Movement Infusion Beginner Advice

[Red]

This isn't actually a question, but it's the kind of thing that I feel should be in this forum.

Most new players don't really realize that for the first 25 levels or so you can completely substitute a wild:physical with a movement infusion. You rarely desparately need to cleanse a bleed or poison. You generally use wild:phys to stop stuns and pins. Since movements prevent all stuns/pins/daze/freeze for 4-7 (or so) turns they are actually superior to a wild:phys.

Lifted from this forum and moved here so it's easier to find for newer players. http://forums.te4.org/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=42743

Movement infusions can be somewhat hard to find from monster drops, but they'll usually be available from Last Hope or Zigur, so you should be able to get one after your first dungeon. Use your third infusion slot on it, or if you're a mage class (except alchemist*), replace your physical wild infusion with it. (And save any physical or, better yet, physical/mental wild infusions you find for when you've got the cat point for it.)

*Alchemists have much less mana troubles than most other mage classes, especially early game, so it's often a better idea to replace your manasurge rune instead of the wild infusion.

[malboro_urchin]

Movement infusions though, don't remove existing stuns/pins/dazes. Are you suggesting that we use movement infusions when surrounded by stun-happy enemies for the stun prevention, instead of a wild infusion?

[Red]

Yes. (At least in early game, definitely.) For at least four turns and up to 7, I believe (don't know how high the duration can go) you will completely ignore any existing or newly received stuns or pins. And if you are surrounded by four or five foes, all of which can stun you, unless you have four or five wild infusions, you will be stunned relying on them.

What movement infusions do is give you a speed buff and a buff called "Free Action". Free Action does not remove stuns, dazes, or pins, but it negates their effects for so long as it lasts, and in the early game, it will almost always last as long or almost as long as the debuffs themselves. In the later game (the OP of this advice gave a general benchmark of level 25, but also noted there's really no exact point) you'll have enough status conditions outside of these effects that you'll need some kind of universal debuff management technique, be it ridiculously high saves, Providence, or whatever else works.

[cctobias]

Movement infusions though, don't remove existing stuns/pins/dazes. Are you suggesting that we use movement infusions when surrounded by stun-happy enemies for the stun prevention, instead of a wild infusion?

Absolutely you should use a movement before a fight, possibly before every fight, the only time this can change is if you are quite sure you don't need the immunity or you really feel you need to be able to escape from a fight for some reason and have no other option.

On my Madness(and on the Insane version as well) Adventurer winner I used movements before almost every fight. However I had phase door 5 as my escape method.

There is, of course, always a balance since it has two uses and you may have only 1. But certainly you can and maybe even should pre-load a movement for every fight (when you have nothing else to do the same thing).

This is if you are melee. Ranged types have other possibilities, most stuns/pins are melee. On Insane+ this becomes especially desireable as many rares will stun you twice in 3 rounds or so due to their extra talents. But I have run non-melee Insane characters that had good CC (gravity in one case) and they do not necessarily need to pre-load a movement, although that still has its uses.

[Furey]

Couldn't agree more. As melee, preloading a movement is genius. As ranged, I prefer to keep it for getting away from enemies. I would not swap out a phys/mental wild for it, but I would certainly use it in place of phase door.

[Davion Fuxa]

Movement Infusions are definitively worth noting for their ability to prevent you from being pinned, but I would not recommend a beginner replace their Wild with them. The thing about them is that they won't remove the effect if you are already suffering from it - leaving you down an infusion or two. Stun can also put other escape buttons like Teleport or Phase Door 5/5 on cooldown as well.

Additionally, it is very unlikely you will get into a situation where more then one or two mobs will be able to pin you in the early game. The age old practice of corridor fighting, chokepoints, and simply moving where the AI won't make mobs surround you is more then effective a ensuring it won't be an issue on Normal or Nightmare difficulties - Insane or Madness advice need not apply to a beginner.

Wild Infusions also have other important uses - such as negating some incoming damage in a fight along with removal of detrimental effects like Blind in Sandworm Tunnels/Lake or Nur; and you can also find some that can removal dual effects which can let you remove other detrimental effects as well. What's more is that they can have fairly quick cooldowns.

Movement Infusions should best be used to supplement a character along with a Wild (or Status Removal Offensive Rune) but not replace it.

[jaumito]

Also, disarm is a nasty status that can kill you just as well as stun when you live by your sword, and acid wave runes are fairly common in places like Dreadfell or the Halfling Complex. Sure, your second movement infusion can help you escape, but not always. Get switch placed, bone grabbed, knockbacked on top of disramed, and you may find yourself without a clear line of retreat. Same thing if a necro summons minions to block your escape route. A physical wild could save your life in situations like these.

[cctobias]

Well let's take a step back here and rephrase this as actually useful and somewhat clear advice.

For a beginning setup of 3 infusions for a melee I would say you want (in a rather general sense) something like:

-something to prevent or cure stun/freeze (movement infusion or wild:phys)
-something to cure mental (wild)
-an escape (depends)
-a heal or shield (this can depend a lot and may not even be an infusion for some classes/builds)

Now this is 4 things but some are either found in talents or can be done by one infusion, ex: Wild:mental/phys. Given this set of things it is possible to run without any sort of wild:phys when you can account for the 4 things vs 3 slots issue. Or in the worst case you can be very smart and swap the Movement to do either function it serves in the right situations (hard to manage but possible).

Later on you will want, depending on personal taste:
-Almost certainly a second movement so you can pre-load one and escape with other.
-Probably Heroism
-Maybe an extra Wild or a Teleport or whatever


*In general you should use your movement before most fights whenever you think you may get stunned or frozen (dangerous conditions). Daze and pin are not as big, but pin may be problem so that can also qualify. Daze, while annoying, is usually taken off by damage for melee characters. However for Urkis on High Peak specifically always always pre-load a movement for daze protection.

*This advice is no good if you do not pre-load reliably. Therefore its effectiveness is somewhat based on either knowledge or general paranoia.

*Having a Wild with some sort of Physical cure component is nice when you do not know whether you should pre-load or cure and possibly flee with movement. You can either use a phase door/teleport rune and always pre-load or you can attack and cure and save the movement. When you are fairly confident you can kill something always pre-load your movement.

*This is the crux of the situation, if you can reliably flee in some other manner you should essentially always pre-load. If you have 1 movement and absolutely no way to flee you will need to make an assessment of general danger.


I haven't found disarm to be that big of a deal in the early game although is very common later on and very annoying. I would say that by dreadfell you should be transitioning into extra infusions if your build calls for more than 3 infusions and thus may have an extra Wild to deal with this. Or you are a brawler and don't care. Dreadfell is certainly past the point where you can just skate by preloading with movements.

Once you have finished daikara you should be thinking past this into a more mature and solid condition defense.

So my contention is that up to and including T2, when you have some other means of escape, you should basically constantly pre-load your movement as melee and can basically completely forgo a wild:physical. This does not mean they are not useful right from the get go or that some combo of move and wild:phys is not useful. Merely that in this range of content you can run with no wild:phys if you use a movement.

Ideally you want a way to deal with dangerous and common physical conditions and a means of escape. You want this as soon as possible. This is true on all characters or all types. For melee characters you can use a Movement Infusion for either purpose. You cannot use 1 movement for both simultaneously.

For the purposes of dealing with stun and freeze pre-loading a movement is essentially always superior to a wild:phys unless you kill extremely slow. Especially if there is a group of monsters that can each stun. But the opportunity cost of putting an escape option on CD may be too dangerous for some characters. Therefore you must balance this approach with other concerns.

No matter what in T2 and below I would say that phase door+wild:phys is always inferior to phase door+movement. This is a situation that is not obvious to new players. It would actually appear, on its face, to most people that PD+WP is the more conservative cover all your bases setup and PD+MV is the two escapes options. This is incorrect one is just plain superior initially. It is not until later when other physical stuff becomes much threatening that the "beginner perception" actually turn out closer to the actual situation.

In T2 and below if you can get 2 movements you have both bases covered and a whole lot of flexibility as well. Not only do movements work on no-tele zones, but they are completely controlled. You also have the option to escape very far by using 2 or to have extra long Free Action buff. Its a very strong setup, but its also a pro-active setup. In this case you should basically always pre-load one movement unless you have a very specific tactic in mind.

I do not expect everyone to really pull it off due to playstyle differences but its very strong when done a certain way and the key take home point is that Movements are equally condition defense tools and escape tools. But most new player see them as escape tools. The tool roles are at least equal in effectiveness for this infusion and in the early game strong enough to replace physical removal.

Later on they are not able to replace some form of physical removal. At the very least disarm becomes to common. But other things as well. But even with this you will find their immunities extremely useful and will want to preload a movment throughout the entire game (unless you find certain equipment to give permanent immunity), they are just not enough later on due to other conditions.

[cctobias]

Movement Infusions are definitively worth noting for their ability to prevent you from being pinned, but I would not recommend a beginner replace their Wild with them. The thing about them is that they won't remove the effect if you are already suffering from it - leaving you down an infusion or two. Stun can also put other escape buttons like Teleport or Phase Door 5/5 on cooldown as well.

Additionally, it is very unlikely you will get into a situation where more then one or two mobs will be able to pin you in the early game. The age old practice of corridor fighting, chokepoints, and simply moving where the AI won't make mobs surround you is more then effective a ensuring it won't be an issue on Normal or Nightmare difficulties - Insane or Madness advice need not apply to a beginner.

Wild Infusions also have other important uses - such as negating some incoming damage in a fight along with removal of detrimental effects like Blind in Sandworm Tunnels/Lake or Nur; and you can also find some that can removal dual effects which can let you remove other detrimental effects as well. What's more is that they can have fairly quick cooldowns.

Movement Infusions should best be used to supplement a character along with a Wild (or Status Removal Offensive Rune) but not replace it.

I want to specifically address the last sentence here that I bolded.

Movements infusions can definitely be used to replace wild:phys in the early. I have done this on both Insane and Madness and it has worked well. I have gotten characters to level 20 on Madness with a Movement and a wild:mental and/or a wild:mental/magical.

You will not convince me that the above statement is correct. I have playtested it and it is simply not true. Not only can you get to level 20 just fine on the hardest setting of the game but it is sometimes "optimal" to forgo a wild:phys for various reasons (for example you got unlucky and had to choose between mental and phys and there were no mental with phys, in that case you always choose mental if you have a movement).

Now it may be the case that it requires too much of a certain playstyle to be likely to work for new players that is possible. But it CAN and HAS replaced wild:phys in the early game just fine and works reliably when done right. This is proven from playtesting. If you can fit in a wild:phys go for it, but sometimes under certain circumstances it is entirely possible and optimal to leave out the wild:phys entirely.

In my case I have done it with a move/wild:mental/shield setup on madness. On lower difficulties you could replace that shield with a wild:phys, but on Madness I needed that shield to not die. The fact that this setup works on madness is pretty solid evidence you can in fact completely replace the wild:phys. Do I like doing it? No, I would always prefer and wild:mental/phys, since I was running a wild slot. But the cards were against me on at least 2 madness initial tries before my winner (winner had mental/phys and mental/magic available in stores from start). And even though both those madness tries were shelved or failed they were not because of the wild situation they were because of lack of damage. Later on I was using various things as extra condition removals (displace magic, timeless and eventually draconic will after returning from east) but up until mid twenties I have run multiple characters using Movement infusion as the main or sole physical condition answer. And substituting any of the infusions I was running with a physical infusion would have gotten me killed on madness.

[Davion Fuxa]

For Beginners starting out a Movement Infusions should best be used to supplement a character along with a Wild (or Status Removal Offensive Rune) but not replace it.

There, rephrased for you; if for some reason you somehow doubted that the last sentence didn't also apply to beginners.

[cctobias]

For Beginners starting out a Movement Infusions should best be used to supplement a character along with a Wild (or Status Removal Offensive Rune) but not replace it.

There, rephrased for you; if for some reason you somehow doubted that the last sentence didn't also apply to beginners.

That's cool, and that is your opinion which is fine. I can't say this is objectively wrong. I don't agree with it though. I think beginners can make it work just fine.

But that is why this is "advice" and not a "rule".

[Red]

I will say this personally: Being overall pretty bad at this game, I will gladly take "expert" advice. I might screw it up something fierce, but it just might give me some help and I've never had a piece of advice hurt me. Well, other than making me feel stupid because I saw how I could have survived and just didn't.

[Mankeli]

For Beginners starting out a Movement Infusions should best be used to supplement a character along with a Wild (or Status Removal Offensive Rune) but not replace it.

There, rephrased for you; if for some reason you somehow doubted that the last sentence didn't also apply to beginners.

That's cool, and that is your opinion which is fine. I can't say this is objectively wrong. I don't agree with it though. I think beginners can make it work just fine.

But that is why this is "advice" and not a "rule".

Maybe so but I think the logic behind this so called "new player" reasoning is wrong (as you already kind of hinted).

Why can't new players use the best strategies right from the get go if they are indeed considered the best? Why can't a new player learn the value of using movement infusions in other ways than just retreating?

My own experience: I've played some characters on insane and madness but only very recently I started playing melee characters who especially benefit from the stun prevention and closing the gap capabilities of movement infusions. Honestly, I wish I had learned just how great they are for melee characters as a status prevention tool earlier. So, in these kind of situations where learning new things can improve your characters lifespan I certainly would like to be told that movement infusions are really good substitutes instead of "let's not tell him, he is a new player" attitude. I mean, what's the point of hiding information instead of teaching the "new player" to actually use the best strategies in the best way possible? I don't see why new players should be taught inferior strategies just because they are new: Actually, it should probably be the opposite. There are of course many situations where 100 % correct information is not available to new players, in these instances the 70 % correct one is probably better than nothing.

There is truth in that statuses on madness tend to be nastier and more common than on normal: Physical wild doesn't help much in the very early game when you have 0 % stun immunity and the enemy can stun like every 2-4 turns if it has many talents. So I'd say that they are even better on the higher difficulties than on normal. However, this is a point about the differences between difficulty levels, not about "new players" themselves. And just for the record, movement infusions can be used just fine on normal too.

[Lyoncet]

In T2 and below if you can get 2 movements you have both bases covered and a whole lot of flexibility as well. Not only do movements work on no-tele zones, but they are completely controlled. You also have the option to escape very far by using 2 or to have extra long Free Action buff. Its a very strong setup, but its also a pro-active setup. In this case you should basically always pre-load one movement unless you have a very specific tactic in mind.

Bolded what I (as a new player) consider the crux of the issue. Having made it to 19-20 only three times, I don't have a whole lot of experience with when to expect stuns. For example, I know some abilities can stun, but outside that I don't know what the conditions are (e.g. creature types, big hits, physical hits vs. mental vs. spell, etc.) So for someone like me, it's probably advisable to have a status removal for two reasons. 1) I don't know when best to pre-buff with Movement, and 2) I won't learn as quickly when to expect stuns if I'm avoiding them altogether instead of clearing them. Even if it's a better option when you have greater knowledge of the game, at my level it's not as clear.

That said, I find the arguments about Movement > Wild Physical pretty convincing overall.

[Red]

Lyoncet, just in case you don't know, you can right click and inspect any creature you encounter. Still probably get blindsided by an enemy you forgot to inspect (god knows I don't bother checking every last monster that comes my way), but if you see any rare or a boss you don't know incredibly well, this lets you check out all their talents and see just how nasty they are.