Nintendo Switch Catch Up & Synch

Official News
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Hi Adventurers,

Since Gems of War released on Nintendo Switch, you’ve had your own separate events and new content release schedule in comparison to all the other platforms the game can be played on.

Originally, we set your event schedule up differently due to Nintendo Switch having different game update requirements to the other platforms, which meant we were limited in how many updates we could provide you per year. The separate schedule also allowed us to release old content to you without inundating you with several years of game content all at once when the game launched on Switch.

However, we’re now able to release Gems of War updates more inline with the other platforms and Switch has been running for almost 4 years now, so it’s time to catch up and synch up!

Gems of War players on Nintendo Switch will still be on their own Gems of War server playing with and against other Switch players, however, you will soon have the same content and events every week as our PC, mobile, Xbox and Playstation players.

There’s quite a few benefits to catching Switch up and putting you on the same schedule as everyone else, but the main ones are:

  • All Gems of War players get to experience all the new updates, content and events at the same time. No more seeing what shiny new things everyone else is getting and not be able to get your hands on it yet!
  • We can reduce the number of Blog entries and social media posts we’re making each week by half because Switch will have the same announcements as everyone else. This will give our team more time to focus on you and your enjoyment of the game.
  • Less Problems – Currently, we have a whole set of extra events and content to plan, implement and test. By catching up Switch and synching the schedule, we can free up time to focus more on planning, implementing and testing the same content for all platforms.

The Plan

On Monday March 18th at 7am GMT (weekly reset time), Switch will start running from the same event and content calendar as all the other platforms.

  • The start of the next Campaign on Switch will be delayed, so that you can start the next Campaign alongside everyone else.
  • In the meantime we will run several new events Switch hasn’t had a chance to experience yet. This will help you catch up before the synch.
  • Roughly 35 days after March 18th, a Global Mail will be sent to all Switch players containing Chest Keys, Vault Keys, Diamonds and Chaos Shards to help you collect some of the Troops that weren’t available on Switch prior to the synch. The date for this mail will be announced closer to the time.

Content Catch Up

All previously unreleased content such as Troops, Pet and Weapons will be released to Switch as part of the synch. There’s going to be a lot of new stuff!

All this new content will be available where you’d expect to find any new content that had been released via your normal event schedule. For example:

  • Tarot and Gnome Troops will be found in the Vault
  • Faction Troops will be found in Chaos Portals in the Underworld
  • Event Weapons can be crafted in the Soulforge during their Kingdom’s event weeks
  • Pets will be available in Pet Rescues
    • Cosmetic Pets will be available during special scheduled 24 hour Pet Rescues as part of the regular event schedule & in Harper’s Magical Managerie Offers
  • Chat emojis, portraits and titles will be available for purchase in the chat window

We’re so happy to finally bring Switch the same content as everyone else so we can share all the excitement with the rest of the community when new content releases and new events start. We’re sure you’ll enjoy getting your hands on the Troops and Weapons you’ve all been asking for.

UPDATE March 18th:

Happy synch day everyone!

Just a reminder that at today’s weekly reset the event and content schedule for Switch will be the same as all the other platforms!

In roughly 35 days we will send a global mail containing some goodies for you to use to collect some of the catch up content.

Please note that Rewards from Campaigns that haven’t run on Switch won’t be available until next week! We will post to let you know once that Campaign content has been released.

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So … RIP next four Campaign Artifacts then? (Aravatar’s Skull, Dread Captain’s Chest, Mydnight Countdown, Labyrinthine Tablet)

The current PC campaign ends mid-March so… if the Switch continued following the PC content schedule to the letter then March 18th would be Week 8 of Aravatar’s Skull campaign, so obviously something else is getting planned.

I’ll agree it will be easier for EVERYONE for Switch to have its content schedule synced with PC, but the Campaign Artifacts (as inventory items) are a giant question mark…

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Thank you for the informative post and upcoming changes for us over on Nintendo Switch. I never lost faith that we would be able to one day enjoy new content alongside our brothers and sisters on other platforms. Well…maybe just a little.:rofl:

If it is alright, may I ask a couple of questions?
•will missed weapons be only available in the soulforge or with alastair’s weapon cache during a specific kingdoms week?

•how will missed troops be handled? If we have to wait for a specific kingdom to target missing troops with event keys, it’s going to be awhile before we can realistically get all of them.

•how will campaigns work if we’re planning to catch up with other platforms? Are we just going to magically get the missed campaign artifacts with lore in our stash and pretend we just time traveled into the future? (Alongside everything else associated with the kingdoms, like troops and weapons being “unowned.”)

I think that’s enough for now, but I’m thinking way too much about this, and hope that everything will work out. Hopefully. Maybe.:pray:

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best case scenario, everything will be unowned and available in chests (except stuff like underspire guardians, gem/cosmic dragons etc).

You’ll get a vast majority of them opening chests for new monthly Mythics at some point, though getting missed Mythics via the Soulforge might be a pain.

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Seems to be already answered here:

On the plus side, it means less/no waiting for the current weekly featured troops to get added to the chest drop tables. (For comparison: if the weekly Glory troop is an Epic, I can usually farm enough copies to fully Ascend it before the week is over – i.e. 16 copies = 6400 Glory; but if it’s an Ultrarare then I generally can’t – aka. 41 copies = 12,300 Glory)

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I am grateful that we will be able to finally catch up with other platforms. It always felt like Nintendo Switch was handicapping the development team from fixing or adding new content. If this weight can be lifted, hopefully it is a sign of better things to come.

Am I stupid or naive? Maybe. But I don’t care anymore. I’m too invested in this madness to give up now.

The compensation they decide to give us in the mail will be interesting. How do u put a price on missing out on 9 months of content? They should ask Christopher Lloyd for advice.:rofl:

I’m just worried about things like the ruby macaque. Waiting for the 3 weapon pieces from dragons claw, blighted lands and broken spire is going to take a loOoOoOong time.

(Or I guess u could pay money for them with alastair’s weapon cache, but 4.99 USD each? Nope. Not happening. No chance).

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The artifacts will be added to your inventory so you can read the lore :slight_smile:

We are definitely not going to try to put a price on all that content. We’re just going to give you some goodies to help you collect some of it to get you on the way with collecting it.

We’re also looking forward to the extra time this will give us to focus on improving things for everyone.

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Thank you, @Kafka. I’m just expecting that all of the missing troops and weapons will be unowned, and we will just have to get them over time. (Or be crazy and try to get all the missing troops from chests all at once).:scream:

It will probably be a big relief for u guys when Nintendo Switch is caught up after March 18. If this makes gems of war better for everyone, then I’m all for it.

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I am a pc player but this is long overdue. Not having two versions out in the wild will free the team up to focus on other aspects… the team member that thought of this idea needs aplauded :clap:

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How will the content get handled that was only available once before getting paywalled? Like the Hands of Time weapon from the Mydnight free kingdom pass?

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Surely these just go into the standard weekly cash weapon slot in the shop that already exists. Nothing else makes sense given you can only get them for cash on other platforms.

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Wow, such tremendous news… wow.

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Okay, that will be good news!

The bad news is that our botched Sword’s Edge week (because I’m not letting go of that one yet) is probably going to get skipped entirely (it’s expected February 12th on PC), depending on what the remaining NS weeks before March 18th get filled with.

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Sword’s Edge week in February with PC/ others. Same event and troops (also gonna work as part of “test, sync and catch up”.
Feb 12.

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Since it’s specifically mentioned, does that mean we won’t get a cross save/play feature with any other platform soon? :thinking:

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This request would GREATLY improve competition and longevity, but it may be too much ATM while they work out the new pvp game mode.

There r only a handful of competitive guilds during guild wars in bracket 1, and it’s becoming harder and harder to keep experienced players or try to get new people to join.

But who knows what will happen once NS is caught up with everyone? The devs won’t have to worry about dragging us along anymore with overdue updates, so maybe they can put more time and resources into improving the game…for everyone.:+1:

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:laughing: :laughing: :laughing:

Is there any evidence at all that maintaining the Switch version separately is a significant drain of resources for the devs?

I don’t see how this will be anything but a loss for Switch players. We lose our fair chances at a host of weapons and mythics, for what? The chance to get the same on-release glitches the other platforms suffer from? Some extra keys and resources that in no way will get us close to where we would have been had the gap content been released normally?

I for one appreciated us getting versions of content with the kinks smoothed out.

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Didn’t you usually get extra kinks worked in? Like campaigns missing rewards, loot tables missing troops, weapons not showing up in the collection? Basically everything that needed manual configuration not getting done without a lot of prodding?

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I don’t think we got the same bugs as y’all. I don’t remember any campaign reward issues being a thing, for example. And issues like bugged event chests haven’t been a thing for us either.

One time for a new deep delve the troop was not in the shop. And the weapon issue popped up recently too when we got a new kingdom. So we have had a few incidents of our own.

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Both those exact things have DEFINITELY happened, and quite recently too!

  • At least two (three?) Campaigns launched on Switch with the paid rewards track incomplete (no campaign pet/weapon/mythic), though each time it was resolved quickly, presumably before players could actually reach the relevant tiers.
  • Event chests were misconfigured over Christmas during what was supposed to be a Sword’s Edge week, except (among other things) event chests were awarding Adana troops.
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