Without his uniform, it's hard to find a purpose at all for Beast, but with it he has a very specific niche. Making debuffs stick is very valuable in specific situations, such as pairing him with D
eadpool against a group boss, or teamed with other exploiting heroes in PvP. Incidentally, there's an argument to be made that one doesn't need to level Beast past level 13, as only one of his A-ISO slots is useful.
Pestilence. I am assuming Tactician because I am building for PvP (where Infiltrators are currently little but fodder for Quicksilver), but nothing much changes if we go with Infiltrator instead.
E-ISO[]
There isn't any E-ISO that has obvious synergy with Tactician Pestilence, so we go with Relentless (for 80 CPs). Infiltrator Pestilence could instead use Lingering (for 5 Gold) to add yet another debuff.
A-ISO[]
Pestilence is likely to go L6, L1, L9, L2.
Heart of Darkness is an Unarmed Melee attack which we are likely to follow with another unarmed melee attack, which is where our damage is. We'll use Pulverizing (for 10 Gold) to set that second attack up.
There is currently no A-ISO that can be slotted on a debuff-only move.
This is also a debuff-only move.
This takes a Powerful Blackbelt or Martial to get as much damage out of this hit as possible. Pestilence is not a direct damage dealer, but we may as well use the damaging move that we do have to its maximum potential.
Cost[]
90 CPs for Cyclops, 60 CPs for the (currently expired) Pestilence uniform, 80 CPs for the Relentless E-ISO, 10 Gold for the Pulverizing E-ISO, 30 CPs for the Powerful E-ISO. Total in CPs is 280, or 210 if we use the Infiltrator alt with Lingering.
Cyclops: Blaster-ish Tactician[]
Cyclops can fulfill either the damage-dealer or support role. He also has uniforms and E-ISO options that are somewhat redundant. Given that, I have two different builds for him.
Tactician Cyclops is going to wear his P5 outift. This gives him a chance for every attack to critically hit and ignore defense, which replicates the Blaster class advantage.
E-ISO[]
For this build we will go with Commanding, as Oversight is redundant with the benefit of the P5 uniform.
A-ISO[]
Cyclops' progression is L6 --> L1, L2, L2 unless facing an Infiltrator, in which case it's L6 --> L2, L1, L2.
Optic Blast has deadly crits. We'll want either a Charged Ballistic or a Charged Kinetic to take advantage of them.
We're only using Exploit Weakness in order to get Disadvantage and Weak Point. It's not where our damage comes from. So we put a Focused Blackbelt or Focused Martial on to make sure that it connects.
We don't have a lot of options here, so this gets Gracious by default.
We're not going to be using this very often, but it also has deadly crits, so we will again socket either a Charged Ballistic or Kinetic.
Cost[]
15 CPs for Cyclops, 45 CPs for the uniform, 20 CPs for the first Charged E-ISO, 10 CPs for the Focused E-ISO, 5 Gold for Gracious, and another 20 CPs for the second Charged. Total in CPs is 120.
Cyclops can fulfill either the damage-dealer or support role. He also has uniforms and E-ISO options that are somewhat redundant. Given that, I have two different builds for him.
In this build we use the Uncanny uniform. This gives him a chance for extra turns, which replicates the Tactician class advantage.
E-ISO[]
For this build we will go with Oversight, which gives us Blaster advantages even when there is no Bruiser opposing us.
A-ISO[]
Cyclops' progression is L6 --> L1, L2, L2 unless facing an Tactician, in which case it's L6 --> L2, L1, L2, or a Blaster, in which case it's L6 --> L1 --> L2, L2, L2.
Optic Blast already has gauranteed crits from the E-ISO. So we'll pump up the damage with a Powerful A-ISO.
Per above, we put a Focused Blackbelt or Focused Martial on to make sure that it connects.
We don't have a lot of options here, so this gets Gracious by default.
As with Optic Blast, we use another Powerful for the same reason.
Cost[]
15 CPs for Cyclops, 30 Gold for the Oversight E-ISO, 20 CPs for the first Charged E-ISO, 10 CPs for the Focused E-ISO, 5 Gold for Gracious, and another 20 CPs for the second Charged. Total in CPs is 135, not including the cost of acquiring the Uncanny outfit.
Deadpool: Group Boss Killer[]
One sees Deadpool somewhat regularly in PvP, and it's true that he does bring some things to the table. But in my opinion he's simply way too slow, and the AI is incapable of getting his (very simple) progression correct. Nevertheless, it's worth putting a proper build on Deadpool, because he is a solid choice for doing damage to Group Bosess.
ISO[]
Deadpool gets ISO'ed per PKB. I normally wouldn't reference a build that adds any Stamina, but we're not using Deadpool for PvP, so this build is an exception.
Uniform and E-ISO[]
It's worth taking a close look at how to dress Deadpool. We have to choose two of three options:
The argument for Spicy is that Deadpool needs to stay alive until he gets his L9 off, which is usually three rounds, and can be four. My recommendation is to start off with the more aggressive options to wring out every silver piece possible, and only swap out Savory for Spicy if he actually does wind up getting killed too early in the boss fight.
A-ISO[]
Deadpool's progression could not possibly be any more straightforward. Ideally we will manage to get the L1 to go off either through a Counter-Attack (I typically carry Neurotrope on my agent, for instance) or a follow-up (perhaps from his being a Scrapper and attacking an Infiltrator) so that we can speed him up to three moves instead of four. The caveat is that if the Agent is bringing the Synthetic Cube, we actually want Deadpool to be slow enough to use his L9 after the Cube's debuffs, so we need to keep an eye on turn order to make sure that works.
Normally we would put something on here to set up the rest of the progression, but this is Deadpool's only melee attack. Putting his Ridiculous A-ISO here is likely too dangerous when fighting a Group Boss, even if it would set up Boon Buster, but there may be situations in which it makes sense. This move isn't even tagged as Slashing, so we cannot use Vorpal. We'll just put a Powerful here, lacking a better option.
Now we can set up future moves, with an Aiming A-ISO. It's a better choice than Sniping, because we don't really care if we miss a few shots in the barrage.
This move isn't typed, so we cannot socket Augmented ISO in it.
We've got Guaranteed Crits on this already. All we care about here is damage, so it takes another Powerful.
Cost[]
135 CPs for Deadpool, either 60 CPs or 75 CPs for his (Limited Edition) alternate uniform, 30 CPs for the first Powerful E-ISO, 5 Gold for Aiming, and another 30 CPs for the second Powerful. Total in CPs is 265 CPs for Scrapper Deadpool and 280 CPs for Blaster Deadpool.
Emma Frost[]
Emma is a pretty easy, obvious build. One doesn't have to make a lot of choices with her, with the exception of the A-ISO on her L9.
Emma should always be wearing her Phoenix Five uniform.
E-ISO[]
Her character-specific one, Eternal, is very good. I used to run her with Skullthumper, but the marginally better stun rate is not worth trading off the massive increase in survivability that she gets with Eternal.
A-ISO[]
Emma's progression is very situational. I often go L6-L2, L9. As PKB points out, the L1 is often useful for getting around protection to get an extra turn from Blasters.
We'll go with Controlling. I don't see the Mind Control effect proc very often, but using the L1 at all is so situational that we may as well use her character-specific one. There's a strong argument to be made for Maddening, which is a more aggressive play.
This move is more about the stun than the damage, so we'll put a Focused Blackbelt or Martial on here to make sure that it connects.
This gets Gracious, lacking any other options.
This is where I'll put a Maddening. One could argue for either a Powerful or an Aiming, but the Maddening works better if we do wind up following up with an L1 in the future. On a heavily ranged-based team without any other way to apply Lock On, Aiming is probably the better choice.
Cost[]
200 CPs for Emma, 40 CPs for the P5 outfit, 10 CPs for the Focused E-ISO, 5 Gold for Gracious, and another 5 Gold for the Maddening. Total in CPs is 270, not including the cost of acquiring her character-specific A-ISO
Fandral[]
I spent a lot of game time farming their E-ISOs, and leveled them all up to 14, but have never actually used a Warriors Three team in PvP. I am using Fandral and Hogun as my default team for killing Bastion however, so there is some practice behind the theory of their builds. Using them with the builds here, I can take the Blaster or Tacticians from full health to zero. Their worst showing is against the Scrapper version, against whom they still do around 30% damage at minimum.
Fandral's E-ISO is very helpful, making his counters all the more painful to go through. His other slot takes a Ukemi crystal, since he has that Infiltrator class weakness.
A-ISO[]
Fandral doesn't have a progression, with each of his moves being independent of the others, with the exception of his L1 applying Pin Cushion which helps build his counter-attacks from the L2. One really wants Fandral using En Garde as often as one can. Of course, the AI really likes his L9, and there's a lot to recommend it. The pattern is generally going to be L2, L9, L2, L9 etc. Ideally we can trigger the L6 by spending a quick action by the Agent with a Tankard and a Quick E-ISO (I might go so far as to say that I wouldn't run a W3 team if I couldn't do this), but if not, Hogun can skip an L1 or Volstagg can do it on a round when his protection ability is on cooldown.
Have at Thee is a Slashing Melee attack. Since all of his attacks are melee, we'll put a Pulverizing here. That way his preemptive counter will apply Depower, Migraine and Wide-Open. It's a shame we can't get Tenderized on here as well, but it's on his L9 so the enemy will get it soon enough.
He's going to use this every other round. It's only tagged Buff, so it gets a Gracious.
Another Buff, another Gracious.
I would put Vorpal here, even though the real damage from the attack comes from the bleeds, on the assumption that everyone is alredy going to have Wide-Open on them from his preemptive counter. A case could be made for going with a simple Powerful for the same cost.
Cost[]
Fandral costs 90 CPs. The Reflexive E-ISO is 40 Gold. Pulverizing costs 10 Gold, while Vorpal costs 15, and the two Gracious are 5 Gold each. Total cost in CPs is 240.
Havok doesn't have an alternate uniform. The upside to this is that there are more than two E-ISOs that are useful for him.
E-ISO[]
In spite of my bias towards using the character-specific ISOs, Havok isn't a tank. So instead we want to put Unavoidable on him, which solves a very common PvP problem, and an Explosive to throw some extra damage around.
A-ISO[]
Havok's progression is L6, L9 --> L2, especially if there is a Tactician on the opposing team. In certain situations we may go L1, L9 --> L2.
I put an Ionizing here. This isn't a finishing move, and all of Havok's attacks are Energy.
His signature move. I hate the self-stun, and it's unlikely that combat is going to go to round three, so this gets his own Stabilizing A-ISO.
This also gets an Ionizing. We're setting up the L2.
This gets Gracious, lacking any other options.
Cost[]
200 CPs for Havok, Unavoidable is 10 Gold, Explosive is 20 Gold, it is 10 Gold each for the Ionizing A-ISOs, and 5 Gold for Gracious. Total in CPs is 310. Building Havok this way is expensive.
In my opinion, the developers really hit the sweet spot with Heimdall, at least when it comes to his power level. Upon release he was good enough to be PvP viable, but not so good that he wound up swamping the meta. He pairs well with heroes who want the Rising Up buffs, obviously. He's vulnerable to having his buffs stripped away, just like any other hero who needs to self-buff as part of their progression, and he can be a little slow in that one typically won't get around to doing damage until the second round.
ISO[]
ISO slotted per Shade99. It's worth mentioning that Zforce911 has also posted a build but it trades a lot of Health, Attack, Defense and Accuracy for a truly massive amount of Stamina.
Uniform[]
I do hope that we see an alternate uniform some day.
E-ISO[]
With two slots available and nothing that really stands out, we'll go Relentless and Close. Defensive Fighter would also be a reasonable choice, but Heimdall's defense doesn't rely on his getting hit, so boosting his Defense stat is less compelling.
A-ISO[]
Heimdall has a clear progression, and the AI actually seems to follow it. On the first round we L2 --> L9, and then on round two we go either L1 or L6. If we can afford it, it's better to go L6 first and then L1, but we're then talking about waiting until round 3 for the big hit and giving the opponent all that time to ruin our buffs.
This is the big hit. We really need our buffs in place, or we won't get the damage we want. Normally we would put a Charged on anything with Deadly Crits, but this is a Slashing attack, and so can take a Vorpal. Always Ignoring Defense is better than an increased chance to crit.
As a Buff / Debuff action, the only thing that can be socketed here is Gracious.
If we knew that we were always using this to set up the L1, we would put a Pulverizing here. But sometimes we just need to damage everyone in the group, and this is a Slashing attack, so it is another opportunity to socket a Vorpal.
This gets Gracious, lacking any other options.
Cost[]
Heimdall is 200 CPs for Havok, Relentless is 80 CPs, Close is 40 CPs. Two Vorpals cost 30 Gold, and two of the Gracious cost 10 Gold. This build is a pricey 400 CPs.
I spent a lot of game time farming their E-ISOs, and leveled them all up to 14, but have never actually used a Warriors Three team in PvP. I am using Fandral and Hogun as my default team for killing Bastion however, so there is some practice behind the theory of their builds. Using them with the builds here, I can take the Blaster or Tacticians from full health to zero. Their worst showing is against the Scrapper version, against whom they still do around 30% damage at minimum.
Hogun's E-ISO is very defensive, and is great at preventing anyone from slowing him down. Hogun really falls apart without counterattacks, and this makes sure that he doesn't lose them. To balance that, we'll socket an Agressive E-ISO to keep increasing that damage.
A-ISO[]
Hogun has a very short progression, which is L1, L9. But his play is slight more complicated than that makes it sound. The decision for which move to use is based on whether or not he has a guaranteed crit. If so, use his L9. If not, use the L1 to set it up. Ideally we can trigger the L6 by spending a quick action by the Agent with a Tankard and a Quick E-ISO (I might go so far as to say that I wouldn't run a W3 team if I couldn't do this), but if not, Hogun can skip an L1 or Volstagg can do it on a round when his protection ability is on cooldown. Fandral's turns are too valuable to use up like this.
This is a melee setup attack. Just like every other melee setup attack, it takes a Pulverizing. On top of setting himself up, this will also help out Fandral's L1 if it gets used, Fandral's counterattacks, and any of Volstagg's attacks. If we wanted to get more creative, we could figure out which of the W3 used their setup melee attack the most often (I would guess Volstagg, as Fandral wants to use his L9 just like Hogun) and just add damage to the other setups, but a little overlap protects against debuff removal.
He's going to use this every other round. As a Debuff attack, it doesn't get any A-ISO slotted.
A Buff, so Gracious.
The Melee tagged finishing move. Normally a move with Deadly Crits on it would take a Charged crystal, but we're going to be setting up guaranteed crits with his L1. We will put a Powerful Martial A-ISO here instead.
Cost[]
Hogun costs 135 CPs. The Aggressive E-ISO is 5 Gold. Pulverizing costs 10 Gold, while Gracious is 5 Gold and Powerful costs 30 CPs. Total cost in CPs is 205, making this one of the least expensive builds so far.
Iron Fist[]
As I write this Iron Fist is enjoying some new popularity. He's showing up as a counter to 'Quicklocke' teams with his Combo Breaker, and he's also a surprisingly effective OHKO choice on top of that thanks to the Deadly Crit on his L2. I'm unhappier to see him on the opposing team than I am to see yet another Quicklocke, and his new E-ISO and A-ISO just came out, so I expect he'll become a mainstay of PvP going forward.
Our question is whether or not a 100% chance for Combo Breaker worth our only E-ISO slot. With the Deadly Crit on the L2, Streetfighting has its appeal, but interrupting every follow-up and pre-counter is the better choice for the current meta-. There's nothing wrong with his Masterful E-ISO either, and we can hope that it eventually turns into an A-ISO, which is what it should be.
A-ISO[]
Iron Fist has a simple progression; going L1, L9 --> L2. We shouldn't get so focused on setting up the Combo that we forget to watch for opportunities to open with the L2 for the OHKO instead, however. I almost always pull L9 --> L2 on the enemy Agent on the first round, and the AI likes to do that as well. One might want that L9 unused against a stun-heavy team, though, so some thought ought to go into whether or not to use it up out of the gate, but if one can eliminate the enemy Agent on round one, one can probably afford a stunned Iron Fist afterwards.
K'un L'un Combo takes a Pulverizing, even though it already applies Wide-Open when used with Hidden Potential. The reasoning is that we shouldn't be using it that way. If we have Hidden Potential active, we want to be hitting someone with our big hit, not using it to apply one more debuff. The only exception to this might be when we want the Fatal Blow, but in that case we only care about hitting, not about anything else, and it's too unusual an occurance to build around.
The big, big hit. It already exploits Combo Setup and has Deadly Crits, so the temptation might be to go with Charged, and I normally would. But we can get High Crits with Hidden Potential, so we'll go with Powerful instead.
As a Buff Heal move, the only thing that could get socketed here is a Gracious if it weren't for the newly released A-ISO, Ferric. Since the release of Season 2, Iron Fist has received an awful lot of attention fromt the developers, in spite of having no storyline in the game.
This gets Gracious, lacking any other options.
Cost[]
It's only 15 CPs for Iron Fist, Pulverizing costs 10 Gold, Powerful costs 30 CPs, and Gracious costs 5 Gold. Put this way, it sounds like Iron Fist properly built is a very inexpensive 75 CPs, but that is ignoring the significant expense involved in getting his Heroic Age uniform.
Juggernaut[]
Ideal partner for another melee character and capable of pulling off a one-shot kill. Otherwise there's not a lot to say about him.
I doubt that we will see an alternate Juggernaut uniform for a long, long time.
E-ISO[]
We have two slots to fill. The first one gets socketed with a Close Empowered for Street Fighting. We're spoiled for choices for the second. Since we don't need Relentless, we'll go with Skullthumper to up the Stun chance.
A-ISO[]
Juggernaut follows the familiar 'buff, setup, finishing' pattern. In his case that's L9 --> L1, L1, L6. Keep an eye on the estimated damage, though, and don't spend the L6 when the L1 is sufficient.
This is his standard attack, and it's not obvious what the best choice is here. Many other melee heroes are going to put Combo Setup on enemies, and Juggernaut will spend that with this punch, which does not exploit Combos. But given how situational that is, the safer bet is to go with Pulverizing.
This is a nice move to have in one's back pocket, and made him popular back in the days that Rescue ruled defense. It has Deadly Crits, so we'll throw a Charged AISO on it to leverage that.
This is the finisher. Like some other finishing moves, it's to one's benefit not to use it, since it spends the stack of power-ups (in this case, three Momentum). It has High Crits, so we'll put a Powerful on it, although the argument could be made for a Focused, considering how bad his Accuracy is.
This gets Gracious, lacking any other options. One would be forgiven for skipping slotting this entirely, since one won't have spent any Stamina on the first round, when this will get used.
Cost[]
Juggernaut is a lockbox hero, which makes it hard to price him in CPs. Lockboxes cost 1 Gold (equivalent to 2 CPs), and it takes on average 182 lockboxes to get the hero. Close E-ISO costs 40 CPS, while Surprising costs 10. Pulverizing is 10 Gold, Charged is 20 CPs, Powerful costs 30 CPs, and Gracious costs 5 Gold. Using this calculation, we get 494 CPs, but this tells us less than the calculated cost normally does, at least for those of us who were playing when Juggernaut was released.
Psylocke: 'Quicklocke' Psylocke []
I think that Psylocke's Synchronized Empowered ISO is the first E-ISO to completely change the PvP meta. Psylocke's gone from being completely off of the PvP radar to the second-most popular hero after Quicksilver.
ISO[]
ISO'ed per PKB. Note the comment about her not being the PvP "beast" that she used to be. That goes to show how characters can come in and out of fashion as the game continues to change.
Uniform[]
I prefer the Tactician Uncanny X-Force costume to eliminate her weakness to opposing Quicksilvers.
E-ISO[]
There's debate about whether to use her Synchronized or to put a Quick in that slot. The argument for Quick is that she can go L2 --> L6 and then either L1 or L9 all in the first round. That's useful, but I agree with PKB that Synchronized is better. There's not a lot that's worth giving up the ability to take out enemies before they even get a chance to take a turn.
A-ISO[]
For this team-up, Psylocke doesn't have a progression. Her job is just to keep Mental Coordination up and running.
This is Psylocke's set-up move, and applies Weak Mind. Since Quicksilver will be applying Wide-Open already, we may as well go with Vorpal to boost the damage here. If one is only using 'Quicklocke' on defense, Pulverizing might be better, since the AI will sometimes strip off Combo Setup by using Vortex Lariat in an early round.
This is why we use Psylocke. It's tagged Buff only, so it takes a Gracious.
This is another Buff move, so also gets a Gracious.
Psylocke's finishing move. This gets another Vorpal, since Defense is pretty much the only thing that this attack doesn't ignore.
Cost[]
Psylocke costs 135 CPs, and her (Limited Edition) Tactician alt cost 75 CPs. Vorpal A-ISOs cost 15 Gold, which Gracious ones costs 5. Psylocke built like this costs 290 CPs, but much of that is the original investment in the hero, not the build.
We're probably all pretty tired of Quicksilver at this point. Even before the rise of 'Quicklocke' teams he was dominant in PvP, but as of the tournament going on as I write this, he is on almost every team in my meta-. Similarly, Quicksilver is regularly the solution to any Incursion problems one might be having. On top of that, I use him for five-starring old missions quickly, so he also has a specific PvE niche.
Scrapper Blue Suit Quicksilver enrages Bruisers. I consider that a reasonable price to pay for getting the follow-up attack on Infiltrators. If there are really no Infiltrators in one's meta- at all, the Generalist suit makes more sense.
E-ISO[]
I actually like his Accelerating, but majority opinion is that Aggressive is the better play.
A-ISO[]
Quicksilver's progression depends on whether or not there's an Infiltrator present. If there is, it's L1, L1. If there's not, it's L2, L1.
The clear choice here is Pugilist, to exploit the Combo Setup from his L2.
Another clear choice, this time Pulverizing. This sets up the L1 (or the L6) with both Wide-Open and the Combo Setup (to be exploited by the L1).
This is Quicksilver's finishing move. If we're using it, we should be sure that it will put someone down. We want this to connect even if we're de-buffed, so it gets a Focused. Another Pugilist would work as well, if one is confident that Accuracy will never be an issue.
I really never use this move. By the time that I have built up enough Quickness to make going for Stuns worth it, the fight's going to be over. The AI uses it, though, so if we have Quicksilver on our defensive team, we want to take that into account. I'd put another Pulverizing, to set up future damage rather than expecting a lot out of this move.
Cost[]
Quicksilver is a cheap 48 CPs, and his Scrapper uniform is another 45. It's 5 Gold for the Aggressive E-ISO, Pugilist is 10 Gold, the Pulverizing A-ISOs are 10 Gold each, and Focused is 10 CPs (although I notice that Focused Blackbelt and Martial A-ISOs seem to drop a lot from Season 2 deploys, so it's likely one will eventually find one of these for free). Total cost is 173 CPs, making this one of the least expensive finished builds on one of the most powerful heroes.
Rescue: Debuff Team Defense[]
Rescue ruled defensive PvP before getting nerfed repeatedly. Incidentally, my opinion was that Rescue just needed Afterburners removed and otherwise left as she was upon release. Given that she can now go through her entire moveset in one turn when built properly, I think that my position had some merit.
ISO[]
I'm going to disagree with PKB's build for once. First off, there's no reason to waste ISO on building Stamina. We're going to get rid of that completely. Secondly, we really need to consider whether or not building Evasion makes sense. Unfortunately, I don't think that the answer is a simple 'yes' or 'no' for every situation. On a debuff-heavy team, Evasion is going to help her out as the opposing team loses Accuracy. If she's playing support for a straight damage dealer, it's probably better to focus on Health and Defense. This build is going to focus on the former, so we'll make only a minor tweak to PKB's build, just swapping out the two Chaotics he put in for another two Patients. This costs us a little Attack along with the Stamina but we won't miss it.
6x Reactive Patient (White)
1x Reactive Spry (Green)
1x Reactive Adroit (Orange)
Uniform[]
For now we only have Heroic Age Rescue.
E-ISO[]
The first slot goes to Quick, without a doubt. For the second slot, we'll throw in Generosity. With as much buffing as she does, the Health bumps can add up.
A-ISO[]
Rescue begins every round with her L1. After that, we pick two of her other moves to use, or three if we just flew by a Blaster. That assumes that none of them are on cool-down, which often won't be the case. She'll often have to resort to L1 --> L2 --> L1. All else being equal, I would begin round one with her L2 and her L9.
It's not obvious what should go here. It's tagged melee and energy, so we might want to consider who else is on her team when choosing. If we can't anticipate that, or the other team members have a mix of attacks, Ionizing is better since it does active damage and stacks.
This is tagged Buff only, so it gets Gracious. Beyond the general principle that it is not worth building Stamina in PvP, the fact that we'll be restoring it here (which compensates for the fact that we actually do expect PvP fights involving Rescue to go on for a while) helps us to eliminate it from her ISO build.
This is also tagged Tech along with Buff, but Rescue doesn't have any Tech attacks, so it's another Gracious.
Up until recently, this would have been a third Gracious, but Rescue now has her own A-ISO, offering Hard Reset. Unless there's a Pestilence on the field, it's going to be hard to keep Debuffs on a team with this build.
Cost[]
Rescue, as a former Special Operations reward, costs 200 CPs. Quick E-ISO is 20 Gold and Generosity is 10 CPs. The Ionizing A-ISO costs 10 Gold, and the two Gracious ones cost 5 Gold each. Total cost for this build comes out to 290 CPs.
Rogue: Famine Rogue[]
I find Famine one of the more fun to play heroes that are PvP viable. There's enough going on with her that you're not just pressing the next button in your progression, but not so much that you're having to keep track of what buffs she's got / what debuffs they've got.
We know that Rogue is scheduled to get another uniform in the future, but for now the Horseman of Famine outfit is fantastic -- one of the best alternate uniforms ever released. I suggest the one that starts her with Infiltrator powers.
E-ISO[]
Not even my strong preference for the hero-specific E-ISOs would lead me to recommend socketing hers. I am using Inspiring for the Morale Boost.
A-ISO[]
I'll almost always open with her L9. In the regular outift, it can make more sense to open by draining a handy Tactician, but I typically want Reduced Potential on the enemy Agent more than I want my extra turn early. On the other hand, if she's taken a beating from a 'Quicklocke' dogpile, for instance, one might want to go L6 in the hopes of surviving until the tide turns. On the second round I will usually start with the L2, preferably on a Tactician, and then L1 if I have any moves left. If everything comes off perfectly, that's L9, L2 --> L1 --> L1.
Her L1, Brawl, gets a Pulverizing to increase the damage of every other one of her attacks.
I've put a Powerful here. The point of this move isn't the damage, but we might as well get the most out of it, and there's no other obvious choice.'
As with other desperation moves, I have a Focused on this one. The logic being that if Famine needs healing, she may also be badly debuffed enough that missing the target is a concern.
As our opener, this also gets a Pulverizing.
Cost[]
Rogue was released for 90 CPs, and her (Limited Edition) Infiltrator effect Famine outfit cost 60 CPs. Inspiring E-ISOs cost 10 Gold, Pulverizing A-ISOs also cost 10 Gold, while Powerful ones cost 30 CPs, and Focused cost 10 CPs. The total cost for this build is 250 CPs.
War Machine[]
War Machine was the other half of the Emma Frost team that I used for so many PvP tournaments. His damage relies on follow-ups, so the current meta with Combo Breaker all over the place is less friendly to him, but one still hears people calling for a nerf.
Tactician Iron Patriot. One sees some Original suit-wearing War Machines out there. Comparing the two suits, it can look like the Original is better at what we want him to do, which is unleash his guns for big damage. Normally it's true that one should prefer direct immediate damage to damage-over-time, but Radiation Exposure amps up the damage of energy attacks, so it functions both as DoT and as a debuff that sets up his next attack. Unless you wanted him to be an Infiltrator for some reason, the Iron Patriot uniform is better.
E-ISO[]
Disadvantage is a great debuff, so we'll use his character-specific E-ISO (Tactical). Conveniently, it's available from an easy Heroic Battle on a mission with other drops one would want to farm.
A-ISO[]
You have one decision to make with Iron Patriot, and that is whether or not you Overcharge on round one or on round two. Round one is certainly the more conservative play, but you're giving up a lot of damage for that security. Note only is it costing you the two (and maybe three) barrages you could have used, you're also not getting the benefit of the Radiation Exposure. Of course, you lose more by dying before round two, but I tend to take that chance unless it is obvious that he's going down.
This is useful for Brutal Strike. If that was the only time it was used, we would put a Focused on it, because we wouldn't care about the damage. But this is also his counter-attack (or follow-up attack on a Flanked opponent), so damage helps. Putting an Ionizing here means that a counter can set up either of his real attacks.
We'll only use this if there's only one enemy left. An Ionizing sets up the Exploit for the follow-up.
This is our big hit, the move that we actually use Iron Patriot for. We want Aiming here to apply Lock-On, which we get with our L2, but not here.
When they first released Augmented ISOs, I saw Automated and immediately realized that it would jack Iron Patriot's L9 --> L6 damage even further. We'd be crazy to put anything else here.
Cost[]
War Machine is inexpensive at 48 CPs, the Tactician Iron Patriot costume costs 50 CPs. The two Ionizing A-ISOs cost 10 Gold each, Aiming costs only 5 Gold, while Automated costs 15 Gold. The total cost for this build is 178 CPs, in another case of a cheaper build being one of the most powerful.
X-23: War X-23[]
I'd say that playing War in PvP is a high-risk / high-reward tactic. If things don't fall out her way, she can wind up being sidelined. If things do go her way, she can pull off a total party kill on round one. Unfortunately, Heroic Age Iron Fist is a pretty good counter for her, since she relies a lot on follow-ups, so she may be on her way out of being PvP viable.
ISO[]
See PKB's build. I've stuck with it even though it relies on Evasion. Evasion is better for Bruisers than it is for other classes, because they don't get the benefit of Defense at all against Blasters. I've stuck with this even though one rarely sees a Blaster in this PvP meta-. Unfortunately, she's poorly supported by my anemic PvP Evasion bonus. She's not all that fragile regardless, thanks to her Healing Factor passive.
Uniform[]
Now we know what War is good for.
E-ISO[]
I do use her Killer Instinct specific one. I don't perform that many single-target attacks with her, but when I do having this is fantastic (unless Iron Fist is around).
A-ISO[]
I just spam her L2. That really is pretty much my entire strategy with her. Every so often one encounters an enemy hero that needs the Brutal Strike on the L9, or there's only one enemy left and so we want the L6, but mostly the goal is to get Trigger Scent on and then hit everyone once with the L2 and then everyone gets a follow-up L1. I look forward to when the Chapter 2 A-ISOs are rolled out to see what she gets.
This gets a Pulverizing in spite of it not seeing a lot of use, because it is what she counters and follows up with and it already ignores defense, so Vorpal is redundant. There is clearly an argument to be made for a Powerful here.
This also gets a Pulverizing, since we're hoping to follow it up with a Trigger Scent-induced round of L1s for everybody.
This does get a Powerful, since it is our 'there's only one enemy left' finishing move for healthier, non-ressurecting enemies.
Our other finisher, we instead socket a Focused. We don't care about damage here, we're using it for the Brutal Strike and Fatal Blow.
Cost[]
X-23 was a PvP release, and costs 135 CPs. Her limited edition Horseman uniform cost 60 CPs. Two Pulverizings cost a total of 20 Gold, a Powerful costs 30 CPs, and a Focused costs 10. Her total built this way is 275 CPs.
