Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - 21. The Sunken Ruins Heroic

After venting my frustrations with the Alliance bonus campaigns in my last post, this map was a welcome breath of fresh air.  For one, no flying enemies.  That means I'm free of Royal Archers and also Dwarven Flamethrowers, getting to finally go back to the Tricannon for the first time in what feels like forever.  Just having a moment's peace from having to account for "the flying wave" and getting to use a tower I like was immensely rejuvenating.

And besides the build, this map eases up on the difficulty enough that I was able to go back to one hero.  "Easy" might not seem like the right description as you view the grades below, but it's quite telling when a map is doable with only one hero.  When I first started the map I did two heroes, as I just had accepted that all the maps from here on out were going to require two, but then I aced it on my first attempt without breaking a sweat.  I literally thought, "Really, that's it?" in my head.  So I realized that one hero was probably in reach, and in fact it managed to just about hit the sweet spot of being challenging without being overly frustrating.

Unusual for this map was the need to build a forward choke point on one of the islands.  If you've watched any of my videos, you know that I lean towards a traditional choke-points-at-the-exits kind of strategy for my builds.  But this is one of the rare maps that I feel rather demanded it.  It's hard to tell from the video only, but an early barracks there during wave 2 is crucial for slightly delaying the Quickfeet so that they can't turn an Crok into a Killertile at the upper right exit lane, which basically is a game over if they do.  Then in wave 4 it's best to try to contain all the enemies coming from the lower left on that island, because if they advance to the upper center exit your defense is likely to get overrun with Wise Croks constantly disabling your towers.  I appreciate so much genuine difficulty like this based on clever wave composition over "here's a bunch of spongy flying enemies".

Impressions

The grades may seem brutal but they're also more honest, being single hero.  Raelyn really sucked it up as usual, but what was really surprising was Vesper's dismal 'D' performance.  I don't know what it was, but he really stunk at this map.  To be fair he was one of the first heroes I did, and I probably should have gone back and redone him at the end once I had more experience with the map, but I just didn't have it in me to do so.

This is definitely one of those maps that tells a story of heroes who dominate and those who don't.  All our 'A+' heroes were able to insta-call all waves, which would have been unthinkable for all other heroes.

Final Grades

• Vesper - D
• Raelyn - C-
• Nyru - B
• Torres - A-
• Anya - B-
• Grimson - C
• Broden - A+
• Therien - B+
• Onagro - A-
• Warhead - C-
• Lumenir - A
• Kosmyr - A+
• Stregi - C+
• Bonehart - A+

Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - 21. The Sunken Ruins Heroic

Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - 21. The Sunken Ruins Campaign

I know my pace has slowed down a lot lately, for which I apologize.  Some of it has to do with life factors, but some of it has to do with the fact that I'm just not really getting into these Alliance bonus campaigns.  The first one was okay at best, and I made my feelings on the boss map abundantly clear.  I'm not particularly enjoying this one either, and today's map I've started referring to as "the slog in the bog" in my mind.

My feelings about Alliance and how the Kingdom Rush series has evolved overall are gradually crystallizing as I keep playing, but one thing I've begun realizing is that as the series has progressed build variety has been steadily decreasing.  I've done several one-tower challenges on my channel for the original Kingdom Rush on some of the most difficult levels, and I realized that that would just not be possible on most of the harder maps in Alliance.  I'm not entirely sure why that is, but I will say it's sucking the fun (for me, at least) out of a lot of these levels.

Part of the charm of the original Kingdom Rush is that you generally had a lot of flexibility in terms of your build.  Every tower was powerful, and so every tower could - generally speaking - get the job done.  Now you would think that would be an indication that the game was easy - you can just throw any old build at a map and it will work - but for whatever reason that was not the case.  Hard levels were still hard, even though with enough experience you could have the skill to do challenges like one tower.

In Alliance I generally have the feeling with any new map that there's the One True Build that I have to figure out.  That's putting too fine a point on it, and of course there is wiggle room for variation, but I still feel cramped in terms of playstyle.

Part of that may be due to the fact that I limit myself to non-premium towers only.  I do that of course so that these videos can serve as walkthroughs for mobile players who don't want to spend money on the game.  It could very well be that if I was using those towers I would feel the freedom to do something crazy like a Stargazer-only build.  But as it is I feel like I'm treading the same rut just with different scenery every time - okay, the Royal Archers have to go here to deal with the flying enemies, I need a Dwarven Flamethrower here to deal with large packs as well as provide additional flying enemy support, etc.

That's a lot of prologue, but I just don't have a lot of enthusiasm for discussing this map.  It's a different premise, I'll grant, given that non-flying heroes are confined to the exits.  I'm possibly forgetting, but I don't think that's been the case on a map since The Sunken Citadel in Frontiers.  Given the similarity in names, perhaps there was a deliberate attempt to recreate that experience?

Besides that the only new gimmick here is the Hydra, who is quite the tough customer.  I thought the flavor text on its card was a hint that fire could prevent it from transitioning to its second phase, thus I originally started trying the Dwarven Flamethrower, but alas it appears Ironhide was just trolling us.  It turns out the Flamethrower is the best DPS option for the upper right chokepoint anyway, since it hosts both magic resistant enemies like the Hydra as well as some Nesting Gators at one point.  And yes, in the Bonehart video I did forget that the Hydra had good magic resistance when I replaced the Flamethrower with an Eldritch Channeler.

Impressions

Grades are unsurprising and largely unremarkable.  I will say I don't feel I'm doing a very good job of accounting for the fact that I'm relying hard on the second hero in these grades.  I'm slightly resentful that the game is forcing me to have to use two heroes, ruining my perfect grading scheme, but at the same time I'm also grateful that it's challenging enough to require me to do so.

Final Grades

• Vesper - C+
• Raelyn - C
• Nyru - B-
• Torres - C-
• Anya - C+
• Grimson - B-
• Broden - A+
• Therien - B+
• Onagro - B
• Warhead - B+
• Lumenir - A-
• Kosmyr - A
• Stregi - C+
• Bonehart - A+

Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - 20. Arborean Hamlet Campaign

Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - 20. Arborean Hamlet Iron

This iron mode is a tale of two maps, as occasionally is the case when I'm doing these challenges.  When I first started doing this map I struggled mightily, and for the longest time I could not get a win at all (although I was using the weakest hero pairs, like Grimson and Torres, since that's what I do my initial testing with), despite trying several different strategies.  I got really frustrated and put the game down for a couple of weeks as a result.  Then when I went back to it, for some reason everything just clicked and I was able to beat it fairly easily.  It's an important reminder that when you're really struggling with something - whether it's a video game, job task, or anything else - sometimes the best thing you can do is just walk away for a while.  When you've been beating your head against a wall and then give yourself some space, your brain often will silently level up during the break, so that when you return the problem magically goes away.

This is still a difficult map, make no mistake, although less so than heroic mode.  It's all about investing in the Arboreans to handle the Winged Croks, then doing everything you can to keep them alive so you're not wasting money repurchasing them.  Properly timing the Old Trees is a key part of the strategy, and it makes me miss maps from previous games where figuring out the precise timing of Rain of Fire / Thunderbolt was the key to winning.

Impressions

Grades are much better here than in heroic mode, with only Raelyn ending in the 'C' tier.  Sadly I was not able to give Broden his usual 'A+', as it just felt like he didn't bring the heat like normal.  Thus we have a rare instance where Kosmyr earns a better grade than him, as he definitely tore it up.  Other than that the heroes pretty much ordered themselves appropriately based on their GPAs so far.

Final Grades

• Vesper - B
• Raelyn - C+
• Nyru - B+
• Torres - B-
• Anya - A-
• Grimson - B+
• Broden - A
• Therien - B+
• Onagro - B
• Warhead - B-
• Lumenir - A
• Kosmyr - A+
• Stregi - B
• Bonehart - A+

Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - 20. Arborean Hamlet Iron

Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - 20. Arborean Hamlet Heroic

We have another two-hero map here, and I'm beginning to suspect that will probably be the case through the rest of this campaign, and probably all of the elite campaigns, unfortunately.  I certainly prefer to finish maps with a single hero when I can, not just for the flex but because it also makes the job of grading heroes so much more straightforward.

The only subtlety to this map is figuring out the tear-down build, which is an extreme rarity in Kingdom Rush games, surprisingly.  We have to build a couple of Royal Archers to handle the Winged Croks of the first two waves, but after surviving wave 2 they can then be torn down and we can go all-in on Tricanons.  Surviving wave 2 is largely the win condition here, although things can get a bit dicey at the very end of the final wave.

Impressions

Again the grading strategy is to assign a normal grade, then deduct accordingly based on how much the second hero had to carry the day.  The result is that while a lot of the wins look fairly easy the actual grades are pretty brutal, with half the heroes ending up in 'C' tier due to them relying strongly on the second hero, for which I would deduct up to one and a half letter grades.  Thus while Stregi's video, for example, felt like a 'B', I knocked her down to a 'C-' just because Grimson was so critical to her performance.

On the opposite end, the top tier heroes really don't need a second hero, although I keep using them to keep things consistent.  Broden, Kosmyr, and Bonehart all wreck this map pretty hard with their AoE ability, and so I didn't feel the need to dock anything from their grades.  This is definitely going to a lead to a "rich get richer" and "poor get poorer" dichotomy in the final GPAs, but I'm fine with there being a strong separation in the final analysis, as there's no question (as usual for KR games) of the giant gulf between the top and bottom heroes.

Final Grades

• Vesper - C+
• Raelyn - C-
• Nyru - C+
• Torres - C-
• Anya - C+
• Grimson - C+
• Broden - A+
• Therien - B+
• Onagro - B-
• Warhead - B+
• Lumenir - A-
• Kosmyr - A+
• Stregi - C-
• Bonehart - A+

Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - 20. Arborean Hamlet Heroic

Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - 20. Arborean Hamlet Campaign

After a long hiatus we're finally back to doing new maps.  We begin the Ancient Hunger campaign today, and crocodiles are on the menu.  Unfortunately I ended up not caring for this map all that much.  I don't hate it like I do Temple of the Fallen, but we have the same problem here where I feel like I'm pigeonholed into using towers I'd rather not.  Don't get me wrong, the Dwarven Flamethrower is brilliant, but I like the Tricannon (bonus points if you get the meme reference).  And then of course we have to fall back on the Royal Archers yet again to deal with the flying enemies.  At least the Winged Croks don't have any gimmick like other flying enemies.

However, I will say there is one thing I liked and that I expect to continue to like as the campaign progresses.  The enemies here have a couple of transformation tricks - Crokinders transform into Gators, and Gators can be transformed into Killertiles by Quickfeet.  Now normally in the Kingdom Rush series when this kind of thing happens you don't get the normal gold for killing a transformed mob but just the base value of the mob it transformed from.  However, that's not the case here, meaning a 3 gold Crokinder can transform into a 50 gold Killertile.  This gives you the option of pursuing a high risk / high reward playstyle by deliberately letting transformations happen.

Because of this the videos are somewhat of a story of two maps.  When I did the Dark Army heroes first, I played very conservatively, using Nyru's hero spell to kill Crokinders wherever possible to avoid getting overwhelmed.  Then as I continued through the Linerean heroes I realized the above fact and started playing far more aggressively, rarely trying to kill Crokinders before they hatched, and even letting them get turned into Killertiles for extra gold.

You'll notice that I ended up using both secondary heroes to their maximum potential this time around, unlike previous maps.  This map justified it with it's ridiculous enemy count.  While the upper end heroes could probably do it solo, there's just no way Raelyn has the tools to do so.

Impressions

Unfortunately using both heroes makes the grading extremely difficult, because you have to account for how much the secondary hero is contributing.  Both Nyru and Grimson did a lot of work as the secondaries, and Nyru in particular as her hero spell is clutch in taking out waves of Crokinder.  What I settled on was figuring out a grade the normal way based on how the map felt, then deducting up to a full letter grade based on how much I felt the hero needed to rely on the performance of the secondary hero.

Thus Raelyn takes a 'C' here, as Nyru performed a hard carry, both with her hero spell as well as taking down the Flying Croks.  On the flip side, I still awarded Broden and Bonehart 'A+'s here, deducting nothing.  While I did use the secondary hero, it was clear that I didn't have to, and couldn't have finished the map solo, and for that reason I felt they deserved to keep their 'A+'s.

The Linerean heroes we definitely worse off here, and the grades reflect it.  Nyru is just very well suited to this level as discussed.  But while Grimson certainly contributes a lot as well, it's nowhere near the same amount.  I considered bumping the Linerean heroes grades up one notch (like a 'C+' to a 'B-') to account for this, but ultimately decided the grades were muddled enough already and didn't need this extra layer of futzing.

Final Grades

• Vesper - C+
• Raelyn - C
• Nyru - B-
• Torres - C-
• Anya - C+
• Grimson - B-
• Broden - A+
• Therien - B+
• Onagro - B
• Warhead - B+
• Lumenir - A-
• Kosmyr - A
• Stregi - C+
• Bonehart - A+

Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - 20. Arborean Hamlet Campaign

Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - Mid-Term Report Card

As I mentioned in my update post a while back, I really should have done a report card after completing the main campaign.  My S.O.P. for these challenges has generally been to do a report card at that point, and then again after each bonus campaign.  And while I have the data to go back and present the grades as they were at the end of the campaign, at this point I think it's just better to give all the grades through the end of the first bonus campaign, Undying Fury.  A single three-map campaign generally doesn't shake things up too much anyway.

As a reminder, we use a scale of 'A' = 4, 'B' = 3, etc.  Of course new to this challenge is that I started adding pluses and minuses to the grades.  I decided that pluses and minuses would be worth 0.25 in terms of adjusting the base grade.  This allows them to have a measurable impact on the grade, while still maintaining a solid separation between the grade tiers (e.g., there's still a difference of 0.5 between an 'A-' at 3.75 and a 'B+' at 3.25).

Without further ado then, here are the GPAs in descending order:

• Bonehart - 4.21
• Broden - 4.20
• Kosmyr - 4.04
• Lumenir - 3.85
• Therien - 3.44
• Warhead - 3.41
• Anya - 3.23
• Nyru - 3.21
• Onagro - 3.21
• Stregi - 3.20
• Vesper - 3.02
• Torres - 2.88
• Grimson - 2.88
• Raelyn - 2.42

Surprising no one, Bonehart and Broden stand head and shoulders above the competition, with Bonehart edging Broden out by a mere 0.01 and Kosmyr as the only other hero to finish in 'A' territory.  I like how these grades delineate the heroes into three distinct tiers.  You have the top performers in Bonehart through Lumenir, then a distinct drop before getting to a well-defined middle tier in Therien through Stregi, and finally a bottom tier from Vesper on down.

It also shouldn't be a surprise that Raelyn takes the bottom spot by a wide margin.  She is the epitome of a one-trick pony, and as the trick is just tanking, it's not a very good trick.  There's just not a lot you can do with a hero with horrible DPS and no other tools.

Originally when I started this series I though that Torres would be the bottom hero - or at least compete with Raelyn for that dubious distinction.  However, he got a pretty decent buff in an update fairly early in the series.  While his grades in videos prior to the buff technically could have been a little higher with his improved kit, I lack the motivation to go back and do them over again.  After all, it only affected maps in the first half of the series which are pretty easy to begin with.  He might tack on a few hundredths of a point to his GPA, but I highly doubt it would be anywhere near enough to leapfrog Vesper above him.

As for our new heroes, they ended up pretty much where I though they would when I started using them.  Bonehart rocketed to the top with his insane AoE DPS, and Stregi is clinging to the bottom of the mid tier.

Now that we're into the bonus campaigns and the difficulty has gone up, GPAs really have nowhere to go but down.  The story will be all about who runs into a rough patch and plummets faster than everyone else.  If I had to make a guess as to the hero most likely to do so, my money would be on Warhead.  I can just see him really struggling more as the difficulty ratchets up, and while he has a decent lead on Anya at the moment, it's not out of the question that he could drop below her if he starts racking up 'C's with regularity.  But that's why we do these challenges, so I hope you'll stay with me for the rest of Alliance.

Kingdom Rush Alliance Impossible Hero Challenge - Update

So if you've been following my channel you know that after completing the Undying Fury elite campaign I've gone back and started working on getting Stregi and Bonehart caught up in the series.  I've decided this is how I'm going to handle bonus content going forward - after completing a bonus campaign that introduces one or more new heroes, I'm going to go back and do all the previous levels with them so that they're up to speed going into the next bonus campaign.

I originally did this just because I felt like I needed a break after finishing the Undying Fury bonus campaign.  Life has been exceptionally busy lately - as you've no doubt noticed by my haphazard upload schedule - and I just wanted some easy, mindless content to do before diving into the next bonus campaign.  And nothing says easy and mindless like replaying the first half of the main campaign - especially with new heroes who are at least mid-tier or better.

I really like Stregi and Bonehart.  So far both of them are coming out about where I initially predicted them to grade-wise - Stregi is a pretty middle-of-the-road hero, while Bonehart is the Dark Army answer to Broden - an AoE powerhouse who trivializes maps (sorry Kosmyr, you're awesome, but you just can't quite hang with Broden).

Something I've been neglecting so far in this challenge is report cards.  I really should have done one after finishing the main campaign, but life was just a little crazy around that time and I just didn't get to it.  However, I promise that once I get Bonehart and Stregi caught up through the Undying Fury campaign I'll do a mid-term report card so we can see where everyone stands.

As for the rest of the channel content, I promise I will get back to my Skyrim series soon.  I've just been devoting the remainder of my time recently to some works in progress that I needed to do just for a change of pace.