You nailed it the best hero is the one you have the most fun with! One extremely powerful and often overlooked DPS option is a Squire or countess with a weapon that has 100 to the block stat. Stick a DPS pet on them and free portable road block.
There's really two ways to build your aura monk. Damage auras, which as you say focus on Tdmg more than Trange, but they've kind of fallen out of meta and only see niche usage. Range auras, which are by far the most commonly used, focus on Trange over anything else. Most of the time these are by far the better option, as you'll be weakening enemies in a larger radius for your LTs to clean up. Summoners you want to spec pretty much purely into THP. LTs are your damage dealers, the Summoner is your waller. As for your Adept, you want to strike a balance between Tdmg and Trate, since rate increases the target count on your LTs. TRange is also important. Adept armor pieces are the ones everyone is after since they have such high stat requirements. The Barb, while indeed very fun, is not a good option as an upgrader. His casting speed doesn't scale well enough to be able to quickly pump upgrades into towers like an upgrader adept or jester can. Barb can be used decently as a boss killer though if you invest heavily into hawk stance and hero damage. Good DPS characters (not upgraders, they are built very differently) include a HBoost monk, Beam EV, Piercing Shot Huntress, and arguably a Hdmg invested Jester with 3726 AB2. Wheel o Fortuna is a very powerful ability. Generally speaking, you don't need DPS characters in waves. You'd be better off with a Tboost monk and Summoners with Guardian pets to boost your LTs. You really ought to look into these characters, especially the summoners since they're place-and-forget low maintenance chars. All that aside, this video seems really nice for newer players who feel lost in the early-midgame. Your tips and playstyle work well for the earlier maps on Nightmare and survival. :)
I'll add to this, 1. Attack rate is straight up another damage stat for lightning towers... fun fact. 2. Series EV's buff beam priority is Damage > HP since usually people use huntress guardians to boost the attack rate when it matters. HP is for Physical Beams which are often used to replace minion walls. (Huntress Guardians are a better boost then Buff Beams and they don't stack). The Stun Time stat is also translated to range when you use the buff beam.
2:46 actually believe it or not, as long as you have decent damage and rate, you can focus range>thp>damage>rate on auras, thp will keep them alive longer, while usually at a certain point your electric auras should be enough without needing more tower damage, to the point where more damage would make little difference 4:42 it actually makes enemies take double damage, im like 99% sure it doesnt make them do less damage, it does slow them tho 6:13 when you start using tower boost and/or golems youll realize you wont need this anymore ;) 7:36 im quite positive that past like 2k, range and rate make minimal difference if any at all on a summoner, so you can really just ignore them, in fact in endgame i see people completely forgo every stat but thp if they find a piece with a lot of thp, like usually i try to find pieces with a good amount of at least 3 relevant tower stats but summoner honestly literally only needs thp so long as you got at least a little bit of the other 3 8:57 dont neglect reflects! (didnt really intend to rhyme there lol, hey maybe itll get the point across a bit better xD) 9:59 this only applies if you have a bunch of stuff on one beam, in the case of this one beam and one harpoon, it is actually significantly more efficient to upgrade the harpoon as opposed to the buff beam, buff beams strength comes from affecting multiple towers, as when upgraded the bonuses are minimal but add up when theres more towers, usually you will have multiple towers on one beam so this doesnt matter much 10:46 tower damage. thats it. tower damage. as usual it doesnt hurt to have the other stats, but we all know the magic number, 2k, past 2k the scaling is absolute horseshit, even for tower damage its bad, it just so happens that tower damage scales the best, the difference between a 2k ev and a 10k ev is…minimal at best, very low priority character to boost in stats 14:10 while you are correct, damage is the main thing on an app, you want gear with damage rate and range, and upgrade all into damage, however in endgame survivals, you will be spamming the hell out of lightning towers which scale really well with rate, in which case you would “rate spec” meaning youd respec your character and put every last point into rate (but still prioritize upgrading tower damage on your gear) 15:53 well, while i do respect you for playing the barb because its fun as fuck, its uh…sub optimal when it comes to utilizing a genie, if you wanna upgrade towers theres two characters that do it best, a jester focused into cast rate with a lupine bow or bow of bonny/hearts (shoots really fast and through walls, maxes out your mana with a genie in a single frame essentially), or, and this is actually even better, an adept focused into ability 1 with a serpent staff or proto staff (serpent is better), what this does is it’s essentially an aura that so long as you have mana, AUTOMATICALLY upgrades towers in its radius, so you just point and shoot at a spawn and keep getting mana and before you know it all your towers will be maxed and you didnt even move a finger 17:12 a tower boost monk should be a seperate thing from a dps monk, since a dps monks damage comes from a pet, but a tower boost monk needs a genie, they dont synergize well together 18:00 chikuthedarkling (as im sure you know) and washboard productions both have very good guides, chikus more so in the form of a steam guide but he does have raw unedited vods that kinda walk you through the game, but washboard is more focused into a video walkthrough rather than a steam guide, his videos are edited and straight to the point, and then theres theoran who just has a ton of really well made videos on various topics throughout the game if youre looking for something specific
You nailed it the best hero is the one you have the most fun with! One extremely powerful and often overlooked DPS option is a Squire or countess with a weapon that has 100 to the block stat. Stick a DPS pet on them and free portable road block.
There's really two ways to build your aura monk.
Damage auras, which as you say focus on Tdmg more than Trange, but they've kind of fallen out of meta and only see niche usage.
Range auras, which are by far the most commonly used, focus on Trange over anything else. Most of the time these are by far the better option, as you'll be weakening enemies in a larger radius for your LTs to clean up.
Summoners you want to spec pretty much purely into THP. LTs are your damage dealers, the Summoner is your waller.
As for your Adept, you want to strike a balance between Tdmg and Trate, since rate increases the target count on your LTs. TRange is also important. Adept armor pieces are the ones everyone is after since they have such high stat requirements.
The Barb, while indeed very fun, is not a good option as an upgrader. His casting speed doesn't scale well enough to be able to quickly pump upgrades into towers like an upgrader adept or jester can. Barb can be used decently as a boss killer though if you invest heavily into hawk stance and hero damage.
Good DPS characters (not upgraders, they are built very differently) include a HBoost monk, Beam EV, Piercing Shot Huntress, and arguably a Hdmg invested Jester with 3726 AB2. Wheel o Fortuna is a very powerful ability.
Generally speaking, you don't need DPS characters in waves. You'd be better off with a Tboost monk and Summoners with Guardian pets to boost your LTs. You really ought to look into these characters, especially the summoners since they're place-and-forget low maintenance chars.
All that aside, this video seems really nice for newer players who feel lost in the early-midgame. Your tips and playstyle work well for the earlier maps on Nightmare and survival. :)
I'll add to this,
1. Attack rate is straight up another damage stat for lightning towers... fun fact.
2. Series EV's buff beam priority is Damage > HP since usually people use huntress guardians to boost the attack rate when it matters. HP is for Physical Beams which are often used to replace minion walls. (Huntress Guardians are a better boost then Buff Beams and they don't stack). The Stun Time stat is also translated to range when you use the buff beam.
If you want a good dps upgrader best option is adept or jester.
Don’t stop making videos man i love dungeon defenders, i appreciate what ur doing ❤️
2:46 actually believe it or not, as long as you have decent damage and rate, you can focus range>thp>damage>rate on auras, thp will keep them alive longer, while usually at a certain point your electric auras should be enough without needing more tower damage, to the point where more damage would make little difference
4:42 it actually makes enemies take double damage, im like 99% sure it doesnt make them do less damage, it does slow them tho
6:13 when you start using tower boost and/or golems youll realize you wont need this anymore ;)
7:36 im quite positive that past like 2k, range and rate make minimal difference if any at all on a summoner, so you can really just ignore them, in fact in endgame i see people completely forgo every stat but thp if they find a piece with a lot of thp, like usually i try to find pieces with a good amount of at least 3 relevant tower stats but summoner honestly literally only needs thp so long as you got at least a little bit of the other 3
8:57 dont neglect reflects! (didnt really intend to rhyme there lol, hey maybe itll get the point across a bit better xD)
9:59 this only applies if you have a bunch of stuff on one beam, in the case of this one beam and one harpoon, it is actually significantly more efficient to upgrade the harpoon as opposed to the buff beam, buff beams strength comes from affecting multiple towers, as when upgraded the bonuses are minimal but add up when theres more towers, usually you will have multiple towers on one beam so this doesnt matter much
10:46 tower damage. thats it. tower damage. as usual it doesnt hurt to have the other stats, but we all know the magic number, 2k, past 2k the scaling is absolute horseshit, even for tower damage its bad, it just so happens that tower damage scales the best, the difference between a 2k ev and a 10k ev is…minimal at best, very low priority character to boost in stats
14:10 while you are correct, damage is the main thing on an app, you want gear with damage rate and range, and upgrade all into damage, however in endgame survivals, you will be spamming the hell out of lightning towers which scale really well with rate, in which case you would “rate spec” meaning youd respec your character and put every last point into rate (but still prioritize upgrading tower damage on your gear)
15:53 well, while i do respect you for playing the barb because its fun as fuck, its uh…sub optimal when it comes to utilizing a genie, if you wanna upgrade towers theres two characters that do it best, a jester focused into cast rate with a lupine bow or bow of bonny/hearts (shoots really fast and through walls, maxes out your mana with a genie in a single frame essentially), or, and this is actually even better, an adept focused into ability 1 with a serpent staff or proto staff (serpent is better), what this does is it’s essentially an aura that so long as you have mana, AUTOMATICALLY upgrades towers in its radius, so you just point and shoot at a spawn and keep getting mana and before you know it all your towers will be maxed and you didnt even move a finger
17:12 a tower boost monk should be a seperate thing from a dps monk, since a dps monks damage comes from a pet, but a tower boost monk needs a genie, they dont synergize well together
18:00 chikuthedarkling (as im sure you know) and washboard productions both have very good guides, chikus more so in the form of a steam guide but he does have raw unedited vods that kinda walk you through the game, but washboard is more focused into a video walkthrough rather than a steam guide, his videos are edited and straight to the point, and then theres theoran who just has a ton of really well made videos on various topics throughout the game if youre looking for something specific
for 18:00 he was definitely talking about Theoran i think, haha
@@chikuthedarkling probably, theoran is a chad💪🗿
I personally am a bit of a TRate hoe ngl (doesnt meant that i have lot of it lmao)😂
Tower boost monk was a game changer for me, it's way to strong.
Great video! Definitely considering a dps monk or jester now!
Great Video, very helpful, keep it up!
How are you readying up without touching the tower? What button is that?
G or ctrl+G if you have multiple characters out!
You've come so FAR :D Very cool tutorial :)
Do you have a discord server?