Beside the common issue - lack of mobily, which is probably the biggest problem you are facing in co-op when playing this commander, I would like to discuss Alarak (hero unit).
Ascendants and mech play are both viable and pretty strong. However, I would like to see one more option, especially on fast maps (LL, VT or RTK), based on Alarak + supplicants only. This would require some changes and minor buffs to Alarak hero unit, which would bring him closer to Nova or Kerrigan hero units and made him stronger in mid-game, but didnt break early game or late game. My ideas:
1/ Changing his first mastery to +30 attack damage AND +30% attack speed (full mastery).
2/ Reducing Alarak deadly charge from 10 seconds to 8 seconds
3/ Adding one more Alarak upgrade in Forge, allowing him to store up to 3 charges of deadly charge.
In my opinion, these small changes would make the gameplay much more interesting in mid game, without breaking the early game / late game.
Mmm… I dunno how I feel about this one. I feel like his attack speed isn’t much of an issue, considering that you have Charge and Wave to help deal boat loads of damage.
I would be more than happy with this change. Faster Deadly Charge would benefit Alarak for sniping key ground units.
This, I don’t entirely agree with. That’s an immediate 600 damage worth of casts. At that point, I’d rather have Alarak be able to manually eat Supplicants.
Blink Slayers is a very fast option if you don’t want to go Robo or Ascendants. The double damage they get on Blink is very powerful, especially against Armored targets.
I mostly play mass slayers. I know they are fast to ramp up and very strong. However, I wlould like to see more options for Alarak. 600 dmg with “triple tap” dealy charge seems like a lot on paper (and it is), but comparing to Nova snipe, which can be used much more often, from safe distance and does whoping 300 dmg with full mastery, I dont think it is too strong.
But you also have to remember that Nova is limited by Energy, and doesn’t get anywhere near as strong as Alarak does with Empower Me.
Nova is a very tactical unit that can swap forms and break bases very easily. Alarak is a unit that wants to be in the front line, dealing consistent damage rather than complete burst and running over things.
While Nova can easily pick apart things, Alarak just wants the brute force. The less subtle and more aggressive approach. Having just the shorter cooldown on Deadly Charge would be fine enough. Adding charges onto it would be too much. If anything else were to be added to the Forge’s upgrades, I’d rather have Telekinesis give +15 damage to Destruction Wave, so that Alarak can consistently kill Combat Shield Marines all game long, like he can with Zerglings.
This might just be game-breaking (or too impactful for what you’re looking for), but what about an upgrade that got rid of the cooldown of Destruction Wave, but made it cost a supplicant with each cast?
I’m actually leveling Alarak right now, and so far he’s my fav protoss commander. The mobility is annoying, but the way he can tank for his army or switch to BEING the army with Empower Me is fantastic. With him in front I feel like I actually get value out of the expensive protoss units.
Not if you wanted to use an Alarak focused strat. Thematically, Alarak should really have the ascendent’s powers. His schtick is drawing power to himself. But that’s a whole nother conversation.
My thought though would be a way to keep Alarak viable in the late game beyond the 20 seconds that empower me lasts.
Well, to be fair, Empower Me can last up to 50 seconds, which is well more than long enough to delete attack waves and bases, with or without help from his Ascendants. Empower Me does better with his Mech anyway.
Alarak is there for early to early-mid game presence, and then a face tank that can power up late game. Most of your power is going to come from Slayers, Wrathwalkers, Ascendants, and Structure Overcharge (which at this point should be renamed to Photon Overcharge, given that it can target War Prisms now.)
As an Alarak Main increasing the range from which supplicant sacrifice is triggers his cooldown reset would be more than sufficient for me. As it is with havoc range increase, Alarak tends to go too far ahead from the rest of his army, leading to his resets not triggering with 1QE2C. Otherwise, bringing his army ahead puts his ascendants at too much risk of dying, cancelling out any benefits from using the technique in the first place.
Costing a supplicant with each cast of Destruction Wave (removing cooldowns) would be absolutely amazing
I think the better solution is
-Alarak gains the ability to sacrifice supplicants on demand
-that is the Only way to charge his wrath/lightning (ascendants sacrificing supplicants only charges them)
Yeah, I wouldn’t mind an increase to Wrath of the Highlord’s AoE. It’s kind of a pain in the butt between the range of Ascendants and Alarak diving in.
Attack Upgrades are near pointless if you’re playing Ascendant style. You get such a piddly little increase in DPS between base Ascendant/Supplicant and Level 3 attack. It’s always better to go Shield, or Shield + Armor.
The only time getting Attack Upgrades on Alarak is useful is if you’re going the Slayer route, or Wrathwalker route.