/Empathy

[Xandyr]

I've not played an Empathy toon since Live...like Issue 5 if that tells you anything. 

 With so many other secondaries offering, what many believe,  superior powers (debuffs,  "better" buffs,  and some with healing to go along with it), is there even a case for Empathy anymore? Especially whenever you get on a team and everyone just steamrolls everything?

 

 With that said, IF Empathy still has any love, what would you pair it with? I thought Necro, but I have gotten 2 different Necro MMs to 50 recently. So, my next thought is Mercs.

 With Equip and Serum (perma or as close to perma), the Mercs will have great resists, with just the Medic helping toss out heals. The Mercs are excellent at -Defense, and with an Achilles' proc in the Soldiers, you can keep the enemies' Resistances debuffed as well. 

 It seems to me you could keep AB on 1 pet perma, and keep Forge (rotating permanently) on 4(?) possibly 5 other pets? If Forge is slotted with 1 LotG Dwf/global recharge and 5 pieces of Red Fortune, that's almost +18% to Defense. Maneuvers would add 4-5%, and the Pet Uniques another 10%. Is it feasible to think that you can have at least 4 pets perma-Forged and their defense at around 32% plus whatever their base defense is? If this is the case, then it seems like those pets would be well rounded, as far as resists and defenses go.

 

 So...any thoughts?

 

-x

[Ringo]

Two thoughts:

 

1) Adrenaline Boost gives a 100% recharge boost for 90s to the target in addition to the +Regen +Recovery and +Debuff Resist.  MM Pets don't benefit from anything that boosts their recharge.  If you're soloing it's the best option to give one of your pets AB.  But if you have anyone on a team, that buff should go to someone who gets the +recharge boost.

 

2) While I think Mercs would work fine with /Empathy, it occurs to me that Beast MMs can benefit specifically from /Empathy because Fortitude + heals can do everything Fortify Pack does while not wasting the 20% damage boost of stacked Pack Mentality.  Saves you a power pick as well as the unfortunate Beast MM dilemma of ever using Fortify Pack

[Frozen Burn]

Empathy is still viable and a strong set for any AT that uses it.  And it pairs with anything.  Even steamrolling teams can use an Emp's buffs.  ...and it's "Fortitude" - not "Forge."  Forge is Thermal's version of the power.  🙂  And yes, with enough global recharge, you could perma AB 1 pet and rotate 4 Fortitudes on others.  With Maneuvers and the pet +Def procs, you could have some fairly untouchable pets.  

 

Pick whatever MM pet set you want and go for it!

[Ringo]

The R-Auras have a base recharge of over 8 minutes, Empathy's strength is in having teammates to buff/heal and nothing else.

 

Luckily MMs bring their own!

[Gobbledigook]

It could be quite busy keeping forge on the pets. Forges +to hit and a Kismet in Tactical upgrade and maybe Tactics running, plus the - defense of Mercs should mean they won't miss much.

[kelika2]

Healing to keep pets alive is ok at lower levels, not so much in mid levels and no way in hell does it work at max level.

With a huge amount of recharge you can keep 4 targets under fortitude.  3 in general, 2 at low level.

 

I personally do not like that.  If you are going to go through with emp then your best bet is ranged pets

most mercs like to stay back.  Commando likes to march in with his short range flamethrower.  spec ops i treat as melee because they have no cone attacks and they get a rifle butt attack.  3 fort targets right there

same with thugs.  arsonist goes in for firebreath, bruiser is melee

also same with bots,  assault bot flamethrower, and prot bots do not have a cone so i send them into melee + their seeker drones go off more effectively.  a prot bot in melee summoning seekers on themselves vs seekers coming in at a range and exploding on the edge of a group.  another 3 fort targets

 

I got more mileage out of Thermal with demons, thugs and zombies.  the 3 resist auras IOs are required to not die instantly.  Demons natural resists + IOs + fire shields

[WumpusRat]

On 10/2/2023 at 8:46 AM, kelika2 said:

Healing to keep pets alive is ok at lower levels, not so much in mid levels and no way in hell does it work at max level.

With a huge amount of recharge you can keep 4 targets under fortitude.  3 in general, 2 at low level.

 

I personally do not like that.  If you are going to go through with emp then your best bet is ranged pets

most mercs like to stay back.  Commando likes to march in with his short range flamethrower.  spec ops i treat as melee because they have no cone attacks and they get a rifle butt attack.  3 fort targets right there

same with thugs.  arsonist goes in for firebreath, bruiser is melee

also same with bots,  assault bot flamethrower, and prot bots do not have a cone so i send them into melee + their seeker drones go off more effectively.  a prot bot in melee summoning seekers on themselves vs seekers coming in at a range and exploding on the edge of a group.  another 3 fort targets

 

I got more mileage out of Thermal with demons, thugs and zombies.  the 3 resist auras IOs are required to not die instantly.  Demons natural resists + IOs + fire shields

 

Keeping your pets alive with healing works fine at all levels as long as they have good resists or defense or both.

I have a ninja/empathy MM and she works fine even in incarnate content. I have enough recharge in the build that I can keep fortitude on all six pets if I stay on top of the cooldown, which pushes their defense up to around 45% for range and melee, and 60% for aoe, though their resists are somewhat lacking, having only 35% from the three +resist auras, so when they DO get hit, they get hit pretty hard. But they have enough defense that it's not frequent enough that they're dropping constantly, unless I'm trying to go up against bosses at +4.

Regeneration and recovery auras have a recharge of around 130 seconds for her, so with 90s uptime, they can be maintained about 70% of the time, and I'll always pop them before going into a big fight. While the pets not having a ton of HP means regen isn't quite as effective on them, being able to give them around 1200% regen heals them enough that combined with spot-healing and their own self-heals I only occasionally lose minions. 

[Yomo Kimyata]

On 10/1/2023 at 2:45 AM, Xandyr said:

Especially whenever you get on a team and everyone just steamrolls everything?

 

This is entirely you.  It is completely irrelevant what AT or powers you have when you are on a team.  

[kelika2]

43 minutes ago, WumpusRat said:

 

I have a ninja/empathy MM and she works fine even in incarnate content. I have enough recharge in the build that I can keep fortitude on all six pets

I am legit curious how much recharge you have to have fort on 6 targets all the time.

[WumpusRat]

2 hours ago, kelika2 said:

I am legit curious how much recharge you have to have fort on 6 targets all the time.

I'm at work so I'll probably be slightly off, but off the top of my head:

 

97%-ish recharge in the power itself (4 x Def/Rech enhancements)

70% from Hasten

4 x 10% recharge from ATOs (splitting Superior Mark of Supremacy amongst the three tiers of pets, 4 parts Superior Command of the Mastermind in one)

2 x 8.75% from full sets of Preventive Medicine (Healing Aura) and Reactive Defenses (Maneuvers)

3 x 6.25% from 5-part Decimation in Aimed Shot and Single Shot, 5-part Positron's Blast in Fistful of Arrows

2 x 5% from 5-part Doctored Wounds in Heal Other and Adrenaline Boost

5 x LotG 7.5% globals

 

I THINK that's about it. So in all, around 194% global recharge, and 97% in the power itself, for about 290% recharge total.

120s duration, and around a 22.5s or 23s recharge 15.5s recharge. Enough to keep it on 6 targets if I don't slack off.

And if Secondary Mutation gives me Quick Reflexes, it becomes easier.

 

<edit> Oh, duh. I had a brainfart and was calculating the recharge time on it being 90, not 60. With 60 it recharges in about 15.5s. 

Edited October 9, 2023 by WumpusRat

[StrikerFox]

It looks a lot easier get enough +recharge to perma Fortitude on 6 pets than it is to get perma Hasten. Fort has a 120s duration, 60s base recharge time, so it needs to recharge in 20s to cycle it between 6 pets. +200% recharge should be close to enough. Around +75% recharge slotted in Fort + 70% recharge from Hasten + 55% from LotG/set bonuses will get it there. +200% recharge bonus.

 

If we account for Fort's cast time, 2.5s, it would need to recharge in 17.5s. It would need around +92.5% recharge from LotG/IO set bonuses. +237.5% recharge bonus.