Ultimate Bot/FF Guide [I7]

*What’s New*

So what’s new versus the old I6 guide? Since Rogue Spark (my Bots/FF) MM is 42 now, I have a lot more experience under my belt versus when I wrote the first version of this Guide. I’ve re-written slotting options on some powers and have a revised (and accurate) ToHit table at the end. I also have a build for Rogue Spark through 50 but if you guys want more sample builds, I can whip some up in a jiffy. Finally, I have a little discussion about I7 Defense toward the end.

Purpose

Robotics/Force Field is one of the more synergized sets because the Primary has Bubbles as well. Robotics has an excellent array of ranged energy blasts in addition to a huge assortment of Area of Effect attacks with the level 32 Upgrade. Force Field, on the other hand, gives good (but not stellar) damage mitigation with its +Defense but also good Mez protection with Dispersion Bubble, but best of all you get Personal Force Field that gives the Mastermind excellent protection while still using their Bots to do damage. Of course, there are downsides with this combination: no way to heal damage, no boost to damage and the need to Bubble everything, which is time consuming, tedious, and endurance intensive. However, it is a great set to play as and there are many ways to succeed as a Bots/FF MM.

I rate all powers on the 5-Star system. 5 stars means it’s a cornerstone power that you’d be insane to pass up while a 1-star means that you should probably avoid it like the plague. Not too many powers get the dreaded 1-star because most powers have some redeeming quality. Everything in between is your call. I hope to remain as objective as possible. Also, the Star system is not relative. That is, there is not just 1 5-star power and the rest are compared to that.

A couple notes, before we get started:

All Masterminds have an inherent power called Supremacy. This power gives henchmen within a 60 foot radius a boost in Damage and Accuracy of 25 and 10%, respectively. Supremacy does have a line-of-sight requirement so if an obstacle such as a box or crate gets between you and your Bots, they will lose this power. Going around a corner has the same effect. Once you get into the higher levels, Supremacy will a play large role in the Accuracy of your lower Henchmen because they will be a lower level than you are and they need all the Accuracy they can get. Also note that Invisibility, Personal Force Field, Phase Shift, and a few other powers (but not Stealth or a buff like Grant Invisibility) will turn off Supremacy.

Supremacy range is also important for the Bodyguard function. Inherent to all Masterminds, Bodyguard allows your Henchmen to partially take incoming damage to you, the player. The feature only exists, however, when your Henchmen are set to Defensive/Follow and within Supremacy range. You can order any Henchman to be in Bodyguard mode and at any time. However, telling your Bots to attack, move, or perform any function will cancel Bodyguard. Also, damage is evenly split between however many Henchmen are in Bodyguard and you, the Mastermind. So, an incoming attack that would do 100 damage to you would be split anywhere from 1-6 ways, depending on how many Henchmen in Bodyguard you had.

Here is a quick chart for when you get your various Henchmen.

Level 1: First Battle Drone (Tier 1, +0 levels)
Level 6: Second Battle Drone (Tier 1, -1 level)
Level 12: First Protector Bot (Tier 2, +0 levels)
Level 18: Third Battle Drone (Tier 1, -2 levels)
Level 24: Second Protector Bot (Tier 2, -1 level)
Level 26: Assault Bot (Tier 3, +0 level)

All told, you will have 3 Battle Drones (-2 to you), 2 Protector Bots (-1 to you) and an Assault Bot (same level as you).

Robotics

Pulse Rifle Blast Level 1
Accuracy: 75
Brawl Index: 2.778 (Energy)
Recharge: 4 seconds
Endurance Cost: 6.5
Range: 80

The first of 3 Primary attacks in the Robotics line, Blast does little damage but recharges quickly and is a boon to the starting player who only has one Battle Drone running around and wants to increase their damage. While the power actually does more damage/second than Pulse Rifle Burst, it will drain more endurance to do so and will take away from managing your Henchmen. Ultimately, the damage of this power will pale in comparison to the damage output of your Henchmen and unless you really want to have a little measure of offense yourself, it becomes obsolete. Combined with the other 2 Primary Blasts, however, you can dish out some pain, though it would still be lacking compared to your Bots or other Archetypes. Early going, it works well and you’ll prolly suffer without some form of attack but if you get the chance to Respec, this will be among the first to go. If you plan to slot it, 1 Acc and 3 Damage are plenty but a Range might good too. All the Rifle attacks have a shorter range than your Bots attacks so that puts you in front of them in order to get your shot off. For the most part, you want your bots between you and the enemy, not behind you.

Overall: 2-star Power. Leaves a bit to be desired but it does help you through those early stages where you don’t have much firepower to begin with. It has fast recharge but little bite, so either combine it with other Pulse Rifle blasts or respec out of it.

Battle Drones Level 1

Accuracy: 75 (drops in level will affect this)
Recharge: 60 seconds
End Cost: 19.5
Range: 90
Inherent: Laser Burst (3 “ticks” of energy damage), Melee Smash (smashing damage)
Equipped: Heavy Laser Burst (Energy and Smashing damage)
Upgraded: Full Auto Laser (Cone, 17 “ticks” of Energy damage)
Inherent Resistance: 28 to Lethal/Cold, 48 to Psionic. Disorient/Fear/Sleep
*Note* Drones (like all Bots) have Super Leap
*Knockback*

Battle Drones are your Tier 1 Bots that will serve you well from level 1-50. At first, it will be your sole companion as you level up but at level 6 you’ll get two and you’ll also probably get the Equip Power. Their Super Jump is really handy early on, as they can attack enemies on rooftops and high platforms without your needing to be there. They’re damage is lackluster and their HP is low but when you finally get three of them all attacking the same target, they can handle themselves fairly well. Their melee attack does more damage than their first laser burst so you might want to Go To command them into melee when they are all you have. This works early when enemies don’t hit hard and your Drones are still near your level. Once Equipped, they have a pseudo-attack chain that will be fairly consistent with their damage. The Heavy Laser Burst does roughly twice as much damage as the Laser Burst but takes awhile to charge and fire, kind of like a Snipe. From 6-32, these three attacks is all your Battle Drones will get and it’s a long road but well worth the travel. At 32, Drones get Full Auto Laser with the Upgrade and while it seems like a really cool power on paper, unless all three Bots fire their Full Autos at the same time, the damage is really poor. The animation time for the power is also really long and the Drones could probably fire off two rounds of their other Lasers in the same time (which would do a lot more damage than the Full Auto). However, because it’s Area of Effect, you might get 3-4 enemies in range and that’s when it adds up. 3 Full Autos all firing at once is quite cool. Also, it makes sure that your Drones always have something to do because by the time Full Auto is done, the other two blasts have recharged.

Drones get into trouble later on when they start dropping in levels and by level 18, since they’re -2 to you, they’ll be fighting +2-+5, depending on what you (as the MM) are fighting. Because of this, they’re damage is going to be lacking, as is their Accuracy. See Appendix A for Accuracy tables. The moral of the story is that you really can’t have too much Accuracy for these little guys. If you’re fighting +2s or higher, 3 Accuracy is necessary for them to hit at a “capped” level (which is what you always want). As for Damage, that’s all these guys do so also slot up as much damage as you can. 3 Acc/3 Damage is the way to go and unless you want to skip out on of the Accuracies, 6-slot this power as fast as possible because you’ll use it your entire career. (As a side note, if you plan on taking and slotting Tactics, you can easily get away with just 2 Accuracies)

One last thing, Drones will run into melee range on occasion (more often than I’d like) and if you don’t keep a tight reign on your Drones, they’ll get themselves killed. The Numpad Bind Pad is what I use and I can just tell all my Drones to Go To if one decides to be heroic. Drones’ health are also the most “roller-coaster” like in that they can go from Green to Red (or Dead) in one hit. Bosses are Drone Killers and will happily chew through your Tier 1s unless you Bubble them or make sure something else draws aggro.
I highly suggest Aid Other and it will save your Drones numerous times. Protector Bot Heals will also repair a large amount of health to your Drones unslotted. Just don’t’ rely on them to save Drones because the heals are infrequent.

Overall: 5-Star Power. As one of your Henchmen, it’s a no-brainer to pick this power up at level 1. While Battle Drones aren’t as powerful as Protectors or the Assault Bot, they still will do their part. Tactics will keep them alive more than anything so read the Tactics section after viewing the rest of the Powers.

Pulse Rifle Burst Level 2

Accuracy: 75
BI: 4.66 (Energy)
Recharge: 8
End Cost: 10.7
Range: 80
*Knockback*

This is another direct attack, and in my opinion, the best of the three. While its reload and animation are slow, the damage is superior to anything your Bots will do for quite some time (even when the Burst is unslottted). It has a chance (40%) to Knockback, which synergizes well with Force Bolt, the first power you get in the Force Field Secondary. However, like the Rifle Blast, the range is less than your Bots so you might want to compensate with a Range Enhancer. Damage on this is actually decent if you slot it up and will do about as much damage as your Assault Bot’s heaviest hitters. It’s a great way to supplement your Bot’s damage, especially if you want them to move to a new target while you finish off the last slivers of health. If there was one of the Primary Rifle attacks to keep, I’d say this is it. The Rifle Blast, some would argue, has a higher DPS than this but in order to achieve that higher DPS, you have to spam the Blast instead of controlling your Henchmen. In addition, because Rifle Burst takes 8 seconds to recharge (base) you don’t have worry as much about how much endurance it costs. In 8 seconds, you’ll regain the endurance (barring heavy toggle use).

Overall: 3-star power. Of the Primary Rifles, it is the best but that’s not saying a whole lot. I Respec’d out of it at 26 because I really wasn’t using it that much and didn’t want to invest the slots. It will help early to gain the first 10 levels while your Bots are still few and still don’t do a lot of damage. I find that I don’t need the personal attack to keep safe because I have Force Bolt around to keep enemies off me but you could be different.

Equip Robot Level 6

Recharge: 6 Seconds (2 second activation time, 8 seconds total)
End Cost: 16.3
Battle Drones: Heavy Laser Burst
Protector Bots: Heal Beam, Heavy Laser Burst
Assault Bot: Dual Plasma Cannon, Flamethrower

Equip is one of the first powers that you’ll have a love/hate relationship with. You’ll love that it gives your Bots new powers but will hate going through and Equipping them all. It is among the most tedious things in the game and until it changes, it is the price you pay for having Endurance-Free damage and meat shields at your disposal. Equipping will have to be done every time you zone or enter a mission (just like summoning) but will be permanently on the Bot until it dies or you leave it. The recharge is only 6 seconds but the animation time takes time too. The Bot being equipped will be unable to take action until the animation time is up, which is roughly 6 seconds also. Doing this mid-battle isn’t bad as long as you’re willing to put that Bot into a vulnerable state.

When you get all 6 Bots, Equipping (unenhanced) will take at least 40 seconds so just realize this when you’re on a team. That’s the reason I said the recharge was 8 seconds: because in actuality, you’ll spend an additional 12 seconds in animation time over the course of 6 Bots, just so you know. All the other Archetypes will be able to rock and roll at the start so understand that you’ll be slowing them down at the beginning. Also, Summoning and Equipping all 6 Bots will literally drain you completely from 100 Endurance to nothing if you go as fast as you can. I highly recommend an Endurance Reduction in the default slot. If you do that, you’ll have around 1/3 of your Endurance left after the initial summon and Equip. If you can spare the slots, another End Redux is highly recommended because after level 32, the summon/buff cycle becomes incredibly endurance intensive. Saving 7 Endurance per Equip (with two End Redux SOs) will save you 42 Endurance when equipping all 6 Bots.

Overall: 5-star power. You really can’t get by without it and while it is a necessary evil to Equip all your Bots, it makes them considerably better. With a few Endurance Reductions, it’s not a strain to Equip everything and doesn’t make the level 32 Upgrade cycle as much of a burden.

Photon Grenade Level 8

Accuracy: 75
Brawl Index: 1.777 (1.222 Energy, .555 Smashing)
Recharge: 16
End Cost: 19
Range: 80
*Disorient*

Unfortunately, this power is not as effective as its graphics. It’s really cool looking but it’s deceptive because this a high-endurance, low-damage power that really isn’t effective at all. Yeah, it does AoE but the tiny damage it does is not worth the Endurance. Also, the chance (40%) to Disorient is kind of cool but it is only Mag 2 (Minions only) and has a short duration. This is the worst of the 3 Rifle powers, which is a shame because it looks so darn cool. Stay away from this power unless you pick up the previous two Rifle attacks because on its own, it is a waste of Endurance and brings nothing to the table that your Bots couldn’t do 10 times better. If you do decide to get it, slot it with Accuracy, Recharge, and Endurance Reducer and Disorients. The damage is not worth enhancing but the Disorient is. 1 Acc/2 Recharge/1 End Redux/2 Disorient is the way I’d slot it so that you could maximize the Disorient and get it up as often as possible while also not severely impacting your Endurance. However, this is a power not worth 6-slots so if you only had 3 slots to play with, I’d go with an Accuracy, a Recharge, and a Disorient. Don’t worry though, this power comes back at 32 when your Protector Bots get it. Not only is it more powerful on them but it doesn’t cost you Endurance and they can stack their Disorients. I guess you could try to time your Photon Grenade with the two from your Protectors (alpha strikes maybe) but that’s going to be few and far between. I say skip this power.

Overall: 1-star. It’s a shame this isn’t a more useful power but unfortunately it is. Low damage for high cost and only a decent chance to Disorient is simply not worth it, in addition to the extra aggro it generates to you.

Protector Bots Level 12
Accuracy: 75 (drops in level will affect this)
Recharge: 90 seconds
End Cost: 19.5
Range: 90
Inherent: Laser Burst (Energy), Force Shield (7.5% Defense to All)
Equip: Heavy Laser Burst (Energy), Heal Beam (33%? of Protector’s Health)
Upgrade: Photon Grenade (see above), Seeker Drones (-Acc, -Dam, Disorient)
*Disorient*
*Knockback*
*Seeker Drones: ToHit Debuff, -Perception*

Inherent Resistance: 28 to Lethal/Cold, 48 to Psionic. Disorient/Fear/Sleep
The moment you hit level 12, you start to see why you picked Robotics. Protector Bots aren’t the melee monsters that Necromancy or Ninjas get but they are far more powerful than their Battle Drone brethren. Your damage output will double at level 12 and, if you took Equip, you get a mini-Healer that will help keep your Drones alive.

Protectors have a lot of slotting options and when you get the Upgrade at 32, those options become much, much more tempting but the fact of the matter is this: Protector Bots are Combat Medics, not Healers/Defenders. What I mean by this is that a Protector’s primary function is dealing damage, not mitigating it. The Bubbles and Healing is welcome and necessary but they are not the Protector’s primary role, even though the name seems to imply it. During battles, Protectors will fire their guns 95% of the time, stopping only to reposition or Heal occasionally. For that reason, I cannot stress it enough, slot for Accuracy and Damage. The Disorients, the Heals and the Defense are great but not boosting what a Protector does 90% of the time seems a bit foolish to me.

That being said, I’m in the camp that says maximize the damage of your Protectors by slotting 2 Accuracies and 3 Damage and at 32, put an Endurance Reduction in them so that they don’t run dry during long (or repeated) battles. I wish I had more than 6 Slots for these guys because the other Enhancements would really help, but I have to be reasonable and realize that these Bots are first and foremost damage dealers.

With that out of the way, I’ll focus on what Protectors will and will not do. They will heal sizeable chunks of a Battle Drone’s health (close to half), less to another Protector (1/3), and even less to the Assault Bot (1/4 maybe), unenhanced. Up until 32, I suggest placing a Heal in the 6th slot of your Protectors (if you’ve slotted them up that much by then) because it will help your Assault and other Protectors. After 32, however, the Endurance Reduction is needed because with all the Photon Grenades, Bubbling, and Seeker Drones (which Protectors will Bubble for some reason), your Protectors will run dry on Endurance. They also will Bubble all your Henchmen and you (but they will not stack Bubbles on you personally) in addition to other Mastermind’s Henchmen. They don’t seem to have an order to their Bubbling, besides starting to whomever is closest. The Bubbles last 4 minutes, like Force Field Bubbles and give 7.5% Defense to all. Stacked, that’s 15% of free Defense.

What Protectors will not do is save your Bots by themselves. At 18, you have 3 Battle Drones and only 1 Protector. Levels 18-24 are tough because that one Protector has a hard time managing 3, -2 minions that generate a lot of aggro. At 24, however, you get your second Protector and life becomes a lot easier. Not only do you get more damage but the second Protector can Heal the first and vice versa. The stacking Bubbles help as well in addition to another target with more HP then your Drones. Even with 2 Protectors, however, your Drones will get in over their heads and die without supervision.

When the Assault Bot comes at 26, Protectors take a backseat because the Assault is your lifeline. It becomes the Primary damage dealer of your forces and the Primary tank so you’ll focus on keeping it alive. In team settings, some people don’t summon their Battle Drones a.) because it causes more lag and pathing problems and b.) so their Protectors can focus on healing the Assault Bot. This isn’t a bad idea for large teams so think about next time you’re on a big team or on a team with more than 1 Mastermind.

At 32, Protectors become do-it-alls. They have Area of Effect Damage, Single Target Damage, Damage Mitigation, and can Mez enemies. They Disorient quite a bit with their Photon Grenades and Seeker Drones and also do their fair share of damage. Seeker Drones have a chance to Disorient as well while their Debuffs are also quite excellent. I don’t know how much –Acc and –Dam they have but since you get two per Protector, it’s possible to have 4 Seekers explode on one target, quadrupling the effects of the Debuffs. Seekers are kind of dumb though and the Protectors have to be close to the enemies to summon and use them. They also Bubble the Seekers, as mentioned before, which is annoying and silly considering the Seekers are suicide bombers. Seekers do a little damage to the area in which they explode but that’s not their primary purpose. If you can help it, try to get all 4 to hit a Boss to hopefully Disorient and definitely debuff them.

If you go against my advice and slot for Defense, Disorient, or Heal, I recommend at least two Accuracy SOs in any Protector Build. 3 Defense SOs will up the Bubble’s Defense from 7.5 to about 12% and the Double Bubble nets about 24%. This is pretty substantial, especially in the I7 world, but you must also consider that 3-slotting for Defense will lower your DPS considerably. Allowing enemies to sit there and fire back will negate whatever greater Defense you have. Instead, taking them out faster will mitigate more damage than the extra 9% Defense. Of course, you could always mix it up and go 2 Damage, 1 Defense and squeeze out an extra 1.5% per Bubble. However, since you’re an FF Secondary, you’re already providing Defense. While I love hassle-free Free Defense, sacrificing damage to do so is not wise, in my opinion.

A single Disorient SO will make the Disorients quite a bit longer although they aren’t terribly long to begin with. Finally, you will see an obvious increase in Heal strength with Heal SOs but even with two Heals in them, they won’t be able to fully heal even another Protector, let alone an Assault Bot. Protector Heals have a 30 second recharge.

Overall: 5-star power. Extremely versatile and always needed/wanted, Protectors are your bread and butter. Treat them well and they will treat you well. Know their limits and you’ll do fine.

Repair Level 18

Recharge: 120
End Cost: 16.3
Range: 60

This is another let-down power that should be better then what it is. Repair is useful, don’t get me wrong, it’s just that it doesn’t come up enough to be worth the power pick or the slots. Repair, when activated, sends out 3 of these little disk-like blue swirly things on the ground that go out to the Bot you have selected and refills all of their HP and Endurance. It has good range, too, but the further you get away from your Bots, the further the little swirly disks have to go and if your Bots are on the verge of death, they might not make in time. This is an addition to the 2 second activation time this power has (it’s the same animation as summoning your Bots). Because of the delay between activating the power and the actual Heal going off, you may have to preemptively use the power on a Bot in the yellow and hope the nano-bots get there in time. Because it is on a two minute timer, Repair is not a “every fight” power but rather an escape button when a Bot is very close to death and you need to have everything fighting. Because the Assault Bot has a lot more HP then the other two Tiers, Repair’s usefulness is maximized when healing the Assault from little to Full. The Endurance aspect of this power is almost entirely wasted because the only Bots that ever start running low on Endurance are Protectors and that’s only if you have the level 32 Upgrade and make them fight non-stop for about 2 minutes. But, with one Endurance Reduction in them, they never come close to bottoming out so I guess the only time the Endurance boost from this power could be used is when there are Sapping enemies like Carnies or in PvP.

Three Recharges in this power will drop it to about a minute, which is still far too long to be your only Heal for your Bots. Even with Protector Heals, Repair needs help when it comes to keeping all of your Bots on their feet. I say take Aid Other early and let Repair supplement its Healing for the times where you’re under attack (Aid Other is interruptible) or when your Assault Bot is going down and you need to repair it to full (which Aid Other will never be able to do in one application).

Overall: 2-star power. Its recharge is simply too long to be your primary heal power but in conjunction with Aid Other, it can bail you out of hairy situations. If you had to pick one, Aid Other is the better Heal by far and you can do just fine without Repair. I know, because I Respec’d out of Repair into Aid Other and haven’t looked back.

Assault Bot Level 26

Accuracy: 75 (won’t change! *gasp*)
Recharge: 120
End Cost: 19.5
Range: 90
Inherent: Plasma Blast (Energy), Smash (Smashing)
Equip: Dual Plasma Blast (Energy DoT, AoE around target), Flamethrower (Cone DoT)
Upgrade: Swarm Missiles (AoE, DoT), Incendiary Missiles (AoE, Ignites ground, DoT)
Inherent Resistance: 28 to Lethal/Cold, 48 to Psionic. Disorient/Fear/Sleep
*Disorient*
*Knocback*

After 26 Levels of sub par damage compared to other Masterminds and other Archetypes, you get your Tier 3 Bot and he totally kicks butt. Towering over the Drones and Protectors, the Assault Bot is quite a sight to behold when you first get him and is even more impressive when you first see him in action. The Assault Bot has more HP than you (as the MM) do and this is to your advantage because you can send him ahead to scout around corners and blind spots. He also has natural Bot resistances meaning he’d survive an encounter better than you, as well.

In action, with just Equip, the Assault likes to use his Flamethrower. This is not actually a good thing because while it is an AoE Cone, it doesn’t do a lot of damage and what’s worse is that is has a really long animation time. In the same amount of time, the Assault Bot could have fired off two Plasma Blasts and a Dual Plasma Blast. These two attacks are quite solid. Plasma Blast is direct energy damage that just hits hard and recharges quickly. It’s up every few seconds and has good range (and looks cool too). It also stops Regeneration, which is incredible. Stopping the regen of high HP targets is paramount if you want to defeat them because often times their Regen is higher than your DPS. The Dual Plasma Blast is by far the coolest looking attack the Assault Bot has and is also the most powerful. It has an initial hit of Energy damage that is meaningful but not great which also hits any/all enemies standing right next to the primary target. Next, the blast has Damage over Time for about 7 “ticks” to the primary target and these add to the damage. This attack, too, has a –Regen component. Finally, the Assault Bot has a melee Smash that does pretty good damage (just under Dual Plasma Blast damage) and also has a chance to Disorient. However, once in melee range, that’s the only attack he’ll use so not only will he wait on the Smash attack to recharge, he won’t hit anyone else either. Get him out of Melee as much as possible because his DPS will suffer if you don’t not to mention he won’t be able to use any of his AoE attacks later on.

With the level 32 Upgrade, you’ll find that your Assault Bot out-damages your other 5 combined. The AoE missiles are too freakin’ sweet and you’ll wish they fired them more often. I personally can’t tell the missiles apart (as they fire) but once they hit, it’s obvious which is which. Swarm Missiles explode and do DoT to a large area around the target. It’s not uncommon to hit 10 guys scattered around the main target. I haven’t counted the “ticks” yet but I estimate anywhere from 7-10. Incendiary Missiles will be your favorite attack because it also has the large AoE, like Swarm Missiles, but when it hits a target, it ignites the ground beneath them, much like a Burn patch or the Ignite from Scrapyarder Lieutenants. This goes for every enemy hit so there could be a dozen Ignite patches from one volley. This does cause the mobs to scatter as they try to run from the flames and this gives you a chance to start wiping them out. The Ignite patches will stop once the enemy that started it dies but if you have multiple patches up, all enemies will be hurt by the flames if they are knocked into it. Ignite patches have the same duration as the Incendiary missiles have Recharge (20 seconds) so you could perma-Ignite a particular boss or high HP target.

Also with the level 32 Upgrade, you’ll find that you’ll want to hold off on mopping the floor with enemies until they’re all nice and clumped up. It makes the light show so much more impressive! It also kills them faster. If all your Bots have the Upgrade, 5-6 minions will fall in seconds if they’re grouped up and your Bots use their AoEs all at once.

You will want to lead with your Assault Bot and this will get him into trouble sometimes. He will take a lot of punishment on the frontlines but at the same time a quick Aid Other or Protector Heal will usually be enough to keep him upright. Of all the Bots to lose, the Assault Bot is the easiest to replace because, generally, you rarely have to and the Summon is recharged, and because he’s so easy to get Upgraded/Equipped. There is only one of him so it’s not like you’re “wasting the power” like you would if you only lose 1 Drone. However, if you lose your Assault Bot, I’d say the battle is going downhill or you were careless. He really doesn’t get killed that often so his death might mean you’re in over your head.

Be sure to Bubble your Assault Bot first and Upgrade/Equip him first when you enter a mission. He can easily defend you while you set up your other Bots if there is an ambush at the door. He also gets the most benefit out of Upgrades and Equip because his damage output is so much higher with them (versus the meager gains on a Drone and moderate gains on the Protectors).

As for slotting, I say go with 2 Accuracy and 3 Damage, if you don’t have Tactics and 1 Acc and 3 Damage if you do. His Smash attack has a chance to Disorient, but not worth slotting for. One Accuracy SO might be enough for you if you don’t see yourself fighting above +2s. +3s and higher will require some added Accuracy if you want to be “capped” at the 95% To Hit ceiling. The second Accuracy SO ensures that your Assault Bot will hit almost always and also has Accuracy to spare if he gets Debuffed. Missing really sucks with some of his big attacks so I’d rather be safe than sorry.

One final note is that the “Plasma” attacks (the single and double beams) have a 50% -regen component on them that lasts for 30 seconds. So, against targets with considerable regeneration, your Assault Bot will be very helpful (think AVs).

Overall: 5-star power. I’d give it a 6th star if I could because this guy will totally change the game for you. Your damage output will finally start rivaling other ATs and you’ll be safer because you have the Big Guy taking hits for you and dishing out as well. He’s a monster when fully Upgraded.

Upgrade Robot Level 32

Recharge: 10 (2 Second Activation time, 12 Total)
End Cost: 22.8
Battle Drones: Full Auto Laser
Protector Bots: Photon Grenade, Seeker Drones
Assault Bot: Swarm Missiles, Incendiary Missiles

I know how I was when I was approaching 32. I was running Relentless missions with my 6 robot chums without any problem and couldn’t conceive of how much the level 32 Upgrade would really affect me. I mean, I was doing just fine, right?

Getting the level 32 Upgrade was cooler for me than getting my Assault Bot, after I saw it in action. It’s that awesome. You go from taking out single-targets pretty easily (with just Equip) to taking out a 5-6 guys simultaneously in a matter of seconds. The fireworks are amazing and all of a sudden mobs are getting disorients, things are blowing up, orange numbers are flying everywhere and when the dust settles, you see all your little Robot friends with their now-glowing eyes asking for seconds. After you get Upgrade, it’s no longer “Can I beat this guy?” it is “How many guys can I kill at once?” Just remember that when you get to your 20’s and wonder if Robotics is right for you. It gets better, my friend, just stick it out.

Upgrade is on a 10 second timer, which puts it slightly behind Equip but not by much. A single Recharge Reduction will bring the total time (including activation time) to 9.5 seconds, which is only a mere second behind default Equip recharge. What this allows you to do is Equip/Upgrade right down the line of your Bots without having to wait for the Upgrade power to catch up. I highly recommend this. In addition, 2 Endurance Reductions are incredibly helpful for the initial summon/buff cycle since you’ll save 9 endurance per Upgrade, or 54 Endurance for all 6 Bots. If you wish to get all your Bots fully buffed as quick as possible, I suggest slotting 1 Recharge, 2 End Redux so that not only is hassle free, but so your Endurance can sustain it.

Overall: 5-star power. Again, this deserves 6-stars because of how much it will change your gameplay. You’ll love your Bots when you get this and the AoE damage is incredibly welcome by this point in the game. Stick it out until 32 before giving up on your Bots because I assure you, they will not disappoint.

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D3 Bible I6/ED
Bots /FF Guide

Force Fields

So why pick Force Fields when there are other cool sets like Dark Miasma or Traps? You tell me! You picked it! No, Force Field has some cool possibilities with Robotics and they synergize well both aesthetically and for concept reasons. I figure if you can build super-advanced robots, making a force field is just another display of your genius.

Force Fields in the Mastermind line are unfortunately the weakest Bubbles out there. They are 60% of a Defender’s Defense and 75% of a Controller’s. However, no other CoV Archetype possesses Force Fields, so you are somewhat unique. Your Bubbles, by themselves, will keep your Bots alive longer than un-Bubbled but that’s not to say that they will flat-out keep them alive. Even maxed, your Bubbles alone won’t drop an even minion to the 5% ToHit basement. However, in your travels you will notice that Bubbling your Bots has a profound effect so do it as often as possible or at least before bosses or other tricky enemies.

Force Fielders (Bubblers) will also have to get used to applying and re-applying Bubbles. It’s tedious, boring, and drains your Endurance but that is what your Secondary does. Also, Teammates come before your Henchmen when it comes to Bubbling Priority. Teammates will get debt, get angry, and get frustrated if they die. This does not hold true for your Henchmen. Be a team player and things will go much more smoothly. If there is such a thing as a Bubbling Hierarchy, I would say it would go something like this:

1.) Brutes. They are going to be in the thick of it more often than any other AT and will have more attacks thrown at them. Your Bubbles deflecting anywhere from 12-30% of that (depending if you slotted your Bubbles and if they’re in Dispersion range) will help, even if that Defense doesn’t seem like much. On top of their Secondaries, Brutes will be able to last longer against the same number of foes and take less damage.

2.) Stalkers. They, too, are a Melee class and will have heavier attacks thrown at them. Be sure to Bubble them up after the Brutes. They have the misfortune of not coming close to Brute HP so they might actually *need* the Bubbles more than Brutes but they’re also more equipped at escaping hairy situations versus Brutes.

3.) Squishies (Corruptors, Dominators, other MMs) Again, the Squishies might *need* the Bubbles more than the Brutes or Stalkers (because they have no Defensive Secondary) but they are also going to be taking less damage because they’re not the ones aggro-ing everybody. Corruptors generally can heal themselves so they can handle themselves a bit better. Dominators can Mez any enemies that are causing them trouble and other MMs have their Henches and Secondary to bail them out. So it’s a toss up at who needs them the most but that’s up to you to decide.

4.) Assault Bot. He’ll be taking most of the damage for your “team” and needs the Bubbles to stay alive. You might be able to get away with Bubbling your Assault before the Squishies but if you do, hide it well

5.) Protectors. You’ll want to keep these alive for the Heals, Bubbles and Damage so they’re next on the list.

6.) Battle Drones. In the team setting, they’re expendable and while Bubbling them will help them live longer, the hassle is probably not worth the survivability.

7.) Other MM Henchmen. I rarely Bubble other Henchmen and if I do, it’s only the Tier 3s. It’s too hard to even attempt to Bubble more than 7-8 people (endurance plummets) so other Henchmen are generally not considered.

After “The Big 3” Bubbles (Deflection, Insulation, Dispersion), what you get in the FF Secondary is up to you. There are a lot of Knockback powers out there as well as a couple utility powers. The Last 3 Powers are love or hate and I personally “hate” all but one of them. However, do test them out for yourself and see if you like them.

Force Bolt Level 1

Accuracy: 90
Recharge: 4
End Cost: 6.5
Range: 80
*Knockback*

You have to take Force Bolt and that is a very good thing. Some people would skip out on this power and miss how much of a life saver it is. Force Bolt does no appreciable damage but it does have a 100% chance to Knockback in addition to an inherent Accuracy bonus. Basically, you can throw enemies around with it and because of ragdoll physics, they don’t get up very fast. With just an Accuracy in it, you can consistently hit +3s and keep Purple Bosses on their butts while your Bots cream them. Force Bolt does have less range than your Bots so just like the Pulse Rifle attacks, you’ll be in front of them should you wish to Force Bolt from max range. Also note that your Bots have a myriad of Knocback powers and will do a lot of Knockback for you. When this happens, there is a window of time where an enemy can’t be knock backed any further. So you may waste a Force Bolt here and there. You’ll use this power liberally throughout your career and I have yet to slot it but it could use the slots. An Accuracy is mandatory because you’ll want to hit with it every time. A couple optional Enhancements would be Range, so you can fire from behind your Bots, and Recharge, to make sure that Force Bolt is on its way by the time the enemy gets up. Be wary of the enemies that are Knockback resistant: Circle of Thorns Nerva Spectral Daemon Lords comes to mind, because that is your primary tool to control them.

Overall: 5-star power. Yep, your first power is a 5-star. It might not do damage but it will save you or your Bots a lot of headache by pinning down a tough enemy or knocking them away from melee range. However, understand that Knockback isn’t among the most team-friendly powers.

Deflection Shield Level 2
Recharge: 2
End Cost: 9.8
Duration: 240 (4 minutes)
Defense: 11.25% to Smash/Lethal, 11.25% to Melee (Positional), 30% Toxic Resistance

Deflection Shield is the first Bubble you’ll want to get because it protects against the most common damage types in the game: Smash and Lethal. Smashing damage usually comes in the form of Melee attacks (and can hit quite hard) while Lethal damage usually comes at you from bullets, swords or other sharp objects from range. The Positional defense you get from Deflection is actually better because it gives 11.25% Defense against All Melee attacks, meaning that it doesn’t have to be Smash/Lethal but could be Energy, Fire, etc. and you’ll still be protected because of this Positional Defense.

Bubbling is something you’ll get used to but be warned: because of the quick recharge of the power, you can drain yourself quite quickly if you Bubble non-stop for awhile. Also, as mentioned above, have a mindset of who needs Bubbling first so that your Bubbles get maximum use.

Slotting Deflection Shield is a no-brainer: 3 Defense Buffs and an Endurance Reducer. With 3 Defense Buffs, you’ll get 18% Defense. After going 34 levels without an Endurance Reducer in Deflection/Insulation, I highly recommend you slot for Endurance Redux before Defense. Being able to Bubble your whole team (or all your Bots) without dropping toggles is the way to go. I’d also recommend slotting Deflection/Insulation early while enhancements have little effect on overall gameplay. Training Enhancements do very little so slotting up Bubbles should come early so that you don’t have to later (when more tempting powers come up). Just get the slotting out of the way early and you’ll thank me later.

Overall: 5-star power. It’s one of the Big 3 and you’ll use it a lot. The Defense it provides isn’t stellar but it’s better than nothing. Slot it early and use it often to help curb the incoming damage.

Insulation Shield Level 4

Recharge: 2
End Cost: 9.8
Duration: 240 (4 minutes)
Defense: 11.25% to Fire/Cold/Energy/Negative, 11.25% Range (Positional)

Just like Deflection, Insulation protects against specific types of damage in addition to Positional damage. Between those two Bubbles, you’ve protected your team against everything but Psionic damage.

Bubbling an individual with Deflection/Insulation drains you quickly, so like Deflection, put an Endurance Reducer in it ASAP. Also, just like Deflection, slotting it is easy: 3 Defense Buffs and the aforementioned Endurance Redux and you’ll have 18% Defense to the types listed.

Overall: 5-star power. The 2nd of the Big 3 and worth getting early and slotting early because there’s little to take at level 4 anyway. You could push this one back a little later since the damage types it protects against are a little less common but I say get early and get it out of the way.

Detention Field Level 10

Accuracy: 90
Recharge: 60
Duration: 30
End Cost: 13
*Phase*

Detention Field is also in the love/hate relationship (I know it’s getting old but it’s the best way to put it) because it’s great solo and in small teams but a lot of teammates hate it in large group settings.

What Detention Field does is takes an enemy completely out of the picture, much like Phase Shift. The enemy cannot affect you nor can you or your team affect it. They just float there (or run around if they have Immobilization protection) until the duration runs out. This can be really useful against a target that you want to handle later (like a Boss) while mopping up another mob. It also can be used on really tough guys like Heroes, AVs, and Monsters.

I found it to be useful, when I had it, but I think the Duration is almost too long. Also you have to tell your teammates not to waste endurance attacking the Bubbled enemy. If you like it, I’d slot for Accuracy (1) and a couple Recharges.

Overall: 3-star power. It can be useful at times and can save you if things go down the tubes. However, because teammates dislike it and sometimes you have to wait around for it to wear off, it can slow you down. It’s a toss up so try it sometime and see if you like it.

Personal Force Field

Recharge: 120
End Cost: 0.2 End/sec (Toggle)
Activation Time: 2
Defense: 67.5% to All Damage Types and Positions
Resists: 32% to All, Teleport resistance (100%)
*Unable to Affect Others or control Henchmen*

Personal Force Field is actually one of the gems of the set because you can “hide” behind it while your Bots keep attacking. This comes at a cost, however. While under PFF, Supremacy and any other Buffing Toggles (Leadership, Dispersion Bubble, etc.) don’t affect outside allies (team or Henchmen). However, they still cost endurance and will continue to drain you, because technically, they’re still affecting you. What this means is that your Bots will be less effective while you are under PFF. Since you cannot control your Bots while in PFF, it’s best to leave them on Aggressive so that they acquire new targets automatically. They will still follow you, but you will not be able to give them any orders.

PFF’s Defense is so high that you probably won’t get hit from even +6s and 7s. I’ve been able to stand in the middle of level 40s (while I was level 34) without getting touched. So, while you’re in PFF, you’re virtually untouchable.

This leads to a couple of interesting strategies. First, it’s the Panic Button. Crap hits the fan and the team starts to wipe, your Bots start dying and you’re next so you hit PFF and walk out of the situation nearly unscathed. You can heal yourself while under PFF so if you have Aid Self, you can use it to regain HP while remaining unharmed. Second, it’s great to absorb the Alpha Strike of a large group. Since only 1 out of 20 attacks will hit you, you could walk up to a mob of 15 and let them all fire and you have a good chance of not getting hit at all. Even the melee classes can’t do that without a Tier 9 type power. You can also survive the big hits from AVs or Giant Monsters because they’ll rarely hit you either. However, you won’t exactly keep their attention if you wander off because while your presence makes them attack you, it doesn’t generate enough aggro for them to follow.

I find that I don’t need to slot PFF because like I said, even +6s don’t touch me. In PvP you would want to slot for Defense and if you want it to come up faster (120 seconds is a long time) slot for Recharge. I personally have it slotted for 1 Recharge so it comes back a little faster.

Overall: 4-star power. Once you get it, dying should be a thing of the past. You can raise PFF and walk out when the rest of your team wipes. Just realize that your Buffs are helping no one but yourself and you can’t control your Henchmen.

Dispersion Bubble Level 20

Recharge: 15
End Cost: 0.3 End/sec
Range: 25 Feet
Defense: 7.5% to All, 7.5% to AoE (Positional)
*Hold/Disorient/Immobilize Protection*

Dispersion Bubble is the last of the “Big 3” Bubbles of Defense and is the cornerstone of the Force Field set. When you activate this power, a big ‘ole Bubble goes out 25 feet in every direction (and about 15 feet above/below you) and everyone inside it gets the Buffs it provides. The Defense is quite low but because it is Defense to All, it always helps. The main reason to have it, however, is for the Mez protection that, generally, Squishies don’t have. It’s not Brute resistance, Mag 5 or so, but it will save you from the stray Hold or Immobilize that will get cast on you or your Henchmen/Team. Keeping everyone in the Bubble is hard considering the size and breadth of many maps and while the Bubble seems large from the outside, it’s actually pretty small when you try to get all your team in it.

It is a bit of an Endurance hog and slotting for Endurance Reduction is prudent. If you’re trying to keep Stamina out of your build, two slot for Endurance because this is going to be running everywhere you go. At 0.3 End/sec, it’s not a monster but with Endurance SOs in it, it can be dropped to a very manageable 0.18 or so. See Appendix B for Toggle numbers.

Three Defense SOs are also mandatory, even if you only get 1.5% more Defense per SO. Dispersion will be running almost all the time so you might as well squeeze out as much Defense as you can. Fully slotted with Defense SOs, you get 12% Defense to All. Add to this the Deflection/Insulation, and you can walk away with 30% Defense to All. On top of that, your Protectors may be able to add another 15% with their Bubbles for a grand total of 45% Defense to all. That’s really quite good in the I7 world.

Overall: 5-star power. You’ll want this ASAP as it gives Mez protection and the Defense to All doesn’t hurt. Once slotted, it’s easy on the Endurance and you’ll see a lot of benefit as long as you keep your allies within it.

Repulsion Field Level 28

Recharge: 20
Range: 7 (just outside of Melee)
Cost: .5 End/sec + 1.25 Additional Endurance per Foe in range
*Knockback*

Repulsion Field sounds really good on paper: it keeps high damage Melee targets from getting to you by throwing them back violently if they enter the field. I’ve experimented with this power and tried to get a feel for it but never could because the range on it is so small. I had to be practically on top of enemies for it to knock them back. It also is a Endurance hog. Stamina pretty much is required if you want to permanently run Repulsion Field and that’s unfortunate.

The cost of the power aside, it still doesn’t appeal to me because I can throw most enemies away with Force Bolt or my Bots will do it for me with their combination of Knockback powers. The enemies that I can’t knockback, because of KB resistance, aren’t even affected by Repulsion Field, so it doesn’t help me at all.

Now, in PvP, Repulsion Field has a chance to stop an Invisible Stalker from cleaning your clock but it doesn’t always work and like I said, the enemies have to be in Melee range for the power to work anyway. If it had greater range, it’d be more worthwhile.

I will say it does look pretty cool, especially the activation animation. After that you just pulse, which is also cool in its own right. I believe Repulsion Field has a small chance to De-Toggle as well, which is another reason to get it for PvP.

If you get it, I’d slot it with Endurance Reducers and maybe a Recharge because it has a 20 second down time. I’d use it to pin enemies against a wall and knock them up in a corner, unable to retaliate. This tactic might not be so great with multiple foes because it drains you for every foe repelled (although the endurance/foe has been reduced).

Overall: 2-star power. Some people may like the extra cushion it gives them but Force Bubble, at 38, does all that and more. PvP players may want it for the de-toggle and the Knockback against melee. Experiment with it and make your own judgments.

Repulsion Bomb Level 35

Accuracy: 90
Recharge: 30 Seconds
Range: 70
End Cost: 13
*Knockback*
*Disorient*

Repulsion bomb was changed from a “Targeted Ally” to any enemy and I have yet to play with the new version. The Recharge was also increased to 30 seconds, from 10 seconds, and the chance to Disorient was reduced to 40%. It also has the ability to De-Toggle in PvP, which remained unchanged (though it doesn’t have a great chance).

The new Repulsion Bomb can be used Solo, but for a MM, it could already be used Solo by targeting a Henchmen. The change makes it less powerful but it still has some use. Think of it as a AoE Force Bolt, except on a 30 second timer. It will launch enemies away from you (not where the bomb hits) and has a (40%) chance to Disorient.

The major downfall of the power is its activation time. Yeah, it looks cool to lob the giant ball of force but if you’re trying to get attackers off an ally, it takes too long to really help. Also, the new Recharge really kills it because it’s so situational now. 3 Recharges will bring it down to roughly 15 seconds but you used to be able to fire it off almost as fast as Force Bolt (especially back in the Perma-Hasten days).

If you want to use it, slot an Accuracy and 3 Recharge in it so that it is up as often as possible and so you can reliably hit with it. It has an Accuracy bonus already so the one SO should be enough.

Overall: 2-star power. Before the change, it would have gotten 3 stars because as a MM, you could control where it went, had a good chance to Disorient, and came up quickly. Now, it’s more situational and more of a PvP thing. As always, try it out for yourself to see if you want to use it.

Force Bubble Level 38

Recharge: 15
End Cost: 0.2 End/Sec
Range: 50 feet
*Repel*
*Knockdown*

This is the last Force Field power you get and it’s a biggie. As in, it’s huge! Force Bubble is twice the size of Dispersion and is really easy to spot. Its size can be its undoing, but we’ll get to that in a bit. What it does is pushes (but not violently) enemies out toward the rim of the Bubble, keeping them from Melee range. This helps immensely against foes with hard hitting close-range attacks that would tear your Tier 1s (or you) apart. Since it pushes them out to around 50 feet, they’re prime targets for your Bots’ attacks and they can attack without fear of getting smashed in the face. The Repel effect is strongest right next to you and weaker toward the edges so a few enemies might get a few feet in before being pushed out. Knockback resistant enemies will walk right through it, however, as will tough enemies like AVs and Monsters. Force Bubble has a small chance to knockdown foes in its field but it isn’t often enough to depend on.

The problem with this power is actually the size of the field. Foes inside the Force Bubble will aggro to you and if you move around carelessly, you might aggro a group of mobs that you didn’t even see. Because of this extra attention, you might find yourself taking way too many hits because of Force Bubble and decide to drop it.

There are some interesting strategies concerning this Big Bubble and most of them revolve around pushing a bunch of enemies against a wall and clumping them up so your Bots’ AoE attacks can rip them apart.

Because the power isn’t draining and takes virtually no enhancements, all it needs is an Endurance Reduction in the default slot.

Overall: 4-star power. It can be really useful or very dangerous depending on how you use it but Force Bubble can save your Henchmen and teammates from the really damaging Melee attacks that a lot of foes have. If you can get used to its size, I think you’ll be alright.

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D3 Bible I6/ED
Bots /FF Guide

Power Pools

I wouldn’t say that there are any mandatory pools for Bots/FF but I can highly suggest a few. Certain others don’t make much sense for a MM, while others come down to personal preference. Travel Powers are always at your discretion and some people swear by some and curse others but I’ll remain as objective as possible.

Medicine

Aid Other: Probably the single best Power Pool pick you take as a Bots/FF, this short range, interruptible, power heals an ally (teammate or Henchmen) for 20% of your life and has a recharges every 10 seconds. There are a couple drawbacks to Aid Other that should be mentioned briefly. The first is that you can’t use it on the move or if you’re under any kind of status effect or Debuff as these will interrupt the power (but still take your Endurance). The second is that is has fairly short range and a long-ish animation that keeps you from performing other actions. It doesn’t cost much (6.5) so you can spam it and I highly suggest slotting this up with as many heals as you can. 3-slotted for Heal, you can net almost another 20% for a grand total of 40% of your life imparted to an ally. Aid Other, when fully slotted for Heals, will typically heal a Tier 1 about 90%, a Tier 2 about 75% and a Tier 3 about 55%. Since you can also slot for Recharge (which I also highly recommend), you could also bring its recharge down to about 5 Seconds with 3, but I only recommend 2. The difference between 2 Recharge SOs and 3 is less then a second and if you have green SOs, the difference is even less. I say stick with 2 Recharges because the slot could be used elsewhere. If you feel that you’re not able to get the heal off mid-battle, slot an Interrupt Reduction in there too.

Stimulant: Since the Bots you travel with already have Fear/Disorient/Sleep protection and your Dispersion Bubble protects against Holds/Disorients/Immobilization, you’ve pretty much covered all the bases and this power is superfluous. It’s not a bad power to take if you want to help out teammates but since I so highly suggest Aid Other, this shouldn’t be the first power you take out of the Medicine line, nor the second. If you want to pick it up, be my guest, as it will help your teammates but like I said, you’re already providing some Mez protection in Dispersion.

Aid Self: This is another gem in the Medicine line because as a /FF you have no way of healing yourself. Granted, this is a second-rate heal (compared to the Secondary Heals of the other sets) that can’t be used on the move nor if you’re being damaged, debuffed, or under some kind of status effect. However, it can be used while under Personal Force Field, which allows you to fire off this heal without worrying too much about what’s going on around you. It heals for 20% of your life, like Aid Other, but has twice the recharge (20 seconds) so it would be prudent to slot for Recharge and Heals so that you get the most bang for your buck and have it up reasonably often. Again, you could heal for about 40% of your life in a single application and with 1 Recharge, it would be up every 15, 2 Recharges it would be up every 12 seconds, 3 Recharges would be every 10. It’s up to you to decide how often you think you’ll need to heal yourself. I stuck with 2 and have found that to be adequate. Slot an Interrupt Reduction or two in this one, too, if you seem to be interrupted too much.

Resuscitate: Raising fallen allies is always a plus but I could never find room for this power. It doesn’t let you revive Henchmen but being a team-player never hurts. Inevitably, people will die on Strike Forces or 8-man teams and it sucks for no one to have a Rez ability. While Resuscitate isn’t a terribly great Rez (on par with an Awaken), it does get the job done so take it if you have room in your build and plan to team a lot. Solo, the power is useless.

Flight

Hover: A prerequisite to Fly, Hover lets you well, hover for low cost and adds a tiny amount of Defense. It’s slow, brutally slow if you get it at 6, but it lets you get out of Melee range and control your Bots from a better vantage point. I’m not a fan of Hover for Bots/FF because how fluid many battles are and if you’re too slow, you won’t be able to keep your Henchmen or Team in Dispersion Bubble. The only way around this is to slot Hover with 3 Fly Enhancements (which will allow you to move at around normal running speed) or not take it at all and save the slots. I’ve seen a lot of effective MMs flying around the battlefield with slotted Hover so I’m not knocking it but I, personally, wouldn’t invest 3 slots to be able to move vertically in battle.

Air Superiority: Another prerequisite to Fly, Air Superiority is arguably the best Pool Power melee attack. It has a Brawl Index of 2.778 (same as your first Pulse Rifle attack), has a 4 second recharge, has a –Fly effect and has a 90% chance to Knockdown an enemy. I took this instead of Hover so I could have another power that can keep an enemy from an attacking (the first power being Force Bolt). Knockback and Knockdown are two separate classes of status effect and unlike multiple Knockbacks not registering (if they’re too close together, extra Knockbacks have no effect), Knockdown followed by Knockback keeps the enemy down longer. I can also cycle between AS and Force Bolt readily because they have the same recharge and this keeps just about a single target down indefinitely. It’s obviously useful against Fliers that are annoying you but since your Bots are ranged, it’s usually not a huge a problem. Now some of you may ask the rationale of the squishiest AT running up into Melee range to use AS. Good question! I don’t! I only use AS if the enemies run to me and I can’t keep them all off with Force Bolt alone. It allows me to throw one guy away with FB and then knock another down next to me with AS. I then switch to FB on the guy next to me to get him out of melee range. It works quite well. I don’t use AS all the time but when I do, I usually needed it.

Fly: It’s the slowest Travel Power by far but boy does it make the Rogue Isles a lot easier to traverse. I tried Super Jump for 26 levels and while it was markedly faster, it’s annoying to hold the Space Bar down all the time. I finally gave up and took Fly and decided to slot it up to make it competitive. Trying to avoid Stamina, I added 2 Endurance Reductions (I might add a third later) and to keep it at a decent speed, I also slotted 3 Fly Enhancements. “5 Slots to make a travel power worthwhile?” you ask while scratching your head. Yes, it took 5 to make it worthwhile while Super Jump only required the default slot but again, this is a quality of life issue and you’d be surprised how far some people go to make the game less irritating. Fly slotted this way is quite manageable, both endurance-wise and speed-wise. Originally costing 2.03 End/Sec, two Endurance SOs drop it to 1.2 End/Sec, enough to allow you to run Personal Force Field while Flying. This is by far the safest way to Travel, barring some kind of Phase Shift power. How fast is it, you ask? It’s slightly faster than unslotted Super Jump, but noticeably slower than a single-slotted Super Jump (about 15 feet/sec slower, or 10 mph). It’s still the slowest, but it’s not moving at a snail’s pace.

Group Fly: One little perk about being a Robotics MM is that if you use Group Fly, your Bots turn on their leg boosters. It looks cool and makes you feel pretty good about yourself. But the problem is that Group Fly is more of a hindrance than a help in most situations. For starters, your Bots will not keep up with you, even if you don’t slot Group Fly with Fly enhancers. Seconds, it costs the same as Fly but is only about half the speed of Fly (which is slow to begin with). Also, flying allies get a -20% Accuracy added on to them so attacking while airborne penalizes you. To put it realistically, Group Fly would just about negate the Accuracy bonus from Supremacy and Tactics combined. It is nice to be able to take your Bots with you over troublesome areas, like Orenbega maps or over a large area of a zone, but because of its cost and slow speed (not to mention Bots dropping from the air if they get too far), I can’t recommend getting this power unless you simply want to look cool.

Leaping

Jump Kick: Melee Pool Power attacks bad for Mastermind. You no take. Seriously, I had a justifiable argument with Air Superiority being a control power but Jump Kick has no such excuse. They simply don’t do enough damage to warrant the risk you put yourself in when entering melee.

Combat Jumping: This is always an excellent prerequisite to Super Jump because you can bounce around in combat and also receive Immobilization protection. The tiny Defense it gives also helps but that shouldn’t be the reason you take it. Take it for the mobility it provides you and because of its insanely low cost (.08 end/sec). This will allow you to control yourself in the air quite well so you can position yourself better. CJ also works great with Hurdle from the Fitness line as a pseudo-travel power. I wouldn’t slot for anything besides a Jump Enhancement because the Defense is so tiny that it’s not worth slotting.

Super Jump: The Rogue Isles need a better urban planner because it’s impossible to get anywhere on foot. City of Villains has a lot of vertical landscapes and without any kind of vertical movement, you’ll find yourself running way out of the way to get where you want to go. Super Jump alleviates both the vertical and speed problem most people have and is arguably the best travel power out there. Almost as fast as Super Speed with a nice vertical component, Super Jump will let you travel the Rogue Isle’s in quick order and for very little endurance. However, like mentioned earlier, there are a few drawbacks. Holding the Space Bar down really makes it hard to type and you can’t just hit “R” and go. Timing jumps becomes second nature eventually but until then you might find yourself falling down alleyways or not hit the bridge you wanted to hit. Also, while you can jump pretty high, it might not be high enough for some obstacles. The wall in Cap Au Diable is one such obstacle that a single Super Jump can’t get over. Super Jump is also the one travel power that is really difficult to use in missions because you’ll bang your head on the ceiling trying to get up to speed. You have also have to jump about every half a second to keep it low enough. Despite its shortcomings, though, Super Jump is an excellent travel power even with only a Jump enhancer in the default slot.

Acrobatics: Any kind of Mez protection is usually a good idea for a Squishie but since you already have Dispersion, it’s not as necessary. Acrobatics does provide knockback/down protection which is also a plus but if you’re trying hold off Stamina, an extra toggle doesn’t help. You can decide whether or not you need the extra protection by how much you get thrown around. If it’s little to none, don’t worry about Acrobatics but if you do, think about investing an Endurance reducer into it.

Speed

Flurry: Looks cool but don’t get it. Melee attacks are no-no’s.

Hasten: Hasten is a great power, just not for Bots/FF. The only thing that could really use the extra speed are the Henchmen summons themselves because Bubbling, and Toggles come up pretty quick as is. I guess you could Equip/Upgrade a bit faster but that’s even more endurance intensive. I just don’t see too much use for Hasten.

Super Speed: Speed freaks everywhere have been taking Super Speed so that they can get from point A to point B as fast as possible but in the Rogue Isles, Point B might be 200 feet off the ground compared to A. Super Speed lost a lot of its luster after surveying the Rogue Isles but it still can be used effectively. You just simply have to know the routes of level ground are. Grabbing a Jump boosting power, like Combat Jumping and/or Hurdle helps a lot while some people, like myself, had Fly or Super Jump already and added Super Speed into the mix. Super Speed + Super Jump is excellent, traveling insanely fast and with all of Super Jump’s perks. Super Speed also has a Stealth effect to it so you will draw less attention that a Super Jumper passing through the area. It’s also cheap and caps its speed with just two SOs.

Whirlwind: Surprisingly, Whirlwind is quite similar to Repulsion Field in that it causes Knockback to everyone around it, however, it has twice the range and less Endurance cost! However, since I’ve never actually used Whirlwind, I can’t compare the two directly. I don’t believe Whirlwind had the de-toggle effect. If you have Hasten and Super Speed already, Whirlwind might be a way to get foes off of you, a la Repulsion Field but I couldn’t tell you if that’s viable or not.

Fitness:

Swift: Increases your running speed without having to turn on Sprint, Swift is actually a boon because you’ll be running at the same speed as your Bots and those pesky Hostages. You won’t outdistance them, like you would with Sprint, and you won’t be running a toggle. Also, the ability to run around faster in battle is quite good, especially if you’re trying to use an Aid Other on a Bot or teammate. This won’t make or break your game but it’s a nice passive boost on the way to Stamina.

Hurdle: Most people say that Hurdle is the better of the two Fitness level 6 Powers because it gives so much increased speed when you jump (literally, double normal running speed). As long as you don’t mind jumping everywhere, those people are right. It also gives an additional 6 feet to your Jump (Combat Jumping adds 8). Slotting Hurdle and taking Combat Jumping gives a remarkably fast pseudo-travel power. If you put 1 Jump Enhancer in CJ, Hurdle, and Sprint, you can travel as fast as 2-slotted Fly! If you want to boost that Speed, slot Hurdle with 3 Jump Enhancers and you’ll be clipping along faster than 3-slotted Fly. For max, non-travel power speed, 3 slot Hurdle and Sprint with Jumps and you’ll be jumping as fast as Super Jump with a Jump Enhancer in the Default slot. You’ll have used 4 slots but saved a power. I wouldn’t recommend that approach but it’s a way around getting a Travel Power at 14. You definitely don’t jump as high as Super Jump but you’ll still be jumping 30-40 feet in the air.

Health: Not the most exciting power out there, Health gives +40% Regen. What this does for you is reduces the time it takes to go from 0 health to Full by about 90 seconds. It won’t save you mid-battle but it will help you recover from battles faster. Some have thought about slotting Health up but it doesn’t give enough of a bonus (especially for a MMs incredibly low HP) to be worth it. Stick with the default slot and put a Heal in it.
It also gives Sleep resistance, that is, if you’re slept you’ll come out of it faster but it doesn’t protect against sleep, meaning if you’re hit with a Sleep it will absorb it and you won’t feel the effects. Since Dispersion Bubble does not have Sleep protection, Health will get you back from the ZZZ faster.

Stamina: The debate rages on whether or not MMs need Stamina and so far in my playing experience I have not needed it. I can run Dispersion, Assault, and Tactics and Bubble my entire team or Henchmen without dropping Toggles. I have slotted my Toggles for Endurance Reduction heavily and found that I don’t need Stamina but that doesn’t mean I don’t want it. If you want to run Repulsion, Dispersion, Leadership, and Force Bubble, I’d say get Stamina because there is no way you can do all of that with Base recovery, even if they’re all slotted with 3 Endurance reductions, and still be able to use powers like Aid Other or Force Bolt (woe to you if you have to re-summon!). The great problem with Stamina is that it takes 3 powers to get and for a MM, that can be hard considering that you *can* play without it. Many of the ATs practically need Stamina but we are not one of them.

However, Stamina makes Summoning/Upgrading less of hassle and allows you to take some of the Patron Pool Powers without worrying about your endurance situation. I took Stamina at 35 knowing I wanted a Patron Shield. Also, it’ll help against all the Endurance Draining enemies in the 40+ world by regaining lost Endurance faster. It’s still your call, however.

Teleport

Recall Friend: Always a handy power, you can TP a teammate or a Henchman to you from just about anywhere. This speeds missions along and it helps when your Henchmen get stuck going up/down elevators or whatnot.

Teleport Foe: Also handy because you can teleport a foe directly into the hellfire that your bots will unleash on them. Of course, it will aggro all the mobs you just teleported the deceased fellow from but at least you know they’re coming.

Teleport: Like Fly, this is a power you’ll have to slot up if you want to be effective. While it’s still the fastest travel power out of the box (and bar none), it requires the most finesse…and computing power. Teleport can kill the framerate of older computers as they try to load all the geometry all at once, instead of while in transit. Lag can be bad but if your cpu is up to snuff, you can really cook with Teleport. 3 endurance Reducers and 3 Range increases allow you to go about 160 mp/h, or about 150% faster than capped Super Speed. Everyone will be in your dust as you travel 470 feet per jump (235 feet/second). This is incredibly endurance intensive if you don’t slot for Endurance or have Stamina and it requires all your attention. A bind is also virtually necessary. When I have used Teleport I bound it to my left Shift key (some use left Alt but Shift is easier to reach for me). Just type /bind lshift “powexec_name Teleport” and there ya go. Unfortunately, you can’t target the air and go X amount of feet, you always go max distance but once you get used to it, you’ll be fine.

Group Teleport: This one can be useful because of all the Henchmen you bring with you. You could TP out of a hairy situation (as long as you’re not hit, it is interruptible) or TP into a hairy situation, should you so desire. It costs the same as Teleport but it doesn’t have the range. It’s about 2/3s as fast as TP but it can bring others along with you. If you already have Recall Friend and Teleport, it might be worth a shot. Try it out to see if it’s worth anything to your playstyle.

Leadership

Maneuvers: Giving only 2.75% Defense to All, Maneuvers can help with Defense but only by a little. Fully slotted with 3 Defense SOs, you’ll get 4.31%, which in addition to Dispersion Bubble, will net you about 16% total to All. This adds to your own personal protection and everyone else around you. Adding another 4% doesn’t sound like much but on top of Force Field’s already impressive 30% and Protector’s minimum of 7.5%, every Henchman you have could be running around with at least 41% Defense. That’s mighty impressive in the post I7 world. I do suggest getting and slotting this power since, as you approach 50% Defense, the scaling really kicks in.

Assault: Boosting damage is king in this game because the faster you can take down an enemy the less chance they have of turning around and killing you. This is how Brutes and Stalkers survive: killing faster than the enemies can kill them. I promote the same approach because Bots will eventually do a hefty amount of damage and can kill many foes in seconds. Assault adds a respectable 11.25% Damage to everyone around you and while it can’t be slotted for more damage, it doesn’t require more slots to be effective. Just throw an Endurance Reduction (or two) in it and you just added 11% more damage to Supremacy’s 25%. That means that with Assault and Supremacy, you’ve added an SOs worth of damage to all your Henchmen. Assault also adds Placate protection.

Tactics: Generally this is why you get Leadership. Tactics boosts Accuracy to everyone around you while also giving them a Perception bonus (useful in PvP). Masterminds get a 7% out of this, which doesn’t seem like much, but it can be slotted with ToHit Buffs. ToHit Buffs only give 20% per SO (Type B) but you can boost that 7% up to 12%, which adds to your Supremacy Bonus of 10% giving you a grand total of 22% more Accuracy. Your Battle Drones will greatly appreciate it! Teammates also benefit from the Buff and lower level Teammates will be able to hit more often, helpful to everyone because they’re an extra body doing something to the enemy, instead of missing wildly. If you plan to go without Stamina, slot for Endurance Reduction at first and slot ToHit Buffs when you get the chance to (probably in the 30’s).

Vengeance: If it worked on fallen Henchmen, this would be an incredibly useful power but alas, it does not. Vengeance does a lot of things once a teammate dies. It restores a small amount of health, boosts Accuracy and Damage, and also gives a Defense Buff (for MMs, it’s 27.5% to all). It has a 5 minute Recharge, so you won’t fire it off often but should a Teammate fall, it gives a very nice boost. I don’t know the exact +Dmg/+Acc values but I assume they’re decent nor do I know how much health you get back. I’ve never actually seen the power used as either a Hero or Villain, though I have seen it used plenty of times by Nemesis troops. I say anything that needs a death to use is probably not a good idea because, even though deaths will happen, you’re trying to prevent them, not capitalize off them. Woe to the team-player that doesn’t help a teammate so they can use Vengeance!

Concealment

Stealth: Stealth provides, well stealth, and a slight Defense Buff to you and allows you to sneak around much better. It is not Invisibility, however, and you will be seen if you get close enough. Stealth De-Buffs your movement speed so if you have it on, it will slow you down. A power like Swift will offset this, however, if you’re using it mostly on the ground. The Defense it provides is a little strange. If you haven’t been spotted, it gives 2.5% Defense to All but when you are spotted, it cuts that Defense in half. 1.25% Defense really isn’t going to save you so don’t slot this power for Defense but rather Endurance Reduction because it will drain you if used in conjunction with other Toggles. Another thing about Stealth is that it will not suppress Supremacy or other Buffs, unlike Invisibility. You can be Stealthed and suffer no penalty minus the Endurance drain and the movement de-buff.

Grant Invisibility: This is an incredibly handy power if you want to stealth a mission and just get it over with. Grant Invisibility gives Invisibility (meaning most enemies cannot see you, even if you get up in their face) to allies for two minutes in addition to a 3.5% Defense Buff. If you’re planning on taking Invisibility, take this power first so you and your entire team can walk around unseen (seems a bit silly for you to be the only one the enemy can see!). Because this is a Buff, the Invisibility gained from this power will not suppress Supremacy or other Buffs (unlike the power Invisibility).

Invisibility: Invisibility is a toggle that turns you invisible so that you can’t be seen, even at close range. It is a costly toggle and will require Endurance Reductions to be made useful should you want to run other Toggles. It gives a 3.5% Defense Boost while active, but the Defense will be suppressed if you are discovered. Invisibility will also suppress Supremacy (like Personal Force Field) and other Buffs since you cannot attack while Invisible. If you were to run around Invisible with Personal Force Field on, I don’t think there is a safer way of traveling, next to Phase Shift.

Phase Shift: This power turns you completely intangible, unable to affect or be affected by anything in the outside world. You’re completely invulnerable for the duration of the effect, which, while a Toggle, only lasts 30 seconds before automatically turning off. Phase Shift is also on a 3 minute timer, which is excessively long but can be reduced to a minute and a half should you slot it. It also costs quite a bit, if I remember correctly. It’s more of a panic-button than anything but it guarantees that you don’t get hit, unlike PFF which makes it highly unlikely that you’ll get hit. This power is too situational for my tastes.

Fighting

Boxing/Kick: Nope. If you had to choose one, get Boxing for the shorter animation and chance to Disorient.

Tough: A toggle that gives 7.5% Resistance to Smash/Lethal. For a MM, that’s really not enough to warrant two powers and the slots necessary to make Tough easy on your blue bar. You could slot it with 3 Resistance SOs to get around 12% but it’s not worth it.

Weave: Even more useless than Tough (even Maneuvers), Weave only grants 2.5% Defense to All and it only gives it to you. There is no reason to get this power unless you really want to max your (as in your personal) Defense. With 3 Defense SOs, you’d net a grand total of 4% Defense. Ugh.

Presence:

Challenge: Basically it makes an enemy attack you, the Mastermind. Since you’re the squishiest AT out there, I don’t think that’s a good idea.

Provoke: This causes multiple enemies to attack you, the Mastermind. See above. There has been a crazy idea of pulling mobs with this power by Provoking them and then trying to get inside PFF. I don’t think this would work because the attack animations have begun right as the enemies react to you. If the animations have begun, the ToHit calculation has already happened and PFF was not up when that calculation was made. You’d absorb the alpha with whatever Defense you had on before PFF. The second volley would have to go through PFF but you might be dead by then! If you want to live dangerously try it out.

Intimidate: Fears a single enemy. Fear is a good status effect as it causes the enemy to cower and not attack or move, a pseudo-hold if you don’t touch them. Once you attack them, they are able to attack for one cycle then resume the Fear. Intimidate only lasts 7 seconds so you’d have to put a couple Fear Durations in it to make it effective and an Accuracy and a few Recharges are worthwhile as well. However, to get to Intimidate you have to get Challenge or Provoke, which is kind of silly for a MM, not to mention slotting this power, which by no means should be a priority.

Invoke Panic: Having never used it nor ever seen it used, my knowledge of this power is coming from multiple Hero Planners. Basically it causes Fear to everything around you but I don’t know the duration or the Accuracy of the power. It is on a 60 second time so you couldn’t spam it like I’d want to. However, like the previous power, you have to choose two Presence powers before this and none of them are all that appealing. Neither is this one. Stay away from Presence if you can help it.

---

D3 Bible I6/ED
Bots /FF Guide

Tactics, Tips, and Tricks

- Masterminds practically need a good set of binds to function. Use Khaiba’s Numeric Keypad Controls and you’ll love it.

- Use Focus Fire. Until your Bots get AoEs at 32, you’ll want to take out single targets and remove their damage from the equation. Focus all firepower on the Super Star Destroyer…er…single enemies to kill them as fast as possible. Also, as tempting as it may be, until you get AoEs, don’t send Tiers of your Henchmen against multiple targets. Only the Assault Bot will be able to go toe-to-toe with anything of substance alone. 3 Battle Drones could easily all get one-shotted by Melee damage from minions.

- GoTo is your friend. If one of your Bots runs into Melee range, GoTo him back toward you. Even GoTo_All is better than nothing. Use GoTo especially in doorways where your Bots will clump up and keep each other and other teammates from going through. The Numpad Controls makes this incredibly easy.

- Aggressive is not always your best friend. While I do leave my Bots in Aggressive most of the time, there are definitely times when you want to keep a low profile, like during the Respec Trial. Putting them on Passive allows you to hand-pick targets but at the same time Protectors will not Bubble or Heal (so be warned!). Defensive is similar but they will attack anything that attacks them or you and mid-battle, that means they’re pretty much doing the same thing as Aggressive.

- Walls are your best friends. Force Bolt can keep an enemy on their tush for about as long as you can keep a hit streak going and Force Bubble will simply ram them all together against the wall. Repulsion Field will keep them knocked around as well. Use the walls to your advantage.

- Keep on top of your Bot’s health. If you ever have to hesitate to which Bot you want to heal first, simply heal one so that the recharge on Aid Other can come up faster. Waiting two seconds to see which one needs it more meant that you have to wait another 2 seconds for Aid Other to come up. When all else fails, just heal the closest one. Battle Drones will have their health all over the place while the Assault Bot is steadier. If the Assault Bot begins to bite it, he takes priority. His death means a massive loss of firepower and tanking ability. A loss of a Drone does not. However, like I said, if you do lose the Assault he can be re-summoned and re-equipped/upgraded quite quickly so don’t despair.

- Henchmen wipes happen and you don’t have to go down with the ship. Rule number one is this: your life is worth far more than your Bots’. Do not put yourself into excessive danger to bail out even the Assault Bot. It’s not worth it. If the battle starts going downhill and you see that your Bots are getting overwhelmed, make a hasty withdrawal or put up PFF and withdraw. If you can, order your Bots to follow you and run a distance away from the enemy, preferably past their “cut-off point” where they turn around and go back. Then, re-summon what you lost, re-equip and go back at it. You lost no XP, gained no Debt, and have no lasting consequences minus the endurance spent to re-summon and the time lost. Don’t lose your head.

- Bubbling. Fully slotted Bubbled will have an effect on your Bots and will increase their survivability. The only thing stopping you from Bubbling each one and every time the Bubbles run out is your own impatience. Call it what it is. I’m impatient and don’t Bubble my Bots unless I remember to or before a big fight. I seem to get by alright but there are times where they get creamed and I know the Bubbles would have prevented that. The same goes for Bubbling teammates. Do it because that is your role. I know it sucks and is tedious but it helps everyone out for you to take one for the team. If you put Endurance reducers in Insulation/Deflection, you won’t even have to drop your Toggles.

- Levels 18-24 are typically the worst levels in a Bots/FF career. You only have 1 Protector and have 3 Drones, all of which do little damage on their own and have to combine firepower to be decent. The Drones are -2, you don’t have access to SOs yet (nor can you probably afford them), and your Damage is sub par compared to most others on your team. You can’t seem to find a role because you sure as heck can’t tank and you sure as heck can’t out-damage anyone. Just do your best to help your teammates and provide whatever middle-ground assistance you can. At 24, things speed up because of the 2nd Protector and you’re only 2 levels away from the Assault Bot.

- The Respec. I highly suggest having a pre- and post-Respec Build. Finding teammates to Respec with is not difficult, even if it is a Pick-Up-Group. Pre-Respec, pick up the Primary Rifle attacks (at least one) and try to maximize your Defense. Your Damage will never be all that great until 26 so don’t try to compete with other ATs for damage. The Respec itself is difficult but doable. Make sure everyone is the same level because the spawns are +2 higher than the highest player on the team. Big teams cause a higher Vine count so be wary of the 8-man uber team. This may be the hardest part but I’d wait until 26 to Respec. Get your Assault Bot before attempting it otherwise you’ll be a third (or 4th, or 5th…) wheel. There’s nothing you can offer that another AT can’t outperform you in before 26. At least with the Assault Bot you can dish out damage and take some too. At 24, your Two Protectors and 3 Drones are mincemeat. If you maximize your Defense, at least your teammates and Bots are protected as they try to fight the Vines/AV.

Post-respec, get those SOs in your Bots and they’ll start lighting up the enemies. 26-32 is fast and furious if you fully SO your Bots and Bubbles and once you hit 32, you’ll breeze through the next few levels. The 30’s open up a ton of slots for you to use on earlier powers and you might find yourself with slots you don’t know what do with. Be alert, however, enemies start to ramp up in HP as you approach 40 and you won’t be able to melt them like you could when you first hit 32. The 40s-50s will be similar as your overall damage output doesn’t decrease but enemies’ HP increases to the point that you can’t walk all over them anymore.

- A Mastermind’s Role. As a Bots/FF, I’d say your role is to protect the team. I know it sucks but that’s how it is. You have a very Defensive powerset that can boost survivability so use it. Post-32, this changes as you can now melt +2 and 3 Minions faster than just about any other AT. Teaming with a Brute or Stalker makes life really easy because you can blow through the minions while they take out the higher HP targets like Lts. and Bosses. On big teams, your role gets a little hazy because Corruptors can support a team better than you and Brutes/Corruptors can out-damage you but you still have a Defensive powerset at your disposable and significant damage so fill in the gaps of your team.

- Teaming with other Masterminds. I’m a big fan of limiting the number of MMs on my teams to two (including myself) simply because of pathing and lag issues. However, I do love me a good teammate with Robotics. Bots MMs go well together because Protectors will heal any robot in range and when you have 4 Protectors, that’s a lot of healing. Also, the Protectors will Bubble everything in site, meaning Quadruple Bubbles. It’s hard for me to imagine 3 or more Bots/* MMs teaming but the synergy would be amazing.

- More tips and tricks will be forthcoming as I think of them and as other people raise issues. Stay tuned to this thread for more up-to-date info.


Appendix A

The new ToHit calculation works like this:

(Base to Hit + (ToHit Buffs – Enemy Defense)) * Accuracy (1+Enhancement) = ToHit
These are the calculations for the various ways of slotting, in addition to Tactics being thrown in. All were done by hand so excuse me if there is some human error.

Tier 1: (-2)___1 Acc________2 Acc_______3 Acc
+0 – 71______94.43________118_________141
+1 – 65______86.45 (108)___108_________128.7
+2 – 58______77.4 (98)_____96 (123)_____115(147)
+3 – 51_______68 (89)______85 (111)____101(132)
+4 – 44_______58.5 (80)_____73(100)_____87(118)

Tier 2: (-1)___1 Acc________2 Acc_______3 Acc
+0 – 78_______104________129_________154
+1 – 71______94.43_______118_________141
+2 – 65______86.45 (108)__108_________128.7
+3 – 58______77.4 (98)____96 (123)_____115(147)
+4 – 51______68 (89)______85 (111)_____101(132)

Tier 3: (+0)___1 Acc_______2 Acc________3 Acc
+0 – 85_______113________141_________168
+1 – 78_______104________129_________154
+2 – 71______94.43_______118_________141
+3 – 65______86.45 (108)__108_________128.7
+4 – 58______77.4 (98)____96 (123)_____115(147)

My personal opinion is to slot according to +3s because that is the maximum you’ll generally be fighting. Strike Forces will be +2-3 of you and Relentless missions have +3 spots in them.

With that being said, it seems the best slotting (for +3s) would be 3/2/2 for your Tiers if you don’t run Tactics.

If you’re wondering what slotted Tactics would do, the parentheses show what 3-slotted Tactics does. As you can see, it has a profound effect but what it is exciting is that you don’t need 3 Accuracies in your Drones (just two) and you can leave your other two Tiers with 1 each. Saving you 3 slots (that you can place in Tactics! ) that you can place other effects like Disorient, Heal/Defense/ToHit Debuff (Protectors), or Knockback.

Appendix B

Defense Numbers

Deflection: 11.25% (18%), Smash/Lethal, Melee
Insulation: 11.25% (18%), Fire/Cold/Energy/Negative, Range
Dispersion: 7.5% (12%), All, Area of Effect
Force Shield: 7.5% x 2 (12% x 2), All
Maneuvers: 2.75% (4.31%), All
Weave: 2.5% (4%), All
Stealth: 2.5%, All
Invisibility: 3.5%, All
Grant Invisibility: 3.5%, All
Combat Jumping: 2.5%, All
Hover: 2.5%, All

Slotted (3 SOs) Defense is in parentheses. I run Relentless missions using fully slotted Big 3 and Maneuvers. Force Shields on my Protectors are base. Therefore, I run around with about 49% Defense on all my Bots. save the Protectors, which have 43%. I, as the MM, have about 24%. This does not include Patron Powers. If include Black Scorpion’s Shield, I’ll add another 18% S/L Defense and 11.6% Energy Defense for a grand total of 42% S/L, 37% Energy, and 24% for all others. (Minus 7.5% if I don’t have Protectors around)

Here’s my build through 50, respec’d at 35 for Stamina and taking the Mace Mastery Patron Set:

---------------------------------------------
Exported from Ver: 1.7.6.0 of the CoH_CoV Character Builder
---------------------------------------------
Name: Rogue Spark
Level: 50
Archetype: Mastermind
Primary: Robotics
Secondary: Force Field
---------------------------------------------
01) --> Battle Drones==> Acc(1)Acc(3)Dmg(3)Dmg(5)Dmg(5)
01) --> Force Bolt==> Acc(1)Rechg(40)
02) --> Deflection Shield==> DefBuf(2)DefBuf(7)DefBuf(19)EndRdx(33)
04) --> Insulation Shield==> DefBuf(4)DefBuf(7)DefBuf(23)EndRdx(34)
06) --> Equip Robot==> EndRdx(6)EndRdx(31)
08) --> Aid Other==> Rechg(8)Rechg(9)Heal(9)Heal(11)Heal(11)IntRdx(37)
10) --> Air Superiority==> Acc(10)
12) --> Protector Bots==> Acc(12)Acc(13)Dmg(13)Dmg(15)Dmg(15)EndRdx(31)
14) --> Fly==> EndRdx(14)Fly(17)Fly(17)Fly(19)
16) --> Personal Force Field==> Rechg(16)Rechg(40)Rechg(40)DefBuf(43)DefBuf(46)DefBuf(50)
18) --> Aid Self==> Rechg(18)Heal(37)Heal(37)Heal(39)IntRdx(39)IntRdx(39)
20) --> Dispersion Bubble==> EndRdx(20)DefBuf(21)DefBuf(21)DefBuf(23)
22) --> Maneuvers==> EndRdx(22)DefBuf(34)DefBuf(34)DefBuf(36)
24) --> Tactics==> EndRdx(24)TH_Buf(25)TH_Buf(25)TH_Buf(31)
26) --> Assault Bot==> Acc(26)Acc(27)Dmg(27)Dmg(29)Dmg(29)
28) --> Swift==> Run(28)
30) --> Health==> Heal(30)Heal(43)Heal(43)
32) --> Upgrade Robot==> EndRdx(32)EndRdx(33)Rechg(33)
35) --> Stamina==> EndMod(35)EndMod(36)EndMod(36)
38) --> Force Bubble==> EndRdx(38)
41) --> Scorpion Shield==> EndRdx(41)DefBuf(42)DefBuf(42)DefBuf(42)
44) --> Web Envelope==> Acc(44)Acc(45)Rechg(45)Immob(45)EndRdx(46)Rechg(46)
47) --> Web Cocoon==> Acc(47)Rechg(48)Rechg(48)Rechg(48)Hold(50)Hold(50)
49) --> Assault==> EndRdx(49)
---------------------------------------------
01) --> Sprint==> Empty(1)
01) --> Brawl==> Empty(1)
01) --> Supremacy==> Empty(1)
02) --> Rest==> Empty(2)
---------------------------------------------



So, there you have the Ultimate Bots/FF Guide. I put a lot of work into it and I hope it sticks around as long as my Dark/Dark Defender guide. Feel free to start up conversation here in this thread so we can answer as many questions as possible!

Addendum

Issue 7 Defense Changes

Defense scaling occurred in Issue 7 and this is a major boon for us FF’rs. The Devs basically re-wrote the critter ToHit calculation and made Defense much more powerful.

A simplified version of Critter ToHit looks like this:

(50 + Buffs – Defense/Debuffs) * Accuracy multiplier = ToHit

All critters, minions to Giant Monsters, have a base ToHit of 50%. Buffs, inherent or otherwise, add to this value, Defense and Debuffs subtract from this value. That “gross” value is then multiplied by such things as Class (Minion, Lt, Boss, AV, etc.) and level relative to the Player.

The Accuracy multiplier is as follows: Minions = 1.0, Lts. = 1.16, Bosses = 1.3, AVs = 1.5 (all of this assuming even level foes)

So, without Defense, base ToHit is 50%, 58%, 65% and 75%.

Long story short, it is far easier to reduce enemies, regardless of level (up to +5) to the “basement” ToHit. Getting 50% Defense basically floors any enemy type unless they have buffs on them. 40% Defense is stellar now since even AVs would only have a 15% chance to land a successful blow.

What these new changes actually do is level the playing field between Minion and AV. The difference between a Minion’s chance to hit against 40% Defense and an AV’s is only 5%. At 49% Defense, the difference is only 2.5%. So, if you’re running around near 50% defense, an AV is only going to hit you 7.5% of the time while the minion nearby is at 5%, thereby putting the AV virtually on the same level of effectiveness as a Minion.

Thus, adding 18% Defense to your Allies will greatly boost their chances against not only Minions but especially against higher ranking foes like Bosses and AVs.

Finally, I’ll update the guide with Patron Power info as I am able to glean from other impressions from the board. You can help out by sharing your experiences with your PPPs. I chose Mace Mastery to supplement my already impressive Defense and I liked the Immobilize and Hold powers.

Much of the information in this guide is compiled from my own personal tests, the I7 Prima Guide (which is dubious), and Hero Planners that have been updated with player-base tests throughout the life of CoX. I cannot guarantee their accuracy but I think I’m pretty close.

I hope this guide helped and thanks for reading!!!

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D3 Bible I6/ED
Bots /FF Guide

you forgot to mention how minions go into defensive when you bubble up in pff now. also i dont think you mentioned the 2 minute recharge

ugh. i respecced out of it :/ with bodyguard and aid self i dont need it anymore anyway. oh well at least i still have my status protection :/


wish i could swap /ff to /traps

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I did mention the 2 minute recharge in both the Recharge Stat (120 seconds) and in the slotting suggestions, where I said that a recharge or two would help a lot since it had a long recharge.

As far as PFF switching Bots to Defensive, I was unaware of that. I was always under the assumption (and even while playing never noticed otherwise) that when I turtle up in PFF, my Bots simply perform whatever they were doing prior to PFF and continue doing so until given different orders. Since I generally use PFF when things start to go badly, my Bots were probably already engaging an enemy and continued to do so, even if in Defensive.

Anyway, thank you for bringing that up.

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D3 Bible I6/ED
Bots /FF Guide

You forgot to mention that insulation shield grants resistance to end drain, which is very nice in the late game.

Also, the leadership abilities add resistance to some odd status effects. Assault grants resistance to taunt and placate, and tactics give resistance to confuse and fear.

Just thought you might want to add that in. Great guide BTW!!

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Level 50s: to many to remember at this point

I like how you explaind it and with the information it will help me out alot ofcorse ill modifie it a bit to my acord but it realy help thank u

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Excellent guide. My Bot/FF is at 45 now, and I concur with almost everything. I'd just like to add my 2 cents.

1. I think you unfairly devalue the use of Repulsion bomb. True, it is not the same as it used to be, but I personally have come to favor the tactic of opening on a mob with this attack and telling the bots to attack whatever isn't disoriented. I have it slotted with 1 acc 3 disorient and 2 recharge. Coupled with the disorients from your bots - even bosses can get dizzy.

2. Detention field with 3 recharges effectively comes up again 1 sec after the shield drops. This lets the mob get 1 shot before you trap him again. With all your defense that 1 shot will likely miss.
Extremely useful tactic on bosses/avs and some EBs: you practically take them out of play while your teammates/bots cleanup. I use it almost everytime when soloing. On a team - only against an av and I give everyone fair warning. slot with acc though, cause you don't want to miss. Recluse' SF comes to mind. You go into Bodyguard mode (for when the 1 shot gets through) and use det field to effectively perma hold an AV while your team takes other AVs. Invaluable.

3. Combat Jumping is handier than Hover or air supp. I'd recommend going with the leaping pool. And CJ is less end heavy than fly. Besides - all your bots now leap, so they can easily keep up with you this way.

4. I personally find the patron powers to be less effective than what you already have to choose from and won't be using them at all.

5. whatever you do, do NOT use Autoit v3 to automatically do stuff. It violates the license agreement. So don't make any scripts to automatically bubble all your bots every 4 minutes or to upgrade all your bots with 1 click. And don't pm me for sample scripts of how this is done.

My current PvE (I don't PvP) build that I LOVE:
(I will likely take either the rifle burst for more dmg or the photon grenade to couple with Repulsion Bomb for bosses next)
Exported from version 1.5C of CoH Planner
http://joechott.com/coh

Archetype: Mastermind
Primary Powers - Ranged : Robotics
Secondary Powers - Support : Force Fields

01 : Force Bolt acc(01) recred(7) recred(19) endred(37)
01 : Battle Drones acc(01) acc(3) dam(3) dam(5) dam(5) kbkbak(7)
02 : Deflection Shield defbuf(02) defbuf(9) endred(39)
04 : Insulation Shield defbuf(04) defbuf(9) endred(40)
06 : Equip Robot endred(06) endred(34) endred(40)
08 : Combat Jumping endred(08)
10 : Detention Field acc(10) recred(11) recred(11) recred(19) endred(31)
12 : Protector Bots acc(12) dam(13) dam(13) dam(15) heal(15) defbuf(17)
14 : Super Jump endred(14)
16 : Personal Force Field defbuf(16) defbuf(17) defbuf(42) recred(45)
18 : Aid Other inttim(18) hel(42) recred(43) inttim(43) hel(43)
20 : Dispersion Bubble defbuf(20) defbuf(21) defbuf(21) endred(25) endred(37) endred(42)
22 : Aid Self inttim(22) hel(23) recred(23)
24 : Assault endred(24) endred(25)
26 : Assault Bot acc(26) dam(27) dam(27) dam(29) disorient(31) disorient(31)
28 : Tactics endred(28) endred(29) thtbuf(34) thtbuf(34)
30 : Swift runspd(30)
32 : Upgrade Robot endred(32) recred(33) recred(33) endred(33) endred(40)
35 : Repulsion Bomb acc(35) disorient(36) disorient(36) disorient(36) recred(37) recred(45)
38 : Force Bubble endred(38) endred(39) endred(39)
41 : Health hel(41)
44 : Stamina endmod(44) endmod(45)


-------------------------------------------

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205723: A Different DESTINY
When Soldiers of Arachnos got their names added to the Destiny List, Longbow managed to get a copy of the list and began rounding villains up. But one name on the list shocked them...

I have to disagree with you about the patron powers.

I have a lvl 47 bots/FF and chose to take the Black Scorpion Patron powers. 2 of his powers makes bots/ff godly.

The first is Web envelope. The aoe immobolize combined with the ignite patches from the Assault bots missles is a site to behold. Web envelope has a good duration and a low enough rechage to use almost every battle (with a recharge SO or 2)

The second power is Scorpion Shield. The Shields DEF stacks with Dispersion bubble and the Protector bots shield to give you a great amount of personal DEF. Although the shield only give DEF to smash/lethal/energy, most attacks in the game have at least part of that damage as S/L. This makes your shields fully effective against those attacks, unlike resistance shields.

The PP hold would be nice if the rechage wasnt 32 seconds (stupid). I still have yet to figure out how a hold rounds out a MMs powers, all of the secondaries except FF have a hold power in them.

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Level 50s: to many to remember at this point

yeah i would've liked another pet

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Wouldn't know about Scorpion. since it didnt fit with my concept I didnt even look at it. The only one that seemed to fit ok was scirocco and his shield does NOT stack. the recharge on the attack makes it useless. I have no need for an AOE immob or a hold in my build. I can effectively do both without the patron powers - but better(FF, RB). On the whole, it is just more efficient to use existing powers and/or dip into another pool (in my case Stamina). The Patron adds nothing to my build.
jmo

---

205723: A Different DESTINY
When Soldiers of Arachnos got their names added to the Destiny List, Longbow managed to get a copy of the list and began rounding villains up. But one name on the list shocked them...

[ QUOTE ]
The only one that seemed to fit ok was scirocco and his shield does NOT stack.

[/ QUOTE ]
What exactly doesn't stack about it? Charged Armor gives resistance. The only Force Field power with resistance is Personal Force Field, which, if you're running, doesn't really need the extra from Charged Armor anyway.

Otherwise you'll have that resistance no matter what else you have.

---

I meant that perhaps scorpions shield is Def and that stacks with your existing def which may make it useful. But sciroccos Resistance shield is on its own. Resist does not stack with def.

and on its own, a resist toggle isn't useful imo. Manuevers would be more useful that that it addes to existing def - even if it is only 2%.

Don't get me wrong, PP powers do work. I just think all the other powers available to us are better.

---

205723: A Different DESTINY
When Soldiers of Arachnos got their names added to the Destiny List, Longbow managed to get a copy of the list and began rounding villains up. But one name on the list shocked them...

Love the guide, it's very well written. One thing to note, tho, is Stamina and Endurance reductions. As a currently level 42 Bots/FFer (who has gone both with and without Stamina), I can say that Stamina makes your life a lot easier (especially if you're running 3 Leaderships, Dispersion, Force Bubble, and trying to control with Force Bolt), but can be overshadowed with Endurance Reduction Enhancers. The question (that I'm still asking myself, to be honest), is whether three powers and two slots are worth the additional endurance reduction slots necessary (to bring it up to three in each power) in Dispersion Bubble, Force Bubble, Tactics, Assault, and Manuevers to make using the powers like Force Bolt and the Rifle Burst and Aid Other a viable option in battle (or if you need to battle bubble!). It's super being able to run 5 toggles and Group Fly and keep everyone bubbled and not worry about your End bar...but that means you likely don't have the power choices to take much else. For a level 50 respec build, this is less of concern, but while on the road is a choice that has both pros and cons.

A note on healing (and part of why I don't have the powers available for Stamina =P): having both Repair with Aid Other can either be your best friend on large teams...or pointless on large teams. If you're running a Mastermind heavy team (especially one with a Thermal or Rad around), you may never need to use either. But if you're the only MM on an 8-man team, you may easily find yourself in situations where having both is a boon (and I've found more than a few soloing on Relentless, too ^_^. This is again more of a personal play-style choice, and Blasterminds(tm) won't like it while Defendsterminds(tm) (like me) will.

A note on Group Fly: you're very right in your assesment of Group Fly, but if your Bots all have three Acc SOs (or even just two in your Assault and Protectors) while running Tactics and in Supremacy range, your bots will still be hitting fairly often. That said, however (and as much as I do like the power), now that all the bots have Super Leap to reach high places, it's less necessary. Although convoluted caves and interior designs can cause AI pathing trouble...I've stuck by this power, but am considering Recall Friend in its place. Unless I take Stamina, in which case I'll have too many pools (Fitness, Leadership, Fly, and Medicine leaves no room for TP).

Another note on healing: Protector Bots. Call me crazy, but I slot my bots 2 Accuracy, 2 Heal, and 2 Defense. Like you, I would never under any circumstances consider dropping those two Accuracy slots. However, I have found that with two Heal SOs, a Protector bot can bring another Pro Bot from 1 HP to almost full and bring the Assault Bot from critical condition to safely in the green (over 3/4th health). One other phenomena that came from this: I could solo a +2 Longbow Ballista (something I simply couldn't do when I had 2 or 3 Dmg in them)...without using Pulse Rifle Burst and only very intermitently using Aid Other or Repair (something I had found myself scrambling to do before). There was also no need for using a Shivan or other temp powers, or even inspirations. Having the bots all fully upgraded and in range of being buffed (Drones 3 Acc / 3 Dmg, Assault 2 Acc / 3 Dmg / 1 Disorient) by triple slotted Dispersion, Insulation, Deflection, Manuevers, Tactics, and (the obviously not slotted for anything but End Redux) Assault. My only real wish for the Protectors is that were some way we could throw about a final total of 14 slots in them (so we can slot them for more attributes), but hey, a guy can dream, right?

My points are mostly nitpicking from personal experience and preference, and again, the guide is great. If you're a Defendstermind(tm) like me, you'll probably find yourself liking my input, but if you're a Blastermind(tm) you'll find you would rather go with the guide over my nitpicks and have more offensive slotting (and skip Repair).

[edit] Almost forgot! My villain SG (MechaNations) on Virtue consists of robots and tech users of all types, but Bots/FF MMs are predominant (still make up about half the SGs toons). I gurantee that if you get three Bot/FF MMs in a mission, you can eat Relentless missions. One time we had a team of five Bot/FF going (all VG members), with a good Thermal Corr (wife of an VG mate), a Brute (VG mate), and a Rad Corr (also a VG mate). None of us ever used our single target bubbles: we didn't have to. The AoE heals from the Corruptors covered all our healing needs, and without them, I suspect the Protector Bots (there were only ten of them, after all) would have handled the lack. We just moved through missions like an unstoppalbe juggernaut. It was an impressive day in the Isles, and when we actually faced an AV, it went down fast. (Five assault Bots + 1 Rad + 1 Thermal = n0 r3g3n 4 j00!) Lag was actually a non-issue (even with the 30 extra bodies), since all we really had to do was keep moving forward The only thing that slowed us down was summoning/buffing, and we didn't have to wait for the bots to be fully buffed before starting on a steady keel. If you have a choice of teaming with other Bot/FF MMs: do it. You'll love every second of it.[/edit]

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great guide, as a relatively new bots/ff mm (lvl 10), I plan on following this build nearly to the letter. (I had planned close to that anyways). It's always helpful to know just what a power does and have some experience opinion on it before you pick it up. Great job again on the guide

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My Toons
Apocalypse86 50 Fire/energy blaster Triumph
Menace Mech (FKA Burning Gundam) 50 Bots/FF Mastermind Protector
Celestial Striker 43 Peacebringer Triumph
Mind Slice 35 Mind/King Controller Triumph
Obsidian Assassin 30 Night Widow Protector

I'm definatly interested in the guide. I'm not a big fan of AT forums since several are just horrors, but I've been looking for the numbers for bubbles, etc and nice to see them here.

The guy who took Ballista-1. WOW.

In my life I have learned something... I am the universe's whipping boy. If there is ANY chance an enemy can hit -ME-, he will. I carry a Shivan in my back pocket because for people like me who have multiple purples + our shields going, those bosses will still hit and kill. If you got the golden ticket or random dice rolls in your favor, awesome. For people like me who can still roll a 1 with a throw of 2D6... we'll dream of it.

To MM's out there who try to reproduce that feat, follow the suggestion of the guy who is a lightning rod for AV/EB fire: Take greens, take a Shivan, and take care.

Aid Other: Get it.
Aid Other > the two Shield buff powers.
Resuscitate: Get it. I'm personally shocked that as a 50 you can't get Resus in your build. I didn't grab leadership myself, but I did take 2 rifle blasts(no shields buffs), Repair, recall, TP, and GTP. I did all of that and still had Resus at I think either 28 or 35, with GTP at 30.

Playing w/o the bubble buffs, using dispersion only: Do-able, specially with Aid Self. I started back when my Tier 1 pets were the ones dying and Def didn't really matter against +4-5's. Aid Other was my best bet. Now that I have a respec, am 48, and (most importantly) the DEF starts scaling at +4, not immiediatly, I'm bringing shields along which do help(I'm still not sold on them except by word of mouth).

Tough: Tough is not worthless for an MM, not nearly. Tough + Bodyguard and bubbles means you could foreseeably absorb an alpha from a large group with fair odds of survival. Yeah it's alot of slots, but it's 10% off S/L. Like a Freakshow + 2-3 Boss 1 shotting you with a swipe. 2 slotted for Boss fights only would mean you stayed up through a lucky hit(or forgetting to put bots on Bodyguard mode). Don't discount a power that gives you a quick Tier 1 Inspiration whenever you want. The cost to buy this power -IS- kind of high. Weave is an extra 4.5. Take it or leave it, but I literally just got totalled 2x in a row by a Gunslinger who has some kind of ungodly acc with his sleep blasts. I'm grumbling while looking for guides trying to find as much DEF as I can right now and those stupid lucky sleep dart shots are the reason.

Against Malta(and really you should consider warning people of this in your guide) Robot/bubble can have some of the worst battles of their careers. I have had my entire team 2 shotted by AoE EMPnades many times. Drones 1 shotted, Assault Bot drained of end or slapped around like someone's monkey...

Slotting Pro-bots: 2 acc 2 dmg 2 heal. The 2 heals mean they got your back solidly on their heals, and to be honest, how much actual dmg do you get from the extra dmg slot? It normally is a 20-25% boost but it's nerf'd by a level difference. Normally I run relentless and +3 Luits and Bosses don't feel anything short of Assault Bot fire. Depending on my actual enemy, some bosses don't even want to die w/o 4 or more Bots firing on them, that would be Assault Bot + 3 others. It could be argued that my 2 acc/2 dmg approach (tier 1 and tier 2 pets both) is part of that, but against +5's, Drones just don't bring that much pain, and I don't think Probots do that much either(the heals + seeker drones + goofing off, knocked down, etc cuts into DPS).

Also Hover: What's better than waiting 32 levels to keep enemes from closing to melee range on you? Waiting to level 6. Hover keeps ALOT of enemies from Melee range, and I don't play a chessboard game of bot control and Hover really saved my bacon against multiple hard hitting melees(Force bolt can't juggle 3 Wolves)

Slotting end redux: Slotting end redux into the Bots will also cut the cost of their summoning, meaning you have more end availible to summon/bubble. Personally all of my toggles(except Scorpions shield which is 2/2) slot 3 end redux with the exception of Sprint and PFF. My heavy rifle shot is 1 acc 2 dmg 2 end 1 rechrg and allows me some fairly heavy extra burst dmg. The End redux is very nice. With Villain Side SHO's you could lower Bot(any pet really) slotting from 6 to 3 with the exception in Probot's case since you'll want to slot out dizzy/heal/end/def buff. But the great part is, you can stack lots of end reduction in pets this way. The final part of end redux is I have 1 end redux in Drones and just tested it right now. From full end, no toggles on, and 1 slotted end redux it drops me to the middle of the N in menu. Without the end redux it's more like the M/E area. I slot 2 end redux in equip, 1 in upgrade(w/2 rechrgs) and before all my bots are summoned and fully equiped/upgraded I'm out of end. Just wait a few moments or rest and you have your full end up and ready with 3 extra powers at your disposal during missions

I heavily slot end redux for my build. I whole heartedly endorse the stamina-less power of an MM.

That's about all I can say. Again, great guide, good numbers and warn people of the demons that are Malta
/e shudder

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"IF You see a Tanker Taunting you STOP IMMIEDIATLY. Everybody knows... if the Tanker has to come and get you, he's bringing a Butt Kicking with 'em."

Super Shotty Mario Bros.
Champion

Great guide.

I'm not sold on leadership as I think it definitely dictates the need for Stamina.

Personally my best MM was a 32 Ninja/Poison MM that I've been playing since beta, but got bored of him. Man did I need stamina.

Anyway, with my Bots/FF guy, I'm only 21, but I'm actually considering skipping Stamina (for the first toon EVER). I'm frankly tired of taking 3 power to essentially get one (although I'm sure you could argue the validity of health). Everyone I team with warns me against skipping Stamina with FF.

So, I'm kinda stuck. I enjoy this toon a lot.. enough in fact to go looking at articles like this (which does rock by the way). But one thing that doesn't make any sense to me... look at when you guys are taking Stamina... why even bother? It can't be that necessary if you're taking it that late in the game.

And I did take the grenade attack. I'm totally sold on it. I would hate to drop it, for the same reason that someone else mentioned (the damage isn't bad, and the stun effect is great).

I also took the isolation field (or whatever it's called), what a life saver if you solo. I often bubble the boss and it sticks more than it misses. At the very least I'll bubble a LT and that buys me a good chunk of time to get the toasters firing on all cylinders.

I haven't taken any of the 'Aid' line up, nor leadership. It saves me time and lots of slots for my single attack (grenade). But what I do swear by is the two early bubbs. Even with just DO's and the Dispersion bubble, I can quite clearly see how much improved 'Defense' is. It's nice seeing enemies miss once in a while.

I'm not sure if it's really worth getting Aid other. The protector bot does a good job, and if I lose one, it's usually a low level bot. I don't want to fall into the trap that I did with my Ninja MM.... I was so busy healing ninjas with my poison ball of snot, it bored the crap out of me and became a very labour intensive set to play.

My opinon may be in the minority, but I don't die very often unless I'm in a team wipe situation. Like I said, my biggest surprise is how late you're all taking Stamina, like I said, what's the point? Can't you skip it, if you've got all the bots up and running?

Things I'm considering changing since reading your guide:
- Dropping my only attack. (It's a tough call. It looks purty and I think it is effective)
- Stamina: no idea. I have 'sprint' right now, but no idea if I should respec out of it. This guide confuses me on Stamina.
- Aid Pool. Didn't even consider it before now, but it looks interesting.
- Leadership. I was thinking of skipping it, but if I consider leadership, that means I have to take Stamina (IMHO). My other toons that had it are sucking wind without Stamina. So in other words Leadership means 5 Power Choices. ouch. Maybe not.
- Flight. The status protection provided by Jumping is covered by Dispersion field, so I'm thiniking Flight would be fun.

Any additional help would be cool. Again, great guide. I'd like to see other builds and additonal 'pre-26 builds, and post 26 builds. I have a feeling what I'm seeing up there for your build isn't what you took at my level (I'm 21).

Thanks again. Great job!

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Nekron: Beam Rifle / Poison Corruptor and Slayer of Evil!! (Exalted)
Intergalaktic: Fire / Time Corruptor (Exalted)

On taking Stamina late:

For Bot/FF, unless you plan to run a lot of toggles from early levels on, there's really no need (IME) for Stamina for much of the game, especially with endred slotting (you'll have the slots, the bubbles don't need many for max effectiveness), unless you plan to get and use the personal attacks (which I would recommend against doing). Late game though, you will want to spam the immobilizes to get max performance out of the incediary missiles and will likely be running an armor toggle (Black Scorpion's is +Def and stacks well w/ the FF bubbles and/or Leadership), which will be that much more of a drain on your blue bar. This is why it's often recommended to wait until the 30s (or later depending on build) to get Stamina (if at all), unless running Leadership toggles early (they're big end-hogs, but they do pay for themselves once you have a few bots available to benefit from them).



On Leadership:

While they're very handy to have for a MM, they do (exc Assault) require a fair number of slots, cost a fair bit each to run, and have ungodly long (4 seconds IIRC) animation times. That said, if you plan to go against either +3s (or higher) or hard targets (EBs/AVs mostly) a lot, they will pay off in spades, especially once you have all your bots out and fully loaded. The extra damage will mean things die faster (and partly offsets slotting the Probots for Def over Dmg, as I do), the extra to-hit means you can change up your slotting a bit and possibly free up a couple of slots for elsewhere, and the extra +Def (slotting Maneuvers up will actually pay for a Bot/FF, plenty to stack with) will make it that much harder for even AVs and such to hit your bots (you'll have over 50% +Def on 4 of your bots if you slot everything you can w/ 3 +Def).

Conversely if you plan to take on at most +3s (i.e. soloing on Relentless), you probably don't need them until the late 30s (if at all), and then mostly for AV fights (you really don't want your bots to miss against an AV, and some of them have insane +Def in godmode) . Taking Leadership may also necessitate taking Fitness (for Stamina), which will eat more power picks.

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Been a while for me, but now I'm back (from outer space [duhnuhnuhnuh]). _Elektro_, you're definitely right about Leaderships and Stamina. I can say that at level 50 (and I made it there without Stam to boot), I still run Stamina less, and have the leadership pool (all four powers), Aid Other/Self, my bubbles, force bubble, everything. I still run quite successfully! But, the cost is that EVERY toggle is 3 End slotted, and the bubbles have the few extra slots I can scrounge for End as well. If you're willing to lose some Leadership punch, the load gets easier. And Detention Field still saves my keister sometimes! I actually fit a second Acc slot in, just to make it stick. Also, I'd keep one attack, at least, since having extra burst damage (or for the grenade, stunning!) helps a lot.

I've also now run successful LRSFs and other crazy nonsense. While I am considering changing up some powers, my previous advice and the great guide are still right on the money. The thing about the LRSF and the amount of defense output is that I can actually save some room in my Inspirations tray (from purples) to add more of other goodies (orange to stay alive, break free for Psyche nonsense, damage/acc for Assault), and teams always appreciate having the extra topping off of their defenses [and status protection from Dispersion]. And I still love running with other Robot/FF MMs, because it's just utter carnage.

On a PvP note, my MM does well in Recluse's Victory. Bloody Bay? Only go for Shivans. Siren's Call? Badging. Warburg? Get my nukes, and I'm out. But in RV, the PvP aspect final really comes out, as you have all your tools and they can be effective. It's still annoying to have the occasional Scrap/Tank with that Uber-acc buff Focused Accuracy come along, or an Insp popping Blaster or Controller, but you can hold your own and succeed. What you can do with a pillbox is amazing! I rather enjoy holding off a taken pillbox against invading heroes [especially if I picked up a heavy], because they just can't touch you, for the most part. With your bubblage and mixing the attack/bodyguard commands, you can hold out against just about anything shy of the zone Sig Heroes or getting one-shot by a stupid-ridiculous-buffed-blaster or lucky Scrapper crit.

The introduction of IOs only makes me more hopeful of what I'll be able to do (and hopefully, make my End bar better ). From the looks of some of the numbers and set bonuses, we should be able to get multiple +recovery bonuses [bar fills faster] and any slotting for discounts will be more effective [less bar used], all while making the pets even better (and with resistance buffs to boot). Not to mention some other benefits like +regen, minor resistances, and other helpful holes shored up (please for the love of frog let us get some Sleep protection -_-). I hope that shortly after I9 hits Live, you'll update or get out a 2.0 with and IO update!

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