Drakantos is primarily a PvE game, but it runs a competitive PvP layer that the developers describe as a "Mini MOBA" inside the MMO. Unlike most MMORPGs, where PvP unlocks much later, you can jump into PvP from the very start, right alongside the PvE Adventures. Both Casual and Ranked PvP grant experience and rewards, so PvP works as a full alternative progression path rather than a side activity: players who prefer it can level and reward their Heroes by competing, even though the pace is slightly slower than PvE.
Every PvP fight uses equalized stats. In PvP everyone is set to max level with maxed equipment and skills, so raw power is taken out of the equation and only skill, decision making, and teamwork decide the match. Your Orbs, Artifacts, and Trophies are also maximized for PvP, and you do not need to have unlocked them first. To check exactly what an Artifact or Trophy does at max level, hold Tab while hovering over it. For more on the wider game systems, see Gameplay.
PvP Modes Overview
Drakantos splits PvP across structured Arena matches and a set of open-world and special encounters. The table below summarizes the confirmed PvP activities and how each one places players against each other.
Mode | Type | Summary |
|---|---|---|
Arena | Structured 3v3 PvP | The main competitive mode. Casual and ranked queues across 13 maps and three game modes (Control, Escort, Assault). |
Duel | Open-world PvP | Casual, spontaneous fights you can start with anyone anywhere in the open world. |
Red Chest | Open-world PvP | A free-for-all chest event where the last player standing claims most of the rewards. |
Adventure Invasions | Involuntary PvP | A rare chance for two groups to share a Guild mission instance and race to collect Erilith crystals. Both teams are rewarded. |
Hellgates | PvPvE extraction | An intentional extraction mode: fight demonic enemies for loot in a shared instance and extract before you lose it. |
Arena
Arena is the main competitive PvP mode and the part of Drakantos built to feel like a Mini MOBA. Every match places players into 3v3 teams. The game then randomly selects a map and a game mode for the match, and the Hero Selection phase begins. Because you already know the map and mode going into selection, your picks become highly strategic: some compositions are stronger on wide open maps, others excel in tighter spaces, and some heroes are better at zone control while others favor fast engagements. Orbs, artifacts, and trophies are adjustable during Hero Selection, so you can tune your presets to the match ahead. There are 13 maps spread across the three Arena modes.
Arena Modes
The Arena rotates between three objective-based game modes. An older 2023 build of the game called the third mode "Deathmatch," but the current Arena modes are Control, Escort, and Assault.
Mode | How It Works |
|---|---|
Control | Stand on the control zones to earn progress while your team holds them. Maps have one or two control points, and the first team to fully capture all zones wins. |
Escort | Escort your crystal to the final point while stopping the enemy from escorting theirs. The crystal moves when an ally is nearby and stops if an enemy is close to it. |
Assault | A MOBA-like mode with towers and a core. Towers share their health; destroying them exposes the core and makes enemies take longer to respawn. Towers prioritize minions, and without minions the towers and the core have 80% defense. A buff spawns in the middle of the map every 3 minutes and 30 seconds, granting 25% attack for 60 seconds. Assault matches last longer and give more rewards. |
Two balance rules sit on top of those objectives. The first concerns how much a build can spend across a match. During the second closed beta, artifacts ran on a charge economy and Control and Escort cut those charges in half, so a charge-hungry build got fewer uses in the shorter modes than in Assault. That economy was replaced in July 2026: artifacts now draw on focus, which a hero generates in combat, with a cost per artifact. The developers have not restated the mode-by-mode rule under the new system, so the practical point to carry forward is that the shorter modes give a build less room to spend than Assault does, while the exact figure from the beta no longer applies. The build systems themselves are covered on the Orbs, Artifacts, and Trophies page.
The second rule is about printed durations. Any skill or artifact whose description reads "up to" a number of seconds is scaled down against players and bosses, so the printed duration is a ceiling rather than what to expect in a match.
Mode choice also changes how quickly different rewards arrive. Assault pays out more than Control or Escort because its matches run longer and the rewards are scaled to match, while achievements complete faster in Control and Escort precisely because those matches are shorter. The developers framed this as a wash rather than a correct answer, and told players to queue whichever mode they enjoy.
Why Three Against Three
The team size is a design choice rather than a technical one. The developers describe the combat as tactical and reaction-based, built around reading a specific moment: blocking a key ability, baiting out a cooldown, landing an arrow through the centre of a target. Their argument is that this texture survives at three players a side and disappears once a screen fills with people, so the competitive format was sized to protect it.
The same reasoning limits open-world PvP rather than expanding it. Large-scale open-world fighting is judged a poor fit for this combat, and the contested chest event from the first beta was described as something built in a single afternoon for fun rather than as a pillar of the game. The open-world encounters below are meant to stay occasional.
Ranked
Arena includes a full ranked system on top of casual play. The ranked ladder runs through nine tiers that represent your progression and skill level, climbing from Bronze up to Ethereal. The Hero Selection process changes as you climb: casual and lower-ranked matches use a simple simultaneous pick where everyone chooses at the same time for faster, more accessible games. From Diamond upward, matches introduce ban and pick phases to cut down on unpredictability, and at the highest ranks picking becomes turn-based, letting teams read enemy choices and respond with counters.
Order | Tier | Hero Selection |
|---|---|---|
1 | Bronze | Simultaneous pick |
2 | Silver | Simultaneous pick |
3 | Gold | Simultaneous pick |
4 | Platinum | Simultaneous pick |
5 | Emerald | Simultaneous pick |
6 | Diamond | Ban and pick phases |
7 | Mithril | Ban and pick phases |
8 | Adamantite | Ban and pick phases |
9 | Ethereal | Ban and pick phases |
Each tier also has a cosmetic reward attached. The studio produced a display for every rank from Bronze through Ethereal, with the Ethereal display described as going to the top players of a specific hero rather than to everyone who clears a rating threshold. Displays are account-unlocked and equipped per hero, and they show up in lobbies, party screens, and victory screens, so a player can carry a ranked display into ordinary missions or bring a rare drop display into an arena match. Some displays come from bosses and mission drops instead, and those are covered under Pets, Mounts, and Collectibles.
The ladder is intended to run in seasons rather than continuously, rotating which maps and which modes are in the competitive pool from one season to the next. The developers have also raised the possibility of banning particular artifacts in ranked play, in the way a hero can be banned during selection, though nothing has been published about which artifacts or when.
Open-World and Special PvP
Outside the Arena, Drakantos mixes PvP into the shared world and into its PvE layers. These encounters range from casual challenges to involuntary clashes during Open World and Adventurer's Guild missions, and they give even PvE-focused players a natural way to taste PvP. Several of them lean on the demonic Erilith crystals and the Bosses and Enemies that share the open world.
Mode | Description |
|---|---|
Duel | A classic MMORPG feature: invite anyone to a fight anywhere in the open world. Duels are casual and spontaneous, perfect for testing new skills or simply challenging friends. |
Red Chest | Two chest types spawn in the open world. A blue chest summons enemies, and players who survive earn the rewards. A red chest is PvP-focused: it gives a short window for players to gather, then everyone fights, and the last player standing claims most of the rewards. These encounters are intentionally chaotic and unbalanced. |
Adventure Invasions | Very rare involuntary PvP during Adventurer's Guild missions. There is a small chance two groups are placed in the same instance, and the objective changes to collecting red crystals called Erilith that spawn across the map alongside demonic enemies. You can defeat enemy players to steal the crystals they carry. Both teams are rewarded whether they win or lose, so no one feels punished for the invasion. |
Hellgates | A PvPvE extraction mode. Enter solo or in a group, fight through demonic enemies, and gather valuable loot. Other players share the instance, creating tension between pushing forward and securing what you have. You can extract at any time or risk going deeper for better rewards, and dying means losing the loot you collected, so every decision matters. |
The reward rule behind Adventure Invasions is what keeps the involuntary part fair. The winning side takes the invasion rewards, and the losing side still receives the rewards for the mission it originally queued into, so a group that loses the clash is no worse off than if the invasion had never happened. Both teams also arrive unprepared, with compositions and builds chosen for a Open World and Adventurer's Guild run rather than for a fight, which the developers consider the point: everyone meets on equal and equally awkward footing.
Custom Games and Tournaments
Players can create custom games to set up their own matches. In a custom game you choose the modes and maps, invite players or spectate, and customize the rules (for example artifacts and timings). This opens space for community-driven events and player-organized competitions, which is especially useful for streamers who want to run their own tournaments. Wingeon has also announced plans for in-game tournaments, described as regular or weekly tournaments in store text; the custom game tools are confirmed in the current build, while the dedicated tournament infrastructure is a planned addition.
Match Feedback
A few interface and reward details help during a PvP match. An ally's ultimate charge is visible on the scoreboard, so you can read when a teammate is ready to commit. The best performer in a match is highlighted as the MVP and earns +10% points. For communication and information, pressing the mouse wheel opens a ping wheel where you can choose a ping option, and Tab opens the scoreboard (and, while hovering an Artifact or Trophy, shows what it does at max level).
The MVP is marked visually as well as numerically: the best performer is given a distinct frame with a warm yellow glow on the Tab scoreboard, so the result is readable at a glance without hunting through the score column. The same 10 percent bonus applies to the best performer in a cooperative Adventure, not only in the arena.