Kingdom Rush Origins (Steam) Impossible Hero Challenge - Waterfalls Trail Heroic

This one was only mildly challenging, so no one gets worse than a B.

Impressions

Again, not much to say when it's an easy map.  Hopefully that will stop soon.  I was slightly surprised to only be able to give Bruce a B, but other than that impressions were few.

Final Grades

• Eridan - B
• Arivan - B
• Catha - B
• Reg'son - B
• Prince Denas - A
• Razz and Rags - B
• Bravebark - A
• Vez'nan - A
• Xin - B
• Phoenix - A
• Durax - A
• Lynn - B
• Bruce - B
• Lilith - B
• Wilbur - A
• Faustus - A

Best Choice

Durax actually takes top spot for this map.  His Crystallites ability plus the ability to move the clones plus his fast movement makes him the king of maps like this where enemies are coming at you from multiple wide-spread lanes with varying intensities.

Kingdom Rush Origins Impossible Hero Challenge - Waterfalls Trail Heroic

Kingdom Rush Origins (Steam) Impossible Hero Challenge - Waterfalls Trail Campaign

I knew as soon as I trivially completed the map with Catha that this one wasn't going to pose any challenge.  I had to fight off boredom by making sure I caught every item going over the waterfall.  So again, 'A's for everyone and let's move on.

Kingdom Rush Origins Impossible Hero Challenge - Waterfalls Trail Campaign

Kingdom Rush Origins (Steam) Impossible Hero Challenge - The High Cross Iron

While this map isn't completely trivial, it's still easy, so everyone gets an A or B here.  Even the Bs aren't really that bad, you just have to work slightly harder than with an A hero.

Impressions

Not much to say since it was so easy.  Reg'son gets his first non-trivial A here, which I like.  For some reason he's a personal favorite of mine.  Xin gets another A as well, so perhaps I've been misjudging him.  I might have just gotten really bad RNG on that first go-round.  Durax continues to impress with how awesome he is as well.

Final Grades

• Eridan - B
• Arivan - B
• Catha - B
• Reg'son - A
• Prince Denas - A
• Razz and Rags - B
• Bravebark - A
• Vez'nan - A
• Xin - A
• Phoenix - A
• Durax - A
• Lynn - B
• Bruce - A
• Lilith - B
• Wilbur - A
• Faustus - A

Best Choice

Wilbur again, not surprisingly (get used to hearing that).  Once I get through this challenge I might go back and see what maps Wilbur can solo without any towers whatsoever.

Kingdom Rush Origins Impossible Hero Challenge - The High Cross Iron

Kingdom Rush Origins (Steam) Impossible Hero Challenge - The High Cross Heroic

Finally we're back at a map that provides some challenge.  Again, though, the scores are somewhat relative.  I chose to examine each hero's performance when aggressively calling waves early.  It made things a lot harder with some heroes, who nearly leaked mobs to the exit, but if I didn't call any waves early it honestly would have just been another fairly trivial map.

Impressions

There weren't as many surprises this time around.  Catha ended up being the only hero getting a C, which is ominous for a "free" hero on so early a map.  Her DPS is pretty bad, of course, which played a large part.  I haven't used her very much aside from leveling her up though, and I'm guessing that her strengths are actually on harder maps with tougher enemies where you can rely on advanced towers for DPS and use her more for crowd control.

My only genuine shock was giving Xin an A after his awful performance on Gray Ravens heroic.  Now it may be that I was so pleasantly surprised at how easy it was with him that I was a little over-generous and he really should have been a B, but regardless he did a lot better than expected.  A lot of it had to do with him being able to actually put Daring Strike to good use, taking down Gnoll Gnawers before they even got far on the map.

Lilith somewhat redeemed herself on this map, pulling a B.  Like Catha, I believe her strengths will be more evident on maps with powerful individual enemies, not tons of fodder.  Other than that everyone else performed just about as expected.

Final Grades

• Eridan - B
• Arivan - B
• Catha - C
• Reg'son - B
• Prince Denas - B
• Razz and Rags - B
• Bravebark - A
• Vez'nan - A
• Xin - A
• Phoenix - A
• Durax - A
• Lynn - B
• Bruce - B
• Lilith - B
• Wilbur - A
• Faustus - A

Best Choice

Wilbur, of course, because he again can just about solo the map without towers, but special mention needs to go to Durax, who absolutely destroyed this map.  His ability to be in two (or three) places at once is enormous when you have divided streams of enemies.

Kingdom Rush Origins Impossible Hero Challenge - The High Cross Heroic

Kingdom Rush Origins (Steam) Impossible Hero Challenge - The High Cross Campaign

And once again we have a trivial map that everyone does well on.  'A's for everyone, high fives all around, and let's move on in search of more interesting challenges.

Kingdom Rush Origins Impossible Hero Challenge - The High Cross Campaign

Kingdom Rush Origins (Steam) Impossible Hero Challenge - Gray Ravens Iron

There's really nothing to say about this one.  It's an easy map again - far easier than heroic mode - so everyone gets an A again because there's simply no challenge.  Wilbur technically takes the top spot as he can basically solo this map with no towers at all.

This was to be expected with the earliest maps.  Things will heat up and get interesting once we get a few maps in.

Kingdom Rush Origins Impossible Hero Challenge - Gray Ravens Iron

Kingdom Rush Origins (Steam) Impossible Hero Challenge - Gray Ravens Heroic

Things actually become slightly interesting on this map.  The grades are relative here, since it's still extremely easy and there was never a worry of anyone not being able to get the job done.  But we do get to see how well heroes handle a long stream of weak enemies, which gives us a preview of trickier later maps like Royal Gardens iron mode.

Impressions

There were a few surprises here in how some of the heroes did.  I was pleasantly surprised by Lynn's 'A' performance.  While she doesn't have any typical AoE abilities, Fate Sealed's area damage on death coupled with its relatively short cooldown did excellent work on the more tightly packed groups, and she allowed very few leaks.

Bruce also surprised me.  He's definitely geared more as a single-target damage dealer, but he did very well in holding back the tide nonetheless.  Partly this is due to his high base DPS - he simply can kill the enemies almost as fast as they come like Wilbur or Faustus.  But even though his DPS isn't quite as good as theirs (and isn't true damage, either), just whenever it seemed like he was going to get overwhelmed, either King's Roar fortuitously came off cooldown or I was able to use Guardian Lions to keep things under control.  He still is not ideal, hence the B, but it's a lot better than I was expecting.

I was disappointed with Lilith's C-grade performance, although in retrospect perhaps I shouldn't be.  She allowed a lot of leaks back to my melee blockers, and was actually very low on health by the end of the map.  But this is probably the worst type of map for her.  Reaper's Harvest is woefully overkill on gnolls, making it pointless, and wimpy enemies like this basically negate the power of Soul Eater as well.

I was not surprised by Xin's C performance.  So far I have been pretty underwhelmed by him in other scenarios where I've used him, and I fear there might be a number of Fs in his future.

Final Grades

• Eridan - B
• Arivan - B
• Catha - B
• Reg'son - B
• Prince Denas - B
• Razz and Rags - B
• Bravebark - B
• Vez'nan - A
• Xin - C
• Phoenix - A
• Durax - A
• Lynn - A
• Bruce - B
• Lilith - C
• Wilbur - A
• Faustus - A

Best Choice

Phoenix, hands down.  This kind of scenario is tailor-made for her, and she chewed through it without a sweat.

Kingdom Rush Origins Impossible Hero Challenge - Gray Ravens Heroic