Call to Arms Patch 11 - Version 18.110.1 - October 13, 2021

Season Winner Statues Unveiled

The statue for Season 13 Winners Blue Army has been unveiled in Conquerors’ Hall, and Season 13 Winner Statue Furniture Items are now placeable.

Black Zone Map Improvements

Hovering over Black Zone map headers now displays Zone Quality Level, which determines the following:

• Season Point multipliers for Territories, Castles / Castle Outposts, and mobs
• Energy Storage by Territory

Faction Warfare UI Changes

• Faction Warfare Player Rankings now only list players who were active within the prior week
• Resolved a rare issue that caused Faction Warfare Player Rankings to display incorrectly

Duel Changes

• Duel circles now have a defined maximum height difference between participants:
  • If one player exceeds a certain height/depth, the fleeing countdown will start
  • This is intended to fix terrain obstruction duel exploits in certain areas

Combat Balance Changes

Arcane Staffs

The Locus is a very strong support weapon in ZvZs. Previously it served a dual role when the frontline engaged or was engaged by removing the enemy’s buffs and cleansing all allies, thereby acting as both offensive and defensive support. To encourage more considered decisions in these situations, the Purge effect of the Void has been removed. This opens up the ZvZ meta to other support weapons, with less focus on this single item. Additionally, the max target count for Motivating Cleanse was increased to make it more useful in large-scale fights.

• Motivating Cleanse (all Arcane Staffs):
  • Max affected targets: 5 → 10
• Void (Malevolent Locus):
  • No longer purges enemies

Crossbows

Explosive Mine damage was lowered in the past to reduce the one-shot heavy meta in earlier patches. However, since AoE Escalation has been reduced since then, the damage nerf has now been reverted to make the Explosive Mine a ZvZ force to be reckoned with again.

• Explosive Mine (Weeping Repeater):
  • Damage: 230 → 270

Cursed Staffs

Enfeeble Blades was a very underrepresented ability. To give it a more useful role, it has been reworked into a ground target area which purges each enemy hit. Since the Locus is now cleanse-only, Lifecurse Staff can take over the role of AoE purging in large-scale fights.

• Enfeeble Blades (Lifecurse Staff):
  • Can now be cast at the ground and no longer requires an ally target (Blades remain on the ground area)
  • Is now a channeled ability, and the Blade area lasts for the channel duration
  • The area now also continues purging enemy buffs on every hit (doesn't purge enemy HoT)
  • Cast Range: 11m → 15m
  • Cast Time: 1s → 0.6s
  • Cast and channel are now uninterruptible
  • Area Radius: 6m → 5m
  • Area Duration: 5s → 4s
  • Damage Debuff per Stack: 5% → 4%
  • Debuff Max Stacks: 10 → 5
  • Cooldown now scales with Item Power:
    • 900 Item Power: 50s
    • 1700 Item Power: 34s

Fire Staffs

Wildfire Staff has struggled to find a valuable spot in group compositions. Its core mechanic meant it was not well-suited to small-scale fights, while other DPS options outshone it in large-scale combat. To give it a specific DPS sub-role specifically suited to punishing enemy frontlines, the burning effect now ignores armor and deals 3.75% of the player's max health per tick as damage. This makes it more desirable against tanks and heavily-armored players. This fits the ability design better, as the rolling Magma Sphere is quite difficult to land on the enemy’s backline but much better suited to punishing overextended frontlines.

• Searing Flame (all Fire Staffs):
  • Fixed an issue where its collision detection was unreliable at max range - this means its effective range is now increased
• Magma Sphere (Wildfire Staff):
  • Projectile Speed: 7.67m/s → 11.5m/s
  • Cast Speed: 0.6s → 0.4s
  • Instant Damage: 267.43 → 296
  • Ignite Damage per tick: 20.06 → 3.75% of the target's Max Health

Hammers

Hammers have been the main tank in 5v5 Crystal League play for a while. To make them somewhat less powerful, the damage and armor reduction of Iron Breaker, which could generate heavy pressure over the course of a fight, has been reduced. The cooldown of Power Geyser has been increased by 2 seconds to reduce the up-time of this ranged displacement. The stun duration of Tackle, meanwhile, has been reduced slightly as that, along with its mobility on a relatively low cooldown, made it more valuable than other Hammer E-abilities.

• Iron Breaker (all Hammers):
  • Resistance Reduction: 0.14 → 0.12
  • Damage vs Players: 120 → 90 (Damage vs Mobs stays unchanged)
• Power Geyser (all Hammers):
  • Cooldown: 8s → 10s
• Tackle (Great Hammer):
  • Stun Duration: 2.35s → 2.10s

Holy Staffs

Healers in Albion offer a very strong sustain, meaning they have the tools to prevent their group members simply being burst down in group fights. As a result, Healers are usually designed without a lot of damage in their kit, and are thus encouraged to choose whether to use their Q-slot for full sustain or additional damage. However, there was also the option to go full sustain and get damage from other sources such as potions, capes, or armor. To balance this approach, base damage output has been reduced when equipping any healing staff. Healers can negate this penalty by using the damage ability on the Q-slot. This change should reinforce the original intention that Healers choose between sustain and damage.

Holy Flash was rarely used and has thus been reworked: instead of a spammable heal without cooldown, a 3s cooldown was added for a rebalanced high-impact heal, meaning Healers don’t need to remain still to get the maximum healing from this ability. Cast Time was also reduced to make it less susceptible to interrupts, but the Hit Delay was kept in order to broadcast the same ground-based telegraphing to both allies and enemies.

Additionally, some E-abilities of the Holy Line have been adjusted. Holy Explosion has high healing output and good defensive utility with its knockback, so to reduce its self-sustaining quality the Energy Cost per tick was increased. Celestial Sphere is now an uninterruptible cast so that it can't be fully denied (as it often is in competitive 5v5), while the bouncing sphere after the cast still allows for counterplay. Lastly, Hallowfall's Cooldown Reduction now receives a slight buff when hitting an ally, which is meant to somewhat alleviate its very long base cooldown.

• Equipping any Holy Staff reduces all damage output by 50%
• Smite (all Holy Staffs):
  • Now increases the caster's damage by 50% for 8s
• Holy Flash (all Holy Staffs):
  • Cooldown: 0s → 3s
  • Cast Time: 0.8s → 0.4s
  • Hit Delay: 0s → 0.4s
  • Heal: 34 → 130
  • Removed the additional 10% Healing per target effect
• Holy Explosion (Great Holy Staff):
  • Energy Cost per tick: 3.6 → 4.0
• Celestial Sphere (Redemption Staff):
  • The cast is now uninterruptible
• Divine Intervention (Hallowfall):
  • Cooldown Reduction when Healing an ally: 35% → 40%

Maces

Maces have been out of the Crystal League 5v5 meta for a while. To give them a potential unique tank role, Guard Rune has been overhauled to make allies immune to knockbacks and stuns. This could be used to support a caster backline like Holy, Frost or Fire, protecting them from displacement and stun-heavy enemy frontlines (which currently keep Casters out of the meta). To further increase the appeal of Mace tanks, Sacred Ground has been boosted with an additional Slow effect, to offer some value in reducing enemy movement too. Furthermore, Battle Howl's cooldown has been reduced to better fit the faster meta that has developed over the years. The ability to remove HoTs is now on a lower cooldown than Nature Cleanse, which could generate increased value against Nature Healer comps.

• Sacred Ground (all Maces):
  • Cast Time: 0.8s → 0.6s
  • Enemies inside the area are now slowed by 20%
• Guard Rune (all Maces):
  • Allies inside the area are now immune to forced movement and stun
  • Resistance Increase: 0.20 → 0.25
  • Removed the Healing Increased bonus
• Battle Howl (Heavy Mace):
  • Cooldown: 20s → 15s

Nature Staffs

As noted above (under Holy Staffs), base damage output when equipping healing staffs has been reduced. This is to counter a workaround whereby Healers could go full sustain on the Q-slot and get damage from other sources. Now they would have to use the Q-slot damage ability to counter the reduced base damage output, in line with the original intention that they choose between sustain and damage.

Spirit Animal is currently underrepresented in large-scale fights, although it is in precisely these situations that it is meant to shine. To increase its impact, cast range has been adjusted and the cast direction can now be chosen independently. This allows the Healer to better support his army from the back line.

• Equipping any Nature Staff reduces all damage output by 50%
• Thorns (all Nature Staffs):
  • Now increases the caster's damage by 10% for 10s (stacks up to 5 times)
• Spirit Animal (Rampant Staff):
  • Cast Range: at caster → 12m
  • Now cast direction can be selected independent of cast position
  • Base Heal per tick: 12 → 13.5

Spears

Spears are a highly versatile weapon, offering a lot of utility and different options for different situations. This high utility, paired with its strong sustain damage, makes it difficult for weapons that are focused on pure damage and less utility to compete with spears. For this reason we have reduced the sustain damage of the Auto Attack Buff.

• Spirit Spear Charge (all Spears):
  • Normal Attack Damage Increase: 40% → 32%

Swords

As with the Weeping Repeater, Galatine Pairs were previously nerfed to mitigate the one-shot heavy meta. This has been reverted to make them a notable force in ZvZ again. Crescent Slash has not yet found widespread use since the recent rework. Since it had so many effect possibilities per stack, the additional value of each was set very low to balance this. This was probably too low, however, so the value of 2-stack and 3-stack effects has now been increased.

• Crescent Slash (Clarent Blade):
  • 2 stacks - Silence Duration: 0.8s → 1.4s
  • 3 stacks - Additional Damage: 48 →  94
• Soulless Stream (Galatine Pair):
  • 0 Stack Damage: 75 → 84
  • 1 Stack Damage: 119 → 134
  • 2 Stack Damage: 179 → 201
  • 3 Stack Damage: 254 → 285

Shoes

Druid Sandals have been out of the meta for a while now. The slowing effect provided by Frost Walk was very strong, which is why its speed gain was limited. But this low move speed was too much of a disadvantage and they were hardly used. For this reason Frost Walk mobility has been slightly increased, while Run still provides considerably higher mobility.

• Frost Walk (Druid Sandals):
  • Move Speed Increase: 30% → 45%

Mounts

The Tower Chariot is currently one of the weaker Battle Mounts in the game. Since it will return as a reward for the Energy Surge Season, it has received a slight overhaul to make it a potential useful support in the modern ZvZ meta.

• Tower Chariot:
  • Health Factor: 3.6 → 5.3
• Energy Cloud (Tower Chariot):
  • Standtime: 0.3s → 0s
  • Removed Energy Cost Reduction
  • Instead, it now restores 3 energy per second (stacks up to 2 times)
• Toxic Crystal Waste (Tower Chariot):
  • Standtime: 1s → 0.6s
• Tower Shield (Tower Chariot):
  • Shield no longer restores energy
  • Shield now also affects mounts

Fixes

• Spell fixes:
  • Fixed a rare issue where Wall of Flames triggered rapidly when cast close to a wall
  • Corrected effect area length display for Spirit Animal (Rampant Staff)
  • Activation buff of Poison (Mage Cowl) can now be purged as intended
  • Adjusted Soul Shaker (Grailseeker) tooltip and spell indicator to show correct range
  • Fixed an issue where spell slot cooldowns were sometimes wrong after failed cast attempts (e.g. in connection with Soul Shaker spell)
• Fixed an issue where /suicide would sometimes not work when knocked down
• Fixed an issue that prevented crafting of Ballistas when it should have been unlocked
• Fixed an issue that prevented deleting character names with non-alphanumeric characters; corrected entry prompt to allow only alphanumeric characters
• [MOBILE] Fixed an issue where side menus would overlap Premium and Gold menus - opening these menus now closes others
• Additional graphical, audio, animation, terrain, UI, and localization fixes