Dechs Kaison

Ok, I'll give you three options:

1) Use enhancements which are cheap and single aspect but require maintenance every few levels to upgrade or replace.
2) Use enhancements which are relatively expensive, are single aspect, must be crafted, but do not require maintenance once slotted.
3) Use enhancements which are dirt cheap on the market, have several aspects which provide greater enhancement values than comparable single aspect ones, must be crafted, do not require maintenance once slotted, and occasionally give you set bonuses on top of all that.

Out of those three, option three is very often the cheapest and it gives you far better results while leveling your character.

Maybe using only SOs and only Common IOs isn't "poor planning." But if you can come up with a better term for "an alternative plan which yields worse results for a greater cost" that doesn't imply poor planning, I'm all ears.

Because, clearly, "everybody's doing it" is to be taken as a literal statement. You said you don't slot IOs till 47. You said you don't think it's unique. That certainly implies that it's a common practice, if not a majority opinion. That has still never been a good excuse for poor planning. And defense based scrappers are still going to get much less benefit out of Fortitude than resistance based scrappers. It's not about dying in regular PvE shenanigans, it's about pulling extraordinary shenanigans.

Because "everybody's doing it" has always been a valid excuse for poor planning.

Regardless of when you start using IOs, though, you still don't need to be softcapped before level 30 or even 40. When talking about the high end, you're going to get a great deal more mileage out of pairing a resistance based set with Empathy than you will a defense one.

What level do IOs start to drop again?

Who uses SOs anymore that's not a free account?

Who needs to be softcapped before level 30?

C'mon bro, you know all this.

Hang on a second, no one's saying that to properly play a human only shade that you have to pick one of the other forms.

It's just one of the options available to you.

I actually agree with THB on this topic. To me, Human Only is a playstyle, not a build restriction.

I've taken a lot of mule powers across a lot of characters, and each one of those powers gets more use than THB gives his Dwarf form. Yes, I've actually used Boxing and Grant Invisibility.

For a great example, look at my Soldier of Arachnos. He took some powers from the Bane trees, but none of the mace powers that you recognize as a Bane Spider, choosing to fight with the rifle and provide tactical support to the team in the form of leadership buffs. Tell me, how would you describe his build? If someone asked you what my SoA was, would you tell them it's a "Bane Spider"? I know what he plays like, and it's no Bane. We have a name for that kind of character. It's Huntsman.

I've seen THB play. I've seen THB's build. When people ask me what THB plays, I say a Human Form 'Shade.

What they said, and a purple pony.

Aeris dies.

To be fair, they didn't tell you the end. They said statesman dies in part 5. That's not the end.

It wouldn't do any good, by the way. The Protector Bots, who have no melee attacks, still run into melee range.