Bots, Maintenance drone...?

[Ultimo]

I'm feeling conflicted about this fellow.  I have lost a power slot, since I now need to take this power to replace an ability my Protector Bots used to have.  More, the drone itself just looks like a cannibalized torso floating around (indeed, when dismissing the pets, it transforms into a Battle Drone).

 

Anyone else feel like this is actually a bit of a nerf?

 

I mean, the bots are still pretty strong, it's just cut into my ability to take other powers a bit.

[smnolimits43]

Maintenance Drone is great, i love it.

[Neiska]

2 hours ago, Ultimo said:

Anyone else feel like this is actually a bit of a nerf?

 

I mean, the bots are still pretty strong, it's just cut into my ability to take other powers a bit.

 

I don't want to re-ignite old arguments, so all I will say is that of all the MM changes, Robots was the most contested and debated one. Some liked it, others did not, for differing reasons. Their damage is improved and more evenly distributed, but there are also downsides that I will not elaborate about. It's an old debate, not worth digging up. And I wouldn't expect them to revert or change it.

 

But no, you are not alone in your musings or preferences.

Edited February 10, 2023 by Neiska

[WumpusRat]

3 hours ago, Ultimo said:

I'm feeling conflicted about this fellow.  I have lost a power slot, since I now need to take this power to replace an ability my Protector Bots used to have.  More, the drone itself just looks like a cannibalized torso floating around (indeed, when dismissing the pets, it transforms into a Battle Drone).

 

Anyone else feel like this is actually a bit of a nerf?

 

I mean, the bots are still pretty strong, it's just cut into my ability to take other powers a bit.

Personally, I really like the maint drone. It allowed me to drop the medicine tree from my bots masterminds, as the prot bot healing was never good enough to really keep up with a lot of incoming damage, while the maint bot is pretty good at it, able to heal a lot more rapidly. Does it look a little goofy? Yeah, maybe. But I don't mind that. 

 

I see it as a huge buff. 

 

If you never took the medicine tree I suppose it could be seen as a "nerf", since you have to take another power, but still. I like it.

Edited February 10, 2023 by WumpusRat

[Zerethon]

Maint bot is alright, heal robot (Repair) was never an auto-take but it was useful at times, as Neiska pointed out, it's not as contested as other things (Moving -regen to the masterminds still crap-tier attacks, for instance)

Overall, the bot's alright and since you get buffs/heals/etc from your secondary it's actually pretty darn alright in the long run.

 

Edited February 10, 2023 by Zerethon

[kelika2]

First alt I went full 5/6 doc wounds in it, overslotted

all alts after just 1 rech in base slot

early levels it gets a lot of use but once you start getting those slots in shields or other +def/-tohit stuff they just get hit less and less.  and sometimes and prot bots beat the drone to the heal

[StrikerFox]

3 hours ago, Ultimo said:

 I have lost a power slot, since I now need to take this power to replace an ability my Protector Bots used to have. 

 

I don't quite understand. What power did the Maintenance Drone (tMD) get that the Protector Bots lost? I kind of like tMD. It's not close to being the best T7 but it's more useful than Repair ever was. Also tMD seems to heal more frequently than the Protector Bots do. 

 

Tested by taking Group Fly and dropping all Bots from max height in Atlas. tMD healed 6 times (251.38 HP ea) VS Protector's 4 times (193.91 HP ea), in the same time frame (When tMD blew up). Tested with a level 42 MM, build 2, so there are no enhancements slotted. It would have been great if tMD had a PBAoE or TAoE heal as well as ST.

 

The worst T7 imo is Ninja's Smoke Flash (SF). It feels like a downgrade to me. Building aggressively for recharge will get SF's recharge down to around 20 seconds. All pets will crit for one attack, when there's a pretty good chance that one/two of them were going to crit anyways. 

 

Before i27.5, we were able to get SF's recharge down to around 5 seconds. Buffed ninja would have a good chance to crit for 10 seconds. In the end, multicasting SF, alternating between pets, would average more crits overall. The only thing we're really saving on is endurance. Spamming SF before the changes was rough on end.

[Neiska]

5 hours ago, StrikerFox said:

 

I don't quite understand. What power did the Maintenance Drone (tMD) get that the Protector Bots lost? I kind of like tMD. It's not close to being the best T7 but it's more useful than Repair ever was. Also tMD seems to heal more frequently than the Protector Bots do. 

 

 

It isn't the Power that people had issue with, its the slotting. If you take a secondary that doesn't have a heal in it, such as Cold, then the Maintenance Drone is a good thing. But for secondaries with their own heals, such as Electric, Time, Nature, Dark, and so on you don't gain much. So its a better option for those builds that didn't have a staple heal, for those with one its kind of "meh." There are certainly better as well as worse T7's. Personally my objections to the robot update was never about the Drone. The drone is a good option for people who want to use other secondaries, and I usually support more options for people. But as a whole, the primary didn't encourage different builds, but made what is arguably the primary that has the least amount of available optional slotting (IE the tightest slotting) even more so. And that's what some people who didn't like the new Robots objected to - the tighter obligatory slotting, not the heals, damage, or math.

[tidge]

Strictly limiting discussion to Maintenance Drone: I like this change. I have it on Robotics/Traps.

 

While leveling up, prior to the Assault Bot, I was using the Medicine pool to keep the small number of Henchmen healed. Once I had enough Henchmen, I found it to be unnecessary to worry about healing individual henchmen, and worrying about the T1 and T2 is ultimately just a waste of Endurance. I chose to respec into Triage Beacon, which is a non-moving device. I feel that in solo play, I was able to use a 6-slotted (with Preventive Maintenance) Triage Beacon about as well as could be expected (with large spawn sizes), but I won't kid myself that this power brought much to the table except for some rather corner cases (I'm thinking mainly about turned-up Positron TFs, or certain GM/AV fights).

 

Maintenance Drone has replaced Triage Beacon in my build, with same slotting:

1. I fire it once in a new map instance, and then I pretty much can forget about it,
2. It follows me around the map,
3. It fires its heals more reliably than the Protector Bots use theirs (perhaps this is the perceived 'nerf' to the Protector Bots?)

IMO: Any opportunity to slot Health Enhancement sets is a good one for MMs. 2 and 3 piece sets bonuses from some already good sets get Regenration and/or Recovery bonuses.

 

Now, about the entirety of the Robotics changes... I haven't radically changed my Robotics/Traps play style with the latest changes to Robotics, I attribute this to the way I was playing before: I was always using MM attacks (two from Primary, one from Patron) to debuff, aggro, and soft-control enemies via Knockdown. The recent changes simply inspired me to change the order of power picks (to not delay the picks of MM attacks as previously). The changes to the primary meant that I got a lot more freedom in slotting enhancements such that I see improvement in performance of the Henchmen independent of the way the individual power were changed:

1. With Knockback (mostly) removed from Henchmen attacks, one slot previously used for Knockback->Knockdown became available!
2. Protector Bots get a dedicated Defense 50+5 IO, which improves survival rates
3. Equip Robot gets enhancement sets which also boost resistance

 

[Ultimo]

Well, it used to be that my Protector Bots could cast a heal periodically.  Now, they don't have that ability, it's been assigned to the Maintenance bot, which means instead of taking one power (Protector Bots), I have to take two in order to get the same effect.  My build was pretty tight as it was, it's meant leaving out ALL my personal attacks... which is discouraging.

 

I mean, MM personal attacks are pretty trivial anyway, but even so, it's a loss.

[StrikerFox]

5 hours ago, Ultimo said:

Well, it used to be that my Protector Bots could cast a heal periodically.  Now, they don't have that ability, it's been assigned to the Maintenance bot, which means instead of taking one power (Protector Bots), I have to take two in order to get the same effect. 

 

Protector Bots still have their heal. They have Repair with the second upgrade, and can be enhanced with heal IOs. Though, a couple of attacks were added to Protectors, that they didn't have before, so they may be healing less frequently. 

[tidge]

6 hours ago, Ultimo said:

I mean, MM personal attacks are pretty trivial anyway, but even so, it's a loss.

 

This is really not true for Robotics, especially in the recent Homecoming changes.

 

What does the build look like? (text please, if possible) So I can better understand what you are going for.

[Ultimo]

I haven't been able to redesign the character in Mids, it's still using the old power setup.

[tidge]

1 hour ago, Ultimo said:

I haven't been able to redesign the character in Mids, it's still using the old power setup.

 

If you are tight on powers, I'm curious how many of the other (non-Maintenance Drone) primary/secondary powers you are taking, and how deep you are getting into pool powers. My own experience with leveling Masterminds (prior to page 5 revamp) was that because the attacks were so bad, that combined with the levels that late-tier powers were available, it was always an easy choice to go deep into pools. As the number of henchmen grows the MM pool powers become less crucial, and at 50 when Superior Enhancement slotting is possible, things become a game changer.

 

Because of the Endurance tax and crummy damage scales, I don't recommend taking personal attacks except as a debuff/aggro mechanism (especially true for Robotics). A no-pet or single-pet build is a different game of course. I like Seeker Drones, but I don't have them in my build because they just weren't doing enough across most content for my play style. I also skip Trip Mine and Detonator; I find that the first just slows me down and the second is counter-productive. Poison Trap doesn't need much slotting to do what it does best. As noted above Triage Beacon has even fewer corner cases of utility (I do find it to be a cool power).

 

The revamp in T2 choices means that it is possible to skip Web Grenade (for Caltrops). Of those two powers, I sacrificed Web Grenade because its use was almost entirely limited to trying to keep AVs and certain GMs from fleeing. (My build includes Group Fly, because Robots with Rocket Boots, so I'm less concerned with escaping fliers) In contrast Caltrops is a non-targeted AoE damage/slow that also happens to distract enemies in the area, both good effects for aiding survival. This is a power that could be squeezed in as a later power choice, or replaced with something like a Patrol pool immobilize.

[Ultimo]

My MM is based on Dr. Doom, he's Bots/Force Fields.  He uses several pools, including Flight, Leadership, and Fighting.  My intention is to get into the Field Mastery pool, but he's not at that level yet.

 

I'm sure I could drop the Fighting pool, I don't use it much, except for Tough and Weave.  It just feels like a bit of a nerf.

[tidge]

I'm not that familiar with Force Field, but at first blush I would think that the Fighting Pool's Weave isn't necessary and two picks to get Tough (presumably to be mostly a mule) is... well "tough". Given the inspiration, I'd be tempted to forgo both Fighting and Flight, and leverage Sorcery (loss of Group Fly of course) which has many powers that can act as mules (for a variety of types), and if slots are needed in the defense powers (a good idea, probably) then I'd add Concealment for default-slot LotGs global recharge mules. I would probably skip Arcane Bolt on a MM, but it has a cool thematic animation.

[Ultimo]

Well, I don't do anything sorcery, I'm sticking to classic Doom for inspiration.  All tech.  Group Fly is kind of a must, it's just SO good with the bots.  I do like having a personal attack, but I could easily rely on Air Superiority for that.  I even have a bind for those rare occasions when someone does try to melee with me: "Fool!  Dire does not engage in petty fisticuffs!" followed by an Air Superiority and Force Bolt.  Sorry, "Repulsion Bolt."  What was the point of renaming that?  I find the new name kind of... repulsive.

[Arbegla]

Before page 5, i was using Spirit Ward as a 'spot heal' on my pets to keep the in the action while taking damage. After page 5, I was able to swap Spirit Ward for Maintenance Drone, and use the same IOs.

 

Maintenance Drone not just lasts longer then the absorb shield from Spirit Ward, but it doesn't cost as much Endurance. Plus, between it, and the heals from Protector Bots, even if they don't happen quite as often due to the Protector Bots getting a few more attacks, my bots are MUCH more durable and last longer in prolonged fights.

 

The only issue I have is the time before you get Maintenance Drone, where you have zero healing at all, and you used to at least have the repair in Protector Bots to cover small holes in the build. Granted, as you can get Maintenance Drone at level 16, its available down to level 11, so its not that big of a deal overall.

 

They did however remove the endurance gain from Repair completed, so while you used to be able to slot Endurance Modification in Repair, and help top off the endurance of your pets if/when you actually used Repair, you can't do that anymore. If they would add even a small endurance boost to the Protector Bots repair, and maybe the Maintenance Drone's power, I would be a very happy camper.

[Force Redux]

Just going to opine that for my Bots/FF maint. drone is a huge boost. I dropped Aid Other as a result. 

 

I can see for heal-capable secondaries, MtD is a bit of a superfluous power, be nice if it offered a Stimulant or other side buff for that purpose. Or choose between a drone that can either heal or offer a buff (similar to how Swap Ammo branches into different powers).

 

That said, for Bots/FF it was a big boost. Yes, I took a second Rifle attack for the -Regen. I was able to make it work, even with the new goodies in FF that I previously skipped. I should toss out a build here, I feel that it was an overall buff for me, personally, though I acknowledge how this went for other Robotics power set users, too. 

[Avilister]

I'll echo Force Redux's sentiment for Bots/Traps. I'm 30 levels in now and Maint Drone feels critical to keeping the bots up in extended engagements and is nice for topping them off between engagements too (though you can also just resummon between engagements, particularly if you're solo). That said, I'm almost completely unslotted, so maybe it'll be different once I've got some more serious defensive slotting online. As it is, Protectors and my FF drone do a good job keeping a lot of attacks off the bots and MaintDrone fixes up the ones that make it through, or top the bots off after I take a hit (or an alpha) in BGM.

[kelika2]

nope, drone is an upgrade to repair in every way.  finalized builds just has 1 rech in it tho

and i think this was said before, but the level 32 upgrade contains the prot bot heal