Lose Yourself to the Abyss!

Summoner!

Since The Contest began, an extreme danger has lurked around every corner, ready to prey on those seeking a true challenge…

First, The Realm of Legends was created by the Collector, with the intention that no Summoner would pass through it. The days grew into months before the first Legend of The Contest was able to claim victory over the Realm. Now, this relic of the early days of The Contest plays its role as a test of strength against the one-armed Assassin.

Then, seeking to trivialize his brother’s accomplishment, The Grandmaster created the Labyrinth of Legends to test the skill of the Summoners of The Battlerealm. His determination to break the Summoner’s spirit was met by our Summoners determination to best the Grandmaster’s game.

Now, a dark presence, formerly unknown to all, has opened up their corner of the Battlerealm. Dare to delve into this pocket of despair and dread, where hope goes to die.

Welcome to The Abyss of Legends!

The Abyss of Legends is the hardest content ever seen in The Contest.

This is the new Everest of content in the game. With each addition such as Realm, Labyrinth, and now the Abyss, the intention is to create content that Summoners will grow into in the coming months and years, and not content that can be fully explored in an afternoon.

When Realm of Legends was introduced, it was several months before all of the secrets and tools were uncovered to beat it. This is our goal for The Abyss.

Doesn’t sound so bad? I like your optimism. Shame it won’t do any good here.

Firstly, to enter the Abyss, you must have earned the Cavalier designation. If you have not yet been able to complete Act 6, Chapter 1, The Abyss is being locked away for your own safety.

Like the Labyrinth, The Abyss has an extensive, twisting map, with multiple paths and a locked camera, preventing you from scouting ahead. Unlike Labyrinth’s 2 Global Buffs, Abyss has 7.

Bear in mind, Summoner, the “Mark of the Labyrinth” buff contained multiple smaller effects encapsulated in one single buff. The Abyss breaks all of these effects into different buffs to allow the space to better describe them.

Additionally, many of your encounters will introduce new abilities to Champions that you are not familiar with. Be sure to read up on these every time you come across an encounter.
Rewards

Besides the standard Completion and Mastery rewards, the Abyss has 5 Abyssal Chests scattered throughout. Once claimed the chest will not respawn. Though these are rare, each one contains great treasures.

Legends of the Abyss

The first 20 to 100% explore the Abyss will receive a duped 6* Thanos (2x 6-Star Thanos).
The first 300 to 100% explore the Abyss will earn a Legends title.
The first 300 to 100% explore the Abyss will also receive a 5* Kang & a 6-Star Awakening Gem Crystal.
The first 300 will also get Legends points, as detailed in the Legends Leaderboard section below.

Yes, you read that correctly - first to Explore. Unlike our event quest Legends Runs, where the best times in a given window receive Legends titles and rewards, Abyss Legends are first-come, first-served.

We will be periodically (after the first few weeks, about once a month) checking to see who completed Abyss, review their play, and award Legends.

Abyss of Legends - Legends Points
#1 -300 Points
Top 20 - 250 Points
Top 100 - 100 Points
Top 200 - 75 Points
Top 300 - 50 Points

Our Vow

Let it be known, Summoner, that using any nefarious exploits, cheats, or other manners of manipulation will not be tolerated in The Abyss, and will be dealt with swiftly.

All those that make their way through the Abyss will be reviewed to ensure their legitimacy before any Legends prizes are awarded.

The Abyss does not deal in second chances, and will banish forever those who would attempt to break its rules.
The wait is almost over…
The long awaited, and fabled follow up, to the Labyrinth of Legends will be here on January 22nd at 10AM PST.

Heed these words, Summoner! The Abyss is not a challenge to be trifled with. We do not expect anyone to conquer the challenge any time soon. You will fail multiple times, but you can use those first attempts to acquaint yourself with the challenge ahead before you commit to taking on the darkness of The Abyss of Legends!

Comments

abhi7215

7 t2a for completion but only 4 for exporation?

LeNoirFaineant

I don't have an issue with the idea that most current Cavalier players won't be able to complete this for a long time. It would be pointless to put out something like this that most of us could get through right away without spending. It's fine if it seems impossible at first. I can live with the locked camera. What I keep coming back to, though, is that these rewards will not be that useful by the time we have the ranked 6*s to do it reasonably.

Lvernon15

All I wanna know is, based on early predictions for now.

Does Ægon seem like the best champion for the Abyss?
Quake seems like the only champ capeable of a solo, but it’d be near impossible, stealth spidey and crazy intercepts could as well, the best general options are appearing to be ghost with minimal hits aegon with the furies from getting hit and potentially a few others who hit hard in low hits
Interesting. Kinda made my G2099 useless because you can't ramp her. So, 240 hits with a 5/65 right? So, if I die 4 times with Ægon, I still carry over the combo and get 999 hits. Correct e if I'm wrong. I use a translator.

It will take more than 4 with aegon, he can only carry over 180 hits per fight, so it will be in the middle of fight 6 he hits 999, guilly will be practically useless

Lvernon15

All I wanna know is, based on early predictions for now.

Does Ægon seem like the best champion for the Abyss?
Quake seems like the only champ capeable of a solo, but it’d be near impossible, stealth spidey and crazy intercepts could as well, the best general options are appearing to be ghost with minimal hits aegon with the furies from getting hit and potentially a few others who hit hard in low hits
Interesting. Kinda made my G2099 useless because you can't ramp her. So, 240 hits with a 5/65 right? So, if I die 4 times with Ægon, I still carry over the combo and get 999 hits. Correct e if I'm wrong. I use a translator.

It will take more than 4 with aegon, he can only carry over 180 hits per fight, so it will be in the middle of fight 6 he hits 999, guilly will be practically useless

I expected nothing less ... when LOL was released I didn’t even touch for a long time ... that’s how this is gonna go

Only thing is that they want to annoy their players with camera lock because that is all that it achieves
The goal is never to Annoy our players. This is an ongoing theme, and whether somebody likes it or not, it adds to the atmosphere of the Labyrinth and Abyss. It's a Maze, and it's supposed to be hard to find your way around.

The issue is it doesn’t, it just makes you search for community maps

Sieger7999

All I wanna know is, based on early predictions for now.

Does Ægon seem like the best champion for the Abyss?
Quake seems like the only champ capeable of a solo, but it’d be near impossible, stealth spidey and crazy intercepts could as well, the best general options are appearing to be ghost with minimal hits aegon with the furies from getting hit and potentially a few others who hit hard in low hits
Interesting. Kinda made my G2099 useless because you can't ramp her. So, 240 hits with a 5/65 right? So, if I die 4 times with Ægon, I still carry over the combo and get 999 hits. Correct e if I'm wrong. I use a translator.
It will take more than 4 with aegon, he can only carry over 180 hits per fight, so it will be in the middle of fight 6 he hits 999, guilly will be practically useless

Yeah the only hope is they release a synergy champ for her to get around it

Run477

What's the stance on Abyss of Legends and mercs?

Are hundreds of legit grinders going to lose out on Legends rewards to the same Mercs that run half the endgame Whale accounts or are Kabam actually going to put their foot down on this one?

Cheers
As you know, we can't discuss what actions we take, or how we find players that are using nefarious means to beat content, but we're always working to improve them.

The short answer is that we're aware that some might try and use Mercs, and we will not hestitate to Ban those players permanently.

If this were true, 80% of the accounts that got act 6 legend run rewards would be banned.

Branu0727

All I wanna know is, based on early predictions for now.

Does Ægon seem like the best champion for the Abyss?

She hulk and domino by a longshot. Domino has fewest hits for good damage and she hulk can mayyyybe weave in heavies after the sp for the slow

VanillaCoke

Hullo, question, are all 7 “brands of the abyss” present on each path of this quest?

So essentially, 85,000 damage cap throughout the abyss?

Also - please don’t “lock the map.”
This is genuinely the worst possible feature that has ever been present in this game.
Sorry for the slow response, I had to track down the Answer. Yes, All 7 Brands of the Abyss will be on every fight.
Thank you for the response @Kabam Miike

I'm sorry to see everybody attacking you as if you designed this quest.
I feel like sometimes people forget that Miike is a PR employee for Kabam, and doesn't make the decisions in regards to whether the map is locked, combo/damage cap, etc.

"Don't shoot the messenger" folks. There's a way to relay dissatisfaction without being rude.

That being said, I do really hope you relay to the designers how LITERALLY every single player in the entire community finds the locked map & "combo cap" to be nothing but an obvious cash grab.

My suggestions -

1) Don't lock the map. Seriously, I can't stress enough how unproductive this is. All this does is force people (yes, force) to use third party sites with maps of the content. Instead of "locking" the map, make all of the fights hidden - just like they are in Labyrinth. This way, players can see where they are going without having to use a map. This, of course, isn't as nice as just having an open quest with nodes available, but if they want to keep this quest a mystery, at least there's some sort of consolation to allow players to see where they are going.

2) Please - PLEASE - come up with a way to "pause" the fall of the Skirmish/Warfare charges. For example, "The drop of charges is paused for 8 seconds each time the defender is knocked down," or something of the like.
This will not only reward skill, but also make the fights POSSIBLE to be done with current (advanced) rosters.
The damage cap also makes me a little sad. But it's something that we can live with - I just was looking forward to finally opening up Proxima to her full potential.

I personally have 17 Rank 5 champions, and 1 Rank 2 - Masters AW/Map 7x5 AQ - and with the way this content seems to be developed, I don't see it possible to even think about initial completion without "spending." I feel like this shouldn't be this way.

I appreciate your time, and would love it if this was relayed to the team.

P.S. please buff daredevil.

I hope you do realize the messenger’s message = the developer’s message. You’re acting as if Miike has an opinion of his own about this content that he can freely share (which he doesn’t). He gets his paycheck from those above him and those above him tells him what to write on the forums and he does just that EVEN IF he doesn’t agree with it. It’s as simple as that. It’s easy for the developers to let somebody deal with the heat than doing it themselves.

RoninMan

I don't understand how any of these fights could be completed in one go. Unless the plan is to force using multiple revives on every single fight regardless of how well you play.

You do understand though. That’s always been the goal.

becauseicant

I agree with DNA and others that locking the camera to create a "maze atmosphere" is not worth the annoyance and headache it will cause for everyone who attempts the Abyss. Yes, it means the community will have to work together to create the map and paths but after that all it does it force players to track their path progress outside the game which removes the mystery of the maze anyways. This content is so insanely difficult that any player doing a serious attempt will have their entire path and every opponent mapped out before starting because doing otherwise would lead to instant failure.

Either remove the camera lock after the Legends are awarded since it will have served its purpose, or perhaps remove the camera lock after a player completes their first path so that they can experience the "maze" atmosphere but can then track their progress in the game itself afterwards.

(Side Note: 1% evade? so unnecessary. Only exists to kill players after an unlucky special attack whiffs. Get rid of it)

Ollyoxenfree

How does Brand of the Abyss V function with challenge rating? I vaguely remember challenge rating but might need a better explanation on how that node will work.

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Sieger7999

Will that chance to evade be the same broken logic used in LOL where champs that have abilities to stop being evaded are still evadable?

DNA3000

How does Brand of the Abyss V function with challenge rating? I vaguely remember challenge rating but might need a better explanation on how that node will work.

Your champion's challenge rating is based on their star tier and rank. From the combat mechanics FAQ:

CR -> star & rank
10 -> 1* r1
20 -> 1* r2 / 2* r1
30 -> 2* r2
40 -> 2* r3 / 3* r1
50 -> 3* r2
60 -> 3* r3 / 4* r1
70 -> 3* r4 / 4* r2
80 -> 4* r3 / 5* r1
90 -> 4* r4 / 5* r2
100 -> 4* r5 / 5* r3
110 -> 5* r4 / 6* r1
120 -> 5* r5 / 6* r2

R3 is CR 130. CR is used in the diminishing returns formula that applies to flat stats, and nowhere else until now.

Based on the node description when the fight starts the defender will get a bunch of stacks of Skirmish charges equal to the challenge rating of the champion you're using to attack. Each time you hit the defender, hit into the block of the defender, or the defender hits you back they will lose one charge. When all the charges are gone they will gain those benefits in Brand 5. Also, they will immediately gain the same number of Warfare charges and those will work like Skirmish charges until they run out, whereupon the defender will gain the Brand 6 benefits.

Duke_Silver

While I am very excited to see this, I have to say that I’m extremely disappointed with the decision to add a damage cap to the content. If these are the highest health pools we’ve ever seen, their size alone should be challenge enough, a damage cap ruins the aspect of threat.

Duke_Silver

So basically you can only get in 200 hits at a time thanks to brands V and VI cuz after they go permanently unstoppable AND unblockable the fight is over

I have a feeling She Hulk might be an option to reach long matches.

DNA3000

I agree with DNA and others that locking the camera to create a "maze atmosphere" is not worth the annoyance and headache it will cause for everyone who attempts the Abyss. Yes, it means the community will have to work together to create the map and paths but after that all it does it force players to track their path progress outside the game which removes the mystery of the maze anyways.

That's another good point about camera lock that I know to be already true in other parts of the game: it forces players to keep track of progress outside of the game. Not only does it make it impossible to scout ahead, but does Kabam actually think players are going to run Abyss over and over again repeatedly all at once? But just like with LoL and Act 5, if you do a run, and then take a break and do another run much later, which seems like how most players will do it if they do it at all, how are you going to remember which paths and nodes you've done? Are we all supposed to keep a journal for the Abyss like we're playing Ultima IV?

The single most frustrating thing about camera lock in Act 5 is that it was a pain in the neck to not just do everything at once, in a specific systematic way, so as to not accidentally repeat a path. And Act 5 at least has portal identifiers. I'm assuming the Abyss like LoL before it won't. So you're literally going to have to make notes about your exact progress so you don't do something stupid months or maybe even years later.

I've played RPGs and MMORPGs for decades and yet there was no part of camera lock that I found even a tiny bit entertaining or interesting. It felt to me like I was playing Missile Command but the track ball wouldn't roll in one direction. Broken, not challenging.

I've been inside real mazes. You know what you can do in a real maze you can't do in MCOC? If you discover you're going down the wrong path you can just back up and go a different way. You don't have to completely start over from the beginning. The mystery of a maze is generally only interesting if you can explore that mystery with freedom of movement. The Abyss isn't a maze if it locks camera but doesn't give people freedom of movement. It is actually one of the Saw movies.

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DNA3000

While I am very excited to see this, I have to say that I’m extremely disappointed with the decision to add a damage cap to the content. If these are the highest health pools we’ve ever seen, their size alone should be challenge enough, a damage cap ruins the aspect of threat.

I'm not sure how important the damage cap is in the grand scheme of things. The Skirmish and Warfare brands seem to be functioning a bit like enrage timers that kick in at about 120 and 240 hits (depending on your CR). If you can hit the 85k damage cap consistently you can deal about ten million points of damage in 120 hits and twenty million in 240 hits. The cap seems less about slowing the players down and more emphasizing consistent damage over short burst damage.

Duke_Silver

I have to say, I do respect the integrity of the challenge. Even though there are aspects that disappoint me, it looks really hard. Kabam’s general idea for this content is perfect. A lot of players now think that once content is released they can do initial and 100% in a matter of days. This is evident with Act 6. Abyss is here to tackle that disillusion, and I support it. Yes, it’s hard. Yes, you will have to rank up champions much higher. And no, most of you (us) will not complete this content anytime soon. A true new Everest if what I am reading plays out well.

Neonoctis

I couldn't agree more with the implementation of a damage cap against opponents with much larger health pools than we have seen already seems like a counter productive addition the content. Like why give us these champs who can do seriously massive damage (Proxima/Corvus/Ghost/Guilly2099) if you don't put in a form on content where unleashing their maximum potential is possible.? The fun part of this new content and a 3-5 million health pool per fight would be that my proxima midnight if ramped up correctly could do 400k per sp2 or more. to combat the massive healthpools.

ECOMA

Locked maps just slows effort really I wont even look at it till I have a map same as I did for lol and 5.4

DNA3000

So basically you can only get in 200 hits at a time thanks to brands V and VI cuz after they go permanently unstoppable AND unblockable the fight is over
I have a feeling She Hulk might be an option to reach long matches.
She’ll die at 240 hits as well

Until I see the map, or rather someone else's map, I can't be sure that every fight has to end at 240. It might be possible to temporarily stun lock a target or other strategies that are unlikely to be permanently chainable but might extend the fight beyond the Warfare brand's limit. Unlike LoL, I don't see a Limber node in the list of Brands for the Abyss.

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Duke_Silver

While I am very excited to see this, I have to say that I’m extremely disappointed with the decision to add a damage cap to the content. If these are the highest health pools we’ve ever seen, their size alone should be challenge enough, a damage cap ruins the aspect of threat.
I'm not sure how important the damage cap is in the grand scheme of things. The Skirmish and Warfare brands seem to be functioning a bit like enrage timers that kick in at about 120 and 240 hits (depending on your CR). If you can hit the 85k damage cap consistently you can deal about ten million points of damage in 120 hits and twenty million in 240 hits. The cap seems less about slowing the players down and more emphasizing consistent damage over short burst damage.

This is the best reasoning I have seen as to why a damage cap is alright. It does open some doors for different strategies. I think I would still prefer the lack of a cap though. I suppose however, that I’m one of the people who really wanted another thing out of the abyss: an opportunity to see champion’s full damage potential.

Psy26

I wonder if the unstoppable and unblockable when warfare charges deplete are passive effects or active buffs. If they are buffs some champions could get rid of the unstoppable and you'd only have to deal with unblockable, but if they are passive could she hulk get rid of them despite increased AA and play perfectly?

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DNA3000

I wonder if the unstoppable and unblockable when warfare charges deplete are passive effects or active buffs. If they are buffs some champions could get rid of the unstoppable and you'd only have to deal with unblockable, but if they are passive could she hulk get rid of them despite increased AA and play perfectly?

My suspicion, and this is only a guess, is that both effects will be node effects that are not buffs or passives, and thus impossible for the player to remove or prevent with any normal champion ability. If they were effects with ability accuracy that would be too easy to prevent and if they were buffs it would be too easy to stagger or nullify them.

Codenamejimmy

“Besides the standard Completion and Mastery rewards, the Abyss has 5 Abyssal Chests scattered throughout. Once claimed the chest will not respawn. Though these are rare, each one contains great treasures. “

Will each chest contain a random one of these rewards or all in one chest.

Also re: class advantage penalty. Will this apply only to natural class advantage or will be active if there are any with the universal class?

Psy26

I wonder if the unstoppable and unblockable when warfare charges deplete are passive effects or active buffs. If they are buffs some champions could get rid of the unstoppable and you'd only have to deal with unblockable, but if they are passive could she hulk get rid of them despite increased AA and play perfectly?
My suspicion, and this is only a guess, is that both effects will be node effects that are not buffs or passives, and thus impossible for the player to remove or prevent with any normal champion ability. If they were effects with ability accuracy that would be too easy to prevent and if they were buffs it would be too easy to stagger or nullify them.

Of course that is what will probably happen but who knows, few more days and we will see