Ugh. Not my favorite map of the game. Better than Temple of the Fallen to be sure, not by a lot. I talk a lot about this blog that a game's difficulty always lies on a spectrum with fun at one end and frustrating at the other, and this one is definitely a registered member of the Frustrating party.
It's all about the flying mobs, as is the case with so many Alliance maps that fall in the frustrating category. It's very easy for a Flying Sentry or a Tinkerer's Drone to slip by your defenses, and there were a lot of restarts when recording these videos - even with the most powerful heroes. I don't think that means that the strategies I'm showing are not reproduceable, but rather this is one of those maps where your micro has to absolutely be on point. Proper positioning of heroes, reinforcements, and the Cannoneers is crucial to make sure the Sentries get taken down properly.
This level is one of those tales of two maps. I originally tried an all-Cannoneer build and was reasonably successful, but there were so many restarts in getting a hero over the finish line that I just felt like there had to be a better way. Thus I settled on starting with two Cannoneers and finishing out with Arcane Wizards. I would rather have gone with a Tricannon build, but the Sentries appear so early you have to have towers that can deal with them, and the Cannoneer's dual ranged and AoE attacks (with Incendiary Ammo) make them rather ideal for the mob variety here.
At the very least I am glad I managed a solo hero solution. Throw in a second hero - especially one that can hit flying enemies - and this map becomes easy. Heck, it might even move back towards the fun side of the spectrum. But as always my priority is trying to grade the heroes on their individual merits.
Impressions
The most obvious thing about the grades is that I did not give anyone an 'A+' this time around - not even Bonehart or Broden. Even with those powerful heroes things can go awry, and you still have to be ultra-careful with calling waves early. This is definitely one of those maps where if you early-call a wave at the wrong time you can get the snowball effect - you end up early-calling the next wave because you desperately need your cooldowns refreshed, but then you simply end up getting overrun by all the mobs.
You'll also notice that for all my discussion about the difficulty spectrum above, no one lands in the 'C' tier. It's not that this map is really super hard. Difficulty is by itself a spectrum from easy to hard, obviously, but then for a given level of difficulty, a map will then lie on a spectrum of fun to frustrating. The truth is this level is just middling in terms of its difficulty, but for that difficulty it is extremely frustrating.
Final Grades
- Vesper - B
- Raelyn - B-
- Nyru - B-
- Torres - B
- Anya - B-
- Grimson - B
- Broden - A
- Therien - B+
- Onagro - B+
- Warhead - B+
- Lumenir - A-
- Kosmyr - A
- Stregi - B
- Bonehart - A
- Sylvara - A-
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