šŸ§Ŗ Early Information on ROUND 4 Costumes [Part of The Beta Beat v36]

NOTE: Please do not, under any circumstances, share IMAGES OR VIDEOS from Beta in this or any public Forum thread. Violations can cause players to lose their Beta accounts, or threads to be closed down.

This thread is to provide early insights and discussion on the FOURTH round of costumes.

NOTE: This is the first round of NON-SEASON 1 Costumes, now that Costumes have been introduced for all Season 1 3* through 5*.


Donā€™t get too attached

Details from Beta, especially brand-new Beta content, donā€™t tend to be very reliable for actual release.

Itā€™s incredibly common that features are changed during Beta testing, or sometimes even after testing but before release. That is, after all, the purpose of Beta testing.

So I wouldnā€™t get too attached to any of this ā€” itā€™s not unheard of for entire portions of features to be removed or reworked, or for radical changes to functionality to be made.


:abacus: Poll

:question: Whatā€™s your opinion on this Beta?

  • Very Positive
  • Slightly Positive
  • Neutral
  • Slightly Negative
  • Very Negative
0 voters

:performing_arts: Costumes!!!

There are a total of 6 new Costumes being tested in v35 Beta 4 Testing Cycle.

All 6 of the Costumes in this round of Beta are Legendary, and draw from a diverse mix of old HOTM, Season 2, Challenge Events, and Seasonal Events.

5 :star: ā€” Legendary Costumes

  • Finley (Challenge Event: Pirates of Corellia) ā€“ ā€œBleak Commodoreā€
  • Gravemaker (HOTM) ā€“ ā€œBurning Avengerā€
  • Jabberwock (Challenge Event: Wonderland) ā€“ ā€œJabbermothā€
  • Killhare (Seasonal: Springvale) ā€“ ā€œUltimate Farmerā€
  • Master Lepus (Seasonal: Springvale) ā€“ ā€œRift Breakerā€
  • Poseidon (Season 2) ā€“ ā€œSlayer of Atlantisā€

New:

  • Yunan (Seasonal: Sand Empire) ā€“ ā€œKing of Lifeguardsā€
  • Rana (Seasonal: Sand Empire) ā€“ ā€œSurfer Queenā€

NOTE: All numbers are presented INCLUDING the costume bonus.


Finley ā€” Click for Beta Information (Extremely Likely to Change)

Normal Finley:

šŸ“ā€ā˜  Finley ā€“ 5* Ice/Blue from Pirates of Corellia

Costume Finley ā€” Beta Info & Stats (extremely likely to change)

Rarity: Legendary/5*
Power: 822

Attack: 790
Defense: 782
HP: 1445

Class: Fighter
Element: :snowflake: Ice

Mana Speed: Fast

Special Skill: Commodoreā€™s Malice

  • Deals 355% damage to the target
  • If the target has buffs targets another enemy with buffs. If none of of the other enemies have buffs, targets a random enemy. Damage is reduced on each consecutive hit.
  • All hit targets get -44% defence for 3 turns.

Gravemaker ā€” Click for Beta Information (Extremely Likely to Change)

Normal Gravemaker:

ā„¹ Gravemaker ā€“ 5* Fire/Red - June 2018 HOTM

Costume Gravemaker ā€” Beta Info & Stats (extremely likely to change)

Rarity: Legendary/5*
Power: 810

Attack: 757
Defense: 735
HP: 1533

Class: Paladin
Element: :fire: Fire

Mana Speed: Very Fast

Special Skill: Dust to Dust

  • Deals 85% damage to all enemies
  • All enemies receive 280 burn damage over 2 turns
  • Elemental Link gives all Fire allies +5% attack and +5% defence for 6 turns. This effect cannot be dispelled.

Jabberwork ā€” Click for Beta Information (Extremely Likely to Change)

Normal Jabberwock:

šŸµ Jabberwock ā€“ 5* Dark/Purple from Riddles of Wonderland

Costume Jabberwock ā€” Beta Info & Stats (extremely likely to change)

Rarity: Legendary/5*
Power: 821

Attack: 788
Defense: 778
HP: 1449

Class: Druid
Element: :new_moon_with_face: Dark

Mana Speed: Fast

Special Skill: Avenger of Mothkind

  • Deals 250% damage to the enemies on the edges of the enemy formation. If only one enemy is alive, the damage is doubled.
  • The enemies on the edges of the enemy formation receive 435 poison damage over 3 turns. This effect canā€™t be cleansed.

Killhare ā€” Click for Beta Information (Extremely Likely to Change)

Normal Killhare

šŸ° Killhare ā€“ 5* Dark/Purple from Springvale

Costume Killhare ā€” Beta Info & Stats (extremely likely to change)

Rarity: Legendary/5*
Power: 832 814

Attack: 757 742
Defense: 808 793
HP: 1542 1486

Class: Druid
Element: :new_moon_with_face: Dark

Mana Speed: Average

Special Skill: Championship Carrot

  • Deals 350% 330% damage to all enemies
  • All allies except the caster get -20% defence -34% attack for 4 3 turns. This effect cannot be cleansed.

Master Lepus ā€” Click for Beta Information (Extremely Likely to Change)

Normal Master Lepis:

šŸ° Master Lepus ā€“ 5* Ice/Blue from Springvale

Costume Master Lepus ā€” Beta Info & Stats (extremely likely to change)

Rarity: Legendary/5*
Power: 803 787

Attack: 812 797
Defense: 741 727
HP: 1332 1283

Class: Ranger
Element: :snowflake: Ice

Mana Speed: Fast

Special Skill: Rift Blade

  • Deals 270% damage to all enemies
  • The caster gets +24% mana generation for 3 4 turns.
  • The caster gets -34% attack for 3 4 turns. This effect cannot be cleansed.

Poseidon ā€” Click for Beta Information (Extremely Likely to Change)

Normal Poseidon

šŸ”± Poseidon ā€“ 5* Holy/Yellow from Season 2

Costume Poseidon ā€” Beta Info & Stats (extremely likely to change)

Rarity: Legendary/5*
Power: 817

Attack: 771
Defense: 745
HP: 1529

Class: Ranger
Element: :sun_with_face: Holy

Mana Speed: Fast

Special Skill: Tidal Slayer

  • Deals 480% damage to the target
  • All allies are immune to new status ailments for 2 turns.


Yunan ā€” Click for Beta Information (Extremely Likely to Change)

Normal Yunan

šŸŒ“ Yunan - 5* Nature/Green from Sand Empire

Costume Yunan ā€” Beta Info & Stats (extremely likely to change)

Rarity: Legendary/5*
Power: 787

Attack: 659
Defense: 818
HP: 1506

Class: Paladin
Element: :leaves: Nature

Mana Speed: Slow

Special Skill: Wipeout

  • Deals 161% 176% damage to all enemies
  • All enemies recieve 258 360 Sand Damage over 3 turns.
  • All allies get +24% +33% mana generation for 3 turns.
  • Cleanses status ailments from all allies.

Rana ā€” Click for Beta Information (Extremely Likely to Change)

Normal Rana

šŸŒ“ Rana - 5* Holy/Yellow from Sand Empire

Costume Rana ā€” Beta Info & Stats (extremely likely to change)

Rarity: Legendary/5*
Power: 787

Attack: 746 767
Defense: 748
HP: 1438 1475

Class: Cleric
Element: :sun_with_face: Holy

Mana Speed: Average

Special Skill: Surfā€™s Up

  • Deals 185% damage to the target and nearby enemies.
  • The target and nearby enemies recieve 414 Water Damage over 3 turns.
  • The Target and nearby enemies get -75% decrease for any healing received for 2 turns. This effect canā€™t be cleansed.
  • Cleanses status ailments from the caster and nearby allies.

NOTE: All numbers are presented INCLUDING the costume bonus.


:performing_arts: Costume Bonus

The new costumes have & follow the existing progression for costume bonuses in terms of the boosted stats for the base hero & for the costume.

Changed in V36.2 of Beta, the Non-Season 1 Costumes impart a DIFFERENT costume bonus to what is applied to Season 1 Costumes.

Stat S1 CB Non-S1 CB
Attack 5% 3%
Defence 5% 3%
HP 10% 6%
Mana 5% 1%

Costume Bonus Progression:

Stat Tier 1 Tier 2 Tier 3 Tier 4 Max
Attack 0% 1% 2% 2% 3%
Defence 0% 1% 2% 2% 3%
HP 0% 2% 4% 5% 6%
Mana 0% 1% 1% 1% 1%

NOTE: All numbers are presented above are INCLUDING the costume bonus.


:hugs: Family Bonus

The costumes are retaining their family bonus.

So Master Lepus and Killhare still retain the Springvale Family Bonus; Finley retains the Pirates family Bonus etcā€¦


:game_die: Summoning

As implied in previous staff statements, the costumes are available for summoing as a bonus for summoning their normal counterpart in the given portal.

:rabbit: Seasonal Portal ā€“ Springvale

Added for testing in V36.2 of beta was the ā€œSpringvale Portalā€ containing the two costumes added for testing.

New / Changes are:

  • You summon the hero and its costume together
  • Addition of 2 Featured Heroes
    • Master Lepus & Killhare

Note: itā€™s unlikely that these portal odds are finalā€¦ Given that this is their first round of beta testing & that there are no 3* or 4* costumes.

Hero Current Odds Beta V36.2 Odds
Classic Rare 56.8% 56.8%
Classic Epic 20.8% 20.8%
Classic Legendary 1.0% 0.9%
Seasonal Rare 14.2% 14.2%
Seasonal Epic 5.7% 5.7%
Seasonal Legendary
Non-Featured (Roostley)
1.5% 0.3%
Seasonal Legendary
Featured (Killhare or Lepus)
0% 1.3%
Bonus HotM Draw 1.3% 1.3%

:arrow_up: Beta Updates

19 January, 2021

Beta closed early, based on feedback: view post from Small Giant Staff

18 January, 2021

Initial release of Beta v35.4 with 6 Legendary Costumes

18 February, 2021

Killhare and Master Lepus returned for more testing in V36.2
Changes to the costume bonus and some of their skills.
Also added the Seasonal Portal with some changes to it.

5 March, 2021

The following update was provided:

27 May, 2021

Some new Non-S1 costumes were added to Beta V39.1 for testing. Specifically Yunan & Rana costumes. See above for specifics.
There do NOT appear to be any changes to the Costume Bonus etcā€¦ (donā€™t know for sureā€¦ didnā€™t really look too hardā€¦)


:calendar: Release Date??

It is NOT known when these costumes will be available in the live game.



:link: Related Threads

20 Likes

Personal Note from Guv

Please donā€™t hate the messengerā€¦ Iā€™m just reporting on this stuffā€¦ But it does look as if SG are now rolling the ā€œcostumesā€ thing out to other heroes in the Game (beyond S1 Heroes) to include Event, Seasonal & HotMā€™s.

Overall I think itā€™s something of a ā– ā– ā– ā–  move; and has some rather obvious undertones of greed and further extenuates the lack of balance that is appearing in the game based on recent Beta Content.

Initial Thoughts.

  • Initial feeling is not at all positive or in favour of thisā€¦ In fact, it could very well be my breaking pointā€¦

  • Costumes, while not necessarily perfect in execution, were a good way to boost the stats (buff if you will) the vanilla/ S1 heroes bringing them more in line with the newer shiner heroesā€¦

  • Adding/ extending costumes to non-vanilla heroes just undoes all this work and (effectively) makes them obseleteā€¦ againā€¦

Costumes really add/ bring balance???

The other thing to consider is that costumes must be summoned & levelledā€¦

This was a major argument against the Costumes actually being an effective means of balancing/ buffing the old Season 1 Heroes.

Essentially it means that you still have/ can get a ā€œweakā€ or ā€œunderpoweredā€ version of a hero. Then in order to ā€œbuffā€ or ā€œupgradeā€ the hero, you then need to spend {x} hundreds (more likely thousands) of gems just to SUMMON the hero costumeā€¦ Then you must spend resources, feeders, materials etc in order to level the hero up.

All of which just adds $$$ to the coffers of SGG/ Zinga without actually fixing the issue or imbalance at hand.

The Need for Balance (?)

Generally Speaking, I agree that the Old HotMā€™s, Seasonal Heroes & Event Heroes could use a bit of a bump up to get in line with the newer onesā€¦ I mean compare Lady Locke to Lady of the Lake & there is a substantial power differenceā€¦ Or Guardian Owl to Guardian Gazelleā€¦

BUT

I donā€™t think that Costumes is the most effective way of doing thisā€¦ I think itā€™s just trying to throw additional reasons at players summoning & it just 100% smacks of greedā€¦

If the devs WERE wanting to address the issue of balancing the other older hereos, I think that:

  • Old HotMā€™s can be balanced by
    • giving them elemental links
    • Adding a Family Bonus
    • Adding a passive / innate ability or resistance
  • Old Seasonal & Event heroes can be balanced by simply giving them a stat boostā€¦ Nothing more is really needed
191 Likes

Just to provide an alternative perspective (and Iā€™m not sure where I land on this topic), it also provides more opportunity edit people to obtain some of the more desirable heroes. Without this, Killhare is available two weeks of the year only and Finley will be available once every 5 months (soon to be 10).

Again, I donā€™t know where I land, but wanted to share an alternative perspective.

22 Likes

Personal Note from zeph

Much like @Guvnor, my gut reaction to seeing this before Beta opened was not very positive.

Overall, with new Challenge Event and Season 4 Heroes coming already, this new addition of Costumes makes me feel like Small Giant is dumping new Summoning targets into the game like:

image


Iā€™ll reserve judgment until seeing some of this in action, since Beta hasnā€™t even opened yet. (As of when I wrote this.)

While I agree with @littleKAF, that this may increase access to some rare and well-liked Heroes ā€” if executed well ā€” I also echo the sentiment that this feels more like a mechanism to motivate Summons than to address player desires.


So I think a lot will come down to how Summons and/or other access are executed.

Ideally Iā€™d like to see some sort of Training or other non-Summon option in the mix.

70 Likes

Yeah; potentially. And that was something Zeph mentioned in another chat we hadā€¦

I have no idea how they will end up rolling out these costumes, if they even do get rolled out.

Iā€™d be surprised if these heroes were available all the time tho in the chamberā€¦ I almost think itā€™s more likely that the costumes would be added to the regular portalā€¦

So in the case of:

  • Killhare Costume added to the Springvale Portal
  • Finley Costume added to the Pirates Portal
  • Etcā€¦

But I have no idea;

17 Likes

OP updated with all relevant information.

5 Likes

Wow this makes me quit this game as fast as possible. (Edit at least thinking about it). I did not even liked the old costumes. They should have been obtained without random to upgrade season1 heroes to more modern times.
But puting then into a portal and add random ontop of random like the did in the 1. Version is just horrible execution. Itā€™s just new heroes to be obtained from summon that are a bit less hard to level (somtimesā€¦sometimes they are extra much afford). The update portal was better but still horrible.

Costumes could have been such a great way of buffing older heroes. But seriously a buff to Killhare, Gravemaker and Finley? What the ā€¦

Just add a 500$ deal for a Telluria Costume to restore her original power and be done with game.

49 Likes

Lmao this is unbeliavable, most of those are already the creme de la creme of heroes lol.

Edit: I mean I could get behind of old hotms and old event heroes getting these costumes. But cā€™mon Finley/Jabber/Killhare/Lepus?

46 Likes

Yeah, if these go live Iā€™ll be feeding off my roster. It makes zero sense.

23 Likes

Even testing this in beta has been absurd. I wouldnā€™t mind a small stat boost to heroes that truly need it, E.G: Natalya, Owl, Ares, GM, Lady Locke, King Arthur etc etc, but this is over the top.

I have no reason to keep playing other than to summon based on these new costumes and Villians. If you canā€™t keep up with changes like these that are ultimately behind a paywall then the average player is screwed.

I donā€™t even want to discuss what this will do to war teams.

30 Likes

All Iā€™d really like to say to SG is April Foolsā€™ begins on April 1st not January 18th.

41 Likes

This was my first thought. I was hoping costumes would come and boost non season 1 heroes that donā€™t see much use. To me that means probably all 3 and 4 stars and then older premium heroes (Thoth, Natalya, Guardian Owl come to mind).

Even when I look at these costumes, they donā€™t seem super inspiring as theyā€™re so similar to the base hero.

Finley: so itā€™s the same special damage, but now he gets a larger defense down, and thereā€™s no limitation on hitting each enemy once. A top hero just got even better.
Gravemaker going to damage all can be nice. Iā€™m more interested that he wonā€™t do extra damage to Nature in the costume version.
Jabberwocky: less damage up front, but more poison damage
Killhare: extra 50% damage for one more turn of defense down.
Lepus: this is the most interesting of the costumes. 270% at fast speed will be powerful! Iā€™m not sure if the attack down is better or worse than defense down.
Poseidon looks very similar except blocking more status ailments which makes a solid costume.

I donā€™t have any of these heroes to begin with, so I like that I have more potential. Iā€™m already overpowered by the enemy. This doesnā€™t drastically change it for me.

I do appreciate that the moderators made sure their comments against SG came first. Wonā€™t save them from blame.

10 Likes

Absolutely ridiculous.

The whole draw with costumes was to make weak heroes viable.

Expanding them from S1 should have begun with the likes of Perseus, Mok-arr, Thoth, etc and all the other junk heroes.

Costumes for the likes of Finley, Gravemaker, Jabberwocky and Killhare who are among the most powerful heroes in game is just wrong :rage:

62 Likes

I think you may be missing the costume bonuses. I agree that in most if not all cases, Iā€™d stick to the uncostumed version of the hero, but the boosts in stats (+5% in attack and def, and +10% in health) and mana generation (+5%) are far from negligible.

20 Likes

Old Hotms like Hel should have gotten costumes after S1

14 Likes

How did I miss that? Iā€™m not saying I wouldnā€™t use the costume bonus or costume version. Iā€™m just saying the costumes seem to be almost identical to the current already good hero. The costume doesnā€™t change much about the hero and they get more powerful.

2 Likes

We have just briefly discussed this ā€œfeatureā€ inside our alliance. We are top-10 alliance (even top-3 during the last months) in the game and more than 50% of alliance would quit immediately after this. The rest will follow soon after.
I have more than 70 maxed 5* heroes, most of them donā€™t have costumes yet. Do they want me to pay TWICE for the same heroes to make them viable?
If developers want old heroes to become stronger they have 2 ways of doing this:

  • Just increase their stats as a part of balance update. They did balance updates for Telly, Vela and they are going to do a balance update for Frigg and Odin. So thereā€™s ALREADY a way of balancing heroes. Just do this for old heroes which need a buff
  • Add another elemental link or 1st/2nd passive skill as new 2021 HOTM have.

Honestly, I didnā€™t think that old HOTM or old event heroes or Season 2 heroes strongly needed a buff at this stage. But looking at Ninjas and future Season 4 heroes - I am leaning towards a buff for old heroes. But this should be free for players. We should not pay for this. This is absolutely insane.

SG, please listen to the players, you will lose them soon

227 Likes

This is really all that needs to be said.

It is such a mad idea, that maybe itā€™s SGā€™s last hoorah.

34 Likes

Agree that it feels like a breaking point.
Seems like today was last time I bought an offer for this game.

27 Likes

Nice joke LOL I post this in my alliance chat and most of us including me will quit the game if this goes liveā€¦ I totally agree with Guv here all work with costumes for S1 heroes will disappear make them crap again

31 Likes