Deus_Otiosus

Fair enough, I go through the same song and dance myself with my own builds.

I really do enjoy holding aggro for teams, and I'm willing to accept the lower Brute damage for it.

I play around with inspirations and time things like T9s coupled with the Demonic Accolade and soon I'll be able to juggle Barrier or Ageless as well. I think most players, would be better off with a Scrapper or Tanker - but obviously you (and I) aren't "most players".

So far I haven't seen too much powerset elitism on freedom - although one person was looking for "T3 Slotted Destiny Scrappers ONLY" - which was a bit ridiculous IMO.


I wouldn't get too carried away with the Brute numbers.

Brutes can get chewed up as easily as Scrappers for the most part with the kind of incoming damage on these trials right now - these trials were really designed to make Tankers higher base numbers & higher HP caps shine (although I realize that it will make a significant difference on Invuln).

Also, be prepared to spend most of any trial at 50% Fury or under due to all of the running around, sequestering, etc. Waiting for/Chasing the mindwashed prisoners is extremely detrimental to having any kind of Fury - so is being put on a 9CU spawn camp team.

I'm trying really hard not to be frustrated with it as its all new, and most players pretty much only know blueside - but generally puck up raid teams want Scrappers for Damage and Tankers for Tanking. They take brutes, but there is no clear role for them in most people's minds.



I chopped off your quote, but it's all true - at least in my experience on Freedom.

One player on a PUG-Lambda I went on yesterday couldn't keep up with the team because he refused to open his map - because he was playing on an old laptop...


Of course, he ended up with acid grenades that he couldn't find for ages and then when he found them he didn't know what to use them on.

Lambda really can be crushing, you can have 15 people who all know the drill and one moron can literally cause total or near failure.

The problem with Lambda is that it requires everyone on your team to be able to follow instructions.

This is not found in abundance in this game.

If they get to hang around for a while, yeah pretty much anyone is toast.

They definitely get the better of me here and there, but I don't feel like a blaster.

It doesn't, because you seem to have no real idea how much damage scrappers are already capable of at their damage cap.

You also forgot about blasters, unless you want to give them the ability to simply vaporize stuff on sight.

Don't worry about what powers you chose, you can switch to a different build and start all over again - its not as clean as a respec, but most people will never make use of all 3 builds anyway.

The point you are missing, is that we are discussing completely different ATs, with completely different ability sets.

You also seem to have difficulty with reading comprehension, even of things that you yourself have quoted.

I made it big so you would see it this time.

I've been primarily on 'semi-PUGs' - that is to say the leagues were formed before entering the queue, there is usually a little bit of team balancing and looking for general capabilities (i.e. "Control", "buffs/debuffs", "damage") but other than that it's a pretty random assortment of ATs and players.



No, because we are discussing Scrappers.

On the one hand, 5% is more than the Gladiator Unique, and I think more than Manuevers for most ATs.

On the other hand, I would never rely on this pet for defense.

I'm pretty dedicated to the principle on normal content - especially on my team focused Brutes.

I go so far as to select specific inspiration layouts to maximize survivability.

I've accepted I'm going to die here and there, more than usual, on the new incarnate trials until I've got the level shifts/powers and teams get smooth in their execution of them - but once that times comes, death will simply be unacceptable.

If I'm on extreme settings, I kind of expect to die a fair number of times. (Vanguard at +3x8 I'm looking at you!!)

On any softcapped Scrapper, even regen - if you are built for defense you can go the entire TF without dying at all - you aren't invincible, but your survivability skyrockets.

I'm not a fan of dying, ever. So that's always a part of my build goals.

Have you ever noticed that resistance and regen need to build for defense if they want survivability?

I dare you to take a resistance or regen based scrapper - build for zero defense (that includes no katana/BS) and then take it on the ITF and see how much fun that is.

With enough time and investment, you can have both - swapping out to reactive for AV fights if it seems more useful.

I don't think it's affected by Fury, nor is it affected by the damage scalars each AT gets.

The only way to improve on Judgement is through your alpha slot, excluding the Recharge from Spiritual which does not help.

So you can increase the damage, acc or end cost through Alpha choice.

Don't worry, it isn't.

It's more on the scale of the Praetorian mission arcs, where there are constant ambushes and timed (from zone events) portions.


You will not really be in a duo, it can happen but for example BAF it's a lot of running around and dealing with the fleeing prisoners, or taking down the two AVs (usually with 2 groups of 8) while people (a third group of 8) deal with the waves of 9CUs & Victorias that continually show up to reinforce Seige & Nightstar (the goal is to cut off the reinforcements from the main AV killing group).

When those reinforcements arrive, your goal is to kill them before they kill you (as their buff strength increases over time iirc) - this should appeal to Scrappers.

Exactly.


Coming to the boards and basically asking for a handout is bad form.

Most of the posters in this thread with the heavy snark are actually posters that often spend a lot of time helping other people with their builds or giving advice.

But asking for YET ANOTHER SS/FA farming build, when there are already elven threads on the first page discussing FA, a thread with over 500 replies titled "very best farmer", and three threads total on the first page that are all SS/FA - is just bad etiquette.

Expect to be mocked.


The path less traveled is the one where the poster brings their own build to the forum, puts it up for critique and asks for help.

For every 1 of those, there are like 3-5 of "Show me your best builds so that I might plunder ideas for free with no effort on my part!!".

EDIT: Since Scrappers are hardier, shouldn't Stalkers do more damage? (sorry, couldn't resist)

Depends on how much more damage.

Depends on how much hardier.


The benefits Scrappers get out of AAO & the significantly better damage they get using SC* for example, far, far outstrip the extra 12% HP the Brute gets.

*This applies even moreso to LR, which is a sad version on a Brute.

This was doom and gloom for no reason.

The Brute buffing advantage exists, but it is not some free gravy train. I almost never get +RES buffs or +HP buffs. (+DEF on the other hand is plentiful)

Mostly it only comes into play with specialist sets like Elec & FA, or when using T9s and/or insps - and now Barrier.

Useful? Absolutely, and often critical. Equivalent to a Tanker? Not even remotely.

Funny, as a primarily Brute player I feel like the Incarnate content is somewhat nudging Brutes out of being capable of the main aggro role in favor of Tankers.

The upping of To Hit numbers (which tankers can handle better buildwise than either Scrappers or Brutes), the higher damage spikes, damage that forces you to rely on HP alone (higher Tanker base resistance, higher Tanker base HP, higher Tanker HP cap) While these favor the Brute over the Scrapper in a minor capacity, they favor the Tanker much more.


It could also just be an overreaction to "new stuff" and that melee players will just have to come to terms with the fact that for incarnate content, we will need to rely more and more on support ATs for their buffs and debuffs.

You want SM/L Defense to around 35-45%.

All other typed to around 30-40%

You can actually softcap these, with the exception of Psi - but I find it requires some solid sacrifices I don't like making, namely recharge. With the spiritual alpha, you may be able to make that work for you.

After that slot for +HP and Recharge when possible.

If you're very serious about tanking you also want SoW & Darkest Night.

Your main sets are Kinetic Combat & Reactive Armor. After that you can have a lot of leeway depending on the direction you want to take.


As for slotting for resistance, the only thing you can do is properly slot your toggles. There are few to no bonuses worth chasing here.

Don't worry, Brutes get an amazing -1% more damage compared to the -damage the Scrapper gets!!

IT'S SO GREAT I HAVE TO PUT IT IN CAPS.

I'm trying to figure out when this would be.

I really can't come up with a scenario where the Brute having aggro and high DPS somehow threatens the squishies to the point that the Tanker needs to step in and save the day by taking aggro from the Brute and thus lessening DPS.

Let's say they are standing next to each other sharing 16 enemies worth of aggro including an AV, worst case - Brute dies. At which point the tanker is already there and has been generating threat.

When does the Brute having aggro pose a threat to the team?

When are you, personally, making this choice in game right now?


Actually 15% is an amount I am totally comfortable in chasing like a Rabid dog.

I've spent billions on the build(s) for even lesser amounts than that. Why stop now!!


Well played.

While DPS is the main conversation here, -15% of a 300 point Footstomp is -45 DPA. I don't want to do 255 point Footstomps when I can do 300 point foostomps.

Especially when I can do those 300 point footstomps every 6s.

If this really was for the benefit of the team, I could accept it.

I just can not come up with a situation when the Tanker getting in my aggroz and reducing my damage actually can benefit the team.

Unless you mean by both of us running around and grabbing more and more mobs for wholesale slaughter - then yeah, I'm all for that. I'm not expecting any tank to wait for me to take spawn dives because that would mean we are not both rushing headlong into violence.



I would say their survivability performance is also subject to team comp.

Unfortunately there isn't a small army of guys like Silas on my server who play those mythical sets I've read so much about like thermal and sonic - getting +RES buffs is a pretty rare day for me. Usually it's +DEF out the wazoo, which I already built for (useful in new content though).



Agreed.

Then I recommend downloading Mids Hero Designer if you don't already have it, putting your build together and posting it in this forum for tweaking.