Why Petrify and Pacify are the most underrated masteries in the game
Colonaut123
Member Posts: 3,091 ★★★★★
When we are talking about masteries, we are talking about suicides, mystic dispersion, willpower, deep wounds, assassin, despair, etc. Nobody talks about Petrify and Pacify. Why? Because they are not deemed worth your points. Is that correct?
I wish to make a case for these two masteries, citing concrete champions who benefit greatly from these masteries. I'm not going to say you MUST use points on these masteries (I assume you can make that choice yourself), I only wish to provoke thinking and discussion on how these two masteries have been neglected.
Let's start with a quick recap what they do.
THE MASTERIES
Petrify: When your Champions inflict Stun Debuffs, they also reduce enemy Regeneration by up to 10%-20%-30% and Power gained from attacking or being attacked [red: Combat Power Rate it is now called] by up to 10%-20%-30% for the duration of the Stun.
Note: Petrify does not affect the power gained through buffs or passives, like Hyperion's power gain buff, unlike the petrify from CAIW or She-Hulk.
Pacify: When your Champions inflict Stun Debuffs, they also reduce enemy Ability Accuracy by up to 10%-20%-30% for the duration of the Stun. Ability Accuracy governs the chance that an ability activates.
Note: Pacify is a general ability accuracy reduction, so both offensive and defensive and abilities that fall in neither category are included.
With the Stupefy mastery, all stun effects lasts up to 0.5 seconds longer, benefitting even longer from the Petrify and Pacify masteries.
I'm not 100% certain, but I do not think the masteries alone can go below 100% reduction. I can confirm that the combat power gain rate reduction does not result in power drain.
IMPROVEMENTS
Before I start with describing how awesome these masteries are, I do think they can be better to entice the player base to invest mastery points into them. So I want to take the opportunity do make some constructive feedback to Kabam in case they would ever change these masteries.
First of all, I think the potency should increase. This can be done in three ways:
Petrify: Alongside combat power rate reduction, Petrify should also reduce the potency of power gain effects by the same amount. Petrify usually reduces power gain effects and it would expand the utility to all kinds of match-ups (Hyperion or Luke Cage for instant). In short, Petrify would reduce the potency of power gain rate from all sources. The Petrify mastery should be able to reverse the effects of regen and power gain on its own, and drain power when the combat power rate reduction goes above 100%.
Pacify: Pacify just feels it needs extra effects. When an active ability triggers during a stun positively modifies the base attributes of the enemy, the potency of that ability is reduced by 10-20-30%. When an active ability inflicted during a stun negatively modifies your champion's attributes, the potency of that ability is reduced by 10-20-30%. Alright, what does it mean? Any buff or passive that activates on the opponent that increases attack rating, critical hit rating, critical damage rating, armor rating, block proficiency, energy resistance, physical resistance or critical resistance has its potency reduced. Any debuff or passive that is inflicted on you that reduces attack rating, critical hit rating, critical damage rating, armor rating, block proficiency, energy resistance, physical resistance or critical resistance has its potency reduced. I keep the old potency as I think 40%-45% potency reduction would be too much to be balanced. This should be able to go into the negative as well.
Thirdly and lastly, the effects of both Petrify and Pacify should extend to all stun effects and not only stun debuffs.
Without further ado, let's dive deeper how these two masteries affect your gameplay and certain god tier champions.
PETRIFY
This mastery synergises well with the Despair mastery, which reduces Regeneration and healing effects by 5%-10%-15% per debuff. With max. Petrify and max. Despair, healing is reduced by a whopping 45% during stuns. As parry is still an integral part of this game, this is a large part of the fight.
CAIW: It is only fitting I start with the petrify king himself, CAIW. With the Petrify mastery maxed out, you have access to a default 30% (45% with Despair) Petrify, regardless if you've another tech, cosmic or science champion in your team. Without the Petrify mastery, you can get up to 85% regen reduction from a single parry (4 x 15% = 60% regen reduction from Despair and 25% regen reduction from CAIW Petrify debuff). However, maxing out Petrify mastery gives an extra 30% regen reduction, giving 115% regen reduction. In other words, one single parry is sufficient to reverse healing. This is only as long as the stun, but doing MLM and another parry can make sure you reverse heal the entire time.
Void: The petrify god, even better than CAIW, is Void. His Petrify gives 50% regen reduction and can stack twice. Let's count again. Without the Petrify mastery, a single Petrify debuff and the stun debuff gives maximum 80% regen reduction (1 x 50% + 2 x 15%). However, with the Petrify mastery maxed out, that becomes 110% regen reduction. Again, a single parry can reverse healing for the duration of the stun, without taking into account the other debuffs or Fear of the Void passives.
She-Hulk: If CAIW is king, She-Hulk is the petrify queen. Her SP2 gives a Petrify effect that reduces regen by 115% (130% with Despair) for 15 seconds. In those 15 seconds, you can do some parries, increasing it to 175% regen reduction with maxed Petrify. If you unintentionally get pushed to a SP3, she inflicts a stun debuff for 3.5 seconds (+25% longer with sorceror supreme synergy), ensuring 45% regen reduction while it is active. And don't forget the Slow debuff from her heavy, that gives extra 15% regen reduction thanks to Despair.
Human Torch: Flame on! Human Torch's incinerate effects reduces healing by 20% for each effect, up to 35% for incinerate debuffs (not nova flames) due to Despair. Without the Petrify mastery maxed out, stun debuffs only give 15% extra regen reduction. However, the Petrify mastery maxed out ensures that stun debuffs count for one extra incinerate debuff. This means you need one less incinerate debuff to reverse heal (2 instead of 3). Even more, the long stun debuff on the SP2 ensures that any regen champion melts away. With my 6* R1 HT, I could easily beat ROL Wolverine by reverse healing with minimal upkeep of incinerate debuffs.
Archangel: Archangel already has tremendous regen reduction, even unawakened. Frequent bleeds with Despair gives 15% regen reduction per bleed debuff and poison gives 45% regen reduction per poison debuff. As parrying and heavy attack is an integral part of Archangel's gameplay, with a maxed out Petrify every parry counts as having an extra poison debuff applied. The stun debuff is removed upon knock-down, but Archangel's heavy animation is so long it lasts the whole stun duration, so you have maximum heal reduction. When Neurotoxin expires, it triggers a stun debuff so you can utilise even more the regen reduction from the Petrify mastery.
Apocalyps: Apocalyps is a pretty good champion that has huge benefit to Despair. He can have up to 7 debuffs, including a poison that reduces regen by 30%-60%, which gives 135%-165% regen reduction. The Petrify mastery just throws another 30% on top of that, for maximum 195% regen reduction.
Darkhawk: I haven't talked about that other aspect of the Petrify: the reduced power gain from attacking and being attacked. Darkhawk has a Stealth Mode that reduces opponents Defensive Power Gain by 70%. With the Petrify mastery maxed out, this becomes 100%. Ergo, you can do a cycle of parry-MLM and the opponent gains no energy. With max. sig, the increased Offensive Power Gain might be good enough to cycle SP2's. This gives Darkhawk superb power control, still one of the biggest utility in the game.
Punisher 2099: When the buff of Punisher 2099 came out, players speculated how good he would be with Collar Tech mastery. They forgot that the Petrify mastery is better and cheaper. While Collar Tech reduces power gain by 18%, the Petrify mastery does it by 30%, and that for lesser points. Overdrive reduces power gained through attacking by 90%, so a single point in the Petrify mastery ensures you can have 100% power gain reduction while stunned. However, I didn't notice any reverse power gain when you have max. Petrify, sadly enough. But still, doing parry-MLM ensures your opponent gains no power but from special attacks. You can rinse and repeat SP1 to keep up the overdrive without worrying too much about opponents launching special attacks.
Yondu: This is more an honourable mention, as Yondu isn't considered to be a great champion. However, the Petrify mastery ensures you can more easily reach his maximum power control potential. Yondu has the ability to reduce power gain from attacks by 10% for each debuff up to 50%, a bit the power version of Despair. With maxed Petrify, every stun reduces power gain by a total of 40%. In other words, you only need one extra bleed or armor break debuff to have maximum power control.
White Mags: White Magneto is also an honourable mention. When Magnetized, the opponent suffers from 15% combat power rate reduction. While stunned, this goes to 45% thanks to the Petrify mastery. 45% is still almost half less power, and White Magneto relies on many hits to get Prowess buffs. Parry-MLM ensures max. chance to gain Prowess with the least amount of power gained. Petrify doesn't work on stun passives, so it won't work with his pre-fight ability.
Spider-Gwen: Spider-Gwen utilises both effects from the Petrify mastery. On her SP2, she applies a stun-and-petrify-effect-in-one debuff that reduces regen and combat power gain rate by 80%. Only 2 points in the Petrify mastery is needed to reverse regen (115% with Despair) and stop combat power gain (that doesn't reverse). She can reverse even more healing with max. Petrify (125%). In effect, the Petrified debuff is the same as the Enervate debuff.
Gambit: Gambit and the Petrify mastery is a bayou gift that keeps on giving. Gambit's stun debuffs have a build-in petrify effect that reduces regen by 40% (55% with Despair) and combat power rate by 40%. With maxed out Petrify, that becomes 85% regen reduction and 70% reduced combat power rate. That gives him amazing power control during parries. Even more, he has a longer stun debuff with his SP1 and two (!) 5 second stun debuffs with his SP3, a whopping 170% regen reduction and 140% combat power rate reduction. During special attacks, stun debuffs are paused so even then you can take full advantage of this.
Even better: any champion that applies a lot of debuffs, can be a potential heal reduction champion thanks to Despair. With Petrify, that becomes even more easy.
Blade: It is easy for Blade to stack up bleeds, every parry gives a bleed, the SP1 gives two bleeds and the SP3 gives three bleeds and a stun. So it is pretty doable to get 4 bleeds and a stun at a time. With Despair, that gives a maximum of 60% regen reduction. Not bad, not bad. But with Petrify, that goes to 90% regen reduction! So even if Magik procs Limbo or Mephisto triggers his regen, you can reduce its effects significantly.
Hyperion: It is so easy to spam SP1 and get 4-5 incinerate debuffs at a time. Just parry-SP1 gives 75%-90% regen reduction while stunned. With Petrify mastery, this goes to 100%/105%-120% regen reduction. Even if you get pushed to two bars of power, his SP2 gives a stun and armor break, reducing regen by 60% for the duration of the stun, compared to 30% with only Despair.
Nick Fury: Another bleeder. He has insane amount of bleeds. The parry-MLM and parry-heavy combo are most effective to get a steady amount of up to 7 debuffs for 100% regen reduction (as Despair cannot go below 100%). However, the Petrify mastery you can get that 100% regen reduction during stuns with only 4 bleeds. Yeah, that's pretty insane. On top of that, Nick can get those 4 bleeds and stun debuff by using a single SP2.
I think I can write up so many more amazing champions, but you get the point. Having access to maximum 45% regen and combat power rate reduction while parrying for any champion is super useful.
PACIFY
This mastery synergises well with the Assassin's mastery that gives 12-20% DAAR while the opponent is below 18%. I do not include this in the calculations as, let's be honest, most of the time you're fighting champions above 18% health. But do keep in mind that it exists, with 42-50% DAAR it is a fifty-fifty failure for everything, like Punisher's Endure or Hulkbuster's/G2099's nasty regen.
Void: Wait, isn't he mostly a heal reversal champion? Yes, but one of his debuffs is an agility debuff that reduces the chance to evade by 30%. Normally, you need at least one Fear of the Void and two agility debuffs to be reliable (120% evade reduction). However, thanks to the Pacify mastery, you only need the two agility debuffs and a stun or a single Fear of the Void and a stun (90% evade reduction).
Blade: Blade isn't considered the meta anymore, but he still has his uses. His Danger Sense reduces general ability accuracy by 40% (58% with Sparkey) against interdimensional beings, villains (with GR) and mystic champions (with Mephisto or Dormammu). With a maxed Pacify mastery, this goes up to 70%/88% ability accuracy reduction. When timing your parry right, you can push over Magik over a bar of power and have greatly reduced chance of activating her Limbo. Or preventing Mephisto's regen happening at all. If it fails, no problem, you've still the Petrify mastery to count on.
Nick Fury: Yes, him again. Nick Fury has a Disorient debuff on his SP1 that reduces Defensive Ability Accuracy by 70%. Thanks to the Pacify mastery, this goes to 100% while stunned. So even if you didn't have 5 tactical charges to bypass evade, the Pacify mastery will ensure it doesn't either.
Hit Monkey: While you do want Assassin's Cunning for max. amount of damage and evade prevention, this does not mean Primal Rage can't be useful. Primal Rage gives light attacks and special attacks 20-45% chance to trigger disorient with 40% DAAR. As you have most damage with MLM combo's, you can get 70% DAAR during parries. All kinds of nasty opponents that deal passive damage can be mitigated, like Killmonger, Elektro and Korg. Even evade can be good enough mitigated during Primal Rage.
Elektra: Elektra isn't considered a good champion, but she gets pretty useful thanks to the Pacify mastery. She has the ability that she reduces defensive ability accuracy by 85% while the opponent is under the effects of a debuff. With the Pacify mastery, this goes to 115% while stunned. Great for evade, auto-block, thorns,...
Ronin: Ronin is a peculiar champion. His playing style is not meant to stay in one stance for long, but he has the flexibility to do so. If you parry and do MLLM, you can stay in Wraith Stance. Wraith Stance reduces DAAR while attacking by 40%. It is not much, but combined with the Pacify mastery this goes up to 70% DAAR (with 30% general AAR). The SP1 inflicts a disorient that gives another 40% DAAR, resulting in 110% DAAR. This is enough to reliable bypass evade.
Archangel: Another champion that is just perfect for Petrify and Pacify mastery. When awakened, Archangel's neurotoxins grants up to 35%/40% AAR. The Pacify mastery gives a base max. 30% AAR while stunned, already reducing the chance for your heavy to fail due to evade or some other detrimental effect triggering. At max sig, you only need two (!) neurotoxins to shut-down the champion while heavy attacking. That is pretty easy to upkeep.
Gambit: The bayou boy keeps on giving. Gambit has access to a concussion debuff after the last hit of his SP2, reducing ability accuracy by 85%. During stuns, this can become 115% AAR thanks to Pacify. This means a total shut-down of the opponent, with even a 15% safety margin on nodes with increased ability accuracy.
Apocalyps: Another good champion for both Petrify and Pacify. Apocalyps SP2 gives a concussion debuff that gives 35% AAR. With the SP3, this becomes 70% AAR. But throw the Pacify mastery, and you get 100% AAR during stuns.
Cable: Cable wouldn't even have made this list if there wasn't Apocalyps. That synergy gives him a stackable degen debuff. This grants him 100% regen reduction (thanks to Despair, with even less debuffs with Petrify). But I don't want to talk about that. No, I want to talk about the concussion debuff of his SP2. That gives 90% AAR. But Pacify makes that 120% AAR while stunned. Because why not? His heavy attack lasts the whole duration of the parry stun, so the opponent won't trigger any abilities during those 11 seconds.
Red Magneto: Red Magneto is probably the best reworked champion ever. While Magnetized, good ol' Red Mags reduces both ability accuracy by 70% and regen rate by 105%. With the Pacify mastery, this goes to 100%. The regen reduction by 150% due to Petrify mastery won't matter, the opponent will not be able to trigger regen anyway. Red Mags has such a long parry stun due to his high perfect block chance, it is crazy. He can reliably shut down any metal champion thanks to the Pacify mastery.
White Magneto: Considered to be the lesser Magneto, he is still quite as good. While Magnetized, he has the same 70% AAR like Red Mags. Unlike Red Mags, he does not rely on heavy attacks that removes the stun debuff, but his stun debuff lasts less long. This is on top of the 45% combat power gain rate reduction from the Petrify mastery.
Having access to 30% AAR for all champions, even for regular champions, is still super useful. I noticed when fighting a champion like Spider-Man with no evade counter, parry-MLM is the best way to avoid that evade.
If you've survived the wall of text, I hope I've encouraged to look at these two masteries and try them out sometime. If you think I missed a champion that works great with Petrify and/or Pacify, please share!
I wish to make a case for these two masteries, citing concrete champions who benefit greatly from these masteries. I'm not going to say you MUST use points on these masteries (I assume you can make that choice yourself), I only wish to provoke thinking and discussion on how these two masteries have been neglected.
Let's start with a quick recap what they do.
THE MASTERIES
Petrify: When your Champions inflict Stun Debuffs, they also reduce enemy Regeneration by up to 10%-20%-30% and Power gained from attacking or being attacked [red: Combat Power Rate it is now called] by up to 10%-20%-30% for the duration of the Stun.
Note: Petrify does not affect the power gained through buffs or passives, like Hyperion's power gain buff, unlike the petrify from CAIW or She-Hulk.
Pacify: When your Champions inflict Stun Debuffs, they also reduce enemy Ability Accuracy by up to 10%-20%-30% for the duration of the Stun. Ability Accuracy governs the chance that an ability activates.
Note: Pacify is a general ability accuracy reduction, so both offensive and defensive and abilities that fall in neither category are included.
With the Stupefy mastery, all stun effects lasts up to 0.5 seconds longer, benefitting even longer from the Petrify and Pacify masteries.
I'm not 100% certain, but I do not think the masteries alone can go below 100% reduction. I can confirm that the combat power gain rate reduction does not result in power drain.
IMPROVEMENTS
Before I start with describing how awesome these masteries are, I do think they can be better to entice the player base to invest mastery points into them. So I want to take the opportunity do make some constructive feedback to Kabam in case they would ever change these masteries.
First of all, I think the potency should increase. This can be done in three ways:
- 10%-20%-40%: it starts with the same 10%, but every extra point doubles the potency up to 40%. Players who want to commit fully to these masteries, get rewarded more. However, I don't think players would want to invest more than 1 or 2 points, so it wouldn't change a bit.
- 10%-25%-40%: it starts with the same 10%, but every extra point increases the potency with a flat 15%. The end result is the same 40%, but investing 2 points will yield higher results. However, 5% extra compared to now is not that much, but it is only 5% lesser compared to investing 3 points for 30%. It still requires commitment to go for the full 40%.
- 15%-30%-45%: it starts higher (15%) but it keeps the same flat increase of 15%. Two points give as much as currently three points. However, 45% is really on the edge what I feel is balanced, but if it is lowered to 40%, the diminishing return will scare off players investing in it.
Petrify: Alongside combat power rate reduction, Petrify should also reduce the potency of power gain effects by the same amount. Petrify usually reduces power gain effects and it would expand the utility to all kinds of match-ups (Hyperion or Luke Cage for instant). In short, Petrify would reduce the potency of power gain rate from all sources. The Petrify mastery should be able to reverse the effects of regen and power gain on its own, and drain power when the combat power rate reduction goes above 100%.
Pacify: Pacify just feels it needs extra effects. When an active ability triggers during a stun positively modifies the base attributes of the enemy, the potency of that ability is reduced by 10-20-30%. When an active ability inflicted during a stun negatively modifies your champion's attributes, the potency of that ability is reduced by 10-20-30%. Alright, what does it mean? Any buff or passive that activates on the opponent that increases attack rating, critical hit rating, critical damage rating, armor rating, block proficiency, energy resistance, physical resistance or critical resistance has its potency reduced. Any debuff or passive that is inflicted on you that reduces attack rating, critical hit rating, critical damage rating, armor rating, block proficiency, energy resistance, physical resistance or critical resistance has its potency reduced. I keep the old potency as I think 40%-45% potency reduction would be too much to be balanced. This should be able to go into the negative as well.
Thirdly and lastly, the effects of both Petrify and Pacify should extend to all stun effects and not only stun debuffs.
Without further ado, let's dive deeper how these two masteries affect your gameplay and certain god tier champions.
PETRIFY
This mastery synergises well with the Despair mastery, which reduces Regeneration and healing effects by 5%-10%-15% per debuff. With max. Petrify and max. Despair, healing is reduced by a whopping 45% during stuns. As parry is still an integral part of this game, this is a large part of the fight.
CAIW: It is only fitting I start with the petrify king himself, CAIW. With the Petrify mastery maxed out, you have access to a default 30% (45% with Despair) Petrify, regardless if you've another tech, cosmic or science champion in your team. Without the Petrify mastery, you can get up to 85% regen reduction from a single parry (4 x 15% = 60% regen reduction from Despair and 25% regen reduction from CAIW Petrify debuff). However, maxing out Petrify mastery gives an extra 30% regen reduction, giving 115% regen reduction. In other words, one single parry is sufficient to reverse healing. This is only as long as the stun, but doing MLM and another parry can make sure you reverse heal the entire time.
Void: The petrify god, even better than CAIW, is Void. His Petrify gives 50% regen reduction and can stack twice. Let's count again. Without the Petrify mastery, a single Petrify debuff and the stun debuff gives maximum 80% regen reduction (1 x 50% + 2 x 15%). However, with the Petrify mastery maxed out, that becomes 110% regen reduction. Again, a single parry can reverse healing for the duration of the stun, without taking into account the other debuffs or Fear of the Void passives.
She-Hulk: If CAIW is king, She-Hulk is the petrify queen. Her SP2 gives a Petrify effect that reduces regen by 115% (130% with Despair) for 15 seconds. In those 15 seconds, you can do some parries, increasing it to 175% regen reduction with maxed Petrify. If you unintentionally get pushed to a SP3, she inflicts a stun debuff for 3.5 seconds (+25% longer with sorceror supreme synergy), ensuring 45% regen reduction while it is active. And don't forget the Slow debuff from her heavy, that gives extra 15% regen reduction thanks to Despair.
Human Torch: Flame on! Human Torch's incinerate effects reduces healing by 20% for each effect, up to 35% for incinerate debuffs (not nova flames) due to Despair. Without the Petrify mastery maxed out, stun debuffs only give 15% extra regen reduction. However, the Petrify mastery maxed out ensures that stun debuffs count for one extra incinerate debuff. This means you need one less incinerate debuff to reverse heal (2 instead of 3). Even more, the long stun debuff on the SP2 ensures that any regen champion melts away. With my 6* R1 HT, I could easily beat ROL Wolverine by reverse healing with minimal upkeep of incinerate debuffs.
Archangel: Archangel already has tremendous regen reduction, even unawakened. Frequent bleeds with Despair gives 15% regen reduction per bleed debuff and poison gives 45% regen reduction per poison debuff. As parrying and heavy attack is an integral part of Archangel's gameplay, with a maxed out Petrify every parry counts as having an extra poison debuff applied. The stun debuff is removed upon knock-down, but Archangel's heavy animation is so long it lasts the whole stun duration, so you have maximum heal reduction. When Neurotoxin expires, it triggers a stun debuff so you can utilise even more the regen reduction from the Petrify mastery.
Apocalyps: Apocalyps is a pretty good champion that has huge benefit to Despair. He can have up to 7 debuffs, including a poison that reduces regen by 30%-60%, which gives 135%-165% regen reduction. The Petrify mastery just throws another 30% on top of that, for maximum 195% regen reduction.
Darkhawk: I haven't talked about that other aspect of the Petrify: the reduced power gain from attacking and being attacked. Darkhawk has a Stealth Mode that reduces opponents Defensive Power Gain by 70%. With the Petrify mastery maxed out, this becomes 100%. Ergo, you can do a cycle of parry-MLM and the opponent gains no energy. With max. sig, the increased Offensive Power Gain might be good enough to cycle SP2's. This gives Darkhawk superb power control, still one of the biggest utility in the game.
Punisher 2099: When the buff of Punisher 2099 came out, players speculated how good he would be with Collar Tech mastery. They forgot that the Petrify mastery is better and cheaper. While Collar Tech reduces power gain by 18%, the Petrify mastery does it by 30%, and that for lesser points. Overdrive reduces power gained through attacking by 90%, so a single point in the Petrify mastery ensures you can have 100% power gain reduction while stunned. However, I didn't notice any reverse power gain when you have max. Petrify, sadly enough. But still, doing parry-MLM ensures your opponent gains no power but from special attacks. You can rinse and repeat SP1 to keep up the overdrive without worrying too much about opponents launching special attacks.
Yondu: This is more an honourable mention, as Yondu isn't considered to be a great champion. However, the Petrify mastery ensures you can more easily reach his maximum power control potential. Yondu has the ability to reduce power gain from attacks by 10% for each debuff up to 50%, a bit the power version of Despair. With maxed Petrify, every stun reduces power gain by a total of 40%. In other words, you only need one extra bleed or armor break debuff to have maximum power control.
White Mags: White Magneto is also an honourable mention. When Magnetized, the opponent suffers from 15% combat power rate reduction. While stunned, this goes to 45% thanks to the Petrify mastery. 45% is still almost half less power, and White Magneto relies on many hits to get Prowess buffs. Parry-MLM ensures max. chance to gain Prowess with the least amount of power gained. Petrify doesn't work on stun passives, so it won't work with his pre-fight ability.
Spider-Gwen: Spider-Gwen utilises both effects from the Petrify mastery. On her SP2, she applies a stun-and-petrify-effect-in-one debuff that reduces regen and combat power gain rate by 80%. Only 2 points in the Petrify mastery is needed to reverse regen (115% with Despair) and stop combat power gain (that doesn't reverse). She can reverse even more healing with max. Petrify (125%). In effect, the Petrified debuff is the same as the Enervate debuff.
Gambit: Gambit and the Petrify mastery is a bayou gift that keeps on giving. Gambit's stun debuffs have a build-in petrify effect that reduces regen by 40% (55% with Despair) and combat power rate by 40%. With maxed out Petrify, that becomes 85% regen reduction and 70% reduced combat power rate. That gives him amazing power control during parries. Even more, he has a longer stun debuff with his SP1 and two (!) 5 second stun debuffs with his SP3, a whopping 170% regen reduction and 140% combat power rate reduction. During special attacks, stun debuffs are paused so even then you can take full advantage of this.
Even better: any champion that applies a lot of debuffs, can be a potential heal reduction champion thanks to Despair. With Petrify, that becomes even more easy.
Blade: It is easy for Blade to stack up bleeds, every parry gives a bleed, the SP1 gives two bleeds and the SP3 gives three bleeds and a stun. So it is pretty doable to get 4 bleeds and a stun at a time. With Despair, that gives a maximum of 60% regen reduction. Not bad, not bad. But with Petrify, that goes to 90% regen reduction! So even if Magik procs Limbo or Mephisto triggers his regen, you can reduce its effects significantly.
Hyperion: It is so easy to spam SP1 and get 4-5 incinerate debuffs at a time. Just parry-SP1 gives 75%-90% regen reduction while stunned. With Petrify mastery, this goes to 100%/105%-120% regen reduction. Even if you get pushed to two bars of power, his SP2 gives a stun and armor break, reducing regen by 60% for the duration of the stun, compared to 30% with only Despair.
Nick Fury: Another bleeder. He has insane amount of bleeds. The parry-MLM and parry-heavy combo are most effective to get a steady amount of up to 7 debuffs for 100% regen reduction (as Despair cannot go below 100%). However, the Petrify mastery you can get that 100% regen reduction during stuns with only 4 bleeds. Yeah, that's pretty insane. On top of that, Nick can get those 4 bleeds and stun debuff by using a single SP2.
I think I can write up so many more amazing champions, but you get the point. Having access to maximum 45% regen and combat power rate reduction while parrying for any champion is super useful.
PACIFY
This mastery synergises well with the Assassin's mastery that gives 12-20% DAAR while the opponent is below 18%. I do not include this in the calculations as, let's be honest, most of the time you're fighting champions above 18% health. But do keep in mind that it exists, with 42-50% DAAR it is a fifty-fifty failure for everything, like Punisher's Endure or Hulkbuster's/G2099's nasty regen.
Void: Wait, isn't he mostly a heal reversal champion? Yes, but one of his debuffs is an agility debuff that reduces the chance to evade by 30%. Normally, you need at least one Fear of the Void and two agility debuffs to be reliable (120% evade reduction). However, thanks to the Pacify mastery, you only need the two agility debuffs and a stun or a single Fear of the Void and a stun (90% evade reduction).
Blade: Blade isn't considered the meta anymore, but he still has his uses. His Danger Sense reduces general ability accuracy by 40% (58% with Sparkey) against interdimensional beings, villains (with GR) and mystic champions (with Mephisto or Dormammu). With a maxed Pacify mastery, this goes up to 70%/88% ability accuracy reduction. When timing your parry right, you can push over Magik over a bar of power and have greatly reduced chance of activating her Limbo. Or preventing Mephisto's regen happening at all. If it fails, no problem, you've still the Petrify mastery to count on.
Nick Fury: Yes, him again. Nick Fury has a Disorient debuff on his SP1 that reduces Defensive Ability Accuracy by 70%. Thanks to the Pacify mastery, this goes to 100% while stunned. So even if you didn't have 5 tactical charges to bypass evade, the Pacify mastery will ensure it doesn't either.
Hit Monkey: While you do want Assassin's Cunning for max. amount of damage and evade prevention, this does not mean Primal Rage can't be useful. Primal Rage gives light attacks and special attacks 20-45% chance to trigger disorient with 40% DAAR. As you have most damage with MLM combo's, you can get 70% DAAR during parries. All kinds of nasty opponents that deal passive damage can be mitigated, like Killmonger, Elektro and Korg. Even evade can be good enough mitigated during Primal Rage.
Elektra: Elektra isn't considered a good champion, but she gets pretty useful thanks to the Pacify mastery. She has the ability that she reduces defensive ability accuracy by 85% while the opponent is under the effects of a debuff. With the Pacify mastery, this goes to 115% while stunned. Great for evade, auto-block, thorns,...
Ronin: Ronin is a peculiar champion. His playing style is not meant to stay in one stance for long, but he has the flexibility to do so. If you parry and do MLLM, you can stay in Wraith Stance. Wraith Stance reduces DAAR while attacking by 40%. It is not much, but combined with the Pacify mastery this goes up to 70% DAAR (with 30% general AAR). The SP1 inflicts a disorient that gives another 40% DAAR, resulting in 110% DAAR. This is enough to reliable bypass evade.
Archangel: Another champion that is just perfect for Petrify and Pacify mastery. When awakened, Archangel's neurotoxins grants up to 35%/40% AAR. The Pacify mastery gives a base max. 30% AAR while stunned, already reducing the chance for your heavy to fail due to evade or some other detrimental effect triggering. At max sig, you only need two (!) neurotoxins to shut-down the champion while heavy attacking. That is pretty easy to upkeep.
Gambit: The bayou boy keeps on giving. Gambit has access to a concussion debuff after the last hit of his SP2, reducing ability accuracy by 85%. During stuns, this can become 115% AAR thanks to Pacify. This means a total shut-down of the opponent, with even a 15% safety margin on nodes with increased ability accuracy.
Apocalyps: Another good champion for both Petrify and Pacify. Apocalyps SP2 gives a concussion debuff that gives 35% AAR. With the SP3, this becomes 70% AAR. But throw the Pacify mastery, and you get 100% AAR during stuns.
Cable: Cable wouldn't even have made this list if there wasn't Apocalyps. That synergy gives him a stackable degen debuff. This grants him 100% regen reduction (thanks to Despair, with even less debuffs with Petrify). But I don't want to talk about that. No, I want to talk about the concussion debuff of his SP2. That gives 90% AAR. But Pacify makes that 120% AAR while stunned. Because why not? His heavy attack lasts the whole duration of the parry stun, so the opponent won't trigger any abilities during those 11 seconds.
Red Magneto: Red Magneto is probably the best reworked champion ever. While Magnetized, good ol' Red Mags reduces both ability accuracy by 70% and regen rate by 105%. With the Pacify mastery, this goes to 100%. The regen reduction by 150% due to Petrify mastery won't matter, the opponent will not be able to trigger regen anyway. Red Mags has such a long parry stun due to his high perfect block chance, it is crazy. He can reliably shut down any metal champion thanks to the Pacify mastery.
White Magneto: Considered to be the lesser Magneto, he is still quite as good. While Magnetized, he has the same 70% AAR like Red Mags. Unlike Red Mags, he does not rely on heavy attacks that removes the stun debuff, but his stun debuff lasts less long. This is on top of the 45% combat power gain rate reduction from the Petrify mastery.
Having access to 30% AAR for all champions, even for regular champions, is still super useful. I noticed when fighting a champion like Spider-Man with no evade counter, parry-MLM is the best way to avoid that evade.
If you've survived the wall of text, I hope I've encouraged to look at these two masteries and try them out sometime. If you think I missed a champion that works great with Petrify and/or Pacify, please share!
Post edited by Kabam Porthos on
31
Comments
Petrify is definitely one of my favorite masteries, and as you said in your post; it works extremely well with a champ like Void. I also run max petrify because it synergises well with a champ like Archangel. I can get 3 heavies in due to the reduced power rate, compared to 2 heavies without. Helps a lot against champs like Magik. Hyperion and CMM are some other champs that work extremely well with the Mastery. With hype, that reduced power rate during a stun allows you more opportunities for heavies. With CMM, you can decide how you want to manage your opponent's power meter. If you don't want to push them to SP 2, you can safely do 2 comboes into your SP 2 then go for a medium and 2 heavies during the stun without the opponent getting to 2 bars.
As for pacify, I don't run it anymore mostly because it disables some beneficial nodes in cavalier difficulty from activating.
It's a matter of skill, learning to adapt to an opponent that gains less power. If I would spend my points on something else I would need to unlearn a lot as well. If it is only a matter of preference, I would pick my current mastery, it is always better to have less power.
I had mixed results with Thing. Occasionally, a rock stack would fail to trigger. However, fighting with NF makes Thing easy as you can shut him down completely.
Colossus was at first hard, but once you learn to take advantage of it, it's just like any fight.
Overall, it has been more an advantage than a disadvantage but I respect your opinion.
As far as Pacify goes, it's more often useful than not, so I won't be getting rid of it any time soon. But it doesn't change the fact that there are negatives.
I run max petrify and benefit from it extensively, but I don’t want AAR in play when I’m hitting a stunned opponent (masochism, Thing, etc). It could be used in niche circumstances, but it’s not worth it to me.
I like your write up, and agree on the petrify but not the pacify
In my opinion, trying to sell how great these masteries are by beginning with the above statement says it all. They work for some champs and work for some situations, same as most masteries but in my opinion are not must have’s.
Personally, there are way too few instances where Pacify hurts more, I agree with you.