One-hit wars (before October 10, 2026)
From the Polandball Go Wiki
This page describes the old war system. It no longer applies. Since the attacks of Saturday, October 10, 2026, an alliance war attack is one team duel of 1 to 5 balls against a squad, with HP carrying over between attacks. The current rules are on War attacks and team duels.
From the preseason wars of summer 2026 through the war week labeled Oct 1, every attack in an alliance war was a one-hit series. This page records how that worked, for readers of older guides, war records and discussions from that time.
1 A five-match series#
An attack sent five of your balls against one enemy squad of five defenders. The game played it as five matches, shown on screen as "Match 1 of 5" through "Final match". Your first ball met the squad's first defender, your second met the second, and so on, slot by slot.
Each match was a single hit. There was no Attack, Block, Swap or Weapon, no HP and no rounds. The game compared the two balls and the stronger one won.
To take the squad you had to win all five matches. Four wins and a loss still left the squad standing, and a 3–2 result showed on screen as DEFEAT. That is where the old phrase "winning a squad 5–0" comes from.
The other rules of the time:
- Each ball attacked once per war.
- A ball on defense never attacked.
- A squad under attack was locked, so no one else could hit it until that attack ended.
2 Effective CP#
Each match was decided by effective CP, a figure the game worked out for each ball against the other. It had three parts:
- The ball's CP, raised or cut by how its primary typing met the opponent's types.
- The item's attack, raised or cut in the same way by the item's resonance type.
- Minus the opponent's item defense.
When the ball's typing was strong against the opponent, the game added its Type Boost, the figure from the Attack track of Type Proficiency, once for each point of advantage. A recorded attack showed the boost as "+20%" with the words "super effective". When the typing was weak against the opponent, the opponent's resistance cut the figure instead. A neutral matchup left it unchanged. Each part was rounded to a whole number, and the ball with the higher effective CP won the match.
This made a one-hit match a calculation, not a chance. If you knew both balls, their typings and their items, you knew the result.
3 A worked example#
This is a made-up match, using real balls, types and items.
The attacker is a Fourth Reich at 7,000 CP. Its typing is Chaos, and its Attack track gives a 20% Type Boost. It holds a Chaos Blade, a Chaos item with 5,000 attack and 5,000 defense.
The defender is a Holy Roman Empire at 9,000 CP, Faith typed. It holds a Pure Diamond, with 0 attack and 3,000 defense.
Chaos is strong against Faith, so the attacker's figures are boosted by 20%:
- CP: 7,000 × 1.2 = 8,400
- Item attack: 5,000 × 1.2 = 6,000
- Less the Pure Diamond's defense: −3,000
- Effective CP: 11,400
Faith is neutral against Chaos, so the defender gets no boost:
- CP: 9,000
- Item attack: 0
- Less the Chaos Blade's defense: −5,000
- Effective CP: 4,000
The attacker wins the match, although its card shows 2,000 CP less than the defender's. Typing and items could swing a one-hit match by thousands of CP, which is why the era's war planning revolved around lining up the right ball in each slot.
4 Why it changed#
Patch 4.3.3 replaced one-hit PvP with round-based duels on October 1, 2026, and its notes said wars would follow. They didn't, at first: a recording of a real war attack on October 3 still showed the five-match series. The change reached wars with the war labeled Oct 8, whose attacks opened on Saturday, October 10. From then on an attack has been one team duel, with the same moves as PvP.
5 What no longer applies#
Older advice that rests on the one-hit rules is out of date. In particular:
- "Line up your slots." Defenders are now fought in seat order by a whole team, not one ball each.
- "Win it 5–0." A squad now falls when its last defender is KO'd, across as many attacks as it takes.
- "Compare effective CP." A war fight is now decided round by round, by damage, Protection, Speed and moves.
- Item effects. Items in war duels now count only through their attack and defense numbers. Bonus effects never apply.
How items work today is on Items, tiers and resonance, and the duel itself on How a duel works.
6 On polbielytics#
War records from before October 10 are kept and still shown, but they belong to a different game. polbielytics keeps them apart from team-duel wars and never mixes the two in one figure.
See also Two PvP systems, War seasons and ladder history and the patch timeline.