Counter-heroes in duel mode (3.1).

I'm interested in the Karl-Shak pairing (in reality, this pairing is quite boring for many). Who is stronger, and is it worth playing Shak defensively?

Ultimately, the advantage is more on Karl's side. But a definitive answer cannot be given. Here, Shak needs to eliminate the ballista with Ogres as quickly as possible, which will be difficult, as the ranged attack of Cyclops deals damage in the range of 100, and there will probably not be many Shamans at the moment when they can use Chain Lightning. Erls should be attacked with Shak's direct attacks; the bears are quickly eliminated by Wyverns, but Spearman will be the ones to deal with the Stone of Prophecy, and it will be difficult to reach them. I don't remember ever playing this pairing; I think I'll test it with someone on the Heroes of Might and Magic 3 Complete in the near future.

I'll post a couple of replays, including one where Shak defeats Helmar, a rather interesting pairing, as it is believed that Helmar has more advantages here. However, there is nothing complicated about it; at the very beginning, we use Battle Cry so that the Cyclops reach the enemy on the first turn, and then Shak deals direct attacks to the Lava Golems. In the end, at the end of the battle, there will be a bunch of Goblins left, which are not very easy to burn with Chaos without magic, and Divine Retribution will not help much either. In general, at the end, the advantage will be with Shak with his frequent direct attacks.


Razaz vs. Sinistar: here, the opponent made several fatal mistakes that distanced him from victory. First, he left the teleporting Golems near the Red Dragons, when it would have been better to attack the latter. As a result, the Golems were easily destroyed physically. Secondly, one of the stacks of Gremlins had a miniature of magical defense; here, it would have been better to combine the two stacks.

Ibba vs. Garnua: again, the opponent was messing up from the very beginning, using something unclear instead of Runes of Invisibility. In addition, the opponent positioned three of his stacks at a dangerous distance from the free Cyclops, who eliminated almost everyone with luck. I finished off the remaining Dragons with a retaliatory attack from the Shamans with support and direct attacks from Garnua.

Ravenna vs. Orson: here, everything is as it should be, but I almost fell for the enemy's trick when he left mana for 3-4 resurrections and began to position the remaining troops so that they could be easily destroyed by Meteor Shower and thus burn all the mana.

And I'll also allow myself a little off-topic)) I play both regular duels and RTA (Random Team Arena), and they are equally interesting to me. However, at the moment, I don't have as much time for online games, so if I do play, it's in duels. But I get just as much pleasure from playing RTA. I don't see any limitations in duels at all; there are quite a few controversial matchups, considering that there are 24 duel heroes, and therefore 276 different matchups. It is quite difficult to learn the tactics for each side for all battles, which is what makes duels interesting. And the skill of the players is of great importance here; sometimes it happens that even counter-heroes lose. In short, tastes differ, and I don't understand the negativity towards duels, especially since this topic was not created for that.