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Doll review

Overview

UMP9 is a craftable four-star German SMG and the sister of UMP45. She is a part of ‘Squad 404’ along UMP45, HK416, and G11.

Her skill, the Stun Grenade, will completely stop certain enemies in a large radius, making her fairly good at crowd control and tanking. Although there are many potentially stronger and more generally usable main tanks, her strong crowd control combined with her solid stats make her a decent and easy-to-use option for any ARSMG teams in need of a tank.

Pros

Good Tiles

UMP9’s tile shape lets her be placed on the usual position 5 and reach any ARs in the backline. The multiplier on her tiles is similar to that of many other decent main-tanks like RO’s, and therefore decent.

Strong Crowd Control

Stun grenades will stop affected enemies from moving or attacking, sometimes buying valuable time.

Cons

Long Initial Cooldown

5 seconds initial cooldown and an extra couple seconds for the grenade’s throwing and flight animation means oftentimes battles are over before UMP9 lands the stun.

Ineffective Against Certain Enemies

Stun grenades do not have any effect against bosses and specific other enemies like Doppelsölders, which means UMP9 would only be left with her defensive stats, where a survival self-buffing main tank would perform better.

Full analysis

Performing well in a tank position usually requires a good mix of well-balanced stats and a skill that offers sufficient utility. UMP9, while not the absolute best in either of these areas, still brings enough to the table to garner consideration for use in AR Echelons.

UMP9 is a decent tank, toting 880 HP and 76 Evasion. She does not have any glaring deficiency in this regard -- though her kit is not exactly suited for dodge tanking so much as it is suited for controlling the flow of battle, which is mostly due to her skill.

UMP9’s Stun Grenade skill is what allows her to enact crowd control, as it completely stuns enemies within a 2.5 unit radius for a 4 second duration. UMP9 does, however, suffer from a mismatch in this regard as her skill has an initial cooldown of 5 seconds, which is only added to by the aiming and travel time of her grenade. UMP9’s Stun Grenade will in most battles be activated too late, and since Stun Grenades do not work on bosses or certain units, she cannot take advantage of it as much as she would like to. Therefore UMP9 is better off in mid-length fights, where her stun grenade can buy time for the DPS to get through beefier enemy setups.

ARs that self-buff their own RoF like ST AR-15 and Type 97 are often able to max out their own RoF due to their self-sufficient kit, and therefore would not benefit much from UMP9’s RoF tiles. The 30% accuracy buff is something ARs do not often need much of given their high innate accuracy, but can help a little for more evasive enemies. When these two factors are taken into account, while UMP9’s tiles can’t be considered to be actively detrimental, they are largely less applicable in a wide number of compositions than Damage or Crit Rate buff tiles.

Other maintank SMGs like MP7, P90, and RO635 that can perform better survivability-wise due to strong self buffs with similarly long initial cooldowns to UMP9 are available, and their skills work in boss fights. Because of this, UMP9 is generally only used for early options and when stun grenades are required.

Overall, these factors do not make UMP9 a bad SMG. She is a decent choice as a tank, but not without some downsides. While she’s nowhere near bad, she is perhaps not as efficient as she could be.

Mod review

Overview

UMP9’s Mod brings her stun length up to her 5 star counterpart’s and adds a skill 2 that adds some extra survivability/support potential to her kit. Her Mod III special equipment is a fancy EOT and not really needed for a maintank, so stopping at Mod II will be fine. Her skill 2 is a passive whose effect is determined by the state of the target. If the target dies before the stun grenade lands or is cannot be stunned, so that would be bosses and certain units, she provides a 25 HP shield and a 25% evasion buff to her column including herself. If the stun grenade is successful, she instead provides a 50% damage buff to everyone in her column including herself. This flexible support buff can have interesting applications, as well as attempts to fix the flaw of stun naders being useless against unstunnable enemies. There are a lot of great contenders for the maintank slot, but if one knows how to use her then UMP9 Mod is an additional option to invest in.

Pros

Good Tiles

UMP9’s tileshape lets her be placed on the usual position 5 and reach any ARs in the backline. The multiplier on her tiles is similar to that of many other decent maintanks like RO’s, and therefore decent.

Strong Crowd Control

Stun grenades will stop affected enemies from moving or attacking, sometimes buying valuable time.

Flexible Support Skill

UMP9 Mod can puff the survivability of the front row for units that need it like off-tanks or buff the dps depending on the situation of the enemy

Cons

Long Initial Cooldown

5 seconds initial cooldown and an extra couple seconds for the grenade’s throwing and flight animation means oftentimes battles are over before UMP9 lands the stun.

Less Effective Against Certain Enemies

Stun grenades do not have any effect against bosses and specific other enemies like Doppelsölders, which means UMP9 Mod gets what is usually a weaker survivability buff than other maintanks.

Potentially Difficult to Control Result

UMP9 Mod’s stun grenade could have an unpredictable result. Even against swarms of enemies that can be stunned, even if her grenade lands, there is the likelihood that the dps will kill her chosen target before the stun lands, and the defensive portion will activate instead.

Position Dependent Skill

Because her passive is column based, it requires position specific movement, which will not be easy in situations with high damage pressure, during kiting, or when fighting bosses that attack certain positions.

Full analysis

It should be noted that UMP9 Mod’s tiles and base tanking stats are still decent, albeit a little stronger due to her mod 1. As always, ARs that can use extra RoF in the first place appreciate it. Her skill 2 result is highly dependent on the type of enemy. It is a passive whose effect is determined by the state of the target. If the target dies before the stun grenade lands or is cannot be stunned, so that would be bosses and certain units, she provides a 25 HP shield and a 25% evasion buff to her column including herself. If the stun grenade is successful, she instead provides a 50% damage buff to everyone in her column including herself. To be able to get the most out of it, commanders should know which version of the skill will proc against the enemy you are facing. If directly tanking the enemy is not the concern but just bursting them down as quickly as possible, then her mod 3 special equipment might come in handy as an EOT, but otherwise it is better to just stop at mod 2. The defensive portion of her skill 2, the hp shield and evasion buff, is generally weaker for evasion tanking than other defensive skills. Because of this, while it lightens the issue, UMP9 Mod is still not well suited for fighting bosses. However, because it provides an HP shield, which is valuable for lowering chip damage and link splashing attacks, and buffs her entire column, the defensive portion can be used to further increase her survivability against the enemies that are not stunned. Additionally, it will lower the chance that the off-tank will take chip damage, which is especially helpful for direct-fire off-tank SMGs like SR-3MP. The offensive portion of UMP9 Mod’s skill 2 is a massive 50% column-wide damage buff. This can either be used to benefit the off-tank SMG’s dps or one can move UMP9 Mod to the back row while she is in her grenade throwing animation, thus providing the backline dps ARs with insane burst damage similar to Ribeyrolles. Keep in mind that doing this means risking the maintank’s protection while UMP9 Mod moves to the backline before her stun kicks in, and will not provide anything useful to the dps if the enemy her stun grenade lands on turns out to be dead or unstunnable. UMP9 Mod still suffers from certain issues due to her stun grenade’s niche applications, but with some creative applications and good skill management she can provide some great utility to a team.