Kicking Butt Never Sounded So Sweet: A Guide to Kinetics/Sonic Blast Defenders 1.0
Introduction
Kineticists have been known to reach the damage cap by virtue of using Fulcrum Shift on large numbers of targets, flooding other players' icon bars with itty-bitty damage symbols. With the advent of I5, crowd control has become ever-increasingly difficult and Fulcrum Shift is now maxed at 10 targets, making this task vastly more difficult and risky. The answer to the problem of reaching the damage cap comes in the form of the sonic secondary. While seemingly redundant, the purpose of this pairing is to get closer to that cap quicker. This team build relies on the use of the sonic blasts' - res and high damage to tear through your opponents, while buffing you and your team with the power-accelerating, end-recovering, damage-augmenting powers of Kinetics.
A solo build is also very feasible with these powersets. Relying upon Siren Song and Screech allows you to exert the control that kineticists need to get running. Even the Ancillaries have a word to put in edgewise in this regard, granting more control powers, and a significant defense.
Something to note: my Kin/Son is still in her mid 20s, so most of the sonic blast powers descriptions beyond those levels are educated guesses and calculation estimates. I'll add more and change it as necessary. The late-game strategy may change dramatically, as I experiment with these powers.
This guide does not definitively crunch numbers, but gives a few approximated values. If you want them for kinetics, look at
Ladioss Sopp's Kinetics Guide for more information. I'm mostly adding commentary, and suggestions as to how to use these powers synergistically.
Enough talk, on to the powers!
Primary powers: Kinetics
Transfusion:
Available at: Level 1
Description/Comments: Use wisely, use often. It has among the highest healing percentages, as well as one of the fastest healing rates. Like most powers in this set, it is hit-based, and reduces an opponent's endurance. Be
very careful when you use this power; if an enemy is defeated during the animation, the heal will not go off. The heal centers around the enemy; be sure to mention that to teammates, and pick the correct target when healing. Ctrl-tab is useful for finding the nearest baddie, for when your team is close together.
Recommended slotting: 2 Acc, 4 Heal, you WANT this to hit whenever you use it. Slot it heavily with acc early; the heal is strong enough to last you until you can slot it up fully. When used in tandem with stacked siphon speeds, this heal comes up very quickly, eliminating the need for recharge reducers.
Siphon Power:
Available at: Level 1
Description/Comments: Your damage buff before Fulcrum Shift. Use during battle gratuitously. It is a single target, hit based buff that reduces and enemy's base damage by 25%, and increases your and surrounding allies'
base damage by the same value. Timing is key to using this power well. If you time it correctly, you can work in tandem with blasters to buff your allies while they are pulling, or coordinate properly if you think they're going to use a big damage power. You may also use it while an opponent is being finished off, you can hit them up again for a small boost for the next fight. Unlike Transfusion, there is no worry that the buff will not occur if an enemy is defeated during the animation.
Recommended slotting: 1 Acc, 2 Recharge
Repel:
Available at: Level 2
Description/Comments: Creates a PBAoe effect that knocks enemies back when they enter its radius. Useful, comical, but adds nothing to this build (as it's more team-oriented.) If you want cheap, powerful knockback, use Shockwave.
Recommended slotting: Not a clue. I would think End Reducers.
Siphon Speed:
Available at: Level 6
Description/Comments: A hit based single target debuff/self buff. It sharply reduces enemy speed, while increasing yours. Two Siphon speeds will allow you to run about as fast as super speed. Older guides will say that this power, while useful early, loses its shine when a travel power becomes available. However, it has picked up a new trick since then, and that is the +recharge. The purpose of this build is to use the sonic attacks' secondary effect, -res. When used in tandem with your other powers, they make you do everything fast, buff fast, blast fast, everything, with no suppression penalty either. It's also useful for keeping monsters, AVs and other fleeing miscreants from getting that breathing room they so desperately need in long fights.
Recommended slotting:1 Acc, 1-5 Recharge Reducers. 6 will get you 4 running at the same time, but you can slot these as needed. 1 will gets about 2 running simultaneously.
Increase Density:
Available at: Level 8
Description/Comments: This is the first power that directly targets an ally. It is valuable primarily as a Mez recover/preventative. Unlike Clarity, Clear Mind and Stimulant, it does not protect against sleep, instead, trading it in for 25% resists against Smashing and Energy. However, it is a short-lived buff, and keeping it up in a team of more than 4 is tedious and not worth the end. Instead use it on the alpha-striking blaster, and the not-yet-uber tank, or anyone that needs to be a little less held. The inability to recover sleep is not necessarily as big a pitfall as you would think, as that can easily be recovered with Transfusion's heal. However, don't get this until AFTER you get Speed Boost, and use it only in tandem with speed boost. Most people don't like going slower if they can help it, and most people won't notice any slowdown when speed boosted, anyway.
Recommended Slotting: 1 Recharge, that's all you'll need. It would be an awesome resist buff if it lasted longer, but alas, it doesn't.
Speed Boost:
Available at: Level 12
Description/Comments: A major landmark of the Kinetics set. This baby does four things, and it does them very well. It buffs speed, bringing you a bit under super speed's run velocity. Valuable early, get it ASAP to make mission traveling faster. It buffs Recharge, allowing your allies to attack with their strong powers more often (and even harder with your buffs). It buffs end recovery, making this the most sought-after power both before and after everyone obtains stamina. Finally, and my personal favorite, it reduces the duration of slow powers, making it invaluable against fighting Chimera's ninja, Earth Thorn Casters, and Mortificators.
Recommended Slotting: 1-6 End Recovery. If I could enhance recharge reduction buffs, I would.
Inertial Reduction:
Available at: Level 18
Description/Comments: When someone asks you to cast Super Jump on them, this is what you use. It doesn't have the vertical oomph of SJ, but it certainly has enough speed. Some people opt to use this as a travel power, granting Super Speeders and un-travel powered the needed vertical movement to get around areas like Faultline, Boomtown, and Terra Volta with ease. Purely optional. If you would rather have the real deal, you can skip this. I prefer to have the extra power available to me, though.
Recommended slotting:1-3 Jump. One is plenty, 3 for the travel-obsessed. No recharges necessary; with hasten, this power can recharge about twice during its duration.
Transference:
Available at: Level 26
Description/Comments: Awesome. Simply awesome. It's end recovery and a major endurance drain on your opponent. Recovers the endurance of you and your allies when they are in range of the targeted foe. Get ASAP. Some people prefer to opt out of stamina in exchange for 3 other powers, but I don't. I like having increased end recovery so that I can run toggles with fewer hassles, and so that this power doesn't have to be a crutch.
Recommended Slotting: 2 acc, 2 recharge, 2 end recovery. Slot hard with Acc, you WANT this to land often.
Fulcrum Shift:
Available at: Level 32
Description/Comments: The Hope Diamond of the set. It saps damage from foes around your opponent, and gives it all to everything nearby. It's one big buff and a smaller buff for each opponent affected to all your allies. When heroes could gather giant hordes of baddies, a kineticist could easily FS over 100 targets, bringing everyone in the team to their damage cap. Must have.
Recommended Slotting: 2 acc, 4 recharge, Must be accurate. You're hitting a slew of targets with this one attack.
Secondary Powers: Sonic Blast
Shriek:
Available at: Level 1
Description/Comments: Reasonable damage, but slow activation time (3s). Bread and butter early, but alter you'll only need it to cycle in attacks when your kinetics powers aren't ready. Must take. Boo. Resist debuff increases damage by 15% for ~5 seconds.
Recommended slotting: 1 acc
Scream:
Available at:Level 2
Description/Comments: A strong blast for how early you get it. It does a good deal of damage, and when buffed allows you to take down most even cons in two hits up until the late teens. Strong mainstay. Because it is a DoT, you can see the sonic -res debuff in action. Resist debuff increases damage by 20% for ~7 seconds
Recommended Slotting: 1 Acc, 1 Recharge, 1-4 damage
Howl:
Available at: Level 4
Description/Comments: The only aoe - res in your arsenal, this will be the cornerstone of your - res debuffing. It's a fairly wide, deep cone, and does as much damage as shriek. Resist debuff increases damage by 20% for ~7 seconds
Recommended slotting: 1 Acc, 1-3 Recharge, 1-3 Damage. You want to shoot this off as often as possible. the -res debuff is valuable, and the more enemies it hits, the more effective aoes will be.
Shockwave:
Available at: Level 10
Description/Comments: Massive knockback is what this power does best. The damage is rather miserable; but it hits many targets and gives you breathing room. Useful solo, maybe not so much on teams. Has no resist debuff.
Recommended Slotting: Unsure. Never used it. At least 1 Accuracy, some Recharge for ready availability, and damage if you absolutely need the oomph.
Shout:
Available at: Level 16
Description/Comments: This is the set's strong blast, and will replace shriek as one of your main attacks. Cycle shriek in for the -res, but use this instead. It activates faster and does far more damage. Debuffs resists.
Recommended Slotting:1 Acc, 1 Recharge, 1-4 Damage. Big damage is good. It has a higher base damage, so if you need to choose between giving this or scream the extra SO, go with this.
Amplify:
Available at: level 20
Description/Comments: Useful for hitting anything and everything. Use it before crucial attacks, buffs, or heals.
Recommended Slotting: 1-4 recharge. Any more and diminishing returns kicks in with a vengeance. 3 SOs and hasten will get you down to a recharge of 30ish seconds, making it available 1/3 of the time
Siren's Song
Available at: Level 28
Description/Comments: Cone sleep with better duration than Mass Hypnosis. However, I'm not sure of its range yet. Does not debuff resists. Still, a valuable attack when you want to buff/debuff in peace, or if you need to get some heat off of your from all that howling, and fulcrum shifting, and siphon powering, and...
Recommended Slotting:1 Accuracy, 1 Recharge, 1-2 Sleep, if you miss, use siphon speed to mitigate damage from the ones running at you by staying away from them.
Screech
Available at: Level 35
Description/Comments: Single target stun with low damage. Unlike the other two "effect" powers (Shockwave and Siren's Song) this power has -res. Consider adding it to your attack chain (substituting it for howl) on hefty single targets. If Siphon Speed is stacked, you should be able to stun bosses. Mag unknown. Debuffs resists.
Recommended Slotting:1 Accuracy, 1 Recharge, 1-2 Disorient. Use it for the -res, use it for the stun.
Dreadful Wail
Available at: Level 38
Description/Comments: Nuke, with more benefits than most. This not only reduces enemy resists, it also can disorient them making this a fairly useful nuke for a defender. I haven't gotten it yet, but I'd imagine it's useful both early and late in battles. I'd suggest using it when you've got a lull in buffing or attacking. Debuffs resists.
Recommended Slotting:1-4 recharges, 1-4 damage. Use with Amplify and Power Build Up if you have it.
Pool Evaluations:
Medicine:If you need a resurrect, take it. I don't recommend it. The other powers are fairly trivial. You already have a strong heal, as well as decent mez protection/removal. However, if you must be able to rez or heal outside of battle, go for it.
Presence:The Fear powers are okay, but not all that useful. If you want crowd control, go with Siren Song or the Psychic Mastery pool.
Fighting: If you want to make an offender, you could go with tough/weave, but something tells me the slots are better spent on other, mroe ancillary shields.
Teleportation: Recall friend is nice, but without a rez power, it's only for carrying the dead. Since you have travel-granting powers, there's no reason to take it for yourself or for your teammates. Still, TP is a decent travel power, while TP foe may be useable as a "foe line" allowing you to take a less than harmful minion and bring it into your midst for healing (that is, if you're not interrupted).
Flight: Fairly useful. While you want to be around your allies for Fulcrum shift and Siphon power, the long range aoe healing of transfusion and recovery of transference makes this a reasonable choice.
Leaping: Most people like toggling SJ. I like not having suppression, but to each their own. Acrobatics can be used to save you from a hold, and Combat Jumping gives you immobilization protection, which is very valuable for a character that needs to position him or herself around others fairly often.
Speed: Hasten is a cornerstone to this build. You'll need it to fire off everything quickly. Go super speed if you want to toggle your fasty fastiness, and whirlwind is useful if you can recover your end fast enough.
Leadership: I definitely recommend tactics. Considering that kinetics powers need heavy acc buffage, this power effectively adds one Acc SO when fully slotted with tohit increases. This means your powers can be far more reliable, hitting the high level baddies that give you and your team sweet, sweet xp. Maneuvers is nice if you feel the need to add some defense, while assault pours on more pain (not so much more, but more nonetheless). If you take tactics, feel free to remove one acc from each power (excepting maybe transfusion). Vengeance, while more useful in I5, is a nice way to acknowledge that you have no rez.
Fitness:This is really up to you. I think that having higher innate recovery is good for situations where you need to eek out that little extra end to shoot a transference or other vital power. It also mitigates the end costs tactics and any other toggles I may be running. Simply put: the more end you have in the first place, the less you have to worry about landing transferences/drains.
Concealment: Stealth is a useful power, even with the new suppression. While Stealth can't make you fully invisible, it still saves you in case you misplace your landing with Inertial Reduction or Super Jump. Invis might be more a useful power for this purpose, though. Grant Invis is very useful for trials and TFs. Phase shift is arguable at this point, but worth considering if you need to get the heat off of you.
Ancillary Pool Evaluations:
Power Mastery: Awesome synergy. You don't really need Conserve Power, I think, but knock yourself out. Power Build Up is probably the best "short boost" power available, increasing effects by 150% (not sure about -res, though), and your damage by 100%. Temp Invulnerability grants high resists against smashing and lethal, the two most common damage types. Total focus has a long animation time, but it's crazy useful in situations where the team can't get that irritating foe off of you.
Dark Mastery: Strong synergy. Oppressive gloom is an HP cost aoe disorient, and can be useful to disable enemies for the one shot of transference or fulcrum you want to get in. Dark Consumption is a self-version of transference, but with shorter range, and is dependent on target quantity. Dark Embrace is this pool's shield, and confers resistance to smashing, lethal, dark, and toxic. These are fairly sparse later, with the exception of a few AVs, their minions, and CoT Death Mages. Soul Drain is a nice way to power yourself up; sonic blasts are strong, even with the defender "penalty", and a properly placed Soul Drain can allow you to do great things.
Psychic Mastery: Bweeeeoo! </Mentok> Strong choice. Psychic mastery adds a control element that the Kinetics set is lacking. Dominate is still a fairly strong hold, while Mass Hypnosis can help you pick up the minions that you missed with Siren's Song. Mind Over Body is a strong shield, conferring resistance to smashing, lethal, and psionic, the last of which is a major player in late-game fights (Carnies, Psy Clocks, AVs). Telekinesis is fun, and can be useful for rounding things up to make them all the better to Fulcrum Shift. It's end-heavy though, so be careful.
Electric Mastery: If parts of you still want to play a Draineticist, you can invest in some of the elec powers. While it's not short circuit strength, you can still sap a good amount out of foes with these powers. Electric fence is a standard immobilization, adding - knockback. Nominally useful, but still nice if you want to single out a troublesome boss or minion with shockwave. Thunderstrike is similar to Bone Smasher, with a chance to disorient. However, it also has an AoE component that does collateral damage with a chance to knock down. Charged Armor is useful, conferring smashing, lethal, and energy resistance, all three of which are common types. Power Sink is the strongest draining power in this set, draining endurance from foes and giving it to you.
Additional Comments:
*A viable strategy with the ancillaries is to drop stamina and use the end recovery/conservation power in tandem with transference. It frees two extra powers (except in the case of Elec Mastery), and is fairly versatile.
*A solo build is viable with this set. Using Siren's Song for crowd control, along with the single target stunning power of screech, you
can gear these powersets toward a solo build.
*This is a very active defender set. You will ALWAYS have something to do in battle, and you'll need to be up close to your targets, both ally and enemy. The difficulty of this task varies between enemy groups. You may need to duck in and out accordingly, especially in the early levels, to avoid excessive aggro.
*Done properly, you can increase total damage output by at least 50% at a time, just by firing. This is huge, considering that unlike its siphoning counterpart, this debuff increases the damage of enhanced attacks, synergizing with and resulting in greater output than two siphon powers.
Future version additions/requests:
-Cone description on Sirens song.
-Mag information on Siren Song, Screech
-Debuff quantities for attacks.
-Figure out if damage increase directly corresponds to res (does a 20% increase in damage numbers translate to a -20% decrease in resists?)
-Builds/build advice (Team, Solo, Pre-Level 27 Respec)
Thanks/Credits
Numbers and power descriptions are from Joe Chott's Hero Planner and
Ladioss Sopp's Kinetics Guide
Thanks go to Upsen Downs for advice, and Silver Shrike, Converted Clock, and Helms for teaming, proofreading, and moral support.
This is my first guide. Please be nice! ^.^