Commanders!
The Into the West Battle Path is right around the corner and, as usual, we’d like to take a moment to tell you more about its prizes.
As we’ve discussed in the previous article, the Battle Path is inspired by the legendary Chinese novel “Journey to the West” and the story of Sun Wukong (the Monkey King) and the scroll pilgrims tasked with bringing Buddhism from India to China. The prizes of the Battle Path follow all four unabridged novel volumes and are inspired by the events within the books.
The main prizes of the Battle Path are three cutting edge Chinese vehicles:
- ZBD-100 Tier 10 Premium Armored Fighting Vehicle for reaching Level 15
- Type 100 CSV Tier 10 Premium Tank Destroyer for reaching Level 30
- ZTZ-100 Tier 10 Premium Main Battle Tank for reaching Level 50
All three vehicles feature a new unique ability called Synergy – thanks to a shared cutting-edge Battlefield Management System they are able to boost each other’s performance as well as the performance of their other teammates. And when all three join together, they can create a shield protecting them and other friendly vehicles from guided missiles. You can read more about that in our dedicated article.
Naturally, there’s more to the Battle Path than that:
- Pilgrim Loot Crates are making a return (allowing you to obtain a single Tier 6-10 vehicle that you do not have yet)
- Legendary Blueprints are also available in this Battle Path
- Chinese-themed content (such as various prizes from the previous Rise of the Dragon Battle Path) is available by completing the Battle Path’s missions
And much more. But let us focus on this Battle Path’s new content. The Battle Path shares a common topic based on the novel and all its new visual customization items are tied to it. This time around, the Battle Path has a single new skin for VN20 called Pilgrim.
The skin is unusual in the sense that the original design that we adapted into the game came not from our art design team, but from player TobiichiOrigami who created this skin initially as a mod for the game. Its high quality and care for detail allowed us to integrate the skin into the game after reaching an agreement.
The skin is full of references to the Journey to the West, from character design and surface resembling Chinese porcelain, to various inspiring quotes such as this one from chapter 13 of the novel:
- When the mind is active, all kinds of māra come into existence; when the mind is extinguished, all kinds of māra will be extinguished.
The word māra refers to inner demons (threats, such as fear or lust) as opposed to external threats (actual demons encountered on the journey), pointing to the dichotomy of the ordeals the heroes of the book encounter.
You’re invited to decipher and ponder the meaning of other such quotes as they often do carry the wisdom of centuries in them. The skin is available for both VN20 configurations.
All the other assets are specific references to the events in the book and are available in chronological order, covering many (if not most) events in the plot. From the beginning of the journey over its many ordeals to the finish – it’s all there. The events are covered in item descriptions.
Let’s start with the camouflages as some examples.
Camouflage: Flowing Sands
Camouflage: Tiger Stripes
Camouflage: Blaze
Camouflage: True Fire of Samadhi
Camouflage: Scorpion Carapace
Camouflage: Red Python Scales
Camouflage: Centipede
All in all, 16 new high-quality camouflages await you. But we’re just only getting started. The decals are also closely tied to the novel and depict specific characters, elements and scenes described in the book. A lot of effort was put into making them as accurate as possible based on Professor Anthony C. Yu’s unabridged translation of the novel and we hope that you’ll agree with us that these are some of the best-looking decals made to this day.
Decal: Curtain-Raising General of Heaven
Decal: Star Lord Orionis
Decal: Spider Spirit
Decal: Sacrifice
Decal: Princess Jade Countenance
Decal: Journey’s First Step
What’s the meaning behind each of these? Why is there a lady with a spider? And what of the big black rooster? We can’t wait for you to find out the meaning behind these.
The flags are equally meaningful. They all depict locations from the Journey to the West model along with their Chinese names for maximum authenticity.
Flag: Yellow Wind Cave
Flag: Black River
Flag: Guanyin Hall
And how many are there? More than forty decals and flags are awaiting you along with a number of player avatars, titles, base paints and much more.
The Into the West Battle Path is now available for preorder in bundles that include special preorder bundles only available for a few more days.
The bundles can be found in our Web Shop:
We hope that you’ll enjoy this event and, as always:
See you on the battlefield!
