Glazer

It sounds like a fun combination! I have experience with Dark/ and /Elec, but not this particular combo.

/Elec in general tends to be somewhat squishy against multiple enemies (as long as they do anything other than energy damage). Dark/ has some decent mitigation with Siphon Life and Tohit debuffs, so that should help. But I have a feeling you'll still need to invest heavily (in Tough/Weave and/or expensive IO sets) to feel comfortable against most anything other than Rikti.

Single-target you'll do great...that's what Dark/ is all about. But honestly, I would call Dark/Elec AoE-lite. Dark Comsumption and Soul Drain are on pretty long timers. Their damage isn't too hot, either. Lightning Field does noticeable damage at high Fury, but other than that...eh.

My Dark/Shield is constantly gasping for End, even with Dark Consumption and fully-slotted Stamina. And his toggle burden is less than you'll have with /Elec. Power Sink and Energize will definitely close that gap, but I doubt you could do without Stamina (unless you have massive +Rec and/or +Recharge from IO sets). If anything, Dark Consumption is the weakest of the 3, so if you're looking to drop an End recovery power, I would consider that one first.

I have my Siphon Life slotted for Acc and Heal. Dunno why Deth thinks it isn't "reliable". It hits as well as anything else in Dark/ does, does a decent amount of damage, and returns about 20% of my blue bar per hit. I'm not a number-cruncher, but even though it might not provide as much healing over time as Energize, it comes with an attack that will be part of your main ST attack chain anyway. Of course, it's not a huge amount of mitigation all by itself...but then neither is Energize, really. They're both meant only to patch up the holes in your secondary's mitigation.

Of course, most any Brute combination will work just fine with infinite infamy for IO sets. I get the feeling many forum posters sort of tacitly assume that lol. But IMO, you'll be starting with a pretty solid foundation with Dark/Elec.

As a solo player who likes to experience game content, I've pretty much given up on /Elec, although there is so much to like about the set. I've gotten both an Energy/Elec and Elec/Elec to 38 and can't bring myself to go any further with them. They are just way too squishy outside of very specific situations. Energize is sweet, but IMO a poor substitute for the fact that you're always getting hit, debuffed, etc....even if not for as much as other secondaries. And heaven help you if you get anywhere close to anything with Toxic damage.

I could "fix" these toons by doing one or more of the following 3 things, but none of them appeals to me much. I've seen Elec/Elec farming monster builds that use all 3...but they still only work against just the right type of mobs (e.g. Rikti).

(1) Get Tough/Weave: Much hate for this option...3 powers down the tubes, two very End hungry toggles. Power Sink keeps you going, but it seems like a high price to pay. I go from not worrying much about my blue bar to constantly worrying about it. Besides, IMO these should be reserved for turning a beast into a total monster if you really want to...not to prop up a secondary that can't cut it on its own.

(2) Stack +def IO set bonuses: Not only is this ridiculously expensive--because everyone wants to do this on their melee toons--but you can still only go so far, since you're starting from 0 Def To All. Also, I'm playing the game to, uh, play the game...not to endlessly grind farm grind farm grind farm to afford the sets. And/or to stand at the black market trying to figure out how to trick it into coughing them up for less than stupidly high selling prices.

(3) Take Soul Mastery: Lots of juicy -tohit here. I have nothing against this PPP; my reasons for hating this for an /Elec Brute are mostly conceptual. I can't quite figure out how a hyper-charged lightning beast suddenly has access to the souls of the dead, no matter how cozy he might get with Ghost Widow. Besides, who else is going to take Mu Mastery?

Maybe all purely resist-based secondaries must suffer this same doom. It's hard to see making any kind of comfortably survivable (solo) melee character in this game without at least some decent amount of defense. Even with Elec/Elec's sapping potential, you have to survive long enough to floor your opponents' blue bars. It mostly works. Mostly.

One more random gripe about /Elec: Power Surge Yeah, woot!, god mode. But then...no health, no end, no <$#@!!> toggles. Time to pray you're in a totally safe spot. Might be useful if you really need to run away (or if you're absolutely positive you're gonna kill that EB in under 3 mins), but it's way, way too hard a crash for me to want to use this regularly...or at all.

On the plus side...getting back to the OP's original topic...my SS/WP/Soul Brute pretty much glided in to 50 with only common IO's. He struggles somewhat with some +2/+3 EB's, but is otherwise fine in +2/2 player mode for most anything you can throw at him.

Ironblade: Yeah, it was the soloable part I was referring to. I've gravitated towards ATs and powersets that can solo fairly well. Even my defenders are more offenderish. And all can manage a standard story arc just fine. If I had any desire to, I could even farm well enough on some of them with some minimal IO sets (one of my first toons was a fire/rad controller and the ninjas/dark MM I referred to is a beast).

But still...completing a story arc means getting 5-10ish merits and once in a blue moon some kind of reward roll. The SF/TFs would qualify, except for the soloable part (even if you managed to pad those and then solo them, you would still have a tough time with most). But even then all you get are slightly more merits...just enough for a single reward roll at the merit vendor. And then we're straying into the luck/farming territory that makes me feel sad.

What I was thinking of was some kind of "epic" story arcs. Long, with an interesting story and fun encounters. Involved enough not to be farmable for groups (or maybe even solo/small group *required*) and possibly lasting several real-time days with lock-out timers and such. At the end, you get a definite, really cool reward...maybe a whole IO set or a purple of your choice or something.

Thanks for all the advice, everyone! Most of my builds lean heavily on the Uncommon sets already, but I'll definitely try some of the other techniques you've suggested. I know a capitalist guru isn't required to play the market hehe ...but I'm much more of "reluctant capitalist" than anything else.

I solo 99% of the time, absolutely abhor farming for probability-based drops and "cash", and am a very poor capitalist. So for me to gear up in most MMORPGs is a bit of a challenge, unless there are some juicy, content-driven, mostly soloable (hah!) quests that I can take advantage of.

Sadly, CoX has no story arcs that qualify.

I'm a packrat, so your run-of-mill mats are usually pretty easy for me to manage, and I've got crafters who can crank out common IOs fairly cheaply. So that's no problem. I avoided IO sets for a long, long time. I have finally started dipping into them a bit, but the market is not kind to folks like me. I've planned my builds to avoid the more popular (i.e. expensive) sets and uniques, but those IOs are popular for a reason...they have lots of sweet bonuses. Unfortunately, now that I've taken a bite out of the forbidden fruit, there's no going back to a state of innocence.

I took a break from CoX shortly before Issue 14 came out, and I'm just now discovering that (a) AE tickets drop at a decent rate and (b) you can get specific rare salvage items from the ticket vendors. I ran one AE mission this morning on my ninjas/dark MM and got enough tickets for 1 rare salvage of my choice. Woot!! Now that's a time investment vs. reward ratio that I can live with! Aside from the ticket drop rate (which probably doesn't vary much), there is also nothing probabilistic about it. It's even soloable. And so much better than spending a few million inf for a single Reactive Gas. Perfect!

So packrat + a limited number of AE missions seems to be the solution for salvage. I may even be able to avoid the market completely (wooo hoooo!!).

Is there any similar strategy for recipes? There are so many recipes in the game that the odds of getting any particular set are way, way, way too low for me, and packratting recipes only goes so far with limited storage space. Merits are fairly hard come by compared to the prices of individual recipes at the merit vendor--especially since my main sources of merits are soloable story arcs. 20-some odd story arcs to get enough merits for a single, 250-merit recipe is not gonna happen.

I guess that pretty much leaves me with rewards rolls. 20 merits is not so bad. The number of AE tickets for a gold-class reward roll seems a bit steep, but may also be doable. But is it worth it? Once again, the odds of getting anything I need seem depressingly low. I suppose I could attempt to sell the recipes I don't need (or ever anticipate needing) but that almost always means that no one needs them, and I'll be lucky if they sell at all.

Probabilistic drops and market economies are two of the things that frustrate me the most about MMORPGs these days. I'm supposed to a super-powered force of nature...and whether or not I'm lucky or a capitalist guru should have nothing to do with how unstoppable a force I am.

Cool, thanks for all the details!

Summarizing: For Fire/Rad, your attack chain will be some permutation of RoF, Char, Fire Blast and Fire Ball. And the set bonus priorities are: (1) ranged defense (~40%), (2) recharge (for Hasten/AM, Fire Ball), (3) recovery (to keep up the attack chain with all the toggles running). Stay at max Hot Feet range with the big bad guy pointing away from your impys, and fry. Rawr!

For Ill/Rad, the attack chain will be some permutation of SW, Blind, ST epic blast, AoE epic--keeping PA up as much as you humanly can. Set bonus priorities: (1) recharge (goal is perma-PA with Hasten/AM) and (2) recovery. For those of us who don't yet have perma-PA (or may never, depending on how expensive that is), what do we do while PA is down? Kite? Hope Phanty's decoy gets the aggro?

Please forgive an AV killing newb here, but what attacks would a Fire/Rad use that are doing so much more damage? It seems to me that Hot Feet pretty much has to be out of the equation if you don't want to get crunched, so that leaves patron powers (which Ill has equal access to) and...what? The ST Fire Immob? Wouldn't Spectral Wounds be about equivalent to that in damage?

Of course, the imps have to do more damage than phanty, but are also squishier since they have to be in melee.

Edit: I've also head mention that Choking Cloud is a must, but is that just for farming? I can't imagine that it would do anything but drain end against an AV.

Totally forgot about the Mag 3 stun on Psychic Wail lol. Well,that works for me. Thanks for the reply!

My Fortunata is looking ahead to the 40's, and one of the things I'd really like to fit in is Soul Tentacles. I've got all the AE attacks (Dart Burst, Psychic Scream, Psionic Tornado) slotted up, and my biggest issue now is scatter. Holding my enemies in place while I'm frying their brains out would be nice.

The problem is...I'm running seriously short on slots. I could easily give up TT:A or even TT:L, but I don't see where I would pull the slots from. So I'm considering dumping Aura of Confusion. Confuse is way to handy for bosses and others that I really don't want to have to worry about being hit by. But AoC...eh. It's a nice panic button, but I don't see using it much. I have a Plant/ Dom for that.

Total Domination was already off the table pretty much right from the start. I don't always even get the AE hold powers on my Doms or Trollers, and I see less need for it here, especially with the superior AoC option.

So my question: will I be gimping my Fortunata if I don't have either of the AE control powers?

Seems like a lot of Rad/ and /Rad, but I haven't noticed that my Fire/Rad troller is particularly uba against EBs, let alone AVs. Are there certain Rad powers or techniques that make AV-soloing possible for those builds? Or basically just hit as hard and fast as you can and hope the AV doesn't break through your defenses too often? For a Fire/Rad troller in particular, you pretty much need to be close (for Hot Feet) to do any kind of decent damage, and that leaves you open to all kinds of nastiness--status effects, in particular.

Also, for the MM experts out there...how do you think Ninjas/Dark would fare? My Ninjas/Dark MM is at 45 currently and does very well against EBs. I don't generally run at Challenge Level 5, so haven't met any AVs yet.

(Sorry if this is a thread hijack. My main question applies equally to /Rad Corruptors. )

I'm working through the 30's on my Fortunata, too.

I'm saving TT:A and TT:L until the 40's. The buffs are nice, but not essential, IMO. I've rarely taken any of the Leadership abilities on any of my many other toons, pretty much for the same reason.

I'm also holding off on Aim in favor of Psychic Scream, and I'm loving PS a lot. I use it as an opener (along with Dart Burst and Psionic Tornado) when the spawn is nice and clustered together. The damage is nothing to write home about, but the -recharge is beautiful...definitely helps in the defense dept. I even work PS into my attack chain against bosses, for the -recharge and to take out any friends while focusing on the boss. Between soft-capped defense (with Mindlink) and the -recharge from PS, the boss usually ends up running away at about 1/4 health, which is the best defense of all lol (well...other than actually defeating it ) and only slightly annoying.

Depending on the power, I almost always slot 2 Accs, 1 End Redux and 1 Recharge enhancements in my attacks before putting in Dmg. The Accs and End Redux are essential for most powersets, IMO, but especially since Fortunata attacks are not particulary cheap nor do they have any substantial to-hit buffs, -Def debuffs or special End recovery abilities. I'm not having any End issues at the moment, except against the usual suspects (Carny bosses, EBs). If I had to rely on expensive IO set bonuses just to handle standard End balancing issues, I'd go crazy and would probably quit the game lol, so it's worth it to me to use the enhancement slots. Stamina is 3-slotted with End Mods, of course.

I'm anticipating some End problems when I add the last couple toggles (running TT:M, IW, Mask Presence and Combat Jumping now), so I might have to reserve Mask Presence for when I really need to be stealthed (and keep Sprint use to a minimum, of course). I *may* resort to some IO set bonuses at that point, but only against my will...and only the cheapest ones for what I want.

For Psychic Wail, I have 1 Acc/3 Recharge/2 Dmg, but I'll be picking up Aim at 35 to offset the lower Acc.

I only slot 1 End Redux in each toggle. The SoA toggles are cheap, End-wise, and the second End Redux barely makes a difference.

I guess I should also mention that I'm planning a Hasten-less build; hence all the Recharge slots. And yes, I have a 5-frankenslotted Mindlink filled with the cheapest Def/Rech and Def/End/Rech IO set enhancements that I could find.

If you're not so lucky to be plvled to post-24 greatness, I found it somewhat of a grind--most especially because I was working on a Fortunata and really wanted to be doing ranged, psionic damage lol. That's a weird design choice--start out as a claws scrapper to make a psionic blaster!

Anyway, the grind wasn't much worse than any other class--or really any better, except that Conditioning was actually noticeable and helpful. I even noticed that my regen/recovery were better than I'm used to before I even noticed I had Conditioning. You get some decent attacks that chain well, and since some of them are ranged (the Dart ones), you don't have to spend any time chasing the runners, which is cool.

I'm totally loving my Fortunate post-24, so I wouldn't write them off just because these boards are melee-obsessed. It's like having the perfect psionic blaster--at least perfect for my playstyle. Whatever you sacrifice in raw damage (and I'm guessing you do, but I honestly don't know), you easily make up for with passive defenses (near enough to softcap without IOs and well beyond with Mindlink), complete status protection (Ah, Heaven!!!), excellent debuffs (-regen on Dart attacks, -recharge on some of the Psy attacks), decent controls, a crashless nuke (woot!), nice AE/ST balance, etc. Not to mention cool psionic attacks! What's not to love??

My Fortunata--who's been 100% solo so far--is cruising in his 30's. I can't comment on the 40's, but considering that the primary bane of ranged attackers at that range is status effects and debuffs (which have to hit you to be a problem), I'm hoping he will continue cruising all the way to 50.

Cool, thanks! I'll definitely give it a try.

Before I get this power and regret it, just want to check whether Psionic Tornado does knockback or knockdown. Seems like I've seen both listed in different places. Flinging a spawn every which way would definitely be counter-productive to lining up my cone attacks lol...but it would be nice to have it for the AE damage and -recharge.