Healing Pulse. This is all for this meta report and the next two. Thank you for reading and see you next season.
Okay this is not entirely true but pretty close to the reality in terms of the top leaderboard. Brutal Claw Bleed and Last Stand Perch may be the only hope when we look at the top.
I still remember when most of us were just focussed on why Feather Descend was not nerfed, Bubble was too strong. We do not see much of these at the very top as it is blooded by Healing Pulse.
I think this era highlights the downside and constraint of a Web3 game. The inability to make balance changes during the season could lead to poor gaming experience, making some players take a break or even leave the game if the meta is too imbalanced.
Having said that, the majority of the players are not at the very top, and so the imbalanced meta at the very top may have a small impact for the rest of the player base given that the meta is still relatively diverse as we go down the leaderboard.
tldr:
Healing Pulse dominance at the top
Brutal Claw AoE Bleed as a counter to Healing Pulse!?
Last Stand Perch also still fighting
Player Base Statistics
Rank # Players Rankings
Challenger 5152 1-5152
Dragon 8468 5153-13620
Tiger 9728 13621-23348
Bear 4490 23349-27838
Wolf 4309 27839-32147
Boar 5025 32148-37172
Hare 7024 37173-44196
Chick 12104 44197-56300
Egg 12702 56301-69002
Another 6000+ players joined the game this Season with about 4000 players in 0-200 Victory Stars. Total number of players in Challenger is now over 5000 which is a good aim for causal players. The number of players in Tiger saw a slight decline compared to last week, again suggesting that more players moved up from Tiger than moved up into Tiger.
One thing I start to wonder is whether Axie Origins will even break out like Axie Classic did back in 2021 or Pixels in the past few months. The player base has been stable for the whole 2023 and there is no sign in any increase. Will Axie Origins continue to be like this for the next year and beyond? Is Sky Mavis satisfied with how Axie Origins currently is (in terms of revenue)? Will Sky Mavis make any drastic changes to Origins one way or the other? Over time will tell.
Archetype Usage
Overall archetype usage
At the time of writing, there are 3 players at 2600+ VStar, 6 players at 2500-2600, and 15 players at 2400-2500. Guess what, most of the matches played by these players are none those than Healing Pulse.
Brutal Claw AoE Bleed is possibly the only archetype that can fight with Healing Pulse at the moment. We see some Feather in 2400-2500 but this might be from earlier on and I would not be surprised that Feather will continue to drop as more players are picking up Healing Pulse.
Note that there are quite a number of teams with "Multiple archetypes" including Perch + Tiny Fan, Brutal Claw + Feather, Brutal Claw + Healing Pulse, Sustain + Sturdy Fighter, Triple Owl + Healing Pulse, Hot Butt + Confused in the top 200.
Archetype Win Rates and Matchups
Overall Archetype Win Rates
Healing Pulse is green across the board. Players are just climbing with Healing Pulse at whatever level it is played. Brutal Claw is finding a similar level of success and it has the potential to compete with the dominance of Healing Pulse. Feather and Perch are doing okay. One interesting archetype to note is Ramp Tiny Fan, which may have the potential to pick up more popularity as players are looking to counter the meta at their VStar bracket or just play some different.
In the opposition direction we see some archetypes declining such as Anemone, Jinx, Sustain, and Pure DMG Sturdy Fighter. Perhaps this could be due to players not adapting to the meta in the Mystic Era or that the archetypes are a bit too weak compared to others. Some popular archetypes such as Sandal, Sponge, and Perch are still holding their ground as they adapt to the meta.
Archetype Matchups
Not surprising to see Healing Pulse mostly green (above 50% win rate) but it is surprising to see that the win rate of Healing Pulse against Brutal Claw is only 40%! Of course part of it could be due more non-optimal Healing Pulse teams compared to Brutal Claw at 1900+ VStar, but the win rate of Brutal Claw against Healing Pulse is positive in most VStar brackets except the very top, suggesting that Brutal Claw is an effective counter to Healing Pulse. I would not be surprised to see more top players switch to Brutal Claw to counter the meta at the very top.
Brutal Claw is not without its weaknesses. It seems to struggle against Poison (which tend to have a lot of Heal and Cleanse) as well as Perch and Sponge. Interesting, Spikes and Ramp Tiny Fan also seem to do well against Brutal Claw.
Perch is still in a good spot except when facing Healing Pulse. Healing Pulse has some much Shield while dealing so much damage, and the Shield makes it difficult for Perch teams to go through. Similar story can be said for Perch against Sustain.
Archetype Highlights
Healing Pulse
Healing Pulse: "This Axie's Heals also Heal / Reverse Heal the target's allies for 30% Value. Overheal from this Axie is granted as Shield to its target and dealt as DMG to the lowest HP Enemy."
Healing Pulse with Cucumber Slice and Strawberry Shortcake can do a lot of damage as well as gaining Shield as the Overheal grants Shield + deal DMG. Overheal also applies to Summons, which is why Healing Pulse teams tend to run Shiitake and Hollow with the Cucumber Slice AoE Overheal. The Reverse Heal on Strawberry Shortcake and Silence Whisper helps with making a particular enemy Axie with the lowest HP, which will then be damaged by Overheal. Single carry teams (or any teams to be honest) stand no chance against Healing Pulse.
Some form of Card Draw (and redraw) is good for consistency, hence we see Nerdy (or Clear) and Blossom. 1 Cottontail for extra Energy to do more damage. Double Nimo tail to thin out deck and get to Cottontail earlier. Pretty simple and effective.
In terms of Runes, Holy Prayer and Pure Instinct are there too buff the Healing Pulse damage. Pure Instinct gives +15% (assuming 3 different classes Axies) and Holy Prayer gives +15% when the deck has any Cursed Card (+10% without Cursed Card in deck), which is interesting in that the unevolved Nerdy, Clear, and Cottontail are better than the evolved versions in this case. Not much to say about Charms, just buff the Healing Cards on the Healing Pulse Plant.
Brutal Claw
Brutal Claw: "On targets with Bleed, Single and AoE Attacks create Bloodstorm then double the Bleed stacks on targets with <10 Bleed."
Bloodstorm: "-1 Bleed from target then all Enemy Axies -12 HP."
If it is not for Healing Pulse, Brutal Claw AoE Bleed may get the spotlight for this Era. The new addition of Discount Coupon helps Brutal Claw to apply Bleed more effectively with 1 Energy Chubby. Paralysing Glare applies Doubt and deal more Pure DMG with Debuff Cards. Multiple Hidden Razor to apply more AoE Bleed while 1 Mantis Dagger on Garish Worm helps with Discarding opponent's key Cards such as Cucumber Slice and Wing Horn. The new Gloomy Dice also helps, especially against teams that plays many cards in 1 turn like Feather Daggers, Innocent Lamb, Nimo tail, Confident, Puppy etc.
Conclusion
While Healing Pulse is certainly dominating the very top of the leaderboard, players lower down can still enjoy our games with our favourite teams while occasionally disrupted by Healing Pulse players making their way up. There is certainly quite a number of things for the Origins balancing team to address after this Season is over. I hope they will focus more about player experience in terms of adjusting archetypes. I hope to see more possible counterplays against different archetypes and less polarising matchups. We all know that feeling having to effectively auto-concede when faced against certain archetypes (yes, I am thinking about things like Bubbles and Perch, and of course Healing Pulse in this Era).
So I think this seems to be it for this season. More than 2 more weeks before the end of this season and probably with another few weeks off-season before the next balance patch comes. I do hope that Axie Origins will move to a model without (or a very short) off-season to keep players engaged but from experience it will be at least another month before we see something new in Origins. Let us hope I am wrong on this one.
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Additional Data
# Matches Played in Days 4-6
2600+ 53
2500-2600 621
2400-2500 1272
2300-2400 4304
2200-2300 10049
2100-2200 21285
2000-2100 41219
1900-2000 76858
