4Star Aeon Complete Off-Meta Restricted Run -- Regular builds, no top powersets

[Projector]

TLDR; You can do any 4star with the right roles. Roles will always matter more than builds. IMO, it just makes it take longer, but doesn't really make it more interesting. 

Hey everyone,

 

With the growing talk around procs, 4star builds, and what is and isn't possible, I decided to record a run of Aeon that would specifically avoid all of the meta sets and would only utilize general PVE builds. Here was the specific ruleset:

 

• No Kinetics, Nature, or Cold Domination
• No Ice Blast, Fire Blast, Fire Melee, or Battle Axe
• No Bio Armor or Rad Armor
• No 4star optimized builds, only general PVE builds (my Rad/Rad Corrupter had only 2-3 additional procs that weren't already included in an IO set (like a Glad Javelin Toxic Damage+5 Apocalypses in Proton Volley).
• No prep like respecs or acquiring additional accolades beyond what a toon already has
• T4 incarnates were obviously allowed because Hardmode was designed specifically with them in mind
• I also did not seek any specific powerset combinations other than that I did want an Electric Affinity. Otherwise, I just said I needed roles filled (like debuff, buffs, taunt, etc.) and this is what people had.

Here's the video of the run with gameplay audio only: 

• Rad/Rad Corruptor (Barrier) ME!
• AR/FF Corruptor (Barrier)
• FF/AR Defender (Incan)
• Psi/Time Corruptor (Barrier)
• Grav/Elec Affinity Controller (Clarion)
• Stone/Stone Tanker (Barrier for missions 1-2, Ageless for the rest of the TF)
• Energy/Elec Blaster (Barrier) Trick Arrow/Electric Defender (Barrier)

Here is the biggest takeaway that I hope people get from this:

 

Those who advocate for 4star builds aren't being elitist, nor are they saying it's impossible without said builds. In fact, I've never heard anyone seriously claim that. The closest I hear is that it's just not worth the time it takes to do it with regular builds (I'm inclined to agree).

The 4* builds are not about being the only way to succeed, but they ARE about EFFICIENCY and SPEED, and honestly they do make things easier. There's a reason people don't do Shadow Shard TFs a lot. Not everyone has 2 hours to spend on one type of content. It's also horribly inefficient if you're trying to get as many DSyncs and HOs as possible to fund your altitis.

This was not a hard run at all. None of us were even worried about difficulty at all. We were chillin and having casual conversation throughout most of this and joking about things like putting detention field on the Brickernauts (particularly hilarious moment of this at 55:00 when we can't kill literally the last Boomer we need to move to the next area).  

In reality, 4star builds mainly make these easier and more casual. 4star builds also enable specific strategies that would actually be impossible without the time saved by killing things faster. In Mission 3 of the ITF, the time saved by the increased DPS means that if everyone survives, you can actually have your Lores out for Romulus, Requiem, the Phalanx Computer, the giant robots, Vandal, and all of the Generals. It makes all of those fights much easier.

I've completed the Vanguard fight in less than 2 minutes flat with an optimized team. I know of other teams that have taken down Dra'Gon/K'ong in less than 3 minutes. But this run took us more than that to kill only Hero 1.

In my opinion, sitting there for 5 minutes chipping away at Hero 1 isn't interesting gameplay and there is no challenge. Once you are standing in the right spot, you just keep cycling your attacks until he dies. In that same vein, I hate how long it takes to defeat U'Kon Grai in a standard MSR now after the Page 7 GM changes. Not only is this not interesting to me, but I've also been experiencing several nerve/muscle issues in my arms (so I prob shouldn't make these long posts), limiting my play time and making me miss out on things I would like to do. With that limited play time, I want to experience as much as possible, so doing things efficiently is really valuable to me to minimize the physical impact to my body.
 

Here are a few other takeaways I hope people get from this:

1. There is one specific build requirement that you need to keep in mind for all 4-star content--whoever is tanking needs to have a minimum of 2,400 HP. I thought this was just a best practice, but as our tank discovered and was shocked by, Hero 1 and Mr. Rodney were both hitting him casually for ~2,300 damage through full defense and resist cap from Barriers. So, if you want to tank 4star content seriously, get yourself more HP.

2. Your roles matter more than your powersets. While the roles can overlap, here is what you need:

• 2 Defense buffs
• 2 AoE healers (kin and nature/elec affin are the best options),
• 1 Taunt,
• 2 debuffers (prioritize -regen, and -res, with -heal being equal priority for Romulus in ITF and Dra'Gon/K'ong in LGTF.)
• 2 DPS
   

You can immediately see in that role list why Cold Domination is so good--you get AoE key stat debuffs, You get def buffs for your team, you get an additional source of end recovery, and you get high DPS with ice blast. One Ice/Cold fills 3 different roles simultaneously, making it much more valuable than just a single toon. This is also why Thermal just isn't as good--Resistance buffs are not as helpful, because, obviously, attacks that don't hit you will always do less damage than the ones that do. 

A typical, meta 4star run with powersets is: 
 

• Bio/BA Tank or Bio/BA Scrapper (though, admittedly, anything with high regen and an absorb is good here. I've even tanked all the 4* TFs on my shield/BA Tank)
• 3 Ice/Cold Corrs
• 2 Ice/Fire or Fire/Fire Blasters
• 1 Ice/Kin
• 1 Ice/Nature
   

The reason Ice is so good, beyond just what procs it can take and the versatility of the various powers, is that it also gives you another beautiful advantage: You can control when enemies die. Instead of relying on sudden bursts of damage from Inferno, stacking Blizzards allows things to die at a slow enough rate that you can track them and adjust your positioning accordingly to avoid things like Nullification fields.
 

For my next demonstration, I suspect that regular builds could actually beat the Omega K'ong fight, given you have 25 minutes to do it. I did a run a few weeks ago where we had all the meta power sets, but only myself on a Kin and our Nature were 4-star optimized builds. We completed the TF, but failed the K'ong fight, but our strategy did not include stacking Dra'Gon and K'ong whenever the gas was down to double up the DPS+debuffs, so we could not overcome Dra'Gon's second heal. We were basically stuck with Dra'Gon at a little under half-HP until the time ran out.

Again, I think we will be successful, but I don't think the fight will be any harder, I just think it will take longer. The only risk there is that there are more chances to mess up a barrier call, get your positioning wrong, get caught by a stray shot, etc. That's really it though. The fight isn't any harder or more complex, it's just...slower.

Hope you enjoyed this and thanks for coming to my TED Talk.
What are your thoughts?
 

Edited Tuesday at 12:14 AM by Projector
Fix Video Link

[Glacier Peak]

This is a well-written post. I appreciate the video as well and have followed your continued uploads. It's exactly what players need to read to know that this Advanced Difficulty (Hardmode) content is not out of reach and doesn't require specific Archetypes or builds. Only when players want to complete these efficiently (meaning quickly and with minimal defeats) does optimization of Archetype and builds become common place, though again as you point out, still not mandatory. 

 

I think you should post a shorter post linking to this thread in the general discussion section because the forum community doesn't traffic through this section very much yet (newest sub forum on this website).

 

And to add a personal anecdote, I've been running Advanced Difficulty badge runs on Indomitable and used your walk through of the Lady Grey Task Force to assist in leading and navigating (especially that last part in the final mission). Thanks for posting!

[Lunar Ronin]

I tend to agree on the "just a carry" portion, for sure. The problem with this comes in the fact that many people have been the carry in a 4* team, but did not think they were being carried, so you hear things like, "Yeah, I did a 4* on my regular slotted blaster with no problem! You don't need 4* builds or anything"

 

 

So yes, you can play anything on a 4* run, provided you have 6-7 other people that are all optimized and willing to carry you through it. Though, at that point you're basically just a walking Barrier user and that's about it.

 

 

1 hour ago, Projector said:

TLDR; You can do any 4star with the right roles. Roles will always matter more than builds. IMO, it just makes it take longer, but doesn't really make it more interesting. 

What are your thoughts?

 

 

First you said that a month ago that anyone who isn't using a meta build on a 4* advanced mode is a carry.  Now you're saying that roles matter more than builds, and 4* advanced modes can be done with regular builds.  Which is it?

[Spaghetti Betty]

What a great little experiment! I will admit that Aeon isn't my favorite SF, and I prefer to get it over with pretty quickly. There also isn't much point to grinding the hell out of 4* ASF since MDCs are no longer allowed in missions (unless?).

 

Also, I would definitely still consider it the Intro to Hard Mode. Outside of the optional Vanguard fight, nothing is especially demanding and can be completed by any team full of IO'd/T4'd toons and a bit of brainpower.

 

But, as you said, it really is down to how long one wishes to take to complete the run when it comes down to optimization. If this takes longer than an hour, I start getting cranky!

[Projector]

4 hours ago, Spaghetti Betty said:

(unless?).

Check most of my Lady Grey videos. Basically, go next to a mission door, click to summon your pet, and then immediately click the door so you enter while the animation is happening. The dummies will follow you inside, and so will the MDC 😉 

[Spaghetti Betty]

2 hours ago, Projector said:

Check most of my Lady Grey videos. Basically, go next to a mission door, click to summon your pet, and then immediately click the door so you enter while the animation is happening. The dummies will follow you inside, and so will the MDC 😉 

Yes, I know. 🤭 I was being a rascal!

[Projector]

13 hours ago, Lunar Ronin said:

First you said that a month ago that anyone who isn't using a meta build on a 4* advanced mode is a carry.  Now you're saying that roles matter more than builds, and 4* advanced modes can be done with regular builds.  Which is it?

Let me clarify a couple of things:

1. "Anyone who isn't using a meta build is a carry." I mean that, specifically, one player is getting carried.If all 7 other people are using meta builds, the 8th person will likely get carried through and not contribute much. So, I've taken an 8th man who doesn't have a proper build or not really done 4star content at all through Omega Kong 2-3 times now, and other times we've completed the Omega Kong fight even after someone DCd. That's how strong the 7 meta builds are. The 8th man really matters more for helping with barrier rotations or using Clarion or Ageless in that situation. This is also how you can easily carry Masterminds and Sentinels through 4star content. Because things like Ice/Cold corruptors fill multiple roles, the 8th man can be whatever and it doesn't matter.

As I said in a prior post, it's like being a lowbie on a +4x8 KM ITF, You'll be there, but you'll be doing far less than the 50s on your team, and you won't be able to finish without them doing most of the work. 

The other example in this context would be a total new player doing a speed ITF. Even if they have a proper build but have never done a speed ITF, they'll be lost, and they won't contribute much, relying on their team to do most of the work and TP them around.

2. "The roles matter more than the builds." They do.  As long as you have the proper roles filled and people are using their powers correctly, you should be able to complete the task forces. It will be slower, but you can do it. If you're the person bringing a weaker build, you'll be contributing less to each fight. That's literally just how the math works out in terms of damage and tohit calculations, etc. And if everyone is bringing non-4star builds, then you cannot afford to have someone not filling a role, period. If your whole team is using regular pve builds, then the importance of EVERY player filling a proper role skyrockets.

So, everything I've said in prior posts is still true, but which is more relevant will largely depend on what team you are playing alongside, and what you specifically are bringing.

[Projector]

7 hours ago, Spaghetti Betty said:

Yes, I know. 🤭 I was being a rascal!

YOU SCALLYWAG!

[Projector]

14 hours ago, Glacier Peak said:

This is a well-written post. I appreciate the video as well and have followed your continued uploads. It's exactly what players need to read to know that this Advanced Difficulty (Hardmode) content is not out of reach and doesn't require specific Archetypes or builds. Only when players want to complete these efficiently (meaning quickly and with minimal defeats) does optimization of Archetype and builds become common place, though again as you point out, still not mandatory. 

 

I think you should post a shorter post linking to this thread in the general discussion section because the forum community doesn't traffic through this section very much yet (newest sub forum on this website).

 

And to add a personal anecdote, I've been running Advanced Difficulty badge runs on Indomitable and used your walk through of the Lady Grey Task Force to assist in leading and navigating (especially that last part in the final mission). Thanks for posting!

Thanks for the advice. I've feel bad because I don't want to spam multiple forums just for visibility, and I figure if I start posting here, more people will start to use these sections as they fill with more content.

But I really like the idea of just linking here in another section just to help with the visibility. That's not the same thing as just copy/pasting a post, so I definitely feel better about that method!

[Projector]

@Cobalt Arachne Since you stopped by, I just wanted to say thank you for the hardmode content. For real. I have an entire new group of friends because of doing this content together with them, and it's given me a space I can also meaningfully contribute to in the game. Aside from the cool, unique, and more challenging gameplay, the kind of camaraderie it's provided has been wonderful during a really rough period in my life.

Also, and this is my favorite thing about 4* content: It brought Role-based teamplay back to City of Heroes. Playing through 4star content feels like the old days where I'd be on lowbie teams struggling through low level CoT Ruin Mages or original posi 1 and crying out that we desperately need a tank or a healer. With things like Barrier providing so much survivability across the board, everyone is left to focus on what their role actually does best. It's less about steamrolling and more about using your role's strengths to eliminate/neutralize key targets quickly. Aggro control is meaningful for tanks again, blasters get to really blast and enjoy all the orange numbers on their screen again. I think it's the most under-appreciated/under-recognized contribution that hardmode content has brought to the game.

[Cobalt Arachne]

4 minutes ago, Projector said:

thank you for the hardmode content

You are most welcome! 🙂Thanks to everyone who's played my stuff! 😄

It's been real great seeing players engaging with the advanced content, I'm glad they're an experience people can find fun with and enjoy together.