Playing Guide : Mag/mag Prime

[(PSN)friedricetheman]

I am starting off the series with the Frame that I chose as my starter frame, Mag. I will be using Mag Prime as the point of reference for my build as I have used her extensively since I obtained her a few months back.

 

For reference sake, this is my build. Do note that this is the build that I feel most players should strive for if they want to play high level content with Mag Prime. Feel free to debunk my thoughts on this.

 

 

As you can see above, I have forma'd my Mag Prime 3 times (changing the aura polarity slot to a '-' for energy siphon, and changing two '=' ability polarities to a 'V' and a 'D' respectively).

 

Here's a breakdown of my build.

 

Aura - Energy Siphon (Maxed)

This is needed as to have enough power to cast your shield polarize and pull. Without an energy siphon, you may not have enough energy to cast them with a Maxed blind rage.

 

Maxed Efficiency - Streamline (Maxed) and Fleeting Expertise (Maxed)

Both of these will provide 90% efficiency (hard cap in game is 75%) but the Maxed Blind Rage will reduce the power efficiency to 35%. The duration loss is not a problem in this build as none of the powers (Pull and Shield Polarize) are effected by duration.

 

Maxed Power Strength - Intensify (Maxed) and Blind Rage (Maxed)

These mods at maxed will make Pull deal 687 damage per target and Shield Polarize (where these two mods shine the most) to drain/restore 100% of shields and deal 572.5% damage ratio of shields.

So, draining a shield value of 500 will result in a damage of 3,362.5 to the target and its surrounding.

 

Maxed Energy Max - Flow (Maxed)

This build is very power hungry so a Maxed Flow is needed.

 

70% Power Range - Stretch (Maxed) + Coil Helmet

The maxed Stretch (+45%) and Coil Helmet (+25%) will increase Pull and Shield Polarize range by 70%.

 

Maxed Redirection + Maxed Vitality

This will effective increase Mag's shields to 1100+ after the reduction of 5% in shields from Coil Helmet. The shields acts as a safety buffer during long survival missions as if you find your shields running low, you can always cast Shield Polarize to instantly regen your shields. The Maxed Vitality gives an additional buffer to your health in long survival runs or against infested (as they have multiple bleed procs).

 

How to play her

 

Against Corpus - Shield Polarize is your best friend against corpus as their units are shielded. Higher level Corpus will have more shields than health which makes your Shield Polarize 1 shot them easily.

 

Against Grineer - You should be spamming Pull against heavies to knock them off their feet. Once they are down, shoot them with your primary or secondary. Rinse and repeat. Use Shield Polarize only when your shields are dangerously low. Using her against Grineer is very tricky as you have to time your Pulls as to maximize the number of units that gets knocked down. Pull's effective range is like a cone so do remember that when you use pull.

 

Against Infested - I would suggest that you use some other frames unless you want to be spamming pulls. They have a lot of units with bleed procs at higher levels that ignore shields. Play her against Infested at your own risk!

 

Against Void - A combination of Shield Polarize and Pull will get you well into Void missions. The thing is, as you go longer on T3 Survivals, Heavy Gunners will make more frequent appearances. These can only be taken down with a Pull (to knock them down) and a good gun (to kill them before they get up again). Make sure you pack a high DPS weapon (Boar Prime, Phage or Boltor Prime) if you are doing a 1 hour runs on T3 Survival.

 

This concludes my guide on Mag/Mag Prime. I hope this guide gives new players some idea on how to build her.

Edited April 30, 2014 by (PS4)friedricetheman

[(PSN)Jonesie_78]

Thanks for the guide I found it useful!

I prob keep her existing helm though as it looks badass!

[(PSN)Hiero_Glyph]

You should be running at 50% efficiency, no less.  While the added damage from maxed Blind Rage can be useful at times it really only matters for refilling shields as Pull is a CC not a DD.  Having 50% efficiency will also allow you to drop Flow and add something lacking like Equilibrium.  Vitality is probably not needed either and could be dropped or swapped for Vigor (having more shields means more restored by Polarize).  Lastly, for Grineer and Void you want Corrosive Projection, not Energy Siphon, as your aura, and for Corpus you want Overextended as Shield Polarize will still nuke everything with only +42% power strength (but your range will be 65m).

Edited April 30, 2014 by (PS4)Hiero_Glyph

[Darzk]

You should be running at 50% efficiency, no less.  While the added damage from maxed Blind Rage can be useful at times it really only matters for refilling shields as Pull is a CC not a DD.  Having 50% efficiency will also allow you to drop Flow and add something lacking like Equilibrium.  Vitality is probably not needed either and could be dropped or swapped for Vigor (having more shields means more restored by Polarize).  Lastly, for Grineer and Void you want Corrosive Projection, not Energy Siphon, as your aura, and for Corpus you want Overextended as Shield Polarize will still nuke everything with only +42% power strength (but your range will be 65m).

 

QFT, this advice is dead on.

 

+102% PS (the amount you get with BR Rank 7 making 50% efficiency) will deal 505% of drained shields instead of 572.5%, only a 13% damage decrease, and will cost 30% less. Basically it's a slightly less powerful nuke, but a more efficient shield restore.

 

I would also point out that you only need +40% power strength to kill most Corpus units, so for my Corpus build I use the 50% efficiency (which has +102% ps) with Overextended (making +42% PS) to get a MASSIVE range on Shield Pol, something like 65m radius IIRC.

 

For Void/Grineer, I basically run Vigor instead of Vital, and either Equil instead of Flow, or if I'm with a Nekros or feel like dropping health restores Vigor instead of Flow, giving a lot of extra health.

[Dalawantahr]

Against Void - A combination of Shield Polarize and Pull will get you well into Void missions. The thing is, as you go longer on T3 Survivals, Heavy Gunners will make more frequent appearances. These can only be taken down with a Pull (to knock them down) and a good gun (to kill them before they get up again). Make sure you pack a high DPS weapon (Boar Prime, Phage or Boltor Prime) if you are doing a 1 hour runs on T3 Survival.

Not recommending Pull too much 'tho as it throw off your team mates aim, unless it's for emergencies. But I do have some questions on pulls, why is it sometimes they are pulled way back behind you flying, and sometimes they just face plant where they stand.

[(PSN)friedricetheman]

QFT, this advice is dead on.

 

+102% PS (the amount you get with BR Rank 7 making 50% efficiency) will deal 505% of drained shields instead of 572.5%, only a 13% damage decrease, and will cost 30% less. Basically it's a slightly less powerful nuke, but a more efficient shield restore.

 

I would also point out that you only need +40% power strength to kill most Corpus units, so for my Corpus build I use the 50% efficiency (which has +102% ps) with Overextended (making +42% PS) to get a MASSIVE range on Shield Pol, something like 65m radius IIRC.

 

For Void/Grineer, I basically run Vigor instead of Vital, and either Equil instead of Flow, or if I'm with a Nekros or feel like dropping health restores Vigor instead of Flow, giving a lot of extra health.

My concerns are that the 60+% increase in damage (572.5% - 505%) is a sizable amount as this damage scales with enemy levels. It may not seem much when the target concerned has 500 shields but when they start to have 1k shields or more, the amount of potential damage that I missed out on for R7 Blind Rage comes up to quite a bit. Also, with shield polarize, you will only have one chance to do it so why not the maximum damage instead of gimping yourself with less damage.

Also equilibrium is next to useless on Mag as she has high shields. Her health at base level is only 200+ so even with a maxed vigor, you will be having at most 400+ health. With shields of 1k+, I don't think equilibrium has much of a use unless you are affected by bleed procs.

I have maxed equilibrium on my Nekros but I also have a maxed vitality mod on him. Even with 180 shields and 740 health on him, I don't see much use of equilibrium unless he gets hit by a disrupting ancient or getting sustained fire from heavy gunners.

Mag's shields are very high and in order to benefit from equilibrium, you must have low shields and high health. Which is something that Mag doesn't have.

Overextended also kills Shield Polarize as the -60% hit to power strength is massive especially with an ability that deals damage in percentage instead of being static damage. Coil + Stretch gives me a +70% range which is more than sufficient for nuking a whole room.

[(PSN)friedricetheman]

@(PS4)Heiro_Glyph - The 50% efficiency only applies to certain frames. But frames with percentage increase in damage instead of static damage (eg. Banshee's Sonar, Mag's Shield Polarize) benefits more from a Maxed Blind Rage than you think.

 

Shield Polarize can only be casted once per enemy as the first cast will drain all its shields (even at Rank 7 Blind Rage). If the damage done is not enough to kill it, you will be taking substantial damage from the mob. There is no second chance with Shield Polarize. It's a one off skill per shielded enemy.

[(PSN)Hiero_Glyph]

I'm with Darzk 100% on this.  The minimal damage gain could theoretically increase your damage to allow you to kill an enemy that would otherwise survive but I'm not taking a constant reduction in efficiency for a situation that seems difficult, at best, to reproduce.  Also, using Corrosive Projection (CP) will cause more overall DPS gain than maxing Blind Rage when facing Grineer or Void enemies.  I understand how Shield Polarize works but I have never had an issue with it in the past and when using CP controlling your energy orb usage matters more than this theoretical one-shot threshold that you mention.

[(PSN)friedricetheman]

I'm with Darzk 100% on this.  The minimal damage gain could theoretically increase your damage to allow you to kill an enemy that would otherwise survive but I'm not taking a constant reduction in efficiency for a situation that seems difficult, at best, to reproduce.  Also, using Corrosive Projection (CP) will cause more overall DPS gain than maxing Blind Rage when facing Grineer or Void enemies.  I understand how Shield Polarize works but I have never had an issue with it in the past and when using CP controlling your energy orb usage matters more than this theoretical one-shot threshold that you mention.

Go wave 70 on T3 survival and you will see what I mean. Your R7 blind rage will no longer 1 shot shielded targets but instead they will 1 shot you.

[Darzk]

In Void especially Shield Pol is just as important as a survival tool as it is for the nuke. 

 

Corpus units will die, and Grineer will not, no matter the setup, due to incredibly high armor scaling at higher levels. Corrosive Projection will help, but SP won't be anything like the nuke it is against Corpus. If you're set up with a CP or 3, lesser Grineer within range of a Fusion Moa might die, but either way you're not gonna do much other than scratch heavy gunners.

 

Because it's not as effective of a nuke either way, there's no way I'd trade 13% damage for effectively making it cost twice as much (2 energy orbs instead of 1).

 

Not to mention the higher efficiency making Pull less costly, making it easier to spam for room CC.

 

For Corpus, where the nuke is more important than the shield restore, everything's gonna die with either setup, so again, efficiency is the better way to go. I only use OE for Corpus because +40% PS is enough to kill all corpus units, with the single exception of Oxium Ospreys, which will survive even a full +129% PS nuke.

 

Equilibrium is, as you stated, for countering bleeds. I mentioned that if I'm with a Nekros or willing to drop health packs I'd exchange it for more health. The bigger picture is that Flow is completely unneeded when using 50% efficiency, freeing up a mod slot for personal customization. I've even gotten in the habit of using Bullet Attractor for defenses, but its more fun than really effective.

[Corrupted_Ertai]

Go wave 70 on T3 survival and you will see what I mean. Your R7 blind rage will no longer 1 shot shielded targets but instead they will 1 shot you.

And if you push it far enough that a maxed BR won't one-shot any more then what are you left with? A 30% more power hungry ability that you still have to find a way to spam to be effective. You get a small cushion as far as how long it takes to hit that point with the extra 13% damage, but not enough to justify that kind of power usage. 

 

And BTW there is no wave 70 in a Survival mission. 

Edited April 30, 2014 by Corrupted_Ertai

[-XeqtR]

For the argument against mag in T3 survival, you're incorrect. With corrosive projection the grineer will be just as susceptible because shield polarize removes shields and does damage in an aoe which hits them as well.

Shield polarize scales infinitely with enemy shields so not sure what the guy above me means by "far enough where it doesn't one shot." It will always one shot in high level. Those shield numbers are crazy high.

[(PSN)Count_Dante]

For what it is worth, my build is nearly exactly the same as the OP and my playstyle is very very similar. I personally do not use Flow. I think it is a great guide that allows for solid and robust Mag play to allow for a solid start before personal touches can be added. 

[Corrupted_Ertai]

For the argument against mag in T3 survival, you're incorrect. With corrosive projection the grineer will be just as susceptible because shield polarize removes shields and does damage in an aoe which hits them as well.

Shield polarize scales infinitely with enemy shields so not sure what the guy above me means by "far enough where it doesn't one shot." It will always one shot in high level. Those shield numbers are crazy high.

Not everything in the Void relies on shields. No matter how big the shields get, the AoE won't be able to one shot the Heavy Gunners (for example) forever. Once their armor and health scale to a certain level even Corrosive Projection won't help.

[-XeqtR]

Not everything in the Void relies on shields. No matter how big the shields get, the AoE won't be able to one shot the Heavy Gunners (for example) forever. Once their armor and health scale to a certain level even Corrosive Projection won't help.

Stacking 4 corrosive projections makes the Grineer have 0 Armor. I hate to plug my video like this, but I'd like you to see for yourself.

[Darzk]

I'd be willing to bet you'd get the same results with a +102% PS build as compared to a +129% PS, and not have to rely so much on energy restores.

 

In addition, a premade team, with synchronized auras, dropping consistent energy restores, and playing properly as a group is outside the scope of normal gameplay. I'd call it a specialized build for a specific purpose.

 

In addition, while I'm not sure on the shield amount supplied by ospreys;

(With no armor:)

 

Crewmen have 150 shields for every 60 health that Lancers have. Not much PS is needed to kill a Lancer.

IIRC Gunners have 700 health for those 150 shields, so you would need a shield multiplier of 466% to kill them, which both builds achieves.

Anything caught by a Fusion Moa's SP explosion is going to die, as they have 250 shields, scaling.

 

So I'm at least fairly certain that if you can get 4x CP's running, both builds would have enough power strength to kill the same enemies.

 

The only thing I can think of is a Lancer with shields supplied by an Osprey, which would be ~ around 50 shields, scaling, trying to kill a gunner, which would need a multiplier of 14, or 3 casts with either build.

[-XeqtR]

I'd be willing to bet you'd get the same results with a +102% PS build as compared to a +129% PS, and not have to rely so much on energy restores.

 

In addition, a premade team, with synchronized auras, dropping consistent energy restores, and playing properly as a group is outside the scope of normal gameplay. I'd call it a specialized build for a specific purpose.

 

In addition, while I'm not sure on the shield amount supplied by ospreys;

(With no armor:)

 

Crewmen have 150 shields for every 60 health that Lancers have. Not much PS is needed to kill a Lancer.

IIRC Gunners have 700 health for those 150 shields, so you would need a shield multiplier of 466% to kill them, which both builds achieves.

Anything caught by a Fusion Moa's SP explosion is going to die, as they have 250 shields, scaling.

 

So I'm at least fairly certain that if you can get 4x CP's running, both builds would have enough power strength to kill the same enemies.

 

The only thing I can think of is a Lancer with shields supplied by an Osprey, which would be ~ around 50 shields, scaling, trying to kill a gunner, which would need a multiplier of 14, or 3 casts with either build.

Well, the energy restores in the video are more for a spamming Nekros. It just so happens to supply the other frames and that energy spills over, but that's fine. I also disagree, as whenever you run a tower key you have to invite everyone. If you want to be successful you should coordinate what frames you're bringing (you can't all bring an ash). Similar to frame you should also discuss which aura mod to bring. Why not use a mod that makes things significantly easier? Seems pointless to handicap your group.

 

I wasn't really arguing for the percentage of strength for killing, rather disagreeing with someone saying that the shield polarize would stop killing at some point (even though it scales infinitely because shields scale infinitely with increasing levels).

[Darzk]

I wasn't really arguing for the percentage of strength for killing, rather disagreeing with someone saying that the shield polarize would stop killing at some point (even though it scales infinitely because shields scale infinitely with increasing levels).

 

Ah. I believe the statement was made with a single CP aura in mind, not 4x of them. The problem being that when I join randoms for a T3 surv, probably half of them haven't even heard of CP and would refuse to use it even if they had - the mindset is still much too 'Energy Siphon is king'.

 

A team of 4 good players with no synchronization beforehand can easily go 40 mins; if one of them is a Trinity you can go 60 without much of a struggle. Most pugs wont go beyond that due to time constraints anyways, but the effort:reward ratio becomes so small it's not worth it, imo. 

 

I've very rarely been able to convince a group to run 4x CPs, best I've ever seen is 3x, which is enough to make the first hour or so ridiculously easy, but not really enough to take out heavy gunners with Shield Pol.