Why is steel ball + mustang strong?

The synergy between steel balls and mustangs is very strong. Mustangs struggle against any kinds of shields and high health (or armored) targets, while steel balls can melt them down quickly. Steel balls are vulnerable to air units and distractions from crawlers/fangs, while mustangs are great against them.

Both mustangs and steel balls are very fast and share the same speed, so you can deploy them in the back or in the front and they are very flexible in different situations.

.embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; }

How to play steel ball + mustang

This written guide will focus on how to rush with the composition by deploying them aggressively.

The general mindset

Even though you are deploying your units on the enemy border, it doesn’t mean you have to all in it. Many factors indicate what you should do on your next turns. For you to use this strategy most effectively, you should remain flexible. However, it is a good learning tool to just force something for many games in a row so you come across different scenarios and have more knowledge in the future to make better decisions. This is an example game of me starting out a push but immediately abandoning it due to card choices.

The composition is very snowbally as both mustangs and steel balls get out of hand very quickly as they start gaining levels. When playing this composition you should base your future decisions on the levels of your units. Some games you immediately get lev 2 or 3 steel balls while in other games they just stay lev 1. In this situation you need to understand that mustangs will be the main carry of the comp and tech them, put all items on them and possible sell the balls to gain economy to support the mustangs with hacker barriers. And vice versa, focus on energy absorption tech and items on balls if they level quickly.

How to counter Steel Ball Mustang push?

Depending on what you have as your starting units and starting specialists, the optimal tactics can vary greatly. What you should do in every situation is place fangs vertically in front of your tower. This pulls the enemy into a choked position and you can use sentry missiles and splash damage to hinder the push.

When deploying you need to think about the flanks a lot, you need some kind of defense there, but you also don’t want your key damage units and majority of your chaff to be pulled into the flank, thus leaving your tower vulnerable.

.embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; }

The easiest defense against a straightforward push is going arclight carry with charged shot as your first tech. This will work if the enemy doesn’t transition into different unit types, as it will leave you quite vulnerable to overlords. Because of this reason, arclights are the biggest bait. I’m including this defense tactic just because the arclights are simple and easy to play and many lower level players don’t ever transition into air with a steel ball push and you can go a little bit into this route with an arclight start.

The best counter is using Stormcallers early game as they delete both steel balls and mustangs. From stormcallers you can transition into overlords or Phoenix+Mustang or hacker (depending on if the mustangs are the itemized/leveled threat, or if the steel balls are). If you go overlords too early you leave your towers vulnerable as you don’t have enough chaff in front. You need to keep developing fangs every turn to block the paths. A competent enemy will use mobile beacon with his steel ball mustang lineup to drive past your defenses.

With giant specialist you can even go early Fortresses with rocket punch. Never go vulcans.