Minion Masters!




Throughout the various Battle Passes we've released this year, we always included small insights of lore into the world behind Minion Masters, telling stories of new masters or conflicts between factions that could be reflected in the updates we made. In our next Expansion, for the first time you'll be able to share the journey one of our Masters and their allies will take in their quest to retrieve a legendarily powerful artifact before it falls into the wrong hands. Will you be able to command them to overcome the trials they face? Stay tuned...




While his #2 tournament is drawing to a close BadAsAFish80 has opened registrations for the next tournament that will be bigger and better than before.

https://www.toornament.com/en_GB/tournaments/2912934180307738624/information

Key points:
- Morellia Dynasty skin and other in-game content to be won, plus the event additionally grants experience towards in-game content via the Team Mana Frenzy Community.
- Winner (plus others depending on participant numbers) to be invited to Sinobii's cash prize monthly tournament.
- 1v1 / Dual Elimination / Best of 3 format / No wildcards
- A flexible schedule gives 3 days for you and your opponent to arrange and complete your match for each round at your convenience.
- Start planned for Monday 7th October.

If you have any questions please feel free to reach out to BadAsAFish80 on Discord (all the details are in the link) and he will be happy to help you.

Many thanks for your time and I look forward to seeing you in the tournament.

Good Luck, Fish.

Cheers from BetaDwarf!

Minion Masters!

We've got a bit of a shorter blog post this week as we're working on lots of awesome future content for Minion Masters, but that doesn't mean the news we have to talk about is by any means small.




Coming in Version 1.6, we'll be removing the ability for two players in a Premade 2v2 Lobby to queue with the same Master. A big part of what gives Premade teams a huge advantage over regular solo queue players is the ability to co-ordinate their deckbuilding perfectly, and with some masters synergizing too well with themselves (Double Mordar, Double Stormbringer, Double Ravager) it could often feel outright unfair as a result. When making a 2v2 lobby, an error message will come up if you try to Search while sharing the same master as your partner.

After a small delay from Version 1.5, we're fairly confident that we'll be able to include the Reconnect feature in Version 1.6. Currently, when a player disconnects from a match, the game will instantly end - Giving the win credit to the player (or team) that were still present. With the new Reconnect feature, the match will continue until completion when a team dies. The disconnected player will be able to reconnect to the match as soon as their issues are over, and hopefully start mounting their epic comeback.

In 2v2, this also removes the scenarios where a teammate disconnects during the win animation, and not being credited the victory as a result, or a game that you feel was still winnable by yourself resulting in you being thrown back to the main menu.

Between this and the Premades Double Master change, we're hoping the quality of the 2v2 game mode will be improved significantly in Version 1.6!

After the successful first TCL tournament, we've been provided with a full schedule of their planned upcoming tournaments. You'll hear more details about them as they approach, but check them out:

• October, Saturday 12th - Official event.
  
• October, Saturday 26th - 2v2 Guild Wars.
  
• November, Saturday 2nd - Official event.
  
• November, Wednesday 13th - Casual event.
  
• November, Saturday 23rd - Official event.
  
• December, Wednesday 4th - Casual event.
  
• December, Saturday 14th - Official event / Season End.
  
• Make sure to participate and get competitive experience with our awesome high level players!

Cheers from BetaDwarf!

Minion Masters!

We've got some extra followup from last week's Apep redesign reveal and some details of Minion Masters for Steam China:

Last week we showed off Apep's brand new look. We're ecstatic at all of the positive feedback we received from all of you, and there were quite a number of requests to show off what all of his previous skins look like with the new model. Well, they've just been completed and we're ready to reveal our new Snake God's outfits:




The Molten, Toxic and Blood Apep skins will retain their animated emission vfx, which we'll hopefully showcase on the next Developer Stream. Which one is your favourite?



Minion Masters has always had a healthy Chinese audience, which is why we were super excited to be one of the first titles confirmed for the platform's release. We're hard at work making sure everything is in the right place for the future release, and while it's a significant time away before anything concrete happens, the possibility to spread Minion Masters to another audience is a fantastic prospect.

For those who've already followed the news and voiced concerns, we want to emphasize that no existing in-game content will be affected by our plans for Steam China. While there will be alternative models, art etc. to meet Chinese regulations, they will be exclusive to the Steam China edition.

To those Chinese Minion Masters players who have been playing already, we want to thank you for showing your support and hope we can bring you an even better experience over the coming months!



You've only got a couple of days left to get your entries in for the Minion Masters Emote Contest! Entries will be closing this Monday at 0900 UTC+2, at which point we'll be selecting 5 entrants to be polled by the community for the winners! We've got some fantastic entries so far - Will yours be among them?

Don't forget to tune into the brand new grassroots Minion Masters tournament happening on Saturday at 1300 UTC! It's a Sideboard Double Elimination format with over $200 in cash alone up for grabs as well as the brand new Dynasty Morellia skin! Join the TCL server for all the information on the event as it happens: https://discord.gg/qNCEtRG

Cheers from BetaDwarf!

Minion Masters!

With the balance changes of Version 1.5 hitting the game, it's time to get to work on Version 1.6, and we've already got quite a bit to share. So let's not waste any time:

As many of you no doubt saw on the roadmap, we've been tinkering away at a visual upgrade for Apep the Almighty behind the scenes for a while now to bring him up to the better standard of our other masters. The model he currently uses is from our previous game Forced Showdown, where his design was to be somewhat brutish and arrogant, resorting to direct approaches to a fight. A more modern Apep is a much more sinister and cunning figure however, manipulating his devoted followers for his own gain. Here's what our redesigned Slither Lord looks like:




As with the Slither visual upgrades, we've incorporated a healthy dose of Aztec mythology into this new look. We're looking forward to hearing what you think!




Don't forget to enter our second Minion Masters Discord Emote Contest! There's still plenty of time to enter, with the deadline being the 23rd of September. Three lucky winners will be having their emotes permanently added to our server, so if you think you've got what it takes to make some cool icons, check out our blog post here and read how to enter!

1.4 saw the release of our new ranked league, the Contender League, a new height to reach requiring players to prove themselves in the Grand Master ranks by attaining 2000 Ranking Points without the aid of win streaks. It's been a lot of fun seeing those that push themselves above and beyond the others, and we've got some statistics to share from its first ranked season.

Of all Grand Masters in each rank, the following amount of players proved themselves to reach the prestigious rank of Contender:

• Solo 1v1: 1.74%
  
• Solo 2v2: 3.11%
  
• Premade 2v2: 4.42%

We're very interested to see how those numbers change in future seasons! Could you be skilled enough to be in that top percentile of Minion Masters players?


A new Competitive Minion Masters League will be starting very soon! The Challenger League, headed by long time Minion Masters veteran Julaiwnl will be featuring its first Double Elimination Tournament on the 21st of September. Here's what they have to say:

Exciting news, Masters!

A few passionate community members are now going to be hosting monthly tournaments for all of you to enjoy, whether you are a casual player, or a really competitive one!

The Challenger League is now open to the public, and looking for its first champion!

The TCL: Volco Cup 1 will be hosted on September 21st, 13:00 UTC.

It will consist of a Double-Elimination Bracket (Best of 3 & Best of 5), with people submitting 4 decklists + Sideboard.

All participants must join the TCL Discord to compete: https://discord.gg/qNCEtRG

Prize Pool of $200 + In-Game Prizes, check on Rulebook below!

Take a look at the full rulebook of the event here: http://docs.google.com/document/d/1SpQc4yC4G0ngJVUwKMbWDZlAsNY68wO9xkpXBQVWS_A

Register to the TCL: Volco Cup 1 on challonge: https://challonge.com/TCLVolcoCup1

The TCL Staff wishes you all good luck!

We're certainly looking forward to more tournament play, and we hope you'll be there to support this new grassroots league!

Cheers from BetaDwarf!

Minion Masters!

It’s been a hectic month for Minion Masters after the release of Sand Wars with Version 1.4, and it’s time for a small spot of house cleaning with Version 1.5 bringing you balance changes and bug fixes. Initially we had planned to include the Reconnect feature as indicated on the Roadmap, but with vacations being taken to enjoy the last bits of summer we’ve had to push it back for now, though it’s still high on our list of ideas.

Bridge Shrine

• Health 250 > 300
  
• Now has Placement Aura (I.E. Caged Prowler, cannot be placed in the gap beside the Master Tower)

Chain Lightning

• Radius 8 > 7

Combustion

• Duration 2 > 2.5
  
• Cast Delay 1 > 0.5
  
• Targets are now stunned for the duration of Combustion
  
• Master damage 15 > 50

Crossbow Guild

• [BUG FIX] Production Speed 4.2 > 4.8
  
• Now has Placement Aura
  
• Spawn Radius 4 > 3

Crystal Sentry

• Damage 55 > 60

Cursebearer

• Curse Aura persistence after death 5 > 4

Dragon Nest

• Health 250 > 350
  
• Now has Placement Aura

Guardian

• Protection Range 8 > 9

Herald Ah’Mun

• Damage 175 > 200
  
• Sacrifice healing 50 > 75

Illusory Cleaver

• Damage on death 30 > 20

Morellia

• Book of the Dead cooldown 25 > 30

Rock Rivals

• Enemy Living Statue now spawns further away from the Master tower

Shars’Rakk Twins

• Mana Cost 7 > 8

Snake Druid

• Now has Call Slitherbound

Stun Blast

• Cast Delay 1 > 0.5

Styxi

• Depression Time 6 > 5

Swarmer Totem

• Swarmers spawned 2 > 3
  
• Production time 6.6 > 7
  
• Gets Placement Aura
  
• Duration 60 > 50

Wreckinator 9000

• Slam and bam damage 110 > 150

Misc

• Created new advanced tooltips for some Minion Abilities to better clarify their statistics.
  
• Added a notification for a player coming online in the Guild Chat.
  
• A new House Event has started! This time you can collect keys for your house and earn your choice between a Radiant Morellia skin, 10 copies of Fire Imp, or 10 copies of an unknown Rare card. Additionally, for this event we’ve doubled the rewards from Twitch Drops!

Bugs

• Fixed the number of Total Wins not being displayed - Thanks everyone!
  
• Fixed Lord-Sentinel Thelec not properly having Mana Surge in his description - Thanks Steven!
  
• Fixed being able to purchase shop offers of cards you had at Max Glory - Thanks FFA!
  
• Various fixes to Localizations, including tooltips that were previously set to English to prevent bugs.
  
• Fixed Daily Quest progress being visually granted even if you lose
  
• Fixed an issue that could cause mass freezes.
  
• Fixed Caged Prowler Avatar’s “Z”s being too large on the leaderboard.
  
• Fixed being able to buy items you already own from the Shop.
  
• Fixed Lone Scout not being highlighted if she started the match in your hand.
  
• Fixed an issue where Call Slitherbound would sometimes display on a card, but not summon any additional units.
  
• Fixed a case where Wreckinator could continue attacking after death.
  
• Fixed Grand Master ranks not displaying at the start of a match.
  
• Fixed Cursebearer Aura particles becoming far too large when applied to certain minions.

Cheers from BetaDwarf!

Minion Masters!

We're back to our regularly scheduled blog posts after some dwarven Summer vacation. Version 1.5 is coming up swiftly, and we've got lots of exciting news for Minion Masters, both patch related and external!



Production Buildings such as Bridge Shrine and Crossbow Guild have been integral parts of Minion Masters since the start of our journey. Loved by some, disliked by others, they've always been a hot topic of debate when it comes to the balance of the game, having defined the metagame at several points in Minion Masters history. A core part of what made these strategies so powerful at times was the ability to slot the buildings in a small "pocket" next to the Master Tower, rendering them immune from most direct pushes the opposing Master could make, needing to rely on spells such as Beam of DOOM! and Infiltration to get the job done.

This ultimately meant Production Buildings could feel very uninteractive at times as there was little commitment needed to maintain their presence on the board, allowing a constant stream of reliable Crossbow Dudes or the ability to gain a huge XP advantage with some enemy decks having no real opportunity to contest them. This was doubly so with dedicated Building-target minions like Rammer and Bazooka Scrat who could only target the Master due to their targeting mechanics. With the release of Might of the Slither Lords, we introduced a "Placement Aura" mechanic to Caged Prowler to make it a more involved card, requiring proper commitment from its owner in order to get its payoff.

We believe that, going forward, this is a desirable trait to have on Production Buildings and will enable better balance considerations for how impactful they can be. As such, Bridge Shrine, Crossbow Guild, Swarmer Totem, and Dragon Nest will all be receiving the Placement Aura mechanic in Version 1.5, along with some other balance changes to compensate for this. We'd love to hear what you think about this upcoming change to Production Buildings, so keep us informed on our usual channels!



We're proud to announce that we're currently exploring the opportunity of getting Minion Masters onto your phone! We want to make sure everyone in the world can enjoy Minion Masters, and as the game grows we can do crazier things with the game that wouldn't have been possible before. We're particularly fond of the idea of making it accessible enough that you can invite your friend over, and have him download Minion Masters and jump right into a Team Battle with you. Minion Masters for iOS is an exciting opportunity for the game, so stay tuned in the future for updates as we progress!


As many have noticed, our Minion Masters Roadmap estimated Version 1.5 to have a Match Reconnect feature. Unfortunately, due to a number of Dwarves taking Vacations after the big release of Version 1.4 and our choice to prioritize the investigation (and fixing) of various server issues that came up after the patch, we weren't able to fit it into this patch. It's still very much on our list of features we want to make, but there just isn't the time to include it in this patch. Hopefully we'll have more news about it soon.


We're opening signups for the Minion Masters PTR groups again! Selected users will be able to help us balance future content and engage in behind the scenes discussions with like-minded players. To sign up, simply follow this link here and follow the instructions: https://forms.gle/5y43SVMtjQR991Lt7



Coming this Sunday is the first Sinobii's Battleground Invitational tournament! The conclusion to his thrilling Battleground Ladder, Sinobii offers an exciting tournament full of the top players from this Competitive season competing for real cash prizes and an all-new Dynasty Morellia skin. You can read up on all of the details for the Tournament here - We'll certainly be tuning in to check out the action. And if you enjoy the experience, maybe you too should consider entering the next series of Ladder matches to compete with the best.

Sinobii's Battleground Invitational will be held on Sunday, September 1st, with the stream starting at 1200 Noon EST.



BadAsAFish80 is holding his 2nd Minion Masters Tournament and would love for you to join. There are in game prizes including a rare skin and Big Dwarf packs available plus invitations to Sinobii's Battleground Invitational which has actual cash prizes to be won! The tournament has a very flexible set up and is scheduled over a 2 week period (Registrations open 27 August 2019 - Tournament starts when we have enough entrants) to maximise the number of people that can participate. This is a Double Elimination tournament featuring no wildcards.

To find out more and to register check it out right here!

If you have any questions please reach out to BadAsAFish80 🐟#0275.

Cheers from BetaDwarf!

Get the new $15 Might of the Slither Lords DLC 100% off this weekend!


Biggest Minion Masters expansion to date!
Haven’t played recently? Try everything from the last updates; Guild Conquest, 2on2, two new Masters, Faction Mechanics, Expeditions, massive Balance changes, Mayhems, and more.


Thank you!
BetaDwarf

Minion Masters!

War! The Scrat factions have waged an all-out assault on the Slither Dominion with their new contraption of carnage, the Wreckinator 9000, to fulfill their insatiable desires for more “Shinies”. The Slither Lords are swift to retaliate, with Apep’s most formidable Herald, Ah’Mun, leading his army of Slitherbound on a mission of pest control…

Sand Wars is a new Expansion packed with new content.

Featuring 10 new Cards:




















New Mechanic: Poison
Deals 20 damage per Second. Extra applications of Poison extend the Duration, but do not stack the Damage. Cannot be applied to Masters or Buildings.

New Faction Mechanic: Call Slitherbound
Adds a Slitherbound Minion to a Slither card in your hand. Summon all Slitherbound when played. Max 3.

New Faction Mechanic: Sacrifice
Kill all Slitherbound you command.

The following Slither minions now have Call Slitherbound:

• Empowered Soulstealer
  
• Hypnotise
  
• Living Statue
  
• Musketeer
  
• Rabid Prowler

• This Expansion will last until November
  
• 10 new cards have been released!
  
• Two brand new skins have been released - Scrattsu and Stormfeather!
  
• Get your hands on Minion Masters’ first Legendary Arena - Altar of the Almighty Apep!
  
• Scrat and Armoured Scrats have received a completely new model!
  
• All existing Slither Cards have had their models and textures updated to create a new, cohesive art style for the Slither faction, inspired by Aztec and Egyptian culture. Learn more about it on the blog

Contender League & Season Roll-over Changes

A new summit for the most skilled of Minion Masters players has appeared!

• Achieve Contender rank by earning 2000 Ranking Points while in the Grand Master League.
  
• Contender rank players earn a special in-game chat icon to signify their achievement.
  
• Your ranking points are now always displayed for Grand Master and Contender ranks.
  
• Contender has a Conquest Glory modifier of 250%.
  
• It is now possible to drop out of the Grand Master and Contender Leagues if your Ranking Points drop below 0.
  
• The amount of points required to rank up from Silver and above have been increased.
  
• The Season Roll-over now gives players a higher rank in a new season than before. For example, Grand Master and Contender players will start a new season at Platinum 5.
  
• Season Roll-overs now happen during Update downtime, rather than at the start of the month.

Share the love!

• When purchasing Shop Offers for rubies, you now have the option to Gift the offer to a friend or a member of your Guild instead for the same price.
  
• The other user will receive their Gift instantly.
  
• Gifting cannot be used to buy a user the same Shop Offer more than once, or buy a Shop Offer the user has already purchased.

Beam of DOOM!

• No longer deals 50% damage to non-Master buildings

Brothers of Light/Caeleth Dawnhammer

• Damage 130 > 140

Demon Warrior

• Damage 100 > 110

Fire Imp

• First tick of damage removed

Gax the World Bomb

• Damage 175 > 200

Haunting Hugger

• Damage 20 > 40

Lord-Sentinel Thelec

• Health 500 > 600

Mythic (Keyword)

• You can no longer have two of the same Minion with the Mythic keyword in play on your team at a time.
  Developer Note
  
• For example, you cannot have two Nyrvirs on your field at the same time.

Rabid Prowler

• No longer activated by having a friendly Minion with Rage on the field.
  
• Now has the Sacrifice keyword - Rabid Prowler gains Rage if you control any Slitherbound Minions, and kills all of them.

Scrat Tank

• Health 700 > 650

• A new House event has started. Collect all the keys for your House of choice and choose a Legendary card as a reward!
  
• Our Twitch Extension is fully functional again! Enable it on your Twitch Streams to streamline your viewers’ audience interactions.
  
• The Conquest retry price has been adjusted from 100/500 Rubies to 100/300.
  
• Added Master Damage and Cast Time stats to certain Spell cards.
  
• Various improvements and changes to Card Descriptions to clarify mechanics.
  
• Added new VFX to Gax the World Bomb.
  
• Added the ability to sign-up for the Newsletter directly in-game.

• Fixed an issue where Morellia’s Basic Attack would stop working - Thanks Kyoshiro!
  
• Fixed Bridge Buddies’ tooltip being outdated - Thanks Steven!
  
• Fixed Empowered Soul Stealer still having Marksmanship in his preview - Thanks TomatoMato!
  
• Fixed Guardian protecting Milloween - Thanks Joel Jones!
  
• Fixed the Red Dot indicator for Deck Building remaining on if you didn’t own a card that had the “Changed” status - Thanks... everyone!
  
• Fixed Nether Bat being able to blink while Stunned.
  
• Fixed an issue where a Jungle Jumble discounted by Morellia would grant more than 3 cards.
  
• Fixed in-game Chat showing the wrong emoticons.
  
• Fixed freezes caused by Reporting a bug in Challenge mode.
  
• Fixed the Recruit Friend button on the Colossus avatar not doing anything.

We’ve got loads more planned in the future for Minion Masters. Keep your eyes peeled on our Road Map for hints at future content and updates!

Cheers from BetaDwarf!

Minion Masters!



Coming in Version 1.4 is a brand new Ranked League for those that want a challenge beyond Grand Master. There'll be changes to the existing Grand Master league, where your ranking points within Grand Master are now visible on a scale of 0 to 2000. It's now possible to drop out of Grand Master, much like other ranks, and once you achieve 2000 points within Grand Master you will be promoted to the brand new Contender rank. Keep in mind that there are no Win Streaks in Grand Master and full rank loss for defeats, meaning reaching this new League will be a testament to your prowess as a true Minion Master.

While you're in Contender league, you'll receive a new icon next to your name in the in-game chat to represent your accomplishment. However, it's still possible to drop out of Contender if you lose too many matches, so stay on your toes!

The Contender League is just our first step in our ranked changes, and we have many plans for the new rank such as E-sports related interactions. This also of course comes hand in hand with our new changes to the rank roll-over being at the start of every new patch to ensure the entire season is played on the same set of balance changes.



Starting with Version 1.4, you will also be able to buy gifts for your friends and Guildmates! Any Shop Offer item can be instead sent to a friend of your respective platform or any member of your guild, paying the usual costs. A user cannot be gifted the same Offer more than once however, and if you are gifted a Shop Offer you cannot purchase it for yourself from the store. Get out there and spread the love!

On top of the upcoming Sand Wars battle pass, Version 1.4 will be holding host to a number of Balance Changes we've been working on. It won't be the truly crazy roster of 20+ changes we had in Version 1.3, but some adjustments to existing cards that need an extra nudge to be effective, or perhaps a tuning down in regards to their power level. We also have a change coming to the Mythic mechanic that only allows a singular copy of a Mythic Card to be in play on your team at a time. You'll be able to read all about these Balance Changes as we get closer to the release date of Version 1.4 on the 16th of August.

That's all for today, Masters. We're super excited to bring these features and more in Version 1.4, and we're looking forward to your feedback as always!

Cheers from BetaDwarf!

Coming in Version 1.4 is a set of visual redesigns for the Slither faction. We wanted to craft a unique identity for the units to help set them apart from other factions such as the Empyreans by ensuring a similar color scheme and unique identifiers so that they are easier to recognise in a match. To that end, we've gone for a more Teal-based color scheme with feathers to help with the visual flair the units provide. We also wanted to help cement the Slither faction's roots in Aztec and Egyptian culture/mythology - Upcoming cards in the brand new Sand Wars Battle Pass will further indicate and explain the culture of the Slither.

We're a bit late to the draw, but Minion Masters was in the Top 5 games with highest playercounts during our launch in May! Steam's post here details that the support of our awesome community pushed our Peak player count above and beyond the norm. And with the content-packed update that is Version 1.4 swiftly approaching, we can't wait to see if we can smash that record again!


The community Deckbuilding website, MM Deckbuilder recently updated to have all cards and masters up to Version 1.3! You can create decks of any kind as if you owned a full collection, with useful stat calculations such as the amount of Shards required to craft the deck, or how many of your units can hit Flying units. Once you're done crafting your perfect deck, you can share it with everyone else as well as your insights on how to play it, and have users vote on the quality of your decklist. High rated decks get pushed to the front page!

It's a fantastic site made by u/TheConcepteur on Reddit, and we highly encourage you to check it out here!



If you're a fan of high level competitive Minion Masters (and who isn't?) you'll love the 35th King Puff Cup happening this weekend! Happening on July 27th at 1400 UTC, you can tune in and watch top players fight through the Last Master Standing format for their piece of the $600 prize pool. Make sure to stop on by their Twitch channel here!

Cheers from BetaDwarf!