Welcome to patch 3.21!  In this patch we have a new BoTW for the week, new Skins, the Imperial Chest, adjustments to Test Features, improved input buffering, adjustments to animation, bug fixes, special tournament map set and map improvements!

Brawl of the Week – KO Mania!

• 1v1
• 300% damage
• 5 Stocks

Malhalla

This week we have the Imperial Chest that includes three exclusive skins.  We have also added two new skins to Malhalla! Jiro’s price has been reduced from 7200g to 5400g.

The Imperial Chest is in the store for a limited time!

• Imperial Chest emerges with three exclusive skins: Death Adder Hattori, Warrior Spirit Kor, and Yakuza Koji.

New Artemis and Azoth skins!

• Necromancer Azoth – “Dominion over the dead and the Grave itself.”
• Street Race Artemis – “Gone in a blaze of smoke and fire.”

Jiro’s price reduced!

• Jiro’s price is now 5400g!

Test Features

Dash Deflect has received a few upgrades, in the form of a new visual effect and more noticeable angle of deflection. This will help players better follow the action and clearly see when they have successfully deflected a thrown object. For better consistency, Dash Deflect now also applies to Gadgets, so you may now deflect any thrown object heading your way by boldly dashing towards it! This should lend itself towards a more universal feel for the Dodge button, allowing it to more fully serve as the counter option to thrown objects.

• Dash Deflect now has a different bounce angle to help communicate the moment of deflection.
• Dash Deflect now works on Gadgets as well.

Gameplay

• Improved input buffering by taking the directional state at the time the input was entered instead of the direction at the time the input was accepted.

Animation

• Extended swooshes on Axe Down Air and Axe Neutral Air animation closer to the body to match new hitboxing.
• Added more animation frames to the end of the air version of Axe Ground Pound to match the current recovery time better and make it feel less sticky.
• Adjusted posing on cannon nlight animation so that the legend doesn’t lean as far forward the frame before hitboxes come out.

Maps

We have made some improvements to the Enigma and the new Fangwild map!  We also now have seperate map lists for Tournaments and Ranked.

The map lists for tournaments have now been made separate from the Ranked map sets. The tournament versions of the 1v1 and 2v2 map sets have removed all versions of Kings Pass, Grumpy Temple, and The Fangwild. These map set are now available to select in custom Stock games, and they’ll be the forced lists for Tournament 1v1 and Tournament 2v2 game settings.  Here are the full lists:

• Tournament 1v1:

• Small Brawlhaven
• Twilight Grove
• Small Thundergard Stadium
• Small Blackguard Keep
• Small Enigma
• Small Mammoth Fortress
• Small Great Hall
• Shipwreck Falls
• Miami Dome

• Tournament 2v2:

• Small Brawlhaven
• Twilight Grove
• Thundergard Stadium
• Blackguard Keep
• Small Enigma
• Mammoth Fortress
• The Great Hall
• Shipwreck Falls
• Miami Dome

Fangwild:

• Adjusted the ceiling collisions on Small Fangwild to be 4 sloped collisions instead of a single curved collision in order to make the bounces off the ceiling more predictable.
• Updated platform art to extend corners on Fangwild and Small Fangwild to more clearly show when you are at the edge of the platform (art update only).

Enigma

• Improved initial spawn locations for both 1v1 and 2v2 in Small Enigma.

Balance

This week we are focusing on some quality of life improvements for several kits and Signature attacks. Players will find greater ease of use on some powers that were a bit too slow to use effectively, as well as some with appropriately decreased risk for their more specific usage.

Axe

The vertical aerial light attacks on the Axe kit, while useful in the right hands, did not provide the expected coverage of the swing. This often led to an unintuitive and cumbersome feel to the kit as a whole. We have slightly increased the coverage on the Neutral Air and Down Air attacks on the innermost portion of the arc for more reliable usage of these powers.

• Axe Neutral Air: Increased visual swing and threat coverage on the inside of the attack arc.
• Axe Down Air: Increased visual swing and threat coverage on the inside of the attack arc.

Sword

We have shifted some power from the often-used side attacks into the Recovery. This leads to a more meaningful choice of followup to the Down Light combo starter, with Side Air providing positional advantage towards edgeguards, Down Air for continued strings, Neutral Air for higher damage, and Recovery for good damage and KO potential at the cost of an aerial resource. Players will also find a slightly larger gap to engage against opponent’s that overuse the Side Light attack.

• Sword Side Light: Increased Cooldown on miss from 17 to 19.
• Sword Side Air: Decreased Damage from 17 to 15.
• Sword Recovery: Increased total Damage from 16 to 18 and weighted more towards the final hit.

Unarmed

As we continue to bring the Unarmed kit in line towards emphasizing armed combat, there are several notable adjustments this week. The often used Neutral Light and Recovery attacks have had their coverage further cleaned up, while the Side Air finds itself at a more appropriate Damage value compared to its armed counterparts. The Neutral Heavy has traded some of its strength for greater ease of use and reliability, not only in the neutral game, but also when used as a combo ender.

• Unarmed Neutral Light: Slightly Decreased coverage towards the rear of the user.
• Unarmed Neutral Heavy: Decreased Force from 40 Fixed/65 Variable to 40 Fixed/56 Variable; Decreased Minimum Charge time from 12 to 10.
• Unarmed Side Air: Decreased Damage from 16 to 13.
• Unarmed Recovery: Slightly Decreased coverage near the bottom of the swing.

Lance

The Down Light has received a quality of life improvement as a designated setup attack, allowing players consistent followups across all health ranges. Landing a Down Light now lends itself towards dashing into a Neutral Light, or attacking straight away with a Side Light on a more consistent basis, rather than simply creating space near the end of a battle.

• Lance Down Light: Changed Force from 35 Fixed/4 Variable to 50 Fixed/0 Variable with a specific setup location.

Signatures

Following the theme of improved quality of life, several Signatures such as Xull Side Cannon and Isaiah Side Cannon have been sped up for appropriately less risk to match their specific use, as well as increases in reliability for a couple of the more unique anti-air Signatures. To that same end, powers that were overperforming have also received more appropriate risk to match their utility.

• Mirage Neutral Scythe: Increased total Recover time on miss from 17 to 20.
• Isaiah Side Cannon: Decreased total Recover time from 24 to 22.
• Jiro Neutral Scythe: Decreased Minimum Charge time from 5 to 3.
• Yumiko Down Hammer: Increased Stun of final hit from 8 to 11.
• Xull Side Cannon: Decreased Recover time on miss from 23 to 20.

Legend Rotation

This week’s Legend rotation includes Caspian, Sidra, Artemis, Wu Shang, Azoth and Cassidy.

• Caspian – Lead by his showmanship and thirst for danger, he has come to Valhalla armed with Katars and Gauntlets to put on a show!
• Sidra – The Corsair Queen, known for her legendary and fearless raids, is prepared to fight with her Sword and Cannon!
• Artemis – Transversing the universe in search of her rival Orion, Artemis has ripped open a wormhole into Valhalla, armed with a Rocket Lance and Scythe; she is ready to fight!
• Wu Shang – Using the way of peace, discipline and martial arts, he takes down his foes with Spear and Gauntlets!
• Azoth – Devoted acolytes bring this brilliant and ruthless lich lord to life as he comes into Valhalla to do battle with Bow and Axe.
• Cassidy – the Marshal of the Old West is ready instill justice into Valhalla with both Hammer and Blasters!

Bugs

• Cannon Side Air: Fixed a case where the target could be dropped before the final hit. (Credit: Juangana)
• Cannon Neutral Light: Adjusted animation and hurtboxing during startup to delay forward motion until the hit window for more reliable use at close range.
• Fixed a bug where Blasters Recovery would frequently drop on Ceiling, now called Small Fangwild, if the target player was carried into the ceiling.
• Queen Nai Neutral Katars: Fixed a case where the target could be dropped before the final hit.
• Fixed a bug where releasing a signature also required that the light attack button not be pressed. (Credit: u/enterman234)