Ares Underwhelming?

Hey guys!
With Ares up again in this months featured heroes, I wonder if he is still that great!

Back then when he got his well deserved A+ ranking for the tank position there weren’t many great alternatives as well as strong buff killers, so how does he perform in comparison to powerful tanks like Guin, Kunchen or Aegir now in the current meta?
Is he still at least a great red tank or should you use him mainly for attacking purposes?

Sadly almost nobody seems to use him as a tank anymore outside of tournaments or wars, so probably this question answered itself…

He’s incredibly dependent on his flanks for his effectiveness, meaning you can’t just stick him in with odds and ends and expect to hold cups very well. In that sense, I wouldn’t recommend him as a tank for a player without a reasonably deep roster to choose from.

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well it be great if i had him lol… so sad.

What flanks would complement him best? I haven’t had a lot of experience with him and got me self two of them.

He will be my fifth fire to ascend when Mitsuko and Anzogh are finished?

Zeline is the premium Ares flank. In general, high attack stat splash and AoE is what you’re looking for, since they turn into lethal weapons when Ares fires.

Stacking double green flanks is a decent play. Ares is a tricky tank to neutral stack, and red has no dispeller. Evelyn and Kadillen would likely be very lethal.

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I put up an Ares tank in the last tournament which gave additional +20%(?) attack for each buff… Didn’t run into any Ares tanks but mine did really well.

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Whenever I come across Ares in raids he never really causes any problems, don’t really get why people like him so much. Maybe against titans he is better but i don’t have him so can’t comment on that.

I have the same experience, which is what prompted the initial question.

It sounds like he really needs optimal flanks–which I’ll look out for when raiding now–and that in the current meta, he’s probably better on offense and war defense than raid defense.

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Performance on defense does not equate to a fair assessment of overall quality, otherwise Grimm, Scarlett, WuKong, etc would be “garbage” heroes.

Once again, second hand information, but Ares’ premier tank status was from before Guinevere and back when dispellers were few and far between. He’s still one of the best red tanks, but he’s been outclassed and outgunned in the current meta. Also that past meta hadn’t developed the 3-2 or even 2-1-1 attack composition and went in full rainbow in offense, so that skews the perception as well.

But yes a tank Ares needs good flanks to perform well. He’s like Elkanen, Horghall, and Justice in that he buys time for the rest of the defense, but if the rest of the defensive team isn’t up to snuff, Ares isn’t going to turn that around by himself.

An offense Ares is still incredible, though.

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This, cause many HotM since Evelyn dispel 3, but dreamteam Boldie Ares Azlar can put a whole defense down on offense.

I mean you usually don’t bring a green to fight Ares… :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

But yeah, there have been a lot more dispellers than the days of “Sonya and nothing else because we haven’t figured out color stacking yet.”

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@Kerridoc @Garanwyn Thanks for this, I finally pulled ares too. I remember end of last year, thought he was OP, but now I don’t even think twice if I see him on defense.

For green titans, where would you use him using 5 of the below heroes.

Tarlak Zim GM Wilbur Falcon BT Scarlett

Also have these 3 sitting 3/70 QoH Mitsuko Marjana
Off topic but have 9 rings, whom to give to? Thinking Mitsuko as I already have Kage and Inari maxed, thanks.

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I am neither of those guys, but against green Titans, I usually stick Ares with my highest attack neighbors. For me that’s a +18 Kelile and a +19 Wilbur, but for you that’d be Grave and Scarlett.

I usually arrange my stack in an order from left to right so the abilities fire in a way I’d want without having to think about it while fighting to maximize time. So my green Titan stack is BT-Wilbur-Ares-Kelile-Ranvir. Ares’ better buff is centered, so it’ll override Boldtusk as I’m mashing the heroes when they all light up.

So with that in mind, I’d probably go Tarlak-Zimkitha-Scarlett-Ares-Grave, though I don’t have any experience with either Scarlett or Grave, on offense, so maybe swapping those two would be more optimal.

And I’d go Queen. There’s nothing else in the game right now that does what she does, and her ability to protect from AOE, attack all, and debuff all or just divert a sniper is incredibly useful. The only other hero who acts kind of close to Queen of Hearts is Kadilen who is a distant second in versatility and effectiveness.

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Not to thread-jack but I want her so bad. One of the last heroes that I’ll chase (Guardian Panther, Kiona and Ageir being the others. Maybe Zeline now that I pulled Ares).

Thanks for the suggestion. I do the same with both my heroes and mats on titans :smile:

Good point about QoH, the combination with Wilbur is really good so I’ll think some more on this.

We face 12* so even with nados and stops, I love Wilbur buff link. The defense buff is better than BT but I’m not sure how well it works with Ares.

So considering Wilbur Falcon Ares GM Tarlak?
Does Ares replace Zim or Scarlett+11?
For titans, it seems Ares and QoH would be fighting for similar utility role.

Maybe I need to give attack emblems to Falcon with his elemental defense down.

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Falcon won’t ever be much of a hitter–he’s just not built that way. Based on other input in this thread, I suspect that you’ll be better off putting your Paladin emblems on Ares and using him in place of BT.

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Falcons sole purpose is to provide the element defense down but if I insert Ares, Falcon would be the second red hitter.
GM
Falcon
Ares (would you rather have Zim or QoH in this slot?)
Wilbur
Tarlak

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For Titans I’d rather have Ares.

In that lineup, your weakest Titan contributor is actually Gravemaker, so I’d drop him in favor of Zimkitha who benefits the whole team with another attack buff on the non-Ares wings and cleanses at need.

So for that you’d have to make a “non-ideal” conscious decision to not trigger Zim after Ares, but it’d be necessary to maximize tile damage unless you flank Ares with Tarlak who wouldn’t be the worst neighbor but doesn’t benefit red tiles.

So either:

Falcon-Wilbur-Ares-Zimkitha-Tarlak

Or

Falcon-Wilbur-Zimkitha-Ares-Tarlak

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Why isn’t GM your second hitter? Ares crit only works on tile attacks, and GM’s attack stat is way higher than Falcon. Better to have him buffed rather than Falcon.

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