Guide last updated on 10-10-2013
Latest additions: 8. What are these HoL glads I have heard and read about?
Please Note: This guide contains my personal opinions about wars so feel free to ignore anything written in the following guide, I misplaced the previous war guidein progress I had so I ripped Cynaidh’s rage guide as an example for the style this guide is written in.
1. What is a War?
The War specialty can carry the heaviest armour in all of the great realm and is made for tanking hits from your opponent whilst either dealing them adequate damage or making them run out of endurance.
2. What stats are good for a War?
Attributes also called Stats affect skills to a certain extend. This section gives you a basic idea on the stats you should be looking for for your fresh war and what stats you should be looking for as the equipment attributes in the future.
Attribute allocation in the war tree excluding weapon skill:
Strength: 12 (all skills in the war tree)
Intelligence: 6
Agility: 4
Stamina: 7
Size: 3
Presence: 1
Chi: 0
By looking at this we can see that Strength, Stamina and Intelligence are very important stats for Wars. But we also have to consider the other stats for other reasons besides skills: Chi affects no war skills BUT it also effects how often your war will crit his opponents. Wars have the least activated attacks of all the specialties so making sure they are either hitting hard or tanking the opponent is very important, this does not only make Chi good for offensive gladiators but also for defensive gladiators wanting to get some hits in rather than standing on the sands whilst getting stuff thrown at him and getting slammed into the wall by the enforcer (This will be explained later in the guide). Agility is a factor in how many attacks per round you get so the more the better since wars make a limited amount of attacks you will want to do the most you can while still hitting fairly hard. Stamina increases both your hit points and your endurance during a fight (a low stamina can be mitigated some by using the Urk race, as it gives an endurance boost). Presence is used for helping to attack first in each round (initiative) and helps your gladiator both kill other gladiators and be saved by the enforcer when someone is trying to finish your gladiator off.
Last but certainly not least is the size stat, Size although only mentioned 3 times in the skilltree is of a huge significance for war gladiator as a bigger size allows them to carry heavier armour while staying reasonably encumbered. Since you are using a war gladiator you will want to utilise as much of the heavy armour as possible, heavy armour really is HEAVY armour the grey medium armour from the armoury has a total weight of 61.8 excluding weapons while a full heavy armour weighs at a total of 115.5 without weapons. No need to be a wizkid to see that is A LOT heavier.
By taking all of this information in I place the stats into 3 groups of importance:
Group A: Size, Strength, Stamina, Agility
Group B: Chi, Intellect
Group C: Presence
This is the order of stats I look for in a slave to determine if it will make a good war.
The war tree itself however is only really viable when you run defensive war, when you run an offensive war you will want to branch out with some skills to either the Theatrics skilltree or the Rage skilltree. These gladiators are often referred to as Hybrid slaves.
There are 5 skills you can obtain from the other skilltrees no matter what speciality you are. These skills are Feint, Called Shot, Crowd Pleaser, Gratuitous Violence and Hamstring from the Theatrics tree and Devastating Power, Barreling Attack, Blood Drunk, Brute Force and Adrenaline Rush from the rage tree
The list of attributes in these trees skills is as follows:
Theatrics:
Strength: 1
Intelligence: 4
Agility: 5 (all in the theatrics tree)
Stamina: 0
Size: 0
Presence: 4
Chi: 0
Rage:
Strength: 5 (all skills in the rage tree)
Intelligence: 0
Agility: 0
Stamina: 2
Size: 3
Presence: 0
Chi: 5 (all skills in the rage tree)
Looking at these you have probably noticed a huge difference, theatrics –war hybrids make a lot more use of agility, int and presence compared to the Strength, Stamina, Size, Chi using rage hybrids. This is a great indication of what you will want to be building towards/looking for when selecting/raising your gladiator.
There are 2 different kind of gladiators out there, Normal gladiators outof which the strong ones cost between 950 and 1040ish and premium slaves also known as HOL slaves. Premium slaves are obtained by sending a normal or premium slave that had a good run to his retirement.
What I generally look for in wars in terms of attributes varies with the war I want but it's usually a checklist like this:
For normal gladiators:
Is the size of the gladiator 75 size or above?
Yes: continue looking at the other attributes to decide if he's worthy, No: stop thinking about making it into a war(72-74 being taken into consideration depending on the rest of the attributes)
Does it have either 70+ Strength or Agility?
Yes: continue to look at the other stats, No: Stop (again as with size if the str/agi is 67-69 it may be considered)
Does it have 65+ stamina?
Yes: continue No: stop
What are the stats on the presence, intellect and chi?
What I look for here isn't asmuch as an actual number but more like how high they are Chi being preferably higher compared ot presence and these 2 don't really factor much into picking a war gladiator. Intellect I prefer having atleast above 60, preferably at 70
For Premium slaves I am way more picky ofcourse, the price for these monsters as I have seen it can go up to 1145 gold but possibly way higher and they can have attributes like 4 in 80+ 2 being 70+ and 1 being in the 90+ and so on. Long story short: Theyre strong.
As aforementioned they can be obtained by retiring a gladiator that has done well in the game. The requirements your gladiator has to have completed are as follows:
The gladiator must have reached the Primus Bracket
The gladiator must be level 50 or higher
The gladiator must have a total of 1000 fights or more
The gladiator must not be fighting in the bloodgames
The gladiators winrate must be over 53% (This particular winrate requirement becomes lower as your gladiator has more fights meaning if your gladiator keeps up a 50% winrate he/she could eventually retire albeit later than a gladiator with a 55% winrate).
At the end of the guide there is a better explanation about Premium slaves and retirement of gladiators.
Now as for the requirements I have for my Premium slave wars. The same checklist applies however with increased numbers
Is the size above 85? Yes: continue No: stop
Is the strength or agility 80 or above? Yes: continue No: stop
Is the Stamina 75 or above? Yes: continue No: stop
How does the presence, chi and intellect correspond with the other 4 attributes?
Same rule as before applies, Intellect preferably at 70+ (shouldn't be a problem for most premium slaves) 70+ for presence and if possible but not necessary Chi at 80+
In addition to these I have the policy not to consider a gladiator under the cost of 1100 gold however this is just me setting the bar rather high for myself
3. What races are good for a War?
Technically speaking all races are viable for wars aslong as you center your build and strategies around it. Race, Build, Attributes and Strategy all contribute towards the success (or demise) of a gladiator. My favourite races for wars consist mainly out of Dunders, Spites and Elaars depending on the gladiators type (more of these in the next chapter)
4. What types of Wars are there?
Too many to count! But most wars fall into 1 of 3 categories: Offensive Agility based War, Offensive Strength based War, Defensive War .
Offensive Agility based War – These are the wars that had a high agility and normally use either blades or pole arms as weapons to take advantage of their high agility. They get more attacks per round than any other type of war. I prefer the Elaaran race for this type of glad because 1 of it's racial benefits is armour penetration which enables you to pierce through heavy armour more often.
Offensive Strength based War – These are the wars who either duel wield axes/maces or 2 Handed weapons with large strength scores. Landing fewer attacks per round then a Agility based War but doing much more damage per hit in general. Often I favour the Dunderan race for this as the race gives a bonus to damage.
Defensive War – These are probably the trickiest Wars to properly master as it is with most defensive glads. Under defensive war any war that has his strategy based around parrying hits is included however the main thing that comes to mind when saying defensive War is ofcourse the one carrying either a sword or an axe/mace along with a shield. Their purpose is to take/parry hits as they deal damage or last long enough for the opponent to run out of endurance. I prefer spites for this type of glad because they get a boost to their defense.