Mini-Guide: Choosing your starting hero

[StrayDogStrut]

This is a mini-guide for new players, who are staring at the "Choose a Hero for your free starter deck" screen and trying to decide what to do. I'm writing it because my friend just called me to with the same questions I had when I first began... and I couldn't find a post with the answers.

To begin with, there is no "best" hero, and don't get worried if you chose something I didn't recommend. Although some heroes are a little easier to get rolling with, none of this will matter if you stick with the game very long.

This list was compiled for Shadow Era version 1.26. These are only my opinions, and if you scroll down I'm sure you'll find several useful posts with different ideas.

Recommended Starter Heroes:

• Eldawen Frostmire - Human Mage
• Boris Skullcrusher - Human Warrior

Both Boris and Eldawen have excellent and straightforward-to-use abilities, and both are considered competitive at high levels of play. Their decks feature a fair number of "keeper" cards, which will remain useful for a long time.

Competitive decks featuring Eldawen tend to be inexpensive, because they require relatively few "rare" cards, so if I had to recommend one it would be her.


Also Good Starting Heroes:

• Lance Shadowstalker - Human Rogue
• Nishaven - Human Mage

You won't go wrong with either of these. Nishaven has the same cards as Eldawen, but fails to make the top list because of his somewhat niche playstyle. Lance is fun to play and has a good set of starting rogue cards, but rogues are considered a bit underpowered at the moment. His deck relies heavily on the ambush and stealth mechanics, which may be hard to for new players to make the best use of.


Average Starting Heroes:

• Jericho Spellbane - Human Priest
• Zhanna Mist - Human Priest
• Serena Thoughtripper - Human Rogue

Both human priests ended up in this bucket for the same reasons... their starting decks are playable and both heroes are excellent in the long run. However, competitive priest decks rely heavily on a rare and expensive card called "Wizent's Staff". This staff also significantly changes their playstyle.

Serena suffers from the same issues as Lance, but imo is a bit harder to use. She needs to have a weapon equipped to use her ability, and you only get two in the starter deck. Luckily, she can make use of the cheap "Throwing Dagger" weapon, so take some of your starting gold and buy two more copies.


Not Recommended

• Gwenneth Truesight - Human Hunter
• Amber Rain - Human Warrior

These heroes have abilities which are useless without an equipped weapon, and you won't get any in the starter deck. The weapons they need are rare and expensive... it's common for a Gwen deck to have 6,000+ gold just in armor and weapon cards. That being said, both heroes are very strong in competition.


Someone has to be last

• Victor Heartstriker - Human Hunter

There's currently no good reason to choose Victor over Gwen.


I've picked a hero, now what do i do?
You're all set... go to the "world" tab and play against the AI to get a feel for the game.

Once you come up with more questions, go read Everything you need to start playing Shadow Era successfuly.

[StrayDogStrut]

Reserved (for what I don't know)

[Raphael Majere]

This is a good read. Highly Recommended. Excellent.

If there was a first choice, I would go with Boris. Esp, if grinding against AI.

A few reasons:

1. Starting gold - buy an aldon and it becomes easier to win against AI.
2. Blood frenzy and War Banners, extra Enrage are cheap and really good. (esp BF and Enrage)

Other tips for beginners playing against AI using boris.

1. Never sell allies unless you are sure. U need allies to deal dmg and win...(duh)
2. Have at least up to 3 puwens and 3 Blakes.
4. 4 Blood Frenzy in a 30 card deck.
3. 2 or 3 War banners
4. rem: 30 card deck against AI.

[Lahiri]

I started with Eladwen and I'm sure it's been a good choice.
With her you get weenies (blake, puwen) and burn spells (Fireball, Lightning Strike) which are the cards you want in this deck.
I've also bought Gwen's starter deck but it is very weak if confronted with Eladwen and if you.want a competitive Gwen you need to buy a lot of new expensive cards

[Raphael Majere]

Portal with Eladwen. not bad. Portalled Raven, or t6 portal + Puwen/Blake - Mini- FB

[Stefi]

good work! Thanks a lot!

[Lahiri]

Portal with Eladwen. not bad. Portalled Raven, or t6 portal + Puwen/Blake - Mini- FB

It doesn't fit my playstile... but it could work

[squishyvillian]

nice post. good info for new players. will recommend +1

[The Witch Doctor]

I don't really agree.
I think a new player should start with what ever deck he feels comfortable with. I started with Amber and wasn't disappointed at all. Winning against the computer was not so challenging and not having the weapons was a real incentive to try and get more money by any ways.
I like challenges and I think going for what you like should be the right way to chose your starter. If you are not sure, just reset your account and try other starters!
However the topic is interesting as to know the level of difficulty you are setting at the beginning. But you can catch up quite fast and the starter doesn't make it all...

[kentuequi]

Really good thread, a lot of new players ask about which hero to choose, and this thread is the best answer.

I only disagree about serena, which is really unplayable in a competitive way IMO, and can only deceive the player after some games in PvP.