Newbie questions! (bots/traps)

I'm pretty fresh at this, currently level 5. I have battle drones (obviously), no rifle powers, and the first three traps powers. Triage beacon is better than I remembered it being -- it really does make some mobs winnable that weren't otherwise. But I'm finding life a little rough with a single fragile bot.

What should I be looking at, or doing differently? Should I just stick with it and start working on bot-boosting stuff, maybe picking up some leadership powers? (Maneuvers sounds tempting, just because I really need some defense, the bot and I are pretty fragile). Should I pick up one of those pulse rifle attacks now, even though it's not at all obvious that I'll still want it later?

Are you feeding your li'l pal all the insps he can eat? A healthy diet of reds and purples helps your buddy be all he can be! Other than that, I leaned a lot on the vet attacks, which you obviously don't have given your regdate. Leverage web grenade and 'trops to keep things off you and the little guy. Next level you get Upgrade Robot, which is gonna make a pretty big difference, as well as getting another robobuddy.

Nice thing about bats/tarps is that you have a constant feeling of increasing power. You keep getting new and better tricks and you can gradually handle more and more challenges. My bots/traps mastermind is a death machine and yours will be too!

Yeah, level 5 was horrible, level 6 is being really fun. I have had one of them die, but only once, and it was due to inattention.

I'm trying to figure out whether leadership is a good bet. On the up side, boosts for my little buddies. On the other hand, I get pretty weak leadership bonuses. Really not sure.

I'd be interested in seeing some effective builds. So far, I haven't taken either of the pulse rifle things, and while I assume they'd do more damage than my taser, I'm not sure they'd be enough better to justify missing out on one of the other powers.

I would strongly consider taking at least one of the pulse rifle powers, if not two. The one I don't like it the photon grenade, it doesn't stun nearly enough for my taste.

Also consider taking Aid other from the medicine pool to boost your healing powers even more. Acid mortar at level 10 and FFG at level 16.

I won't worry about Leadership just yet. You don't have anything to stack them with, really. Maneuvers and 14 (for FFG later) and Tactics at 18 (for the 3rd bot) is a good plan, imo.

Actually that only gives you one free power, at 8. Maybe push Leadership back to level 20?

Level 8 : Pulse Rifle Burst
Level 10: Acid Mortar
Level 12: Protector Bot
Level 14: Aid Other
Level 16: FFG
Level 18: Maneuvers
Level 20: Tactics

That looks ok to me.

The tankerminds will call me a heretic. When I got to level 6 with the equipping of the little bots, I noticed they have significantly better range in their ranged attacks than the aggro range of most mobs. What I did a lot on my lowbie Bot MMs was to dogpile a close target (NOTE: I don't do this with a boss like a Damned or Consigliere in the spawn) with an attack my target command. I have veteran staff attacks added to two robot ranged attacks means one guy down before the spawn knows what's up. If they weren't dead, the kb from the bots usually got them off their feet long enough to finish the job. You can substitute a purchased temp power of plasmatic taser for the vet staff attack for the same result. After that, you just roll through the spawn, knocking them on their butt.

I'd skip the pulse rifle/grenade powers. They are absolutely atrocious endwise for terrible damage. Once you mature into your character you will have better things to do with your animation time and endurance than plink with your rifle.

Of course, you could take them to assist in the run up to 20, skipping stamina prereqs, then when you hit 20 use your second build to fake-respec into stamina and drop the blasts. I didn't and had no troubles but I filled the gaps with vet attacks. Your mileage may vary.

No vet attacks, but I can usually be doing SOMETHING. Sure, taser's sorta crap, but it's something, and it didn't cost me a pick.

Thus far, especially because I don't have the rifle attacks, I barely use endurance at all. I may rethink, but acid mortar vs. basically anything, well, acid mortar wins. And I think I get a new bot at 12. Thus far, I'm doing okay with the taser and just using caltrops, web grenade, and so on -- I can do SOMETHING with nearly every available second, even if it's pretty marginal.

Okay.

Can someone explain the whole "ranged minions in melee" thing? I've been told it's a bug, I've been told it's a feature, I don't get it. I can lock enemies down at close to my bots' maximum range, which would allow them to quietly snipe until whatever it is falls down. Obviously, this means they run forward and whack things. WHAT THE HELL GUYS! THAT IS A PRECISION-CRAFTED PULSE LASER! IF I WANTED YOU TO HIT THINGS, YOUR HAND WOULD BE A CRICKET BAT.

It's based on the AI and the priority of attacks. Naturally if the bots have all their attacks the AI prefers the ranged attacks while farther from the foes. If they run out of ranged attacks due to recharge time, then they bum rush the foe and try to whack. What is funny is when the bot recharges a ranged attack right when they arrive in melee and they 'put a cap in' the foe's head with a snipe shot. LOL

Okay, I'm starting to get into levels where it's worth slotting things.

What should I slot for in battle drones? What should I slot for in protector bots? I'm assuming that enhancing the bots as much as I can is a pretty good strategy.

Once you've got three of them, your battle drones will be two levels below you, so they need to be slotted heavily for accuracy and damage: three of each, or a set of Blood Mandate.

Your protector bots have a great many things they're doing: healing, forcefielding, attacking, and they tend to use quite a bit of endurance doing so. Once you've got two of them, they'll be one level below you. Ideally, you'd slot them with three damage, two accuracy, three defense, and one endurance. Adding three healing to that is somewhat controversial: some people report that if you do so, the bots will wait longer to heal, but I haven't seen that.

Slot your Bots like attack powers.

1-2 Accuracy, 2-3 Damage.

Once you get 4 or 5 slots in the Protector Bots it's worth it to slot a Def in there too. It'll boost the Def of their bubbles and stack with FFG and Leadership:Maneuvers. This becomes way worth it as soon as you get two Prot bots at level 24.

Made it to 15, still loving it.

So far:

1: Web Grenade, Battle Drones
2: Caltrops
4: Triage Beacon
6: Equip Robot
8: Hover
10: Acid Mortar
12: Protector Bots
14: Maneuvers

Planned:
16: Force Field Generator
18: Tactics
20: Poison Trap
22: Repair
24: Fly
26: Assault Bot
28: Seeker Drones
30: Swift
32: Upgrade Robot
35: Trip Mine
38: Detonator

Things I want:
Health/Stamina (optional, maybe, and if I don't get them, I'll drop Swift -- not sure what else I'd get, maybe Assault?)

I'm not sure whether I need Stamina. Thus far I haven't used much blue in combat, because it's all robots anyway; spamming taser and web grenade, plus caltrops/etc., is simply not using much, but I think that changes once I have a couple of leadership toggles.

Group Fly has been recommended just because it makes it easier to keep together with bots while travelling.

Repair, I know some people compare it unfavorably to the Medicine pool power, but it's not interruptible, and I often have one bot badly injured while the others are fine. Sounds like it would help.

What's a good Patron pool for this? What am I doing wrong?

I'd skip Detonator. It costs far too much end, being as you then need to resummon a robot and buff him up. If you do take it, know that it inherits the robot's slotting and is not affected by damage slots in Detonate, so leave it at the one slot it comes with.

Repair is really bad and Aid Other is superior. You will find that you need it up more often than it is, or you will find yourself holding off on using in just in case your big robot friend needs it, or you will use it on a protector bot and then suddenly your big friend will eat a few heavy hits and keel over. At best it's up once a minute or so and that's just a waste of a power. Aid Other will heal far more over time and be up a dozen times for every once that Repair is up.

I feel the only patron worth taking is the Mu patron because it is the only AoE immobilize with -kb, preventing Big Bertha from blasting everything out of her burn patches with missiles.

Some key enhancements/IOs ideas and thoughts:

• Three Nucleolus Exposures, one Explosive Strike proc, and the Sovereign Right(10% resist all)/Edict of the Master(5% defense against all) uniques is the best way to slot your little guys. Up till the point you can slot the Nucleolus Exposures, slot one acc/3 dam or four pieces of Blood Mandate, excluding the two that don't include damage. The uniques make a huge difference so get them as soon as you can!
• Protector bots need endredux, I find. Their bubbling shenanigans cost them a good chunk of end. I keep them slotted with the aforementioned Blood Mandate foursome, and the last two slots are Defense IOs. Gotta softcap them bots!
• Don't slot heals into the protector bots. They will not use their heal until it will be fully used, meaning if they can heal for 300, they won't heal at all until someone has taken a minimum of 300 damage.
• Big Bertha works well with three Nucleolus Exposures, the Explosive Strike proc, and the Soulbound Allegiance proc. Alternates are once again the four piece Blood Mandate, but the Soulbound Allegiance proc is not optional. It's a really huge deal!

I leveled a Bots/Poison to 50 without stamina prior to the change where all the pets are affected by a single equip/upgrade. I am sure with some endurance slotting in your Traps in well placed IO enhancements you will be fine.

I would skip Detonator, too. For detonator, you get more bang for your buck from your top tier robot self-destructing. That's also your biggest damage dealer.

Mu has the kb resistant immobilize, but I like the Scorpion shield for its stacking of defense on the mastermind in bodyguard mode at higher levels.

There are situations especially in warehouse and tech lab maps where I like group fly to position the bots for attack to avoid problematic pathing if they run up ramps and stairs under the gun. Group fly is also a god-send, even with the -acc, for fighting Knives of Artemis and their ungodly stacking of caltrops. Finally, you just have to love the robots using rocket boots when in group fly mode for the visual effect.

I would have thought that "interrupted in combat" would weigh against Aid Other. I guess I shouldn't be getting hit too much, though.

I like Aid Other and Repair on my non-heal Robot masterminds like traps, FF, Trick Arrow, etc. Save Repair for the protector bots and the assault bot. Patching up with Aid Other is useful.

I'm not seeing a noticeable endurance cost from bubbles on SHOVER-01. He briefly dips to nearly 90% when bubbling three new bots, that's it.

I sorta like that idea -- wouldn't hurt to have both, since I have more free slots than I'm used to due to not taking the pulse rifle stuff. Three skippable power is win.

Okay, given some useful feedbacks, the revised thoughts are:

18: Tactics
20: Poison Trap
22: Aid Other
24: Fly
26: Assault Bot
28: Seeker Drones
30: Group Fly
32: Upgrade Robot
35: Trip Mine
38: Repair

I have no picks for 41/44/47/49. I could fill stuff in from another regular power pool or from a patron pool. Group Fly really does appeal just for the fun value of the Flying Robot Squadron.

FFG is love. With FFG, protector bot, and maneuvers, my defense against just about everything is already 23%. That's starting to be pretty effective. I do note, though, that later on I may well find myself well past soft-cap, in which case maybe I should at that point think about swapping maneuvers for assault.

Still, FFG has moved this character from "I do decent damage but I have to be totally on top of my powers or my bots fall over" to "how do I position my mortar so I can get both of these mobs at once".