It's worked for four group bosses now and has not been patched, despite me commenting in many threads, so I thought I would finally put it down in blog format, so it will be easy to understand.
This is the famous EA-GA-P4-ARC combo that will take a group boss from 100-0 by the second turn. It works. But only if you do it the right way. And it is expensive in terms of resources and heroes used.
What You Need[]
- Electrostatic Arm (EA)
- The Custom Electrostatic Arm Does Not Work!
- Galvanic Arm (GA)
- Power of Four (P4)
- Arc Reactor Charge (ARC)
- A Hero who can refresh your stamina
- Emma Frost
- Iron Fist (White suit)
- Mr. Fantastic (Not recommended)
- A hero who can get your agent extra turns
- Cable
- Angel (default costume only)
- Doctor Voodoo (only recommended if the group boss does not have allies)
- A suit to counter the class of the group boss.
As I said, this is an expensive strategy. ARC is not generally available (and can be replaced by having either Emma or Iron Fist do the stamina refresh/buff clearance). EA requires Luke Cage to load the epic boss. GA requires Spider-man. And P4 requires War Machine. Emma Frost is a very expensive hero if you didn't get her from her operation. White suit Iron Fist requires a ton of heroes. Cable and Angel are 135 CP. Again, this is not an entry level strategy, but if an entry level strategy could do consistent massive damage to a group boss, group bosses wouldn't be interesting, would they?
How It Works[]
GA applies Negative Static Charge (NSC), a stacking debuff. EA applies Positive Static Charge, a single buff to the agent that causes damage on single target attacks, and extra damage against targets with NSC. The extra damage is in the form of a follow up hit, which does fairly large damage, based on how many stacks of NSC the target has. It progresses geometrically, so one stack of NSC may only produce a couple thousand damage (remember, I am L300 and my groupbosses have about 400K health), while 5 stacks produce enough to do an epic overkill of the group boss (I estimate that requires at least 500K worth of damage, if not considerably more).
The Agent[]
So, for the agent, the task is fairly simple. Get as many stacks of NSC on the group boss, as possible, in the shortest amount of time, while also putting PSC on yourself or an ally (more on that later). This is done as follows. In the first round, GA to groupboss. If you are a tactician, you can put another GA attack on the groupboss. In the second round, you will have used your extra turn hero to get your agent another turn. In the first turn, your agent will use the EA on himself or one of the heroes. On the second turn of the second round, you will use the ARC to refill your stamina, THEN the Power of Four, and then fire enough shots of GA on the groupboss to kill it. If you are playing as a tactician against a blaster, your sequencing changes a bit, as you do the EA on yourself, a GA on the groupboss, the ARC, the P4 and as many GAs as it takes to kill the groupboss.
If the groupboss dies before you have died from the Power of Four, you can attack his minions, if any. 2 shots should kill a minion.
The Extra Turn Hero[]
I prefer Angel for this, so I will start with how he proceeds. He will lead with the L2, leading the charge. That is a QA, so he can read the field and make a call as to whether to use his L9 on the Agent (a dead agent will ruin this strategy) or his L1 on a minion or the group boss. In the second round, Angel will be disabled from his L2, and your agent and other hero will get extra turns. If there are minions or cleanup work, you can do that in round 3. It is so much easier doing this with Angel than with anyone else, so this is a fairly strong recommendation.
If you use Cable, you will want to hold his normal mode L9 for the second round. His L6 produces distraction, which will help you get there, while his Psychic L6 increases his physical damage and applies pressure points. Read the situation and figure what will work best, with the idea in mind that you need him to be alive to use his extra turn machine in the second round and you need the agent alive.
Doctor Voodoo's extra turn machine would be used like Cable's, since it is not available in the first round anyway. I do not recommend using it, because it costs you a ton of turns from the rest of your team, and you don't need that many extra turns on the agent (though they are nice).
The Stamina Hero[]
The stamina hero is most important if you do not have the ARC. We are not packing the ARC for extra damage, but rather, for the stamina refill. I use the two that I prefer because they also do debuff clearance with the stamina refreshing move.
My preference is White Iron Fist. His L9-L6 heal refreshes stamina, clears debuffs AND locks debuffs out. This helps survival and keeps you from getting hit with any nasty debuffs which might derail the process (like Stun or Incap)
Emma Frost's L6 boosts team stamina and clears debuffs, while also increasing stats for the target. I prefer Iron Fist because he is less reliant on proper sequencing, like Angel.
Mr. Fantastic's L9 will boost stamina, but not do any of the buff clearance. If you wanted to do this cheaper, you could replace the ARC with Mr. F and something like the Scroll of Angolob, but if you get stunned, it can set you back a round.
Last Words[]
I do not know for how much longer this strategy will continue to work. I have been waiting for Playdom to take it away from four group bosses now.
It is very important that you do the moves of the agent in the proper sequence. If you don't get the 5th hit, you will not take him from 100-0. Doing the sequence out of order limits your ability to apply the 5th hit.