Alliance War Season 50 - Changelog + Persistent Placement Defense Changes

MCOC Team

Foreword

Welcome back to another season of Alliance War! It’s no secret, we’ve had a few tumultuous seasons; we are confident the new season of Alliance War is going to be a nice breath of fresh air! We’re looking forward to new challenges, and new reduction of pain points revolving around the Persistent Placement System. These improvements have been in the works for a while, and now that we’ve ironed out some kinks, we are excited to get them into your hands!

Timeline

Wednesday, May 29th

• Pre-Season 50 kicks off
  

Wednesday, June 12th

• Season 50 kicks off.
  

Changes to Persistent Placement Defense

We are excited to announce an update to our Persistent Placement Defense feature! After identifying some of the pain points with its initial release, we have implemented the following changes for the upcoming build.
(Note: Summoners must Enable the new system, this will not be enabled by default. Until then, your settings will be set to Manual placement)

Inside the Next War Screen…

• Added the ability to DISABLE the Persistent Placement Defense. 
• Added in Placement Options
  • Manual Placement allows Summoners to place their Defense individually per map (what Summoners are currently experiencing)
  • Automatic Placement will templatize their placement. 
  • For example, if a Summoner places on Challenger, each Defender Placement will be the same if they are to shift down to either Hard Map, or go up to Expert. If a Summoner goes down to Normal, or Easy Maps, the Defenders will be placed according to the node number.
• Added in the ability to “Auto-Clear Defenders” from the map after every Matchmaker Event.
  • This will empower Alliances who want to drop in and drop out of Alliance War. 

Inside the Battlegroup Screen…

• Officers now have the option to CLEAR ALL of the Defenders from the map.
  • This allows for the Battlegroup to be emptied in one fell swoop and will require a new placement of defenders. This must be done before the Matchmaker Cycle kicks off. 
• Officers have the option to REMOVE a Summoner’s placement from Alliance War Defense.
  • To do this, Officers must select the Profile Picture of the Summoners they wish to remove and select CLEAR DEFENSE. This will allow the Defending Alliance to replace the defense before the next match begins.

Diversity Scoring Update

After updating the Defender Diversity Score we are happy with the behavior changes we’ve seen. Therefore, we are planning on making this a permanent change to Alliance War. That means that for every unique Defender that you have in your Alliance War map, your Alliance will gain 270 Points. This is the equivalent of 3 Attack Bonuses. Learn the map, upgrade potent Defenders, and pair them with unique nodes to challenge your Opponent’s roster diversity!

Loyalty for Attacker Kills

Each Defender that an Attacker defeats now yields them additional Loyalty, which can be modified based on how many Battlegroups your Alliance runs in War.
We had this update a few seasons ago, but because of the way that we calculated Loyalty on the server, it meant that people earned far more Loyalty than originally anticipated. We have since fixed this issue and are excited to bring it into Season 50 to let players who take on more fights in Alliance War to be rewarded for their hard work.

Increase in Bans

We are increasing bans for Alliances playing on Elite Maps from 3 to 5! This is being done to give Defending Alliances more control over how the map is to be approached. Smart bans will challenge the opposing Alliance to think outside of the box and dig into their toolbox to help them defeat Defenders on the map!

Black and White Lists will remain Unchanged.

Defense Tactic Tuning

Our newest tactic takes loose inspiration from Dodge with an update using what we've learned from recent tactics. We'd like to introduce you to the new tactics that will be live for the next two seasons: House of Mirrors, and Clarity!

Defense: House of Mirrors
House of Mirrors - 1:

• If the Defender has the #houseofmirrors tag, every 20 seconds they switch between a 5% chance to either Auto-Block or Evade incoming Light and Medium Attacks. These Auto-Blocks have a 10% chance to count as a Well-Time Block, and these Evades have a 10% chance to Evade incoming Heavy Attacks. When this mode switches, or when the Defender Auto-Blocks or Evades for any reason, they gain a 5% Critical Resistance Passive for 10 seconds. Max stacks: 7. For each of these Passives, the chance for this node's Auto-Block or Evade to trigger against Light and Medium Attacks increases by +5% flat. This node cannot be affected by Ability Accuracy.
  

House of Mirrors - 2:

• If the Defender has the #houseofmirrors tag, every 16 seconds they switch between a 10% chance to either Auto-Block or Evade incoming Light and Medium Attacks. These Auto-Blocks have a 10% chance to count as a Well-Time Block, and these Evades have a 10% chance to Evade incoming Heavy Attacks.When this mode switches, or when the Defender Auto-Blocks or Evades for any reason, they gain a 10% Critical Resistance Passive for 10 seconds. Max stacks: 7. For each of these Passives, the chance for this node's Auto-Block or Evade to trigger against Light and Medium Attacks increases by +8% flat. This node cannot be affected by Ability Accuracy.
  

House of Mirrors - 3:

• If the Defender has the #houseofmirrors tag, every 12 seconds they switch between a 15% chance to either Auto-Block or Evade incoming Light and Medium Attacks. These Auto-Blocks have a 10% chance to count as a Well-Time Block, and these Evades have a 10% chance to Evade incoming Heavy Attacks.When this mode switches, or when the Defender Auto-Blocks or Evades for any reason, they gain a 15% Critical Resistance Passive for 10 seconds. Max stacks: 7. For each of these Passives, the chance for this node's Auto-Block or Evade to trigger against Light and Medium Attacks increases by +10% flat. This node cannot be affected by Ability Accuracy.
  

Attack: Clarity

• If the Attacker has the #clarity tag, each hit in the Combo Meter and each Buff gained (other than from the Dexterity Mastery) grants a Clarity Charge. Reaching 10 Clarity Charges consumes them to grant a Clarity Passive for 10 seconds. Max stacks: 5.Each Clarity Passive reduces the Opponent's Critical Resistance by 30%, and prevents the activation of Auto-Block and Evade. These Clarity Passives are paused during the Defender's Special Attacks, and are not affected by Ability Accuracy.
  

‘House of Mirrors’ Champion List
Coming Soon, Immortal Hulk, Spiderman (Classic), Invisible Woman, Mister Fantastic, Red Guardian, Spiderham, Quicksilver, Spot, Scorpion, Mister Negative, Jessica Jones, MODOK, Cassie Lang, Spider Punk, Miles Morales, The Overseer, Wolverine, Arcade, Ironman (Infinity War), Mysterio, Shocker, Shuri, Spiderman (Stark Enhanced), Ultron Prime, Green Goblin, Guardian, Guillotine 2099, Darkhawk, Sam Wilson (Captain America), Peni Parker, Hulkbuster, Future Antman, Prowler, Deathless Vision, Infamous Ironman, Omega Sentinel

‘Clarity’ Champion List
Coming Soon, Daredevil (Hell’s Kitchen), Squirrel Girl, Black Cat, Killmonger, Attuma, Moon Dragon, Bullseye, Valkyrie, Crossbones, Black Widow (Deadly Origin), Thor Ragnarok, Hit Monkey, Chee’ilth, Moleman, Aegon, Silver Sable, Falcon, Blade, Deadpool, Venom, Odin, Captain Marvel (Movie), Maestro, Gladiator, Gorr, Adam Warlock, Cosmic Ghost Rider, Vox, Medusa, Deathless King Groot, Nova, Angela, Silver Surfer, Knull, Hyperion, Coming Soon, Superior Iron Man, Terrax

Bans

Elite

Blacklist - Domino, Sunspot
Whitelist - Bishop, Kushala

Expert

Blacklist - Kushala, Domino
Whitelist - Bishop, Iceman

Challenger

Blacklist - Kushala
Whitelist - Iceman