The 30 Minute Sewer Trial Guide (LONG + spoiler)

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Unfortunately, with the change to monsters, you will probably only be getting even level XP from defeating the Krackens.

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The devs have said that the monster change only applies to monsters spawned outside of missions and trials (the Kraken in Perez, Adamastor in Dark Astoria, etc.). The Kraken within the trial should not be affected.

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I've thought about this a bit, and I don't think it's an exploit as much as a shortcut. I mean, someone had to intentionally program the shield to go down to holds, since I don't see how that could happen by "accident" otherwise. It's probably just something the designer thought up to encourage people to bring along controllers.

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Maybe. Or it could just be that the game considers the force field to be a "toggle", and when you get mezzed your toggles drop. Maybe restarting the force field "toggle" is tied to the generators respawning...so if the generators never have to respawn, the force field doesn't toggle back on.

It would be interesting if someone were to knock out the shield using holds, then kill all four generators and see if the shield respawns when the generators do.

I was onl last night and I walked a group throug this via chat, so this is not first hand. They had 5 controllers! From what I gathered, they went in and held the Hydra from the get-go using invisibility and the FF never came up! We were using PA to grab aggro and they would invarably wake him up and he woudl bubble, but I guess you can just keep him held, and it does not come up. I didn't ask them if they could prevent the psi-lance attack or not. Anyway, we did it again later last night. This is a great TF, I cannot encourage people enough to do this.

Cheers

THz

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I don't know where this rumor of 5 levels got started. I have a 35 Dark/Dark Def, and RJ45 gave her a 40 damage/mez Hydra-Enhancement. And it's red, and it says she can't use it 'til she hits 37.

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Yeah, I eventually found out the rumor was false too, but not before I could no longer edit the guide.

Ok, a quick (and stupid) question - whats the level range for the trial? 41 is the max, but whats the minimum? While I'm still just shy of the trial cap, I've got some friends hanging around level 31-32 that I'd like to try and bring aboard too.

I believe 36 is the minimum level for this.

Nice guide. Pretty similar to the tatics we have used farming this mission.

Except we never clear the rikti at the bottom or all the tentacles.

Just the closest Kraken. The tentacles right in front of the head. Send in tank, chain mez the head and blast away. Done.

Spend as much time as you want clearing from the bottom up for experience.

This trial was made for good controllers!

Nice guide!

Cheers!

If 41 is the max...then how can you do this with higher level heroes? We had 2 level 50s in the trial in with a level 38 controller and had some issues. Mainly that we couldn't do damage to the hydra with the particle cannon (despite blowing up the force fields). Is there some kind of safety in effect for this trial? Do all the higher levels need to exemplat down for the duration?

Here is a faster guide... Have someone with Inivis., Phase Shift and Recall friend run to each box and Recall someone there. Once all weapons are gathered, Phase to the Hydra, teleport the party and clear out the area. once clear, chain hold the Hydra and Blast away.

Excellent guide. Another small correction regarding the special enhancements. You said, "all the Hydra enhanemcents are level 40." That's not accurate. I've done it twice now at level 36, SK'd to a 40 during most of it but not SK'd at the end. The first time, the special enhancement I got was level 40. The second time, I got a 42. I just dinged 37 tonight and can now use the 40 but the 42 is still sitting there in my tray waiting on my long haul to 39.

Dwimble

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If 41 is the max...then how can you do this with higher level heroes? We had 2 level 50s in the trial in with a level 38 controller and had some issues. Mainly that we couldn't do damage to the hydra with the particle cannon (despite blowing up the force fields). Is there some kind of safety in effect for this trial? Do all the higher levels need to exemplat down for the duration?

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I don't know all the ins and outs of it because I've just done it twice. Both times, however we had a team ranging from 36-50. Sometimes during the trial the 50s were exemplared and sometimes they weren't. I think they were exemplared when we started it, but I'm not sure.

One thing though, although you can DO the mission at higher and lower levels (as long as you can get into the sewers, which means level 36 minimum) you can't GET the mission before 38 and after 40 (maybe 41). So, there's a narrow window for getting the mission but a wide window for participating in it.

One note: when the 50s unexemplared, the usual XP rules seemed to apply. Most of the team, if not all, won't get any XPs for kills but still get mission rewards. Further, the 50s don't get booted from the team like in TFs, and if they reexemplar then the XPs will return to normal. Both times when we did it the 50s exemplared for the Kraken fights (so that we didn't lose the XPs) but unexemplared for the Hydra's head.

Dwimble

If you're 50 and participate in this, what level reward do you get?

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If you're 50 and participate in this, what level reward do you get?

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Sorry, I meant the OTHER people still get mission rewards. I don't think the 50s get any rewards. I'm not positive on that though because I wasn't following the chat too closely after we finished.

Dwimble

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If 41 is the max...then how can you do this with higher level heroes? We had 2 level 50s in the trial in with a level 38 controller and had some issues. Mainly that we couldn't do damage to the hydra with the particle cannon (despite blowing up the force fields). Is there some kind of safety in effect for this trial? Do all the higher levels need to exemplat down for the duration?

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Though this is a Trial it isn't a Task Force. So it works just like a mission. 38-41 is the range that you can be in and be allowed to get the mission from the contact, after that anyon can join your party. The only restriction after that is the mission is located in the Abandoned Sewers which is a Hazard Zone that requires yo uare 36 to enter.

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I don't know where this rumor of 5 levels got started. I have a 35 Dark/Dark Def, and RJ45 gave her a 40 damage/mez Hydra-Enhancement. And it's red, and it says she can't use it 'til she hits 37.

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Yeah, I eventually found out the rumor was false too, but not before I could no longer edit the guide.

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The Prima Guide (source of all my bad CoH info [I bought it with the game]) is the source for this "rumor". *Pulls piece of crap out* Page 279 of the guide says "The reward for this trial is a medal on your ID card, a large Experience Point bonus, and a special Enhancement that modifies two or more (yeah right where are the more than two kind???) powers/effects and is valid at +/-5 levels instead of the normal 3.

But it also messed up just about every detail about the trial except that you have to be 36. Just thought you might want to know that the "official" guide is the source of some pretty funny lies.

Using this guide, our team rocked the trial in less than 45 minutes. We went point-to-point, taking out the Rikti, then the Krakens, the tentacles, and finally, the big Head.

Of course, our team consisted of 2 lvl 50s, a 47, a 43 (me), and a 42. The 39 & two 38s were SK'd to the higher lvls once they got the weapons, so killing the mobs went very quickly. We weren't shooting for XP, although we got a fair amount of that, but to complete the trial, and earn the badges.

I wonder if they've changed something, but no Rikti spawned while we were zapping the Hydra head. I kept watching its health bar go down, all the while warning my team to expect Rikti to materialize right on top of them, yet, the Rikti never appeared. Not that I'm complaining, mind you, since things went even faster, I'm just wondering if they always appear, or the trial has changed since this was originally posted.

All-in-all, a most excellent source of information.

If you keep spaming the holds, the rikti won't spawn. Thats what makes this strategy kinda cheap

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If you keep spaming the holds, the rikti won't spawn. Thats what makes this strategy kinda cheap

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When did "effective tactical strategy" become 'cheap'? This is the standard strategy most often used on mobs that summon other mobs (the exception being Illusionists, because we WANT them to spawn their pets, heh).

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If you keep spaming the holds, the rikti won't spawn. Thats what makes this strategy kinda cheap

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When did "effective tactical strategy" become 'cheap'?

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It was cheap, when 'effective tactical strategy' was the exploiting of a bug. See Issue 4 test notes.

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o Modified Hydra Head powers. Fixed bug that allowed attacks to get through without taking out the shield generators.

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glad to see this exploit finally bite the dust

Interesting thought...

What the notes seem to be saying is that now holds won't go through the shields without taking out the generators first.

I wonder if, if you take out the generators and then spam holds on the Hydra head, and keep it held, if it will prevent the shield from coming back up again when the generators revive?

Well, you're holding him through the shield, which isn't supposed to be possible and is fixed in issue 4 aparantly according to the patch notes.

Don't get me wrong, I've use this strat too. It's just really not the way things are supposed to be done.

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I wonder if, if you take out the generators and then spam holds on the Hydra head, and keep it held, if it will prevent the shield from coming back up again when the generators revive?

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Does anyone know?

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I wonder if, if you take out the generators and then spam holds on the Hydra head, and keep it held, if it will prevent the shield from coming back up again when the generators revive?

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Does anyone know?

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Doesn't work anymore, and hasn't since issue 4.

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I wonder if, if you take out the generators and then spam holds on the Hydra head, and keep it held, if it will prevent the shield from coming back up again when the generators revive?

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Does anyone know?

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Doesn't work anymore, and hasn't since issue 4.

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In I4, they changed it so that you could not hold the Hydra head through the shield while the shields were up. Once the shields go down, and you can hold the Hydra head, will the shields come back up? Or will they stay down as long as the head is held?