After playing some matches in a group with the new matchmaking system in place, I can see where the meta game is going. All heroes currently in the game have some way to save themselves from a spike of damage except for Aessa, who can save someone else from a spike, and Volrik, who can force someone to blow a save. At the highest level of play, the game will resolve around forcing a save to be used, or using CC to prevent the save, and then spiking someone down while the save is on cool down or disabled.
This warband is built around having a hard spike every 10 seconds. It’s melee heavy, with Ilanya as the ranged focus. Ilanya calls the targets since she needs 7 seconds to set up her burst. This group has a lot of crowd control, so Volrik will not be needed. It’s going to use crowd control to prevent the save rather than pressure to draw out the save early.
The heroes for this warband are Olwyn, Bax, Drulg, Ilanya, and 2 Glowgobs. The idea is coordinate a Word of Pain + Gloomburst from Ilanya with a knockdown from Olwyn or Bax, Tenderizer from Drulg, I’m Da Biggest! from Bax and Vengeful Strike from Olwyn. This is about 1200 damage and will kill anyone almost instantly unless a save is blown or Aessa dodges a couple things.
For Olwyn, Relentless is a must. One of the key ways to stop this group to make sure the knockdown doesn’t happen. With Relentless, there’s no way she’s going to lose her target once she’s on it without someone blowing a knockdown or stagger on her. With that in mind, Relentless, Proficiency, and Balance is a good Mastery for her. Empowered Strikes also helps the damage a little bit. Combine Empowered Strikes and Grudges Repaid to make Vengeful Strike hit really hard. Relentless, Empowered Strikes, and Grudges Repaid is good for this group too.
Bax is around for his knockdown and his heavy burst from I’m Da Biggest! Honestly, just about anything will work for Mastery in this group. I’d focus on CC reduction and survival. Grim Pragmatism adds a nice bit of finishing power to I’m Da Biggest!, so that’s a good option too. An’ Stay Down is also useful if you find opponents that slot Proficiency. Rapidity is also good for helping close distance.
Drulg needs to get his Tenderizer cool down below 10 seconds. To do this, we need to take Nice an’ Tender and Endless Knowledge. The last Mastery can either be Grim Pragmatism or something to help him survive, like Strong Gut or Desperation.
Ilanya should be absolute glass for this group. Ideal mastery would be Perfect Assault, Overwhelming Force and Doomburst, but that’s not realistic for most players. With all the crowd control on the frontline, she should be relatively safe. Power of Darkness should likely be saved to escape from the Ikkriks that will almost certainly be going behind the frontline to assassinate her, especially if Ikkrik is free that week.
Glowgob, in addition to providing healing, also provides burst support. Glory is an amazing perk for forcing a kill. It can give the damage to push through even the Temerity and Desperation stacking tanks on the field. An’ We Means It! is also key to this group. ‘Ere We Go! adds a percentage of damage dealt by nearby allies to every target the allies hit. That just pushes the spike even higher. The 3rd mastery should likely be something for survival.
This is best done in voice communication of course. Ilanya will place Word of Pain on the target and stack Impending Doom as fast as possible. When the Word of Pain is less than 2 seconds away, the target is knocked down and everyone drops their big attack on that target. Ideally, the damage abilities should all land within a quarter second of the Word of Pain and Gloomburst spike. Drulg can use his silence to prevent healing from being cast while this is happening to make this even more deadly.