Hey everyone, lemmingllama here. Last week we talked about the non-raiding changes coming in the 5.18.0 update. This week we’ll be discussing the large raiding overhauls. Let’s get into it! Also for players less focused on raiding, you can scroll to the bottom for some details on the new equipment sets being added!
Starting off, we are going to be reworking the effects of existing cards. These changes are to help improve the conditionality of various cards, and also lower the randomness associated with some cards. We’ll also be changing a few cards to help give them more defined identities.
Acid Drench will be changing to have a lower Affliction Chance and a higher Affliction Duration. This change should allow for more consistent damage dealing when playing with Acid Drench, while still maintaining its core design of targeting roughly three parts.
Crushing Instinct and Soul Fire will be changing to affect both the Head and Torso parts. Additionally, Crushing Instinct will give a Burst Chance bonus, and Soul Fire will give an Affliction Chance bonus. These supports were more niche cards before, and these changes should allow for them to be used in more scenarios.
Fragmentize will deal increased damage to Cursed Armor, helping players participating in tier 4 raids to clear curses.
Fusion Bomb will have a lower Affliction Duration and an increased Affliction Chance. This will decrease the amount of randomness with Fusion Bomb, and will still maintain the core design of targeting six or more parts.
Insanity Void and Victory March will now have a base All Raid Damage bonus, and then will also gain additional damage for each exposed body/skeleton part. Insanity Void will also have a maximum effect at six exposed body parts. Overall, this will increase the effectiveness of Insanity Void and Victory March with more strategies, allowing for more diverse attacks on the Titan Lords.
Purifying Blast will now have a consistent Bonus Damage Per Affliction multiplier for all levels. This will help normalize the power of Purifying Blast across all levels, rather than the card being less effective at lower levels and more effective at higher levels. One other change being made is that we’ll be adjusting the Affliction Chance of other cards to allow for multiple cards to be effectively paired with Purifying Blast. Rather than “only” being optimal with Acid Drench, there will now be other alternatives that can also be used to great effect.
Ravenous Swarm will have an increased Affliction Chance, allowing for an easier time spreading stacks of Ravenous Swarm to the titan. We are also changing the behavior of Ravenous Swarm so it will now be impossible to exceed the max stacks per part when spreading Ravenous Swarm stacks, which will change Ravenous Swarm’s behavior to work best with three or more parts. To help ensure that Ravenous Swarm can be used effectively on lower parts, we are also raising the Max Stacks to six.
Totem of Power will be changing to increase the number of fairies spawned and decrease the duration of the fairy totem. This will allow for more consistent damage when using Totem of Power, as you’ll have a more averaged number of totems active at a given time.
In addition to the individually reworked cards, we are also going to be making a large rebalance of cards. Overall, the changes being made will be to raise up the viability of cards that were less potent, and bringing in line the power of cards that were too effective. There are other changes detailed below coming to ensure that no players will lose damage as a result of these rebalances. In particular, burst cards will be seeing an increase in effectiveness essentially across the board, and most supports will also be seeing an increase in effectiveness. Certain key cards that were very high power such as Totem of Power, Insanity Void, and Victory March will be seeing some balance changes to bring them closer to other support options.
We will also be changing the power given by each level-up of cards. This should help normalize the level curve for cards a bit more, and ensure that all levels feel strong to achieve. We’ll also be adding some key card breakpoints at level 50 and 58 cards to give goals to aim for.
We are going to be adding a new feature that rewards Player Raid XP whenever you level up a card. The higher level your card is, the more Raid XP you’ll earn by leveling it up. This will mean that even if you don’t use a particular card normally in Clan Raids, it may still be efficient to level it up so you can increase your power with all your decks. All cards you already have leveled will reward you the bonus Raid XP with the update, so there’s no need to hold off upgrading cards! This change overall will help ensure that players can upgrade a range of cards, allowing for more diverse strategies and smoother progression through Solo Raid Worlds. Also, the damage gained through this bonus Raid XP will help ensure that players will be stronger than ever as players level cards through the 5.18 update.
We’ll also be changing the scaling for Player Raid Levels, with earlier levels becoming cheaper to complete, and later levels becoming a bit more expensive. The cost to reach Raid Level 500 will remain the same overall. We’ll be raising the maximum Player Raid Level to ensure that all players can benefit from these increases in Raid XP.
With all the new cards that players will be leveling to gain Raid XP, we are also going to be adding a new feature to help you level up your desired cards. Players will now be able to earn Wildcards, a new type of card fragments that can be used to level up any card. When you go to level up a card, you will use all card fragments for that card that you own, and then you can fill in the missing cards with Wildcards. Wildcards will thus be usable for any card.
Wildcards will be earned in a few main ways. One is through Solo Raids, where a good number of the cards earned via your Daily Farming Portal will be Wildcards. You will also be able to purchase Wildcards from the dust shop, where there will be a guaranteed slot with Wildcards every shop reset. Lastly, Wildcards will be offered in the Daily Deals of the bear shop, allowing you to spend your diamonds on raiding resources directly.
Now, we’re still not done with all the changes. We’ll be introducing two new raid cards with this update that fill niches not currently filled by other cards.
Ruinous Rain is a new tier 1 Affliction card with an exceptionally long Affliction Duration and 999 Max Stacks. You’ll be able to just keep on building up more and more stacks on a single part, until you reach devastating amounts of damage each second. This is the first affliction card we’ve introduced that can be truly a single target card, and the high duration will also allow for interesting synergies with cards like Whip of Lightning and Thriving Plague that require many parts to be afflicted.
In addition to the other mechanics of the card, Ruinous Rain will also deal increased damage to Cursed Armor, allowing Ruinous Rain to be an excellent method to focus down and destroy Burst Damage curses.
Our second new card is Skeletal Smash, a tier 2 Support card. Skeletal Smash will increase your damage dealt to Armored parts, and then will further increase your damage dealt to Armor if a Skeleton part is exposed. Unlike cards like Insanity Void or Victory March, Skeletal Smash will not scale based on the number of exposed parts. As long as one Skeleton is exposed, you will gain the additional damage boost. It may be a good idea to break a low HP part to help expose the skeleton, and then benefit from Skeletal Smash to help break the armor off higher HP parts.
Lastly, we’ll take a look at the new equipment sets being added in the 5.18.0 update.
The Drip Witch legendary equipment set will give a Mystic Boost bonus, increasing your Mage Hero Damage and the effects of your Aura equipment. Additionally, it will increase the amount of mana you receive from defeating a Manni Mana titan, multiplying how much you earn.
The Weekend Warrior event equipment set will increase your Critical Damage and help you welcome summer!
That’s all for this week’s DevUpdate. We are very excited to hear from you all about the changes being made. I’d like to stress this again, but players will not be losing damage overall as a result of the reworks and rebalances, and instead overall most players will be gaining damage with the rebalanced cards and Raid XP bonuses. Thank you in advance for all your wonderful feedback, and I hope to see you all back next week for more details on the coming changes.
Happy Tapping!
lemmingllama
