I thought it would be interesting to show how I makes bgs from scratch for those interested in the process of finding and mixing synergies, and fine tweaking a bg. Also it will be a nice opportunity for me to get feedback on the bg I'm making. 1) The inspiration BG ideas don't come from nowhere, things have to change, or you have to learn something new for the idea of a new battlegroup to spring in your mind, in this case, the trigger is the recent buff to puppet master, wich in his current state, has access to the ability mystic push, exclusive until now to tortun battle mystic, and is a ability that is particularly powerful when stacked. Check this thread, were the new bg concept was born: http://forums.poxnora.com/index.php?threads/puppet-master-buff.687/. 2) Finding the core To make a bg, one has to fulfill some requisites in order to guarantee consistency, enough champs, good balance between melee and ranged, support, powerturn, detection and such, you can read about it in my basic battlegroup guidelines. So, we already have in the bg 5 runes, 2x puppet master, 2x tortun battle mystic and Mangleshell, because stacking mystic push and dread are the reason to make the bg at first place, but, even if that's the motivation, and the synergy is indeed nice, you need something to win the game, and that's were we have to look out for more synergies and combos to fill the bg. For that, we are limited to the possibilities that tortuns bring to make up a wincon, we have, apart from the core strategies of every tortun bg of range domination and stalling, pygmy rampage, knockback gimmicks and mortar. For tortalleon pygmy, we have relocate ally and scramble on infiltrators to support it, and regular stuff from FS, it's not like SL and IS were we have instant double attacks but is something. Knockback tricks we have with pillars of flame, fiery ambush, erupt and lava sources, this looks like a possibility. For mortar, we have the most potential, with things like summon borghas, ember wasp and other fire support. also the mortar synergizes perfectly with puppet master, so we have a really safe bet with this interaction. Besides those strategies, that are meant to become the core of the gameplay, we should also look for some other combos, not so impactful to become the center of the bg but good enough to include them: Stiched librarian recycle + horn of order for free powerturns Several rogue class tortuns with cloak of long knives Blade of the snake/mandate from sheould to go with fishkisser manic orb of protection + fire damage from mortars and grenadiers With that in mind, we make our first draft of the bg, triying to see what would fit, we have several ways to go, but we cannot fit all those at the same time, so we have to choose: http://poxbase.com/#!/deck/Cj0cu_ChYC9FcyPCo7CyDcyHcizCyFcimS2ls6Fs86sAS2zr3Tr20e1 e24E2w Stuff we already discussed + some faction staples. That should work in theory, but we have to test to see if the synergies are powerful enough or if they have to be replaced, and to see if we can mechanize the interactions correctly. This is moment to look out for unintended interactions on the bg. 3) testing and correcting First thing we test is if the mechanics work like they we suppose they do, we use single player to do this and... Firelight gem + tortun mortar: we find that firelight gem doesn't affect the artillery splash damage, this looks bad at first glance. Puppet master + unstoppable units: We find that the unstoppable tortuns make using energy thief on the puppetmaster (we want it for the possibility to feed him ap and transfer it to a mortar) more comfortable. Deep elf infiltrator: we find that it's hard to detect with just rank 1, and that pygmy doesn't shine when relocated because of the lack of KF bonus. Borghas: we find that borghas has only 10 hp and receives 8 damage from the splash of a 15 damage mortar attack, and that the splash of a 17 damage one kill the borghas outright, and he doesn't release a blast if artillery kills him. We have to reconsider one of our main strategies because it's not effective this way. To correct a little, we will include a stitched librarian instead of deep elf infiltrator, to detect better, and also it will bring the possibility of making a horn of order powerplay with recycle. With that, and sacrifice, we can consider almost anything we put on the battlefield to be an investment that can be recovered later in order to make a fnal powerturn, changing our useless board presence into nora and then into shrine damage with spells. This is a very unique capability that only UD has, so we should make full use of it. Then, we include a ember wasp to keep with the fire volatility module, and to make borghas more useful, as borghas will release flame pulses when it's chained with another fire volatility unit even if the pulses kill him. This will double the efficiency of borghas in terms of damage output. At last, we are going to introduce a way to take advantage of all the potential that sacrifice give us to end a game with 2 price of victory, that not only grants extra AP, but also extra HP, and that will go nicely with the fire volatility sources, that will find increasing his damage output increased at the same time the mortars become able to attack again. The rearrangement of the deck: http://poxbase.com/#!/deck/cj0c8dcu_ChYC9FcuPcyPCo7CyDcyHcizCyFcimS2ls6FS3os86sAs2zr3Tr20E2w 4) Final tweaks After testing the bg some more, we may want to add additional trickery to the bg, something that may be considered as highly situational by some people, but all non-mediocre bgs are filled with silly little combos and they can make the difference between victory or defeat, also, we want to address some problems we may have found, to reach to the most successful bg we can make. The thing we are going to add is a bit of lava generation to the bg, because, with the help of privateer captain's lockdown, we can ground a ember wasp into lava to unleash his pulse, we can do this repeteadly by moving the privateer captain back and forth, and then moving the grounded wasp, this may give us a good amount of damage, that can be easily overlooked, but it wouldn't be surprising if you could get and extra 24-32 damage out of the wasp alone, not counting volatility chain reactions, so, this little combo can decide a game easily. The options for lava generation are many, but I ended up deciding that the better option are sixul (who also has fire volatility) or corrupted overlord replacing the pygmy. Then we replace gunslinger with a favored to add healing and nora shield, that can be useful in many situation, specially when mixed with sixul, and also situationally, we can grant flight a unit to bypass lumbering from puppet master, and at last, we replace the portalmage with a boghopper shaman, wich is a more efficient healer and can be used to heal borghas/wasp/sixul to continue the chain, and so we get our final BG: http://poxbase.com/#!/deck/ctcj0c8dcu_ChYC9FckBcuPCo7CyDcyGcyHCyFS2ls6FS3os86sAs2zr3Tr20E2w The bg is open to critics now.
haha! I was thinking the exact same thing when seeing new puppet master one thing one could do is combine tortuns that have slam with either traps or lava! I just built a lava BG today because I always wanted to and think that could benefit tortuns as well. With that you could also run Nora Shield on a unit, run it over lava spots, generate nora and then sac/retribution it.
No ammon, it's not that, this is a thread were I intend to show how I make battlegroups from the initial idea, I already have the final battlegroup, but I want to write down all the steps on how I reached that.
Youre an evil person, you hurt my feelings AND you made me cry! In all seriousness you got some typos in your post and apparently it wasnt clear to me that you reserved the rights to yourself to post content here. If I could provide, and you didnt object, some more help or share more ideas and even a finished BG I would.
http://www.poxbase.com/#!/deck/c8dc...CyFco8cufs4@s2Hs86sAs2zs5+R20rNrWr2ae2je2we25 It is ridiculous. In my real BG I run some champs a little different though because I just simply level them. But this is almost what I'd play in a serious match. Namely imp alchemist, tortun corsair and repeater. I got them on hold atm.
Aweshome mortal + wasp and 40-50 dmg aoe in one turn. the only sad thing i cant get a sixul. im too poor for it. but im working on it. maybe anyway. against every bg works exept ud cus of fire res / fire eater. all other factions dies fast if u can make the combo well.
the problem is. i cant even affor any other lava makers :/ or dunno wich one would be good. i use that bg atm : http://poxbase.com/#!/deck/ctc8dcw cu_C9FcuPCyDcyGcuQcyHCyUCyFco8 the spells / equipments are same like hes final bg.
Well there arent too many lavaformers around... sadly. In another BG I use Firestarter to generate some. Volcanic Burst works too but it is delayed so not the best option. If you have a Magma Elemental works too.
Look, the bg is really nice from a synergy stand point, but tortuns powerlevel is similar to meta units with awestruck (no kidding! look at those stats) So I don't want you to jump into ranked with this bg and expect to do well, seriously. The best replacement for sixul is corrupted overlord. I tried to update the bg to compete in meta, but his only hope is a devasting shrine rush with mortar, before efficiency starts to matter too much. This is my current interaction: http://poxbase.com/#!/deck/ctc8dcu_Ch2ChYC9FckBcuPCo7cyDcyHCyFS2ls3os86s5BsAs2zr20r2ae24E2we2K Mortar + drive + firelight gem= 30 shrine damage So it all about getting your mortar into range and doing a massive and overly complex powerturn involving sacrifice, recycle, wasp, puppet master, borghas and price of victory to do between 60 and 90 shrine damage depending on the successfulness of your previous positioning. Tinder box on a fire volatility unit is lol.
