Character Spotlight: Ajax

Character Breakdown

Trait

Name: Alert

Role

Name: Tank

Description: Protects allies from enemy damage or other negative effects by redirecting enemy attacks to themselves, as well as providing defense buffs to themselves and/or teammates.

Base Stats (Max 90)

Attack: 1,733

Health: 1,412

Defense: 1,688

Rush

Cost: 85 AP

Effect: Deal 325% Damage and Taunt for 1 turn to up to 3 enemies. This character regains +70% of their max HP.

Active Skill

Turn Count: 2

Effect: This character gets Elusive and Pain Split for 2 turns.

Note:

Elusive – A character under the effect of Elusive won’t cause enemies to receive any AP from the damage it causes when attacking, and any enemy attacking a character under the Elusive effect won’t earn AP from their attack either.

Pain Split – A character that uses Pain Split will apply a status to their highest HP ally and themselves. A character can only have one Pain Split status applied at a time. While the status is active, if either character takes damage, the damage they would normally receive is split evenly across both linked characters. This damage is calculated as normal on the actual target, then divided by 2 and distributed equally across the two linked characters.

Specialist Skill

Name: Human Shield

Effect: If this specialist defends on their turn, all attacks from human enemies may only target them.

Special Weapon

3rd Slot Effect: When taking damage, a better chance to deal 150% of the damage taken back to the enemy.

Gameplay Walkthrough

Ajax is the first Alert, 6 Star, Human Shield character to be released in TWD:RTS. As a Tank role character, Ajax comes well equipped to handle a barrage of attacks from the enemy team. His overall gameplay design comes with 4 major elements that helps him stand up to his foes: Human Shield, Taunt, Pain Split, and 150% Reflect Damage.

Human Shield is a game changer when it comes to a team’s defensive capabilities. This Specialist Skill, when used, forces the enemy team to attack the Human Shield character during their next turn. This really helps avoid damage to other teammates, and allows you to concentrate the rest of the team around keep your Human Shield character going (especially on a Timeout Defense team). The best part about Ajax though, compared to other Human Shield characters, is that his Rush and Active Skill already comes equipped to help with his own survivability.

With most existing Human Shield characters, finding a good opportunity to use their Rush is difficult, since you typically want to continuously use Human Shield each turn to continue to control the attacks of the enemy team. However, the risk in doing so is that the Human Shield character can potentially be taken down over time if the enemy team’s damage output is high enough. With Ajax though, he solves this conundrum by having a Rush that both Taunts a large portion of the enemy team, as well as significantly heal himself. While the Rush is simple, it’s powerful in that Ajax can stop using Human Shield in order to restore his own HP, without fully losing control over the enemy team via his Taunt effect.

Additionally, Ajax’s Active Skill comes with Pain Split and Elusive, which can be activated starting on Turn 2. With this fact acting skill, you can reduce the damage dealt to Ajax, as well as negate any AP gain that the enemy would receive when attacking Ajax. Since Human Shield forces the enemy to attack Ajax, if Elusive is active, you can shut down standard AP generation for as long as Elusive is active (and the enemy attacks Ajax). Finding key moments in battle to leverage this Active Skill can really affect your opponent’s strategy.

Finally, Ajax’s weapon reflects 150% damage taken [by Ajax] back at the attacker. While this weapon doesn’t reflect typical Rush Damage, Rush effects that leverage multi-attack (such as Tough Konrad) are susceptible to Reflect Damage. In instances where enemy characters rely on hard-hitting basic attacks and/or multi-attacks, Ajax’s Reflect Damage has to potential to deal a significant amount of damage (sometimes resulting in death to the attacker). Combine this weapon effect with Human Shield, and your opponent will quickly find that Ajax can put an immense amount of pressure on the enemy team all by himself.

[6 Star] Synergistic Characters

Leaders

Alert Erika – Given that Ajax is a more Defensive character, Erika is a solid complimentary character to synergize with Ajax, since she provides +40% HP and DEF to all ranged teammates. She also continues to be a powerful Alert Medic, and combined with her Revive Rush, really makes her an ideal choice for a team with Ajax.

Alert Mirabelle (“Road to Survival” #3) – An alternative leader for Ajax is Mirabelle, who provides +40% HP and +40% ATK to all ranged teammates. While Ajax doesn’t benefit greatly from the ATK boost, the 40% HP can be clutch if and when Ajax comes under heavy fire. Due to Human Shield being active most of the time, you should be able to clearly see this buff directly benefiting Ajax on a turn-to-turn basis.

Specialists

Tough Magna – Magna is a powerful character to pair with Ajax on a defense team due to the fact that Magna also has Human Shield. On a Defense Team, the AI knows how to tag-team multiple Human Shield characters to optimize each character’s efficiency. For example, if Magna gets low on HP, Ajax will use Human Shield instead, and vice versa. This also gives time for at least 1 of the Human Shield characters to use either their Rush or Active, which is great for Ajax given his Rush and Active skills. Magna in particular is useful for a Ranged Team pairing with Ajax.

Tough Mackenzie – One of the obstacles that Ajax faces is Healing Reduction or other debilitating effects (Stun, Confuse, Impair, etc.) that can really mess with his overall effectiveness in combat. Having a character that can remove these effects (such as Mackenzie) can prove to be a great benefit for Ajax, reducing the overall effectiveness of characters like Wayland who rely on Healing Reduction and low HP characters. Plus, Mackenzie can Revive, bringing back Ajax in case he goes down.

Alert Hershel – Hershel (or other Guardian II characters) is useful for most teams, but especially so for Human Shield characters like Ajax. Since Human Shield forces attacks against the Human Shield character, having a Guardian II buff on that character can potentially reduce the overall damage that the enemy team is trying to deal to Ajax. Hershel also applies a -50% Attack debuff to the enemy team when he uses his Rush, reducing the incoming damage to Ajax.

Alert Lori – Lori is a well-rounded Support character that can cover Ajax when needed. Her Rush can potentially provide Ajax with +60% Defense, reducing damage dealt to Ajax when Human Shield is active. Lori can also Impair enemies with her Rush and Specialist Skill, reducing opportunities for opponents to either try to kill Ajax or find ways around him.