New Quick Play Game Mode - 3v3 Ranked Teams

It’s finally happening! The Teams update is here!

Teams game mode will replace the current FFA game mode in Quick Play. For now, this game mode will only be available in Quick Play.

Matchmaking:

Once you choose your powers and click Play you will be matched into a team with 2 other players against another 3 player team. Matchmaking will take into account both the rank of your teammates and the rank of your opponents when creating the teams so that both teams are equally matched. ( ex: a team with 2 gold players and one bronze player will not be matched against a team with 2 diamond players and one gm).

Gameplay:

Initially, we wanted to just tweak the current gameplay, add the new matchmaking and release. As soon as we started testing amongst ourselves, we realized that keeping the same point system and overall goal as we now have in FFA was not working very well when playing as a team. We had to get creative.

Many brainstorms and iterations later we came up with the idea of Red Team vs. Blue Team each team with their respective crystal core.

Sounds vague so let me elaborate: Each team has a crystal core that the enemy team has to destroy to win. To destroy the enemy core you need to go with your ship over the drop area surrounding the core. When you reach that area, the points you have will automatically fly from your ship and attack the core. If everyone on the enemy team disconnects at the beginning of the round, your team will have 10 seconds to drop off their points before the round ends. Both cores start with 300 points and the match will last until one of the core reaches 0 points and explodes.

You win points by:

• Surviving: Each opponent you outlive gives you 10 survival points. If you outlive everyone on the opposing team, you get a bonus of 100 points.
• Stealing: Use your offensive powers, fevers or mines to steal points from your opponents before they attack your teams’ core. Beware though! The stakes are much higher than before! Stealing will be more substantial than you might remember!
  
• Going through gaps: Every time you go through a gap you will earn 1 point!
• Donations: You can give away your points to your team-mates by going over the drop area of your crystal. If you are in a team with 2 other players, the points will be split between them, if you are in a team with 1 other player, all your points will go to that player. We added this to allow players a choice when it comes to their role in the team: if someone prefers a more aggressive playstyle they might not want to risk their points getting stolen and choose to give them to the more defensive player on the team, etc.

Ranks

The Teams game mode will have a separate rank. You will be able to see both your FFA rank and the new Teams rank in your user profile.

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As with most big updates we put live please be aware there might be bugs that have escaped our notice during testing. Feel free to report any bug you might come across as the programmers will be keeping their eyes out for these reports! Thank you!

Last but not least, any feedback you might have will be greatly appreciated as we are looking forward to seeing what you all think of the new game mode.