High Five was a split character for me. On one hand I was looking forward to him
because he was a dragonfly and I thought that could bring a lot to the table
and his aesthetics are unique and colorful.
Then, on the other side, he was the Frito Lay promo Skylander…and I’m
not a fan of their promotions, lol. That
said, the more I have played with High Five the more he has grown on me!
Box Stock he isn’t the most impressive character, but often
these are the very ones who wind up with great upgrade paths. His primary attack, which sadly never gets
directly addressed, deals 23-34, but it is spammable and he maintains mobility…That
makes it offset a bit, but a slight increase would have been appreciated. Buzz Dash is a typical quick dash move and
attack combo. High Five quickly darts
away, or into an enemy and deals 44-66.
Base Upgrades
Poison Cloud is an offspring of the primary attack. After your Poison Pellet hits at 23-34 the
Poison Cloud forms and lasts roughly 8 seconds.
It seems to deal both 8-12 and 16-24.
I am thinking it does this based on proximity or a series of hits, but in
the given time there was no definitive answer.
Fly Slam is High Five’s tertiary attack and it really sets the table for
what is to come! You essentially jump up
and do 20-30 damage and then slam down to deal 90-135. Buzz Charge takes Buzz Dash up a level. If you tap your secondary attack, you dash at
44-66, but if you hold it for roughly 1.5 seconds, High Five darts forward and
delivers a much more menacing 136-204. The
best thing is he auto deploys. You don’t
have to look for a shimmer, glisten, or change in appearance…he just goes when
the time is up! Buzzerker Overdrive is
where things get interesting…If you hold your tertiary attack button down, you
begin to spin rapidly around your targets.
In this time ,a full charge will deal 20-30 10 times AND THEN smash down
a devastating 334-501! The catch here is
that you lose HP while charging this up.
You can stop before the 10 hits and 334 and the damage seems to be somewhat
scaled back, as is your health loss.
This is a catch 2-2 attack. You can
dominate your opponents, but you do so at the cost of your own well being.
Pollen Prince
If the thought of giving up health to deal damage doesn’t
set well with you, or you just really like the Poison Cloud then Pollen Prince
is the path for you! This is a tough
path to document because you have to be “in game” vs real enemies. Cloud Control lets you have 5 Poison Clouds
active at once…they also move faster and seek enemies. The damage increase is minimal. Most instances of damage remained at the 8-12
and 16-24 range, but a few hits were a new 18-27. Buzz ‘Em Up combines the Buzz Dash and Poison
Clouds. When you dash thru a cloud you
extend it’s life and up the damage, although not significantly. Power Clouds makes the Poison Cloud extra
big. You can use Buzz ‘Em Up to extend
the life cycle, but I found that they deal more damage 27-40 naturally than if
you buzz through them as that actually drops the output back down to
24-36. In theory, you would think that
buzzing through a Power Cloud would result in 30-45, but that is not the
case. Overall, I think this is actually
a good path, but it doesn’t deliver the same impressive grandeur you find with
Speed Slammer. This path also has a few
issues. First, as mentioned, buzzing a
Power Cloud results in them doing less damage…and since all clouds are now
Power Clouds, you kind of get shafted on that front. There are also two things that I think would
have made the path much better. First,
if the primary attack itself was directly upgraded from 23-34 to anything
higher, it would have made a substantial improvement. Second, I think that the Power Clouds could
have been greatly enhanced if they either detonated on expiration, or you could
dash thru them twice (or something like that) to trigger a radial explosion with
a larger damage number, say even 60-90.
Despite the shortcomings, I still think this would be a solid path, it
just feels a little under developed and doesn’t quite match up with Speedy
Slammer.
Speedy Slammer
If you weren’t scared off at the thought of losing health
toe execute the Fly Slam, you’ve come to the right place! We get started with Spin Cycle which seems to
pull enemies in and add 2 hits to the charge time, dealing the same 20-30 12
times instead of 10. Buzz Buzz Buzz lets
you dash up to 5 times by holding the secondary attack button. The standard dash stays at 44-66 and the
chained dashes remain at 136-204. There
were some instances of 68 and 92 that came off broken chains and singular Buzz
Dashes, but they didn’t occur at a marked frequency. Slam Apples sees the Fly Slam extend from 10
to 12 to 18 counts of 20-30 damage. If
you are sad that didn’t increase by now, fear not…the final slam, which has
remained at 334-501 since Buzzerker Overdrive now does an insane 734-1101! That is in OP Wow Pow, or Elite
territory! However, you do loose more
health than you regenerate, despite the Slam Apples dealing out +5 Health. That said, you should, at this pace, destroy
your opponents before your own health is truly jeopardized. If you are concerned, just wait for Organic
Slam Apples.
Soul Gem
Organic Slam Apples is an upgrade that might make you take Speed
Slammer, with or without research. Many
of you, myself included, likely preview the upgrades in game and then see Slam
Apples tied in with Speed Slammer. There
is NO mention of apples with Pollen Prince.
So, you might say, “Ok, this is one of those paths I need to take to
utilize the Soul Gem.” The good news is,
this does function with Pollen Prince and it delivers the same +10 Health from
the apples…however, there aren’t as many of them. Essentially it is a nice boost each time you
elect to use your tertiary attack (which has no further upgrades via Pollen
Prince). If you couple this with Speed
Slammer, however, you are very well served.
Where we were putting down a ridiculous 734-1101 from Slam Apples, we
were also doing so at the expense of our own well being. Organic Slam Apples seems to deliver 10
Apples around a fully charged slam that each regenerate +10 Health. Similarly, this is what you lose when
executing a slam. So, in theory, as long
as you didn’t take damage from the enemy horde you are attacking, you can start
the slam, fully charge it, and finish it at the exact same health if you
collect all the apples. In a clutter
free environment with little lateral movement from the attack, you automatically
pickup all the apples. If you migrate towards
more, or different enemies you will get most of the apples, but might miss a
few. You have a few seconds to collect
the remainder. Either way, this Soul Gem
clearly favors the Speed Slammer Path, but does at least work with Pollen
Prince.
Attack Damage Numbers (Click to Enlarge)
Conclusion
I personally prefer Speed Slammer. I would recommend it for rookie players,
younger players, and those who just like simple to master paths and/or paths
that deal insane damage. That said, Pollen
Prince is a unique path and one that I would not hesitate to stick with…It isn’t
as impressive, but when mastered, you can essentially keep 2-3 of the 5 clouds
on screen and alive. This means they
deal roughly 20-40 while you dash, or fire off the primary Poison Pellets. I do fell my earlier suggestions would make
this path more formidable, but it certainly does stand on its’ own merits. That said, my vote would go to Speed Slammer
for uniqueness and devastating damage.
The Soul Gem pretty much eliminates the downside to fully charging the
Fly Slam.
