Really Hard Way -- Strategy tips

Just completed two runs on Virtue today. Here are a few tips that we patched together on our runs:

1. Last phase is 20 mins, just enough time to spawn lore pets twice. Once at the beginning and once again at the 15 min mark. Some pets are ready in 10, but hold onto those until all lore pets are ready at 15 mins and have a coordinated release if necessary at the 15ish min mark.

2. Bring 6 ultimates on each character. They don't stack and last for 3 mins. Use them to keep everyone on the league level shifted throughout the final battle. They are 2 astrals per insp in ouro. You can also get them on the market though they appear to be relatively expensive right now.

3. The succesful leagues that I've run on have had lots of corruptors. The advantage being that they have both buffs and damage. Defenders are good as well but controllers MMs and Doms, not so much. At this point, keep those ATs to a minimum. Tanks as well. Corrs, stalkers and blasters, and to a lesser degree, scrappers and brutes. I can't speak to heats and veats as I don't play them much. I'm guessing that if you've a solid team of single target damage, a solid team of corrs, the third team can be a mash up of anything else.

4. Support Hybrid is a plus, barrier destiny is a plus, and Longbow Cat+Null lore is a plus. Support hybrid gives bonus damage to all, barrier helps keep everyone alive, and longbow Cataphracts have a good -regen (I'm told, I cannot independently confirm).

So essentially, pop ultimate insps as often as you can, spawn lore pets immediately when the phase starts and be sure to put them on aggressive towards Tyrant, keep hybrids up as often as you can, and keep destinies and all other buffs fresh throughout. Wait until ALL lore pets have recharged, about 5 mins remaining in the phase, then do a mass spawn of lore pets and do a final push if you didn't defeat within the first five. Use barrier AFTER you spawn your pets to make sure they get the res and def buffs from the get go.

Just some pointers that worked for us. Let everyone know if you have something that could work better. Lets hammer it out so that we can get everyone the badge. Good luck everyone and send me a tell in game if you need help, got lots of toons I can bring.

I like to think my MM helped! It's worth noting that while we were heavy on the Corrs- and team make-up definitely did matter- it wasn't absolute.

One thing worth mentioning is Team Inspirations; I don't know how many were used in total but we had a lot on my team. I definitely used several.

Also, while you don't need to be 100% obsessed with the league make-up, I do think you need to insist on everybody having +3 level shift unless they bring something else amazing to the table. Even with that, everybody will be -6 to Tyrant, or -5 with Ultimates. Even if you do well on the earlier part of the fight you really need everybody to maximize their chances.

Communication is key, as well. The make or break moment for us was when we held the Lore Pets for our final push; that involved keeping everybody focused for 10 minutes when his health bar was relatively constant and making sure those with 10 minute recharge didn't drop their pets early.

This one definitely takes a well-coordinated, high-powered team. Which, of course, is the intent of the badge. I think, while difficult, it's relatively low on the luck factor, unlike Keyes, for example.

I can't thank Dogma enough for having lead us to victory on this particularly tricky badge!

Hi,

thanks for all above info and grats on the run

What about the use/value of our "Old Style" temps such as the 3 Warburg Nukes and Shivans and Heavies et cetera? Envenomed Dagger?

Have they any place in this trial and if so when strategically would be best to pop them? Would you drop them all together or on a rolling basis (looking at the 3 Nukes here)?

Any thoughts will be muchly appreciated.

Thanks

Thanks for posting Canine.

My experience running these on Freedom is that, yes, DEF/COR/CON/MM will probably make or break a 50+3 league. I think that will change noticeably in the next year when we get 50+4 or 50+5, as you Arcana notes considering purple patch issues, 50+3 against 50+9 is a huge disadvantage.

In the meantime, it seems having a good mix of buffs/debuffs will be essential.

However, I disagree with some of the conclusions people have made that -regen or LB Cats (because of their regen debuff) are helpful against Tyrant. Tyrant has regen debuff resistance = 100% (167%) : +87% from Resistance and 80% from Resist Physical Damage.

That means -regen does not work against him. Looking at his stats with Surveillance, for example, I could see multiple people debuffing him, including Cataphract Essence at a whopping -1.5%/sec, but nevertheless he was only affected by these 3 values:
Base: +.33%
Favor of the Well: +.50%
Scaling: 0.26% (observed at 29% health, it scales once he goes below 50%, so it's not the same number all the time)

What does seem to work is -HP and -RES powers.

Some have observed that Degenerative Interface is good for -HP, although it's stackable only 4 times and only -1000k HP each. Still, it's something.

His RES is somewhat underwhelming as well, it's just counterbalanced by his scaling REGEN.

Some -RES debuffs
Colds have Sleet and Heat Loss
Darks have Tar Patch
Rad has Enervating Field
Sonics have Sonic Siphon and Disruption Field
Storms have Freezing Rain
Thermals have Melt Armor
Times have Slowed Response
Traps have Acid Mortar
Tricks have Acid Arrow and Disruption Arrow
Pains have Anguishing Cry
Poisons have Envenom and Venomous Gas

and there's a host of other -RES powers (e.g., Munitions : Surveillance) available to other players.

Some +DMG buffs
Kins have Fulcrum Shift
Rads have Accelerate Metabolism
Pains have World of Pain

as well as ST buffs on some players, etc.

I'm considering Storm elementals as the alternative to Longbow for the exotic dmg. Ageless probably helps with Storms since they tend to run out of end, reducing their effectiveness in pylon tests (see http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=288994)

If Seers could be recharge buffed with Ageless and make them more effective, then they would probably be best, but never tested DPS of Seers with and without stacked Ageless.

I've also heard several leagues praise Ageless, probably for its Recharge bonus as well as End bonus. I think that's something to take seriously. If you only have a few ST attacks and some long recharge buffs, you want to have the best available asap throughout the fight.

I would also suggest using maybe 1 Incandescent on the league so the league can be ported together for the 2nd summon of Lores. That would help ensure they get the buffs they need and then into the fight. Trying to summon in last 5 mins with everyone spread probably minimizes their effectiveness.

Hitting Lore pets right away to do some initial burst damage, and then waiting until 5 minutes left until the final push (if you didn't get it done in the first one) really did seem to help out, and I think that's mainly because it let us get rid of the Olympian Guards quickly. Once Tyrant hits 40% he'll stop calling them and (unless I'm mistaken) even if he goes back above 40% after that they still don't come back. The Olympians feed Tyrant's buffs, which can be annoying, but they also run around and kill players. When you're taking out the wells you barely notice them because of the levelshifts, but on a Really Hard Way run they can be a HUGE pain. Taking them out early makes the rest of the run earlier.


Other than that, let's talk Hybrid powers for a bit. Support Hybrid is pretty useful here, as mentioned in the OP. Buffs/Debuffs are key here, so a power that buffs the entire league (as long as they're close enough together) is a definite help. However, it's important to note that you can only have 5 stacks of this power on you at any given time. Because the Hybrid powers are 2 minutes up and 2 minutes down, 10 Support Hybrids is probably the most you'll need (try to get people to stagger them so you have 100% uptime!).

After Support is nicely covered, I'd say Assault is the second pick. I'd suggest the Radial version for this, since it's still useful even if you're at the damage cap. During the attempts I was keeping myself as close as I could get to the damage cap as I could (between the team buffs and using inspirations), so Core would have been a waste. With Radial Assault, I could boost my damage even more, which helped a lot. And for this fight, you need every bit of extra damage you can get.

At a certain reward tier, you get an account reward of a certain number of team inspirations, it's one time use, though.

I am not the expert on regen, nor do I claim to be. But, it seems to me that my regen scrapper has a higher regen rate when I use Dull Pain. (thus increasing my HP - which by default, increases my regen rate)

I realize that with The Really Hard Way, no lights are being used, so none are worried about pets taking the level shifts away from the players.

However, if it can be stated that Trial AVs HP scale down corresponding with league size, than it is entirely possible that Tyrant is easier with 16 than with 24.

My base regen starts with 7.42 and then after DP has 10.04.

I do know that the Avatar of Hamidon HP does scale down with league size. It stands to reason that Tyrant's HP would also scale down.
Anything that lowers his base regen rate would probably lower that massive regen rate he gets - because it's probably the base regen that get's multiplied by some number that gets bigger as his hp gets lower.

Tyrant at 15 hp might have some ridiculous regen rate of 1500 hp, but that large value might be arrived at from his base regen rate. Lower that number with smaller league size, and you might have far easier time.

I will try to let you know if the theory works.
I've seen nothing to think it will or won't - it's just a theory. For all I know, Tyrant's regen rate has a floor.

These are some of my thoughts and tips for obtaining TRHW badge. They come from experience in leading 2 successful RHW runs on Union and the criteria I used for putting together the leagues.

1. +3 Level shifted only : Pref with Destiny and Lore slotted not just unlocked!

2. At least 5 Ultimate Inspirations (2 Astrals from ouro) the level shift is crucial)

3. Furious Rage Inspirations (ouro 1 Astral) and Large Green insps

4. As much Debuffs as you can get (-regen, -res, -hp)

5. As much ST Damage as you can get

6. Kinetic Buffs (constant Dam cap from FS, constant SB, -regen heals)

7. Dark Buffs (-regen heal, massive -regen rez, -res tarpatch, Mass rez)

8. Plan B and Plan C : As a contingency plan in case I didnt see us getting THW badge I had 3 people ready on my go to take out only 3 Lights 4 times to get us the HW badge. I also had 6 people prepped to take out all 6 wells should neither RHW or HW be an option. FAILING the trial was NOT an option, need to keep your league motivated, and getting some reward for completing. So Leader needs to be aware of time and dps and make the calls.

9. Committed League : you are asking 24 to potentially spend upwards of 10 Astrals or a considerable amount of inf, and several players thinking "meh I dont need to the others will carry me through" will impact the attempt.

10. FULL instructions and the 3 plans in place BEFORE you start the run. If at this point you have people not listening or saying "are we starting yet", or asking "what about lore pets" when you have clearly just said what your plan is regarding lore pets, then I'd kick rather than have the other 23 people waste Astrals/inf/time cos one person is not paying attention or is too impatient to not understand how crucial the instructions are Harsh? you're darn right!

11. My strategy was this: ALL in melee : CRACKLE WARNING - MOVE : RANGE ATTACKS till clear : ALL back in melee

I asked the league NOT to queue attacks, I asked the league to move AS SOON as the Red warning appeared and not to think "I have time for another attack cos I'm Uber" THAT one attack means the lightning strikes in melee of Tyrant. MOVE as soon as you see the warning and the lightning strikes away from him, leaving the FULL league able to get in Melee ASAP.

12. Lore pets/Hybrid/Interface/Destiny : I wasn't obsessed by any of these in particular, a nice mix was enough again looking for -res : - regen and -hp, and +rch +dam +regen, yes certain choices are better than others, but more important to me was a league that listened to and followed instructions.

13. Lore pets : I make the call for them when I see the "brick wall" where our DPS is getting Tyrant no lower, this has been both times around the 24-30 mark, so thats when we have been summoning the pets. Our Fights with Tyrant have been quite fast, took us 6.5 minutes the first time, so for us using lore pets at the beginning of the fight with him, then waiting for them to recharge for the final push was no use. The longer people have to focus the less focussed they become imo.

14. Guards and Other Damage: ALL being in melee as much as possible helps: Mass heals and Destiny buffs should keep you safe enough. A player missing out on 23 destiny buffs, or not in the spam heal radius for the 30 or so seconds inbetween each Crackle is gonna have problems.


Constant DPS is key, Dead players don't do damage : This will become easier when more people are able to dodge the lightning and so less deaths occur.

Fortunately this is a short, frustrating but fun trial so yeah it could be worse!

The Lore Longbow Cataphracts do indeed contribute -Regen

Kisana, thanks for posting the tips. I think the Freedom runs I've done are missing the melee component. That is, plenty of us are not going into melee if we're ranged, we're staying range to avoid the foot stomp.

Zombie Man, I would agree that against most AVs, LB Cats would do -regen, but check Tyrants Combat Attributes. Based on using Surveillance, I saw the following:

Tyrant has regen debuff resistance = 100% (167%) : +87% from Resistance and 80% from Resist Physical Damage.

So if his regen debuff resistance is 100%, I assume that means nothing can debuff his regen, even a little bit. I did screenshots with his regen in the window, and never saw it affected by player or pet debuffs.

I just want clarification, because I'm sure some people will think -regen is useful on this fight, but I think it was designed to be removed completely from the equation.

I'm also expecting Tyrant to have complete immunity to -regen. I'm not sure if that was intended, but it might be.

Even if his two resistances were compounded instead of added together, he would be reducing all -regen effects to around 3% of their base value, and that would be for even-level effects.

Edit: By the way, Tyrant definitely does scale with league size. Tyrant grows in +MaxHP and +Damage with larger leagues. He also suffers a regen debuff that increases in a stepwise fashion at 8, 12, 16, 20 and 24 players. (That's right, the more players there are, the less he regens. This Regen debuff cannot be resisted, so his 100% resistance is irrelevant.) These scaling effects are standard for iTrial AVs in all trials, but there are different values used in different trials for how high the scaling is.

I haven't been successful on a Really Hard Way run yet, but I like to instruct melee to run [i]backwards[i] from Tyrant when the warning comes. There's enough time for players who aren't queueing attacks to step backwards. If we're all facing him this leaves his back exposed where we can regroup to take him down.

Makerian got a lot of screenshots of AVs in the Mag trial using his Blaster with Surveillance, and I took a close look at them. The early AVs are no big deal, lots of HP and the level shift but vulnerable to regen and resistance debuffs like regular AVs.

Tyrant had 136,513.34 HP in a trial with 23 players and was a 54+5 AV. He had 100% Regen resistance, which means HE IS COMPLETELY IMMUNE TO REGEN DEBUFFS for the entire final scene. Ditto for Recovery, Recharge Time, and Defense. His base Regen is 0.07% HP/sec or 102 HP/sec. According to Makerian, Degenerative Interface does reduce his max HP and thus his Regen, but no one was using it in the screenhots I got so I can't verify that.

For resistances he had Unyielding and Resist Elements or Resist Energies which gave him around 19% Resistance to most things. He had 0% Psi Resist. Sometimes Unyielding would double stack for another 9% or so. Bruising and Achilles Heel are fully effective at 20% because of the way they work, but other resistance debuffs were resisted as usual due to the level difference. At +6 most debuffs are only 16% (about 1/6) effective. Reactive Interface was 0.38% with no lights.

Below 50% HP he gets Temp Invulnerability which adds 50% Smashing/Lethal Resistance for a total of around 70%. He resists Smashing/Lethal Resistance debuffs by that much as well. With a lot of stacked debuffs, he was at -62% Psi Resistance, -20% Fire/Cold/Energy/Neg/Toxic, but +50% Smashing/Lethal.

Below 50% HP his Regen starts increasing fast. It looks like it scales up linearly from 102 HP/sec at 50% HP to 1365 HP/sec at 10% HP. You need to REALLY crank up the damage at the end to beat his Regen and take him down. Note that Regen always happens in tics of 5%, the rate just determines how long it is between those tics. Near the end I believe he gains 5% HP in 5 seconds.

Now some personal observations from my runs...

Accuracy is VERY important in this. My Illusion/Rad Controller isn't slotted for much Accuracy at all, but she gets a lot from purple and other sets. She was hitting 95% of the time. PA was slotted with about 73% Accuracy, and was only hitting 35% of the time. It doesn't benefit from Tactics or anything else. PA really needs a LOT of Accuracy for this. It's probably worthwhile for me to slot Nerve Core Paragon. My Seer Lore pets were hitting 6.5% or 14% of the time!!! That Nerve Core Paragon is looking better and better as I believe Alpha slotting affects Lore pets, and I'll need Tactics as well for the Lores. Remember Tyrant resists Defense debuffs 100%, and you can't actually slot Lore pets with anything, so they need a lot of +ToHit from the rest of the team or league.

We don't have hardly any Kins in the hardcore Freedom badge community, so we don't have many or sometimes any on the badge runs. My damage bonus sucks. Due to sets I'm at +20%, plus I have Accelerate Metabolism, but in a trial with a single Kin the best I got was around +120% damage. That's simply not enough. We need more Kins.

I die a lot. I'm built to let PA tank, so no Tough or Weave. I need to change that. Between toggle debuffs and PA I can get a lot of agro from the guards, and a sneeze from one of them plus one of Tyrants PBAoEs and I'm dead. The Freedom badge community is light on bubblers, colds, sonics, and therms as well, so I have to rely on the healing around Tyrant. Frequently it's not enough.

Since Tyrant's damage can be buffed by eating his guards, that means it should be possible to debuff his damage as well. Kins are great for this, but Rads and others can help as well, maybe even Paralytic Interface.

People like Ageless Destiny, but a few Kins can easily give you massive Recharge and Recovery buffs. Have I mentioned that we need more Kins? Barrier Radial Epiphany is good for protection and rezzing people. Incandescence Core Epiphany is actually great for the huge Healing bonus it gives you. Those 222 point PBAoE heals become 400 point heals. That's HUGE! Plus it gets everyone together for buffs. Rebirth Core Epiphany is good for extra HP to keep people alive between heals, and squishies really need this.

Summary...

Regen debuffs are worthless.
Avoid Smashing/Lethal damage as much as possible.
PSI damage is best.
At least 1 Tanker for Bruising is highly recommended.
Several Achilles Heel procs are recommended.
At least 2 Bubblers/Colds for Defense.
At least 2 Sonics/Thermals for Resistance.
At least 3 Kins to cap damage & help with END & Recharge.
Everyone running the first 3 Leadership abilities.
Healing umbrella around Tyrant.
Interface: Degenerative, Reactive, Paralytic, or Cognitive for the Psi DoT.
Destiny: Barrier Radial, Incandescend or Rebirth Core.

Due to Scourge, Corruptors would be great for this. I suspect a league of 4 Psi/Kin, 4 Psi/FF, and 16 Psi/Sonic Corruptors could walk all over Tyrant.