Bobitron

Happy birthday! I hope you get a shiny new TF.

Cool. I'm in with Pallidae, lv50 Night Widow.

Hope to see you again soon.

I'd love to run a Numina. We can save RSF for another time.

I'll bring My Little Demon (lv39 Fire/Kin troller) for Numina.

I'm in for just about whatever.

We should run something uncommon. RSF, maybe?

Macod!

I won't be able to make it this afternoon. Have a great time all!

I'm up for some tag! I'm not a very good player, but it's fun.

I'll try to be there! Not sure what toons I have available.

Have a great trip DB!

Nice work, Des! Thanks for taking the time to consolidate all the great advice you have given elsewhere into a very useful guide.

Hey John!

Here's what I ended up at for a final build. It's short some Numina's, but I don't feel like the investement is worth it on a toon I already spent waaaay more on that I was planning.

Thanks for the feedback you gave. It was helpful in planning my goals and giving me some set ideas.

Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 1.401
http://www.cohplanner.com/

[u]Click this DataLink to open the build![u]

Thanks! I'll take a look at that. I'm moving pretty quick (should hit 32 today!), so I might take that build and scale the IO's back to the 35-38 range and see how it looks there.

John, can you take a look at my build? I'm looking to make it relatively cheap, thus the inclusion of lots of lower level IO's and no purples. I couldn't help throwing a Numinas +Regen/Recov in there, but I might drop it off.

Thanks very much for the guide. My DM/SD Scrapper is at 23 currently and a bunch of fun.

[u]Click this DataLink to open the build![u][/color]

Great job! I've been looking for a good concept to get behind for my Shields toon after deleting a half dozen scrappers and tanks. Maybe Dark/Shield will work for me. I'll review your builds and play around in the creator. It'll be great to have a roadmap to work with.

Thanks for the guide.

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hey Bobitron can you post mid's build too that will help few people out thanx man.

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Hmmm... I can't say it is a particularly great build in Mid's compared to some people's more focused stuff. You can learn a lot about the power of IO's from looking at the various builds people post in the AT forums.

If I get a chance I'll get a Mid's build up, but it will be pretty basic compared to a more modern build.

Thanks.

What the heck is a snort fort?

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War mace is an awesome looking option for brutes.

Mind you I haven't seen anyone pull off the bone or wood club look with success.

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I saw someone with an awesome caveman brute that used the wooden club on Infinity. He kinda reminded me of Zangief from street fighter though, but with cavemanish clothing.

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Metacomet

Metacomet w/ bio

Hey, Pippy. Thanks for the write up.

I just started a DB/SR scrapper and I'm a little curious how it is going to play out. I usually end up overinvesting in attacks on melee toons and having more than needed to give a good solid attack chain. I'm only level 4 right now, so bear with me as I speak about stuff I have no experience with...

Looking over some people's DB posts, it sounds like the Attack Vitals combo (Ablating Strike>Vengeful Slice>Sweeping Strike) and Blinding Feint make a pretty good chain. I think I'd like to take Typhoon's Edge, too, 'cause it just plain looks great. That would mean only taking five attacks from DB. Considering I am /SR and will have an IO heavy build once I hit the mid-30's, do you think that is a viable option for late game play? It is ignoring the tier nine and most of the combo options, so I'm not sure if that is just folly or a solid choice.

Edit: Dang it, I suppose I'd have to take a tier one attack too. Power Slice it is.

Okay, I'll give that a shot. Thanks Garth!

I'm back with a few questions after getting Metacomet, my Ice/Mace tank, up to level 32.

1) Is slotting Energy Absorption for Defense really worth it? So far I'm finding that the numbers it adds are really minor.

2) I have Chilling Embrace slotted with a couple Slow IO's, which seems to make a noticeable difference. Is it really viable, or are the slots better invested elsewhere?

...and a quick tip for all Ice tankers who aren't yet running at that magical 45% Defense yet: Buy purple Defense Inspirations! Like I mentioned earlier, I'm new to Defensive sets, so I was pretty impressed with the difference stacking a purple or two with my toggles makes. Way better use of Inspiration space than Oranges or Greens.

Nice, Garthalus! I'll be referring back to this while I work on my new Ice/Mace tank.

I've never played a defense set other than my /Nin Stalker, so I'm still getting used the the ups and downs. It was nice this morning, just after dinging 22 and getting lv25 IO's slotted, to be able to jump into a big giant group of 8 Tsoo that would have stunned the heck out my Inv/ tank or /Dark Scrapper and just stand there with all those pink fists whiffing by.

Thanks for taking the time to write this one up.

I think the Virtueverse page is fantastic! Lots of really nice stuff on there. Congrats on making such great content, everyone.

-Bobitron from Justice

Pretty awesome pace! Great job. Thanks for posting the full video.

Hi Celtic! Thanks for the writing up this guide. I don't know Claws very well, but I have been meaning to try one.

I do have a couple comments on your Dark Armor information. Seems pretty complete and accurate! I appreciate the way you talk about some of the misconceptions around /DA's endurance heavy reputation.

Dark Embrace/Murky Cloud/Obsidian Sheild: Don't forget Toxic Tarantulas! Psi and Toxic resists don't make up for the Energy hole, but they sure soften the blow. Murky Cloud has a nice resistance to Endurance drain. Also, your Endurance costs on these powers are high. Each of them are about 0.1/sec.

Death Shroud: I tend to take this earlier than you recommend, but I can see your point about putting it off. Frankenslotting this with a mix of Multi-Strike and Cleaving Blow, both relatively inexpensive PbAoE IO sets, can go a long way toward making it viable in the twenties. Even pre-Stamina, just slotting it with a couple EndRed and managing the toggle a bit (shutting it off when not facing three or more baddies or when you can't manage the aggro) goes a long way. Like you stated, Death Shroud can quickly add up to as much DoT as any of your other attacks.

Cloak of Darkness: It's worth mentioning two things here: CoD gives you a place to put a Defense IO if you have the deep pockets to afford those tasty LotG +Rech and Karma KB protection IO's. Also, CoD gives +Perception, making fights against enemies that others may hate (Night Widows, Redcap Fiends) much easier.

Cloak of Fear: This can get really long and be a thread to itself, but I wanted to pass along a couple comments from my own Katana/DA guide.

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Desmodos had some good clarifying information about the way I explained CoF in another thread.

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You wrote a great guide, didn't want to derail it with yet another OG vs CoF debate, hence I did not post anything there.

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First, Death Shroud (and your katana, I should hope!) is constantly attacking targets around you, which temporarily supresses the terrorized effect and basically turns this into an accuracy debuff. If the Fear is still active by the time your attacks finished, the target will go back into a terrorized state, but opponents that take damage from Death Shroud or another attack will still get an opportunity to attack you, although with a small accuracy penalty.

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The above statement, bolded part in particular reads like your stating feared mobs get to retaliate for each attack they receive, which is false. You are correct in that feared mobs can attack you if disturbed but their response is not tit for tat. Typically, I can get off 2-5 attacks before feared mobs will attempt to retaliate a second time, or several Death Shroud tics if you will.

I like to think of feared mobs as being on some sort of attack timer, preventing them from attacking until the timer runs out, allowing for the attack and resetting the timer. Unfortunately, I've yet to come up with any reliable reproducible test method for this as Fear seems to vary considerably from mob type to mob type, I.E. Mook, Family, and Council Marksman will run away to snipe from a distance, but instead of attacking, run off to some corner and cower. Air, Fire, and Earth Casters from CoTs behave similarly. Clockworks seem to have no fear resistance what so ever, while other robots seem to have some level of fear resistance. Against Nemesis, CoF is virtually useless.

With all the above variables, I still prefer CoF over OG as the wander effect from the stun annoys me to no end.

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It also has an accuracy penalty and a short Fear duration combined with a long activation cycle of 5 seconds.

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This statement is also mis-leading. Yes, CoF tics every 5 seconds, but base duration for the fear effect is 7.5 seconds, though the effect does not stack. This makes the fear effect of the power quite perma while mobs remain in melee range.

Slotting for fear duration, while not practical, can have some rather entertaining effects. While under HO slotting, I attempted heard an entire room of council once and was confused as to how I failed to herd single one upon exiting the room. A SG mate laughing hysterically informed me I'd feared the entire room. It lasted about 3 seconds before the room rushed us.

The Tohit Debuff portion lasts for 5 seconds.

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CoF is definitely worth trying out on a Dark Armor Scrapper, without a doubt. I might even sneak it into the build on my newest DA toon. I'd advise at least using the power before dimissing it. Like I mentioned above, I've had it in and out of my build a few times, both pre- and post-OG, and decided to skip eventually. But I don't discount it's effectiveness!

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Thanks again! Nice work.

-Bobi

Thank you for the comments.

Good point about Divine's Lethal Defense buff, Fleur.

I'm currently enjoying my second /DA to hit level 38, a Spines scrapper. Lots of fun! After fighting a bunch of Night Widows recently, I will heartily agree with the usefulness of Cloak of Darkness as a Preception booster.

Dark Armor is such a great set that I've barely had to slot the defensive aspects of my secondary yet. Current slotting at lv38:

Dark Embrace- Steadfast KB Protection, EndRed IO, Resist IO
Death Shroud- full six slots, frankenslotted IO's for maximum Dam and EndRed plus a Lethal Proc.
Murky Cloud- EndRed
Obsidian Sheild- EndRed
Dark Regeneration- four IO's frankenslotted for EndRed and Rech
Cloak of Darkness- EndRed
Oppressive Gloom- Acc
Soul Transfer- Rech

That's it! I'm starting to fight a lot more purples/reds, so I'll be putting in a bit more resistance over the next few levels.