Quantcast
Channel: Rogue — Marvel Heroes Omega
Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 400

The Lazerhawk - A Beginner Friendly Build

$
0
0

Let me begin by saying that this is a simple build. It is not optimized for TTK. It is optimized for fun. And lazy. And being just a little over the top. It tosses aside the concern of an orderly "rotation" in favor of cutting loose and just having a bit of fun. It plays comfortably on one power bar and adapts well to both single-target and massive group situations.

Here's the points pre-gear:

Powers

20-Pointers (aka, all the Steal from Friends powers)

I spend a lot of time not having a Rogue build. I write a guide about all of Rogue's stolen powers, after all. It doesn't afford me the luxury of a constant, untouched build and requires I hit the "reset" button a lot. Being able to throw a competent build back together in short order is a must. To that end, all my 20-pointers are all in one tree. Since Steal from Friends is the undisputed king of Rogue trees, that's where I chose to put them. They are:

  • Sunspot Punch (Sunspot Team-Up) - This build is almost exlusively energy damage and Sunspot Punch fits that need nicely. It's fast, flashy and a little random -- this build, basically. If you wanted to tame the build a little, you could trade it out for Crushing Blows, which opens up a much-desired Hero power slot for customization and hyrbrids the build a little more. I personally hate Crushing Blows, so if anybody asks you didn't hear that from me.
  • Photonic Wave (Captain Marvel Hero) - Photonic Wave is often dismissed for being weak. It's true, it only deals about 75% the damage of Rogue's average Attrition output. However, it is one of her few "clingy" DoTs and has a monstrous duration at max-ranks. The cone is easy to apply and the stun offers nice group utility with a 3.5s stun. CC in Marvel Heroes is admittedly weak, but almost 3.5s is plenty time to kill most trash unopposed.
  • Psychokinetic Barrier (Cable Hero) - Psychokinetic Barrier is often passed over among Rogue's "clingy" DoTs due to the difficulty of applying the wall-shaped area. However, it makes it into this build for its unparalleled duration. The DoT lasts for at least 10s at any rank (longer if the enemy stays in the area) and is above average in terms of damage. The Wall it places down just happens to have a scaling duration very close to that of Photonic Wave, outlasting it by about half a second. In a boss-fight situation, you can throw down a Photonic Wave and Psychokinetic Barrier as your damage layers. They'll last almost 10s, after which the Psychokinetic Barrier will vanish, notifying you that Photonic Wave's DoT has fallen off and it's time to refresh both. As an added bonus, Psychokinetic Barrier can be placed up to 3 times simultaneously, giving it utility vs large groups. The projectile weakening effect also has decent utility since the Defense Review left projectiles a little over-powered in places. I personally used it to face-tank Madam Hydra's telegraphed bullets in the Cosmic Trial. ;)
  • Blood and Thunder (Beta Ray Bill Team-Up) - I wouldn't normally recommend augmenting your damage with an Impact power, let alone putting 20 points into it. Impacts are best spent on utility in optimal builds, but we put such notions out of our head the moment I said "one bar" in the first paragraph of this guide. Blood and Thunder isn't the top DPS Impact power, but it is a gorgeous combination of DPS and flexibility. It covers a massive area, applying a powerful 2s DoT to practically everything on screen. It then drops a series of 10 extra bolts of damage. The bolts don't do a lot of damage, but they do add up in a single-target situation such as a boss fight. It's competent at both clearing screens and bursting bosses, while being very flashy in the process. Ergo, it wins a spot in this build.
  • Weapons Specialist (Gamora Team-Up) - I'm still not sure how this power got through the censors, but here we go. This is a melee build, so WS is basically mandatory. It gives solid Damage Rating to Melee and Ranged powers (see also: almost everything) and then has a scaling tertiary bonus that flarking doubles its melee bonus. Yeah, it's broken. Yeah, I took it.
  • Ragin' Cajun (Gambit Hero) - To the people who are sick of seeing Ragin' Cajun in every build: I'm sorry, I don't work at Gazillion and can't fix the problem. Ignoring the blatant power imbalance, this build is sorta about crazy random energy explosions and such, and probably would've taken this anyways. If it's off cooldown, press the button. BOOM BOOM BOOM! (Yeah, it sounds like a cyborg elephant sneezing, but just enjoy the explosions.)
  • Recall Overload (Signature) - Yay, her Sig doesn't suck anymore! Well, it still needs work, but the damage is up to par now. Sunspot Punch can get a little spirit hungry, so a reprieve and 140 extra Spirit back doesn't hurt. The long DoT duration on Photonic Wave and Psychokinetic barrier makes popping this randomly without thinking less punishing than a lot of builds. All but one of the Lazerhawk's powers use energy damage too, making it easier to gear in the Sig's favor. This is about as accommodating as a build is going to get for Recall Overload, so go all out. No regrets.

1-Pointers

  • Ricochet Blast (Cyclops Clone Boss) - Stop by Midtown during a Sinister wave and grab this guy. It's her best Basic power, hands down. When enemies are everywhere, pick a target and go full Pinball Wizard. It conforms to almost any mob situation other than single-target. If a boss spawns a totem, take advantage of it and bounce a few shots between them to conserve some Spirit. As a basic attack it does fairly low damage like you'd expect. That quickly becomes a non-issue when you activate Ragin' Cajun, which cheerfully shapes itself to the bouncing beam and wipes out entire rooms of enemies in seconds. Many encounters can be lazily demolished by nothing more than these two powers. It also offers a Spirit-free attack, in a pinch.
  • Molecular Transport (Sinister Boss) - There are plenty of powers you could be using for your "dash" power, but how many of them do real and noticeable damage? People often confuse Molecular Transport for a "Movement build" power, but truth be told it's actually pretty bad in that role. Where it truly shines is filling in as a dash power, which you use to bounce away from an enemy and back in when it's safe. Once you stop your dashing about, it'll detonate an explosion (noticing a theme?) with appreciable damage. It's almost like saying "I'm sorry I spent time not dealing damage to you while I avoided your attack; here's what I owed you". It's not a DPS increase in a dummy TTK scenario, but it is a nice filler in a real, imperfect situation. (Sadly, it doesn't work as a dash in hubs. You'll be a Lazerpedestrian around town. Lazerpedestrian is getting fixed, yay! Thanks, @MichaelMayhem!)
  • Osmium Skin (Colossus Boss) - Again, Sinister Wave in Midtown. It's almost like I wanted to get all my powers quickly from one place (except for when it makes me wait 30 minutes for it Language! RNG). Osmium Skin is Rogue's best defensive passive. Also, it's not a passive. It's a Support toggle that you activate and pretend it's a passive while gaining crazy amounts of Defense and Deflect Rating (gaining almost 9% damage resist in my case). It also looks really awesome with her Savage Land costume. Even if it wasn't crazy awesome defensively, I'd probably take it anyways as a means of not having two Support abilities on my single 8-slot power bar. The one caveat is that you can't go anywhere near Dodge Rating with it. It takes about 2,000 Dodge Rating to chew through the -5% Dodge Chance penalty, which just isn't worth wasting your items on.
  • Deadly Throw (Bullseye Boss) - Most well-geared Rogues have to buckle under and accept their lord and savior Brutal Strikes into their life at some point. The options are Drax's Destroyer's Vengance, Moon Knight's Khonshu's Wrath and Bullseye's Deadly Throw. Drax is ideal for his +2% Brutal Chance, but I blew all my hero slots. So we use Bullseye instead. It wasn't my perfect choice from a "quickly put my build back together" standpoint, but he does usually tend to show up while I'm waiting on a Sinister Midtown wave, so no major harm done.
  • Kree Resilience (Marvelous Physique) - One point here is mandatory, at the very least. Get you them cheap passive bonuses that scale horribly but are better than nothing.
  • Steal Power - Slot 6 (Idunnoyoupick Boss) - Rogue wouldn't be Rogue if you weren't exercising your freedom to build her your way. In the spirit of a "cut loose, have fun" build, Passive #3 is unclaimed. Sometimes I fill it with Pyro's Fire Manipulation, since it gives the most Energy Damage Rating you can find for one-point. If I'm blessed with a visit from the Lizard, I might tap him for a few gobs of Health regen. If I'm going raid-ward, I might hit up Shocker for his extra Spirit management in a long fight. Mood, need and opportunity often dictate this slot for me.

Optional 1-Pointers

You've got lots of extra points but no bar space left. But if you're comfortable in the ways of the bar-swap-fu, these might be appealing:

  • Flight (Marvelous Physique) - I always take it. I dunno, it just seems right having a travel power. When we gettin' the spirit cost removed, huh Gaz?
  • Any Teleport - I took Laser Shift because flarking Lazerhawk!, but no really. It's an underrated power in that it offers a brief moment of invulnerability. Other characters have been called OP for less. It's way too slow at crossing maps, but it serves just fine at getting you through most walls or height differences. The extra Defense and Deflect Rating are worth maybe 1% Damage Resist and not worth losing sleep over, but it's there. If you prefer, Kirigi's Vanish serves just fine. That's assuming you didn't ignore my Molecular Transport suggestion and sub it in as your main dash already. It's okay, I get it. Teleports ftw. No offense taken.
  • Gloves Off - The bar2 wonder; nobody in their right mind puts a 1-minute cooldown steroid on their main bar. Still, it buffs your Damage Rating on par or better than most Passives. The 25% uptime isn't horrible and is long enough to down most bosses. We'd all use it if it wasn't such an inconvenience to swap power bars. Using this power makes your build objectively better. But the limited power bar space was a design choice. So it's not in this build by default. Making it worse. By design. </salty>

Extra points

You'll find yourself with lots of extra points. Not enough to 20-point another power (unless you have all the bonus points possible and took none of the optional 1-pointers), but lots. Where you put them will help you define your version of the Lazerhawk as yours. Me, I tend to put them all into Osmium Skin for an extra 2%ish Damage Resist. Throwing them into Deadly Throw will net you a fair bit of extra damage. Maybe you'll want them in your undefined third passive. If you find your Critical Hit Rating is suffering, it's one of the few stats that scales "not horribly" in Kree Resilience and should net you up to an extra 2% Crit Chance.

Another choice for pure-damage and utility is boosting and using Drain Life. Both the damage and healing are very solid on it, but the duration is short and requires constant babysitting. It's not really in the spirit of this build, but it will be an all around upgrade for those willing to endure its demands. With the long durations and cooldowns elsewhere in the build, it should be easy for experienced players to fit it into their rotation.

Remix - Alternate Build Considerations

  • Swooping Flames (Sauron Boss) - While Photonic Wave and Psychokinetic Barrier are possibly two of the easiest Attrition Powers to keep rolling, they don't exactly offer the pinnacle of damage potential (with Photonic Wave being the easier to use but weaker of the two). Enter Swooping Flames, one of Rogue's most powerful Attrition powers in terms of raw damage. It drops a flame at Rogue's feet that absolutely tears up anything within melee range of her. It also has a 9s cooldown that settles quite comfortably with the durations of both Photonic Wave and Psychokinetic Barrier. The downsides? It only lasts 6s, with the flames she leaves behind lasting only 3s, both of which ignore Power Duration. It also only does reliable and continuous damage to enemies that stay standing in the flames, which will pretty much only be those directly in melee with Rogue. That all adds up to a melee-only power that requires you to stay aggressive and on top of your cooldown. The reward will be significant extra damage in boss encounters.

  • Electromagnetic Flux (Silver Surfer Hero) - Not enough Lazer in your Lazerhawk? It doesn't get much more Lazer than Electromagnetic Flux. EMF has two major caveats that need addressing before it can be used to its full potential. The first is maintaining two Attrition powers on your target, which Photonic Wave and Psychokinetic Barrier manage without equal. Their lengthy durations and the fact that they don't require the enemy to stay standing in a specific spot make it very easy to lay on the Flux for long periods of time without worry. The second concern -- and one you'll have to work around elsewhere in the build -- is that it chugs Spirit like a keg at a frat party. You may consider swapping Blood and Thunder for Thor's Godly Valor or Ragin' Cajun for Invisible Woman's Invisibility to add some extra Spirit restorers, but a lot of it is ultimately going to have to come from gear. Since the build is no longer melee-centric, Weapon Specialists can also be swapped for Hawkeye's Precise Aim passive to good effect.

Gearing and Omegas

I'm only going to touch lightly here, because this is meant to be a flexible, non-optimized build.

To start, Rogue's own uniques are sufficient to get things rolling. I'm not timing TTKs, so there's no point in telling you you need a Fragment of Twilight or a collection of other rare items. As of this writing, Rogue just had her uniques updated and they're solid enough for the job. The build is also almost exclusively Energy damage, so you can get away with throwing Energy Damage Rating at it where available. However, Psychokinetic Barrier makes applying long-duration Mental damage very easy, opening up options for hybrid items such as Power Cosmic and Doop Ectoplasm. "The Power Doop" is the obvious runeword, both in terms of damage and Spirit management.

Critical Hit Rating is a must grab where possible in most Rogue builds. Brutal Strike damage often makes up a lot of her higher tiers of damage, and you can't Brutal Strike unless you Critical Hit first. The latter is something she has difficulty achieving without appropriate gear and Omega points.

I hope to go into a little more detail in this section, with more specific suggestions, but for the time being this is a first draft. Have fun and play around in the spirit the character was intended. There are plenty of other builds out there for when you're ready to get serious.

Misc

As you may have noticed, there's not actually that much in the way of Lazers or Hawks in the Lazerhawk. It's a slight nod to the Synthwave artist of the same name, similar artists, and that raw '80s sense of unrestrained spirit and live-for-today attitude that often characterized pop-media of the decade -- and hopefully this build as well. For the full effect, pop on Lazerhawk's Redline Album while you burn up Midtown under a (admittedly, you'll have to pretend) neon-saturated night.


Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 400

Trending Articles