L3GEND

Originally Posted by Prancing_Pony

Does anyone have any builds for FM/SD?

Originally Posted by Flints

As it's been said before, its mostly for solo.

And that a 20% -res debuff is a pretty hefty debuff.
I believe I dev stated the reason for Bruising was because they saw a very little amount use of the Tier 1 tanker attack in game.

Originally Posted by EvilRyu

I tried pairing KM with regen. Previously I had given up on regen due to the squishieness of the set compared to what it was back in the glory days or even before issue 5. I was hoping with this combo the -dam aspect of KM would help on the squishienss. Does -dam on a critter translate into +resistance for you? Thats really what I hope for because so far KM has been extremely meh on damage. Yes I do have power siphon but it doesnt last long enough to make a true impact on combat. What worries me is that once I start slotting SO level enhancements its just going to dilute noticeable effect of the minor damage buff this power is giving. People have been saying it can give up to 150% damage but it sure as hell doesnt feel like it even when you get it to 5 stacked up. My goal is to eventually do a Km/Shield but I gotta save up enogh merits for the pvp IO so I can get more defense.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville

I did a bunch of analysis on Power Siphon during the I18 beta, but oopsie I forgot to save the threads.

The gist of it was that without too much difficulty you could average about +55% to +65% damage buff from Power Siphon, and that included the downtime of the power, when slotted with SOs (recharge) and using any reasonable attack chain (this was for Scrappers). This wasn't a computed estimate, but an actual measured estimate based on combat logging.

That's actually fairly consistent with assuming that you'll have about the peak buff for 20 seconds, and be up about a third of the time. Why this tends to be true is that so long as you have enough attacks to be attacking fairly consistently, you will stack the buff enough to get at or near the buff cap, and the only difference between a slow attack chain and a fast one is the ramp up time to get to the peak buff. Almost no one has an attack chain that is so bad that (if they have enough attacks at all) it takes longer than ten seconds to emit five attacks, so the ramp up should reach the five buff limit within the duration of a single buff stack.

Ramping up slowly doesn't hurt because if the buffs ramp upward slowly, they will also tend to decay downward slowly with about the same stagger. Something many people forget to consider is that while the Power Siphon power itself has a 20 second duration, it enables 10 second duration buffs. The last buff you get will linger for up to 10 seconds, so you'll actually have close to 30 seconds of at least some buffing. The ramp up to full roughly cancels the ramp downward to zero, and you end up with something close to 20 seconds of 5-stacked buffs (excluding missing).

So you'd guess that the buff would be something close to 5 stacks (+156.25% for scrappers, +125% for brutes and tankers) for 20 seconds, with approximately 60 seconds of cycle time (slotted with recharge SOs). And that is about +52% average buff. That agrees well with the measurements I took that were between +55% and +65% (the higher numbers included concentrated strike, which can insta-recharge Power Siphon and give it a better availability).

The biggest thing that will reduce the effectiveness of Power Siphon, besides being inactive, is being tohit debuffed: the buff only happens if your attacks hit. In that respect, its vulnerable in the same way that Follow Up and Soul Drain are.

For comparison, Soul Drain's peak peformance is to saturate the buff at +150% (again, for scrappers) for 30 seconds, with 60 seconds of up time. That is +75% average buff. Conversely, to beat Power Siphon with Soul Drain you have to average hitting more than 6 targets every time SD is recharged, like clockwork. *Waiting* for six to be available after Soul Drain recharges would reduce the efficiency of SD. You don't have that problem with Power Siphon, because you only need a stream of single targets to keep it saturated.

Stacked Follow Up has the same peak performance as Soul Drain (+75% damage when stacked, and it can be perma-stacked with enough recharge), and can be generated against single targets like Power Siphon.

Still, I think for Scrappers Power Siphon has the potential to reach or possibly exceed them both due to the potential benefit of Concentrated Strike. But only at higher levels of recharge than I tested with.

Originally Posted by Jibikao

I second this opinion.

I have a Ninja/FF at lvl 46. While I think Ninja/FF is effective, I get bored by bubbling all the time. Since I am a good team-player, I also try to bubble teammates. I can't stand the amount of bubbling after 3 battles. lol

Originally Posted by Deathstroke33

Thanks, but are things like leadership worth taking or are the bonuses not worth the end usage? Its things like that, that I'm really unsure about. I won't be doing a ton of big groups, I will always be playing with 1 MAYBE 2 others.

Originally Posted by Werner

I don't know which would be better. I'm just pointing out one of the big advantages of Foot Stomp is the radius, by which I'm saying that the stated damage isn't the only thing that matters with an AoE. I do suspect the Scrapper will do better DPS. But again, I've run no numbers, and I can't really tell seat of the pants from playing both.

Originally Posted by Werner

Probably the most recommended approach is Blinding Feint -> Sweep -> Attack Vitals, or at least having all those attacks. I have more tolerance for lack of AoE than most people. I also have more tolerance for pressing the same three attacks over and over than most people (four or five for my Dual Blades). Weaken and Empower are generally ignored. In regards to Weaken, I simply never care about mild debuffs, because I'm generally hunting uplevel, or AVs, and the debuffs are much less useful in those cases.

A big advantage to Foot Stomp is the 15 foot radius. That's much better than the 8 foot radius of Typhoon's Edge/Sweep. You can pretty much jump into a crowd and Foot Stomp and hit most everyone. Typhoon's Edge would take more work. If you're doing Sweep, though, probably everyone will have gathered pretty close before you hit it, at least if you're solo.

I'd give a damage comparison, but my Mids' has gone insane, such as reporting fire damage for Foot Stomp on a SS/Dark Brute, and I'm too lazy to look it up in game.

Originally Posted by Desmodos

It depends on what you are trying to do with the character. Scrappers generally want to be able to solo anything and to do so requires a solid single target attack chain. On Dual Blades, Blinding Feint + Attack Vitals is the most effective way to dish out single target damage.

Building around Blinding Feint + Attack Vitals does not require you give up the other attack chains. My DB/WP scrapper took every DB attack except Confront. I team as often as I solo, so get mileage out of those AoE attack chains when teaming, but shift back to the ST chain to take out bosses and AVs.



Keep in mind RttC's debuff value is really low. Dual Blades doesn't really have anything to build on it. Then consider that to hit debuffs will be considerable resisted by tougher targets. This is not an area I would recommend putting any effort into on a DB/WP build.

Originally Posted by Werner

Honestly, I don't know which has better AoE. I played the Scrapper mostly single-target, skipping the major AoE attacks in favor of running Blinding Feint -> Attack Vitals, plus Power Slice at the end when Hasten was down. There's a little AoE in that chain, but not much. The Dual Blades has more AoEs, but Super Strength has Foot Stomp. Foot Stomp! I love that power. I really don't know that I can call it for one or the other.

I think I fought further uplevel on my Brute as I leveled, but I also remember dying a lot. I suspect they're about equal on survivability, with the Rage crash canceling any advantage the Brute would have had.

I enjoyed the Dual Blades/Willpower the most, but I also prefer the Scrapper mechanics to the Brute mechanics (fury chasing), and I hate the Rage crash, so if you like Brutes in general and don't mind crashes as much as I do, you might like the Brute. The Brute was still plenty of fun.

So yeah, not sure I'm much help, but I think it's probably because they're so comparable. It's hard to go wrong with either. Both are classics.

Originally Posted by Werner

I haven't run any numbers on Brutes, so I don't have any hard facts for a comparison. But I do have both a DB/WP Scrapper and a SS/WP Brute at 50. Both were loads of fun to level, even though I'm not a fan of the Rage crash. I suspect that the Scrapper does better single target DPS. The Brute will have better survivability due to higher hit points, but it probably isn't a massive difference, and both have plenty of survivability for normal play and beyond.

Originally Posted by Doctor_Xaxan

I can't really speak for the scrapper/brute version of this powerset combo, but I have a level 30 SD/FM tanker and the whole "scorched earth" effect is awesome. Combustion is a great power.

Also being nigh-indestructible is great. I have a feeling (in my bones) that scrapper/brute would do more AOE damage even without combustion, but I can't imagine the tanker is far behind.

Originally Posted by Blue_Centurion

Is it just me, or is the AR powerset really really useful? I have leveled a few Blasters. Solo'd a Fire/Psi in AE to 50 before the great nerf. Have a 40 Ice/Ice that is just too weird to run. Now have a 39 AR/Dev and man, is he ever easy to offer team support with. All I have to do is get a clear spot with an angle on a crowd, fire off 2-3 attacks, find another sweet spot, repeat. To assist in this I have caltrops and stealth. Did the Devs forget to screw this pairing up? When does the nerf hit? i19?

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow

Something occurs to me that I should post. With the announcement of the I19 Blast animation changes, there's something I've wanted to be able to do:

Fire all blasts from either just the left hand or just the right hand.

I would actually accept using the same animation six or seven times with different power effects if that's what it takes. I'd even accept using the already existing "cast" animations, as we have one for each hand, though I'd prefer something with a closed fist. Say, Sniper Blast's animation seven times over for Energy Blast.

The reason I ask for this is because I have a Blaster who uses one of those big robotic right arms, and it would REALLY make the character shine if I could have her powers come out of that.

Originally Posted by DarkMaster

If you disagree with something someone has to say, fine, show your evidence and numbers to prove that your way is right and to back your case. There is no need to belittle or talk condescendingly to someone in order to disagree and prove your side. If the person you responded to decides to go off on you then at that point feel free to be rude, condescending, or just plain mean. It's that simple. Just because this is an online message forum does not mean that you can't practice some sort of civility. Its like a "road-rage" mentality around here: just because I'm not standing in front of you, I'm 10 feet tall and can be a ******, I don't need to be civil or even humane at all...I think that anyone can be better than that. Maybe even you.