Duel of Champions – Make a Name for Yourself in the Might and Magic Realm

Six factions, one champion. Hundreds of creature-cards, awesome in power and ability. You’ve got to choose your allies with caution, but most importantly pick, your battles carefully. Might and Magic Duel of Champions is all that – a strategy card game that transcends the famous concept into something else, something more. If you’re up for an action-packed, virtualized adventure, then this may very well be the game for you. We couldn’t agree more that this Ubisoft title is a worthwhile one. In fact, we created this page solely for the purpose of sharing the joy and excitement of playing Duel of Champions. As your trusted Ashan Sherpa, we’ll start by framing out the basic concept of the game and then we’ll move on to the more intricate details about it.

Strap Your Sword at Your Side – Adventure Awaits

Indeed an adventure of might and magic it is, and the best part is – you are the protagonist. If you have previous experience playing strategy card games, you will be able to quickly trim your sails and get a handle on the rules of this one. What’s also true however, is that Duel of Champions is as different as it’s similar to the other games of this genre. This is where our words of wisdom will help you draw a bead on the mechanics implemented therein, as well as to identify the dissimilarities in the rules.

Let’s start with a basic introduction, shall we? Since this is a free-to-play, turn-based strategy card game, much like the all-time-favourite Heroes of Might and Magic saga players take turns to act. Participants, battle with each other by controlling virtual hero cards. Heroes have decks – also called libraries – consisting of 59 to 209 cards, of which 1 is a hero-cards, 8 are event, and 50-200 represent a mixture of creatures, spells, fortunes and buildings. The in-game battle system puts you in mind of the mother of all strategy card games – Yu Gi Oh!. Judging by the way battles unfold however, instead of calling it a derivative title, we like to think about it as a revamped version with a Might &Magic spin added to it.

Global Conflict is Knocking on the Door – The Six Factions in Duel of Champions

In a universe were six factions (each devoted its cause) co-exist, it’s fair to say that peace hangs in the balance. Before you start engaging other players in battle, you’ll have to choose a hero. In turn, this is going to determine which faction your army belongs to as well as the spells you can cast. Heroes too belong to one of the six factions in the game: Haven, Inferno, Necropolis, Stronghold, Sanctuary, and Academy. There’s a seventh side in the game – the neutral creature cards. They are mercenary-like creatures who can take orders from all heroes. In other words, this means that you can add the cards of this variety to your deck and use them in duels, no matter what faction your hero belongs to. Definitely, a nice way to mix the gameplay up and add more possible strategies to the already rich arsenal. We’ve gathered the pre-history of the six main warring kingdoms, albeit short, to give you a better perspective on the storyline of Might and Magic Duel of Champions.

Haven

We’ve been hooked up on the fantasy genre long enough to know that in the type of universe where conflict takes place, it’s oftentimes a knight in shining armour that saves the day. The faction called ‘Haven’ is the epitome of the ‘knight in shining armour’ idea. Servants of The Holy Empire and militant defenders of their faith, this theocratical society of monks and medieval knights strives to spread the light of Elrath (their dragon-god) around the world. Don’t be fooled into thinking the troops of Haven defend their cause with swords and arrows. They’ve got a significant boost on their firepower, being able to call on mysterious and doubly terrifying angelic beings. It’s a lot of fun to play this faction, there’s no two ways about it.

Inferno

Spawned by the Dragon of Chaos, the Demons were purposed to oppose the children of the Elemental Dragons. But a turn of events – the sacrifice of the highly esteemed prophet Sar-Elam – doomed them to stay shackled for the rest of their life in a place of eternal fire called Sheogh. Not only have the demons adapted to the heat of the infernal realm, but became aware of a loophole in the spell of Sar-Elam and started exploiting it to crawl out of their prison. The predominant colors of this faction are black and red. The most fearsome champion – the Pit Fiend. It’s a flyer unit, which makes it all the more dangerous and hard to stop.

Necropolis

What started as a small sect, has evolved into a full-fledged necromancers’ faction. In its very foundation are wizards who worship the little-known side of Asha Primordial dragon of Order associated with death. In their pursuit of restoring the balance between life and death, the necromancers know no boundaries. They raise the dead, use dark magic and stop at nothing to fulfil their quest. The prevalent colours of Necropolis cards are luminescent green and black, used so as to achieve an overall dark feel to each piece. The creature cards you’ll be seeing a lot playing this faction are Plague Skeleton, Plague Zombie, Putrid Ghoul, Neophyte Lich and others of the sort. Along the same vein, the ultimate war unit of this faction is a monstrosity called Fate Weaver.

Stronghold

Born by injecting demon blood into human criminals, the orc race was meant to fight the demon legions back to their forsaken realm. As a token of gratitude for their courageous deed, the proud nation of the orcs was granted, well, slavery. Orcs are in a unique position of both benefiting from having natural-born leaders by dint of their human roots and being able to make use of their demonic heritage by means of, the essential for their warfare strategy, ‘blood magic’. The orcs are not the best tacticians nor do they have much of a defence to fall back on. Stronghold creature cards rely heavily on the strength attribute, plus they are very beefy and can take a lot of hits. Warriors that have devoted themselves to the cause of this faction are Suicide Goblinn, Dreamwalker, Cyclops Brawler, Sahaar Orc, Centaur Chieftain, Striking Fury, Stormrage Warrior to name but a few.

Sanctuary

True to the saying ‘still water runs the deepest’ this engulfed in mystery nation is water-based. Their main source of power is The Dragon Goddess of Water, on whom they rely on for protection and leadership. This is an interesting faction where Naga, other sea creatures, and water spirits join forces united by the common goal of self-perfection and purification. The ideals of the Sanctuary people are similar to those described in Zen mysticism and Eastern philosophy as a whole. Even some creature cards like the Kensei and Shinje Warrior are telling of Eastern martial arts influence. The main colours of the Sanctuary nation are azure blue and nuances of green. Its strongest warriors are Naga Tide Master, Greater Kirin, and Sacred Kirin.

Academy

The core of this faction’s armed forces consists of mechanical beings and mythological creatures. A clear reference to Heroes of Might and Magic V is there for players to see. By opting for the Academy deck at the beginning of your quest, you’ll have a sophisticated army of diverse warriors on your disposal. Some of the most powerful creatures available to those who choose to play Academy are Power Blast Titan, Dragon Golem, Djinn Mentor, and Surging Titan.

Finishing the Tutorial, Complete Your First Quest and Grab a 10, 000 Gold Reward

The game offers the perfect training grounds for all new players – a comprehensive tutorial, helping those unfamiliar with the genre to ease into the new environment. Upon completing a mission, you will receive gold and experience points which are crucial for your progress in Might and Magic Duel of Champions. After you complete the tutorial and finish the first mission, you’ll have more than enough gold to buy the ‘ Base Set 2 Pack’, which contains most of the starter cards you’re going to need further down the road. That’s why we highly recommend that you buy namely this pack instead of something else form the store. You access the store by selecting the rightmost of the five icons in the upper right-hand corner.

Ready Your Spells, It’s Time for Battle!

As the name suggests, the primary hero attributes in the game are Might, Magic. Surprisingly, there’s a third one – Fortune – which also comes into play when summoning creatures on the field. Each turn you can either increase one of those attributes or pay mana to draw a card from your deck. There are types of units when it comes to battlefield positioning – flyers, archers, and melee. Mele units can only be summoned on the front row, where as archers, for example, can be positioned only on the back row. Flyers, on the other hand, can play from either position. There’s also single-use magic cards, which can turn the tide of the battle if played correctly. Some of the most powerful spells include:

Armagedon

Lightspeed

World of Light

Divine Intervention

Fireball

Clashing Tides

Firestorm

Tsunami

The Might of Nature

Void Ripple

Curse of the Netherworld

Enthrall

Speaking of turnarounds, event cards are of pivotal importance to the gameplay too. Each player brings 8 event cards to a standard duel – a total of 16 on the field. At the start of the duel, two are drawn and made active. Both players can benefit from either of the two events, which could bring, to coin a phrase, various effects to the table.

The most straightforward to win a duel is to bring the hit points of the enemy champion down to zero. Of course, this is done by attacking them with the creatures you have on your side of the battlefield. Unless using a special attack, you have to first clear the enemy’s army before attacking the hit points of their champion. The rules are pretty simple and reminiscent of Yu Gi Oh! as we pointed out earlier, so you can rest assured learning them will not be much of a challenge.

Fight Real Players in Ranked Matchmaking

You can learn the ropes on your own by playing against the AI, but we recommend you start playing versus other players as soon as possible. Facing off another player is a completely different story in that, the battles are more intense, you get to learn more and experience more of the game. PvP comes in three modes. You can challenge a player in competitive, non-competitive or practice mode. This way, you are able to control whether the winner will raise their ELO rank and whether they are going to collect loot for their effort. The official Herald of the Void Gameplay teaser showcasing some of the possible twists and turns of a typical Duel of Champions card battle.

Players can use special tokens to increase gold and experience gain for the duration of 60 minutes. With the currently available tokens, the gold acquisition rate can be enhanced by 50% and experience earning rate can be doubled. Reaching ELO rank 200 allows the player to take part in Might & Magic: Duel of Champions tournaments. If you’re craving fame, glory and piles of gold, the best way to do that in a reasonable amount of time is winning a tournament. As if to make things even more interesting, there are different types of tourneys to pick from. Those can be team events in which players collaborate with each other or the winner-takes-all type.

Might and Magic Duel of Champions – A Hero in the Making

Yes, we think this title has the makings of a great strategy card game. The fact it’s been developed by the experienced team of Ubisoft makes us all the more optimistic that it’s going to go a long way. Let’s not forget, however, that space is very competitive, and it might be some time before we see Duel of Champions into competitive gaming. Even if it doesn’t make it big, it will continue to be a force to be reckoned with in the gaming industry.

Just look at the facts. We are talking about a free-to-play online multiplayer game steeped in history that the fans around the world love. Does it get any better than this? Hats off to the guys from Ubisoft for creating something that fans of the genre can truly enjoy. If you want to keep learning about the game, we’ve got plenty of information you’ll find useful. Feel free to scan other pages of the website to get the full picture of how awesome this game is.