Kilgoth
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Posts
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Joined
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Granted, Ice Control is nothing you'll be looking for for the traditional lockdown, but it can do the trick if you know how to.
1. Frostbite: You don't HAVE to use it on Ice Slick, right? That doesn't make it useless though. As you will probably know, Arctic Air causes enemies to run away from you (slowly but consistently). Frostbite can prevent them from doing that at any time while also providing a recharge debuff. Which brings us to
2. Arctic Air: While it may be true that AA gets A LOT better with the contageous confusion proc (I can't tell, my only Ice Control char - which is an Ice/Earth Dom - is only 40 so far), it'y not useless before that point. If you slot for Confuse Duration, you can pretty reliably Confuse the vast majority of the mob while they're busy falling on the floor. If they're not dead until Ice Slick's gone, they're confused and ready to shoot each other down.
3. Shiver: That's one power I'm not sure wether it's useful or not. I have it, but I guess I could do better things with my animation time. The Slows stacks nicely with all the rest of the powerset though.
4. Flash Freeze: Yeah, it does have the general problem of sleeps, but so do Earth and Mind (maybe more, I'm too lazy to look it up and can't remember right now). It's generally known that AoE Sleeps are for solo use only.
5. Jack Frost: He's dumb, true. Not sure what else to say, but he looks pretty cool. If the devs came around to giving him a better AI, he may become a valid Singy/Rocky Hybrid. Wouldn't ever skip control Set pets anyway, so you might as well get it.
In a whole: Ice Control needs a little time for its control to take effect. There are only three ways to mitigate an alpha, one of which is the AoE sleep and the other the AoE Hold (we all know AoE holds aren't that reliable for every-mob-control). That leaves us with Ice Slick. It's probably not a wise choice to pick Ice Control for no reason because it can indeed be frustrating, but if you can make it work for a concept and you like the toon it's really not as bad as common gossip. -
Looks like long animating knockdowns. Maybe some kind of Energy Melee with KD instead of stun and some kind of Siphon. It doesn't look THAT impressive in the video...
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I got a Dark/Stone Tanker that can stun whole mobs of bosses unless it's something mez resistant like Rikti Chief Soldiers. The staggering can be annoying at times, but I guess with a Brute's damage that's gonna be less of an issue than building Fury. I've shied away from building him as a Brute for that very reason. Therefore that is pure theorycraft.
€dit: Oh, and I procced out Fault. It helps a bit with AoE dmg if you feel you're lacking in that department. -
CoD looks cool and offers perception and Def. Why wouldn't you love it?
I mean: Dark has proper Resistances, Mez Auras and a massive heal, as we all know. If you add Def to the mix, you can almost make it into a kind of Granite without the penalties. A little End-Heavy if you do so, but that can be fixed with IOs. Also: If you're using a secondary that offers whatever kind of weapon, you get extra coolness. My Dark/Stone is an invisible Mist of deep red with glowing eyes attacking with a hammer floating in mid-air. How awesome is that? -
Quote:100% this. The reason I myself play tanks is because either the powersets aren't available to brutes (namely the ice sets) or because the idea of the toon is contradicting the basic principle of brutes (speaking about my Dark Armor/Stone Melee stunbot - which is amazingly fun, but not all too fast to play). I usually try to keep aggro with about 3/4 of my concentration. The rest is about smashing faces and having F.U.N.. I've never had a high level tanker, so my experience with them is sub-par at best. You might have encountered some of my type in that mission.Originally Posted by Jet_Boy
The only thing anyone in this game is "supposed to be doing" is having fun. Everything else is negotiable.
Also, being a villain player, I'm an advocator of the principle of caring for yourself. While I personally think that a Tank SHOULD sooner or later get Taunt and try to keep aggro, you should never under any circumstances overly rely on that. Nobody's perfect after all. Not even you. And in my experience, supporting, controlling and holding aggro are significantly harder than simply dealing damage (which is why playing brutes is so relaxing). -
I'd also go for the Dark/Fire Brute and Fire/Dark Corruptor combo. Dark Melee is single target DPS king while Firey Ranged thingy (whatever its actual name is) brings loads of AoE to the table. Also both are hella fun.
I pesonally would avoid dual Brutes. Racing for Fury is a pain. -
Even though I have never had a brute high enough to test it, I'm not a fan of DA on brutes because all the control might make building fury harder, and DB is not a set with ultra fast animating attacks, thus won't help it that much.
However, this is pure theorycraft. You may or may not like the combos on Stalkers.
I suggest taking other people's opinions into consideration. -
Quote:You must have played a different Energy Melee Set than me, because for my EM/Fire Brute the Stun of Whirling Hands helped greatly, not to speak of all the single target stuns that can be stacked on Bosses or even EBs. All you have to do is not to believe that everything's gonna be stunned once you start fighting but go with the expectancy value of stunned foes. You don't HAVE to push your difficulty to unimaginable heights just because you can.Originally Posted by Siolfir
Energy Melee? Mitigation? What?! Okay, yes, it has semi-reliable, single-target stuns. And no reliable AoE mitigation at all, plus a power that - as has been mentioned in the thread already - can kill you. Energy Melee is either tied with Fire Melee (which doesn't have any mitigation but at least doesn't actively hurt you) or else behind it in mitigation.
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I've NEVER ever seen an Energy/Shield, so that's probably a good reason to start one
Since I got an Energy/Fire Brute (should be comparable enough, except Fire is Resistance/Heal instead of Def) and he worked quite well with the stun of Whirling hands and the single targets, I don't see a reason not to do it. Probably not gonna be the king of kings, but you don't seem to be looking for that. However. Have fun with your new EM/SD toon
(I would have started one myself, if only for the looks of Whirling Hands with a Shield, but I've seen so many /Shielders around that it's probably gonna take a while before I start another) -
I usually drop an Ice slick and jump in with Arctic air running. To prevent the mobs from getting out of the AA zone I also add Frostbite - that prevents knockdown, too, but if you have your AA well slotted for Confuse duration, that doesn't matter too much. You may also throw in a Shiver before jumping in if you like.
Or you can alternate Ice Slick with AA+Frostbite with a Shiver thrown in. However, the latter doesn't prevent the alpha. -
Kudos to you for apologizing.
Seriously. I'm not sure I could do that. -
Quote:This. However, building for Defense is usually a slot-cheap (that counts for typed defense) way to greatly improve the survivability of a character. Most of the time you get other useful bonuses/boni for free. For example Kinetic Combat offers 1.5% HP in addition to its awesome S/L Defense. This and the fact that it's a viable tactic for ANY charakter. While Recharge is always good on most toons (except for those who already have endurance issues), it's often more expensive, as was stated before, due to the need of purples to do it effectively. That said, I would rather slot my Fire Brute for Recharge than defense if I find a way to do so in an equivalent way. I personally like toons that don't die at the instant they're being shot at (hence the love for brutes) and would rather take longer to kill stuff and survive the mob than dishing out insane damage but getting a heart attack if I happen to look at my HP bar.Originally Posted by Lord Mayhem
Generally I pick all the powers I want first, then worry about how I'll use sets to get what I want - I'd never sacrifice a power I wanted purely for a set bonus.
General addition: This goes to Fire Minded in person: Your nitpicking on fictive issues that are really viable options, just because you're trying to be different - or maybe because it's not your playstyle (which I can both respect) is getting tiring. I'm all for individualism, really - I refuse playing Super Strength, and I refused to play a Dark/Shield because I hate playing chars that everyone does, so I know what I'm talking about - but what you're doing isn't just stating your opinion. It's more of a desire to make everyone think the way you do (disguised as stating your opinion). So get a grip and just let people do what they like. It's not like they restrict you in any way at all. -
Redraw really isn't half as bad as most people make it.
I've got a Bane that uses the Mace single Target attacks and the Rifle AoEs, constantly jumping in and out of melee and it's really not much of an issue, even if I just stay in melee range and use the Target AoEs, skipping the Cone.
You're probably gonna have to try for yourself. -
Quote:Pardon?Originally Posted by Tonality
Frankenslotting Crushing and Touch of the Nictus, or going the Hami-O route will give you the best of both worlds.
As for the build, Going for the soft-cap really does reduce your offensive capability. For example, followup has poor accuracy, which means at a higher-level difficulty (the only reason why you'd even need to worry about survivability with defense) it isn't going to be incredibly accurate.
I'd rather add a healthy amount of defense (say around 36%), enough to easily soft-cap me with a single luck when I need it and know I can tear through enemies a lot quicker.
Now slotting:
you'll find the eradication energy proc will increase your damage output. Replace the dam/rech of erad, and then use scirr's acc/dam/end and dam/rech. You don't get as much of a damage bonus, but the proc in an AoE more than makes up for this.
Putting an achille's heel -res proc in slash and incorporating it into your attack chain will also help you kill tougher targets faster.
Using numinas in heal, HPT, RTTC, and whatnot will increase your regen and your HP.
For endurance-efficiency, at 3.71-1.9 (1.81 eps), you're going to have a fairly rough time constantly running, especially if you like to spam spin. You want to get about 2.5 or hopefully around 3 net EPS to have a continuous attack chain (which is where claws really shines) -
Not exactly what I've been looking for in certain areas, for example Siphon Life is only slotted as a Heal with little damage - I would rather use it as a heavy hitter with a healing side-effect. But it's certainly cheaper than my build (and actually affordable), I might consider some of your ideas I'm seeing in that build. Thanks for the feedback
I guess the build's gonna change anyway once I've played a while, but the combination just sounds like so much fun that I don't want to wait till I get high enough to actually experience it. So I have to get my imagination running
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Well, so I've been thinking about Dark/Fire due to the fact that I liked both sets on seperate chars and also because I've never seen one before. The combination of 2 Heals, one of which is an attack that will be spammed anyway, and 2 AoE damaging Endurance-Management tools sounds quite flashy to me. Also the damage in Fire should make the toon somewhat like a Dark/Shield (though most probably not quite as strong and a little different, but Dark/off. Sec. - you get the point). Anyway, my guessing was that slotting for HP might make sense with the two heals, and while I'm at it I could just use Kinetic Combat in my single target attacks and thus get a little S/L Def for free to make up for the squishiness of /Fire. So this is what I came up with without even having created, let alone played, the char.
One last explanation: You might be shocked about the missing Fitness Pool, but my positive experience with my Energy/Fire has told me that those Endurance-leechers can be quite effective. I've been able to delay Stamina to lvl 24 on that toon without any problems, and seeing as I have two Consumes, that might actually work out. However, that's a thing to be tested by actually playing. Here it is:
Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1,601
http://www.cohplanner.com/
Click this DataLink to open the build!
Level 50 Natural Brute
Primary Power Set: Dark Melee
Secondary Power Set: Fiery Aura
Power Pool: Fighting
Power Pool: Leaping
Power Pool: Speed
Power Pool: Concealment
Ancillary Pool: Mu Mastery
Villain Profile:
Level 1: Smite- (A) Kinetic Combat - Accuracy/Damage
- (3) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Endurance
- (7) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Recharge
- (37) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (39) Mako's Bite - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (A) Reactive Armor - Resistance/Endurance
- (13) Reactive Armor - Resistance/Endurance/Recharge
- (15) Reactive Armor - Resistance
- (15) Reactive Armor - Endurance
- (29) Steadfast Protection - Resistance/+Def 3%
- (29) Steadfast Protection - Knockback Protection
- (A) Kinetic Combat - Accuracy/Damage
- (3) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Endurance
- (7) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Recharge
- (37) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (39) Mako's Bite - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (A) Doctored Wounds - Heal/Endurance
- (5) Doctored Wounds - Endurance/Recharge
- (5) Doctored Wounds - Heal/Endurance/Recharge
- (43) Doctored Wounds - Heal
- (50) Doctored Wounds - Recharge
- (A) Dark Watcher's Despair - To Hit Debuff/Endurance
- (45) Dark Watcher's Despair - To Hit Debuff/Recharge
- (45) Glimpse of the Abyss - Accuracy/Recharge
- (45) Glimpse of the Abyss - Accuracy/Endurance
- (50) Glimpse of the Abyss - Accuracy/Fear/Recharge
- (A) Kinetic Combat - Accuracy/Damage
- (9) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Endurance
- (9) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Recharge
- (11) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (11) Touch of the Nictus - Heal/HitPoints/Regeneration/Recharge
- (13) Touch of the Nictus - Accuracy/Endurance/Recharge
- (A) Empty
- (A) Luck of the Gambler - Recharge Speed
- (A) Reactive Armor - Resistance/Endurance
- (17) Reactive Armor - Resistance/Endurance/Recharge
- (17) Reactive Armor - Resistance
- (34) Reactive Armor - Endurance
- (A) Reactive Armor - Resistance/Endurance
- (34) Reactive Armor - Resistance/Endurance/Recharge
- (34) Reactive Armor - Endurance
- (36) Reactive Armor - Resistance
- (A) Eradication - Accuracy/Recharge
- (19) Eradication - Damage/Recharge
- (19) Eradication - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge
- (23) Eradication - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (A) Eradication - Accuracy/Recharge
- (21) Eradication - Damage/Recharge
- (21) Eradication - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge
- (23) Eradication - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (A) Recharge Reduction IO
- (43) Recharge Reduction IO
- (43) Recharge Reduction IO
- (A) Multi Strike - Accuracy/Endurance
- (25) Multi Strike - Damage/Endurance
- (25) Multi Strike - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance
- (31) Scirocco's Dervish - Damage/Endurance
- (31) Scirocco's Dervish - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance
- (A) Eradication - Accuracy/Recharge
- (27) Eradication - Damage/Recharge
- (27) Eradication - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge
- (31) Eradication - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (A) Eradication - Damage
- (48) Eradication - Accuracy/Recharge
- (48) Eradication - Damage/Recharge
- (48) Eradication - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge
- (A) Mocking Beratement - Taunt/Recharge
- (36) Mocking Beratement - Taunt/Recharge/Range
- (36) Mocking Beratement - Taunt/Range
- (37) Mocking Beratement - Recharge
- (A) Kinetic Combat - Accuracy/Damage
- (33) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Endurance
- (33) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Recharge
- (33) Kinetic Combat - Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (39) Mako's Bite - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (A) Recharge Reduction IO
- (50) Recharge Reduction IO
- (A) Eradication - Accuracy/Recharge
- (40) Eradication - Damage/Recharge
- (40) Eradication - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge
- (40) Eradication - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (A) Enfeebled Operation - Accuracy/Recharge
- (42) Enfeebled Operation - Endurance/Immobilize
- (42) Enfeebled Operation - Accuracy/Endurance
- (42) Enfeebled Operation - Accuracy/Immobilize
- (A) Luck of the Gambler - Defense/Endurance
- (46) Luck of the Gambler - Defense/Endurance/Recharge
- (46) Luck of the Gambler - Defense
- (46) Luck of the Gambler - Recharge Speed
- (A) Blessing of the Zephyr - Knockback Reduction (4 points)
- (A) Luck of the Gambler - Recharge Speed
Level 1: Brawl- (A) Empty
- (A) Empty
- (A) Empty
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Set Bonus Totals:- 26,8% Defense(Smashing)
- 26,8% Defense(Lethal)
- 3% Defense(Fire)
- 3% Defense(Cold)
- 22,4% Defense(Energy)
- 22,4% Defense(Negative)
- 3% Defense(Psionic)
- 14,9% Defense(Melee)
- 12,7% Defense(Ranged)
- 3% Defense(AoE)
- 9% Max End
- 2,75% Enhancement(Terrorized)
- 27,5% Enhancement(RechargeTime)
- 9% Enhancement(Accuracy)
- 3% Enhancement(Immobilize)
- 4% Enhancement(Heal)
- 354,2 HP (23,6%) HitPoints
- Knockback (Mag -8)
- Knockup (Mag -8)
- MezResist(Held) 2,75%
- MezResist(Immobilize) 14,3%
- MezResist(Sleep) 1,65%
- MezResist(Terrorized) 2,2%
- 1,5% (0,03 End/sec) Recovery
- 20% (1,25 HP/sec) Regeneration
- 2,21% Resistance(Fire)
- 2,21% Resistance(Cold)
- 1,88% Resistance(Negative)
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My first Brute to reach a reasonable level was
SM/SD - Pretty heavy on end and I have yet to figure out a way to softcap her without gimping and losing the concept, but she's definitely fun. She's the Queen of Knockdown and SMASH and packs loads of fun.
DM/EA - I'm quite impressed with the tools of DM, wouldn't have believed that such an unimpressive (effect-wise) set could be fun. The secondary however is quite boring and thus I stopped playing him around lvl 25. I'm currently thinking about replacing him with a DM/FA, though I'm a little concerned with the survivability and I really like the concept of the DM which is based upon another of my characters
ElM/SA - While I have liked the Stone Armor Set throughout the whole ride (Rooted Regen ftw) and I generally like being tough, I can't say the same about Electric Melee. It's just missing the smash feel a brute should have - Though I really like Chain Induction (practically AoE with the damage and cost of a single Target attack, what more could you want?).
EM/FA - My most recent toon. Started a few days ago and lvl 36 by now. He's one hell of a fun brute and has always been from the start. I simply got Tough with lvl 14 and tried to get a little cheap defense from IO Sets and Combat Jumping (15% S/L). Fire's still a little Squishy, but the stun in Energy help A LOT with that. The other way round, Fire helps a little bit with AoE damage for Energy, and a Built up Energy Transfer with full Fury in the face of a Boss is always good for a laugh - so is stunning EBs (and I don't even have the power "Stun" yet). Currently playing on +0/x4 and having no real issues. Addicting, too. Edit: Also he looks REALLY cool with his Plasma and Fire colored auras and Plasma Pompoms.
Update: I've actually started the DM/FA project, and by now she's lvl 33 and amazing. A single target monster, as is inherent to Dark/, with enough AoE to drop all of the Minions and some Leuts until the Boss is dead. If there's no Boss in the mob, the Burst damage makes everything drop like flies. As for playstyle: My health bar harmonically oscillates and often I wonder how I just survived that situation. I'm running without stamina, so the End bar is pretty much the same, but without any problems in that regard. It's a boat load of fun. Especially since lvl 27. -
For Brutes I suggest */*.
It's fun! -
Well, I'm not really good at buildcrafting but as far as you can afford this, it looks solid in my opinion.
However, some things struck me as strange:
1) You're focusing on S/L Def, but you also got 2x2 pieces of Blessing of the Zephyr in your powers, which means Ranged Def. I personally would use those slots somewhere else. For example keeping one additional slot in CJ for a Def IO to put you just a tiny bit above the softcap.
The same applies to the Thunderstrike in Stone spears. You could use 5 pieces of Decimation instead to squeeze a little more Recharge out of it, unless it's for the Accuracy.
2) This one's personal preference: I would actually skip Power Boost and instead take Tremor with 5 pieces of Obliteration in it for at least a little more AoE (The animation is awfully slow and the damage is sub-par, but the area is actually quite big). However, that comes down to your playstyle, so it's your decision.
3)If you can somehow move a slot, a Force Feedback proc in Fissure might be worth a thought. Maybe one of the four out of Hasten.
In a whole I'm impressed about how much Def you can squeeze out of that char without sacrificing Recharge. I might consider a build similar to this for my own Ice/Earth. -
Hello everyone!
This is probably my first own thread so you're up for a premiere.
Anyway, since I've had a lot of Defense based Brutes (and other ATs) I would like to sip into resistance based sets. I'm already rolling a Stoney at the moment and have been thinking about trying Fiery Aura next.
As for the primary: I don't like obvious choices, so the pairing with fire is out of the race despite maybe being the theoretical best choice.
What I've been thinking about is
1) Claws because they look pretty cool and a flaming clawslinger might be fun conceptually - besides everyone seems to agree that claws are pretty awesome (although I don't really like the KB on Shockwave when teamed with Claws Scrappers)
2) Mace because I've liked the Mace smashing on my Bane already, and having more of those attacks can only add to the fun. The mitigation might also fix the defensive side of Fiery Aura.
3) Energy Melee - Yes, yes, I know it's crap, but I've never had one and the glowing hands look kinda cool, especially whirling hands.
What I want you to tell me now is not which is the best of these choices in numbers (well, not exactly at least - it might actually be a component to my final choice if all else fails) but which one would be the most fun to play. While I know this is as subjective as it can get I also want you to tell me why you think your choice would be the most fun, stylish, awesome, strong, pretty, whatever.
I'm usually a fan of being near immortal, even if it takes me a little longer to kill stuff, so Fiery Aura might be the wrong choice in general, but I've already told you I was going to have a look at something different
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This might not be the correct Thread for this, but I've recently begun thinking about a spear set for melee characters (and probably dominators).
It could deal moderate lethal damage with the side effect of improved range and the single targets having a pierce effect, namely all being very narrow cones like Shatter from the War Mace set.
The set could have one or two javelin attacks as a ranged component with a different secondary effect, maybe -Def or DoT (bleeding).
Had to write this down somewhere.
Should be tons of work to develop though. All the animations for two-handed and one-handed versions (since I'd like a Spear/Shield char) and the possible spear designs, ranging from simple stone age spears to Vanguard or Rikti Laser stuff or Rularuu. -
I recently started an Ice/Earth Dom despite all the critique against Ice/, and on my way to 20 I've started wondering more and more why the set is ill-reputed. I just put on an Ice Slick against the alpha, slow the enemies with Shiver to stop them staggering too far without suppressing Ice Slick and then jump in activating AA. I rarely have any issues due to everyone being busy crawling away from me at a ridiculous speed and attacking each other instead of me.
I'm seriously looking forward to the Contagious Confusion proc at lvl 50.
I've also been on a lvl 42 8-man-team yesterday and while I wasn't able to stand the remaining aggro myself, I noticed that at the moment I died, the Brute was toast, while she didn't take any noticeable damage at all while I was alive. I've wondered if I'm a real Dom with Ice/ - This was my proof that I am. -
As for /Earth I can suggest the ones I recently made, which are
Ice/Earth (Melee, actually useful for ITF, which is rare for Doms)
Grav/Earth (I play him pretty much like a brute with wormhole, teleporting enemies into a corner and smacking them with my AoEs (including Mud Pots - like that, the radius is no issue at all) and the ultra-powerful single-targets. Since the AoE Immob doesn't suppress Knockback, Fissure is your friend)
As has been stated before probably numerous times, the Crystal Theme for Earth can be tinted to look like ice (actually missing the proper color, but it's close enough for government work).
As for the Grav: Grav may not be the most powerful or easiest to play primary, but it packs loads of fun, and once you learn to use your wormhole, can be quite safe - also, you can wormhole one spawn into a second and hold the combined mobs for maximum AoE insanity. -
Gogogo!
I recommend the Grav/Earth, though judging from this topic so far I guess I'm not actually too close to you in playing style. I suppose as soon as you got AoE Control (especially Wormhole, if you're mobleader) you're gonna want any AoE damage you can get, at least I did, but then again I didn't ever find Tremor THAT bad. You might argue that I die a lot though
Anyway, good luck furtheron.
Won't wish you fun, since grav/earth has a pretty good built-in fun factor if you play to it. -
Quote:*cough* wormhole *cough*Originally Posted by Frosticus
[...] doms don't lend themselves well to compacting spawns (other than plant) as they have so many rooting powers and everything has such large aoes. [...]
Also: Not everything is about performance. Some might not yet have noticed, but this is a game. It's about fun, and earth with it's shaky brutish feel offers a damn lot of that - and that comes from someone who tends to crunch numbers in Mid's.
Sorry for the off topic but I'm tired of everyone speaking so ultimately low of Earth assault (which I totally like, the single target damage is awesome and if you manage to clump em together, the AoEs can work wonders, too).