How do Duck Wars Work? Learn Victory Strategies

With the introduction of Play to Earn, Waves Ducks acquired a whole new strategic layer allowing players to spend their time in a fun and profitable way.

Duck Wars is now one of the key game modes that is meant to convey the thrill of PVP skirmishes while rewarding out-of-the-box thinking and experimentation. Today, we would like to delve deeper into the battle and skill card mechanics as well as share some useful tips to increase your win rate.

Duck Wars basics

So, you’ve decided to spice up your serene farmer life or start a free-to-play Waves Ducks journey by dominating others in PVP battles. If you’re new to Duck Wars, please refer to our Official Guide that will help you to learn the ropes. In essence, this game mode functions as a turn-based battle between two players, and even a modest gaming experience will allow you to get a hang of the interface and rules right away.

Duck Wars mode is available 24/7 (with the exception of scheduled downtimes) and is divided into 6-hour laps. You are free to switch collective farms each lap and you can get your winnings every 4 laps, after 13:00 GMT. The number of fights you can participate in during a lap is unlimited but the prize pool is capped at 6 EGG in each lap, so you’d want to win as many battles as possible within the shortest time.

Collective farms & Jeducks

Collective farms in Waves Ducks are closely tied to play to earn mechanics since you cannot participate in Duck Wars on your own. You must choose a collective farm to represent, similar to selecting a guild in any other multiplayer game. The only difference is that you can switch collective farms each new lap, so you don’t have to fully commit to a single one. This gives players an opportunity to try out as many farms as they like and experience the entire spectrum of the Waves Ducks community.

It’s a good habit to check farm communities regularly for contests and other activities. Some of these may motivate you to compete for a particular farm and get extra rewards from its manager.

One important detail to note is that you don’t actually fight with your own ducks in Duck Wars. Each battle starts with a selection of a champion Jeduck from the roster provided by the collective farm of your choosing. This roster is formed by those who send their spare ducks to Duck Wars, enhance their earning capabilities with mantle upgrades, and also choose a collective farm to fight for. Jeducks bring rewards both to the fighter and their owner.

Each Jeduck can take part in only one battle at a time, so the strongest ones are constantly in high demand. Jeducks are differentiated by their mantle level, gene combination, and acquired achievements. While mantle level directly affects the size of your winnings, genes and achievements define the set of cards available to you in the battle. The Jeduck’s rarity has a minor effect on its attack and defense (higher is better).

Skill Cards

Skill cards are used to deal damage, block incoming attacks or heal in battle. Each card has two stats at the bottom corners which signify the number of defense points chosen during a turn as well as the attack points, both up to a maximum of 3. The top corners are reserved for the healing values for you and your opponent, those can also be negative and harm the user.

Pay close attention to the attack value of the card, as it can have positive and negative modifiers indicated by the green or red number above. Each increment modifies the attack by 50%.

There are four tiers of skill cards in Duck Wars:

• Basic (Dark blue). These cards are always in your deck disregarding the duck’s genes.
• Genotype (Light blue). These cards are defined by the first 8 letters of the duck’s genome. If there are multiple similar genes, only one card will be added to your deck.
• Generation (Pink). These cards depend on the 9th letter of the genome, thus, you can have only one generation skill card in your entire deck.
• Achievement (Cyan). The set of these cards is derived from the particular duck’s achievements. Each achievement grants a respective skill card.

If your strategy relies on a particular skill, it is advised to watch your card count, since you can have only 3 cards in your hand at any given time. Try finding a duck that has less gene variety to keep the deck size to a minimum. We will give some hints and share example strategies for you to theorycraft further and come up with more advanced battle tactics.

The All-out strategy

Our first strategy is quite simple and bold since all that it implies is choosing cards with maximum damage every single turn. As they say, the best defense is offense, so we recommend that you embrace your inner berserker and focus on obliterating your opponent’s HP while skipping the defensive cards. This strategy is meant to put heavy pressure on your opponent from the very start and corner them with low HP in a matter of several turns. The All-out strategy also comes with the benefit of ending the fights quickly, which increases your overall gains during a lap.

When it comes to basic skill cards, Critical Hit is your best friend, as it attacks all three points at once with 100% power. You might also consider Jeducks with the following genes: A, B, C, D, and G. Those provide better attack options than your standard set. The generation cards don’t do much for the All-out strategy, so you can ignore the last two letters. What you ideally should be looking for is the Rarity Destroyer achievement. This achievement gives you one of the most brutal attack skills in the game targeting all 3 points at once and dealing increased damage with the potential to destroy your opponent’s HP. Pioneer is also good. These cards can single-handedly win you a match.

The Bulwark strategy

This strategy relies on wearing your opponent out by stacking defensive cards. Although slow, this strategy doesn’t make you a sitting duck, as it manages to counter the All-out strategy pretty well. All you have to do is sit back and watch your enemy struggle breaking through your defenses while chipping away at their health bar.

The basic card set is pretty defensive by itself but it would be a good idea to mix in some of the Jeduck skills, such as Hit’n’Run which provides 2 defense points and has a bonus modifier to attack. As for the generation skill cards, almost all of them are solid for our chosen playstyle but there is one that outperforms them all. We’re talking about Tank. It gives you 3 defense points, effectively making you invincible, and also has some damage to boot. Good luck with landing that Rarity Destroyer to whoever is against you. To get the Tank skill card, you need to look for the letter N among the two last ones. You can go for the I letter that will give you Balance, which is decent as a second option. Throw in a couple of heals and you’re golden.

How to win reliably?

Duck Wars is all about time and efficiency: the more battles you win, the more rewards you receive. You want to engage in as many battles as possible and win them in the quickest way. Losses are certainly inevitable due to the element of RNG but you don’t lose anything apart from the time spent on each battle.

With the most recent update revealing each player’s hands, it takes more than sticking to a single basic strategy to win. You have to consider your opponent’s choices while trying to lure their best skills out before using your own bangers. So we suggest you adapt and improvise on the fly, but don’t forget about the top-tier cards, you always want them to be in your deck.

The decisions made by both players during the first several turns are usually chaotic. Both ducks are at full HP and there’s virtually no punishment for risky plays. However, during the midgame, the leading position becomes more obvious and from there on, you have to pay close attention to your opponent’s cards depending on the HP levels.

A player with less HP will tend to be more cautious, so it is a good idea to use weaker skills for a chance to bait a strong defensive response, which will leave your enemy open for a decisive blow. The same applies to you. A single Tank card can save you for quite a few turns by just sitting in your hand. No one would want to waste Rarity Destroyer knowing that you can negate all that damage.

At this point, Duck Wars can be deemed a psychological duel where the most resilient of minds have all the chances to emerge victorious. Ultimately, your task is to juke your enemy into wasting opportunities and capitalize on your available options, and how you do it, is up to you.

Want to discuss winning strategies with seasoned Duck Wars players? Join our Discord and Telegram channel. Also, follow Waves Ducks on Twitter to be the first to know about the latest game features and changes.