Question: There doesn’t seem to be a penalty if a player doesn’t destroy 2 buildings and retreats. Is this true?
EP / Dev Answer:  Correct, there is no intended penalty to either player, though any damage taken by the attacking fleet will persist.

Question: When this new Medal System starts - will bases with medals be reset, or will they be ranked by the amount they currently have?
EP / Dev Answer:  Current medal counts will be used to seed the player's position in the starting tiers, for example, players at the top of the current leaderboards will start in a higher tier. However as each season ends and players are moved up or down tiers depending on their position, medals will reset to ensure a level playing field for the next season. 

Question: Many of us retreat early instead of waiting out the timer for the last building etc and I would hate to lose the battle just because I retreated 5 minutes early AFTER crushing a base. Will this happen?
EP / Dev Answer:  If you complete all of the objectives the battle immediately ends in a 3-star victory, you won't have to wait out the timer, similar to 100% destroying a base.

Question: Will there be any restrictions to prevent players from exploiting the defensive medal system, such as repeatedly sacrificing lower-rank players or using buddy bubbles and alliance hopping?
EP / Dev Answer:  The system is designed to be resistant to exploits and abuse. 1: Red bubbles will limit how frequently people can feed fleets into another player’s base.  2: Retreating will result in losing all rewards. If you retreat to deny the defender any medals, you will also forfeit any medals you would have earned. 3: You only earn medals from defeating players in the same tier as you. For a player to attack and lose to another player to give them medals they would also need to maintain their tier with each feeder.

 Question: Are the medals still subtracted from the losing player's total and added to the winning player's total?
EP / Dev Answer:  No, medals will no longer be transferred. This is intentional to prevent abuse.

Question: Will the new system prevent the tactic of players hitting each other’s bases with the same medal count to remove both bases from play and avoid losing medals?
EP / Dev Answer:  One can no longer take medals from another player, so there’s no competitive benefit to blue bubbling. 

Question: Will players still be able to exploit medal exchanges by leaving an alliance, hitting a teammate, and then rejoining after a cooldown to maintain a net-zero medal gain/loss?
EP / Dev Answer:  Because there's no medal transfer, all you are doing in this instance is getting medals from defeating the other player.  Red bubbles will limit this from being an effective exploit. 

Question: There is a specific mention that attackers have to hit their rank or higher to get medals. Does the same apply to defenders? As in, do defenders get medals from everyone, or is it the same where they only get medals from their rank or higher?
EP / Dev Answer:  The same, you only ever get medals from the same rank or higher.