_Elektro_

Like I said, I was just asking for opinion. I certainly didn't mean to tell people they don't 'invite me enough' or something of that nature.

The reason I wanted to know if anyone else had this problem was to get a sense of :

Is it the archetype? (That's a whole other discussion on whether people know they need a tank, or there are too many tanks, etc. etc)

-or-

Is it a population thing at level 30+?

Because if it's just me, that's ok. I'm ok with forming teams. Probably not now because my tank is very dated, but eventually.

The reason I said it doesn't happen to my other toons is not so much my choice of naming convention (though I don't think any of the names would offend anyone. , but instead I was wondering if it was just people think they do better without a tank, or bad luck, or his level.

Just sort of an informal poll. While my tank is a lot of fun, I did get a lot of teams with him a year ago. So I wondered if it was just me or I'm seeing the result of a population drop.

Thanks again.

ok. Thanks for the replies.

Just wondering if it was just me. To be honest the only character I have this issue with is my 31 Tank, so I was just wondering if it was a population thing or....?

So thanks for the advice.

Hey guys,

I'm still testing out a few of my favorite characters after nearly a year away from the game.

One of my fave's was as an old tanker I made (pre I/O era) and I dusted him off, found him broke, and in dire need of a respec.

He's still pretty darn effective without the best of I/O's but I found teaming with him VERY difficult. I think he's level... 31.

I do find ONCE I'm on a team, it goes really well, and you get the old 'I'll friend you' messages, and compliments on tanking, but it's -finding a team- that I'm having trouble with.

I don't have a lot of content on this guy yet, but I'm always LFT.... but this character is hard pressed to get an invite. This has happened over 4-5 evenings and I started to wonder is this a common problem for a tank in the 30's?

No I am not in an SG. As mentioned, I just came back a few weeks ago. I was just disappointed in the lack of team invites for this guy and wanted to know if it was normal or not? (I moved this guy from Guardian to Freedom in hopes of fixing the problem, but no luck.)

Thanks.

Well now at nearly level 26 (I think a bubble away), I have to say this guy is doing well.

As a fire/ice I see the benefits of mixing these two, even though I am probably much more 'fire' reliant. The ice patch is huge for soloing when things just simply aren't going my way.

This guy really shines on teams though. I'm amazed (with a good tank, and even just a few buffs) how omnipotent and devastating this guy feels in large missions. The AOE's are icing on the cake. If I have a team without too many people pushing mobs, and scattering them with various powers, it is very good damage output even in the mid 20's.

It's a simple enough combo... Hasten + Aim + Build Up + Fire Ball + Fire Breath = mob gone.

As I said earlier my character is pretty broke, so there's a lot of 'discount' and Franken-slotting going on here. I don't think I have an I/O on him worth more than a bucket of beans, and he still does the job pretty well.

That's the fun stuff... being on a good team that lets me crank out those AOE's and finish up with single target stuff.

Soloing is getting a little rougher. I haven't upped my mission difficulty but the mob type is trickier, even after adapting my playstyle, I can see this is always going to be my character's achilles heel.

At 26 I still haven't picked up a travel power, nor Aid Self. I'm doing fine with mission teleporter and Ninja Jump and this way my character's powers are pretty well rounded but yes I can definitely see the benefit of Aid Self in solo mode.

So far so good... he's fun, and even funner on a team. Some times it -does- feel.... repetitive, but he's really starting to shine.

Thanks again for all the tips.

Well you guys are certainly giving me a ton of good options.

Since I rolled the Fire/Ice I have worked hard on him given my limited play time. Solo was painful... but if there's no team... there's no team.

I started with honest intentions of getting badges, but he just has so much trouble with the 'rescue' style story archs.

I reached a point where I just really wanted to get him closer to 20.... I made contact with Huge Redding and I simply ran back and forth buying tons of insps, gulping them down, and running to the park at Steel Canyon (10 yards away from Hugo) and downing as many CoT as I could in hopes of 1: Leveling. And 2: Getting good Salvage.

Doing this in a short (but boring) time burst I reached level 12, got 5 Ancient Artifacts, 6 Luck Charms, and 4 Scrolls.

The thing is do you keep these at this level so you can make some of the better recipes? Or do you let them go for short term financial gain? Hard to say.

Finally I realized I was down to about 20K influence from my little Huge/Insp/CoT trick, but I landed a fantastic team. My time was limited but the damage output was good. We headed to Faultline and I hit 18 in a couple short hours! (6 levels)

Part way through I trained up and saw -some- of the good stuff you guys are talking about... I gave him some of the powers you guys have suggested are 'must have'. (admittedly I would have normally taken aim OR build up at this point, but not both).

And as a result even pre-Stamina, Pre-IO, I could see some light at the end of the tunnel. Ice had a soft control from level 1, and now I had a little bust combo of :
Hasten + Aim + Build Up + Fire away... pretty much torched anything. With a good defender buffing me (even at that level) it was a considerable amount of damage!

That was probably the best time I've ever had with a blaster. I think of the small, but very significant changes I made in his build thanks to this thread, and I just wanted to say thanks.

So he's called: Prazus and he's on Freedom. I really hope to stick him out to 50.... would be a first on a blaster. Feel free to shoot me a tell if you're on there! He does seem like he's starting to come around, but I don't want to jump the gun.

The few things I haven't decided on are still Travel Power? (I'm enjoying the 'spare' powers afforded by Ninja Run/Sprint) Aid Self? (yes I definitely see the short term benefit of this.. especially solo, but it's two powers at a level where it feels like you want everything!)

Fire and Ice seem really fun... more fun than I thought. I've only got the first power from Ice for the soft control, and I skipped Fire Rain until I get Stamina rolling, but this is definitely the most fun I've had on a blaster in the last... 6 years!!! So again I really appreciate all the great ideas, and suggestions you guys have given me. It's helped a lot.

yea I'm really enjoying this character so far. I'm taking my time, getting most of the badges, etc. He's 27 and seems very flexible, but he does suffer from some massive health hits if a halfway decent NPC gets a few successive shots in....

I think he'll need tough. I don't want to get it, but even at level 27 if a 'red' Hewer boss gets two shots in, I go down to about 1/3 health. I think shields relies on the defense a lot....

I'm also considering dropping CJ because I never got super jump and just enjoy ninja run. It's really nice not having to dump powers on traveling.

Thanks for the advice.

I'm currently working my 2.0 blaster (fire/ice) and I can start to see where this might go.

Now that I apparently have the primary/secondary out of the way, let's talk about complimentary pools/powers that also go along with my overall goals.

Firstly, I'm using Ninja Run/Sprint/Hurdle, and it's not bad complimented with Bank Mission Powers.... But how important is Flight to a blaster in my type of build? Hover is nice but not nearly... always useful. Flight is nice too.

I have a level 27 scrapper that I just made since coming back to CoH and he's only got the Ninja Run Combo and I find he moves really well. I also landed a universal but in reading up on that, it looks like a bad recipe... anyway getting off track.

So Aid Self is pretty much needed. How about Tough/Weave ? Or is the mentality that if you're relying on Tough/Weave you're probably in too much trouble as it is?

I used to always think of "flight" pool as a very "blaster" thing. Is this still true?

Okay... I just rolled a fire/Ice.... first time for that combo.

I went with an outcast/CoT/Magic kind of theme. It works. We'll see how far I get with this guy!

Thanks again.

Just a quick thought...

I am creating a new blaster (against my earlier post's ideas) and I never tried radiation blast. No one really said anything about that one.... any thoughts?

Sorry folks, I didn't mean for my original post to come off as a 'I want to power level' request.

Basically, as some of you figured out, I'm talking about a blaster that can handle himself, but has some contributing factor to teams. But most importantly, from the more experienced blaster, I was hoping to find out which sets are going to... 'empower' me the most throughout the levels without making it too much of a grind.

I'm probably only on an hour a day so it makes joining a real group difficult. (Most seem fairly barren these days anyway). So pug'ing and soloing is about all I do.

I fired up my elec/elec, my energy/energy, and my archery/dev.... I got back in the mode of pulling, and separating groups that have too large an alpha... I still found it extremely frustrating.

I logged my scrapper back on, finished a story arch and got 15 merits, a very rare recipe, and wondered... why does it have to be like this between these two archtypes? I know I shouldn't ask.....

Anyway, I'm still trying to figure this out, but now I'm thinking of just sticking with ONE of the blasters I have in the low numbers because to be quite honest, I'm really burned out on doing the levels 1-20. (I created and/or ran about 10 characters from 0-10 or 0-15).

There's only so much of that 0-19 content you can take without wanting to stab your eye out with a monitor or something.

So here's the new question:

Of these Blasters, which do you think gives the average player the best combination for the following criteria (in order):
+ Soloing
+ Leveling Capability
+ Team Friendly
+ Potent in most levels of the game (0-50)

-I realize there are other choices I have to make myself, like what looks cool? Feels funnest, etc.

Here is what I have:
LVL 20: Archery/Devices (seems pretty good actually, but I had a bad death run with him)
LVL 10: Elec/Elec (Elec is one of the 'fun' sets to me, but seems behind the rest?)
LVL 12: Energy/Energy (probably one of my favourite concepts, but the sound of that energy blast is driving me nuts! Plus I hear everyone hates knockback on blasters? But if it's the big vote getter, I'll try it)
LVL 21: Assault Rifle/Devices (this guy dies a lot and seems to take a long time to kill anything)

I know I'm forgetting something... Right now I'm really, really wishing I hadn't deleted my level 28 fire/fire. I really liked the look/sound/feel of fire. The AOE's were 'fun' but what a debt magnet. Again, I have no doubt I'm a big part of that. lol That being said, posters like Aragain are tempting me to roll my 3rd one.

Thanks for looking and your advice is much appreciated.

Thanks John.

Unfortunately I became so frustrated with my fire/fire... I deleted him... he was about 28 at the time. lol

The effects.. visually, I loved, the AoE's were fun but man did I pay for them.

I just can't seem to get anything done with my AR/Dev blaster....

I've just fired up my 20 archer/dev blaster... we'll see how it goes. I made him when Archery came out... so I'll be rusty.

Fire/fire was fun, but if I recall.... as you say, he needed a lot of support to stay alive, but he did great mob damage.

I am sorry to make one of these threads, but as I've come back to this great game, one of the archtypes I have to admit (embarrassingly) that I've never got past 30 is a Blaster.

I want to do a concept blaster up, and have him work well alone, but be a good contributor in a team.

The reason I'm posting this is I really know little about how to answer my own question, and as I've admitted, I've failed even getting past 30 with any blaster I've made.

Closest? Fire/fire. I had a guy that always got invited to teams... but his debt load (this is years ago) was massive.

Funnest? Tie Elec/Elec. I always loved "Electro" but the first version didn't do much. The second version was built for END drain, but made him terrible on his own.... I now have a 3rd version (Krackle) and he's fizzled out at like... level 10.

The other funnest? Arrows/Devices. Looks cool, but is it just me or is he slow?

I really hate to put up a post like this, but considering how little success I've had with blasters, I'd appreciate the thoughts of those of you that have hit 50 with a blaster or two.

Thanks for the answers Santorican.

I'm thoroughly enjoying the shields. I am getting a little tired of DM though... in the last years I have made probably too many DM characters, but I couldn't think of anything that seemed to fit as well with shield.

And yes, I did use searchy. Thanks for the advice. I'm about to respec at 27... but I might build a blaster next.... We'll see. Shield is a lot of fun though.

Hey all,

I came back from a fairly lengthy hiatus and created a few new toons on Freedom. Namely Srixxon my scrapper. He's been a ton of fun, but I'm not sure I'm understanding Shields too well.

Firstly, it seems strange to me that it appears to be largely defense based. I was under the impression it would be a resistance set thanks to an object between your body and incoming damage.... to me it would seem the damage would negate portions of damage, but I guess they did it this way to make it unique? The reason I bring this up is I'm starting to see shields as a 'jack of all trades' / 'master of none' kind of secondary. Would you agree with this?

Anyway Dark Melee is an old friend of mine, and I feel comfortable with the build from that stand point. It's fun, and has some utility and fits my character's style, but here's what I'm wondering about Shields:

1- Why do so few people seem to slot TRUE GRIT with health? I am only level 26 but seeing some nice survivability bonuses from greater hitpoints. Am I missing something?

2- DEFLECTION: To me this seems to benefit defense/resistance equally. I see very few people slot it for resistance, why is that? Personally I have taken TOUGH early, and slotted DEFLECTION 6 times with a combo of end rdx/Def/Res. Is this a bad idea?

3- PHALANX FIGHTING and GRANT COVER: Are these powers in anyway useful as a solo player?

4- This might be a little vague but can a Shield Defense scrapper take on AV'S? (without uber slotting?).

5- With Shield Defense, is TOUGH mandatory for late game survival?

Thanks for reading. That's it for my questions for now. Like I said, I'm enjoying coming back to the game, and have been slowly leveling this toon and grabbing all the mission arch badges I can... he's been a blast, but felt a tad... glass like at time... he almost reminds me of Regen but again, right now he's only 26.

Thanks.

I like the guide, but 2 attacks for 12 levels of play seems a tad harsh. I see why you did it, but it must be really hard to avoid another attack in that time.

+Edit+
Oops, missed follow up.

And no stamina needed?

Very nice contrast in the two characters.... feisty and sexy! Very nice.

[ QUOTE ]
Very cool! Gratz!

*ordering now*

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks again for the nice compliments. I guess it doesn't really support me, or hurt me if you order the book. Heck I just ordered a copy myself. I think it's mostly someone else's interior art. I just did a few issues of this series.

Thanks very much for the compliments. I really appreciate it.

As far as suing, a lot of these companies have very little money. Barely enough to publish a book.

I'm in Canada, and back in the day I used to shop my portfolio down in San Diego and stand in god awful line ups hoping for a shot....

Most of the time as you improve you get a 'shot' with very small publishers. I was very close to getting a very good gig on a very popular book, but in the end I was doing a lot of work for small publishers.

Over the years I notice an issue here or there get advertised on the 'net.

I think my worst finding was a publisher that asked me to come up with an idea based on a female character (they sell better in the independent market overall). So I did, and I had a contract to go up to issue 7, at 27 pages a month. That's a lot of art. I never got the first issue back so I never sent the rest in for scanning...(Publisher claimed they were lost in shipping). Long story short, a writer I worked with in N.Y. went to a comic convention and called me up to tell me the Publisher was selling my original pages at about 80-100+ bucks a page.

So it's a really scary business. I'd suggest caution to anyone who'd giving it a serious shot. It's one thing to subject yourself to an editor who will rip your work to shreds, but it's another when you are getting taken for a rid by shady publishers.

I just found this piece, but I've actually been published a few times. I just thought I'd share this with a like minded group of fans.

Thanks again for the kind words.

I've been a fan of comics, and especially comic art since I was a kid (like many of you I'm sure).

A decade ago I used to work very hard at becoming a penciller and I nearly got in the door with Marvel before the firing of my only contact there....

Anyway long story short, I got ripped off by a lot of independent companies, but some were okay.

Every once in a while I Google my name to see if anyone has published my artwork that I did for comic companies that I never got paid for (or the company just went out of business or whatever).

I found another one! This was something I drew a few issues of and never got paid for and had a few disagreements with the publisher.

I actually remember drawing the cover for this issue. Check it out:

Cover shot:
http://www.atlantisstudios.net/images/covers/wotp.jpg

Order page:
http://www.atlantisstudios.net/store.htm

I never posted in here before, but thought this might be the appropriate place.

I just moved my level 30 Inv/SS tank to Freedom.... and I was completely lost with the new IO system. (I just came back after a few months off).

And then I stumble on this guide. Wow, what a fantastic job. Some of this guide makes my head hurt, but what a great, detailed job you've done.

Stupid question time. As I make builds based on some info you have shared here, I can't help but wonder, would there be such a thing as a pure 'offensive' based tank build?

All of your builds are great but they focus on complimenting the defensive nature of the tank. Would it be possible instead to emphasize the damage output of the character with I/O's?

I see some I/O's with smashing/lethal damage possiblities or something like that. I'm not sure how it would fit or even if it's worth the effort. Do you have any thoughts?

Thanks again for this. I'm tearing my tank apart right now, and rebuilding him using this advice (probably do the same with my DM/REG scrapper (38) too.)

Just to add to the comments. As someone who's come back to the game from a bit of a break, this guide is a godsend.

The guide would even be better with your additional comments. Stuff like 'buying' did not click with me. Now I see you actually 'bid' on things for 'sale'. Still this is kinda confusing to me. Is there a way of seeing the 'minimum' bid in order to buy something that is listed for sale? This seems awkward.

I'd like to know more about sets. What defines a set? If you have a special IO, and it gives a 'set bonus'... does that mean you need all of them? Can they be slotted in any power? Or do they have to be all contained in the same power to have their bonus kick in?

Thanks again. This is very helpful.

Great guide.

I'm not sold on leadership as I think it definitely dictates the need for Stamina.

Personally my best MM was a 32 Ninja/Poison MM that I've been playing since beta, but got bored of him. Man did I need stamina.

Anyway, with my Bots/FF guy, I'm only 21, but I'm actually considering skipping Stamina (for the first toon EVER). I'm frankly tired of taking 3 power to essentially get one (although I'm sure you could argue the validity of health). Everyone I team with warns me against skipping Stamina with FF.

So, I'm kinda stuck. I enjoy this toon a lot.. enough in fact to go looking at articles like this (which does rock by the way). But one thing that doesn't make any sense to me... look at when you guys are taking Stamina... why even bother? It can't be that necessary if you're taking it that late in the game.

And I did take the grenade attack. I'm totally sold on it. I would hate to drop it, for the same reason that someone else mentioned (the damage isn't bad, and the stun effect is great).

I also took the isolation field (or whatever it's called), what a life saver if you solo. I often bubble the boss and it sticks more than it misses. At the very least I'll bubble a LT and that buys me a good chunk of time to get the toasters firing on all cylinders.

I haven't taken any of the 'Aid' line up, nor leadership. It saves me time and lots of slots for my single attack (grenade). But what I do swear by is the two early bubbs. Even with just DO's and the Dispersion bubble, I can quite clearly see how much improved 'Defense' is. It's nice seeing enemies miss once in a while.

I'm not sure if it's really worth getting Aid other. The protector bot does a good job, and if I lose one, it's usually a low level bot. I don't want to fall into the trap that I did with my Ninja MM.... I was so busy healing ninjas with my poison ball of snot, it bored the crap out of me and became a very labour intensive set to play.

My opinon may be in the minority, but I don't die very often unless I'm in a team wipe situation. Like I said, my biggest surprise is how late you're all taking Stamina, like I said, what's the point? Can't you skip it, if you've got all the bots up and running?

Things I'm considering changing since reading your guide:
- Dropping my only attack. (It's a tough call. It looks purty and I think it is effective)
- Stamina: no idea. I have 'sprint' right now, but no idea if I should respec out of it. This guide confuses me on Stamina.
- Aid Pool. Didn't even consider it before now, but it looks interesting.
- Leadership. I was thinking of skipping it, but if I consider leadership, that means I have to take Stamina (IMHO). My other toons that had it are sucking wind without Stamina. So in other words Leadership means 5 Power Choices. ouch. Maybe not.
- Flight. The status protection provided by Jumping is covered by Dispersion field, so I'm thiniking Flight would be fun.

Any additional help would be cool. Again, great guide. I'd like to see other builds and additonal 'pre-26 builds, and post 26 builds. I have a feeling what I'm seeing up there for your build isn't what you took at my level (I'm 21).

Thanks again. Great job!

Thanks for this guide. It's one of the few I can find that openly suggests something for both Ice and Cold.

I wish you had a few more builds for me to consider... this is a tough one.

Speaking of PvP, I wanted to ask you if you are looking at how Hide functions in PvP.

I don't know if this is a result of beta, but back in beta there was a lot of fear mongering, and knee jerk reactions to Stalkers in PvP. The hero communitty in general seemed to think we could one shot anyone, at anytime.

Now I feel we're at the opposite end of the spectrum. There are so many ways to counter Hide, and many of them put the Stalker at a severe disadvantage. Can we get some effectiveness put into Hide? Right now it's as easy as an Insight Inspiration, a Targetting Drone, a mission reward, an aura, etc to reveal us.

I don't think we should have to dip into a pool power to get Hide to function (minimally) in PvP.

Hide is our defining function. I don't want to be _impossible_ to see, but right now I honestly feel we're far too easy to counter. Thoughts?