Dev Discussion Episode 43: Artifact - M.E.R.C.Y Amazotron Matrix

Fury hits WAY harder without MAM. I thought this artifact was suppose to enhance offering and make Fury hit even harder but that’s not what’s happening.I tested this artifact with a few other players and let me tell you, the burn isn’t there anymore. With that being said, I went back to my old pet build, Grim/Source/Quizlet. I’m honestly disappointed, especially because I ranked up this artifact from 0 to 200 in a heartbeat, and that ain’t cheap. I had high hopes for this artifact. I hope something gets done asap.

About the highlighted part: How is the attack pattern?
Im curious if there is a way to command the pet to a certain enemy.

Does using Attack protocol command my pet to damage the enemy i focused just before using the attack, or is it just going to attack the enemy it targeted before, or is it targeting the nearest enemy to itself or myself?

Seeing how random HoL Bot attacks adds although i was only hitting the boss specifically for 30 seconds before using it, makes me wonder if i would ever enjoy a Pet build for boss damage.

I do wish we could get our pets to focus on what we hard target lock onto, but to my experience, it still focuses on what it wants to. The scan is really just to see if it needs to do single target beam or an AOE detonation. It can't choose a beam on just a boss if adds are around it.

Have you tested it without source? Mercy should make fury do the tiny targeting attack then 3 attacks that add up to more than the usual fury attack. It was a little weaker in AoE vs Crystal and rsk but stronger in ST than both on test. Timing source/ godwave is much different/ more difficult than just regular fury/ offering. But just wondering if you’ve compared mercy vs offering without source involved. Not leveling one up on live just to test and I had already decided to leave my main as is with grim/quis/source. But was thinking about this arti for my ice toon.

I have tested it out without source For both RSK and Fury and the dmg is even less. On the post Ranmaru recommends using source with MAM, and I really thought it would make fury react even faster and hit harder but no. I kind of wish I could get a refund or reverse on all my actions in ranking up that artifact.

Do you have parser numbers? Like fury hits for 50k for the one big hit with offering vs fury hits 3 hits for 15k with map? Sorry, none of my friends have it so I’m curious to see what’s happening. If you find the test thread, there were posts showing results that made it seem like map was stronger.

I don’t have the screenshots but without source its 3-4 ticks of 20ks and with source shard it’s like 50ks. Without MAM, running source/grim/quizlet, Fury hitting for almost 150k+, and it’s instant. Compared to running with MAM, he hesitates and I’m losing hella dmg

Yeah, on live my fury is hitting close to 180k at 373cr and aquaman procced on a single target. I like the burst so I knew I’d be sticking to source/quis/grim even tho map sounded like I could come up with something different. Hopefully someone can post some results so the balance can be looked at again

The MAM artifact has several effects:
1.Power Recovery .
2.New attack for Robot, Crystal and Fury.
3.Additional melee attack (almost medium range) when summoning a trinket pet.
4. Decreased CD for trinket pets when using Power Recovery .
5. Healing pets.
6.2 different duration shields for pets with different triggers.

Only by using all 4 first points do you fully reveal the damage potential of this artifact. Minus each of these points and comparing with other artifacts will give you the wrong result.

I’m fully aware of all the effects this artifact has, including the additional attack when summoning a trinket pet and that you have to really close in order to apply that dmg. I can’t achieve the same level of dmg I was doing with my old build. Like I said, I thought this was going to further enhance offering, but it seems like a major downgrade for me. Did you see the clips I posted, regarding Fury/RSK? Can you explain that behavior to me?

I gotta level that Aquaman ally.
Anyway, i haven't tested it, but it would seem like any slowdown with Fury would be a nerf. The Artifact might help Crystal, because she doesn't attack as fast. Fury can get 2 big hits with GW, if the RNG is with you, at the start of most add/boss fights. The Artifact might help earth, because Crystal and Bruck both attack slow anyway

Yes, I watched your videos, but I have noticed similar behavior of pets before (in the open world of a flashpoint, for example, a trinket pets very often do not want to rise above the floor level, other pets seem to get stuck out of the blue (this behavior has become more frequent with the flashpoint DLC.) , perhaps this behavior has become more frequent due to the MAM mechanics (pets, after using a new skill, first scan the situation (to determine which skill to use-aoe or on a single target) and only then make their big attack (internal delay 2 seconds (due to this delay, the sequence of using the shard also changes...))).

According to my tests in terms of damage in an ideal situation, a long battle (at least 2 minutes ....) the difference in damage is 3-6% on average, but this does not take into account the faster regeneration of the supercharge with MAM (if this has not changed ... .), I think this is quite normal, given that the artifact has 3 additional effects (healing, shield and pi (I forgot about pi and supercharge generation)...

Agreed, I'm not sure how it works for RSK and Crystal users, but for me personally as Sorc it has been a disappointment.

My loadout with Grim in it definitely works better. In a controlled environment on the dummies the parses are about the same...And that is including damage being done from calling in a trinket pet...

But the biggest difference for me has come in actual content. Fury scanning and then doing damage throws everything off....even with everything the artifact does my damage just isn't where it is when I use Grim instead.

And I have noticed Fury acts strange and doesn't always attack like it should when I use it. I have to constantly pay attention to it's power bar to see if it is actually attacking or not...When I see the power bar isn't moving I know I have to banish and then resummon it.

Unless something changes with this artifact I can't see myself using it.

Have a league mate that got it for his electric and rage toons. He’s really liking it on rage range. Melee, which is where I thought this would shine, is good but he’s seeing his rsk die too much to be very viable. On his electric, he’s not loving it paired with source so I told him to try it without source. The big attack is nice but it’s not great to implement mid elite raid fight. I can see it being great for earth tank battle builds tho. And again, it doesn’t have to pair with source. It can be paired well with many other artifacts. Like electric… mercy/quislet/ scrap tac swapped with EoG or just leave EoG full time. CB for dayssss

In this video, you left fury behind to fight unfinished adds. That’s normal behavior no matter what artifacts you’re running. Fury stayed till the add walked off and then fury came back over to you. I personally love that that’s how he acts vs grim or quislet who will teleport back to you quickly. I’ll pop gw and offering, drop an attack and float away while fury mops up. He’s usually done by the time I’m at the next set of adds.

Your 2nd video, I feel like that’s just rsk being rsk. He ain’t the brightest bot. I only use him on one toon anymore and I know he looks good on parsers but doesn’t help nearly as much in content. But he’s still good passive damage. I switch armories for boss fights so he gets resummoned at the start of every fight. May want to try that? As far as how they act with the mercy artifact equipped, I can’t try on live. On test, he acted how he always does. He’s slow. He sped up a bit in actual fights so maybe when you 1st start a fight you need to pop map count to 4 then hit gw. Once the initial one is done, see if you can pop mercy then hit gw. Mercy has the ability to put out more damage than any pet combo, we just need to figure out how to work it. Not saying the arti or rsk couldn’t use some tweaks but it’s still a little early to tell.

I’d imagine you’d like it to do all the extras but keep fury exactly how he was with offering? Rsk is projectile based so he can’t ever do what fury does. Which is that fury is instant and never misses. This artifact wasn’t intended to make sorcery even better, it was made to give other classes the ability to make a pet build. Which it has done. You can drop Strat card and a pi/ supercharge generator (6sec cd) and do equal/ better damage with any powerset.

I agree with you about Fury, but in the video he’s not responding. Usually if I leave Fury behind, he’ll continue hand blasts, or if use offering he’ll do his attack. But in the video, I left him behind and he’s just standing still, floating instead of continuing to attack. And this is all when I have MAM artifact on

If that’s the case, they shouldn’t advertise it being for sorc. In the description of MAP on the artifact, it specifically talks about fury, (Crystal and RSK too), to MOVE FASTER and HIT HARDER. Why advertise that? They are targeting sorc/earth players and trying to add more to the pet build so they can rank up all the other arts that require a pet build. Definitely suckered me into ranking up to 200. I feel robbed and I’m disappointed.

MAM Defensive Module is being applied to allies.

Just ran CoU e and noticed that HoL bot would get the green shield around him. I wasnt running the artifact so I cant speculate on any numbers (incase they may be buffed too) but the shield effect definitely applies to the ally

I don’t see anything about move faster or hit harder. But they do hit harder. Crystal now has a stronger AoE I believe and fury has a stronger ST than with offering. I don’t have it on live but that’s how it was on test. And rsk was below both in both categories but much stronger than base rsk. And you’re just looking at 1 aspect of an artifact that throws the kitchen sink. You no longer need grim to apply pi. You’re getting enough super regen to replace quislet even. Add the two together and you’ve got more super regen than a leveled scrap of the soul cloak. You’ve got the ability to keep your pets alive so as not to lose out on passive damage or have to deal with the painful resummons if using rsk. You’ve also now got a hard hitting “sonic shout” type of attack that doesn’t take up a loadout spot. And you’re calling your (hopefully) t3 pet out more often and since you no longer need grim, that pet will be buffed by godwave to do much more damage than grim ever could.

I know you’re not happy but how much have you really changed your playstyle? Did you read any of the testers reviews about it? A lot of us tested it a ton and gave our feedback. I personally have not leveled one up on live. I had said in the test section that I couldn’t come up with a build that surpassed mine while using it. Sorcery works well as is. Could I make this work? Yes absolutely. It would take a whole new approach but with enough time and testing, I’d get there. And if I couldn’t, then I’d at least have numbers to show the devs so they could work on adjustments. I see players using it and I’ve talked to some that really like it. It’s not a meta artifact but it may very well be once someone has figured out how to work it properly.

The attack pattern and timing is different. It’s projectile based. Which means slower time to travel and easier to miss. That alone should tell you that you need to be thinking about a mid range build. Seeing as the bonus attack is also mid range, this is where a lot more testing and theory crafting comes into play. Sorcery has some decent mid range stuff. Try multiple different artifact combinations. I personally really liked quislet/ mercy/ EoG on ice and munitions. Gadgets worked very well and using some of the sonic iconics could probably do some really cool things with the aforementioned artifact combo. If you hate it and want to give up, that’s fine. Save it for next double nth and plop it into something else. Use test next time or at least find some feedback/ ask some questions before leveling up any artifact. Or stick it out. Spend some hours on the sparring targets. Start a convo with other users. Your call. We’ve all made bad choices with artifacts. It’s not wasted even if you hate it, it’s just a savings account for nth till the next double.

Nice but why did you leave out Guardian? That thing needs all the help it can get. No one runs it. This couldd have really added to it's use.