NM 3--> NM 4 Gear Wall

I've spent the last 15-25 hours of gameplay ramming my head against the NM4 gearwall and feel like I have to be doing something wrong.  On the plus side, I've made a bunch of new Steam friends who're in the exact same situation.  On the minus side, we don't really feel like we're making progress.  This is how we've been trying to progress:

Liferoot Forest

End Game Incursion NM 3--> End Game NM 4--> End Game Incursion NM4

We can very rarely make it to wave 2 in NM4 and the rest of the time have to NM 3.  As is we're only getting minuscule upgrades every few hours and something seems off.  Is there an intermediary step we're missing?  Any advice would be an absolute godsend.  If any noble souls are willing to add me on Steam and help jumpstart me'n mine some time, I'll name my [nonexistent and not going to happen] firstborn after them.  No matter how ridiculous the name.  But even any tips would be extremely welcome. 

Add me Devils_Demon USA Iwo Jima Picture, i cant let me tactics be public

Firstly I'd recommend NM3 Throne Room over Incursion as it drops higher ilvl. 

Getting into NM4 is kind of luck based as when you're NM3 geared bad lane luck can kind of screw you over, but it shouldn't be too difficult. I'd suggest getting ~230k hp walls and 2k DPS traps before trying to push up though.

If you're still struggling with that then super slow Serenity aura and slow frosty can be pretty helpful. And also it may seem obvious but try to figure out exactly why it is you fail. Trap placement can be pretty important in the hard lanes to prevent things stacking up.

When breaking into NM4, i find that it's a million times easier to start the map with one person, to get the right resist makeup for double lanes, and wave 1 is slightly easier if started with one person.

Also, as the poster above me mentioned, slow is super strong. Bonus slow on Serenity and Frosts can't be underestimated. Some of the best groups I've played in, I could take naps between enemies hitting the frosts and getting to the wall.

I just think the first wave or 2 are ridiculously hard, because of the way defenses scale vs mob HP/Mobs per wave. Once you get to wave 3, you usually are pretty set (provided you can tank Ogres), since your defenses will be handling the waves far better than the first 2 waves, where most of your mana goes into repairs.

I was in that boat for a while.    I could get to wave 3 sometimes in NM4... and could faceroll NM3.

The key that turned NM4 from a headache to a surmountable challenge was my build and 1 additional passive.

My mage has the standard Frost Fire/Frosty Power...    but I dropped some DP for Slow on the Amulet and on the Staff. (Running I think 24% slow... maybe 20% I am not logged in I don't recall).  The Slow made a HUGE difference.

Then I dropped my 4th builder and stuck with only a Trapress, a Squire Barricader, and Frost Mage with freeze of course for my builders.

I go 5/7/5 frost per lane.  Traps are 7/10/8, and of course 1 barricade per lane.  Watch the lanes for where they bottle neck, the mobs will get frozen and block the lanes and it will be a bloodbath with all your frosties hitting the traps at the bottle neck.

As your 4th hero, and this was important...   I went with a HD/AP Huntress with Sticky bombs to repair/defend the lanes. 

I can beat Nm4 without a hero DPS,... but I need to get lucky on the lanes.  If I get Draken with Mages, or a lot of mages I will lose without my huntress.

I was able to beat Nm4 with only like 550 gear and a few Nm4 pieces.  Assuming you have the Barricade and Frost Passives....  this is totally doable.

At this point my Solo rate is about 5/6 on LR Nm4.  If I carry a noob, I usually lose on wave six.   If I bring in another huntress or two that are capable It's faceroll.

If you are running a projectile build...   I can only get to wave 6 in NM4 with mine... so I can't tell you how to beat it.

@tonyb quote:

As your 4th hero, and this important...   you need a HD/AP Huntress with Sticky bombs to repair/defend the lanes.  

Honestly, this isn't as important as some people make it out to be. I broke into NM4 at around 540-550 ipwr on all my characters and did decently with purely builders. From what I've noticed a decently geared serenity monk helps more than a dps huntress does.

Obviously it's personal preference but I found that purge evil procs + the bonus slow helped out a lot more on hard lanes + it requires no additional attention. There's also the bonus that you can play as any character you choose to, being limited to a huntress is annoying considering the current drop mechanics.

@Cuddles quote:

@tonyb quote:

As your 4th hero, and this important...   you need a HD/AP Huntress with Sticky bombs to repair/defend the lanes.  

Honestly, this isn't as important as some people make it out to be. I broke into NM4 at around 540-550 ipwr on all my characters and did decently with purely builders. From what I've noticed a decently geared serenity monk helps more than a dps huntress does.

Obviously it's personal preference but I found that purge evil procs + the bonus slow helped out a lot more on hard lanes + it requires no additional attention. There's also the bonus that you can play as any character you choose to, being limited to a huntress is annoying considering the current drop mechanics.

If you don't use a hero DPS you must use the Monk AA tower, correct? That sucks up a lot of DU. If you are also using serenity auras and lots of frosties, you must not have a lot left over for traps.

@Professor_Valconian quote:

@Cuddles quote:

@tonyb quote:

As your 4th hero, and this important...   you need a HD/AP Huntress with Sticky bombs to repair/defend the lanes.  

Honestly, this isn't as important as some people make it out to be. I broke into NM4 at around 540-550 ipwr on all my characters and did decently with purely builders. From what I've noticed a decently geared serenity monk helps more than a dps huntress does.

Obviously it's personal preference but I found that purge evil procs + the bonus slow helped out a lot more on hard lanes + it requires no additional attention. There's also the bonus that you can play as any character you choose to, being limited to a huntress is annoying considering the current drop mechanics.

If you don't use a hero DPS you must use the Monk AA tower, correct? That sucks up a lot of DU. If you are also using serenity auras and lots of frosties, you must not have a lot left over for traps.

If a frosty freezes a flying unit it instantly dies. More effective than AA's are.

[[119027,users]]

You can get away without any ranged DPS and no AA? What if one gets through the frosties? Aren't you pretty much toast in that situation? Trying to dispatch a wyvern at your crystal with a Squire waller just doesn't cut it.

@Professor_Valconian quote:

Cuddles

You can get away without any ranged DPS and no AA? What if one gets through the frosties? Aren't you pretty much toast in that situation? Trying to dispatch a wyvern at your crystal with a Squire waller just doesn't cut it.

If you have extra slow on frosties it's rare they'll make it even half way down a lane, especially on LifeRoot where they seem to take damage from the traps too.

I've failed a couple of times due to flying kobolds going straight for the eggs on LR but it's honestly a rare occurrence. So rare that I've failed more times due to regular kobolds running through walls and into the eggs.

Any tips for the build on nm3 throne room? (playing solo but have all chars - walls 240k, traps 1.8k, 70% ish frosty increase using some old low ipwr app stuff).  I can't seem to figure out a good setup. Thanks in advance!

@Dadogy quote:

Any tips for the build on nm3 throne room? (playing solo but have all chars - walls 240k, traps 1.8k, 70% ish frosty increase using some old low ipwr app stuff).  I can't seem to figure out a good setup. Thanks in advance!

1 Wall + 4-5 traps for each of the top lanes, couple of frosties behind the walls. Double wall off each lane down the bottom where the individual lanes meet up at the throne. Couple of AA's in the middle of the map, purge serenities in each lane if you have them.

@Shinnyshin quote:

I've spent the last 15-25 hours of gameplay ramming my head against the NM4 gearwall and feel like I have to be doing something wrong.  On the plus side, I've made a bunch of new Steam friends who're in the exact same situation.  On the minus side, we don't really feel like we're making progress.  This is how we've been trying to progress:

Liferoot Forest

End Game Incursion NM 3--> End Game NM 4--> End Game Incursion NM4

We can very rarely make it to wave 2 in NM4 and the rest of the time have to NM 3.  As is we're only getting minuscule upgrades every few hours and something seems off.  Is there an intermediary step we're missing?  Any advice would be an absolute godsend.  If any noble souls are willing to add me on Steam and help jumpstart me'n mine some time, I'll name my [nonexistent and not going to happen] firstborn after them.  No matter how ridiculous the name.  But even any tips would be extremely welcome. 

If you COULD go from NM3 to NM4 in 15-25 hours of gameplay, then the devs would have done something wrong.

This is suppose to be hard, you need a well balanced well geared w/passives team. If any casual could go in and beat all the content in the game within 50 hours of gameplay, there wouldn't be much of a game.

Advice?

Do your daily loot bonuses, get Mythical or Higher gear w/Builds, and try NM4 again.

You shouldn't beat NM4 with NM3 Greens and Blues.

@vSyNd quote:

If you COULD go from NM3 to NM4 in 15-25 hours of gameplay, then the devs would have done something wrong.

This is suppose to be hard, you need a well balanced well geared w/passives team. If any casual could go in and beat all the content in the game within 50 hours of gameplay, there wouldn't be much of a game.

Advice?

Do your daily loot bonuses, get Mythical or Higher gear w/Builds, and try NM4 again.

You shouldn't beat NM4 with NM3 Greens and Blues.

Alas, I've been on NM 3 for far more than 15-25 hours, though it's just recently that I've really done a concentrated effort to upgrade.  Also not sure I'd call myself a casual given that I've over 250 hours of gameplay and have been regularly doing my dailies since the first very day we could buy into alpha...after they fixed the daily bug.  It's more that I was so drained by the gear wipe (though I agree with it) that I hadn't been trying to regain my status until recently.  I do agree with the rest of what you said but the assumptions seemed a little off base.

To everyone else, thank you very, very much for the wonderful advice which should make things much easier.

[[119027,users]]

Thanks very much, my main mistake was wasting double barricades on the top lanes and also running 3 frosties instead of 2 there. All sorted now :) Although I don't have a decent purge evil staff so just used boosts to strengthen the barricades a bit.

ou can get away without any ranged DPS and no AA? What if one gets through the frosties? Aren't you pretty much toast in that situation? Trying to dispatch a wyvern at your crystal with a Squire waller just doesn't cut it.

The barricades agro most fliers.   The only ones that it does not is the kobolds...   and with the Frost  + Ice my frost towers kill them better than my AA.

On rare occasion a wyvern will get through the frost and ignore the barricade....  but occasionally Ogres do the same thing so I consider that a non issue.  So yes you can get away with no hero DPS and no AA.  I only see a wyvern ignore my barricade about 1 out of 10 runs, ogres and orcs, and walking kobolds tend to do it more. 

Cuddles

As for Serenity Monk vs Huntress,

Yes I can and have many times run Nm4 with Serenity/PE/Slow Monk...  it works just fine.   I can squeeze out a win about 50% of the time with it, and you are correct playing repair bot allows you to play any character so you can get the loot you want.  I can also squeeze by with Boost Aura and AA monk.  

Hell I can get to Wave 6/7 with Fireball towers and cannonball towers....   point being there are a lot of builds that will get you into Nm4 Liferoot and most can get your the win depending on RNG of the waves and how fast you are at repairing.  

Solo Serenity doesn't seem to help as much though when you are on wave 7 with a Combo of mages, spears and drakens in the left lane while the 3 ogres are beating on your other barricades.  Its pretty much game over at that point.   Well I guess if you had 400 mana and +100% repair rate it might work. 

With the huntress you can start a repair, and deal with the biggest threat...  it takes practice of course to know what to repair, what to kill and what to leave alone for the defense to kill but I can take down a mage in about 5 seconds with my huntress depending on the lane resist...  that makes a huge difference when you are getting overrun.

And since they were struggling to break into Nm4 I was was offering up the easiest way to play Nm4 liferoot that i have found.

Then again, it could just be my specific build that makes the huntress more effective.   Possibly a different map set up would make Serenity more effective.

personally for me, i grinded NM3 for quite a long time before beating NM4. Actually, i couldn't beat NM4 before stat allocation came in, so... I can finally beat NM4 after tower changes and stat allocation system introduction. So yay to that.

What i do, is: my waller is pure NM3, not top tier items either, walls at around 220k hp at tier 1.
I use huntress equipped with NM3 gear and a couple of NM4 items (blue, green). One or two, idk. My bow is outdated and has DP + 7% tripwire. Blue. And i use Apprentice to boost my traps, boost aura monk with 330-ish DP on boost to boost my traps / walls.

So with these builders, i could actually farm NM4 4-5 waves before i would be destroyed. At the end of the day, i got through, collected some blue / mythicals along the way, and now i can beat the map.

The experience was solo / duo. Duo was easier because of one extra repairman and not so much pressure increase on the lanes (compared to 3-4 man parties).