News from the Arena

Patch 1.08 - Reforged Campaigns version 1.6.3

Sep 8, 2026

BOTTA 6.0.22

Sep 6, 2026

Legends of the 3rd Age 0.5.2 Released!

Sep 6, 2026

Version 0.5.2 overhauls leaderships (mostly back to 1.06/2.22 numbers), reduces costs of secondary resource structures and adjusts some recharge times of spells and hero powers.

Patch 2.02 v9.7.7 Released!

Jun 30, 2026

Patch 2.02 v9.7.7 has been released, which resolved a critical bug + implemented several balance changes and improvements.

Patch 2.02 v9.7 Series Overview

Jun 30, 2026

Patch 2.02 prides itself on its competitive-balance tuning, bug fixes, QoL improvements, and other immersive features. Find below some of the biggest highlights of the v9.7 series patch

Patch 2.02 v9.7.6 Available for Download!

Jun 7, 2026

Patch 2.02 has been released with several fixes and improvements just in time for the upcoming tournament

Clan Wars!

May 25, 2026

Clan Wars is coming to Arena, with clan based matches, a separate clan elo ladder, and dedicated clan competition.

Inviting players works again

Sep 7, 2026

The invite window was opening empty, so there was nobody to pick and no way to invite anyone to your group or into your game. It lists people again: your friends who are online first, then everyone else in the arena you are in. Restart Arena to update.

Live spectating, friend groups and supporter backgrounds

Sep 7, 2026

Spectating a live game used to freeze Arena while it waited for the game to catch up, sometimes for two minutes, and it looked like a crash. It now holds the picture, tells you it is waiting, and starts again on its own. You can pause a BFME1 replay with ctrl and period, rotate the camera with the bracket keys and zoom with PageUp and PageDown. Games where little is happening no longer drop off the live list. Replay comments now have replies and likes. You can reply to a message in any chat. Chat previews show real text instead of raw codes. You can sort friends into named groups, invite someone to your party from the right-click menu, and a new Parties tab shows the parties in your arena so you can ask to join. There is an optional notification for when a friend comes online. When you report someone for how they behaved in chat, you can now say roughly when it happened and which chat it was in, and the report arrives with the surrounding messages already attached. Supporters can change the app background, with four to pick from: Minas Tirith, Isengard, Edoras and Helm's Deep. Supporters also get a replay watch list they can add notes to, and unlimited friend groups. You now get a warning before your support runs out instead of finding out afterwards. The neutral host of a tournament match can pick which server the match runs through, the same way a freeplay host already could. Tournament match chats on Discord now open by pinging both players. Downloads no longer sit on Stuck on checking files, and a download that stalls now stops instead of hanging. An app that had already updated no longer restarts itself over and over. The Custom Games tile showed zero online and zero searching for everyone. It now shows the real numbers. Notifications arrive in your own language. Numbered lists in news posts keep the numbers the author typed. A verification link opened in a browser for the first time no longer says it expired when it had actually worked. Restart Arena to update.

Connection changes for BFME2 and RotWK, and control over your account

Sep 3, 2026

BFME2 and RotWK now use the same connection changes BFME1 received last month. Commands are sent slightly earlier, and a dropped packet is re-sent after a shorter wait. Both are on by default. This update also records connection timing during matches, so the effect can be measured. You can now delete your account, from Arena or from the website. Deleting removes your email address and personal details, and your name stops being shown to other players. Your games, ladder history and achievements stay exactly where they are. You have 7 days to change your mind. You can also download a copy of your data, and read the terms and privacy policy any time from your account page. Replays now count plays separately from downloads, and each is counted once per person, so the numbers on a replay mean what they say. Freeplay rooms that were already gone no longer appear in the list, and there is a CLOSE GAME button in the room for when a game will not shut down on its own. Co-op missions that cannot be played now say so instead of loading the wrong map. A host can no longer open a slot out from under someone who already joined it. The update bar no longer sits at 0 percent claiming to download. Launcher tabs are translated in nine more languages, and buttons that spilled outside their tiles in longer languages now fit. Your friends list and who is online both load faster. Restart Arena to update.

Smoother BFME1 games, and a workshop you can ask to join

Aug 30, 2026

BFME1 games should feel noticeably better if you are not the host. Commands now leave your machine sooner, the game stops adding delay it does not need, and a command that goes missing is retried five times instead of once. Before this, a lost command was retried once at the exact moment the game was about to throw it away, which is what a stuck player and a sudden drop often were. News posts and changelogs are readable on the website again. Paragraphs, bullets and headings were being stripped out, so every article arrived as one solid block of text. If your account cannot reach the Workshop, you can now sign in to Mission Control and ask for access on a form. No more emailing anyone. Arenas and tournaments can now be marked as no smurfs. If another account from your computer is already playing there, you get one warning before you continue. The quickmatch match screens are translated. Updating an app no longer leaves stray files next to it, which for a lot of you meant leftovers on the Desktop. Restart Arena to update.

Eleven languages, and no more administrator prompts

Aug 25, 2026

Arena now speaks eleven languages: English, German, Russian, French, Spanish, Turkish, Dutch, Polish, Czech, Portuguese and Italian. The launcher, the Arena, the Workshop and the website are all translated. The website answers in your own language too, so a link you share opens in the language of whoever opens it. Arena picks up your Windows language the first time it starts, and you can change it any time in Settings. Your choice now follows you between the launcher and the Arena instead of being quietly reset. A few screens, including tournaments, are still English and will follow later. Arena and the launcher no longer need administrator rights. Signing in, starting a game and normal everyday use all run as your own Windows account now. The only step that still asks for permission is adding the firewall rules, and that happens once. If your game folder is not writable, Arena now repairs it for you in a single prompt, instead of failing later with an error that did not explain itself. The download is much smaller. A 546 MB component that nothing actually used has been removed. Chat no longer falls behind your typing on busy nights. On a crowded evening the friends list was being rebuilt once for every player who came online, which is what made the cursor lag. Your display name can now be up to 16 characters, instead of 10. Match results are recorded more carefully. Where two accounts shared the same in-game name, a game could previously be recorded against the wrong player. Arena now records no result at all rather than the wrong one. Quickmatch army selection works properly. Picking several armies now selects those armies, and your picks are remembered next time. Settings no longer asks you to save changes you never made. Winner claims are limited to one open claim per replay. Filing the same claim again is refused, instead of quietly adding another copy for the moderators to work through. News posts and tournaments now have readable links you can share, and every link that already exists keeps working. Tournaments have a shareable link at all for the first time. Restart Arena to update.

Quitting players are much less likely to freeze your game

Aug 18, 2026

When someone quits mid-match, the rest of you could be left stuck with the game locked up and no result recorded. That should now be much rarer. Both players need to have updated for the full benefit, and we are not going to tell you it is gone for good: the root of it sits in the game engine itself and it happens on other services too. If it still happens to you, tell us. The post-game ladder screen was often showing grey bars with no names and no ELO. It was giving up on the ladder if it took a moment to load, which at the end of a match it usually does. It now waits and fills in properly, and the list no longer starts out of position and slides into place. We were also drawing our own connection diagnostics over the corner of your game. That is gone. The small line in the bottom left with your connection status stays. Supporter colours and the heart now show up everywhere they should: your friends list, the online and in-arena lists, friend requests, the blocked list, direct messages and party labels. Before this they only appeared in chat and on the ladder. This one you get without updating. The short feedback card now has proper red to green faces, the whole face is clickable, and the grey box that used to sit over them is gone. Restart Arena to update.