STRONGER THAN YESTERDAY With the Collector out of the picture, the Grandmaster has seized control of the Contest and has concocted his first game, but beware the Grandmaster’s treachery! This Chapter of Act 5 has some surprises in store that will require you to play in a way you’ve never played before!



NOW IT’S NOTHING BUT MY WAY

The Grandmaster’s first test for you is merely a taste of the things to come! Frustrated at the disorganization of his brother’s collection, the new boss of the Battlerealm has resorted a a grand game to organize it, suppressing all but one Class of Champions in each area of his new gauntlet!



Act 5 Chapter 3: The Struggle is coming September 6th at 10AM PDT. Prepare your teams!

Q&A



How long does this quest run for?

Like Chapter 1 and 2, this’ll be around until the inevitable heat-death of the universe. A cursory Googling says this is 10 to the power of 10 to the power of 10 to the power of 56 years from now, so make sure you complete it before the end of time and space!



How hard is this Chapter?

We want to avoid making direct comparisons to other content in the game since that can create unrealistic expectations, but the PI of the enemies ranges between 17000 and 21000 in each Quest.



It doesn’t increase between Quests?

It does not. We have tuned this chapter to have relatively flat PI values across all 6 quests, which we did for a reason...



What’s the reason?

Well, the main reason is that we have 6 new global buffs activated in each quest. Each of these buffs severely limits the damage output of all classes except one. You can read more on each of the buffs and others below, but we opted to keep PI flat across the quests so we weren’t making one quest harder than another from a tuning perspective when it will already present an interesting challenge based on the Classes of Champions in your roster. There is another reason though, and that is that Act 5 Chapter 3 will contain Gates and Keys!



Gates and Keys?

Exactly. If you played Rocket’s Scrapyard back in May, you already almost know how these work, with some small but important changes. First off, for those who don’t know: some Gates in our game require specific items or resources to pass through. In Act 5 Chapter 3, some paths (but not all of them) will be blocked by Gates that require Class Keys to pass through. There are 6 types of Key (1 for each Class) and there are also different Keys in each quest on the map, as well as 1 Key for each class as a reward for first-time completion in each Quest. This means in order to master Chapter 3, you’ll need to hop around these quests to collect the needed Keys.



We’ve made a couple of changes to the way Gates and on-map items work to help enhance your experience, however. First off, these Class Keys will be Permanent Items. Once collected, Permanent Items will never respawn in a Quest. You’ll see which items are Permanent because they have a different looking node beneath them, as well as a soft glow emanating from them on the Quest Board.



Second, we’ve changed the way spending resources when passing through Gates works. Previously, when you spent a resource to pass through a Gate and Quit the Quest without finishing, those resources were lost forever. From now on, any spent resources from Gates will be refunded to you if you quit or are removed from a quest before completing it.



We’ve also made a small UI Improvement to show more than 1 available resource for Gates in any given quest. Now, the bar at the top that shows how many of a needed resource you have will display as many as are required in a Quest. i.e. if a quest has 10 Gates, each with different resources needed to pass through, the bar at the top of the screen will become scrollable to show how many of each of those resources you own.



And lastly, Items and Chests on the Quest Board can now be tapped to view their names and descriptions! This means you can see what an item is before committing to a specific path. This applies to more than just Keys, too, so any Item can be tapped to see its description from now on!



Okay, that was a lot, so to recap:

- Chapter 3 has Gates that require Class Keys.

- Each Quest has some non-blocked paths, and some Class Keys to Collect both ON the map, and as a reward for first-time completion.

- Class Keys are Permanent Items; they can only be collected once.

- Collecting a Key then quitting the Quest before completion will not result with you acquiring the item; when re-entering the Quest, the Key in question re-appears on the same node.

- Quitting Quests before completing them now refunds all resources spend on Gates.

- You can now tap on Items that appear in Quests to see their name and description.





Is there some insane boss like The Collector?

No. Obviously the bosses in Chapter 3 are hard - they’re supposed to be. As you now know, becoming Uncollected is meant to be a major point of accomplishment in the game, and we wanted to make sure it was something that felt like an accomplishment and not just another fight.



What are the Buffs in this Chapter?

First off, let’s talk about the Class Buffs. These are Global Buffs in each quest, so you won’t be seeing them used together at the same time in Chapter 3. Keep in mind, this attack reduction does apply to things like Fury and Star-Lord’s signature ability. I.e. if you’re using Star-Lord in a Quest that doesn’t have Overclocked as the Global Buff, it will take him twice as long to reach the same attack strength as it normally would. Also note: these Buffs do not affect the boss.



X-Gene

All Champion classes but Mutant reduce their Attack by 50%.

Physical Perfection

All Champion classes but Skill reduce their Attack by 50%.

Split Atom

All Champion classes but Science reduce their Attack by 50%.

Ancient Knowledge

All Champion classes but Mystic reduce their Attack by 50%.

Stellar Pulse

All Champion classes but Cosmic reduce their Attack by 50%.

Overclocked

All Champion classes but Tech reduce their Attack by 50%.



On top of these, we have 2 other new buffs, which aren’t used globally but are used on multiple fights throughout nearly every Quest.



Cornered



- Whenever a damage over time Debuff is applied to this Champion, they gain X% more power for the duration of that Debuff.

- There are 3 versions of Cornered which give 100%, 200%, and 300% more Power. All 3 versions are used in Chapter 3, though again, not across all fights.

- Also important to note is that this isn’t a passive Power Gain like Hyperion - this is simply X% more power from normal sources like being struck or landing hits, etc.



Power Reserve

Special Attacks for both Champions cost 50% less Power.



Did you Beta Test this?

Yes we did! Thanks once again to our testers for their invaluable feedback. We made lots of changes based on their thoughts, perhaps most notably: we removed Magik completely from this Chapter, as her interactions with Power Reserve were… let’s just go with “fun” and “interactive.”

Post edited by Kabam DK on September 2017