I was the person who played the last two alpha periods the most - token holder and the public one. With all my experience I tried to find the best battle strategy but for the soft launch, this will not be a good one anymore
The 5 starters of Augmentors (source)
What was my strategy?
My strategy was pretty easy. Every creature is able to learn two nice skills like stunning your enemy or destroying his shield. I tried to blast hard attacks right then I was able to use my skills. This worked like follow:
- I took many shields with myself. With this shields, I was able to take like no damage all the time. If my enemy used a "shield destroy" skill with a really good timing I tried to rebuild a new shield even before the enemy attack hits me by a better timing. Timing was so important all the time - have a shield up whenever my enemy attacked.
- I had just 2-3 attacks with me. All my attacks needed a high amount of my mana. I just used an attack while a normal battle if I had no shields anymore to get some again but normally I tried to save my attacks. The moment both my skills there charged again, I stunned my enemy, attacked him hard, refilled my mana and attacked him again with another ability as long as he was still stunned.
With this strategy, I won many games as I was able to get better in timing. At the beginning of public alpha, I had problems with this strategy but it worked out in the end.
Why will this strategy not work anymore?
There is one really big change this soft launch: Every skill will not recharge anymore you will just be able to use them once. Because of this change, I cannot try anymore to hit my opponent 3-4 turns per game. With my old strategy, I would only be able to hit him just one time. And after my attacks will stack until I have to hit his shield with my attacks.
What will be my new strategy?
I have two ideas right now. I need to mention that another big change to soft launch will be that you are doing more combo damage. So if you are able to hit a combo it will be way more effective to your opponent. Fun Fact: With 2 skills he will just be able to counter maximum two combo tries of me. So here are my strategies I can think of right now:
- The first strategy is to build high combo attacks. You will take more attacks in your deck. If there are enough abilities it will probably be smart to take 3 "combo I", 2 "combo II" and 1 "combo III" attack with you. By this, you can fire many combo 1 attacks without caring about your full combo. You will need this for 2 reasons. 1st: Your opponent will use shields. With your first attacks, you will try to let your enemy use all of his attacks. 2nd: Many players will be able to interrupt combos even once. So if you are at 2 already it can happen that he will use a stun skill and your combo is over. Now you need more combo 1 attacks in your deck so that you have enough abilities on your hand to start from the beginning again. With this strategy, the chance is high to hit some nice combo 3 attacks.
- The second strategy is a "shield overloaded" strategy. What you need are as many shields you can carry in your deck. After this, you would fill your deck with attacks which cost just 1 mana and one attack that cost high mana. While you are in a battle you will have shields on your hand all the time. If you do not have a shield currently you would just use a 1 mana attack and get a shield back again. You try to annoy your enemy by using the skill poison now. While the complete match with some good timing you will not take any damage (this will be with a fast mana reload even better). You do not use attacks yourself you just hit your opponent with poison. Now you need to be good until the end of the match. Your opponent already took some damage. With your strong attack, you try to hit your opponent even once in a battle and you wait now until the countdown of the match is over.
Both strategies are risky and both strategies are just predictions of the game right now. What the final best way to battle will be we will see on soft launch. I hope that I told you not too much about my thoughts so that you can create counter strategies already ;) for example strategy 2 will die if you time a "shield destroy" skill really good. In the end, I am just happy that we can play in just 4 days.