Evolve Monster General Strategy Guide

Evolve Stage 2 Monster General Strategy Guide by LocoPojo

Hey all, it’s me again. I had a few requests for monster guides (as monster is my primary role) and although I don’t feel like they need a lot of help, I definitely want to see people playing their best on both sides of the aisle. So I thought I’d share a few basics on what kind of decisions you should be making and what skills you are trying to learn.

Basic Goals (What should I do?)

Stage One:

• Feed quickly and avoid detection as much as possible.
• Try to Evolve without getting domed (yes you can).
• If you get into a dome, try to win the dome (incapacitate one to two hunters) and immediately leave when it goes down. If you’re behind on food, look for quick snacks as well.
• Try to Evolve close to twenty seconds after a dome is over, behind cover, and preferably under a roof.

Stage Two:

• Get full armor
• Look for good places to fight and try to be caught only in those places. Expect two fights at least. Pick up strikes, but don’t get baited into fights without a dome.
• Pick up a useful buff.
• When domed, try to win the dome, then make a decision whether or not to stay based on who is incapped and what the remaining health of the hunters are. Remember you can always leave if you are not making headway.
• In between domes, consider quick engagements to pick off separated hunters but always leave time to run.

Stage Three:

• Get full armor
• Pick an objective – the Crowbill Sloth/Armadon buff, or the Relay. Get to that objective before the hunters and control it.
• Pick off any separated hunters with extreme prejudice.
• Only worry about domes if they aren’t tossed. You may have to jump away from a fight to force the dome.
• Kill all the hunters or destroy the relay.

In order to accomplish these goals, learn the map you’re on. Behave like a speedrunner at first: figure out some basic “routes” between food sources and learn to traverse them quickly. Try to hit both of the wildlife in a pod with a single ability and shave seconds off your time. Know when you’re visible to the hunters (green outlines and planet scanner pings) and plan on them using that information before making decisions. You move faster than hunters, always try to move so that they are at your back in a group. They need fifty meters distance and some way to see you to dome you.

Order of Operations (Who should I kill?)

Who do you kill first? In general, the monster wants to kill the Medic or Support first, followed by the Trapper, followed by the Assault. However, anyone that you can catch in a situation where they are cut off from backup and shielding can be prioritized. If you convince the Assault to pop their shield early, make a note of it, and when it wears off you can consider targeting them. Never focus an Assault if the enemy team has a Bucket – doubling the damage matrix makes them completely unkillable.

Rogue Val is tough to kill but getting her to pop her heal burst turns off her passive healing aura and halves her ability to keep the rest of the team in green, making her and her teammates more vulnerable. Slim prefers to be up in your face and you should only focus him if you’re going to be knocking him around and preventing him from shooting you – it is easier to focus on knocking people away from Slim. Hank and Val are priority targets, Caira can be ignored completely if she’s terrible. Sunny’s shield drone must always be broken, which means you should focus Sunny first so you can keep up with the drones she tosses. Griffin can be a problem during and after the dome – remember he can’t do a thing to you if you charge at his face, but he’s a pain in the ass if you try to focus someone away from him. Jack is mostly the reverse.

You will have to divide your attention sometimes. Deployables – like healing buoys, drones, mines, and harpoon traps – need to be cleared out from time to time before they become oppressive. Lennox needs to be knocked on the head once in a while to drop her 4x combo. Look for good AoE on multiple targets as this overstresses the medic and increases the likelihood that someone in their formation will fall when you pressure them. Don’t be afraid to switch around and be surprising from time to time.

What to Commit (When do I fight?)

There are two measures of permanent progress that concern monsters: their health (red bars) and the hunters strikes (white bars). In general, the monster never wants to exchange health for anything other than a permanent strike. Killing a hunter doesn’t add strikes, and it’s mostly secondary to other goals unless Lazarus is on the team.

In a dome, this is a simple decision. A monster gets a 3:30 discount on the 5 minute dome for every strike he puts on a hunter. The only other discount he gets is by taking health damage – not a good option, but if you’re going to spend health, you want to spend it on strikes. That means it is always, always, always best to fight in a dome, although you can be a little cagey about it at first to get hunters out of position and burn some of the remaining minute and a half.

Once the dome is down, the monster has to measure his options. If it has armor left, it can stay and play for a while, but it might have another objective – an Evolve, or a buff – that will take time and possibly put it into a vulnerable position later. If that’s the case, book it.

If the dome is down and you don’t have any armor, you should only be staying if you are looking at a potential game win scenario. At Stage 1, this is two hunters down and two heavily wounded without a lot of good defense. At Stage 2, two hunters down might just be enough as long as you have a lot of health to play with. At Stage 3, even one downed hunter might be good enough to win provided the dropship is 2 minutes out. To make it even simpler: Stage 1-2-3, commit to 3-2-1. Don’t be stupid, you’re only growing stronger with time. The sunk cost fallacy is an exceptional killer of monsters.

Buffs (Are these white critters important?)

These are important. While you’re playing, check your game time with the T button every now and then. Buffs spawn at three minutes (armor regen/smell), five minutes (Move/Cooldown/Slow/Pounce), and ten minutes(Damage/DR), and controlling them can really help you against the hunters. The ten minute buffs (Crowbill Sloth:Damage, Armadon:DR) are transformationally good, and will continue to be after they are nerfed. Learn where they spawn, they’re worth fighting over. Here’s a partial list.

Distillery: Crowbill on the beach near the original drop point. Slow hunters buff in caves at five minutes.

Weather Control: Crowbill below the circular arena near the drop point, Armadon on the beach near the Reaver congregation.

Orbital Drill: Armadon close to the beach, left side from the drop point

Wraith Trap: Crowbill behind the venomhound caves.

Finally, the “I’m poor!” section.

(Who should I pick?)

Here’s a basic rundown of how each monster plays. Decide on the style that’s right for you.

Goliath: A brawler. Slower, heavier than Meteor, but with a lot more single target focus. Can put out a lot of damage very quickly. Meteor Goliath: A brawler. Lighter and faster than Goliath, and applies a DoT to all his AoE’s that can be tricky. Has a hard time focusing targets, but will often collapse an entire team at the same time in a prolonged fight. Kraken: A ranged mage. Tough to maneuver and aim, but very good at pushing hunters around and controlling space. Can hover at safe ranges for long periods of time. Usually needs to close for a kill.
Elder Kraken: A fast brawler. Has some surprising damage sources (linked chain lightning does more damage to each target it hits further from you, for example). Glassier than most, but good damage to go with. Wraith: An assassin. Good single target combos and target selection. Good mobility, hard to hit and follow. Low health and bad at committing. Behemoth: A tanky mage. Relies on accurate combos and controlling space. Amazing area control, awful mobility and hitboxes. Soon to be reworked and made available to all. Gorgon: A trap mage. Relies on spider traps for consistent damage, but can run away with pub groups if hunters don’t doubletap up out of her acid spit. Great traversal, decent area control. Certain parts of her kit (Mimics and Wall Pounces) are tough to use.

(What perks do I use?)

Perks are expensive, but you can get away with a set of three for all monsters until you have enough keys or monster levels to experiment. I recommend: Hunger for perk 1, Speed Climber for perk 2, and Evolved Recovery for perk 3. These are good all-around perks that provide a lot of utility.

That’s about it for now. Maybe more later! Happy hunting (of the hunters)!