So what do you think goes best with Marine now that it's been out awhile?

[tjknight]

I've been leveling up a Necro/Marine mastermind, and it's been a fantastic experience! Marine seems to be the top choice for mastermind primaries right now. At first, it might not look as flashy, but once you factor in the extra hitpoints, the absorb mechanic, solid damage buffs, plus a bit of defense and resistance, it all adds up to a significant boost in pet sturdiness and performance. Marine also makes easier to skip Leadership, which previously felt like a must have. I’m really curious, though—what do people think is the best complementary pet set to pair with Marine? Necro has been working well for me, and I'm currently sitting at level 34.

Edited November 3 by tjknight

[TheSpiritFox]

1 hour ago, tjknight said:

I've been leveling up a Necro/Marine mastermind, and it's been a fantastic experience! Marine seems to be the top choice for mastermind primaries right now. At first, it might not look as flashy, but once you factor in the extra hitpoints, the absorb mechanic, solid damage buffs, plus a bit of defense and resistance, it all adds up to a significant boost in pet sturdiness and performance. Marine also makes easier to skip Leadership, which previously felt like a must have. I’m really curious, though—what do people think is the best complementary pet set to pair with Marine? Necro has been working well for me, and I'm currently sitting at level 44.

IMO Thugs. 

Ranged just generally does better than melee with MM pets. If you want to go melee, sure, its still very playable, its just baseline lower overall performance both offensively and defensively. Melee pets are much more likely to get targeted and focused down while running in and such. Six ranged pets opening up on a group provide shall we say a bit more "diffusion of responsibility" for the alpha lol. 

 

Maintain dps better too just by virtue of often not having to move or pause switching targets. 

So with the ranged you've got bots, thugs, and mercs. Neither bots nor mercs has a mule power for pet uniques, and mercs is weaker defensively providing no defensive buffs to the master besides bodyguard vs leadership and pbot bubble applying to the MM. You kinda want as many uniques as you can get because Marine is layers, not something that just like boosts your resistance a ton or lets you softcap your pet defenses. 

Thugs just work well with the design. They do better at mid range-melee, the bruiser is an ideal focus for shifting tides, thugs procs well while still being strong defensively, double leadership helps ease slotting burdens in the primary compared to other sets. You'll be tougher and do more damage than bots/marine and tougher than mercs/marine except for the first like 10 seconds of serum. 

[TygerDarkstorm]

Thugs actually isn't really the strongest pairing with marine; thugs has fallen somewhat behind since they were excluded from the mastermind revamp that happened a while back.

 

Necro, Ninja, Mercs, and Demons are some of the strongest pairings with Marine Affinity right now. Keep in mind, Marine Aff also likes to be in melee, or jousting, due to whitecap. If you search Marine Aff threads, you'll see a lot of people's commentary regarding the set. If you want to play it ranged, I would play Mercs over Thugs, personally, regardless of the lack of mule power, Mercs are very strong now.

[Crysis]

Have a Demons/, Mercs/, Ninja/, Necro/, Bots/ and Thugs/Marine Affinity alt, all of them at 50+3, most with full T4’s now.  Had a Beast/Marine I took to level 35 but abandoned it and it’s scheduled for deletion.  Beast just needs help.  Thugs is as good as Thugs/Time or Thugs/Storm (my two previous most-played MM’s), but it’s not quite got the capabilities of all the other sets.  I’d rank it last place, although it’s still far better than many other MM pairings for Thugs.

 

For PVE content, including soloing GM’s and AV’s, take your pick.  They are all effective.  I have solo’d all of the non-Incarnate AV’s and regularly go GM hunting.  Have downed them all with several of the above.  My favorites thus far have been Ninja and Necro.  On Ninja, take and use the Smoke Flash every time it’s up.  Literally “Crits on Demand” and on Necro take and use all three of your primary attacks for the Specters.  +3/x7 is easily do-able at low 40’s, and +4/x8 by late 40’s pre-Incarnate.  It’s a great soloer and even better on teams.  I took Fold Space on most of them….helps keep everything in the Tide Pool.  You’ll seldom need to invoke Bodyguard mode.  I play with them almost always on full Aggressive mode outside of some trials where I want to keep them on a tighter leash.  People think you need Melee pets to maximize Shifting Tides and Tide Pool but Mercs and Bots both get into the pool just fine.  Since I have TP pool, I have combat TP on a bind and will just TP to the other side of the spawn, usually dragging the Mercs and Bots along with me.  Otherwise, and I think people forget this, just drop Shifting Tides onto Barrier Reef….it’s almost always with you (or near you) and thus it triggers the stacks as well.  Or drop it on the AV/GM if a long battle.

 

For any of the “hard mode” stuff, including the new Labyrinth stuff, you really need Ranged henchmen and Destiny>Barrier.  It’s just too hard to keep the melee pets alive in hard mode content.  Same is also true for “speed run” TF’s like Tin Man/Apex and such.  Ranged Mercs/ and Bots/ survive those far better and it’s easy enough to face tank the AV’s yourself while they whittle down the target and/or get your top tier henchman to draw aggro while you just step back and debuff/heal.

 

*DO NOT SLEEP ON BRINE* if you plan to solo AV/GM’s a bunch.  It stacks and slotted with health/absorb it makes a measurable difference in target elimination times.  Even if all you can spare is one slot for it, take it and spam it.  For PVE content, I have a macro for targeting primary threat targets (mezzers, sappers and the like) and at +4/x8 a Sapper is eliminated with a single application opener of Brine and a single shot of any attack.

 

Shoal is entirely skippable but you’ll want everything else in /Marine.  Don’t forget that Barrier Reef offers more value for the Absorb than the defense, so slot it up with heal sets or if you can spare the slots do 50/50 of heal and defense.

Edited November 4 by Crysis

[TygerDarkstorm]

22 hours ago, Evercent said:

I didn't level it past 20 I think, but Illusion and Symphony on controller are both amazing. I feel like any controller primary that does damage will do really good. All the CC prevents damage to you, and you in turn do damage to them. As I haven't levelled them up far, I don't know how well powers synergize but the levels I did play so far were a blast. Beyond that, like Tyger mentioned, a pseudo melee powerset would work really well. I have a 50 Pistols/Time that is awesome, and from what I've heard Marine plays like a combination between Time, Dark and Nature. If that's the case, I think Marine/Pistols Defender, or the reverse for Corruptor would do really well levelling and in endgame content.

Erm, this is the Mastermind forum and the OP was asking about MM combos.

[Evercent]

1 hour ago, TygerDarkstorm said:

Erm, this is the Mastermind forum and the OP was asking about MM combos.

 

Oop, my bad, posted this in a half asleep state, sorry!

[TygerDarkstorm]

1 hour ago, Evercent said:

 

Oop, my bad, posted this in a half asleep state, sorry!

I think we've all been there lol

[Octogoat]

Bots or mercs for ranged, ninjas or necro for melee

[evetsleep]

I'm going to go ahead and say it.  Concept is King.  We get 1,000 slots per server.  Use'em (I have 826 now 🫡).  Marine is so well done it still surprises me how powerful it ended being, especially in the hands of pet wielders.

 

That being said I've given them all a spin and they all have different ways they can play well with Marine.  Recent I took the much maligned Beasts and paired it with Marine (Wet Fur!) and they do really well with everything that the new set brings.

 

Personally I think the choice first is do you want to be in melee range with your pets.  After that come up with a concept you like and have at it!