Sparkgrinder, The Tesla Of Adana! (Team-building! Tips and Assistance Welcome!)

Gameplay Chat (PlayStation 4/Xbox One)
1

Hopefully this is in the right place for this, as I want some experienced player input on my team. Also, this team is finished or final in anyway except for maybe Mr. Nicol Tesla the Dwarf himself as he just seems WAYYY too good.

So, I have a thing for artifacts…just ask anyone who plays Magic The Gathering with me. So, since Constructs are obviously on a similar level…I HAD TO HAVE A CONSTRUCT DECK! :heart_eyes: Though to be honest, I wasn’t super hype about it until I unlocked Sparkgrinder and was blown away by his potential. Oh, and keep in mind, this team will be a Forever Team: aka, we are talking max stats, full ascension, all traits. Also, I’m VERY aware of the Mechanist Class and the Dragonator 8000 and all the ridiculous stuff that can result from my hero being considered a Construct…but PS4 doesn’t have classes yet…but I hope we get them soon! :slight_smile:

So, this is the team I have so far, in order of my team comp:

Banner of Progress (R/Y)
Fortress Gate (Lvl 5, No Traits)
Sparkgrinder (Lvl 6, No Traits)
Deep Borer (Lvl 5, No Traits)
Steam Turret (Lvl 4, No Traits)

The team works like so: Fortress stands there (and eventually falls on people), Sparkgrinder keeps peeps alive and helps them hit like a truck, Borer taps off Sparky (fills up mana when there are no matches) as well as getting Fortress and Turret refreshments, and Turret…well, Turret does… sigh :disappointed:

Is it too obvious which one I feel like replacing the most? :wink:

I REALLY don’t like Steam Turret, I just REALLY don’t like it, and here are my reasons why, in no particular order I guess:

  • His ability costs 10 mana, the second highest on my team
  • His colors are Br/Y, which means he gets mana only after Fortress or Sparkgrinder, and only when they are full…so not very often.
  • He doesn’t start providing Soviet levels of damage until Lvl 12
  • The enemies damaged by his ability are randomly picked
  • The damage is spread out instead of being the same for each enemy (a la Terraxis)
  • The damage is spread out between randomly-picked enemies randomly (‘Oh, he only has 2 Health left and no armor? I’ll deal 1 damage to him, and 4 to this guy’) This makes me only use him when there is one enemy left so that he can be of actual use.

Honestly, the only reasons I have it in here are for the tanky stats it has and the fact that it gives me the Lord of Gears for having two Adana troops.

Now, there aren’t TOO many construct choices, regardless of the version you are playing, but here is the list or the remaining Constructs:

They all have their perks, but currently the only one I’m interested in replacing on my team is Steam Turret, but if you guys have any input at all, feel free to leave it as this game is pretty nice about letting you try different stuff…even though leveling takes time, :expressionless:

Blast Cannon can burn with skulls when fully committed, can boost his mana gain, and deals decent damage plus a silence…but his target his random and only hits one enemy, his first trait is likely to get little use, and his colors conflict with Fortress, Sparkgrinder, and Borer.

Carnex looks to be VERY tanky with good damage potential when maxed out and he offers mana from a color that normally does nothing with this team…but his other color conflict with Sparkgrinder as well as Borer and his ability…well, I guess it’s kinda like a more offense Fortress…I guess it would have potential. This is one of the two that has my most intrigued.

Flame Cannon can be very tanky and can burn on skulls with investment, and deals damage to all enemies with a chance to burn with his ability…but his ability damage is piddly, the burn chance is VERY low for a status that can be remove without any effort, and his colors conflict with Borer and HEAVILY with Sparkgrinder.

Goblin Rocket (a card I was pleasantly surprised to find out was considered a Construct) gives an extra turn (which is always pretty huge) and can do major damage to an entire team…but the damage is randomly targeted (meaning no consistent adjacent damage) and his colors conflict with Sparky and Borer, not to mention I won’t get a Kingdom Buff if I run him.

Tankbot 2000 has an ability that I think would be useful at all levels considering he first steals armor (which adds to his) and THEN deals damage to the same target (at Lvl 1 and against someone with 4 or more armor, he’s effectively doing 8 damage and gaining 4 armor…that seems pretty good, and it only gets better with age! :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:) He would be getting 75% out of 100% when it came to Fire Brand (that’s if Fortress Gate stays and doesn’t get replaced by another Red user, but Gate is SOOO tanky and so good as a PvP lead!) and his other traits are great…but his colors conflict with the rest of the team (no Brown until after Gate and no Red until after Sparky and Borer, unless the team gets swapped around which isn’t too likely) but he would get mana from Borer and seems like he would get minimum two abilities off per turn (which at max is effectively 21 damage against someone with 4 or more armor, holy moomooz! :hushed:). This is the second one that has my interest.

Well, what do you guys think? Right now for me it’s either swapping out Steam Turret for Carnax or Tankbot 2000. Please, give me any insight or ideas, I’m always open enough to read and consider.

Once again, CONSTRUCTS IS A FOREVER TEAM, and I will be hitting the PvP with this team a lot…so the goal is to make this deck as good as possible! :smile:

2

Carnex is what i recommend however i am more giant based unfortunately.

3

I’m interested in building Giants too, but this is the first deck I want to complete…

After that would be Dragons, because all the ones available are just flat-out busted. For example, my roomie dumped some bucks into GoW and got Venoxia, and he just wipes the floor with pretty much any quest with her. I can only imagine the power of the others together!

Thanks for the input, and I do agree: I feel like getting mana from purple alone would be huge, and with that mana Red users I could change to the Proud Banner and just go crazy as Borer and matches alone would be enough to keep Fortress’s ability around when needed.

4

Interesting Team. I have been using the following Construct Team for a number of Tasks: 4 troops same Kingdom, 4 troops same Mana, 3 troops same Race, 4 troops from Adana. Just a note the last troop (Flame Cannon) is useless and only is there for completing tasks. In addition if Carnex was fully Traited I would have it in front of the Tankbot 2000. With Sparkgrinder this team hits VERY hard.

Tankbot 2000 *
Carnex
Sparkgrinder
Flame Cannon

R/Y Banner

5

Ahh, so I’m not the only one who wasn’t impress by Flame Cannon, good to see I know how to spy a good card still.

That’s two for talking up Carnex, and I was already impressed with him. Let’s see if anyone else has anything to say.

6

@ForsakenM
Do you need all 4 troops to be constructs?

I would swap tankbot out and replace with alchemist.
Still 4troops from adana.
One cast of alchemist normally fills sparkie and flame cannon.

carnex
Sparkie
Alchemist
Flame cannon

7

That’s not too bad, although my team currently only has 3 Constructs and already doesn’t get a full bonus for having 4 Constructs, so if I took another one out for Ol’ Yeller Maker there I would lose the +4 Armor to all troops.

That being said, Alchemist is absolutely incredible: I run him in the majority of my teams, including the stall team I have that I’m about to post here soon.

Yet another person who suggests Carnax, hmm…

Carnax > Steam Turret is almost a give at this point.

8

I did a write-up on why Adana isn’t good enough and how it could be improved in @Machiknight’s thread on building better synergy. It’s so close to being really good!

9

You mean this one?

1 Like
10

That’s the stuff!

11

Personally, I disagree: he gives any ally insane armor and attack, and doubles it on an ally construct. Sure, he takes away some potential extra buffs by not being a construct, but when the team is at complete max he will give Fortress Gate 24 Attack and Armor…ontop of the Armor it already has…that is insane.

He would give himself 12 in both, and with a Mono-Red Banner you would get his ability in three regular matches, no mana surge…what makes you think he’s not that great?

12

It’s not that Sparkgrinder isn’t great, it’s that he’s surrounded by mediocrity.

13

It’s not that Sparkgrinder isn’t great, it’s that he’s surrounded by mediocrity.

I’m not sure I agree with that, I mean sure none of the constructs do anything that blows you away, but when you just can’t kill that wall and all of a sudden it starts killing you, I don’t think constructs need to do anything too crazy if the developers don’t want them to.

As for the team topic, I think it’s official!

This is the team I will be striving for: Custom Team - Teams - Gems of War Database

14

Carnex with third trait, with Sparkgrinder’s buff spell, is an awesome combo… just need some reliable ways of (1) powering them up and (2) creating skulls… I found Mercy and Aziris went well with them, or Giant Spider and Aziris…

1 Like
15

Unless you want to kill MUCH more slowly, I feel like Carnex is a bad choice for this deck. This deck revolves around buffing the attack and armor of your troops, and hence you will want skulls on the board to utilize that attack. Carnex blows these up for much less damage. Personally, I would try to utilize purple/green and go with Boar Rider, Siren, or Venoxia for the last slot, probably in that order of preference. Yeah, obviously they aren’t constructs, but sometimes you just can’t find what you need where you want it… Sparky isn’t going to be firing off rapidly enough to target everyone on your team anyway. I would put your Gate in slot 1 and Borer in slot 4 to soak up damage and target mainly those 2 slots with Sparky.

The other advantage of this setup is it gives you a way to do damage when skulls are not plentiful…

16

Yeah, that’s one of the central problems. Carnex consumes skulls and Sparkgrinder buffs attack. You can work around it, but there’s a fundamental contradiction in their designs. That’s why in my write-up I suggested making Carnex an uber-tank that returns damage when taking damage instead of having him be a walking contradiction with his spell vs Legendary trait. Add to that buffing some of the other Adana troops’ ability to cast spells. It would then work as a tanky, attack denial, spell-focused squad. As it is it’s just a mishmash that feels close but no cigar, and Carnex hardly feels worthy of the Legendary Trait.

And, yes, you can look outside Adana to troops like Mercy and Aziris to make it viable but that breaks my heart and even then it’s just okay.

17

Hi,

Mana wise, I would go with Carnex. However, as @Studs already pointed out, there is a contradiction in their designs.

Look, as far as Constructs go, he’s you’re best bet. However, if you’re willing to sacrifice a construct for another troop type I offer the following set-up:

Try the following Sparky Construct team:

Construct in Front (By Default these units are pretty Tanky, so any additional armor to them allows them to take a good beating before they can be sacrificed.

For Construct: I would choose anyone that uses Blue Mana (You’ll see why).

Deep Boarer (R/Blue) ( Low Cost - > Good Default Stats & Used to charge up Cauldron)

Put Sparky (Sparkgrinder) in 2nd (R/Y) → He will DOUBLE the Attack of the Construct and increase armor.

Sacrificial Priest (P/Y) - > Use him on Deep Boarer once the construct reaches at least 75-80 attack.This coupled with his 20+ Split Damage will be able to one shot most normal to hard difficulty teams. No more than 4 CASTS are needed from either Sparky or Cauldron.

Ranger Hero with Cauldron (G/Brown) ( Huge Life Bonus and Doubles the Deep Boarer’s Attack again)

As for the Banner I would use Brown/Yellow or Brown/Any Color

1 Like
18

Actually once you get him strong enough, Carnex blows up enough that it shuffles the board a fair bit and more skulls appear… alternatively don’t actually cast his spell, just use him as a beatstick, as his third trait gets pretty abusive when buffed by Sparkgrinder…

19

Yeah, that just feels like ill-conceived design to me though. And it’s particularly egregious b/c it’s a Legendary and its his Legendary Trait that makes it so bad. “Don’t use his spell, he’s better that way!”

20

Eh no? Look at carnex his armor to skull trait, with the amount sparky gives carnex his skull dmg flies off the charts.

sparky+carnex core is perfect.

And to everyone complaining about him not being perfect: thats called balance, if he wouldnt remove skulls hed be op as hell. Cards need a drawback when they have such good stats.