Korean Atlantica Online Titan Final April 17th, 2009 : Atlantica Online General Discussions

Korean Atlantica Online Titan Final April 17th, 2009










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Description:

A long and close match between Axe main focused on single target/column damage (Pirate) and the Musician main from last week's final running duo monk with a BT still but no Elementalist and still no healer.

Players Stats:


Formation Breakdown:
Left side Axe main:

Front:

A standard front line formation using four melee with a Pirate. Pirate is considered the weakest melee so in order to protect her, he decided to expose his Exorcist in the front row. Thankfully, the other team does not feature Silence or Lightning Spear, so this isn't too big of an issue.

Mid:

Having a Shaman in the 2nd row has been standard since the beginning, letting her take some splash column damage so she can cast Noble before any other mercs die. Remember Noble was nerfed recently, so it will only last two turns. Personally I value the Inventor more than Jani so having an Inventor in the 2nd row instead of Jani is questionable. And again, no silence from the other team allows a comfortable 2nd row Pirate (she's not much use while Silenced).

Back:

An Archer, even with Dark Archer upgrade, is still the weakest ranged merc by far. Hiding her in 3rd row will keep her alive to score the critical Silence late game as well as preventing a hole in your own formation if she goes down. The Monk is a given and Jani might have been more effective if switched places with Inventor.

Right side Musician main:

Front:

Running a Viking and a Spartan is very common, however having a BT center is something you don't see often. But since this is the 2nd time he made it to finals with this lineup, we can only conclude that it works. Again he is taking advantage of the opponents lack of Swords and LK, so he let his low mdef mercs sit in the front row - this might prove to be a critical mistake against his opponent, who is using a Pirate.

Mid:

A ranged main is very solid the 2nd line along with the standard 2nd liner Cannoneer, howeverl choice to use an Exo in the 2nd line is unusual. The other team is also using an Archer but I suppose he isn't worried about lack of AP on his monk since he has two.

Back:

Spotting two Monks, this doesn't leave many options for another select merc in the backline. He chooses to leave his precious Inventor in the back because of how overwhelming stuns can get during the later turns. There is a huge chance that the decision of using 2 Monks came from last week's brutal defeat in the hands of the Spear main running absolute AP shutdown with a single Monk.

Match Breakdown:

The biggest advantage of having two Monks is to counter low damage based stun teams and low damage based AoE teams. However the Axe main is running neither, a focus fire team might just be what it takes to bring home the trophy.

Soon as the match starts, it was clear that the Axe side had decided to focus on the weak yet important merc. A Viking, even with the Northern upgrade,is still very sad in terms of AP regeneration. If he's hit by the Pirate's Toxic Sword (which takes off quite a huge chunk of AP per turn) he will have little hopes in casting Ice Ridge in the next four turns.

Noticing this, the Musician immediately take advantage of the power of two Monks. On just turn two, he managed to both awaken the two paired Vikings, as well as putting up protective HG on front row. This is very big against most teams that focus on attacking front row mercs as a defending merc with HG is very hard to take down.

Both teams also pulled out Summon Machine on turn two, as it looks like they both planned on winning the mid game with the sacrifice of early combo advantage.

Axe makes a nice play on turn three, War Cry on both monks instead of aiming for Cannoneer and Main. With War Cry lasting seven turns, it will be the difference maker due to the lack of healer on the other team, especially if they are not removed by HG or Purification Scrolls.

Taking further advantage of the lack of preempted purification, Silence was added to the mix to stop spells and Speed Cast on 2nd row.

Musician was able to toss out Ice Ridge on frontrow without Mana Seal due to his ability to combo both front and back, making HG a risky option.

At this point both sides have already started aggressively scrolling as well as scroll canceling, any scroll that goes off uninterrupted will provide a huge lead for it's team.

Axe main makes yet another big move here, knowing that if frontrow was left frozen, he'll most likely fall behind for the rest of the fight - he decides to HG front row even if it means opening the Monk for a stun. This was only viable because he have awakened his main - whom can use Stimulant to awaken the Monk provided the main wasn't stunned too.

Sure enough the next couple turns went just as planned, Musician spends quite a few moves on putting up combo on back and also uses the precious mana seal even when front row has no combo nor frozen.

The tide of battle turns here as Axe pulls off the Mana Seal and Freezing Axe combo while focusing further damage on the frontline target without HG, Viking.

The risk pays off on turn six. Even with monk stunned Axe has full five turns, spending one to Stimulant on the Monk and another couple to awaken the rest of the team he has recovered fully from his aggressive 2 turns play for the price of just one turn.

Musician now face a team with zero combo and is at quite the disadvantage due to lack of healer. He attempts another Ice Ridge without Mana Seal hoping to fully stun the opposing team this time around.

Not falling for the same trick twice, Axe plays it safe with awaken, a beautiful situation was created: Viking at 2/5 the life and bleed damage is starting. He goes for it and cast the most powerful single target attack - Blood Vengeance on opposing Viking in hopes to create a hole in enemy formation and thus destroying the duo monk advantage.

It works, as the Viking falls so did the chance of winning for Musician. With the opposing Archer still high in life, it's now very easy to Silence the back row Monks and finish the game. In a desperation, Musician decides to awaken and HG back row to prevent the game winning Silence on his Monks. The cost of this move is heavy as without Speed Cast on the Monks, they're not very likely to have enough AP for another HG. He ends the round with a poorly timed Mana Seal, this shows how much he was shaken by the unexpected death of his Viking.

Axe main goes for the win on round eight. A Guard Dispel effectively prevents two turns of HG healing and the addition of War Cry further re-enforces the pressure. 1st place is almost secured with a Noble coming up on the following turn.

Not able to do much, Musician pokes awhile in hopes of a miracle.

At this point I'm convinced the Axe main has a fetish for his Jani. Not only did he puts him in front of his Inventor, he even risk his trump card - Silence to the mid row instead. The Musician in a desperate attempt, tries to avoid back row Silence by casting Madness on the Archer, it bought him a turn only to be Mana Seal.

The fight is officially over when Axe main lands the final Freezing Axe. Although it does seem quite close due to the timer, it was just a matter of another turn before all of Musician's mercs go down.

This was a great finals match. Many big plays were made and both players demonstrated skillful usage of abilities and items.

Author: mabiguru@gmail.com (Zpirit)
Category: frontpage
Publish Date: Tue, 21 Apr 2009 08:10:21 +0000
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