Using Suicide masteries for the first time
Nightheart
Member Posts: 2,125 ★★★★
So I unlocked one of the suicide masteries liquid courage and run it with willpower. The damage and PI increase is very noticeable but when I turn them off I feel as though a big amount of attack is taken away. it's really addicting to use and I can't stop using them. Thankfully mastery loadouts come in handy in this case... so I can switch them on and off whenever necessary. I know using them has drawbacks depending on champs and type of nodes. But it's awesome I love suicide masteries. I can't wait to get double edge and deep wounds fully unlocked.Should I invest in coagulate as well?
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Or don't watch if you're anything like me and don't really look at the screen while you're arena grinding
Glad you are at least trying them! 😌 I've been using them since 2018 and wouldn't play the game without them personally.. but I'll explain why later.
I know their popularity has dropped off recently with the introduction of BGs.. and what I mean by that, is.. game modes shape our rosters. For example, BGs is a popular game mode, and generally speaking, is best played without Recoils based on the scoring metric being weighted towards attacker health vs time in fight. That, and the fact that unlike AW, your masteries are shared between your defenders and your attackers both. Which essentially forces people to use a non-Recoil build in the mode.. to play at a competitive level at least (it's fine to play with Recoils if you're playing more casually for alliance and solo milestones however)
As a result, anyone who is into BGs a lot ends up having their roster shaped by this dynamic. They seek out characters who have ways of doing good damage without them.. and what I've noticed is these characters also often rely on specials (in one form or another) to achieve this damage.. over time, it just begins to shape your roster.. and your entire way of viewing champions and the way you value them. Once your roster gets heavily weighted and committed to these types of champions, you become more and more biased against Recoils - "oh, I can't use them.. my favorite champs require special spamming to succeed.." etc.
Personally, as someone who views the game from a different perspective, I see new characters come out who people rave about and frankly, sometimes I just don't get it. People get really excited about characters who can achieve passable damage without Recoils, but as someone who uses them all the time.. I'm kind of like "Umm.. all my characters have damage?" 🤷♂️ I know I will get even more disagrees from this, but here goes.. OG Hulk can replace most popular Science champs in most situations imo haha.. for example. For one reason, damage *is* utility...
So many nodes and defensive abilities are designed to become more difficult and take effect the longer you're in the fight. End the fight quickly and many challenges are simply bypassed. "They can't use their abilities when they're dead?🤷♂️" is often my response when I've been asked.. "how did you do that fight with XYZ (how did you counter the abc node or defensive ability)?"
Which brings me to another reason people chase new champs.. utility to counter the latest problematic defender abilities. Again, I'm often just not impressed here.. I watch footage and shrug.. and just use a high damage champion (I do have many options to suit different scenarios at this stage of my account - I'm not saying I spam 1 or 2 high damage champs.. I have built an army of them to choose from) I'm also not saying you don't have to play well, you do.. but with a good high damage character who fits the scenario and a good understanding of general combat mechanics and AI behavior you can go pretty far without the latest and greatest new character imo.
So, I'm excited about finally having mastery loadouts (once the issues are ironed out, of course 😅).. this is huge guys. Especially persistent AW defense masteries.. that alone should remove one of the other biggest objections to using Recoils "Well, I can't have them on my AW defense.. so, to save the hassle and cost of swapping.. I'll just play with them off all the time.." I now have 2 attack builds and 1 defense: Recoils/MD, Recoils DW and Defense.. it's perfect for me as those are the 3 fundamental builds I'm interested in.
I use a Recoil based build for all game modes (excluding AW def - I don't currently push BG, just milestones).. either with MD or with DW depending on the situation. It's not just for Arena guys.. Here's the thing, its amazing for AQ, Solo content and AW attack, etc. I have had success all those game modes using them.
- I very rarely use items in AQ.. I use champs that not only end the fights way sooner (also nice from a QOL perspective).. they actually heal from Recoils lol, it's a no brainer for me
- In AW attack, the "Damage is Utility" saying really and truly applies.. the best course of action in a war fight is always to get out of said war fight as quickly as possible imo.. the longer you are in the fight, the more opportunity for something to go sideways. Whether it's a mistake on our part, a lag spike, an AI who decides to stop cooperating or a node or character ability that escalates as the fight goes on.. kill the defender and get out is always the best strat imo
- Solo content, see above (Damage is Utility/Improves QOL and amount of content you can complete within a set amount of time, etc.)
- Arena.. duh
Literally, at this point, the only thing I am missing is the ability to seperate my defense masteries from my attack in BG.. if we get the ability to do this.. that will be the final change required for me to be competitive in all game modes using Recoil on attack - yes, I would 100% still use them on attack in BGs competitively.. it's only from a defense standpoint that they are harmful - for my roster at least
While there are many characters who are either friendly, better with or even considered unplayable without Recoils.. they really aren't bad for nearly all characters anymore. One of the biggest pro Recoil build things that happened in the game is the modern quest format (6 fights or less per path - it used to often be 12 or even more) Any champ is recoil friendly in this scenario lol... you have 5 champs and 6 fights 😂 and yes, Coagulate can be useful for "non-friendly" (I still run it, but it's not as required as it used to be)
As for the 5% you take for throwing an sp1 or 2.. couple things here, first is.. you're doing 60% greater damage on all sources and 90% more damage on Specials lol.. (you're going to be throwing markedly less specials as a result of this) and in short to mid range fights.. using a high damage champion you're gonna kill on your first sp2 (recoil doesn't apply if it ends the fight).. or even just don't throw a special lol.. or throw sp3.. with so much more damage, you're just not so reliant on specials anymore.. it's a really freeing perspective once you experience it. Sometimes people say "I enjoy spamming specials.." ok, that's great, to each their own.. I'll enjoy being finished with a grindy SQ path 60% faster 😌
Haha.. tldr: Now that we have persistent AW defense masteries (once it's actually working correctly), I'd recommend Recoil builds for nearly every mode in the game.. to all players.. except for BGs and only if you are pushing competitively, then maybe skip them there, other than that I see zero downside to using them in every other mode in the game