some questions about /marine with a few different pet types

[brasilgringo]

I'm enjoying my thematic Necro/Marine MM named Marine Corpse. Seems quite powerful. I tend to run in groups or for iTrials, so there are also a lot of group buffs around.  I also chug purples when solo.  Got a 42-second pylon time.  Whitecap on refresh keeps the +rchrg up to make Power of the Depths perma while also providing some target debuffs.

marine corpse v7.mbd

Edited December 8 by brasilgringo

[R jobbus]

23 hours ago, Meknomancer said:

 

I have none. I don't take a lot of notice or do numbers when it comes to av resistances to stuff like that. I do know Rommy is particularly susceptible to slows which cocoon does. But i only know this from years of playing kinetics and hitting him with siphon speed. I can only make assumptions. Web envelope recharging faster on the mercs allowing you to reapply it faster? Try slotting it with 5 grav anchor or something similar if you haven't, i just use it for slow res and some procs for damage vs mobs because i hate flyers, its not gonna make a lot of difference dps'wise vs a +4 av.

 

My testing on the bots/marine was just messing about in general content and teams i haven't tried it solo vs anything except the seed of hammi and i couldn't get it below 70% before it popped all its buffs back up. I didn't see the point in trying it against standard gm's/av's that i know it will beat and its the winter event so i'm working thru about 600 toons on 4 servers.

 

There's a lot more knowledgeable players about this stuff, hope 1 of them can help.

 

Thanks for the response. Yea i'm just trying to learn about MM, and i just like doing ITFs, so i appreciate any info as always.

 

2 things: 

 

1) What do you think about assault. I don't have m30 grenade for my mercs build, or white cap (cause on ranged MMs I prefer to just keep my positioning clean and also I dont want req or rommy to 2 shot me if I get too close) but I do have assault. Should I drop assault and go m30 with force feedback to help with the recharge. I have like.. 9 seconds of downtime on power of the depths with hasten.

 

2) I saw in a topic somewhere that apparently in an older version of the game or previous issue or something, that assault bot was actually better if you didn't upgrade him and only did equip robots. Is that still a thing? something about equipping robots gave him missiles instead of the flamethrower. Was this changed, or do you guys just fully upgrade assault bot everytime now? It may have been an old topic, just curious. I figured I'd of heard about it by now if it was a current thing

 

again thanks for the tips. I usually play tank/scrap, i've only picked up MM in the last few months and it's been a blast

[R jobbus]

edit: accidentally double posted

Edited December 9 by R jobbus

[Meknomancer]

7 hours ago, R jobbus said:

 

Thanks for the response. Yea i'm just trying to learn about MM, and i just like doing ITFs, so i appreciate any info as always.

 

2 things: 

 

1) What do you think about assault. I don't have m30 grenade for my mercs build, or white cap (cause on ranged MMs I prefer to just keep my positioning clean and also I dont want req or rommy to 2 shot me if I get too close) but I do have assault. Should I drop assault and go m30 with force feedback to help with the recharge. I have like.. 9 seconds of downtime on power of the depths with hasten.

 

2) I saw in a topic somewhere that apparently in an older version of the game or previous issue or something, that assault bot was actually better if you didn't upgrade him and only did equip robots. Is that still a thing? something about equipping robots gave him missiles instead of the flamethrower. Was this changed, or do you guys just fully upgrade assault bot everytime now? It may have been an old topic, just curious. I figured I'd of heard about it by now if it was a current thing

 

again thanks for the tips. I usually play tank/scrap, i've only picked up MM in the last few months and it's been a blast

 

1) I run with whitecap and M30nade, whitecap gets the fury of the glad proc, M3O gets the ff+rech. Yes i'd be dropping assault, i would try to fit in both. With whitecap you can just use it and hop/fly backwards out of range, on av's+gm's you'll notice the extra -res stacking up with brine. I never skip M30 nade, on mercs i want max rech for serum when low lvl/exempting and with /marine i want power of the depths perma. You can never have too much recharge. Its also nice soft control. But since its just the ITF you won't notice that so much with cims having so much resistance to kb/kd (i blame the engineers) but you will notice the ff+rech firing off consistently. AT 50 with a t4 barrier toroidal and power of the depths and barrier of the reef serum maybe superfluous but i prefer to have it regardless. Something you'd have to test by dropping it.

 

2) You'd pop the t2 first and use both upgrades then summon the t1+t3 and give them the 2nd upgrade, something to do with t3 firing off swarm missiles more often instead of just the laser and t1 doing less kb (or something) which i think you'd have to do every time you zoned so..... i rarely bothered. But i'm almost 100% certain you can forget all that since bots got the upgrade a few issues back. I actually preferred them when all the damage was loaded into the t3 but they are easier to level now than they were before with the damage spread out a bit more evenly. Not that that matters if you just PL it to 50. It does help if you like to exempt. 

[Maelwys]

8 hours ago, R jobbus said:

 

2) I saw in a topic somewhere that apparently in an older version of the game or previous issue or something, that assault bot was actually better if you didn't upgrade him and only did equip robots. Is that still a thing? something about equipping robots gave him missiles instead of the flamethrower. Was this changed, or do you guys just fully upgrade assault bot everytime now? It may have been an old topic, just curious. I figured I'd of heard about it by now if it was a current thing

It was the first upgrade (Equip Robot) that used to be skipped on both the Assault Bot and Battle Drones.

But that's old news.
Don't do this any more.

They buffed the Assbot's (previously AWFUL) Flamethrower attack that gets granted via Equip Robot in Issue 27 Page 5.
Also Equip Robot is now what gives all your 'bots their Damage Resistance - so you're far better off using it on all of your henchmen.

One other thing worth noting is that whereas previously all three Robotics henchmen types inflicted knockback (which was counterproductive to you trying to keep stuff in your Burn Missile Patches; and the main reason why the first upgrade used to get skipped on Battle Drones) nowadays the only henchmen ability that deals knockBACK instead of knockDOWN is the Assault Bot's regular Swarm Missiles (which has a 40% chance to inflict Mag 6 KB). This means you only really need to stick a KB->KD IO in it (the Overwhelming Force unique is best if you're not using it elsewhere); but not in the Drones or Protector Bots. The Battle Drones' Single Target attacks do however inflict a fair bit of Knockdown and so they really benefit from slotting an "Explosive Strike" Damage Proc. The Assbot's AOE attacks will also benefit somewhat from slotting that same Damage Proc; however don't bother with sticking one in the Protector Bots.

(Also; "Repair" became "Maintenance Drone" and is now worth taking, particularly if your secondary doesn't have a heal. And they moved the -Regen debuff out of the Assault Bot Henchmen's attacks and into the MM's own Pulse Rifle Blast, Pulse Rifle Burst, and Photon Grenade Blast attacks. And unfortunately they also gutted Incendiary Swarm Missiles' Burn Patches so they now only hit a maximum of 3 targets - Bots are still good at AoE damage; but they can't melt entire maps anywhere near as fast as they used to... the tradeoff is greatly increased survivability due to the new Maintenance Drone; Equip Robot becoming slottable for +Resistance; and Protector Bot bubbles becoming AoE!)
 

Edited December 10 by Maelwys

[tidge]

The Robots revamp was quite a gift, since IMO they got a lot more than they lost. Losing almost all of the Knockback AND being able to slot the first upgrade power with enhancement sets really contributed to saving slots on a build. The henchmen weren't slouches before when having to "burn" one slot each for a KB->KD enhancement, but there is so much more freedom of build choices without having to do that. Maintenance Drone is also crazy good.

 

Mileage varies for how players reacted to the move of the -Regen from the henchmen attacks into the primary rifle powers, but for me it ended up making essentially no difference: I use two of the rifle powers to debuff/soft control as well as keeping aggro. The main difference (for me) was that with the henchmen not doing -Regen, I can't AFK defeat Giant Monsters... which seems like a decent change.

 

Another change that radically improved MMs (across the board) was the lowering of the level limit for higher-tier powers. It makes a huge difference for improving the MM experience at mid-levels (or when exemplaring to certain content).

[R jobbus]

do you guys know what the deal is with AVs running around when they are burning. I was trying out beasts/marine and it is actually pretty great how well they do, but the AVs keep running away and it kinda just kills it for me. it means that in order to solo the stage I have to go through and kill *everything* and just follow them. There's no way to have them not take fire/burn damage or whatever is doing this? I guess I could slot -immobilize again. I've noticed necro, demons, and beasts seem to cause them to do this. Necro with the summon phantoms power, demons with hell on earth(?) i think, and beasts with i'm assuming one of their final abilities. is this happening for other people? it makes me appreciate ninjas so much more after this, unless i'm just doing something wrong. I can't get them to sit still unless I use ninjas or something slotted with -immobilize. 

 

Which.. doesn't make any sense, because I thought the oni had only fire attacks. am I missing something? 

[Riverdusk]

17 minutes ago, R jobbus said:

do you guys know what the deal is with AVs running around when they are burning. I was trying out beasts/marine and it is actually pretty great how well they do, but the AVs keep running away and it kinda just kills it for me. it means that in order to solo the stage I have to go through and kill *everything* and just follow them. There's no way to have them not take fire/burn damage or whatever is doing this? I guess I could slot -immobilize again. I've noticed necro, demons, and beasts seem to cause them to do this. Necro with the summon phantoms power, demons with hell on earth(?) i think, and beasts with i'm assuming one of their final abilities. is this happening for other people? it makes me appreciate ninjas so much more after this, unless i'm just doing something wrong. I can't get them to sit still unless I use ninjas or something slotted with -immobilize. 

 

Which.. doesn't make any sense, because I thought the oni had only fire attacks. am I missing something? 

 

Some AV's like to run no matter what.  But yes, burn patches tend to make things run even more.  You'll also see it on Thug's arsonist who also creates burn patches.  Personally I tend to always grab an immobilize power from an epic pool when I can, unless it is a character that has a taunt or already has immobilizes. 

 

I even had a beast/dark once where it was a real issue as debuff toggles also like to trigger things running and it was even more a pain on a melee pet set.  I literally couldn't solo one AV because the pets never stayed in range of him for more than 2 seconds at a time before he'd take off running again (and regen all the damage).  That is when I forever changed my epic pool strategy.

 

Of course if you don't care much about soloing AV's it isn't as much an issue, usually someone on a team will have either immobilize or taunt.

[R jobbus]

2 minutes ago, Riverdusk said:

 

Some AV's like to run no matter what.  But yes, burn patches tend to make things run even more.  You'll also see it on Thug's arsonist who also creates burn patches.  Personally I tend to always grab an immobilize power from an epic pool when I can, unless it is a character that has a taunt or already has immobilizes. 

 

I even had a beast/dark once where it was a real issue as debuff toggles also like to trigger things running and it was even more a pain on a melee pet set.  I literally couldn't solo one AV because the pets never stayed in range of him for more than 2 seconds at a time before he'd take off running again (and regen all the damage).  That is when I forever changed my epic pool strategy.

 

Of course if you don't care much about soloing AV's it isn't as much an issue, usually someone on a team will have either immobilize or taunt.

 

I really want to solo AVs though. that's part of what I enjoy doing. Thanks for the info.

 

I really probably am just gonna respec anything that burns and go web envelope again, which im ok with doing. I just didn't know this was a regular issue. It may also be cause ITF stage 3 rommy just runs at the drop of a hat.

 

I'm just not used to it mostly playing tank and scrap, as you say with the taunt powers

[R jobbus]

5 hours ago, Riverdusk said:

 

Some AV's like to run no matter what.  But yes, burn patches tend to make things run even more.  You'll also see it on Thug's arsonist who also creates burn patches.  Personally I tend to always grab an immobilize power from an epic pool when I can, unless it is a character that has a taunt or already has immobilizes. 

 

I even had a beast/dark once where it was a real issue as debuff toggles also like to trigger things running and it was even more a pain on a melee pet set.  I literally couldn't solo one AV because the pets never stayed in range of him for more than 2 seconds at a time before he'd take off running again (and regen all the damage).  That is when I forever changed my epic pool strategy.

 

Of course if you don't care much about soloing AV's it isn't as much an issue, usually someone on a team will have either immobilize or taunt.

 

ran school of sharks on beasts instead of bile spray and it really did -immobil rommy for the whole fight! I am impressed that beasts took him down. He did kill one of the wolves but that's way better than I expected. Thanks for the info.

 

Requiem seems to be a beasts problem though. THey just don't seem to pull enough aggro from him before he insta kills me from held/ ranged attacks. it seems like beasts take a little bit to fully pull aggro sometimes, even if they're just attacking the hell out of whatever is targeted.

 

This is still a win in my book though. I'm glad I was able to keep the mako pool/shark theme with marine and beasts with some success.

Edited December 11 by R jobbus

[tidge]

In my experience, all enemies that survive long enough in a fight will eventually run. Practically, I think I've only seen this after they've taken damage (of some amount). I've read speculation that it is the AI responding to one or more of the following:

• The enemy missing a certain number of attacks
• The enemy being debuffed
• The enemy taking enough damage relative to its HP
• All of the enemy powers are still on "cooldown"

At one point, the analysis was that some majority of AVs and GMs were susceptible to Immob, or didn't haven't any special protection from it. There are some enemies that are not susceptible to Immob (or slows), and there are many enemies that fly, and of course Immob has to hit, so there are some enemies that can shrug off even those tricks.

 

The only thing I've observed to stop something from running away (tested up through Elite Bosses) is a Placate (when solo). I've observed this with my Bane, I can't remember if I've tested it with a Stalker. Sadly for MMs, Pacify from the Presence pool doesn't really duplicate all the effects of Placate, so I have no reason to believe it would work the same. The pool version also requires a ToHit check.

 

Casual observation against the zone giant monsters: Eventually, everyone of them (except for the Arachnos flier, while vulnerable) has been observed to "run", but they never run very far before making an attack. This is in contrast for the DE "Monsters" of the Hive/PI/etc. I suspect the "monsters" run further than Jurassik partially because the monsters have fewer attacks. Without an immon, my MM has much more of a problem finishing off the DE "monsters" than it does Jurassik.

[Riverdusk]

59 minutes ago, tidge said:

In my experience, all enemies that survive long enough in a fight will eventually run. Practically, I think I've only seen this after they've taken damage (of some amount). I've read speculation that it is the AI responding to one or more of the following:

• The enemy missing a certain number of attacks
• The enemy being debuffed
• The enemy taking enough damage relative to its HP
• All of the enemy powers are still on "cooldown"

 

 

Another one I've heard is a certain amount of attacks taken in a certain period of time (>x number of attacks that hit a mob in say a 10 second period can cause a run trigger).  Each tic in a dot counts as a separate attack for this calculation. 

 

Anecdotally I noticed an increase in the number of runners my dark melee scrapper had when the change to touch of fear happened.  ToF does 5 tics over 3 seconds and is easy to spam.  So, I give some credence to that theory from personal experience compared to when ToF wasn't in the rotation.

 

Masterminds due to number of pets tend toward a great number of attacks in short periods of time (if they are focused on one enemy) would certainly trigger that if it is an accurate theory.

[R jobbus]

8 hours ago, Riverdusk said:

 

Another one I've heard is a certain amount of attacks taken in a certain period of time (>x number of attacks that hit a mob in say a 10 second period can cause a run trigger).  Each tic in a dot counts as a separate attack for this calculation. 

 

Anecdotally I noticed an increase in the number of runners my dark melee scrapper had when the change to touch of fear happened.  ToF does 5 tics over 3 seconds and is easy to spam.  So, I give some credence to that theory from personal experience compared to when ToF wasn't in the rotation.

 

Masterminds due to number of pets tend toward a great number of attacks in short periods of time (if they are focused on one enemy) would certainly trigger that if it is an accurate theory.

 

This is interesting. I am typically making full builds and testing them on the test server before I ever build up and pay for them in the live server, and one thing I add is t4 interface (Or t3 usually cause sometimes the difference between 50% and 75% isn't worth the merits if i have a ton of characters lined up that all need incarnates)

 

I did try removing reactive radial though in testing and AVs still run...but I could try again I guess and see what happens. I had initially thought it was the fire damage, since the AVs seem to run with some orange light attached to the center of them. That's what confused me. I thought it was a burn affect of some kind. But I did try removing reactive radial and they still do it.

 

The next time I try necro, I may go for degenerative just to be sure, but I am assuming it's something the specters do, maybe a debuff that's causing running as described above. And again, I tested this with ninjas/marine against the same AVs on stage 3 of the ITF with reactive radial equipped, and no running from either req or rommy. So maybe it's just a specific debuff or something necro/demons/beasts do that spook the AV.  

 

Regardless, I just full slot graviational anchor into any -immobilize I use to negate this, either web envelope or shark school and it seems to do ok. I know there are limits on the potential for MM soloing though, compared to something like a shield tank. I still haven't been successful with clearing the 4 AV fight at +4/x8 on stage 4 of the ITF with solo MM without abusing the aggro limit (which I avoid doing, since it seems to be subject to change, which I don't like). The auto hit nictus and rommy just shred pets immediately, even while in the sky.

 

 

Edited December 12 by R jobbus

[Maelwys]

10 hours ago, tidge said:

• The enemy taking enough damage relative to its HP

AFAIK this was the main one, at least prior to i25.

There was/is a behaviour setting within the AI that corresponds to "Fight then Run" and makes any creature it's assigned to engage in combat normally at long as their current HP is higher than a certain value (default is 30%) but if their current HP drops below that value then they start trying to flee.
There is also another oddity called "Grief Mode" which can kick in depending on current HP (default is 70%) and has a start and end time (defaults = 10 secs and 30 secs).

Under the hood, there are many variables that the AI holds separately for each NPC entity. Generally if something has a high "fear" value but a low "confidence" and "loyalty" value then it'll try and flee. However those values can move up and down in realtime by things such as getting attacked or having your allies get attacked. And they can be overridden entirely via getting affected by the 'Afraid' mez effect or being Taunted.
Specific mob types are tweaked so that they *NEVER* feel fear and/or are always confident; such as Banished Pantheon and Zombies and Inanimate Objects.

So the short answer is "it's complicated"... however as far as I can tell in general the typical breakpoints that an NPC will start trying to run away at if they think things aren't going well are "after 10 seconds of being engaged in combat if below 70% HP" and "if under 30% HP".
 

Edited December 12 by Maelwys

[R jobbus]

2 hours ago, Maelwys said:

AFAIK this was the main one, at least prior to i25.

There was/is a behaviour setting within the AI that corresponds to "Fight then Run" and makes any creature it's assigned to engage in combat normally at long as their current HP is higher than a certain value (default is 30%) but if their current HP drops below that value then they start trying to flee.
There is also another oddity called "Grief Mode" which can kick in depending on current HP (default is 70%) and has a start and end time (defaults = 10 secs and 30 secs).

Under the hood, there are many variables that the AI holds separately for each NPC entity. Generally if something has a high "fear" value but a low "confidence" and "loyalty" value then it'll try and flee. However those values can move up and down in realtime by things such as getting attacked or having your allies get attacked. And they can be overridden entirely via getting affected by the 'Afraid' mez effect or being Taunted.
Specific mob types are tweaked so that they *NEVER* feel fear and/or are always confident; such as Banished Pantheon and Zombies and Inanimate Objects.

So the short answer is "it's complicated"... however as far as I can tell in general the typical breakpoints that an NPC will start trying to run away at if they think things aren't going well are "after 10 seconds of being engaged in combat if below 70% HP" and "if under 30% HP".
 

 

fascinating stuff. And even more confusing because it literally happens instantly, well well before 70% hp. With necro, demons, and beasts.

 

Within probably the first 10 or 20 seconds the AV will have some orange glow in the center of it and start to create distance. As long as I don't follow him, he'll come back, but sometimes they just keep running, or it'll take a while. I'm assuming it's a necro/beasts/demon debuff that they are doing.

 

But I've definitely noticed other npcs run and behave how like you're describing, definitely cool info to know. 

[Riverdusk]

5 hours ago, R jobbus said:

 

fascinating stuff.

 

Agreed.   And I find sad that most newer games don't seem to bother having such complex systems.

Edited December 12 by Riverdusk