The latest changes in the Alliance War

Quietly, without any real preparation, we were informed about some major changes in the Alliance War. Those changes come as a surprise and disappointment for many players whose focus was on AW Defense.

I am not one of those players, because I’ve always suggested that the best defense is the offense. For those who haven’t read my previous articles, I will explain again.

Strategy

Ultimately your goal in War is to clear all enemy rooms before they clear yours and with that in mind it doesn’t matter what your defense is. What I mean is whatever you put in Defense can be countered by the right teams, therefore, your focus should be on being someone who can counter any Defense team before an enemy can do the same. If you think that way then it is obvious that you need 14 of the best MSF teams for Offense, and what remains can be put in Defense.

Obviously, specialized War Defense teams should not be used in Offense and that is not the question. What I want to say is that it is a mistake to put META teams like Horsemen, WX, Eternals, 8W, etc. in Defense, and that is my whole strategy about War that proved to be right for me because my average damage score with average f2p account is minimum 50 million in every War, and I am MVP in my alliance almost always.

As you know, many players think otherwise. They think if they put META teams in Defense, they will make their enemies impossible to clear Rooms, and they will achieve wins by preventing enemy progression in Helicarrier. It is important to say that many players emphasize War Defense for other reasons, such as not being able to be fully active during the War.

Changes

Anyway, for all those who relied on WAR defense, the changes we are about to talk came as a big disappointment. Permanent Bonuses for 3 rooms (Medbay, Barracks, and Bridge) are considerably nerfed. I will try to explain what you can expect from now on.

Medbay

Old:

•  +40% Max Health to all Defending characters

New:

•  +20% Max Health to all Defending characters

Previously Medbay increased the HP of all defending characters in all rooms by 40%. That bonus has now been reduced to 20%. The change will not be drastic except in power numbers. HP increase does not crucially affect the outcome of the battle, because the teams that can counter defending setups will do so regardless of enemy HP.

However, when a player sees a team, whose strength is above 1 million powers, that has a psychological effect and suggests that they need much more power than they actually do. The only real effect of this nerf is that some META teams like Darkhold/Dormhold will no longer have a big advantage because of limited time for battle.

I want to say that from now on (with the introduction of the GAMMA team) you will be able to beat them within 5 minutes in the first attempt. With the right counters, you could win either way but earlier there was a high chance that you cannot win on time even with auto-combat. With this HP bonus decrease, the chance that you will lose on time is considerably reduced. 

Barracks

Old:

• +20% to Primary Stats to all Defending characters. Extra +10% bonus to Military Allies.

New:

• +10% to Primary Stats to all Defending characters. Extra +10% bonus to Military Allies.

Unlike Medbay, Barracks increases all stats of defending characters. This bonus has decreased by 10%, meaning that from now on, fighting enemies in a Helicarrier while Barracks is on will be easier.

This change will affect Offensive Focus because the importance of Barracks will no longer be as it was before. Barracks will make things harder for attackers still, but their importance will now be much lower than Armory. The fact that defending teams will now have lesser offensive capabilities opens a possibility of using some other teams in the offense.

Overall, this change will indeed affect the priorities of the War, which would not be the case if only Medaby was nerfed.

Bridge

Old:

• The following effects could be applied: Deathproof, Minor Deflect, Regeneration, Stealth, and Immunity.

New:

• The following effects could be applied: Deathproof, Minor Deflect, Regeneration, Defense Up, and Offense Up.

The change to the Bridge may seem symbolic but actually, those changes are quite big. Before this nerf, there was a high possibility that your opponents on Bridge spawn with Immunity or Stealth. That could have a massive impact on counters because some teams like Shadowland or New Warriors, for example, would be ineffective against defenders.

Now, it is no longer possible that Defenders spawn neither with Stealth nor Immunity. They got an option to spawn with Defense up or Offense Up instead but, honestly, that is a big nerf compared to earlier bonuses. Overall, fighting Bridge will now be much easier but this change will not have an essential global effect on WAR tactics and strategy.

Besides changes in those 3 Rooms, some Heroes have received slight buffs in War. Those Heroes and their new abilities are: 

• Mordo – Got Dark-Hunter Trait; 100% chance to place Blind with special; Places mass Def Up on allies and reduces Speed Bar of all enemies with blind; permanently increases Focus of Dark Hunters in War by 30%.
• Elsa Bloodstone – clears Deathprrof from City (H4H) enemies before causing damage with ultimate.
• Captain Marvel – can crit with Ultimate, permanently increases HP and damage to A-Force allies.
• Jessica Jones – A-Force allies with taunt when their HP drops below 50% get Taunt cleared
• Nico Minoru – Whenever a debuff is placed to A-Force ally there is a 75% chance that Nico grants 1 Ability Energy to Jessica Jones.
• Namor – His base stats are considerably increased (HP +16%, DPS+43%, Focus +25%, Resist +40%) 

With those changes, the Dark Hunter team is now fully assembled with Mordo, while A-Force is slightly stronger with Namor as a viable addition in War. Dark hunters will prevail against H4H more easily, while A-Force with Namor can be a legit answer to many teams specialized in Defense.

Conclusion

All in all, all those changes will have a serious effect on upcoming Wars. From what I could hear, many players are not happy because their opinion is that their defensive strength depends on the number shown in their power score. In my opinion that is fully misleading, and the power of teams never played a crucial role in the outcome of War battles.

If you know the right counters, you can prevail against any defense. That is the secret to the success of some Alliances and the reason for failure for others.

As soon as you realize that any defense can be countered and that power is just a number that doesn’t crucially affect the outcome of the battle if you know what you are doing, you will not be bothered with those changes.

If you can’t understand that you will continue living in a lie that if you invest enough in the team and put that team in defense, you will prevent an enemy from defeating you. And if they defeat you, you will say that they are krakens who won only because they spent more than you. In short, that is not the truth.

My f2p account, 18 million TCP strong, who is MVP repeatedly, and helped my alliance in the last 2 months moving from 1400 points league into 1600 points league is the proof of that. At least it is proof for me.

Till next time, keep tuned and enjoy MSF!