What to Pair with Mercs?

[Lich-King]

Heya Mastermind Gurus...

 

I've finally reached the point where the only set I have yet to play (not just Mastermind Primaries, but Power Sets in general) is Mercs. 

 

Yes, I know.  I would probably be better off if I kept it that way.  But the completionist  in me is requiring that I at least try to make one.

 

I have a concept and I'm considering /Thermal, /Pain, and /Elec as secondaries.  Any thoughts on the relative merits of these different options?

 

Thanks.

 

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Lich-King

Exiled from Pinnacle

Now on Torchbearer

[Coyote]

First of all, I asked the same question though I had different sets that I was looking at, but the discussion could be interesting:
Merc/ Secondaries

 

Second, I don't like any of your choices because Merc AoE is all cones, and they benefit from secondaries that have a way to keep mobs away from you... Force Bubble, Caltrops, Hurricane, etc. This gives them better angle on their AoEs.

 

However, if limited to those sets, I think that Pain will be better than Thermal outside of AVs, but Thermal will be better against AVs. Electric is better defensively, but without a -Resist power it will struggle with killing speed. If slow and steady rattle of bullets, shell casings all over the place, and a rain of DoTs over enemy heads appeals to you, Electric would probably be my choice.

[Lich-King]

Thanks, Coyote.  I appreciate the feedback.

 

I did see your earlier thread and was already planning to give Redlynne's "Airborne Rangers" strategy a whirl as a way of dealing with the lack of crowd control options in the sets I'm considering.  I get that they are probably all sub-optimal choices, but if I cared about optimal, I probably wouldn't be playing Mercs in the first place.

 

I would welcome additional feedback from anyone else with thoughts about how /Thermal, /Pain, or /Elec would synergize with Mercs.

 

Thanks.

 

------

Lich-King

Exiled from Pinnacle

Now on Torchbearer

[kiramon]

Did you know Pain can get perma World of Pain, that gives 11.25% Resist all - not too much beneath the 15% from Thermal.

 

And Anguishing Cry is a pbaoe with a stronger defense debuff/wider aoe than the targeted Melt armor (which also has a 30 second longer recharge)?

 

My point is - Pain is better than Thermal. So I would consider Pain or Elec.

 

And that depends on how you want to play more than anything. If you're more into using your guns and being involved, I'd go pain. If you wanna spam the secondary like a little rabbit going at it, then go Elec. They're both good sets. Really depends on how you want to play it, more than anything. From how >I< would end up playing Merc, I'd go with Elec.

 

(I'm not saying Thermal is bad; they're fairly similar. But what Thermal brings (-500% regen) is really cheap to get from P2W. vendor...)

 

[Nyghtmaire]

When I played Mercs pre-shutdown, I ran it with /pain and an S/L defcap tankermindbuild (Mace Mastery). It was ... adequate? Most of the time was spent micromanaging the pets for placement, so it turned into a chore after awhile. Definitely not a character to zone out with.

 

If you choose to go this direction, feel free to consider the following. Build goals will be a bit easier to reach defensive benchmarks and enough recharge to bring anguishing cry and world of pain up to permanency on Homecoming. Painbringer helps with the Commando’s damage, but it’s not a game changer by any stretch. Web envelope WAS helpful.

 

The pets will have some serious challenges for slots. If you take tactics with world of pain, you can skimp on accuracy (with the end challenges that come with it, basically a choice between tactics or assault). Still need room for the def/resistance IOS. Likely prioritize the resistance uniques to build on top of world of pain’s resistance if you have to drop some. Achilles -res procs in the soldiers, along with at least on -def set damage proc. 

 

Here are the pets’ resistances (from last I checked):

 

Mercenaries

Soldiers:

• 25% Smash/Lethal Resist
• -33.33% Confuse Duration
• +2.0 Confuse Protection

 

Spec Ops:

• 26% Smash/Lethal Resist
• -33.33% Confuse Duration
• +2.0 Confuse Protection

 

Commando:

• 26% Smash/Lethal Resist
• 6% Toxic/Cold/Fire Resist
• -33.33% Confuse/Terrorize Duration
• +4.0 Terrorize Protection
• +2.0 Confuse Protection

At level 50, MM pet uniques will add 35% resistance of all three are selected. With World of Pain, those are respectable S/L numbers, and decent resistance for everything else. 
 

I never got around to crafting incarnates so I can’t comment on that aspect. 

 

Good luck and let us know what you pick!

[Coyote]

17 hours ago, kiramon said:

I'm not saying Thermal is bad; they're fairly similar. But what Thermal brings (-500% regen) is really cheap to get from P2W. vendor...

 

That's what I was saying, that Pain is better in general (and it also gets a PBAoE +Regen aura to help keep henchmen HP up, and Painbringer). But remember than a level 50 AV needs about 666% -Regen to floor it, and if you fight at higher difficulties that could mean that up to 1000% -Regen is still useful, so Thermal's -Regen is pretty much always useful even with the use of an Envenomed Dagger. Plus, it does -Damage on a single target, which is useful against an AV. Outside of that, as you showed, Pain is IMO better.