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The last thing you never see.

Shadowrath,


The Shadowrath is an Order unit introduced in Stick War II: Order Empire, serving as a fast and powerful assassin.

History[]

Stick War II: Order Empire[]

The Shadowrath were formed by Swordwrath that escaped the conquest of their homeland. Regrouping to strike back against the Order Empire, they practiced the arts of stealth and assassination to survive.

Shadowrath fought against the forces of Order as part of the Rebel nations, but were defeated. Once Medusa revealed herself and the Chaos Empire, the Shadowrath and the other rebels rejoined the Order Empire to fight against them.

Stick War III[]

Initially formed by Princess Shade, the shadowrath were a group of assassins commonly recruited from the best of the Swordwrath. Originally formed to battle the mafia stranglehold, after some success. Princess Shade gifted them to King Zarek during the second great war.[1]

In Stick War 3, the Shadowrath seem to have given up the ways of assassination as they no longer have the Shinobi ability and instead focus more on being a dangerous combat unit like Juggerknights, shown by their fast attack animation and "Parry" ability.(only user control)

Appearance[]

Shadowraths take on the appearance of a ninja. They wear a mask that covers all but their eyes. By default, they are equipped with 2 deadly weapons, a sword and a staff. They move back and forth in a ninja pose.

Shadowrath-stick-war-3

Shadowrath in Stick War 3

The Shadowrath in Stick War III have 2 black ribbons which emerge from the back of the mask, these ribbons sway in the wind. They are now completely stationary in their stance.

Development[]

During the original Stick War, the idea was already thought up but because of the deadline, it was cut out. The idea of the Ninja was later revived during the creation of Stick Empires. The Ninja is one of the fastest unit in-game and has two abilities which are Fixate and Shinobi in Stick War 2: Order Empire and Stick Empires while in Stick War 3, Shinobi has been replaced by the Parry ability.

Abilities[]

Fixate (Passive Ability)[]

Each attack made by the Shadowrath against the same target deals more damage than the last, stacking up to 5 times (3 times in Stick War 3). This bonus resets if the Shadowrath switches attack targets.

Shinobi[]

The Shadowrath becomes untargetable by enemies and turns invisible (however they still have a visible outline). If the Shadowrath attacks during Shinobi, the invisibility breaks and the attack deals heavy bonus damage and inflicts Poison.

This ability is only available in Stick War 2/Stick Empires.

Parry[]

The Shadowrath uses his sword to block incoming attacks. Successfully blocking attacks allows the Shadowrath to stun enemies.

This ability is only available in Stick War 3.

Tactics[]

Stick Empires[]

The Shadowrath is an upgraded Swordwrath. It has four bars of health and fast speed and light armor. Its damage falls between the Swordwrath and the Spearton. Training an early Ninja is a good tactic since it can survive at least two waves of harassing tactics (only a single wave if another Spearton or a Juggerknight) before he dies or forcing you to garrison him. His main advantage in combat is the Fixate ability. Shinobi is mainly used during hit and run attacks or backstabbing. However, his main disadvantage is that he has low health for the cost, and must be controlled carefully to avoid losses.

One must note, that even though Shadowrath are the highest damage dealing unit, they are strong in numbers. Doing a "Shadowrath rush" in early game is usually a terrible idea as they don't have armor and are very expensive. Eclipsors are a great counter to the power of Shadowrath.

Order vs. Order[]

The main problem of the Ninja is that it cannot bypass walls or a Spearton phalanx formation (again, because it is still solid). Another problem of a ninja is armor. The Ninja has no armor and is soft like a Swordwrath, meaning swarming or continuous harassing will make the ninja fall back to castle. Its Shinobi ability, once activated, will decrease its speed, meaning you must time the use of the ability correctly. Archidons and Flying Crossbowmen are one of the best ways to kill ninjas.

Order vs. Chaos[]

The ninja is a unit not to be "messing around" with, because once the Shinobi Level 2 is unlocked, important units of Chaos will be easily taken out, one example being Medusa. The only disadvantages against Chaos are: 1: They passively regain health and cure poison over time. However, they don't have an instant cure and heal like Order, so most of the time they die before they get cured. 2: Chaos spell casters are slightly tougher than Order spellcasters. For example, Medusa has 250 health instead of the Magikill's 200, meaning she can survive a backstab from Level 2 Shinobi (214 damage) while Magikill cannot. Eclipsors are pretty effective against Shadowrath.

Stick War III[]

The Shadowrath is now built for direct combat rather than assassination, trading out Shinobi for Parry and gaining a much faster attack speed. As such, Fixate becomes a much more prominent part of its damage output due to stacking more quickly despite its lower stack limit. They serve as fast shock troops that use their speed and powerful attacks to close with enemies and break through the enemy's front lines and destroy statues very quickly as attacks against statues will stack Fixate.

Shadowrath are particularly powerful in numbers for the massive damage they can deal, while giving more bodies to split incoming damage and reduce the chances of losing each individual Shadowrath, but are slow to build due to their Crystal cost and training time. Playing defensively and using hit-and-run tactics by using them to charge enemies near your statue before garrisoning them to heal up is a common Shadowrath tactic. Once you mass enough of them, an army of Shadowrath can easily rush all the way down to the enemy statue.

Cards that pair well with Shadowrath include Rage and Vampiric Soul for improved combat ability (through increased DPS and healing respectively), Ripriders to keep in front with their speed and tank for the Shadowrath, and Projectile Barrier to protect against enemy ranged attackers and shut down Castle Units while tearing down statues.

Summary[]

His speed, high damage output and high health compared to units such as the Miner, Swordwrath and Archidon make him a dangerous unit, however because he has no armor and is very expensive, he should always have reinforcements backing him up. The only two units that can consistenly beat a Shadowrath in a 1v1 is the Eclipsor and Albowtross, Speartons come close but his hit and run tactics due to his fast attack speed gives him the edge.

Trivia[]

  • In the Stick Empires Game Guide, Shadowrath are described as "Fast sneaky ninja with cloaking, poison and assassination."
  • In Stick War 2 and Stick Empires the shadowrath's description is just the description for shinobi.
  • The Shadowrath is the second unit that has the most unlockables in the Order Empire. Surpassed by the Spearton.
  • Due to Fixate, Shadowrath have the highest damage per second of any non-General unit in Stick War III (dealing approximately 31.1 damage per second at maximum stacks).

References[]

  1. Voice introduction as given in the official Stick War discord:

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