I’m trying to get a plan for defense team- Here are my options:
Green: Greg, Kingston, Lianna
Red: Grazul, Khagan, Marjana
Blue: Athena, Richard
Yellow: Neith, Poseidon, Vivica
Purple: Kage, Seshat
I’m kind of set on using Richard as tank (because my alliance uses blue tanks and I can give him 100% of paladin emblems) and Kage right now. Mainly looking for Green, Red and Yellow ideas. (Or non-rainbow suggestion perhaps)
My problem is, I mostly have snipers, and my few support heroes aren’t great defenders IMO (Grazul and Vivica). Do I need to use one of them anyway just for balance?
Kage has much more, so I’m likely to stick with him. I like your second one a lot, just wondering if having to split emblems between two fighters should discourage me at all?
A defense with a tank and 4 snipers is fine especially if they are fast/ v fast snipers. Many of the defences in diamond run Guin/ Kunchen tank with 4 snipers. I would go Kingston, Kage, Ariel, Neith, Marjana.
For tank, I actually prefer Ariel over Richard. Richard just doesn’t hit hard enough or do enough for me. Meanwhile if Ariel fires, she transforms all your fast heroes into Gravemakers/ Kage. For wars, healers also have the benefit of frustrating your opponent especially when they dont have strong teams left. But I do understand if you decide to go with Rich here.
Kage is a damaged based hero based on how much health your oppoennt has. You have decided he should get all your barb emblems so he is your auto include. The key to him being successful is that you want him to be firing early. As such, you want him as a flank rather than wings (who fire a bit later) as this will maximise the chances of him hitting for full damage rather than half damage.
Marjana vs. Grazul is a good debate. Marjana is not the best sniper (well the optimal choice would be gravemaker) but at the same time Grazul on defense is just not ideal. Her status protect is too short and can be played around (e.g. firing specials later, using a debuffer) and she is best suited to offence where she can nullify your opponents specials. I also have a soft spot for Marj because of her Rogue class and evade can sometimes be annoying.
I could make a case for Neith and Poseidon for your Holy hero. If this was Drake then it would be and easier choice. Honestly, I do not have enough experience with Neith to say if she is good on defense in the Flank position (we know Drake is good but he is fast) but Poseidon is an excellent defensive hero. My rational for Neith over Poseidon is simply because of the Fighter class that Poseidon shares with Kingston. For defense you want to maximise all your emblems with different class heroes.
Finally with your green, Kingston is the best sniper on defense of the three, so he gets the nod.
Thank you for your detailed and very insightful thoughts. I would love to run the defense you suggested but unfortunately I don’t have Ariel! I think maybe you read Athena as Ariel. Given that, would you still do Kingston/Kage/Richard/Neith/Marjana? Or does having Richard tank instead of Ariel leaving me with no healers or buffers make my team just too offense oriented in nature?
Sorry! too much wine for lunch. I would do Richard > Athena for tank. You don’t need a healer on defense for raids. A healing tank for war is preferable, but only if the tank heals + does something else. Guin is a premier war tank because she not only heals but mana cuts (stalls your opponent and allows your snipers to fire first) so if you happen to have a bad board, you could easily end up with a big fat 0 despite the early damage dealt as she heals up, stalls and allows her support heroes to kill your team.
