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Character Guides - Brooks - Abilities, Siphon - May 30, 2020 High Gravity Pros Brooks starts with High Gravity by default in Story Mode and Endless Dungeon. High Gravity creates a large area in front of Brooks that prevents enemies from moving or dodging and lasts for 3 seconds, with a cooldown as low as 15 seconds. Brooks' Plasma Shot weapon can allow High Gravity to deal up to Attack x 3 damage per second to all enemies caught in its area of effect. Useful for pinning down enemies to be hit by Brooks or his teammates, or to allow Brooks time to put some distance between himself and the enemy. Cons High Gravity is very useful in just about any scenario, but its short duration and relatively high cooldown need to be considered. Field Tactics Pros Brooks starts with Field Tactics by default in Story Mode and Endless Dungeon. Field Tactics drags Brooks' teammates toward him at high speed, with a cooldown as low as 5 seconds. While typically good for saving teammates afflicted with Stun or Knockdown from being beaten down, it can gain many buffs -- Track and Field from the Pandemonium tree (both allies gain Combat Movement + 100% for 5 seconds to get back into the fray faster), Field Dressing from the Black Hole tree (heal both allies for 40 HP) and Fog of War from his Ireland MRND-48 AAG weapon (up to Attack + 20 and Defense + 50% to both allies for 5 seconds). Since all of these buffs last for 5 seconds and Field Tactics' cooldown is 5 seconds, Brooks can immediately re-apply the buffs and healing the moment Field Tactics wears off. Cons Without Augmentor investment into 2 trees and investment in the Ireland MRND-48 AAG weapon, Field Tactics is just an okay rescue ability. Brooks also does not gain access to the healing and buffs -- that is given only to his allies. By default his AI is not set to use Field Tactics, though it is an option -- it would get annoying for the player to be constantly pulled away every few seconds by default, and is meant more for player-controlled Brooks to use. Power Drag Pros Power Drag grabs the closest enemy to Brooks and drags them at high speed towards him, with a cooldown as low as 5 seconds. Since Home Run (an ability that synchs up well with its massive collision damage when Power Drag is used near walls/battle boundaries) also has 5 seconds of cooldown, the two abilities were practically made for one another. Power Drag's tree also contains two powerful Earth Field Effect passives -- Golem Spirit (4x Body ability damage during the Earth Field Effect) and Druid Psyche (5 seconds less cooldown for all of Brooks' Mind abilities during the Earth Field Effect). Cons Power Drag does not allow Brooks to choose a specific enemy -- the enemy chosen is based on closest to him at the time, so if a specific enemy is desired, Brooks may have to reposition or accept whatever foe is closest. If an enemy is dragged to Brooks with Power Drag and they are not targetting him, they may immediately run off towards their original target before Brooks can hit them, and therefore may be best to wait and use on enemies aiming for Brooks. Pandemonium Pros Pandemonium is an all-enemy Knockback infliction tool that sends all enemies in random directions with a cooldown as low as 10 seconds (similar to Knight's maxed out Unexplained, but no damage). Like Field Tactics, is useful as a way of pulling enemies off of a Stunned/Knocked Down ally. Pandemonium's Soul Triad tree also contains valuable Collision Damage passives, that boost damage of ALL sources of Brooks' Knockback collision. Cons Aside from being a useful all-range interrupt and its powerful collision passives, Pandemonium itself will see little use aside from as an emergency rescue for prone allies -- and even then, Field Tactics with all of its buffs has more utility. Black Hole Pros Black Hole is Brooks' one ability that is capable of dealing a lot of damage without needing a lot of abilities to combine (as his Knockback collision and long-range builds would require), and is also simple to use -- just place it in front of Brooks and let enemies walk into it. Maxed out, Black Hole deals up to Attack x 1.6 per second and sucks enemies towards its center for 5 seconds. When those 5 seconds ends, Black Hole deals Attack x 10 damage and Knockback to all enemies still caught inside it with his Explosive Evaporation passive. With Brooks' high Attack stat and the Ultra Rifle weapon (2x damage for Black Hole, both the Attack x 1.6 and Attack x 10 parts), Black Hole can be both a very simple and very powerful damage tool for Brooks. Cons Black Hole has 20 seconds of cooldown, and if it is the only source of damage Brooks has in a build, he cannot be relied on as a damage dealer. Enemies may also be able to escape the Black Holes in some cases with some dash attacks or high enough Combat Movement, and Brooks will need to try and get them to go back into the Black Hole before it ends with Explosive Evaporation if he wants to deal big damage. |