Ooh! Ooh! Nerf! Nerf!
Aw... who am I kidding? This build owes much of its current AV soloing ability to the "nerf" Illusion received in Issue 2. I wouldn't mind a few more of those...
I've personally soloed every 40+ (non-TF) Archvillain in the game with my Illusion/Radiation Controller, and I had a lot of fun doing it. I actually soloed all of the 40+ story arcs, and I think it's fair to say that the majority of my login time in that level range was spent in battle with one AV or another. Most of them were +1 or +2 to me at the time, though there was the odd even or lower level opponent. I've taken down many of them in their Issue 3 incarnations as well.
This guide is pretty solid. I have a very similar build, except for some minor differences in slotting, a maxed RI, and flight. Hover can make a
huge difference in AV battles, although you certainly don't need it for all of them. Sometimes I reslot to fit the mission.
Some comments and additions...
Terra is a joke. You can even hold her for the whole fight if you feel like it.
Baphomet is like a big Envoy. I swear he must have ADHD or something... he just can't stand still.
He's not a jumper like Nosferatu or a runner in the traditional sense. He just ignores a lot of aggro and heads wherever he feels like. Other than that, and the complications that could arise if he jumps off the cliff into a pack or three of enemies, he's not overly difficult.
The Psychic Clockwork king was the first Issue 3 AV I soloed. His Psychic Wail is dangerous and might one-shot you and/or your pets, depending on your level and accolades. Otherwise, his power level is pretty standard for an AV.
I don't see why some Ill/Rads have such a problem with Anti-Matter. His radiation debuffs are all warm and tickly!
He can only use his most painful attacks on you if you're up close, so... uh... don't be.
You get to fight him up to 3 times on Tina's watch, and the only time I died was in the non-story arc encounter. He spawned in the corner of a lab corridor where I didn't have enough room to maneuver, and I messed up when trying to pull him out into a nice open space.
Neuron isn't very difficult either, and he comes back for more punishment many, many times over the course of your career. For some reason, his Tesla Cage didn't last very long. It's only dangerous because it drops all the toggles.
Nosferatu was really, really hard in Issue 2... by far the hardest AV I fought. It took me many, many hours and capfuls of debt to come up with a strategy to beat him (which involved a trayful of blue, a lot of very careful pet placement, hopping around, and knowing just how many blasts I could squeeze out of my poor endurance bar and still make it to the end). In retrospect, it was good that I ran into him early, because the tactics I learned from those fights made every subsequent AV seem weak by comparison. He's not as tough in issue 3, despite the increased hit points and regeneration, so long as you pick up the Primal Forces epic or slot up some other non-psychic epic attack. Power Blast does maybe twice the damage of Spectral Wounds to him, and/or Conserve Power will keep you going for the long, painful battle to beat his heals. He now has an Immobilize attack (Tenebrous Tentacles), so it might be a good idea to stay airborne or at least perched above him for the battle if you can.
Nemesis... well, you get to fight 3 different versions of him if you do all the missions, so there's plenty of time to practice.
Heavy rad debuffing is useful, but it won't save you from attacks because his force bolts have an inherent accuracy bonus. Judicious use of pets, terrain, and Lingering Radiation takes care of most of the running and PFF problems. Think of him as a really big Fake Nemesis. Heck... most of them probably are. Only Rex had the balls to own up to his name.
Don't try to solo Madame of Mystery until you're
absolutely sure you have the damage and endurance management to at least match her regen rate for a protracted fight using regular tactics. It might be a good idea to try a practice run first until you're comfortable. Then all you have to do is put that Psychic Cleaver thingy that Cadao gives you on autofire and face her as you would any other AV. You've got 500 charges, but they go fast... I have no idea how you'd go about beating her without it, since it's the only thing that can actually do enough damage to hurt her.
Infernal most certainly is soloable. He often looks scary when you first fight him because he's Maria's first mission, so with his level fixed at 48 he could be well be +2 or even +3 to you. Seriously... any +2/3 AV is a tough fight (although I can confirm that Infernal's Issue 2 incarnation was soloable at +2). And the non-arc mission has him next to one of those scary demon summoning portals (with AV hit points, no less!). The trick to that one is to pull him away from the portal first, and then just use regular anti-AV tactics. That was the battle in which I learned the fine art of pulling with pets (a tactic I first tried against Anti-Matter), and I admit I did die a few times before getting it right. He doesn't do that much more damage than regular AVs. A lot of it is ranged AE, however, so it might help to find cover and keep your Phantasms a bit spread out where he can't hit them all. The second time you face him, he feels almost like a little puppy compared to his girlfriend.
Speaking of whom... I rate Diabolique as the 2nd hardest AV I fought solo... or at least 2nd most frustrating.
Her force attacks have an accuracy bonus and knockdown (so you can't heal in the middle of her combos), she Phase Shifts, and she
runs all over the $#@$ map (did I mention that she's a speedster, too?). In the story arc mission, that's a royal pain, because she spawns in the cramped corridors of Orenbega and can even pull you into her boyfriend if you're not careful. I finally managed to beat her by forcing her into a dead end and using my pets to block her in. That battle was mostly hard because of the terrain, and because she was +1 to me at the time. My second encounter with her at even level was honestly the most exhilarating battle of my AV-soloing career. I figured that if she was going to be annoying and fly around anyway, I'd just join in the fun... We had a fantastic aerial dogfight above a graveyard with all these little ghosts cheering us on. At least, I pretended they were cheering us on...
Mother Mayhem can be a bit tricky because her AEs can easily wipe out your pets if you're not careful. Keep your Phantasms away from her and close to you. You'll be doing a
lot of healing this fight.
The Kronos Titan
ambushes you when you come out of a door mission, so you're in for a horrible, painful death if you're not ready for it. There was a great moment in that fight where I was flying away from this 40-foot tall monstrosity with a
huge swarm of hero-seeking missiles heading my way... and
I didn't get a screenshot of it.
I wanted to try to get him to missile me again on round two so I could snap a picture, but it was a timed mission and I decided not to risk it.
Standard anti-Monster tactics (death from above!
) work against him.
Requiem is cool now, because he's a Warshade, and Warshades are cool. Uh... that's all I have to say about him.
The rest of the AVs not on the list (Black Swan, Malaise, Giovanna, Vanessa... did I miss anyone?) are nothing to write home about. Standard AV tactics work just fine.
A few parting remarks...
In my opinion, the keys to AV soloing are pet control and endurance management. Conserve Power is a cheap way of getting out of having ot learn the latter. It's not that I don't recommend taking it, but I'm an old fashioned type who believes you should learn the ropes without it first.
Pet control is an art and a science. There's no way to get around having to master it if you want to face the harder AVs in single combat. Learn to judge their range. Learn where to summon pets and how to move them. It's often helpful to have your pets airborne. There are some AVs against whom you want to spread your Phantasms out (e.g. Infernal), and others that demand clustered pets (e.g. Mother Mayhem). Sometimes, you want to keep your pets away from you so they pick up aggro more easily (e.g. Anti-Matter), and others where you want them close by to heal. Some battle
must be fought from the air (e.g. Kronos), while others you want to go out of your way to keep on the ground (e.g. Siege/Nightstar). Consider the terrain carefully: There are often summoning locations from which you can place Phantasms so they won't be on the receving end of the AVs' more dangerous attacks.
Battles against even level AVs now easily run up into the 20-30 minute range for the weaker ones (assuming you aren't killed or forced to retreat), and potentially much, much longer for the hard ones. Soloing the mission with both Siege and Nightstar, for instance, took more than an hour in Issue 2 and is now a ridiculous multi-hour marathon that lasts longer than most TFs. It feels kind of like you're fighting Hamidon himself instead of a bunch of rogue androids. They were beatable at +1 in Issue 2, but I wouldn't recommend soloing their Issue 3 versions unless you're higher level than them and blessed with saintly patience. Or insane.
To anyone wishing to take up the AV soloing gauntlet, kudos and good luck to you. With Issue 3 live, the golden days of AV soloing are over. Instead of becoming more challenging, it's just... tedious. The devs seem dead set against it, and some people keep crying NERF! I wouldn't have a problem with that if they kept the super-epic enemies to TFs, but there are literally dozens of AV battles in the 40+ missions--they show up more often than regular bosses in newbie missions. It's just sad that the amazingly rich 40+ content has been reduced to either forced grouping or hour-long solo battles...
