Robots and Traps: A MM's guide to PvP [i6]
By
Arrowleaf,
Posted on: 2006-01-16 20:20 in Player Guides
[color= yellow]Doctor Kronos Presents:[/color]
The Kronos School of Tactics and Strategy: General PvP thoughts:
These are some thoughts I have on PvP in general, regardless of what AT you are playing. Im including them here, just because.
Cultivate a thick skin:
Dont go into the PvP zones if youre not willing to be laughed at by people who (judging from the Broad Channel chatter) have the maturity level of a 12 year old. Seriously. Really. You WILL meet people who are very ungracious losers, ungracious winners, and general freaks. If you cant ignore people yelling juvenile insults at you, then the PvP zones are not for you. If you PvP well, you WILL get people insulting you, telling you that you are cheap, have no skill and couldnt beat them if it was actually a fair fight. (By which they mean, one where the odds are in their favor.) Especially if you win. And that, of course, is the goal. 
Be prepared to lose:
You wont win all the time. It just wont happen. Sometimes theyll get the drop on you, sometimes theyll come at you with 8 people at once, sometimes theyll just do something you havent seen yet. However it happens, get used to the idea of losing from time to time. Get used to the idea of losing, and then being insulted for it, in fact. Because, through no fault of your own, you will occasionally get ganked by a stalker who will shout LOL N00b MM over the broad channel. We get used to the idea of winning a lot from playing the game, because, well, the game designers have done an excellent job of tuning it. PvP, this goes out the window. The simple fact is, unlike PvE, everyone cant win all the time. Someone has to lose. Sometimes that someone will be you. Get used to the idea, and dont get your ego so tied up into winning that you get discouraged when you have a bad night, and the stalkers are on you thick as mosquitoes, and you cant go 5 feet from your hospital without getting assassin-struck.
Dont keep doing the same thing if it isnt working:
If you find yourself trying something again and again, and it isnt working (even if it is one of the brilliant and well thought-out schemes from this guide) then stop doing it! I know that this sounds obvious, but there are an amazing number of people who will just keep blindly trying the same thing again and again, because it worked once for them, or because they feel it ought to work. If every time you attack a controller, you end up held and killed and unable to fight back, then dont just keep charging in and hoping theyll somehow feel bad for you and stop using their best tactics on you. Change your strategy. Bring break frees. Put out a force field generator. Hold them first. Do SOMETHING different. Because, if what theyre doing is working, they have no reason to stop doing it.
Dont be afraid to reuse thing what works:
The reverse of the above, if you are doing something that keeps killing someone, feel free to keep doing it. If every time a pesky blaster flies by, you web grenade him and your robots tear him up, then dont feel like youre somehow honor-bound to stop doing that. (I mean, if nothing else, were villains.) Its effective, so keep doing it until they change tactics. (Just be careful that they dont use your consistency to set up traps for you.)
Play the game that is:
One of the most important lessons of PvP is, play the game that is there, not the game that you wish it was. People will complain a lot about things being cheap. What this usually means, is that it doesnt conform to their idea of what the game should be. People get used to the way things work in PvE, and get upset when PvP is not the same. Stupid blasters! They keep attacking squishy me instead of my armored and replaceable robots. Thats cheap! Players, unlike npcs, will NOT always run in straight lines into your caltrops, will not always attack your robots instead of you, and above all, will not always stick around long enough for you to kill them, if the fight starts turning sour. Get used to it, and do the same thing. Everything has a counter, if you look long enough. If someone does something to you that you cant figure out a way to deal with, dont bother whining over the broad channel. (It probably wont make them stop anyway.) Instead try to figure out why it is working on you, and what you can do to get around it.
Pick your battles:
Dont be afraid to run. Dont be afraid to not attack someone as they fly by, if youre not ready. More than many sets, traps relies on some set-up time. But even without traps, there is no reason to start a fight if you dont think its one youll win. If you see a group of 5 people walk down the street in Warburg, then maybe thats NOT the best time to jump out with your robots half-assembled, and start shooting one of them. Dont be afraid to bide your time. And if a fight starts out well, but starts going poorly, dont be afraid to run and come back later. Dont be afraid to make sure you have as many advantages as possible before you start a fight. There is nothing noble about starting a fight without being fully set up, any more than it is noble for a tanker to start a fight without all their toggles.
[color= yellow]Doctor Kronos Presents:[/color]
The Kronos School of Tactics and Strategy part II: PvP with a MasterMind:
Any hero or villain who finds themselves in a fight they werent ready for is at an automatic disadvantage. The easiest way to make sure to win, is to make sure the fight is over before the other person even realizes youre fighting. Stalkers know this. Many blasters know it. We should learn from them, and use it as much as we can. Of course, it works well for those classes, since they can do spikes of damage high enough to kill people, in one or two volleys.
Well, we can too, with some setup. TP foe and tripmines work great for that. Even if they survive the initial blast, they still start out with a lot less HP, and a significant disadvantage.
That is, of course, the extreme case, but anything else you can do to get the other guy before he is ready, will only help your chances.
Masterminds have, like every class, several things that they do better than some, or all others. And, like every class, we have some things that only we can do. The trick then, is figuring out how to best make use of the things that are unique to us. Again, stalkers understand this lesson very well. They have one real trick that is unique to them, but they milk it for all it is worth. Well, we have a few tricks of our own, so we need to make sure were milking away ourselves.
What are our tricks? The main one, as I see it, is our ability to attack people from very long distances or around corners, and without line of sight, through pets. Ill explore this more, further down, but its worth keeping in mind. Also, with traps, we can make areas that are extremely hazardous for other people to be in, and that often they cant see until it is too late.
[color= yellow]Doctor Kronos Presents:[/color]
Sinister Schemes: Specific Robots/Traps tactics
A wide, wide world of traps
Got nothing better to do? Plant a trip mine, right on the spot youre standing on. Or maybe a poison trap. Why? Who knows. Maybe you wont use it. But it doesnt cost too much endurance, and it lasts a really long time, so every so often, youll be really glad you did. And remember where it is, so if you need to, you can run back to it when a scrapper rushes at you. Remember, enemies dont get to see your traps. All they see is a helpless (heh heh) mastermind, who they charge at, and suddenly theyre on fire and vomiting. If they hit mines often enough, theyll start getting kind of paranoid about being near you. Which, all things considered, is not such a bad thing for you.
Zones of Sudden Death:
Set up a bunch of trip mines and a few poison traps, all on one spot. Sprinkle with caltrops. An acid mortar garnish is optional, but always appreciated. Wait for someone to come near. Teleport them into it if theyre a ranged attacker, otherwise stand in and lure melee-types in with yourself as bait. Watch them go boom. Have the robots attack. Laugh maniacally. Repeat.
You can do several variations on this, depending on how you are trying to play. For example, if you are trying to pick someone off without attracting too much attention, you might not bother summoning a FF generator, (because it is so visible) and trying to kill them fast enough that it wont matter. Alternately, if you are already set up, but no one is getting close (or you want to get a scraper or tanker) I find that summoning the FF generator, and putting down a triage beacon or two (and turning off stealth) is often enough to get people to come over and at least get close enough to see if Im an easy target or not.
As a traps/robotics mastermind, I find myself doing this sort of thing a lot.
If you get a really nasty pile of mines set up, but dont see anyone nearby to fight, then make sure you remember where you left it, if you go looking for people. Ive won a number of fights just by knowing where to run back to, after things turned ugly. If youre in a battle, and running low on hp, thats a great time to lure people into your traps. Theyll be frantically following you, trying to land that last couple of hits needed to take you out, and so less cautious than normal.
The inescapable pit:
Caltrops has several interesting effects, all tied together into one nice, tight power. For one thing, it does minor, auto-hit damage, which is useful for destealthing stalkers. It also makes people run really slow, which is the primary use. But it also has the interesting side-effect of making people unable to jump. (Since otherwise theyd just jump out of your caltrop field.) This means that if they are in a small, confined place that they need to jump to get out of (such as a dumpster) then they may be sort of stuck, if that small, confined place has been carefully lined with sharp metal objects in advance by a cunning mastermind. After that, its just a matter of getting people in it, either through subtlety (oh deary me, Im a helpless mastermind in a trash bin! I hope no tankers jump in and try to punch my head in!) or force. (TP foe, sucka! Hah!)
While sticking someone in a pit they cant get out of isnt particularly dangerous in itself, it is a major tactical advantage, especially if there are other problems on their mind. (Such as the continuous stream of damage coming from the robots, or the continuous stream of debuffs (and potentially holds) coming from your cloud of poison gas.)
And nothing is quite as embarrassing for SupahHurtz02, scrapper extraordinaire, (son of zeuse Ill kill u all lol I have the power of nite on my puches u r doomed make ur time), as being unable to get out of a simple pool of water. (The small, (1-foot or so) lips for fountains work wonderfully for this tactic, and are especially demoralizing when they keep you from escaping.)
The Long Distance Relationship
OF DOOM:
Think for a moment about comic book villains. Did Dr. Claw ever bother to lead his thugs into battle? Did Shredder bother to go out with his foot soldiers on every outing? Did Darth Vader bother to accompany every storm trooper squadron? Of course not. Because, why subject yourself to danger, when you have minions to do that part for you?
Well, the same is true for us. As most people have noticed by now, if you kill the mastermind, the pets all die. No point in focusing fire on the replacable pets then, when the mastermind is so much squishier, and so much more important to kill. And so, of course, most players will do exactly this: Focus fire on the mastermind, and ignore the pets.
But that doesnt mean we have to make it EASY for them. Nothing says we have to be anywhere even remotely nearby when they start fighting our robots. I spent a perfectly enjoyable evening harassing some groups of heroes by sending in my robots to attack them, while I hid on top of a building, just barely in sight range. (And I was stealthed, so I was fairly hard to see.) They spent a lot of time trying to find me, and ignoring my robots, and I ended up getting several kills this way, since no one wanted to waste time attacking the bots until it was too late.
You can do the same thing in a lot of ways; hiding around corners, behind billboards, under bridges, etc. Just make sure youre far enough away (or behind enough cover) that they wont see you, and let your minions go to town. Just make sure to keep an eye on them, and have them switch targets before some hero leads them through a pack of malta robots, etc.
The downsides with this tactic are that you lose any leadership and supremacy bonuses, but honestly, with 3-slotted damage and 2-3 slotted accuracy on all the bots, they still are pretty formidable, even if youre not around. One thing I did discover is that you dont get credit for the kill unless youre close, however. So its often worth it to wait until theyre nearly dead, and then teleport close, for the final blow, before warping away to safety. Also, its frankly hard to kill someone whos paying attention this way, since they can always just run away if things get bad. (Unless you get lucky and disorient them.)
The upsides are that it has extremely low risk, and a lot of people wont want to run away, and so will instead run around looking for you, while the robots blast away.
[color= yellow]Doctor Kronos Presents:[/color]
Ask Doctor Kronos: How do I deal with...
Stalkers:
If youre running around in Warburg, or Bloody Bay too near an asteroid, be prepared to deal with stalkers. Unless you are on a team with lots of people all running tactics, you wont see them before they attack and [normally] kill you. If you know there are stalkers around, then you need to take certain precautions. For one thing, dont move in straight lines, if your travel power is flight or superspeed. (Or while sprinting). (teleport seems pretty safe.) When youre standing still, try to make sure that youre in an area with some kind of auto-hit effect that will disrupt stealth and assassin strikes. Powers like hurricane, force bubble, mud pots, etc are marvelous for this. Sadly, we have none of these. With traps/robots, the best Ive come up with is standing in caltrops. Still works, but limits you a bit more. If you have dark miasma as a secondary, tar patch works rather well also. (Especially since it is so huge.) Now, most stalkers are smart enough that they wont actually come IN to your no-stalker-zone, but will wait outside of it for you to get careless or bored. If you have an AoE attack that doesnt require a target, you can use it to try to ping for nearby stalkers. Detonator can work for this, as can things like repulsion bomb (on a robot) or nuclear missiles, if you have any extra.
The other thing to remember, is that if you tell your robots to attack a stalker, it doesnt MATTER if they hide again, your robots will keep attacking them. Which makes them more likely to be revealed, as well as making it really obvious where they are. (just watch the laser beams.) Now, the clever stalkers will run off and lead your robots through zone mobs, to try to bring you extra agro, so use this tactic with caution. But remember, if you need to keep a stalker off you, just send your robots after them, and youve bought yourself at least some time.
Honestly, stalkers will probably be the hardest fights youll have, if youre not on a team. Good stalkers will either not attack if you have caltrops set up, or attack with other ways. Good stalkers will also run away if they dont kill you right away and you start fighting back, only to return later, all sneaky-like.
Bottom line is, stalkers are some of the most dangerous people youll meet. Or rather not meet, since theyre all hiding.
Brutes/Tankers/scrappers:
Brutes to some extent, and tankers even more, have the unfortunate (for you) combination of lots of hp, and good defensive toggles. Especially on a tanker, youre really not going to be able to kill them as long as they have their toggles up. A competent stone tank, with full toggles, just dies too slowly, and has more than enough time to get away. (and can cause you a lot of harm if you wait around in melee range for your robots to take him down.)
So what to do? Well, debuffs can help some. Acid mortar can negate, to some extent, some of the toggle defense. And seeker drones can buy you some time while they whiff in melee. However, the bottom line is, you need to get rid of some of their toggles. It just isnt going to happen otherwise, unless the tanker is playing very poorly.
Luckily, we have a REALLY GOOD move for getting rid of toggles. The best in the game that I know of, actually. (And sadly Im probably playing a part in its downfall by publicizing it here, since it will no doubt be a target of calls for nerfs at some point.) Our Poison Traps are GREAT. I still havent figured out if they just stack holds really quickly, or if they just happen to occasionally trigger a mag-100 hold that blows through resistance. (Seems to be the huge hold, but its hard to tell for certain.) If people stick around in your clouds of poison, they will very often be held (and lose toggles) as a result. Granted, the hold is only for about a second. But thats all you need to get rid of toggles and get your bots a chance to do some real damage to an otherwise impervious scrapper or tanker.
Caltrops and possibly web grenade can slow people down, which increases the amount of time they have to spend in your cloud of poison. Use them as much as you feel you can. Stand in the cloud yourself, so they have to come into it if they want to melee you. If they are waiting around outside the cloud, waiting for it to disperse, feel free to teleport them in. And after they get in, make sure you keep them as immobile as you can, with caltrops or any other means you have at your disposal.
The inescapable pit technique is good here, to keep people in a cloud, if there is a suitable spot to set up.
Melee types tend to be the easiest to hit with seeker drones, since their location is more predictable, and less likely to be 50 feet up in the air. By all means, slap a couple on them, to mitigate their damage output as much as you can.
If you see one of these people use their ultimate defensive power (moment of glory, unstoppable, elude, etc) then the best thing to do is usually just run away, or withdraw, since you really cant kill them during this time. (Or rather you can, but its really really hard.) And since its a click power, you cant drop it like a toggle. So just withdraw until it wears off, and then continue the fight from there.
Blasters:
Blasters can pose a serious threat, if they get a chance to build up/aim, and then hit you with their hardest attacks. Ive been one-shotted by thunderous blast before, and its somewhat frustrating. However, blasters themselves are also fairly squishy, and if you get the drop on them, they die just as fast. So the secret to fighting blasters is, attack first, attack hard, and dont let them run. Also, if you can, dont let them get direct line-of-sight to you, so they cant hit back. Hide just around a corner, or behind a dumpster, etc, after you start the fight. That way they cant just shoot you and end the fight through massive damage spikes.
Some blasters will use tripmines and try to teleport you into them.
If you can get some seeker drones to hit a blaster, it helps a lot, but realize that they can still ignore most of the effect by using aim/buildup. (And they will.) It still helps a lot if you survive the built-up volley however.
Try to web-grenade them, so they cant escape if things turn sour. Especially since many blasters can fly.
Blasters have almost zero access to status protection, so lay any holds, disorients, and roots on thick.
Corruptors:
Both less and more annoying than blasters. They are less likely to kill you in one-two massive hits (since not even corruptors do blaster damage) but more likely to extend the fight through healing, etc. A lot of the stuff I said about blasters applies to corruptors as well.
Corruptors can also take the same traps set we have, and use a lot of the same tricks with it. Ive only met one that did, though, so I dont think its as popular as, say, radiation or dark miasma yet.
The main secret with corruptors is to keep on them, and not get discouraged by their self-heals. Eventually, one of your robots photon grenades, or maybe a seeker drone, will stun them, and then youve got them. Corruptors DO have some status protection, but it is mostly for teammates, and so you can usually still stun the corruptor. (There are a few exceptions, such as sonics)
Defenders:
Tend to be very frustrating, since they can often heal themselves faster than you can hurt them. Also, very frustrating in groups, since they can often put allies hp bars back up to full at a moments notice. The good news is that they have just as hard a time killing YOU, since their damage output isnt marvelous. These fights are often stalemates, unless you can get them to hit a lot of mines, or other sudden spikes of damage, with some knockdown to delay the inevitable heal.
Status effects can help a lot. Some defenders can guard against them (forcefields, sonics) but others arent quite so well protected.
If you get a toggle debuff on you (enervating field, darkest night, snow storm, etc.) feel free to quick teleport away for a jump or two to get rid of it. All of those debuffs have a set range, and will go away if you get too far away. Or, if youre feeling especially nasty, go find a group of enemies to stand in the middle of, so that they get mad at the person who put the debuff on you
Controllers:
Annoying in teams, since they heal their teammates, AND throw annoying effects around like volcanic gas and ice slick. If you have your force field drone out, you have a little more time before they get you with a hold, at least. Happily, they have a harder time controlling your robots, and often wont even try much, beyond throwing an area effect at them. Many controllers will ignore your robots all together, which is generally a bad idea for them.
Theyre not TOO dangerous solo, even if they have pets (since theyre in the same boat you are: the pet may be scary, but if you kill the master, the pet dies. And the master is fairly squishy. Except we have more pets
)
Controller fights tend to feel a lot like corruptor fights to me. They can heal themselves often, but they cant kill you quickly, so the fights usually last longer. And, like corruptors, if one of your robots gets a disorient through, you basically win, on account of their low hp.
Dominators:
Dominators are basically controllers with holds that dont last as long, and offensive ability instead of support. They can still be dangerous, especially in teams, but they have nowhere near the spike damage potential of blasters or stalkers. Fights with dominators tend to go more like defender or controller fights, except without the parts where they heal themselves. Theyre pretty dangerous when they start using their AT ability domination, though. Happily they cant do that too often in PvP.
Kheldians:
Kheldians have some weird tricks, and seem to have an answer for everything. The problem is, they cant use all those answers at the same time. They can have great offense, nearing blaster level, if they turn into a squid. But then they have no defense, and no mez protection. They can get awesome defenses, and mez protection by turning into a giant glowing lobster thing, but then their offense is fairly low. They can have some melee skills (the peacebringers more than the warshades) in human form, but again, no mez protection. Peacebringers can use a power called light form, which is basically like unstoppable for tankers (massive defense, mez protection, but runs out after a bit, and their hp go way down) but it doesnt last terribly long, so you can just wait for it to run out. Theyll look like a small, white ball of energy when using this, and they cant use other forms.
Warshades have less obvious defenses, but if they find some enemies to power up on, can have incredible resistance in human form for a short while (90 sec) afterwards. However, again, no mez protection, so in both cases, disorients and stuns are going to be your friends.
Just realize that a lot of fights will be stalemates, where the kheldian will realize theyre in trouble, turn into the invulnerable lobster, and teleport away in relative safety.
TP-Foe Abusers:
As an abuser of TP foe myself, I am quite aware of just how difficult it can be to counter. Im also quite aware of how easy it can be to counter, if youre watching for it. Super speeders often are moving fast enough that my trip mines dont even detonate. Fliers that are moving upwards while teleported sometimes miss the mines as well. And teleporters who are watching have no trouble. Heres the trick: if you get out fast enough, the mines wont always detonate, and the caltrops wont always effect you.
You can do this with most travel powers, if youre watching. With superspeed, just start moving as soon as you see the telltale teleport sparkles, and hope you dont run into a wall. (many people will TP you into corners or dumpers for this reason.) With flight, just fly straight up as soon as you see the glitter. With teleport, (my favorite) just quickly start to teleport yourself somewhere as soon as you see them start to TP you. Youll warp to them, and then immediately warp to wherever you clicked, giving them a very small window to attack you in. (Youll miss a lot of mines this way too.) [this also has the advantage that you know youll end up somewhere mostly safe.] Superjump has the easiest time, since you can just hold down the jump button and youre safe. You can get away if you are paying attention, and not overly lagged. (And not sleeping, held, or in another fight.)
Youll still die from time to time to being teleported into mines. But its not as inescapable a tactic as some people think.
And this concludes our guide. Sorry it got a little long. It was fun to write; there was about a week where after every night, I was thinking "oooh, that worked, I should add that to the guide!" If you liked it, then wonderful! Your loyalty will be remembered in the coming revolution, after I achieve my rightful place as ruler of the world! And if you didn't like it, then your name will be remembered, for... later. But, if you didn't like it, please, tell me why! Post comments! Feel free to call this guide the most useless load of drivel you've ever seen. Just tell me what parts you find to not be useful, or that you disagree with. I'm looking to learn here myself. I'm sure there are scores of evil tricks I've never thought of or encountered. If you know of a good counter, or variation for any of the things I've written, post it in the comments! Feedback feedback feedback!
Thank you for your attention. And happy hunting.
Nice guide!
five thumbs up! (eh, we have super powers.........) i had a lvl 30 robotics trap mm and was thinking about making a guide but you outdid yourslef here.
I love my poison trap. One of the funniest things that happened with it was in pve with a group not long ago. Fighting CoT I got confused while I was toe bombing with poison trap. I did not think it was possible but the trap popped on my own team during that fight and got the only team wipe that evening. The chat lit up with "what the heck was that??!!!" and "nasty debuff/hold, never seen CoT use that power before". I was laughing and told them it was the poison trap. Got a lot of "did not know it was that good" remarks.
Minor update:
I have discovered a technique that cuts down on the number of times I die from stalkers TREMENDOUSLY. I still get killed by other people, but since I started trying this, I have been stalker-killed ZERO times. This may be in part because I didnt find any really good stalkers to test it on, but the ones that I did encounter, either tried and failed (And were shot by robots), or probed the edges, and couldnt find a safe way to get me.
So, without minor ado, I present to you, dear audience:
The Gazebo... of TERROR
Heres the theory: Stalkers who get an AS off on me have basically just won the fight. Caltrops slows them down some, and prevents most actual AS attacks, but it has some problems. In particular, a number of stalkers have instead used superjump to make long, low jumps over my caltrops, and hit me in the middle of it. (Jump-jousting.) And while they cant AS this way, they can still hit me with nasty things like total focus, bone smasher, and energy transfer. (Which usually, if they used build-up and some inspirations, is enough to take a very large chunk of my life, in addition to often disorienting.)
So the problem is, how to make it so they cant do jump-by hits? Well, the best way Ive come up with is to use terrain. Pick your spots so that they cant do it. On Warburg, northwest of the globe, there is a small gazebo, for which this tactic is named. One day, after getting hit by a few too many stalkers, I tried going into the gazebo, laying caltrops, and planting mines. It worked WONDERFULLY. The geometry blocks people from jumping by, so they pretty much have to come in through the front door. It also turns out to be a GREAT place to TP foes into, since it is harder to get out of by random jumping than most places. I got a lot of kills in that gazebo. It seems as close to stalker-proof as anything Ive seen. You could probably use other geometry features the same way, if you had to. A lot of buildings have alcoves in the sides that could probably work almost as well.
I want to stress that this is not a cure-all tactic. It works well vs stalkers, but some stalkers still have some pretty decent ranged attacks, which they can still pester you with. (especially with buildup/rage/crit upping their damage) Also, while this works well for stalkers, it still has problems with other people, such as blasters and TP-foe abusers, since they know exactly where you are. (Especially if you have your force field drone out, etc.)
Anyway, thats all for now. Let me know if anyone else has luck with this, or comes up with any other good answers to the stalkers damage spikes.
-Dr. Kronos
What? No tips on fighting other MMs? 
Seriously though, great guide.
heh. good point.
I just assumed that other masterminds would naturally cooperate with your nefarious schemes. :P
Seriously though, I haven't fought very many. Very few seem to hang out in warburg on Justice, it seems. The one time I met one, they got the jump on me, and got me to about 3% health with what I assume was LRM from their commando. I ran away, healed, came back, blew him up when he wasn't watching. It seems like the most important thing is to strike first. He got the jump on me, and I very nearly died. I got the jump on him, and he did die. I think that we're fragile enough (unless you took forcefields and have the amazing PFF) that attacking first is vital. You're going to be at a major disadvantage if they get a head start on you, damage wise. (Maybe less of one if you're dark miasma, and can actually heal yourself.)
Hi Doc Gravity,
Awesome guide! ( I fought you a couple times recently, "Brother Bee", Merc/Traps in Sirens Call. That was fun too ) PVPing there was a good learning experience ( I had already had planned respeccing into Stealth) but theres some awesome tactics and tricks in this guide.
I would also mention that you really need SOs on your mastermind. Many classes can at least PVP somewhat effectively with DOs, but I think Masterminds need SO'd minions or they are kaput.
I do have a question though. Is caltrops really That Awesome? My build feels awful tight for powers that I want already, and I dislike the idea of only having 1 attack (Slug). I would have to swap out either Slug or Burst, and I like Slug better...I feel Burst is pretty much the suck in PVP. But you really emphasize their use as a utility power. I liked caltrops when I played CoH (Way back in Issues 0-2), but I dunno. It just didnt seem to fit my guy (a professional revolutionary type) as well as Burst did.
Also, what's your opinion on Grant Invisibility?
I remember you! Yeah, those were fun!
Caltrops and grant invis - Caltrops is good, but it does overlap slightly with web grenade in effect. (stoping jumpers, and slowing walking.) I think between the two of them, web grenade is probably more important. Caltrops is, however, one of the few anti-stalker powers we have at our disposal. Since it does damage as well as slow, it not only prevents assasin strikes, but it also destealths them. Experienced stalkers will stay away. (or at least resort to less crippling "jump by joust" attacks, or ranged attacks, which are less likely to one-shot us.)
Caltrops is also extremely useful for trapping people in shallow depressions, such as dumpsters, fountains, and other geometry. You can do the same thing with web grenade, but if you miss, they'll get away.
It also helps a ton for keeping people in poison traps long enough for the detoggling to take effect.
I feel like caltrops is fairly important, all in all. (Or at least I find myself using it a lot.) You could probably get by without it, but it makes life easier. (and i LOVE it vs melee people, since they tend to have to come into range to melee, so they often get slowed by them. I've spent whole fights just running around, keeping the caltrops between me and a brute, while the robots fired away.)
To summarize:
Web grenade advantages:
-recharge component
-range
-can bring down fliers (Caltrops has -fly also, but it's harder to get the caltrops up to the fliers. )
Caltrops advantanges:
-auto-hit
-helps more vs stalkers
Grant invis, I have no idea or opinion on yet. It seems like it could be very handy, for moving your pets around unseen. (I'm constantly envious of Dark Miasma's group stealth power for this reason.) Probably great in teams. It's hard to know though, since stalkers have everyone so paranoid about stealth that lots of teams pack tactics and other +perception powers. Could get a pain to reapply constantly though, since I believe it only lasts 2 minutes.
I recently happened into Warburg and ran into a blapper. I'm still not quite sure what happened. I'm Rob/FF, btw.
I had all 6 bots out, upgraded and equipped, and as he started getting closer I ordered them to attack. He had whirlwind, ss, and sj on but I was in the middle of my bots FF'ed out with Repulsion Field up, trigger finger on the greens just in case.
Well, he slipped in, 1-shot me with a punch, and was out. The bots just sat there as he came in range like they didn't receive my order or couldn't see him (tactics+assault was up, btw).
Soooo, I thought I'd play it safe the next time. I got the bots out again, equip+upgrade, and this time I put on personal force field and hover (each 3 slotted with def SOs). Got in range of the blapper again and ordered the bots to attack. Nothin'... they didn't budge and I didn't get a targeting error message. The blapper evidently saw me and 2-shotted me with punches through PFF and hover, no problem.
I'm guessing he used Aim+Build Up but he was in the middle of a big battle both times. I want to beleive that's the only possible solution BUT it doesn't explain how or why my bots ignored him and it seems unlikely I'd happen to be the guy that got the Aim+BU blast both times.
Any ideas? Aside from "don't get seen" is there a counter to that?
Hide behind something before sending out your minions...? That's what I usually do in high risk situations as a super squishy MM (no defenses or stealth whatsoever)
I have no idea why your minions wern't attacking, that's really weird.
I've never faced whirlwind before, I was wondering if it provided stealth or something.
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I've never faced whirlwind before, I was wondering if it provided stealth or something.
[/ QUOTE ]
No, just knockbacks people, wouldn't think a blapper would have whirlwind though........... bug maybe?
When whirlwind is on, your toon does the whirlwind animation, and no other animations. The end effect of this is that your blapper is not rooted in place during the animation time of attacks. So drop Total Focus, Bonesmasher, whatever, and you can keep moving the whole time.
[ QUOTE ]
When whirlwind is on, your toon does the whirlwind animation, and no other animations. The end effect of this is that your blapper is not rooted in place during the animation time of attacks. So drop Total Focus, Bonesmasher, whatever, and you can keep moving the whole time.
[/ QUOTE ]
Yeah, ice/EM blappers have, in my book at least, surpassed stalkers as my least-favorite matchup in PvP. They tend to have knockback protection, root protection, and get in and out fast enough to kill me before the robots can take them down. Web grenade seems to be my only real friend here, but even then, it really only takes 2 ice blasts to take me down, usually. (At least with buildup.) Maybe 3, tops.
Currently, my tactics against them are mostly "attack them before they attack you." Since if they attack you, the fight ends very quickly. I've had some luck with Teleport-foe, dumpsters, and boatloads of mines. If they don't have a heal-bot, you can usually have your robots at least scare them off. They tend to pack trays full of greens and breakfrees though, so it's tough either way.
Still researching how to deal with these. They may be one of those "you need to find a team" matchups though.
[ QUOTE ]
What? No tips on fighting other MMs?
[/ QUOTE ]
tell message and ask if they would like to do a pet fight.
pet fight rules
*the only powers the mm him self can use is his second and power pools only pets atk.
hehe it is very fun. the better mm will win 
*DR_TECH does a ninja bow
if your ever on victory and you need some assassins for hire call us (the night lords)
website in sig
[color= yellow]Traps and Robots: The art of Guerilla warfare.[/color]
A guide to PvPing with mechanical monstrosities.
Hello. My name is Doctor Kronos. I am a scorned scientific genius, with nearly limitless resources, a bewildering array of gadgets, and a seemingly endless supply of killer robots.
I have been having a tremendous amount of fun in the PvP zones, and so Im writing this guide for other lovers of mechanical mayhem who want some ideas on how to be effective against other players. Sorry if this gets a little long.
Disclaimers:
This guide is primarily aimed at PvP. There may be PvE comments thrown in here from place to place, but the definite focus is on PvP. This guide is my opinions, based on my own gameplay experiences; if you disagree with me on points please say so in comments. This is what has worked for me, but Im not trying to preach the one true path of masterminding. Go with what works for you. And if you have your own masterful schemes, by all means, post them in the comments, so we can see them.
General level:
This is not a guild telling you how to be a good mastermind. There are other guides for that. But this guide does assume that you have at least some level of understanding of how to control your pets. In particular, make sure you can
a) have some or all of your pets start shooting a given target
b) tell all your pets to go to a location
c) quickly change your pets stances (aggressive, defensive, passive)
d) tell your pets to stop attacking, and follow you, no questions asked.
There are obviously a lot of other things you should make sure you can do as well (I recommend some of the excellent bind guides on this forum, if you dont feel up to making up your own.) But these are the things youll find yourself needing to do the most, particularly in PvP.
Doctor Kronos Presents:
All about me! General build info:
First, a quick rundown of my build: Heres what I took and what worked for me:
(presented here, not because Im saying you should mirror it, but so I can talk about what I did, and what worked for me and what didnt)
Robotics:
Battle drones
Equip Robot
Repair
Protector Bots
Assault Bot
Upgrade Robot
Traps:
EVERYTHING!!! Muahaha!
Web grenade
Caltrops
Acid Mortar
Triage Beacon
Force Field Generator
Poison Trap
Seeker Drones
Trip Mine
Detonator
Leadership:
Assault
Tactics
Teleportation:
Teleport Foe
Teleport
Stealth:
Stealth
[color= yellow]Rundown of Powers:[/color]
Battle drones (3 accuracy, 3 damage)
Equip Robot (1 recharge)
Protector Bots (3 damage, 3 accuracy)
Assault Bot (3 accuracy, 3 damage)
Upgrade Robot (2 recharge)
These are sort of the big 5 of any mastermind set. Kind of annoying, really. We have to take 5 powers just to be a mastermind. Oh well, I guess other classes also have their must haves. I just wish that over half our powersets werent like that. Anyway, enough ranting. I took those because I had to, to have lots of robots. And to keep them upgraded. Pretty much everyone takes them, because its silly not to.
For slots, I recommend 3 accuracy on every robot, just to make SURE they hit. (remember, minions are -2 levels below you, and lots of players have defensive powers.) That much accuracy may seem redundant, but it really helps when you start meeting people with defensive powers. Damage is also nice, of course. I wobble back and forth, on whether the healing is worth it on the protector bots. Sometimes it is helpful, but I figure, they shoot bad guys more often than they heal allies, so that has to get priority. Individual results may vary.
Repair: (2 recharge)
I like this power. Its a good spike heal, for when a robot is getting in trouble. I rarely use it on minions unless I feel really safe. (It seems whenever I use it on a minion, the assault bot, or a protector starts to die. I call this Kronoss Curse) Its great for saving the assault bot though, since it automatically heals them to full. The recharge is nasty, so dont plan on using it more than once or twice a fight. But its still a nice situational power. It could probably be skipped, for a more PvP-centric power, but I feel nervous without at least some way of healing my pets directly.
Web grenade: (2 accuracy)
They make you take this power. At first, I hated it. Then, once I got to PvP, I realized what a blessing it was. Its a marvelous single target root, with two fairly powerful side effects.. First off, the recharge is quite handy for reducing how much someone gets to do. But the fly is a godsend. This is your one-stop choice for stopping every travel power cold except for teleport. Its also a great panic inducer. Nothing messes a flier up in the head more than suddenly plummeting to the ground. It has to do with the mindset: While youre flying, youre pretty safe. You can see everything coming. A lot of stuff cant reach you. Melee combat is something that happens to other people. As soon as you fall, your field of view drops, your mobility is cut down tremendously, and at this point, there are likely a lot of robots running at you very fast, with very nasty looks in their cold, metallic eyes. Use this ability as much as you can. Got a free moment? Toss a web grenade. Slot some accuracy in it so you hit a lot, and youre set.
Caltrops: (2 recharge)
Wonderful, great, power. Quick to throw out, nice effect, good recharge. (You can keep them down perma, straight out of the box.) This is good for several things in PvP. You can stand in it, to be stalker-proof. (since it will de-stealth them and interrupt their assassin strikes.) It also is great for keeping fliers and jumpers grounded, after you land a web grenade. (since it suppresses both fly and jump) Superspeeders and teleporters will still escape with ease, but hey, you cant have everything
Acid Mortar: 2 recharge, 2 accuracy, 1 defense debuff
A marvelous PvE power, but sadly not quite as useful in PvP. It has a very nice resistance debuff of around -20%. Not quite tarpatch level, but still pretty good. Put this down if you see other people fighting, and want to help, or if youre setting up a really nasty spot to lure people into. It is most helpful against melee types, who rely on their resistance to save them a lot. (It also has a decent defense debuff, so it helps against super-reflex type people as well, if it can land that first hit.)
Triage Beacon: (3 recharge, 3 healing)
It gives everyone around it +150% regeneration (+300% or so, with 3 healing SOs) for 90 seconds, which can be significant. Its a solid power, but it announces your presence to everyone for a long ways. In PvP its useful for both prolonging fights (it works really well when combined with force field generator, for keeping people alive) as well as for luring people to you, when youre set up and looking for people to come to you, since it is so visiable.
Force Field Generator: (3 defense)
This power is, in my mind, one of the must-take powers from traps. First off, its an area defense boost, just like dispersion bubble in force fields. Also, like dispersion bubble, it gives you resistance to immobilize, disorient and hold. But UNLIKE dispersion bubble, it costs no end to maintain, and (most importantly) if someone DOES hold, disorient, or sleep you, it doesnt drop. This power has saved me sooo many times, where I get held, think oh crap, and then my faithful little generator bobs into range, and Im free.
In theory, they could attack the drone itself, but it seems fairly annoying to try to kill. No one really tries much. And you can summon a new one every 10 seconds, so youre fairly safe.
This is a really really good power.
Poison Trap: (3 recharge, 1 hold duration)
A medium power in PvE, this power really shines in PvP. Heres how it works: You plant a small green ball. It has a very small trigger radius. You cannot be interrupted while planting it, although if you get knocked back, you may end up planting it in the wrong place. If someone triggers it, it explodes into a VERY large (much larger than the trigger area) cloud of poison. Anyone staying in the cloud will get a LOT of ticks of a nasty debuff to their recharge and regeneration. (The regeneration only really matters when fighting people like regen scrappers/stalkers.) Anyone in the area when it is triggered will get a mag-2 hold. (I think this may auto-hit. It seems very reliable, at least.) ALSO, anyone remaining in the cloud has a chance to vomit. Vomit seems to be an unresistable, 2 second hold. (Either that, or its just spamming them fast enough that it overcomes peoples resistance.) This is where poison trap is especially effective, since if folks are foolish enough to stay in it, (or find themselves stuck in a caltrop patch and cant leave) they have a good chance of losing their toggles.
Seeker Drones: (2 recharge, 3 accuracy, 1 accuracy debuff)
Another amazingly good power. You summon 2 small flying drones at a target location. (Which can be quite far away.) They home in on enemies, and explode. Their explosions cause damage/-accuracy debuffs, as well as sometimes disorienting. As far as I can tell, each drone does -17.5% damage. (not sure about the accuracy.) The debuffs are AoE, and stack, however, so if someone gets hit with both, they have about -35% damage output. The protector bots will also throw these things out, so if youre set up for a while in one spot, youll often have a nice swarm of them.
They are not very good at following you, but with a few recharges, you can recast them pretty much at will. Just make sure you throw some up whenever you are planning on staying in one spot for a while; they make great early warning sentinels. Ive had several times where the way I knew I was being attacked was because the drones darted offscreen and exploded.
Trip Mine: (3 damage, 2 accuracy 1 recharge)
This power is almost required for PvP with traps, I feel. Its the defining power of the set. After all, what is more trap-like than having someone come down to attack you, and suddenly exploding?
Its basically the same power that blasters get. It does random damage. (several successive hits that each have their own to-hit roll.) It does a lot of damage slotted though. One is usually enough to bring an orange minion down to 15-20% hp. And of course, you can have a lot in one place
Also, it drops toggles sometimes.
Whats not to like?
Detonator: (1 accuracy, 5 undetermined.)
I havent fully slotted this yet, so I dont know what Ill end up with. Im leaning towards 3 damage, and then some combination of recharge and accuracy. It has a LONG recharge (10 minutes, I believe) but is a pretty good power, none the less. Its pretty much a nova, except without the stand in the middle of a bunch of enemies now that you have zero endurance. Part. Seems moderately useful in PvE, and unsure in PvP. If it recharged faster, then it would be great for checking for stalkers, but alas, it does not. Nice if the scrapper decides to try to melee your robots, at least. And the animation is extremely quick. Either way its a very nice chunk of damage all at once. With no slots in damage, the assault bot comes within 5% of killing white minions. (Higher tier pets yield more damaging explosions.) You can use inspirations to buff the damage of this power, but you need to give them to the robot that is going to explode instead of using them yourself.
Assault: (1 endurance reducer)
I dont like this power. I turn it on, because, why not? But Id skip it in a moment, if there were an easier way to get to tactics. It gives us around +11% base damage to our robots. Of course, since most of our robots have 3 damage SOs, the net gain is something like +6% to our total damage output. Not great, but so it goes. At least it provides resistance to tanker taunts and stalker placates!
Tactics: (1 endurance reducer)
This gem is the reason I endure assault. It gives us something like +7% accuracy, which is ok. But more importantly, it lets us see through at least some stealth effects. This is EXTREMELY important in PvP. People will still be able to sneak up on us (especially stalkers) but it helps. Things like stalker hide, or illusionist invisibility are still troublesome, but we can at least see them with it. And the wimpier forms, like stealth, cloaking device, steamy mist, shadow fall, etc, we can see them at nearly twice the normal range, which is significant.
If you plan to PvP at all, I recommend this power, if you can fit it in.
Teleport Foe: (2 accuracy)
The purpose of this is probably pretty obvious. We make wonderful little death-dens with our traps. But sometimes people (especially blasters) wont be coaxed to coming in. Or maybe they already DID come in, and dislike losing half their HP in the first 5 seconds of combat, and so are trying to leave. Either way, this is a great power to bring them back. If you have a pile of mines, just wait for someone to get close enough, and pull them onto your pile. This is a very hard tactic to counter, unless you are paying attention. Also, note that you do NOT need line-of-sight to snatch people. I will not be surprised if this tactic gets nerfed at some point, either by reducing TP foe, or by giving more powers teleport resists. Meanwhile though, abuse it.
Teleport: (1 endurance reducer)
A good travel power, for people who are willing to micromanage. In particular, I like it for PvP because it is quick, and extremely difficult to jam. Basically, unless Im mezzed in some way, or out of endurance, I can TP. Through all the web grenades, caltrops, tar patches, and ice storms in the world, I can TP away. Also, unless they are watching closely (which turns out to be fairly hard to do) they may not see where you went. 2-3 teleports are almost always enough to shake someone; especially if you have stealth. The downside is, its very difficult to pursue someone with this power. But, thats what TP Foe is for, I guess.
I highly recommend using something like the click-bind (where you press control+click, or something similar) to teleport, and get used to using it quickly, on reaction. And not just for traveling. TPing straight up, when a melee type is in your face is often a good way to buy some time to pop inspirations, and let your bots go to work, while they wonder where you went.
Stealth: (1 endurance reducer)
So-So in PvE, but in PvP, this power shines. The difference between no stealth and stealth is huge. Even though they can see you if you get close, it gives you a lot better chance of surprising people. Youre far more likely to see them before they see you.
[color= yellow]Build strengths and weaknesses:[/color]
First off, my build does not have stamina or hasten. After the great ED nerf of aught-six, I decided to try to not have them. (Ive never liked the mandatory glowing-hands of hasten anyway.) Hasten would be nice for buffing robots, but otherwise, I feel fine living without it. Stamina is a different story. With all the toggles (assault, tactics, stealth, and often sprint) I find endurance is often an issue. Personally, I feel that Im willing to wait sometimes, in exchange for 3 extra power slots, but many other people feel differently.
This build has zero direct offense, except for trip mine and detonator. I am fairly unimpressed by the guns in our primary line. The grenade is nice for the occasional disorient, but the protector bots do that anyway. The other gun shots are about defender level damage, but I feel there are better uses for my endurance and time. (As well as the question of, why give your position away?) So this build relies on pets to do pretty much all the damage, except for the initial spike from trip mine. Happily robots seem up to the task.
What this build is VERY good at, with all of the traps and what not, is setting up in a spot and obliterating anyone who comes into it, willingly or unwillingly. This is not a mobile build. This is not what you want to have if you want to chase people across rooftops, lasers and swords flashing in the moonlight. This is what you want to do if you want to fortify a position, and just DARE anyone to come close.
To me, this is a very fun build. Individual results may vary.