Arbegla

I usually slot performance shift Endmod, Endmod/rech (or endmod/acc, whichever is cheaper at the time) and the +end proc. I like the 5% movement speed bonus, and the 1.88% HP bonus is nice too. I really don't need the 2.5% recovery, as I can get that other places and it'll benefit me more with other powers.

Plus yes, all in all the +end proc is very useful, and the more you have, the less likely you are to bottom out your endurnace, even if your getting end drained (as each proc may tick every 10 seconds, but due to the 20% chance, one could proc on 10 seconds, another could proc at 20 seconds, and both could proc at 30 seconds)

I"m really only interested in Powersets.

While Costumes are nice, the powersets are what your using, and most times costumes are just a blur of color and design when your smashing powers like crazy.

So far, I've been able to buy both powersets that have been release, being Beam Rifle and Street Justice, and i have about 350 points left over. Which gives me just enough to pay for another powerset next month. Also, being a VIP I didn't have to pay for /time, which a premium player would have to pay for. That basically 'saves' me 800 points right there.

Then you have the SSA (currently 800 points as well..) plus IOs, the market, AE, etc. There are plenty of things a VIP get that a premium or free account wouldn't, and try to undervalue those things because you want to have things NOW just isn't correct at all.

Another thats not actually mentioned is the sheer amount of -regen poison gas trap has. Its -1000%. And perma with 200% recharge, for reference, the other -regen values that other powersets have are as follows:

/dark: -50% in twilight grasp (perma without any enhancements), -500% in howling twilight (requires 100% recharge to perma), -50% in dark servant's twilight grasp (could be perma, if dark servant used it often enough)

/poison: -25% in envemon (perma without any enhancements)

/thermal: -200% in Heat Exhaustion (requires 200% recharge to perma)

/time: -100% in Time crawl (perma without any enhancements), -50% in time stop (easily perma)

/trick arrow: -1000% in emp arrow (unable to be perma, due to 300 seconds recharge, 15 second duration)

Now, looking at other non MM secondaries, and using defender values:

/cold: -500% in benumb (requires 300% recharge to perma)

/kin: -50% in transfusion (perma without enhancements)

/rad: -500% in Lingering radiation (requires 200% recharge to perma)

So in conclusion, poison gas trap has the highest -regen value out of any -regen powers, double what Lingering Radiation gives, while requiring the exact same recharge.

For now, SOs are your best bet. Once you get a better handle on the IO system, which is worth looking into, you can branch into that. Until then, just use SOs.

And Even with IOs your still limited by ED, so sticking with 2 or 3 slots in those powers is the best bet.

I love my dual pistol/dev, mainly due to cloaking device, and smoke grenade.

Keep cloaking up, smoke grenade a mob, and toe bomb a trip mine. They have -preception, so they don't notice you, and just queue up hail of bullets, so right as the mine goes off, your shooting your guns. everything dies.

With enough recharge, you can do it every 20 or so seconds, or you can throw caltrops, and kite your way around mobs shotting at them in the face as they crawl over your caltrops.

On a SO build, you only want to 3 slot (maybe even just 2) fast healing, health, stamina, and quick recovery. Resilence on SOs only need 2 slots (1 with IOs) but recon, dull pain, and IH need 6 slots (3 healing, 3 recharge, slot the recharge first, then the healing) MoG could get away with 3 slots (all recharge) as the base defense, and resistance values throw you over the caps anyways.

Most of your attacks can be slotted with 3 damage, 1 acc, 1 end reduct, and 1 recharge. Integration can get away with 4 slots (3 heal, 1 end reduct)

On SOs, the above slotting should last you quite awhile, and give you plenty of slots to play with in other powers. 1 thing to keep in mind though is ED, which is http://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Enhancement_Diversification which in a nut shell basically says that anything over 3 of 1 aspect (3 damage, 3 healing, etc) is wasted.

You could also change one of the damages for a recharge in your attacks, but with claws being as fast as it is normally, i'd lean on the damage more then the recharge.

Probably a claws/elec or claw/SR brute. Even at low levels you have decent resistance, very nice damage (spin and your lightning field) and a decent-ish single target chain (especially if you cycle in brawl)

I for one really enjoy the ambushes. It not just forced me to focus entirely on the game (something i have an issue with sometimes, ADHD is mostly to blame there) but it also lets me 'field test' my characters.

I build almost all my characters in mids before i play them, then work my way up to the mids build as i level them up, this lets me get a feel for the character before i spend billions on a build, and because of that i don't always get to field test the characters. If i can handle X number of ambushes on a SOs build that follows similar enhancement values as my IO build, then my character is working out great. If i can't, then i need to rethink the approach i'm doing.

Enough though they make this guy out to be a tool sometimes (i/e Iron man 1) Its nice to know he is more then just a desk clerk.

Well, it looks to me like Mids does some pigg diving of their own to keep ahead of the 'curve' if you will of what the devs throw out. That way they can release the information on 'release day' instead of having to wait for them to re-code everything once its released to the live servers.

But, these set bonuses look like either specfic IO sets, or IOs that will be added at a later time (i21.5 or i22 perhaps?) especially if they are linkable on the live servers right now.

+healing will NOT affect +regen powers.

So it will NOT affect rest, or health.

+healing will also not affect self affecting healing powers that do more then just heal (i/e recon, dull pain, etc)

+healing only affects healing powers with no other benefit (Healing aura, heal other, etc)

So, basically, +healing will not benefit /traps (triage beacon is +regen, unaffected by +healing), /TA, /storm (O2 boost gives resistance to other affects), /poison (the heal gives +toxic resistance), /FF, /cold (frostwork is not a heal, its a +HP boost, like dull pain), and /sonic (no form of healing at all)

If you need to see what powers will benefit from +healing set bonuses, load them up in mids, and apply a +healing set bonus to them (easist way is to 4 slot numina's in health, and look at the value of the power your looking at, if the heal value goes up, its affected by +healing set bonuses)

Kinetic Melee is best on a scrapper, and second best on a stalker, then prolly ok on a tanker, and worse on a brute (due to power siphon being mostly negated by fury)

Street Justice is best on a brute (due to fury feeding the combo system) Ok on a scrapper (your critting off combo 0, which means stacking combos don't mean higher crit values) decent on a tanker (intial strike is your bruising power, so you have to work with more recharge to get decent attack chains, but your BU powers gives you combo points atleast) and worse on a stalker (limited combo building until last 20s, Bu doesn't give combo points etc)

Good armor sets on a scrapper are shield, Good armor sets on a brute are elec armor, fire armor, willpower, and regen. Everything else is about even between those 2 ATs.

The best armor set on a stalker is /nin. really, thats about it. Its not that the others are that bad, is just that /nin is THAT good.

So from the above infomation, I'd go a kin/nin stalker, and a stj/wp brute, with kin/WP stalker, and stj/EA being a secondary choice.

Kin/nin is very nice due to stacking the -dmg from kinetic melee with the high +defence of nin, so when you do get hit, its not as hard, and the quick recharging heal keeps you alive. Plus the kin/ AS is pretty nice, and BU->AS->placate->CS->BU is a pretty nice attack chain you can pull off once you hit 32. It'll also feed burst, which is a VERY AoE on a stalker (due to the 100% crit rate, you can literally go placate->burst, and crit everything in bursts range)

If you don't want to do /nin again, I'd recommend willpower. You skip RttC, but you get recon, and with the added defense of willpower, plus some nice IOs, you can scrap pretty well for a stalker, and you won't suffer from redraw with kinetic melee. You also lose quick recovery, but kinetic melee isn't that much of an endurance hog, so some IOs, or liberal use of endurance reduction will help cover that up.

Stj/Wp will basically never stop. Once you get quick recovery and stamina slotted up, you'll never have to worry about endurance, and it'll be all about punching things in the face.

stj/EA would be a good mix as well, due to higher +defence numbers, a decent heal, and a means to get back endurance. Stj/EA scrapper or brute would be very nice (ea is slightly better on a brute due to Energize giving a higher heal, and more regen, but the rest of the set is pretty even between brutes and scrapper)

Regen is basically all about situational awareness. Because your going to get hit, and its going to hurt.

You then have to decide if its worth it to pop your t9 (which is fast recharging) to soak the alpha, or prevent that AV from landing a hit. Reconstruction is up often enough that you can literally heal over 50% of your HP every 15 seconds, dull pain even on SOs, if up often enough to not just heal about 80% of your HP, but it boosts your HP cap by about 40%, giving you not just a very nice heal, but boosting your overall regen in the process. Have a ton of minion/Lts mobs pounding your face? Hit Instant Healing, and watch them never get your HP below 80%.

Thats where regen benefits, from high situational awareness, You have to judge when would be a good time to use your clicks, and how to juggle your offensive powers with your defensive powers.

Basically the saying is, if you can't kill a regen in the first 10 seconds, you'll never kill a regen.

I'll echo the */* combo, though i do love my claws/elec brute, and I've falling in love with my stj/wp brute (for different reasons)

If you want a character that can solo pretty well, and still work decently on teams, make a */nin stalker. You'll have all the defense of SR, plus a nice heal on a quick recharge, and some nice toys to play with. My kin/nin is my goto character for when i just want to solo and pound things in the face.

I rolled a beam/rad myself, and so far, I'm loving it.


Basically, pop your rad debuffs on a minion, and disentegrate the boss. Due to the spread mechanic, the minion will start taking damage, and boss is debuffed from the rad debuffs.

Solo, it works wonders, you just have to pick 2 anchors (1 weak, 1 strong) and work backwards, using spread, and your cone attack to kill minions, and your disentegration and nice single target attacks to kill bosses.

Plus mine is a hover blasting, range defense capped, 50-ish lethal/smash resistance beast.. I can't wait to play it at higher levels..