The Banshee Gang

[rags-6094]

That would take a little explaining on my part... but I think I'll let Stormseye explain my cringing when he returns to the forums..!

[Stormseye]

my crurrent goto blocker these days, why the cringing?

Because I really love that character and every other word from my mouth is "Desert Marauder" when I message Rags.

So we have had a major shift in the high end arena and it is all do to one new character, Assassin Banshee. I have come to running two separate attack teams to deal with this ally based on the builds.

First team is designed to deal with normal builds and any Banshee build with Primordial Prisoner. Most builds use FFE/KP as their base and add Assassin Banshee/Magus Lillith or Prisoner. This set up deals with Banshee/Prisoner. Other builds are usually not an issue but if the AI wants to win, it is going to win no matter what you do. The key is surviving the initial round where you can be one-shot by FFE if you have no blocker or if your blocker is exposed.


FFE - Eternal - Protection and Power Generation for Gunner Banshee. Mostly using Earthbound to stun and generate power. I do use Hallowed Bones on any build like FFE/KD/Madam/Osiris as the heal block makes this build easy to take down. You can alternate the attacks and heal block them first then stun to ensure that Osiris does not cleanse. All the while building power and using Gunner Banshee to remove their beneficial effects.

Assassin Banshee - I have debated with Angel/Warlord/Random Green or Sustaining/Warlord/Immunity - The second setup helps against the initial round from Primordial Prisoner but leaves you vulnerable to stun later in the match. The first setup is what I am using and though you are initially "Passive Disabled" at the start of the match, it is quickly removed by the Angels and you are only susceptible to silver negative effects thereafter. The Warlord is in place to boost damage as Banshee can do a fair bit and can multiple attack. Inflicting Crave with her power move will also cause any healing builds some issues. I have had Alchemist kill the entire team with

Set - I played around with Magus in this set up but she was easily taken down the first round with the Passive Disable in place. On Set I run Shadow and Immunity. The Shadow keeps him protected during the first round so Prisoner cant disable passive and you still have a blocker though no Banshee passive until you cleanse. He also does descent damage when the Shadow set kicks in.

Gunner Banshee - Primordial Set - I could play around with her talismans but the benefit and random chance to perfect corrupt an opponent is too good. She is also great at removing effects and piercing any ally hiding behind Invincibility.

Second Team - used against Assassin Banshee/Magus Lillith. This combo can be quite troublesome no matter what the Eddie and extra ally are with them. Similar to the first build but we change out the Gunner Banshee. The goal here is to disable passive on the Magus Lillith so that you can target the Assassin Banshee directly as her passive does not protect herself.

While I had been using Sentinel Desert Marauder with Eternal talismans for this, I have found a better replacement. The Marauder was having issues putting on Disable, as the Magus would usually have regular Immunity and Perfect Immunity from the Assassin Banshee. I could remove regular with Hallowed Bones from FFE but the Perfect was a little harder to remove. Sometimes it could be removed with Darkened Void from FFE and sometimes his Fury but it was too slow. Warrior Derby Demon is far superior. Her passive will remove up to 3 beneficial effects per swing before attempting to Disable Passive for 2 turns. So she can remove Immunity THEN disable. I am still debating using Sustaining and Purge with a Strength talismans but I will continue to use Energy and Tranquility plus Strength. The reason being that I have a better chance to remove both Immunities in one swipe plus steal Energy. In addition, Derby Demon can go multiple times so if you don't get the buffs removed the first time you can try again. She is also superior in that she disables for 2 turns. Sometimes one turn is not enough to kill the Assassin Banshee if she has too many buffs or is being cleansed by Alchemist. It still takes some time to get the effect but its better than a 10 minute war of attrition against a equal build.

Bare in mind that you can use these allies as you see fit for your particular build but the Warrior Derby Demon is quite good at putting on the Disable Passive on the blocker so you can target the Assassin Banshee. Once she is removed then your team can proceed as normal. Anyway good luck fighting these builds.

[Muzzleloader]

Nice, analysis stormseye. You have put some time into this in the last few days. Am I wrong, but it seems that m lilith on my offensive team doesnt pull invincibility as much as it used to before the nerf.

[R1ck]

Devs have introduce lately some heavy hitters like KP, FFE or some talismans that help to hit very hard. It seems they wanted to introduce a different kind of blocker with Assassin Banshee. Any team without her is just finished in one turn, even with magus Lilith. Will see how devs balance things.

[Muzzleloader]

It looks like the lowly sentinal desert guardian has been elevated into the arena play. His mighty sword with passive disable is a bane to banshees.

[Natasmai]

Nice, analysis stormseye. You have put some time into this in the last few days. Am I wrong, but it seems that m lilith on my offensive team doesnt pull invincibility as much as it used to before the nerf.

I swear I never get any good buffs from the destiny on my M lilith, but the defending team ALWAYS gets the best possible. Like many times I have used an attack to remove invincibility from her and I see the buff disappear and then immediately go back on her. It is like the AI automatically gives the defending team whatever buff it is that you were just able to remove. I mean I am running the same thing, so I cant complain I guess, but M Lilith + Destiny is extremely frustrating.

[Zantarath]

It looks like the lowly sentinal desert guardian has been elevated into the arena play. His mighty sword with passive disable is a bane to banshees.

He has always been viable ever since sacrifice talisman got introduced

I’m trying running sacrifice pulse the new tower talisman once I leveled the set

[edsel]

Right on Rags, just saw your team sporting assassin Banshee. Well worth whatever you had to make happen to get her. I had opened over 160 event souls to complete the set.

[Stormseye]

I did not mention the Prisoner as a viable option to over come this build as his passive works great for the first round but is unreliable thereafter. If you have some heavy hitters it may work well but it is not 100%

Hallowed Eddie can still be good at inflicting Disable Passive and removing Immunity with Wide Arc. With the new Dominance talismans he can be a nasty opponent though Valor are still great on him too.


Alchemist - though his normal damage may not deal damage, his Doom ability will kill the enemies if you can survive long enough to have it land.

Just some afterthoughts about the build and what I have seen appearing in the last few days.

[rags-6094]

Thanks Edsel, yeah it can be a bit of a challenge sometimes snagging the character your after.... put it this way, I had 2 x spare Gunner Banshees, (their ok Stormseye but I don't rate them quite as highly as you do) 2 x spare Sentinel Banshees and an endless bunch of 3 * crap.

I do like Warrior Derby Demon but I kind of wanted to be original too, if you can't find a good passive disabler any character who can dish out Perfect corruption will do a good job too, Warrior Banshee can dish it out and stack the bleeds and grievous burns up as well, enough hits in a row from her will drop most enemies despite the blocker(not tested against ABanshee teams Yet).
W Banshees passive is good too removing offensive effects from all enemies, I use echo talisman but redemption talisman will do a good job of removing 2 x effects from all enemies at start of play...

There are many options, just a matter of putting in the effort to find them and test them, before you know it your defence will be copied...

I'm still using Set as my blocker, Stormseye can take credit for that, The good part with Set is he's more original than MLillith, and I like the shroud on his power move, the bad part is he's a multiple hitter, which would be fine except that FFE quite often sleeps his enemies after fury and Set blunders in there and wakes them all up again, it's also a pain if your trying to avoid an enemy with revenge or strike buffs.
So that leaves me with one more character on the table, good old Sentinel Desert Mafriginrauder, yeah he's good Edsel what can I say Stormseyes right...