Decision Help

[Toma85]

Hello,

 

After a long break, I’d like to get back into CoH, and for nostalgia’s sake I’d like to roll a Mastermind.

For the secondary I want to go with Marine.

For the primary, I can’t decide between Mercs / Bots / Thugs.

 

Which one is the most popular / least popular in endgame and in teams, and why?

 

Thanks for your help :D.

[tidge]

Marine is excellent no matter the henchmen. Marine improves Mercs and Thugs more than it improves Robots IMO. The reason is because Robots are ranged attackers, whereas melee attackers will benefit more from what Marine brings and melee henchmen generally require more effort to keep in any given fight. Marine provides coverage for melee.

 

Personally, I prefer Robots. As they are ranged, they are easier to control in all combat. In particular I find that they work very well in bodyguard mode solo... on teams they require a little more direct management.

[Uun]

1 hour ago, tidge said:

Marine improves Mercs and Thugs more than it improves Robots IMO. The reason is because Robots are ranged attackers, whereas melee attackers will benefit more from what Marine brings and melee henchmen generally require more effort to keep in any given fight. Marine provides coverage for melee.

Only the T3 Thugs henchman fights in melee. The T1 and T2 stay at range.

[tidge]

18 minutes ago, Uun said:

Only the T3 Thugs henchman fights in melee. The T1 and T2 stay at range.

 

Which is more melee engagement than the robots. Towards endgame, it's the T3 that is doing the big damage... and Marine makes the Bruiser more effective IMO.

[Toma85]

Why exactly does Marine work so well for melee henchmen compared to ranged ones? Which specific buffs or mechanics make a bigger difference for Mercs/Thugs than for Bots?

And if I were to go with Robots/Mercs instead, which secondary powersets would generally pair best with a ranged primary?

Edited yesterday at 03:23 PM by Toma85

[TygerDarkstorm]

5 minutes ago, Toma85 said:

Why exactly does Marine work so well for melee henchmen compared to ranged ones? Which specific buffs or mechanics make a bigger difference for Mercs/Thugs than for Bots?

And if I were to go with Robots/Mercs instead, which secondary powersets would generally pair best with a ranged primary?

If you look at the Marine powerset, you'll see why. Whitecap jumps you into melee in your tide pool. The amount of buffs and damage mitigation that Marine brings to the table allow melee henchmen to perform their job easier, as well as Marine's own playstyle benefiting directly from playing in melee. I have a Marine MM in pretty much every flavor--it pairs extremely well with Necro and so far seems to be good with Ninjas.

[Maelwys]

2 hours ago, Toma85 said:

Why exactly does Marine work so well for melee henchmen

 

It doesn't.

 

It works well for Henchmen that happen to be in melee range.

 

It's perfectly possible to use GOTO commands on your ranged henchmen so that they move to (and remain in for the duration of each fight) a melee location. My Bot/Kinetics does it all the time to leverage Fulcrum Shift. My Bot/Marine does it all the time to leverage Shifting Tide and Tide Pool. In fact, IMO ranged pets are actually better suited to /Marine because they tend to stay exactly where you put them rather than chasing off after runners.

[BZRKR]

Since there's good advice upthread, here's the obligatory "Roll All Three!!" comment.

 

Also, in my opinion /Marine on a Mastermind is a winner no matter what. Of your three choices, all you need to worry about is which Primary you like best. Then leverage your build from there.

[Toma85]

And among Mercs / Bots / Thugs, which one is generally the most (or least) welcome in endgame groups nowadays? I remember Bots used to be unpopular because of their knockback and large size – is that still the case?

[Maelwys]

The only thing that inflicts knockBACK these days is the Assault Bot's Swarm Missiles. Which can be converted to Knockdown easy enough via an Overwhelming Force IO.

Thier models are still pretty big and tend to block line of sight in some indoor maps, but you can usually shove them out of the way (unless the geometry gets very wonky)

 

Mercs is almost as well behaved as Bots. And Thugs only really has the Bruiser (and Arsonist) to watch out for. But neither of them can vastly improve their master's survivability like Protector Bot bubbles (plus Power Boost and/or Radial Clarion).

[Toma85]

Thanks for the insights! Which of the three primaries actually puts out the highest damage overall?

[Maelwys]

Of those three it'd be Bots for AoE, Mercs for ST (assuming you're sticking damage procs in the pets). Bots aren't as utterly horrible at Single Target damage as they used to be, but they still lag behind the other primaries. Necro and Demons are both higher ST damage than Mercs FWIW, but Mercs can leverage Serum very effectively with extreme levels of global recharge.

 

Thugs isn't half bad at damage either, but the bulk of its AoE damage output comes from the T1 Arsonist, which spawns at -2 to you and vs higher level foes will be hit very hard by the Purple Patch.

Thugs does have Gang War though, which makes a good dumping spot for the Pet Aura IOs.

[TooManyButtons]

Slightly off-topic question, but does putting an Achilles Heel proc in Mercs T1 minions stack? I heard conflicting information and a 60% debuff sounds better than another damage proc.

[twozerofoxtrot]

Personally I'd go Bots/Marine for two reasons.

 

1) MM primaries these days often want you to pick up a lot of powers from the set. The attacks tend to have powerful modifiers, you need your pets, and then there's the Tier 7 "burst mode" power like Serum or Gang War. But Marine is similar in that it wants you to usually pick up 8 of 9 of it's powers. This crowds out power pool option. 

 

But you can skip that Tier 7 power on Bots because it's really bad, and your Protectors already heal with the second upgrade, and because very likely you'll have your own heal with Marine. Skip that, and skip one or two beam rifle attacks and now you can fit in a new power pool.

 

2) Between Protectors' bubbles, Toroidol Bubble, and Barrier Reef? Your pets (and you) are pretty tanky. And that matters when you're fighting at +4/8 and your minions are -2. Dead DPS does no damage. Instead of summoning new minions you can be doing other offensive tasks with your action economy.