Lord Recluse Strike Force/Strategy

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Strike Force Strategies

Lord Recluse's Strike Force has earned much notice and generated much discussion amongst the City of Villains community, given its high difficulty and entry threshold. Thanks to this discussion, there are a number of viable strategies discussed - even though most proponents of one strategy voice dissent at the validity of the other strategies.

Ignoring the controversy for now, the Strike Force has a number of possible strategies to make play easier, and for some players, make defeating the Strike Force feasible.


Assault Malta Base

The team will zone into a section of Warburg. There is one waypoint marking the entrance to the building where Slinger waits, with the mainframe and rifle nearby. In order to gain access to the building the team must first defeat the Kronos Class Titan.

Kronos spawns as a Monster within this mission. Either pull Kronos away from its location, or defeat surrounding mobs before engaging Kronos to maximise success. Kronos and surrounding mobs will drop the keycard required to enter the building.

Somewhere inside the building is a safe containing the temp power. Although the description does not specifically state so, the Orestes Rifle only works on Ms. Liberty. Statesman and Lord Recluse, though also possessing powers derived from the Well of the Furies, are unaffected by this temp power.

As his health drops, Slinger will prepare a massive pet summons of Mastermind robotics pets. To avoid having to defeat this entire pet spawn, have one teammate retrieve the Orestes rifle from the wall safe behind Slinger. Meanwhile, have the rest of the team focus on defeating Slinger, then mop up any of the original Malta spawn (not the summoned pets) - when the last of the Malta falls the mission will complete.


Defeat future Freedom Phalanx

The team zones in through a portal to a future broken Atlas Park, similar to the layout of the final mission of the last Patron Story Arcs.

There is a random "phase shift" effect that drifts around the map, trapping you in between the future and present time; this will make you intangible at random for a fairly long duration. If you are hit, changing physical locations may get you out of the zone of danger. If this is not an option (e.g. in combat) you may still get a few powers off occasionally since there seems to be some "flicker" to the effect.

In this mission you will have to defeat what remains of the future Freedom Phalanx, located around the main door to city hall. The roster in standard defeat order is:

Some teams prefer to rush this mission; while fighting multiple heroes at once is challenging, it is much, much easier than the last map, and rushing this group can make the strike force as a whole go faster. On the other hand, the phase shift effect seems to hit more frequently on the ground, and this author is more familiar with the more standard divide-and-conquer method used below.

When rushing, the defeat order above can be varied to place Manticore above Back Alley Brawler; otherwise it is fairly fixed. Numina goes first because she can buff teammates if not otherwise occupied; Sister Psyche's psi damage makes her too dangerous to leave alone; and Manticore's lack of travel power makes him easy to leave until last, as we'll see.

Divide and Conquer

Move the team to the top of the globe; this is a very tactical advantage for you since only 3 out of the 4 can get to the top of the globe. A villain on your team with –fly powers will make things easier, but is not required. You will need a team member that is able to pull, survive, and jump/fly to the top part of the globe. All heroes will follow except Manticore, as he does not have any travel powers to reach the top of the globe.

Place your team back towards the head of the Atlas Globe statue, hopefully this will bring Numina next to the team (once the puller joins with you) and also have Sister Psyche just outside the ledge of the globe. If you have them, you can use -fly powers on Sister Psyche and drop her back down to the ground. You may need to adjust your position on the globe to make sure as Sister Psyche is flying up that you can get her back down to the ground. Doing this will buy you a few seconds to finish off Numina.

By this time Back Alley Brawler has made his way up to the top of the globe. If you can continue to keep Sister Psyche down from –fly power continue to work on Back Alley Brawler. If you can’t keep Sister Psyche away from you defeat her next. Her psychic powers and holds are harder to deal with than Back Alley Brawler's power sets.

Once you have defeated all three of these heroes you can proceed to Manticore where he waits on the ground. To complete the mission, you need to defeat both Manticore and his associated Longbow spawn, which is scattered around him on the steps.


Assault Vindicators Base

The team enters an indoor tech complex housing many Longbow. Fairly close to the entrance the team will come to a room holding the Vindicators: Malaise, Swan, Luminary, Mynx, and Valkyrie. The team must defeat them in order to advance.

The room with the heroes is behind a door; it's the first door on the map, so it's fairly easy to recognize. Many teams stealth/tp to this point, although this is not critical. Set up around the corner from the hallway leading to this door, or just inside the hallway itself, before opening the door - this is a good place to summarize strategies and coordinate the sequence of events.

The Vindicators spawn at level 51 no matter what level and reputation your leader has, and the battle may at first seem overwhelming. Keep in mind that this is still a warmup act for the final mission, and while you can consider using shivans here, doing without makes for good practice for strategies you'll need later.

Here is a roster for the Vindicators in the usual defeat sequence:

The defeat sequence is fairly fixed. Malaise goes first because he is the most dangerous, between his psi damage, pets, and fear-inducing powers. Next is Swan, who also does psi damage. Luminary comes before Mynx and Valkyrie, who each have powers that make them time consuming to defeat: Mynx with Elude, and Valkyrie with self-resurrection.

This battle is difficult but possible for just about any team makeup. Buffs must be kept fresh, inspirations used freely; debuffs to resistance and regeneration are going to be key, while pets can be used to spread aggro and add some damage. As difficult as it seems, try if at all possible to avoid using shivans here; you'll need them more in the last battle than now.

Once you have defeated all of the Vindicators, open the door leading deeper into the base. Your next target is the key to unlock Ms. Liberty's final room, which is located up the western elevators, through the intersection to a room in the south quadrant. If you have a teammate with stealth and TP, they can sneak past the Longbow to this room and summon enough people to defeat the room and gain the key. Then sneak back through the intersection to the north, where the door to Ms. Liberty awaits. Again teleportation can be used to summon the team into battle to clear the area before the door. If you have no stealth, then you can fight your way through, which is time consuming but not overly difficult. Keep in mind an ambush will arrive after you take the key.

You are ready to buff up for the final battle of the mission. Use the Orestes Rifle on Ms. Liberty to weaken her as soon as you engage. She is not exactly a pushover, but compared to fighting five Vindicators she should go down rather quickly.


Defeat Statesman and Freedom Phalanx

In this mission an Arachnos Flyer has landed on a corner of the Atlas Park map - essentially the same map as the fourth mission, but present day. The area is surrounded by Longbow with City Hall and the Atlas Globe in the center of the map. Below the globe will be Ms. Liberty defeated, with the Freedom Phalanx around her ready to rumble.

No matter what level and reputation your team leader has, the Freedom Phalanx always spawn at level 53. This is +3 to the team at best, and +4 to any lackeys. Taking even one of these heroes down can prove challenging; defeating all eight is without question the most difficult task in the game.

General Considerations

The full roster of the Freedom Phalanx, listed in a common defeat order, is:

Consulting their individual profiles to gain an understanding of their damage types, travel powers, and resistances will give you an edge in this battle.

The defeat sequence should always start with Numina, because if left unengaged she will give her team empathy buffs (including Fortitude) that make them much more difficult to defeat.

After Numina the sequence is up for debate. Some teams (particularly those with buffed shivans) immediately close in on the hero who took the most damage during the assault on Numina, based on the idea that that hero will drop most quickly. Other teams consider Sister Psyche as the mandatory next target because her psi damage is not resisted well by many defensive sets, including /stone for brutes.

Most teams finish with Statesman, because he has the highest resistance and base HP, and therefore takes the longest to kill; however, this author has heard that if there is some other hero alive when Statesman goes down, Statesman will not activate Unstoppable. So there is an argument for leaving someone else alive while taking States down. Regardless, Statesman does not seem to have the highest threat level since his damage is almost all smashing, which most brute sets should be able to handle with a reasonable amount of healing/buffing support. As soon as Statesman's HP drops to a point where he would use Unstoppable, he will start using Zeus' Lightning Bolt, a large energy-based PBAoE which is on an eight-second timer.

Whatever defeat order you use, the team should designate one person to call targets and focus fire. The rest of the team (save only the taunt brute, if applicable, and his/her healer/buffer) should attack only that target. Doing otherwise spreads damage unnecessarily and prevents the team from penetrating the huge regeneration the Phalanx has.

Pull

This tactic involves pulling members of the Phalanx, either solo or small groups at a time. Generally, in order to pull, the player must aim at the Heroes who are not being watched by other members. As Synapse is in the corner of the group, he is usually the first one to be pulled. Upon pulling, the player immediately makes his or her way back to the rest of the team who is usually hidden beind the wall on the side of the building. Synapse's super speed will allow him to catch up quite quickly.

Rush

Many teams start the last battle with the following sequence: teammate suicide, buff, summon pets, summon shivans, vengeance everything, resurrect teammate, and rush. If you do this, make sure to have the teammate suicide against a side spawn, not the heroes - once aggroed, Numina will buff her teammates, and you don't want that stacked against you from the start.

If you plan to rush, you should also rush the Vindicators in the fifth mission - and to have any hope of succeeding in the end, you should do the fifth mission without shivans and without nukes. Yes, the last mission is just that much harder. If you need shivans against the Vindicators, the Freedom Phalanx will most likely prove impossible.

Warhead Rush

This strategy requires, at a minimum, that everyone on the team have both Shivans and Chemical Burn. In addition, if the team lacks damage buff potential (from Corruptors or Masterminds) the team may need a number of Biological Mutagens. Also required is a team member with Vengeance, and before starting everyone should buy inspirations from Ouroboros.

Gather the team together on the steps in front of the Freedom Phalanx. Notice that they are already grouped fairly closely - close enough for a Chemical Burn to hit them all. This is key to the strategy. Have someone suicide against a Longbow spawn. Then begin buffing teammates while everyone prepares themselves mentally.

As quickly as possible do the following in exactly this order: 

  1. Summon all pets and Shivans
  2. Cast Vengeance
  3. Resurrect teammate, who summons Shivan
     a. If anyone has Biological Mutagens use it now
  4. Team pops the following inspirations:
     a. 4 Lucks
     b. 7 Sturdies
     c. 1 Breakfree
  5. Team moves onto platform together
  6. Team drops all Chemical Burns into the center of the Freedom Phalanx
     a. If anyone has Nuclear Warhead use it after Chemical Burn
  7. Team targets through team leader, who attacks Heroes in defeat order

This author has seen the entire Freedom Phalanx destroyed within thirty seconds to a minute using this strategy. Combat logs reveal that the Shivans' damage outclasses the team's significantly, making even step 7 of questionable importance - the critical parts of this strategy are the Shivans, buffed with Vengeance, pounding on heroes crippled by Chemical Burns. If all the warheads are deployed correctly the only thing the team needs to do is survive long enough for the Shivans to do their work - hence the use of inspirations to max everyone's defense and resistance to start.

Much fuss has been made on the forums regarding the relative value of Dominators and Stalkers on this strike force as compared with Brutes and Corruptors. By publishing this sequence, this author hopes to encourage Dominators and Stalkers to run the strike force on teams that might otherwise fly in the face of conventional wisdom.


General Strategies

Listed here are some basic tactics employed by many players. Some of them are regarded as exploits, and others signs of design problems, rather than as entirely legitimate tactics in their own right.

Time Saving Tips

Spawn levels: Recluse' contact should have his/her reputation set to the lowest possible. Additionally, the team might also consider using the lowest level teammate for this role. The heroes will spawn at defined levels, but the Longbow and Malta agents key off the leader's level.

Zone time: Another option is to have the teammate with the fastest zone time be Recluse' contact, so that (s)he can reach Recluse and grab the next mission as quickly as possible. The rest of the team can meet directly at the launch point for the mission without having to head into Grandville's center.


Critical Powers

There are certain powers that many teams won't consider starting the strike force without. Again their necessity is a subject of much debate on the forums. It is quite possible to finish the mission without any given power set in this list.

Stone brutes: They have the highest resistance of any brute defensive set, and have the highest survivability against heroes.

Kinetics corruptors: Stone brutes move incredibly slowly, and they in particular need kinetics to help them out. In addition, kinetics heals have a -regen component and speed boost is widely regarded as one of the best buffs in the game.

Radiation corruptors: The debuffs in this set are amazingly strong, and given the huge regen and resistance base that the Freedom Phalanx starts with, they are in high demand. The debuffs in this set serve much the same purpose as Chemical Burn warheads from Warburg (see below).

Thermal corruptors: The buffs and heals in this set are nice, and particularly if you have a non-stone brute for holding aggro on the last map, you may need them for sheer survivability. The debuffs are also welcome although not held to be as critical as Radiation's.

Dark corruptors or masterminds: Tar patch is a great AoE resistance debuff, and resistance debuffs seem to be a critical component for succeeding against the ridiculously high hit point and regen base of the Freedom Phalanx.

Vengeance: This is a critical component of rush strategies that require huge initial buffs (see above). While vengeance does not, by design, stack (i.e. subsequent casts after the first have no effect), it is possible to exploit a timing bug to stack it nonetheless, by casting simultaneously. Apparently the window for stacking is the length of the cast time for Vengeance, which, while small, is nonzero. The key to stacking vengeance is having everybody with the power set it on auto, while targetting a dead teammate, out of range of the power. Then, have someone with Recall Friend teleport the dead teammate to the group, and the Vengeances set to auto will fire simultaneously. This is considered an exploit and devs have stated it will be fixed one day.

Stealth or Grant Invisibility + Teleport: There are several opportunities to stealth and TP through parts of the first five missions - particularly the middle of the second and fifth missions. Using a stealth + teleport strategy can help keep the team moving quickly and the faster you reach the last mission, the fresher and more alert you will be.


Temp Powers

Shivans: The Shivan Shard is a temporary power acquired by completing the Shiva Strike Mission in Bloody Bay. Each of its 5 uses summons a powerful Shivan Decimator, which is an Elite Boss capable of going toe-to-toe with even the Freedom Phalanx heroes. With some practice a team can fully equip itself in about ten minutes - well worth it for any team build. Starting this Task Force without a full complement of Shivans is usually considered foolhardy.

Warburg Weapons: These are quite powerful, but extremely tedious to gather; the instructions are detailed in the article Missile Launch Mission. It's easiest to use teams of three, where you grab three technicians at once and trade them off to whoever is getting the nuke at the time. Gathering these in advance is highly recommended, since large teams getting techs all at once just get in each others' way, and overall, more time is wasted before the strike force proper can start.

Here are the possible warheads and their capabilities, listed in order of desirability:

  • Chemical Burn - Ranged AoE Foe -Res(All), -DEF: These are critical for lowering the Freedom Phalanx resistances so that your damage output exceeds their regeneration.
  • Biological Mutagens - PBAoE, Ally +Regeneration, +Dam. These can help buff the damage from Shivans as well as teammates. Shivans do huge amounts of damage at base; with damage buffs they are unbelievable.
  • Nuclear Blast - Ranged AoE, Extreme DoT(Energy), EMP, Foe -End, -Recovery. Combined with Bio and Chem, these can dish out a huge amount of damage all at once.

The warheads really shine when they are stacked, and the bio warhead shines when it buffs the Shivans. Chemical warheads are such a huge debuff stacked that they can cut the time to defeat an individual hero down into half or less of the length of time a set of inspirations lasts - meaning you can max your defenses with inspirations and get a good part of the way through the Freedom Phalanx before they wear off. See the "Warhead Rush" strategy above.

Enchantment of Serafina: The Enchantment of Serafina is a team buff awarded to the leader of a successful Ice Mistral Strike Force. Activation not only grants resistance to psychic damage, it also adds psychic damage to all attacks - both very useful for the final battle with the Freedom Phalanx. The buff has 10 charges.


Accolades

Demonic is very commonly used by aggro brutes to increase survivability.

High Pain Threshold and Born in Battle are desired for any character to help survive the high burst damage from the Freedom Phalanx.


Inspirations

You will definitely need to use Inspirations throughout the whole Strikeforce. You can get them from the Arena in St. Martial, from the vendor in Ouroboros, or from base storage. Most useful are going to be defense, resistance, and life inspirations.

With the issue 7 changes, characters with no other defensive powers will max their damage mitigation from purple inspirations on the 4th small luck. After that characters should start using orange inspirations. Brutes and stalkers may have additional defense that makes the 4th or even 3rd luck wasted. Both purple and orange inspirations are recommended for the final encounter because it is so brutal.


Mass Hypnosis Strategy

There is a way to single-pull every hero in this Strike Force by having a Mind Dominator. The information below is quoted from a now-deleted post on the Official forums.

I will only list my tactics for the last mission, as it can be applied to the 3rd and 4th as well. You will need to 6 slot Mass Hypnosis with 2 acc / 2 sleep / 2 recharge to start. If you can get 3 Acc/Mez SHOs and 3 recharges you will be golden. Also have hasten with 3 recharges obviously.
On your team you will need 1 brute of any type, and a minimum of 2 /Kinetic Corruptors. After that you just need damage dealers; Stalkers, Masterminds, any Corruptors, and more Dominators. Still try to have the debuffs and heals, but the Kinetic's heal alone seems to be enough.
Start off with targeting Citadel, as he is most centered among the heroes. Then pop megalomaniac and force of nature. Stacking as much duration as you can is most important on first few pulls. Jump up and hit Mass Hypnosis, and keep at it until you are sure all heroes are asleep. Then have a corrupter pull Numina to start, avoid flying because even though Statesman is asleep he can still call out for Liberty
As long as Statesmen doesn't say "This is for Liberty" the heroes won't join the fight if they wake up from a missed sleep. However as soon as Statesman says "This is for Liberty" any heroes you miss with sleep, and awake, will attack. You must use your single target sleep on any missed heroes after this point. The single target sleep does have a damage componant, so heroes will sometimes get one shot in. Always make sure you are at full health to avoid being one-shotted.
You can pull heroes in any order, but if Statesman does call for Liberty, I always go for Synapse after he says that. The reason being if I have to single target him he runs so fast he can run out of aoe sleep range fast.
The /Kinetic Corruptors MUST keep the Mind Dominator with 2 SB at all times, or Domination will stop and the heroes will wake up, and it becomes ugly.
This method has given me a 100% completion rate on the LRSF.
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