Don't Understand How to Beat some Elite Enemies

[Pixxel Wizzard]

After the 1st boss, there's these three guys (elite) and they each do 8-12 damage (that's over 30 dmg) almost every turn. Even if I only played block cards I still couldn't negate all their damage. 1st of all, I don't have enough block cards to do that, and second of all, how am I supposed to get attacks in? Maybe I'm missing a strat, but I thought I had a great deck. :shrug:

[LHGreen]

Weakening them can help mitigate their damage, as can relics. Also, it helps to go after the far one first, since he can afflict you with vulnerable and cost you even more health.

[Nibbie]

Well one of the things you should learn about the game in general is that it is totally unrealistic to prevent all damage. That should almost never be your goal. Instead, you can often prevent more overall damage during fights by playing damage cards over block cards to kill enemies sooner, so they have less turns to attack you. Killing an enemy that is attacking for 13 is the same as blocking for 13. This is especially true against the various enemies that scale up over combat, they need to be killed quickly or they will overwhelm most decks. The old adage "The best defense is a good offense" comes to mind.

In this case, your main goal at the start of this fight is to kill one of the slavers as fast as possible. This reduces the damage they are doing per turn by a lot, and reduces how many negative effects are coming you way. I typically focus the back slaver, since he can entangle and vulnerable you, which are both potentially devastating debuffs. You are typically in a good spot if you can kill him before his second turn. Once he is dead, it is much more possible to block damage while dealing damage to the other two.

[Zu]

Short version to corroborate:
Dead things can't attack. Use your health as a resource. Bring potions.

[Cress]

All act 2 elites are very hard for the time you are fighting them, and unless you have good answers to them then it's advised to take an easier path through act 2. You almost certainly cannot block 30 a turn by mid-act 2, and even if you could that doesn't bring you any closer to victory. Health is a resource, you need to recognise when the time is appropriate to spend it.

All act 2 elites test your ability to single-target burst (there are some exceptions where your deck is good enough to AoE the slavers, but this is rare). If the back slaver isn't dead by turn 2 then you're probably just dead, and even then it can be a rough fight. General rule of thumb is if you can't do at least 40-50 damage in a good turn with reasonably likely draws, you're going to have a bad time with these elites, all of them.

[Pixxel Wizzard]

Originally posted by Cress:

All act 2 elites are very hard for the time you are fighting them, and unless you have good answers to them then it's advised to take an easier path through act 2. You almost certainly cannot block 30 a turn by mid-act 2, and even if you could that doesn't bring you any closer to victory. Health is a resource, you need to recognise when the time is appropriate to spend it.

All act 2 elites test your ability to single-target burst (there are some exceptions where your deck is good enough to AoE the slavers, but this is rare). If the back slaver isn't dead by turn 2 then you're probably just dead, and even then it can be a rough fight. General rule of thumb is if you can't do at least 40-50 damage in a good turn with reasonably likely draws, you're going to have a bad time with these elites, all of them.

Excellent evaluation. Yeah, I try to avoid elites most of the time, but I got railroaded into one with the huntress.

After this post I made another run with the orb slinger dude, and I *was* able to block 30+ per turn in Act II. But, as I mentioned, this post was about the huntress, and there's no freaking way I could do it with her.

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by Pixxel Wizzard:

But, as I mentioned, this post was about the huntress, and there's no freaking way I could do it with her.

Just a quick FYI, Silent is pretty much the tankiest character in the game.

[Zu]

Are you counting wraith form and timely piercing wail? Cuz the consistent block you can work toward as defect n watcher is absurd.

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by Zu:

Are you counting wraith form and timely piercing wail? Cuz the consistent block you can work toward as defect n watcher is absurd.

Well, I'm certainly not only counting block. And I'm also trying to factor in all builds (or maybe deck-states would be a better term), not just specific ones that are optimal for defense. Which is impossible to actually do, granted, so it's more of a rough estimate, like most attempts to gauge the potential of something that's hard to quantify. Still, I think it's reasonably accurate.

[Cress]

Originally posted by Pixxel Wizzard:

Excellent evaluation. Yeah, I try to avoid elites most of the time, but I got railroaded into one with the huntress.

After this post I made another run with the orb slinger dude, and I *was* able to block 30+ per turn in Act II. But, as I mentioned, this post was about the huntress, and there's no freaking way I could do it with her.

Well, don't be discouraged to take on elites as this is the main source of power via relics, and if you get the right relic for the right hero at the right time it can be absolutely gamechanging.

Once you gain more experience you will be able to foresee how a fight is likely to go down given your deck, relics, and potions. My point is rather that you should be wary of A2 elites in particular, because they pack quite a punch and most decks cannot reliably deal with them at that point in the run.

It's certainly possible to have a nice deck at that point and completely walk over the elites, but more often than not the case will be that 1-2 A2 elites is pushing it (especially when you get to high ascension levels).

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by Cress:

Well, don't be discouraged to take on elites as this is the main source of power via relics, and if you get the right relic for the right hero at the right time it can be absolutely gamechanging.

monkey paw and urn are OP for Defect, Strike Dummy is great for Ironclad, and so on.

Originally posted by Cress:

My point is rather that you should be wary of A2 elites in particular, because they pack quite a punch and most decks cannot reliably deal with them at that point in the run.

It's certainly possible to have a nice deck at that point and completely walk over the elites, but more often than not the case will be that 1-2 A2 elites is pushing it (especially when you get to high ascension levels).

Well, this aspect of Act 2 is something that partly comes down to play style. But only partly.

[Cress]

I agree that Silent is very tanky out of the box, and this is mainly due to Neutralize being amazing. Always upgrade this ASAP, the +1 weak will save you tonnes of health over the course of a run. She also has many mitigation options as others have mentioned above, piercing wail being a notable mention because it is a common card.

In terms of taking out A2 elites... she is probably not the best suited for the job. Unless you have an early catalyst and/or corpse explosion, her poison is far too slow. Shiv deck is probably not putting out enough damage at this point to be great. She can mitigate, but these fights all quickly scale out of control over time.

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by Cress:

I agree that Silent is very tanky out of the box, and this is mainly due to Neutralize being amazing. Always upgrade this ASAP, the +1 weak will save you tonnes of health over the course of a run. She also has many mitigation options as others have mentioned above, shrieking wail being a notable mention because it is a common card.

Not just out of the box. She maintain it and improve at it, more readily/easily than the others.

Originally posted by Cress:

In terms of taking out A2 elites... she is probably not the best suited for the job. Unless you have an early catalyst and/or corpse explosion, her poison is far too slow. Shiv deck is probably not putting out enough damage at this point to be great. She can mitigate, but these fights all quickly scale out of control over time.

No, sorry, I meant for all the base characters in general, not just Silent. She has trouble against Lagavulin, and that's an Act 1 elite. And anyway, poison and shivs aren't mutually exclusive.

Also, why do you use 'A' to abbreviate Act, instead of Ascension like the rest of us? You're only saving yourself 2 letters, and it just makes things potentially confusing to others.

[Cress]

Poison and shiv aren't mutually exclusive obviously, but both options are quite slow unless you have the cards/relics to support them is my point. Having a couple blade dance in your deck is almost always useful, but that's not really all too powerful by itself. Same as with poison, it doesn't really take off until corpse explosion or catalyst. There are other options that use neither as well, discard w/ sneaky strike being one example.

I don't think anyone thinks I'm talking about ascension 2 elites... I would use different abbreviations if it mattered, but it's not difficult to comprehend what A2 means.

[Pixxel Wizzard]

Great discussion here, guys. Thanks for the input, I appreciate it. Looks like I got a lot of cards to look forward to unlocking. :)

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by Cress:

Poison and shiv aren't mutually exclusive obviously, but both options are quite slow unless you have the cards/relics to support them is my point.

Eh, it's more of a steady pace than a slow pace. That's just how her chip damage often works.

Originally posted by Cress:

Same as with poison, it doesn't really take off until corpse explosion or catalyst.

I've made plenty of good poison decks that didn't require either.

Originally posted by Cress:

I don't think anyone thinks I'm talking about ascension 2 elites... I would use different abbreviations if it mattered, but it's not difficult to comprehend what A2 means.

Most of the time, no, there wouldn't be any confusion. But sometimes, there might be. A3 or A1 elites or A2 hallway fights could easily mean two very different things, for example.