Modern Cheap Meat

Discussion in 'Forsaken Wastes' started by kalasle, Oct 25, 2014.

  1. kalasle

    kalasle Forum Royalty

    Yeah, it's been my inclination for a while to agree: some zombies-goodstuff mix is what meat is best as now. At this point, without anyway to receive flat returns from death or otherwise generate reasonable increments (Bird is not reasonable for a return), Meat just can't play like it could.

    Agreed on WZ. The guy is a beast, has been for a long time. Also tried out Lost Queen before, and she is alright. Does some neat stuff. 1x if anything. Throw Bones is a fine 1x for cleanup. I didn't find myself using it all that much, but that was pre-Ronin. Goresplosion ain't good enough. Just run Anathema if you want AoE, Soulbane if you want reach.
     
  2. negatorxx

    negatorxx I need me some PIE!

    I think that's exactly the problem. I tried so hard to "set up" with unholy tomb, tome of hate, death harvester and dusk creeper but it cost sooooo much in terms of board position. This combined with 4x short lived champs just didnt let me keep up any kind of pressure. Really really wanted those 2x polluted martyrs i traded for and leveled to work :(

    i looked through all the zombies out there, any im missing out on? none strike me as being the right mix of cost and utility

    edit: bonecrusher?
     
  3. kalasle

    kalasle Forum Royalty

    Yeah, I think you can't be at all greedy about setup. It does actually work, but Harvester is probably the last piece. I think I posted earlier about this in the thread, but with the changes to Harvester - especially now with Creeper changes - you really have to balance deploys across a few turns. There's a rhythm and time to deploy SL champs, and once you work that out, then the cost reduction can work in your favor.
     
  4. negatorxx

    negatorxx I need me some PIE!

    So bored and really loving zombies, so i feel the need to talk about them. My win rate is still the complete opposite of what it was prior to going full into it.

    Corrupted Guardian is out due to his ability going on CD on just the turn i need it on. Maybe again later
    Bonecrusher was stupid. hp and damage dont match its nora cost.
    Creeper/death harvester out for good.
    Fallen Hero out, though it has won me games against big nasties before.

    Abomination out, though awesome, for a Bladed corpse to try the utility of shatter and sunder for beefy champs. The CDs on zombies are so low that mid game, i can do whatever i want, so having a shatter seems nice.
    Zombie Behemoth is in, going to try and abuse knockback and apply its unstoppable to the right situations. dat hp tho. ZA for kicks.
    Second Risen Moga in. Entangle too good.
    Crafted Coragh! in.

    Want to try an anthropomancer sooner or later. Making the already hard to kill hordes 12 hp harder seems neat.
     
  5. kalasle

    kalasle Forum Royalty

    Anthro is alright. I've constantly wanted to make him good, but 70~ is a lot to pay for what you get. Not exactly sure what you mean about Corrupted Guardian: his ability costs 0 AP now, so you can pop it immediately for the damage and siphon.

    I think Creeper and Harvester are still 1x for what they do, but it would make sense if you don't miss them much. Harvester is still the best detection option, so it hurts to cut him. And even though Creeper got punched hard, globes are still important.
     
  6. negatorxx

    negatorxx I need me some PIE!

    That's kinda how i feel about anthro. With the guardian, i mean its nice to pop, get the speed for next turn, push in, and a few turns later your naked again. Idk, ill keep trying.

    I find that my plague zombies or corpsepulted zombies are snagging orbs, and early i really just need to keep the pressure on, which creeper doesnt do. Might go back to 1x harvester for late/mid. possibly 2 because of all the stealth crap now. Wanted skeletal lerper to work, but man he is expensive.

    I cant land on a Coragh load out i like. suggestions?
     
  7. negatorxx

    negatorxx I need me some PIE!

    what about Deathcaster or Ghoul?
     
  8. kalasle

    kalasle Forum Royalty

    I think Ghoul is butts, but I'm a big fan of Deathcaster with Lethargic. He makes for a cheap ranged unit to throw out a few points of damage, and has Deathpact, which is a stupendous ability. I run at least 1x.

    For Coragh, not really sure. I think Disease Breath can go either 1 or 3 easily, and still don't like Frightening Blows. Both Rabid and Decaying have their pros. The build I'll probably mess around with will be Breath 1/Decaying. That puts him at a sweet 83 nora - you'll be getting rabid from other sources.
     
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  9. negatorxx

    negatorxx I need me some PIE!

    deathpact is pretty hot....
     
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  10. Nite2kill

    Nite2kill I need me some PIE!

    The Ghoul can hold his own with Damage Shield 3, Rotting Blows, Revel in Misery and a little boost in the nora gain in Essence Capture for 72 nora. If they gave him Zombie back put Amp disease on base he would be a lot better
     
  11. potatonuts

    potatonuts I need me some PIE!

    Im a huge Afflicted Zombie fan in terms of cheap meat, they are pretty handy just to throw on a font to beef out the defense for a turn and if anyone is stupid enough to walk into them they can do a nice bit of damage, especially with the defense shred from locust swarm.

    I do like frightening blows on Coragh but the situations in which it is useful pop up so rarely i don't think i can justify the cost.

    In regard to creepers and death harvester, I run the death harvester as a cheap source of detect as it has a little utility to it as well. Like Negator said i also find that i pick up most nora globes with swarmers and in most games that 60 nora is much more useful to spend on another zombie or corpse pile however when im anticipating a heavy blow such as losing a fairy ill try and get the creeper out in advance to soften the blow and recover. When you are running all that cheap meat those little bits of nora can add up to another deploy per turn.
     
    Last edited: Jan 27, 2015
  12. negatorxx

    negatorxx I need me some PIE!

    On the topic of afflicted corpses, Teascholar was running a pair at 38 nora with disease aura 1/locust swarm. I run one like this, with the other at 44 nora for aura 3/death nova. Im pretty torn; 38 nora for the first is super nice, but having a 2 defense body with aura 3 + chance at exploding really makes people hesitate, and is really nice to just clog up an area.
     
  13. potatonuts

    potatonuts I need me some PIE!

    Yup i run them at 44 with aura 3. When you have them both down the Aura does 7 damage, throw in 8 physical damage from locust swarm and then another 9 from the attack depending on defense ofc, 24 damage from a 44 nora unit is definitely working for me. Hard part is getting them to the fight :D
     
  14. NightmareJack

    NightmareJack New Member

    Hi there, I'm New(ish) to the Forsaken Wastes.
    I played Single player a few years ago, but never tried PvP with FW.

    This is what I've been messing around with in Single Player Skirmishes since coming back to the game.
    I'm not really sure how it'll do in PvP, never tried it. Maybe someday...

    [​IMG]

    ...but I'm wondering how people load out their witches.
    So far I've been running mine as primarily support with Death Charged and Charged Heal. Then she tosses in a Magic Attack when convenient.
     
  15. kalasle

    kalasle Forum Royalty

    I'm experimenting with Afflicteds at Aura 2 - seems to work out. The rational is that rank 2 gives the highest damage without paying for the rank 3 premium.

    Also, my earlier laments about Meat being lost after the Creeper nerf were likely premature. I made a new Xu-Draw-Wins deck (pun in plenty, plenty of ways) making use of the new Statue, and it feels more than viable. I think the crux is a small Zombie-relics module. Will post a full list soon.
     
  16. potatonuts

    potatonuts I need me some PIE!

    So will Xulos get hp from the bonus provided by mason's spire?
     
  17. kalasle

    kalasle Forum Royalty

    Yes. Although I think that is only a small part of why it functions well.
     
  18. kalasle

    kalasle Forum Royalty

    http://poxbase.com/deck/C4Tclvc6qC4mc93c9fC75cw4ckyC39cu+c4Wc9hc4ns4NsnR2XrTr2PR29r3Wr1r8e21

    That's what I'm running right now. Plenty of those slots are experimental: a second Mason's Spire, second Pile, Dark Familiar, and Tempest Crown are just to see how it feels. I'm also working with some new upgrades, namely Aura 2 on the Afflicted and Dead Eater on the Bird. The singleton of Fairy, Martyr, Soldier, and WZ are a result of their corner-case uses, at least compared to the 2x runes. Mason's are both at 1M/1BM upgrades, although I might go 3M/1BM on one of them. Other than that, upgrades are canon.

    I'm going to test out Decay as well as per @JaceDragon 's recommendation.

    I think Meat still holds up, it's just a matter of shuffling around some of elements and foci. This is part of why I like this theme: there are no core runes to gut - it's an idea expressed through mechanics, rather than mechanics per se. (Aside from UTOH, but those have so much seniority at this point I would be astonished at a sufficiently detrimental change.)
     
  19. negatorxx

    negatorxx I need me some PIE!

    Teascholar had double corpse pile, double masons spire last night in a game. Opponent just couldnt handle the zombie horde.
     
  20. JazzMan1221

    JazzMan1221 Better-Known Member

    My current meat deck: http://poxbase.com/deck/C4TC6qC9fCdYCw4CkyCuJC39Cu+C4Ws56sgs12snr1IrTr1r8EJ

    I'm very torn between optimizing the deck for meta efficiency and continuing to run what I've got out of pride. Soldier and Corpse are both running rank 2 Aura, based mainly off kalasle's reasoning and my own testing; rank 2 provides a good ratio of nora-damage. Fairies and Deathcasters are run at max cost (yes, that does mean Rabid 3 on Fairy). I find that powering up your range as much as possible makes life a lot easier on your front line. They are able to absorb many more hits than usual, as the ranged units kill things that much faster. Rabid 3 is especially useful for keeping healing in check, giving your meat plenty of time to whittle the opponent down. I did a write up a while ago on the nora comparison between Short-Lived 2 and Soulsift 2 on Deathcaster, yet I'm still cycling between them. Technically, it is more efficient in the long run to upgrade Soulsift, but a 62 nora Death Pact unit is hard to pass up.

    I'm finding Creeper to still be a decent rune, though that could be because of his central role. Despite the nerfs, I always deploy one when I have the chance; how can I not when Soul Collection is such a valuable tool to the flow of the deck? I run them with Improve: Range to give extra reach to my melee, and 7 range Dead Fairies are pretty sweet when they hit with +5 DOT damage. Skele Zerkers are just awesome. I've been REALLY tempted to run them at 30 nora, but having that additional point of speed is too valuable when running a traditionally slow, 6 speed-centric deck. I find that Blood Frenzy 1 is all the damage needed, and it also has the benefit of not decreasing your defense while already vulnerable. Double Shanks are more of a personal choice. I love the rune to death, and having an extra in your back pocket is definitely handy when the opponent assumes you only run 1 (and they will, most of the time).

    Last but not least, are the Mindshanks. Now, I may get some flak for running them, but they are still one of the most efficient debuff equips in the game. When combined with Risen Yeti's aura, or the Hex from Soldier, your opponent is going to have a hard time killing anything. And with the way this deck tends to focus on attrition, you will almost always get the refund before you kill the unit. I've tried Cursed Blades before, but it's just not the same; that -1 speed makes all the difference, and because it's so cheap you can squeeze it into any turn with ease. There's also the nice side-effect of ensuring the opponent can't equip that unit with something that could potentially ruin your day. And if they waste a Shatter/Disarm/etc. on it, you've probably come out ahead in nora.
     
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