We're no ST, but are beasts not totally horrid right now? What would a post-revamp beast group look like? ...I would love for the Dinosaur runes (mauler, ravager, demolisher, destroyer; the armless, wingless dragons) to gain race: Beast like the Skithmaw Hunter did. Beasts could probably use a Colossal killer or two. Also, Maulers (Sibling too OP, nerf). What off-theme magic/alt damage would one throw in, and how much? Would a faction Angel be a good include? (Battlemaster/Battle Leader for those stacking buffs, magic damage)
Not long ago, one of my guildies said he tryed out every single SL theme and I asked about beasts, and he said they were horrible since revamp. I didnt believe him so made ff SL beast deck trying to proof him wrong, but I also couldnt rly be succesfull with them. Desert herder is just to expensive making the early game to weak. However, I do like to play it, so I sometiems used it in friendly games vs newish guildmates. Here is the deck I came up with: 2x warmandrils, 2x croks, 1x basilisk, 1x manticore, 1x renovator, 2x shrieker, 2x sand hunter, 2x herder, 1x skeez wylder, 1x skit hunter, 1x bearcat, 1x doombringer, 1x varu howler. Normal highlander SL spells/relics/equip with 1x taint and 1x rageband. I like putting taint at sand hunter, using sandspray to boost his damage and so get a high damage stealth ranged unit. The champions offcourse can be changed a bit. warmandrills could go to 3, but beware for aoe when you have 2 or 3 deployed. Croks to 1x, renovator could go 2x sand hunter to 1x skit hunter to 2x. See for yourself what you like. So to answer your questions: I use 2 shriekers and 1x howler as sonic damage 1 doombringer and 1 wylder as magic damage. I appreciate the wylder very much in this deck for various reasons: -He can give any champion magic damage for 1 hit. -His ability is pretty unique in being able to CC KF titan, since you can stun him after he changes to incorporeal and so doesnt get cleansed. -With hidden sand he usually survives pretty well. The deck turns out to play like a debuff deck, using sand sprays and rolling shriekers to lower opposing units damage by 4-8 damage. When your opponent doesnt have good cleanses you can easily win the game by debuffing his units all the time and he is simply not able to kill yours. If your opponent does have cleanse options, it is better to deploy raw damage dealers like warmandrils and renovators
I believe that guildie was me. And yes, SL beasts are quite bad, which is made out of proportion with how good paladins are, since beasts rely so much on debuffs to be on even footing with the enemy. Most importantly though, there is only one vital rune (herder), and it is overcosted and bad. Edit: @paldirs, where did you go?
SL beasts are still a runnable theme, but to run it effectively you will need the LEGs, so that's a bit of a problem. The way an SL beast bg works is much the way it has always worked. Get the herder out early and you win, get him out late and you lose.
What do people think about the Cobra Spitter? I see his support options as being nice, and he also has beater-ish stats. I agree Herder is a huge hit. We need one more beast synergy rune, I feel, though a much-needed recosting of Desert Walker is liable to make Herder much more acceptable as a deploy.
Its funny that you mention him, I did look a few times at him since revamp considering him interesting. However I would deploy warmandrils over him any time. Warmandrils have more speed and more damage and in my opinion, better ability set. All cobra has is 6 hitpoints extra, which I dont value very much at this kind of champion.
You can run both warmandrils and a cobra spitter. True story. Beasts were perfectly viable as of two months ago. I haven't read through the most recent patch notes, but a quick glance at my bg doesn't look like they have changed much if it at all.
