by KipSansal
Overall Grade: A
General Overview:
The legendary gunslinger Mesa uses a combination of power and style to destroy almost anything that comes at her using pistols and secondaries as her main weapon of choice. Released in Update 15.5 on November 27th, 2014, she has remained a very strong frame, even through a nerf to her 4th ability.
Drop Locations:
Mesa Parts are ONLY available through (unfortunately) Mutalist Alad V Assassination on Eris. This requires Mutalist Alad V coordinates, which many players have groaned and moaned over trying to obtain. However, she is available to buy off the market, as many others have done. No shame in doing either.
Mesa currently has no prime version, however these are her current part rates off of Mutalist Alad V:
- Neuroptics: 38.72%
- Chassis: 38.72%
- Systems: 22.56%
Resource Requirements:
- Neuroptics require 1,500 Alloy Plates, 2 Neural Sensors, 350 Polymer Bundles, 500 Plastids and 15,000 credits.
- Chassis requires 1 Morphics, 50 Oxium, 300 Plastids, 1000 Nano Spores, and 15000 credits.
- Systems requires 1 Argon Crystal, 1600 Nano Spores, 300 Polymer Bundles and 500 Circuits, alongside 15000 credits.
Stats;
- Master Rank Required: 0
- Health/Shield: 125/75 (at rank 30; 375 H/ 225 S)
- Armor: 65
- Energy: 100 (at rank 30; 150 energy)
- Sprint: 1.1
- Polarities: 2 Naramon (-) and 1 Madurai (V)
Abilities (Vanilla and Efficient build stats will be displayed below):
Passive: Increased reload speed on single sidearms (20%), increased fire rate on dual-wielded sidearms(10%), and +50 health when a melee weapon is NOT equipped.
Ballistic Battery: On activation, all damage / hits caused by guns are stored, however will cap at 1600 damage. When triggered again, this damage is channeled into the next shot. Not entirely useless when it comes to Mesa utilizing as much damage as possible–if wanting to do high damage to say, a Bombard or a Boss, one should store damage to do a bit extra and make the fight a little faster. Not useless, but not amazing.
Shooting Gallery: Mesa’s main damage buff. Will give allies extra damage % while also disabling nearby enemies’ guns. However, this buff will -stay- on Mesa, meanwhile the team buff will shift between team members during the duration of the entire buff. For example, if I build for duration and my Shooting Gallery lasts 30 seconds, each team member will receive a 10 second buff, one by one.
Shatter Shield: Mesa’s main tanking ability. Shatter Shield reduces all incoming BULLET damage by a fixed percent, allowing her to go into most late/endgame missions with no problem as long as you’ve built her correctly for tanking. These bullets will ALSO be reflected, doing full damage against opponents as if they had shot themselves.
Peacemaker: The big guns. Mesa will draw her Regulator pistols, shooting down anyone in her path (As long as they’re within her Field of View). This ability suffered a nerf that no longer is a “Press 4 and sit back”, it is a “Press 4, hold M1 and aim in their general direction to win”. This ability SCALES with your secondary/pistol as well.
Pros and Cons of Mesa:
Pros: Mesa, if built correctly, can do RIDICULOUS damage for a frame, killing a 140 Corrupted Bombard/Heavy gunner in 2 seconds. Against armor-stripped enemies it becomes even MORE ridiculous, killing a 140 Corrupted Bombard/Heavy Gunner in a second. Her third ability lets her tank almost anything in late/endgame, making her incredibly useful for long survival / solo missions. Paired with an EV you have an almost unstoppable combo. Her tanking ability can literally reflect bombard rockets back at enemies–just think about that. With a cap of 95% damage reduction, you’ve got a strong tank.
NOTE: If you add arcanes, this frame gets ridiculous. On rank 3 Arcane Awakening on proc, you get a 40% chance for +100% damage with pistols for 16 seconds.
Cons: Mesa’s third ability does NOT protect against melee damage, her first ability does not infinitely store damage (Caps out at 1600) and suffers from energy issues in solo. She can NOT regenerate energy through Energy Restores, Siphon, Trinity’s EV, or anything of the sort while Peacemaker is active. As well as a 50 health addition with NO melee weapon, if you’re in a pinch and need to melee, you’re either taking a melee weapon or have 50 less health. Her augments to her 1-3 abilities do not change her much, and as such are really not needed. However her 4th ability augment is said to be coming out soon, so we will see.
Tips and Advice:
Mesa players should always have Shatter Shield up when enemies are nearby, especially higher level enemies as she has a low armor rating on her base stats. Using secondaries is her forte, so bringing only a primary and secondary is ideal, for that extra 50 health. Peacemaker’s fire rate scales the longer you have M1 pressed, and how many shots you have fired. At maximum, you’re doing almost 7-13 shots per second. Building your pistols well is a must as well! Since her Peacemaker scales with your pistol as well, you should focus on high damage pistols, and have status or crit play a secondary role.
Build:
Mesa main build (NOTE: These are NOT maximum values and without arcanes, as some mods are not fully ranked in these situations. A full 5 forma is needed for all maxed out mods WITH Power Drift added in exilus adapter slot, with a total of : 1 Dash in Aura, 3 Dashes, 1 D, and 2 V’s. ) If you would like to build her yourself, building for positive efficiency, and mostly strength/duration are key.
Stats of abilities (before and after current build):
Pistol Builds: (using corrosive damage in this case, change as needed. Take note, these are examples of pistol builds, nothing is better than the other in this case.)
