anonymoose

Relaaaaax, sometimes things take a while, and traps isn't the most popular set.

I took a quick glance and it looks good, you've covered most of the bases and my comments are mostly personal preference.

Looks like your pets are already softcapped, good stuff.

I personally like a defence shield instead of a resist shield, because it softcaps your mastermind.

The soulbound allegience buildup proc works nicely in assault bot, and is relatively cheap these days.

I have 6 slots in caltrops and use them a lot, it keeps everyone in the burn patches, does decent damage and accepts a lot of procs. The ragnarok KD proc works nicely if you've got the cash.

I might steal some slots from triage beacon, or maybe you're using it as a set mule.

Anyway, looks burntastic, hope you have fun with it.

I had a small taste of that getting the "Army of me" badge.

8 mid-level VEAT clones OBLITERATED our 8-man team at +2x0. The kind of team wipes you don't see outside the LRSF. We reset to -1x0. First try we killed 3 or so of them before we wiped, and finally beat them after hosping and regrouping.

Of course the mish clones aren't IO'd and probably don't have optimum power choices

Another time I joined an "Army of me" team in progress, they'd already wiped with a smallish party and had 8 MM clones waiting in the room, all pets summoned and buffed, don't remember what flavour. We got crushed trying to assault that room, so I convinced them to reset the mish and try again, the idea was to smash as many MMs as possible before they could summon pets. That battle was merely difficult.

Compare the size of the other aoe attacks. Footstomp is huuuuuge, and pbaoe, i.e. no fiddling with cones.

I don't know if it's the best, but it certainly doesn't feel underpowered.

I picked a defender for my Dual Pistols because let's face it, DP's good looks can't disguise the mediocre damage. A /DP defender gives you a great looking, fun toon with the full awesomeness of the primary, and some of those primaries are really, really awesome.

Broot can smash with voice?

Well these aren't good reasons, but here's why my main didn't bother with taunt...

It interrupts my attack chain, taking away valuable smashing time.

I have other powers I desperately want to take, especially at low levels.

I solo a lot.

Redside teams, especially PUGs, are usually every man for themselves, I certainly can't count on every corr on the team to go out of their way to heal me.

Running high level content I realise it's a hole in my build. It's no fun watching Statesman squish the squishies, no matter how hard I'm beating on him. One of these day's I'll plan a respec with taunt, but I probably still wouldn't think to spam it while PUGing normal content.

SS is a late bloomer. Footstomp greatly adds to your killing power, and also to your survivability - AoE knockdown is fantastic damage mitigation, and all those guys flat on their butts still contribute to WP's RttC regen buff.

A willpower tank is no doubt tougher, but how tough do you need to be? I've ended up soloing Statesman for a couple minutes at a time while teammates dashed back from the hospital, and my SS/WP is IO'd for recharge, not defence.

So hold them first.

Poison Gas Trap is an un-interruptable AoE hold. Run into the middle of the crowd and toebomb pgt.

If you're getting beat up too badly while laying pgt, start out by casting seeker drones into the middle of the crowd. While the mobs waste attacks on the drones, run into the middle of the group and toebomb pgt.

Now you can leisurely follow up with acid mortar and caltrops, micromanage your dumb minions, etc.

Ah, but he must care a little about inf, or he wouldn't be doing inf/minute calculations

Silver rolls might be a decent compromise between tedium and inf, they'll always be a better moneymaker then rare salvage.

Don't get me wrong, I love /dark too, but if you've got time to hit every single group with Fearsome Stare and tag someone with Darkest Night you've got time to toss down some caltrops and either Poison Gas Trap or Acid Mortar.

You are right on the brute's heels into the middle of the crowd, right?

Nice guide for an under-appreciated set.

A couple of comments from a bots/traps guy. My playstyle revolves around keeping stuff in the AssBot burn patches, but I imagine scourging rain of fire/ice storm would be play similar.

I 6-slotted caltrops and frankensklotted for slow/rech/dmg. I spam them like v1agra emails.

The ragnorok knockdown proc in caltrops is fantastic, aoe mitigation and indirect damage, i.e. KD'd mobs are in the kill zone longer.

You've got a place to slot some of the cheaper purples:

Web 'nade 5-slotted with Grav Anchor will keep bosses and LTs nicely inside the kill zone.

Seeker drones will take 5 Absolute Amazements.

(I suppose bots leaves me more free slots then most builds.)

Also, I agree that you'll rarely have room for TP foe, but it does a great job of pulling Malta Sappers and Cim Healbots out of the crowd, that's the only way my bubbler could handle those mobs

I've taken another route to survivability- softcap myself and pets, run on bodyguard mode.

I'm softcapped with ffg + black scorpion patron shield + protector bot shield.

Don't forget to toss 2 +DEF IOs in the protector bot.

My pets are softcapped with ffg + prot bot shields + maneuvers + the pet +DEF proc.

This setup is very survivable but I haven't tried tough/weave so I can't directly compare.

I could say the same thing about dark miasma - solo I use most or all of the control/debuff powers, on a steamrolling team it's unnecessary.

But when someone accidentally pulls a second group, or there's a big ambush, or something non-trivial like an AV shows up... those powers I haven't bothered with for a while are available and recharged. Bingo, what might have been "interesting" quickly becomes as routine as the trash mobs, and the team continues to steamroll.

LOL you've just described my /traps Mastermind, except for the auto thing.

Admittedly they benefit my pets as much as other players, but I skipped the fitness pool to squeeze that all in. The toon performs well on SFs, so I've invested in powers to keep everything moving smoothly and quickly.

1 thousand inf isn't even pocket change to a 50, even the guy with zero market skills vendors IO recipes for 100 thousand each.

I've managed to overcome my inner Scotsman, at least about salvage. I'm overjoyed to leave bids up and get a bargain for a purple recipe (only 65 million!) but I'm not going to creep-bid on common salvage to craft the thing.