The Ironclad is the most advanced pod The Planetary Union has ever concocted. Limited quantity now available.
The Ironclad Drop Pod is — in many ways — the pride of the Planetary Union. It is these interplanetary couriers that keep our society running and united.
Direct Agitation of Space (DAS) technology allows the instant transport of any inorganic body within transmission range, but the production of gamma rays at the moment of agitation threshold is intense enough to dissolve any carbon-based object within 937 meters. As a result, it has long been the tradition of the Earthen Cluster to drop these pods from satellites before agitation. This ensures that created radiation harmlessly disperses.
Did you know!?
Ironclad is actually a misnomer, as these models are encased in a shell of lead-234 to limit the reach of their radiation.
They were originally called “Leadboys” until NamingConventionBot56.093 authorized their rebranding to a more inclusive title.
While the rigor of transporting matter through space will quickly wear down Atomic Drop Pods made of synthetic materials, Ironclad Drop Pods have a recommended operating life of 4,934,788 years.
Even better, when you scoop your pod up after it’s done, Ironclad Drop Pods will have purged 97.65% of their contained radiation. This makes it almost entirely without gene-degrading risk to use an ironclad!
Sale Details
Today’s Ironclad Drop Pod Sale will take place in three tiers in the Spider Tanks Store, based on supply. Ironclad Drop Pods are not NFTs and are permanently bound to your account. Each purchased pod will allow your account the permanent ability to deploy an extra Tank of any rarity, without the need to purchase an Atomic Drop Pod for it.
First 50 Ironclad Drop Pods: $200
Drop Pods 51–100: $250
Drop Pods 101–150: $300
There will only be a maximum of 150 Drop Pods available from this sale, so make sure you get the tools you need to be a successful Captain for years to come!
The Arena Family
Piloting and Captaining aren’t the only way to get involved in the community of the arena. The recent community wallpaper contest has wrapped up, and it’s time to vote on a winner! Haven’t voted yet? Head to https://links.gala.com/ST-Wallpaper-Contest-Vote and decide which you think is the best of the best!
Didn’t get a chance to get your wallpaper in? Craving more opportunities to unleash your creativity on unsuspecting opponents? Well, you’re in luck. We’ve just started up a short video contest!
Now that patch 1.4 brought free cam to exhibitions, it seems a great time for Pilots to see who can whip up the best short video. All you have to do is make a short action clip or promo video focusing on Spider Tanks. Submit your ~15 second videos by uploading them to YouTube Shorts and tagging @GalaGames.
The winners of this contest will receive the following:
1st Place: $200 in Components of your choice
2nd Place: $150 in Components of your choice
3rd Place: $100 in Components of your choice
Drop Into the Arena Today
You can’t get those action shots without action, so head into the fray today!
Enjoy the new Drop Pods Pilots, and don’t forget to vote on the wallpaper contest! Your community needs you.
Now tighten those blast shields, arm those torpedoes and go white knuckle the wheel into some high firepower combat! Those other Tanks aren’t going to blow up themselves… the Union needs YOU!
Don’t forget to grab an Ironclad Drop Pod before they run out! Only 150 are available!
The new legendary Hero Yormag arrives soon, ready for this week’s Dragon Strike!
Yormag stay. No one pass.
Yormag knew he wasn’t very good at thinking, but he knew what King Leonas told him. “Yormag, you stay. No one gets past until morning.”
Yormag loved his king. He always did what he said. This was a very important job they had said. The King must be proud of Yormag if he gave it to him.
It had been nearly the entire night, and still, no one had passed.
The gateway was littered with enemy soldiers. The mean Malum men had killed a lot of his friends. Yormag was happy the King had asked him to do this.
A commotion was coming from down the narrow cliff ledge that led to the gate. Yormag tossed aside bodies at his feet, inspecting broken weapon after broken weapon for something usable.
No time. Forty… fifty? Counting always made Yormag’s head hurt. They were already charging up the hill towards the gate.
The men rushed towards the marble pillars, yelling at Yormag. Yormag’s ears were ringing. He wanted them to stop.
THUD — three men kicked off the ledge. POW — two more crushed under a thrown comrade.
Yormag didn’t give an inch.
Dozens of men charged and were repelled, falling to or fleeing from this immovable mountain. Then, they all heard the sound together. An approaching, repetitive thump that gave hope to Malum’s troops… but not quite the despair they thought it would to brave Yormag.
Cheers went up from the attacking soldiers as the manslayer approached. Its rider raised his fist triumphantly as he bolted down towards this single soldier obstructing the path of his army. Yormag was not afraid.
“Dragon BAD!” As the dragon approached at blinding speed, Yormag caught it by its mighty jaws… only sliding back slightly on the dusty ground as he halted the beast in its tracks. “King say NO! ONE! PASS!!!!”
With a great effort he whipped the dragon’s neck to the side, sending it careening into the great pillar to his left. He jumped onto it and began pounding its belly with his fist.
The dragon struggled frantically at this tiny, confusingly powerful man. As he tried to escape the blows, his tail whipped against the opposite pillar. There was a great crack and a short moment of silence as soldiers and dragon alike looked up just in time to see their fate.
The gate crashed down on all. None would pass this night.
From under a pile of rubble — filled with arrows and slices from axe and blade –Yormag peered through the unimaginable weight of the stones covering him.
There it was. A twinkle of sunlight on the horizon. “None pass until morning” Yormag muttered to himself as his adrenaline began to fade. As he gazed at the twinkle of a new morning, another light pierced his fading vision… a warm blue glow. To him, it seemed as if the rocks themselves were glowing.
He suddenly felt like the rocks around him were slipping free. He made one desperate jerk towards the blue light.
“You did good Yormag.” He opened his eyes emerging from a strange door in a calm meadow. Was that the voice of the king!? “You can rest later. There’s more work here that we need you for.”
The King smiled. Yormag was so very happy to see him smile.
Yellow Dragon Slayer Hero: Yormag
Yormag is a mountain of a man. Usually a gentle giant, those who attack him or his friends rarely get far… and sometimes even have a few moments to regret their foolish choices before he makes them pay.
Yormag is a master of the Ability Spike Guard. His mighty armor can be temporarily empowered to provide powerful protections to Yormag and his allies, while also biting back hard at any opponent who dares throw attacks his way.
Yormag will arrive on Thursday, September 21st for the next Dragon Strike event. Will you be ready?
Dragon Slayers, Attack!
As usual with a new Hero, Yormag will have a 10x modifier to all Tournament and Dragon Strike damage that will scale down gradually to a 5x modifier for the Legendary version.
The Rare Yormag will have a 5x modifier for all Tournament and Dragon Strike damage that will scale down gradually to a 2x modifier, where it will eventually remain permanently.
Like other Heroes before, Yormag is available all week as a possible bonus summon and will enter the permanent summoning pool.
Yormag will be a great help in this weekend’s Dragon Strike. Don’t miss this new hero!
Coming up next week is a Blue Tournament… What hero will be unveiled then?
Estates better get cracking on construction, because there are two entirely new Estate structures to build!
Estate Board
The Estate Board can grant you an Estate-exclusive mission for you to complete using your Champions. Each time you complete an Estate Board mission, you and the Estate the building is in will receive rewards.
Estate Store
Your Estate will start to build up a lot more treasure with the Estate Board. Luckily, there’s a great way to put all this clutter to use with the Estate Store. Using this building, Estate owners can place rewards the Estate has accumulated for sale. As this building levels, more and more of the proceeds will go to pad the coffers of your Estate.
Store and Trade Market Update
To make managing items easier, any item purchased from the Shop will now go directly to your inventory rather than your mailbox. Note that this does not apply to Cash Shop or Gala Store purchases, which will still be delivered to you through in-game mail.
The minimum price of items in the Trade Market is now dynamic based on the category and item level. This change is not yet reflected in text within the game, but you can view these minimums below:
Champion Updates
This update brings a minor change to the Champion Boxes that can be received through the Shop. From now on, Leopold and Sophia will no longer appear in the Rare and Legendary Champion Boxes respectively. This change applies to all boxes, even if previously purchased but not yet opened.
The special event with increased summoning chances for Lavina, Zafrina and Jia ends with this update. While there may not be a boosted chance to summon these three anymore, through the end of this season they will still get their +15% VP Bonus.
Balance Updates
Lavina
Lavina’s Passive skill has been adjusted.
Previously: Maintain Execution Stance for 1 turn. Grants Attack +20% and Defense -20%
Now: Maintain Execution Stance for 2 turns. Grants Attack +30% and Defense -35%
True Balance (Passive) Previously: Critical Hit Rate +30% and Speed +10%
Now: Critical Hit Rate +30% and Critical Hit Damage +60%
Sakaris
An animation will now play when Sakaris’s Passive skill is activated, and the skill name will now appear when the death skill effect is applied to an ally.
Battle Updates
The default Speed of all battles has now been changed to 2x. Arena Battles will now occur at 2x Speed as well.
Randomly during arena matchmaking, players will be asked to solve a very simple quiz to verify that macros and automations are not being used.
All battles will now become unavailable five minutes before any server maintenance to avoid loss of progress or other issues.
Let the Battles Begin!
The arena is open and ready for true Champions. Will Season 3 bring you glory? Do you have what it takes to fight for victory?
This is just an abbreviated summary of everything that has been updated, and you’ll probably notice other small changes throughout the game. Expect to see more updates soon… the battle is just getting started in Champions Arena.
Lock and load, because in today’s spotlight we’re running and gunning with the Shotgun!
Welcome to another Spider Tanks Showcase! In today’s edition, we’re looking at a time-honored killing machine that tears through enemies up close. This antique design has been perfected for the modern arena and has achieved all new levels of deadliness.
Today is all about Shotgun. This Weapon may not have the range of other shooters, but it makes up for that by firing a spray in a wide arc. Peppering enemies with shells, this firing pattern is specifically beneficial when you’re up in another Tank’s face so that multiple projectiles find home on their chassis.
A Shotgun in the right hands is feared across the arena.
The cone of fire from a Shotgun will only hit people up close with every bullet, but that doesn’t mean any that don’t land won’t keep going. You can use it to hit multiple people and control chokepoints and bottlenecks. As your fire spreads out once released from your barrel, opponents at mid distance from you may not get hit by everything, but they’ll definitely have trouble escaping at least some damage.
Riding Shotgun
To create a build with Shotgun, the first thing you need to know is what you’re trying to achieve. If you’re looking for maximum damage overall, a small Body like Flea or Scout will let you bolt across the battlefield and unleash hell on unprepared opponents.
If you’re looking for extreme zone control, a Body like Titan with a Shotgun can plant themselves firmly and control traffic. While they may not maneuver as well to do the damage of the little guys, they’ll ultimately cause more problems for the opposing team even if they get overwhelmed and destroyed eventually.
The Titan tricks the Hurricane into rushing him while guarding the health pack, and it’s already done. When Shotgun goes against Shotgun, the one doing the chasing loses.
Most Pilots will probably prefer something more in the middle. The medium range of Bodies like Junker and Hurricane can give you a lot of flexibility in how you play. Extreme strengths leave you with extreme weaknesses, so often balance is best.
Looking Down the Barrel
When you come up against Shotguns in the arena, they should be approached differently than most other Weapons. Unlike longer range linear Weapons such as Cannon or Twin Guns, Shotgun can’t hurt you while you approach. It will, however, start dealing damage very quickly as soon as you break into its range. A good Shotgun player will know the exact moment this happens, and you may not have time to think twice.
Try to make sure that they are chasing you instead of you chasing them whenever possible. Since their blast pattern spreads out as it gets further away, if you’re chasing a Shotgun you are essentially running straight into the funnel of doom coming from the barrel. Conversely, if they are chasing you and firing, their shots are getting less concentrated as you continually move away from them.
Putting a Shotgun in a position where they have to chase you is the best way to bring them down. If, however, you do end up in close quarters combat with a Shotgun, try to control the pace of the melee dance if you can.
This Scout is right to business. It knows this artillery can’t hit it up close, so it continually crosses its path. Once victorious, it’s straight onto the next foe. Distance is the real enemy.
A good shotgun player will try to cross through you in the direction they want so they’re ready to blast you with everything they’ve got. If you are the one dictating what direction your paths meet with sudden movements and pump fakes, they may shoot in the entirely wrong direction. Their blast may be deadly up close, but the margin of error is non-existent at that range.
Protip:A non-omnidirectional Tank like Nomad can actually synergize quite well with Shotgun. Due to the looping motions often needed to maintain constant motion, these Tanks can offer greater control over enemies crossing the range threshold or which part of the cone makes contact.
Shotgun in the Heat of Battle
Being severely limited in range can be a major liability in battle. Depending on the teams you face, much of any given fight may be mostly about posturing and positioning rather than actual Tank on Tank violence from your perspective. That doesn’t mean you aren’t part of the team… more that your very presence acts as a deterrent.
Most good Pilots will know better than to just roll up on a Shotgun. You holding down a chokepoint necessarily means that less traffic will approach it, and when they do, they’ll come in hot. This forces them to match you 2v1 or 3v1 often. You may lose, but what is the rest of your team doing while they concentrate on a single bunkered in Shotgun?
This ability to dominate opponents’ sense of urgency is the biggest bonus of Shotgun. Take the example of a Chicken Chaser match. If you are able to pin down two enemies in their backfield, that means that the race for chickens just became 2v1 in your team’s favor.
Likewise in a game mode like King of the Hill, you can instantly make your opponents sound the alarm and abandon their plans when you threaten the Control Point. This makes Shotgun the perfect option for kamikaze attacks and particularly destructive decoys.
This Hurricane rushes in with Repair Zone support and the enemy team’s plans just melt away. It is able to engage their entire team with relatively little movement. A few skillful dodges, and the point is theirs!
Two Cheers for Shotgun
Shotgun overall can leave you with some very serious weaknesses. Its fire rate isn’t very good, its range is severely limited, and at extreme close range it gets less accurate even as its damage rises. Still, its strengths and unique playstyle make it worth all of its failings.
Get ready for an improved arena experience and some sweet bundle packages to keep you at the top of your game!
The time has come again for improvements, balances, and other general awesomeness to come to the arena! This patch is already live, and you can find all the details about it below!
Drop Pods v2
Drop Pods are better than ever now, with added options for Captains that will help add up to a smoother experience for Pilots.
Captains may now “redeploy” one or all Drop Pods using the previous build in the Drop Pod. For owners of multiple Drop Pods and those that work with long-term Pilots, we hope this is a welcome quality of life addition!
Captains will also now notice an “Unpack” or “Unpack All” option available to them. From now on, when a Pilot is done with your Tank it will now stay in the Drop Pod until unpacked after it is returned to you. This will allow Captains a chance to view their Pilot’s progress from the previous day if they want before collecting their Tank parts.
Deployed Drop Pods now have an “Unlock” option, which will instantly return the contained Tank to you from the Pilot it has been sent to. This option will carry an Arachnium cost, but will be free for the first 10 minutes of deployment, just in case you make a mistake.
The cost to unlock a Drop Pod after the 10 minute grace period will be .5 Arachnium per 12 hours that remain on deployment.
Drop Pods may also be deployed for a variety of time periods now, depending on the rarity of your Drop Pod.
P&E View v2
The Play and Earn menu now shows far more statistics about your activity than it previously did.
This page will display the current market price of SILK, as well as the most recent VP/SILK ratio. You’ll also be able to track lifetime stats now for your account on this dashboard.
This feature is under maintenance at the moment, and has been pulled out of the build until it can work as intended. Hopefully there will be a solution shortly.
It’s not just this main dashboard though! Each Weapon, Body, Map, Node or Drop Pod now shows more statistics about the rewards you’ve accumulated.
Report v2
The mute button on the in-game scoreboard is now a “mute and report” button. Muting a player will stop you from receiving communications from them, and will also report them for in-game communication abuse.
Any reports for communications abuse will now no longer be punished with game bans, but instead with a global mute.
Every player now has a maximum of three reports to spend daily. It’s important to note that the above “mute and report” action will never count as one of these three reports.
If you report a player and that player is found guilty of abuse and is punished, you will receive an in-game notification and receive an extra report that you can use whenever you need it.
Killfeed v2
Get ready to get vicious out there Pilots!
The in-game killfeed UI has been overhauled, and tons of new ways to stand out from the crowd in battle have been added.
Domination: Destroying the same player two times in a match before they destroy you sends a notification that you are dominating them! This gives extra points at the end of the match.
Revenge: Destroy a player Dominating you to get a Revenge notification and your own extra points.
First Blood: A shoutout and extra points granted to the first player to destroy another.
Multikills: You’ll now see info about multikills broadcast to the entire match!
Introducing: Freecam
You’ve all been waiting for it… and the time is now!
Spectators in Exhibition matches will now be able to freely move their camera about the arena, rather than having to follow the point of view of one specific player.
Use this power wisely Pilots. Explore the arenas, get into the action, record epic battles!
Hidden Ranks
The overall goal of Spider Tanks as a gaming experience is to create a competitive and rewarding experience, but also for players to just have some good old fashioned fun.
Testing has shown that ranks being visible before a match has a negative effect on players’ enjoyment of the game and perception of matchmaking, while offering no meaningful strategic benefit. It arguably could also detract from the time that they devote to thinking about team composition and strategy in the limited window before Ability selection.
We want players to enjoy the game as much as possible, so now players will no longer see the rank of other players before a match.
Players will, however, still be able to see ranking info after a match. This change will not affect matchmaking, but only change what is displayed and when.
Improvements
A player that manually leaves a match will now be counted as abandoning. Players who manually leave a match can no longer re-join this match.
This should make sure players won’t be able to quit and rejoin on purpose to prevent death, while still keeping the possibility to rejoin for players whose game has crashed or got disconnected.
The Select Region popup is now much more descriptive about which region will be chosen for “Use Best Region”.
[BOT] Players on your team will no longer callously ignore the flag! Rejoice!
Weapon and Body properties in the Garage now show a lot more information about each. This feature is under maintenance at the moment, and has been pulled out of the build until it can work as intended. Hopefully there will be a solution shortly.
The match placement UI is more clear overall.
Players affected by the “Jammed” status effect (applied when being hit by the Stun Grenade, Grapple or when using the Shield Drone) can now no longer Deliver Chickens in Chicken Chaser, Contest or push the Payload in Poultry Pusher, Capture or contest hills in KotH, or carry the Chicken in CtF.
Survey Says…
The results of the community survey on everyone’s favorite game modes are in, and the distribution of modes randomly chosen in matchmaking has been adjusted accordingly.
While the results of this survey were certainly tilted towards certain game modes, it’s also obvious that the community is somewhat divided in the games they enjoy most. Everyone enjoys the arena how they enjoy it, and that is perfectly fine!
To help accommodate all Pilots, no matter how they enjoy playing, game modes have been weighted at the following levels for every match:
Team Deathmatch:
16.66% ⭆ 24% chance
King of the Hill:
16.66% ⭆ 22% chance
Kill Confirmed:
16.66% ⭆ 18% chance
Hold the Flag:
16.66% ⭆ 17% chance
Poultry Pusher:
16.66% ⭆ 11% chance
Chicken Chaser:
16.66% ⭆ 8% chance
You may have won this round, but the chickens will be back!
Balance Adjustments
-The Good News!-
All Bodies
Changed Speed/Armor distribution to generally give lighter bodies a little more health.
Sniper Rifle
Damage at max range: 4000 ⭆ 4400
Reload Time: 2.1 ⭆ 1.8
Fire Artillery
Explosion Damage: 1320 ⭆1450
Rocket Artillery
Explosion Damage: 630 ⭆ 666
Laser Blaster
Projectile speed: 17 ⭆ 18
Base projectile damage: 500 ⭆ 550
Brambler
Explosion Damage: 1200 ⭆ 1300
Bladespinner
Projectile damage: 2000 ⭆ 2150
Crossbow
Self slow while charging: 25% ⭆ 15%
Flamethrower
Self slow on use: 40% ⭆ 30%
Eggxecutioner
Projectile speed: 17.2 ⭆ 18.5
Explosion damage: 1250 ⭆ 1350
Grapnel Launcher
Self slow: 50% ⭆ 45%
Pull force: 0.75 ⭆ 0.8
Stun Grenade
Explosion Radius: 4 ⭆ 5
-The Less Good News!-
(Just a few though)
Triple Threat
Projectile Damage: 550 ⭆ 525
Reactive Plating
Self slow: ⊘ ⭆ 15%
Energy cost: 6 ⭆ 7
Repair Zone
Repair amount per tick: 500 ⭆ 450
Pest Control
Bugs don’t stand chance.
As usual, the bug assassins have been working behind the scenes to root out problems.
Fixed:
Ripper range not properly being increased when upgrading the weapon.
Bouncer Gun bounced projectiles going through walls and barriers.
Shield Projector being able to push players out of bounds.
Poultry Pusher chicken sometimes being the wrong teamcolor.
Upgrade UI elements sometimes being in the wrong positions.
[BOT] players with healing weapons to sometimes try and heal full-health players.
Shield Drone flying too far for its user sometimes.
Artillery Turrets shooting past targets when having a weapon equipped with upgraded projectile speed.
Several localization fixes.
Various small fixes.
Arena Bundles of Joy
Do you think that’s all!? Of course not, Pilots!
We’re introducing a series of new products in the Spider Tanks Store designed to give people a one-stop shop for improving their Tanks… as well as giving those that may be grabbing their first Tank an easy way to get started!
Component Bundles have now been introduced to the store. These bundles come in a variety for each rarity, and have been priced at an introductory discount of 50% off the overall cost of all Components contained within!
Purchase Component Bundles with $GALA or ETH and receive an additional 5% off!
Have you been Piloting other people’s Tanks and are ready to strike out on your own? Have some friends that want to get into the arena and don’t know where to start? Well then, get excited about our new Starter Bundles!
Starter Bundles come in four varieties currently. Each contains a Common Body, Common Weapon, 15 Arachnium and 1500 Bolts!
Note that these bundles cannot be bought in bulk and the store will only allow one per transaction.
Any of these new bundles give you tons of extra components compared to buying a la carte from the store. Now is a great time to trick out your ride!
Experience the New and Improved Arena!
Wow, that was a mouthful!
Oh, are you still here? That means all the other Pilots probably have a destructive head start on you. You better hurry over to the Spider Tanks Store and load up on these discounted components so you can get to the arena!
We hope you really love this new build… but for chicken’s sake — Get out there and blow some stuff up already!
