KD's Bonus Potions and Entrance Speed guide

Contents:

Preface


Neo monsters is an incredibly strategic game and the monsters are all carefully balanced with their attack damage, defence and movesets. An unfortunate downside of that is we are not able to upgrade them much with boosts or customisation. However, we can reduce the time it takes for them to get their first turn, aka their entrance speed, and lower the TU of their skills so they can attack more frequently. This is far stronger than you might think! This guide is going to take you through the benefits of "potting" your monsters and give you some advice on how to prioritise use of your potions.
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Where to get potions and how to use them


Potions are primarily gained from completing limited-time event content. At my time writing this it's very common to see 2 epic, super epic and legendary potions in each of the bigger events (10+ days long). Legendary potions are typically very near the end of each event and will require some time devotion as well as only being possible to get for experienced players. If you're someone who plays lots then this is where you can get an advantage over other players!

Another place potions are gained is when hatching monsters you already have from eggs. If that particular monster is between +0-8 then it will get an additional +1 automatically added. However, if the monster is +9 already you will instead be rewarded a potion. This is only going to happen to you once you’ve been playing the game a while. Also, it only happens for both epics and super epics. For legendaries and mythics at +9 you instead get a 6*/7* ticket.

To use a potion on a monster you must go to the bonus potions screen in the menu. Once there you should see a screen like this…

By clicking “use” it will use a potion on the monster selected. It will automatically select the correct potion to use. Once a monster has been potted you’ll see a number on it under “bonus”. You can see on my Malwing above it’s got +5. The button next to that will bring up the following screen…
(Note: you can only click this in the “edit team” section)

Here you can choose to customise how much of a bonus is applied to the monster’s entrance speed and seconds reduction of the moves. The entrance speed isn’t clear on this screen but don’t worry because this guide will explain that. Also, it may not be clear why you’d want to reduce the bonus applied to either of these but that will be explained in the later section “tips for using potions”.

Important note for using monsters as ingredients:
Whenever you evolve a monster which you have multiple copies of it will automatically select the one with the HIGHEST bonus. Therefore if you have 4 Galvboss with one +9 and the others +0 then don’t worry, the Galvbane you create will be +9.
If you have multiple copies of a monster and are using one as an ingredient (sacrificing it for another monster to evolve) then it automatically select the copy with a LOWEST bonus. Therefore if you have 4 Galvboss with one +9 and the others +0 but are making Wolfrozor then don’t worry, it will consume a Galvboss+0.
While creating the final forms of all the starters and Chronox you will need two copies of each starter in their 5* form. Therefore, you should make one which is +9 that you keep and one +0 that you use to evolve Chronox into a legendary.

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Reduction to move TU (seconds)


First let's look at a table of the raw numbers...
Move TU +3 +6 +9
300 285 270 255
250 237 225 212
220 209 198 187
200 190 180 170
160 152 144 136
150 142 135 127
130 123 117 110
120 114 108 102
110 104 99 93
100 95 90 85
80 76 72 68
70 66 63 59
60 57 54 51
50 47 45 42
30 28 27 25
10 9 9 8

Move TU reduction has been simplified enormously since version update 2.12 so we only get a reduction every +3 bonus and it is 5% each time, rounded down. There’s no early optimal bonus for move TU, the more the better. However, since you don’t get any extra reduction on +1, +2, +4, +5, +7 and +8 you should not waste potions on these unless you can get to the next “+3” or you want the faster entrance speed. Entrance speed has been left untouched so is still complicated. We’ll go through that in a second but there’s a couple of interesting notes to make first.

Rounding and acceleration notes:
It’s worth noting that while the game will round the TU’s to a whole number, they’re stored as a fraction so when you accelerate you may get different results from what you expect. Also, elem accelerate is a 26.5% reduction rather than the 25% as stated. Before version update 2.32 accelerate had diminishing returns on monsters with bonus (4% less effective for every +3), so 20% accelerate on +9 was actually 17.6% acceleration. (I’m mentioning this because old conversations/videos may be confusing with this).

Note on sleep: When a monster is asleep and gets a turn it will automatically skip 50TU. However, this will be reduced by the “seconds reduction” bonus on a monster by the same amount displayed in the table above for 50TU skills (47, 45, 42) and takes into account acceleration too.


Old move TU table (for reference only)

Move TU +1 +2 +3 +4 +5 +6 +7 +8 +9
300 290 282 274 266 259 258 256 254 253
250 242 235 228 222 216 215 213 212 211
200 193 188 182 177 173 172 171 169 168
160 155 150 146 142 138 137 136 135 135
130 126 122 118 115 112 111 110 110 109
120 116 112 109 106 103 103 102 101 101
110 106 103 100 97 95 94 94 93 93
100 96 94 91 88 86 86 85 84 84
80 77 75 73 71 69 68 68 67 67
70 67 65 64 62 60 60 59 59 59
60 58 56 54 53 51 51 51 50 50
50 48 47 45 44 43 43 42 42 42
30 29 28 27 26 25 25 25 25 25
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Entrance Speed (+ bonus)


The best way to start with this is to give the entrance speed general formula:

  • Seconds from entry = (35 + (100-speed) * 0.8) * [potion factor] * variance

“Speed” is the speed stat of the monster.
The “0.8” is a relationship between the speed stat and the number of seconds… 1% speed = 0.8s.
“Potion factor” is explained below.
“Variance” is a small factor which I’ve never been able to work out but is minor.

What we have here is each monster gets a turn in 35 seconds plus their speed * 0.8. Potions will reduce the total time, not just the bit beyond the 35 seconds. Here’s an example of the fastest possible entrance speed being calculated then some useful numbers for reference in a table:
(35 + 1*0.8) * 0.842 = 30.1436s

Monster speed Entrance +0 (s) Entrance +5 (s) Entrance +9 (s)
99% 35.8 30.9 30.1
80% 51 44.1 42.9
60% 67 57.9 56.4
40% 83 71.7 69.9
20% 99 85.5 83.4

The fastest entrance possible is 30s and the fastest entrance for an unpotted monster is 35-36s. Interestingly, an accelerated 50TU skill (e.g. crescendo strike) becomes about this low, meaning they’re almost guaranteed to be able to use on each newly entering monster before it gets a turn.

Another great thing this table shows is how bonus to entrance speed has a much larger impact to slower monsters. Looking at +5 vs +0, the fastest monsters will only get a reduction of 5-7 seconds while the slowest get a reduction of 14 seconds!

Start of battle:
The start of battle works exactly the same with entrance speed. When the first monster gets a turn it’s actually 30+ seconds since the “start of battle”. This is important for some skill restrictions which say “100s since the start of battle”. If you use a 100TU move that’s reduced to 85TU then don’t worry because at least 100s will have passed from the start of the battle, even if it was the first monster to get a turn in the battle.

Potion factor explained:
Entrance speed still uses the old bonus system with percentage reduction on every +1 bonus. Collecting together information from the old move TU system it was possible to work out how much of a reduction we get from adding each bonus because both move TU and entrance used the same percentages. Unfortunately the reductions are slightly inconsistent across the different move TU’s, so I tried my best to find an average or the clearest, roundest number that ignored outliers and such. Basically, don’t take this as 100% accurate but it almost is.

Bonus Percentage reduction Potion factor
+0 0% 1.000
+1 3.3% 0.967
+2 6.15% 0.9385
+3 9% 0.910
+4 11.3% 0.887
+5 13.6% 0.864
+6 14.2% 0.858
+7 14.8% 0.852
+8 15.4% 0.846
+9 15.8% 0.842

Taking a look at this table you can see the amount of reduction given by each bonus from 0-5 is actually quite similar. 0-5 gives 13.6% reduction (average 2.72% per bonus) then 5-9 gives a further 2.2% reduction (average 0.55% per bonus).

Hence, taking a monster beyond +5 gives almost no faster entrance speed! In general when potting monsters you should go to +3, +6 or +9 to get the move TU reduction but you will get most benefit from the first 3 and almost as much from the next 3. Going from +6 to +9 is only really giving you the move TU reduction.

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Tips for using potions


So now let's bring everything together. There are two main factors: move TU and entrance speed. Move TU will reduce by 5% on every 3rd bonus, while entrance speed reduces by lots in the first +5 (13.6%) then only a tiny bit from +5 to +9 (13.6% to 15.8%). Also, in this section I will focus almost solely on legendaries. For epics you want to get all the important ones to +9 first, for super epics you should get all the important ones to +6 and then with excess potions take the best to +9 and for mythics there's no decision to be made because they automatically get +3 for each shard. However, there may be some specific super epics you want +9 for combos or because you use them everywhere so you may choose to boost these up first rather than get other good ones to +6.

We know from the analysis above that +5 is a great point to reach on monsters, but since move TU only reduces every “+3” then +6 is a more sensible stopping point. +9 is the ultimate goal for any of your monsters.


General rule:
If you’re looking for some simple, general rules to follow then here it is. Get limited monsters you like to +3 and when you have potions to spare make the best +6. If you get duplicates of a monster you use so it becomes +2, +5 or +8 then use a potion to get that third bonus for the move TU reduction. You will get monsters from the normal egg pool a lot more so I’d avoid potting them at all if you can, better to save your potions for the limited monsters. However, there are many ways you can do this so make up your own mind. Some normal egg pool monsters you will love or use a lot so having them +3 will be useful or there might be a particular monster you desperately want +9.


More strategic thinking:
If you’d rather feel like you’re being more clever with your use of potions or otherwise your potions are very limited and you want to know where to stick them then here are some things to think about:

  • The first +3 gives you the biggest boost. There’s very little reason to stop before +3 so a monster you want to pot should be taken to +3 at least.

  • Monsters with slow speed get a bigger boost on their entrance speed so those slow monsters you like to use which have a huge impact as soon as they get a turn may deserve the potions more.

  • Monsters which get their power from their passive skills that affect the battlefield (rather than their active skills) typically gain less benefit from potions because these passives receive no boost.

  • Monsters which rely on using moves frequently to perform well generally benefit from potions more, e.g. Polaboss heals with every crescendo strike and it charges with number of uses so attacking more frequently makes it both a far better damage dealer and harder to kill. Also this extends more generically to any monster with low TU moves and no immunity to stun because these monsters are typically built to have a lot of impact as long as they can keep attacking.

  • Monsters that gain combos or improved movesets because of reduced TU / entrance may need a specific amount of boost to unlock that, e.g. Chronotitan can be sped up so it can use bomb curse just before using OoO, which is a very effective way to get the bomb to go off.

  • Monsters that care most about getting their first turn quickly to make their impact but don’t care about move TU are good targets for +6 and not bothering to ever go higher (e.g. a number of cloning monsters like Doomengine or Sanctallion)

  • (More relevant to PvP) Monsters which are the ones you use in your front line for gaining control of the battle are good targets for making +6 or even +9 to take control as early as possible, e.g. repulse, OoO or cannibalise monsters.

  • Specific customisation (see below)

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Customising entrance speed / move TU


You may be wondering why you'd ever want to reduce the bonus on monsters once you've used the potions. However, there are a few cases which could make you want to do this or to pot another monster to keep something happening.

Here are some examples:

  • (Slowing GT with 160TU sweeping moves) Delugazar has a 160TU move that is extremely good for killing two enemies, double bloodthirst. It’s incredibly common to pair Delugazar with give turn monsters so you can use double bloodthirst as much as possible while Delugazar is alive. However, give turn is also 160TU so the two can get in the way of each other if you don’t have the bonuses done correctly. What you should do is you keep Delugazar “+3” more than the give turn monsters you use around him, or otherwise have their give turn TU adjusted to be slightly more than Delugazar’s double bloodthirst. By doing this it means he can get a move in right before the GT monster gets a turn again.

  • (Slowing moves so time restrictions are passed) Doomengine was a famously annoying monster to have potted before we got the option to customise move TU. The monster revolves around passing 150s for the twin bomb but the 70TU + 100TU moves go faster than 150s once the monster is potted too much. This is the most obvious example of a monster you want to lower the move TU bonus on but there are a few other examples too.

  • (Timing wake-up from OoO) As mentioned earlier in this guide, the amount of time a monster gets set back while asleep is 50TU but gets reduced by “seconds reduction” just like 50TU skills are. This can be utilised to your advantage if you know exactly how many seconds there will be between the monster using OoO (one-on-one) and this other monster. In some cases, by having the monster with the full +9 it will wake up just after getting a turn and have to wait 40+ seconds to get a turn. However, by reducing the bonus a little you can time it to get a turn 1-2s after waking up. This was popular on Captainwhiskers before it got nerfed. Originally the neko barrage attack (which kills all enemies through HG and shields) had a 300s restriction and when paired with a fast OoO it was possible to have Captainwhiskers get a turn 1-2s after waking up and then kill the entire enemy team before they got a turn with any of their monsters.

  • (Front line entrance speed) There are numerous cases where you want certain monsters to go in front or behind other monsters in the front line to get desired interactions. Cannibalise in front of retribution monsters, accelerate first, protect first… the list goes on. As you create different front lines you’ll see them all.

You may find there are other unique cases as you play with your monsters. Some interesting interactions can get caused by customising entrance speed and move TU! I hope this has given you enough to think about for using your potions.

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Please leave any comments you have in this thread here:
https://www.neomonstersforum.com/t/feedback-thread-for-killerdogs-guides/15934

See my main thread for more information/tips:
https://www.neomonstersforum.com/t/killerdogs-guides/15936/1