Friday, December 4, 2015

Building Your Dragons B10 Team

Unlike facing giants, braving dragons requires a little more than bravery and a pretty good aim. You need the right tools, the right team, and the right strategy.

Thankfully like all things in this game, that boils down to a few, easily reproducible core strategies that you can change as you need.  

The first is a slow and steady approach that relies on a core team of supportive monsters that ensure your teams lives longer than the dragon, while the second is a riskier, speed based approach  that relies on fast heals and copious DOTs.

So why does this team work? Let’s examine our scaly friend shall we?

The left crystal inflicts continuous damage, quickly eroding your team.

The right crystal acts like an overly-eager support and makes sure the dragon is frequently cleansed of negative effects and covered with immunity.

And the dragon… Well he’ll take a bite out of you if you bully any of his buddies, and constantly jets out blasts of putrid flame that will pepper you with DOTs and deal double damage when he’s irate and wounded.

To avoid a tragic and very messy (or crispy) death, we’ve got to get us our own cadre of friends to help us out.

In a Slow Team that means removing both those pesky crystals before hitting our draconic foe and making sure we've got the competence and courage to stay alive long enough to do it!



Cleanser: The one guy (or bird) you can’t live without. Whether it’s Konamiya with his constant use of “Peace”, Fedora with his buff, or Veromos with his passive, you need at least one (and often two) of these guys to keep you from falling prey to numerous dots courtesy of both Dragon and his jerk friend, left crystal.

Immunity: This guy can be the same as your cleanser (as in the case of Delphoi) or he can be an overly-ambitious buff spammer like Draco on violent. His role is simple: keep everyone covered with immunity so nothing lands. If you’re running a non-immunity cleanser like Konamiya, you will want one on the team. If your Veromos is swift and slow, that goes for you too.

Healer: If you haven’t learned by now, every team needs a healer (except maybe in arena AO but that’s another matter entirely). For facing the dragon you’ll need a dedicated healer to patch up all those burns and bites so you can keep on striking. As a result, you’ll likely want to lean towards a tanky or speedy AOE healer like Ariel or Belladeon (built with lots of hp or def) rather than something less stocky like Colleen or Hwahee. Chasun works well in this sort of team, but often will require additional support as she will be heavily targeted and you probably won’t have the Violent runes needed to keep her on her feet.

Reviver: Unless you're bringing a pair of fantastic healers (or an Ariel) you will probably need a reviver to save your sorry self when the crystals, baby dragons, or raging golems decide that your healer looks tasty or your Dot dealer would look better as a rug. 

Dot: As for any great foe, you need a dot dealer. Though you can technically replace this with an enemy HP based attacker like Spectra or Sigmarus, or you can run a powerful nuker like  Khali (who actually works pretty well) or Theomars, it will take a lot more turns and is likely to lead to failure in a slow team. Veromos fills this role nicely due to his dual use, but other possibilities exist in monsters like Baretta and Hermos.



A fast team, however, operates under an entirely different principle. 

You'll need a dedicated speed lead like Verdehile or Baretta, a fantastic speed buffer (pretty much Verdehile since Bernard will be eaten alive), a buff remover (like Megan if your Belladeon isn't consistent), an AOE healer, and a reliable cleanser or immunity giver to stand a chance.

Since much of this team is repeated, I'll focus on the new guys.



Speed Leader: If you aren't running Verdehile, you're probably not going to be able to do this, but crazier things have happened! In either case, you'll want your speed leader to fill in one of the roles on your team so Baretta as your lead and Dot is a very viable option.

Speed Buffer/Attack Gauge Booster: Sorry Bernard, you're the wrong bird for this joint. Ideally, you'll be running Verdehile, but if not you'll likely be looking at monsters like Wayne that have an elemental advantage in B10 or those that fill multiple roles like Megan who will fill your attack gauge, keep you buffed, and remove that pesky immunity, or Kahli who will act as a nuker and second DOT dealer to help you along. 

Speed Debuffer Option:
You may also choose to use a speed debuffer such as Spectra or Hwa who will also work as additional damage, but you will need to bring someone who can boost your team or keep them well buffed (like Megan) along for the ride.

Buff Remover: While a well built Belladeon will be able to fill this role (and therefore free it up for more healing, buffing, or damage) you will likely need a dedicated monster for this. Popular options include the much mentioned Megan, a fantastically built Serpent (wind can be extremely good), a well built (and usually Vampire) Geoffery, or something like a Xiao Lin (or any of the Kung Fu Girls) or Aegir who can steal effects.

Healer, Cleanser, Immunity, and Dot follow the same pattern as in the first team.


Need more monster options? 
Check out this nifty tool to find more monsters that fit these roles.
Searchable Monster Skill Database- http://sw.toolshack.ch/



Thursday, December 3, 2015

SW Research Results June 2015 Edition

This is a study I ran a few months ago on the data I collected from various databases, but since I'll be running a new one and there are new guildmates who've probably never seen this before, I wanted to give it a home here.

Ta-da! Presenting Serefina's first Summoner War Summon Times Infographic! All the information you know and love in an easy to digest format for the less-statistically savvy or the visually inclined!

New one is in the works, but Serefina's got a life to live too!

Note: 
Population estimated based off of 20 Million Downloads, 3.3% digital app retention rate, revenue distribution between Com2us Domestic and Global profits, and medium estimate of 20 scrolls summoned per user per month. 5 Star population further estimated based off 0.5% calculated rate. 


Saturday, November 28, 2015

Building Your Own Giants B10 Team

Throughout my time playing Summoner's War, I've got a lot of questions thrown my way, but none as popular as:


"Can you help me make a B10 team?"


Every older player has heard it at least once and its a valid question that plagues most people, and while there are a number of team suggestions on YouTube, well... a lot of the time people don't have the right monsters to copy it. So I've put this little info-graphic together that reduced what a B10 team looks like to a simple formula you can customize to suit your needs.

As a F2P player, I've geared my examples here to reflect easily obtainable monsters; however, in the case of the dragons speed team, you're a bit out of luck if you don't have Verdehile, a Theomars, or a Hwa. But I'm getting a head of myself, first we've got our friend, the big, blue giant!


The Giants B10 Team







Now why does this team structure work? Let's consider how our big, blue friend behaves, shall we? 

The Damage Reducer
You hit him 6 times, he gets grumpy and attacks, sadly for us, he doesn't really know his own strength and is liable to crush us to tiny pieces. That's where the damage reducer comes in! Using a combination of glancing debuffs (Shannon), defense buffs (Shannon again--or Megan if you really want her), shields (like Acasis), or passive skills that reduce damage (Darion and Diaz) those life-threatening attacks became merely bruising reminders to be more careful.

The Dot
He's big, he's blue---his HP is MASSIVE! Rather than balking at how you can't possible do 100k damage on this burly, bloke, you play smart: you choose Dots. Slowly eroding that giant hp 5% at a time, all you have to do is wait, and survive, for the big guy to kill himself. Talk about slingshots, huh!

The Speed Buffer
He may be big, but he's certainly not lumbering! Those two naughty little crystals are more than ready to keep him ready to hit and smash faster than you can run and hide with attack gauge boosts. That's why you bring a speed buffer! By increasing your own speed, you'll get more turns and more chances to either fill him up with DOTs or to put up your shields and buffs!

The Healer
Do I have to say it? If you've played this long you know that big, deadly things take a while to kill, so it's always good to have someone along that can fix you right up! If they can break defense and boost your attack gauge while at it, well, I think you just found your soul mate!

The Player's Choice
Depending on the group of friends you've chosen to invite to this party, you probably will need a certain, special type of help to help you succeed. Those with unreliable DOT dealers or using a speed lead will want a secondary DOT or Nuker to join the team (especially something that damages based off enemy HP). Those with survival issues (like if your runes suck) will want to bring along a second healer or another damage reducer, and if you're really having problems, you may want to even bring a revive (but that's not really suggested). Most of the time though, you'll be filling this role with another damage reducer or a healer because if you're farming B10 for this first time, well, your runes probably suck.

HP or Speed Lead

Not a strict necessity, but running a HP lead like Veromos will keep you free to work most of your team with 5 Star monsters rather than spending time getting squishy buddies like Shannon and Bernard the extra HP making them 6 Star promises. A speed lead, in contrast, will promise to keep you safe by virtue of making you much, much faster than the big guy, so if you can bring two DOT dealers or something amazing like Orochi, you're set. 


Next up, the anatomy of a Dragon's B10 team, so stay tuned!




Saturday, November 21, 2015

Welcome to Golem Luck's First Ever Blog

For a guild that's been around almost as long as the game has, we're sure behind in terms of pages. But who would have thought that silly little mobile game could be so addicting?

Anyway, big changes are abreast in the Summoner War world and that calls for some change here too!

So welcome to Golem Luck Guild page!

If you're part of us, read on, we're happy to have you! If you're spying for some other guild, shoo!
And if you're just a lost little lamb or a hopeful aspirant, well, I hope you find what you need here to get you started or get you to call us home!

What this is here for:
Synchronizing schedules for the current and upcoming guild events.
Providing useful news on new monsters, how to use them, and just general good news we want to share!
Consolidating resources for new members to help them grow, because there's only so much you can write in a 300 character text box.
And...probably more than a little boasting (congratulations again Dig on beating ToA Hard!)