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[Review] Fact or Fiction: An Analysis of Thermal Tower Dismantle Timing Criticisms in Infinity Kingdom

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Article Publish : 12/17/2023 15:51

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💠Introduction

What’s up, folks? Welcome to my series, Fact or Fiction, where I take a look at some community criticisms of an update or change in the game, and make an argument using examples for whether I think the criticisms are valid or an overreaction to a change. This week, the topic is going to focus on the reduction in time to dismantle Thermal Towers in Legion of Frostborne(LoF).

💠Table of Contents

Overview
The Criticism
Argument
The Verdict

💠Overview

A prior patch saw the time to dismantle Thermal Towers in LoF drop from about 9.5 hours with the extra 5,000 HP alliance tactic to about 3.2 hours and 1.5 hours with the demolition tactic. The change was due to alliances being able to stall towers for days at end and it became a very tedious process. The Iron Wall tactic healed towers back to full, held two charges, and recovered a charge every 12 hours. This meant opponents had to rotate demolition tactics between alliances to bring the dismantling time down to 4.25 hours. Alliances can then use Iron Wall to waste another 4.25 hours of the opponents’ time and demolition charges. If your alliance can then stall three hours in between those 9.5 hours it takes to burn through the two Iron Wall charges, you can get another Iron Wall charge back to waste another 4.25 hours. If the opponents spent all their demolition charges from their main and farm alliances, then stalling for the next Iron Wall charge becomes entirely possible, without even considering the two Security Alert tactics that unleash 30-minute barriers on the towers, recovering an hour’s worth of time for the towers.

💠The Criticism

As soon as the patch came out, public sentiment was mixed about the lowered dismantle times. Powerful servers with mostly winning LoF seasons mostly liked the change but mid-tiered and low-tiered servers generally leaned towards the opposite. With reset and gate opening being past midnight for Europeans, the 1.5 hours with the dismantling tactic forces those players to stay awake and play through the night if the server was primarily European and didn’t want to lose their towers and gate access by the time they woke up. Although the dismantling time was reduced, the repair time stayed the same. It took about three hours to nearly dismantle a tower but 12 hours to heal back to full. Lowered timers also meant weaker servers could not hold onto their zone for long and only had small windows to fight back. Most LoF brackets would end within the first couple of days of the gate opening.

💠The Argument

To make my argument, I’d like to take a look at a fairly balanced matchup that occurred prior to the change. In Conquest Season (P3), Servers 5, 57, 66, 90, 105, and 121 allied against Server 38 and Server 73. Server 38 was incredibly strong but the matchup was fairly lopsided in favor of Server 105. With some great Thermal Tower control and play, Server 38 was able to enter Zone 2 and even Zone 3 to contest a citadel. Unfortunately for them, they were not able to succeed, but the long dismantling timer and tactics gave them a chance. Server 105 spent so much more time dismantling towers that season than any season after the update.

Now let’s fast forward to the present. We have had two seasons of LoF since the change. The first season saw every single Conquest bracket matchup end within the first two days, albeit the matchups were pretty much all uneven and there was always one highly superior server that crushed every other server. In the current season, Server 56 vs Server 105 is probably the fairest and equal matchup, but even that matchup had ended before Zone 2 even opened.

However, some other factors worked against Server 105. Since the update, more LoF changes have come through. The cooldown for swapping between tactics went from 12 hours to 48 hours which meant alliances could not use Iron Wall, swap to Wonderbuilder, and then swap back to Iron Wall when needed. Wonderbuilder also used to hold two charges and took 12 hours to recharge, now alliances can only hold one charge and it takes 24 hours. This limits the number of towers alliances can drop on a whim and puts more emphasis on having multiple farm alliances ready to drop towers. Iron Wall was also updated to mirror Wonderbuilder so alliances can only stall for a maximum of about 6.5 hours with Iron Wall. Only alliances above level 4 can enter LoF so it is more difficult, especially for smaller servers, to have multiple farm alliances ready with towers.

💠The Verdict

The criticism against reducing the dismantle timer itself at the time is mostly fiction. Towers took way too long to dismantle and felt more like a chore than anything else. Equal servers would sometimes have a lot of trouble breaking into enemy zones due to how long they can stall. However, that doesn’t mean I agree with how Thermal Towers work now. I believe reducing the dismantling time is generally fine and much needed, but it shouldn’t be coupled with so many other changes like the increased recharge time and decreased charges for the alliance tactics. If Iron Wall and Wonderbuilder still held two charges and recharged every 12 hours, decreasing the time to dismantle Thermal Towers to 1.5 hours with the demolition tactic or 3.2 hours without the tactic is fine because alliances can stall for at most about 10 hours with two Iron Wall charges. Implementing all the changes with the swapping cooldown to the decreased effectiveness of the tactics is too much.

I would like to see some of the tactic changes reverted or dismantle times increased or have dismantle time decreased inversely proportional to the number of troops inside the tower, but not all. Reverting some of these changes would give weaker servers and servers at a disadvantage more of a fighting chance and a larger window to make plays, as well as prolonging the season for some brackets.

Do you agree with the timer changes? Why or why not? Let me know in the comments below.