Hmm.
This is old and somewhat out of date, but when I was levelling my fire/fire tanker (which was some months ago), I was taking notes as I went. This might have some stuff in it that's of use to you, though I understand I commit the heinous crime of not including Tough in the build.
This was written some time ago, but it was a rough outline chronicling my passage through the first 35 levels of the game on my fire/fire tanker. By the time I hit Crey's Folly, a lot of my tactics had solidified, so that's where the majority of the information lies.
This is a guide. It is not a guide to how you should build and level your fire/fire tanker. It is a guide to how I built and played
my fire/fire tanker. Everything presented herein is 100%, honest to god tainted by my opinion, by my ideas and my playstyle. If you're coming here expecting to find a guide that says 'well, take it if you like it, but I don't like it,' to hell with that.
Time to be bold.
The Build
Reforged is a fire/fire tanker. I opted to take as many primary powers as I could, and to take as many powers from my secondary as I could. With that in mind, his final build features everything in Fiery Aura except Temperature Protection, and everything in Fiery Melee except Fire Sword, Taunt, and Breath of Fire. Of those powers, I can imagine a case being made for Taunt and Fire Sword, but I found them unnecessary. Simply put, they're individual tools that have pretty obvious purposes - taunt is if you feel you have a hard time roping aggro off others, and Fire Sword if you feel your single target attack pattern is lacking.
Breath of Fire, however, merits a mention. I played a Fire/Fire Blaster to 50 before I ever tried this tanker, and Fire Breath on my blaster wasn't to my taste. When I hit the appropriate level on Reforged, I gave Fire Breath a shot, but found the attack was
awful. Given its extremely long animation, I'd hope for an equally large effect, but it's honestly a bit of an embarassment. The cone is narrow and the damage is mediocre. In essence, it's not really an AoE and better compares to a line attack.
Temperature protection, when I took it - and when this guide is likely to come out - offers nothing meaningful to Reforged. Since he didn't choose to skip either of his toggle armours, having extra fire resistance is unnecessary in the extreme, spilling well over the cap for a damage type that he doesn't see himself needing to worry about.
Typical attack slotting is 1 accuracy, 1 endurance reduction, and 2 damage. As I levelled up and got more slots to play with, I simply added them to the powers that I felt needed them - no research, nothing beyond my extant knowledge gained from playing melee archetypes before and getting to know the attacks as I levelled. At level 35 - the point this guide ends - I resolved to just tough it out until level 37, where I will use common IOs. In fact, at the point I've finished writing this guide, he's level 39, and I still haven't gotten around to getting those common IOs. SOs do the trick, quite fine, and unlike common IOs, I don't need to be patient to get them.
I have veteran badges. I have Sands of Mu but do not have the Nemesis Staff. I imagine without Sands, the early game is harder, and with the Staff, it is easier. I've included a Mids' Hero Designer code chunk that you can use to look the build over in a more manageable state, and see what I did, and at what level the slots were added where.
[/code]| Copy & Paste this data into Mids' Hero Designer to view the build |
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|'@/@"/@3Q`HCMK\)=)JAYX861<LZ=,_>>>S-CY_+`%.+M`Z&9#WTWC@=]-SB74=9QQ]|
|XP=R1/PV@L1[H0HL$G@P-Y*H-8VH>>C*:#_5>16U<GCO3E7*?8>AR<R4@&B3T/C%X8^|
|O:A[XW/$I-C+PED'!=H\W0BY6B9PCX83,(H<1,O#*Q'$V]H]Z:1'#ANG$"#.DRT`[\O|
|>:'6+"U\H$U1N"`R+YFF1%;A2MY+DE(NTPE7#8F^@I^F45Y*L S64*KM$W=M$53!**Z,|
|T-\QPP\P;HMQK]H,[RW)>)LL-E[CA$C?,<</=$8N0KG-?H=\@Z1N,DE>=\OO4O'0?J"|
|U*>T05A\0?D&2H4J-.)P:X%;E4%+?(30>IK++*VR3]A$)+C6A%)"T'3#>)-MI$7;[)'|
|#A4U=54-TBZMD#?P6]%:#3PRD5*B.MB]9SI/5'G`^_@"FO*J,:=Z@OT"XP:*J'!4G.!|
|:N"PIJYFC1^AQ8_0XMOO\%MLPLAM9=3FT@Y3E^DW=%IGH]2Z^M,+-/OG:F7^?E5"-*G|
|@R57I%DD]D#0E:6R[@UD\V'^M3^;<)W^$7W@?H0>@'6/T#.$Y;E]@Y&)T@C#$[>RS.9|
|^UO(<#W4&XBW`/X1TFZ0:`@6`B%!%*"&6$"D(5816AB?`18?8'TG#B&@``|
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|[/code]
1-2: Outbreak
You should not need a guide to Outbreak. If you do, just
do Outbreak. It's its own guide. Seriously.
2-5: Galaxy City
This is the stage of the game with the least guidance. I was level 2. In about an hour of street-sweeping, I was level 5. I mostly did this by hitting bosses and lieutenants who were standing around on their own. You can find spawns of lieutenants who are lodged halfway into the wall, who can't fight back as you club them to death. I expect that bug to have been fixed, though, so perhaps it's not the case any more. Either way, you shouldn't need to do any cheesy stunts. I actually don't bother visiting a trainer up at the odd levels.
Note that I also, once I had a small amount of inf, put my two Outbreak inspirations on the market, one for as much as I could afford (usually around 9,000 inf), then the second (once the first paid out) for 250,000. This is a very reliable way to get starting funds. At least, it was. I don't know how the merit system will affect that.
5-9: The Hollows
Note, this guide was written and this character was started after the Issue 12 revamp of the Hollows. The approach was simple. I would talk to David Wincott, and buy 3 Lucks and 5 enrages. With that in my pocket, I'd run to find a big group of guys and huff the lot. Charge in, wipe the group out, and move on to another group, then return to Wincott. This process seems like it's slow - because you're running back to Wincott - but it's remarkably quick and lets you race up to level 9. Plus? It is awfully fun.
During this period, the enemy groups are mostly the same, except Bricks and Trolls have a lot of knockdown. Since I didn't have my Knockback Protection IO at this point, I preferred to focus on the Lost and Skulls. Something to notice is that you have protection from stuns straight out of the gate, but not against sleeps or holds. I was hoping to leverage that, but you'd be surprised how few low-level enemy groups stun compared to the high-level spam stunfest.
It's also worth noting during this period of your career, one of the things that differentiates the fire
tanker from the other street-sweepers I've played is how much the damage aura plays into the game. There were many times in a spawn where the most endurance efficient thing I could do was just stand still and let the aura kill them. Aura ticks represent a very significant quantity of enemy HP at this level range.
9-12: Perez Park
Perez is an oft-maligned zone. My plan, which I was able to follow, ran thusly: head into the middle of any spawn that didn't feature a Boss and kick the hell out of it, ideally full of greens. This is a good way to stock up on inspirations. With inspiration-combining, I could rely on having a purple or two running at all times, and a yellow as well. Once you have a decent pocket full thanks to beating up -2 enemies, you can jump into spawns of white enemies. There are certain transition points between spawn types that are good for this - around the fountain at the southern end, for example, or in the northeastern corner of the map.
12: Detour to the University
I do the Invention tutorial at 12. I then drop the 'craft an IO' mission, and keep the luck charm as salvage, which usually can fetch about 50k or 100k. Of course, with the large number of arcane opponents you fight in perez, it's very easy to stock up on good common arcane salvage which is now selling quite, quite well. Either way, Steel Canyon is connected to Perez, so it wasn't a big deal. I then use the money made to buy DOs.
12-15: Boomtown
Boomtown is one of the more arduous places because you have a short lifeline, and getting to grips with what you can and can't handle is tricky. I recommend beating up -4s to start with, to get an idea for how a hazard spawn
reacts, and how quickly they do damage, then slowly working up to fight greens and blues and of course, eventually whites. Another area in which tankers differ from other street-sweepers I've played. The tanker can afford to just stand in a spawn letting his damage aura do all the work, using inspirations or terrain to minimize incoming damage. Blasters don't have that luxury. For this reason, I found endurance consumption remarkably light, using scorch to pull opponents closer to me and letting the aura do the rest.
Combustion is also golden at this stage, because its size and that its DOT means it can do pretty good damage considering the scale you're dealing with.
15-17: Faultline, Part 1
The first time I went to Faultline, it was with a fire/kin controller and I remember barely squeaking it out, solo, as I struggled to keep Fusionette alive despite her stupidity. Again, much, much easier on a tanker.
22-24: Dark Astoria
This was pretty much why I made a fire/fire tanker. Zombies in Dark Astoria are weak to fire, and do primarily smashing and lethal damage. While you need to be careful about Avalanche Shamans (who have an immobilize, a slow, and knockback, to all of which you're vulnerable), you can rip through normal zombies like nobody's business. Again, Combustion is great in this situation. Don't be afraid to walk away from a spawn when it's mostly stragglers - because you're a tanker, you'll easily and reliably get them following you. Inspirations should fall pretty easily.
Remember, wiping out a spawn of greens can restock your inspiration tray without threat, and that can give you enough to slowly ration them out across a spawn of whites and yellows. If you can afford SOs at this point, this is less necessary, of course. The main problem at this level range is
distributing the damage. Dealing damage to large groups with Breath of Fire is difficult (this is where I primarily tested the power), so again you rely on Combustion and your Aura.
24-25: Faultline Part 2 and Welcome to Oroborous
Faultline's outrageous plotline rewards lured me in to do it again, and I try to complete the Oroborous arc as well because it offers some nice XP and a break u in the flow of mowing through zombies.
25-28: Dark Astoria
Your AOE blossoms here with Burn and Fire Sword Circle. Before FSC, I would run into a spawn, melee its lieutenant until he was at about 2/3rds health, Air Superiority him to knock him down, build up, then Burn and Combustion. This meant that enemies would scuttle out of the burn patch (except the lieutenant, who was getting up), and then scuttle right back into it, dragged by combustion's large taunt effect.
28-30: Croatoa
Croatoa's a lot like Faultline, in that its huge plotline rewards encouraged me to come here. It's worth noting that in some areas in the forest, there are choke points through which large groups of Fir Bolg run, and when you drop a burn patch there, they will run through the patch, turn back around to the center of the patch and close in on it as if they can attack it, then turn around and head out of it, and then, if you do anything to taunt them, will come back in again, all without really leaving the patch for a significant period of time.
Weird Things:- If you Burn Patch on the non-Fir Bolg trees in Croatoa, they turn into Devouring Earth Herders.
30-34: Crey's Folly
The Folly offers four major villain groups of note: Freakshow, Crey, Nemesis and Rikti. There are devouring earth swarms scattered all over the place, and Jurassik himself, but there's not enough to be had wiping out spawns of underlings to really make it worth while. So, four groups, with pleasantly predictable details. There's one special thing to note, however - Snipers abound in this zone.
Snipers are awesome. Whenever you want a drink or something, just fly over to a sniper, sit down and put Burn on auto. I'm serious. They're immobilized, so they'll just sit there and melt to death over time while you check your e-mail and download dirty pictures of Miss Liberty. They simply will not run, and as a tanker, you're not threatened by even the attacks of the +5s. They have such a slow attack routine you just wear the hit and burn 'em up. I loved wiping out snipers. You can even find some alleyways in the Folly where snipers will spawn at the corners, out of sight of one another. So you walk from one to the other and just burn 'em down.
During this level range, I recommend you break up the street sweeping with trips to Croatoa, to round out those plot arcs, and, despite the Folly being good until level 40, I prefer to leave it as soon as I can access Cimerora and the Rikti War Zone. Both of those zones are more specialised in what they offer, while Crey's is a little dilute. Plus, honestly, Creys has a lot of enemies who are dull to fight after a while. There's not the same feeling of velocity I got in other hazard zones. It might just be that there's less feeling of development, of evolution.
Freakshow
The perennial powerleveller's choice, Freakshow do bonus damage, have a powerful dull-pain style self-heal, they resist a lot of damage types quite well, they stun, they drain endurance, and they self-res sometimes. They are an almighty pain in the *** unless you have sufficient burst damage to wipe them out very quickly. As a fire/fire tanker, I had sufficient burst damage to wipe them out very quickly in an area.
Freakshow congregate in a few ways. In small, narrow areas you'll find spawns of 2-3 bosses. These guys I didn't find it worth the time to kill, because if they're even-con or higher, killing the second boss invariably leaves you exhausted, and given their propensity to resurrect, they will sometimes get up and kick your *** while you're taking a breather. Three equal-con bosses you can handle in a timely fashion. Four or five is pushing it.
The real gem way that Freakshow spawn is in a big street fights. They'll gather in groups fighting Crey or Freakshow, and in these street packs you can have as many as sixteen guys all in one spot. Bosses only spawn in multiples here if you're facing down two enemy factions, and they tend to generate smaller spawns. Ideally I chased down the bigger packs with lieutenants and left the boss spawns alone. One boss took a lot more time to wipe out than an entire spawn without a boss, so I just preferred the latter.
Freaks and Crey generate the best mobs. Crey Riot Guards are complete sissies, so they add to the head count but don't do that annoying Dull Pain stunt, but they generate bigger groups at +0 and +1 when they mix in Crey. Plus, the lieutenants are less annoying.
But, still, this entry is about beating up Freakshow. Fortunately, they're not very complicated. The only real tricks I know for fighting the freak gangs run thusly:
- It can, if you're fighting a group of +0s and +1s, be worth it to cycle combustion, then single-target the lieutenants down to about 50% health before you do the BU+FE+Combustion+FSC cycle. This way you wipe them out before they Dull Pain. If you're focusing on Freaks it's easier to keep on top of that tactic.
- If you don't like to keep on top of that, don't bother and just whale away on them. They're really not that hard.
- They spawn in big freak-on-freak packs on top of the silo you land on when you teleport in from a supergroup base.
Rikti
The Rikti sometimes engage in street-fights with Nemesis. They're typically heavily one-sided matches, with a wing of about 3-4 Headman lieutenants and a guardian taking on a same-numbered gorup of equal-level Nemesis minions. I tend to ignore the Nemesis in these situations because they scatter. Equal-con Rikti will fall in one simple attack cycle, which is why I avoid going for +2 and +3s. Why bother? Time spent ST-attacking things is time wasted, really.
Rikti monkeys congregate in large spawns, and they're what I recommend taking on for your aura mission. The Rikti spawns at level 30 are a bit too rough to deal with, especially the 2-3 boss spawns. In the trashed areas around the corners of the map, and around the Freakshow silo, you'll find spawns of Rikti mucking with things on the ground. These spawns are a hassle for me because I have this habit of cycling very quickly with control-tab, then attacking based on that. Sometimes you'll tab to the 'Strange Object' on the ground, which you can't attack or deal damage to. Since it won't cycle you on to the next target, I'd sit there trying to Scorch it and chalking my inactivity up to sync lag. Not good.
That aside, Rikti bosses don't do anything all that remarkable - they deal a ton of damage but they hit slowly, and you can usually keep ahead of them with Healing Flames. As with most bosses, avoid +2s and +3s. Communications Officers are the prize, though. If you see a spawn full of Comms Officers and minions, dive on it and rip it in half, then move on. Rikti don't have any real resistance to Fire damage.
Crey
Crey are the thorn of this zone. While Nemesis are easy and boring, and Rikti are exciting but risky, nobody gives you tedium like Crey. Crey spawns snipers, who are nice and easy. Feel free to treat them like any other sniper. The other kinds of Crey Spawns run the gamut:
- Street-fights with the Freakshow. Typically fantastic. They very rarely spawn bosses and the damage output of the Riot Guards is so not a bother for a tanker. The lieutenants don't have enough stuns to stack on you, so you're basically fine.
- A group of riot guards and medics around a single lieutenant who's as much as +4 to the rest of them. Avoid these spawns. They are slow and boring and annoying due to the resistances of the purple lieutenant and if the spawn is anything but +1 to you, you'll be fighting the purple patch to deal damage to the lieutenant.
- Small squads of two bosses and a lieutenant or another boss. As with all the small-boss spawns, I found them tedious to fight due to my comparatively low single-target damage.
The thing that makes Crey more annoying than the other spawns is the types of lieutenants and bosses they have. Power Tanks will turtle up and run, which means if you want the XP they represent, you have to run them down, wait for the forcefield to drop, then finish them off. Note that it's not worth it to huff yellows to try and punch through the sphere, it seems to include resistance as well as mere defence. The Cryo and Electric tanks resist a lot of damage, have a lot of hit points and can occasionally toss you around like a dog. Basically, avoid Crey spawns that feature bosses. Not because you're Not Tough Enough, but because they're Not Worth Your Time.
Nemesis
These come in three basic flavours;
- A group of eleven mixed minions and lieutenants. Sometimes these spawns can be lieutenant-heavy and sometimes they're entirely minions.
- A group of about eight minions and lieutenants and a Warhulk Boss, and
- a spawn of about three minions or lieutenants, and two Warhulks.
I've yet to encounter one of these Nemesis spawns that's got more than four lieutenants in it, and these guys are a bit of a hassle in some of these possible spawn configurations. Now, as you might know, nemesis lieutenants cast Vengeance when they die. This isn't usually a problem because the lieutenants all die the same time, and the minions are dead before them. The place it can be annoying is fighting the Warhulk spawns, because the bosses outlast the spawn around them really easily. That means they heal the boss, and boost his defence, which is enough to be a problem.
The trick I use for this is to approach these three mobs in this way:
- The first spawn type, which is just minions and lieutenants is to charge in, jumping over the first rank and standing as close as I could to the central trooper, hitting Fiery Embrace and Build Up, then chaining Combustion into Fire Sword Circle and then, if it's available, Consume. Consume is a perfunctionary component there - it's just another AE attack. You might have to polish off a lieutenant, or if you position yourself too far away, the back rank. Combustion is a big area, but it's not quite enough to cover everyone. On the other hand, you'll be riding a damage high at that point and they go down pretty easily. You typically won't need your self-heal.
- For spawn type 2, it's similar; again, jam FE and BU, then close and launch your two PBAOE attacks while melee range with the Warhulk. Then, targeting the Warhulk, Air Superiority and Burn. Burn makes the lieutenants - who will be alive at that point - scatter away for a short distance, but the warhulk has such a long stand animation that you can keep him constantly on his tuchus with Air Superiority. He'll try to move away once he stands, except if you chain scorch. So, Scorch -> Air Superiority, and that'll effectively hold him. The burn patches will kill the warhulk and the air superiority will mitigate the damage constantly while the lieutenants maintain their distance, jogging in and out of patches. Typically, you don't need to use burn more than twice. So far, only Warhulks seem to have a slow enough animation to make this trick work. Even Freakshow tanks get up too quickly.
- These spawns are more annoying, because you can't keep two warhulks pinned in place. Instead, I use the AE opening and chain air superiority and scorch on one of the two. Fortunately, the damage aura makes up such a significant portion of your damage output, your whittling away on Warhulk #1 will leave Warhulk #2 on about half health by the time you're done. Then you can default to the Air Superiority juggling. In the end, these spawns aren't very fun to rip through - it's not something I can do very quickly, so I tend to prefer the spawns with a lone boss.
Nemesis troops, barring for Snipers, are just not really worth a lot of XP. They're not a bad enemy type by any means, and I spent a lot of time in my mid 30s offing them, but they don't offer any bonus XP and they're often in annoying locations, on tight walkways where a bit of lag can toss you over the edge.
In the end, the reason I didn't stay in Crey's Folly all that long was mostly due to the lack of a feeling of progress. Tech salvage just isn't
exciting to me, though chances are it should be. Getting a Mu Vestment is about the same as getting an Impervium, but the mu vestment represents the tail-end of one value curve while the impervium represents the top end of the other. Plus, unlike the other hazard zones, there was a clear unlock in the early regions - Hollows can keep you going until Perez, Perez can keep you going until Dual-Origin enhancements, and Boomtown can keep you in opposition until single-origins.
34-35: Croatoa
And this is where the story ends. At level 35, the character is pretty much fleshed out. Yes, there is more to come, for me, but that's not what this guide is about. At 35+, I have SOs, I have the War Zone and I have Cimerora, two zones that can be endlessly mined for content and which let me team with my friends much more actively. At this point, I tend to let the hazard zone sweeping die down. There's no big investment to save up for that I haven't already had a chance to work on, and the money-making steps up from just running missions at this point.
So there you go. One tanker's tale, from 1-35. It's not the only way, but it is one way. And I had fun as I did it. I didn't have someone else doing my damage, I didn't grind papers endlessly, and not once did I look at my tanker and say to myself 'Self, I need to do more damage before I can be satisfied.'
The question I have to ask myself is, is there anything a tanker can do that's more demanding of the tanker as an individual? I can't think of anything. You can claim, tanking for a team of 8, but then you're disregarding that the spawns for a team of 8 are everyone's problem, not just yours.
Either way. Lots of fun.
The devs did say that they were adjusting the base damage of Dominators based on the performance of Dominators under permadom.