Showin' Some Skin - Part 2 of 3

Picking up right where we left off, part two of the series will start with:

• Elmir - For Elmir, there are two things that he desperately needs.  Dodge, and Armor penetration.  His Barbarian skin, and his Devil skin are must haves.  The Devil skin also became available for purchase recently.  Prior to this, it could only be achieved through Outland Chest pulls.  The Winter skin is optional.
• Thea - Personally, I don't use this hero.  If you plan on doing so, you'll need to get her Winter skin.  Thea is extremely light on armor.  The Winter skin will keep her in the fight much longer.  Thea's Angel skin is an optional purchase.  The same functionality is provided by her Champion skin, without using real world money.  It is a good idea to get the Champion skin as well.  All of her abilities other than her Violet skill are derived based on her Magic attack.
• Arachne - I wouldn't buy any of these skins.  Arachne will become increasingly useless as you progress.  There are some that advocate using her on a C team for Grand Arena.  If you choose to do this, you *might* want to get her Winter skin.
• Orion - You'll want both of his skins.  Period.
• Artemis - Artemis has Critical Hit Chance.  The higher you can get that stat, the more likely she will score a critical hit.  If you are using her, you should get her Angel Skin.  You will likely also want to get her Devil skin as it increases her physical attack. 
• Judge - Save your money and pass on this one.
• Lilith - Another hero that requires all of her available skins to be truly useful.  But in the long run, she's just not worth it.
• Jet - Jet will need both of his skins as you level him up.  They don't seem to be as important long term, due to his position in the team, and when paired with heroes that can do high amounts of damage, the fight doesn't last long.  I recommend getting them.  But, if you are trying to decide between multiple skins that you can afford, you should skip this one.
• Sebastian - Sebastian only has one skin.  This is his Romantic skin.  You REALLY want to get this one.  Currently, it is only available as an Outland Chest pull.
• Heidi - Just don't.
• Astrid and Lucas - Her most valuable skin by far is her Romantic skin.  Her other skins offer much needed functionality, but are not as important as he Romantic skin.
• Ginger - If you're planning on using this hero, you will need all of her skins.  They don't provide as much of a stat bonus as others, but you will need them if you're serious about winning with her.
• Satori - Yes, you need his only skin.  It gives him armor, making him much harder to kill.
• Helios - Helios has fairly weak health out of the box.  His Devil skin fixes that.  If you're going to build Helios (and it should be part of your plan), you will at least need to get his Champion and Devil skins.  Buying his Romantic skin is also not a bad idea.
• Phobos - Why? Why would you?  Just why?
• Aurora - If you are going to use Aurora, stop.  You are not Ghost Warrior.  If you are Ghost Warrior, then you'll need all of her skins.
• Qing Mao - If you are using her correctly to weaken enemy armor and backing her up with a really good DPS unit like *cough* Kiera *cough* cough*, then you need to get her Phoenix skin.  The others are helpful, but not needed.
• Andvari - You need his Winter skin.  It's the only one, and you need it.
• Fox - Just keep it moving.  Skip these.  If you're seriously using Fox, then as your friend, I'm asking you to stop.
• Daredevil - You absolutely need to get her Rowdy skin.  It increases her Critical Hit Chance.  Her Romantic skin isn't needed, if you're fighting battles with her where health is a concern, you're doing it wrong.
• Mojo - I think we all know the answer to this one.
• Peppy - Peppy receives substantial benefits from her Champion skin and her Lunar skin.  If you're using her in a Cleaver team, you'll want to at least get her Lunar skin.  If you don't have Cleaver, you shouldn't be using Peppy...
• Luther - If you're serious about using Luther, then you'll need to get all of his skins.  He will not hold up without them.  If you have to choose only one, you should get his Stellar skin.  He needs the Physical Damage boost the Stellar skin gives.
• Cornelius - You'll want to get the two skins that he has available.  If you get the chance to get his Masquerade skin (event only) you should get that one too.
• Dante - Stop where you are and put Dante down.  You are making a mistake here.

There you have it people.  There are six heroes missing from this list.  This list will be updated as.  I acquire them.

Showin' Some Skin - Part 1 of 3

This question seems to come up a lot, so I figured I'd share my perspective on skins, which to get, which aren't worth it, which to get first, etc.  So, let's look at which to get first.  This list will be incomplete since I don't have all of the heroes in the game.

• K'arkh - Get the Stellar skin.  It's absolutely essential for K'arkh
• Astaroth - You need all of the skins available.  He is the best tank in the game, and he absolutely needs all of his skins to be the most effective.  If you can only get one, you absolutely without a doubt need to get his Barbarian Skin. This will boost his armor, and battles with him will be decided based on the amount of armor he has.
• Dorian - I have never seen a need for his additional skins. Dorian can stand on his own without them.
• Nebula can benefit from her Romantic Skin and her Winter Skin, but by far the most effective skin for Nebula is her Spring Skin - it gives her Dodge ability a substantial boost.  Unfortunately this skin can only be gained through Outland.  But you can buy it by saving Outland coins.
• Cleaver - Cleaver has four skins available, all of which offer him needed stats.  His Barbarian skin is  the most important.  It increases his health.  Next up would be his Masquerade skin.  He gets a crucial armor boost from it.
• Faceless - Get the Stellar Skin and his Masquerade skin.  They are both worth it.  If you can only get one, then the Masquerade skin is the one you should get for him.
• Ishmael - You have to get them all, period.  His stats have been nerfed, and the way the devs made up for it is by selling skins to fix what they took out.  The skins should be free in my opinion, but that's an issue to take up with the devs.
• Jorgen - I have not found it necessary to get and of Jorgen's skins.  That said, his creepy ass Masquerade skin will be very useful to you if you find yourself facing a lot of Satori teams.
• Maya - You will want to at least get her Champion skin, and her Romantic Skin.
• Galahad - You'r going to want to get them all.  There's no way around it.  His skins turn him into a MONSTER.
• Lars - This one is sure to draw some debate.  You can avoid Lars's Masquerade skin if you team him with Nebula.  She will provide the same functionality with her magic attack boost.  Lars absolutely needs his Cybernetic skin.  This will give him sorely needed armor.  His Devil skin can be avoided.
• Krista - She will greatly benefit from her Devil skin.
• Rufus - His skins are not needed unless you are fighting Physical teams.  If you're fighting Physical teams with Rufus, you're using him wrong.
• Celeste - You'll want to get both of her skins.
• Kai - His health is weak, his Champion skin will fix that.  His Solar skin is also worthwhile as it will boost his magic penetration, and allow more of his magic damage to get to the enemy.
• Kiera - The goal with Kiera is to have her do as much damage as possible.  Both of her skins will help in this regard.  But if you're finding yourself limited, her Winter skin is the most important.
• Jhu - As far as he is concerned, his Solar skin is going to be far more valuable than any of the others.  It boosts his Critical Hit Chance, and this will give you more mileage than any of the other skins.

That's all for part one.  We will continue down the list of heroes in part two of the series, and close with some general rules of thumb to help you decide if a skin is really worthwhile to you.

Gumballs, Pokeballs, stupid little things that won't give me Super Titan stones Drop Rates

Titan	Drop Chance	Number of Spheres Needed
Sigurd	10.95%	10
Angus	10.95%	10
Moloch	10.95%	10
Nova	10.95%	10
Vulcan	10.95%	10
Sylva	10.95%	10
Avalon	10.95%	10
Igneous	10.95%	10
Mairi	10.95%	10
Hyperion	0.5%	200
Ajar	0.5%	200
Eden	0.5%	200

For every 10 spheres you open, you should pull at least one of the Support, Marksmen, or Guardian titans. For those titans this means 30 stones.

For every 200 spheres you open, you should be able to pull at least one Super Titan.  All data I have found indicates that it doesn't matter if you open the spheres one at a time, or all at once.  Personally, I disagree with that data.  I know that I have opened 200 spheres in the last few weeks, and I have not received a Super Titan yet.  So, I'm going to try to save 200 to see what happens.  

Archaeological Expeditions

For those interested, here are the drop rates for the different items found in the different chest levels.

Artifact Chest Item Drop Rates Based on Chest Level

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
Chaos Cores	4.76%	4.76%	5.03%	4.76%	4.89%	4.82%	4.82%	4.85%	4.85%	6.34%
Artifact Coins	-	10.20%	9.43%	10.58%	10.86%	8.77%	8.77%	7.46%	7.46%	7.46%
Artifact Fragments	11.90%	10.20%	10.06%	10.58%	10.86%	9.64%	9.64%	9.32%	9.32%	7.83%
White Resources	71.43%	61.22%	40.88%	26.45%	12.5%	12.71%	12.71%	13.05%	13.05%	13.05%
Green Resources	11.90%	13.60%	18.86%	21.16%	24.25%	25.43%	25.43%	26.11%	26.11%	26.11%
Blue Resources	-	-	15.72%	15.87%	15.76%	16.66%	16.66%	16.79%	16.79%	16.79%
Purple Resources	-	-	-	10.58%	10.32%	10.96%	11.19%	11.19%	11.19%	11.19%
Orange Resources	-	-	-	-	10.32%	10.96%	11.19%	11.19%	11.19%	11.19%

0 - 25	624 White Artifact Fragments
26 - 50	1,050 Green Artifact Fragments
51 - 70	790 Blue Artifact Fragments
71 - 85	555 Violet Artifact Fragments
86 - 100	555 Orange/Gold Artifact Fragments

Meta Teams

There is often a lot of talk about META teams, but what exactly is a META team?  Basically, it is an acronym that stands for:  Most Effective Team Available.  This isn't meant to be an exhaustive list of all possible heroes/teams.  Rather, it is a starting point with the intent of giving the reader the knowledge needed to evaluate and create their own META team compositions.

So how does one create one of these fabled META teams?  A meta team starts with choosing one hero who can become an absolute Monster.  There are different forms of monsters, but for our purposes, we will group monsters into two categories: Tanks and DPS.  Healers, with the exception of Dorian Jet and Maya, will not be on this list.  Martha and Celeste are also excellent choices for any of these teams.

DPS Monsters (These are our heroes that can do over 50K damage magic or physical at maximum level):

Satori

Jhu - Jhu does not do over 50K, but his Critical Chance ability will allow him to deliver almost 60K physical damage when a critical hit lands

Helios

Orion

Ishmael - Again included due to Critical Hit Capability

Dorian

Maya

Lars

Krista

Kiera

Kai

 

Tank Monsters (Theses are our tanks with over 16K armor once fully leveled.)

Cleaver

Galahad

Ziri

Astaroth - Included because of his Last Word ability, it brings people back from the dead.

Once we have decided on a Tank and a DPS hero, we can choose the rest of our team.  For that it will be helpful to cover some effective combinations.

META Hero Combos (These are some of the best combinations you can create in this game)

Helios + Orion + Dorian

Kiera + Qing Mao + Nebula

Jhu + Sebastian + Jet

Lars + Krista

Lars + Krista + Jorgen

K'arkh + Faceless/Kai - There are some caveats here.  Kai delivers a much stronger Magic attack once he is leveled to maximum.  Faceless on the other hand, is much more versatile and can activate K'arkh's skill without using a full energy attack.

Cleaver + Peppy

Choosing a tank for any of these combinations is highly subjective.  With the exception of Galahad, the best tanks all provide increased armor with the activation of their first artifacts.  Galahad will provide increased physical attack, which makes him ideal for a physical damage based team that has heavier armor.  One final caveat in tank selection is Ziri.  She will abandon your team for a brief period of time when she buries herself to heal.  You will want a team behind her that can handle her absence.  

For support heroes, Jorgen, Nebula, Dorian, Sebastian, Jet, and Peppy*. Are our best options.

*Note that Peppy is not very useful unless she is in a Cleaver team.

Jorgen will always work better in a team that does Physical Damage due to his Blue Skill, Leper.

Nebula will be more effective in a Magic Damage team.  Her attack boost for Magic based attacks is almost twice as strong as her physical attack boost.

Dorian will be more effective in a team that specializes in physical damage.  His artifact boosts physical damage.

Jet will be most effective in a team that does Critical Damage, but he also has a place in a team with Kiera. 

Sebastian will be wasted in a team that doesn't have Critical Hit Chance.  He will only boost Critical Hit Chance for those that already have it.

With this in mind, some sample teams might be:

Cleaver+Peppy+Nebula+Jorgen+Dorian

Astaroth+K'arkh+Kai/Faceless+Jorgen+Martha/Dorian

Galahad+Qing Mao+Kiera+Jorgen+Martha/Dorian

Astaroth+Nebula+Orion+Helios+Dorian

Satori+Lars+Krista+Jorgen+Martha

Ziri+Elmir+Jhu+Jet+Sebastian

Please keep in mind that there really isn't a such thing as a "META" team.  There are many different mechanics involved here, and often times you will find that one team will not work against another due to a specific weakness, or timing issues, etc.  Also, if you don't have some of these heroes, then it does not fit the requisite of AVAILABLE.  

The Rarity Fair

The Rarity Fair can be a very good option for promoting your heroes to new color ranks.  The cost in emeralds to do this can often be less than what you would have to spend in energy to do so.  Items highlighted in yellow offer the best value.

Glyph/Stat Priority

There is an image floating around on the Hero Wars discord that suggests an order that glyphs should be leveled.  I will not be addressing the accuracy of that chart, though I will be reproducing it here:

I will say that I don't necessarily agree with everything that is written there, but if you want a simple solution that requires little effort on your part, this is a good rule of thumb.

I would add Elmir to the exceptions.  He needs to be leveled in the manner suggested for Aurora above.  As I said, I don't follow this exact guideline, but it is a good starting point.