How to clear "Storm the Sheep" on extreme in Defender's Quest?

I found it pretty easy using all level 20 troops (with level 22 librarian), using some of the advice from previous answers. The sheep ate it just past 1/2 way.

The general strategy was to follow the sheep with 3 unboosted ice mages for the first 1/4 of the path to build up slow debuff duration, then ambush him near the 1st corner with inspired berserkers and archers while he's under bleed, light and slow debuffs.

Party:

• 3 Ice Mages - to build up slow effect before the ambush (-65% spd.).

  - Lvl.9 Chill. I also had Lvl.9 Freeze which is probably useless, so most likely Lvl.10 mages would be just as good.

• 6 Archers
  • 1 to apply bleed debuff (+89% dmg.). (Lvl.9 Deep Shot & at least Lvl.1 Rapid Shot)

    - 5 to do damage. (Lvl.9 Rapid Shot and Lvl.9 Sharp Shooter)

• ~3 Berserkers - to do damage. Perhaps these are not needed.

  - Lvl.9 Flurry and Lvl.9 Madness.

• 4 or more Healers - to Inspire other troops & apply light debuff. I had 6, but 4 would be plenty I think.
  • Lvl.9 Inspire, Lvl.1 in all other skills. Inspired troops do +34% damage. I'm not sure if the light debuff increases (doubles?) damage taken or not, but the icon shows on the sheep so perhaps it does.

Equipment:

Everyone was equipped with weapons and armor bought at the dragon city/lair nearby, except one of the archers who had slightly better Captain's Warbow, rewarded from one of the earlier battles.

What I did:

1. Put someone to kill the weak sheep at the other spawn. (I used an unboosted berserker, but anyone would do I think, so long as it's not a dragon who might cancel the slow effect.)

2. Put 3 ice mages at start and follow the sheep with them up to about the 1st corner, without boosting them. By that point they'd built up enough slow effect to last the rest of the battle and I had enough psi to start following with berserkers instead. You can see if the slow effect has worn off by checking if the sheeps speed has gone back above 0.03.

3. Start setting up the ambush near the 1st corner. I set up Archers and Berserkers first, then Healers last, though perhaps setting up healers 2nd might be better. Anyhow, the troops were positioned as follows:

   • 1st row (adjacent to path): 3 Berserkers, fully boosted (move with the sheep).

   • 2nd Row: Healers, fully boosted (as many as you can get in range of the sheep and the troops they will inspire). Note: it seems they only cast Zeal (Inspire) when the sheep is in range, so you've got to keep an eye on them to make sure they're not slacking off.

   • 3rd and 4th rows: Archers, fully boosted, preferably within the range of a few healers. Bleed archer was the priority at the beginning (+89% dmg), then less so later when sheep had built up bleed debuff.

4. Keep moving everyone to keep them busy and inspired. By the time the sheep got to the 2nd corner I had enough psi to follow him with 3 berserkers as well as 2 healers beside them on the front row, other healers on 2nd row and keep all the archers in range, mostly near the healers. The sheep was practically finished by then anyway, so perhaps all that is required is Lvl.9 slow, Lvl.9 bleed and the the healers light debuff (if that actually has any effect), IDK.

Other tips:

• If you have a low level librarian, be careful not to recall more than a couple of fully boosted guys at once, otherwise the psi will max out when it returns and you'll lose some. It's best to use all the psi building/boosting before unpausing (if you pause to recall & move guys).

• As others mentioned, spamming Lvl.9 Frenzy spell helps too I think, though mostly I forgot.

This level is annoying, but I got it with everyone under 30, mostly 26-29, but a few archers were recently added and leveled only up to 16-19. It's a tedious level having more to do with patience and care than anything else. You can't just go AFK and expect a dead sheep. But with a lot of re-summoning, I got the sheep dead a little bit before it could round the bottom-right corner. This area is pretty good for a last burst of damage, since there aren't too many rocks stopping your whole party from getting Inspire from multiple healers. None of my equipment was significantly better than the stuff you buy in the last store; I haven't done the last few Extreme challenges yet, and it's not necessary.

I spent most of my scrap respecing my six archers as well as my two ice mages (only needed two). Luckily, I already had a few berserkers who had Flurry and Madness maxed, as these are quite indispensable in the main game anyway. The same goes for Healers with Zeal + Inspire.

• By now, you should have a good feel for how to place archers so that after a couple boosts, they'll cover as much of the track as possible while also getting Inspire boosts frequently. It can be finicky, but you don't have to be perfect, either.

• For archers, the useful upgrades are bleed, poison, crit, rapid shot, and range. Extra one-point investments in other attack skills such as Black Out The Sun aren't a waste, but armor pen, for example, is a waste. Only one archer needs poison, and only one archer needs bleed, probably not the same archer, unless it's a high-level one.

• Archers should typically be boosted to 3 for Rapid Shot. Higher boosts are quite useful later when you have more Psi to work with, especially since they can sometimes work effectively for a fair amount of time without being resold. The best candidate for a boost is one who is high level, will be firing on the sheep for a long time, and will be getting Inspire from all three healers for the while. Eventually, all archers can be kept at 5 at all times.

• The one who applies bleed needn't be that high a level. All that is needed is perhaps bleed and range maxed.

• The one who applies poison should have crit and range so that a more effective poison is applied. From reading their blog, it sounds like only the most potent of any effect is ever active, with the durations stacking, so that one strong poison re-applied constantly is all that you could ever really need here. I'm not sure if crits up the poison potency, but I'd guess so and you may as well get the base damage from it anyway.

• The rest of the archers should just hit over and over. Rapid Shot should be maxed, as well as range and crit. Crit and Rapid Shot if you don't have the levels for more, because then you can just deploy and boost to 3 and leave them until you earn more psi.

• Ice mages need to max Chill. You may as well max Ice Ball and Ice Shard, the latter because it doesn't cost much psi to boost them both to 2 and more damage is useful. Like another comment said, spamming slows until they've pretty much stacked to last forever will do it, and then you would probably be better off having berserkers. No dragons allowed.

• Berserkers are good for DPS when boosted to 3; they should be used continuously after your slows have been stacked up, since no one else will be using that space directly by the road. An unboosted berserker can farm the little sheep for psi without trouble. Berserkers can be boosted over 5 if you're swimming in Psi, but they have to be frequently sold and re-placed, making it more efficient to level up your archers. Early on, sometimes I alternated Ice Mage with Berserker.

• Healers need to actually hit the sheep for Zeal to go off, I think. They need to be max level if you deploy them at all, and you have to place them so that they cover a lot of the sheep's path as well as a lot of allied squares. Any summon who is getting zealed by three healers more or less has Inspire continuously, if you look at the numbers. Good times.

• You can respec Azra to have Frenzy at 9, but I didn't bother; I'd already spent more scrap on this dumb level than I wanted to. :-/

*Some parts of the map are easier to get three Inspire buffs on your whole troop all at once than others. When you are at a good part of the map, it is better to use Frenzy then. If you're close to a point like that but not there yet, you should wait.

Whew, I'm glad that's over with. I kind of hate having to redo my whole party just to do one level... Guess I won't be getting Evni anytime soon.

TL;DR:

• 6 archers, 4 berserkers, 3 healers, 2 ice mages
• Always recall idle defenders

• One unboosted berserker to farm little sheep is plenty

• One archer with Bleed and Range max

• One archer with Range, Poison, and Crit max
• Other archers need Range, Crit, and Rapid Shot in some combination high as possible
• Always one-point (or more) Rapid Shot, and start archers at 3.

• Boost to 5 when possible

• Healers should always be at max or not in play at all. Try to have three casting Zeal with max Inspire at all times before too long, with most defenders getting most of the buffs. Build Healers AFTER you have your ice mages and 6 archers out, otherwise there's nothing to buff.

• Ice Mages need to max Chill. Spam slow until it's stacked indefinitely, then stop summoning these. If you misjudge the duration, just summon one next to the sheep again ASAP. Can be boosted 2 for added damage from level 9 Ice Shard, but that probably won't matter much either way. Never upgrade past 2.

• Berserkers need to be 3, with max Flurry and Madness. After healer and archer, you can upgrade these to 5 when there is extra psi and you don't have to move too many units around soon.

• Frenzy should be spammed. Level 9 is useful, but not necessary.

The way I did it was with 6 archers and nothing else (except for one beserker to kill the normal sheep).

The magic sheep is immune to knock back, stun, freeze, etc., so all those kinds of units are useless. Instead, go with archers (highest DPS), and reposition them when the sheep is out of range. I did it with my archers all at level 40, but I killed the sheep at 2/3 or 3/4 of the way around the circuit, so I'm sure this is also a viable strategy at lower levels.

Also, I should clarify, summon as many archers as you can initially afford, and bring more online as you accumulate PSI, which should happen fairly quickly, because you won't need to reposition your archers very often.

Good luck!