For Honor News

Hey Warriors,

Today our Warrior’s Den was heavily packed! It featured a Recap of Year 4: Year of The Reckoning, the S12 Event, and a very special announcement 😊


As you may have already known, last week we announced Year 4: The Year of Reckoning.

Here’s the recap:

• Each season will have its own theme, rewards, activities, and art from a renowned artist each season.
  
• There will be two new heroes – one at Y4S2 and the other Y4S4!
  
• We’re introducing a new reward system –with the For Honor Battle Pass.
  
• Improved Fight Core Experience: Emphasis on Testing Ground
  
• An All-Access Competitive Program will be launched.
  
• There will be new armor! (In Year 4, not this year, Y3)
  

More info will come out in January, but you can read more details here!

We’re super excited for Year 4 and we hope you are too!


We have partnered up with one of our games for a cross-over collaboration: FOR HONOR is in TRIALS RISING! The Raider skin is available in Trials—now you can also be legendary 😊 The Raider is part of the Season 4 content which is plenty interesting and worth checking out this season!



From December 19th to January 2nd, earn exclusive rewards by playing this Season’s Event Game Mode!



Zhanzu’s Fire will be available to all heroes until January 2nd!



“The emperor's order were clear; go back to Qiang Pass and retrieve the artifact. The explosion has left the palace in a terrible state and surviving Blackstone still roam it, slowly dying. Careful where you step.”

From December 19th to December 26th, retrieve the experimental weapon which altered the Blackstones in dark, unexpected ways…

From December 19th to January 2nd, be the faction with the most executions performed:

• 1st Place: 2,000 Steel + Event Symbol
  
• 2nd Place: 1,000 Steel + Event Symbol
  
• 3rd Place: 500 Steel + Event Symbol
  

From December 19th to January 2nd, help the Emperor escape Qiang Pass in a 4 player co-op against A.I! You can think of it as a hoard mode with progression, and with the more progress, the higher the difficulty.

Rules and How to Play:

• Get out of Qiang Pass with the Emperor, and at least one player, alive.
  
• If all players die, you lose.
  
• If the Emperor dies, you lose.
  
• Clear and capture zones to move forward (the Emperor stays behind in the last captured zone.)
  
• Enemies come from everywhere and continuously respawn.
  
• Capturing a zone respawns dead players.
  
• Cursed enemies, identifiable by their purple flames (from the chemical weapon), are stronger than normal enemies.
  

GL Warriors!

• Gao Lei’s Ultimate
  
• Gao Lei’s Keepsake
  
• Gao Lei’s Warrior Outfit
  
• Illustrious outfits: Qiang Emissary & Sun Da’s Gambit
  

There is a mass of gorgeous, on-theme weapons available for loot in The Zhanhu’s Gambit seasonal event! Play it and loot now!


The Arena 4v4 Dominion Tournament Series

• When: Saturday Dec 21 (PS4), Sunday Dec 22 (PC) @ 1 PM EST
  
• Prize: Donation funded
  
• Sign up here

The Warriors Guild Seasons Beatings

• Seasonal duelfest! Duration will take place over the course of the month of December, with matches taking place within 3 days after registration closes.
  
• You can register as a spectator or a participant – sign-ups have already begun and will continue until Friday, Dec 20th.
  
• PSN 1v1
  

There are a lot of tournaments happening in the next few weeks, so make sure you search For Honor in the battlefy search bar to participate in all of them!

If you have any tournaments or montages, send all information to [email protected].

Thanks a lot for those who hung out with us on stream today, now make sure you go check out the ZHANHU’S GAMBIT event in-game! See you next year for another edition of the Warrior’s Den!

And if you haven’t already, join the For Honor Community on Twitter, Twitch, and Reddit!

🎄Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!❄️

Hey Warriors,

We know that you have been waiting patiently to know what’s going on for next year in For Honor. We are excited to announce, today, what we have planned for Year 4: The Year of Reckoning.

From launch three years ago to For Honor today, we are incredibilisly proud in the progress the game has made, none of which would have been possible without the unique relationship that we’ve built together with you, our players.

Year 4 is about learning and building upon what we have experienced together in these past 3 years. Let’s keep the party going!

We’ll be able to share more details in January 2020 but here is an overview of what’s in store.


The Year of Reckoning is a turning point in For Honor’s history. The great war that has been raging over the past years takes an unexpected turn. The earth has quietened down, but new leaders arise and warriors across all factions need to decide what they are really fighting for.


Like Year 3, Year 4 will have four new Seasons, each with its own theme, rewards, and activities.

Two new faces will arise during the Year of Reckoning. One Hero will be released during Year 4, Season 2, and the other during Year 4, Season 4. Their arrival will coincide with the storyline, as well as the events of the Year and its seasons. We can’t wait to find out which side you choose!

You will be able to purchase them upon release or unlock the new Heroes with steel as usual.


Starting with Year 4, Season 1, we will be introducing a new reward system with the For Honor Battle Pass.

In the past, rewards relied solely upon random drops after matches and scavenger crates, which gave little visibility on the items you were able to unlock.

Now you will have clear objectives throughout the 100 tiers within the Battle Pass where you will be able to unlock items through gameplay. The battle pass will be limited to character customization items and consumables meaning that you do not need to purchase it to have access to the two new heroes coming during the year.

The For Honor Battle Pass will consist on a Free pass and a Premium pass, with a shared progression across the different tiers and resetting with each new Season.

Everyone will have access to the Free pass and its rewards. In the Free pass, you can unlock items such as ornaments, steel, color swatches, champion status, embossings, and more.
Owners of the Premium passes will have access to unique customization rewards such as new signatures, new weapons, new executions, new effects, and more.

Both free and premium passes will have rewards for all heroes.

It was also important for us to make the Premium pass an addition to, and not a substitute for, the existing means of getting content in the game. Thus, we will be keeping original options for players with new content of the week, sales, and scavenger crates /drops at the end of the matches to get customizations items.

We will have more details to share on the Y4S1 Battle Pass and the season itself in January 2020.


With 26 heroes in the current roster and two new faces joining the fight in Year 4, balancing remains a top priority for us. This includes hero balancing, of course, but also game mode balancing.

A major step toward strengthening our process of balancing has been the introduction of Testing Grounds.

For Year 4, you can expect this tool to have a big role in how the dev team continues to bring changes to the game. The focus of the year remains on increasing character viability, allowing for a wider range in team composition at a higher level of play, and continue to improve offense to enhance the core gameplay of For Honor on a more general level.


The competitive nature of For Honor has been part of the experience since the get-go. One of the main reasons why the competitive scene has continued to grow over the years is thanks to you guys who have supported it at a grass roots level. Year 3 was the first step in better supporting the tournament/competitive scene of For Honor, with more visibility on community tournaments, in-game prizing, but most importantly the introduction of the spectator mode.

The competitive scene is extremely important to us as it is to you. It helps us grow the community and is ultimately a compass in shaping the experience of the game. It is a pillar which we intend to expand on in Year 4 with a new all-access competitive program set to launch.

More details will be shared soon.


We will expand on all of these elements in January as we get closer to launch of the Year of Reckoning, we are really excited for what this year has to offer!

Lastly, we want to thank you for all the creativity that you guys have shown us over the past 3 years. Whether it be cosplays, fan-fiction, memes, videos, and fan art; we felt inspired for Year 4.

That is why we will be working with renowned artists for each season’s iconic image,
starting with the Year 4 image below, made by the American illustrator AJ Frena. Representing the Year of Reckoning, we are proud to be able to share her piece of art with you all today and cannot wait to share more details later in January for what’s to come in For Honor.



Oh! And one last thing… new armors are coming this year.

Happy Holidays Warriors,
For Honor Dev Team

Hello Warriors! Welcome to this installment in our ongoing series of State of Balance, where the Fight Team analyzes the results from the just-completed season and discusses where we are headed in the future.

In this blog, we will share data on the Win Rates and Pick Rates of our heroes with you, the community. We will also look at the data to discuss our perspective on certain balance issues, and where we see it heading over the coming seasons.

(To read more about the methodology of the data presented, click here.)

Now, let’s get to the data!









Note: In this State of Balance, we use the version of the “Viability vs Playstyle Tables” that was posted on 2019-October-30. These Viability Tables are the community-created tool to replace the Tier Lists, and you can find the latest version here.

Hitokiri and Raider perform highly in Duels across both Full Population and Platinum-or-Above. This Player Data is in-line with the Community’s Viability Table – both Hitokiri and Raider are listed as being Strong in Duels. Hitokiri is especially high, sitting at 68% win rate in Full Population and 61% in Platinum-or-Above. They both received nerfs in Year 3: Season 4 (Raider’s Stunning Tap change, Hitokiri’s Uninterruptible Stance timing nerf, damage nerfs to both), and as such we will be closely monitoring to see where they end up after their changes.

Uninterruptible Stance / High Damage Heroes appear to have a large presence at the top of the Player Data. Most heroes who appear at the top of the Player Data Charts seem to have one or both of these traits. This seems to suggest that these properties (especially when combined on heroes such as Raider or Hitokiri) are very strong when used in the context of Full Population or Platinum-or-Above play in Duel. The main outlier is Berserker, who has an Uninterruptible Stance but appears quite low in Full Population play.

Raider, Hitokiri, Lawbringer, Black Prior and Conqueror all show up roughly at similar locations high up in the Player Data and the Viability Table. This suggests that these heroes are both strong in competitive gameplay as well as Full Population. We’ve already made changes to Raider and Hitokiri this season, and we’ll monitor how these changes affect their viability and see if we need to further act on other heroes as well.

Jormungandr appears rather high on both sets of Player Data, but low on the Viability Table. We’ve seen that, at a competitive level, Jormungandr’s gameplan is inconsistent as top level players are able to react to more threatening attacks. At the Full Population level, this becomes much more difficult, and frustration with the hero remains high as players struggle to deal with the melee attacks. In Year 3: Season 4, we have adjusted the recovery timing of the opening lights, in order to fix an issue where it would be impossible to dodge the melee finisher in certain cases; we’ll see what repercussions this will have in the future.

Warden, Berserker and Shaman show up much lower in both sets of the Player Data than in the Viability Table, where they are placed as Strong. One theory for Full Population players is that they might approach Duels much like they approach 1v1s in Dominion, which makes them throw out big attacks much more often and take more risks, whereas competitive players tend to play it safe and are much more patient.

Reflex Guard Heroes appear at the bottom of the lists. Orochi is leading the pack in both sets, despite being listed as Weak in the Viability Table. We’re keeping an eye on this situation.





The top half of the Player Data for Dominion for Full Population and Top 4% is essentially the same, with some minor position switches. This shows a high similarity at these different levels of play. Similarly to Duels, we see that heroes with Uninterruptible Stance and/or high damage perform at the top of these Player Data sets.

Raider and Hitokiri appear near the top of the Player Data for Dominion (just as they did in Duel), and we shall see how the nerfs applied at the start of Year 3: Season 4 affect them.

Reflex Guard Heroes appear to be having a difficult time in Dominion. All Reflex Guard heroes currently appear at the bottom of the Player Data. We’re keeping an eye on this as it is a trend that is problematic.

Mid Heroes (a role defined in the Community’s Viability Table as a hero that maintains control over the minion lane) fall into a rather similar rank in both the Player Data and Viability table, with the exception of Aramusha, who still ranks higher in the Player Data. This, similarly to Roaming heroes, shows that control over the minion lane is generally well-understood.

Side Point Heroes (a role defined in the Community’s Viability Table as a hero who is strongest at taking and holding side points) are generally defensive heroes that are able to stall at points and hold them for long periods of time. The overall ranking of these heroes is similar in both the Viability Table and the Player data with the exception of Jormungandr, who is higher in the Player Data. Typically this also indicates that Side Point gameplay is understood, but most Side Point heroes are in the middle to bottom of the Player Data. We’re keeping an eye on this as we want to ensure that we have heroes that are still viable on Side Points.

Roaming Heroes (a role defined in the Community’s Viability Table as a hero that rotates around the map and helps as needed) has a high similarity in heroes that perform at the top of the Player Data and the Viability Table. It appears as if Roaming is a role that is well understood at all levels of play.

Ganker Heroes (a role defined in the Community’s Viability Table as a hero that can quickly kill a single opponent with the help of a teammate) appear to be much stronger in organized competitive play than in solo queuing. The Community Viability Table defines Shaman and Gladiator as Strong in that role, but Player Data had both appearing very low. While this difference in behavior makes intuitive sense, owing to the difference in team cohesion and coordination between full population games and competitive play, there is quite a large discrepancy between the results of the Player Data and the Viability Table when it comes to Shaman and Gladiator.

BREACH

Generally, it appears that Breach Player Data appears quite similar to Dominion. The one major difference is that Nuxia appears to fall considerably more in Breach Top 4% Win Rate than in Dominion, presumably because her fight kit and Caltrops are much less effective in a context with Pikemen.

Note: There is no Community Viability Table for Breach – so it’s not included in this blog for that reason.

CLOSING NOTE

We would love to hear more from you on the results of the Player Data for Full Population, Platinum-or-Above, Top 4%, as well as the Community Viability Tables. Please remember that we look at all this data, information, feedback, and a whole lot more when we make our decisions.

Keep sending us your feedback, and we look forward to sharing the next installment of the State of Balance!

- The Fight Team

Hey Warriors,

Here is what’s happening in For Honor this week:




In this week’s Warrior’s Den, Mike & Stefan presented a deep analysis of The State of Balance. If you want to skim the highlights click here.






From December 6th-9th, be the Faction with the most take-downs performed!




“As you feast with your allies, one of them asks you about the legendary Wu Lin Sovereigns.
‘Yes, it was indeed one of my ancestors who defeated them eons ago,’ you answer with a witty smile..."



From December 5th to December 12th, face a series of 1v1 encounters where after the encounter, you absorb the modifier of your enemies!






New Elite Outfits are now available for all heroes!





Slayscion Gaming 4v4 #1 (XB1)

• First Place: The Smoothbrains
  
• Second Place: SCG Yeet Street
  
• Tournament was single elimination, 14 teams participated
  

Click here for results.






Elek’s 4v4 Tourney (PC)

• When: Saturday, Dec 7 @ 8 AM PST
  
• Prize: Donation Funded
  
• NOT REGION LOCKED
  

Click here for more info.


The Warrior’s Guild

Tournaments (low rep)

The Hunters Lodge – Bounties


Click here for more info.

If you have any questions, have any upcoming tournaments, or highlights you would like for us to shout out, please send all information to [email protected]




Tune in on December 19th for a SPECIAL EDITION of Warrior’s Den (where you might also see Boomer Mike wreck Youssef in battle) !

And if you haven’t already, join the For Honor Community on Twitter, Twitch, and Reddit.

Thanks a lot for hanging out with us on stream today!

Warriors: in this Weekly Recap, we’ll cover the in-game Black Friday sale, as well as the Hyper Duel event!

Remember: we’ll have a live Warriors Den stream on December 5th to cover the State of Balance for Year 3, Season 3 (Hulda). Catch it on our Twitch channel at 12pm ET, 17:00 UTC!





Have you had your eye on an Execution that you’d like to introduce your opponents to? The Black Friday sale includes offers of up to 50% off on Executions, Outfits, Ornaments and Emotes.






It’s Duel with a twist: there are no rounds – just immediate respawns. Your only opportunity to get more health (besides dying) is to kill your opponent. First to four kills wins!






The Faction with the most wins in the Hyper Duel playlist will earn the best rewards!

1st Place: 1500 Steel + 3 crates

2nd Place: 1000 Steel + 2 crates

3rd Place: 500 Steel + 1 crate

You have until December 5th to aid your Faction in their quest for the most loot.




The Arena 4v4 Dominion Tournament Series EU (PC)

• When: Saturday, November 30th 2019 @ 1 PM EST
  
• Prize: Donation Funded
  
• For more details/sign up here.
  

The Arena 4v4 Dominion Tournament Series NA (PC)

• When: Sunday, December 1st 2019 @ 1 PM EST
  
• Prize: Donation Funded
  
• For more details/sign up here.
  

Torneio de Invasão 4v4 (PS4)

• When: Sunday, December 1st 2019
  
• Prize: TBD
  
• For more details/sign up here.
  

Slayscion Gaming 4v4 #1 (XBOX ONE)

• When: Sunday, December 1st 2019 @ 1:30 PM CST
  
• Prize: $200 USD + donations
  
• Registration ends Nov 29th
  
• For more details/sign up here.
  

If you have any questions regarding organizing For Honor tournaments, or have any upcoming tournaments or highlights you would like for us to shout out, please send all information to [email protected].

And finally, just a quick reminder that the Spectator Mode Beta is live. We’re taking community feedback over in this thread on the subreddit!

And if you haven’t already, join the For Honor Community on Twitter, Twitch, and Reddit!