How are Explore teams generated?

I try to explain it to people and always start to self-doubt. I’m going to post what I think is true, and I’d like to be corrected. I think that Explore teams can:

  • Be a random mix of the selected kingdom.
  • Be one of the Quest teams from the selected kingdom’s troops. (Does this include factions, now?)
  • Randomly contain a troop available in event chests.

Is that correct?

The context here is once a week someone reports “I am fighting bagless gnomes in Explore” as a bug, and we have to explain it to them (thanks, devs!) So I’d like to have the right explanation.

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This is a pretty good question. I always thought it was just kingdom troops, but that can’t be true. I’d like to know this as well.

Thank you for not making this a thread where no one else is allowed to comment.

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I would add, from my own experience:

  • The event troops also seems to have a slightly higher chance of appearing. For example Half-Gim appeared quite often so far this week and the same for previous troops from Invasion and bounties.
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Dude… players have already explained this to you, but you disagree with support from “some people” who seems to be still only just you.

It’s not a theory, it’s a fact based on actual observation from many players. And you can’t disagree with fact, you know?

As for the Gnome in explore, it’s mainly happened in Zeajin, as it’s a leak from its future class. Gnomes with no bag do sometimes randomly appear in explore in other places, but it’s quite rare.

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Tbh i think “old explanations” need a little rework, facts tend to change in games costantly patched and/or messed with, it’s been a while (a little before 4.0) i’ve noticed a lot more randomness on explore teams.

Dont see anywhere anyone mention dungeon bosses x example? but i fought those too while exploring, Megavore? he appear quite often (infernus and some more mythics) on kingdoms they got nothing to do with.

Isnt so rare also that there’s not a single troop of the kingdom i am exploring in the team.

So imo explore teams are just randomly generated with a some higher chance x troops of the kingdom you’re exploring.

I knew somewhere it had been explained but couldn’t find the specific post. This time around I’m going stash a link to this in my game notes so I won’t lose track of it again.

This part interests me, though:

Do we have a reason why no-treasure Gnomes appear outside of this case?

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As far as I know, nope. They’re not in most of the questling/challenge, except some rare cases, and Gnome/The Vault is never a part of any 10%/20% weekly event.

I’m not sure how that happened, but if I have to guess, they might somehow get included in the owned Mythic list, like you will only start to see them once you get their copies from Vault Battle.

But then, it should appear as often as other Mythic, but it’s not, as it’s almost like 1 in 500 chance, it might not be a case. Could it be they actually supposed to be actual Gnome with a bag, but some rare error cause a bag to be missing? I have no idea…

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Usually when I get a gnome in explore with no treasure bag, there’s two or three gnomes on the enemy team.

Dungeon bosses shouldn’t be appearing in Explore. There’s the one “Super Gorgotha” (rainbow mana) but he’s in the advanced questline of Khaziel (I believe) so he’s eligible (but still not the dungeon boss Gorgotha).

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Yep, also lucky enough to get it right now.

It’s from “Gorgotha Returned - Gorgotha Evolved” battle, from questline which include Rock Worm/Rock Worm/Ancient Horror/King Gorgotha, with Frost Giant replacing first Rock Worm for “Event troops” rule

Here’s another example.

This is from “Shadows Gather - Warlock Minions” battle, from questline which include Ancient Horror/Golem/Acolyte/Warlock, with The Wild Queen replacing Golem for “Owned Mythic” rule.

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I see imps very often as the replacement troop too, so is it an “owned mythic or imp” rule?

Sometimes one of the quest missions have one of the imps appear on the enemy so they can appear. For example, Spooky Imp in Ghulvania along with Draakulis.

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Only thing I dislike about explore is a fully traited Undine cause his third trait slows down me cheating a lot :sleeping:

Since I have this thread bookmarked for my own use now, I want to update it.

I’ve seen random All-Seeing-Eye troops in Explore this week, so I think the rules are now:

  • The teams are the Quest and Challenge teams from the Explore kingdom.
    • Yes, Zaejin has some teams that look like Vault teams. No, you do not get Vault treasures.
  • One troop on the team will be replaced by ONE of the following:
    • A troop from this week’s event chest.
    • A faction troop from the faction associated with this week’s event kingdom.
    • A random mythic you own.
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FWIW I have seen mythics in explore that I don’t own. Example: I got Plague twice during the last gnome event. Took a screenshot second time bc it was also first time I’ve seen 3 mythics in an explore, which I think breaks all the above-stated rules. I don’t remember what kingdom I was in but likely Urskaya, I think I was farming Lava to have some for Umbraxis

It doesn’t break the rules. One of them is if they appear during story missions or challenges and uh… the last story mission of Sin of Maraj is the battle against Plague, War, Famine and Death so it isn’t odd to see them there even if you don’t own them. It’s like running into Gargantuar in Shentang without owning him or meeting any of the other requirements because he appears in a challenge.

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OK, thanks that makes sense. And Sin is another Lava kingdom. So I guess I must have actually been there, and then it looks like War was replaced by sacrifice. I probably switched to Urskaya after getting this lineup :wink:

Yes, this is why people report troops as bugged. Unless you have a very good memory, the game doesn’t give you the tools to figure out if the troops you see in Explore are correct.

The conventional wisdom is “explore is the kingdom’s troops”, but this is only part true. Questlines often use non-kingdom troops, and sometimes even go so far as using Boss troops.

That’s actually what made me remember to update and led me to investigate why All-Seeing Eye troops were haunting me. Someone reported “I see treasure gnomes in Zaejin” again as a bug in Discord. So I put that as a separate “yes, this happens and is not a bug” bullet point. They aren’t Zaejin troops, but they are part of that questline.

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OK I’m bumping this with a puzzle:

Today while I was doing events, I noticed I fought a battle in Whitehelm with a Xerodar in the party. That makes no sense given the current rules I know:

  • ASE is associated with Darkstone and faction troops aren’t even in event chests.
  • No faction has a mythic.
  • Whitehelm has no quests with Xerodar.

What happened?

It isn’t a week in which the troop is buffed either. Xerodar isn’t Raksha or from Pridelands so that makes it even more confusing unless Xerodar was slipped into a story quest or challenge without any of us realizing? No clue otherwise.