Season 19 just dropped and it brought a whole boatload of changes with it.

From seasonal rewards to minor tweaks in gameplay, I’ll be going over all of them in this article.

Season Rewards

There are over 3000 AXS tokens up for grabs for the top 1000 players in the leaderboards. That’s over $400,000 worth of AXS with its current price of $150+!

The seasonal MMR has been reset so everyone will start back at 1200, while Season 19 is expected to end on December 21 at 4pm GMT+7.

Formula Updates

The formulas for critical strikes and combo damage from the Skill stat were also updated. 

Critical Strikes

Random lucky critical strikes have been plaguing the game ever since battles were introduced, turning from what should’ve been a sure win to downright pain and suffering. The developers theorize that the main cause of this is the sheer number of cards Axies with High Health and Speed stats play, causing them to deal more critical strikes than they should.

In order to address this issue, the developers have made it so that the damage critical hits deal would scale with the Morale stat of an Axie; the lower the Morale, the lower the critical damage.

The new formula for determining the damage of critical strikes goes as follows:

sqrt(Base Morale stat points) x 10 + Base Morale stat points x 0.4 – 18

Note: the formula used in determining the chance of critical strikes is still the same

Good riddance lucky crits!

Skill

The developers have also revamped the way the Skill stat plays into combat. This will make it stronger and more competitive when compared to the other stats. 

The new formula for determining the bonus damage from combos goes as follows:

Base Skill stat points x 0.55 – 12.5

In Axie Infinity’s main Discord server, a pinned message in the #arena channel shows the skill formula table.

While there were lots of card buffs and nerfs, unseen balances appeared in the Skill stat point.

As shown in the image, Dusk Axies deal less damage because of their low skill, despite playing in a combo. On the other hand, Mech Axies deal lots of damage for comboed cards.

Card Balance Changes

Finally, balance changes to cards have been implemented. 

This is the most controversial part of the balance update. Some people got hit by the nerf, and some didn’t. So far the most important move to make is adapting to the new meta.

Nerfs

As we all know, there were a few builds and meta Axies that have been wreaking havoc in the arena. The Terminator Dusk/Reptile, Doubletalk Bird, Aqua-Aqua-Plant, and Shrimpinator/Poison team compositions are to name a few.

Fortunately for their victims, a.k.a. me, they all received nerfs to maintain balance in the game.  

Here are the nerfs made to the cards that were deemed to be too strong for the arena:

	Old Values		New Values
Part/Card Name	Class	Damage	Shields	Changes Made	Damage	Shields	Change to Description
Anemone – Aquaponics/Aqua Vitality	Aqua	80	40	Reduced Shields	80	35	N/A
Goldfish – Swift Escape	Aqua	110	20	Reduced Damage	105	20	N/A
Nimo – Tail Slap	Aqua	30	0	Reduced Damage	20	0	N/A
Risky Fish – Fish Hook	Aqua	110	30	Reduced Damage & Shields	105	20	N/A
Shoal Star – Star Shuriken	Aqua	115	10	Reduced Damage	110	10	N/A
Dual Blades – Sinister Strike	Beast	130	20	50% less critical damage	0	30	Deal 200% damage on critical strikes
Cuckoo – Cockadoodledoo	Bird	0	40	Reduced Shields	0	30	N/A
Doubletalk – Soothing Song	Bird	80	0	Reduced Damage	60	0	Ignore shield. Apply Sleep to target
Post Fight – All-out Shot	Bird	120	0	Reduced Damage	110	0	N/A
Antenna – Bug Signal	Bug	80	60	Reduced Shields	80	50	N/A
Cute Bunny – Terror Chomp	Bug	120	30	Reduced Damage, Increased Shields	100	35	N/A
Garish Worm – Barb Strike	Bug	100	50	Reduced Damage & Shields	90	30	N/A
Gravel Ant – Numbing Lecretion	Bug	30	40	Reduced Shields	30	30	N/A
Lagging – Mystic Rush	Bug	40	0	Reduced Damage	30	0	N/A
Thorny Caterpillar – Allergic Reaction	Bug	105	30	Reduced Damage	100	30	N/A
Yam – Gas Unleash	Plant	30	20	Reduced Damage	20	20	N/A
Croc – Nile Strike	Reptile	90	60	Reduced Damage	85	60	N/A
Grass Snake – Venom Spray	Reptile	10	20	Increased Damage & Shields; Reduced Poison Stacks	20	30	Apply 1 Poison to Target
Tiny Turtle – Chomp	Reptile	80	50	Reduced Damage	75	50	N/A

Unfortunately, my fishies got hit with nerfs as well. On the bright side, I won’t get one-shot by Doubletalk Birds anymore so that’s that I guess.

Buffs

While there were cards that were insanely strong and hard to fight against, there were also cards that were extremely lacking and borderline laughable. The most notable buffs were to cards from the Beast and Bug classes, while certain Reptile cards were surprisingly shown some love as well.

Here are the buffs made to the cards that were deemed to be too weak to be used in the arena:

		Old Values		New Values
Part/Card Name	Class	Damage	Shields	Changes Made	Damage	Shields	Change to Description
Cottontail – Luna Absorb	Beast	0	0	Increased Shields	0	30	N/A
Imp – Ivory Stab	Beast	70	20	Increased Damage & Shields	80	30	N/A
Jaguar – Nitro Leap	Beast	115	35	Increased Damage	120	35	N/A
Merry – Merry Legion	Beast	65	85	Increased Damage	75	85	N/A
Ronin – Single Combat	Beast	75	0	Increased Damage	80	0	N/A
Timber – Woodman Power	Beast	50	100	Increased Damage; Reduced Shields	80	80	N/A
Tri-Feather – Triple Feather	Bird	35	10	Increased Damage	40	10	N/A
Ant – Chemical Warfare	Bug	30	80	Increased Shields	30	100	N/A
Buzz Buzz – Bug Noise	Bug	100	40	Increased Damage	110	40	N/A
Fish Snack – Anesthetic Bait	Bug	60	80	Increased Shields	60	90	N/A
Mosquito – Blood Taste	Bug	70	40	Increased Damage	80	40	N/A
Pupae – Grub Explode	Bug	60	0	Increased Damage	70	0	N/A
Scarab – Scarab Curse	Bug	110	40	Increased to 2 rounds	110	40	Target cannot be healed for 2 rounds
Twin Tail – Twin Needle	Bug	30	0	Increased Damage	40	0	N/A
Cactus – Prickly Trap	Plant	110	20	Increased Damage	115	20	N/A
Rose Bud – Healing Aroma	Plant	0	40	Increased Shields	0	50	N/A
Strawberry Shortcake – Sweet Party	Plant	0	0	Increased Shields	0	40	N/A
Kotaro – Kotaro Bite	Reptile	80	20	Increased Damage & Shields	85	30	N/A
Razor Bite – Why So Serious	Reptile	90	50	Increased Damage & Shields	95	55	N/A
Red Ear – Slippery Shield	Reptile	10	135	Increased Shields	10	145	N/A
Scaly Spear – Scale Lunge	Reptile	100	50	Increased Damage	110	50	N/A
Scaly Spoon – Tiny Catapult	Reptile	80	40	Increased Shields	80	50	N/A
Unko – Poo Fling	Reptile	30	80	Increased Shields	30	100	N/A
Wall Gecko – Critical Escape	Reptile	90	10	Increased Shields	90	20	N/A

Congratulations to the Beast, Bug, and Reptile fans out there and I hope I won’t come across you guys in the arena.

It briefly discusses everything about the balance updates and changes to Skill and Morale.

Key Points

Here are the main points you need to remember:

• Season 19 is live with 3,000 AXS tokens ($400,000+) in leaderboard rewards 

• MMR has been reset: everyone starts at 1,200

• A major rebalancing patch has been implemented based on data the developers have collected over the past few months

• The formulas for both bonus damage on critical strikes as well as the effect of Skill on bonus damage for combos have been tweaked and balanced

What do you think about the changes made for Season 19? What are you looking forward to the most this season? Tell us in the comments down below!