Crash of the Titans Cycle 4: Star-Lord

jojeda654

5/3/5 at 170. I currently have 2 covers expiring in 4 days, but I only have 25k iso.

Previous Runs

• Cycle 1 (2015-10-30)
• Cycle 2 (2016-02-12)
• Cycle 3 (2016-06-26)

Black Duke

BlackBoltRocks wrote:

My lv270 Starlord is ready to go after punching Thanos into oblivion

I guess that Gamora will be his opponent again.

I barely made it with my level 130 5/3/4 SL last time but now he´s is my highest 4* champion at level 282 (3/5/5). Due to his recent rework I´m pretty sure that this crash will be a lot of easier than before.

Rick_OShay

We know it is vs Thanos? Why would be be up against Gamora? She was the opponent last run?
So we let him get green so that we get our yellow working. Then be sure to have our purple ready to over-write his CD before it goes off. Hopefully two purples saved up if possible so that we have more of our own CD's to fuel our red at least twice in a row.
Thinking Star-Lord at 4/1/5 level 146 will be able to do it, but I'm ready to head up to lvl 200 if needed.

Smudge

Rick OShay wrote:

We know it is vs Thanos? Why would be be up against Gamora? She was the opponent last run?

Thanos was only the opponent in the Crash of the Mad Titan. It has been Gamora in every DDQ Crash for Star-Lord. No reason to suspect they'll change that.

I don't remember my last attempt at this, but I think it ended in failure. Re-worked Star-Lord should be able to handle her, but there's no way we can rely on his yellow this time. If you have him champed, you will want to re-spec to 5/3/5 and focus on gathering red/purple and denying black.

Her black will hurt as always (and use up all the yellow on the board), you want red for punching, and her green will stun you and prevent you from placing any yellow CDs in the first place.

Now that I think about/write that, Gamora is pretty much the perfect counter for Star-Lord! Mine is champed somewhere around level 274, so I should be able to handle this one.

carrion_pigeons

What shot does a 1/0/1 have, do you think? Is it a 1% chance, or a one in a million kind of thing?

Very recently got his cover out of daily resupply. Star-Lord has been my unicorn for so long...

ClydeFrog76

carrion pigeons wrote:

What shot does a 1/0/1 have, do you think? Is it a 1% chance, or a one in a million kind of thing?

Very recently got his cover out of daily resupply. Star-Lord has been my unicorn for so long...

Match damage alone will make short work of him, I'd say.

Mine's at 209, 5/2/3, so I'm hoping to have a shot.

Cousin Simpson

carrion pigeons wrote:

What shot does a 1/0/1 have, do you think? Is it a 1% chance, or a one in a million kind of thing?

Even with his buff, I doubt you'd have enough health to survive long enough to fire your powers, and at one cover each, they probably would barely scratch Gamora.

For reference, pre-buff records:

Level 100, 2/1/2 by CT1888; 3 attempts with +2r/y, +50%r/y, +100% all
Level 168, 5/0/2 by Vhailorx

Smudge

Agreed, save your boosts carrion pigeons. Gamora is too fast and will burn through a level 78's health pool too quickly for you to even think about it. 1/0/1 is pretty much a no-go match-up for anyone regardless of powers or opponent (unless one of those powers grants invisibility, huge amounts of stun/airborne for cheap ala Nova, or you pray super hard to the cascade gods with max damage boosts and a lot of luck).

With Star-Lord, it's even worse. The only power she can fire that doesn't block your yellow from firing (which you don't have anyway) does 2k damage a pop for 5 AP, and Star-Lord doesn't have one of the tanky health pools; he'll be at, what, 4.3k life at level 78? 4.6k? Even just matching single match-3s on her strong colors will down you in a few turns.

Anon

Lvl 117 3/5/5.

Think that'll be enough? Or should I pour ISO into him?

Tatercat

ClydeFrog76 wrote:

Mine's at 209, 5/2/3, so I'm hoping to have a shot.

You should, I was able to beat the crash with a lvl 200 Starlord and that was before the update to him. I had a 5/3/4 then though , so it may take you a few tries (it did me), but its definitely doable.

I just champed SL last week finally, so I’m hoping this is a smooth fight this time. Got him currently at 3/5/5.

Cousin Simpson

Anon wrote:

Lvl 117 3/5/5.

Think that'll be enough? Or should I pour ISO into him?

Those are ideal covers, and you'll certainly have a chance. How much health does he have? How much damage does his red do at his current level? Answering those questions with some quick math will probably tell you whether or not to level him up.

stochasticism

Starlord was one of the Crashes that was supposed to be made easier, so there's a chance it is not Gamora, or they make it so she has fewer covers. Will be interesting to see what they do as this was one of the 2 or 3 hardest matchups before.

Anon

Cousin Simpson wrote:

Anon wrote:

Lvl 117 3/5/5.

Think that'll be enough? Or should I pour ISO into him?

Those are ideal covers, and you'll certainly have a chance. How much health does he have? How much damage does his red do at his current level? Answering those questions with some quick math will probably tell you whether or not to level him up.

6171 Health. 1980 + 832 Damage. The damage is nice but the health has me worried.

Black Duke

Anon wrote:

Cousin Simpson wrote:

Anon wrote:

Lvl 117 3/5/5.

Think that'll be enough? Or should I pour ISO into him?

Those are ideal covers, and you'll certainly have a chance. How much health does he have? How much damage does his red do at his current level? Answering those questions with some quick math will probably tell you whether or not to level him up.

6171 Health. 1980 + 832 Damage. The damage is nice but the health has me worried.

This may be a bit too low. Gamora is a damage-dealer on drugs in this crash, when she've enough red or black AP you are doomed due to SL's low health (I speak from personal experience). If possible, I would hold a smidgen of ISO back to level him up to 130 or 140.

Smudge

Cousin Simpson wrote:

Anon wrote:

Lvl 117 3/5/5.

Think that'll be enough? Or should I pour ISO into him?

Those are ideal covers, and you'll certainly have a chance. How much health does he have? How much damage does his red do at his current level? Answering those questions with some quick math will probably tell you whether or not to level him up.

I strongly disagree with 3/5/5 being ideal in a 1v1 fight. For standard play, yes, he's a demigod at 3/5/5 (he, Black Panther, and Iron Fist cut through the Strange PvE like a hot knife through butter), but especially against Gamora 1v1, you should be running him 5/3/5.

Reasoning:
1. 3/5/5 only lets you reduce your purple cost by 2, which doesn't add much. That still requires you to make 3 matches assuming you aren't using AP boosts. You're better off using +1 purple and running yellow at 3 covers, and if you're going to add +2 purple boosts, just save up for 6 purple matches to maximize your red.
2. If Gamora fires black, you're in bad shape anyway from the match damage, but she will clog pretty much all of the yellow tiles with her black, so you won't see any benefit from your yellow anyway. You need 9 or more yellows on the board; it's possible since neither you nor her will prioritize yellow, but we know how fickle RNG can be with boards.
3. If Gamora fires green, you won't get a yellow CD tile. You're stunned.
4. Relying on Gamora to fuel your yellow is relying on her to dish out ~2k damage to you or eat you alive with match damage after she floods the field with strikes. This is a recipe for disaster, especially if you haven't collected all of the AP you need, because your CDs don't last long, and you're only going to get one out of the deal (maybe two if she uses red and black, but that might be game over).

Running Star-Lord 5/3/5 gives you a much better chance of maximizing damage output:
1. My level 275 champion will be doing 4500 damage assuming all of his purple CDs go off.
2. You generate CD tiles much more reliably with your purple than with your yellow; you can use it when you're ready to unload on her rather than relying on her to prime your punch for you.
3. If she does get her black to activate, you can overwrite more of her strikes to mitigate the damage.

This fight is already a tricky one with the minimal overlap, but I don't think Star-Lord's yellow is going to be the key to victory. Purple into red is much more likely to get you somewhere. His yellow reduces your red at 3 covers, which is ultimately what you need. Getting the purple power cost boost and one extra random AP at 5 yellow is only so-so.

Now... to Anon... I agree with Black Duke. 6171 HP won't get you far against Gamora. Her red is cheap and difficult to prevent, especially when you also need to focus on denying black and green. You should be able to still win with a 3/5/5 build, but I'd level him up a bit more to maybe 140 if he isn't a champion priority (he should be imo!), and you'll need boosts to tackle her.

Anon

Yeah I think I would've preferred 5/3/5, but that's simply how the covers fell. I already leveled him to 134 and after DDQ tomorrow I should have enough Iso to boost him a couple more levels.

As for champing Star Lord, I will get to it eventually. I have Red Hulk at 257 and after that was planning on leveling Professor X. I would LOVE to finally champ Jean Grey and Hulkbuster, but they've been stuck in RNG limbo for like a year. I'm not kidding. My Teen Grey has been stuck at 250 since like March. She could be 17/4/3 now.

So yeah. Red Hulk, then maybe Professor X and then I'm not sure.

metallion

4/5/4 lvl 268 no boosts first try. So much easier than the previous run. I actually think Gamora's red being so cheap really helps, as she can just throw those reds out quickly and I won't be in a shortage of CDs to take advantage of my own red.
Downed her pretty quickly with 2 reds, each time after she used her red and I threw down my own CDs with purple. Just needed to deny black as I couldn't even feel much of the effects of green.

Got a 5trange for my efforts, which I'm happy with.

sambrookjm

Got it on the second try with a Champed Star Lord at LVL 277, respeced to 5/3/5. First time I tried with no boosts, and it went about as badly as you could expect. Gamora's first four matches were green for a very fast Skull Cracker. Shortly thereafter, she reached 12 black, and turned every yellow tile on the board into a strike. Star Lord did about 2K damage to her before getting destroyed.

Second time through was just the opposite: +2 Red/Yellow, +2 Purple, and +2 All AP. I was rewarded with a far more friendly board for Star Lord. She used her red, which gave me a countdown tile. One purple and two red activations later, the Legendary Token gives me a for another Champ level.

sambrookjm

Anon wrote:

As for champing Star Lord, I will get to it eventually. I have Red Hulk at 257 and after that was planning on leveling Professor X. I would LOVE to finally champ Jean Grey and Hulkbuster, but they've been stuck in RNG limbo for like a year. I'm not kidding. My Teen Grey has been stuck at 250 since like March. She could be 17/4/3 now.

So yeah. Red Hulk, then maybe Professor X and then I'm not sure.

As someone who had a 2/14/4 Nick Fury, I can sympathize with your problem. At the risk of threadjacking, this is one of the cases I'd suggest saving up 120 CP to Champ her. Jean Grey's one of the best 4-stars out there. I'd champ her before Prof X or Star Lord.

Xzasxz

5/2/2 - feels like not even worth trying.

madsalad

I won with my 5/3/5 champed SL on 2nd try, but just barely. I also do not remember getting any countdown tiles from Gamora launching her Red or Black power. Did anyone else notice this? It would have been helpful to reduce my costs along the way.

hmmmm... It is possible she fired Razor's Edge after she fired Bad Reputation which, in that case, there would be no yellow tiles open for a CD tile. not sure.