I have been studying top HoN teams and builds while not nerd raging and crying like a little girl. As the game is being released next week, I would like to quickly become competitive with a set team. As I have said earlier (albiet while frothing at the mouth) the Shens community easily has the individual skills to play competitively, all we need is a strategy and teamwork. On a side note, the sticked thread is a little outdated and contains alot of information that will hurt your gameplay. Again, I cannot stress enough reading the guides on the HoN site.
Note: As of May 10th, pushing comps with no carries are the metagame. I'm thinking we should try a soul reaper, nymphora, pollywog, defiler as a core. Maybe run hellbringer as well?
HEALERS IN COMPS
Three healer comps are godlike. Two heals on a team is basically mandatory. The reason is this; early game survivability, midgame domination, and late game endurance. In an early lane with Demented Shaman and Soul reaper, you sure as shit aren't getting a gank off in that lane. No fucking way. Midgame is when heals peak in effectiveness, this is where healing in team fights is a deciding factor. When you've got early and midgame dominated, lategame is basically already in the bag; heals are still incredibly useful for turning a barely won teamfight in which everyone must back off and heal into a successful push.
Top tier healers- Accursed, Demented Shaman, Ophelia, and Soul Reaper. Each of these heros is omgwtfnerfthatshit when played with coordination. NOTE: You were right, Maguile. Jereziah gargles man mayonnaise and is rarely picked. It is my opinion that the ability to spam their spells, the ability to dps or heal, and the utility (see: Accursed shield/ulti purging) are king.
Accursed- Accursed is disgusting nasty due to his spammable spells. High level Accursed is almost never seen in play; he is always banned. FUCKING ALWAYS. The purge ability of his shield and his spammable nuke make him very, very powerful. His ulti makes him impossible to focus.
DShamz- Dshammerz is a great babysit, and early game healbombs will dominate a lane like no other. His shield ups survivability in leaps and bounds, and his heal/slow are quite powerful early/midgame. Late game he loses much of the utility of Accursed, but his shield and ultimate are still very strong.
Soul Reaper- Soul Reaper has a great aura, great spammable dps/heal, and great finisher ulti.
Ophelia - Even after the nerf, Ophelia is still supposedly a monster support. This is less due to her heals (although her ulti is quite potent), more due to her ability to chain stuns and gank.
Finally- Items. There are two* items that make a healer change from "good" to "fuck off and die, you're broken." Nome's Wisdom and Astrolabe. With these two items on either of the above three healers, you're looking at a massive output of healing. There is a very solid trend regarding heals: more heals = less deaths.
Note: Nome's Wisdom is getting nerfed, might not be godlike anymore.
*I am personally of the opinion that a properly dropped barrier idol is game breaking as well. 400 damage not taken is 400 damage healed.
CARRIES IN COMPS
Not all carries are created equal. Furthermore, many carries peak in effectiveness at different levels of farming. A Chronos reaches his maximum awesomeness earlier than a Sand Wraith, etc. If you plan on playing competitively, research this. Again, there's a guide on the official HoN forums.Madman has the interesting ability of being incredibly useful in every phase of the game
Now that that's been said, Hero synergy is also something that must be considered. If we run a Demented Shaman/Arachna carry build, substituting a Pestilence as our initiate could be very, very powerful. Dsham and Pestilence can put an enemy hero's armor into the negative 30's easily, and the damage numbers on Arachnas ult at that level get simply staggering (something like 50% to 100% higher than Pyromancer ult)
