_Elektro_

Looking at your dilemma, Sonic seems really end heavy.... am I wrong?

How many of those toggles will you take? (I've never played Sonic personally)

Looking at Traps, you get your -res plus some other toys without worrying about toggles. Is the redraw that bad with Traps?

personally I'm looking at Traps over Sonic.

Been waiting a long time for something like time (pun intended).

Fire-Time corruptor. I'd love to do something more 'cosmo' like than fire, but knockback sucks and so does all the single target stuff.

Beam Rifle was something I was really heavily anticipating but I don't know that as a blaster it really clicks with anything? It also looks like the feedback on it has been very... underwhelming. I'm assuming we'll see it a lot with Defenders where its functionality is slightly less important. Just a guess though.

Beam Rifle had a lot of potential.... The creativity of AR was certainly lost a bit with BR. Still, giant laser beams are always 'cool'.

I'm more of a thematic player myself, but don't want to walk around 'regretting' my secondary.

I'm thinking of a Sci-Fi based character... Time Manipulation and Rad? I don't know. Rad is kind of the red headed step child of blaster sets.

Fire would probably be the -strongest- to pair up with Time, but thematically I'm not sure it works for me.

Well there is one other possibilty. People could be snowing us in hopes of getting some tweak or to protect against a nerf pending the release of the set. Reminds me of beta days....

But I find it weird that we've been dying for a set like this to come out and it's such a simple, yet coveted weapon type... I'm really confused on -why it wouldn't- be like a teir one choice for blasters.

I guess we'll see tuesday. My only 50+ blaster is dual DP and I've been thinking it would be nice to try something in blaster that doesn't involve some form of FIRE! (all my blasters burn something at some point.)

Well this is really strange....

Some of you folks responded to my comment with some good thoughts, but even though I don't think anyone is really trying to 'sell' me on the stalker, I find myself firing him up, and trying to get him blue side!

The painful part is I still really enjoy the AT. I enjoy what he's supposed to do. The question is, if I get him to blue side will I feel -usefull- enough to keep playing him?

I'm not going to lie to you. When we started discussing this I was trying to think of the 'worst case' scenario where being a Stalker would probably hinder my chance at getting an invite. I started to think of things like:
- Incarnate trials (the people escaping one)
- Rikti crash site , or just rikti invasions

Stuff like that. I'm think you'd be hard up for invites on stuff like that for starters. We'll see.

Stalker was from the very beginning my favourite AT.

Finally when Beta came out I playtested every stalker type, and fell in love with MA/Ninja.

He's been sitting at 43 since beta days.... I don't have the heart to delete him, and he's stuck on red side...

You guys saying that damage is the issue are missing the point. They just don't bring anything to a team in the 40's. They just use up a team slot. How many teams are you on featuring stalkers? How many of those (few) times do you actually benefit at all from the Stalker's presence?

They're not even good at guiding hostages out of missions. Their number one use is stealthing a mission and team tp'ing everyone to end of the mission.

IMO they really left stalker in the dark (pun intended). It really is the red headed step child AT, and it needs more than a damage buff... it needs to function on a team. We have enough 'solo' AT's and farmers... how about making it a team player?

Like as a small example (one of many) how about that AS rendering a 'crippling' side effect? Something that carries a real debuff? A -res? Anything... stuff like that.

It seems to me taking Beam Rifle and relegating to Defender status is like saying it's going to be a 'meh' set at best.....

I was hoping it would be something a damage dealer type would actually covet.... I guess we'll see.

You definitely got me thinking about Cardiac in my Elec/elec tank now. I figure it won't get me to resist cap, but around 86.5 %

But it also helps my Psi resist a lot, same with some other obscure damage types. Probably looking at Cardiac Core Paragon to get the full 45% and 20%(res) since the Radial won't really help me much.

Lots of great advice. Thanks guys.

The musculature is the way I was leaning, but wasn't sure. Recharge is nice for sure... Lightning Rod is fun, but my attack chain is 'ok'.

My damage is a little lethargic, and the advice on secondary is great advice. I often cycle sink and I've 6 slotted my electric field to do some end drain so this would be even better. I never thought of that, so thanks.

I am unsure about anything beyond Alpha as that stuff is all new to me.... but I didn't realize I'd have to re-create some slots for consumption by higher abilities in the tree.... I guess I'm going to need a Lot more shards!

I do enjoy my elec tank a lot. I got him up to 80% resists and he seemed good... and great Psi resist.... but with my Invuln/SS tank I felt a bit lost. So I appreciate the advice there too.

Hey guys, and gals.

Long time no see..... I finally got my Elec/Elec tank to incarnate last week and I realized I'm not sure what the heck to do with him. So I have a few basic questions to bounce off of you....

Soooo.... I have no endurance issues with elec/elec, and obviously being elec/elec I don't have much in the way of Def going on.....

So I was going to take the Musculature route. Not sure which one, but probably the one that gives me 45%. Does this sound reasonable? It seemed I could do with some help in the damage department. Any thoughts on that?

Second question regards my Invuln/SS tank. I haven't got him to 50 yet, and I farted around with tanks a LOT before deciding on elec/elec for my first incarnate tank....

But I couldn't help but wonder what incarnate route you would take with the Invuln. He seems rock hard in some ways, but less flexible than my elec/elec. What's the favoured incarnate ability for you Invuln tanks? And why?

Finally, the characters I do have that are incarnate are just halfway up one tree. I noticed with my Shield Scrapper, that if I want to make another ability in the tree, it has requirements that I've already created. To me this would seem to indicate that when you create an Alpha, it actually consumes the previous power you made. So if you need to make another power higher up in that tree, you may have to re-make some of the lower powers again.

Does that sound right? If so... I got a while to go to finish an incarnate tree! Woot.

I just realized this last night as I haven't touched my CoH account for a few months.

Thanks.

Pilgrim,

Yes I've read your guide and it's really good, and one of my favourite parts of it is the builds. They are really affordable.

I've tweaked my own up at this point, but I'm not sure if I like it yet: too soon to tell. But you made a great resource there.

Severe, thanks for the reply. And I mean that.

I think it's fine if you want to put things in either column A or B, but don't put words in my mouth like 'easy' or 'safe'.

Actually I am finding my Fire tank the easiest toon I've played in a long time. There are so many great powers early on, it's really quite offensive out of the gate, and has early resists that, let's say a blaster, can't access.

I think maybe some people have ruffled your fire-feathers and I don't want the topic to get lost in your 'defensiveness'.

I think I had a fair question on the validity of Fire-Fire in late game. You've definitely given your opinion, and thanks for that.

Without completely repeating myself- I understand you are saying 'everything' (tank wise) can tank in any situation.... But for a time people tried to convince my my Claws/WP scrapper could do -anything- in late game too.... while that is feasible, and accurate, my Dark Melee- Shield toon mopped the floor with him.

So a very vanilla statement like 'anyone can do it' is a little misleading and not quite what I was asking for. I mean I didn't want a tank that has to avoid enemy type A/B/C but can handle X/Y/Z. To repeat your words... do you get it?

I've stood next to a WP tank that (with the thanks of Spiritual Core) generated so bloody many hit points, he could have worn his underwear as a shield and had an ice tea while taking. So of course I am familiar with making a concept work.

I'm going to continue my Fire-Fire. I legitimately mean that I am not going to spend a zillion influence on him. YES I realized everything is accessible, but with a career/family/house I just can't spend quite as much time chasing carrots as some can. I need to... maximize my fun time. The forum helps me do that.

So I'll keep barreling through with Fire/Fire..... and see what happens in the 30's.

Severe,
I don't think anyone here is saying "fire tanks are poo'..... far from it.

I just wanted to ask about late game survivability because lately I have been burning though (pun intended) levels, trying to find my favourite tank!

I am hating the idea of working every minute in game to get to 40ish to figure this out with fire, so that's why I ask the comunitty. I know a lot of you guys have experience with Fire/Fire and I thought a fair assessment, and comparison would be helpful for me.

Low and behold I've been having fun with the toon at low levels, but the end game concerned me, so I thought I would ask for help.... and opinions.

Of course up front there are inherent strengths in elec/elec, but I didn't want to make assumption.

I'll tell you what, Post your Fire/Fire build in my Fire topic on the forum, and I'll post my Elec/Elec tank build in this topic. ;D

Mine has 31/31 % S/L Def.
78.2 % S/L resist
56% Fire/Cold resist
90% Energy resist
42.6% Negative Energy resist
68.3% PSI resist (!!!)

No purples, and no glad's, just a steadfast, and some LotG 7.5's.

That's fair Elf... very fair.

I just keep flashing back to trying Statesman Task Force.... and think, how would my Fire/Fire tank fair in that scenario?

I keep bouncing between the two tanks (I have sort of shelved my Shield/SS project for now)

Well mine is Elec/Elec, and you can see a few threads down, I am having trouble sticking to fire/fire because Elec/Elec seems to offer more in just about every category -except- AOE and burst damage.

As has been mentioned, without really trying that hard (and I do mean an inexpensive build) I have about 10% more S/L than Fire/Fire will have.... And if you swap Fire resist for Energy resist (basically it's a wash) between the two tanks, Elec/Elec brings more resists across the board..... Especially attractive to me is.... drum roll please... Psi Resist. Love it for late game. It is a beauty for that. (My elec/elec is sitting at 68% Psi resist.)

So aside from the obvious, I'd say it honestly feels like Fire on steroids (as a primary), you have offensive aura's, an Endurance drain that feeds you, and robs your opponents (it's not uncommon at all to totally drain LT's and Minions in a few seconds). Two of my favourite attacks leave opponents on their butts.

The heal goes beyond healing and gives you a regen boost. (Try to get this as close, if not perma'd by mid game.)

You get a recharge bonus built into the set. There's also far less pressure to work knockback resist into the set (but you can if you want to.)

If you go to an AE mission center, you'll find a zillion fire tanks. I think they should rename it to Fire Plaza or something because that's probably Fire/Fire's biggest attraction right now. There you can 'utilize' the best assets of fire/fire.

That's a nice recap Mephe.

I would add one tweak though. Your initial thoughts about Stealth are helpful, but not mandatory. I have heavy enough Recovery that I run SS almost constantly, but even if I didn't, running in with Super Speed, then starting off with HOB works every time. I've never, ever had it fail.

I went Musculature, then dumped it for Spiritual and haven't looked back. With a healthy dose of LotG's 7.5, and Spritual there are very seldom times where I don't have an AOE of my preference up and ready to roll. I believe my HOB is up in under 30 seconds now. I'd have to verify that.

Thanks for adding your experiences to the thread. I'm always glad to see another DP who has truly learned the set, and sees the 'good' in it.

Golden Pie,

I see your point about cycling, but at the same time, as nice as your recharge is it's a build that would cost a brazillion influence.

I am in a bit of a bind.

I worked hard on my Elec/Elec tanker and he's now 46 and change. His build is actually quite inexpensive and he seems a fair bit more survivable than the Fire Tank builds I'm seeing.

Regardless, I kept trying to level my fire tank, jumping on my Shield/SS tank for a change of pace, and the contrast between Sheild/SS and Fire/Fire is huge. Fire just motors along..... (I've got a 50 + Shield scrapper thought so I know what the payoff is in the end game.)

As I'm playing the Fire/Fire I am having trouble figuring out exactly why I would make him my 'main' over my Elec/Elec and I'm having trouble justifying it.

It would seem the Elec/Elec 'appears' superior in every way except AOE damage, and even then he's no slouch.

I enjoy the ease of the early levels with the Fire/Fire. There's no doubt it's built to be successful at an early level, whereas Elec takes more time to become more rounded. But the Elec, or should I say my Elec has superior recharge, better resists across the board (swapping Energy for Fire obviously), two AOE's that have a form of crowd control, a Heal that boosts REGEN (it's nearly perma).... and a very, very nice late game high resist to Psionic which is not entirely from IO's but a shield in the set.

That being said FIRE is cool. Cool animations, and the idea of walking around, on fire, is pretty cool. I'm thinking though that as fantastic as Fire/Fire seems to be a low levels, that Elec/Elec tips the scales in the later stages of the game.

I still like to team quite a bit, and usually as a tank, actually all of my tanks, typically get called in when a team is having real issues with something. Now when I think of that scenario, the Elec/Elec would seem to fit that role better, no?

Has anyone out there played both Elec/Elec and Fire/Fire to 40+?

Hey guys,

I'm in this big Tanker phase of CoH I guess and I just started up a 'pure' good ol' fashioned Fire/fire tank.

He seems really fun, but when I look at builds posted, and the build I've made in Mids a few things stick out at me.

Would it be safe to say that Fire tanks are probably the squishiest?

Would it be safe to say Fire tanks (with fire secondary) can do the most damage? The most AOE damage for certain I would imagine?

I made a build and it seemed like my Electric Tank is more durable, and thanks to two powers in Elec/elec, better at mitigating damage through crowd control.

But where Elec/Elec probably falls behind Fire/Fire is in pure damage output. Both might seem to have issue with Knockback?

Anyway just wondering how Fire compares overall to the modern tank sets.

Strato, you are correct. Moving the slider on rage to 1 instance running works.