a second tower defending the southern wall.
2. Decreased blocking on the right side of the map (see minimap image).
3. Updated Minimap to reflect changes and to be more accurate in general.

 Sunbridge:
1. Fixed several terrain and water visual issues.
2. Moved the single Power Well on the right side down a bit.
3. Moved the 3 Power Wells and Monument on the right side down a bit.
4. Slightly improved blocking to allow better spawning of units at wells near terrain.
Minor quality of life improvements. The changes to the Wells and Monument on the right side of the map should hopefully prevent the player from aggroing the next camp simply by claiming the Wells and Monument. 

Joined because of this, I looked at those potential featured and thought "I need to make this happen".
Been so long! Those things take a lot of time and effort :X
Cosmetics - Done
Compare Profiles - Done
Community Map Rework - Done
One day, all of those will be done :)

Just in case, from previous month

Yea, you guys should indeed check out the ongoing event 😉

Greetings Skylords!
A new month; a new Community Update! It's time to bring you up to speed with everything going on in Skylords Reborn!

• Patch Date Announcement - 19th of May
Exciting news! Our next content patch is almost ready for release. We are currently hard at work to finalize its content, and are ready to announce a patch date. Our spring patch is planned for a release on the 19th of May. 
We have a lot of exciting things in the works in various stages of development, some of which you will see in later patches. While we highlighted some upcoming Lost Souls changes in last month's community update, we are still working to resolve some issues before we can confirm their inclusion in this patch. We appreciate your patience and want to assure you that if these changes are not ready for the spring patch, they will be included in a later one.
As we get closer to the patch's release, we will provide more details about the content in the patch notes. In the meantime, we are pleased to share that the Nature faction will be introduced to the game as a new enemy for rPvE.
 
• A look at Nature rPvE
On December 18th, 2021, we introduced the Fire faction as a formidable new enemy to be faced in rPvE. We're thrilled to announce that the Nature faction is now ready to be added to the ranks, In celebration of this occasion, we sat down with Hodron to give us some insights into its development.

 
Let's start with introductions, for those who do not know you, what is your role on the Skylords Reborn team?
Hey, I am Hodron, I am part of the map department of the Skylords Reborn Team. I have mostly worked on the Fire rPvE set before Nature, which has been a quite monumental task in both cases.
 
How long have you been working on Nature rPvE?
In early 2022, after the release of the Fire rPvE faction, we had a poll to decide what the next faction would be; Nature or Frost. The overwhelming majority voted for Nature, and we started working on it around February 2022. If I had to estimate the time I was actively working on the faction, I would say about a year due to some pauses during development.
 
How do you start designing a new rRvE faction?
First of all, I think of all the Nature cards in the game and then imagine the AI using their abilities like the Fire units are already. Terrifying thought, am I right? Our very brave map testers can probably still remember the horrors of some early testing versions of Nature rPvE. The camps were stacked with healing and damage reduction while constantly paralyzing the player, almost like a horde of Twilight Willzappers. For the first few rounds of testing, we never actually won a match on difficulty 9, not even close. From there the process turns to cutting and / or improving the units, buildings, and camps until a good mix across all difficulties is found.
What about units?
Nature units were proving to be problematic in their original state because they are supposed to give the player a varied box of tools, but they cost energy to balance this. For example, Deep One: The ability to move player units into a camp and root them in place was immensely frustrating to play against, especially when multiple of these fellas were in one camp or attack wave. Swamp Drake also went through multiple iterations; first having the Sleep ability, then being like a Bandit Windhunter and lastly now only being a stat unit. 
 
Are there more units that act completely different compared to their card counterparts?
Of course, there are some units that differ quite a bit from their card version, either because of balance or because of how some card abilities would be wasted on the AI. Some examples include the Timeshifter Spirit which does not have his anti-magic field but can instead
 
While adding the Fire faction, we had the challenge of a faction that does not really have access to CC, resulting in a more glass cannon approach for the faction. Did you have a specific theme in mind for the Nature faction?
So I knew that the core of the nature faction would be healing and crowd control. But I also wanted to let the Root Network shine a bit. Then there were the more problematic things like Parasite Swarm, Mind Weaver and Mind Control, which we played around with for a while. However, it was simply not fun to play against enemies that took away too many of your units, even though it made for some hilarious scenarios, in which first timers got half of their army stolen, the other half eliminated and then after regaining control, also losing the other half.
 
So a focus on mindcontrol did not work out, were you able to find alternatives?
I think the mix of paralyze and root the faction now has, while also using the root network to some extent, will provide a unique experience.
 
What about buildings, can you tell us something about those?
Nature buildings were in a weird spot, some were completely overpowered against some frequent player strategies like early Strangleholds, while others were quite underwhelming like the Primal Defender. Because AI units only root while in combat, they are unable to provide support, and buildings that depend on the root network may fluctuate greatly in difficulty based on the amount of support a camp can generate. In the end, buildings are one thing that I did not want the focus to be on, so they are maybe even a little boring compared to the units.
 
What would you say is unique about facing the Nature faction, compared to the other factions?
Nature introduces a completly new mechanic which amps up their late game and can thus break the mold of later camps feeling all the same.
 
You mentioned our brave map testers, can you tell us something about balancing?
I think we almost exclusively had to nerf units after their initial inception, which were mostly just a carbon copy of the player card with their abilities set to automatically be used. Which really goes to show how strong crowd control and healing in a faction can be, even if they have only slightly above average damage. As mentioned before, we had to nerf quite a bit before we could actually win a match on difficulty 9 with quite experienced players and exclusive S-tier decks. Through playing a lot we found the parts that were annoying or outright destroying the flow, which we then tried to smooth out.
 
How difficult do you think rPvE is compared to the other factions?
I was aiming for this faction to be around the difficulty level of Twilight due to the depths of the mechanics that Nature uses. You will have to focus targets or their healing will overwhelm you while you are paralyzed, but there is room for outplaying that.
 
What was the thing you enjoyed most about designing the faction?
Designing the boss units was very enjoyable, as it had been the case for Fire. I also had a lot of fun just looking at camps and watching their mechanics interact with each other.
 
What was the biggest challenge while developing the faction?
A big challenge was to make units distinct, by which I mean to give each unit traits by which each player could gauge their threat level to their deck and playstyle. In the beginning, almost all units were tanky and had a lot of damage or had damage and some form of crowd control. We had to shift stats to make damage dealers less tanky, make crowd control units deal less damage and tanks have shorter range on their crowd control abilities.
 
Fire rPvE introduced some fun and fan favourite bosses. Will we see new boss units for Nature as well?
Yes, absolutely! The nature faction will ship with a set of nine new boss units. I really like how the low tier boss units based on the Burrower which is spitting acid all over the place and the Timeshifter Spirit which summons hordes of poisoned creepers turned out. But there are of course some threatening late game bosses.
 
Will we see rPvE Frost or Shadow next?
After working on rPvE for quite some time now, I really want to shift focus to campaign maps for a while, as that is also a huge part of the game that I and many others enjoy.
 
Is there anything else you'd like to share with our players?
Thank you for being so loyal to such an old game. I hope you enjoy this new faction once it is released and see you in the forge.
 


A big thanks to Hodron and our map testers for pouring so much love and time into the development of this new rPvE faction. We hope you look forward to facing them! 
 
• Easter Event Recap
We are glad to share our Easter Event was a huge success, with nearly 700 of you unlocking the new special Easter banner. Although the banner is no longer obtainable, you can still find the map in the Community Map section by searching for "The Easter Tree" if you wish to play it.
We hope you enjoyed all the effort that was put into the special map. While we always try to carefully balance our time investment into special events like this. We would love to hear some feedback. Would you like to see more events like the Easter and Halloween ones, where we modify a familiar map to suit the holiday theme?
We noticed that not many of you participated in the speedrun competition for the map, and we would like to know why. Your feedback is very valuable to us, so please leave us a message below.
 
• Event: Through Ice and Flames
While you are waiting for our new patch, be sure to check out the community event Through Ice and Flames. This event takes place on two great community maps, created by @Damo and @Hrdina_Imperia. Check out the trailer below, and go here for more information.
The event lasts till the 14th of May, though the maps will still be playable after. 

In between our monthly Community Updates, we host various events and tournaments, so be sure to keep a close eye on the in-game event tab and the forum calendar to stay informed and not miss out on any exciting events!

• Host your own tournament / event
Want to host a tournament or event yourself? Please reach out to our Event Organizers, @Metagross31, @Minashigo Hiko, or @nukie! We can help you out with various topics and are glad to discuss potential ideas. We can also sponsor the prize pool for your event. If you have a cool idea for a PvE event, or want to host a PvP tournament, please don't hesitate to reach out to us, we will gladly assist you.
 
• Team Changes
Katchau has recently departed from the team. We greatly appreciate his contributions, especially his development of the search card in market feature. We wish him all the best in his future endeavors.

That being said, we are happy to announce three new community members formally joined our team last month!
We have a new developer in Piskr, who will start out with a focus on Client Development. He is currently working on improving the player right click menu, including a way to improve importing decks. 

Known in the community for his streams and beautiful artwork, Ultralord has joined the team as our first Video Editor.
Another well known community member with terrible luck in opening promo's from boosters, Volin, has joined the team to help us out with coordinating Map Testing. 
Volin and Ultralord also worked together to give us the Lost Souls overview video from last month.

Welcome everyone, and we are looking forward to your contributions! 
 
• Contribute
Interested in joining the team yourself? Skylords Reborn is a community-driven project fuelled by the passion and dedication of over 30 volunteers. We are always on the lookout for like-minded individuals. If you have a passion for gaming, programming, design, or marketing, we invite you to take a look at our open positions!
 

 
• In Conclusion
That's all for this Community Update! We appreciate you taking the time to read through it.
As is tradition, we're including a scratch code as a small token of our appreciation for your support.
The code will reward you with a General booster: 19TH-MAYN-EXTP-ATCH
The code is valid until June 1st, when we will bring you another Community Update. 
We're always looking for ways to improve and value your feedback. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, please don't hesitate to share them with us. We'll be back next month with more updates on our ongoing projects and upcoming features. You can also sign-up to our e-mail newsletter here. 

Archive
• Skylords Reborn Documents (Deep Dives, Behind the Scenes, PvP Guide)  
• Overview Community Updates
• Community Update April 2023

We tried something new this month with the interview, let me know if you like to see more of this in the future! 

I do not think there is many people that would dislike that, but I also think there is no technical possibility to do that, and that it could make the game unplayable (performance wise) 😞

Hi!

Based on the attached draft, I think it would be an improvement to see the possible target count next to the mouse pointer

You still keeping this alive, crazy