Justaris

Last I heard, first meeting was this Friday.

This is a good point, and if I made it sound like that level of buff was necessary on a regular basis then I apologize. My playtimes are somewhat erratic, so my Rad/Rad ends up doing pickup groups for things about half the time, which makes 'overkill' abilities that Power Boost provides very helpful. If I were able to play 75% of my time or better with veteran players in an SG or other group then I'd probably see less use of those combos.

In short, while it may not be necessary in many situations, particularly when playing on a very good and experienced team, I like to have the option when I need it. YMMV.

Obviously this is a subjective ranking and some other Rad/Rad players might rank things differently than I have here. The "big three" debuffs (Rad Infection, Enervating Field and Lingering Rad) are pretty standard, however, and most people expect Rads to have these powers. Accelerate Metabolism is a great buff and another of Rad's signature powers that pretty much everyone takes.

Choking Cloud is somewhat controversial, a love-it-or-hate-it power that I like very much. Whether or not it's worth it will likely have a lot to do with how comfortable you are getting into melee range. Radiant Aura's the heal, it's a PbAOE aura heal and the weakest heal of its kind in the game. You're not here to heal. It's good to top off what little gets through your debuffs, but a healer you're not and you shouldn't play as though you are. EM Pulse is the most powerful AOE hold in the game. Really. It's pretty nice.

Mutation is probably one of the best of all the resurrect powers (I'd only rank Howling Twilight from Dark Miasma higher), but resurrect powers in general are skippable these days since anyone can make an awaken and many players have temp self-resurrect powers. There is a difference between powers like this an a battle-resurrect power like Mutation that puts a player right back into things with full health and endurance and no kind of stun, so it does have its place, but it can also be passed over understandably. I took this power but not until very late in the build.

Fallout, while fun, is an AOE damage power that centers on a dead teammate. Someone else on the team therefore has to die before you can use it. A good Fallout-Vengeance-Mutation combo is a lot of fun, but of course highly situational.


Probably the single best power in Radiation Blast is Cosmic Burst. That's the gem you don't want to miss from your secondary, a hard-hitting ST attack and stun all rolled into one. I also highly recommend Irradiate and Neutron Bomb because these two powers have very high Defense Debuff components which makes all the enemies easier to hit for you and everyone else on the team. If you have Choking Cloud this also makes it easier for that to hit. Neutrino Bolt is a nice, quick-cycling attack and thankfully not a bad pick since you're stuck with it.

Aim is nice if you have room for it - powers like Aim and Build Up are always nice. Atomic Blast is a fun nuke - who wouldn't want to literally mushroom-cloud nuke stuff? It's a crashing nuke, however, so it will bring down your endurance, which means your toggles drop. Used at the wrong time this can be disastrous, so Atomic Blast is definitely situational.

I'm not a big fan of Electron Haze mainly because of the knockback component. This is mostly because I play my Rad/Rad in melee more often that not, where my Irradiate and my choking cloud can do the most good, and knocking things around isn't compatible with that. If you're playing a Rad/Rad primarily from range, this is a much better power.

Proton Volley is a snipe. If you like snipes, you will probably like Proton Volley.

X-Ray Beam, while kind of cool-looking, is a not all that powerful of an attack. I never felt like I needed both Neutrino Bolt and X-Ray Beam, and since I had to take Neutrino Bolt...


Anyway, that's my rundown and my reasons for what I think. That's a melee-centered Rad/Rad for you. YMMV.

I'm also curious about this. Based on the stipulation that we were to roll new characters for this event I've been holding off leveling up the Illusion/Emp I made, but I can certainly start gaining xp on my own, just tell me what level to be by what date.