Wtzky's beginners guide to Shadow Era heroes

For my next guide, I want to look at the other Human Warrior, Boris. A hero that was very strong before 1.29, slid down the ranks slightly because of the death race style of play, and is now set to make a comeback as a very solid hero choice. Read on for more

Boris Skullcrusher



Faction: Human
Class: Warrior
Tier: 1.5
Utilisation: Boris is very underused. In fact, I hardly ever see Boris in quick match at the higher levels, and I have yet to bump into him in any competitions. For the life of me, I can’t figure out why. He is still a very strong hero, and his ability is particularly useful against the onslaught of Lance’s out there, as he can destroy instantly any hasted ally that Lance is sure to bring in (especially when going second) during the early game.

Pros and Cons (explanations after table):

Pros: Very versatile play style1 Very strong support ability1 A decent card pool2 High starting health
Cons: No mass wipe ability 3 Nerf to his ability to heal and draw has hurt his ability to be tier 14

1 Boris is an interesting hero for me. Back in 1.27 he used to be everywhere, especially after he was used so well by players like RaphMajere and BlanketEffect to win the 1.27 tournament and was seen often in Quick Match play, especially at the higher levels. Back then it was common to see Aeon rife in the decks as Boris could easily play as a steady control hero. He can still do so, and can do quite well with a control style play. He can also play very well as a death race style hero, using weenies and his ability to get a very early board advantage and keep it locked down using his abilities and protectors. His ability is perfectly suited to the Human allies and being able to get out a Kris/Skullborn, Puwen/Blake, Jas/Aldon, Preist of Light/Aldon combo is made that much easier by the fact that he has his ability kick in to take out any drop that is played by the time he is ready to bring out Jas or POTL/Aldon on turn 4. His ability is made all the better by the fact that he doesn’t loose any tempo in getting allies out on the board when he uses it (ie. he doesn’t need to play a weapon like Amber to get back the board but can simply kill off whatever ally he wants on the board while playing his own ally). Thus he can quite easily get a strong weenie swarm up and running very quickly.

He can also play quite effectively as a control hero, and having his ability handy to control the board means he doesn’t lose out quite as much if he wants to play a turn 3 Blood Frenzy – a big bonus compared to all of the other Warriors, who can lose a lot of tempo by playing Blood Frenzy over an ally on turn 3. He can thus set up for power plays in later turns, such as Aeon + EP combinations, or King’s Pride + War Banner combinations. The inclusion of Ley Line Nexus and the buff to Stop Thief certainly does hurt his old King’s Pride combinations, but a smart player can still pull off some really decent moves by including a mixture of items that people will want to destroy and even by using item recursion cards.

2 I have heard a lot of people stating that the Warrior card pool is amongst the worst in the game. While I wholeheartedly agree that the addition of one card (Severed Ties) and the nerf to Blood Frenzy (from a cost of 2 resources to 3) has definitely reduced the effectiveness of the Warrior cards, there are still a lot of positives:

- Access to unilateral draw - Blood Frenzy is still one of the best draw engines in the game, hands down. On Boris it is still particularly useful as he can make use of his ability to instakill any early drop and can afford to lose some tempo by playing this card on turn 3, knowing that he can get the board back from turn 4 onwards with his ability and the extra cards he will get.
- Access to item destruction – He not only has access to Smashing Blow, but also misplaced and Ley Line Nexus. Poor quality is not even needed really, but I suppose it also can be used if you so wish. All these cards mean that Boris is never at a loss to deal with various items. He also has (as does everyone) the ability to use Severed Ties for any pesky attachments.
- Access to ally disables – Crippling blow costs 2 resources and shuts down any allies attack – particularly useful for those high damage Shadow fatties. Not only that but he also has access to Retreat!, which in my opinion is the best tempo altering card in the game, and again is extremely useful against any fatty. While Crippling Blow is at risk of being removed now with Severed Ties, it still retains some usefulness as a disable until you can remove the ally that is crippled.
- Access to heal - I’ll speak more about this later on. Unfortunately, Enrage got a huge huge nerf with the addition of Severed Ties, and is basically unplayable now. Luckily, there is still Rampage available, which does combine quite nicely with Boris’ ability to instantly kill any ally with a cost of 4 or less.
- Access to weapons/armours - Not only does he have access to weapons/armours, but she has access to the BEST weapons and armours. Not being able to buff his weapons, means that Boris tends to use armours more than say Amber or Logan, but he can still make use of cards such as Jeweler’s Dream (for the resource acceleration), Dimension Ripper (for the 2 damage and card swap) and even Beserker’s Edge (I have experimented with a solo Boris and this card is by no means useless for Boris). On the defensive side, he has Nova Infusion (now a strong card), Armour of Ages, Snow Sapphire and King’s Pride which not only protect him from a lot of damage but some of them have the best extra effects in the game. King’s Pride can especially hurt when combined with aldon/war banner for some ridiculous damage from allies that only cost 1-3! If you have a war banner/King’s Pride/aldon combo down (not easy, but it is an example) you can theoretically do 20 damage with your four Kris’ and even more when you use the Retreat! combo. Add to that the addition of all of the armours such Mocking Armour or Legion United (which afford protection to both Boris and more importantly, his allies), and you can easily see why Warriors have the best weapons/armours.
- Access to resource acceleration - Jeweler’s Dream gives him a healthy advantage in terms of the number of cards he can play per turn.
- Access to card modifiers - Some great cards are available for him to use. War Banner makes Kris a scary prospect when combined with Aldon. Warrior Training can give you even more protectors (not that it’s really needed), Reserve Weapon provides extra damage for your weapons and Valiant Defender protects your weenies from those pesky Logans and Lances. He also has access to some of the human modifiers that may help, like Good Ascendant (useful against Darkclaw) and Shrine of Negatia. All in all there is no shortage of great cards to add to your deck.

As you can see, Boris certainly has a lot of good cards at his disposal, and suffers slightly less from the Blood Frenzy nerf as all of the other Warriors.

3 To be honest, this isn’t much of a downside. I included it because it IS technically a con, but hardly ‘make or break’. He really doesn’t need a board wipe with how good his card pool and ability can be.

4 This is one of the biggest issues for Warriors now. Enrage is now, in my opinion, an almost completely useless card because of how easily it can be removed by Severed Ties, and how damaging that is. I smile to myself every time an opponent plays Enrage against me, knowing that I can hold on to a Severed Ties and at the right moment, play it for an instant 10 damage hit. This is such a powerful play, because you can often get a Warrior down to the teens with Enrage on (especially if they use Blood Frenzy and Rusty Longsword) without much drama, and once you do, a simple Severed Ties will get them into an area where they can die in one hit (Kris + Retreat/Damage modifier anyone?). In fact, you only really have to get them down to 11 health with enrage on to kill them in one shot if they also runs Blood Frenzy (which almost all Warriors will), as on the next turn they will take 1 extra damage.

Rampage is now a much, much better option, and even there the heal is conditional. It does work quite nicely with Boris’ ability to instakill any low cost ally however, and the extra heal can be life saving.