I'm not going to say this map broke us, but...well, you'll see in the grades. It's a dark day, and one I knew was coming, but that doesn't make it any easier to bear. No, we didn't hand out our first 'F', but it feels just as bad.
This is one of those iron modes - very short, but extremely intense from start to finish. Your play has to be near perfect almost regardless of which hero you're using, because you need every possible advantage to keep up. Delaying a reinforcement or an upgrade by even a second can have disastrous consequences. Heck, even though the magic tower I built for the Twilight Golem could barely scratch the spiders, just getting a teleport on one of them proved to be extremely beneficial.
Partially this is because there's a lot of RNG involved in this map. The spiders that hatch and drop from above get random placements, so you can't know ahead of time how many you'll get on either exit lane. There's really no time for lane switching on this map, even with a teleporting hero, so you really have to commit your hero to one side for the fight (the left being the best). But that means that it's possible to get bad RNG and get an excess of spiders heading to the other exit and not have the DPS to deal with them. It can happen even when using our Best Choice hero below.
Impressions
Let's just cut right to it: our straight-'A' honor roll's streak finally has come to an end. Yes, even Wilbur walks away with a 'B' for this one. They're DPS may be great and true, but it's remarkably their flying ability that largely took them down here. The ability to block - even if it's just a temporary body-block by Vez'nan - is huge on this map, and being down one blocker makes a big difference. They still get 'B's because their DPS is still amazing, but it's just not enough. I even gave Faustus a 'C' initially, because this is a hard map to get good work out of Dragon Rage, but after I had finished everyone else and had maximum experience with the map I went back and retried him. The extra experience made a difference, and I moved him up to a 'B'.
Though this map is quite tough, most heroes wound up with a 'B' - most everyone's abilities work well on this map, and it's largely just a matter of playing really well. I ended up only handing out 'C's to Eridan and Arivan, as their low DPS really catches up to them here. Razz and Rags unsurprisingly pull yet another 'D', as their atrocious DPS combined with a lack of opportunities to use Changeling make them extremely RNG dependent to get a win.
Truly it was really the outstanding performance of our two 'A' stars that consigned everyone else to no better than a 'B'. Reg'son and Durax are the way to go on this map. Reg'son's Vindicator means you don't have to worry about the Twilight Golem at all, and instead of devoting resources to building a magic tower you can upgrade your ranged towers faster, which is amazingly helpful. It also frees you to use Thunderbolt on the Twilight Harassers instead, which usually has the benefit of damaging other enemies on the screen at a very opportune time. Finally you can get a second Vindicator on the last Twilight Heretic, making the final cleanup a breeze.
Durax does so well because Crystallites means you can guard both exit lanes simultaneously, reducing the chance of RNG problems described above. If you're wondering why I pause for several seconds before calling the first wave, remember that your hero's abilities start cooling down as soon as the map loads. So I wait a while to get through the cooldown of Crystallites (50 seconds) so that he can use it as soon as the first wave starts. In addition, Sapphire Fangs does great work when used solo against the Twilight Golem, reducing the amount of work the Wild Magus has to do and alleviating pressure on the right side.
Final Grades
- Eridan - C
- Arivan - C
- Catha - B
- Reg'son - A
- Prince Denas - B
- Razz and Rags - D
- Bravebark - B
- Vez'nan - B
- Xin - B
- Phoenix - B
- Durax - A
- Lynn - B
- Bruce - B
- Lilith - B
- Wilbur - B
- Faustus - B
Best Choice
Reg'son completes his sweep of Mactans' Retreat with a win here by a country mile. In fact, he distinguished himself so much I almost gave Durax a 'B' anyway. I relented, but if Durax is an 'A', then Reg'son is a perfect 100.
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