MSF: Dread The Darkness Live Blog – Mission #15

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MSF - Dread The Darkness Mission 15

Posted By: ljcool110 December 14, 2020

Dark Dimension III: Dread The Darkness is the ultimate endgame content in Marvel Strike Force, and I begin fighting the 15th mission after just over a week of fighting the 14th mission. Like the previous two, this mission requires City characters, and this again leaves me incredibly under-manned. While I have been working to boost my City roster of late, especially the Symbiote faction, this is a slow, slow grind for even the light Pay To Play (PTP) of MSF. Below I am going to live blog my daily attempts as I look to defeat the Dark Dimension and earn a 5-Red Star Ultimus.

 

My Dread The Darkness eligible City characters:

Here are the starting stats for my City characters fighting this mission.

  • Punisher – 125,370 power, Level 77, Gear 14 +1 piece, Abilities Levels 7-7-7-5 – 7 Stars, 6 Red Stars – Striker Level 4
  • Spider-Man (Symbiote) – 121,559 power, Level 77, Gear 14 +1 piece, Abilities Levels 7-7-7-5 – 6 Stars, 6 Red Stars – Skirmisher Level 4
  • Jessica Jones – 119,090, Level 77, Gear 14 + 1 piece, Abilities Levels 7-7-7-5 – 6 Stars, 5 Red Stars – Healer Level 4

I began this note to show the timeline for acquiring the Gear 13 pieces to add more eligible characters to my posts for the Dark Dimension III. As of 11.21.20 I has Jessica Jones at Gear 13 +4 pieces, needing the Superior Molecular Scan pieces to advance her gear level. I note this in an effort to document how long this takes in a FTP environment to finish this piece. JJ currently needs 26 more Superior Molecular Scan pieces to get to Gear 14.

11.27.20 gear update – I have the pieces needed for JJ’s 5th Gear 13 piece thanks to good RNG and the current Symbiote event.

12.05.20 gear update – The Symbiote event is over and JJ is a total of 4 Superior Molecular Scan pieces away from Gear 14 after some (rare) good RNG in the stores and one of my Orange Gear War Orbs.

12.08.20 gear update – I wish I could say that RNG is smiling upon me, but it simply is not. This battle is tedious without at least 3 members. I have been refreshing the main store at least 1-2 times daily as well, so this is proving to be a bit ridiculous for the FTP or light PTP in terms of advancing characters.

12.10.20 gear update – After a lot of paid refreshes the past two days I took the cheap route today and it paid off, as I bought 2 of the final 4 pieces needed in the War Store this evening. I fought my battle in the evening and then saw the Doom War level 3 additions allowed for the Superior Molecular Scan pieces to be farmed. This, in my opinion, is what makes Marvel Strike Force such a good game in comparison to others. There is a consistent progression and the gates are listed a bit to allow players to keep going at a good pace. In the end I got JJ to Gear 14 and added a second attack for the day.

 

 

Dread The Darkness – Mission 15

Rhino (2.03m power), 13.5m total enemy health

12.05.20 – I start this battle with my City duo, Spider-Man (Symbiote) and Punisher. 8 of the 24 total enemies appear on-screen to start, and my Spider-Man (Symbiote) will get the first turn with his ultimate available to start. Targeting Scarlet Witch I use the AoE to slow the enemies down, and after a few hits Punisher is up, using his basic on SW and getting an Iso-8 bonus attack in as well. Three attacks later Juggernaut taunts and SMS uses his basic, which chains nicely. 7 attacks later the enemies are weakening SMS and have killed Punisher, then SMS again uses his basic before watching SW heal the team just before they kill me off.

 

12.06.20 – I start the battle with a special from Spider-Man (Symbiote) and it hits 5 enemies because of the arrangement of the enemies. 5 enemy attacks later and Punisher uses his basic on Scarlet Witch, my main target, who takes the bonus Iso-8 attack from him as well. SMS uses his basic and chains it, then takes 5 hits and is dead. A quick battle today as 12.528m health remains on the enemies after 2 days of attacks.

 

12.07.20 – Now at 247.2k power for my City duo after a Iso-8 upgrade to Punisher’s damage, I start today’s battle facing the same 8 of 24 total enemies. After taking a hit from Juggernaut I use Spider-Man (Symbiote)’s ultimate and stun Scarlet Witch and add the Vulnerable status effects as a result. After a few enemy hits Punisher is up and targets SW as well, getting her to yellow health after the bonus Iso attack. SMS uses his special, but the enemies kill off Punisher in their next round of attacks, and SW continues to self heal on turn which is making this near impossible. SMS gets a basic in and chains to two others, but is killed in the next round of enemy attacks. After 3 days of attacks I still have 11.8m of 13.5m health left on this group and have made zero progress on getting Jessica Jones the gear needed to join my City duo.

 

12.08.20 – I typically fight these battles in the morning so as not to forget, but given I am just 4 pieces of gear away on Jessica Jones, despite not making any progress in several days, I am going to hold out hope for some better RNG when the stores refresh. After over 250 crystals wasted today refreshing the main supply store my frustration is building. I did buy the $19.99 Battle Pass for the Premium rewards in the Real-Time Arena. I will be analyzing the rewards difference and plan to write about my thoughts in the coming weeks.

On to the battle, Juggernaut begins the attack asks and misses Spider-Man (Symbiote) and now SMS uses his basic on Scarlet Witch as I continue to try and remove her from the battle. After 6 enemy attacks Punisher is up and the Iso-8 Skirmisher class I use for SMS in this game mode pays off. Because SW had the Vulnerable status effect, Punisher lands the bonus attack from his basic and kills her leaving 23 of 24 enemies after my first kill. Because he is the weakest remaining, I target Ant-Man but make very little progress here. I end up getting killed after Punisher’s next attack with 5 of the 7 remaining on-screen in yellow health. I head into Wednesday with 11.142m health remaining across 23 enemies.

 

12.09.20 – Another 200+ crystals on store refreshes today and not a single piece of gear gained in terms of progress. Thus, this continues to be my two character era facing a bunch of OP enemies. Fun…

To the battle, I have 23 enemies remaining with a total of 11.1m health and 7 of them are on-screen to start. Juggernaut comes out and runs my guys over to start and here we go. I have Spider-Man (Symbiote) up with his ultimate and choose to target Merc Lieutenant over Ant-Man as I do not care to deal with Ant-Man’s self healing. I get Merc Lieutenant down to low red health after Punisher uses his special and then follows with an Iso bonus attack, then SMS uses his special to finish him off. My next 2 hits are on Rhono and I am able to kill him off rather easily. Now 21 enemies remain and 5 are on-screen, but they take out my Punisher. I use SMS to I target Juggernaut with a basic, then take a few hits and do so again, this time finishing him off. After I take another hit it is SMS vs. 4 enemies, so I use his ultimate to stun Ant-Man and it allows me to survive another turn where I use the special, then thanks to the Slow on all 4 enemies, I get back-to-back turns. My SMS basic kills Ant-Man and I am down to 19 enemies left and 3 on-screen. I land two basics on Wasp and continue to regain health on attacks, then finish her off when the ultimate comes around again, leaving Vision in red health and Wolverine annoyingly at full health. I finish Vision with two basics and it is SMS vs. Wolverine, both near full health. I am able to trade hits with Wolverine but he heals a lot, so keeping the Slow debuff on him is key to getting extra attacks. The ultimate is used as soon as ready to stun and gain even more attacks and after 7-8 attacks I finish him off. 8 enemies join the fight and I take a few hits before a final basic attack hits Shocker before the new enemies crush me. A good run – far better than expected. Tomorrow I will have 16 enemies and 8.880m health to go.

 

12.10.20 – After an awesome day yesterday, today should be the opposite. 16 enemies reman and 8 are on-screen, and I do not even get to take a turn as Punisher dies while I type this and as I look down SMS has 7 debuffs on him and is killed. Ouch.

After a pleasant surprise that Doom War level 3 allowed for the farming of the Superior Molecular Scan pieces, I got JJ to Gear 14 and then used my Dark Health packs to revive both SMS and Punisher and fought a second battle. Starting with 16 enemies total with 8.8m health and 8 on-screen, I focused first on Shocker and was able to take him out before using the SMS ultimate which slowed the battle down significantly. I lost JJ and Punisher around the same time as killing Vulture and getting Mysterio to red health, and was able to kill the initial Mysterio before my battle ended.

 

12.11.20 – My threesome checks in at 366k opposite a total of 13 remaining enemies with 6.715m health left. The 5 on-screen are Spider-Man (Miles) in low red health along with Rhino, Spider-Man and two Venoms, all at 85% or higher health. With Rhino having counter on him I target the two Venoms in the middle with Spider-Man (Symbiote)’s special and then take a couple of hits, which removes stealth from SMM. JJ hits SMM and kills him to make it 3 v 4 on-screen, then Punisher uses his special on the Venom that SMS started with, gaining a bonus ISO attack as a result. Both Venoms attack and add a ton of bleeds on Punisher, but SMS uses his ultimate and stuns Rhino to avoid the counter attack. I focus my next few attacks on Rhino, Punisher included for the bonus attack, and have him at low red health when Punisher dies. JJ is up and jumps high into the air, killing Rhino and leaving 3 on-screen – Spider-Man and 2 Venoms. I focus my attacks on one Venom and after a few hits finish him off. SMS is up again after Spidey his JJ hard, but SMS stuns Venom and JJ grants him ability energy to use his ultimate back-to-back, which stuns Spidey too. My next 3 hits are all on Spidey and I finish him off before focusing my attacks on Venom who is about 50% health. JJ punches his face and he is down, causing the final 8 enemies to appear. SMS starts with a special in the middle of 5 of the enemies, Scarlet Witch being one of them, then JJ cleanses before a barrage of 10+ attacks from the bad guys to finish me off. Tomorrow I will start with 8 enemies left and 3.884m health to go.

 

12.12.20 – My threesome with their 366k power enter battle opposite 8 on-screen enemies with my Spider-Man (Symbiote) up first with his ultimate. I use it to stun Scarlet Witch, and after a couple of hits both Jessica Jones and Punisher take their turns hitting SW, but the ensuing barrage kills Punisher and have JJ at 50% health. Rhino is taunting which throws off my next two attack rounds, and SW heals the group to screw everything up for today at least. SMS gets a blocked basic in on SW and that is all I have to show for today. Tomorrow I will still have 8 enemies to beat and they now have a total of 3.089m health, so I made some progress…

 

12.13.20 – Back again and still at 366k power, I target Scarlet Witch with Spider-Man (Symbiote)’s basic and place the Vulnerable on her. I then take 12 hits in a row without man attack, barely surviving long enough for Jessica Jones to cleanse. She does, which pulls Punisher out of stun, allows him to double hit SW, and sets up SMS to use his ultimate and kill SW with it while stunning Rhino. I take 3 hits after this an have JJ and Punisher at low red health, but get to hit Rhino again and see Punisher’s AoE hit the enemies just before he dies. A couple of basics from SMS and then they gang up on him, ending the battle with 7 enemies remaining with a total of 1.564m health.

 

12.14.20 – It’s a new day and my three City characters now check in at 368 power thanks to a Level 5 Striker upgrade to Punisher that has been in the works for some time. to the battle, I have 7 enemies remaining, all under 60% health. Rhino is in red, Vision, Spider-Man, Spider-Man (Miles) and Mysterio all in yellow, and Ant-Man and the other Mysterio close to 60%. My Spider-Man (Symbiote) is up first with his ultimate, and given Rhino starts with counter, I target him for the stun. Three attacks from the enemies and Jessica Jones and Punisher finish Rhino off. Two hits from the Mysterio twins and SMS is up again with his special, and targets the two Spideys in the middle, adding Bleed. JJ is next and cleanses, allowing Punisher to kill SMM, then Punisher’s normal turn follows, but Spider-Man dodges. SMS is next and hits, but cannot kill Spidey, but JJ finishes him off. Now 4 enemies remain and Punisher is up as the effect of the Slow on the enemies from Spider-Man (Symbiote)’s ultimate at the beginning of this battle are setting things up nicely for me. At this point my team just powers through the remaining enemies as I complete the penultimate battle in Dark Dimension III. 250k gold and 8k Gold Orb Fragments are my reward.

 

 

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