Bots/Traps Info needed.

I've recently returned to CoX and the US servers after a long break. Before that break, I played on the EU servers and decided to fire up my original US account duel to dwindling numbers.

I used to play a Bots/DM MM and loved it, I never seemed to have any issues playing that setup. Having returned to the game and not having any of my old chars, (can't remember if I deleted them or they were transferred to EU) I decided I needed to have a character that would be able to farm well. I did some reading and decided on Bots/Traps .. Problem is, I'm 24 now and things just don't seem to be going as smoothly as I remember my Bots/DM going.

I'm currently built like this: (Pay no attention to slotting levels etc, just thrown this together to show the build)

Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1.803
http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Level 25 Science Mastermind
Primary Power Set: Robotics
Secondary Power Set: Traps
Power Pool: Speed
Power Pool: Leadership
Power Pool: Fitness

Villain Profile:
Level 1: Battle Drones -- Acc(A), Acc(3), Dmg(3), Dmg(5), Dmg(5), EndRdx(7)
Level 1: Web Grenade -- Acc(A), Immob(7), Immob(13), Immob(15)
Level 2: Caltrops -- RechRdx(A)
Level 4: Triage Beacon -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(15), RechRdx(21), Heal(21), Heal(23)
Level 6: Equip Robot -- EndRdx(A)
Level 8: Hasten -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(9), RechRdx(9)
Level 10: Maneuvers -- DefBuff(A), DefBuff(11), DefBuff(11)
Level 12: Protector Bots -- Acc(A), Acc(13)
Level 14: Super Speed -- Run(A)
Level 16: Force Field Generator -- DefBuff(A), DefBuff(17), DefBuff(17)
Level 18: Acid Mortar -- Acc(A), DefDeb(19), DefDeb(19), RechRdx(23)
Level 20: Hurdle -- Jump(A)
Level 22: Health -- Heal(A)
Level 24: Stamina -- EndMod(A)
Level 26: [Empty]
Level 28: [Empty]
Level 30: [Empty]
Level 32: [Empty]
Level 35: [Empty]
Level 38: [Empty]
Level 41: [Empty]
Level 44: [Empty]
Level 47: [Empty]
Level 49: [Empty]
------------
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Supremacy
Level 2: Ninja Run

| Copy & Paste this data into Mids' Hero Designer to view the build |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|
|MxDz;986;432;864;HEX;|
|78DA9D91DB4EC2401086B750288742A91535C42BBDF2A6D71E2E4C3C252490A8683|
|46A240516D9045AD2AD463C243E80AFE08BA0F1D5EA4E770A8A57BA49BF7FF7DF99|
|D9E96EFD7E4F27E4659B28A5DDBEC379B3EEF080FA03E676B4469B51B74D894608A|
|94CFD66E37630F05CFBD86B79016BF3F2B7AD9DDB6ED73EF19D2137AB6E8FFAD40D|
|EC78923BF4BCBEDD1852DA31A2698D3A1DEAF31E1BEAD1FA80052EE5DC8C1655F78|
|E71D6627D168CACFD216BDBBB3DC7BFA1D8E0684934B526BE718AE008E54C4D9244|
|AC49A9EA8CA635A92375929B8C73D3BA541DB588FA206215194B14537A8FC29389A|
|19A44AF883A1F6B4EEA02EA87E832857552D8C78A504D7A090DF332336A8A802CC6|
|6455E9E566F45314CECB18258FFFA3A3AE8AFC029E5BB0A4F72CF20CAC69608DD28|
|C3E0935F18E4CAC3597FAA90BE6F45E2D459E6115A5A709AF8C5E19EF2023BC45F4|
|16D3D20BFF3C96A7AF47A27452FBE51C7E7FB5C8A94F63C26C69B2FBDF31D6E372D|
|923F8BB06E014700638075C002E0157806B401310BE4FB28D75E86B03B009D80294|
|457FE415223578CE3C4007140045800128012C4005F00608BF0010DAE065|
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|

Move hasten and SS farther down to later levels if at all. You can buy jet packs in grandville if you have grandville access. My traps mm didn't even get SJ till 41.

You should have poison trap by 22 latest this is one of the gem powers of traps it is a pulsing puke hold and -regen.

I didn't go with leadership pool but with aid other and self to heal pets and self from damage that gets through FFG, scorp shield and enforcer buffs which should be about the same for bots defense wise though they have more resist and 2 healing pets.

You might consider taking one of the single target attacks instead of triage beacon as that is not that great for healing pets because of thier low hp's and it's long recharge. If you go with rifle burst the knockback can give you some breathing room and also gives you a pulling tool other then vet attacks or origin power or using pets allowing you to use bodyguard mode for alpha's.

Also if you wasn't around the pet upgrades are Area buffs now and will upgrade all pets in range(have seen some new/returning players cast it on each one of thier pets when it is AE effect now)

You want acid morter, seekers, ffg, and poison trap from traps as those are the 4 major powers of the set. Trip mine can give you some self damage. Caltrops is a area denial or scatter and with range pets it keeps targets from closing to melee for a bunch of attacks. Use web nade on difficult targets it slows recharge so they can't use big powers as often.

My bots/traps just made 28, and has started habitually running missions at +1/x2 or so instead of the +0/x1 or even -1/x1 I tend to favor while levelling (I'd rather get mission XP and not die, thanks).

I got hover about where you got hasten, and fly at 24. My level 18 power was tactics (this was intended to cover the weak spot introduced by the battle drones being another level lower than me). Key points:

1. Level 6 helped a ton for moving from "I suck" to "this isn't so bad".
2. Web grenade has -50% recharge to enemies. Don't overlook that.
3. Caltrops, caltrops, caltrops.

By 20-22, I had a bunch of things slotted with IOs, especially recharge speed on things like acid mortar and triage beacon and caltrops -- the key weakness of most traps is that you can't have them up ALL THE TIME.

The biggest difference: I have not taken ANY of the fitness pool. The reality is, I just plain don't need that much endurance, and triage beacon > health.

So... Up through 6, we agreed. I then did:

8: hover
10: acid mortar
12: protector bot
14: maneuvers
16: ffd
18: tactics
20: poison gas trap
22: aid other
24: fly
26: assault bot
28: seeker drones

PGT is an awesome ability. It's a big enough -regen to make it pretty practical to wear an elite boss down... And a hold that will take anything short of a boss out of the fight for a while. Aid Other covers for the biggest weakness of this set -- lack of heals for those fragile little bots. (Which gets a lot better at 24, but even then, it sure is nice to have a spare heal around.)

My basic strategy when pulling: Leave bots on defensive/follow, run into group, drop PGT, drop acid mortar, drop caltrops, work on knitting that sock I wanted. This is why I don't have Stamina; on most pulls, I don't need it. Other subtleties include droping an acid mortar on my way in, or opening with seeker drones (still not used to them, and haven't got enough +recharge in them to have them up all the time).

This annihilates most pulls. If I'm having trouble burning things down, once I've got enough debuffs out, I'll start picking targets and setting bots to attack them. Be sure you have keybindings for all bots follow, all bots attack, and probably defensive/passive/aggressive. Be sure that, if you use the "default" buttons, you edit their macros to remove the sucky "attack always implies a shift to aggressive" thing, because that CRIPPLES your control over your bots.

Thanks for the replies, folks.

Quote:

Originally Posted by seebs My bots/traps just made 28, and has started habitually running missions at +1/x2 or so instead of the +0/x1 or even -1/x1 I tend to favor while levelling (I'd rather get mission XP and not die, thanks).

Back when I was playing my Bots/DM, I played on max difficulty. Not sure how the new difficulty settings work, but I've left it at default and could quite easily drop it lower at times.

Quote:

Originally Posted by seebs I got hover about where you got hasten, and fly at 24

I went with hasten to give me more access to acid mortar and triage beacon. Taking hasten led me to super speed. I would prefer hover and flight for defense and mobility.

Quote:

Originally Posted by seebs By 20-22, I had a bunch of things slotted with IOs, especially recharge speed on things like acid mortar and triage beacon and caltrops.

I'm using DO's right now, but cash is flowing a lot easier now that i'm selling crap on the black market, so i will look into IO's.

Quote:

Originally Posted by seebs The biggest difference: I have not taken ANY of the fitness pool. The reality is, I just plain don't need that much endurance, and triage beacon > health.

These skills weren't needed on my /DM MM, the only reason I took them on this build is because my bots die constantly. So it would make life a little easier when I need to resummon, mid battle.

I have ninja run now, so when I respec, I will be dropping any travel skills, maybe just take hover. I will also pick up poison trap and give it a go. I'll push to 32 and decide if it's worth continuing this setup, or if I'm going to remake my bots/dm

Poison trap is UNBELIEVABLY AMAZING.

I see your point about Hasten -- by 25ish, I have enough recharge that it hasn't been a big problem for a while, I nearly always have one or two of those powers up, and the bots are a LOT more durable now than they used to be.

Hover's combination of defense and mobility is awesome, and it also helps a bit with the problem where I can't see anything but robot butts.

Ok, this is what I have planned now. Not too sure about trip mine, it was thrown in at the last level. It was a choice between that or vengeance. Perhaps the latter would be better, considering the lack of slots. Feel free to tear it apart, any and all advice is welcomed.

Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1.803
http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Level 50 Magic Mastermind
Primary Power Set: Robotics
Secondary Power Set: Traps
Power Pool: Flight
Power Pool: Leadership
Power Pool: Medicine
Power Pool: Fighting
Ancillary Pool: Mu Mastery

Villain Profile:
Level 1: Battle Drones -- Acc-I(A), Acc-I(3), Dmg-I(3), Dmg-I(5), Dmg-I(5)
Level 1: Web Grenade -- Acc-I(A), Immob-I(7), Immob-I(29), Immob-I(34), RechRdx-I(36), EndRdx-I(43)
Level 2: Caltrops -- Slow-I(A), Slow-I(36), Dmg-I(36), Dmg-I(37), RechRdx-I(37), RechRdx-I(37)
Level 4: Triage Beacon -- Heal-I(A), Heal-I(7), Heal-I(9), RechRdx-I(9), RechRdx-I(39), RechRdx-I(39)
Level 6: Equip Robot -- EndRdx-I(A)
Level 8: Hover -- DefBuff-I(A), DefBuff-I(43), DefBuff-I(43)
Level 10: Acid Mortar -- DefDeb-I(A), DefDeb-I(11), DefDeb-I(11), RechRdx-I(34), RechRdx-I(39), RechRdx-I(40)
Level 12: Protector Bots -- Acc-I(A), Acc-I(13), Dmg-I(13), Dmg-I(15), DefBuff-I(15), DefBuff-I(40)
Level 14: Maneuvers -- DefBuff-I(A), DefBuff-I(19), DefBuff-I(19)
Level 16: Force Field Generator -- DefBuff-I(A), DefBuff-I(17), DefBuff-I(17)
Level 18: Tactics -- ToHit-I(A), ToHit-I(25), ToHit-I(29)
Level 20: Poison Trap -- Hold-I(A), Hold-I(21), Hold-I(21), RechRdx-I(23), RechRdx-I(23), RechRdx-I(25)
Level 22: Aid Other -- RechRdx-I(A)
Level 24: Kick -- Acc-I(A)
Level 26: Assault Bot -- Acc-I(A), Acc-I(27), Dmg-I(27), Dmg-I(33), Dmg-I(34)
Level 28: Seeker Drones -- ToHitDeb-I(A), ToHitDeb-I(31), ToHitDeb-I(31), RechRdx-I(31), RechRdx-I(33), RechRdx-I(33)
Level 30: Tough -- ResDam-I(A), ResDam-I(46), ResDam-I(50)
Level 32: Upgrade Robot -- EndRdx-I(A)
Level 35: Weave -- DefBuff-I(A)
Level 38: Fly -- Flight-I(A), Flight-I(40), Flight-I(42)
Level 41: Charged Armor -- ResDam-I(A), ResDam-I(42), ResDam-I(42)
Level 44: Electrifying Fences -- Acc-I(A), Dmg-I(45), Dmg-I(45), Dmg-I(45), RechRdx-I(46), RechRdx-I(46)
Level 47: Static Discharge -- Acc-I(A), Dmg-I(48), Dmg-I(48), Dmg-I(48), RechRdx-I(50), RechRdx-I(50)
Level 49: Trip Mine -- RechRdx-I(A)
------------
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Supremacy
Level 2: Ninja Run

| Copy & Paste this data into Mids' Hero Designer to view the build |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|
|MxDz;1408;593;1186;HEX;|
|78DA9D93EB6E125110C70F3791025D10B194B2A5B4A52D6EBB2DFAC5CB07132F4D4|
|CBA49B51A8D1A09C216368185B09058AF7D005FC11769ABD127C3993353D813FBA9|
|1BF8FF76FF3B7366E6ECAEF5F1714288E30722907AD4A97B5ECDAA7B437BD075DC6|
|6C4AAB79C86880A21F253B77630EA767BAEF9BCF7A137741A5ED677EBE1E8F0D07C|
|31A8F7BDF453B76D0F6C77689E9FC4F77BBD8EB9DB715AEDA126CFF7EC7AD31E786|
|DA79F94D796DD741A8E6BD3D52E063A6E2BFFA4EF344C5F116BC43D1EE5A0B30AFC|
|4F22828F7158E401551164E812610547E1497884C3AFAC49140825C28A2171B324F|
|109B2029C15D8A600062DBBCA30FCF80C5921CE0AAD522DC25506C5AD2938838168|
|A6B18850F9183C862859C1E82235A6E00B548A71A558515A330A4A4A8975C26F281|
|3E7AC38ED458241E3CC32A8C83A210D9D24B9992459D7147C8566340ED0C84A29C8|
|C00A690E48DF92568E50207C831532DC58A62CADEB0A6E187EE4083A2C9BE58DCB9|
|215046B8EAD391AED0F0C3DCFEFCB3C5979064DBB442811BE432B0BDCCAC26D692D|
|AAA04A4B0A4250570FD084FAA6B4B60855C25FE8A2C88D15E9218721679972C4326|
|D541CAC326F5479851E02A1423883D76B83033668E58A825F106070FB068DB9A95F|
|802DC38F53C83239CBA4AC6DFD02540D3F8E61AB7678A61DB20AD3AF0D7E7088BDF|
|F9CFDE9B72502D2B1A631E3586A72F7B2C749E27CB9D8B319D003949728AF505EA3|
|BC41798BF20EE53D4A0D657C3AC9D6EE605F7751EEA1DC47C9427FE2074646F1538|
|AA324509228B3281A4A0A25839247F98932FE071C9BE47C|
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|