congrats everyone (: AI was really easy this round, yeah

Season 2 of Snow Wars has begun! It will run through the end of the Festival, January 22nd at 11:59pm.

The following changes have been made:

New AI Tiers

There are now 6 Tiers of AI Difficulty. They are as follows:

Tier 1: AI Rating of 600. Beginner level of difficulty. Awards 1 Item each victory.
Tier 2: AI Rating of 1200. Easy level of difficulty. Awards 1-2 Items each victory.
Tier 3: AI Rating of 1800. Moderate level of difficulty. Awards 1-3 Items each victory.
Tier 4: AI Rating of 2400. Hard level of difficulty. Awards 2-3 Items each victory.
Tier 5: AI Rating of 3000. Very Hard level of difficulty. Awards 2-4 Items each victory.
Tier 6: AI Rating of 3000+. Impossible level of difficulty. Awards 4 Items each victory.

As you transition from one Tier to the next, you may face either Tiers of difficulty. For example, if your Player AI Rating is between 500 and 700, you can face either a Tier 1 or Tier 2 AI Opponent.


New Player Ranked System

There are now 6 Tiers of Ranks for Player vs Player. They are as follows:

Rank 1: Player Ranked Rating of 0-399. Awards 2 Items each victory.
Rank 2: Player Ranked Rating of 400-799. Awards 2-3 Items each victory.
Rank 3: Player Ranked Rating of 800-1199. Awards 2-4 Items each victory.
Rank 4: Player Ranked Rating of 1200-1599. Awards 3-5 Items each victory.
Rank 5: Player Ranked Rating of 1600-1999. Awards 4-6 Items each victory.
Rank 6: Player Ranked Rating of 2000+. Awards 6 Items each victory.

There is now also a slight bump for Rank 1 Players to help them earn rating faster to advance to Rank 2. This should help spread out the player base so that not everyone is clumped in on the same rating.


Game Play Changes

In addition to new AI Tiers and a new Ranking system, there have also been a few changes to game play:

-Snow Fort Health reduced from 48 to 30.
-Infantry Health increased from 12 to 18.
-Skipping your Turn now deals 1 Damage to any of your Units with a valid Move action.
-Cooldown Acceleration: If any player commands only 3 Units, all Unit cooldowns reduced by 1. If any player commands only 2 Units, all Unit cooldowns reduced by 2. If any player commands just 1 Unit, all Units have no cooldown.


Loot Changes

At this time, only minor changes have been made to the loot tables. I am tired and will mess with this more tomorrow. =P

But probably the biggest notable change is that Frost Tokens have been removed from "winners" loot tables.


Season 1 Leaderboard Prizes

The Leaderboard prizes for Season 1 winners will be announced sometime tomorrow. They will also most likely be the same prizes for the eventual Season 2 winners.

I think damage dealing is now kind of messed.
Damage:
Cavalry to artillery - 6 health bars
Infantry to cavalry - 4/5 health bars
Artillery to infantry - 2/3 health bars
And infantry to infantry - 1 health bar?
And arti have a huge cooldown. So basically now the only "counter" for infantry is a not-movable tower?

Also, if my opponent have only 1 unit, it was supposed to delete its cooldowns AND mine?

Omg thank you so much for the Cooldown changes and Loot changes xD

Link: https://www.sylestia.com/forums/?thread=42634&page=10#93 Author: Galaxis Time Posted: 1/15/2017 at 4:46 AM I think damage dealing is now kind of messed. Damage: Cavalry to artillery - 6 health bars Infantry to cavalry - 4/5 health bars Artillery to infantry - 2/3 health bars And infantry to infantry - 1 health bar? And arti have a huge cooldown. So basically now the only "counter" for infantry is a not-movable tower? Also, if my opponent have only 1 unit, it was supposed to delete its cooldowns AND mine?

For the Cooldowns, that's right.

I found it to be overpowered if it was just the player with the small army getting the advantage. You could just take a cannon and blast your way to victory while your opponent sat in Cooldowns. I felt it was much more fair and balanced if the acceleration applied to both players equally.

For the damage stuff, the best counter to Infantry are Cannons and Towers; correct. Infantry deal very little damage to all but Cavalry, so they still are quite a bit weaker in that regard.

Prior to the 6 Health buff, they were all but useless unless your opponent was stacking Cavalry and you happened to pick a few Infantry. I feel like they are more usable now with 18 Health, despite still dealing the least amount of Damage.

Ooh that's great Krin! Makes me want to do Snow Wars even more lol
Thank you so much for your hard work!!

Thanks for working so hard!

I really think the changes you made will revitalize the game in many ways that made it stale and forced a lot of draws, so really good job with the cooldown changes as well as the skip a turn changes, Krin! As for loot, do you think it would be possible to slightly buff frost essence chances from the rewards? Speaking from the loots that I received, out of the 2000 rank I climbed to in AI in season 1, I only received a single frost essence (being an Aurleon). Many others I spoke to also received extremely few frost essences as rewards. I understand if not, but still thought I would make the suggestion.

They should be more common once you climb the ranks of either game modes. Once you start earning multiple rewards per match, you're essentially increasing your odds by 100% per each additional reward.

Skipping your Turn now deals 1 Damage to any of your Units with a valid Move action.

I have one issue with this change. Currently, if the only move action you have is a tower (which can't move and still light up even when there are no enemies in range), it give you 1 damage. Since the towers can't move, I don't think this is fair.