What’s up Commanders! Season 6 (Lost Rainforest) is live, and you already know what that means—the Global Expedition is back to rain free Hero Awakening Shards and Exclusive Weapon Shard Choice Boxes on us. But if you’re trying to auto-battle your way through weeks 2, 4, and 6 with a generic team, you’re gonna hit a massive wall fast. Raw Combat Power (CP) isn’t enough this time around. In this guide, we’re breaking down the exact Area Buffs and squad setups you need to squeeze out an extra 50 stages. Time to lock in.
Entry Requirements & The New Meta
Before you even try to look for this mode, there's a major UI change you need to know about.
- The New Building: Stop tapping your Alert Tower. The devs moved the event to its own dedicated building called the Expedition Base.
- The Level Cap: You need to be HQ 27 just to drop this building in your base. If you aren't there yet, you can't even enter. The good news? It doesn't cost resources to upgrade once it's built.
- Say Goodbye to 4+1: If you are still running a hybrid 4+1 squad, you are actively griefing your own progress. Season 6 completely removes the hybrid squad card from the equation. Running a mixed faction drops your type bonus from 20% down to 15%. Pure, single-type mono formations completely dominate now. Pick a faction and commit.
Area Buffs & Best Squad Lineups
Each 14-day round features 4 distinct areas that unlock progressively every two days. If you want to push maximum stages, you have to swap your lineup to match these active mechanics.
Area 1: Energy Damage Focus
This zone gives a massive +150% extra Energy Damage after a hero lands 6 damage instances from skills.
- Best Squads: Aircraft Faction (DVA, Tesla) or Tank Faction (Kimberly, Stetmann).
- Pro Strategy: Prioritize rapid-fire or multi-hit awakened skills. DVA and Kimberly trigger this 150% bonus constantly because their skills hit multiple times per activation.
Area 2: Critical Hit Scaling
Area 2 grants a flat +7.5% Critical Rate boost to all heroes, making physical burst lines go absolutely nuts.
- Best Squads: Tank Faction or any high-Attack DPS squads.
- Pro Strategy: Stick the new Dimensional Crit card on your highest-attack Tank (usually Kimberly or Stetmann) to leverage this flat buff.
Area 3: Defense Penetration
This area massively amps standard armor pierce metrics, making enemy mitigation useless.
- Best Squads: Missile Faction (Swift, Fiona).
- Pro Strategy: This is where damage-over-time (DoT) builds shine. Swift’s burns and Fiona’s radiation benefit exponentially from the defense pen, ticking down high-HP enemies fast.
Area 4: HP Recovery on Skill Use
This late-stage range provides essential sustain and lifesteal when firing active skills. You won't be one-shotting waves here.
- Best Squads: Aircraft or Endurance-heavy Tank Squads (Murphy, Williams, Marshall).
- Pro Strategy: Drag out the fight. Position defensively because high-sustain stages reward survival over pure burst.
The Non-Core Tactics Card Trick (The 60-Level Math)
Want a massive passive combat boost? Stop ignoring your purple and blue Non-Core Tactics Cards (Battle and Resource cards).
- The Math: The game tallies the total combined upgrade level of all equipped Non-Core cards and converts it into a massive flat stat boost.
- The Trap: Core cards are completely excluded from this calculation, so don't just dump points there.
- The 60-Level Goal: Maxing out your own 4 battle cards (level 12 cap) and 4 resource cards (stuck at level 1) only gets you to 52 levels (12×4+4). But the ultimate buff tier requires Level 60 for a massive +20,000 Attack and +4,000 Defense boost.
- The "Peak Lock" White Lie: To bridge that 8-level gap, hoard cards that roll with +2 or +3 level attributes. Level them up, equip them to hit the Level 60 milestone, and then dismantle them. Your stat bonus stays permanently locked at that historic peak even after the cards are gone.
Diamond Universal Cards to Equip
Make sure to equip the three new Diamond Universal Cards tailored to your dominant team type:
- Dimensional Crit (Tanks): Focuses entirely on amping the Tank hero with the absolute highest attack stat. Check your gear beforehand to ensure it's sitting on Kimberly or Stetmann.
- Frontal Suppression (Aircraft): Requires exactly 3 Aircraft heroes in the back row. Move DVA to the back row to capitalize on the massive Attack Speed surge.
- Aftermath Burst (Missiles): Specifically boosts damage-over-time rather than basic attacks, synergizing perfectly with Swift and Fiona.
Rewards & Hard Thresholds
Before we talk about tactical tweaks, let’s look at the actual numbers you need to hit for those juicy rewards.
- The F2P "Sweet Spot" (Stage 400): Aim for Stage 400 each round. Clearing this, plus doing the day 1 Hero Trials, gives you the exact 40 shards needed to unlock a Hero Awakening.
- The Benchmark: You’ll need roughly a 50M power First Squad to comfortably clear Stage 400 in Area 1.
- The Safe Feature: Starting in Round 2, the game tracks your progress. If you push further than the previous round, it backfills rewards you missed out on from earlier weeks.
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Pro-Tips to Smash Through Hard Walls
When your squad hits a definitive roadblock on auto-battle, don't just sit there. Use these quick fixes to squeeze out an extra 20 stages:
- Flip Your Warleader Skills: Your Commander profession talents work here. Swap to Riot Control for extra PvE damage reduction, or Assault Squad to nerf enemy crit rates.
- Pop Core Card Actives: Cards like Zombie Purgatory have active skills. Trigger them manually right before a tough boss stage for a quick damage mitigation window.
- Swap Frontline Positions: If your main tank melts at 95% completion, swap slot 1 and slot 2. Changing the enemy's targeting pathing can buy your back-row DPS an extra 5 seconds.
- Check Your Drone Chips: The game loves to bug out and default your drone configuration back to Level 1 presets here. Manually check your screen before pushing.
- Eat the Fish Buff: Pop an Attack/Defense food buff from your alliance inventory right before a hard pushing session to secure the final milestone boxes.
- Revisit Cleared Areas Late-Round: By Day 10, your season tech is much higher. Go back to Area 1 and 2 to easily clean up another 10–20 stages.
Conclusion
Anyway, that’s the play for this season. Go hit the tower and burn your entries before time runs out. If you need an extra push and want to grab some cheap speedups or gear packs to fix your squad, go check out LDshop. Let's maximize these rewards, cheers!
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Neolle The Completionist Writer
Half editor, half hardcore gamer, I spent my career at the intersection of search intent and player experience. I know the ranking math, but I also know the frustration of a 3 a.m. dead-end in a hidden quest. Having shipped tens of thousands of words in original guides and reviews, I’ve mastered the art of stripping back complex systems into readable, actionable insights. I don't write for bots; I build roadmaps for the community.