Instanced Battle (or IB) is a Life is Feudal: MMO in game mechanic that allows Guilds to fight each other away from the open world. The goal of the battle is to gain control of a Province. The attacking and defending team have a 50-vs-50 or 100-vs-100 battle which decides the ownership of the province and the wager which the attackers provide.
Starting a battle[ | ]
The leader of the attacking guild needs to:
- Declare war on the guild that owns the province they are going to attack;
- Come in person into the province they are going to attack;
- Bring a Lesser battle totem or a Battle totem with him, the choice of the totem will define, whether a 50-vs-50 or 100-vs-100 battle is declared;
- Right-click the totem in his inventory and issue the battle;
- Select his wager (see further).
When he issues the battle, the timer starts. The battle is scheduled to happen in at least 24 hours later, so that both sides have time to prepare and select their teams. Moreover, if the defending guild doesn't have a Judgement hour at that time, the battle timer will extend, so that the battle starts at the beginning of the next JH of the defenders. This is supposed to guarantee that the time of the battle is appropriate for the defenders.
Finally, when a battle is issued, the attackers select a wager. There are two possible types of wager:
- an adjacent province;
- an outpost in this province, that is upgraded to Level 3. Usually a military outpost is used but a regular one is also fine.
- Note: if a province is unowned, one can similarly declare a battle; the result is going to be automatically a win.
Result of the battle[ | ]
If the attackers win, they gain the province and keep the wager (whether it is an outpost or a province) in their posession. If the defenders win, they keep the province in their posession and gain the wager (whether it is an outpost or a province).
- Note: there is a bug currently (autumn 2020) with the wager. If the wager changes ownership between issuing the battle and the battle itself, it will not change hands even if the defenders win. This cannot be exploited in case of province as a currently disputed province cannot be a wager, however there is an exploit with outposts: you have a t3 military outpost (or, alternatively, a t3 non-military outpost sitting between two monuments), issue the battle, light HJH on it and then capture it from another guild.
Enlisting to the battle[ | ]
Initially the battle is "closed" which means that only members of the attacking and defending guilds can join. Also there is a "battle code" that they can distribute for other people to enlist. However, the leader of any of two guilds can decide to "open" the battle, making the lists visible for everyone in the world. After that, any person may enlist on any side of battle. Then an officer of the corresponding guild can accept him or decline him. The officers can also sort people in the list, as the order will matter if there is not enough space for everyone (see further). The person may withdraw his character from the list at any moment.
When the timer ends and the battle begins, top 50 (or 100 in case of a bigger battle) candidates from each side are called in, skipping those who are offline. Additional people will not receive any invitation, even if someone from the top list declines. If one side is heavily disadvantaged in numbers, for example, has only 10 people available, the other side will have not everyone invited, but only x3 times more than the first side (so 30 people in this example). The constant of x3 was changed in several patches and may be not up-to-date.
Process of the battle[ | ]
Those who accept invitation are teleported into the instanced area, which is stripped of any buildings, objects, and terraforming, leaving only natural foliage and water in the battle area. After a small timer both armies may move freely in the bounds of that area.
The rules of the battle are quite simple - be the King/Queen of the hill (the area in the center of the map, placed slightly closer to the defending armies side) or you can alternatively just eliminate all players of the opposing side.
The winner of the battle gets the province and the wager. Also they get all the equipment of the losing army that was dropped on the ground during the battle; that equipment will be available inside the totem. The losers also lose the ability to issue battle challenges for the next 3 real-life days. All the dead characters will lose all their equipment, however they will immediatly return to their original position before the battle and they will not suffer Resurrection sickness or lose the Food multiplier.