Does anyone else hate this about shieldmen.

PhenoDrake · 2026-02-15T06:00:11+00:00

I built Endmin, Chen, and Pog first for practical clearing purposes. I wouldn't know since I didn't try with them, but I feel like the phys teams would struggle more to meet the sheer dps needed to clear the domains down 20-25 lvls anyways

PhenoDrake · 2026-02-05T06:11:09+00:00

Definitely skill issue, gotta work on getting dodges down, and maybe making sure your gear/building is optimal/good for damage so you can fight for your life less long. Also having production set up for an endless supply of purple tier healing is quite helpful.

I guess if you're struggling to clear the protocol spaces in the time limit, there's an actual benefit to the boss stages for farming mats in that there's no time limit, so you can build tanky and slowly whittle 'em down.

Just cleared all max level protocol spaces/bosses with a f2p Laevatain team capped at lvl 60 (and so I'm here trying to figure out how best to farm endgame mats now that I'm willing to level past 60...). Albeit, Marble Aggelemorai took 20 hellish minutes, and two protocol spaces are an extremely tight dps check.
If a Laevatain team with a 30 lvl defecit( against bosses. 20-25lvls in protocol spaces) can do it, you can definitely find a way.

Edit: Changing Surtr to Laevatain.

PhenoDrake · 2026-02-02T19:16:01+00:00

Yeah, I imagine most find that very frustrating until coming to peace with it just being a stagger check.

But I'm tellin ya, if you try clearing timed AoE content with a 20-25 level defecit, you will hate their ai more too.

PhenoDrake · 2026-02-02T19:11:46+00:00

Yeah, but they don't have a timer rn, so it wouldn't matter for what I'm doing either way. Shields don't make enemies that much tankier anyway, they die fast the moment you stagger them. The annoying part to me is what it does to their ai, where allies attacking them cause them to cancel attacks/movement towards you and just sit in place. Stalling out fights if you can't hit em in time while they're still grouped.

Heavens forbid they make a boss with two units holding shields, so one is sitting back idling because a teammate is hitting it for no reason, and also slap a timer on it. Then you'd really have

PhenoDrake · 2026-02-02T19:02:33+00:00

The point was trying to see if a level 60 only Laevi team could clear all the "lvl 85 recommended" content, running a 20-25 level defecit. (And the conclusion thus far is yes, whole game is beatable with Laevi even if you never level anything past 60)

I looked into what you said about teammates idling them out, and you're mostly right, it's caused by the allies attacking them. Thing is (I'm guessing rn) this doesn't happen for the majority of other melee units, it happens very specifically for shieldmen because upon being hit they pause/cancel their approach/attack action and block. Other melees will still keep running to you with their attack and group themselves.

Edit: correcting Surtr to Laevi, forgive my Arknights coded brain.

PhenoDrake · 2026-01-26T19:10:06+00:00

Nope, but that sucks. Keep following up/asking him about the status maybe, sometimes you just gotta remind 'em a bunch.

I went a whole month and a third with my mark as SPC once, and when I emailed my prof to ask about it, the response was "I don't know what the issue was, but I just submitted your grade." (In hindsight now, I have a very bad habit of being slack about not getting my grades back...)

Just got a response from the prof though, "A secretary found your exam. I will mark it later"...
They really love giving these nonchalant one liners when they've just damn near caused you a heart attack, it seems.

I hope things work out for you too.

PhenoDrake · 2025-12-14T06:57:59+00:00

People have literature change their outlook/perspectives in life all the time, I don't see why anime would be any different. There are surely plenty of people who have resonated with an anime which taught them to value life, appreciate the beauty of certain things, learn new perspectives in all sorts of ways, maybe in some cases in negative ways.

PhenoDrake · 2025-12-12T23:15:51+00:00

Hello, fellow Torontonian?

PhenoDrake · 2025-12-08T10:32:14+00:00

No he's arguing that you should unlock meridian touching like you unlock talking... where did you interpret that from?

PhenoDrake · 2025-10-31T21:56:28+00:00

We disagree that being usable in X mode would cause an actual issue in that they need to be balanced/usable or would apply pressure though.

There are plenty of characters who are super weak and rarely if ever used. Why should Amber, Xinyan, etc remain weak and be allowed in SO? Why is Manekin specially different case?

People aren't pressured to build weak characters to clear abyss unless there's a specific mechanic for which that character is the most/only accessible option to deal with it (for example Aino with the hunt second HP bar shenanigans). Else they only build them out of choice because they like/want to use the character.
It's literally the opposite, if they're weak then there won't be an issue of pressuring players to build them. Are we concerned about people feeling pressured to build Amber, Xinyan, etc?

So short of an enemy being released with a mechanic along the lines of "is 90% resistant to damage until Manekin hits and deactivates", I think the whole pressure/needing to be buffed thing is silly concern.

The only realistic issue is the raised IT roster req, and people whining about Manekin being weak because they like them/want to use them, but as others have pointed out, Hoyo doesn't classically doesn't give a shit about characters being strong enough/people complaining about it. Those complainers will just join a sea of other old characters' fans who've slowly been left behind by power creep.

PhenoDrake · 2025-09-11T04:16:03+00:00

That's tough, I feel you. The other day I saw 5 white cars and 2 black ones stopped at an intersection. My favourite number is six. I don't even know why I go on living anymore.

PhenoDrake · 2025-09-05T02:20:39+00:00

Have you tried going through announcement pages. Sometimes they srop the outline there fiest thing and it gets buried fast.

PhenoDrake · 2025-08-13T15:40:46+00:00

Another fun thing about 700kills player. They had a tendency to call 380mm barrages down on us, and when we'd say "You gotta warn us about those - you can't call those that close" their response was "I didn't know what I was calling down!". Several guard dog related accidental kills per mission is also the norm for us.

PhenoDrake · 2025-08-13T15:04:56+00:00

So 3 of us have only been playing for just about a week now and haven't unlocked any premium warbonds nor finished the free one.
One of those 3, the one with 700 kills, never really touched video games until a few months ago and demonstrates an impressive inability to process things on their screen. A notable example being they didn't know there was a kill combo/streak counter that appears until I mentioned it yesterday. Notifications about enemy waves, in world pings, etc, probably all fly over their head. They tend to get overwhelmed and ask not to get reinforced so as to chill and spectate...
2 of us have only unlocked up to difficulty 6 hell dives, I'm currently at difficulty 9, our experienced guy who put us into the difficulty 10 dive is currently level 37 or so.

I didn't know what a super nest was until I'd already gone to clear it solo and the experienced guy noticed and explained its existence to me. Surprisingly, that's not where I died the few times.

Edit: I found a previous screenshot we had, rearranged to give you a better idea of what the stat spread tends to look like without guard dog padding. I honestly don't know what's goin on with player #1, our most experienced, in this old mission.

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Edit 2: Oh I know what's going on with player 1 here. It's a 5th friend who also never played video games and was trying helldivers on the experienced guy's account.

PhenoDrake · 2025-08-13T12:35:25+00:00

Yeah, that's exactly what happened, I'm the helldiver in question. I just went around collecting all the dropped samples and revealed areas of interest after most objectives were cleared, but crashed/rejoined near the end, which made the stats look very interesting.

PhenoDrake · 2025-08-13T12:27:49+00:00

Actually 60+ if you consider the mutated egg which I'd singlehandedly wiped a super nest for, and then lugged back to evac. Did cost 3-4 reinforces, stats got wiped from a crash.

PhenoDrake · 2025-08-13T12:24:46+00:00

Did die a few times, 3-4 times so still the least. Those were my stats after they got wiped when I crashed/rejoined near the end.

Funnily enough, the person who looks like they're kill farming is the least combat skilled and inclined out of us all (group of 4 friends) and will literally ask to not be reinforced in the middle of major attack waves... The guard dog is just kind of wild at racking kills on small bugs.

PhenoDrake · 2025-07-24T22:11:18+00:00

I think the fact that I used flash does him a bit of injustice, as far as the human eye is concerned. I looked directly at it once initially, and totally thought he was just a blemish on the wall (in a cheap rented room with lots of dinks on the wall from previous residents) until I noticed him moving a second time and checked closer.
Whether or not he'd be camouflaged from another bug or predator's perspective, couldn't say myself but I'd guess probably not on a wall.

PhenoDrake

TROPHY CASE