Abyss 100%: Review and Advice
StevieManWonder
Member Posts: 5,019 ★★★★★
Last night (technically early this morning since I finished it at 1:00 AM) I finally finished exploring Abyss. I used the units from all the July 4th deals to push through paths 2-5. I ended up spending a rough total of 25K units to do paths 2-5 (it would have been a lot less, but path 4 was way harder than I anticipated without Fury), which brings the total cost of my Abyss exploration up to around 30K units plus a lot of hoarded revives and potions. So here is the big question:
Was it worth it?
Well.
Yes.
From the exploration rewards I got 5 star OG Hulk (first time), 6 stars Rocket, Gamora, and Angela (Only one of the 6 stars I was really happy about). From the Abyss Mutant Nexus Crystal, I was hoping to pull Omega or Red Magneto and then awaken Omega and bring him up to sig41. I didn't get either, my choices were: Awaken Gambit, Blue Cyclops, OML, Awaken Beast, Emma, Domino, Colossus, Red Cyclops, White Magneto, or Awaken Havok. I was struggling to decide between Emma and Domino (already have Colossus at 5/65) and ultimately decided to go with Domino, so I got my top tier champ still. Now, I know White Magneto is also getting buffed, but I just wasn't willing to risk it like I was ready to risk it for Red Magneto. As for the t5cc, I pulled two Mystics. Ordinarily, I'd be pretty pissed that I once again doubled up on a class (My Abyss completion was a mutant and my Act 6 Exploration was also a mutant and that was before I had champs I wanted to rank up, now I have Psylocke and Havok at r3), but I was struggling to decide on if I should rank up Sym Supreme or Doom if I got a mystic, but now I can just take them both up, so happy times! I will hold onto the generic gem for Omega.
Now onto the Review and Path Advice.
First off, I just want to say that the Skirmish charges are absolute BS and are an incredibly cheap and lazy way to force us to spend units and items even when we are playing perfectly. Almost every single fight in Abyss would be soloable without the Hit Cap and it's annoying that the reason why Abyss is so expensive to complete isn't that it's hard but simply because Kabam decided to make it so you absolutely have to spend units and items no matter how good of a player you are. Secondly, the Damage Cap is annoying and I still don't understand what the purpose of creating Champs like Proxima and Sunspot who can do these massive damage numbers if you can't use them anywhere where they can actually hit their full potential. For the most part, Abyss sucks and isn't enjoyable because of the Hit Cap (the damage cap is irrelevant to me) and because the final boss is a purposefully designed cash grab.
Onto the paths.
Path 1:
Team Used: Aegon, Fury, Doom, Ant-Man all 5/65 and unduped r1 Void.
Units Spent: Around 5K I think, I did path 1 in February so I don't really remember.
I don't recall any specific advice I have for this path since I did it a while ago and it's pretty straightforward. Also, there are a ton of videos and guides for this one, so I'll move on.
Path 2:
Team Used: Aegon, Stealthy, Doom all 5/65, r3 Torch, 6r1 sig80 something Void.
Units Spent: Around 5K
Path Advice: I took in both Void and Torch because I couldn't succeed in taking down Darkhawk with my r3 Torch and didn't have the t4cc to take him to r5, but was able to take down DH with my 6r1 Void in one revive. Little did I know that this fight would change my entire Abyss Exploration Run.
Darkhawk: With Void it's a fairly straightforward fight, get the petrifies up and push to his SP2 then heavy counter it. The best way I found to fight him was to parry, light, heavy to give him enough power to go to his SP2 and keep him in shield mode to get the regen twice when he launches his sp2 and when you heavy counter him. One thing to note is that when you have Fear of the Void active and at least one additional petrify, you will reverse his healing a ton, but he will also lose power every ten hits from the node and it makes it a little harder to manage the flow of the fight.
Luke Cage: Ahem *clears throat* SCREW THIS FIGHT. I legitimately consider this fight to be the worst fight in Abyss, even worse than Red Skull and Sym Supreme (I'll get to them later). This fight is the sole reason why I brought in Stealthy since I saw that Lagacy was able to solo LC with him. Now, LC is absolutely soloable, but I am not nearly (anywhere) as good with Stealthy as Lagacy is and, as so, ended up having to revive a lot. A lot of the times I had to revive throughout the THREE times I had to fight LC was because I forgot to activate his Prefight Web-Foam, I'm a dork, I know. Additionally, my Stealthy isn't awakened, so his damage output is lower. Anyways, this fight is just intercept and keep your debuff active. The most I was able to take off him in one go was around 40% and that was a 987 combo. Blegh.
Dorm: Basic Mystic Abyss fight. Ramped up Aegon some on him before finishing him off with Doom.
Mephisto: Torch with prefight took off 37%, used Void for the rest.
Captain Sparkles: Two revives with Doom because I'm a moron and forgot to block once and another because I forgot to dump my power. Very easy fight, totally soloable with most Mystics.
Ghost & IMIW: Basic Abyss Tech fights, used them to ramp up Aegon. Last 15% of IMIW is annoying but manageable with a 999 combo.
Joe Fixit: Aegon just pushes through it.
Mordo: Screw Mordo. Used Doom. It's basically just like fighting any other Mordo but with 2.7 million health (I might be off on the health, but I don't care enough to check).
Deadpool: Easy solo with Torch, just keep up your incinerates. Even a four star Torch could do this fight.
Korg: Used Doom. Launch Sp2 when Rock Sheild is done. Rinse and repeat.
Taskmaster: Probably one of my favorite fights in Abyss. It's so fun with Aegon. You get more special damage for each hit on your combo, so the best thing to do is never parry and save all your debuffs for launching massive sp2s and getting huge bleeds. I was hitting the Damage Cap on Aegon's sp2 after around a 100 hits. Also, heavy charge to get the furies before launching the sp2 for extra extra bleed damage.
Modok: Just Aegon through it, it'll be a little more costly than you expect because the Abyss Science node where you get stunned when the power sting debuffs expire, but it's really not too bad.
HtD: Just plain annoying, but easy fight with Aegon. Bait Sp1.
Hyperion: Easy Doom fight.
The Champion: Moderately easy Doom Fight.
Green Goblin: This fight also really really sucks. I didn't have a good counter because I thought that Aegon would bypass his physical resistance, but he didn't. Cries softly. I think it would have gone a lot better if I brought in an armor break champ but I also didn't have an available slot.
Sinister: Used Doom, pretty easy, just make sure not to push him to a bar of power while you have the incinerates on him. Also, he blocks unblockable specials, so either parry before you use them or use them in your combo.
P2099: Aegon. You will die a lot to block damage, otherwise it's a simple fight. Beware the regen at 10?%
Loki: Aegon, just don't use specials.
Aegon: Aegon. Simple fight.
IW: Used Aegon, fairly simple fight.
Cull: Doom. Don't heavy since the staggers don't cause him to lose health the same way nullifying does. Bait Sp1 and respond with your sp1.
Collector: Revive and Cry.
Path 3:
Team Used: Doom, Aegon, Stealthy, 6r2 sig90 Void, 6r3 Havok.
Unit Spend: 5-6K, Don't quite recall.
DH: See above.
LC: See above, also screw this fight.
OML: Cakewalk with Void.
Havok: Used my Havok, build up to 5 prowess by heavy countering his heavy and then cycle sp3s. I was hitting the damage cap plus around 15-40K plasma detonations every time depending how many plasmas I had on him.
Dorm: See above.
Joe Fixit: Don't see above because I tried something different this time. This time, I turned on Willpower and used Void. If he didn't roll hearts at the start of the fight, I'd let him heavy me until he did (The willpower healing from the debuffs he places on you keeps you alive) and then let his healing kill him. Two revives reverses like four to six with Aegon.
Mordo: See above, also screw Mordo. He is the only champ in Abyss that you have to fight on every path. I am convinced this is because Kabam knows how much we all love to fight Mordo. Additionally, I forgot to mention this earlier, but the Abyss Evade still causes Mordo to do his Astral Evade animation and place a degen on you. I don't know if this is intentional or not.
VtD: Used Doom. Always make sure you have either a stagger or nullify ready in case he procs a regen. Otherwise, it's a long fight, but simple. Bait sp1.
HtD, Hyperion, Champion: See above.
Red Skull: No. Just no. I don't know who decided that this is a good fight, but they were wrong. I used Doom since it's relatively easy to keep RS between 2-3 bars of power, but it's a really long and hard fight. I usually managed to take off around 10% per revive if the AI was cooperative, but sometimes he'd throw his specials a lot, which is bad, and sometimes he'd be super super passive, which is what you want. For this fight, forgot the normal Doom rotation, just go for one Sp3, then focus on throwing as many sp2s as you can before the fury expires. I know some people bring in Ronan for this fight and I totally would have if I had an open slot for him (or had a duped Ronan beyond a sig5 r1 four star).
Bishop: This fight is probably my favorite fight in Abyss, so long as Bishop is playing passively. Now, when I read the nodes, I thought it'd be a pretty hard fight, but then I remembered that Bishop has a built in suicide mechanic where if he is over 30 prowess, he starts loosing health (for the Abyss one, he loses 85K health per tick). Since he gains prowess whenever inflicted with an energy debuff or attacked with an energy attack, I took in Doom. On my first try, I took him down to 17%. The trick is to get him to 30 prowess and then spamming your sp1s to keep him from using an sp3 and to keep him from doing anything since you can launch back to back to back sp1s if you play carefully. Using this tactic, I was able to take him down in 1-8 revives in all my runs depending on how passively the AI was playing (sometimes he's very aggressive).
Korg, Havok, Champion, Ghost: See above.
Karnark: Backdraft intercept until you die. Revive and repeat. Fun and easy fight.
Collector: Revive and Cry.
Path 4:
Team: Aegon, Doom, Stealth, 6r2 sig96 Void, 6r2 sig20 Corvus.
Unit Spend: 9K
DH: See above.
LC: SCREW THIS FIGHT. See above.
Killmonger: Used Corvus (got him to 2 charges on DH). Parry, three hit combos, sp2. Repeat. I had Suicides on for this fight, took about 4-5 revives, I think.
Ghulk: Used Void (turned off Suicides). Got my petrifies on him and then let myself get beat down to 20% and then reversed his healing. Rinse and Repeat until he's at 25%. Used Aegon to bleed him down to 1% and finished him off with Corvus to get the Avenger charge. NOTE: If you are using Void, you need to make sure that you have more hits on your combo than Ghulk lands on you, otherwise he will trigger the Fury instead of the Regen. The best way to get beat down to 20% is to let him hit your block. Also, Ghulk's sp1 has a weirdly long range. This is a fight that cost me 8-14 revives because I did not bring in a proper counter for the last 25%. I should have brought in Fury instead of Stealthy, but like I mentioned earlier, I needed Stealthy for LC.
Yellowjacket: Another fight that cost me a lot of revives because I didn't have Fury. I used Aegon and spent 10-15 revives. Just beat into him until you die with Aegon. I will have a better write up on the path 5 one since I brought in Fury for that path.
Mordo: See above.
Ghost Rider: Just make sure you are hitting GR when the incinerate timer goes off if you are using Aegon for this fight. If you brought in Torch instead of Void, enjoy what is probably an easy fight.
Korg: See above.
Hood: Dude. Screw this fight too. He has a node that makes him more likely to launch an sp2 or sp3 (you can't dex his sp2 and sp3s are insta-kills in Abyss, plus he goes invisible after his sp2) and one that poison and bleeds you on a timer. I used Aegon and it cost me a lot of revives, don't remember how many. He still does throw his sp1, so bait that one as much as possible.
Modok: See above.
Morningstar: Every ten hits on your combo needs to be a heavy, so just slow play with Aegon and you'll be alright. It's not too bad, but it did cost me a fair bit of revives.
DH: See above.
Red Skull: I'm on a PC right now, so *middle finger emoji*.
Bishop: See above.
Sym Supreme: I was not prepared for this fight at all. Every time you crit against Sym, he gains a mana charge and at twenty crits, this is converted into a power gain passive. That part is fine. You can totally control the power in this fight with Void to the point where you can just Heavy spam in the corner the entire time (which is what I did). However, while this power gain is active, you degen unless he is powerlocked. So it's just another, shorter version of a hit cap (the power gain lasts for 20 seconds I think). Now, if you have Torch with the prefight, this fight is probably a lot more manageable, but I didn't bring mine in (also he's still at r3 since he has to compete with Void for t4cc and I'm trying to take Void to 6r3 [only missing the t4cc now]). I turned off my precision masteries and just used Void. Luckily, Void has a low crit rate and I usually managed to take off between 7-12% before I crit twenty times. Anyways, this fight sucks.
Masacre: This is why I brought in Corvus. I heard people say this fight is fun and it is, if Masacre actually holds his block. The entire time I fought him on this path, he was playing incredibly aggressively and was rarely blocking even when I was baiting his block (he plays more aggressively when you are blocking, so if you idle, he usually blocks but he also charges at you too a fair bit of the time). Anyways, this fights sucked and I hated every minute of it. Cost me a lot of revives.
Omega: Used Aegon, just don't get ten spores on you and bait the sp1. Used Corvus for the last 1% to get the last charge (I wanted to see how he did against the Collector; I'll save the words, Aegon is better by far).
Now, if you follow the path guide after you fight Omega, to continue on path 4, you go right at the fork and go on to fight Hyperion and Killmonger, but I decided to take the Path 5 route and knock out the Cable boss since I was already 7k units into the run and wanted to just take him out now so I didn't have to do it on path 5. It doesn't really matter though if you take him now or on path 5.
Medusa: Straightforward Doom fight.
Cable: So I knew that this is a tough fight, but I also knew that Cable has a chance to regen when he fills a bar of power and it's a pretty lengthy regen. With this in mind, I took in Void. He doesn't always proc his regen, but usually you can count on him proccing it at least once a fight. This made him pretty easy to take down and I think I only used 4 revives on him.
Karnak: See above.
Collector: Revive, Cry, Revive.
Path 5: Whew, the last one.
Team: Aegon, Doom, Fury, 6r2 sig104 Void, 6r2 sig20 Corvus.
Units: 4.7K
IMIW: This is just a mean first fight since your Aegon won't be ramped up to handle him. I used Corvus and it went alright. Got three charges right away and it cost around 4 revives.
IW: Used Fury, not too bad of a fight.
Ghulk: See above, except used Fury for the last 25%. Long, but much easier.
Yellowjacket: So the trick with this YJ is to bait out around 14 sp1s, then just keep attacking into him since after that, he will be at two bars of power and permanently powerlocked. His sp2 is way easier to dex and because of the Abyss node that gives him power back when he uses a special, after 14 special ones, every time he uses a sp2, he will be right back at a sp2. It was a much easier fight this time around, but still long and cost me a fair bit, but much less than my first run.
Mordo: Screw you and your Evade Degen Mordo.
Mephisto: Void.
Thor: You'll notice that I haven't used Aegon yet this run. When I went into this fight, I only had a 79 hit combo (ramped him up a little earlier, but didn't want to waste the units to ramp him up fully). I used this fight to fully ramp up Aegon. For this fight, don't use your sp2 or sp3 since Thor gains power when afflicted with a debuff. Just manage his Boon of the Gods charges and it's an easy but long fight.
Aegon, Sinister: See above.
Thing: So I found out something interesting with the Abyss nodes here. While you are in the first phase of the charges, you can beat into Thing with Aegon and not really worry about him gaining rock stacks since you are reducing his ability accuracy by 100%. However, once the second phase starts, he gains rock stacks like normal since the second phase gives him an additional 100% ability accuracy. So once you are in the second phase, make sure you manage them. Other than that, simple fight.
Red Skull: Last time fighting this pos.
Bishop: He was not being cooperative this time and cost me 8 revives.
Sym Supreme: Sucks.
Masacre: He was a lot more cooperative this time and I was able to take him down with Corvus in about 6 or so revives (I used Sinister to get the final charge).
Omega: See above.
Hyperion, Killmonger, Karnak: See above.
Collector: Done and dusted.
Overall, I hated Abyss. I found it to be manufactured difficult rather than fun difficult. Also, I think it is plain lazy to reuse the same defenders so many times (Mordo, Hyperion, Killmonger, Havok etc). It's one thing to fight like LC or RS multiple times since multiple paths go through them, but there's no reason to have two Killmongers and Havoks on the same path or to place Mordo on every path. They should have just added in different defenders.
Do I recommend doing Abyss? Well, if you care about having a competitive roster, you have to. It's the only place in game to get three t5ccs and six star sig stones. It also gives you the best chance to get a champ you are targeting (though, like me, you aren't guaranteed to get them, but you are still likely to get a good champion).
Will I ever do Abyss on my second account? Dear god no, I will never step foot back into Abyss. Ever. I hated it. The sad thing is that if there wasn't the hit cap or if there was a way to play around the hit cap with skill (like intercepting adds five charges to it instead of taking charges away or something) than I would have loved it, but as it is, the Abyss is designed to be either a cash or unit grab.
Anyways, I hope that this helps you if you are planning an Abyss run!
Was it worth it?
Well.
Yes.
From the exploration rewards I got 5 star OG Hulk (first time), 6 stars Rocket, Gamora, and Angela (Only one of the 6 stars I was really happy about). From the Abyss Mutant Nexus Crystal, I was hoping to pull Omega or Red Magneto and then awaken Omega and bring him up to sig41. I didn't get either, my choices were: Awaken Gambit, Blue Cyclops, OML, Awaken Beast, Emma, Domino, Colossus, Red Cyclops, White Magneto, or Awaken Havok. I was struggling to decide between Emma and Domino (already have Colossus at 5/65) and ultimately decided to go with Domino, so I got my top tier champ still. Now, I know White Magneto is also getting buffed, but I just wasn't willing to risk it like I was ready to risk it for Red Magneto. As for the t5cc, I pulled two Mystics. Ordinarily, I'd be pretty pissed that I once again doubled up on a class (My Abyss completion was a mutant and my Act 6 Exploration was also a mutant and that was before I had champs I wanted to rank up, now I have Psylocke and Havok at r3), but I was struggling to decide on if I should rank up Sym Supreme or Doom if I got a mystic, but now I can just take them both up, so happy times! I will hold onto the generic gem for Omega.
Now onto the Review and Path Advice.
First off, I just want to say that the Skirmish charges are absolute BS and are an incredibly cheap and lazy way to force us to spend units and items even when we are playing perfectly. Almost every single fight in Abyss would be soloable without the Hit Cap and it's annoying that the reason why Abyss is so expensive to complete isn't that it's hard but simply because Kabam decided to make it so you absolutely have to spend units and items no matter how good of a player you are. Secondly, the Damage Cap is annoying and I still don't understand what the purpose of creating Champs like Proxima and Sunspot who can do these massive damage numbers if you can't use them anywhere where they can actually hit their full potential. For the most part, Abyss sucks and isn't enjoyable because of the Hit Cap (the damage cap is irrelevant to me) and because the final boss is a purposefully designed cash grab.
Onto the paths.
Path 1:
Team Used: Aegon, Fury, Doom, Ant-Man all 5/65 and unduped r1 Void.
Units Spent: Around 5K I think, I did path 1 in February so I don't really remember.
I don't recall any specific advice I have for this path since I did it a while ago and it's pretty straightforward. Also, there are a ton of videos and guides for this one, so I'll move on.
Path 2:
Team Used: Aegon, Stealthy, Doom all 5/65, r3 Torch, 6r1 sig80 something Void.
Units Spent: Around 5K
Path Advice: I took in both Void and Torch because I couldn't succeed in taking down Darkhawk with my r3 Torch and didn't have the t4cc to take him to r5, but was able to take down DH with my 6r1 Void in one revive. Little did I know that this fight would change my entire Abyss Exploration Run.
Darkhawk: With Void it's a fairly straightforward fight, get the petrifies up and push to his SP2 then heavy counter it. The best way I found to fight him was to parry, light, heavy to give him enough power to go to his SP2 and keep him in shield mode to get the regen twice when he launches his sp2 and when you heavy counter him. One thing to note is that when you have Fear of the Void active and at least one additional petrify, you will reverse his healing a ton, but he will also lose power every ten hits from the node and it makes it a little harder to manage the flow of the fight.
Luke Cage: Ahem *clears throat* SCREW THIS FIGHT. I legitimately consider this fight to be the worst fight in Abyss, even worse than Red Skull and Sym Supreme (I'll get to them later). This fight is the sole reason why I brought in Stealthy since I saw that Lagacy was able to solo LC with him. Now, LC is absolutely soloable, but I am not nearly (anywhere) as good with Stealthy as Lagacy is and, as so, ended up having to revive a lot. A lot of the times I had to revive throughout the THREE times I had to fight LC was because I forgot to activate his Prefight Web-Foam, I'm a dork, I know. Additionally, my Stealthy isn't awakened, so his damage output is lower. Anyways, this fight is just intercept and keep your debuff active. The most I was able to take off him in one go was around 40% and that was a 987 combo. Blegh.
Dorm: Basic Mystic Abyss fight. Ramped up Aegon some on him before finishing him off with Doom.
Mephisto: Torch with prefight took off 37%, used Void for the rest.
Captain Sparkles: Two revives with Doom because I'm a moron and forgot to block once and another because I forgot to dump my power. Very easy fight, totally soloable with most Mystics.
Ghost & IMIW: Basic Abyss Tech fights, used them to ramp up Aegon. Last 15% of IMIW is annoying but manageable with a 999 combo.
Joe Fixit: Aegon just pushes through it.
Mordo: Screw Mordo. Used Doom. It's basically just like fighting any other Mordo but with 2.7 million health (I might be off on the health, but I don't care enough to check).
Deadpool: Easy solo with Torch, just keep up your incinerates. Even a four star Torch could do this fight.
Korg: Used Doom. Launch Sp2 when Rock Sheild is done. Rinse and repeat.
Taskmaster: Probably one of my favorite fights in Abyss. It's so fun with Aegon. You get more special damage for each hit on your combo, so the best thing to do is never parry and save all your debuffs for launching massive sp2s and getting huge bleeds. I was hitting the Damage Cap on Aegon's sp2 after around a 100 hits. Also, heavy charge to get the furies before launching the sp2 for extra extra bleed damage.
Modok: Just Aegon through it, it'll be a little more costly than you expect because the Abyss Science node where you get stunned when the power sting debuffs expire, but it's really not too bad.
HtD: Just plain annoying, but easy fight with Aegon. Bait Sp1.
Hyperion: Easy Doom fight.
The Champion: Moderately easy Doom Fight.
Green Goblin: This fight also really really sucks. I didn't have a good counter because I thought that Aegon would bypass his physical resistance, but he didn't. Cries softly. I think it would have gone a lot better if I brought in an armor break champ but I also didn't have an available slot.
Sinister: Used Doom, pretty easy, just make sure not to push him to a bar of power while you have the incinerates on him. Also, he blocks unblockable specials, so either parry before you use them or use them in your combo.
P2099: Aegon. You will die a lot to block damage, otherwise it's a simple fight. Beware the regen at 10?%
Loki: Aegon, just don't use specials.
Aegon: Aegon. Simple fight.
IW: Used Aegon, fairly simple fight.
Cull: Doom. Don't heavy since the staggers don't cause him to lose health the same way nullifying does. Bait Sp1 and respond with your sp1.
Collector: Revive and Cry.
Path 3:
Team Used: Doom, Aegon, Stealthy, 6r2 sig90 Void, 6r3 Havok.
Unit Spend: 5-6K, Don't quite recall.
DH: See above.
LC: See above, also screw this fight.
OML: Cakewalk with Void.
Havok: Used my Havok, build up to 5 prowess by heavy countering his heavy and then cycle sp3s. I was hitting the damage cap plus around 15-40K plasma detonations every time depending how many plasmas I had on him.
Dorm: See above.
Joe Fixit: Don't see above because I tried something different this time. This time, I turned on Willpower and used Void. If he didn't roll hearts at the start of the fight, I'd let him heavy me until he did (The willpower healing from the debuffs he places on you keeps you alive) and then let his healing kill him. Two revives reverses like four to six with Aegon.
Mordo: See above, also screw Mordo. He is the only champ in Abyss that you have to fight on every path. I am convinced this is because Kabam knows how much we all love to fight Mordo. Additionally, I forgot to mention this earlier, but the Abyss Evade still causes Mordo to do his Astral Evade animation and place a degen on you. I don't know if this is intentional or not.
VtD: Used Doom. Always make sure you have either a stagger or nullify ready in case he procs a regen. Otherwise, it's a long fight, but simple. Bait sp1.
HtD, Hyperion, Champion: See above.
Red Skull: No. Just no. I don't know who decided that this is a good fight, but they were wrong. I used Doom since it's relatively easy to keep RS between 2-3 bars of power, but it's a really long and hard fight. I usually managed to take off around 10% per revive if the AI was cooperative, but sometimes he'd throw his specials a lot, which is bad, and sometimes he'd be super super passive, which is what you want. For this fight, forgot the normal Doom rotation, just go for one Sp3, then focus on throwing as many sp2s as you can before the fury expires. I know some people bring in Ronan for this fight and I totally would have if I had an open slot for him (or had a duped Ronan beyond a sig5 r1 four star).
Bishop: This fight is probably my favorite fight in Abyss, so long as Bishop is playing passively. Now, when I read the nodes, I thought it'd be a pretty hard fight, but then I remembered that Bishop has a built in suicide mechanic where if he is over 30 prowess, he starts loosing health (for the Abyss one, he loses 85K health per tick). Since he gains prowess whenever inflicted with an energy debuff or attacked with an energy attack, I took in Doom. On my first try, I took him down to 17%. The trick is to get him to 30 prowess and then spamming your sp1s to keep him from using an sp3 and to keep him from doing anything since you can launch back to back to back sp1s if you play carefully. Using this tactic, I was able to take him down in 1-8 revives in all my runs depending on how passively the AI was playing (sometimes he's very aggressive).
Korg, Havok, Champion, Ghost: See above.
Karnark: Backdraft intercept until you die. Revive and repeat. Fun and easy fight.
Collector: Revive and Cry.
Path 4:
Team: Aegon, Doom, Stealth, 6r2 sig96 Void, 6r2 sig20 Corvus.
Unit Spend: 9K
DH: See above.
LC: SCREW THIS FIGHT. See above.
Killmonger: Used Corvus (got him to 2 charges on DH). Parry, three hit combos, sp2. Repeat. I had Suicides on for this fight, took about 4-5 revives, I think.
Ghulk: Used Void (turned off Suicides). Got my petrifies on him and then let myself get beat down to 20% and then reversed his healing. Rinse and Repeat until he's at 25%. Used Aegon to bleed him down to 1% and finished him off with Corvus to get the Avenger charge. NOTE: If you are using Void, you need to make sure that you have more hits on your combo than Ghulk lands on you, otherwise he will trigger the Fury instead of the Regen. The best way to get beat down to 20% is to let him hit your block. Also, Ghulk's sp1 has a weirdly long range. This is a fight that cost me 8-14 revives because I did not bring in a proper counter for the last 25%. I should have brought in Fury instead of Stealthy, but like I mentioned earlier, I needed Stealthy for LC.
Yellowjacket: Another fight that cost me a lot of revives because I didn't have Fury. I used Aegon and spent 10-15 revives. Just beat into him until you die with Aegon. I will have a better write up on the path 5 one since I brought in Fury for that path.
Mordo: See above.
Ghost Rider: Just make sure you are hitting GR when the incinerate timer goes off if you are using Aegon for this fight. If you brought in Torch instead of Void, enjoy what is probably an easy fight.
Korg: See above.
Hood: Dude. Screw this fight too. He has a node that makes him more likely to launch an sp2 or sp3 (you can't dex his sp2 and sp3s are insta-kills in Abyss, plus he goes invisible after his sp2) and one that poison and bleeds you on a timer. I used Aegon and it cost me a lot of revives, don't remember how many. He still does throw his sp1, so bait that one as much as possible.
Modok: See above.
Morningstar: Every ten hits on your combo needs to be a heavy, so just slow play with Aegon and you'll be alright. It's not too bad, but it did cost me a fair bit of revives.
DH: See above.
Red Skull: I'm on a PC right now, so *middle finger emoji*.
Bishop: See above.
Sym Supreme: I was not prepared for this fight at all. Every time you crit against Sym, he gains a mana charge and at twenty crits, this is converted into a power gain passive. That part is fine. You can totally control the power in this fight with Void to the point where you can just Heavy spam in the corner the entire time (which is what I did). However, while this power gain is active, you degen unless he is powerlocked. So it's just another, shorter version of a hit cap (the power gain lasts for 20 seconds I think). Now, if you have Torch with the prefight, this fight is probably a lot more manageable, but I didn't bring mine in (also he's still at r3 since he has to compete with Void for t4cc and I'm trying to take Void to 6r3 [only missing the t4cc now]). I turned off my precision masteries and just used Void. Luckily, Void has a low crit rate and I usually managed to take off between 7-12% before I crit twenty times. Anyways, this fight sucks.
Masacre: This is why I brought in Corvus. I heard people say this fight is fun and it is, if Masacre actually holds his block. The entire time I fought him on this path, he was playing incredibly aggressively and was rarely blocking even when I was baiting his block (he plays more aggressively when you are blocking, so if you idle, he usually blocks but he also charges at you too a fair bit of the time). Anyways, this fights sucked and I hated every minute of it. Cost me a lot of revives.
Omega: Used Aegon, just don't get ten spores on you and bait the sp1. Used Corvus for the last 1% to get the last charge (I wanted to see how he did against the Collector; I'll save the words, Aegon is better by far).
Now, if you follow the path guide after you fight Omega, to continue on path 4, you go right at the fork and go on to fight Hyperion and Killmonger, but I decided to take the Path 5 route and knock out the Cable boss since I was already 7k units into the run and wanted to just take him out now so I didn't have to do it on path 5. It doesn't really matter though if you take him now or on path 5.
Medusa: Straightforward Doom fight.
Cable: So I knew that this is a tough fight, but I also knew that Cable has a chance to regen when he fills a bar of power and it's a pretty lengthy regen. With this in mind, I took in Void. He doesn't always proc his regen, but usually you can count on him proccing it at least once a fight. This made him pretty easy to take down and I think I only used 4 revives on him.
Karnak: See above.
Collector: Revive, Cry, Revive.
Path 5: Whew, the last one.
Team: Aegon, Doom, Fury, 6r2 sig104 Void, 6r2 sig20 Corvus.
Units: 4.7K
IMIW: This is just a mean first fight since your Aegon won't be ramped up to handle him. I used Corvus and it went alright. Got three charges right away and it cost around 4 revives.
IW: Used Fury, not too bad of a fight.
Ghulk: See above, except used Fury for the last 25%. Long, but much easier.
Yellowjacket: So the trick with this YJ is to bait out around 14 sp1s, then just keep attacking into him since after that, he will be at two bars of power and permanently powerlocked. His sp2 is way easier to dex and because of the Abyss node that gives him power back when he uses a special, after 14 special ones, every time he uses a sp2, he will be right back at a sp2. It was a much easier fight this time around, but still long and cost me a fair bit, but much less than my first run.
Mordo: Screw you and your Evade Degen Mordo.
Mephisto: Void.
Thor: You'll notice that I haven't used Aegon yet this run. When I went into this fight, I only had a 79 hit combo (ramped him up a little earlier, but didn't want to waste the units to ramp him up fully). I used this fight to fully ramp up Aegon. For this fight, don't use your sp2 or sp3 since Thor gains power when afflicted with a debuff. Just manage his Boon of the Gods charges and it's an easy but long fight.
Aegon, Sinister: See above.
Thing: So I found out something interesting with the Abyss nodes here. While you are in the first phase of the charges, you can beat into Thing with Aegon and not really worry about him gaining rock stacks since you are reducing his ability accuracy by 100%. However, once the second phase starts, he gains rock stacks like normal since the second phase gives him an additional 100% ability accuracy. So once you are in the second phase, make sure you manage them. Other than that, simple fight.
Red Skull: Last time fighting this pos.
Bishop: He was not being cooperative this time and cost me 8 revives.
Sym Supreme: Sucks.
Masacre: He was a lot more cooperative this time and I was able to take him down with Corvus in about 6 or so revives (I used Sinister to get the final charge).
Omega: See above.
Hyperion, Killmonger, Karnak: See above.
Collector: Done and dusted.
Overall, I hated Abyss. I found it to be manufactured difficult rather than fun difficult. Also, I think it is plain lazy to reuse the same defenders so many times (Mordo, Hyperion, Killmonger, Havok etc). It's one thing to fight like LC or RS multiple times since multiple paths go through them, but there's no reason to have two Killmongers and Havoks on the same path or to place Mordo on every path. They should have just added in different defenders.
Do I recommend doing Abyss? Well, if you care about having a competitive roster, you have to. It's the only place in game to get three t5ccs and six star sig stones. It also gives you the best chance to get a champ you are targeting (though, like me, you aren't guaranteed to get them, but you are still likely to get a good champion).
Will I ever do Abyss on my second account? Dear god no, I will never step foot back into Abyss. Ever. I hated it. The sad thing is that if there wasn't the hit cap or if there was a way to play around the hit cap with skill (like intercepting adds five charges to it instead of taking charges away or something) than I would have loved it, but as it is, the Abyss is designed to be either a cash or unit grab.
Anyways, I hope that this helps you if you are planning an Abyss run!
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Comments
I found Gulk to be annoying. And YJ path 3 didn’t bring NF for path 4 made it much easier just going into second phase and being stun immune
With Aegon you can push him to the corner and spam heavy.
The amount of doom/void/torch used is making those science/mystic crystals seem more and more needed
I have path 4 and 5 left and I was wondering if you would recommend torch or void (both r5). From my understanding, void is a lot better for ghulk which is a difficult fight but torch would be better for mephisto, GR, MS, SS, and sinister.
The other champs I plan to bring on these paths are aegon, doom, nf, corvus.
Hate the collector fight so much... He's the main reason I won't explore it anytime soon.
Also are there any specific fights where you need doom? I used symb supreme for completion, and it looks to me like he's a better option. Took me 2-3 revives for mordo with him, wouldn't even call it bs fight. Soloed aegon with him easily. Maybe sinister, but he should be doable with void, I guess?
Just a pointer on Mordo, Void makes him weak. Power control and able to stun hit him. Cant imagine how frustrating he'd be without void.
The fights on the other paths that you can use Doom, can be replaced with other champs, like Ronan for Red Skull, Warlock/Colo for Havok, Ghost/Aegon for Korg.
After trying out both SS and Doom on several paths, I personally feel that overall, SS provides more dps IF you can find alternatives (and fit them into your team) for the fights that he will struggle with.