Aug 8, 2022

Conqueror's Blade - Booming_dingyi.shu

Hola Warlords!

This is the first episode of Ask the Devs, and we want to get started with questions focusing on the current season. In the Ask the Devs, we'll be choosing the questions from within our community from the last 30 days and responding to these.

We'll keep this series going forever, and this episode is just the beginning. Let’s play!

1. Why did the team decide to make a second Viking-themed season rather than one with a new theme?

The Viking era is too vast to cover in a single season. After the Wolves of Ragnarök which focused on the early Germanic and Scandinavian mythologies (Sons of Fenrir, Berserkers, Shieldmaidens) many players requested that we added Vikings more akin to the massive and brutal warriors of history.

Many asked for the Huskarls and Varangian guards. And with those two units, the game now features 5 Viking-inspired units, rivaling the rosters of our units inspired by China and Western Europe.

2. Why did the team decide to only release 2 units this season?

As this is the first time ever we've only released 2 units, we believe it‘s’ important that we explain our reasoning.

First of all, designing, and creating units' behaviors graphs, animations, and balance takes plenty of resources and effort. This means that those working on these will be unable to undertake other equally important tasks. We have collected a lot of feedback from our players that a too big focus on releasing new units may slow down the game as a whole, and that perhaps we should focus more on fixing balance issues and bugs.

We wanted to give our design team and animators time to polish existing animations, AI behaviors, and work on improving the balance of existing units and heroes.

The team was able to release weekly balance patches and address multiple issues for heroes like the Glaive and Nodachi during the production of Helheim. These changes are our initial steps for making these two heroes more viable in the current meta, and we will be analyzing data before making any further changes.

Regarding unit balance - we made changes to the S3 Ottoman-inspired units - Azaps, Jannisaries, and Royal Janissaries, adjusted the Shieldmaidens slightly, and re-worked the Mongolian-inspired T5 Kheshigs. In addition, we made over a hundred minor changes to other units and worked on AI behaviors, animation bugs, and map balancing.

3. How does the team select seasonal themes for new seasons?

Many factors play a part in the decision-making. First, while Conqueror's Blade is not a historically accurate game, it is heavily inspired by history and encompasses certain historical time periods from which we seek inspiration for factions/units/stories. We want the units on the battlefield to look organically when fighting one another, as opposed to having a melting pot of units from every possible era all mashed into one.

While we are based in China, we are an international company with an intercultural team comprising members from all across the globe, similar to how our players come from all over the world. This is why we aim to create a game with a multicultural representation of factions and units.

Some themes and cultures are expansive and very popular among our players, and we naturally want to expand on these when possible.

We need to respect the lore and world vision of Conqueror's Blade. Each following season must be connected and naturally integrated into the world with respect to the game's geography and the lore of previous seasons.

Finally, players often express their opinion on desired factions. And, of course, the marketing potential, timing, and current trends play a part in which theme we choose.

4. Are there any plans to remove "Play X mode" quests from Seasonal Unit Challenges to make them more accessible?

We are continuously adjusting Weekly Challenges and Unit Challenges and plan to continue doing so throughout the upcoming seasons. As many players have noticed, we are adding more and more alternative choices for challenges so that each player can choose those that they enjoy.

At the same time, we want to encourage players to play a variety of game modes and not only grind Siege Battles. That's why we plan to add more alternative goals that can be completed within PvP sieges while still retaining the challenges of other game modes.

5. Are there any plans to introduce more weapons into the game?

New weapons are always a hot topic when it comes to a new season. And for sure, we would love to add more weapons to Conqueror's Blade and plan to do so throughout the upcoming seasons. However, that being said, we won't be adding new weapons as often as we add units due to balancing reasons and the development time required.

We've seen some really cool ideas from the community, and have had serious discussions about those (and I do believe some of you have received our feedback). But it also takes plenty of time to bring new features into the game. Most importantly, we need all of you to keep sharing your crazy and creative ideas with us! You guys are like a never-ending spring of fantastic ideas!

6. Why did the team decide to change up some of the terms in the English MY.GAMES version?

We have partnered with MY.GAMES for years, and they have been supporting Conqueror's Blade in NA and EU ever since we released there, both regions which include a great number of English-speaking players.

We recently began working on an intercontinental mode for SA, EU, and NA to fulfill our vision for Conqueror’s Blade: to enable players from all over the world to have fun together. Confusions and differences in terminologies between the different English versions shouldn't be barriers standing in the way.

We feel you that it'll be difficult when some things suddenly get renamed. So we have announced our plan in advance and will be implanting these changes gradually to give you time to grow accustomed to them. At the same time, we have opened a channel on our English Discord for discussions over some terminology. We are also planning to provide more interesting information about how these units got their names to fuel the discussion.

AND, we have explained it with more detailed thoughts on Discord earlier (check on our Discord #en_term_changes)!

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That's all for the first episode! We know that you have plenty of other questions that need answering. While we cannot directly invite you to be part of the development of the game, we do want to keep you up to date with all that's to come. Just keep sharing your thoughts with us!

In regards to the English Discord, we've made some changes to the channels so that it's hopefully more apparent what each channel is aimed at. Click Here to join our Discord and follow our English Twitter!

Thank you, Warlords! And see you on the battlefield!