The Best Brilliant Event So Far: Fighting Forces

Fighting Forces was, by far, the best Wizards Unite Brilliant Event to date. While there are still plenty of ways to improve for future events, this one did several key things well. Everything from small quality of life improvements to an objective that resonated well with Harry Potter fans all came together to make this event the best yet.

Here, we’ll discuss what made this event great, and what ways the Wizards Unite team could improve with future Brilliant Events.

Repeatedly completing difficult Trace Encounters can get tiring and frustrating. Even with several Masterful casts in a row, previous Brilliant Encounters would resist and resist and resist, sometimes departing after spending ten or more Spell Energy. For players struggling to manage energy, these Foundables felt like a waste of precious Spell Energy once they finished the event page and assignments.

Fighting Forces introduced the first Oddity-style Brilliant Encounters, and the difference was immediately clear. Even after finishing the Registry and Special Assignments, most players continued to tap on Brilliant Encounters to fight another Brilliant Death Eater or Brilliant Azkaban Escapee.

These Encounters, beyond being just good gameplay, also appealed specifically to what Potter fans want. While saving various creatures, objects, and characters is fun, Harry Potter is a story about fighting evil. And nothing says fighting evil quite like duelling a Death Eater. ​​​​​​​

Another thing fighting Forces got right was tying in several aspects of gameplay not limited to Brilliants. Players could stock up on Healing and Exstimulo Potions with the decreased brew times, or they could hunt down the new Oddities V Foundables.

Tonic for Trace Detection also had a chance to shine, with all Oddities having a chance to appear with them, regardless of time, weather, or biome. Players in Southern California, for example, finally found Horned Serpents, while others were able to find Centaurs, Doxies, Leprechauns, and more.

Even for players who weren’t stuck on Oddities I or Oddities II could use the Tonics for a chance to find the new Three-Headed Dog. (Here's hoping we'll still be able to find that one now that the event is over.)

The event also brought key quality of life (QoL) improvements. For the first time, players were able to differentiate Brilliant Portkeys from regular Portkeys before picking them up. This was a huge QoL improvement from previous events, like Part One of Back to Hogwarts, where I picked up eight regular Portkeys in a row while trying to find Brilliant ones.

The Brilliant Portkeys also gave out rare ingredients like Unicorn Hair and Erumpent Horn consistently, to the point that players were more likely to report being limited on Tonics by somewhat common ingredients like Bulbadox Juice, rather than rare and expensive (30 gold each) Erumpent Horns.

And finally, for the first time, the rewards for Special Assignments included one of the most coveted resources in the game: Spell Books. While it was only a small handful, it was certainly one of the most popular changes with the event.

All of that said, there are still several ways the Wizards Unite team could take what worked well with this event and improve it for future events.

Communication

First of all, communication about events needs to happen in the app itself, and it needs to happen with more heads up. While the team do a decent job of sharing information on Reddit, Discord, Twitter, and other social media, many players still struggle to keep up with all the different platforms. 

The countdown for Fighting Forces didn’t even show up in the app until about a day before the event went live. For players who aren’t constantly refreshing social media for news, that’s just not enough heads up, and the in-game alerts provide little to no information on what to expect.

High Threats aren’t fun in large doses

We all love a good challenge now and then. Coming across a rare Emergency Trace and needing to use your best resources and do your best casts is fun. Coming across back to back to back High Threats of something you’ve already finished in your Registry? A lot less fun.

Even with two Oddity-style Encounters in the mix, players grew frustrated and impatient seeing Sirius over and over. Poor Sirius.

While having High Threat Trace Encounters is understandable in order to add some challenge to the event (while also still being doable for new players), something needs to be tweaked to encourage players to keep taking part in the event once they finish, and not just feel like they’re surrounded by pointless spawns. Here are just a few options:

• Stick to only Oddity-Style encounters for Brilliant Events, or at least for High Threat Brilliants

• Make High Threat Brilliant Traces scale down in difficulty after a point, such as after:

  • Placing the image

  • Completing the entire Registry page

  • Completing the Special Assignments

  • Reaching a specific family rank

  • Returning a specific number of that Foundable

• Allow players to spend resources like Scrolls and Books in some kind of Trace effectiveness skill

• Create a 30-minute potion that makes Brilliants easier to return

While these might not be perfect solutions, any kind of change that might lessen the frustration players feel with Brilliant Traces would go a long way to improving future Brilliant Events.

All in all, this event was the most fun Brilliant Event yet. It kept players engaged and interested, even after they’d finished all of the event tasks. The event capitalised on popular gameplay mechanics, and introduced new content that will stick around even after the event has ended. Hopefully, future events can learn from the success of Fighting Forces and get even better.