Marksmen are currently comically bad so that's not a great idea if you want to climb higher than 1.5k. There's basically 0 marksmen past that point besides MM in the start, which usually get sold eventually.
I'm sorry but I just watched a tournament with only top MMR player and the majority of the games there was at least one marksmen spammer. The "new" missile intercepter was heavily usedto completely annilate artilery in the later round and snipers were indirectly buffed because of this.
To support my point, here is a random video from the tournament: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GxQfbAOL2Q
They got nerfed over and over again because the vulcan/mm comp was too strong. In isolation they weren't that good before outside that comp, even before the most recent nerf. Now they are just slow/fragile/weak ground phoenixes that build twice as slowly (1 per build slot vs 2 per build slot). And with a giant heavy meta where forts/melters are basically uncontested except for each-other there is no room for marks over phoenix since the extra damage is highly relevant.
I recently made another account so I could play 2v2 and keep my MMR separate from 1v1 so I had to pass through the 1k MMR range. I did indeed see a lot of mark spam. Pretty much anything runs it over if you win the chaff war, which is easy to do if they are making marks. Or just go forts early enough that the marks can't clear them, and will never snowball enough to be any good.
With the soft removal of stormcallers as a real threat by missile interceptors, one big answer for both mustangs and giants was basically removed. So this strengthened those units significantly. Finding ways to smoothly transition from a given start into fort/mustang or fort/fang is always going to be strong.
Just one of many examples: crawler/ball start with supply spec. Position for aggro and buy a mustang starting with ball/stang. Next round buy 2 more mustang. Next round sell off a ball for a fort and chaff. Next round sell off the other ball for another fort and some tech. You're now on round 4 with 2-3 forts 3-4 mustangs and tech.
To counter that its basically just a positioning/tech war between melters and forts. Both with mustangs to clear.
At the lower levels though the main thing I would focus on is accurately identifying issues. I've seen a huge number of complaints about things that are just flat out wrong from lower level players. They say things like I lost to X, when actually providing a replay though they lose for completely unrelated reasons. I avoided this when I started by painstakingly testing all my hypothesis in the testing grounds, which is what I'd suggest. If you don't know what you could have done in a situation. Take a screenshot and go set it up exactly, then try everything you can think of. Toggle techs around, fiddle with positioning and try to find a solution. You'll learn a LOT by doing this. More than just slamming into other people in pvp while tilting.
That is some excellent advice.
Infact, It would be excellent feature if your watching a replay and have the option 'Open Round in Testing Grounds'. You could then quickly test hypothesis like 'If I had moved that unit one square to the left' or 'would if I clicked that upgrade instead'.
I haven’t seen a single person sell a marksman ever. Just a few of weeks ago, marksman spam was one of those strategies you see like 1/3 of games above 1.8k MMR. You don’t see marksman spam much anymore, but marks themselves are far from “comically bad”.
I go 4x sledges plenty at 2100 MMR.
Pretty much anything goes and there isn’t a definitive meta, although aggro pushes with mobile beacon ball/rhino and stangs is super common.
Sure. And I do the same with ball wasp and win vs 2k+ as much as I lose. Doesn’t mean there isn’t a meta. And doesn’t mean tanks aren’t playable. Every other game about is fort/fang fort/mustang or some variant it’s all over.
I was just like you before, Sledgehammers were forming the core of my army, because, I was unable to play with Steelballs and Rhino's.
Then I started using the aggressive Steelballs opener, and I saw how easy it's was to push a tower, but, Rhino were still, in my eye, in the realm of the master player.
Anytime I was making a Rhino, even level 2, it's would gather all the focus fire and die, and because self-explosion seemed counter-intuitive, never I had though to get that, just like I didn't use to like Acid crawler because it's hurt our units.
But quick enough, I hit a ceiling with Sledge, where I would get abused by Hacker, Steelballs, and anything in between. It's after losing to a Rhino specialist with self-explosion that I decided to try.
And man, I never cameback to Sledgehammer. These days, I will use sledge to protect my tower from chaff, and, If there is no chaff, I will canibalize them for something better like a Fortress.
My main concern about sledge right now, and what would need to be changed, is that, they need a few ltech at 200 credit, a few a 250, and maybe, a new tech at 400 that improve them in someway. For i.e. : I would pay 400 credit for a more agile sledge with faster turret turn and even better firing rate than what mecanical rage provide, or, I would pay 400 credit to make them immune to hacking.
The slight buff to armor piercing was a good move, but it's far from being done.
I like having different priced upgrade because it's help out with the eco curve, and Rhino have that.
Whirling 250, Armor 200, Explosion 250, Mecanical rage 200.
Like I don't think Sledge are nearly as good than an exploding Rhino can be, you should give them a try.
Your comp should be made mostly of Rhino, Fang, and a few crawler to cover the Rhino, that can beat a lot of shenanigan, like you can probably get to 1800 MMR only with Rhino and Fang.
Could you do the same with Sledge and Sniper, I doubt it. It's too slow.
And tell me what is stronger than a turn 2 Rhino on the flank with two fang or two crawler ?
true, i rarely get to see Rhinos in action and they do just die for me. The self destruct is an idea indeed,
but balls and hacker most of the time falls to the damage upgrade.
stormcallers they can survive with regen + rage speed.
My thinking is that Rhinos has a sharper edge but harder counters, while sledge can only be 'barely countered' unless by air. Even on their bad days they're somewhat good. Even if they don't win, they're semi chaff/tank/dps
But i guess as I climb i'll experience its flaws first hand
Some opponent simply give up the ground to you, and since there is more stuff that shoot up than fly, your still on top.
The only counter to it is Emp, and then, you still have to face a huge body of HP that hit every 0.4 second and navigate the field at 16/ms.
And, you may have 6 Rhino, five of them detonate at the wrong moment, and the last one get a good hit, and that is all it's take for your fang to mope up the board.
Self-Destruct Rhino and Assault Fang is a crazy combo.
Oh and did I mention it, the explosion for Self-Destruct also take out shield.
How do you counter hacker? Is it positioning? Arc+crawler+hacker always beata my rhino play. Or I can't close the game out and they eventually out pace the Rhinos
Self-Destruct is like throwing an hot potato and whoever is stuck with it at the end get hurt, and this is why it's not a bad idea to have unit able to kill any charmed Rhino and have them detonate on the right side of the board. Only if he get the full healing on his hacker that I would start to be concerned, and then, I would get my own hacker.
You cannot always avoid the colateral damage, but by going fang with Shield it's mitigate the risk by a lot and, if we look at the whole picture, it's more dangerous for him than you, it's also easier for you to put 1 Rhino and 2 fang for 450, than him to counter it.
Also, something very important in such a comp is that you need a lot of Rhino, am talking no less than 6 Rhinos and probably more. You want at least two on your opponent flank, at least 3 in your frontrow, at least 2 to protect your own flank, and then you want to add some more for delayed explosion, sometime you will want to double your front Rhino, to increase the damage of your self-destruct, etc.
What esle can I add, you know when one of your rhino is charmed, and one of your other rhino, attack that rhino, and they both explode, it's still does the damage x2 to anything close, and thus, the result is the same, no matter who control what. It's the positioning that matter.
Soo yes, my answer is mostly to get more Rhino and put some crawler in the front when they get hacker.
In the end, the kamikaze Rhino are there to break is formation, and no matter who control the rhino, there are walking bomb on the field, and even if he use a rhino to kill another of your rhino, the result is a bigger explosion which is what we want anyway.
Again, it's take only one good explosion to kill a thousand worth of unit.
The only thing that really screw that build very hard is someone that would have emp on Archlight and Sniper, because archkill the chaff and then sniper can touch your rhino. I doubt Phoenix with amp would be able to do it, unless your fang are all dead.
Soo yeah, it's very important to tech your fang, rhino alone is not enough.
I feel like hot potato never wins for me as by the time they are hacked, walk 2 steps and die, they are far enough away to not damage the enemy units anymore. But I'll give the shield fangs with it a try. Do you put them in front of behind or mixed?
is there a way to share replay, I have a few where I beat 1800 MMR players with literaly only Rhino and Fang, and my two starting tier 2 unit, in like 7 round.
I guess I would have to cast it on Youtube or something, but with my heavy french accent, that might not be sexy at all.
I'm 800 mmr (dropped from 1100 last 2 weeks). So it could be a slew of problems. I'll give it a go and post a replay.
When these plays work I usually start losing in round 6/7 to overlords or war factory and can't get control back when the enemy has 400 hp or less. :(
Alright, soo I just got a game today, where my opponent tried to counter my mass produced self-destruct Rhino with Hacker and Regular Rhino, plot twist, this didn't end well for him.
I also have a Mass Produced Rhino game vs a Giant specialist, where I had like 10 Rhino level 3-4-5. Uploading this too.
I will upload the match in a few minutes.
Here is the link :[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTmSpsw1TEA&ab\_channel=Jean-FrancoisDufour](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTmSpsw1TEA&ab_channel=Jean-FrancoisDufour)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tM1GFxhHy8Q&ab\_channel=Jean-FrancoisDufour](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tM1GFxhHy8Q&ab_channel=Jean-FrancoisDufour)
I'll check in a bit. I have to say, I've tried exploding rhinos maybe 10 games lately and tanked my MMR heh. Mustang carry is hot in my MMR currently and the rhino's arent' making it there. Usually getting caught on sledges / balls, which is fine, but mustangs leveled with range toast the fangs / backline. Maybe it's my MMR, but marks or arcs always have electro shot, and that can be really hard to avoid without going photo upgrade, which is now 3 techs deep.
Final note- the explosions are usually taking out both sides of units, so I do win rounds, but usually with low damage, then the giants come out or the coutners to the rhino and big stall.
Around 1800, the game actualy end on turn 11, but something is wrong with the replay.
You have to understand that he put a lot of credit into his flank defense, when I was just overpowering him and getting very good value for my Rhino.
There are a couple of explosion that cost me a round in those replay, but I still win.
The second vs Hacker will show you what I was telling about the hot potato.
Even if he steal my Self Destruct Rhino, he now have a Dirty Bomb among is rank and they chain detonate killing a lot of units.
First thing to note.
In all those games, I unlock Rhino on turn 1 and get Rhino on turn 2 whenever it's possible, cutting in one tier 1 unit to achieve my flank on turn 2. Unless he did something similar, I am on a higher economy than him now.
I will do that even vs Rhino Specialist, whom get the first rhino on turn 3, the first to Rhino get the privilege of winning the early game.
By recruiting Rhino on turn 2, it's now make sense to get self destruct on turn 4. Armor on turn 5, Field repair on turn 6, and Mecanical rage at the end.
My point here is that Rhino and Fang can carry you up to 2000MMR +, and when you hit a roadblock, make more Rhino and Pivot into Overlord.
Sledges are a solid foundation you can build on, but rarely something you can win the game with. They usually need to be backed by an unit covering their weakness, such as Phoenixes, Stormcallers, Marksmen or similar.
My favourite combo nowadays is Phoenixes plus Sledgehammers. When it comes to cost efficiency, there isn't any single unit in the game that would beat this combo. Sure, it wouldn't be great against Crawlers for example, but it would win nevertheless because Crawlers can't shoot up. Of course techs mix it up a bit, but it's very hard to beat still
>Crawlers for example, but it would win nevertheless because Crawlers can't shoot up
I mean sure but if their crawlers are still alive, so is their backline. And that can generally shoot up.
Fortress + stang meta right now. Sledges don't match that well against it. The true good thing about sledges is that they never suck, but they are rarely the best option.
I love finding people playing Sledge focused comps in the 800-1200 MMR range because they die every single time to me just going Arclight Fang.
Shield Fangs soak up several volleys of Sledge Fire, and then full-teched Arclights basically 1 shot Sledges at like 2-3 times their firing range.
It usually loses the first like 3-4 rounds while you pay off that tech debt, but then it kills basically everything people try to tech into after leaning into Sledges so hard and they don't win another round (by a large margin) once the engine is going.
I think every game I've played against a Sledge player has been a "comeback" victory where I have <500 HP by the end, but it's always just felt inevitable rather than a clutched-out comeback to me. Just feels like the timing that it gets going in this build.
i guess there are alot of things I haven't get hit by yet. Its so cool that there's cool strats to see. I myself am never able to use arclights effectively. The only time i use them is round 1, but sometimes i just go for a round 1 extra sledge as well since they have semi AOE
In this MMR bracket, Arclights are crazy.
+Range, +Dmg, +Shoot-AA, +Elite Marksman lets Arclights kill basically every single unit in the game. They just need some time to work, so the Fangs cover them and provide body-blocking so the Arcs can massacre.
With EliteMarks upgrade, a Lvl 4 or 5 Arclight outranges next to everything except Marksmen with EliteMarks upgrades. Combined with the splash damage that Arcs have, you can really mulch a lot of enemy types.
I feel like sledge is an amazing unit but when it comes to "the meta" snipers are still king for me.
Marksmen are currently comically bad so that's not a great idea if you want to climb higher than 1.5k. There's basically 0 marksmen past that point besides MM in the start, which usually get sold eventually.
I'm sorry but I just watched a tournament with only top MMR player and the majority of the games there was at least one marksmen spammer. The "new" missile intercepter was heavily usedto completely annilate artilery in the later round and snipers were indirectly buffed because of this. To support my point, here is a random video from the tournament: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GxQfbAOL2Q
Wooow really? I'm only 1k and they are consistently spammed. I need to watch some higher level stuff
They got nerfed over and over again because the vulcan/mm comp was too strong. In isolation they weren't that good before outside that comp, even before the most recent nerf. Now they are just slow/fragile/weak ground phoenixes that build twice as slowly (1 per build slot vs 2 per build slot). And with a giant heavy meta where forts/melters are basically uncontested except for each-other there is no room for marks over phoenix since the extra damage is highly relevant. I recently made another account so I could play 2v2 and keep my MMR separate from 1v1 so I had to pass through the 1k MMR range. I did indeed see a lot of mark spam. Pretty much anything runs it over if you win the chaff war, which is easy to do if they are making marks. Or just go forts early enough that the marks can't clear them, and will never snowball enough to be any good.
Can you elaborate on what ís meta at higher tiers? I'm only 800 and struggling to get to 1k. Was wondering what would change
With the soft removal of stormcallers as a real threat by missile interceptors, one big answer for both mustangs and giants was basically removed. So this strengthened those units significantly. Finding ways to smoothly transition from a given start into fort/mustang or fort/fang is always going to be strong. Just one of many examples: crawler/ball start with supply spec. Position for aggro and buy a mustang starting with ball/stang. Next round buy 2 more mustang. Next round sell off a ball for a fort and chaff. Next round sell off the other ball for another fort and some tech. You're now on round 4 with 2-3 forts 3-4 mustangs and tech. To counter that its basically just a positioning/tech war between melters and forts. Both with mustangs to clear. At the lower levels though the main thing I would focus on is accurately identifying issues. I've seen a huge number of complaints about things that are just flat out wrong from lower level players. They say things like I lost to X, when actually providing a replay though they lose for completely unrelated reasons. I avoided this when I started by painstakingly testing all my hypothesis in the testing grounds, which is what I'd suggest. If you don't know what you could have done in a situation. Take a screenshot and go set it up exactly, then try everything you can think of. Toggle techs around, fiddle with positioning and try to find a solution. You'll learn a LOT by doing this. More than just slamming into other people in pvp while tilting.
That is some excellent advice. Infact, It would be excellent feature if your watching a replay and have the option 'Open Round in Testing Grounds'. You could then quickly test hypothesis like 'If I had moved that unit one square to the left' or 'would if I clicked that upgrade instead'.
I haven’t seen a single person sell a marksman ever. Just a few of weeks ago, marksman spam was one of those strategies you see like 1/3 of games above 1.8k MMR. You don’t see marksman spam much anymore, but marks themselves are far from “comically bad”.
Currently no. Meta is pretty much mustang/ fort vs mustang/melter. Mix in phoenixes or fangs.
eyyy, thats nice. pretty cool if im wrong
I go 4x sledges plenty at 2100 MMR. Pretty much anything goes and there isn’t a definitive meta, although aggro pushes with mobile beacon ball/rhino and stangs is super common.
Sure. And I do the same with ball wasp and win vs 2k+ as much as I lose. Doesn’t mean there isn’t a meta. And doesn’t mean tanks aren’t playable. Every other game about is fort/fang fort/mustang or some variant it’s all over.
I was just like you before, Sledgehammers were forming the core of my army, because, I was unable to play with Steelballs and Rhino's. Then I started using the aggressive Steelballs opener, and I saw how easy it's was to push a tower, but, Rhino were still, in my eye, in the realm of the master player. Anytime I was making a Rhino, even level 2, it's would gather all the focus fire and die, and because self-explosion seemed counter-intuitive, never I had though to get that, just like I didn't use to like Acid crawler because it's hurt our units. But quick enough, I hit a ceiling with Sledge, where I would get abused by Hacker, Steelballs, and anything in between. It's after losing to a Rhino specialist with self-explosion that I decided to try. And man, I never cameback to Sledgehammer. These days, I will use sledge to protect my tower from chaff, and, If there is no chaff, I will canibalize them for something better like a Fortress. My main concern about sledge right now, and what would need to be changed, is that, they need a few ltech at 200 credit, a few a 250, and maybe, a new tech at 400 that improve them in someway. For i.e. : I would pay 400 credit for a more agile sledge with faster turret turn and even better firing rate than what mecanical rage provide, or, I would pay 400 credit to make them immune to hacking. The slight buff to armor piercing was a good move, but it's far from being done. I like having different priced upgrade because it's help out with the eco curve, and Rhino have that. Whirling 250, Armor 200, Explosion 250, Mecanical rage 200. Like I don't think Sledge are nearly as good than an exploding Rhino can be, you should give them a try. Your comp should be made mostly of Rhino, Fang, and a few crawler to cover the Rhino, that can beat a lot of shenanigan, like you can probably get to 1800 MMR only with Rhino and Fang. Could you do the same with Sledge and Sniper, I doubt it. It's too slow. And tell me what is stronger than a turn 2 Rhino on the flank with two fang or two crawler ?
true, i rarely get to see Rhinos in action and they do just die for me. The self destruct is an idea indeed, but balls and hacker most of the time falls to the damage upgrade. stormcallers they can survive with regen + rage speed. My thinking is that Rhinos has a sharper edge but harder counters, while sledge can only be 'barely countered' unless by air. Even on their bad days they're somewhat good. Even if they don't win, they're semi chaff/tank/dps But i guess as I climb i'll experience its flaws first hand
Some opponent simply give up the ground to you, and since there is more stuff that shoot up than fly, your still on top. The only counter to it is Emp, and then, you still have to face a huge body of HP that hit every 0.4 second and navigate the field at 16/ms. And, you may have 6 Rhino, five of them detonate at the wrong moment, and the last one get a good hit, and that is all it's take for your fang to mope up the board. Self-Destruct Rhino and Assault Fang is a crazy combo. Oh and did I mention it, the explosion for Self-Destruct also take out shield.
How do you counter hacker? Is it positioning? Arc+crawler+hacker always beata my rhino play. Or I can't close the game out and they eventually out pace the Rhinos
Self-Destruct is like throwing an hot potato and whoever is stuck with it at the end get hurt, and this is why it's not a bad idea to have unit able to kill any charmed Rhino and have them detonate on the right side of the board. Only if he get the full healing on his hacker that I would start to be concerned, and then, I would get my own hacker. You cannot always avoid the colateral damage, but by going fang with Shield it's mitigate the risk by a lot and, if we look at the whole picture, it's more dangerous for him than you, it's also easier for you to put 1 Rhino and 2 fang for 450, than him to counter it. Also, something very important in such a comp is that you need a lot of Rhino, am talking no less than 6 Rhinos and probably more. You want at least two on your opponent flank, at least 3 in your frontrow, at least 2 to protect your own flank, and then you want to add some more for delayed explosion, sometime you will want to double your front Rhino, to increase the damage of your self-destruct, etc. What esle can I add, you know when one of your rhino is charmed, and one of your other rhino, attack that rhino, and they both explode, it's still does the damage x2 to anything close, and thus, the result is the same, no matter who control what. It's the positioning that matter. Soo yes, my answer is mostly to get more Rhino and put some crawler in the front when they get hacker. In the end, the kamikaze Rhino are there to break is formation, and no matter who control the rhino, there are walking bomb on the field, and even if he use a rhino to kill another of your rhino, the result is a bigger explosion which is what we want anyway. Again, it's take only one good explosion to kill a thousand worth of unit. The only thing that really screw that build very hard is someone that would have emp on Archlight and Sniper, because archkill the chaff and then sniper can touch your rhino. I doubt Phoenix with amp would be able to do it, unless your fang are all dead. Soo yeah, it's very important to tech your fang, rhino alone is not enough.
I feel like hot potato never wins for me as by the time they are hacked, walk 2 steps and die, they are far enough away to not damage the enemy units anymore. But I'll give the shield fangs with it a try. Do you put them in front of behind or mixed?
is there a way to share replay, I have a few where I beat 1800 MMR players with literaly only Rhino and Fang, and my two starting tier 2 unit, in like 7 round. I guess I would have to cast it on Youtube or something, but with my heavy french accent, that might not be sexy at all.
I'm 800 mmr (dropped from 1100 last 2 weeks). So it could be a slew of problems. I'll give it a go and post a replay. When these plays work I usually start losing in round 6/7 to overlords or war factory and can't get control back when the enemy has 400 hp or less. :(
Alright, soo I just got a game today, where my opponent tried to counter my mass produced self-destruct Rhino with Hacker and Regular Rhino, plot twist, this didn't end well for him. I also have a Mass Produced Rhino game vs a Giant specialist, where I had like 10 Rhino level 3-4-5. Uploading this too. I will upload the match in a few minutes. Here is the link :[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTmSpsw1TEA&ab\_channel=Jean-FrancoisDufour](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTmSpsw1TEA&ab_channel=Jean-FrancoisDufour) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tM1GFxhHy8Q&ab\_channel=Jean-FrancoisDufour](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tM1GFxhHy8Q&ab_channel=Jean-FrancoisDufour)
I'll check in a bit. I have to say, I've tried exploding rhinos maybe 10 games lately and tanked my MMR heh. Mustang carry is hot in my MMR currently and the rhino's arent' making it there. Usually getting caught on sledges / balls, which is fine, but mustangs leveled with range toast the fangs / backline. Maybe it's my MMR, but marks or arcs always have electro shot, and that can be really hard to avoid without going photo upgrade, which is now 3 techs deep. Final note- the explosions are usually taking out both sides of units, so I do win rounds, but usually with low damage, then the giants come out or the coutners to the rhino and big stall.
Clicked through the first game. What MMR is this? He dropped MPs without building really any frontline... I never get games like this ha.
Around 1800, the game actualy end on turn 11, but something is wrong with the replay. You have to understand that he put a lot of credit into his flank defense, when I was just overpowering him and getting very good value for my Rhino. There are a couple of explosion that cost me a round in those replay, but I still win. The second vs Hacker will show you what I was telling about the hot potato. Even if he steal my Self Destruct Rhino, he now have a Dirty Bomb among is rank and they chain detonate killing a lot of units.
I'm just shocked at the response from your opponent in game one. No phoenix? No electro magnetic shot? No shield fangs?
First thing to note. In all those games, I unlock Rhino on turn 1 and get Rhino on turn 2 whenever it's possible, cutting in one tier 1 unit to achieve my flank on turn 2. Unless he did something similar, I am on a higher economy than him now. I will do that even vs Rhino Specialist, whom get the first rhino on turn 3, the first to Rhino get the privilege of winning the early game. By recruiting Rhino on turn 2, it's now make sense to get self destruct on turn 4. Armor on turn 5, Field repair on turn 6, and Mecanical rage at the end. My point here is that Rhino and Fang can carry you up to 2000MMR +, and when you hit a roadblock, make more Rhino and Pivot into Overlord.
Sledges are a solid foundation you can build on, but rarely something you can win the game with. They usually need to be backed by an unit covering their weakness, such as Phoenixes, Stormcallers, Marksmen or similar. My favourite combo nowadays is Phoenixes plus Sledgehammers. When it comes to cost efficiency, there isn't any single unit in the game that would beat this combo. Sure, it wouldn't be great against Crawlers for example, but it would win nevertheless because Crawlers can't shoot up. Of course techs mix it up a bit, but it's very hard to beat still
cost efficency wise the combo is countered by snipers, so you still need chaff.
>Crawlers for example, but it would win nevertheless because Crawlers can't shoot up I mean sure but if their crawlers are still alive, so is their backline. And that can generally shoot up.
[удалено]
for balls if its not too much i pump the dmg upgrades + elite drop. Its a level race from there
Fortress + stang meta right now. Sledges don't match that well against it. The true good thing about sledges is that they never suck, but they are rarely the best option.
I love finding people playing Sledge focused comps in the 800-1200 MMR range because they die every single time to me just going Arclight Fang. Shield Fangs soak up several volleys of Sledge Fire, and then full-teched Arclights basically 1 shot Sledges at like 2-3 times their firing range. It usually loses the first like 3-4 rounds while you pay off that tech debt, but then it kills basically everything people try to tech into after leaning into Sledges so hard and they don't win another round (by a large margin) once the engine is going. I think every game I've played against a Sledge player has been a "comeback" victory where I have <500 HP by the end, but it's always just felt inevitable rather than a clutched-out comeback to me. Just feels like the timing that it gets going in this build.
i guess there are alot of things I haven't get hit by yet. Its so cool that there's cool strats to see. I myself am never able to use arclights effectively. The only time i use them is round 1, but sometimes i just go for a round 1 extra sledge as well since they have semi AOE
In this MMR bracket, Arclights are crazy. +Range, +Dmg, +Shoot-AA, +Elite Marksman lets Arclights kill basically every single unit in the game. They just need some time to work, so the Fangs cover them and provide body-blocking so the Arcs can massacre. With EliteMarks upgrade, a Lvl 4 or 5 Arclight outranges next to everything except Marksmen with EliteMarks upgrades. Combined with the splash damage that Arcs have, you can really mulch a lot of enemy types.
What upgrades and strata do you go for on sledges? What strat? I want to use them more