Magicka: The Other Side of the Coin

So, we'd been waiting for this for a while.  This new DLC for Magicka stars the vampire Alucart, in his fight against Vlad.

Difficulty-wise, it's about average.  Not the hardest thing to beat in Magicka, but not the easiest either.  The final boss strategy is actually pretty simple this time around, unlike in The Stars Are Left.  You don't have very many magicks to aid you, so for the most part it's you and your elements.

The weapon set you have makes you vulnerable to Life, meaning you can't just self-cast it to heal yourself.  Instead, you have to use your "staff" active ability, which refills your health by sucking on the blood of your target.  There are no other staves available.  There are two other swords available, should you desire to switch.  The first one is the Broken Sword, and isn't all that useful (it's the sword you start out with when using the Vanilla Robes).  The second one is the Blade of Surt, which is fairly useful since it sets things on fire.  I just stuck with the default sword and I was all right.

Since you're vulnerable to Life, having a Life shield can help in a few parts.  There are these elves that guard barriers who can cast a healing rain (and Nullify...) that will heal their allies and damage you, so being immune to it is handy.  Also, Vlad uses Life on his sword periodically (as well as Nullify...).

One of the achievements is called "Friendship is Magicka".  You get it by killing all 11 ponies.  Yes.  YES.  Killing ponies!  Yay!  Apparently a good portion of the Magicka Steam forums think it's broken, but I got it first try, no glitches or anything, it just worked.  I'm proud to be part of 0% of the population!

Screenshot or it didn't happen.

The DLC comes with a few extra challenge arenas and a robe for regular play (the robe you use in the DLC itself isn't selectable).

Overall, it's fun, and it's slightly challenging, but it's not worth the $4.99 price on Steam.  Wait for a sale.

Boss strategy after the break.

Vlad has two forms.  The first one is himself.  He's fairly vulnerable to lightning and immune to frost.  He uses Life on his sword, Conflagration, and the occasional area frost attack, as well as Nullify.  Thankfully, you can use your "staff" active ability on him to heal yourself.  The three other people who Vlad is with in the cutscene before the battle just run around like idiots and will die before long, pay them no attention.

My strategy was to put on a Life-Fire-Lightning shield (EWFA self cast) and spam arcs of lightning all over the place (EAAAA, or as many As as you want).  I threw in some fire as well, so mine were actually EAFAF.  Keep putting your shield back up as he Nullifies it and the first form should be rather easy.

In the second form, he splits into three.  He has a one-shot water rock in this form as well as some lightning that can be annoying.  However, this form is vulnerable to Life.  Also worth noting, three Vlads = three times the Nullify.

My strategy for the second form was to put on a Life shield and spam healing mines.  That's it.  Use the "staff" active ability as much as you can to keep your health topped off, keep that shield up, and keep laying those mines, and they'll die in short order.

Like I said, nowhere near as difficult as Cthulhu.  I think it ranks somewhere mid-original adventure difficulty-wise.

And before you ask, yes, the achievement "The Crusader Breakings" is broken.  If it weren'r broken, it would be quite possible to get all six of the new achievements in one play-through if you keep your eye out for the ponies.  There's four in the first part, three in the second part, and four in the last part.

So, once again, I'm waiting on a game update to fix a broken achievement so I can get to 100%...