Clash of Clans Update May 2016
Clash of Clans May 2016 Update
Introduction
The last major update which took place in Clash of Clans was back in March 2016, only 2 months ago. Hopefully this update will be just as good or even better than the previous release which hosted many improvements and brand new features into the game. Supercell have been working hard at this update and have promised a solid update which will enhance the game and improve our “Clash” experience. For now, it is only a question of waiting until the release. As always we will be notified of the public release via social media and a lengthy Maintenance break will take place prior to the reopening of the game. The maintenance break began at around 15:00 BST on Wednesday 24 May and the game opened a few hours later.
Previous Changes
Here are the minor tweaks and changes that Supercell made to the game in between March and Now (23 May):
Certain troops and spells have had reduction in training and brewing times. The long awaited hero regeneration time has also been greatly reduced. This, as a whole will make high level attacking more efficient and allow people to attack more often. Here are the actual changes:
– 2x Spell Brewing
– 3x training for Golem, PEKKA and Lava Hound
– 2x training for Witch, Wall Breaker and Dragon
– Slightly faster training for Valkyries, Bowler, Wizard, Balloon and Healer
– Much faster Hero Regeneration (Varies for each level of Hero)
There has been no alteration to the how much quicker boosted barracks train troops. Boosted barracks are still 4x as quick than non-boosted barracks.
It was expected that this would be an issue just as the release of any troop brings. The bowler is still being adjusted due to its new presence in Clash of Clans. After a series of nerfs and buffs, the Bowler was recently improved as players were complaining that it’s movements were rather lethargic and that it didn’t really have a large effect on raids. Worst of all, people weren’t using the troops in their army compositions and Supercell have emphasised that they don’t want any more stagnant troops in their game. Bowlers will now attack much more quickly once being released onto the battlefield. They will pick their targets more rapidly and move along with the rest of the army instead of being left behind and being sniped off by defences. Hopefully we will see the Bowler in more army compositions and see it at its full potential.
As you might know if you are a keen trophy pusher up in Titan or Legend leagues you will be strongly aware of “clouding.” This term is used to describe the length of time it takes to actually find a base to attack. Up in those leagues it is not odd to wait a few hours (2 – 3 hours) to find ONE base. Previously, a “Retry” button would be shown on your screen only after 5 minutes of searching. As Supercell have become aware of how long searching can take at high trophy ranges, they have changed this to 30 minutes before the “Retry” button appears. This has angered some top level players as instead of actually fixing the problem of “clouding” which is known to ruin the fun of the game, Supercell have only eased the pain slightly. However an advantage of this is that the change doesn’t affect 95% of players in lower leagues. There will still be a plethora of bases to choose from in lower leagues (Non-league – Champions).
The Friendly Challenge
It is obvious that the highlight of this update is “The Friendly Challenge.” You may be aware of a similar system to this in another one of Supercell’s Games: Clash Royale. Within clans you can duel each other in order to test certain decks and just in general train yourself to be the best. This is a similar ideology to the new Friendly Challenge in Clash of Clans.
To initiate a Friendly Challenge all you need to do is click on the new button which will be located among the other clan commands in the Clan information tab. Here you can enter specific text or just leave it blank (a bit like requesting for troops). Your challenge will be shown in normal clan chat and anyone of your clan mates are able to accept the challenge. You will not have to quickly build a base, you can easily select which base you want to use to defend from your friends and clan mates. We are not yet sure if there will be any cool down for this feature however it is unlikely that there will be one.
Once you have accepted the Friendly Challenge you will use your current troops, spells, clan castle troops and heroes against your clan members base which they have selected. There is no gain or loss for utilising this feature. You are not able to gain any gold, elixir, dark elixir or trophies only knowledge and experience. Once finished with the raid, your troops and other attacking facilities will remain unaltered as if they had never been used regardless of whether they were used in battle or not. If your opponent has any clan castle troops in their clan castle then these will be used as defence but again not taken away after the battle has finished.
This feature has been long awaited by the Clash of Clans community and has been expected since Duels were released in Clash Royale. Supercell have said that they added this in due to almost excessive recommendation from the players as well as some good ideas that they had come up with which would help it fit in well with their game. It will mainly be used to test different attack strategies or test how well you base does against certain army compositions. People will also have fun with this as well, everyone has always wanted to attack their friends but couldn’t due to restrictions, now you can! There have been many competitions taking place on Clash Royale using the Duel system so I would not be surprised if we started to see competitions and contests on Clash of Clans.
You may be thinking, can’t this be used to the same extent as “ghosting” or “modding” in war attacks. This was the first impression of many but Supercell have taken steps in order to make sure that this does not happen within Clash of Clans. There have been recent ban waves for people who use the controversial clients such as X-Mod and iMod. It wouldn’t be right for Supercell to release a feature in their game which allowed them to do such things that mods which went against their terms of service also did. Here are the measures that the owners of Clash of Clans have taken in order to prevent use of the feature in malicious and unfair methods:
To select the base you want to use to defend against your clan mate you need to use your Layout Modifier. To prevent people copying their war opponents base and then carrying out multiple attacks on an identical base, Supercell have said that a base modified in the last 24 hours cannot be used in a Friendly Battle. If people were able to copy opponents bases and infinitely test attack them it would ruin the fun and competitive aspects of the game. However this restriction only applies for the higher Town Hall levels, Town Hall 8 and below are not affected by this rule.
There have also been some major changes to the Preparation Day of the 2 day war period in order to enforce the fair use of this new feature which will be in its BETA phase once released (so expect minor changes). Once the update has been rolled you will not be able to view your opponents war base, instead you will be able to see their main base. This means that you will still see their defences, hero levels, walls etc but won’t be able to see the exact layout (to prevent copying). However during Battle Day you will be able to see the exact war base that you will be facing.
Other Tweaks and Modifications to the Game
– The Bowler’s housing space has been reduced to 6 from 8 as people complained that it didn’t actually provide enough worth to be considered such a large troop in the game. Hopefully this will allow the Bowler to fit into a lot more army compositions.
– The Edit mode for building your base has been totally revamped and now has a lot more features for you to try out. Here is an image which depicts what it will be like:
– The new builder tab now shows even more information. On the small page it will advise you in which upgrades you should perform next. I’m unsure on how this will work but I’m excited to see this change.
– You can now donate fully trained troops or spells from the production queue even if your army camps or spell factory is full. This will increase the efficiency of donating and lead to people getting better donating stats in order to level up or finish that friend in need acheivement.
– There is now a new button in chat which will quickly allow the user to request without even clicking on their clan castle.
– You can now instantly use gems to donate troops or spells to someone. No training is required and the troops or spells will be instantly donated regardless of full army camps or spell factories.
– While training troops in your barracks or spells in your factories you can easily drag units across each other in order to increase the priority of one.
– Clans can display their War Log to the public and anyone will be able to see their stats as well as recent wars. This can be disabled in the Clan settings.
– When a raid is being spectated, whether it is a war attack or a friendly battle there will be a spectator count which tells you how many people are watching the attack.
New Releases
Now here is the much awaited list of new releases that are coming to Clash of Clans on Wednesday 24 May:
Spring Trap
People will now be able to upgrade their spring traps from Levels 1 – 5. As you increase the level of the trap the re-arm cost will increase but more importantly, the Spring capacity will increase. We are not 100% sure about what Spring Capacity is but we think that it is the number of troops which can be sprung with the Housing space factored in. (Eg. If the Spring Capacity is 15 then 15 barbarian can be sprung or 3 giants etc).
Town Hall 11 Exclusive Upgrades
The illustrious Level 14 Cannon has been released. The aesthetics of the defence have stayed very close to its previous level but the stats have increased giving the cannon a higher Damage Per Second stat and making them more durable with much more hitpoints.
The next level or levels of Spell Factory have also been released. It’s blue tinge to its colour scheme suggests something about the spells which will be released alongside it. The new spells will be discussed later on in the article.
As you may have noticed, air attacks are becoming less common due to the frequent nerf of the troops and buffs of air defences and those pesky air sweepers. Well now air attacks will be reinvigorated with the release of Level 7 balloons and Level 4 Lava Hounds. If you though balloons couldn’t get any more powerful or that Lava Hound couldn’t become any stronger, think again! Start building up your anti-air bases because I expect a lot of air attacks to be coming your way in the foreseeable future.
The New Spells
With only 3 current Dark spells there isn’t much variety so hopefully we will be spoiled for choice after this update which hosts the release of 2 brand new spells.
Skeleton Spell
As you can guess the Skeleton Spell involves the release of a bunch of skeletons onto the body of the battlefield. The skeletons can be placed anywhere at any time of the battle but they will need to be placed strategically to be of any use in battle. The skeletons should be used as a distraction in order to allow other troops to power into the base or just as an auxiliary force which can help clean up a few extra buildings and maybe earn an extra star and a few more trophies. This spell is available to those at Town Hall 9.
Clone Spell
The Clone Spell is unlocked slightly later at Town Hall 10. The troops which enter the radius of the spell will create exact duplicates of themselves with equal hit points and identical damage per second stats. However the clones only last for a certain duration of time and will soon wear off. Troops with large housing spaces will not be able to be cloned such as Golems and Lava Hounds or the spell would be too overpowered. This will also be useful for distracting defences and packing a bigger punch while raiding strong bases.
The New Troops
With the release of new troops we can expect new barrack or dark barrack to be released alongside them. We were not shown any of these in the Sneak Peaks so it will definitely be a nice surprise.
The Baby Dragon
You may recognise this beast renowned for its presence in Supercell’s new hit game: Clash Royale. There, the Baby Dragon is notorious for taking on whole bunches of troops on at once. You might be thinking that the Baby Dragon will be a weaker version of the Dragon but you are wrong. It does have lower hit points and a small Damage Per Second stat but it also takes a shorter time to train and takes up less housing space.
What separates is Baby Dragon from the normal Dragon is depicted in the picture above. If there are no other air units around the Baby Dragon it will be put into a rage mode where it will have a higher movement speed and higher Damage Per Second. The Baby Dragon will be utilizable by Town Hall 9 and above players.
The Miner
This troops has been frequently suggested and has been long awaited by the Clash of Clans community. We are unsure of the exact stats but the main aspect of The Miner which makes it stand out is that it can dig underneath walls without being attacked by defences or setting off traps as shown in the image below.
The Miner will be only available to Town Hall 10 and 11 players but I expect great things to come from this unique troop.
Conclusion
Well that’s it for this update of May 2016. A massive release packed full of new features and improvements. Hopefully the Summer 2016 update will be as great as this.
Additional Note
This image which you can see above was leaked and we are unsure of its authenticity (whether it is real or fake) but it suggests that Giants will be the first to reach Level 8 and that Wall Breakers will make the jump to Level 7. Hopefully we will see this in the new future but it is real or fake? I will let you decide that one for yourselves.
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