Alliance Wars pit one alliance versus another for a chance at war loot and to fill war chests. Wars are much like raids in terms of gameplay, except that war energy rather than raid energy is used, the defending team is given additional aid, and you will require a total of 30 heroes for full participation rather than 5.
Each player in the alliance attempts to gain points for their alliance by defeating enemy heroes. Stronger enemy heroes are worth more points and there is a bonus for defeating an entire enemy team. When the timer runs out, the alliance with the most points wins. Points for the alliance remain, even if a player leaves the alliance.
Completely defeated teams revive after a period of time, which increases with each defeat. However if all enemy teams are defeated, all enemy teams revive immediately. (Sometimes called forcing a reset.)
You can attack so long as you have war energy, even if your own team is defeated. Each hero can only attack once per war, so in order to use all 6 war energy, you must have 30 heroes available.
There are generally 2 wars per week on the calendar. They are available under Alliance Icon -> War tab. The alliance icon shows crossed swords whenever war energy is available.
Participation
In order to participate in a war, you must
- Be part of an alliance that is participating in wars.
- Be at level 12 as a player or higher.
- Have chosen to participate.
Alliance leaders can opt the entire alliance out of wars. If the alliance leader has enabled wars, each individual player can choose to participate by checking the appropriate box on the war tab.
You must choose to participate in wars before the matchmaking phase begins in order to play in the next war. You cannot join a war once it has already started. The game saves whether or not you choose to participate in wars.
Many alliances require active war participation as a qualification for continued membership in the group. For example, a competitive alliance may kick members who either do not participate or who do not use all of their war energy flags. Other alliances may state that if you will not be able to use all war energy because of real life obligations/travel/etc, you should temporarily opt out of wars so the group is not penalized in their war score.
Matchmaking Phase & War Scores
Empires & Puzzles matches alliances of similar strength based off the War Score. The war score is calculated based on the 30 most powerful heroes and troops of each alliance member participating in the wars, adjusted based on past performance of the alliance.
The war score is not part of the alliance score, but it can be viewed by clicking on your alliance's score.
The game will provide a countdown to inform you of when matchmaking will begin and when you will be matched with another alliance to battle. If you have not chosen to participate in wars before matchmaking begins, you will have to wait until the next war to play.
Note: In previous releases, the war score was calculated to include the alliance's trophy scores. However, this appears to no longer be the case. This is because some players engage in cup dropping in order to help fill their wanted missions.
Preparation Phase
The preparation phase lasts about 15 hours before the war begins. Each player must set up a defensive team. The game will automatically use the same hero and troop setup that was used for the previous war. Once the war starts, you will not be able to change your defense team. However, it will still be possible to level up the individual heroes you have already assigned to your defense team.
You can check on your own defense team as well as the defense teams of your fellow alliance members on the war battlefield. You can also click on the opposing alliance's war banner to view their members and to get a preview of their potential defenses. However, you will not be able to see for certain what teams the opposing alliance are using until the war starts.
Some alliances will coordinate their defenses via chat. For example, by choosing tanks of all the same element so that it becomes harder for the opposing alliance to color stack in response.
War Battlefield
The battlefield looks like a field divided by a moat with 3 wooden bridges. Your alliance members will all be on the bottom half of the field. The opposing alliance will be on the top half of the field. During the preparation phase, the top half of the field will be empty. Once the war starts, you will be able to see the opposing team.
At the top of the battlefield, the following are displayed:
- Your available war energy
- Banners for the 2 alliances - clicking on a banner will display information about the alliance, including members, alliance score, and how many war energy flags are still unused for all alliance members in total.
- Battle Score Bar - your alliance will be blue while the opposing alliance will be red. The alliance with a higher score will have a larger portion of the bar as well as a larger numerical score.
- Timer - showing how long the war or the preparation phase will last. Once the war is over, it will display victory or defeated.
- War Aid Type - represented as an icon under the opposing team's name. Clicking on the icon will provide more information about what type of support defending teams receive.
- Gear Icon - allows chat toggle, war info, or to set up your next attack team.
- Attack info - displays the results of the most recent attacks. The player named first is the victorious player. The number in between each player is the number of points scored. Clicking on this area will allow you to see a complete attack history and the list of top attackers. This information is still available after the war for several days.
Your team shown in lighter blue.
Each participating player has a small thumbnail image representing their defense team. Your individual team will be highlighted in a lighter blue. Highlighting any player will display the following:
- Player Name
- Online/Offline - Represented by a green (online) or red (offline) dot next to their name.
- Team Power - This notes the power of the team at full health.
- Defense Heroes - Small images of the 5 heros chosen for the defense team are displayed. If a hero has been killed, it will be represented by skull on a black background.
- Hero Health - Above each hero is a green bar representing its current HP.
- War Energy - Available war energy is shown as an orange flag with a double chevron. Each player will be given 3 war energy at the beginning of the war and an additional 3 energy halfway through the war, for a total of 6 war energy.
Clicking on player info will allow you to view more detail about the player, such as their troop assignments and individual hero cards. This allows you to view the power level and special skills of any player's heros, including heroes that have already been defeated.
Battles & Aid
War battles are much like battles during raids and the main world map. However unlike raids, the defending team is given additional aid. The type of aid is visible as an icon under the opposing alliance's name.
During PVP battle, there is a bar at the top of the battle screen. As the battle progresses, the bar will fill up. Once the bar is full, the type of aid will be rendered for your opponent. The bar fills up more quickly once enemy heroes have been defeated.
There are three main types of aid:
- Attack Boost - Each defending hero gets a +10% attack bonus that cannot be dispelled or removed each time the attack boost goes off. Represented by an icon with an arrow pointing up.
- Arrow Barrage - The attack does 25% damage on all your heroes based on their current health. Represented by an icon of several arrows.
- Field Aid - Each defending hero will recover 20% of their health. Represented by a cross icon.
Of the two, most players find Field Aid to be more frustrating, as teams may heal themselves even after all enemy healers have been defeated. Some players will utilize the Flee button strategically when field aid is present to ensure the enemy team does not end up with more HP at the end of the battle than it started with.
Revive Times
After a team is defeated, there is a cooldown time until it revives. Each time the team is defeated, the revive time increases.
| Defeat | Revive Time |
|---|---|
| 1st | 6 Hours |
| 2nd | 8 Hours |
| 3rd | 10 Hours |
| 4th | 12 Hours |
The exception to this is if ALL alliance teams are defeated; in which case, all teams revive immediately. Some players refer to this as 'resetting' the board. Some alliances try to coordinate their attacks to try to reset the board as easy teams become available to attack again.
Rewards
There are two types of loot available from wars:
- War Loot - given to the victorious team
- War Chests - given after you receive 25 war chest points. 5 war chest points are awarded for an alliance war victory,1 war chest point is awarded for a defeat, and 3 points for a draw. War chest points are alliance specific. If you change alliances, the number of points will reset to 0 once you participate in the different alliance's war. The rewards are based on what percentage of wars you have participated in. Clicking on the chest will allow you to see your percentage.
Only players that participate in wars are eligible for either war loot or war chests.