It's funny that, after the nerf of Berserker Sven, the devs still fear Sven so much that they skipped the rated up event of him. All summoners except Sven had their rated up events prior to the events that introduced their summoner insignias. But yes Sven is very powerful if he gets 25% stat bonus as an event hero. This is one of the reasons many recent champion classes are introduced during tower event where no hero is too powerful with stat bonus.
Ashes of Divinity Event reminds me a lot of good old days so I wanna write my journal of what Sven can do. It may not be the efficient use today but it may help bring up some other possible tactic for similar utility hero in the future.
Cassiel's Journal (as of April 22, 2018)
When Sven was first released, Berserker Sven was so powerful that he could be used to clear most of the game contents. Being too powerful, he was reduced to ashes by the devs. The nerf hammer was made. Berserker's wyvern has a chance to kill itself if attacking too many times. This big nerf had caused people to turn away from Sven, believing that both of his classes were no longer useful.
However, in my guild, we had a member named Steigen who had a deep love for Warlord Sven till he max lb (limit break) him. This made Steigen's Warlord Sven appeared on the list of Arathos's world record thread (now abandoned thread) which tracked highest stats heroes of each class, built by players. Because of Steigen, we knew that it is possible to have almost 10k atk wyvern summoned by Warlord Sven. And this wyvern will not kill itself like Berserker Sven's wyvern.
After knowing that, I explored and found out that Warlord Sven and Gunslinger Gwen can work in synergy in rangers team. Double whole party attack buffs was what i had put into use. Warlord Sven, GR Kane, GS Cybella, GS Gwen and GR Cybella had been my ultimate team in both PVP and PVE (before talent, insignia, quick skill units and counter aura units had been slowly introduced into the game). Warlord Sven's and GS Gwen's whole party attack buffs stack making the best synergy with rangers team. Placing wyvern in Sven and any trigger ranger's aura will allow you to have 10k + atk wyvern with 'cross shape attack' which will continue to attack as long as the ranger providing aura critical attack. Gwen's bird, which can be summoned anywhere on the battlefield and can be placed adjacent to the furthest enemy, will continue to attack as long as Gwen critical attack. With this formation, you will have 7 units on battlefield and when the trigger catches the wind, this team will have high chance of destroying even the toughest defense enemies.
But this is not the best part yet. Warlord Sven is the only unit in this game that has 2 levels/gears of whole party attack buff. Once you sacrifice and re-summon wyvern in 3 turns, Warlord Sven will cast stronger whole party attack buff than the 1st buff. This will bring whole rangers team to surpass their actual limits even more. This was my ultimate move when the stats were not as exaggerated as today with all talents and insignias. Average attack of rangers was around 9k-10k and 15k atk was so awesome back then. To have wyvern with 10k attack with cross shape attack type really meant a lot. In Tower of Lost Souls, I swapped GR Cybella out and added Assassin Shizu. This team carried me as high as 44th floor in the era that many had to rely on GR Kane sdd to pass certain floors. 2 floors in Tower of Lost Souls provide enough time and turns to allow the 2nd gear whole party attack buff to work marvelously.
I was among the 3 Warlord Sven users in top 100 arena in Everglades. I only recalled Leon7 from Singularity. I forgot the name of another person. In old days of arena, the 2nd gear whole party attack buff is less likely to happen due to quick battle but 1st gear of double whole party attack buff happened often especially when fighting whole guardian team. After the introduction of talent, my Warlord Sven team struggled up and down around the border of top 100, before losing gravity completely once Cassandra was introduced. The quick skill era has arrived as well as the counter aura heroes and bosses being introduced continually, and there is no place for ultimate move that requires too many turns to launch anymore.
Warlord Sven is outdated in the current critical damage buff meta. I would like to thank the devs anyway for finally be able to design the event to hold the wrath of Sven with bonus stats to help me remembered the old glory days of Sven and to remember my former member, Steigen, once again.
Not sure if this journal will be helpful today. But I just want to point out that what majority believes may not be correct. Before the Ashes of Divinity event, many replies involving the best Sven on internet communities will tell people to build Berserker Sven. It's glad to see more comments mentioning Warlord Sven during the Ashes of Divinity event. Sometimes we need crazy people, like our former member, who have deep love on some heroes to show us that such hero can work efficiently. With limited resources, the creativity is limited. This is why we find Valiant Force lack diversity. And most of people only follows meta. Your deep love for wrong hero can kill your fun for many months in Valiant Force. Still, with additional resources given through daily login rewards recently, I hope we will be able to see variety once more in Valiant Force. There is no right or wrong. Some hero is better if looking at him/her alone. Some hero is even better when synergy with others. So it depends on which team you have and what aspect you're looking at such hero. Do not stop believing
