I dislike Subjugators

[madmalkav]

So, I’ve heard Praetorian content is generally more difficult than old world. I honestly didn’t notice too bad a difference in the first 20 levels, and the story arcs are all pretty interesting. But I’ve ran two chars through part of First Ward now, and it seems more difficult than hero or villain in your 20’s. First, on my ninja blade stalker, I noticed that almost everything but ghouls prefers ranged attacks, so divine avalanche wasn’t helping much. Also, there’s a lot more psi damage. That doesn’t bother my ninja too much since his defenses are positional, but it’s definitely keeping me from heading this way on my Invuln brute. It’s also a pain on my primarily S/L resistant demons mastermind. I hear Night Ward is even more challenging than First Ward, but I haven’t tried it yet. Anyway, my point from the title...

 

I’ve handled most of the First Ward bosses without too much issue. There’s a boss called Subjugator that often leads to the hospital for me. I’m not sure the best strategy for her. She summons some basic seers as support.  I’ld normally just whale on the boss and clean up the minions later, but she consumes the minions to heal herself.  So I think I should probably kill them first so she can’t eat them later. On my stalker, I just kept whaling on her until she was dead, but he was still running at base difficulty since I didn’t know to turn it up, and she was still a noticeable speed bump. First time (and only time so far) that I hit one on my mastermind who runs the Ward normally at +2, he went to the hospital two or three times. Psi damage isn’t my fort, and she does a lot. She does a hard hitting aoe psi attack, and she also has a mass confusion. If I’m not immobilized or held or confused myself (I should probably get some break frees for this chick), it seems to be helpful to run away for a min then come back to her.  Anyone seen these before and have advice, so Ido t have to turn the diff back down, since I’m handling everything else without too much trouble?

[AShyStarspawn]

I am not how to help your brute with the psi damage, maybe some pool powers perhaps? With MMs though the general tactic I used go bodyguard, pull her out of the group and have your bets beat solely on her and any seers she pulls out so she doesn't eat them. You have to kill her fast tho because of that confuse you mentioned in your post being especially dangerous to MMs if it catches you at the wrong time. I have survived it a few times but that was because I was healing myself constantly.

 

Subjugators are definitely the most dangerous Awakened mob I'd say for sure since they have unique mechanics and an ultra-rare confuse mez to send at you.

[Coyotedancer]

Subjugators are nasty things... That Confuse effect isn't to be taken lightly if you're running with a partner or a team. (The matched pair of Stalkers that a friend and I were running together nearly killed each other once upon a time because of a Subjugator and some ridiculously bad timing with their quick-assassination attacks. It was not a Good Thing.)

 

If you can't flatten the thing instantly, you'll have to do a little target-juggling... When I was going through with my solo Fire sentinel, my usual routine was to blast them until they summoned the seers, then switch to the adds and take them out as quickly as possible, then go back to finish the Subjugator itself. 

[Coyote]

The Subjugator's Confuse effects is a strange toggle around her that builds up to where it confuses you. Backing off a bit to let the mag of the Confuse drop may be useful. I think she may also have a nasty PBAoE attack, though I don't recall if that's her or the Mindstormie thingie.

 

First Ward is definitely a step up in difficulty from normal content. Night Ward is yet another step up. I don't recall where else you fight the Awakened, or if only in the villain arc from Mr G, but they're like the nastiest villain group at its level. Maybe at any level. Definitely be careful when you get to those. I find the Channelers to be even worse, because they turn an entire spawn from dangerous to "kill you almost instantly", and being LTs they may have several in one spawn. Running at +2/x4 against them was a nightmare. And the Living Spells in Night Ward are almost as tough as the Awakened. It's definitely a wake-up call, and I often want to ask the players who run +4/x8 how they feel about +2/x4 in the Night Ward, hehe.

[AShyStarspawn]

1 hour ago, Coyote said:

The Subjugator's Confuse effects is a strange toggle around her that builds up to where it confuses you. Backing off a bit to let the mag of the Confuse drop may be useful. I think she may also have a nasty PBAoE attack, though I don't recall if that's her or the Mindstormie thingie.

 

First Ward is definitely a step up in difficulty from normal content. Night Ward is yet another step up. I don't recall where else you fight the Awakened, or if only in the villain arc from Mr G, but they're like the nastiest villain group at its level. Maybe at any level. Definitely be careful when you get to those. I find the Channelers to be even worse, because they turn an entire spawn from dangerous to "kill you almost instantly", and being LTs they may have several in one spawn. Running at +2/x4 against them was a nightmare. And the Living Spells in Night Ward are almost as tough as the Awakened. It's definitely a wake-up call, and I often want to ask the players who run +4/x8 how they feel about +2/x4 in the Night Ward, hehe.

Not to mention the Dredges whom hit like trucks (I am sure that they have -res powers up the wazoo), the Talons whom can wipe you if you don't not kill the Sirens immediately, and the Black Knights whom have this extremely annoying taunt mechanic which can really trip you up at times.

 

Honestly the only enemy group in Night Ward that doesn't hurt that much is Spirit Stalkers. First Ward, Awakened already being hard aside, is also pretty hard with the other enemy groups. The Carnival bosses hit extremely hard and the other enemies that follow them are no joke either. The Shephards stack Vengeance on eachother which can easily get you killed depending on your AT, if not it will take you a year to wittle them down. The Resistance gets Mystic Soldiers if you fight them in First Ward and they at that level have this one ability that hits pretty damn hard. The Forlorn if you do fight them also hit like trucks. T.E.S.T is easy to deal with my experiences and the Dregs are just super annoying.

Edited May 10, 2020 by Sleepymoth

[Peacemoon]

Definitely more difficult areas! I like the challenge but you have to be “ready” for it. We talk on here about how the game is too easy, these areas are definitely proof that the old devs were mindful about this. I haven’t done First Ward but Night Ward was hard.
 

The drudges more for the amount of pets they could summon which would cause my own controller pet ‘waste time’. The animated spells purely because they were so hard to see. I hate it when something invisible turns out to be a boss that just did half your health in one quick shot.

 

The worst enemies I’ve fought though are the incarnate Banished Pantheon. The Shamans and Ancients is Sorrow have powerful -defence attacks and it they breaks open my defence for all their friends to exploit. Extremely dangerous!!

[Cix]

I'm currently going through First Ward with a Dual Blades/Invulnerability stalker.  I feel your pain.

 

I survive mostly on inspirations.  If you visit the P2W vendor, you can get Inner Inspiration.  It gives you three medium or large inspirations every half hour.

[Coyote]

Heh, wait till you hit the AV fight at the end of the Night Ward. Right now that arc is my challenge arc for characters soloing AVs in a normal story arc rather than a TF.

[cranebump]

Grab some plasmatic tasers and grenades from p2w. Slap them with KB between normal attacks. Not sure if that’ll do it, but I use these a lot with to augment my lower-mid level solo toons. Seems to work on most things.