Still fairly new to Mercenaries, I’ve not invested too much time learning the nooks and crannies of the gamemode so if someone can be a dear and answer these questions I have:
What’s the deal with Cookie the Cook? Why is his +9 health so popular and is he good for anything else other than that one thing?
Followup, what’s all that jazz about not levelling up Go Fish? Does it make the ability worse of something?
Can you make builds with the same tribe, like all Murlocs or Dragons? I’ve tried a mostly Drag build with Sinestra, Nefarian, Voone, Alex, Yu’lon, and Onyxia but it doesn’t do incredible (but it gets the job done), but I’ve seen people talk about like ‘nature’ or ‘fire’ comps and I’m struggling to make a good build
Which is the best bounty to farm for completing tasks, I try to speedrun the Barrens early ones but it gets a bit difficult finishing quests that require using an ability a certain number of times to complete since they fold so easily (Alexstrasza’s Gambit task of killing 40 with it was a nightmare)
Should I focus on fully completing tasks all the way or just until I unlock the equipment that you get through them? I’m trying to get alot done but I want to find tasks for Mercs I like using so I can level them up, but if it’s more valuable to just fully follow through someone’s questline then I’ll do that - I know if I abandon it the progress is maintained but still, the chances of finding it again at my stage in the mode is pretty slim, there’s a lot of Mercs I haven’t fully levelled
How long does it take for a f2p player to unlock Mercs through tokens? They seem pretty expensive and I only get like 20-40 tokens at a time
Followup, what are the odds of unlocking a Merc through packs? I opened like 12 packs at once and only got Velen, the rest were just 1 portrait
If you answer any of these then you’re amazing, thank you
Cookie’s primary value is not Appetizers, but Go Fish. It helps enormously with the worst tasks in the game. Appetizers is nice for heroic runs if you have a spare slot, but no big deal if you don’t. 1b: If you max out Go Fish, the explosive fish will kill all the other fish when it dies, which is not what you want. There are ways around this (Anacondra), but since Go Fish is a task-farming skill, rank 1 is just as good as any other so why bother spending coins in it.
Yes, very much so. Orcs are one of the standard comps for exactly this reason. Dragons are another standard comp. Murlocs work pretty well too. The key to the Orc comp is Thrall with Ring of Strength; the key to Dragon comp is Yulon with Pearl of Yulon. Without these survivability boosts they’re merely OK as I recall. FYI: Fire comp = Geddon, Balinda, Ragnaros (can use Antonidas or Chi-ji in place of Balinda, but her water elemental is a big help to survivability). Nature comp = Malfurion with Liferoot Staff (key equipment - comp is a glass cannon without it), Brukan, Guff, sometimes swapping in Anacondra if a green would be particularly helpful. Holy comp = Velen and Anduin. Third member can vary, I typically use Cornelius, some fights work well with Natalie or Xyrella, having Tirion or Tyrael on the bench can help (I think all my heroic Onyxia kills had Tirion finishing her off). The other noteworthy comp I can think of is Smite Cornelius - Mr. Smite, Cornelius, Rokara. Grossly abuses Overboard, Blessing of Sacrifice, Offensive Rally on turn 2 (Cornelius’s Shield of Dawn is important to make this work well). I’m assuming you already know about the starter comp of Samuro, Xyrella, and Cariel.
I disagree with the question. I choose bounties by what I’m trying to do - who I need in my party, whose coins I need as rewards. I don’t usually do much of anything in the Barrens (except for the Secret Cow Level, now that it exists, since those coins are still useful to me). Fairly weak parties will do stuff in Felwood that can still give useful coins, like 2-3 to grind Malfurion to being maxed out. Stronger parties do whatever they want. The annoying tasks you mention are what Cookie is for, as mentioned in item 1 above.
Up to you. Depends how annoying the tasks are (even with Cookie), how important the merc is to you, how much you need the packs. For mercs I really don’t care about, I’ll abandon their tasks the moment they require any effort. For a typical merc, Alexstrasza for example, I’ll abandon if something really annoying comes up, like the Dragonqueen’s Gambit task 17 you mentioned. If the merc doesn’t have any particularly annoying tasks (Tavish, for example) or if it’s someone useful to max out (Samuro, for example) I’ll finish all 18 tasks.
I’ve been playing since January, and had all of the mercs available in early April as I recall (right now I don’t since we just got 18 new ones and I’m not in any rush to open all my packs - just opening a pack whenever the previously acquired merc is at a vaguely usable level). You’ll build up tokens as you focus on specific bounties and as other mercs complete their tasks, particularly that nice 13-15 range with coins for two random mercs. 5b: not sure about the numbers, but Old Guardian’s preview of the new batch of mercs said that on average it would take 60-ish packs to get all 18 of the new ones. In my experience you’ll need to craft most legendaries. Focus your bounty choices accordingly. The overwhelming majority of my mercs were crafted, not opened from packs.
Thank you for your answers, can’t imagine how long it took to write that all out hah
Super useful advice too, I’ve been playing for less than a couple weeks so I didn’t even know about the Samuro Cariel Xyrella comp so thanks for that too
Just in case it’s not obvious, the Xyrella-Samuro combo is to use Blinding Luminance to enable Double Strike. Burning Blade makes that even better. Cariel is there just to tank. They’ll take you into the early stages of Blackrock Mountain with no difficulties. After that you’ll need some of the other comps (traditionally Nature comp, but depends on what you have) to continue progressing comfortably.
Speaking of Blackrock actually, have you got any tips on Rend Blackhand? He’s doing my head in I’m so reliant on Nefarian but since his primary attack spawns a drag which is likely to die, it’s not the most useful so I’m stumped on comps
Having +9 health helps grants better survivability, also, u dont need to play cookie to obtain this bonus which makes it more useful.
And of course, this is one of Old guardian’s favorite mercs
Not only u can but u should, just remember that the Attack type of the merc can make it combo with other mercs from other tribes.
In this game right now we have basically 4 main comps:
Holy
Nature
Orcs
And of course the super powerful fire comp.
Once u have them all u have the basic kit for almost all bounties.
The first one, as it has weaker enemies.
Legendary Mercs Receive at least 15 coins on heroic and the max coins they can need to be maxxed is 1715 which means the maximum number of runs needed is 115, but this number falls quickly as u get more and more coins from other mercs tasks, randomly get more than 15 coins in a single heroic run, get them from packs and story tasks too.
Divine Shields help a lot against Rend, lets you protect whoever he targets with his mark. I used murlocs to beat him, which is also very cheap team to make, since Murky you get for free from reward track, and the other murlocs are all rares except for Mutanus who is epic. Mutanus with iridescent necklace can tank all attacks, no matter the colour, Murky gives huge damage boosts with Time to Krill, and can give divine shields to whoever needs it (always position him to the middle), and Old Murk Eye lets all your murlocs to attack while using their other abilities, and gives huge stat boosts with felfin navigator (with navigator’s amulet). The other two murlocs are there mostly just to get more Murky’s Lucky Fish treasures, though Cookie’s appetizers helps too. For the sixth slot you can use pretty much anything you want. I normally use Trigore for that slot which can be helpful in the early fights of a bounty when you don’t have your murlocs buffed up yet.
Also to answer your earlier question, yes it is worth it to complete all tasks for all the characters, not only does it give you plenty of coins to help upgrade them, but the last 3 tasks of each merc award packs as well.
Diablo’s Fire Stomp is awesome against Rend. I think his coins only start showing up a few bounties earlier so you probably don’t have him. But worth remembering for when you do have him!
Not surprised that Dragon comp can’t handle Rend. That’s a DPS race where you need AOEs, and dragons are more of a sustaining type of comp (can’t sustain against instadeath abilities without divine shield).
I don’t remember how I beat Rend on normal, but it was probably Fire comp or Holy comp. Klaital’s Murky murloc suggestion sounds really good too.
PSA: don’t grind coins. I ground out the remaining coins on the best legendaries/teams after completing everything else that would give them …only to get 12 tons of useless ones from new tasks when new tasks are releases etc.
they might be slightly weaker and you will probably just want to finish them off but I would bet you would feel like your patience paid off if you just waited.
cookie is great because of go fishing… you can finish lots of quest with that skill like use you fist skill 5 times or kill 40 minion… i usually just do the first board on the barren in heroic and do them… just do not kill of all the minion on first round, go fish … with that you can keep go fish every other round… just do kill the exploding fish.keep fishing…and kill the other fish… this count to the skill you need to do and minion kill as well as damage needed… also first lvl barren is great to max out your most mercs is your missing coins. i figure how to do the whole board with that one merc in heroic, it gives me 10 coin for that merc im using .in 3 boards,i usually take the raise dead encounter to go faster… and yes use same type minion of same skill set … like holy, nature , fire , shadow, or go type like orcs , murlocs , pirates , demons or the new nagas…good luck
For the kill 40 enemies tasks, I just do normal Ahune, you get it all completed in one run of that, which is generally faster than summoning 40 fishes with Cookie.
The overwhelming majority of my mercs were crafted, not opened from packs.
I’m so reliant on Nefarian but since his primary attack spawns a drag which is likely to die, it’s not the most useful so I’m stumped on comps