Legion TD 2 News

Expected patch release: Monday, September 16 (Pacific Time)

[h3]News[/h3]

• Check out Lisk's Game Dev AMA and Jules' Gameplay & Balance AMA from this past month
  
• Next Nova Cup: September 21-22. Signups are open!
  
• Join the Tournament Discord to participate and receive tournament notifications. View all past Nova Cups here: Legion TD 2 Esports Portal.

[h3]Legion of Bloons Bundle[/h3]

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/42349/Legion_of_Bloons_Tower_Defense_Bundle/

Introducing the ultimate tower defense bundle!

[h3]New Feature: Platinum & Ruby Borders & Monuments[/h3]



Platinum and ruby borders are now unlocked at 20x/40x card copies! (100x/200x for Guilds)

Thanks to Schakara for the suggestion.

Monuments have also been reworked! Monuments now determine their silver/gold/platinum/ruby status based on how many cards you have of the type, rather than how many monuments are equipped.

This means you can have multiple different silver, gold, platinum, and ruby monuments at the same time!

Thanks to Toikan and Danwulfe for the suggestion.

The Profile → Collection menu presentation has also been improved: glows are based off of your border instead of card rarity, and gems have been added to show rarity.



Avatar borders have been polished as well!



[h3]New Feature: Purchase & Donate Multiple Cards[/h3]



At long last, the tech is here! This was a commonly requested feature that we’re happy to finally deliver.

[h3]New Feature: Matchmaking Scouter[/h3]



Enables you to see whether any of up to 10 specified players are queued or in lobby before you enter matchmaking. You may use this to reduce your chances of matching with certain players. Can be unlocked permanently in the shop.

First, customize the list of players in the shop.



Then, when you queue up, you will receive this popup if any listed players are in queue or in lobby.



Note that (due to technical limitations), once you’ve entered matchmaking, the confirm matchmaking popup will not reopen if your scouted players enter queue after you.

[h3]New Secret Card: Housecat Nekomata[/h3]

Like and subscribe for financial advice.

There may or may not be a Pack Rat-themed card next patch ;)

[h3]New Skin: Area 51 Siege Ram[/h3]



Shocks nearby enemies for 10 damage per second.

…Kidding. It’s cosmetic-only.



Read more about our design philosophy on game balance, and use Drachbot to see mastermind, unit, and spell win rates and pick rates!

[h3]Classic[/h3]

Lock-In
- Starting income: 4 --> 2
- Bonus gold for randomizing your lock-in: 8 --> 16

Redraw
- Redraw gold cost: 1-25 → 1-50

All Legions
- Starting income: 3 --> 0

Classic is less balanced than ranked, so masterminds that give you greater agency in picking specific units are too strong.

Hybrid
Gold costs:
- Tier 3: 84 → 85
- Tier 4: 133 → 130
- Tier 5: 182 → 178
- Tier 6: 256 → 251

Thanks to kert for the suggestion.

Dual Building
- Bonus attack speed to waves and mercenaries: 3% → 2%

Giga Mercs
- Fixed a bug where Giga Mimic was giving +12.5% gold per stack (supposed to be +0%)
- Fixed a bug where Giga Shaman was giving +40 damage per stack (supposed to be +25)

This will increase variety of sends in Giga Mercs and make the mode more fun.

Tower Defense
- Now shows up in rotation 67% less often

This mode is polarizing (some love it and others hate it), so we're reducing the frequency.

PvE
- Improved variety of sends

[h3]Masterminds[/h3]

Champion
- Attack speed and damage reduction: 9.25% → 9.5%

We missed the mark with Champion’s balance, in part because we were anchored by feedback that it was strong at 8%. We should have been more aggressive with previous buffs.

[h3]Legion Spells[/h3]

Vampire
Life steal and ability vamp: 24% → 26%

Low win rate and pick rate.

[h3]Fighters[/h3]

Chained Fist / Oathbreaker / Oathbreaker (Final Form)
- Attack speed: 0.921 → 0.909

Overshadowing more expensive fortified tanks.

Sky Queen
- Damage: 62 → 64

Low pick rate.

Seadragon / Lifebinder
- Mana regeneration increased by 4%

Low win rate.

Infiltrator / Orchid
- Shuriken: Damage: 35 → 37

Slightly low win rate and pick rate.

Pirate Skeleton
- Health: 780 → 760

Spectral Scallywag is intended to be strong, but it's currently too safe and easy to get it with 2x Pirate Skeleton opening. This change makes it riskier.

Slime Siren
- Attack speed: 1.34 → 1.32

High win rate and pick rate.

Canopie
- Health: 4050 → 4150

Low win rate.

Honeyflower
Attack speed: 1.03 → 1.01

High win rate and pick rate.

Crab Warlock / Crabomancer
- Mana regeneration increased by 4%

Low win rate and pick rate.

Warp Wing / Void Manta
- Attack speed: 0.77 → 0.73
- Plasma Decay: Damage debuff to bosses: -2 → -1.5
- Fixed a bug where Plasma Decay was wrongly debuffing bounced targets based on the boss status of the initial target

High pick rate and win rate.

Sand Badger
- Health: 2530 → 2500

Iron Scales
- Health: 6800 → 6720

Antler
- Attack speed: 0.95 → 0.92

Whitemane
- Damage 177 → 173

Nightmare
- Attack speed: 1.83 → 1.89

Low pick rate.

Fenix
- Damage: 298 → 305

Slightly low win rate and pick rate.

Shadow Dancer
- Health: 2100 → 2130

Dread Knight
- Health: 4900 → 4970

Slightly low pick rate and win rate.

Soul Gate
- Hellion: Health: 800 → 820
- Nightcrawler: Health: 430 → 450

Hell Gate
- Elite Hellion: Health: 2070 → 2120
- Elite Nightcrawler: Health: 1110 → 1160

Slightly low pick rate and win rate.

Sovereign
- Damage: 226 → 230

Slightly low pick rate and win rate.

Millennium / Doomsday Machine
- Attack speed: Attack speed: 0.613 → 0.606

Slightly high win rate and pick rate.

[h3]Mercenaries[/h3]

Needler
- Attack speed: 2 → 1.11
- Gains mana on kill → Gains mana on attack
- Rapid Fire: Attack speed: 25% → 50%
- Rapid Fire: Mana cost: 3 → 10
- Rapid Fire: Duration: 5 → 15

Removed RNG and increased the power budget of Rapid Fire. Also has a stronger synergy with Shaman.

Thanks to Lyefire for the suggestion.

[h3]Waves[/h3]

Goals
- Buff mid and late game waves to help games close out faster
- Nerf cheap unit spam in the late game

Wave 13: Drill Golems
- Health: 3330 → 3400

Wave 15: Quadrapuses
- Health: 2230 → 2300
- Giant Quadrapus: Health: 8290 → 9200

Wave 17: Metal Dragons
- Health: 3450 → 3550

Wave 18: Wale Chiefs
- Attack speed: 2 → 1.82
- New ability: Feast: Restores 0.1% health and grants 0.5% attack speed when a nearby enemy dies

Wave 19: Dire Toads
- Attack speed: 2.22 → 2
- New ability: Feast: Restores 0.1% health and grants 0.5% attack speed when a nearby enemy dies

Wave 21
- New ability: Feast: Restores 0.1% health and grants 0.5% attack speed when a nearby enemy dies
- Inferno (splash damage): Removed

[h3]Balance Watchlist[/h3]
The dev team is constantly monitoring game balance, between looking at data and listening to community feedback. If anything is being more closely monitored than usual, it will be listed in this Balance Watchlist section. For this patch, the following are on the watchlist:

• Double Lock-In, Redraw, Fiesta, and Castle are performing better than expected, but they are indirectly nerfed by the wave buffs and nerfs to Manta and Honeyflower this patch.
  
• Giant Snail continues to look strong compared to other offensive spells, but waiting another patch to further evaluate.

[h3]Improvements & Fixes[/h3]

• Auras and self-buffs now increase model scale to better visually communicate the buff
  
• Fixed a display-only bug where a stack of Double Down would appear to be used after a match was canceled

[h3]Game Translations[/h3]


Legion TD 2's translations continue to be improved, thanks to major contributions from community members! If you'd like to contribute to improving the game's texts further, visit the following link:

Help Translate Legion TD 2

HUGE thank you to everyone who has helped up to this point!



This patch introduces some long-awaited features, as well as meaningful balance and meta improvements.

As always, with any major patch, we'll keep a close eye on things and rapidly hotfix as long as needed.

Thank you again for playing Legion TD 2! We hope you continue to enjoy the game.

If you've enjoyed the game, but haven't left a review yet, please consider posting a short (hopefully positive ) review for the game! If the game reaches 90% positive, Steam will give it more visibility = more players = more freelo better matchmaking!

If you enjoy these updates, please give it a Thumbs Up, too!

If you have constructive criticism, let's chat about it. Discord and /r/LegionTD2 on reddit are our main channels of communication, and aside from the development team, there are community helpers who can ensure your feedback is heard, as well as answer pretty much anything you've ever wanted to know about the game. If you want a guaranteed answer from the devs, the monthly AMAs on /r/LegionTD2 are your best bet.

Sincerely,
The Legion TD 2 Team

Congratulations to the winners of last month's Nova Cup!
- D1: Secret Agents (Drachir & Aatrocity)
- D2: The Crows (W1TCH0R & 1nc0.o)
- D3: Team Cono (SebAx & Tiburcio)
- D4: Bananas forever (dada007 & Sapal)
- D5: NeroTheLightning_shiwaseki (NeroTheLightning & shiwaseki)

Missed the action? Check the brackets, team lists, & VODs for all divisions on the Legion TD 2 eSports portal!



The upcoming September Nova Cup takes place September 21 - 22.

$875 in prizes and sign-up is free - first come first served!
There are up to five skill divisions, so no matter what your rating is, you have a chance to win.
Participation prize: Every participant who plays all of their matches will receive a FREE random card. If you haven't played a tournament yet, this is a great time to join.


- Everyone that is level 3 or higher can join for free! First come, first served. So even if you recently joined the game, feel free to participate!




When you watch Nova Cups on the official channel, aside from enjoying shoutcasted top-tier Legion gameplay, you'll also receive in-game rewards based on how long you watch!

Watch the official Legion TD 2 Twitch stream during a Nova Cup to earn the following rewards:
- Watch for 60 minutes: 2,000 essence
- Watch for an additional 90 minutes: 4,000 additional essence
- Watch for an additional 120 minutes: Random card

In other words, if you watch the Nova Cup both days, you'll earn 6,000 total essence and a random card!

IMPORTANT: You'll need to link your Twitch account to your Legion TD 2 account in order to earn the rewards.
Link Your Twitch Account

• Sign-ups are open from NOW until September 21 9am PDT / 6pm CEST.
  
• To sign up, find a teammate and form a party. After you're both in the party, have one player type "/signup [team name]" (e.g. /signup Snail Kings) in chat. You should see a confirmation message that your sign-up went through. For those who participated in previous Nova Cups, you no longer need to do /join to signup.
  
• The first 16 teams to sign up in each division can participate. For division 1 and 2 the top 8 teams are drafted per division. Other teams are waitlisted. There are usually no-shows, so waitlisted teams are encouraged to be present in the Discord and ready to play. View the team list to see your sign-up position and division.
  
• If there are more than 32 teams checked in, there will be an additional best-of-1 qualifying round to allow more teams to participate. It is a best-of-1, rather than a best-of-3, to keep the event from running overly long.
  
• Both players must join the Legion TD 2 Official Tournament Discord. Make sure to set your server nickname to match your in-game name.

• You may sign-up as a solo with a suggested team name using the "/signup [team name]" command. Solo teams will be added to the Public Teams list, then be formed into teams on the day of the tournament. Solo teams will be randomly assigned a team name from either of its members.
  
• If there is a waitlist, team sign-ups will always take priority over solo sign-ups
  
• If you sign up as a solo, but then you find a teammate, you can re-sign up as a team any time before check-ins start. Just use the /signup command again with the new teammate. The tournament organizer will void your old solo signup after they process your new team signup.
  
• After check-ins are over, all checked-in solo players will be randomly formed into teams by the tournament organizer. You cannot request a specific teammate at this point; if you want to play with a specific person, you should have signed up as a team instead.

It is still strongly recommended to sign-up as a team to guarantee your spot in the tournament and to give you time to practice with your teammate beforehand.


[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]



Saturday, September 21

• Check-in window: 8:45 - 9:15am PDT / 5:45 - 6:15pm CEST
  
• Games: 10am - 1:30pm PDT / 7 - 10:30pm CEST
  
  • Round of 16 (Best of 3)
    
  • Quarter-finals (Best of 3)

Sunday, September 22

• Check-in window: 9 - 9:30am PDT / 6 - 6:30pm CEST
  
• Games: 10am - 1:30pm PDT / 7 - 10:30pm CEST
  
  • Semi-finals (Best of 3)
    
  • Final (Best of 5)

Check-in

• Teams must check in via the Legion TD 2 Official Tournament Discord. Waitlisted teams should also check in.
  
• Any team that fails to check in will be disqualified. The next team on the waitlist that checked in will earn a spot.

The custom game room creator should enable Tournament Mode in the room. This will ensure the following settings:

• 2v2
  
• Mastermind only
  
• Hybrid disabled

Division 1 & 2 Only
- Conquest rules apply. (Once you win with a Mastermind playstyle, you and your ally can't use that playstyle again for that series)



For a full list of rules, prizes, and other details, visit the following link:
Nova Cup Rules & FAQ

For questions & support, please join the Legion TD 2 Official Tournament Discord.

See you on September 21st! The Nova Cup will be casted and streamed at twitch.tv/ltd2. Check the Tournament Discord on the event day for links to the other casts.

Sincerely,
Your Legion TD 2 Tournament Staff

Congratulations to the winners of last month's Nova Cup!
- D1: abrasiert (Kingdanzz & Widderson)
- D2: hmm (Turnixtheus & Valas)
- D3: Pyro (Snow193 & Shiyuna)
- D4: FLIP (CRiddle & CybY)
- D5: Russian Book(s) (iliksh- & 4Siris)

Missed the action? Check the brackets, team lists, & VODs for all divisions on the Legion TD 2 eSports portal!



The upcoming August Nova Cup takes place August 24 - 25.

$875 in prizes and sign-up is free - first come first served!
There are up to five skill divisions, so no matter what your rating is, you have a chance to win.
Participation prize: Every participant who plays all of their matches will receive a FREE random card. If you haven't played a tournament yet, this is a great time to join.


- Everyone that is level 3 or higher can join for free! First come, first served. So even if you recently joined the game, feel free to participate!




When you watch Nova Cups on the official channel, aside from enjoying shoutcasted top-tier Legion gameplay, you'll also receive in-game rewards based on how long you watch!

Watch the official Legion TD 2 Twitch stream during a Nova Cup to earn the following rewards:
- Watch for 60 minutes: 2,000 essence
- Watch for an additional 90 minutes: 4,000 additional essence
- Watch for an additional 120 minutes: Random card

In other words, if you watch the Nova Cup both days, you'll earn 6,000 total essence and a random card!

IMPORTANT: You'll need to link your Twitch account to your Legion TD 2 account in order to earn the rewards.
Link Your Twitch Account

• Sign-ups are open from NOW until August 24 9am PDT / 6pm CEST.
  
• To sign up, find a teammate and form a party. After you're both in the party, have one player type "/signup [team name]" (e.g. /signup Snail Kings) in chat. You should see a confirmation message that your sign-up went through. For those who participated in previous Nova Cups, you no longer need to do /join to signup.
  
• The first 16 teams to sign up in each division can participate. For division 1 and 2 the top 8 teams are drafted per division. Other teams are waitlisted. There are usually no-shows, so waitlisted teams are encouraged to be present in the Discord and ready to play. View the team list to see your sign-up position and division.
  
• If there are more than 32 teams checked in, there will be an additional best-of-1 qualifying round to allow more teams to participate. It is a best-of-1, rather than a best-of-3, to keep the event from running overly long.
  
• Both players must join the Legion TD 2 Official Tournament Discord. Make sure to set your server nickname to match your in-game name.

• You may sign-up as a solo with a suggested team name using the "/signup [team name]" command. Solo teams will be added to the Public Teams list, then be formed into teams on the day of the tournament. Solo teams will be randomly assigned a team name from either of its members.
  
• If there is a waitlist, team sign-ups will always take priority over solo sign-ups
  
• If you sign up as a solo, but then you find a teammate, you can re-sign up as a team any time before check-ins start. Just use the /signup command again with the new teammate. The tournament organizer will void your old solo signup after they process your new team signup.
  
• After check-ins are over, all checked-in solo players will be randomly formed into teams by the tournament organizer. You cannot request a specific teammate at this point; if you want to play with a specific person, you should have signed up as a team instead.

It is still strongly recommended to sign-up as a team to guarantee your spot in the tournament and to give you time to practice with your teammate beforehand.


[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]



Saturday, August 24

• Check-in window: 8:45 - 9:15am PDT / 5:45 - 6:15pm CEST
  
• Games: 10am - 1:30pm PDT / 7 - 10:30pm CEST
  
  • Round of 16 (Best of 3)
    
  • Quarter-finals (Best of 3)

Sunday, August 25

• Check-in window: 9 - 9:30am PDT / 6 - 6:30pm CEST
  
• Games: 10am - 1:30pm PDT / 7 - 10:30pm CEST
  
  • Semi-finals (Best of 3)
    
  • Final (Best of 5)

Check-in

• Teams must check in via the Legion TD 2 Official Tournament Discord. Waitlisted teams should also check in.
  
• Any team that fails to check in will be disqualified. The next team on the waitlist that checked in will earn a spot.

The custom game room creator should enable Tournament Mode in the room. This will ensure the following settings:

• 2v2
  
• Mastermind only
  
• Hybrid disabled

Division 1 & 2 Only
- Conquest rules apply. (Once you win with a Mastermind playstyle, you and your ally can't use that playstyle again for that series)



For a full list of rules, prizes, and other details, visit the following link:
Nova Cup Rules & FAQ

For questions & support, please join the Legion TD 2 Official Tournament Discord.

See you on August 24th! The Nova Cup will be casted and streamed at twitch.tv/ltd2. Check the Tournament Discord on the event day for links to the other casts.

Sincerely,
Your Legion TD 2 Tournament Staff

Expected patch release: Tuesday-Wednesday, August 13-14 (Pacific Time)

[h3]News[/h3]

• Check out Lisk's Game Dev AMA and Jules' Gameplay & Balance AMA from this past month
  
• Next Nova Cup: August 24-25
  
• Join the Tournament Discord to participate and receive tournament notifications. View all past Nova Cups here: Legion TD 2 Esports Portal.
  
• Check out Drachbot to see mastermind, unit, and spell win rates and pick rates

[h3]New Fighter: Warp Wing[/h3]





Warp Wing

• Tier 4 (Cost: 145g)
  
• Role: Supportive
  
• Ranged / Pure / Arcane

Plasma Decay
Reduces the damage of up to 4 nearby enemies by 3, stacking up to 30 times.

[h3]New Fighter: Void Manta[/h3]





Void Manta

• Tier 4 (Upgrade Cost: 270g)
  
• Role: Supportive
  
• Ranged / Pure / Arcane

Plasma Overwhelming
Each target of Plasma Decay now receives 2 additional stacks.

[h3]New Secret Card: Dank Dino[/h3]

Dank Mage has gone too long without friendly competition.


[h3]Double Down[/h3]

• Price reduction: 10,000 essence → 5,000 essence
  
• Weekly purchase limit: 4 --> Unlimited!

Double Down was initially released at a higher price point and with a weekly limit to guard against being too disruptive on the ranked ladder. Now that things are stable, we feel good about the new price point and removal of the weekly limit.




[h3]Classic[/h3]

• Reverted nerf to AOE damage
  
• Reverted health and damage nerf to Hydra
  
• Reverted the change that prevented Sakura from gaining stacks and Bankers from gaining gold on waves 21+ (Eggsack can still no longer be built on waves 21+)

Initiate operation Make Everything Fun Again! We tried being responsive to community feedback about balance issues in Classic, but realized that only moved the problem. By reverting these nerfs, we create more competition for the currently dominant raid boss Lioness build.

Friendly reminder that Classic is an unranked mode with no skill-based matchmaking, and it will be less balanced than Ranked.

[h3]Systems[/h3]

Leak Gold

• Leaking is now less punishing on waves 1-10 and more punishing on waves 11-21.
  
• The exact numbers vary by wave, but in the early game, the leaker will get, on average, 12% more compensation gold, and the opposing team will earn 18% less breaker gold. In the late game, the leaker will get 9% less compensation gold, and the opposing team will earn 11% more breaker gold.

This encourages risky worker pushing in the early game and makes split sending / breaking your opponent for gold more rewarding in the late game.

Attack Speed Bug Fix

• A few patches ago, a bug was introduced that made certain units attack too fast. To our knowledge, the only units that were affected were Granddaddy (wave 10), Killer Slug (wave 14), Gatling Gun, Vulcan Cannon, and Champion Gatling/Vulcan. In recent patches, these units were nerfed and balanced around the existence of the bug.
  
• This patch fixes the bug, so we’re adjusting the attack speeds of wave 10, wave 14, Gatling Gun, and Vulcan Cannon to remain unchanged. These fixes are not shown in patch notes to avoid clutter and confusion.
  
• Substantively, the only changes you should notice are (1) Champion Gatling Gun/Vulcan Cannon is no longer attacking faster than expected, and (2) wave 14 is getting independently nerfed. If there are other, unexpected effects of the bug fix, we’ll address them in hotfixes as needed. Apologies for this bug.

[h3]Masterminds[/h3]

Castle
- Bonus income on wave 11: 45 → 47

Low win rate.

Champion
- Attack speed and damage reduction: 9% → 9.25%

For such a unique and fun Mastermind, Champion's pick rate is lackluster. And now that Champion Gatling Gun is properly balanced, Champion deserves a small buff.

Fiesta
- Gold from leaking: Reduced by 2 on wave 1 and 3 on waves 2-21

Compensation nerf for the changes to leak gold, which are an indirect buff to Fiesta.

Lock-In
- Random: Bonus gold: 7 → 8

Low pick rate and win rate.

Redraw
- Gold cost for Redrawing: 1 to 30 → 1 to 25

Low pick rate and win rate.

[h3]Legion Spells[/h3]

Battle Scars / Divine Blessing
- Attack speed bonus now affects summons and clones
- Battle Scars can now be applied to Soul Gate and Hell Gate

This makes these spells consistent with Hero and Champion and more versatile.

Giant Snail
- Health: 550 → 530
- DPS: Decreased by 1%

High win rate and pick rate.

Glacial Touch
- Damage: 45 → 50

Low win rate and pick rate.

Hero
- Attack speed and damage reduction: 4.25% → 4%

This change was supposed to go out last patch, but it slipped through the cracks.

Lizard Army
- Retired from the game

This spell is overshadowed by Robo Squad and has historically been difficult to balance and make fun. RIP Lizard Army: 2018 - 2024



Thanks to Schakara for the icon.

Magician
- Mana regeneration: 0.57 → 0.55

High pick rate and win rate.

Vampire
Life steal and ability vamp: 23% → 24%

Low win rate and pick rate.

[h3]Fighters[/h3]

Whirlybird
- Damage: 40 → 39

High win rate.

Angler
- Health: 380 → 360
- Damage: 17 → 16

Bounty Hunter
Damage: 78 → 77
Max mana: 120 → 180

The mana change is mostly a ForFun change for players that want a giga chad Kingpin, but in most competitive games, it won’t change much, as it’s usually optimal to upgrade your Kingpin before it reaches max stacks.

Slightly high win rate.

Honeyflower
Attack speed: 1.04 → 1.025

High win rate and pick rate.

Cursed Casket
- Health: 1470 → 1440

Cage of Pain
- Health: 2600 → 2540

Iron Maiden
- Health: 3700 → 3640
- Blade Storm: Damage: 42 → 40
- Blade Storm: Damage Reduction: -2 → -5

Shifting power from Cursed Casket and Cage of Pain to Iron Maiden, and increasing the power budget of Blade Storm’s damage reduction.

Nightmare
- Attack speed: 1.78 → 1.83

Low win rate and pick rate.

Azeria
- Health: 3300 → 3250

High win rate.

Fenix
- Damage: 292 → 298

The removal of Dual Shot on wave 15, AOE damage on wave 18, and Split Shot on wave 19 indirectly nerfed Fenix. Low win rate and pick rate.

Hades
- Mana cost decreased by 2.5%

Slightly low win rate and pick rate.

Millennium / Doomsday Machine
- Attack speed: Attack speed: 0.625 → 0.613

Very high win rate.

[h3]Waves[/h3]

Wave 14: Killer Slugs
- Attack speed: 1.25 → 1.23

Wave 16: Cardinals
- Attack speed: 1.156 → 1.149

Wave 17: Metal Dragons
- Attack speed: 1.681 → 1.69

[h3]Balance Watchlist[/h3]
The dev team is constantly monitoring game balance, between looking at data and listening to community feedback. If anything is being more closely monitored than usual, it will be listed in this Balance Watchlist section. For this patch, the following are on the watchlist:

• Howler, Sunfang, Antler, and Whitemane are statistically strong, but their power isn’t flashy (compared to units like Whirlybird and Azeria), so players tend to perceive them to be weaker than they are. Perception is important, so we’re holding off on nerfs for now.
  
• Wave 21 Inferno (splash damage) may be on the strong side, but it’s also good for the game when builds with high tier units fare better than cheap unit spam.
  
• Cheap unit spam is stronger than expected on waves 15-19, and we’re still thinking of a good way to address this. Thanks to Kidk and Julian for feedback and discussion.

Smurf Boosting
There was a recent incident of top players duoing with smurfs to boost to the top of the ladder. It's impossible for us to police smurfing, but as this is a matter of ladder integrity, we are responding as follows:

• Reduce the rating and peak rating of the players involved
  
• Modify the duo rating formula to further penalize large gaps in rating. At 2800+ rating, it will now be impossible to smurf boost. This may also penalize legitimate duos with a rating gap, but it's the only way to prevent smurf boosting at scale - without the mod team constantly making subjective judgment calls.
  
• To compensate for the above change, slightly reduce the flat adjustment for duoing. This makes duoing slightly better for players that are very close in rating.

Improvements & Fixes

• Double Down: Fixed a display-only bug where the Double Down message didn’t display properly in the tab scoreboard
  
• Double Down: Fixed a display-only bug where purchasing Double Down didn’t show a confirmation popup
  
• Double Down: Fixed a few cases where the Double Down counter wasn’t updating after finishing a game
  
• Double Down: (Workaround) Double Down is no longer purchasable while in queue, to fix some bugs that resulted when a match was found a split second after being purchased.
  
• Spectator: Fixed a bug where attempting to use -ff as a spectator would crash the game
  
• FairPlay: Fixed a case where players would be mistakenly still marked as suspicious players (the “[!] in postgame”) in the case where no players were able to connect properly. Instead, the punishment is ignored since it is likely the server’s fault in those cases.
  
• Tutorial: Disabled pause/unpause in most tutorials, since players who accidentally paused the game had trouble advancing
  
• Tutorial: Fixed a bug in the Attack Types tutorial that prevented players from advancing

[h3]Game Translations[/h3]


Legion TD 2's translations continue to be improved, thanks to major contributions from community members! If you'd like to contribute to improving the game's texts further, visit the following link:

Help Translate Legion TD 2

HUGE thank you to everyone who has helped up to this point!



This patch has some exciting meta improvements by buffing risk-taking in the early game and introduces new supportive units to the game - Warp Wing and Void Manta!

As always, with any major patch, we'll keep a close eye on things and rapidly hotfix as long as needed.

Thank you again for playing Legion TD 2! We hope you continue to enjoy the game.

If you've enjoyed the game, but haven't left a review yet, please consider posting a short (hopefully positive ) review for the game! If the game reaches 90% positive, Steam will give it more visibility = more players = more freelo better matchmaking!

If you enjoy these updates, please give it a Thumbs Up, too!

If you have constructive criticism, let's chat about it. Discord and /r/LegionTD2 on reddit are our main channels of communication, and aside from the development team, there are community helpers who can ensure your feedback is heard, as well as answer pretty much anything you've ever wanted to know about the game. If you want a guaranteed answer from the devs, the monthly AMAs on /r/LegionTD2 are your best bet.

Sincerely,
Team Legion

I'm Jules, and one of my jobs is balancing Legion TD 2. In this dev blog, I share our design philosophy on game balance and some of our secret sauce.


[h3]Principles[/h3]

• Trust the data
  Every time you play the game, your decisions and the resulting outcomes generate valuable data. Data captures information from hundreds of thousands of games and tens of thousands of players, not just from players who give feedback. It's also always recording, not just when players choose to give feedback (after being tilted by a loss ). For balance data, we recommend Drachbot, which closely matches our internal data.
  
• Listen to the community
  Community feedback fills in the gaps when data is lacking or if a unit's design is problematic. If there's feedback that conflicts with data, that might mean a unit is frustrating or situationally unbalanced, even if it's balanced on average. We often make systemic changes based on community feedback, but not everyone speaks English or chooses to give feedback, and it's unrepresentative of the player base at large.
  
• Balance for Ranked
  Most of our effort goes towards balancing Ranked because it is our competitive mode with skill-based matchmaking. In Classic, we only balance outliers if they are heavily degrading the meta.
  
• Balance for top ladder
  One great thing about Legion is that the meta is similar at all levels of play. However, some units are stronger in top ladder because they are more decision-making-intensive (e.g. Pack Rat, Eggsack) or positioning-dependent (e.g. Priestess of the Abyss). We default to balancing for top ladder, which means that some of these high skill cap units are balanced or slightly strong in top ladder but slightly weak otherwise.
  
• Balance for the present
  Anyone can theorize about how strong a unit, combo, or strategy should be or will be once the community learns it. While their prediction might be correct, our philosophy is to balance for the current state of the game. If the prediction becomes reality, it will be reflected in the data and subsequently addressed.
  
• Game balance is one of many tools for making the game fun
  More balanced doesn't always mean more fun. It's more fun having exciting moments where you occasionally high roll a strong combo or win the game on wave 7, mixed with low moments where you have no tanks in your Yolo roll, than to always have a neutral experience.

[h3]Rolls[/h3]

When balancing fighters, we primarily look at a unit's roll data - how often players pick and win with a unit in their roll, regardless of whether they build it. That's because when a unit is built, its win rate becomes confounded by the state of the game. For example, building a Doomsday Machine has a >50% win rate, not because it is overpowered, but because players that build it tend to already be winning. Because Doomsday Machine is the most expensive unit in the game, only players who have a lot of gold (and who are likely already in a winning position) can afford it.



Win rate and pick rate are both important variables.

In low-rated games, win rate is predictive of how strong a unit is (in that rating bracket). As you climb the ladder, players are more informed and play optimally. They are deliberate about what units they pick. This makes pick rate the more predictive variable and win rate less predictive.

One way to think about it: On the far left of the rating distribution, players are effectively picking randomly or based on what art looks most exciting. On the far right of the rating distribution, players are sweatily drafting the comp that will maximize their chance of winning and counter-picking against the meta.

Because of this, win rates flatten out towards 50% once the meta has stabilized. Here's a good example:

Take the game of rock-paper-scissors, but instead of rock always beating scissors, scissors always beating paper, and paper always beating rock, imagine rock beats scissors 75% of the time, scissors beats paper 75% of the time, and paper beats rock 90% of the time.

In low-rated games, where players pick randomly, paper has the highest win rate, scissors in the middle, and rock the lowest.



However, in high-rated games, something interesting happens. Players take into account the different win rates and adjust the frequency at which they throw rock, paper, and scissors. At equilibrium, the win rate of all three choices is 50%. Win rate loses all predictive power.

This example doesn't perfectly describe Legion, as Legion is a much more complex game with an ever-evolving meta, but it illustrates why we can't only consider win rate and why we must also consider pick rate for game balance.

If a unit is high appeal or especially fun, this will affect pick rate. We do our best to factor that in. For example, Sacred Steed is fun to use, so we tolerate her having a higher pick rate than normal.


[h3]Upgrades[/h3]

Roll data helps us determine which rolls are strong or weak, but it doesn't tell us about the balance of individual units (base unit vs. upgrades). To determine that, we consider two factors:

• Unit stats
  Consider Sand Badger. If roll data shows Sand Badger is too strong, we can compare the HP/gold and DPS/gold of Sand Badger and its upgrade Iron Scales, given they have identical typing, range, and utility. If their HP/gold and DPS/gold are roughly the same, it's likely that Sand Badger and Iron Scales are both strong and in need of a nerf. When a base unit has different typing, range, or utility than its upgrade, we can make reasonable approximations about the power budget of those differences or compare against other similar units. Additionally, we can consider unit usage and win rates.
  
• Usage and win rates
  In this context, usage rate is how often a unit is built, and win rate is how often players win when they build that unit. For example, compare Devilfish and its counterpart Seraphin. If the data shows Devilfish is used more than Seraphin and has a higher win rate when built, we'd consider shifting power from Devilfish to Seraphin. Remember that with unit usage and win rates, we run into the confounder problem (where the ability and choice to build a unit reflects your position in the game), so we have to be smart about adjusting for this.

[h3]Openings[/h3]

We don't worry specifically about opening balance too much. That's because if rolls are balanced, it usually means openings are also balanced. If an opening is strong, players will pick and win with that unit more often, which is captured in roll data.

If too much of a unit's power budget is in its strength as an opening, we'll consider damage threshold adjustments to nerf it as an opening, while buffing or maintaining its power elsewhere. An example of that is Fire Elemental, which used to perfectly 2-shot wave 3, making it a powerful and low interaction opening. By lowering its damage slightly and compensating it with increased attack speed, we kept its DPS the same while making it a weaker opening.


[h3]Mercenaries[/h3]

For mercenary balance, we primarily consider usage and win rates, then make adjustments for the following:

• Cheaper mercenaries are used more often
  
• More expensive mercenaries have higher win rates (the same confounder we talked about earlier when building Doomsday Machine also applies when sending Kraken)
  
• Power mercenaries have higher win rates (players that are already in a winning position are more likely to send power mercenaries)

[h3]Waves[/h3]



In Ranked, our target end-wave distribution is a bell curve centered around wave 15 or 16. This accomplishes the following:

• Makes average game time 20 minutes and 95% of games between 10-30 minutes
  
• Avoid spikes in wave power and makes all waves viable to send on
  
• Makes the lethality of a wave (the conditional probability that the game ends, given that you reached that wave) monotonically increasing, which means tension increases as the game goes on. For example, even if more games end on wave 16 than 17, the probability of the game ending on 17 (given you reached wave 17) is higher than then probability of the game ending on 16 (given you reached wave 16).

[h3]Closing Thoughts[/h3]
We care a lot about game balance in Legion TD 2. It's why every major patch has balance changes and why we respond quickly with hotfixes if something is breaking the meta.

When we buff or nerf a unit, the magnitude of the change is usually small, on the order of 1-3%. That's because the game's balance has been finely tuned over the years, and tiny changes make a big difference in a strategy game like Legion. For example, one patch, Sakura went from one of the top performing units to one of the bottom performing units after a 1.5% nerf to her attack speed.

On a personal note, game balance is one of my greatest joys. I grew up being obsessed with game balance and numbers and would often rebalance board games and theorycraft about how to improve game balance in video games. In 2013, I graduated with a degree in statistics from Harvard. From 2012-2015, I worked as a data scientist and game designer at Riot Games, focusing primarily on game balance for League of Legends. I built most of League's game balance frameworks and dashboards, some of which are still in use today 10 years later. After leaving Riot Games, I began development on Legion TD 2 with Lisk, and the rest is history.

Sincerely,
Jules from the Legion TD 2 Team