Arena Season 5

[Pointless]

@kennymcc I was just going to post the same thing. Just went to finish the week (Diamond) and saw that the Shard reward is now 10. Must say, makes sense to have higher rewards in higher leagues.

[MVNLA2]

Darn — They changed the weekly reward wheel for wood league so that there is one slot with 1 shard! Why couldn’t they start with 5 and increase from there? Don’t see how anyone can possibly get enough shard to do much of anything without spending a fair amount of $.

@roviohuzz

[Bubbley]

I am in diamond league last week I received 5 shards and this week the wheel still says 5 shards.

[MVNLA2]

@bubbley — For me the wheel changed today. Yesterday it was 5 shards in Wood league.

[Pointless]

@bubbley that is strange…definitely 10 for me in Diamond

[Jamairoqui]

It’s ten shards on the wheel for me as well. Maybe the number of shards on the wheel goes up by 5 for each consecutive week you stay in Diamond? That would give some further incentive to staying in Diamond, and also to grinding to get a top spot so you get the shards on the spin. Plus, since trading in set items no longer gives you FE, they’ve become a little more valuable now (or maybe there is a greater benefit to linking your ABE game to your FB account and accumulating FB friends).

[Suikyo]

@jamairoqui Probably not. I advanced to Diamond league in week 6 and have stayed in Diamond. The number of shard in that 1 slot on the reward wheel was 10 on last Sunday.

[Bubbley]

Finally it has changed to 10. My calendar was out also but now is correct.

[LondoJowo]

5th straight season making it to the Diamond league.

This week only 4 of the 15 have posted a score. I’ve completed the objectives for the first 2 days and am in 1st with 12,900.

[JJAtelier]

I believe the Twitter handle made a very shot notice announcement right after the week finished regarding the shard increase. Seems fishy considering how they decided to increase the numbers shards right after the first batch were awarded. Kinda wish I had those extra 5 shards.

Reach higher arena leagues now to get up to 10 Enchantment Shards! #ABEpic

— Angry Birds Epic (@ABepic) January 25, 2016

[Pointless]

@jadedbacon you pose a good question. Although I do not use any of those sets personally, I thought I had seen these proc, but reading their descriptions again, it may have simply been the critical on the individual pieces of Primal and Finisher I was encountering (don’t really see too many Cleansing to say either way).
I have been against many opponents with Banner Breaker, however and although I have seen the crit proc many times, both against my birds and with the chili against my banner, I honestly still don’t know what the Set Bonus is all about. The sheer number of people using this set (maxed out) still makes me think we are missing something, but maybe it’s just as simple as the high damage output.

[Bubbley]

@pointless @jadedbacon I have also played many times against the Banner Breaker. Mostly used by Paladins but also Samurai. It’s difficult to see what happens with Samurai so I try very hard with Paladin; I even took screen shots. I don’t know what it does. Certainly not useful against birds.

I am still using the Blazing Eye and have not lost a battle to an opponent using it and they always also have the Valiant set.

I agree that the Finisher also doesn’t appear to do much. I don’t see Matilda’s new set that often. I use the Mana set, which, since the update, does not confer the immunity it did. Still extremely useful though.

[KillerKea]

On half of the weeks this season I’ve had at least 3 people I compete against not even play. Now that the wheel has shards and the fact that they increased it to 10 in diamond league competition is getting fierce. I completed all objectives the first couple of days and that was only good enough for 13th place, but since I have valiant it isn’t too hard for me to earn a few thousand extra points each day if needed. I just hate getting the knock Mathilda out with Blues 5 times objective because there still aren’t many people that use Matilda and I have to restart battles 5+ times before I get a team that uses her.

Last week I had a cheater in my league who went from 0 to 150,085 and knocked me into 4th. I could have easily earned 4-5k more to get 3rd, but I was curious to see if they’d remove the cheater without me reporting it. They did not. I had to spend 50 essence to get those 5 shards, but it would have cost me 50 even if I had 3 stars.

[Anonymous]

The Finisher set does what it says it does, more or less. 50% of the time you attack the banner with bomb when it’s under 20% health, it does however much damage it needs to in order to KO the banner. I’ve seen it do almost up to 4000 damage. (It doesn’t actually do 314,567 damage, or whatever it says in the description.)

It’s useful when you’re trying to time when you KO the banner. Best example is the “KO the banner while all three opponent birds are also KOed” objective. Interestingly, it also works with Bomb’s rage attack, which is useful if he’s forced to attack one of the birds due to Avenger/Princess/Rogues magic, or when the banner has ‘Protection from Red,’ or Paladin’s Devotion.

[Bubbley]

@poptimus thanks for that. I got the clock part to the set from a free roll yesterday so I might use it when I get the “without healing banner” objective. I’m loathe to give up my bomb.

[Anonymous]

@bubbley
Good point: It’s good for simply killing the banner a turn or two quicker than you otherwise would.
It’s actually saved me a couple of times when playing with my (relatively weak) power team – I (obviously) don’t have any powerful healing or misdirection with that team, so if I lose the toss or run into some bad proc luck, it’s no sure thing I’ll win, and that extra turn or two can make all the difference.

[Jadedbacon]

@poptimus thanks for confirming that Finisher does what it says it does. Would’ve been nicer if the ability just read “50% chance when hitting an enemy with 20% health left to KO that enemy, if possible” (the “if possible” part is for enemies that can’t be KOed by birds, like demonic wizpig). I’m guessing displaying the huge number is probably just to get people to fork out LCs to try and get it.

I just tested Cleansing and it works. Went to Magic Shield – 1 and had Cleric w/ Cleansing and Lightning bird (using support on Matilda for extra attacks) and attacked the Fire Wizard Pig after he put his buff on. It removed the effect and healed all my birds, as described. The healing effect is just like Bomb’s Candy set – healing numbers show up over your birds. However, I didn’t see any dispel message pop up like if you attack with Cap’n/Lightning Birds or even just the Dispel effect, but the buff he had was removed. The dispel message would’ve been a nice way to show that it triggered.

Also tested Primal and it also works. Same location, Magic Shield – 1 and had Guardian (lowest damage, figured it’d be easier to test) with Primal, Lightning bird (same deal, support on Red for an extra attack) and Rogues to apply an extra debuff. When the Fire Wiz pig had only the redirecting effect from the rogue, the attack from Red removed the effect and dealt 500some damage (not every time, took 2 attacks for it to trigger). After Red’s damage reduction debuff was on the Fire Wiz pig, I reapplied the redirect effect from the Rogue and attacked with Red again, the effect triggered and dealt upwards to 1100 damage. Same as Cleansing, no real visual effect to show it happened other than extra numbers flying up and the debuff being removed. Having the “Cleansed” message fly up would’ve been a nice indicator that it triggered.

If someone gets the Banner Breaker please post here if you see the effect work and exactly what happened. I’m guessing an easy way to test is just to go against Piggy McCool with Red + Lightning bird + Time Jump to try to get the most attempts per round.

[Pointless]

@poptimus I assume when you have seen Finisher hit the banner for >4K this is a “kill”? And that this amount is significantly more than your Bomb does on other attacks? I ask because I have had Finisher hit my banner for a similar amount without knocking it down due to various crit procs. I personally use SeaDog with Scissors and regularly hit opponent’s for over 4K, due to the bonus damage chance from Rock, Valiant Tapestry and Valiant Head.

[Anonymous]

@pointless
Usually it’s a kill. There have been times when it’s only been a near-kill, presumably due to some damage reduction banner effect (I’ll try to confirm next time it happens). And yes, way more damage than otherwise possible with my Bomb. I pretty much only ever use his Cap’n hat – a regular attack for me currently does 1318, and a crit proc does 1977.

[Pointless]

@poptimus interesting…so Finisher works but doesn’t really work. Obviously the insane bonus damage described is false (mine lists as well over 400K and I haven’t upgraded either item once), but to advertise it as that is really misleading considering the damage seems to be based on HP left and not considering any damage reducing effects on the other side. I’ll stick with Scissors thank you very much. And another set with a heal effect to Bomb to boot…makes the set choice for “win battles without healing a bird” objective rather slim for those of us using Bomb regularly (ie one rather useless set)

[BINH]

I’m in the most competitive group ever in S5. I usually got 8k points/day to rank 1st. Now the first one has +60k while i still use the same tactics with 32k. Maybe 10 shards brings people more motivation

[Jadedbacon]

@binh it definitely made me have more motivation. Usually I just coast while in Diamond league. Getting the equivalent of 30 LCs on the end of week spin is too sweet to pass up.

[GrauGeist]

Ha! I only have 9 active players on my board, and #1 is only 26k!

[GrauGeist]

@killerkea – I got the Blues KO Matty yesterday, and couldn’t complete it, which is odd, because I keep expecting to see more Witch. But what it really is is a ton of Valiant Attack teams, and I just can’t race them without Valiant myself. In the mean time, I’m banking Shards while I hunt for Valiant Head. It’s rather unsatisfying when the game has devolved into having Valiant or not.

[Anonymous]

Man, screw you guys! I’m in 6th with 40k in my first Diamond experience.