Those aliens never learn! The giant alien motherships hover into view above the freshly repainted White House, Eiffel Tower, and Big Ben. The builders in each country collectively sigh and start collecting their tools again.

The two new Crusaders for the 2017 edition are Slisiblyb, the Alien Scientist who swaps with the Bush Whacker, and Red, the Ace Pliot, who swaps with the Dark Gryphon.

Read more on the blog!

The event runs until Tuesday July 4th at Noon Pacific Daylight Time.

Over and out!

Alright, here goes. tarting with Red...

Red. Not quite a tank. More like...tank support. Her abilities increase damage dealt to enemies attacking the party, which makes it useful when pushing areas. I have to wonder the practical application of damage-buffing under such conditions compared to just a straight damage buff, BUT the fact that the buffs scale per enemy attacking and have a high base-stack means it has potential when paired with stacking AoE effects like "Deflect Evil". A solid tank, a beefy AoE effect, a defense-buffer, and Red can make for some pretty solid setups where tanking is necessary. For those that want to use her, keep in mind how her skill is worded. She does NOT buff your DPS. She increases the damage that enemies take. There is a difference. If 5 enemies are up against your formation, THOSE enemies take more damage, while enemies still spawning take normal damage. That means that AoE skills like "Deflect Evil" will not get buffed until those enemies reach your formation. Considering how fast this enemy-debuff can stack (high ungeared base amount, stacking per enemy), that's probably for the best.

Slisiblyp. Am I reading something wrong here? She seems...HORRIBLY powerful. Basically Bush Whacker, but on cracked up steroids. Her placement in the formation is very flexible since her best position amounts to "anywhere that's not near the DPSer", but even beyond that, her DPS absorption STARTS at an UNGEARED 15%, then ALSO gets buffed up to double it's effect by putting her away from other crusaders. Ideally, with enough crusaders away from her and epic gear, her DPS absorption is 60%, and that is WITHOUT being buffed yet again by trinkets! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNND she slows enemies that are clicked!! Bio-Assimilate is a neat ability, somewhat neutered by anyone using Mr Boggins with legendary gear (since one of his legendaries breaks the crit chance stat), but even so, getting an extra 5-10% is a welcome effective-DPS-buff. I just wish it didn't refresh per area, but that is a minuscule complaint considering her pure click damage is so...nutty. With golden epics and/or legendary gear, no doubt she'll land herself firmly in the "Overpowered" tier. Any firepower Warwick lacked is now compensated in spades by this extraterrestrial bombshell.

Bush Whacker may benefit from the abilities buffing his Swordplay ability, but even with all crusaders that buff his Swordplay ability in the party, I don't think he can actually reach 60%. Considering that Swordplay peaks at 15% with legendary gear and every "buffs Swordplay" ability adds 3% after that, he'd need 5 crusaders that support him just to reach the base 30% of Slisiblyp when she has an epic piece, let alone the 45% when she has legendary pod gear, plus whatever she gets from "Evolution" based on your formation. Considering that with 10 crusaders away from her and with a legendary pod, her DPS absorption peaks at ***90%*** (15 x 3 x 2), she honestly seems like just a better Bush Whacker in every conceivable way, unless your formation forces you to put a clicker near the DPSer.

As for slowing/tanking, if your formation is set up to tank, then obviously tank you shall, but it is beneficial to not NEED to tank. Even if a crusader is meant to tank, they still take damage. Even with a formation built for tanking, the longer you don't HAVE to tank, the better. Slowing monsters so that your tank can go a little longer without being punched in the face just means you go a little longer without taking any damage, and I don't know how that can ever be a bad thing.

I think I'd like Red a lot better if she didn't swap with Gryphon...

Looking at Slisiblyp's legendary abilities (I hadn't earlier since I wasn't sure her data would be on the wiki so soon), it looks like she's heavily geared toward click damage, and JUST click damage. She doesn't buff crit damage at all, but she does increase formation DPS quite a good amount. Between her high floor absorption, global DPS buff for her pod legendary, and enemy debuff for her stick legendary, the lack of crit damage probably makes her about as good if not slightly better than BW. BW can crit way, way higher, but that's a buff based on a lower base click damage. Slis has way higher bas click damage, but a lower crit multiplier, but then her stick legendary causes you do deal double damage (including double crit damage) against enemies you've already clicked.

Disclaimer: The following is a VEEEEEERRRRRYYYY rough estimate that I'm doing abou 10 minutes after popping my head off my pillow in the morning, so don't bet money on this...

Using my own stats while in the event area (to max Slis's usefulness) and without changing crusader formation aside from the clickers in any way that affects base DPS...

With Bush Whacker(all legendaries):
Base DPS - 2.15e219
Click damage - 1.33e221
Crit chance - 122%
Crit damage - 1140%

With Slisiblyp(no legendaries):
Base DPS - 2.63e219
Click damage - 6.02e220
Crit chance - 117%
Crit damage - 350%

The calculations will be (Base click x Crit damage) since my crit chance is over 100% and so every click WILL be a crit.

Bush Whacker average damage per click: 2.15e219 x 12.4 = 26.66e219, or 6.66e221

Slisiblyp average damage per click: 6.02e220 x 4.5 = 27.09e220, or 7.09e222

So even WITHOUT legendaries, Slis out-damages BW WITH legendaries.

I might have done some math wrong here since I've been awake for a grand total of like 20 minutes, so anyone who is actually in their sane mind feel free to correct this comment into oblivion.

EDIT: Actually clicking in my game results in Slis dealing about 1.22e221 per click and BW dealing about 8.50e221 per click, so I probably butchered the process somewhere in there since BW is overpowering Slis like she's nothing.

It's Canada, eh?

Have a great long weekend everyone!