This is our biggest balance change patch to date, in response to player feedback and usage statistics.
Read on to find out what’s changing and why:
Vengeance Warriors
- Death explosion damage reduced to 300% of troop strength (previously 500%)
- Death explosion now does area of effect damage at 50% of troop strength (previously no AoE damage)
- 16% quantity reduction from assists
Many players felt (and we agreed) that Vengeance Warriors dealt too much direct damage to gods when used as a defensive assist option. These changes aim to make Vengeance Warriors shine against groups of units by adding splash damage, while reducing their effectiveness against gods and buildings.
Defensive Buildings
Players often find that their Attack Trophies are higher than their Defense Trophies, so we felt that some defensive buildings could use a little love to bring them up to par.
Hera Monument:
- Summons 4 Vengeance Warriors per spawn (previously 2)
Unlike the assist troops, Vengeance Warriors spawned from Hera’s monument felt a bit underwhelming, so you’ll now get twice as many! The death explosion changes from above also apply to monument VWs.
Hades Monument:
- Summons 16 Skeletons per shot (previously 10)
The Hades monument was commonly underleveled, so we’ve given it a buff to make it a more appealing choice. Read on for other changes to Hades buildings & powers.
Hades Temple:
- 25% buff to Reanimate Chance – eg. maxed temple now has 25% bonus (previously 20%)
This means more skellies for your defense!
Hades House:
- 33% buff to Reanimate Chance – eg. maxed house now has 40% bonus (previously 30%)
Even more skellies!
Hera House:
- 475% buff to Explosion Bonus damage – eg. maxed house now has 40% bonus (previously 7%)
- Bug fix for Level 1 houses that were weaker than intended (900% buff for Level 1 houses)
Hera houses have not yet found their place in players’ cities. We felt that the bonus needed to be much greater to make them worth considering over other houses.
Tip: Explosion damage is calculated on the base health of the adjacent building, so Hera Houses are ideal to place around high health structures like Temples and Monuments. If the houses remain standing when the building is destroyed, melee gods will take significant damage, and enemy troops in range will be flattened. This may also force your opponent to consider different power combinations, rather than charging straight in with Ares/Athena/Zeus.
Aphrodite House:
- 25% buff to Unit Bonus – eg. maxed house now has 25% bonus (previously 20%)
Another underused house, we wanted to make sure Aphrodite’s house could compete with other choices for Academies, Archeries, and Monuments that produce troops.
Tip: Improving your defensive troops’ health means Aphrodite will be able to charm less of them to the enemy’s side.
Cyclops Tower:
- Range increased to 700 (previously 660)
- Strength increased by 20% – eg. maxed strength is now 667 (previously 556)
The Cyclops Tower isn’t being used as much as other towers, so we’ve increased the range and strength to give an overall performance boost and better value for your stone.
Speaking of good value…
Gem to Stone Conversion:
- Gem to Stone conversion is now 33% better value!
Since Stone is easier to earn than Gold, we’ve reduced the cost of upgrading buildings with Gems to reflect this.
Hades’ Powers
Reanimate:
- 25% buff to strength – eg. maxed strength is now 66,000 (previously 52,500)
- Reanimate now kills enemy skeletons instead of turning them
We think part of the reason for the low usage rates of Hades’ buildings is because Hades himself provided too strong of a counter with the ability to turn the defender’s skeletons against them. We’ve addressed this by changing the way Reanimate works. The increased strength means that Hades can raise a larger army of his own (and turn more recently dead troops), but nearby skeletons from the enemy’s side will now be killed, rather than turned.
Rot:
- Buff to strength: ~23% increase at high levels, less at lower levels – eg. maxed strength is now 60,000 (previously 49,000)
Rot becomes less popular at higher levels, because it’s harder to compete with defensive healing and higher HP structures. We’ve increased Rot’s strength across the board, but particularly at higher levels where it saw the least use.
Bug Fixes
- Hera’s Wrath would sometimes leave buildings and troops with a sliver of health when it should have destroyed them
- Explosion Bonus from Hera’s Temple and Houses had an issue where there were unintentional “safe zones” on temple corners
- Assist units would not appear if the building was destroyed before they spawned
These have been fixed, along with a few other improvements under the hood. 🙂
We considered many ideas for this balance update, and some that didn’t make the list may still be on the cards in the future. We’ll be watching closely to see how these changes affect overall balance, and we’d love to hear your thoughts and suggestions once you’ve had a chance to see them in action!
We’re also hard at work on some major features that will be added over the next couple of updates!