Legion TD 2 News

Expected patch release: Friday, January 28 (sometime after 7am PDT / 4pm CET)

This is a small patch with balance changes, bug fixes, and Builder Stats. View your performance with each Mastermind playstyle and legion under Profile --> Game Stats --> Builder Stats. Note that these stats do not contain data before this patch.



Major Fixes

• Fixed a bug where units would stutter/jump/rubberband across the screen when there were ~800+ units in the game
  
• Fixed a rare case where a player would get stuck on the Ready Players popup before entering the loading screen
  
• Fixed a rare case where a player would be unable to build fighters
  
• Fixed a display-only bug where Essence/Premium Essence was displayed incorrectly after making a purchase, then finishing a game
  
• Fixed a bug where restoring default options would break the UI
  
• Various infrastructure fixes
  

Major Improvements

• Profiles: In the Game Stats tab, added a new dropdown: Builder Stats, which displays your stats with each Mastermind playstyle/legion type. Note that these stats do not contain data before this patch.
  
• Profiles: In the Match History tab, you can now see which mastermind playstyle/legion you picked.
  
• Tutorial: In some missions, units attack faster than normal to speed things up
  

Minor Fixes

• Season Goals: Fixed a rare case where a player would be mistakenly shown a message that they unlocked Water Spirit Nekomata after only achieving the first season goal
  
• Season Goals: Fixed a bug where achieving the exact rating needed for a season goal didn’t unlock the goal
  
• Graphics: Fixed a bug on lowest graphics settings where projectiles would disappear when zoomed very far out
  
• Tooltips: Fixed Adapt tooltip for Devilfish/Seraphin
  
• Menu Backgrounds: Fixed a bug where changing menu backgrounds would sometimes play the last played special theme music
  
• Shop: Fixed a bug where finding a matchmade game while in the middle of buying a card from the Card Trader would lock up some parts of the UI
  

Gameplay Fixes

• Gold From Leaks: Fixed some cases where a player was mistakenly marked as an eco player, which resulted in not receiving the correct bounty from leaks
  
• Sell: Fixed a bug where selling certain fighters (like Grarl) would round 0.50 down instead of rounding up when computing the refund. So Grarl, for example, will now sell for 131 gold instead of 130 (145*0.9 = 130.5)
  
• Sacred Steed/Pegasus: Fixed a bug where it wouldn’t cast its self buff if a full-mana Firelord/Fenix was nearby as the only nearby mana user
  

Cartel
- Income +10 → +9
- Income after wave 10: -43 → -40

Win rate: 56% (#1)
Pick rate: High (#4)

Castle
- Income after wave 10: +43 → +40

Win rate: 53% (#2)
Pick rate: High (#3)

Yolo
- Rerolling now costs 1 income

Win rate: 52% (#3)
Pick rate: Very high (#1)

This change encourages Yolo players to play with their given roll, rather than rerolling on wave 1, and to only reroll in case of emergency or in the mid/late game.

Cartel, Castle, and Yolo were power creeping over Greed and crowding out other playstyles. Chaos is not being nerfed because it has a lower win rate, and we believe its high popularity stems from it being fun, not OP. We'll continue to monitor and make changes as needed.

Sincerely,
Lisk, Jules, Curing, and Dani

Expected patch release: Wednesday, January 19 (some time after 7am PDT / 4pm CET)

Ranked
- Mastermind: 1 random option per game → All Pick
- Hybrid is no longer playable in ranked

This means you can now select your favorite playstyle every game. We're making this change in response to community feedback, and because it's fun to be able to main your favorite playstyle. We'll be carefully monitoring the effects of the change.

Cartel
- Income after wave 10: -40 → -43
- (4v4) Income after wave 10: -40 → -38

Cash Out
- Starting gold: +18 → +20

Castle
- Income after wave 10: +40 → +43
- (4v4) Income after wave 10: +40 → +38

Hybrid
- No longer playable in ranked
- Tier costs:
— T2: 44 → 45
— T3: 83 → 84
— T4: 132 → 133
— T5: 181 → 182

While Hybrid is fun, it’s a bit too high variance for ranked. It will continue to be playable in classic, campaign, play vs. AI, and custom games.

Gatling Gun
- Full Throttle: Overheat bonus damage received at max stacks: 40% → 50%

Vulcan Cannon
- Bullet Rain: Overheat bonus damage received at max stacks: 50% → 60%

Dark Mage / Honeyflower & Deathcap
- Dark Mage is now smarter about buffing Honeyflower & Deathcap

Happy New Year!

We're happy to announce that Legion TD 2 has reached over 300,000 total players, with thousands of new players joining every week. A warm welcome to everyone.

Nova Cup
Reminder to sign up for our first Nova Cup! Divisions 1, 2, and 3 have been filled, but you can still join the wait list. Division 4 currently has availability. If you miss it this time around, don't worry - there will be another Nova Cup next month.

Season 2022 Dates

• January 6: Current season ends at 8am PDT / 5pm CET. Ranked disabled.
  
• January 6-11: 1v1 featured game mode
  
• January 6-11: Ranked rewards are given out. Player ratings are soft-reset.
  
• January 7-10: v9.00 patch is released (exact date TBD)
  
• January 11: New season begins at 8am PDT / 5pm CET. Ranked re-enabled.

All featured game modes now have the following:

• Skill-based matchmaking: Play with and against players near your skill level.
  
• Visible ratings: Used for matchmaking and bragging rights.
  
• Event Points (EP) leaderboard: Gain and lose EP by winning and losing games. Additionally, +2 EP each game, so play as much as you can to climb.
  
• Rewards:
  • Top 10 finish: 10,000 essence
    
  • Top 100 finish: 5,000 essence
    
  • Top 1,000 finish: 1,000 essence
    
  • Reach 150 EP at any point: 500 essence

Teammates holding you back? No more excuses. Prove yourself in our first ever 1v1 featured game mode! As mentioned above, the 1v1 mode has skill-based matchmaking, ratings, leaderboards, and rewards.

1v1 lasts from January 6 to 11, but we'll bring it back in the future!

• Achieve up to 3 season goals based on your current rating and previous season's rating. Season goals reward players who play early in the season and keep climbing throughout the year.
  
• Goal 1 must be achieved by April 1. Earn 5,000 Essence.
  
• Goal 2 must be achieved by July 1. Earn 5,000 Essence.
  
• Goal 3 must be achieved by October 1. Earn 5,000 Essence.
  
• If you achieve any 2 goals, you immediately unlock the Water Spirit Nekomata skin, which won’t be offered in the shop until next year (January 2023).
  
• Seasons are now 12 months long and named by the current year. Now that the game is fully released, year-long seasons better reflect the stability of the game. We'll still be patching the game and adding new content throughout the year, as usual.

When you play Mastermind in ranked, you are now given 3 playstyle options: Lock-In Fighter, Greed, and a 3rd playstyle randomly selected from a pool. All players in your game receive the same 3rd option. When you play Mastermind in classic, campaign, or play vs. AI, All Pick is enabled, allowing you to select your favorite playstyle every game.



Mastermind Playstyles:

• Lock-In Fighter: +3 income. Lock in a fighter of your choice
  
• Greed: +5 income
  
• Redraw: +3 income. 4 rerolls
  
• Yolo: +7 income. Fully random roll
  
• Chaos: +6 income. New roll every wave. No rerolls
  
• Hybrid: +5 income. Every fighter you build is random. No rerolls
  
• Fiesta: +4 income each time you leak
  
• Cash Out: +17 gold
  
• Castle: +40 income after wave 10
  
• Cartel: +10 income. -40 income after wave 10

- Essence cost of Mastermind playstyles: 9000 --> 5000
- In ranked, Mastermind playstyles are now always unlocked and don't need to be purchased



Immediately unlock the Water Spirit Nekomata skin for free if you achieve any 2 season goals. Otherwise, you can unlock it via the shop when it's offered next year.









New secret cards! Visit the Card Trader to see which game events can trigger a drop.





Matchmaking & Ratings

• Increased the duo penalty for low-rated parties
  
• Decreased the duo penalty for high-rated parties

Pathing & Targeting

• When the wave spawns, enemies will now more dynamically/accurately attack the target nearest to them, rather than "locking on" to a target ahead of time. This means your ranged units are less likely to be unexpectedly targeted when your melee units run ahead of them. This change is most noticeable on ranged waves and against ranged mercenaries when you build ranged units in the front.
  
• Fixed some targeting cases with Sea Serpent, Deepcoiler, Great Boar, Red Eyes, and units revived from Guardian Angel.

Classic 4v4

• The loading screen now shows a rating badge icon based on your hidden classic Elo. Note that this badge does not unlock end-of-season rewards, and it is not displayed on your profile.
  
• The loading screen now displays income icons if an allied players receives bonus income due to lopsided teams.

Guilds

• Essence gain per 2000 Guild Contribution: +3% → +20%. Now even more rewarding to donate cards to your guild!
  
• This bonus also applies to cards donated in the past, since it is based on your total contribution.

Bots

• Platinum, Diamond, and Campaign Hard bots now play more aggressively and take more risks in the early game. This means it's no longer always correct to try to outscale them.
  
• Now smarter about attacking on wave 21.

Major Fixes

• Graphics: Fixed a bug where projectiles would disappear when zoomed out on non-Ultra graphics settings
  
• HUD: Fixed a rare case where rolls didn’t update properly on the HUD
  
• HUD: Fixed a bug where opening the Codex during the loading screen would crash the HUD
  
• Top Games: Fixed a rare case where the leaderboard would unintentionally get wiped

Minor Improvements

• Weekly Challenges: First Place Finishes (counting ties) leaderboard is now a per-season leaderboard instead of lifetime, while True First Place Finishes remains a lifetime leadboard.
  
• Fonts: Swapped out some text fonts that didn’t support Asian characters for player names
  
• Guilds: After being kicked from a Guild, the inbox message now notifies you how much Essence was refunded
  
• Game Coach: When an ally disconnects, now shows a tip about loss forgiveness (drop only half rating if you lose)
  
• Classic: Ranked callout messages now show for all players in the top 250 instead of just the top player
  
• Guilds: Added an Inbox message if your guild application is rejected

Minor Fixes

• Tooltips: Fixed a bug where skin names would sometimes display on units that didn’t have skins equipped
  
• Profiles: Fixed a bug where peak Elo ranks were incorrect for some players
  
• Hotkeys: Fixed a bug where Downgrade accidentally wasn’t in the last ability slot in some cases
  
• Pity Points: Fixed some rare cases where Pity Points weren’t working as intended

Full Eco (worker only strategy)
2v2: Gold earned from leaking while full ecoing: 50% the normal amount → 0% (now the same as 4v4)

Worker-only strategies dominate low Elo and have even been beating top 1% players. This is not an intended strategy.

[h3]Mastermind Playstyles[/h3]

Redraw
- Rerolls: 3 --> 4

Yolo
- Income: 6 --> 7

Chaos
- Income: 5 --> 6
- Rerolls: 1 --> 0

Hybrid
- Tier 2 gold cost: 45 --> 44
- Tier 5 gold cost: 182 --> 181

[h3]Legion Spells[/h3]

Pawn Shop
- Gold: 85 --> 80

Titan
- Health: 1300 --> 1350

[h3]Fighters[/h3]

Dark Mage
- Damage: 36 >> 34
- Mind Warp: Now stacks with other attack speed buffs additively, instead of multiplicatively
- Mind Warp: Attack speed bonus: 30% → 35%

Less extreme with a full stack Sovereign, Sky Queen, or Atom, but otherwise stronger.

Chained Fist
- Attack speed: 0.71 → 0.93
- Removed Unchained Rage

Was mostly unusable on the base form, so we’re removing it. Still exists on the upgrade Oathbreaker.

Oathbreaker
- Damage: 35 → 27
- Attack speed: 0.71 → 0.93

Masked Spirit / False Maiden / Hell Raiser
- Now flying and can be buffed by Leviathan; however, they no longer "double dip" on the benefits of Aerial Command by getting +18% damage and +18% ability damage. They now, as expected, do 18% more damage (36% if 2 Leviathans).

Proton
- Health: 150 >> 140
- Now flying and can be buffed by Leviathan
- Ionic Force: Attack speed bonus now stacks additively, instead of multiplicatively
- Ionic Force: Attack speed bonus per stack: 20% → 30%

Atom
- Health: 780 >> 700
- Now flying and can be buffed by Leviathan
- Ionic Force: Attack speed bonus now stacks additively, instead of multiplicatively
- Ionic Force: Attack speed bonus per stack: 20% → 30%

More DPS at 1-5 stacks of Ionic Force. Less DPS at 6-10 stacks.

Golden Buckler
- Health: 570 → 560
- Attack speed: 0.76 → 0.74

Royal Guard
- Health: 2080 → 2050
- Damage: 67 → 66

Warg
- Attack speed: 1.09 --> 1.1

Lioness
- Health: 2300 --> 2250
- Entourage: Damage bonus now stacks additively, instead of multiplicatively
- Entourage: Damage and damage reduction: 8% --> 9%

Weaker at 0-1 stacks of Entourage. Stronger at 2-6 stacks.

Alpha Male
- Health: 3360 --> 3380

Infiltrator
- Arm with Shuriken: Projectile speed increased by 60%

Orchid
- Shuriken Cyclone: Attack speed bonus: 80% → 85%
- Shuriken Cyclone: Projectile speed increased by 60%

Butcher
- Health: 1330 → 1310
- Attack speed: 1 → 0.99

Head Chef
- Health: 3670 → 3620
- Attack speed: 1 → 0.99

Honeyflower / Deathcap
Fragrance and Noxious Scent are reworked to deal splash damage instead of being a debuff aura. This has the following benefits:

• Synergizes with damage and attack speed buffs, like Hero and APS, which many players expect.
  
• More consistent gameplay performance. Previously, the debuff would apply every 1 second in "absolute" time, which meant they started applying their first tick of damage after anywhere from 0-1 seconds.
  
• Better visual feedback. The damage now aligns with the attack animation. No longer wrongly looks like a non-stackable aura.
  
• Allows Honeyflower and Deathcap to be tuned in the future at different attack speeds.

APS
- Attack speed: 1.41 → 1.43
- Energize: Attack speed bonus now stacks with other attack speed buffs additively, instead of multiplicatively

MPS
- Attack speed: 1.41 → 1.43
- Mythium Core: Attack speed bonus now stacks with other attack speed buffs additively, instead of multiplicatively

Weaker when stacking multiple attack speed buffs. Otherwise, stronger.

Holy Avenger
- Attack speed: 1.25 → 1.23
- Aegis: Attack speed bonus now stacks additively, instead of multiplicatively
- Aegis: Attack speed bonus per stack: 4% → 5%

Sovereign
- Attack speed: 1.25 → 1.23
- Final Judgment: Attack speed bonus now stacks additively, instead of multiplicatively
- Final Judgment: Attack speed bonus per stack: 4% → 5%

Slightly less DPS at 0-1 stacks or at high stacks when paired with other attack speed buffs. Slightly more DPS at 2-9 stacks.

Harpy
- Damage: 16 → 14
- Attack speed: 1.39 → 1.59
- Acrobatics: Attack speed bonus now stacks additively, instead of multiplicatively
- Acrobatics: Attack speed bonus per stack: 10% → 15%

More DPS at 1-8 stacks of Acrobatics. Less DPS at 9-10 stacks.

Sky Queen
- Damage: 72 --> 70
- Attack speed: 1.39 → 1.59
- Acrobatics: Attack speed bonus now stacks additively, instead of multiplicatively
- Acrobatics: Attack speed bonus per stack: 10% → 15%

More DPS at 0-11 stacks of Acrobatics. Less DPS at 12-15 stacks. Stacks up more quickly. No longer perfectly 2-shots wave 3.

Radiant Halo / Arc of Justice
- Now flying and can be buffed by Leviathan
- Solar Flare: Attack speed bonus is now additive with other attack speed buffs, instead of multiplicative
- Solar Flare: Can now stack with itself, making it stronger with mana effects

Priestess of the Abyss / Azeria
- Invigorate: Attack speed bonus is now additive with other attack speed buffs, instead of multiplicative
- Invigorate: Can now stack with itself, making it stronger with mana effects

Berserker
- Health: 2130 → 1880
- Damage: 30 → 24
- Attack speed: 1.33 → 2
- Brawler: Damage per stack: 9 → 5

Fatalizer
- Health: 6100 → 5340
- Damage: 86 → 68
- Attack speed: 1.33 → 2
- Duelist: Damage per stack: 25 → 15

Faster attack speed makes Berserker and Fatalizer truer to their name and identity,

[h3]Mercenaries[/h3]

Snail
- Health: 280 >> 290
- Attack speed: 0.91 >> 0.96

Diversifying the wave 1 meta with slightly more Snails.

We hope you enjoy the patch!

Sincerely,
Lisk, Jules, Curing, Dani

Happy holidays, everyone! We're excited to introduce our newest tournament series, the Nova Cup! The first Nova Cup takes place January 15-16. The goal is to have 1 Nova Cup every month.

The Nova Cup will be casted and streamed at twitch.tv/ltd2

• Sign-up begins now and ends January 14th at 10am PDT / 7pm CET.
  
• To sign up, find a teammate and fill out this form
• Join the Legion TD 2 Discord and set your server nickname to match your in-game name.
  
• The first 16 teams to sign up in each division can participate. 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.

Saturday, January 15

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

Sunday, January 16

• Check-in window: 8:45 - 9:15am PDT / 5:45 - 6:15pm CET
  
• Games: 10am - 1pm PDT / 7 - 10pm CET
  
  • Semi-finals (Best of 3)
    
  • Final (Best of 5)

Check-in

• To check-in, type !checkin in the Discord’s tournament-lobby channel. Both players on your team must check in during the check-in window above.
  
• Any team whose 2 players fail to check in will be disqualified. The next team on the waitlist will be contacted in the Discord. That team has 3 minutes for both players to type !checkin. Otherwise, the next team on the waitlist will be contacted.
  
• Countdown to check-in

Format

• Mastermind 2v2
  
• Single elimination
  
• Best of 3. Best of 5 final
  
• Teams are seeded based on average peak rating this season

Division 4

• The highest rated player on your team must be less than 1400 peak rating this season
  
• Prize: 7200 premium essence ($50) for the winning team
  
• League Points
  
  • 1st: 3
    
  • 2nd: 2
    
  • 3rd/4th: 1

Division 3

• The highest rated player on your team must be between 1400 - 1800 peak rating this season
  
• Prize: 14,400 premium essence ($100) for the winning team
  
• League Points
  
  • 1st: 3
    
  • 2nd: 2
    
  • 3rd/4th: 1

Division 2

• The highest rated player on your team must be between 1800 - 2200 peak rating this season
  
• Prize: $150 ​for the winning team
  
• League Points
  
  • 1st: 3
    
  • 2nd: 2
    
  • 3rd/4th: 1

Division 1

• The highest rated player on your team must be greater than 2200 peak rating this season
  
• Prize: $300 ​for the winning team
  
• League Points
  
  • 1st: 3
    
  • 2nd: 2
    
  • 3rd/4th: 1

Prizes are split between the players on the team. $ prizes are sent in USD via PayPal. If PayPal is not an option, the prize will be converted to Premium Essence.

Division Rules

• Ratings are calculated at the time of sign-up.
  
• Players must sign up with their highest-rated account. If a player signs up with a smurf, they will be banned from this Nova Cup and the next 2 Nova Cups.
  
• A team may be moved up or down a division at the discretion of the tournament director. This can occur if a player has a high win rate or a high classic rating, or if it will improve the overall fairness of the tournament.
  
• Any player who gets 1st in divisions 2, 3, or 4 must move up to a stronger division in their next 2 Nova Cup participations.

League Points
The 10 players with the most league points after the December 2022 Nova Cup will receive exclusive in-game badges, numbered 1-10 based on ranking.

Substitution
Substitute players are not allowed. If a team cannot present both players in a timely fashion, that team forfeits the next game.

Lobby Creation and Position Priority

• The team with the better seed has position priority in the first game of each match. Position priority then goes to the team that lost the previous game.
  
• The better seed team always creates the custom game lobby and selects “Tournament” as the custom game mode.
  
• The better seed always plays on the west team.
  
• The team with position priority chooses the sending order.

Reporting Results
The team that wins the match should report the match result to tournament-results. For example, Banana Boys beats Brute Gang 2-1.

Remakes

• In general, we will not honor remake requests. Remakes cause delays that compromise the entire tournament's schedule.
  
• You should not request a remake, unless it's an obviously critical bug, such as being unable to build fighters. To request a remake, notify staff that you are requesting a remake immediately at the time of the game-impacting bug. Staff will make a decision based on (1) the severity of the bug, (2) the state of the game, and (3) implications on the tournament's schedule. If it is determined that the bug critically impacted the team's ability to win and if remaking wouldn't disrupt the tournament's schedule, a remake may be granted.
  
• Remakes will never be granted if either player on your team leaked >= 40% on any wave (and either player on your team isn’t on fire) before the critical bug or if either opponent is on fire.

Tournament director: Seraphin. For questions, please @Seraphin in the Discord.

See you on January 15th! And best of luck in the final days of the season.

Sincerely,
Lisk, Jules, Curing, and Dani

Gatling Gun
- Health: 900 → 1350
- Cost: 180 → 190
- Damage: 31 → 39
- Full Throttle: Attack speed at max stacks: 100% >> 80%
- Full Throttle: Now overheats and takes up to 40% more damage at max stacks

Vulcan Cannon
- Health: 2570 → 3930
- Damage: 80 → 102
- Bullet Rain: Attack speed at max stacks: 130% >> 100%
- Bullet Rain: Now overheats and takes up to 50% more damage at max stacks

Gatling Gun is performing well as an opening, but both Gatling Gun and Vulcan Cannon are underperforming beyond that due to being under-statted. Additionally, they are too weak on ranged waves. Summary of changes:
- Stat buffs to increase their baseline power level
- Cost increase to Gatling Gun to keep it balanced as an opening
- Slight reduction in max attack speed and new “overheat” mechanic to buff them on ranged waves (thank you to Pennywise for the mechanic idea and to others for feedback)

Gatling Gun & Vulcan Cannon
- Now no longer block the pathing of other units
- Now spawn at the top of the catch area when catching leaks

Major Fixes
- Fixed a HUD bug where the king sometimes didn’t show up
- Fixed a bug where the Victory/Defeat screen sometimes didn’t show up

Minor Fixes
- Fixed some loading screen cosmetic bugs
- Fixed a rounding issue with damage tracker
- Improved clarity of Guardian Angel tooltip