Vanguard Merits and leveling outside of a farm

[Ukase]

So, before I make a suggestion, I'll check in here, as there may be a historical reason that escapes me why Rikti occur before level 35. 

I'm on a new-ish brute, level 31. I used to hop into Provost Marchand's arcs, but since that's what I usually do, I wanted to do something different. I have no recent memory of doing Philippa Meroux's content, so figured I'd take that path. 

The brute is Electric /Shield, so is quite capable of handling 1/8 so far. Ordinarily, I'd run through this stuff, knock it out, but I just finished the Maria Jenkin's arc a few days ago, and I want a longer break before I run through her arc yet again and get the 4th accolade, portal jockey. 

So, I'm at +1/8, not being real confident as the character hadn't encountered Rikti yet. So far, no problems, but then it occurs to me the reason why I don't do MSR's before level 35 - no Vanguard Merits. 

 Why are Rikti available pre-35? 

I'm reviewing this post, and I realize I'm coming off with some sense of entitlement. Regrettable. But does it make sense to pursue Rikti at this level, when I could maybe defer the contact to level 34, hit 35, get the Vanguard Member badge, and then get VG merits while I go through the arc? 

As I ask, I now realize that even at +4/8, clearing all the maps, I might earn 100 vg merits, as they drop so sparingly outside of MSR. Even so, it all adds up, right? 

So, I am wondering if a pre-level 35 character were to complete a Rikti mission/arc, if maybe that shouldn't award some number of VG merits upon completion. Worth a suggestion? Shouldn't be that hard to implement, I wouldn't think. 

[Bionic_Flea]

4 minutes ago, Ukase said:

Why are Rikti available pre-35? 

Rikti were one of the original enemies and pre-date Vanguard Merits by several years.

[Frozen Burn]

Rikti have always been lvl 30-50.  The Lost, who are lvl 5-30 are mutating into Rikti and supposedly by lvl 30, they do!  That's always been the lore of the game.  (I remember doing cape missions at lvl 30+ and getting Rikti in the final mission instead of Lost like you do at lvls 20-29.)  🙂 

 

Anyway, also, back in issues 1-9, we used to have the Rikti Crash Site (lvls 40-50).  In issue 10, they changed it to the Rikti War Zone and made it lvl 35-50 and instituted the VG merit system.  Why they didn't make new zone lvl 30+, I do not know.  Perhaps, the Devs back then felt like "lore-wise" our characters needed to spend time fighting Rikti in mission arcs between lvl 30-34 before being "experienced" enough to join Vanguard?  I dunno.

 

But now... Yeah, I too have noticed my toons under lvl 35 do not get merits when fighting Rikti.  However, it's never really bothered me as the exchange rate into Reward Merits is not that great anymore and to buy the goodies from the vendor machines in the Vanguard base are easy enough later on anyway.  

 

And honestly, I disagree that a lvl 30-34 character should get a sum of VG merits awarded at the end of a mission or arc when they haven't joined Vanguard yet.  That messes with the lore of the game.  However, a possible solution would be for the Devs to open Leventera's intro arc to level 30+ (her other arcs could remain lvl 35+).  They'd also have to change the critter population in some of the areas to be lvl 30-35 Rikti so lvl 30s can do Leventera's hunt.  Seems like that could be easy to do, but I have no clue - maybe it's some difficult coding to change all that? 

 

But I wouldn't argue against a change like this, but I also wouldn't push for it.  I'm kind of okay with how it is now. 

 

And I'm sure you know, but as a reminder, if you want extra VG merits, once you're 35, be sure to get the VG Day Job and you will get awarded extra VG merits upon ALL mission completions - not just Rikti Missions.  It's only 1 or 2, if I recall.  But as you said, it all adds up.  

 

[Placta]

1 hour ago, Frozen Burn said:

Rikti have always been lvl 30-50.  The Lost, who are lvl 5-30 are mutating into Rikti and supposedly by lvl 30, they do!  That's always been the lore of the game.  (I remember doing cape missions at lvl 30+ and getting Rikti in the final mission instead of Lost like you do at lvls 20-29.)  🙂 

 

If you're lucky enough to run a Lost (or Rikti, using the -1 setting) mission set to level 29, you'll get level 29 Lost and level 30 Rikti in the same mission. Fun stuff 🙂

[Yomo Kimyata]

Well, it's about reward creep and power creep, to be honest.  Every character I get to 35 first goes and joins Vanguard, kills ten Rikti (pro tip:  the silos about a half mile directly in front of the entrance generally have well over ten Rikti monkeys hanging out), runs around and talks to everyone and gets the badge so that defeating Rikti gets me a little extra reward.

 

I can understand not fighting Rikti at level 35 until you have the Vanguard badge, but I don't see the rationale in not fighting Rikti beforehand?  Are you going to fight Council, who also don't drop Vanguard merits, instead?  Or Crey, who also don't drop Vanguard merits?  It's not like there are a limited number of rikti that any given character can spawn.

 

that said, I have no idea what I can save up those vanguard merits for to spend on, so I guess I'm wasting my time even getting the Vanguard member badge, since it just means I have more of a currency I'm not going to spend anyway.  Shrug.

[Ukase]

1 hour ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

I can understand not fighting Rikti at level 35 until you have the Vanguard badge, but I don't see the rationale in not fighting Rikti beforehand?  Are you going to fight Council, who also don't drop Vanguard merits, instead?  Or Crey, who also don't drop Vanguard merits?  It's not like there are a limited number of rikti that any given character can spawn.

A fair point! 

[Bionic_Flea]

3 hours ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

I have more of a currency I'm not going to spend anyway

 

You don't need to spend it.  Just enjoy the pool!

 

 

[DoctorDitko]

4 hours ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

I have no idea what I can save up those vanguard merits for to spend on,

The satchel is nice for holding more salvage, if you like that kind of thing.

[Luminara]

5 hours ago, Placta said:

 

If you're lucky enough to run a Lost (or Rikti, using the -1 setting) mission set to level 29, you'll get level 29 Lost and level 30 Rikti in the same mission. Fun stuff 🙂

 

I hold off on running Montague Castanella's arc until it's well past Lost levels, sometimes waiting until level 50.  The Lost are all replaced by Rikti who have a much more diverse color palette (rather than green, green, green and brown, green, oh, look, green), and they speak English (some of those drones are almost poetic).

[Greycat]

You fight Rikti beforehand because that's where the storyline goes. VMs were a later "grind for this and keep the sub" thing.

As far as what to do with them:

- Before running Gaussian's arc (think it's his,) and/or the Mender's unlock arc, grab Nectembo's Curse Breaker, in case you get hit with the Curse of Weariness, because getting cut to 50% END for 5 minutes sucks.

- get an HVAS.

- Get the storage sack.

- you can get a psi shield and psi bomb as temp powers, but... eh.

- convert to merits.

[MTeague]

It's not like there's a limited number of Rikti in the game. You're not "wasting" a limited resource if you do an arc without Vanguard Merits.

And as you point out, since they drop so (comparitively) infrequently outside of a MSR, I wouldn't even worry about "missing out" on 30-40 this way or that. 

If you find yourself wanting scads of merit, do a few MSR's. 

If not, don't. 

 

I get the siren song of "efficiency". But don't let it stand in the way of just doing whatever seems fun at that moment.

[Snarky]

On the recent story arc character i ran i did all 1-35 content.  There were seriously not many Rikti.  At 35 I immediately got my Vanguard badge.  I then went back to doing story arcs 35-39, 40-44, leaving 35-50, 40-50, 45-50 that i am still working on.  At 50, which took quite a while from 35-44 for me, I still had a meager handful of Rikti merits.  Maybe if i had run missions with Rikti at high difficulty I would have had a bit more.  But still, meh

[Andreah]

The big and significant sources for vanguard merits are group content like the LGTF and especially, the MSR.  Just last night I got 1600+ vanguard merits from one MSR. All 47 other players in the league got similar amounts, I'm sure.

[Ura Hero]

On 3/2/2022 at 8:25 AM, Andreah said:

The big and significant sources for vanguard merits are group content like the LGTF and especially, the MSR.  Just last night I got 1600+ vanguard merits from one MSR. All 47 other players in the league got similar amounts, I'm sure.

 

1200-1600 is ballpark for a MSR.  1600 on a league where the tanks are really working it.  1200 for basically sitting in the bowl with tanks dragging an occasional mob over.

[Andreah]

1 hour ago, Ura Hero said:

1600 on a league where the tanks are really working it

I use [Ultimate] Fold Space to complete the tanker's pulls into the bowl so they can go get more quickly and efficiently. When it's timed right, it's a beautiful ballet of merit production, and we push closer to 2,000. I've never personally got that many, but some people have claimed so.

[DoctorDitko]

7 hours ago, Andreah said:

[Ultimate] Fold Space

Ultimate? Like when Nick Fury is Sam Jackson?

[Andreah]

14 minutes ago, DoctorDitko said:

Ultimate? Like when Nick Fury is Sam Jackson?

No, better.

 

It's literally using [Ultimate].

 

https://hcwiki.cityofheroes.dev/wiki/Inspirations#Level_Shifting_Inspiration

[Andreah]

Just to clarify, what [Ultimate] does, apart from generally making you an additional level +1 relative to everything else, is increase the strength of your [Fold Space], [Shadow Slip] and [Wormhole] teleportations such that they can reliably teleport Level 54 Bosses and Elite Bosses.

 

They last 3 minutes each, so the ~30 minute bowl phase of the MSR will use up 8-10 of them to keep the buff constantly up. They cost roughly 1 million Influence each in the auction, and can be bought for (iirc) 20 Threads from the Astral Vendor.

 

For the one using them, it's expensive; effectively, it costs you 1500 Vanguard Merits' worth to buy ten Ultimates. If the use of these increases the average vanguard merits per each member of a full league by 30 or so, it ends up being a net gain for everyone.  Imo, it works well.

[DoctorDitko]

Wow! Something new every day. Thanks for the info!*

 

 

 

 

 

* I dunno about "better than Sam Jackson as Nick Fury" though

Edited March 5, 2022 by DoctorDitko

[Yomo Kimyata]

37 minutes ago, DoctorDitko said:

Ultimate? Like when Nick Fury is Sam Jackson?

“Do you think this ‘A’ stands for ‘France’?!?”

[DoctorDitko]

"You think I'd get in this thing sober?"

[A Cat]

11 hours ago, Andreah said:

I use [Ultimate] Fold Space to complete the tanker's pulls into the bowl so they can go get more quickly and efficiently. When it's timed right, it's a beautiful ballet of merit production, and we push closer to 2,000. I've never personally got that many, but some people have claimed so.

It is nice. I am a frequent puller. The difficult part (aside from staying alive) is getting them to go to the center of the bowl. The magi and priests are bad about just sitting on the edge and plinking with long range psychic attacks and random controls. I use the lips on the edge of the ramps to force them to the bowl periphery. But it seems random to get certain types of Rikti to follow to the very middle. 

 

[ZorkNemesis]

Forget the merits, Rikti also give more exp and inf per kill than other enemies.  Not just Communication Officers either, but all Rikti (except drones and monkeys) seem to give more exp/inf, probably something to do with how they're basically humanity's mortal enemies.

[Andreah]

8 hours ago, A Cat said:

But it seems random to get certain types of Rikti to follow to the very middle. 

 

Often, if they have ranged attacks, they will stop as soon as they are within range. I've done tanker-pulling in the past as well, and often you have to try to drag them to the other side of the bowl to get them to go to the middle, and then, sometimes you lose leash on them and they start going back out. A well-timed Fold Space pulls them in, and lets you go back for more.

 

When I fold space, I always announce it in local chat, so that the tanker knows there's a good chance they're free to go get more, and also so that others can use their AoE's on the fresh mobs, and make sure they get aggro'd off the puller.

 

[Andreah]

One of the things I do is combine Fold Space and the use of the Ultimate into a single keybind. For example if you wanted to use <key> for this, you could do something like: /bind <key> "powexecname Fold Space$$inspexecname ultimate"

 

This works with Ultimate insps because using one locks out using another until the first expires -- other insps would just pop until you were out of them. If you reverse the order of the power and the insp, then the power would just queue up.

 

One could get fancier, and use a prefix of "+$$" on the front, and do it all in one keystroke, too. And some clever use of rotating binds with this would even get your local-chat announcement in there without repeating it.