Let's place a dumb shield!
DUMMY SHIELD
Dummy Shield for the All Star is an ability that in GW, places a dummy shield in front of you that can protect you and your team, or in BFN, it instead creates a domed shield which can protect you and your allies inside of it from attacks in any direction. This is great from protection from heavy enemy fire, allowing you and your allies to enter battle more safely, reviving allies, keeping you and your allies alive and so on. You get up to 2 stacks of this ability at once in GW and can have to 3 placed at a time, meaning you can defend multiple areas at a time, whereas in BFN, you are only able to have 1 stacked and placed at a time, and it disappears after a limited time as well. In the GW games, these dummies can actually be destroyed by either faction, whereas in BFN, only enemies may destroy it, however they can actually enter the shield and destroy it from the middle, which is actually extremely weak. I reckon these abilities are awesome, being able to protect myself and allies are great and can really aid in team survival and support.
GW Alternate Abilities
Shield Decoy: This ability drops a different type of Dummy Shield. You get up to 4 stacks of this ability at a time instead of the regular 2 and it has a wider protective area, although these shields have much less health compared to the regular Dummy Shield. This could be great for protecting more areas and allies at a time and having a better range of protection. These can be used more on demand to block your enemies from an area or for quick cover, as you are more likely to have some available to you at any given time. Do keep in mind that the significantly less health that these shields have will make it much easier for the enemies to destroy them. I find this upgrade useful, having more available at once means that they can be used more often on demand and the wider range of protection is a useful benefit compared to the regular Dummy Shield.
Future Dummy: This ability is only available in GW2 and rarely from Rux, so make sure to check him often if you would like to purchase this. This ability drops another different type of Dummy Shield. This shield has more health and it explodes when destroyed, which deals significant damage to any enemies that are in range of the explosion, however, you can only have a single stack of this ability at any given time and can only have up to 2 placed at once, basically reducing the amount of times you can deploy them. You can make use of these by placing them when getting surrounded by enemies, or you and your allies can actually destroy these shield automatically to trigger the explosion and damage enemies. I really enjoy this upgrade, having a more defensive shield that can also deal damage to enemies who venture too close can be greatly useful in plenty of situations.
BFN Alternate Upgrades
Injury Time (2 upgrade points): When you revive an enemy while you are inside your Dummy Shield, it only takes you half as long to revive them, or in other words, you achieve the revive twice as fast. This is situational as it depends on if you are reviving an ally or not, but you can save it until an ally is vanquished, then put the shield over you and your fallen ally and quickly revive them while having protection from all sides, so doing this equals extremely easy revives. I absolutely love this upgrade, I already enjoy reviving enough and using this upgrade will make reviving your fallen allies much more easy to achieve, even if enemies are around, and the shield will protect you while reviving and your ally once they have been revived.
Star Struck (3 upgrade points): Activating your Dummy Shield knocks nearby enemies away from you and your shield, and successfully dealing knockback to your enemies gives you a reduced refresh time for your Dummy Shield as well. Being able to knock your enemies away this way is useful as it protects the inside of your shield further, as the center or middle of your shield is extremely weak and gets destroyed really easily. This is also great as you can deal knockback to your enemies in order to use your shield more frequently as well, which is also useful. I find this upgrade useful for sure, knocking your enemies away when using the shield is protecting the vulnerable part of your shield more easily and reducing the refresh time as well.
Conclusion
These abilities are great and can be used well to keep you and your allies alive and fighting for longer, and giving your enemies a harder time vanquishing your team as well. These can be placed on demand and multiple can be placed to heavily guard an area or they can be scattered around for spread out protection, making them more useful again. I really like these abilities, as it can help to protect the team, get revives and having them often available for use at any time just makes even more effective.
