Why BattleCard Battles Include Random Variance
A card's power score doesn't decide a battle outright -- a small random swing rides on top of it. Here's the reasoning, and why the swing is capped where it is.
A BattleCard battle isn't a pure comparison of two power scores. Each side's score gets a small random swing applied before the higher one wins -- on purpose.
The reasoning
Without any variance, a battle between a much larger and a much smaller token's card would be a foregone conclusion every time -- the outcome would just restate which token has the bigger market cap, with no game left in it. A capped random swing means the underlying power score still wins the large majority of the time, but a smaller card can occasionally pull an upset. That's what keeps picking a matchup feel like a choice rather than reading a leaderboard.
When it applies
The variance is applied once, at the moment you hit Battle -- not continuously and not influenced by the clash animation that follows. The outcome is fully decided before that animation starts; the animation is presentation, not part of the resolution.