Venthyr Covenant Mission Table: A Guide and a Discussion of the Meta

It's been discussed frequently that the covenant imbalance for the mission table is agregious. It's true. The trapper combo for the night fae is in fact unbalanced, but we are not without hope. Blizzard came out with a statement that eventually all covenant mission tables would balance themselves out with the new companion we would find, and it seems the time has finally came around!

Below, find my discussion of the Meta loadouts for the different scenarios we find ourselves in.

Venthyr's greatest weakness until now: companions that simultaneously are able to put out damage and sustain heavy damage in return. The greatest example of this is our companion Ayeleth. Ayeleth inflicts heavy damage to the enemy but has a very limited health pool.

The important of a frontline that can sustain heavy damage is to support our strongest companion: Theotar, in working on the enemy's backline. Up until (this week?), the Promises of the Praetor mission has been unbeatable. However, again, we have hope.

The problem with that mission is the ability to be able to push the enemy's backline. Our new follower, Stonehuck, helps with this significantly. This loadout should work for missions where backline needs to be pushed hard, while ignoring the front tanks early:

Front: Nadjia – Meatball – Rahel

Back: Theotar – Stonehuck

Discussion: this comp uses Meatball mostly as a meatshield to absorb heavy mid field damage so that the other allies can push the enemy's backline. Meatball will be taking little damage from the tanks, and the more hits he takes, the more damage he will do. Meatball, since our ability to beat the Soul Ash mission, has been essential. Stonehuck is incredibly strong for ranged damage, and Theotar is a no brainer for this. Nadjia is put in the frontline for her ability to be untargettable, as well as push the backline, and Rahel for the same reason.

However, there are other missions where the enemy doesn't have a frontline, and just an entire set of bruisers. In this case, the loadout changes for us. Instead, we run this composition to better assist the allies that are doing the damage.

Front: Stonehead/Croman – Nadjia – Meatball

Back: Theotar – Ayeleth

Discussion: Ayeleth is one of the strongest in the game for his melee cleave, but sustains very little damage. He needs protection. The reason I put Stonehead or Croman for that slot involves the need for tank, or not. You're choosing a trade-off: do your allies need more block or more heavy focused damage. Stonehead will cleave the enemy, but at a low amount of damage. This pairs very well with Ayeleth's abilities, but isn't as strong at taking out targets altogether, such as Croman can.

There are other niche setups where a specific enemy needs targetting, such as a healer or other caster. This is where Simone comes in strongly, replacing Croman or Ayeleth in our comp:

Front: Nadjia – Meatball – Rahel

Back: Theotar – Simone

This setup is not exact on position. You need to set Simone and Rahel in a position where both of their abilities are going to be hitting the same focus target. Theotar will buff both of them, and Nadjia and Meatball are there to enable that. It can be argued that even Nadjia can be swapped out here for Dug or Stonehead in this instance, because when the focus target dies, the fight is mostly just cleanup.

I hope others found this information helpful and if you have other setups you've found to be particularly strong, please discuss below! Thanks all.

-Dakera