darkSpyro

With so many new Skylanders to play with, I wanted to make a topic going over my experiences with the new Wow Pows on the series 2 and 3 returning Skylanders. These guys aren't generating as much excitement, and are certainly going to be leaving some people questioning why they're even bothering buying the same character again, so at least maybe I can shed some light on whether they're actually worth it or not.Not only do I own all the Wave 1 and 2 guys, but I have them all skilled up and spent some time with each in survival arenas.

Anchors Away Gill Grunt: Compared to series 2, he gets an alternate anchor attack. The series 2 would shoot 3 giant anchors. This guy shoots only 1, but he can shoot it into the ground and create a whirlpool that pulls enemies in and does about 60 damage on initial impact and then about 20 damage continuously to anything standing in it - it ticks about 6 times. He can have two of them out at once, and it takes about 1 second to fire it and another second for it to land. I think this is way more useful than the series 2 Wow Pow because it allows him to crowd control and sometimes even pull stuff off of cliffs. We've all had to struggle with Gill Grunt's inability to shoot upwards to hit things on higher ground. With this he can sometimes pull stuff down. All in all I think he's worth getting if you're a fan of Gill Grunt, and definitely one of the better new Wow Pows..

Heavy Duty Sprocket: Sprocket's Wow Pow gives her a tesla cannon on her tank and makes the tank do more damage. As I was posting in the Swap Force discoveries thread, I love this! The tesla cannon can be charged and shot while you auto attack in your tank, and it does 132 damage every 5 seconds! When you add it all up, this Wow Pow potentially doubles the damage output of the tank. I'm extremely happy about this since it makes the tank specialization worth getting. At the very least, Sprocket is now able to dish out huge amounts of damage, something she struggled with in her series 1. If you have the budget for it, she is absolutely worth getting.

Twin Blade Chop Chop: Chop chop's series 2 Wow Pow was known for being extremely useful, so replacing it with something better is a pretty tall order. The series 2 had a shield dash that did a lot of damage and gave Chop Chop quite a bit of mobility. The series 3 is a sword skill, the twin blades as in the title of his name. This sends Chop Chop into a Frenzy that lasts longer depending on how long you charged it up. This really isn't that great in the heat of a battle, but on the plus side it can be charged while you run at full speed so you can charge it up when you're outside of combat and then let it loose once a fight begins. I think the series 2 skill is better than this, but this isn't bad and would possibly be better for someone who prefers to play Chop Chop as a pure swordsman.

Big Bang Trigger Happy: Trigger Happy's series 2 Wow Pow didn't impress me much. It gave the gatling gun a big laser, but in using it it actually wound up causing you to do less damage to a single target than if you'd just kept shooting. His series 3 Wow Pow is replaced with a slightly more useful ability in my eyes. At any time while charging your main attack, you can push and hold your second skill to hop onto a big golden bomb (as depicted in his figure) and then ride it at an enemy. This bomb can do about 150 damage non-crit. It initially hits for 100 and then the aftershock does 50 more. It takes it about 2 seconds to charge, so it's situational, but it's probably a damage gain over just shooting his guns under most circumstances if you can afford to stand still for a couple seconds. In any case, it's slightly more useful and way more funny than the previous Wow Pow. If you like Trigger Happy you might enjoy this version, although it's not a big difference. In any sort of run and gun scenario, you won't have the time to use it.

Mega Ram Spyro and Series 3 Dark Spyro I thought Spyro's original Wow Pow, a flaming slam while flying, was pretty redundant because it was very similar to his normal ground slam, just hit a little larger area. Mega Ram Spyro on the other hand shoots a fire ball out when he finishes his ram skill. If you go on the blitz path for charging, this can be very good if you do it right. The fireball does 55 damage base, so you can hit something with ram, let go of the button, and hit it for the ram PLUS the fireball at once. This can at least double the damage of a single ram if you time it right. As expected, this skill is alright for people who enjoy using Spyro's blitz path.

Super Gulp Pop Fizz: This being a series 2, he's definitely better than the series 1 since that Pop Fizz had no Wow Pow and lower stats, but I am not that impressed with him. All he gets is one of his walking purple potions will now grow and do double damage. This requires that you're actually going to be using a purple potion which is not a given. Personally I prefer to just go berserker with Pop Fizz because the potions kind of confuse me and are hard to aim. Still, he is better than the old, even if only by a little, especially if you like using purple potions a lot.

Lava Barf Eruptor and Volcanic Eruptor: Lava Barf Eruptor gets Lava Barf 2. The series 2 had a charged move where he basically breathed a huge stream of fire that was somewhat useful, it could do a pretty decent amount of damage to a lot of things at once, but honestly pretty much everything Eruptor does can be described in the same way...except magma balls. Well here comes the new Wow Pow, finally giving a reason for the existence of magma balls! Now you can hold the magma ball skill for an instant spray of about 6 magma balls that do pretty considerable damage in a wide arc. I think it did about 55 damage a ball. I think these are the best versions of Eruptor to date, if you can stomach buying this guy yet again, but the series 3 is still not really essential for someone who's not a completionist.

Knockout Terrafin: I think his old Wow Pow let you go back underground from a belly flop, which was really useful. The series 3, despite what its name implies, is another similar move you use while burrowing where you jump out for a short time for moderate damage, leaving little sharks on the target to do damage over time. This is definitely a useful Wow Pow but I don't think it's necessarily worth buying Terrafin again over.

Blizzard Chill: Unlike with Pop Fizz, I can't even think of a use for Chill's new Wow Pow. You charge up the ice blocks for what feels like an eternity, and mini orcas eventually come out which do about 40 damage if they hit anything, which is definitely not a sure thing. I think she actually has lower stats than legendary lightcore Chill, too. She has more armor and less of everything else. That's not very useful in my book. Blizzard Chill is absolutely skippable unless you need a full collection.

Ninja Stealth Elf and Dark Stealth Elf: Well almost everyone is going to have her, but for the sake of thoroughness I'll put this anyway. I didn't love Stealth Elf's original Wow Pow, a spinning attack, because she did a spinning attack anyway without the Wow Pow. It wasn't that useful. Ninja Stealth Elf's Wow Pow changes her clothing to that of a ninja, and gives her stealth attack a special tiger that comes out after the initial hit and does insane damage to whatever it hits. It's not that easy to hit stuff with it, but if it connects it's brutal. This Wow Pow is way cooler and overall more useful than the series 2 by quite a lot!

To be added: Thorn Horn Camo, Fire Bone Hot Dog, Hyper Beam Prism Break, Turbo Jet Vac, Horn Blast Whirlwind and Phantom Cynder.

(Continued)

My personal ranking so far, with a brief summary:

1. Heavy Duty Sprocket: Insane upgrade to the tank!
2. Anchors Away Gill Grunt: New Wow Pow sucks enemies into a vortex for crowd control.
3. Ninja Stealh Elf: Massive Damage and cool look!
4. Mega Ram Spyro: Better Wow Pow for blitz path
5. Big Bang Tripper Happy: More useful than his old Wow Pow, and is hilarious if nothing else
6. Super Gulp Pop Fizz: Wow Pow not that good, but better stats; slightly better than old Pop Fizz
7. Twin Blade Chop Chop: New Wow Pow not better than the old, but fun to mess around with
8. Lava Barf Eruptor: At least it gives some use to the magma balls
9. Knockout Terrafin: Overall about the same as previous Terrafins
10. Blizzard Chill: I can't imagine any of the new series 2 will be worse. Only buy if you don't already have Chill or if you are a completionist.

Thx! This will help me decide which reposes to get

Suprise Tiger is indeed a good push-up for NSE/DNSE i heard it does aloto of damage......hmmmm......

I am not going to buy any S3/S2 Skylanders

Aww that's lame, I really wished chill had a better wow pow her new armor looks amazing compared to the gold spike armor she had before though

Quote: StalkerSnake

I am not going to buy any S3/S2 Skylanders

you got NSE anyways

Quote: NINJAsk11

Quote: StalkerSnake

I am not going to buy any S3/S2 Skylanders

you got NSE anyways

NOOOOOOO!!
Okay let's stay on the topic

yeah,of course i dont have them all myself, i can only say Chill's wp is lame....

Thank you so much for your input.. I was getting to the point of trying to figure out what additional characters in Series 2 or 3 I would buy if ANY, and Sprocket was NOT on MY LIST!!
I already have Chill though lol.. Her armor looks cool..

Great write up! Good to get an idea of which path to take some of these guys on.

I'm updating this to bump Gill Grunt up the list. I have spent more time with Anchors Away Gill Grunt now and the special new anchor you shoot with it actually sucks enemies into the vortex, giving Gill Grunt crowd control ability that he had always lacked before. Also capable of pulling stuff off of higher ground.

Those of you who have the strategy guide, what does Jet Vac's wow pow do?