Major Anvil

Character

Major Anvil is well-rounded hero specializing in ranged assault. He particularly excels against all kinds of boss units, spine crawlers, and in any defensive position. Anvil tends to be strongest late game when combat becomes slower paced as Odins take the brunt of the damage, but Anvil may not keep up as easily in the early/mid game where constant sieging and unsieging can hamper his pace or place him in danger. Therefore, similar to Nova, Anvil is best accompanied with a good front line like Predator, Tychus, or Tassadar to allow him to play aggressively with siege mode. Anvil's ability for global scans is an exclusive feature and extremely powerful.

Anvil possesses the same two modes of combat as a siege tank in standard play: tank mode and siege mode (siege mode being an ability unlocked via a talent). While his strengths are in ranged assault, Anvil is actually a dynamic hero with several utility abilities. In addition, he is rather durable for a ranged assault hero.

While formidable in tank mode, Anvil needs to utilize siege mode to compete with other heroes in terms of damage contribution. His weakness lies in the 4-second transition period between tank and siege mode. In a defensive position where he can comfortably remain stationary in siege mode, he is rivaled only by Rory Swann. For offense, however, he needs to position himself somewhat aggressively in siege mode to keep up with a fast push (otherwise he loses time sieging and unsieging). Without adequate supporting cover fire, he cannot target units next to him and is vulnerable if caught overextended without time to unsiege and retreat—for example against fast ultralisks, airborne units, or a drop pod from the Zerg. Knowing when and how to siege mode is crucial for an Anvil player. This is much easier in a team which can keep the zerg away from Anvil.

Beyond ranged assault, Anvil has a number of unique abilities that make him rather versatile for a ranged assault hero. These include global scans, immunity to airborne stuns, an AoE buff to allied damage, Stim, detector, and personal stealth. He consistently gains access to talents that increase his movement speed, range, and durability, making him deceptively slippery and hard to kill, particularly in tank mode.

Abilities

Siege Mode - 45 mana to activate; 0 mana to deactivate

This is Anvil's bread and butter ability. In Siege mode, Anvil is immobile and suffers reduced attack speed; however, his damage and range increase, and each attack fires twice. Siege mode also deals bonus damage vs. Heroic as well as area of effect damage to ground units, but single target damage to air (requires a talent to target airborne units). He cannot fire nukes in Siege mode or attack enemies too close to him. The mana cost is only to enter siege mode, not return to tank mode. The transition between modes lasts 4 seconds.

Siege mode is what makes Anvil competitive with other heroes, so finding ways to use it as efficiently and frequently as possible (while staying safe) is crucial for a good Anvil player. It's most powerful at the end of the game in the final push, where the splash damage wreaks absolute havoc on the hordes of incoming Zerg minions. It's not uncommon to catch up and exceed every other hero in damage at this point in the game.

N - Scanner Sweep - 250 minerals

This is a standard scanner sweep like used by an Orbital Command Center. Rather than costing energy, it's priced at 250 minerals per use. It can be used to spot the high ground, most notably against Spine Crawlers that can decimate your units from the fog of war with impunity. With the advent of perks, Battlecruiser Support has made scans less exclusive in revealing the high ground.

Scanner Sweeps can be upgraded to global range via the Siege Mastery. This brings another dimension to its use by allowing a team with the Nuke Mastery to fire global nukes anywhere on the map. This is extremely powerful and can be used to snipe Ultralisk Dens, effectively removing Blue Ultralisks from the map entirely; Spires can be targeted to reduce the mutalisk count; as well as general production buildings, all of which can rapidly accelerate the pace of the game and significantly reduce lag.

Heavy Tracks - Starting ability

Heavy Tracks is a starting ability with two functions. First, it is a built-in mud stomper talent, so Anvil is not slowed by creep at any point in the game. Second, it makes him immune to the Hybrid Dominator airborne stun and AoE knockback, which makes him safe against the perma-stun other heroes suffer vs. packs of Hybrid Dominators (or the insta-kill if spore colonies are nearby).

Q - Combined Assault - 45 mana | 45s cooldown | 30s duration

This buffs the damage, splash, and range of all units around Anvil, including Anvil himself. Damage and splash are boosted by 10%, the damage buff is doubled for melee units; additionally, range is upgraded slightly, initially by 0.5. Combined Assault can be upgraded via Talent to also increase spell damage. It's on a somewhat long cooldown.

W - Mjölnir Protocol - 60 mana | 45s cooldown

Mjölnir Protocol is an emergency defense system for Anvil. For a short duration, it periodically fires lightning bolts at nearby units, that will arc for reduced damage to secondary units. This is useful for a quick spurt of burst damage, when you are confronted by a large number of enemies, or when you are caught out in siege mode and unable to target enemy units next to you. Mjölnir Protocol is on a rather long cooldown, so it may be best to save it for emergencies.

R - Stimpack - 75 health | 50 mana | 30s cooldown | 8s duration

Stimpack is standard fare: take damage in exchange for movement speed and attack speed. The bonuses are 50% movement speed and 40% attack speed. This is best combo'd with Combined Assault for maximum dps. As expected, it's an incredibly powerful ability on a unit specializing in damage, and it's also useful defensively to escape a bad situation.

T - Tactical Nuke Strike

Like other heroes, Anvil can also build nukes. His nuke talent pool isn't as reliable as Tychus, but Anvil can combo Nuke Mastery and global scans to single-handedly clean the map of most dangerous structures.

Inspire and Irradiate

These are same abilities as other heroes. Inspire passively buffs nearby Crap Patrol units, while Irradiate passively damages nearby enemies over time.

Masteries

Asgard Training Mastery

Asgard training mastery provides a well-rounded buff to Anvil's stats. It buffs:

• Damage
• Attack Speed
• Mjölnir Protocol damage to initial targets
• Shields
• Energy

There are 75 total upgrades, each occurring by being combat, especially vs higher priority targets like bosses, as well as completing objectives. This is most useful to upgrade as early as possible to allow the upgrades to develop. It's a standard starting mastery for Anvil in many play styles.

Energy Mastery

Anvil doesn't have much use for bonus energy. His talent pool supplements him just fine. This is not a recommended mastery.

All-Rounder Mastery

All-Rounder provides two talents initially, a bonus to energy, and an additional talent every 45 minutes. This is useful as a end-game mastery when your core masteries are already exhausted. Probably a higher priority than Energy. Early game All-rounder is not worthwhile, as Anvil is not particularly dependent on securing specific talents.

Lightweight Equipment Mastery

• Reduces the cooldown on Mjölnir Protocol, Scanner Sweep, and Stimpack
• Combined Assault: Lowers the mana cost and increases the duration.

This a powerful mastery because it upgrades two of Anvil's primary abilities for DPS: Combined Assault and Stimpack. While not necessarily high priority early on, ideally it will be obtained before tackling the final base.

Nuke Mastery

Nuke Mastery upgrades the area, heroic damage, and range to global for nukes. This is especially interesting for Anvil because of its synergy with global scans that allow it to snipe zerg production buildings. There should always be at least one person, or even better two people, with Nuke Mastery on an Anvil team, preferably by level 50. One person who never dies is enough to clean the map of priority buildings such as Ultra Dens and Spires before reaching each respective zerg base, but two people will allow a full clean, including smaller production buildings.

Big-Game Hunter Mastery

As a DPS-oriented hero, Big Game is a great mastery to have. Depending on your difficulty, it may be troublesome fitting this one in early. In a choice between Big Game and Nukes, the Nuke Mastery will probably be more desirable because it removes most big-game enemies from the map. The exception is the final area, where Big-Game Hunter is very strong against the large enemies in the final push.

Long-Range Combat Mastery

Long-Range Combat Mastery upgrades the Attack Speed, Range, Energy Regen, and Sight of Anvil while in siege mode. Additionally, Scanner Sweeps become global. Given how integral Siege Mode is to Anvil, and how useful global scans can be, this mastery is essential. It's not an immediate priority, as no one will have global nukes early on and siege mode is often too slow in the early part of the game, but by level 30 or 40 at the latest, this mastery is an important upgrade.

Borr Protocol Mastery

Borr Protocol provides broad bonuses to almost every aspect of Anvil's game.

• Tank mode attack speed is nearly doubled
• Siege mode's splash radius is increased
• Mjölnir Protocol chains more secondary targets
• Scanner Sweeps have reduced cost
• Iron Man Mastery increases movement speed when maxed out
• Turtle Protocol Mastery applies increased health regen with stacks of adaptive armor.

Borr Protocol should be strongly considered for an early-priority mastery, because the increased tank mode attack speed is very powerful in the early game when you want to be moving through each area quickly. The mastery scales well into the late game with increased splash in siege mode and reduced scanner costs. It's just good no matter which way you play.

Weapons Research Mastery

Weapon Mastery increases:

• Damage
• Attack Speed
• Range
• Mjölnir damage to initial targets

Weapon Mastery buffs all the stats Anvil needs. It's an ideal mastery that should be upgraded early on, probably just after Borr.

Iron Man Mastery

Iron Man is the same for Anvil as other heroes, buffing over time life and energy, along with providing 90% immunity to slows when it's maxed out. Most beginners benefit greatly from its other bonus: No minerals or EXP are lost upon death.

Typically, Anvil is fairly safe in tank mode due to his durability, base movement speed, and Stimpack. He's mostly only at risk in siege mode. Beginner Anvil players will likely die very often in Siege mode, making Iron Man useful for them. As a DPS champion, more experienced players will find zero benefit from this mastery, and especially in higher difficulties such as Insane and Mental, Iron Man is as good as obsolete anyways.

Graduating Range Mastery

Graduating Range mastery increases Anvil's range while in siege mode over a period of time. The range increases in 0.5 increments, quickly at first (every couple seconds), but more slowly at higher values (as long as perhaps 4-5 seconds towards the end). The total range buff is 6 to 6.5, giving Anvil in siege mode between 16 and 19 range depending on his talents.

This is a great mastery for keeping Anvil safe in siege mode. It should strongly be considered over Iron Man for player's trying to progress beyond normal mode. It's very useful in defense, and in general it's a good upgrade to consider after the core masteries are completed, depending on your play style.

Turtle Protocol Mastery - 1000 minerals

Turtle Protocol Mastery provides access to the Adaptive Armor and Emergency Kit talents. Adaptive armor provides a stacking armor buff each time damage is suffered, and Emergency Kit restores a significant burst of health when low on health, on a moderate cooldown.

Turtle Protocol Mastery's talents are outscaled fairly quickly. Any ultralisk will slice through adaptive armor without a second thought, and bosses are the same. In the early game, it can make you nigh invulnerable to the weaker zerg units such as abominations. This mastery is only worthwhile as a prerequisite to Ambush Protocol.

Ambush Protocol Mastery - 2000 minerals

Ambush Protocol Mastery lowers Shield Regeneration and increases Shield Delay on restoration but in exchange makes Anvil stealthed while in siege mode. This is the ultimate defense in siege mode, as only boss units have detection. This mastery will allow Anvil to be a force in the early and mid game with aggressive siege mode positioning. Later in the game, it's hardly necessary, not only because the Crap Patrol units form a strong front line with Odins, but also because Hive Guardians begin spawning with every wave—and they can detect stealth.

In a good team composition, Ambush Protocol is similarly mostly unnecessary, usually when you have a Predator hero on your team. The problem with Ambush Protocol is it requires the investment of 2 Mastery points to reach. It can be worthwhile, but you will not be able to run global nukes, for example.

Wrath of Thor Mastery - 2500 combined score unlock

Wrath of Thor Mastery applies a single burst of Mjölnir Protocol to each attack delivered in siege mode. It's incredibly powerful as an AoE effect and should be upgraded as soon as possible. Anticipate it in advance and save the mastery point if you must.

Sample order of masteries on mental

I'm not a pro, but here is how I did Mental

1. Asgard Training
2. Borr Protocol
3. Weapons Research
4. Long-Range Combat
5. Lightweight or Big Game
6. Nuke
7. Lightweight or Big Game
8. Graduating Range
9. All Rounder

This is designed to be as strong as possible early on, and reach global nukes after completing the bottom right base to avoid facing blue ultralisks. Graduating Range can be upgraded 5th if you expect to be the team's main solution to Leviathan and Brain Bug. Wrath of Thor Mastery is upgraded as soon as available, unless it's for Nuke Mastery.

Perks used were Mineral bonus, Battlecruiser Support, and Onslaught.

Tankz order of masteries/perks for Coop and solo:

Coop:

1. Asgard
2. Weapon research
3. Borr
4. LW
5. long range
6. nuke
7. graduating
8. BGH
9. allrounder
10. w/e

Perks for Coop should be Zapper, air and onslaught for maximum damage, Mecenary is pretty useless in 4p as people will have more than enough money for nukes.

Solo:

1. Asgard
2. Wep research
3. Borr + LW
4. Armor
5. Stealth
6. Long range
7. Nuke
8. Graduating
9. BGH
10. w/e

Perks for solo: Zapper, Air and compartzialtionsomething (the free LW perk) - Stealth is needed to speed up the process once ultras are in the game, and nuke will be achieved once levi is dead.