GECCo's Guide to the Invulnerability/Stone Melee Tanker
It seems it has been a long time since someone has posted a guide for building an Invulnerability/Stone Melee Tank. I thought I would take some time and create a new one given my nearly 3 years experience with this powerset combination.
Contents:<ul type="square">[*] Introduction[*]
Invulnerability[*]
Stone Melee[*]
Power Pool Recommendations[*]
Invention System Recommendations[*]
Sample Builds[/list]
My Credentials
I began playing CoH back in July of 2005. When I first sat down with the game and read through all of the AT descriptions I settled on Tanker. Further quick reading led me to believe that Invulnerability would be a good primary powerset and that Stone Melee looked cool and should be a good secondary powerset. A Tanker (and MMO addict
) was born!
I took ElectroCroc through the tutorial (not realizing there was an Isolater badge, or badges at all) and eventually landed him in Atlas Park. He learned the ropes of the game and then how to be a good tank. That took a good while. I played solo about 2/3 of the time and teamed the remaininng 1/3. After 11 months of working through his story he was awarded the Hero of the City badge and acheived level 50.
I have continued to play him regularly since then. He has completed all of the task forces (except for the two most recently released which were attempted) and most of the trials. He has collected over 500 badges. I have reworked and rebuilt him with the introduction of Inventions and the addition of new invention sets in Issue 11. He is a living, active tank and I really enjoy playing him.
Guide Disclaimer
There are a lot of guides about Invulnerability either on its own or in combination with other secondary powersets. There are fewer (none?) Stone Melee guides out there.
I have looked over these in the past but am not consulting any of them as I write this guide.
My sources are:<ul type="square">[*] My own experience in the game[*] Knowledge gained interacting with the Tanker community[*] Mid's Hero Planner[*] City of Data[*] ParagonWiki[/list]
I have included a lot of numbers in the guide to try to show the qualities of powers and for purposes of comparison. If any of the numbers are wrong please let me know and Ill make corrections as appropriate. My opinions are my own. If you disagree with my opinions, feel free to share that but dont expect me to update the guide unless you thoroughly convince me I am wrong.
(Any numbers given for slotting are for Single Origin (SO) enhancements. Somewhat better results can be achieved by using Invention Origin (IO) enhancements. I highly recommend using IOs. Numbers given for IOs are for level 50 or the highest level for the given set.)
Powers in the powersets are presented in the following format:
Power Name (Power Abbreviation) (Linked to power entry at City of Data)
Power Type: Auto, Toggle or Click
Target: The target type for attack powers (single target, melee, ranged, AoE, etc.)
Available: The level at which the power may be chosen
Importance: My opinion on the importance of the power. A number (1 - Most Important, 5 Least Important) and an adjective describing my opinion.
Take By: The level by which I think you should have this power (if you take it)
Base Damage at 50: The base damage of the power at level 50 (attacks only)
Secondary Effect: Secondary effects of the power (if any)
Comments: My comments about the power
Slotting Recommendations: My recommendations about how I think this power can be slotted well
(Any items not appropriate for the power are excluded)
This guide was last updated in June of 2008 and covers information current as of Issue 12.
