Profit Taker 2 months afterward

[Lewdcifer]

*opinions based on solo experiences and any comment related to what others might feel is based on logical reasoning.

Since it's credit weekend and all, on top of our event, I took a visit to our old friend to "borrow" some money. Well, I must say, #*!%er's stingy as all hell.

- Spawning terrain is still terrible for both the pathfinding of the boss itself, often making the legs either bugging the #*!% out or clipping 90% of the hitbox into terrain (guess what you need to shoot, huh?); and the pylons
The worse part of this is the pylons. Although the pylons are normally pretty far apart and just a kill joy to run after them and bust them up, spawning at the mushroom forest will completely cuck you if you don't have your operator mobility maxed out (or cuck you anyways if it lands upside down below a mushroom. Bravo). In my case, even with operator mobility not being a problem, the distance between pylons is still much further than normal as they stick to extremely varied elevation that's. See why archwing is not ideal in bullet point 2.

- Crazy damage output: Now, hear me, if a chroma with 4k2 armor AND adaptation is still perfectly capable of dying in without sustainable healing (elevate / grace / hunter recovery), there's probably some problem with the damage output of the boss (and everything around it). While we're perfectly clear from your nerf of magus revert that you really dont fckin like people using any other warframe than this particular one on this particular content, consider the fact that except for frame that can take heavy punishment and a method of sustainable healing, the fight is practically impossible (solo). Archwings will, regardless of frame, of course, get deleted unless you're set to spawn in one and yeet straight to fortuna with blink.

- Archgun is still on a cooldown basis with resets an RNG spawn. I still don't get this, even in regular play. Archgun is such an interesting idea that could effectively add one additional playstyle to your game in one mission, but it is essentially miffed by the cooldown.
Now, in the orb fight, the waiting game is a big problem. You WILL, at one or more point, speed through the shield phase fast enough that your archgun won't be back up in time. This is of course, alleviated by the ammo crewmans... which spawn randomly. Now what shall we do if, luck just happen to not be on our side. Wait. The pinnacle of gameplay. I think if you have been doing our lovely "event" lately, you'd know how incredibly lovely this is. Just wonderful.
Before anyone comment this as if it's by default I'm not doing this, no, I don't even know or register the location of any beacon put down. It is always on 4* full stop. The spawn will still be completely RNG.
The crewman by the way, however crucial they are to the fight, blend in nicely from a distance when they're not shooting their gun, which btw reloads for a long ass time. Now where's waldo?

- The ammount of CCs are still unbearable without anti cc mods. This of course, I use them, but you can only use 1 without skewing your build over, and using one at all is a demerit to your other parameters in a frame. What~does~this~mean. You're either getting knocked down to insanity or getting staggered to it. The "buff" to this didn't help.

- Bug(s). I'm really only talking about 1, which is the randomly regenerating legs, which as far as my memory serve me, has been here since forever. Well, let's just say with archwing cooldown consistency already a problem, wasting a dozen or 2 catridges on a magical leg (which occasionally do some weird demonic technique that assimilate with the topography around them) is not quite ideal.

 

In the end, is this content meant for solo? Afterall, some of these problem can be alleviated in squads, right? I don't know. But consider the demographics that make up all these registered losers and you may find solo players aren't that uncommon, and we want to have fun doing so. The problem is not in difficulty (I can do this 4m just fine), but in the brain-scrawling tedium of the terrible design that somehow still exist until now. And if we as singular players have these problem, even if it's not 100%, it will still translate a portion to squads as well.

Post-script: But man this spider chick is loaded. Pedestal prime for days.

Edited March 17, 2019 by Lewdcifer

[Marine027]

I done it with friends only recently for the first time and in our eyes its Eidolon level of "difficulty", to many effects and AoEs, to many enemys and any non tank frame will go down in seconds, i mean preparing is one tihng and a good setup should make it easier yes, but it should not be mandatory for such fights and make other frames and weapons obselete.

We had that with Eidolons already, it seriously pisses me of that like with EIdolons strong AMPs seem necessary, same for Chroma, Volt, etc. to even do enough damage at all.

This is bad game design in a game with such a variety in your Arsenal honestly, yes it is hard to find balance for such but so far it seems DE straight up ignores those problems.

Small example i can give how to handle things, lets say CC, Guild Wars 2 handles such more well as example, use CC to break a CC bar to make the enemy more vulnerable on strong enemys, making CC abilitys not obselte that way like in alot other MMOs.

[Airwolfen]

First time I did this boss was solo. and even then I only started next week. Knew the basic layout of what the boss fight was. like rotating shields and archwing weapon elemental typing. Did it in one go and have quite a few kills in now solo.

If you want to solo these bosses its like with Eidolons, intended for group play but possible solo, its not MEANT for solo. But if you DO solo you are going to have to build for it.

What I ran with: Inaros, Arca plasmor, Pandero, Melee does not matter much, Larkspur

There is no need for a amp frame as long as you have damage in your main 2 weapons and rotate the orbs shields by yourself with operator attacks if you cant damage it.

[Insizer]

48 minutes ago, Lewdcifer said:

-snip-

 

1.) I haven't had issues with legs and such clipping with the terrain that much, and if i have had it happen to me then it was only very temporary and there are other legs to take out and CC and such to dodge.  The only real terrain issue I've had are those shielding pylons landing on top of or on the stalks of mushrooms.  That is just a pain to get to.

2.) The archwing regens are also kind of annoying as well.  But usually 2 or all 3 of your allies have their guns out so the legs and body will get damaged one way or the other.  If you are doing it solo then you are putting yourself at a very large disadvantage.

3.) As for CC and damage output of the Orb and mobs is large, but i like that.  It make it a challenge, which is what is was made to be.

Frankly, most of the issues you are facing is because you are doing it solo.  It isn't made for that.  As you've said the CC and damage output of this thing is massive, and the reliance of guns with long cooldowns make it very hard if you are the only one.  As a group you have more guns which means more damage and elements (usually 1 or 2 more elements); more archgun damage and more consistent archgun damage; allies to rez you and take care of mobs, reinforcement beacons, and shielding pylons.

I wouldn't ever do it solo tbh, even if I'm playing as Wukong.  Defy is perfect for it, but there is too many constant damage sources that you can quickly find yourself dying while refreshing Defy.

Frankly, I'm glad this there is another difficult boss fight in this game aside from Eidolons.  Ones that make you think about your loadout, however this one is better than Eidolons imo. There are more damage and CC sources, and unlike Eidolons it has no "roles" you need to fill and no pigeonholed gun choices.  All you need in your loadout is something strong, something that will keep you alive, and maybe some element diversity.

Edited March 17, 2019 by Insizer

[Lewdcifer]

It's correct that the content is not friendly for solo, and I've admitted so. Despite that, we do want some support in what is a fairly considerable demographics.
However though, lots of the problem mentioned only exist less in squad, but it doesn't mean it doesn't exist, and I think fixing it improves both sides' experience

28 minutes ago, Insizer said:

Frankly, I'm glad this there is another difficult boss fight in this game aside from Eidolons.  Ones that make you think about your loadout, however this one is better than Eidolons imo. There are more damage and CC sources, and unlike Eidolons it has no "roles" you need to fill and no pigeonholed gun choices.  All you need in your loadout is something strong, something that will keep you alive, and maybe some element diversity. 

I have to say about this though, the boss is not like, difficult. It's very artificial with many things gating your progress like CC and element rotation, or even the damage output. It's unlike the strategic coordination of either exploiter or eidolons. This is why clarified at the end I have said that this list of troubles are basically what edges me close to a sanity slippage everytime I play the content, and not why it's "hard". It is infuriating, it is not fun, it take a long time of doing nothing.
You can run sub 5 solo out of merit from equipments alone, and that says something

Edited March 17, 2019 by Lewdcifer

[Insizer]

18 minutes ago, Lewdcifer said:

I have to say about this though, the boss is not like, difficult. It's very artificial with many things gating your progress like CC and element rotation, or even the damage output. It's unlike the strategic coordination of either exploiter or eidolons. This is why clarified at the end I have said that this list of troubles are basically what edges me close to a sanity slippage everytime I play the content, and not why it's "hard". It is infuriating, it is not fun, it take a long time of doing nothing.
You can run sub 5 solo out of merit from equipments alone, and that says something

I wouldn't call CC a gate persay because it is part of the combat, but yeah the element rotation is definitely a gate.  Sure this gate is bothersome, but frankly our frames and guns are so powerful that gates are needed for bosses.  At least the element rotation still technically allows you to do damage while the gate is active.  Also, even Eidolons have gates and artificial difficulty, their sentient shielding forces us to use the dramatically less powerful amps to eat away at their invincibility, and the lures do nothing but need collecting, charging, and baby sitting.

Profit Taker itself isn't extremely difficult once you get a hang of it but it can be more difficult with everything that is going on around it.  And, sure Profit Taker isn't about the teamwork, rather team firepower.  You don't have to babysit lures, instead you need to stay alive, and pour on damage.

Honestly, the fight isn't nearly as mentally taxing if you have allies with you.  The fight can go rather fast too.  Seriously, try it in a group or in public a few times.

Finally, what do you mean by "sub 5 solo"?  I don't understand what that means.

[541K4T]

Although Profit Taker and Exploiter Orb have different fighting mechanics, they do have one similarity, they are very much frustrating to do solo. Just by having one other member in your party makes huge QoL improvement for both cases.

[trst]

DE was unsure if they would even allow the Orb to be solo viable before they released it and decided on making it so if you were to use specialized builds for it.

 

Chroma, Health Restores/Vazarin Focus/Magus Repair, and Imperator Vandal + Resolute Focus in a single build all set you up to being ready to deal with everything the fight can throw at you in solo. (yes there are other builds one can viably take into the Orb but this is one that covers every base) Also there is no reason to ever need an ammo restore for your archgun if you're outputting enough damage and don't go wasting ammo; if anyone is burning through more than a quarter ammo per phase then you should reevaluate your build.

So much of this game's content has been built around the idea of using the best tools for the job and if anyone simply doesn't want to use their best tools then you're putting yourself at a disadvantage by no one's fault but your own. The solution here is simply don't play the content solo if you don't want to build optimally.

 

Also if the Orb is spawning pylons on top of mushrooms then you should lure it away from the forests as the Orb always follows you in solo. If you're blowing away it's shields and health too fast for it to be lured away then use a weapon that can destroy the pylons from outside their shields. I'm unsure if it's due to aoe damage or punch-through but the Opticor has both and is capable of destroying them through the shield.

[Lewdcifer]

58 minutes ago, trst said:

Also there is no reason to ever need an ammo restore for your archgun if you're outputting enough damage and don't go wasting ammo; if anyone is burning through more than a quarter ammo per phase then you should reevaluate your build.

Even as you say this, 1m is shorter than the time it take to kill the second shield (you need at 1 clip for health phase 1 => pylon => health phase 2 take another clip => 1m cooldown during shield phase). In fact, if I get lucky and don't get toxin during the rotation, 30s won't even be slow enough, given though I only have to wait for about 5 or so second, it's still a downtime not by my fault. If it is, then I would be faulting myself for being efficient with my speed?

1 hour ago, trst said:

So much of this game's content has been built around the idea of using the best tools for the job and if anyone simply doesn't want to use their best tools then you're putting yourself at a disadvantage by no one's fault but your own. The solution here is simply don't play the content solo if you don't want to build optimally

This entire evaluation has from the beginning to the end under the perspective as someone who have built for and executed this efficiently. It is what I have to comment as someone who has done this content in the most efficient way possible.

1 hour ago, trst said:

Also if the Orb is spawning pylons on top of mushrooms then you should lure it away from the forests as the Orb always follows you in solo. If you're blowing away it's shields and health too fast for it to be lured away then use a weapon that can destroy the pylons from outside their shields. I'm unsure if it's due to aoe damage or punch-through but the Opticor has both and is capable of destroying them through the shield.

For a fight which calls necessity in building your weapons around elements and having enough damage to pass through the shield phase in a short duration, building a weapon for the purpose of killing the pylons is simply shooting my own foot