Marvel Heroes Jean Grey Guide

Marvel Heroes Jean Grey Guide by Nomios

This guide is intended to aid new players of Jean Grey or help those that are having trouble with her.
Feel free to contact me in game (Nomios) for questions, help, or grouping.

Jean Grey is the telekinetic/telepathic, supportive backbone of the X-men team. Being Omega class, her potential is near limitless, and this has been best shown in her time as host to the Phoenix Force.

For her appearance in Marvel Heroes, she is given three power trees based on her abilities and history, Telekinesis, Telepathy, and Phoenix.

Jean’s Advantages:
+Her AOE capabilities are better than most, if not all other heroes
+She can disable non-bosses and control the flow of battle very well
+She has an almost permanent bonus to damage and movement speed (Phoenix Transformation)
+Flight
+Her abilities are visually impressive

Jean’s Disadvantages:
-She has disturbingly low health, a breeze can potentially break her bones
-Her single target damage is pathetic, regardless of gear or level
-Can be very difficult to solo

Builds:

There are really two builds for Jean, offensive, and defensive. There is a third, technically, relying solely on Phoenix skills.

Offensive
If the enemy is dead, they can’t shoot you. This build centers around doing as much damage as possible with little regard for your own safety. Most of your point will be in Telekinesis.

Defensive
As long as you’re the last one standing, who cares how long it takes? This build is focused on protecting yourself and allies by disabling or hindering enemies. Most of your points will be in Telepathy.

Pure Phoenix
This build is designed to stay in phoenix form almost indefinitely and take full advantage of it. The only problem is, you will eventually have to leave phoenix form, making this build risky for bosses with high health. Being that this build is limiting itself to phoenix powers, there are extra points which can be thrown around.

IMPORTANT NOTE ON BUILDS: Because retcon devices (respecs) are so rare, you should sit on extra points rather than feeling like they need to be spent (I am currently sitting on 14 extra points). This way you can keep specific skills at the highest level possible for your level. Also, if you aren’t certain about a power, wait till you have a piece of gear that grants it and try it out first.

Now for the specifics on powers.

Powers:

Telekinesis
This is your primary damage dealing tree.

-Telekinetic Bolt
[Basic Power] Mentally hurl a telekinetic bolt that slams into each enemy in its path.
This will penetrate enemies, dealing full damage to each enemy in its path. The attack speed is fairly fast and the damage is average for a basic power. You will need some way of attacking enemies when you are out of spirit. Even if you choose to take Psychic Hammer instead, the +60% damage you get from this at 20 points is worth it. Max this out.

-Psychic Hammer
[Basic Power] Launch a powerful telekinetic blast that pummels enemies in its path.
Unlike Telekinetic bolt, this power does not penetrate enemies, instead, it has a small AOE. You can usually hit 2 enemies at once with this, and sometimes up to 4. The attack speed is slightly slower thanTelekinetic Bolt, but the damage is much higher. You will need a basic power, and even if you chooseTelekinetic Bolt, the +60% damage from this is worth it. Max this out as well.

-Kinetic Wave
Project a burst of telekinetic energy that knocks back nearby enemies and deflects projectiles.
This is a point blank AOE (PBAOE) which does some damage while pushing enemies away from you. The push effect does not work on some enemies. This can be useful for getting enemies away from you, but there are better ways of handling such a situation. This is very ineffective for damaging because it pushes the enemies out of its own AOE, making you hit roughtly 1/2 of the time if you hold its hotkey. Unless you want to buff the damage of Psychokinetic Implosion, avoid this skill.

-Psychokinetic Implosion
Telekinetically throw all enemies in an area into one another.
Produces an AOE at target location, within which, enemies are damaged and pulled to the center. The damage from this is fantastic and the pulling effect is great for preparing enemies for party members to nuke as well. If you are going the offensive route, this will be your main AOE damage skill. Even for the other builds, this is extremely useful because of the pulling effect. For offensive build I would recommend maxing this, for non-offensive, a single point is still very useful.

-Kinetic Tempest
[Tempest Power] Create a tempest of psychokinetic energy around you that buffets enemies and deflects enemy projectiles.
This creates a PBAOE tempest for the duration that pushes enemies out of its radius and deflects projectiles for the duration. Note that this power DOES NOT DEAL DAMAGE, making the synergies listed from other powers a bit silly. This may be a bug. The projectile deflection and enemy push are very helpful when grouping. In terms of group support, this completely outclasses Kinetic Wave. When grouping in end game, a single point in this with a good Dr. Doom Medal is great.

-Mental Focus
[Passive Power] Your mental powers bypass some of your target’s mental defense and have a chance to knock them back.
This passive allows you to ignore a portion of an enemy’s mental defense as well as a change to apply knockback on basic powers. This is most definitely an end game power. Most enemies through the story have little or no mental defense making it useless. The point you start with here provides the biggest bonus and is sufficient till end game. After that point it becomes somewhat more useful.

-Telekinetic Flight
Hold down the hotkey to telekinetically lift yourself over enemies and obstacles.
Flight, enough said. This will let you get around a bit faster, allow you to move over many obstacles that other heroes must go around, and allow you to easily exit and enter combat. One feature that many people overlook is this when paired with Phoenix Tempest. The tempest still deals damage while flying, allowing you to avoid melee damage while hurting enemies. The amount of utility you get out of this skill makes is an excellent choice for 1 point. Additional points only increase the speed boost slightly making this a good 1 point wonder power for any build.

Telepathy

This is your main controller/defensive tree.

-Psychic Lethargy
Induce a telepathic torpor that slows the actions of nearby enemies and makes them more vulnerable to damage.
The vulnerability to damage is where the usefulness of this power lies. Put a few points here or have it maxed to help with bossing. Thanks to panicfreeze

-Mind Crush
Stun nearby enemies with a massive telepathic burst.
Creates a PBAOE pulse that stuns enemies for a duration. This completely outclasses Psychic Lethargy. Rather than just decreasing the damage enemies deal, this halts it. For defensive builds this is a must have skill, and for offensive builds a single point here can be useful in some situations. A single point here provides a huge utility, but extra points can still be useful if you really want an increased stun duration.

-Neural Panic
Telepathically instill terror in nearby enemies, causing them to flee in fear. Hitting enemies under the fear regenerates your health.
This skill can be used as an excellent interrupt on bosses, so instead of dodging attacks, you can just prevent them. Do not use this on trash mobs, you want them dying, not running away. Another 1 point wonder. Thanks to jockthemotie

-Telepathic Detection *bugged
[Passive Power] Your psychic sensitivity reveals all nearby enemies.
Having enemies show up on your minimap is great, and for a single point you no longer need an artifact or medal for this. Throw in a point regardless of build and leave it at that. More points can be added later if you absolutely must know how many enemies are in the next few rooms.

-Psychic Tempest
[Tempest Power] Create a psychic tempest of confusion around you, causing enemies to viciously attack one another.
Like Kinetic Tempest this will disable other tempest powers, making it of limited utility for defensive and phoenix builds. For offensive builds, enemies shouldn’t be living long enough to do much damage to each other.

-Bolstering Aura
[Aura Power] Your telepathic support allows you and nearby teammates to ignore the pain of physical and energy damage.
This buffs you and nearby teammats with increased defense to physical and energy. The boost is pretty small and since you can only have one aura active, don’t bother.

-Reinforcing Aura
[Aura Power] Your psychic support allows you and nearby teammates to overcome and resist negative mental conditions and mental attacks. Activating and deactivating this aura power cleanses you of negative mental conditions.
While mental conditions may be relevant in the future, right now this isn’t very useful.

-Rejuvenation Aura
[Aura Power] Your psychic inspiration allows you and nearby teammates to regain spirit quickly.
This is the main reason the past two skills aren’t worth getting. Having only one aura at a time means picking the best one for each situation, and this one is by far the best in every situation I have encountered. Applying spirit regen to your teammates will make your team happier and keep you using more powers. The first point adds +1.5 spirit per second. After that the bonuses are very small. Put a single point in here and consider more if you are overflowing with points for some reason much later in the game.

Phoenix

This tree has a bit for everyone, and everyone should partake.

-Phoenix Transformation
Transform into Phoenix Form (or back to Jean Grey). While in Phoenix Form, you are flying, deal more damage, and gain Phoenix Force each time you defeat an enemy.
At higher levels you get more than 5 phoenix force per kill, meaning you can maintain a significant bonus to damage and speed indefinitely. The only time this should go down is when not fighting, or when it runs out during tanky bosses. All builds should keep this as high as possible.

-Phoenix Tempest
[Tempest Power] Create a tempest of pyrokinetic energy around you that damages enemies.
This is the reason anyone wants to play Phoenix. A PBAOE is maintained around you that does significant damage every second. The AOE damage is less than half that of most AOE’s, but it is always happening no matter what you are doing, so you can be using other powers with it, and should. Defensive and phoenix builds will want this as high as possible as this will be their main damage source. Offensive builds can have this at just a single point, the extra damage is nice, but until there are points to throw around, they should be focused elsewhere.

-Phoenix Avatar
[Passive Power] Your link to the Phoenix entity allows you to gain Phoenix force when you take damage. While in Phoenix form, you also gain spirit when you take damage.
Yet another beautiful 1 point wonder power. This first point is a very significant change, past that the next big upgrade is at level 4. Offensive builds can be fine leaving this at 1, and defensive builds may consider bringing this up to 4, though it is probably not necessary. Phoenix builds can invest more as they see fit based on how well they maintain phoenix form in boss battles.

-Phoenix Charge
Fly forward, creating explosions at your start and end points and damaging all enemies in your path.
I’m not the biggest fan of this skill, it is very good for easily entering and exiting combat, but it costs you 5 phoenix force. I would prefer to spend 5 spirit to do basically the same thing with flight and have that extra 5 seconds in phoenix form. Phoenix builds will obviously want to take this, but offensive and defensive builds can probably go without. If you find yourself getting stuck in groups too frequently, a single point in this should fix that.

-Phoenix Corona
Raise a protective field around you that absorbs some of the damage you take at the cost of Phoenix force.
A needed boost to Jean’s survivability. At level 1 it is painfully inefficient, easily emptying your phoenix force from a hit or two. Defensive builds will probably not need this, offensive builds should avoid it to better maintain phoenix form during bosses, and phoenix builds should consider putting enough to make this efficient. The only reason phoenix builds can pull this off is by having extra points to put intoPhoenix Avatar.

-Phoenix Rebirth
[Passive Power] If you are defeated while you have Phoenix force available, you may instead be rejuvenated by the power of the Phoenix.
Another 1 point wonder. The first point gives you a 50% change of not dying if you have phoenix force. Everyone should get the first point, but further points have seriously diminishing returns, so this can be a place to put points later on.

Ultimate (Dark Phoenix Wrath)
Converts to Phoenix form in a devastating pyrokinetic explosion, gathering Phoenix Force and temporarily improving all your powers.
The PBAOE damage from this is ok, but that isn’t the beauty of it. This is an excellent power to fire off the moment you log in to get your phoenix force full without killing anything. Furthermore, you can fire this off at bosses to get a nice boost to your skills. Doesn’t make sense to be opposed to this since it doesn’t use points to level (it uses character tokens).

Build Summaries (TL;DR)

All Builds should max out the following skills:
-Telekinetic Bolt
-Psychic Hammer
-Phoenix Transformation

All builds should have 1 point placed in the following skills.
-Psychokinetic Implosion
-Kinetic Tempest
-Telekinetic Flight
-Mind Crush
-Telepathic Detection *bugged
-Rejuvenation Aura
-Phoenix Tempest
-Phoenix Avatar
-Phoenix Rebirth
-Neural Panic Thanks to jockthemotie
-Psychic Lethargy Thanks to panicfreeze

Offensive Build

Max ASAP
-Psychokinetic Implosion

Max Later
-Phoenix Tempest
-Kinetic Wave

Defensive Build

Max ASAP
-Phoenix Tempest

Max Later
-Mind Crush
-Neural Panic (optional)

Phoenix Build

Max ASAP
-Phoenix Tempest
-Phoenix Avatar (not necessarily up to 20)
-Phoenix Phoenix Corona

Leftover Points Once Powers Start Maxing
-Mental Focus
-Psychic Lethargy

FAQ

I keep dying almost instantly, how do I survive longer?
As far as the story portion of the game, you should focus on getting equipment that increases defense and pretty much ignore secondary bonus stats, the increased defense will give you a few more hits, and in some cases can let you tank weaker bosses. Endgame, you will die, a lot, no helping it. Just keep going and you will eventually rise from those ashes.

What boss medal should I use?
As Jean is the AOE queen of Marvel Heroes, the best option is Doctor Octopus’s medal. The increase in AOE radius paired with AOE crit chance is amazing for her.

I want to use a pure Jean build without Phoenix, is this a bad idea?
Not at all. I personally prefer pure Jean to Phoenix and wish she were created that way in the game. However, this guide is for helping people maximize Jean’s damage, and no matter how you build her, Jean will do more damage while in Phoenix Form.