In his latest stream, Isthos took a deep dive into the Alliance vs Alliance (AVA) system in Dofus, offering a look at how it’s been evolving—and how it’s impacting the community at large.

Originally designed to bring dynamic, territory-based PvP to the game, AVA has instead become dominated by the most powerful alliances. Smaller groups and new players find themselves sidelined, unable to compete against entrenched political deals and sheer force of numbers. Instead of epic in-game clashes, control of territories is often settled by out-of-game politics and Discord deals, rather than skillful play. This has left many feeling that AVA has lost its original spirit—players end up “losing before they even get to play.”

There’s growing frustration around how nuggets and resources—once a key incentive for participating in AVA - have become monopolized by these large alliances. Efforts to level the playing field (like shorter fight times and tweaks to loot) haven’t solved the underlying problem: that the biggest alliances dominate everything, pushing others out entirely.

What’s Next for AvA?

Ankama is planning a phased revamp of AVA over the next two years, aiming to tackle these longstanding issues. The initial phase will pause territorial captures temporarily, separate nuggets from AVA rewards (so alliances can’t hoard them), and cap prism shares at 50/50 to curb extreme farming. They’ve also hinted at new intercity PvP content, promising something different than the old Headhunter system. A complete overhaul of AVA is targeted for 2026, with player surveys and community feedback playing a role in shaping these changes.

Skepticism Remains:

While these plans sound promising, Isthos and his viewers voiced skepticism. There’s concern that the same “meta-gaming” alliances might just adapt to the new rules and continue to dominate, leaving newcomers still struggling for a fair chance. The community worries that without a real shake-up, AVA could remain a playground for the few, rather than the many.

The conversation also explored the role of guilds in Dofus—once the social backbone of the game. Over time, guilds have felt less central, overshadowed by the political machinations of alliances. Isthos expressed nostalgia for the days when guilds were tight-knit communities, offering everything from advice to late-night group dungeons.

There’s cautious optimism around upcoming guild raids and daily/weekly missions, which aim to give guilds more meaningful roles and bring players together again. However, there’s also a fear that these additions could turn guilds into pressure cookers for min-maxers—more about efficiency and less about camaraderie.

The Big Picture:

Players are eager to see if these changes will restore some of the excitement and fairness to AVA, while also rekindling the social spark that made guilds feel like home. The community wants to see a balance: less domination by the elite alliances, and more fun and opportunity for everyone to join in.

As always, the question remains—can Ankama’s reworks truly breathe life back into these once-thrilling systems? Only time (and plenty of Kamas) will tell.

The current Ochre quest is no secret - Resource gathering, creating of the soul stones, battling other players for scarce resources - These are all the polar opposite we want to experience when we choose to play an MMO game. Design choices in the game need to be with player’s best interest in mind, and the current ochre quest encourages hoarding arch monsters and selfish play to get ahead.

But are we too far down this rabbit hole when it comes to the Ochre? Thousands of players have sank months and months into the eternal harvest hunt, so would it be fair to make the quest easier for newer players hoping to tackle it?

Ankama have already retconned the lore, created limited time events such as the D’vine Tingies and Combine Harvester events. But what more can be done to streamline this brutal quest for a necessary game item?

Unfortunately there’s no hard stance right now, but here’s what they’re considering:

• Letting everyone soul the arch monster in the fight - This would immediately alleviate the pressure of battling others for the arch monster, and discourage selfishness within the community. Instead, there’s no harm in inviting more and more players to battle the Archmonster together. But why not take it a step further? Why not *encourage* players to join the fights? What about rewarding D’vine Tingies to all those who battle arch monsters, scaling with the more players joining the fight? This encourages team play, and encourages as many players as possible to join.
•  Rewarding D’vine Tingies from Quests - Whilst nice, is a bandaid fix to the core issue, such as soul stones and the immense investment. It will be interesting to know the scale of these Tingies. Too many from quests and it’ll make the DOFUS trivial, but not enough and it won’t be worth it at all.
•  Increased Combine Harvester Events - Again, is a bandaid fix, especially as this is always labelled as a temporary event. 

It seems that, whilst Ankama are thinking about short term fixes, they’re not thinking deeper about the economic problems that a tweak like this could cause, and are certainly not promising any dramatic changes.

I’m a certified oldie who can remember the implementation and eventual removal of the old Dungeon Finder system. For those whipper snappers who weren’t around, this system was simple - You pick a dungeon you want to do, and “sign up” to it. Other players who browse through these menus will be able to see your character, class, level, and name, and automatically join your group. When you’ve got four players, you’re good to go!

Over time, it became clear that this system wasn’t particularly popular. It was extremely limiting, being unable to type any sort of text, show that you have any sort of experience in the dungeon, or even be able to message people within the system. It quickly fell out of use, players opting instead to use the Recruitment channel where you could give people all the information they needed to decide whether they wanted to join you or not. The feature was removed not long after.

It’s interesting to hear they’re planning on bringing this back, but labled instead as a Group Finder, capable of recruiting into groups for farming, levelling, dungeons, quest fights, Dreams, and whole heaps of other content. 

Once again, Ankama are holding their cards close to their chest, and whilst announcing a launch of this by the end of the year, we have no details as to what this could practically entail.