Common mistakes on arena (wip)

[nabnecro 304]

This is another guide to help new players getting better at arena fights.

 

Mistake #1: Rogues not using gouge to help their teammates

 

Gouge is a skill that every rogue should use, even if it's level 1 and even if it misses sometimes. Here are some example situations on how it should be used:

1-A) Protect your teammate

When a Blade Dancer hits hamstring on someone on your team that isn't a Barb or a DK. You should be prepared to use gouge on the Blade Dancer and save your teammate's life.

1-B) Gain initiative

To give initiative to your team: By using gouge at the start of the fight (while invisible), you will greatly help the warlock on your team to hit the first circle or allow the necromancer on your team to safely cast nightmare on the enemy. For example, imagine your are on 2v2 arena and it's rogue + necromancer against 2 druids on the other team. Druid longest stun is 5 yards (root) while necromancer longest stun is 4 yards (nightmare). If you gouge one of the druids before attacking the other, necromancer is allowed to cast nightmare on the gouged druid before the druid can cast root. The simple fact of getting the first stun can determine whose team will win.

 

Mistake #2: Never moving back

 

"Running is for noobs"

"Pros don't run from the fight"

"Noob runner"

Those are some of the catchphrases you will hear when you play smarter than the average warspear player.

 

There is nothing wrong (or noob) in running per se. You should always be doing something which increases the odds of your team to win.

Of course deliberately running away without purpose will make your team lose but there are many situations where running or backing off can pay off and you should be aware of them:

 

2-A) Footsie

Warlock circle, Paladin jump and banner, Shaman level 4 totem, are some of the strongest area of effect skills that can make you lose the match if you don't try to evade then. They can be countered using a strategy called "Footsie". "Footsie" is a term used in fighting games and refers to the act of positioning yourself on an advantageous place. Warlock circle and paladin jump are area of effect skills, which means they can completely miss if used on the wrong place. This is why trying to position yourself just outside of the maximum range of those skills can make the opponent miss. To achieve this, you should move forward but immediately move back again when you think the opponent is going to use the skill. This can be specially effective because Warspear's netcode isn't very good and it can often show the wrong placement of the players on the screen.

 

2-B) Jump into the fight just to use your strongest skills and then immediately move back and stay at a safe range

Some classes like warlock, necromancer, priest, druid have strong long range skills like heal, circle, hex, mental pit, secret link. Those classes are also cloth armor users without shield, which means they can die very easily when stunned. When playing those classes, you should evaluate if the risk of being stunned and dying outweighs the extra damage you will deal on the other team using normal attacks.

 

2-C) Dealing with anti-stun skills (Barbarian nature and Mage anti-stun)

When you see a Barbarian or a Mage on the other team, you should expect one f their first moves will be to use their anti-stun skill. In both cases, you should be prepared to RUN AWAY while using healing skills and dot skills to slow down the enemy with the anti-stun. Yes, running away and using dot skills like necromancer rain, charmer dog, paladin banner, druid vines along with healing skills until the anti-stun is over, is your best bet against those skills. Both anti-stun skills have very long cooldown, which means if you are able to survive those skills, you will be on advantage until they can use it again. 

 

3-C) Always run if there are more than 1 enemy attacking you and you can't tank both

It's very simple, keeping 2 enemies busy chasing over you while the rest of the team is free to capture seals or kill the remaining enemies is better than not running away and dying with "honor".

 

Mistake #3: Not focusing on seals (3v3)

 

3-A) Don't waste time trying to kill wardens

A very common mistake on Seals Arena: people are only worried about killing the opposing team and do not focus on capturing the seals. When playing seals, you should focus on fighting the enemy but also on staying on top of the seal tiles whenever it's possible. If you see a warden on top of any seal, instead of wasting a lot of time trying to kill him, just use your longest duration stun (along with dot skills to slow him down in case he tries to chase you) and go capture the other seals.

 

3-B) Against life seal spammers, capture seals that are far from respawn point

Most of the time, it's impossible to win vs a team using life seals to instantly revive after they die. Against this kind of team, you should focus on capturing the 2 seals that are far from their respawn point. By doing that, you will have more time to breathe (heal and recover skill cooldowns) after you kill the enemy because even if they instantly revive, they will need to waste some time walking all the way back to the seals that are far from their respawn point.

 

Mistake #4: Choosing the wrong target to attack

 

Choosing the first target to kill is not as obvious as you think. It depends on a lot of things like target's defense and resilience, number of stuns and the range of the stuns they have and, of course, the individual skill of the player controlling the enemy character (it's always a good idea to nuke that predictable player who never walks back, see mistake #3).

On random arena demands, since you will not have much time for discussing strategy, it can be useful to establish at least the order in which you plan to kill the enemies. If you are playing seals 3v3 you can type something like "BD->druid->warden" at the start of the match. Another way to handle random arenas is to ask for your team to always attack the same target as one specific member of your team. You can say something like: "attack same as rogue".

HOWEVER, sometimes it's best to just attack the enemy who is closer to your team. Specially if you are playing a class that has the ability to damage the enemy while staying outside the range of their attacks (shaman, warlock, druid, ranger) and there are no healers on the other team.

 

Edited September 21, 2017 by nabnecro

[Kaleidoscope 142]

Nice guide. Especially the "run" part, hilarious that most players expect you to stand on one spot during the whole fight. Maneuvering is important in a lot of games, and ws should be no exception.

[Gladiator 1145]

Nice topic. Lemme contribute and add some stuff if I may.

 

#4 Don't follow the running characters.

Focus on killing the enemies between you instead of running after a runner and getting killed by the other(s). Sometimes even when the enemy runs with 100 HP left, if you can't catch him with a jump or a ranged stun, don't bother to run after him, kill his teammates fast.

 

#5 Spread in 5v5 and 2v2, otherwise you will leave an easy bait for Warlocks/Paladins/Druids/Charmers. In 3v3 seal, also spread even if you will leave seal for some time, better than getting aoe stunned.

 

#6 In seals scenarios, if the fight is in the middle seal lasts a long time and you need more points, sneak to the enemies' first seal and take it. Sometimes the enemy could sneak to your first seal, one should go to block him, not 2, or you will leave the middle seal 2v1 and they will control it. 

 

#7 If you're in a situation in seals where you have to fight 1v1, always make sure you are standing on the seal, you will not allow the other to steal the seal or take it. If you can't lock the other outside the seal long enough to capture it, making it blink is also important because it stops their counter if they already captured that seal, until the opponent enters the seal. Every point counts.

P.S. small seals give 2 points/sec, big one gives 3 points/sec, killing enemies gives 15 points. And it takes a single character 15 seconds to capture a seal, and I suppose 2 characters take 7.5 seconds, 3 characters take like 3.75 seconds.

 

Edited September 16, 2017 by Gladiator

[Higgings 1824]

For sure one of the most interesting guides I have read so far. Good job!