The Yappening (Halo Wars 2)

The Yappening is the name of a humorous in-game event held on Halo Wars 2 between March 29 and April 2, 2018. The Yappening is fictionally (albeit non-canonically) framed through the lens of Yapyap the DESTROYER gaining access to 343's servers and using it to wreak havoc in the games. The events typically come with limited-time changes to game functionality, often for comedic effect.

The Yappening, also referred to in the Halo Wars 2 API as Season 9.5, was the by technicality the tenth season of Halo Wars 2 to launch, beginning on March 29, 2018. The season followed Season 9 and was succeeded by Season 10 on April 2, 2018. The season's emblem is represented by a Methane Wagon.

Overview
On March 28, 2018, a blog post was submitted to Halo Waypoint by Yapyap, detailing that he had found a Forerunner artifact called the "Key of Balance", which promptly began speaking to him about the responsibility of balance. Yapyap proceeded to talk with the key and eventually destroyed it, using the key to bring about change. This post was updated by Jeff Easterling purporting that the post was not authorized by anyone on the Waypoint team, then later again updated noting that the event had also affected Halo Wars 2 game files, with a list of patch notes detailing the limited-time event changes over the weekend. The effects given initially only affected unit balance, but went on to affect leader powers, skirmish, Terminus Firefight, matchmaking, playlist names and the campaign level Under the Dark. Notably, the changes in particular affected Yapyap's gameplay, giving massive buffs to his units and starting army, culminating in Yapyap being given his own Season.

Global

 * To obtain power to upgrade your base, you must capture power nodes.
 * Every leader has a larger starting army to help fight over power nodes and power crates.
 * Leader Powers are all free and can be gained faster.
 * Leader Power cooldowns have been lowered for every leader as well. (1 minute for active drops, 2 minutes for unit drops, 3 minutes for ultimate leader powers)
 * Generators and Power Extractors now produce supplies.
 * Main base structures provide a small trickle of power over the course of the game.
 * Health for Bases, mini-bases, production buildings, and turrets have all gone up.
 * Health for expansion bases has increased, but not as much as upgraded bases.
 * Units across the board have been altered with new weapon types and damage modifiers.
 * T1 does units do low building damage. T2 does more, T3 does a lot more, and Ultimate Units such as the Condor and Scarab are game enders for stalemates.
 * T3 units all cost a very small amount of power.
 * Condors and Scarabs cost 4000/4000 but are significantly stronger and kill buildings faster.
 * All unit upgrades, global upgrades, and armory/war council upgrades cost supply
 * Global upgrades effectiveness has been increased in up to 20%/40%/60%.
 * All unit upgrades have been lowered to 100 supplies.
 * Turrets now build in roughly 15 seconds, minus siege turrets.
 * Shields have not been changed in any way.

Unit Specific Changes

 * UNSC Airpad is now a Tier 1 building and allows Nightingales to be built early game.
 * Snipers and Rangers are both now T2.
 * Locusts and Kodiaks are now Tier 3 units.
 * Flamers, Rangers, and Suicide Grunts now have more units in their squad.
 * Hero units now are stronger vs buildings.
 * Character models have been updated for several units in the game.

Playlists and Matchmaking UI Changes

 * Yap = ranked 1v1
 * YapYap = ranked 2v2
 * YapYapYap = ranked 3v3
 * Updated deathmatch to be called “The Yappening” so it appears under the “Modes” for deathmatch.
 * Updated loading screens for deathmatch game mode outlining the new goals of the game mode.
 * Updated matchmaking background screens to be grunt themed.

Leader Specific Changes
Kinsano
 * Arbiter
 * Plasma bolt now uses a lot more shots.
 * Atriox
 * Eradication’s area of effect is much larger.
 * Anders
 * Multiple waves of ark defense now spawn instead of only having 1.
 * Cutter
 * Close air support now spawns many more pelicans in waves.
 * ODST drop now spawns 10 ODSTs instead of 3.
 * Cutter’s spartan Jerome has been replaced by the ODST hero unit from the Spearbreaker campaign.
 * Isabel
 * Mac blast now gives additional shots for each point spent on this leader power.
 * Shipmaster
 * Raid is now 2 points instead of a 3-point leader power, and the upgrades condense to reflect this change.
 * Decimus
 * Fury is over 10x stronger at the highest tier.
 * Decimus when dropped in now does a lot more damage and his unit’s health has doubled.
 * Forge
 * Scatter bomb now hits a lot harder than it used to.
 * When you purchase heat of battle, Kinsano’s Kodiaks and siege turrets now leave a pool of fire behind that does damage over time.
 * Colony
 * Colony now has teleport.
 * Sergeant Johnson
 * EMP Mac now buffs units significantly more when targeting your own units.
 * Jerome
 * Omega Team now rides Mac blasts down as they spawn because why not?
 * Enduring Salvo now does damage as if a ship is falling on you because it is.
 * Serina
 * Her warthogs are now for lack of a better term frost hogs that now use cryo spray to freeze units.
 * Ice barriers now spawn more barriers at each tier.
 * Voridus
 * His hero unit now spawns infusion for significantly longer amount of time.
 * Pavium
 * Rain of fire now spawns more damage dealing beams at each tier of the ability.
 * Burnout no longer impacts unit production times.
 * YapYap THE DESTROYER
 * 6 hero units instead of 3 can be built now.
 * He has more turrets in his turret drops.
 * Starting army is just literally OP….
 * He also has a 101 pop starting army.
 * And Cannon fodder has an increased capture rate on power nodes to better resemble other units.