Consolidated Thread: Statesman's Task Force
By
abnormal_joe,
Posted on: 2007-04-03 08:09 in The Market and Inventions
It generally takes my groups about 4 hours to get to the final mission and fail. So I'd say ~4 hours for a successful team is doable. 2 hours would be extremely efficient.
-D
Darkonne: Pinnacle's (unofficially) mighty Dark Miasma/Radiation Blast enthusiast!
Be sure to check out this mighty Arc:
#161865 - Aeon's Nemesis
All but one of the successful teams I've been on took about 3 hours. The unsuccessful teams generally took a lot longer. One of the warning signs I look for, for mission failure is to be at the Grandville dock in under 2 and 1/2 hours. If we aren't there in that time frame, then there are problems with the team and we will likely fail.
All that changes if no one has done it before. If the TF is new to everyone on the team, I could see it taking a lot longer than 3 hours.
I think for the most part a good mix of powersets are the key to this especially the final mission. You need a good tank, you need a troller with an aoe immobilize, you need a stormy or a bubbler with force bubble, and you need range damage. Having too much melee damage means ghost widow has plenty of targets to heal off of.
Bump and Grind Bane/SoA
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Legendary Sannin Ninja/Pain Mastermind
Entoxicated Ninja/PSN Mastermind
Ninja Ryukenden Kat/WP Scrapper
Hellish Thoughts Fire/PSI Dominator
Thank You Devs for Merits!!!!
On the success and failure of pulling front, I've seen speculation in the LRSF that the AVs have significantly longer perception ranges then aggro ranges.
Thus, even if you are "standing outside normal aggro range", they have seen you. Then, later, when the team pulls one of them, a buddy or two who saw someone on the team earlier can come to join them.
So it may be worth trying keeping everyone on the team very far from the end AVs, with only the snipe puller (ideally stealthed) going to the max range they can pull from.
Another possibility could be if the AVs are looking at each other when one is pulled, which seems to be a factor in the LRSF.
Actually, I don't believe a perfect mix is required. I could imagine a mixed defender superteam making mincemeat of it. Only the very last mission would I imagine be any problem in trying to juggle Recluse and the towers. I would rather have a team of 8 "good" players than a "perfect mix" anyday. RO superteams exemplify this philosophy.
NOW, that doesn't mean that I think it would be an optimal solution. Each AT has it's strength and they synergize because of that.
BUT, I bet a team of 8 Rad Defenders would make this a joke.
Mako would be a chump with 8 Radiation Infections, 8 Enervating fields and 8 Lingering Radiations. Sure, there is some resistance there, but his Accuracy and AC are FLOORED. If you have a team with Core2 Duo systems, I bet 8 D3s would be real darkity-dark goodness.
I think any mix would work; some mixes are simply better than others.
Ryu, you are correct that GW would be tricky with a group of 8 Scrappers. However, I suspect while it would take a while, they MIGHT be able to do it. That heal doesn't come up very often, and a team of smart scrappers could wait for that to happen THEN take her down with their high end attacks before she could get it off again. Honestly, I'm more worried about her hold.
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What is the typical duration (aka not "We schooled this in 12 minutes, noob!") for this Task Force? Is it in the 90 minute/2 hour range like the Respec mission, hero-side?
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The successful teams to which I've belonged have finished it between about 2.1 and 2.6 hours, so far. It can be done in a lot less time, but I expect 2.5 hours will be about average for a solid and well-balanced team.
Please try MA arc ID 351455, "Shard Stories: Scavenger's Hunt." Originally created for the Dr. Aeon contest, it explores the wild potential of one of the City's most concept-rich but content-poor settings: the Shadow Shard.
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You need a good tank
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Or an Illusion Controller. My last successful group occupied LR with Phantoms. We'd drop PA, take out one tower, then run like crazy to let LR's aggro reset. The same Phantoms kept GW busy while the rest of us dealt with the rest of the AVs in his group.
Aeon and the other pre-Grandville AVs were summarily owned. A good tank is great to have, but STF can be finished in respectable time even without one.
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you need a troller with an aoe immobilize
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?
Why? Immos are useful, and I had a great time with Tentacles last run, but I don't recall anything that really mandated an aoe immo. My earth/rad was extremely effective in one STF, and he doesn't carry an immo at all.
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you need a stormy or a bubbler with force bubble
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Nah. There are lots of solutions to the tower repairmen. Practically any location-targeted, or area-denial, or pbaoe-toggle-damage, or aoe damage power will do. Hurricane and Force Bub might be the ideal case, but oddly I've yet to have a Storm or FF of any flavor on any STF team with me. Hot Feet, Earthquake, Fire Ball, Volcanic Gasses, Ball Lightning, Ice Slick, Stalagmites ... all kinds of things are useful and plenty effective.
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and you need range damage
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Or Group Fly. It's unbelievably useful against the Flier. I assume IR would work well enough too, like it does at Hami raids.
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Having too much melee damage means ghost widow has plenty of targets to heal off of.
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Amen to that ... and my last team found out that one of the worst possible things to have out versus GW is a group of Imps. Even Shivans can be counter-productive, unless you have enough sheer damage to overwhelm her between heals (seen that happen too). You don't absolutely need an empath or even a tank though, depending on the rest of the team. Any way you can arrange big buffs to Defense can traumatize her Dark Regen efficacy, too.
Please try MA arc ID 351455, "Shard Stories: Scavenger's Hunt." Originally created for the Dr. Aeon contest, it explores the wild potential of one of the City's most concept-rich but content-poor settings: the Shadow Shard.
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BUT, I bet a team of 8 Rad Defenders would make this a joke.
Mako would be a chump with 8 Radiation Infections, 8 Enervating fields and 8 Lingering Radiations. Sure, there is some resistance there, but his Accuracy and AC are FLOORED. If you have a team with Core2 Duo systems, I bet 8 D3s would be real darkity-dark goodness.
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Sorry, but with eight fully tohitdebuff slotted Rad Infections, Mako still has a 53% chance to hit you. +4 con and 87% debuff resistance is brutal.
And assuming he has 60% defense, your chance with full defdebuff slotting to hit him is still floored. If his defense is only 45%, you would be at 32% to hit (assuming you have a couple of Accuracies slotted). Making it kind of hard to hit with 8 Lingering Radiations. If you did hit with all eight, you could debuff his recharge by ~40%. But I don't think his defense is only 45%.
Did my second run this weekend and it was a lot harder. No real surprise since the previous one was smooth sailing all the way.
Team had 2 defenders both emp, 2 controllers, tank, scrapper, 2 blasters.
We managed to single pull Mako. It might be worth noting that our tank did the pulling.
Oddly enough we had the least problem with ol Mako. We hit him for a while he popped elude we hit him some more and that was that.
For those keeping score we had 3 tactics, one each of defender, controller and blaster versions.
I think at least two of our dmg dealers had focused accuracy and we had fort from the two emps.
I myself was hitting him pretty good, two acc slotted and I used a small acc insp.
At this point I was feeling somewhat optimistic. Especially since we proceeded to single pull BS. We had a slow going with him, though, and that was a trend all through the TF, our dmg output seemed somewhat lacking.
The bad news came when GW and scirocco showed up suddenly. They were a complete nuisance, one/two-shotting the squishies and GW holding anyone she wanted.
At some point when pretty much everyone was running back from hospital or fleeing, GW and Scirocco apparently felt they had proven their point and went "home" ditching BS. No honor among arch villains and all.
We could then dispatch BS. Single pull Scirocco and take our revenge on him.
Then came GW and this initially looked like the end for us. We could hardly make her health bar budge and she kept holding our tank through anything.
Finally we managed to start moving her bar, and evetually kill her, with the tank taunting from range, the scrapper attacking from the rear and everyone, including two pets staying at range.
Now I really thought the worst was done, since last time we did well with a tank and one emp on Recluse duty and the rest on tower patrol. This time we had two emps.
As it turned out the recluse team was fine and ... the tower patrol was also fine.
We had a storm keep repairmen off the tower, however, with a strategy that involves initially keeping them away from the tower it's important to have someone make sure they get dead.
I noticed the repairmen flying off the tower and took in upon myself to make sure they didn't get the idea to seek out another tower. I had good help from Jack and Phantasm who seemed to really enjoy picking on the gray con for some reason. 
So with the towers down it's just mopping up Recluse left. Wrong!
We got him to about 20% when he spawed his posse but have they changed something or was it always this many?
It must have been at least 20, probably more, bosses.
Somehow we managed to clear them with only a few deaths. But we hardly got started on Recluse when it happed again and to make matters worse Recluse decided to move just far enough for the flier to notice us. Wipe.
We regrouped, and cleared our way to Recluse for a rematch. Once again he spawned a godawful amount of bosses but this time we ignored them, kept hitting Recluse and managed to bring him down before we fell apart.
Took a bit over 4 hours I think but felt longer.
A little bit harder and we would have failed I think. But it shows that depending on team it's not just Mako and GW that can be problem points. For us it was GW and Recluse (after towers).
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The same Phantoms kept GW busy while the rest of us dealt with the rest of the AVs in his group.
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I tried to distract GW with PA and it worked well for the duration but when they dropped she killed my phantasm and then came after me with a vengence. 
Speaking of GW and phantoms, she can't use her heal on them can she? I assume no but since we had a bit of trouble with her last time I didn't want to risk anything when we finally managed to start hurting her.
Somethings to think about when building the team.
0) Teamwork
1) Normal Anti-AV team, hopefully including some -regen.
2) Some way to counter Mako and his 94% defense.
<ul type="square">a) Vengeance
b) Fortitude
c) Tactics
d) Targeting Drone
e) Buildup and Aim
f) Insights
g) Any +tohit
h) -defense (only 15% normal effectiveness)[/list]
3) Some way to counter Ghost Widows Mag 20 Hold
<ul type="square">a) Clear Mind
b) Increase Density
c) Clarity
d) Stimulant
e) other[/list]
4) Some way to counter Ghost Widows Dark Regeneration
<ul type="square">a) Only one person/Pet in Melee
b) Vengeance +def
c) Force Feilds
d) Fortitude
e) Lucks
f) Elude+SR toggles yourself
g) Maneuvers
h) +def
i) -tohit (only 15% normal effectiveness)
[Edit]
j) -resists for multiplied damage
k) Multiple Fulcrums for Additional damage (less effective with only one target)
l) any +damage to try to overwhelm the Dark Regeneration (very hard to acheive, but not impossible)
[/Edit][/list]5) Some way to counter LR's +50 tohit (estimate)
<ul type="square">a) Pet/Tank/Scrapper Taunt and Buffed
b) Vengeance +def
c) Force Feilds
d) Fortitude
e) Lucks
f) Elude+SR toggles yourself
g) Maneuvers
h) +def
i) -tohit (only 15% normal effectiveness)[/list]
6) Some way to counter LR's 4500+ damage
<ul type="square">a) See Above Defenses (5)
b) Sonic Bubbles
c) Any other +resist
d) -damage
e) -recharge (only 15% normal effectiveness)[/list]
7) Some way to pull and separate the 4 AVs.
<ul type="square">a) double stealthed long range pull that doesn't KB or DoT.
b) some other method.[/list]
8) Some way to deal with two AVs at once.
<ul type="square">a) See (5) +Def
b) See (6) +Resist
c) Buffed Controllers (at least 2) and Immobilize (this will not currently work on test, but will be fixed before live)
d) Controller Pets
e) Taunt Tank
f) Buffed Scrapper
g) Double Buffed anything
h) other.[/list]9) Some way to handle all four
<ul type="square">a) See (8) Above
b) Nukes, Shivans, and every other trick in the book, all at the same time.
c) other[/list]
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Sorry, but with eight fully tohitdebuff slotted Rad Infections, Mako still has a 53% chance to hit you. +4 con and 87% debuff resistance is brutal.
And assuming he has 60% defense, your chance with full defdebuff slotting to hit him is still floored. If his defense is only 45%, you would be at 32% to hit (assuming you have a couple of Accuracies slotted). Making it kind of hard to hit with 8 Lingering Radiations. If you did hit with all eight, you could debuff his recharge by ~40%. But I don't think his defense is only 45%.
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Rachael has been conquered by math! (good post)
Oh, and excellent post Linea_Alba. I'm taking that one and keeping it for strategery fodder
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BUT, I bet a team of 8 Rad Defenders would make this a joke.
Mako would be a chump with 8 Radiation Infections, 8 Enervating fields and 8 Lingering Radiations. Sure, there is some resistance there, but his Accuracy and AC are FLOORED. If you have a team with Core2 Duo systems, I bet 8 D3s would be real darkity-dark goodness.
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Sorry, but with eight fully tohitdebuff slotted Rad Infections, Mako still has a 53% chance to hit you. +4 con and 87% debuff resistance is brutal.
And assuming he has 60% defense, your chance with full defdebuff slotting to hit him is still floored. If his defense is only 45%, you would be at 32% to hit (assuming you have a couple of Accuracies slotted). Making it kind of hard to hit with 8 Lingering Radiations. If you did hit with all eight, you could debuff his recharge by ~40%. But I don't think his defense is only 45%.
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That may be, but a Mako with eight Enervating Fields on him is going to be doing 1/10th base damage, and taking 4x base damage. Add in the Leadership that an all-Rad team is able to afford, and he'll be an absolute joke.
Jerk 4 Life
In brightest day, in blackest night/No evil shall escape my sight/Let those who worship evil's might/Beware my power ... Green Lantern's light!/(Meowth, that's right!)
My Arcs: #4827: Earth For Humans. #6391: Young Love.
I assumed Radiation Infection, Enervating Field and Lingering Radiation would all be resisted in i9 ?
That would put 8 rads at
Av tohit Pc: 102 - 52 ~= 50%
Pc tohit Av: 48 - (-48) ~= 95%
Pc to AV dam: -49% resist ~= 50% more damage, or is it double ?
Av Dam: ~= -40%
Av Rech: ~= -125%
Av Runspeed: ~= -125%
Av Regen: ~= -166%
But I admit I don't totally understand how the resists effect or are going to effect and which resists effect how. This was just my general assumptions. But if those resists work anything like that, it's easy to see an apparent bias towards buffing over debuffing, at least vs the AV itself.
But then to equal those 8 debuffs, you need an FF, a Sonic, both with leadership, and you still haven't met the recharge runspeed and regen ... and I'm not sure if you can. So I feel at least a superficial bias, if not a more substantial one. It's hard to quantitate all buffs and debuffs (recharge/slow) with each other, tho others are easier to compare like (def/tohit) and (damage/resist).
If the resists aren't going to be that brutal on all debuffs, the ones that they won't apply to would be crucial to know.
Enervating Field is -damage and -resistance. Those have never been covered by the Archvillain resist, and I9 isn't changing that.
Jerk 4 Life
In brightest day, in blackest night/No evil shall escape my sight/Let those who worship evil's might/Beware my power ... Green Lantern's light!/(Meowth, that's right!)
My Arcs: #4827: Earth For Humans. #6391: Young Love.
hmm, juicey. *trollops off grinning and salivating to ponder the implications*
Hey, that would explain why Darkest Night appeared more effective than I expected. It was the normally overlooked -damage component.
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AVs don't drop SOs automatically anymore.
IOs are now in the game and can be found in the invention table. They enhance better than SOs, except where triple slotting and ED make the difference trivial.
At higher levels, TOs and DOs stop dropping, so, the only enhancement drop will be SOs. If you want +3SOs, fight level 53 bosses.
Story arcs still give an SO as a choice.
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"IO's are now in the game"---- So? And my brother joined last week. My point is, so what? We still fight an AV or 5-6 of them and they are not dropping anything.
Fighting a Boss 53 should drop but AV's dont ? That dog dont hunt.
It needs to be fixed. AV's should be dropping thats the reward, thats the loot, thats the way it has been. IO"s are just a chance to get them.
+3 SO's should be dropped by AVs. No reason for cutting that off now. IO"s is only a once in a while kinda thing because of the "chance" issue.
Repeat Offenders forever !
Make all IO's available in Paragon Market! NCSoft, the chinese are making BIG money selling influence and other stuff in the game. Best way to stop them = make the paragon market a place to buy all IO's and perhaps other things as well.
The AV changed talked about only affects farmable AVs.
Orc&Pie No.53230 There is an orc, and somehow, he got a pie. And you are hungry.
www.repeat-offenders.net
Negaduck: I see you found the crumb. I knew you'd never notice the huge flag.
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Hey, that would explain why Darkest Night appeared more effective than I expected. It was the normally overlooked -damage component.
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Darkest + Shadow Fall was pure happiness on my most recent STF. Psychic Wail? One of them used a Psychic Wail? Yep, you might not have noticed.
Please try MA arc ID 351455, "Shard Stories: Scavenger's Hunt." Originally created for the Dr. Aeon contest, it explores the wild potential of one of the City's most concept-rich but content-poor settings: the Shadow Shard.
<QR>
What happens if ...?
On my last run, our tank was basically gone before we got to the thorn tree mission. We never did find out if he had an emergency, or crashed, or what. Eventually he was kicked just before we attacked LR's towers, but regardless someone else who understood the Thorn Tree temp power's usage took it at the conclusion of that mission.
So I was just now wondering ... what if our tank had been there longer, and he had taken the temp power? What happens if the character who takes the temp power quits, is kicked, crashes, or is otherwise unable to return? Could a person sort-of grief an STF team by grabbing the temp power and quitting? How feasible is Aeon without it? Does it reappear on someone else (doubtful)?
I guess I'm sort of wondering why the mission doesn't simply bestow everyone on the team with the power, or be like the TV reactor coolant belts, where there's enough for everyone?
Please try MA arc ID 351455, "Shard Stories: Scavenger's Hunt." Originally created for the Dr. Aeon contest, it explores the wild potential of one of the City's most concept-rich but content-poor settings: the Shadow Shard.
Did the Statesman TF yesterday, and after a long fought battle we finally had to bail at the end because Recluse kept pounding our behinds everytime we tried to attack a tower.
It was the longest TF I ever did after the first time I did Positron, but I really had fun on it. Kudoes to the Devs for that.
But what I want to know is can any tank but stone/? survive and distract Recluse long enough for the towers to go down?
Or maybe we just needed more dmage to take the towers down fast enough...
My COX Fanfiction:
Blue's Assembled Story Links
QR
1) If you have a perfect mix, your chances of winning goes up.
...But the perfect mix might not win, depending on the players. Duh, of course.
2) It has been proven that a "non-standard" team makeup can finish.
...But the "non-standard" players were from a highly organised SG of highly skilled players.
Leaving nothing proven.
The average player, in a "non-standard" team, will have an even lower chance of finishing the TF.
This average player can be the most fun person to play with, but they may not be a "good" player. "Good" isn't the term I will use, I will just use "skilled". I know plenty of good players who aren't skilled.
Of course, people just building a PuG team for STF will go with the perfect mix, leaving the average player without AT golden-standard powersets in a most RSF situation.
I liked that step-by-step checklist of things to do to overcome STF though... it should really be put up as a guide.
"Honesty is for the most part less profitable than dishonesty." -- Plato
Playing Gods (51106) - Heroic Lvl 5-20
What Rough Beast (255143) - Villainous Lvl 40-50
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I assumed Radiation Infection, Enervating Field and Lingering Radiation would all be resisted in i9 ?
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According to Iakona (who seems to have some VERY good information on these things) regarding AV resistances, their "super special AV resistances" are against;
RunSpeed
RechargeTime
Endurance
ToHit
Defense
PerceptionRadius
Regeneration
Recovery
Note that +4 con mobs of *any* type, from minion to AV, resist 52% of every effect you inflict on them (damage, debuffs, etc.) on top of this.
Enervating Field should still work fine, as it doesn't fall into the list of things AVs resist, if I understand correctly. Mind you, one of those won't stop squishies from dying pretty fast to a +4 AV, nor tanks to Recluse himself, especially since its still subject to the general "higher con" downscaling of effect.
So Rad Infection and Lingering Radiations -recharge/-runspeed are highly resisted, and will barely be noticed. Lingering Radation has a -500% -regen debuff as well, unresisted right now but will be resisted with I9 (according to patch notes). This becomes -32.5% after resistances, which should still be noticable even if it doesn't floor regen any more.
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.......
But what I want to know is can any tank but stone/? survive and distract Recluse long enough for the towers to go down? ...
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Not even a Stone Tank can survive without support. Stop devaluing other tanks in favor of the obvious brute force option. It doesn't work alone either.
(subjective) 20 seconds for a stone vs 10 seconds for a fire vs 5 seconds for a squishy is irrelevant. Dead is Dead, and Dead is LR putting the smack down on the rest of the team. Support your tank, and if you support your tank, any tank becomes viable with only the level of support varying from minimal for stone to medium for fire. Meanwhile, in the rest of the STF your other tanks talents and offenses will make them overall just as useful as another. (and if you have what I call heavy support, even a squishy can tank. 
)
Adrenalin Boost with it's base 500% regen enhanceable to 1000% (think equivalent to Regen Scrapper Instant Healing. A tank with Instant Healing 
and recovery and recharge!) was reported to be sufficient support for a stone tank.
The question then becomes, is AB alone sufficient support for all other forms of tank, if not, would AB+Fortitude be sufficient. If yes, then any tank will do. An unstoppable tank + AB for instance ?
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...But the "non-standard" players were from a highly organised SG of highly skilled players.
Leaving nothing proven.
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I wouldn't say that.
Organised? *Laughs*, if that was organised, I'd hate to see unorganised.
Highly Skilled ? Smarter than the average bear, sure. Highly skilled, meh, some more than others, some less than others. But we were able to STOP, THINK, and DISCUSS without getting impatient and someone flying off at the handle and thinking they "knew it all". We also didn't have 8 people playing in solomode as is so common in pugs. We did have a some isolated cases of solomode, myself guilty of that at a few points even if no others were.
My main advice would be STOP, THINK, EVALUATE, DISCUSS. Read the INFO tab on every person and power in your group, even if you aren't the leader. I do that at least superficially for every group I join, and with a great more care and detail for groups I lead. Know what those characters should be capable of based on that information. Know that even tho they should be capable, based on their powers, they may not be. Work from there.
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Of course, people just building a PuG team for STF will go with the perfect mix, leaving the average player without AT golden-standard powersets in a most RSF situation.
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I'm sure some will, but I wouldn't want to be on those narrow minded bleeps teams anyway. That's why I made the list, to give people a better idea of the options, all the options, not just some narrow minded set of the perfect uber farming team. I expect I even missed some options, I'm not perfect either. I'd love to hear more ideas and options.
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I liked that step-by-step checklist of things to do to overcome STF though... it should really be put up as a guide.
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It is elsewhere. I'll put both halves together in the guides section here once it goes live and I think we've hashed out most (not all, you never get them all) of the issues.
I need to plan for some free time (with wife, kids, job, etc) - and want to get some of my friends to try this as well, but...
What is the typical duration (aka not "We schooled this in 12 minutes, noob!") for this Task Force? Is it in the 90 minute/2 hour range like the Respec mission, hero-side? Or is it 4 hours? Or - even scarier - like Positron's "Task Force of Ne'er-ending Misery" that goes on and on and...