Now that Prestige is out, the theoretical max power levels of commanders have been increased substantially, of them my tier list is as follows:
(Imaginary Tier), 100 maxed out Ascendants. This would probably wipe out all army compositions before they approach.
Zeratul with 103 artifacts (P2)
I think this is the undoubted champion of all the late game army prestiges, pretty much any army can be annihilated by Zeratul’s army without a doubt
Abathur P1/P2/P3 (maxed out army)
I think it’s a tie between essence hoarder (P1) and Limitless (P3). Limitless has the highest dps from Symbiotes but suffers from a lack of sustain which P1 would have (unless there are some swarm queens mixed in). Combined with Vipers Abathur’s army would be the undisputed champion in destroying almost any army
Alarak P1
The Mech/Ascendant Hybrid build has the highest dps (that can be attained at the fastest rate) I believe. With the dps of mechs being multiplied by 4, the effective supply of those units are effectively multiplied by 4 as well (so 200 supply of mech is effectively 800 supply). Combined with Ascendants I believe this army deletes enemies enemies the fastest (ascendant orbs combined with Wrathwalker/Vanguard sustained dps can probably wreck even Abathur’s army, the counter to that however would be Viper abducts and disabling clouds). Strangely enough this army would also be the only one that can break through Zeratul’s army’s armour and kill them outright (so it can beat P2 Zeratul but probably not Abathur).
The exception would perhaps be no CD Alarak with P1 Alarak, which would wreck armies even with disabling cloud
After the above commanders I am not sure which commanders would create the 4th strongest army, but if I were to hazard a guess, it would be as follows:
Stetmann Oil Baron Mecha Ultralisks, Zerglings and Corruptors. If they are kept forever in their peak state with 20 oil baron stacks, his zerglings would never die, and his Ultralisks would effectively have 3x dps. Combined with Corruptors most armies would be vaporized extremely quickly. The weakness however is that this army is fragile compared to Abathur’s/Zeratuls.
Other notable compositions include:
Vorazun (DT/Corsairs)
Kerrigan (P2 with CC, P1 with attack speed buff)
Mengsk (Mass Royal Guard, ESOs, with massive nuke supply)
P3 Dehaka (Mass Mutalisk/Guardian, Impalers and/or Tyrannozors)
Nova (Mass Raven, P3 with nuke)
What do you think of this list? How would you rate the different commanders’ max potential armies? Who is the strongest coop commander ultimately of them all?
Also, how would you rate the theoretical max commanders armies in the following categories?
1: Burst DPS
2: Sustained DPS
3: Long term sustainability in a fight
4: Wave clear
5: Boss clearing
6: Structure clearing
I just wanna add that at 103 artifacts Zeratul alone would technically have a max dps of 1370 with full attack speed mastery. Though at 1,130 damage per swing he’s going to overkill all the dang time outside of spinning.
However, at the same on a per unit basis, each Ambusher would have a dps of 262 if full unit attack speed is used instead, not including each Blink causing 168 damage.
Considering the maximum damage output of Ascendants + 30% damage amplifier of Havoc it goes up to:
(99 Ascendants x 2 Shots x 910 damage = 180,180 )
So it would barely cut Dehaka’s Health in half and Dehaka can simply consume an ascendant to damage most of them as well as healing 102,440 for himself (Ascendants are Biological so yeah).
But I think Alarak’s pure Ascendant build even with normal build will prevail any army, their Psionic Orb are far too overwhelming.
And if I did my math right, said Archon would take 1 minute and 40 seconds to kill a single Probe after 34 artifacts.
(if my info and math are right, a +3 Archon does 34 damage at 1.25 attack speed. Minimum damage is 0.5 per hit. Probe has 40 total health, so 40x2x1.25=100 seconds)
I don’t know, Artanis army might be able to close enough distance to kill the Ascendants with a maxed out army before dying. But I understand that the thread is about raw dps/burst.
Also I’d like to know where would you rate p3 Nova solo. If you don’t even know where is she, how can you kill her? Is basically a gamble game between your aoe vs nuke/drone (but she can see stuff coming, so its easier for her to kill you).
Sustained dps: still Alarak assuming he has wrathwalkers on P1, otherwise Abathur mutas or Kerrigan hydras on P1 creep.
Long term sustainabillity: Zeratul as the massive shield armor+sentry shield healing offsets even maxed out Karax. Maybe Statmann’s mecha ultralisks but over 100 shield armor is no joke. Another competitor is Abathur as long as he abuses vipers and queens to prevent incoming dmg.
If prestiges didn’t exist, Karax and Stetmann would be the ones here due to sheer healing and health.
Wave clear: also Alarak thanks to ascendant orbs and empower me ability, otherwise Nova P3 as she has a lot of splash dmg, or even PoA Mengsk thanks to splash yamato.
Boss clearing: Yet again, Alarak due to Ascendants and Wrathwalkers, seriously, just try P1 Alarak vs Part and Parcel map, boss health just disappears. Another one pretty powerfull is surprisingly Mengsk as his vikings has huge dmg on massive units, which when actually massed and max rank bursts down bosses real fast, but still, wrathwalkers and ascendants does it faster.
Structure clearing: Surprise, Alarak again! Wrathwalkers on Prestige 1! Competitor but seriously far away are H&H due to reapers and Bombers.
Too bad I coudn’t talk about Karax, Swann or Mengsk late-game which are awesome, but some prestiges provides even more scaling than them.
Firstly, there are like 20 different actually viable armies that beat Kerri hydras on creep for sustained dps. Secondly, in case you weren’t reading above +103 ambushers would have 262 dps which would be more than the dps of a max stacked wrathwalker. On a single ambusher. It’s not really close. Plus Zeratul can use purity of essence construct to double attack speed of the ambushers, because why not. Worse yet, technically speaking Void Templar autoattack dps is significantly higher than ambushers, so even more in favor of Zeratul.
By the way, how do we feel about 0 supply things? Because technically if Raynor mines out the whole map and turns that into 10k spider mines that would blow Alarak’s burst damage out of the water. But I mean, that’s kinda cheating.
P3 Nova solo is incredibly powerful in coop pvp, there are only a few ways to kill her:
AoE spells (eg Ascendants)
Spells which can target blast a certain AoE (eg Burrow Charge, Psionic Shift)
Attacks which bombard an area (eg Bile Launchers, ESO)
Looking at that either Nova gets completely curbstomped, or completely stomps the enemy. Eg. if she gets her nuke off Alarak’s army is vaporised, but Destruction Wave + Ascendant orbs will make short work of Nova
The same applies to Karax’s Purifier Beam, Vorazun’s Time Stop, Kerrigan’s crushing grip/immobilisation wave, etc.
Also, P3 Nova has the weakness in that she can’t use snipe without exposing herself, and can only kill ground units outside of nuke.
The problem is that Nova can see stuff coming, while the army facing Nova can’t. So is easier for Nova to kill than the other way around. Still, it’s a bit of a gamble, but p3 Nova alone can kill any commander army without dying given enough time.
If you’re allowing for super super late game: 103 artifacts would take a minimum of: 4 mins first fragment + a fragment every 2 mins x 102 = 208 minutes (3h 28m).
In that much time, a Vorazun P3 Keeper of Shadows could use Shadow Guard 69 times (tee hee hee). 69 * 4 = 276 Shadow Guards at the next time stop.
If each SG has 57.84 DPS, then you’ve got a total of 15,963 DPS with those many SG’s. Shadow Fury gives you 27,000 DPS, or 48,300 DPS vs light. Agreed, it’s only for 72 seconds though. Not including the rest of your army.
And those numbers increase as the game goes on. I wonder if, like Zeratul’s fragment limit, there’s a max on how many SG’s are Kept.
Apparently it’s currently bugged and the blinks do 50% of the original damage, not the extra added on for Ambushers by each fragment. Not aware if that 50% is maintained correctly for the 2nd & 3rd fragments.
The order of OP seems a bit off but those are definitely some of the highest theoretical damage from army.
Like the maxed P2 Zeratul would take it, probably followed by P3 Abathur (reason being Deep Tunnel), and unfortunately Ascendants will have to take a backseat.
Which ones am I mistaken on? I feel P3 Abathur wins out P1 Abathur via sheer symbiote dps, but the sustain on P1 can be pretty insane with viper support
Alarak is 3rd because he’s a glass cannon among other reasons, but does have the capacity to fight Abathur (if deep tunnel isn’t used to just cleave Alarak’s army out of existence)
@Glenvet why would terran commanders always win in dps? Can they beat Kerrigan’s raptor lings? Or Alarak P1 in dps?
This is super accurate, I just meant mass UE can Deep Tunnel onto mass Ascendant. The sustained high DPS still goes to 103/103/103 Zeratul > max UE > mass Ascendant > mixed Alarak.