Anyone tried Master&Blaster since 4.0? Need help.

[IkarusXY]

My team decided that we go through Ravagers again for our new team members for 4.0.

Half the team killed M&B and Cora in 3.0 but our tactics don't work anymore.

 

 

It seem to be insane with the damage the tanks are taking. The push from blaster in the second phase is nearly one-shotting our tank, and with the Vanguard nerf it is not possible to avoid every push.

 

 

There is also some heavy RNG bugs. Sometimes one team member gets randomly 3-4 mines at ones and just getting oneshot. I remember this happening in 3.0 wenn someone died, but now it is happening even if no one died yet in the pull.

 

 

Still our biggest problem is helping the blaster tank survive. Master Tank takes so much damage so fast with the overpowered arm attack it takes both healers in range to keep him alive (especially if he also has a mine). Blaster tank only survives a push if very lucky.

 

 

Might this be a gear issue (both tanks are 220/224 min maxed)? maybe something with the tactics? Or is there something wrong with the damage recieved.

 

Thanks in advance.

[SupaHsuB]

Tanks are taking more dmg in 4.0 from this fight. It is now more a healing check than anything else.

 

Vid of a kill i got last night, healing the fight.

 

- triple mines does happen, infact in the vid, happens to me in early on in P1 then the Blaster tank in P2 and the Mara DPS nearing end of P2. Just gotta be lucky and quick with cooldowns.

 

- vanguard/pt tank on blaster should be using cooldowns only when he knows hes gonna get knocked away, the PT in the video uses HO for the first KB in each phase and then every other one. Using it on first one helps group settle in after Rain of Pain Phase, and mines which usually only explode then, so healers arent stressed with chasing or worrying about Blaster tank flying out of range.

 

- we split 1 healer on each tank, and its enough i think

 

Good Luck!

[xkcurtisx]

My team decided that we go through Ravagers again for our new team members for 4.0.

Half the team killed M&B and Cora in 3.0 but our tactics don't work anymore.

 

 

It seem to be insane with the damage the tanks are taking. The push from blaster in the second phase is nearly one-shotting our tank, and with the Vanguard nerf it is not possible to avoid every push.

 

 

There is also some heavy RNG bugs. Sometimes one team member gets randomly 3-4 mines at ones and just getting oneshot. I remember this happening in 3.0 wenn someone died, but now it is happening even if no one died yet in the pull.

 

 

Still our biggest problem is helping the blaster tank survive. Master Tank takes so much damage so fast with the overpowered arm attack it takes both healers in range to keep him alive (especially if he also has a mine). Blaster tank only survives a push if very lucky.

 

 

Might this be a gear issue (both tanks are 220/224 min maxed)? maybe something with the tactics? Or is there something wrong with the damage recieved.

 

Thanks in advance.

 

welcome to bioware high defense gear on vgs and shadows, and not tuned bosses.

 

Regardless its still doable but everything needs to be perfect.

[Excise]

Our team briefly tried M&B on 4.0 and we got our butts whupped due to the outgoing damage. Planning on returning to him eventually, though.

[sumquy]

the tank in my ops group thinks the multi bomb bug has something to do with our tanks stealthing out at various points in the fight. he might be right.

[Memo-]

Multiple mines is an RNG occurence that can happen if there is still a mine up when the next wave of mines comes. The mines have different lengths that they stay on the target before exploding. The longest mine is like 45 seconds or even up to a minute, not sure. This isn't true for the first phase, not at least the first wave, though.

 

But what you do is you observe who has the longest mine and, if possible, detonate it manually by having someone with a mine run into them, or vice versa. It gets tricky if it doesn't land on someone that can negate physics, though (Bounty Hunters and Snipers have it easy, but some other classes and specs can get by as well).

 

-------------------

 

The mines aren't the problem in this fight, however. It's purely the amount of damage that goes to the tanks from phase 2 onward. In my experience Master hits harder, so that seems to contradict OP's thoughts, but both tanks require lots of healing. You can pretty much ignore all healers and dps in this phase and just rely on your incidental heals to take care of them (Roaming Mend, Progressive Scan, Kolto Waves, Recuperative Nanotech). If you are having someone eat Overpowered Ion Cutter in a manner where they still take damage, that person needs the attention of the healer that is on Master-tank duty, naturally.

Edited February 2, 2016 by Memo-

[IkarusXY]

Multiple mines is an RNG occurence that can happen if there is still a mine up when the next wave of mines comes. The mines have different lengths that they stay on the target before exploding. The longest mine is like 45 seconds or even up to a minute, not sure. This isn't true for the first phase, not at least the first wave, though.

 

But what you do is you observe who has the longest mine and, if possible, detonate it manually by having someone with a mine run into them, or vice versa. It gets tricky if it doesn't land on someone that can negate physics, though (Bounty Hunters and Snipers have it easy, but some other classes and specs can get by as well).

 

I disagree, it is not only 2 mines. Sometimes people get 3 mines up to 4 mines at once. 3 Mines just happend yesterday to me. You can survive 2 mines no problem. But 3 mines is instant death. As a sage i'm lucky with force barrier, but i can only do it in like half a second to mash the button when the debuff appears.

[KEVHOUSTTWO]

The issue here is bioware upped the damage from Master's basic attack to a ridiculous amount, so that the damage taken will actually INCREASE if you try to cheese laser with shadow or sin. It makes it a lot harder for people to do it legitimately, and pretty much mandates that one of the two healers is solely focused on healing the offtank. Since 4.0, SM Master and Blaster has become a nightmare for people with disorganized groups and/or incompetent tanks. Master kiting is extremely difficult in comparison to most other jobs tanks in SM have to do, and people detonating proximity mines on each other is also now a huge deal on SM. Basically, everyone has to be on top of things in phase 2, phase 1 and 3 are a joke like most other SM bosses. It frustrates me as probably nine out of ten groups I'm in can't make it past this boss, especially when other SM bosses were practically destroyed by nerfs in 4.0 (Fabricator and Kephess are insulting, and they even made the droid trash in DF trivial when it wasnt even an issue to begin with- it actually took some of the fun out of the op). Couple that with the fact that the level range is 50-65 makes it even worse, because bolster does not do enough for you to be able to compete in these overtuned fights.

[sumquy]

the multi mine is by far the biggest problem my group has with this fight. i long ago lost count of the pulls where everything was going great until someone got triple bomb insta-killed. the increase in damage just about guarantees that the tank will need the combat rez at some point in the fight, leaving us with only 3 dps. there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that without the multi bomb, my raid group would have spent a lot less time on this boss.

[gabigool]

IMO it's just the randomness that is the issue.

 

The outgoing basic attack damage is so great and of a type that most base strategies rely on particular cooldowns that a random quad may (depending on class) have no other counter for.

 

Reducing Master's Charge Arm damage is one possible solution but it would be the wrong one.

 

I think the more appropriate tuning would be to reduce the duration of the longest duration grenades to not overlap the next cast and/or cap them at 3.

Edited February 5, 2016 by gabigool

[Ambramotte]

A couple of points here about M&B

 

1) I'm not sure stealthing impacts the # of 2x/3x/4x grenades as I've seen this happen before anyone dies or stealths. People should be taking AOE Dmg reduction to mitigate 30% of this dmg and popping DCDs if they have 3x+ or (2x and low on health).

2) Master hits like a truck now, I think, in an attempt to get people to stop cheasing the ion cutters. The sin/shadow strat from 3.0 isn't *as* viable as it used to be because of the increased damage from auto-attack and the fact that stealthing out on IonCutter forces Master to AutoAttack for the remainder of the time he would have been doing IonCutter. This happened before in 3.0 but it wasn't as much of an issue because AutoAttack didn't hit as hard.

3) Instead of burning DCDs on the ion cutters, tanks should instead burn Tech/Force DCDs on auto attacks and using other raid members to take ION cutter stacks.

4) IMPORTANT CONSIDERATION - Master primarily does Tech/Force dmg while Blaster primarily does Melee/Range (aside from his knockback). Subsequently, if the tanks swap on RoP then they should have their appropriate DCDs up for the burn phase.

 

If you're on an assassin, here is a way to make this work

1st AutoAttack - Adrenal & Recklessness

1st FireWheel - Don't stand in stupid

1st IonCutter - Sorc Bubble/Marauder Undying Rage/etc (something that can eat all of it)

2nd AutoAttack - Shroud

2nd FireWheel - Don't stand in stupid

2nd IonCutter - Have 2 players take each 5 stacks each, then Stealth (make sure you have both utilities that give you 4 seconds of shroud to cover the 'fill-in' AutoAttack that he does). This will also reset the medpac in case you had to burn it.

 

RoP

 

3rd & 4th set - Master is other tank's problem. You burn recklessness and deflection on Blaster's normal attacks. Use Phase Walk to get back in healer range after 2nd KB. Save all other DCDs for Master on burn phase. It's actually better to take a 2nd RoP to let your DCDs reset fully and then push Master as soon as RoP is done. This will give you the highest probability of success in the burn phase. RoP mechs are an individual responsibility - no excuses for failing that.

 

During this time the other tank is burning M/R DCDs on Blaster while you're burning T/F DCDs on Master, then the other tank burns T/F DCDs on Master while you burn M/R DCDs on Blaster. When the burn phase hits, you're T/F DCDs should be back up to take Master and the other tank's M/R DCDs should be up to take Blaster. You should be able to hold Master for ~50-60 stacks if you burn your DCDs right (including your stealth+4sec shroud combo). Once you die, you get rezzed and then tank Blaster. At this point, if your group did the 2nd RoP then your M/R DCDs should be up for Blaster and the other tank's T/F DCDs should be up for Master.

 

Hope that helps

[xkcurtisx]

 

its easier to do it like so as per tanking imo.

[Ambramotte]

its easier to do it like so as per tanking imo.

 

It looks like you have 3 tanks, rotating tanks on Ion Cutter, and having DPS eat the Ion Cutter. I'm assuming the tanks are popping DCDs on AutoAttack instead of IonCutter (because the DPS are eating it) which is pretty much what I was suggesting.

 

What I specifically like about the way you guys do it is to have the tank back up and then you rotate dps through. A lot less messy than having the tanks trying to dance trying behind the DPS.

Edited February 28, 2016 by Ambramotte

[UberSamoyed]

There's larger problem now with Blaster. On some of our pulls on the phase one to phase two switch (aka Calling The Boss), Blaster's shield does not drop off. Granted, his shield pops up momentarily on pre-4.0 versions of the boss, but it would always drop off after about a second. Currently, it has started to stay up on the switch. It's a wipe if it does. There's just no way to burn him down.

 

I suspect it has to do with the amount of burn Blaster takes in the phase switch. We might be burning him too hard on the short window(from Calling The Boss cast to shield drop)...I don't really know yet. As of today, I'm proposing the notion to our group that if you burn him below 3.4 million, then the shield bugs out. So...the theory is that you hold him at 53% until the shield drops off...if it does.

 

It's a total bummer that I have to ask my DPS to check themselves. And, then there's the idea that the 53% threshold isn't even the reason that it's bugging.

 

Personally, I was not aware that Blaster had a % requirement after you met his push value. If he does, then this sounds like a ridiculous factor to observe. I'll know soon enough, as we are running him tonight.

 

Has anyone else experienced this maddening issue?

 

Here's a vid of the bug:

*Warning...contains explicit language after the group realizes it's bugged for the third pull in a row!*

 

https://youtu.be/X3TSrIgOfIk

Edited April 6, 2016 by UberSamoyed

[xkcurtisx]

There's larger problem now with Blaster. On some of our pulls on the phase one to phase two switch (aka Calling The Boss), Blaster's shield does not drop off. Granted, his shield pops up momentarily on pre-4.0 versions of the boss, but it would always drop off after about a second. Currently, it has started to stay up on the switch. It's a wipe if it does. There's just no way to burn him down.

 

I suspect it has to do with the amount of burn Blaster takes in the phase switch. We might be burning him too hard on the short window(from Calling The Boss cast to shield drop)...I don't really know yet. As of today, I'm proposing the notion to our group that if you burn him below 3.4 million, then the shield bugs out. So...the theory is that you hold him at 53% until the shield drops off...if it does.

 

It's a total bummer that I have to ask my DPS to check themselves. And, then there's the idea that the 53% threshold isn't even the reason that it's bugging.

 

Personally, I was not aware that Blaster had a % requirement after you met his push value. If he does, then this sounds like a ridiculous factor to observe. I'll know soon enough, as we are running him tonight.

 

Has anyone else experienced this maddening issue?

 

Here's a vid of the bug:

*Warning...contains explicit language after the group realizes it's bugged for the third pull in a row!*

 

https://youtu.be/X3TSrIgOfIk

 

The issue what you are referring to has been existence ever since we reported it on PTS while testing 3.0 Years ago. They never did anything about it nor they will.

Edited April 7, 2016 by Xcurtx

[Qwenther]

We did this fight since we didn't clear Cora in 3.0 and in 4.0 the damage scale seems really wonky. In the end we actually got our tank to go Deception for the 30% damage reduction on AOE since most/all masters damage is AOE.

 

We ended up with a different first phase than we did in 3.0 but it worked. You can see the 2 times we did it below

 

 

[UberSamoyed]

After running it last night, it seems that any damage during the "Calling The Boss" cast has a chance to bug Blaster's shield...and not any sort of damage number like 3.4 million. Our solution was to simply hold dps on any "Calling the Boss" cast. It seemed to work...although I'm not sure if anything we did had an impact on it. There wasn't a large sample size afterwards.

 

It still could be random. Hearing that it has been in place since the 3.0 PTS just makes me sad.

[Memo-]

After running it last night, it seems that any damage during the "Calling The Boss" cast has a chance to bug Blaster's shield...and not any sort of damage number like 3.4 million. Our solution was to simply hold dps on any "Calling the Boss" cast. It seemed to work...although I'm not sure if anything we did had an impact on it. There wasn't a large sample size afterwards.

 

It still could be random. Hearing that it has been in place since the 3.0 PTS just makes me sad.

 

It's hard to imagine dealing damage during the "Calling the Boss" cast has anything to do with it. This is the first time I hear about this bug, and I've been in the second phase of the fight countless times - and we have always kept dealing damage through the cast.

[xkcurtisx]

After running it last night, it seems that any damage during the "Calling The Boss" cast has a chance to bug Blaster's shield...and not any sort of damage number like 3.4 million. Our solution was to simply hold dps on any "Calling the Boss" cast. It seemed to work...although I'm not sure if anything we did had an impact on it. There wasn't a large sample size afterwards.

 

It still could be random. Hearing that it has been in place since the 3.0 PTS just makes me sad.

 

What our theory was when this kept happening to us is that we were pushing too hard. If you allow blaster to cast yellows just before he channels calling the boss, the issue wont occur.

[UberSamoyed]

What our theory was when this kept happening to us is that we were pushing too hard. If you allow blaster to cast yellows just before he channels calling the boss, the issue wont occur.

 

Thanks Curt. I assumed it was because we were pushing too hard, I just didn't understand the threshold.

[Lodinn]

It's still way harder. I don't think we could actually kill it in pug now as opposed to 3.0 state.

Funny how it bottlenecks Cora now.

[Ambramotte]

Bioware, this really needs to be fixed.

 

I'd say the things that need to be addressed here are:

1) The double and triple grenades, especially when they happen on the tank holding master. It's a wipe based on RNG when that happens.

2) Either put the Overpowered Charge Arm back to 3.0 damage levels, make Shroud & Saber Reflect work on it, or turn it into Melee/Range attack type.

[Shrodinher]

Devs definitely disliked us sins soloing Master with 0 help from dps while healers were offdpsing. Sad.

Killed it on 2nd night with guild when needed lock for 16m Cora. Ended with sin on Master (undying classic) and me on a jug taking Blaster most of the time (charge right before kb in 2nd phase == much less healer's headache). For Ion Cutter we had 50/50 split on Force Cloak and dps eating it, basically only change is Shroud being used to mitigate basic attack. In burn jug is nigh invulnerable to Blaster's attacks, so I had all the cooldowns when sin died (pretty sure having Master tank die to reset stacks is almost a must in strategy to ensure kill).

Probably should try to pug it next time it's highlighted with deception sin tanking just for lulz.

[xkcurtisx]

Devs definitely disliked us sins soloing Master with 0 help from dps while healers were offdpsing. Sad.

Killed it on 2nd night with guild when needed lock for 16m Cora. Ended with sin on Master (undying classic) and me on a jug taking Blaster most of the time (charge right before kb in 2nd phase == much less healer's headache). For Ion Cutter we had 50/50 split on Force Cloak and dps eating it, basically only change is Shroud being used to mitigate basic attack. In burn jug is nigh invulnerable to Blaster's attacks, so I had all the cooldowns when sin died (pretty sure having Master tank die to reset stacks is almost a must in strategy to ensure kill).

Probably should try to pug it next time it's highlighted with deception sin tanking just for lulz.

 

We mainly run vanguards for this fight as tanks, due to the reason of making your group move less, however same thing can be achieved with guardian, but not on phase 1. As per you stealthing out an ioncutter instead of putting it on a dps/heals. You are just screwing with your self as the fast 'small attacks' come sooner without any passing of time on your CD timers. *or screwing with your healers in that matter*

 

In anyway it can be killed with any comp whatsoever with proper dedication, this is how hard 'hard-modes' should be.

[Shrodinher]

We mainly run vanguards for this fight as tanks, due to the reason of making your group move less, however same thing can be achieved with guardian, but not on phase 1. As per you stealthing out an ioncutter instead of putting it on a dps/heals. You are just screwing with your self as the fast 'small attacks' come sooner without any passing of time on your CD timers. *or screwing with your healers in that matter*

 

In anyway it can be killed with any comp whatsoever with proper dedication, this is how hard 'hard-modes' should be.

 

Irrelevant 16m is irrelevant.

Also, does infinite Phase Walk bug still work on it?

Cloak puts pressure on healers. Otherwise, pressure goes on dps. Different way works better in different groups and highly depends on group composition (besides, we have that one sage running on our server who claims MB 2nd phase is nigh solo healable and pretty easy). And back in <Katharsis> I could afford both to cloak AND save Shroud exclusively for bad RNG on mines (on one especially terrible try one of teammates got 5 bombs disregarding 0 deaths before... gg bioware). It just takes decent healers.

Closer to nightmare in my opinion. At least after all those claims of poor droids being "harder than many NiM bosses" in 3.x Not that I would mind all HM bosses being that level and NiM even better.