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Testing Characters in the Powerhouse--But Which One..?
eviltwintwo
Posts: 351 Arc User
I'm not sure many people have realized this, since I rarely seen anyone in the PH except in Millenium City, but each Powerhouse allows you to test your character against different villain groups. So for those of you who don't know or have never thought of it, here it is:
Millenium City--Ren Center
(1) Purple Gang (2) DEMON (3) PSI
Force Station Steelhead--Canadian Wilderness
(1) Hunter-Patriots (2) VIPER (3) Gadroon
Project Greenskin--Southwest Desert
(1) Irradiates (2) Cowboy Robots (3) Escaped Prisoners
Bureau 17--Monster Island
(1) Manimals (2) Argent (3) Elder Worms
Aegir, stern compartment--Lemuria
(1) Aquatic Lemurians (2) Karkaradons (3) Ghost Pirates
NOTES
To get to the "stern compartment" on board the Aegir, go to the opposite side of the sub from where you appear when you zone there. Approach the door and it will allow you to enter the stern compartment the usual way (click!).
The significance of this post: If you tend to have trouble with certain groups, you can rebuild your character repeatedly, paying for it (with in-game $$) only once. I don't think this is too much of an issue for most but you never know. To move to another Powerhouse and test against another villain group, take off the powers again and leave the PH, then go the next zone, enter the PH there, re-choose your powers, and test away. Just make sure to write things down or otherwise remember what you did. (There is no issue zoning without all your powers, as all Powerhouse sites are near where you first appear in the zone, no dangerous travel required.)
There are specific reasons to test against specific villains, other than the "they're hard for me" idea. Examples: VIPER has Brickbusters, who are really annoying debuffers; Argent has mobs that can drain your energy. Testing solo team size 5 against these two groups will let you know if your character needs a plan for those circumstances.
In the first version of Vibora Bay (where you go to meet Black Mask), the Powerhouse is "under renovation". Or, at least, I couldn't find a working one there. If anyone knows of any other PH locations (and the villain groups) that I haven't mentioned, please mention them. Thanks, all.
Millenium City--Ren Center
(1) Purple Gang (2) DEMON (3) PSI
Force Station Steelhead--Canadian Wilderness
(1) Hunter-Patriots (2) VIPER (3) Gadroon
Project Greenskin--Southwest Desert
(1) Irradiates (2) Cowboy Robots (3) Escaped Prisoners
Bureau 17--Monster Island
(1) Manimals (2) Argent (3) Elder Worms
Aegir, stern compartment--Lemuria
(1) Aquatic Lemurians (2) Karkaradons (3) Ghost Pirates
NOTES
To get to the "stern compartment" on board the Aegir, go to the opposite side of the sub from where you appear when you zone there. Approach the door and it will allow you to enter the stern compartment the usual way (click!).
The significance of this post: If you tend to have trouble with certain groups, you can rebuild your character repeatedly, paying for it (with in-game $$) only once. I don't think this is too much of an issue for most but you never know. To move to another Powerhouse and test against another villain group, take off the powers again and leave the PH, then go the next zone, enter the PH there, re-choose your powers, and test away. Just make sure to write things down or otherwise remember what you did. (There is no issue zoning without all your powers, as all Powerhouse sites are near where you first appear in the zone, no dangerous travel required.)
There are specific reasons to test against specific villains, other than the "they're hard for me" idea. Examples: VIPER has Brickbusters, who are really annoying debuffers; Argent has mobs that can drain your energy. Testing solo team size 5 against these two groups will let you know if your character needs a plan for those circumstances.
In the first version of Vibora Bay (where you go to meet Black Mask), the Powerhouse is "under renovation". Or, at least, I couldn't find a working one there. If anyone knows of any other PH locations (and the villain groups) that I haven't mentioned, please mention them. Thanks, all.
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Comments
Okay...maybe I didn't say that the way I meant it. If you're having trouble with a villain group, or testing against tougher ones (VIPER/Argent), starting at team size 5 while solo might not be the best strategy.
What I usually do: if I'm confident in my build, but not too confident, I start at team size 3--otherwise, team size 2. If I have trouble with that, then I know I've got some work to do. (I recently put one of my support builds against VIPER, and man did I get creamed repeatedly.) If I handle it okay, I try it again, same conditions; the groups don't always have a Brickbuster, and I want to make sure I get a good test--sometimes I'll win a fight if 0 or 1 Brickbuster is there but lose if there are 2.
After some tweaking, I up the team size by 1. When I can handle that, I do it again until I can handle team size 5 (assuming my build can actually do so).
This particular time, my support build was able to defeat all three groups at 5. Not bad for a solo toon running Aura of Primal Majesty and Compassion, right?
Viper is fairly common in multiple zones, but they had other options for those. Canada could have offered us Bigfeet but they are not particularly diverse.
Anyone thinking about soloing the QWZ dailies though should just go ahead and max out numbers and power when testing themselves.
The QWZ is a lot harder than anything I have gotten the powerhouse to cook up for a challenge.
The damage you take in testing is damage counted towards your perks, by the way.
More options in PH would be good too. For example, Viper-X or a more generic version of such a foe could be added to the later PH's so you can test against a single superior target; if you've ever done "Bullet for Biselle" (hope I spelled that right) or soloed the Chimera at -1 or even level, you know that a tough target with a time limit can be a pain. But it would be a good extra challenge to see if you can take down such a target within a certain time. Again, not a priority for Cryptic, but it'd be nice.
Also, as mentioned above, testing vs QWZ level monsters would be nice.
The stuff they have in there is pathetic and really does not test much of anything.
SIGNATURE:
Used to be coach on the forums. Still @coach in game.
The QWZ villains...hmm...after thinking about that awhile I believe I understand why that particular enemy class isn't in the Powerhouse. They are level 40 only, and you test against them in the zone itself. I wouldn't be surprised if that was their reasoning. Despite that, I agree with having them in the Powerhouse. Testing power combinations against them would be useful in preparing for QWZ content, if a player chose to do so. And some would.
A one-person mini-Grond would be awesome, especially if in a selection of super bad guys with different strengths. Also, these test mobs could get stronger based on the number of heroes entering, so they could be useful to both individual heroes and teams.