Can This Dashing Rogue Be A Difference Maker In Your Squad?
In This post:
Introduction
Hi folks! Welcome to another post on The Nexus.
My intention this week was to cover the two premium banner units — Ashwyn and Ennara.
As usual, it took me longer than expect to finish my Starter’s Guide and life got in the way, so we now find ourselves day past the end of the banner 😤.
I’ll still post this review for posterity’s sake because I think Ashwyn is a great choice for a Guardian that can help your damage output.
He doesn’t play like your typical assassin.
He can hold his own in single combat and dish out a lot of punishment in the process. I wish the warrior class played more like Aswhyn to be honest.
In this article, we’ll cover his kit, how I used him in my testing and some closing thoughts about whether he’s worth putting in your squad.
Let’s get started!
About Ashwyn
Ashwyn is a legendary Core One Cinder Assassin from the Redeemer faction.
Like all assassins, he can deal a lot of damage to back row units. Unlike most assassins, however, he doesn’t teleport to them immediately.
Ashwyn likes to engage front line units first, and he’s very well suited for the task. Here’s why!
Let me start with the skill that sets Ashwyn apart from all other assassins (with the exception of Fieval).
Ashwyn’s passive, Mortal Levy, heals him for up to 9% of his HP every time he lands any critical hit.
Do you see where this is going?
His ultimate, Rogue’s rampage, deals a base of 6 hits to the nearest enemy for up to 100% of his attack. Every time he lands a critical hit, he deals an additional hit up to 12 in total.
That’s anywhere from 600–1200% of his attack to a single target!
Ashwyn will also target new enemies if he kills his first target with Rogue’s rampage, so no damage is wasted.
Since he’s immune to damage while he’s performing his ult, he has the potential to heal himself back to full health while dealing a massive amount of damage to the opponent.
Of course, it all depends on him stringing together crits. His last two skills are there to help.
Blitz makes Ashwyn dart towards the furthest unit about 8 seconds into the fight to deliver a big hit. It also increases his crit chance by 25% — making it easier for him to string crits together with Rogue’s Rampage.
After a 20 second cool down, Ashwyn uses Menacing Mark to teleport behind a front row unit, dealing another big hit. This time, the entire squad gets a 20% bonus to crit against the marked unit.
The trick to getting the most out of Ashwyn is timing his ultimate with his two active skills. That maxes his chance of landing crits, dealing big damage and healing himself in the process.
How I Used Ashwyn
How effective is that combo? Surprisingly…Very!
In this video, I take him for a spin in the Challenge 2 room of the Lava Mines in Brimstone. It’s a good test for Ashwyn and I brought Thorit along to see how well he can boost Ashwyn’s speed.
Let’s see how it goes…
As you can see, Ashwyn’s ability to self-heal is impressive — especially when he uses his ult to clear out multiple enemies at once.
Here’s how I set up him up.
The Gear
I tried to optimize Ashwyn’s gear for crit rate. I had to reroll stats on his helmet and armor to get the right bonus on every piece.
I didn’t get the best possible outcome, but I was able to roll two legendary crit rate bonuses.
That raises his chance to land a critical hit to roughly 30%. That adds up to a 50–55% when Blitz and Menacing Mark are active.
I also landed a big crit damage bonus on his dagger. It isn’t necessary, but it obviously helps his damage output if he crits once every second hit.
The higher Ashwyn’s HP is, the more damage he can offset with his self-heals. I didn’t manage to roll a full set of HP buffs on his boots — but I got pretty close.
I also purchased his unique item in the Endless shop with an HP modifier . The buff also helps his durability in longer fights, but I would have preferred a crit or attack speed bonus.
The Squad
I tried to put Ashwyn in an all Cinder squad for the 25% synergy HP bonus to strengthen his healing.
Ashwyn needs support after he uses blitz, otherwise his chances of survival drop drastically. Ashwyn is tough, but not tough enough to take on the entire backrow by himself.
I paired him with Orthox and Morax — two other Cinder units who rush (or uh…cannonball) the enemy formation.
Morax’s AoE stun move 5 seconds into the fight clears the way for Orthox and Ashwyn to overwhelm back row units with high DPS attacks.
I tried a few different combinations in the last two slots.
I kept Atticus because Bombs Away — his big AoE ult — is great to finish off any survivors in the back row.
My last pick was based on the game mode.
I added Flix for PVE modes to keep the squad in fighting shape through strings of battles.
For Arena mode, I switched between Phoenicia and Thorit.
Blood Brood is amazing for this type of build. Just when your arena opponent starts to push back, she throws up a beefy shield to take back the momentum.
Thorit is the cheaper alternative. His attack speed boosts make Ashwyn hit faster. The more he hits, the more he crits, and the faster he heals.
I’d like to try Ashwyn in that sort of a speed build in the future.
That would involve pairing him with other Guardians who can increase his attack speed, like Tavros, Rufus and Thorit.
Alternatively, he could also pair well with Guardians who slow down the enemy relative to him, like Bronwyn, Oxellus and Palmera.
Andronica is another interesting choice. She’s a rare Core One, but she gives your whole squad life drain. There’s a good chance Ashwyn kills one or two Guardians with his ult, so more healing for him.
Unfortunately, I’m missing a lot of those Guardians, but I encourage you to experiment with this and share your results on my X account or in the comments.
The Runes
I’ve had good success stacking the 3 rarity of redeemer runes together.
They all provide Ashwyn with attack speed boosts, and the higher rarity ones provide life drain bonuses as well.
Bolster and Assassin’s Blessing (check name) are also great choices for Ashwyn.
The first gives your squad a bonus to attack speed for the first 10 seconds of a fight, and the second provides all assassins with a bonus to crit chance.
Unfortunately, I haven’t seen either in Endless yet.
They may be available from the Merchant from time to time, but I wouldn’t recommend chasing them. Choosing the merchant over the Mists of Fate prevents you from rolling Battlefield Ruins for extra points.
Behind Enemy Lines is another Adventure mode rune worth picking up.
It gives you Guardians a damage reduction bonus when they cross into the enemy’s side of the field — which is where Ashwyn spends most of his time.
Is He Worth It?
Ashwyn is a bit of an oddity for his class.
He deals big damage to weaker enemies like all assassins do, but he also moonlights as a tank for parts of the battle.
No other assassin has real utility as a front row unit like he does.
Here are a few other things to consider when you’re deciding whether he’s a good fit for your squad.
He’s Basically A Better Warrior
Tanks and warriors have the lowest and second lowest attack ratings out of all classes. Assassins, on the other hand, have the second highest.
Ashwyn’s active skills also pack some heavy damage multipliers and his ultimate is only second to Abbas in terms of potential single target damage.
If you set him up correctly, he can be tankier than most other warriors too.
That makes him a better choice if you’re looking to beef up your squad’s damage output without re-arranging your back row.
He’s a PVP Performer
Ashwyn’s skillset is universally good, but I found him less effective
Typically, developers try to balance the game’s difficulty level by giving their mobs impossibly high stats like accuracy to counter evade, and crit defense to counter crits.
He’s still viable in PVE modes, but he isn’t as effective as he is in PVP.
In fact, he got on my radar after he wrecked my entire back row of Hydris characters in Arena.
Crit resist isn’t typically something you worry about with mages and supports, so Ashwyn can really hurt your opponent’s back row.
His ult’s high single target damage output could also make him valuable in Boss Rush, where the goal is to inflict as much damage as possible before your squad dies.
He’s Cheap to Upgrade
The best part about Ashwyn is that he’s a Core One Guardian. He’s accessible to everyone for free and he’s a permanent fixture on every free and premium banner.
Even if you decide to purchase him on TokenTrove, his going rate is only 21 USD at the time of writing. That officially makes him the cheapest legendary Guardian on the market.
That’s insanely good considering he can output the second highest single target damage in the game without taking up a spot in your back row.
If you’re a free2play player, Ashwyn is almost a must own over any other Core One epic tank or warrior.
He’s Very Dependent On Gear
Ashwyn’s main drawback is his dependence on gear. It’s the only way to get his crit rate high enough for Mortal Levy to activate consistently.
I was only able to pump his critical to just over 30% with my T3 gear. That puts his crit chance at around 50% after he uses Blitz or Menacing Mark.
That’s not bad, but it’s not good enough if he runs into enemies that are piling on crit resistance.
I have a lot of room to improve on his gear, but that takes a lot time and resources. If you’re not the type that likes to obsessively reroll gear, then you won’t get the best out of Ashwyn.
Conclusion
Overall, I was really impressed with him.
He’s tanky enough to hold a spot on your front row, and still inflict big damage on your opponent’s back row.
He has one of the biggest damage outputs in the game, and his survivability makes him universally good in any game mode.
Given how easy and cheap he is to get, it’s hard not to recommend him for everyone — especially for light spenders and F2P.
Of course, his dependency on gear will be an issue for some. But if you’re a theocrafter who loves to optimize, Ashwyn has the potential to be a beast for your squad.
