Focused Feedback: Mercenaries Revamp

[Yaliw]

After very briefly trying out mercs, I must say the differences are night and day. Focus fire doesn't seem terribly useful BUT the mercenaries deal such better damage that I'm not terribly concerned- it's an option that isn't entirely necessary.

 

I do wish the medic focused more on healing. This is a personal preference but I really want him to give me stimulant all the time. For a tankermind its really unique and powerful- keeping it on the mastermind would give merc-using tankerminds a very unique niche.

 

Other than my nit-picks and inconsequential preferences, I'm enjoying nu-mercs

[Shazbotacus]

I was also kind of hoping for Medic to get better at healing, and for Spec Ops to lean more into doing debuffs and/or CC. AoE on Stimulant would be nice, maybe some kind of absorb buff to help survivability instead of the frag grenade. I'm feeling like Medic should just have one long recharging heavy burst for quickly doing some damage between using healing and buffing powers. Absorb, maybe +Max HP, anything that can be enhanced by healing enhancements, but preferably something that can be applied to the whole squad.

Edited October 13, 2022 by Shazbotacus

[Shazbotacus]

Oh, what are the odds we can get the Serum cooldown taken down from 250s to 240s? Just so it rounds out to the minute :^)

Edited October 13, 2022 by Shazbotacus

[Meknomancer]

Tried ninjas/necro/mercs. Mercs changes bump them to no.1. By a mile (although they've always been no. 1 in my book). Ran through +2/8 it was a murderfest i've never seen anything go through mobs that fast short of nuking toon. Made no changes to a live build and i can only assume it would be even better with def+res bits thrown in the upgrades.

[ChzBoi]

Just tested the Mercs - so much better! Yet another I can't wait to update on the live servers. 🙂 Excellent update for these service folks!!

[Tacheyon]

The one thing I am finding is that the personal attacks need to be a bit cheaper Endurance-wise.  The M30 Grenade is still 18 End which is almost a 1/5 of my blue bar.  I do realize that you don't have to spam all these powers, but with a bunch of toggles running, even a mistimed shot could drop everything (including you).  Since it is a good idea to take at least one attack (if not all) slots are at a all time premium.  Using them for End Reduction for a simple attack seems wasteful.  

 

Hopefully those Endurance costs could come down at least by 25-30% for a AOE power (like M30) if not 50% for say the T1 single shots.

[Black Zot]

5 hours ago, Tacheyon said:

The one thing I am finding is that the personal attacks need to be a bit cheaper Endurance-wise.  The M30 Grenade is still 18 End which is almost a 1/5 of my blue bar.  I do realize that you don't have to spam all these powers, but with a bunch of toggles running, even a mistimed shot could drop everything (including you).  Since it is a good idea to take at least one attack (if not all) slots are at a all time premium.  Using them for End Reduction for a simple attack seems wasteful.  

 

Hopefully those Endurance costs could come down at least by 25-30% for a AOE power (like M30) if not 50% for say the T1 single shots.

 

That's kind of a thing across all MM powers.  Up until recently, you needed at least one blue candy to fully summon and buff your pet complement, because the pet and upgrade skills literally added up to more than a full blue bar even after end reduction IOs.

[Captain Powerhouse]

Nothing changing at this point, but for the record: Mastermind endurance "tax" is 20%. In a hypothetical world where it went away, you would not get anything like a 30% end cost reduction on those attacks.

[PorkTips]

On 10/6/2022 at 3:11 PM, Lost Deep said:

I overall like the upgrades to Mercenaries. I've never wanted to make a Mercenaries character before, and now I do! However, my personal bugbear has always been the basic attacks in the Mastermind sets, and Burst, Slug, and M30 Grenade aren't putting up a strong first impression.

 

In my opinion, +3.33% damage per attack is too little. Any MM with a secondary with -res has a better damage improvement option than getting Burst/Slug/M30. It's still not worth the end cost, and even if a build does want the bonus damage it really needs to get all three to get an amount worth noting and that means three power choices. I think this is in the right direction, it encourages coordination with your henchmen instead of just fighting one guy while your henchmen fight the rest, but it needs to be MUCH stronger.

 

My concerns with these changes are that the weapon upgrades may be too much. I know some people complain about dead powers in sets like Mercs (Serum, or the attacks) or FF (various) but personally I like the flexibility of not taking them and not being weak if I dont take them.

 

So if anything, the fact that the weapon buffs are noticeable but not extreme is a GOOD thing conceptually. For me anyway. I want to feel a power is worth taking, but I dont want to feel that I'm tanking the effectiveness of my build if I DONT take it .... especially for historically "skippable" powers.

 

So having the weapons be useful without being overwhelmingly required for effectiveness sounds good. I dont want to have to respec and completely redesign all my mercs and throw out all the fun weird powers and epic villain powers I took, so I'm hoping for changes that wont create a have's and have-not's situation by making historically skipped powers TOO good.

 

I want to keep puking shark bile and taking weave on all my masterminds without being left in the dust because I didnt elect to opt into the new hotness :)

 

 

[Tacheyon]

On 10/14/2022 at 11:35 AM, Captain Powerhouse said:

Nothing changing at this point, but for the record: Mastermind endurance "tax" is 20%. In a hypothetical world where it went away, you would not get anything like a 30% end cost reduction on those attacks.

 

Well a guy can dream right?  😁

 

Even a 15%-20% reduction, if you use it repeatedly is still a significant savings.

[Riverdusk]

1 hour ago, Tacheyon said:

 

Well a guy can dream right?  😁

 

Even a 15%-20% reduction, if you use it repeatedly is still a significant savings.

 

With the way endurance reduction enhancements work in this game it looks like you'd need to slot 25% worth to offset the penalty.  So, it is 20% base penalty, 25% worth of enhancement penalty.

[Cidri]

On 10/4/2022 at 11:34 PM, The Curator said:

Mercenaries

Burst, Slug, and M30 Grenade

• Each of these attacks applies a Focused Fire tag on the target for 30s.
• Each power's tag will increase Mercenary ranged damage by 3.33%, up to a maximum of 10%.

 

 

I find the language here confusing. Does this increase minion damage specifically on the target you shot at, or in general?

[Player-1]

8 minutes ago, Cidri said:

 

I find the language here confusing. Does this increase minion damage specifically on the target you shot at, or in general?

It is on the main target of the power only.

[Meknomancer]

Really wish i hadn't tested my merc's mm on beta 😛 It's painful going back on live servers after strolling +4/8 without having to heal myself/pets and not having to resummon/run away and being able to slaughter mobs at the equivalent level of my brutes/blasters/corrs. Bring the changes in now....please.

[Meknomancer]

Oh lol you did. Happy Days and thank you thank you thank you.