DISCLAIMER!
This is me doing some half-assed FAQ on my experience thus far in playing Marvel Heroes. Don't expect info any pro might otherwise know. If there's any reason why I want to do this meaningless piece of crap, it's because I got cat mentality.
Firstly, allow me to call myself a liar. You see, I did say that either I'll be playing Remy LeBeau [Gambit], Kurt Wagner [Nightcrawler], or Wade Wilson [Deadpool]. Sadly, I think Nightcrawler costs 500 gold while Gambit costs around 900 and Deadpool... I think that's like 1350 or some 4 figure sum starting with 13. At the moment of typing this, I only got like... 250 gold?! That's half the amount I need to recruit Nightcrawler otherwise!!!!!!
Apart from that, I've got some nifty choices to start with (speaking in terms of Marvelverse popularity ofc!). In the Avengers camp, we got Steve Rogers [Captain America], Natasha Romanova [Black Widow] and Clint Barton [Hawkeye]. For the Fantastic Four, I can only recall Johnny Storm [Human Torch]. As for that movie all in S'pore are waiting for, I only remember this guy below.
My ultimate Chosen One? The Last Avenger himself. Okay, that's me bullshitting. There's no such character, this is me invoking the name of Bast. Or rather the Black Panther himself, T'Challa.
But why you choose such ulu character?
As a certain Steve "not Rogers" Ang Eng Hock can testify to my favour, I always enjoy doing things rebelling against conventional norms. There was a time when people said a writer won't make it, but I did (i.e. not in terms of the result, but my decision to go ahead). I didn't end up earning $$$ like J.R.R Tolkien and C.S Lewis, J.K Rowling or G.R.R Martin. The only thing I've earned in the process were scars and spurs, armour and a sword.
If there's anything T'Challa is most famous for, it'd be getting hitched with Halle Berry. Technically speaking ofc since I'm talking abt Ororo Munroe [Storm]. Albeit briefly.
As a belated member of the Avengers, T'Challa's in-game quotes actually hinted at both his personality (utterly serious and duty-bound) and interactions with specific PCs (most notably his quote towards Human Torch's sense of humour, Iron Man's random gadgets, and his appreciation towards Storm's bearing as a queen/goddess). Not to mention "Greetings, fellow Avenger."
So how did my whimsical choice pan out?
Due to a gross lack in mobility skills, I found the initial training curve to be a tad quite steep. Trying to get past Black Cat required a massive turnaround in terms of orientation (and to be fair, I'm what others might call a directional retard). Going around in circles would prove to be costly very soon...
1st death count
This is technically diff from "kill count" where you get to rack up plenty of dead bodies by solo'ing Diao Chan. Death count basically means my Black Panther's 1st death came in the form of Harry Osborne. Needless to say, I lost count on how long it took me to get accustomed to the gameplay interface.
Super imba equipment?
Seems that I've started getting rare/epic equipment like from... Hell's Kitchen? Doubt it's at the Raft. Regardless of how good my loot drop luck has gotten thus far, I'm pretty much convinced there are plenty of deserving folks receiving equal, if not better loot.
Declaration alert!
By time you're seeing this post, I can assure you that my Black Panther has gotten two pieces of Unique equipment with the rest considered Legendary/Epic.
Getting around your handicap
Mrs W: I feel so retarded...
Ms J: W***! How can you say that?!
Above exchange is based on real life work interaction where people can and will go only 50 km/h instead of your normal 80 km/h. If you think I'm being a jerk, it means you don't deserve to be in the workforce. Long story short, the best thing I've ever done for my Black Panther is running the gauntlet. To do that successfully, you need to level up Stealthy Escape as high as possible. The best thing abt SE lies in the fact that you can run like Kevin Bacon in black w/o getting caught by the cops. Be careful tho. You wouldn't want to run out of spirit/risk exposure.
Be your own running man
Ever watched Running Man apart from wishing Gary Kang and Song Ji-hyo are for real? It takes one entire cast+chosen celebs to form Running Man, T'Chall only needs himself to solo run. Against any given boss, Running Man has became my ultimate secret weapon. More on that later.
You see, Marvel Heroes is all abt real time stage clearing combined with actual side scroller elements. The era where Guy and Cody were popularity equals to Ryu and Ken has truly gone, but not whatever influences left lingering. It took me until post-Hell's Kitchen to grasp the basics 100% correctly, but taking advantage of the terrain IS a must for any Black Panther users. There are mainly four types of terrain available, namely:
1. Urban terrain.
2. Open flat terrain.
3. Hard terrain.
4. Enclosed terrain.
Examples of urban terrain will be Hell's Kitchen and most part of the Purifiers stage. This is actually what I'll call a 50-50 deal between ease and efficiency. It's neither hard nor easy because it depends on how the enemies move about. The East End stage was especially challenging on this end b/c you get to fight plenty of big ass monsters somewhere halfway through. Purifiers wise, you'll have to be mentally prepared for nerfed version of Zerg swarming. If you can't even navigate Hell's Kitchen, then you deserve to use other heroes like Colossus or Nightcrawler instead.
Example of open flat terrain will be Buccaneer Beach. This involves maximum ease in movement and efficiency. Plenty of room to run like Invisible Man himself, plenty of space for sniping. At the same time, you can easily outmaneuver any enemy, be they elite or otherwise (which ultimately results in effective sniping. Duh~). You should ready Fan of Knives for this one.
Hard terrain is all about getting surrounded by obstacles. This is the main reason why solo'ing such stages like Bamboo Village, Fort Stryker, and Savage Island can be totally crazy. You won't have much time and space to run about, you'll need to understand that effective maneuvering is key to stayin' alive. In particular, Savage Island is quite respawn friendly due to plenty of trees and rocks. Basically, it means you need to ready Jungle Snare+Fan of Knives as your tactical mainstay. Period.
And lastly, enclosed terrain means either you have to go underground or indoors. Former case actually has a higher probability in being spacious (go ask Taskmaster if in doubt) while latter cases are like the Kingpin's office or that stupid labyrinth lab in Savage Island chapter.
There's something about being a generic...
In a recent interview, Sir Ian "Gandalf isn't gay, Dumbledore is" McKellen asked an important question:
If you're to make a choice, would you want to be a mutant or a generic?
Why I say this is an important question has got nothing to do with Sir Ian McKellen's sexuality or my status as a conservative Christian. Rather this was something 100% hand to heart. If you say mutant, cynics will call you a liar. If you choose being a generic, you'll risk the wrath of politically correct activists who happened to dislike utterly honest people like Ned Stark. Give me a choice and I rather be a Stark. Because I truly hate faking myself over something like that where in fact I've got no problem with people being honest by choosing option one.
Political incorrect ranting aside, T'Challa is also technically a generic. The only reason why he's different is due to some panther god/goddess earmarking him as that Chosen One. At the same time, Sir Ian himself also likened mutants to outcasts and outcasts with gays, blacks and being Jewish (although we all know how Orthodox Jews view homosexuality). While I won't go that far to say T'Challa is both black and gay (because that's a lie anyway), it remains true that Black Panther abhors the hurting and killing of mutants. In fact, it's a surreal feeling whenever I recalled running the Purifiers gauntlet. Stuff like "human rights are for humans!", "mutant lovers!" are (and should be) considered slurs and we all know William Stryker happened to build his own church. Aptly entitled the Purifiers Church no less. Which now comes to...
Like a Boss
I'll try to list as much personal sharing as possible. If I miss out any, feel free to believe that I'm only human. I'm gonna skip those like Electro, Green Goblin and Shocker since I can't remember what I did to them. To cut down time wasting, I'll only list down Viper, Bullseye, Elektra, Kingpin, Juggernaut, Pyro, and *gasp!* Magneto himself.
Notable Boss 1: Viper aka Lady Hydra
Event bosses are extremely hard to kill, I'll give you that. Particularly, fighting the event boss for Fort Stryker can be extremely anal 90% of the time b/c there's NO way you can try doing it solo. By my estimation, you'll need 3-4 buddies to kill these two. Yes, I'm referring to TWO bosses meshed into one. Blob will always try crushing you via some invulnerable window executed beforehand, Toad can be really annoying with his mobility.
Okay, back to Lady Hydra. Trying to nail her dead will be your biggest challenge b/c she's truly capable of teleporting away while getting hit. My way of dealing w/this situation lies in pulling off SE straightaway. The invisibility status you gain as a result will help you a lot in avoiding unwanted contact (i.e. sudden attacks out of the blue). She's quite fond of proclaiming guns alone can't kill superheroes, basically this means she's capable of shooting while invulnerable.
Tactical key-Using Cryo Dagger to freeze her on the spot with Triple Throw to soften her up. No harm trying Enervating Slash>Slashing Lunge if you're cocksure enough (note that you'll be fighting in Lowtown, which is an urban terrain). Use Predator Frenzy as your only direct measure.
Note: If you're really playing Black Panther with another fellow using Human Torch, then Johnny Storm will be your BFF for this Event boss fight.
Notable Boss 2: Bullseye
This is quintessentially playing cat and mouse with Lester. The only question is who is the cat and who is the mouse? You can try playing the cat if you want to, you'll get yourself killed. Bullseye is perfectly built as Robocop's most dangerous antithesis, playing him out at his own game is the only way. You'll have to play the mouse until you reveal your actual hand. Stage terrain is 100% gauntlet run friendly, so try using it to your advantage. Or else you can die trying so. Once you see yourself getting surrounded by some funny red zoning circle/warning signal/whatever you wanna call that, GET THE HELL OUT!!!!!! Because once you get hit at the bullseye, you're pretty much dead.
Tactical key-Stick strictly to CD-TT chain. Open space means higher difficulty in landing your ES-SL chain. Use PF to decimate and Savage Strike to damage stack. Take careful note of your spirit though as Black Panther is practically 99% spam unfriendly.
Notable Boss 3: Elektra
Best known as Daredevil's ex, Elektra is all about playing mobility and plenty of dodgy shit. The only catch? You're not fighting her along the same terrain as Bullseye.
Tactical key-SE has never been so bloody important. Having high mobility as a melee fighter means two things.
1. High damage dealer.
2. High dodge and movement speed.
Try not closing into her w/o having effective measures to neutralise her greatest strength. Once you slow her down, show no mercy. You'll need plenty of SE and CD to shape the battle, SS to damage stack. If you do this correctly, you'll most likely only need to use PF once or twice. You won't really need TT for this unless you want to include it as a contingency plan.
Note: Alternately, you can use TT and SS in place of PF.
Big ass bastard out to trap you? Use the terrain against him as you'll be fighting under close quarters 100%. Once you corner him, the fight is yours to win or lose.
Tactical key-Use CD-TT as your damage mainstay, PF as your key HP burner so as to speak. You can do w/o SS since cornering Wilson Fisk is more important. If fat bastard manages to summon Bullseye and Elektra, keep on hitting him unless they start closing onto you. Use in strict order SE to jailbreak, outmaneuver the two, and corner Kingpin. Once you KO'ed this guy, Bullseye and Elektra will automatically bail. In short, ignore these two unless you want to waste unnecessary time, effort, and spirit.
Note: Kingpin's office is quite constricted so as to speak. While Storm would have some fear issues otherwise (she's actually claustrophobic), a king of T'Challa's stature would not have problems pinning an opponent back against the corner.
Notable Boss 5: Juggernaut
Apart from Green Goblin, my other two deaths came from the hands of Rhino and Juggernaut. Rhino is an Event boss and I was stupid enough to try taking him head on solo. In short, I deserved to respawn. Juggernaut, on the other hand, is quite another game altogether. In fact, I didn't know what hit me before I was forced to respawn. Below details the reason why I was so blur in the first place.
Tactical key-If you want to use CD, make sure you're mentally prepared to fight someone capable of shaking off slowing effects big time. This is not to say Cain Marko can't be frozen, but whatever effect working to your favour would be halved. TT is important here because it plays a major part in chipping his life away. No point trying to decimate him because you'll get yourself rammed to death. Do not, and I repeat DO NOT, try being clever by running yourself into a corner or against the wall. You need to be 100% aware of your surroundings due to fighting this future member of Excalibur in close quarters. Thankfully, you'll be doing so in a big room rather than Wilson Fisk's office. Now that would have been a disaster.
Note: Once you see a red arrow flashing on the ground, GET THE HELL OUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Notable Boss 6: Pyro
Really hate this Aussie and this doesn't have anything to do with whether Pyro is truly racist. This fellow is my best lesson learnt in terms of "how to destroy nukes" due to his insanely imba damage range. See all those big red circles popping up? You better start running hard and pray equally hard. You'll be fighting in an enclosed area surrounded by fire. What this means is this: Unless you have a good enough movement rating, chances are that your hands and feet will be tied. Once Pyro set off his nukes, it will take out more than 3K worth of HP cleanly. I nearly got myself burnt to death because of this idiot. If I never got my Med Kit handy, chances are that St. John Allerdyce will send my Black Panther straight to St John's Island.
Tactical key-If you can't spam CD-TT chain by now, then you got no chance in hell of winning. Period. Seriously, even I can get the gist of making this work. Unfortunately, I was only clever enough to discover this upon hindsight. Don't even bother trying PF against this guy. Too damned risky. SS is a safer bet, but Pyro will never be that stupid to charge around like dumb Rhino himself. Pyro has a very interesting movement game. He will never try pushing you towards the entrance/exit gate. Rather, he's only content in bumming around the back end of that flaming room. Limited space for you to maneuver, but at least you'll have enough breathing space to plan your next move. He enjoys bumming in the flames every now and then though. Either you try to snipe him w/CD or you wait for him to come out.
Note: In case you really need some major breathing space, you can bail out via the nearest entrance/exit gate. There are actually two, one of which leads to your original entrance point. The other one, I haven't tried yet.
Notable Boss 7: Magneto
Yes, I know Sir Ian McKellen is a homosexual. But that doesn't give me any satisfaction in KO'ing his X-Men character. I mean it's a game! Why should I feel as if I've accomplished something great where in fact my life is worth ten times more than people shouting God hates fags and fags hate God? See William Stryker's tech office? Yep, that's the same manner of terrain you'll be fighting Magneto. Perhaps it's down to a different style of play I've designated for Black Panther, but still it's actually easier for me to defeat Magneto.
Tactical key-Go aggro on him, but be careful of the space warping around him. Once you see something queer happening, GET THE HELL OUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I've gotten myself trapped as a result, I would have gotten myself respawned if not for my high tenacity. Once Magneto hit you, you'll end up having much of your HP gone. It's not that painful compared to Pyro's pyrotechnic nukes, but allow me to say that Magneto is equally good as Juggernaut against opponents out to immobilise/slow/stun. If not better than Cain Marko himself. What it means is this: CD is effective, but TT will serve as nothing bar an itch. Which manner of offensive option serves you the best, go for it. Ideally, you'd want to max out CD and TT so as to speak. If not, try ES-SL chain repeatedly. PF should only be used to wipe off whatever HP remaining.
Note: Using ES-SL chain is assuming you got Black Panther's Unique level boots which grant him a massive boost in Movement attacks. Otherwise, stick to SS as your offensive mainstay instead.
To be cont'd...
(b/c I now need to sleep)
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