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About the basic aspects of Hero Defense - Haunted Island. You'll find about heroes, their skills, runes and bits about shrines and enemies.
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Not about Endless and not about extensive, advanced strategies. As far as I'm concerned I won't write about multiplayer (co-op or PvP) since I really don't like playing with strangers.

I won't go on really deep, mathematical, details either. All you'll see here are mostly simplified explanations and hints.
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Updated in the Version 1.4.2 of the game as of this writing.
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About multiplayer and co-op? Who knows.
About Endless? Not so much.
About PvP? Don't hold your breath. I never played PvP with strangers and won't start now.

Unless there's a big revamp or reworking of the game mechanics I won't be doing any significant updates here either and if some really intensive work is needed due to the former reasons this guide will be put in Hidden Mode until I finish doing so.

Guide creator, author, editor, etc.

5th comprehensive guide I've wrote. I also gathered images, took and re-took screenshots, tried to find as many typos as I could and so on.

This guide by no means aims to be perfect or simply "here, this is how you win at this game" kind of stuff. It's just to give people pointers and, hopefully, help them decide what will suit their style of game the best.

Other guides of my authorship from games of a similar genre (Action-Tower Defense):
http://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2555082930 http://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=321647347 http://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=505739685 http://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=482075212 http://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=621968802
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For creating another game on this peculiar genre that Action-Tower Defense is.

The guide is split in several section each one having its own dedicated section to make things easier to find and identify.

1. Hints and Tips:
   Here you'll see a few things, between hints and small advice I have.
   
   
2. Hero Handbook:
   A small breakdown, overview and personal notes on the heroes of Hero Defense - Haunted Island. Also contain their skill tree and a few personal recommendations on the runes that can suit them the best.
   
   
3. Town Buildings:
   Wondering how much gold and gems you'll have to pay up for those upgrades or/and want to know what bonuses they'll give at certain levels? Then read this section.
   
   
4. Runes Reckoning:
   A small section describing the uses of runes and overall table of their efficacy at certain rarities. I also give (another) piece of my mind on how well they combine with certain characters.
   
   
5. Shrines:
   Another small section about the shrines, buff stations, of the game, how they work and few notes on them.
   
   
6. Creep Compendium:
   The creeps of Haunted Island. A few notes on them and their boss counterparts, including Count Necrosis himself. This section also covers the enemies introduced in the Halloween Campaign DLC as well.

Academy is a good thing to start. Academy has double uses: increases EXP gaining from maps and lets you learn better skills. It might get pretty expensive to upgrade after Level 5~6 until you can farm heavily on Castle Garden, though.

Bank is also another good option to earn small bits of gems here and there and get your gear upgraded in the Forge.
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Try to protect the houses of townsfolk as much as you can and not only to earn Angry Mobs, but because every time a monster kills a townsfolk they'll be turned into one of them (without abilities, thankfully), but that on its own is problematic since it's never a good thing to have one more creep roaming to pester you.

Maps with Hero Challenges is even worse about this as losing a single person means instant defeat. Period.


Protecting people is what heroes do, right?
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Weapon upgrade are very important especially early on, while getting gems in the beginning can be a hassle and very precious, it's worth enhancing the weapons of your heroes before going for the Forge upgrades, especially because Forge upgrades will get extremely expensive.

Upgrading weapons up until level 5 is easy; level 6 to 8 however are also awfully expensive.

Make sure to check Town Buildings section to see what bonuses the Forge will give in other to take your conclusions, though.



Gems, gems, gems...
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Skills like Quickness (Jack and Sam), Attack Speed (Jane) and Predator (Wylde) stack with Swift Strike runes. Having them together will make your character attack really fast and this works particularly well with skill that have a percentage to work like Critical Hit (Jack), Burn (Sam), Pushback (Jane) and Shrapnel (Wylde).

Originally posted by gehirnmutant:

Each character has an "Extra Projectiles" attribute. Both of these skills increase that attribute. If it goes over 100%, you get guaranteed extra projectiles per attack. For example, at 250%, you get two guaranteed extra projectiles, plus a 50% chance for a third one. Runes also add to this attribute and work exactly the same.

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These are among the toughest challenges of the game since you have to use more strategy than merely brute force by charging several heroes.

• Customize your strongest/favorite heroes with the best runes and/or most suitable for the job.
  
• Use shrines. Don't be afraid of building them as you'll probably need those boosts to make up for the lack of help.
  
• Move your heroes around. Hero Defense is all about this after all.
  
• Don't be afraid to use your consumables. Fire Bombs, Freeze Bombs, Poison and Pope Bless will most likely get you out of a hairy situation.
  
• Angry Mob enemies. It's annoying to get them, but it's better to pop one than lose and have to restart the entire map.

In Army of Two challenges picking a good combination of heroes is crucial to win. Some of my favorites are Jack/Barrows, Sam/Wylde, Jack/Wylde.


Shrines, consumables and planning are three crucial things.

Cemetery, the second actual map of the game, is one the earliest maps I found to farm on Hard or Insane difficulty.

"Why not Town Gate?" Town Gate has two separate paths that merges into one way too late and is too dangerous to play when you don't have great runes or upgraded weapons to work with. Cemetery on the other hand has paths merging earlier and tends to be tamer.

Getting gold by winning the challenge "Pure Talent" is rather easy once you get access to Rare (maybe even Uncommon) runes and get Level 4 weapons for at least Jack, Barrows and Sam.

You get 700~800 gold (more with Pickpocket runes), which is nice for early farming to get more Rare runes and Epic ones depending how patient (and lucky) you are buying sets of Rare runes for 500 gold. You can then use it to win maps until you unlock Castle Garden (even if you haven't beaten Count Necrosis for the first time yet).

Be always prepared to deal with Bones O'Malley as he almost always spawns there in Hard. Alana Nightshade can also appear rarely if you go in this map on Insane as well.
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Now we're talking about the big league of farming. Farming Castle Garden on Insane is bar none the best way to get lots of gold in the game.

Castle Garden can be unlocked earning enough stars by beating maps. You unlock this map by defeating Count Necrosis in his throne room for the first time.

To give you an idea proper on how much better this is, on Castle Garden on Hard can easily net you 7k gold and bad runs on Insane can easily give you between 8~10k gold.

• Hard requires you to have, at very least, Sam with her weapon on level 6 or above. Rare runes are extremely recommended as anything bellow will probably not give you enough power to kill all enemies. Damage/Range Shrines will help immensely as well.
  
• Insane will force you to get Sam's weapon maxed with enough Gems to get a Damage Shrine. Epic Runes are a must here, don't even bother trying with Rare ones, you will not make to the end. I'm not exaggerating, you fight an army of Zombies there and they become very sturdy by the end.

Doing this farming on Hard with Tower Defense challenge nets you 15 gems as well (25 on Insane) which is a small helping hand to get new more Rune boosters that requires Gems to buy.

Update 1.3.0 made some of the waves on Insane here have fixed patterns. Wave 10 will always spawn 2 Dr. Amalgams and Wave 20 always spawns 4 Queen of Corpses, be ready for them. Luckily this patch also seems to have toned down the Queen of Corpses regeneration a bit, so the danger of having a nigh invincible boss is considerably lower since then, in any case manual targeting is something that really helps picking them off if there's too many enemies around.

Try to bring at least two Angry Mobs with a good Town Hall (level 5~6) just to make sure things will go smoothly. Hotel is a good map to quickly get them as it has 5 townspeople to save.

Have Sam with Epic runes (Consecrate, Deadly Reach or Barrage) on a Damage, Attack Speed, Range Shrine and watch the gold flow. For even better results give Wylde Swift Strike and Pickpocket Run runes.

Stand tall and keep yourself ready for the kill.

This section will be dedicated to heroes, their skill trees and some hints and tips. A brief overview about them and some of my opinions on their strong and weak points and more or less how well they can work together or by themselves.

Keep in mind this is merely my opinion. You might play differently with each hero and thus have a very different point of view about them.
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Each hero costs 100 Orbs to place and most maps gives you anything from 100 to 200 Orbs to start working with, so beware of that.


Orbs for heroes, heroes for orbs.
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This is tricky. But I did focus more on Jack and Sam as they had a good synergy going with Jack killing sole targets and Sam dealing with hordes of Zombies and softening anything else for Jack (though Igors and Werewolves were headaches).

All in all, Barrows was the last character as I never used him for heavy combat and kept him useful with Swift Strike runes.
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Yes. Everyone but Jack will max their skill trees on Level 61, since Jack has more skills than any other hero he'll maximize it on Level 68.

"Now or never."

Strong vs.


Pros:
+ Excels in killing small group of enemies.
+ Armor piercing attacks.
+ Doesn't need strength runes to hit really hard.

Cons:
- Poor crowd control.
- Mediocre range.
- Zombies and Igors tend to be trouble for him.




Jack is the first character you'll play as and he excels at killing single or small groups of monsters quickly with multi-shot and Critical Hits. He also has access to the best armor pierce skill, all of this makes him very good at killing bosses as well, Ricochet is a skill that can give Jack some crowd control and finally he also has Instant Death which is can be very powerful in Endless.

However Jack suffers from low range and a serious lack of crowd control abilities and large groups of anything that isn't Vampires will give him a rough time unless you beef him up with Swift Strike and Deadly Reach runes.

Most runes can work well with Jack since his set of skills are rather balanced between strong and multiple shots, so it's mostly a matter of taste and need what you'll have on him. In late game Jack can be turned into a insta-kill machine with Barrage and Swift Strike runes and in any case he won't do mediocre damage thanks to his Critical Hit skill alongside the natural damage boost charging does to all characters.

Jack's skill tree.

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Pre-requirement: None
Damage: 10% / 20% / 30% / 40% / 50%

Might is pretty basic, more damage, kill things faster and helps Jack deal with Vampires and other types of enemies.












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Pre-requirement: None
Range: 5% / 10% / 15% / 20% / 25%

Sight is a pretty important skill for Jack in the beginning since his initial Range is mediocre. Having this skill can help you save rune slots for other types of runes as well.











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Pre-requirement: None
Attack Speed: 5% / 10% / 15% / 20% / 25%

Quickness is pretty good for Jack especially if you go with other skills like Critical Hit, Double/Triple Bolts. Faster firing means better damage and chances of triggering those skills.











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Pre-requirement: Might 1
Damage Ignore Armor: 20% / 40% / 60% / 80% / 100%

Armor Pierce is exactly what it says: it makes Jack's attack ignore a portion up to the entire Armor ability of any creeper. However it doesn't do anything against Slow and Steady ability as that increase their health instead of giving them Armor.


Let no pesky armor get between you and your kill.
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Pre-requirement: Sight 1
Chance: 2% / 4% / 6% / 8% / 4% / 10%
Damage Multiplier: 1.75x / 2.5x / 3.25x / 4x / 4.75x

Nothing tricky about this skill, it gives Jack a chance to cause more damage with each shot he fires. Multi-hit skills and Barrage runes increases the likeliness of activating Critical Hit and increases Jack's damage potential.









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Pre-requirement: Quickness 1
Double Shot Chance: 20% / 40% / 60% / 80% / 100%

One of Jack's multi-hit skills, it'll give Jack a chance to fire two bolts instead of one and stacks with Barrage runes.


Double the pain.
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Pre-requirement: Armor Pierce 2
Ricochet Chance: 5% / 10% / 15% / 20% / 25%
Multi-hit: 1 / 1.5 / 2 / 2.5 / 3

Jack's only crowd control skill which can cause his bolts to bounce to one up to three adjacent enemies. Together with his multi-shot skills and Barrage runes it can turn him into a Vampire killing machine and give him the ability to help deal with other types of enemies he's not as good as to kill.


Yellow bolts will ricochet on enemies.
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Pre-requirement: Armor Pierce 3, Critical Hit 3
Instant Kill Chance: 1% / 2% / 3% / 4% / 5%

Nothing subtle about this skill. It gives Jack a chance to kill whatever he hits without another single bolt, the more bolts you fire with Jack the more likely you are to trigger this skill.

Instant Kill however will never work on Champion or Boss class creeps.








More bolts means more chances.
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Pre-requirement: Armor Pierce 4, Double Bolts 3
Triple Shot Chance: 20% / 40% / 60% / 80% / 100%

Triple Bolts will have Jack shoot three bolts instead of one. However having Double Bolts won't make Jack shoot five bolts but rather two or three bolts.


Triplets!

"Rise up and repent."

Strong vs.


Pros:
+ Normal attack slow enemies.
+ Excellent support with Damage and Range increasing aura.
+ Great range.

Cons:
- Slow and weak attack.
- Moves slower than other heroes.



Barrows is an excellent support character. He is your only mean to slowdown enemies - outside Freeze bombs - and he also has an aura that will increase damage and range which can help sane, or further enhance, the abilities of other heroes. Later on Barrows can have a freezing skill as well which adds further his support role in the team.

However in terms of raw offensive strength Barrows is basically the worst character and will hardly do any significant damage even to Skeletons which isn't helped by his low attack speed.

Since Barrows will almost never be the main powerhouse of your team (save for Barrows only challenges) you should give him Deadly Reach or Swift Strike runes in order to make sure he'll keep enemies slowed or frozen in place. Barrage runes can be good for his arsenal if he has Freeze as each extra attack will have a chance to freeze enemies as well.

Barrow's skill tree.

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Pre-requirement: None
Range: 5% / 10% / 15% / 20% / 25%

Spirit Eyes is a bit more than meets the eye. This skill affects Barrows' buff areas as well, so even though you may not use him to attack enemies directly you can level up this skill so his aura range will increase and you'll have to worry about moving him around a little less.









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Pre-requirement: None
Speed Reduction: 20% / 25% / 30% / 35% / 40%

One of Barrows' must-have skills. Slower enemies means more time to move around, plan and more importantly: kill them.












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Pre-requirement: None
Damage: 10% / 20% / 30% / 40% / 50%

This is basically the last skill I had Barrows to max up since I never used him with the purpose to kill anything, even Skeletons as I found Barrows to be much more useful acting as a supporter to the group.










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Pre-requirement: Purify 1
Aura's Damage Buff: 8% / 16% / 24% / 32% / 40%

Pre-requirement: Spirit Eyes 3, Smite Aura 2
Aura's Range Buff: 8% / 16% / 24% / 32% / 40%

Two skills that cements Barrows as one of the best tagalong character and basically the reason I almost always put him after one of the other hero to clear the first waves.

If you don't have access to Epic runes yet, those potential 40% Damage and Range are very tempting and if you have... It'll be irresistible. Just make the test of having it stacked on other heroes' passives and shrines, the difference is immense.


Auras can be powerful as they will stack with other passive buffs, runes and shrines.
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Pre-requirement: Purify 2, Power of the Lord 2
Radius Increase: 14% / 24% / 34% / 44% / 54%
Duration Increase: 2.5s / 3s / 3.5s / 4s / 4.5s

Splash is another must-have for Barrows. What's better than a powerful slow effect? Hitting a lot of creeps with it. Although in the beginning it can be tough to decide whether you want this or invest in Barrows' auras. I chose Purify + Splash first.








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Pre-requirement: Smite Aura 3
Aura Range Improvement: 20% / 40% / 60% / 80% / 100%

Want to have Barrows with a bigger aura and not worry about moving him too much? This is the skill for you.

But honestly, Barrows' movement speed isn't horrible and most maps are small enough that moving around isn't really and issue, so this skill is another I left to level up much later on.


Barrows' aura is indicated by the yellow circle. You can increase even further with shrines or Deadly Reach runes.
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Pre-requirement: Godspeed Aura 2, Aura Range Increase 1
Freeze Chance: 4% / 8% / 12% / 16% / 20%
Duration Increase: 1.5s / 2s / 2.5s / 3s / 3.5s

Freeze can cause Barrows' attacks to stop enemies and keep them there for a moment. On max level this skill has a decent chance of freezing enemies even without Swift Strike or Barrage runes, but, of course, having them can potentially give Barrows enough speed and projectiles to keep a single, or a small number of enemies frozen for an indeterminate amount of time.


Excellent against single targets.

"Burn them all!"

Strong vs.


Pros:
+ Crowd control abilities.
+ Decent starting range.
+ Orb gathering skill.

Cons:
- Slow attack rate.
- Doesn't do well against bulky/armored enemies.

Sam is a character with strong emphasis on crowd control and she can wreck groups of enemies easily with enough investment, especially zombies, and most of her skills focus on enhancing that aspect. Her support skills are pretty good (despite what her status table says) with Burn being able to hamper enemy regenerating health and Curse which is great to build up Orbs since it works pretty well as Sam has great range naturally.

Enemies with armor tend to be bad news for Sam, though. Without runes to help aid her low attack rate or at least to increase her damage she pales to do serious damage to anything but zombies.

Runes for Sam will be what you're in the most need at the moment. You can give her Consecration, and/or Swift Strike, to make her stronger against other types of enemy, or Deadly Reach to increase the effectiveness of her Curse skill. Barrage is also an interesting choice if you want to constantly shower enemies with explosives.

Sam's skill tree.

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Pre-requirement: None
Damage: 10% / 20% / 30% / 40% / 50%

Might is something you always want; more damage to get rid of pests like Zombies and damage groups of any other type of enemies.












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Pre-requirement: None
Explosion Radius Increase: 25% / 50% / 75% / 100% / 125%

Boom increases the area of effect of Sam's pumpkin bombs which is quite good to help her overcome her slow attack rate and possibly affect more enemies with her passives.










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Pre-requirement: None
Attack Speed: 5% / 10% / 15% / 20% / 25%

Quickness is a great asset for Sam since she has some of the slowest attack rates of the game (only being slightly faster than Barrows). Having it alongside other runes can turn Sam into a kid-sized orange fire artillery.










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Pre-requirement: Boom 1
Burn chance: 5% / 10% / 15% / 20% / 25%

Burn is an interesting skill for Sam. It won't stop enemies from healing like Poison Bombs, but will hamper it and can help handling enemies Sam isn't effective against. Double Trouble and Tri-Grenade (or Barrage runes) are good to make this skill trigger as often as possible.


Crispy creeps.
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Pre-requirement: Burn 1
Double Pumpkin Chance: 20% / 40% / 60% / 80% / 100%

Double Trouble gives Sam the chance of throwing two pumpkin bombs instead of one. This skill doesn't stack directly with Tri-Grenade, which means it will never make her throw five bombs at once (without Barrage runes).









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Pre-requirement: Burn 2, Quickness 3
Cooldown: 4.5s / 4s / 3.5s / 3s / 2.5s
Extra gold chance: 0.2% / 0.4% / 0.6% / 0.8% / 1%

Curse is one of Sam's best skills as it'll make her get Orbs automatically just by having enemies in her range, this skill stacks with Soul Reaper runes and can make her incredibly effective at gathering large amounts of Orbs to charge heroes faster.

Deadly Reach runes and Range Shrines also increase the effectiveness of this skill.

Since this skill makes Sam have an extra chance of making enemies drop gold, Pickpocket Run runes are also welcome for her.


Every enemy within Sam's range will be affected by this skill.
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Pre-requirement: Burn 3, Might 4
Fragments: +1 / +2 / +3 / +4 / +5

Shrapnel causes Sam's bombs to hit the targets a second time after exploding, the fragments will cause a second set of explosions that will wound enemies in more or less the same radius of her first pumpkin.


Shrapnel in action.
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Pre-requirement: Double Trouble 3, Curse 2
Triple Pumpkin Chance: 20% / 40% / 60% / 80% / 100%

Tri-Grenade is basically a buffed Double Trouble to three pumpkin bombs. There's not really much to talk about that wasn't mentioned in the other skill. The more the merrier, right?

"Never a victim again..."

Strong vs.


Pros:
+ Fastest hero; great to catch potential stragglers.
+ Pushback can be extremely useful against singular targets.

Cons:
- Weakest character in the beginning.
- Requires intensive micromanagement and Gatekeeper to be truly impressive.
- Low range.



Jane Doe is character that's ideal to deal with stragglers thanks to her fast movement speed and decent attack power, she also has a decent armor piercing skill. Jane shines truly when using Gatekeeper to deal a first heavy hit when jumping in to attack enemies or Pushback to make sure that one tough costumer won't get through.

Jane is probably the character that suffers the most early on due to her lack of raw damage and bad range. Until she gets a hold of Gatekeeper or Pushback she doesn't add much to the team and fall behind Jack, Barrows or Sam in usefulness.

Some of the best runes for Jane are Swift Strike/Barrage (especially if she has Pushback) or Consecrate (for Gatekeeper), especially if you micromanage her - keep targeting enemies so she will jump in and back to fight activating Gatekeeper constantly.

Jane's skill tree.

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Pre-requirement: None
Movement Speed: 10% / 20% / 30% / 40% / 50%

Fast Travel makes Jane walk faster and is probably good to catch anything that got through your defenses.

All in all Jane is already fast and very few maps are big enough to make good use of this passive, but having it on level 3 is a pre-requirement for Gatekeeper.







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Pre-requirement: None
Attack Speed: 10% / 20% / 30% / 40% / 50%

Attack Speed isn't exactly subtle about what it does. It makes Jane bash faster and is a pretty good to go alongside Pushback.












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Pre-requirement: None
Damage: 10% / 20% / 30% / 40% / 50%

One of Jane's damage boosting skill which is very welcome since she doesn't have a lot of power on her own and it does help boost Gatekeeper.












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Pre-requirement: Attack Speed 1
Damage: 5% / 10% / 15% / 20% / 25%
Armor Pierce: 10% / 20% / 30% / 40% / 50%

Jane's second attack boosting skill which gives a smaller increase, but some Armor Piercing abilities too.

It's worth noting that even with both attack boosts Jane won't become a powerhouse of damage on her own and is best used alongside Consecrate runes and Gatekeeper skill.






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Pre-requirement: Attack Speed 2, Rage 2
Quick hits: +2 / +4 / +6 / +8 / +10

Lightning Strike is a skill that will allow Jane to move around after she jumps to hit enemies instead of staying stationary cracking their heads. The higher the more she'll move around, but if she moves too far and she runs out of Lightning Strike hits Jane will hop back to her original position and then resume her attack.


One for everyone.
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Pre-requirement: Fast Travel 3, Heavy Strike 2
Damage on first hit: 150% / 300% / 450% / 600% / 750%

Gatekeeper is one of the two skills that defines Jane Doe and can be very powerful when you learn how to use it correctly. It makes her do heavy damage every time she jumps in to attack an enemy that got in her range.

However to get the best of this skill you can't just let Jane standing still like other heroes, you must micromanage her to ensure she'll be hopping in and out constantly to hit enemies. How exactly you do that? By using manual targeting or moving her around so she'll always target different enemies.


Jump in and crush them.
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Pre-requirement: Heavy Strike 3, Lightning Strike 2
Chance to knockback: 2% / 4% / 6% / 8% / 10%

Pushback is another great skill for Jane. It'll give her a chance to knockback any enemy she hits, including bosses. It can be used to stall small number of enemies or to isolate a single problematic target from others, or both.

Unlike Gatekeeper, Barrage or Swift Strike runes are very welcome to maximize the chances of triggering this skill and Lightning Strike will also help as well.




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Pre-requirement: Gatekeeper 2
Cooldown: 2.5s / 2.25s / 2s / 1.75s / 1.5s
Distance Traveled: 3.5m / 5.5m / 7.5m / 9.5m / 11.5m

Teleport is a pretty good skill but feels superfluous as even Fast Travel will be enough to have Jane fly across the maps. One thing to note is that Jane can cross gaps and go through places normally impossible to any other hero to get shortcuts, so it has its uses.


Jane can hop into places normally impossible to walk to get shortcuts.

"Gonna kill them all!"

Strong vs.


Pros:
+ Fast, multi-hitting, attacks.
+ Fast move speed.

Cons:
- Low damage without Detonator/Berseker.
- Positioning is vital for him.



Wylde is a character focused on hitting multiple times in quick succession. This makes him a pretty versatile character as he can be useful either having more skills to simply kill enemies or act as Orb or Gold farmer.

Some of Wylde's flaws are his initial low damage and range. His attack also flies in a straight path, so positioning is important to him more than anyone else, although Whirlwind can help him if he needs to be on corners.

As mentioned before, since Wylde's attacks can hit multiple times, even without Barrage runes, he's one of the best options to hold on Soul Reaper or Pickpocket Run runes to get the most Orb or Gold out of enemies. This is very convenient for early and late game farming.

Wylde's skill tree.

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Pre-requirement: None
Range: 5% / 10% / 15% / 20% / 25%

Predator increases Wylde's range but not how far his blades will fly. It's a good thing to have since his range isn't exactly his best trait.












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Pre-requirement: None
Razor Range: 10% / 20% / 30% / 40% / 50%

Razors increase how far Wylde's attack will fly. On its own this skill is basically almost useless, but with Reaper it can technically make Wylde attack twice depending on how well you position him.











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Pre-requirement: None
Damage: 10% / 20% / 30% / 40% / 50%

Beast is a damage boosting skill and something Wylde sorely needs especially in the beginning. Having it later with other skills is always welcome especially when you start getting skills like Detonator and Berserker.










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Pre-requirement: Beast 1
Chance to activate: 5% / 7.5% / 10% / 12.5% / 15%
Duration: 0.5s / 1s / 1.5s / 2s / 2.5s

Shards of Death is an oddball. Its damage over time is nothing shinning and nowhere as good as Sam's Burn, but leveling it up is important to get it to activate more often, but only Detonator makes it actually useful.









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Pre-requirement: Beast 2, Razors 2
Chance: 20% / 40% / 60% / 80% / 100%

Reaper will give Wylde's attacks to have a chance to return to him like a boomerang, this skill is pretty good and can effectively double his attack power and make sure Shards of Death/Detonator triggers.


Reaper will give Wylde a better attack rate
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Pre-requirement: Shards of Death 2
Damage: 40% / 80% / 120% / 160% / 200%

Detonator will cause Wylde's attack to explode every time his Shard of Death triggers. The explosion is somewhat delayed whenever this skill triggers, so don't put it close to barricades or houses you may want to protect.


Detonator activating.
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Pre-requirement: Predator 4, Reaper 2
Maximum Hits: +1 / +2 / +3 / +4 / +5
Duration: 0.5s / 1s / 1.5s / 2s / 2.5s

Whirlwind will cause blades returned via Reaper skill to circle him staying there until it hits enough enemies or its duration ends, blades circling Wylde can still trigger any other skill he has (Shards of Death, Detonator) and is affect by Berserker as well.


Keep Wylde close to the enemy path to make sure Whirlwind will cause as much damage as possible.
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Pre-requirement: Reaper 3, Detonator 2
Attack Speed and Damage boost: 30% / 60% / 90% / 120% / 150%

Berserker will give Wylde a decent damage and attack speed buff, but the catch is that this skill triggers completely at random and lasts for a few moments. While it does help a lot, don't count on it to survive or get you out of a pinch.


Wylde entering in Berserker state.

Haunted Island's Town.
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Living and learning to killing lots of creeps.

Academy will boost the EXP Gain and on early levels allow you to learn skills up to Level 5. This is one of the best construction to rebuild at least until Level 6 so you can max up your skills.

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Weapons and runes to makes creeps very dead.

Forge gives you small boosts to your heroes with every level up. This construction is the only one that requires Gems to rebuild instead of Gold, so getting Bank running well might help you a lot rebuilding it into higher levels. It will also help get Gems for the expensive weapon upgrades too.

Since the boosts are not particularly huge, I'd recommend upgrading it last.

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"Capitalism, ho!"

Bank is an interesting building that will allow you to swap Gold for Gems which is very nice, especially on late game. Since you'll need a truckload of Gems to get Epic and Legendary rune packs, rebuild the forge and get the level 6 to 8 weapons, you'll be visiting the Bank a lot later on.




Initial and maximum discount Bank can offer.
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A good old fashioned torch pitchfork trample can work too.

Town Hall has a collection of logbooks that will tell you about Heroes, Shrines, Enemies, Bosses and other Buildings in the town. Leveling up this building will increase the strength of your Angry Mob.

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Gotta have them all. Or at least those pretty purple ones.

Want to make Jack even stronger against one monster?
Want to make Barrows attack faster to keep more enemies slowed?
Want to make Sam throw her pumpkins even farther?
Want to make Jane have attack more times?
Want to make Wylde have a bit of everything above and/or more?

Or maybe you want to mix things up and make Jack faster, Barrows stronger and so on.

In any case runes are here for it. They are used to customize your heroes and fine-tune them into perfect creep killing machines of your personal taste.

• Deadly Reach
  
• Consecrate
  
• Swift Strike
  
• Barrage

• Soul Reaper
  
• Reduce Charge Cost
  
• Pickpocket Run

• Mob Justice
  
• Hero's Strike (All heroes)
  
• Poison

Runes can diversify the style of characters. For instance, Jack can become decent at crowd control with Barrage runes and his Ricochet skill.


Combine powerful runes of a type with shrines for maximum creep killing potential.
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Merging runes is the way to get rid of runes you don't want and at the same time get a rune of better rarity. There are a few notes about merging the first is that you cannot merge runes of different rarities.




The rarer the rune is the more you need to craft another rune, with the odd exception of Epic grade runes which will need four like Common grade runes.



Merging Epic runes will always result in another random Epic rune, however. Legendary runes cannot be merged.



Using only the same type of rune (Consecrate, Swift Strike, Deadly Reach) ensures a better rarity rune of that type.

• Deadly Reach
  
• Consecrate
  
• Swift Strike
  
• Barrage

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• Soul Reaper
  
• Reduce Charge Cost
  
• Pickpocket Run

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And anything beyond? Lots. Let's leave at that.
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• Mob Justice
  
• Hero's Strike (Jack, Barrows, Sam, Jane, Wylde)
  
• Poison

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Charge up a hero equipped with this rune and an Angry Mob will spawn and trample (or damage) any creeps in their way.

You can use this rune as a "smart bomb" of sorts to clean up an annoying wave or keep a hero ready to charge it in case something goes wrong. Just be careful as you cannot control where the Angry Mob will go and if the map has two paths and the mob might disperse into a lane with little to no enemies.

Using several of these runes and upgrading the Town Hall will strengthen the Angry Mob. But remember that Champion creeps and bosses, especially on Hard and Insane, can easily survive even three mobs on a row.


Street justice in progress.
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Hero's Strike will activate a unique attack from each hero when you charge the hero wearing this rune. The level in the slot doesn't affect the actual strength of the skill, but any preceding Consecrate rune will increase the potency of this legendary rune.

Hero's Strike isn't affected by the range of the character and even if the hero is on the other side of the map the attack will be executed.



Blot the sun.



Holy hand freezing grenade.



Squash 'em.



None shall pass.



A clean shave.
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Poison emulates the Poison Bomb consumable. This rune is pretty useful and can be very effective in dealing with pesky creeps that tend to come with regenerative abilities (Skeletons, Zombies, Werewolves).

Swift Strike and Barrage runes goes well with this legendary rune as they'll give more chances for this rune to trigger.

These are merely tips on runes and a few commentaries on them. This is by no means a perfect build or setup for your characters and don't take them for granted.
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If all you have is a hammer...



There's nothing wrong in doing this, but overspecialization can bring problems if you're not careful.

But if you just want ONE thing, or find yourself in a lack of runes overall, don't be afraid of pumping a hero full of a single type, but make sure to assign the hero to the right role (area damager, single targeter, etc...).
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Is master of none, better than master of one?



This is the kind of application that goes for anyone depending on what you want to do. Basically you'll either this or the first rune setup early on mostyl due to the lack of good runes.
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Get Barrows' aura to reach everywhere.



Deadly Reach and Swift Strike. This makes Barrows attacks reach far and slow enemies while also increasing the size of his aura.

You can very well put only Swift Strike runes or Deadly Reach ones depending on how you'll use him early (Splash or Aura).
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Get the shiny.



This is a build more focused on getting Orbs for quicker charge and level up your heroes faster. Both Sam and Wylde are good for this for different reasons:

• Sam has Curse and can hit multiple enemies.
  
• Wylde can hit a lot of enemies all at once and fast enough, especially with Reaper and Barrage runes.

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Gold. You just can't have enough of it.



This rune scheme is similar to the last rune setup this one is made to farm gold.

However one thing worth noting about is that you should avoid using runes and skills to increase the killing power of your heroes as you want them to beat the creeps as much as possible to get gold out of them.
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Heal? I don't think so.



Poison runes are the main course of this build. You can swap anything else to suit your needs, but whoever goes with this must trade their raw damage for the support value Poison has: null the health regeneration of creeps and bosses.

While one Poison rune works, more means better chances of activating.

Jack and Sam with Barrage rune will have great chances of triggering this skill. Jack has Ricochet, and Sam has the benefit of Burn and Blast to affect several creeps.

Barrows can combine this with his Splash, Purify and Freeze skills to give him even more supportive abilities to his arsenal.

Wylde is one of the best candidates for this build because of all his skills to multi-damage enemies (Reaper, Shards of Death, Whirlwind). Combine that with some Barrage and Swift Strike runes and he might be able to Poison large groups of creeps with ease.

Shrines are buff stations that will greatly aid in your battles. You can build gem using gems and even replace a shrine that's built to suit your needs. Shrines can have different buffs or buff a specific hero. Alternatively they can hold other effects like gathering Orbs or temporarily increasing their movement speed.

The correct usage of shrines can trivialize maps that are giving you problems.

Every shrine built in a map is permanent until you build another in it. That means that each time you build a shrine it'll be there regardless of what difficulty you play.

Do keep in mind that for every shrine you build the cost to build another of the same type will gradually increase (shrines provided by the game doesn't increase the cost), so be careful not to back yourself in a corner if you built too many Damage Shrines/Character Specific Shrines and not have Gems to build another in a map you're having trouble.

Lastly, the game DOES NOT keep track which shrines were built in which level, so try to keep a track of them.


Sam's Shrine on the far left; Double Damage on the far right. Vacant lot in the far north.
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5 - 8 - 13 - 21 - 34 - 55 - 89 - 144 - 233...

• Damage Shrine
  
• Range Shrine
  
• Attack Speed Shrine
  
• Movement Shrine
  
• Orb Shrine
  
• Hero Shrines

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Type: Stat

Damage Shrine will double the damage of any hero standing on it, it's extremely useful and can turn even heroes with modest damage per hit like Barrows, Jane and Wylde into fearsome killing machines.

When used with strong characters like a multi-shot Jack or Sam they become boss and crowd slaying monsters respectively.





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Type: Stat

Range Shrines double the range of your heroes. This works great with most heroes, but large range also means you'll need to be more cautious and use manual targeting more often as your heroes can very well aim at anything but the enemy you're intending to hit.

On the other hand, this shrine will also double Barrows' aura (besides his range) and this can easily extend to entire maps if they're small.


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Type: Stat

This shrine will make any hero standing guard on it attack twice as fast than normal, this works very well with any hero, especially when using skills that relies on pure chance to work like Critical Hit, Freeze, Burn and the like.







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Type: Special

Movement Shrine makes any hero that steps on it move faster. And a small correction from DasEimer:

Originally posted by DasEimer:

movement shrine - as long as one hero is standing on it every other hero on the map is moving faster [sic]

While this buff seems situational, this shrine shines in maps that have waves coming in different paths and have you moving heroes from one point to another constantly (especially if the enemy has Fast trait) and you can't waste too much time moving your heroes around.

Don't overlook the usefulness of this shrine in bigger maps.
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Type: Special

Orb Shrine is an interesting shrine that will give you a steady quantity of Orbs. The amount of Orbs is equal to the level of the hero stationed there +1. For example, a level 5 hero will get 6 Orbs per second.







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Type: Heroes

Hero Shrines are unique in the fact they combine Damage, Range and Attack Speed Shrines into ones with some twists: only the specific hero can use it and the effect is 50% bonus instead of 100%. They also increase all skills (learned) of your heroes by 1.

These shrines are very tempting and you might build them a lot, especially if you have one favorite hero in particular, but remember the cost of shrine building skyrockets after fifth one.

Another important detail from DasEimer that escaped my attention:

Originally posted by DasEimer:

hero shrines - they increase all skills! Even the ones you don't have and the ones that you maxed already

Only the right hero may use it.


Jack and Barrows' shrine.


Sam and Jane's shrine.


Wylde's shrine.

"None of us will truly know peace until we defeat Count Necrosis."

In this section I'll describe some of the enemies and what abilities they can have and right below I'll explain a few things about the waves that may or may not be so obvious as well.
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Remember the color. But in case you're colorblind here's a table:

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Manual targeting is your friend. This is particularly effective to catch enemies about to move out of your hero's range or pick off that one pesky Healer patching up a group of creeps.
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A small description on the abilities enemies can hold. The color of the icon indicates which abilities are the most common on which type of enemy.


Enemies will be faster.


Creeps will gain a substantial speed boost upon getting hit. Has a small cooldown.


Enemies will take lowered damage unless the hero has Armor Piercing skills.


Creeps will be slower, but tougher.


Enemies have a chance to revive after being defeated. Revived creeps still give Orbs.


Creeps will regenerate their health at a steady pace.


Enemies can heal other enemies in the wave besides themselves.


Creeps in this wave will have more health than usual.


Enemies will attack in much larger numbers than usual.
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Every enemy can have about every abilitiy. The ones shown in the Town Hall log book merely indicates their usual abilities.
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Watch out for Hordes with traits.


Quantity over quality? You bet.
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Chained waves means all those enemies will come all at once. Be mindful if they go on separate paths.
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The skull icon means the enemies in the wave are Champion variants. Champions are way tougher than regular ones but much less numerous as well.


Exercise caution around Champions.
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The blue orb indicates enemies in this wave will give more Orbs upon defeat for you.

• Vampire
  
• Skeleton
  
• Zombie
  
• Igor
  
• Werewolf

This section will be about the regular enemies. Their threat levels can vary a lot with each ability they may carry.

Reminder: Usual ability means their abilities that they are the most likely to appear, but all enemies can spawn with basically any ability in the game. Be ready for anything on higher difficulties.
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Nemesis:


Vampires are the first enemies you'll fight and their natural trait is their speed. Vampires can come with Armor trait which make them fairly tough to kill by anyone other than Jack.

Be on the watch if you see a Vampire wave coming with Fast or Speed Up traits as they can easily speed through your heroes and be hard to catch up. Vampire waves coming with both traits are not uncommon on Hard and Insane maps.





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Nemesis:


Skeletons are somewhat slow moving enemies that come in fairly big groups; bigger than Vampires, but smaller than Zombies. They're also decently tough even though their status table says they have the lowest health among all creeps; this isn't helped since Barrows is the nemesis of these enemies and his attacks aren't very strong.

The biggest threat these things posses is the variety of traits they can come with; you can have tough Skeletons with regenerating health, fast moving Skeletons that can revive, Skeletons that are tough and regenerate health among other things, so be prepared to deal with them.

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Nemesis:


Zombies are annoying creeps that will always attack in large groups even without the Horde trait. They're slow and deceptively tough to kill and can bring serious problems if you don't have a good way to counter them (normally Sam).

In general waves of Zombies with Resurrect trait tend to be a problem due to how much time you can waste getting rid of the wave and one possible survivor and Healer can bring issues as without Sam the Zombie wave can easily recover before you finish dealing with them. Sometimes a Zombie wave can spawn with Armor trait as well which can be very tough to handle without Sam and maybe even with her, and yes, waves with combined traits can and might come in Insane difficulty.
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Nemesis:


Igors are slow moving enemies that have a moderate amount of health, on their own they're not much of a problem and Jane can easily handle them, things get trickier as they tend to come with regenerative abilities on higher difficulties.

Igors with abilities are treacherous enemies and often come with Healer, Healthy or Regeneration abilities which makes them incredibly annoying and dangerous if they come with other groups of enemies.



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Nemesis:


Werewolves are tough enemies, as fast as Vampires and about as tough as Zombies and comes in numbers comparable to Skeletons. Since Wylde is rather weak in the beginning these enemies might be a headache for you. Try to save consumables if you're having troubles with them.

Like Vampires, Werewolves have the nasty habit of spawning with Speed Up and Fast abilities which adds up to their natural toughness and it's not unlikely they'll show up having Regeneration as well.

• Alana Nightshade
  
• Bones O'Malley
  
• Queen of Corpses
  
• Doctor Amalgam
  
• Redfang Wrathborn

Bosses are souped up versions of regular creeps and are always indicated by a larger wave indicator and identifiable by different icon on their heads.

The most dangerous thing about bosses is the fact that if they reach the end of the level it's instant defeat regardless of how many hits the barricade can take. They can also cause serious damage as most of them can summon lesser versions of creeps or make them much harder to kill than usual.


There's no such thing as overkill against bosses.
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Alana is the boss version of Vampires and carries some treacherous abilities with her the main one being the fact she can speed up any enemy while she is dashing, that includes dangerous things like armored enemies of any type causing even that slow Zombie horde to move much faster than you had anticipated.

Alana will periodically stop on her tracks to prepare that dash, she will gain and give some Armor to anyone near her for that moment, but while she's charging it she's completely vulnerable mainly to Jack as he has the best Armor Piercing skill of the game.


Alana will buff her minions and every now and then dash short distances forward, beware this dash can affect any enemy, from Zombies to Werewolves.
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Bones is a beefed up Skeleton with some tricks up his tattered sleeves. The first and most usual is raising more Skeletons to his aid which he does after travelling some distance; there's no real limit on how many Skeletons he can create, so the more he travels the bigger his gang will get unless you can kill all of them quickly. His second trick is give enemies close to him temporary Armor which is indicated by a blue aura and Bones opening his umbrella.

Manual targeting is a good way to get rid of Bones quickly in case he's surrounded by his merry gang of Skeletons, but be careful not to let them get away and overrun your defenses.









Bones will give his minions temporary armor with his umbrella (left) and raise more as he walks forward (right). Don't underestimate him.
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The Queen of Corpses is one of the most annoying bosses due to her high health and regenerative abilities. Like Bones, Queen of Corpses will can periodically create minions to her aid and she won't stop doing this until she is defeated, unlike Bones she won't give them Armor, but will Heal herself instead. Queen of Corpses will sometimes speed up as well so be prepared for that.

Without Sam this boss can be a royal pain to kill as the Zombies can very well tank her and using manual targeting can leave you with a horde of them to worry about later.

Using things like Ricochet, Gatekeeper, Detonator will help a lot in case Sam is not available. Consumables like Fire and Poison Bombs are also welcome to deal with her as last resorts.


A boss that summons and heals itself. Two things you really don't want.
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Dr. Amalgam is a slow moving boss which will heal other enemies every so often. However unlike Queen of Corpses he cannot heal himself.

The biggest problem about this boss is that he often comes with a large group of enemies and if they have other traits like Armor, Healthy or Slow and Tough they can easily power through your heroes.

The best solution against Dr. Amalgam is either having Barrows slow, or freeze, him or Jane to trigger Pushback against him, isolating the boss from the herd. Without enemies to back him up, Dr. Amalgam is barely a threat at all.


Dr. Amalgam healing enemies.
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Redfang is easily one of the most dangerous bosses due to his ability to Speed Up in straight lines and overall speediness.

Have Barrows and Wylde ready to counter him quickly and worst case scenarios sic every hero on him as one of the levels he always spawns, Watermill, he has a lot of room to move and can easily speed through your heroes to the barricade causing an instant defeat on the last wave. Consumables like Freeze Bombs and Pope Blessings are also good counters against him.


Keep Freeze Bombs and Pope Blessings ready because this guy can be REALLY fast.

Count Necrosis will turn regular enemies into bosses. This ability has a few seconds of cooldown.



The Count himself. He appears as a beefed up Vampire in one map (Mines) and as a unique boss in one of the last levels of the game.

In his second appearance he will never attempt to flee the map and will do nothing besides roam his throne room, but is very dangerous for his sole ability: turning regular enemies into their boss version. Besides the huge problem this can cause, Necrosis can easily spawn more than one boss if a group of enemies big enough reaches him, or in the right interval.

The only upside is that killing Count Necrosis automatically makes you win the map he appears.


Beware the Count...

• Spider
  
• Queen of the Swarm
  
• Ghost Pumpkin

This section will be dedicated to enemies introduced, and exclusive, to the Halloween Campaign DLC which was introduced in the Patch 1.4.0 of the game.

Keep in mind that to unlock the Halloween Campaign you must defeat Count Necrosis in his Castle at least once.


The Mayor warns Jack and the heroes about the appearance of a new threat...
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None

Spiders are new creeps that almost always attack in very large numbers with the Horde trait.

These things are unique in the fact that no one has effective damage against them, they will always take longer to kill, especially on Insane difficulty. On the plus side they can be pushed back even without Jane and her Pushback skill.

Champion variants of Spiders will create a lot of Spiders upon dying, so be on your toes when they pop up.


Champions are not only tougher, they will leave more Spiders behind upon perishing.
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Queen of the Swarm is an odd boss. It does exactly like a Champion Spider and has the same ability, moreover it apparently is even weaker, easier to kill than the Champion variant. Still, this enemy creates a lot of other Spiders when you defeat it, so be careful.


The Queen and her subjects.
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Ghost Pumpkin is the final boss of the Halloween Campaign. The level he appears has 999 waves coming and he must be defeated before the creeps become too strong for the heroes to handle. This boss is initially invincible and the only way to damage him is to activate the Exorcism Shrine.

Unlike Count Necrosis, Ghost Pumpkin is vulnerable to ailments like Barrows' Freeze and can be bounced around with Jane's Pushback, so use that to your advantage while you deal with him and other creeps.

This is an unique shrine that only shows up in the final Halloween Campaign map. It is used to make the boss vulnerable and requires random heroes (from 2 to all 5) to activate.

The Ghost Pumpkin will become vulnerable for a limited time after triggering its effect and its effect fades the shrine will need a time to recharge before being reactivated,the amount of heroes and which heroes will be needed is always chosen at random, so have all of them deployed and ready for combat as soon as possible.

The biggest issue about this shrine is that is stationed near the end of the level and you'll probably be forced to move your heroes back and forth as the boss advances all while waves of other enemies are still marching towards your gate.


Exorcism Shrine turning Ghost Pumpkin vulnerable.

Thank you for reading and I hope this guide helped you even if a little. Please do not forget to rate it so more people can find, and who knows, it may help.

If yes, please make sure to check out my other guides, they're from games similar to Hero Defense, a mix of Tower Defense/Action.
http://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2555082930 http://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=321647347 http://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=505739685 http://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=482075212 http://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=621968802