Beastieball News

A new experimental balance patch is here! On PC ONLY, players on the experimental branch now have access to some new mechanics and parameter adjustments. We welcome your thoughts, your feedback, and your playtesting! I encourage dedicated coaches to join us in our Discord community to discuss these changes live with other players.

[h3]How to Access[/h3]
Right click Beastieball in your Steam library > Select "Properties" > Go to the "Betas" tab > Select "experimental" from the dropdown menu.

Your savedata is not be at risk when changing to different game branches. If your Beasties have plays on the default branch which they do not have access to in the experimental branch, they will be removed. Or, if you use new plays which are introduced on the experimental branch, they will be removed upon switching back to the default branch.

Plays which have been added or changed will be completely free to tutor to your Beasties at the Beastierball Academy on the temporary experimental build. Take this opportunity to try out new tools and let us know how they're feeling!


[p]This update introduces a lot of new features both visible and invisible. We've updated our underlying game engine and re-written a lot of individual effects and objects. We're still testing with all this to make sure it's stable before going into the next Milestone, but we'd appreciate your feedback on anything that stands out as a visual, technical or performance issue.[/p]

[p]On the bright side, you may notice the game's look has improved quite a lot with improved 3d rendering effects. We're excited to fix the remaining issues and talk more about all the changes in detail come next Milestone![/p]

This weekend we held a BIGMOON BASH where all Beasties were allowed!

This is the final Open Bash before our next milestone update which will be sure to shake up the meta with another round of balance patches. How do things stand after a couple months of players optimizing on the current patch?

[h2]👑 Top-Scoring Players[/h2]

1. Mabel (The Clashing Roses) | Bash Score: 3004
2. • Pummy (The Tiny Tacos) | Bash Score: 2920
   • Zonk (The Violet Enigmas) | Bash Score: 2920
3. N/A
4. Boris (The Rutile Lights) | Bash Score: 2912
5. • Bolimar (The Crimson Angels) | Bash Score: 2904
   • Satoros (The Diamond Ducks) | Bash Score: 2904
6. N/A
7. Darc Tech (The Arcane Robots) | Bash Score: 2844
8. UrBestie (The Ill-fated Princes) | Bash Score: 2804
9. Byrd (The Soggy Dreamers) | Bash Score: 2756
10. Dino (The 100 Demons) | Bash Score: 2740
11. 苍庁龙 (紫罗兰幽灵) | Bash Score: 2716
12. Akio (The Arcane Enigmas) | Bash Score: 2696
13. Juninho (The Valiant Storms) | Bash Score: 2692
14. • Phoenix (The Flaming Feathers) | Bash Score: 2684
    • AirMan121 (The Bugs) | Bash Score: 2684
15. N/A
16. Arc Tech (The Arcane Machines) | Bash Score: 2672
17. Pix (The Galaxy Drums) | Bash Score: 2660
18. WebBowser (The Questing Beasts) | Bash Score: 2584
19. Ket (The Lonesome Lovers) | Bash Score: 2572
20. Matt (The Gutter Ballers) | Bash Score: 2548
21. Sadie Bear (The Groovy Crabs) | Bash Score: 2528

The median Bash Score this time was 2010. We started sharing the score median by player request, although I do wonder how valuable it is as a measurement. For most every player, Bash Score starts around 2000, so the median is always around there. The variation of median score from Bash to Bash usually says more about who's playing - when many new players join, it's lower, and when the game hasn't been on sale for a bit and is consolidating to high-skill sickos, it usually goes higher. Regardless of the current state of the player base, though, your distance from 2000 is generally always a better measure of your distance from the "average" player rather than your distance from the median score of a given Bash.

...That aside, congratulations to the top-scoring coaches! I heard this time some of the top-scoring coaches tried to compete with 13 different teams using all 64 unique adult Beasties. Isn't that crazy?! Players are always congregating on our Discord to talk play strategy and help each other build better teams. If you want to jump into PvP or up your game it's a friendly place to visit!

[h2]📊 Beastie Usage Stats![/h2]
As has become tradition, we've collected a ton of data on Beastie usage during this event and we're happy to share that data with you for further investigation!
[h3]> Check out the STATS here![/h3]

[h2]Upcoming balance patch...[/h2]
Tomorrow, we'll update the experimental branch with a new balance patch featuring a lot of new changes informed by play stats and player feedback over the last couple months. The patch will be in testing for about 2 weeks, and then on March 19 it will join the main game branch as part of our next milestone update! For players passionate about competitive Beastieball, we hope to get your thoughts on those changes so we can make the best game possible!

Thank you!!!

Another BIGMOON BASH is beginning soon in Beastieball! During Bigmoon Bashes, coaches can challenge each other in open matchmaking for a limited time.

When: Friday, February 27, 2026 04:00 PST to Sunday, March 1, 2026 04:00 PST
Theme: NONE! All Beasties are allowed!

During the event you'll have a Bash Rank, which will improve based on your performance. After it's over, you'll receive in-game rewards based on your participation, such as Social Battery and Sports Points.

Players of all skill level are invited! All you need to do to participate is to play the game on that day and join the Bash on SportNet! SportNet is typically unlocked within the first 2 hours of your adventure, after beating your first Ranked boss. And if you aren't confident in your own Beastie team, you can use a randomly generated one instead - just go to Team Setup and set "Random Team" as your current team.

[h3]Official Game Rules:[/h3]
First to 2 Points wins
Standard time limit on move selection
No Undos allowed
No duplicate Beastie species allowed
Relationship Combos are disabled
All Beasties are set to Level 50

This weekend we held a BIGMOON BASH where all teams were randomly generated! Although the premise was a bit silly, there was some real skill to playing in it too. Rather than competing with teambuilding, it was a contest of your ability to think on your feet and assess a completely unpredictable matchup... and a fair share of luck too.

As a Bash player myself, I've always felt the top-level players get way too much time building and practising optimal teams for me to compete with. But in a random bash, with my superior game knowledge, I figured I would surely finally show all you nerds who the real boss was. Well, that did not come to pass... I was once again squarely destroyed.

So, let's take a look at some of the sweaty nerds who placed higher than me!

[h2]👑 Top-Scoring Players[/h2]

1. Zonk (The Violet Enigmas) | Bash Score: 2956
2. Beat (The Musical Punks) | Bash Score: 2924
3. Dino (The Chaos) | Bash Score: 2908
4. Stardust (The Starbound Dinosaurs) | Bash Score: 2872
5. GFZA (The Fun Pizzas) | Bash Score: 2816
6. Akio (The Arcane Enigmas) | Bash Score: 2784
7. Arc Tech (The Arcane Machines) | Bash Score: 2728
8. Choc (The Ultimate Dinosaurs) | Bash Score: 2724
9. SPeCtator (The Local Aliens) | Bash Score: 2676
10. • Pummy (The Tiny Tacos) | Bash Score: 2668
    • Score (The Jamming Ballers) | Bash Score: 2668
11. N/A
12. Juninho (The Valiant Storms) | Bash Score: 2628
13. • Naydra (The Starbound Spirits) | Bash Score: 2580
    • CryoPhoenix (The Goofy Birds) | Bash Score: 2580
14. N/A
15. • Mabel (The Clashing Roses) | Bash Score: 2572
    • Charge (The Crimson Kings) | Bash Score: 2572
16. N/A
17. Boolerex (The Speedy Racers) | Bash Score: 2560
18. Lymerin (The Eternal Wings) | Bash Score: 2524
19. AirMan121 (The Bugs) | Bash Score: 2520
20. Igor (The Rutile Artists) | Bash Score: 2476

The median Bash Score this time was 1938. Even with the teams being random, it's interesting to see that the average players scores and even many of the top-ranking individuals are quite familiar to anyone who's watched past bash results.

Of course, it's not completely familiar. Congratulations to the players who excelled in this chaotic format!

[h2]📊 Beastie Usage Stats![/h2]
...Well, this isn't as informative as usual, but for posterity I've collected stats on the top most-used Beasties. In this case, it's really just a reflection of what Beasties are more likely to appear on generated teams. But for folks who played in the Bash, it might be interesting to see which of the more and less common Beasties you wound up playing with.
[h3]> Check out the STATS here![/h3]

For Beasties who appear in the top, it mostly comes down to how diverse their kits are and how many different team compositions they can fit into. Many of the Beasties near the bottom here are ones who aren't available in team generation until you've discovered certain in-game secrets, so it makes sense that they appear less frequently than others. But others may be at the bottom because they lack kits that fit as well into our current generation model.

For just a bit of insight; we have 500+ unique predefined Beastie sets in the game, 8 for each "adult" Beastie. The team generator picks a basic playstyle for the team, and then fills it with some combination of these predefined sets, with effort made to create synergistic combinations. ("Synergistic combinations" includes a lot of hand-coded data; for example, if a Beastie is added to the team with a trait that triggers on tag in/out, then the generator will raise the likelihood of adding a partner with tagging plays such as Quick Tag or Flight). Teams like this are generated for in-game challenges like the Tower Tourney. But when we generate teams for players, we do exclude or reduce the chances of certain playstyles appearing, particularly more passive ones, since they can be fun to battle against in the hands of an AI opponent but not so fun to pilot yourself. This adjustment accounts for many of the non-secret Beasties with some passive sets that aren't given to players as often by the team generator.

For those curious, here are the individual sets who appeared most often:

1. Captain-Beetlback: Confident Pass, Smack, Overpower (2.76%)
   
2. Avenger-Heliath: Rally, Thriller, Heat Up (2.68%)
   
3. Annoying-Noizard: Mighty Yell, Cornershot, Drum (2.68%)
   
4. Captain-Bandicraft: Build, Mindfield, Refresh (2.64%)
   
5. Shanty-Tortanchor: Boom, Patience, Provoke (2.6%)
   

We definitely will be looking at lots of data from this Bash and look for ways we can improve the predesigned sets to produce even better random teams in the future!

[h2]For future Bashes...[/h2]
With such a different format this time, it's natural that some players liked it more and some less. But at least for me, this was the most fun I've ever had playing in a Bash. Overall I think this experiment was a huge success, and I would really like to feature it again in occasional future Bashes between more competitive open-ended ones and restricted theme ones.

But at least for next time, we'll return to a classic Open Bash! I'll see you on the court in 3 weeks!

Another BIGMOON BASH is beginning soon in Beastieball! During Bigmoon Bashes, coaches can challenge each other in open matchmaking for a limited time. During the event you'll have a Bash Rank, which will improve based on your performance. After it's over, you'll receive in-game rewards based on your participation, such as Social Battery and Sports Points.

During this Bash, all games will be played exclusively in Random Teams mode. That's right... your team will be randomly generated every match! We've been iterating on the game's team generation across several past updates and it is good at creating teams that are solid and usable. Whether you like the teams you get or not, you'll have to make the best of it and think on your feet!

At the very least, you can forget about meticulous team-building this time around and just have fun with it!

When: Friday, February 6 @ 4PM PST to Sunday, February 8 @ 4PM PST
Guild Beasties: NONE! You don't get to decide anything!

Players of all skill level are invited! All you need to do to participate is to play the game on that day and join the Bash on SportNet! SportNet is typically unlocked within the first 2 hours of your adventure, after beating your first Ranked boss.
[h3]Official Game Rules:[/h3]

• Random Teams Mode
• First to 2 Points wins
  
• Standard time limit on move selection
  
• No Undos allowed
  
• No duplicate Beastie species allowed
  
• Relationship Combos are disabled
  
• All Beasties are set to Level 50