The two PvP systems
From the Polandball Go Wiki
Polandball Go has had two very different PvP systems. Until the end of September 2026, a battle was settled by five one-hit exchanges, slot against slot. Since patch 4.3.3 on October 1, 2026, a battle is a round-based duel with HP, moves and KOs. Win rates from before and after the change measure two different games, so they don't compare.
1 The old system: five slots, one hit each#
Under the old rules, both sides lined up five balls in slots. Slot 1 fought slot 1, slot 2 fought slot 2, and so on. Each pairing was decided in a single hit: the game compared the two balls' effective CP, which was their CP adjusted for type advantage or resistance and the bonus from their item. The side that took three of the five slots won the battle.
Part of the defense was hidden. Before attacking, you could see the defender's first two slots, but the last three were hidden and shuffled. So an attacker could counter-pick the two visible balls and had to take their chances with the other three.
Items worked differently too. An item added a bonus to the ball's effective CP, adjusted by type, rather than giving it a separate weapon hit.
The game recorded only which side won, never which slots. A ball's old-system record is really its team's record.
2 The new system: duels#
Since October 1, 2026, PvP battles are fought as duels:
- Each side brings five balls, with one active at a time.
- Each round, both sides choose Attack, Block, Swap or Weapon at the same time.
- The first side to knock out three balls wins. If neither has after 24 rounds, the side with the larger share of HP and Protection left wins.
- Each duel takes place in a random arena that boosts some types by 5%.
The five country stats now decide most of a duel. Population sets HP, Military sets Attack, Economy sets Protection, Diplomacy sets Speed and Soft Power raises Weapon hits. CP still matters a great deal, since it scales both a ball's hits and its HP. The duel engine covers the rules in detail.
Items now count through two numbers: attack powers the Weapon move, and defense adds to Protection. Their effect lines do nothing in a duel. See Items, tiers and resonance.
3 What changed in practice#
- Matchups aren't fixed pairs anymore. Swap means any ball can end up facing any other, so "slot 3 against slot 3" no longer means anything.
- Stats beyond CP matter. Two balls with the same CP and typing can play very differently if one has high Population and the other high Military.
- Each ball has its own result. A duel records whether each ball survived and how much HP it had left, where the old system recorded one result for the whole team.
- Attackers win most battles. Defenders are played by the game's bot, and attackers win far more duels than defenders, more so at higher tiers.
4 Wars changed too#
Alliance wars made the same switch a little later. War attacks were a series of one-hit fights until October 10, 2026, when they became team duels: one to five attackers against every defender still standing in a squad, with HP carrying over from attack to attack. See Wars.
5 On polbielytics#
The site keeps the two systems apart. Pages default to the current duels patch, and figures from the old system carry a "Before duels" badge and are never added into duel figures. See the tier list and Most played.