Champions 2.0

Our motivation behind this work

While Champions are an exciting part of the game there are three aspects to them we feel can be improved.

1. They have a wide variety of bonuses and abilities which can make it tricky to discover the best combinations to place in your armies. 
2. Some Champions have bonus combinations that do not necessarily go well together.
3. Time between upgrades can really slow down for both Champion levels and Ranks in the late game. This is compounded by Ranks limiting level upgrades so if you're a long time away from upgrading a Champion’s Rank it can also pause your level upgrades. 
4. Finally, Common and Uncommon Champions, while easier to upgrade, are not powerful enough to be of use later on in the game and become obsolete. 

We have put together an update to Champions that will improve and address many of the concerns above. 
This update builds on the work we have already done for newer Champions and incorporates those changes into all existing Champions. 

It is our hope that the changes will greatly improve Champions as one of the most exciting aspects of the game.

A summary of the changes

1. Rarity Upgrade: We are removing the "Common" rarity, upgrading Commons to higher rarities. Additionally, some Uncommon Champions are getting moved up a rarity level. With increased rarity comes stronger abilities.
2. 40 Levels: All Champions that had a maximum of 20 levels now have a maximum of 40 levels. If you had any of these Champions their levels have been adjusted to maintain your progress towards maxing them out.
3. Level gating change: Champion levels are no longer blocked by promotions, they are instead blocked by Keep level. This lets us ensure Champions do not get ahead of players in terms of power. By Keep Level 30 you can max a Champion to level 40.
4. Ranks: Stars are changing to "Ranks", with 25 total ranks. Your existing stars have been translated to ranks to ensure no progress is lost. In most cases you will have gained progress. Having more steps in the promotion lets you improve your Champions more frequently in the later-stages of the game.
5. Shard Cost: Excluding Commander and Titan Champions, all Champions have had their total shard cost standardized to 3,600. Any unspent shards you had have been adjusted to maintain your progress towards the next rank/star.
6. XP Cost: The XP cost to max out an Uncommon, Rare, or Epic Champion has been *reduced* by 25%. Mythical remains unchanged.
7. Battalion Size: All Champions now improve Battalion Size. The scale of this is based on their Rarity and Rank.
8. Unit assignment: More standardization of which troop types can be assigned to Champions to make them more general purpose so you can better tune which troop you take into battle. For a couple of weeks we will continue to let you assign general troops to the "DPS" and "Tank" Champions, if you are paying attention to their abilities you should already be assigning the correct types of troops.
9. Replacement of non-combat passives: Champions that improved Heal Cost, Deploy Cost, or Heal Speed have had those bonuses replaced by things that actually impact combat.
10. Faction Slayer > Elemental Slayer: Human, Orc, Elf, Undead Slayer have been turned into Elemental Bonuses that match the Faction (Human>Physical, Orc>Fire, Undead>Frost, Elf>Lightning). This maintains their faction bonus while also giving them utility in PvP!

This update includes UI changes on the Champion screens to make it easier to inspect abilities and see what bonuses they add if leveled up. We've also standardized the names of Passive bonuses across all Champions to make it easier to understand.

If you want to go into more detail on each of the above changes, we have an extensive post on our Discord where you can also chat with other player's and the development team.

GL&HF
TeamKM