Defense help: Boldtusk vs. Gormek vs. Kiril?

Gameplay Help & Tactics
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Hi all, I just recently pulled Boldtusk and have been power leveling him. I’m looking to use him on my Raid/War defense in place of Gormek. But I also have Kiril in my defense, and am thinking of how to reshuffle my team.

Current defense: Seshat (almost maxed) / Inari +1 / Kiril +3 / Gormek +8 / Jack O’Hare +7

This defense cannot keep me in Diamond, but does keep me in high Platinum.

Yes, yes, I know, Jack isn’t really a defensive hero. But my only other options are Margaret +1 (who is better on offense but rather useless on defense) and Skittleskull +3 (whose slow mana isn’t ideal); and I’ve tested Margaret vs. Jack and actually retain more cups with Jack.

Anyway, if I drop Gormek for Boldtusk, how woud you reshuffle my team?

Am considering:

Seshat / Kiril / Boldtusk / Inari / Jack

  • Should I put Inari beside Seshat to take advantage of opposing colors? But I would rather have Kiril to the left, so he fires first before Boldy (as Boldy has the better attack buff).

  • Or is one “healer” enough? Should I use one of Triton, Sonya or Grimm as my Blue? But I already have Seshat to dispel and Sonya doesn’t hit very hard (though is extremely tanky); Grimm is too frail IMO. That leaves Triton, who has good synergy with Boldy… I also have Lepus, but am wary of including both him AND Jack!

I’m only considering my maxed or soon to be maxed heroes, so not thinking of my 3/70 5*s Aegir, Aeron, Rana and Gregorion. Once I max these 4 though, it’s a whole new ball game.

My full roster of 4s and 5s by color (not planning to spend money on summons, though I do have one TC20 full time and a second I can flex):

  1. Purple
  • Seshat (almost maxed, now 4/62; have 50 Ranger emblems waiting for her)
  • Aeron (3/70, waiting for 4 tabards)
  • Proteus +13
  • Sabina +9
  • 2nd Proteus 3/60
  1. Yellow
  • Inari +1
  • Rana 2/59 (will ascend to 3/70 as I have surplus Orbs, but waiting for 4 Darts)
  • Li Xiu +9
  • Chao +3
  1. Blue
  • Lepus +1
  • Aegir 3/70 (waiting for 4 Scopes)
  • Kiril +3
  • Triton +6
  • Sonya 4/67 (soon to be maxed, and I have 181 Paladin emblems that I can use, with no competing Paladin…)
  • Grimm 4/1 (next to max after Sonya)
  • Boril 1/1 (will take to 3/60 at least, but will only ascend if I have surplus Capes)
  • Agwe 1/1 (not planning to max unless I run out of Blue projects)
  1. Green
  • Margaret +1
  • Gregorion 3/70 (waiting for 4 Tonics, and yes, I ascended Margaret before I got him ok? :wink: )
  • Jack O’Hare +7
  • Skittleskull +3
  • Gadeirus 3/18 (current Green project, have Shields to ascend)
  • Kashhrek 1/1 (not planning to ascend unless I run out of Green projects, but will do Hisan and Muggy first)
  • Gobbler 1/1 (not planning to ascend)
  1. Red
  • Gormek +8
  • Lancelot +14
  • Scarlett +3
  • Boldtusk 4/25 (and climbing fast, have 50 Fighter emblems for him)

thanks in advance!!

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2 Likes
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Little unconventional but if you have critical troops for Inari, I’d run the following until you get aegir maxed to be your tank.
Proteus gormek Inari kiril Seshat

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thanks @l2ider! Interesting and fun defense.

  1. can I ask why Gormek over Boldtusk? Is it so that I would have two direct damage-dealers (Seshat and Gormek) instead of only one?

  2. Isn’t Inari too frail to be a tank? though I can see her punishing bad boards with her good special.

I’ve tried Proteus on defense with mixed results. With current defense, I held more cups with Sabina than with Proteus. But with Seshat to dispel, I could see this working.

4

Holy and dark are weak vs each other. Inari isn’t a tank, I know because I have her too.

But for a few weeks, I used an Inari tank, granted she was flanked by kage and Victor both with lvl11 mana troops. Had Zim and Eve on the wings so they carried my lack of a tank.

BT and Kiril are similar so you’re probably going to have redundant heal and or attack buffs. This would also mean 3 passives in Inari kiril and bt.

I never maxed gormek because Wilbur makes him obsolete but since you have emblems on him, he’s a meathead and provides attack plus defense down.

Proteus is fragile but you got emblems on him and if I was attacking your team, he would be a priority to take out, so buys your other heroes a couple of turns.

Actually this might be a better setup:

proteus kiril gormek Inari Seshat

3 Likes
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Thanks, I like your reasoning. Gormek as tank makes sense, he has a ton of health and will likely survive long enough to fire once unless the enemy seriously stacks Blues.

I like having Proteus and Inari separated, so the opponent has to decide which one to target. That buys the other one a few turns to get his/her special off.

Thanks for the advice :slight_smile:

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The best advice I was given is that your defensive center needs to punish the opponent for bad boards, which means you need damage or a punishing effect like blind to buy the rest of the defense time.

Having Kiril-BT-Inari as the center is a toothless center that an attacker can ram tiles into without consequence.

The advice regarding Ares tanks is that he should be flanked by fast hitters to inflict the most damage while Ares buys the flanks time. Boldtusk works similarly, so I’d actually put either Jack or Lepus on flanks with Seshat and put Kiril in the left wing if you’re going to run him at all. Lepus on right flank of Ares sounds scary if they fire at the same time.

Based on your bench, here’s what I’d recommend:

Inari-Seshat-Boldtusk-Lepus-Jack/Skittle

Or

Seshat-LiXiu-Boldtusk-Lepus-Jack/Skittle

Or if you want two healers on defense

Sabina-LiXiu-Boldtusk-Lepus-Jack/Skittle

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Surprised no one is advocating for the BT-Triton combo. Adds a hitter, and Triton’s healing buff synergizes well with BT’s heal. If you are happy with the rest of your defense, I might try that simple arrangement.

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If op is trying to hold diamond, I don’t think Triton provides enough oomph for that.

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Eh, I read it as, “this defense is already not holding diamond, so I’m OK with that”. I agree with you about Triton not being an ideal choice for diamond.

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BT - Inari - Seshat - Margaret - Lepus

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thanks @MD-DC , @Noble_Weasel , @AirHawk ! some more great and interesting defenses! Once I max Boldtusk, I’ll experiment with all your suggestions.

I will be very happy if I can find a defense that holds me in Diamond with my current bench. If I can’t, that’s fine as I know I will probably be able to hold Diamond easily once my second wave of 5*s is maxed.

I had considered using Lepus as my Blue on defense, but was concerned about the defense reduction without using Aeron. That said, I can see him and/or Jack really denting frailer teams. If I can’t hold Diamond with Lepus, I will definitely try Triton and see if he holds more cups than, say, Kiril or Lepus.

Li was my tank for a long time, and held me well in high Platinum while I had no 5*s maxed.

I’ve tried both Inari and Margaret on defense before and was disappointed with the results. But a hard-hitting team with Inari and Margaret helping protect Seshat and Lepus sounds interesting… And I totally get putting Magaret beside Lepus, I usually put Margaret beside Jack on offense as the defense debuff actually increases the dodge chance.

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Lepus in the right wing as finisher. No need to worry if you have Aeron or not.

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Holding diamond league is a bit of a tricky task. These days I see a lot of high end defenses, a lot more powerful than what you got at the moment, below the 2400 threshold. Anyway, here’s what I think. When it comes to raiding, defense is only 25% of the puzzle. The real Mc’coy of raiding is attack. If your attack capabilities allow you to breach 2550 on regular bases, your defense team, might be able to hold 2400 for 6 hours, until you are ready to raid again. This is because, below 2600 cups, attacks on your defense tend to get less and less frequent as your cups drop. But you need to keep attacking high cup ratio targets and win, in order to make each 6 raid flags pack count. When you finish your attack run you should be at least 150 cups higher than you were before. At least this is how I keep diamond without worrying a bit about the defense’s performance.

The pic below was taken about 5 month ago. As you can see, at that time, my defense was not much more powerful than what you have now. Nevertheless I had no problem raiding diamond arena on regular bases, as I always relied on attack and not on defense.

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thanks @Ian487, that is really good advice for raiding in general. I agree, attack is more important - even the best defenses still lose cups. My priority is being able to open chests in Diamond. I usually climb to 2450-2550 cups on offense, but I also tend to be more conservative when attacking; I should be more daring in choosing high cup ratio opponents to attack.

You’ve given me some great points to think about, thanks again

2 Likes
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FWIW, I was able to hold about 2500 cups with this defense at the time:

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And I peaked at 517 globally, mostly due to attacks.

That meta is brutal. You start facing top 100 defenses in your radar and get beaten into the dirt on offense and defense, because now you’re competing with the whales and power gamers. Mid to high diamond is the place of Aegir tanks and double GM flanks, Ares tanks and Zeline flanks, Guin and Kage and Kunchen, oh my. It was getting to the point I was running full mono just to have a chance.

If you don’t have the bench to handle that, that meta will eat you alive. Also it’s not fun. For me at least.

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thanks for the perspective @MD-DC ! sounds stressful, and not at all what I want from a “fun” game. I just want to open my raid chests in Diamond :slight_smile:

again, something for me to think about. as a non-spender I definitely do not have the bench depth or the emblems to compete at that level

1 Like
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@Ian487 your defense team looks similar to mine, I have Caedmon/Boldtusk/Grimm/Li Xiu and Cyprian, but I will be swapping Li Xiu and either Grimm/Cyprian for Proteus and Wilbur as well once I finish maxing and giving them emblems. They are both at 4/63, so they will be ready to go in a few days.

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@MD-DC I want to get there but it sometimes feels like I won’t be able to, it takes so long to level heroes and I started playing after some of the big heroes that are on these diamond teams were already featured. So I have no GM/Alby/MN/Guin/Kunch/Aegir/Alasie/Frida etc none of those powerful heroes that I see in most Platinum teams (my current status)

I do have some very good 4 star heroes but they work well when I’m attacking, as for a defense team I’m not sure I have a good strong bench just yet.

My 5s (and 4s that I see in raids) are:

P:
Seshat, Kageburado, Khiona, Sartana, Bosswolf, Domitia, Obakan
Proteus, Rigard, Sabina, Tiburtus, Cyprian

Y:
Justice, Joon, Drake Fong, Ranvir, Musashi, Vivica
None (but I do have Li Xiu/Hu Tao/Chao/Wu/Jackal/Danzaburo/Gretel)

B:
Isarnia, Miki, Misandra, Richard, Thorne, Rumplestilskin
Sonya, Boril, Grimm, Kiril, Triton

G: Lianna (only good 5*), Kadilen, Horghall, Atomos
Caedmon, Hansel, Melendor, Kashhrek, Littlejohn, Skittleskull

R:
Ares, Marjana, Azlar, Elena, Mitsuko
Scarlett, Boldtusk, Wilbur, Colen Gormek

While I do feel like a have some nice heroes, for successful raiding and getting to/surviving diamond I don’t feel like I can do it with these heroes at large.

I’m still leveling, but based on this roster I will take any recommendations for a team that can at least get me there while I can hopefully pull some of the HOTMs and the needed heroes during Atlantis.

My current def team is Caedmon+5, Boldtusk+4, Grimm+3, Cyprian and Li Xiu.

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@Ian487 the only thing I will say is that I don’t like Wilbur and Caedmon together, it only works if Caedmon goes off before Wilbur or after Wilbur’s special finishes because Caedmon dispels it.

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Caedmon only dispels the spirit link, which is sometimes preferable.