GavinRuneblade

As I understand it, both fire melee and shield defense work better on scrapper than brutes because of the higher base damage numbers. Fire's dots don't benefit from fury, and the damage bonus from Against All Odds in Shield is applied to a brute's much lower base damage numbers. If you are considering the tank, then it is because you want the survivability and there the tank really is king.

But as stated by several, Super Strength is the top pick on brutes and it performs very nicely.

Thanks for the clarification on the proc. I always thought it worked a little like the electric attacks that jump from enemy to enemy (jolting chain etc). I just have it on one character and I never really pay that much attention to how/when/if it fires. Shame really a chain-like proc would be cool. But since I have it in seeds of confusion from the plant set, it's not like I really need it to chain =)

I sort of avoided responding to the whole, "only works for one AT or powerset" intentionally just to say that AoEs are already available to stalkers even MA stalkers.

The judgement slot will give an AoE power as part of the Incarnate system.

Additionally, a few of the Patron (Leviathan via Waterspout) and APP Pools (Blaze via Fireball) have AoE attacks in them.

As for what you are asking, I think something like contagious confusion's proc that spread damage rather than a mez condition is theoretically possible.

Not real fond of thorns myself. It works, but I've found it deals not as much toxic as I'd like and the animations are too slow for my taste. Actual performance is not shabby and it certainly has some decent slotting options.

Mind is wonderful.

I'm no good at thinking in terms of whole builds. But for me I have three options I stick to for damage auras (not just this one, but any of them):

Eradication with two Scirrocco's
6 obliteration
4x Fury of The Gladiator and 2 either Eradication (quad, trip and/or proc) or two scirrocco's

FYI, except for the quad and the proc even though it's a PvP recipe, most of the fury of the glad sell for 5 million or less. Which makes them cheaper than even cleaving blow and comparable to multistrike. 4 of them give 3 points of -kb which is nice for /elec since grounded only works near the floor.

I've incarnated all 12 of my 50s, plus all three of the characters that hit 50 post the alpha slot release.

I've got a very small amount of purples on exactly four characters (two doms, one blaster, one controller).

But I've never claimed to be normal =)

I have noticed that the load screen is much longer. I think close to 1 minute of black screen. I should time it.

I have not noticed more mapserver's than usual, but I have noticed my talk-to-npc computer-locks-up bug has gotten much much worse.

Those Acc/Mez hami-os are awesome in dark servant.

That is a great way to make an end-game build affordable by spreading the price out over time. I give that advice out alot.

We actually have a third build now that unlocks after you get your alpha slot.

I don't use domination much except to refill my endurance. I use my AoE hold alot. Especially on bosses where st-hold aoe-hold st-hold takes care of them, but it is also a spectacular way to handle ambushes and second spawns who are too close together.

I alternate opening vs spawns with seeds and creepers.

By teh way, you need generic accuracy in creepers, not just recharge and not set-based accuracy. The creepers have multiple powers. If you slot ranged, then the slow and cones don't benefit, if you slot AoE, the the ranged don't benefit. I have Nucleus HOs in mine. The difference is pretty amazing.

It depends on the set you want. For example if you;re running /dark /fire or /elec you might be building for s/l defense in which case you want kinetic combat and those max out at level 35 anyway so you just roll in the 35-39 range (or 30-34) and any kinetic's you generate will be level 35.

If you purchase anything directly with A-Merits or regular merits you can select the level you wish.

Otherwise you're looking on the market. I also recommend anything you really can't find you post in the market forum. They have a group specifically for generating mid-level recipes who might be able to help you. Fulmens is the leader but there's a bunch of people involved.

Personally, I don't sweat it in most cases. Anything from 30-37 is "good enough" for a character that will exemp alot. Anything 40+ is "good enough" for anyone who won't. I start equipping IOs immediately. I don't use any DOs or SOs on any character anymore. Pure IOs either sets or commons from level 7 through 50.

On Plant/Storm The damage is nice, but for me the knock highly limits it. Tornado can chuck enemies out of a single immobilize and the holds have no -kb. I found that trying to control the knock was more effort than I wanted. Not that it doesn't work, but it is more effort than I want to put in.

That's why I voted for the dominator. But I have both and play both.

So, I know that nukes are no longer useable on COPs, but is the purple rularuu still buggy/nigh indestructible?

I was on two attempts over the weekend, both failed for lack of damage output even with a horde of shivans helping.

I have a character where I made two versions back before we could swap sides: Plant/Storm controller and Plant/Ice dominator. the character is a tree spirit. I also have a spines/nin stalker who bought a super-power kit from devouring earth limited and became a plant-monster ninja. And I have an Earth/thorn dominator.

I can say that spines/thorns really sucks compared to any other attack set I've tried. Sure it has a few ranged options. But the actual AoE is not that impressive (compared to claws for instance which does a better job using nothing more than Spin), the attack speed (animation times) are horrid, and it does too much lethal and not enough toxic. I can't really recommend that you try another spines or thorns character based on my experience with them. the earth/thorn dom I would delete completely except earth/ is so much fun all by itself. I pretty much pretend that character doesn't have a secondary.

Plant, on the other hand, is a spectacular set with many fun abilities. It is powerful when slotted cheaply, and it benefits from dumping lots of cash into it too. I can confirm that both versions are fun, but I like doms far more than controllers and storm has a few too many powers that are hard to control (tornado, hurricane) or are throw always (gale, O2 Boost). I doubt I'll ever make another stormie of any AT having this one is more than enough. It's cool and powerful, but not my bag of tea just like your issues with regen it requires too much babysitting (stand here everything gets messed up, stand there it works ok. Use this power only after applying -kb, use this one before, blah blah blah, way too much hassle, I want click-kill-done and that's not storm).

Try a plant dominator. Go either /fire /elec or /psi for your secondary to get good AoE attacks. /Psi also has drain psyche which is awesome to overcome your squishiness. I really love my plant/ice and it has a solid elemental feel to it, plus you can color the attacks to look like earth crystals if you want. At epic go either /fire /ice or /leviathan. /Soul has some great clickies but they are just what you don't want in the form of click to gain endurance etc.

If you go plant/elec/leviathan you can really have a ton of summons leaving you free to do your thing. Flytrap, Creepers, Voltaic Sentinel, WaterSpout and Coralax out all at once drawing aggro off you and upping your damage at low/no end cost. then you cause confusion and have awesome holds, immobilize and AoE attacks (plus plant's aoe immobilize is the highest damage out there). /Elec has some solid hard-hitting AoE's and leviathan has a cone -res to up your damage against whole spawns (I also slot achiles heel in my flytrap since it has two attacks one of them being a cone that use it).

That's my recommendation anyway.

Don't forget that SO's also drop on AV defeats. You can get level 1 SOs that way.