Sappers.
Just did a tip mission where like, 10 ambushed my Blaster. Perma held with no endurance = death.
Circle of Thorn 1-50 if anything spectral is included.
Low level game - Vahz although endurance-draining clockwork are no picnic either
High level game - Knives & Vanguard
Individuals - Carnie bosses and Shard Eyes.
Runner Ups - Sky Raider Engineers or Malta Sappers when there is more than one in a spawn.
Edit: Super Stunners are climbing the ladder quickly and may soon knock something off the list.
Master Illusionists. Especially when you get two of them and they both pop their Dark Servant, so you can't hit them until the servant goes away, by which time all your insps have expired and they can kill you.
Spectral Demon Lords at those levels when you suck, have no stamina, no accuracy and no mez or anything to turn their stupid debuff off. They also spawn in direct proportion to how much you rely on lethal damage.
Those Vanguard dudes with that debuff that lasts five minutes and persists through death. I'm not entirely sure they should be on this list though, since this is a thread about "tough" critters not cheating critters.
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Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper
Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Progressman
Just for fun, what do you think is the most frustrating or difficult enemy in a group that you can come across?
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When I first started playing and encountered The Vahzilok (oh the horrible memories
) I yelled and cussed and hurt my hand slamming it against my desk! I would say the Trolls bosses but they have nothing on the Mortificators! To this day forward I always...always avoid them like the diseased vermin they are!!
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Let me try my psychic powers....|
Originally Posted by Zikar
Sappers.
Just did a tip mission where like, 10 ambushed my Blaster. Perma held with no endurance = death. |
....I'm getting a vision of a toy....
...An action figure...
...Wearing a brimmed hat and carrying two pistols....
Could it be... A 'Malta Gunslinger Action Figure'?
The ambushes in that mission are ludicrous. I got 12 or 13, with something like 4 second spacing when I did that one. Never again, it gets deleted whenever I get it again.
Warning:
The above post may contain Cynicism, sarcasm and/or pessimism. If you object to the quantities contained, then tough.
It's the Master Illusionists for me. Even with characters who can survive the storm of pets the dark servant combined with their timer phase which ignores being mezzed can stretch a fight with a single Master Illusionist out to EB levels of time to defeat.
Surprised that nobody's mentioned the Longbow Nullifiers yet. Somtimes spacing or being surrounded by mobs doesn't let you get out of that sonic grenade. To say nothing of all the Longbow ambushes in tip missions. Defense bonuses are all the rage these days, which helps, sure, but at base SO/IO levels those grenades can make even the minions in the spawn deadly.
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Can I have yours? I love that one on my DM/SD Scrapper. |
Originally Posted by Canine
Could it be... A 'Malta Gunslinger Action Figure'?
The ambushes in that mission are ludicrous. I got 12 or 13, with something like 4 second spacing when I did that one. Never again, it gets deleted whenever I get it again. |
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Originally Posted by TheBruteSquad
Surprised that nobody's mentioned the Longbow Nullifiers yet. Somtimes spacing or being surrounded by mobs doesn't let you get out of that sonic grenade. To say nothing of all the Longbow ambushes in tip missions. Defense bonuses are all the rage these days, which helps, sure, but at base SO/IO levels those grenades can make even the minions in the spawn deadly.
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The problem with Nullifiers is that the sonic grenade- and beanbag-spamming little ***** are the ONLY lieutenant Longbow have. If you're facing a decent-sized spawn and you're not a defense set the Longbow Burst-spammers will quickly strip any defense you've accumulated from inspirations, set bonuses, and most team buffs, your resistance will be in the negatives, and the Beanbag stacking will probably overcome your mez protection.
What makes their sameness even more annoying is that the devs went out of their way to design 50 million bosses for Longbow. Bosses that you'll hardly see unless you're on a decent-sized team or higher difficulty. Nullifiers, you'll go through multiples even solo on base difficulty. Stupid, boring, lame Nullifiers.
Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper
Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World
Quote:
I did that one as well. I turned around the corner and I swear there must have been at least 30 Malta! This was at 0/0 +3 and it spawned a red named Gunslinger plus 3 of this gunslinger pals along with sappers, a hercules robot, and all the rest of the gang. I had time to say "Oh Sh--!" and was dead!
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Originally Posted by Canine
Let me try my psychic powers....
....I'm getting a vision of a toy.... ...An action figure... ...Wearing a brimmed hat and carrying two pistols.... Could it be... A 'Malta Gunslinger Action Figure'? The ambushes in that mission are ludicrous. I got 12 or 13, with something like 4 second spacing when I did that one. Never again, it gets deleted whenever I get it again. |
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My melee characters have a great time against the KoA. In fact, the fights might be a bit too easy, but they're a breather between tougher factions. Caltrops? What caltrops? Oh, that's right, they don't use them on me when I'm hovering just over their heads.|
Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha
My most hated group, though?
Knives of Artemis on a melee character. FFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUU- CALTROPS!!  |
The Spectral Daemon Lords can be nasty in the lower levels. Destroyer leaders seem to be nasty so far too, with their status effect protection and hard-hitting attacks. Later on, Vanguard can be tricky for my melee characters, while Malta can be tricky for my squishier characters (due to all their long-lasting status effect attacks).
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The Vigilante version of that mission isn't so bad. But yes, the Hero version is ludicrous.
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Originally Posted by Canine
Could it be... A 'Malta Gunslinger Action Figure'?
The ambushes in that mission are ludicrous. I got 12 or 13, with something like 4 second spacing when I did that one. Never again, it gets deleted whenever I get it again. |
At higher levels: Longbow and Arachnos
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they were worse, good lord were they worse. they parked my sr character for a time. this was pre papers and all my arcs were cot, i just gave up. they could stack quicksand and make me cry.
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Originally Posted by Feycat
Ugh, I forgot about CoT. But for me, their range of death comes in the Earth Mage levels. EFF those things and their quicksand. Eff them even more in groups of 5 or more :|
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Vahz are an easy one to pick for the lower levels. Fun and cool looking, but all that slow at that early a level is a huge pain.
Mook Hitmen run off a fair distance for a good chunk once they get sniper rifles(want to say post 10.)
15-22, it's solidly the Circle of Thorns, with thier Spectral Daemon Lords and self-destructing mages spite kills. At least redside, you get a little more mixing it up with the Hordeling Berserkers.
20-35 or so, is Tsoo and their myriad of cool bosses, but 2 lieutenant types. If it's not the Sorcerors teleporting everywhere and healing everyone, it's the Kinetics, not melee, using ones that spam siphon speed and siphon power on you like mad men for what seems like their first 3 attacks and then, to top it off, they run away all the time.
Shock Treatment and Giga Byte, the two Safeguard bank robbers, that both have electric melee and armor that show up in the 30s, popping their tier 9(without a crash) are a pain in the kiester, and if you have the good fortune of taking too long fighting them, they can pop it more than once.
Friggin' LB Nullifiers!!!!! The only time they're not a total scream-at-my-monitor-pain-in-the-*** is when they're confused and helping me.
For me, the nastiest were Void Bosses back in I3-I4 timeframe on my
Peacebringer... 1-Shot hospital trips more times than I can count.
For awhile, there was an Issue with CoT, and they'd spam Mud Pots at
the same frequency Knives spawn Caltrops, with pretty much the same
results.
The "new" Longbow Nullifiers are especially nasty for my SS/WP Brute (at
x/8 difficulty settings) due to them tanking both Res and Regen... Ouch.
My stalkers, on the other hand, eat them for lunch... 
It's very AT specific for the most part.
I guess if I were to pick the toughest critters in general, I'd look at Rikti
Pylons or Giant Monsters (out on Monster Island or N of Peregrine Island).
You're really talking about high-end exceptional builds (or teams, of
course) if you even want a shot at taking those out...
Rikti Cruisers probably top that list (if you can even defeat them at all
anymore), as it took multiple teams typically to handle them.
All the other stuff can be soloed at "reasonable" difficulty settings with
most AT's.
Regards,
4
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Low Level = The igneous. They hit hard, they run fast and they can destroy a good team in a split of a second! But i love them for it 
Mid level = Sky raider engineer. They are the only minion in the entire game that i have to target first otherwise an otherwise easy fight turns into potentially quite tough.
High level = Illusionists. They aint tough really, its just their phase power is very annoying and can frustrate me in to scrapperlock on a controller.
Overall = Rikti monkey. Seriously if you face a large spawn of them, do you see how fast your health goes down? O_o
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That huge mutated and deformed Rikti Monkey monster is a toughy.
Really depends on the mob. My Blasters have an easier time than my melee types with the Vanguard, for instance, though that one mission where you get ambushed by waves of them is quite harsh even then.
Vahzilok and CoT are a tossup in the teens, to be honest. Both can do some nasty stuff to you and make things tough... part of why I usually prefer running both instance of the Posi TF on smaller teams. Tsoo are probably the worst in the 20s, though the Warriors can be tough if you have to close to melee with them (and you don't have what it takes to survive there). They hit hard up close.
Thirties are probably CoT again, as those Earth Mages can be rough on defense. 40s... dunno. Carnies can be easy on some ATs, like my Blaster, but then the Master Illusionists are really hard with the pets and phasing. Now if you have a lot of defense and do lethal damage... Carnies are a breeze. Whereas Malta might be rough with how they resist lethal.
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Originally Posted by Canine
Let me try my psychic powers....
....I'm getting a vision of a toy.... ...An action figure... ...Wearing a brimmed hat and carrying two pistols.... Could it be... A 'Malta Gunslinger Action Figure'? |
Quote:
The what now?
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Originally Posted by LISAR
That huge mutated and deformed Rikti Monkey monster is a toughy.
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Low Level:
Vahz! I am pretty sure my first trip to the hospital has come from a Vahz mish on 100% of my hero characters.
High Level:
Malta, they aren't bad, a few at a time, but they are a major pain when you encounter large mobs. They throw a little of everything at you!
Lately it's all of them. For some reason they seem to run a lot more. It's really annoying playing on a SR.
Before that it was the KoA. They way they stack those caltrops is nasty.
Who do I have to *&^% around here to get more Targeted AoE recipes added?
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Citizens in mayhem missions.
No matter how many times I attack them, no matter how many debuffs they run through, no matter what I do... I still haven't ever killed one. And those are just the grey cons.
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Originally Posted by PleaseRecycle
it has gone from unconscionable to downright appalling that we have no way of measuring our characters' wetness.
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Originally Posted by Brillig
It's hard to beat the entertainment value of Whackjob Wednesdays.
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Vahzilok would be my pick for the toughest enemy group. Multiple toxic hits, stacked slows and exploding zombies can turn any fight into a team wipe very fast if you're unlucky.
Was it Castle or one of the other devs who said a while back they'd like to expand the level range of the Vazhilok? The thought of those guys getting a GR style upgrade is simultaneously interesting and a bit scary.
Most of my other nominations are AT specific, like Scrapyarders, who seem to exist solely to remind Masterminds that they're not invincible after all.
Honorable mention to the Spectral Pirates. To the best of my knowledge the only arc you fight them in is An Arachnos Ghost Story, but they have nasty dark attacks which few characters will have resistance to, sword attacks that debuff your defence, and they fly, rendering knockback and slows like caltrops and tar patch useless.