Sky Mavis has officially launched Classic Competitive Season 4, the second part of the Axie Classic Competitive Circuit that runs for 4 weeks with new features and more rewards for Axie Infinity players to earn.

What’s New This Season?

This season ends on August 19th and introduces daily Mini Tournaments, Artifacts, a full UI overhaul, Mavis ID integration, registration for the Grand Tournament, QoL improvements and a new Arena ranking system.

For those participating in guild battles, the Guild Leaderboard and Guild Points (GP) have been reset to give everyone a fresh start in competing for a total prize pool of 10k AXS, with another 3000 AXS available from completing guild milestones. Rank among the top 8 guilds on the leaderboard to gain Placement Points for the upcoming Guild Wars. Guilds have until August 11th, 9 AM UTC to climb the leaderboard.

As for individual-based rewards, ranking in the top 16 on the Arena Leaderboard will let you qualify for the Season Championship at the end of this season, with the Championship said to feature its own 2000 AXS prize pool and an opportunity to qualify for the Axie Classic World Cup. This means that Guild Tournament placements will no longer let you qualify for the Season Championship.

Let’s now check out all the new updates included in S4.

Mini Tournaments

Mini Tournaments are daily competitions in which players can compete to earn from a total reward pool of 700 AXS every day. Each region is said to have one of 2 shifts: an East or West timeslot, with each featuring a reward pool of 350 AXS. Players can choose to participate in one of 3 tournaments every day: Newbie, Pro or Master Tournament. This makes it possible for players of all skill levels to participate, as each tournament is open to players belonging to a certain MMR range.

You can only play in one of them each day, with every tournament featuring 10 battles that let you earn Guild Points per win. Because of this GP reward, the team has decided to limit the amount of GP you can earn from Cursed Coliseum to 2 Cursed Coliseum sessions a day. Cursed Coliseum has been disabled for the first week of the season, but you can expect to see it go live again next week, according to the announcement.

Artifacts

Artifacts are new items used to temporarily change an Axie’s class during a match. Before starting a battle, you can pick one Artifact from your collection to bring with you, allowing you to activate it during the card casting phase. The opponent will know that you used it, and will be given a 10-second window to decide whether they want to counter the change with an Artifact of their own. If both players happen to use their Artifacts on the same Axie, then the Artifact that was activated the last will be the one to affect the Axie. Since the item can be used on any Axie, including the ones on the opponent's team, this new game mechanic has the potential to open up big new strategies that can significantly disrupt the moves and plans of your rival.

Every Artifact can be used 10 times per battle per day, and can be recharged once every day for 100 SLP to give you 10 more uses. If you’re a Premium Battle Pass holder, then you get even 10 more bonus uses to take advantage of. Players can upgrade Artifacts up to level 4 to make the effect last on the Axie longer, with the highest level changing the Axie’s class for 8 turns. Upgrading requires having a certain number of copies and gold.

You can get Artifacts from Arena chest drops, daily Golden Wheel spins and Battle Pass rewards. The chances of getting one Artifact in an Arena chest differs based on chest rarity.

Battle Pass

The Axie Classic Battle Pass is divided into Normal and Premium tiers, with the Normal Pass rewarding you with Gold and Artifacts as you increase your MMR and achieve higher ranks. To earn AXS and SLP, you’ll need the Premium Battle Pass, which is awarded to Mystic Axie owners for free at the start of each season in the form of a redeemable special code. Since each Mystic Axie gets this special code, players who own multiple Mystic Axies can gift the other codes to their friends to give them the opportunity to gain more rewards during the season.

Arena Ranking Overhaul

The Arena ranking system has been revamped for Axie Classic Competitive Season 4 but also for future seasons as well. Specifically, a new tier system has been introduced that ties directly into the new Mini Tournaments and is said to give players “a clear progression path from Newbie to Master.” Everyone starts off in Bronze III and faces only players who are "within one rank of your own” for a more balanced experience. After getting 3 wins in a row, a win streak bonus will activate to reward skilled players with double points for every win achieved while on the streak until you reach the maximum limit of 20 bonus points or up to 10 consecutive wins.

To keep players engaged and active, an MMR decay system has been added to deduct points based on the total number of points gained from wins and losses. Aside from Bronze and Silver ranks, every other rank has a Point Requirement that players must meet to avoid MMR decay:

  • Bronze & Silver: 0 points (no decay)
  • Gold: 50 points
  • Platinum: 100 points
  • Master: 150 points
  • Challenger: 200 points

Each day, the game calculates your MMR changes from all wins and losses of the day and uses the following formula:

Decay = Point Requirement − sum of all MMR changes for the day

This means that if the sum of all MMR changes is lower than the Point Requirement, you will suffer decay based on how large the gap is between the two factors. For example, if you’re a Gold player whose MMR changes amount to 30 points for the day, you’ll end up losing 20 points because the Point Requirement is 50 (Decay = 50 – 30 = 20 points deduction)

UI Changes, QoL Additions & Mavis ID Integration

After revamping Classic graphics with Origins visuals and adding various UI updates in Classic Competitive Season 3, the UI is now said to be completely overhauled for this season, as the team has now finished updating game banners, the card deck, Axie detail page and more.

When it comes to quality-of-life improvements, the Energy Counter and Card Counter have now been added to the battle UI.

Thanks to Mavis ID integration, Axie Classic now supports seamless in-game transactions and makes it easier for players to create a new wallet as everything can now be done in-game instead of needing to use wallet extensions. Because of this, the Goda Morning and Gems Store are now officially available in-game, allowing players to easily find and buy Axies straight through the game! The Gems Store lets players spend gems on various in-game items while using Creator Codes to support their favorite content creators who earn 5% from gem purchases.

Grand Tournament Registration

Registrations for the 7th Grand Tournament have now officially opened in-game, and you have until July 30th, 3 AM UTC to sign up. The competition consists of a 5-round Knockout phase in which everyone starts off at Round 1 and plays 10 matches to determine if they qualify for the next round. Matches won award GP, while qualifying is rewarded with Gold. If you end up getting to Round 5, you’ll be playing 25 matches to rank in the top 100 who will get 1 AXS and 450 Gold each. The first round lasts 2 days from July 30th to August 1st, 5 AM UTC, followed by 24-hour rounds in the lead-up to the 3-day Round 5, which will run from August 4th to August 7th, 1 PM UTC.

Full schedule and reward details are available in the official blog post, where you can also find info on the Axie Classic S4 Streamer Race that ends on July 25th, 10 AM UTC.

Last week, Sky Mavis introduced the Premier Bounty Board to Axie Infinity, and the same week also marked the start of open beta testing for the new Axie Homeland Avatar Mode, which lets you explore the world of Lunacia using your own Axie NFT without needing to own land.