Linea_Alba

Melee Radial can Taunt, if you can leverage the taunt. However, rebuilding as brute would likely be better; Taunt AND Core.

CoF was better as a Brute than CoF as a scrapper, unless that's been changed ("fixed") since i9.

You might as well remove the pets, slotted as they are they're useless.

Hover, CJ, and Serum could all use improvements.

You may have to-hit issues if you malfactor.

Recharge is below what I would typically call desirable.

Time Crawl, meh. It's not nearly needed as most think. It is useful, but it's not a must have IMO.

Standard Softcap is 45.
iCap is 59

+4's will resist half or more of your debuff. Fully slotted and resisted that's 11%, so you'd want 34% defense all. This improves with the alpha shift.

Level matters for you to-hit them, not rank. Mids can adjust for this if you use the exemp settings options.

Power Boost, Power Build up, and Clarion Radial T4 all can be used to boost Far Sight significantly - be aware you have to do this by hand, as mids boosts toggle powers as well and can lead to misleading results. As a defender there's no reason to not easily hit the standard softcap to all. iCapping is not beyond reason.

Clarion Radial T4 is a mixed blessing depending on what you are fighting and how crucial that 30s status protection gap is vs the extra defense.

My favorite is Time/DP ... see sig.

Traps/Fire, Ice, DP would be my second pick, very soloable.

Rad/Sonic, Fire, Ice is the classic hard target soloer, probably my third pick.

Time, Traps, Cold, Rad, Dark / Fire, Ice, Sonic, DP can all solo.

Cringe worthy.

Looking at the build, I have no idea what the goals were.

It's as if you went for full sets for no other reason than to have full sets that look nice due to all the pretty matching graphics.
It appears you don't understand the bugs and oddities of mids and some of the various procs and powers.
You have neither perma pets, nor soft-cap defense, not even soft-cap defense to range. These are the most common build goals.

If you plan on using and leveraging melee radial, you need not only soft-cap ranged, you'll want near softcap to either all vectors or all types. 32.5 vs all vectors would be a good minimum plan

Clarion isn't really needed for a Veat, at the very least take the Bane Armor.

I see no reason to NOT take bane armor for the better status protection, I'm not sure why You limited yourself to only the basic wolf only powers.

Clarion Radial only boosts defense by those large numbers shown in mids for 10 seconds, unless you have non-toggle defense powers. Your powers are toggles, meaning radial is much less useful for you, if useful to you at all. Radial is useful for non-toggle defense powers like far sight and mind link, but those are the exception to the rule.

Force Feedback +recharge proc, the numbers in mids only last for a few seconds. It's best to figure those by hand and not have mids include them in your recharge numbers.

Guassains Proc, again, the numbers in mids only last for a few seconds. It's best to figure these by hand, or toggle them on or off when looking at specific values rather than leaving them on all the time and giving you a false impression of their power.

I don't see a Numina, nor Miracle Unique, nor proper endurance management.

I don't see any form of HP replacement, although many people would also consider that optional. You can't really use Hybrid melee for this, unless you up your overall base defense numbers. Hybrids are not perma, they are 120 on 120 off, you'll need another way to manage defense and hp replacement during the off time.

Void Radial T4 Judgement could be used as a pseudo T9 power as an option.

Cimmies Core has significantly more ST damage, Lights Core has more AoE. Arachnos is thematic.

Frag without an immobilize can be counter productive

<delete> 43 other comments </delete>

You'll have to buy or unlock the IO license if you're premium.

If you leverage parry, you could likely improve the build significantly. A hole to ranged/aoe Smashing is not a huge issue if you cap melee/fcen.

I would typically recommend the use of ((PB or PBU) and/or Clarion Radial) * Far Sight for additional defense, rather than scorpion shield. Typically cast at the same time synchronized and cast in the order of: (Clarion Radial T4 * PBU * Far Sight)

If you use level 50+3 Recharges, you only need 2 slots in hasten. See also Stamina.

Given accuracy set bonuses, as well as +tohit bonus, especially Clarion Radial * PBU * Farsight, you don't need 90% accuracy slotting. You may need to do the math, or adjust the build and exemp settings in mids, which ever method you prefer, to verify accuracy at what ever character level and enemy level you want, but it would almost certainly be beneficial and let you use those slots in more better ways.

Unless the Hamis are cheap, and/or you don't have any level shifters, +5 Level 50 Set IOs give similar bonuses, and may or may not be cheaper for you. I have more level shifters than I know what to do with, this may not be the case for you.

SBE lockdown hold proc works wonders in distortion field, but will be nerfed in i23/i24. It'll still be worth it I think.

I use FoN as often as it's up, and use CP pre-emptively to mitigate the crash. Standard slotting would be (res/rch, res/rch, rch), but I often slot it in other variations as well.

add 3% to 5% defense to each defiance stack. The more you attack, the more damage you do the more defense you have.

Give each blaster APP a shadowmeld spike survival type power using different mechanics and let blasters unlock APPs at level 14. Fast recharging but short duration spike defense, spike resist, spike regen, spike hot, or spike absorb.

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=287527

Kin is hands town the top of the list. Kins cap the entire teams damage, bug meet hammer.
Then Cold Dom with it's fulcrum like -res, but cold dom needs a high end high recharge build.

Sonic/Sonic it's hard to get more -res.

Sonic Blast/Rad - Traditional top performers.
Fire Blast/Rad - Traditional top performers.

Dark has a larger radius, but it's -res is a bit more annoying to maintain and stack.

Fire/Traps if you want to solo and help the team both. You get a good dose of everything, but you also have to learn to adapt to how fast the team is moving.

The offensive form. I could improve the build more, for farming, but I'm at the point that improved farming would hurt non-farm content, and I'm happy with ~60 minutes. It's possible the recharge form might be of more use to a brute, I've really not tested it enough to know.

I'm pretty sure it can hit the ~50 min mark with a farm-only build, but I don't think it will ever hit the 40m mark. Nor do I want a farm-only build.

Cimmies were in the 360 to 400 dps range depending on Alpha. 400 dps is gonna be hard to beat for all but the most elite builds. Some of the new stalkers, or the most elite DM/SD or FM/SD might manage that.

Something Like the following. Shadowmeld icaps call vectors you for alphas. Vengeance almost icaps all vectors. The rest of the time you still have Standard cap for melee, with Ranged/AoE falling a bit low of the 32.5 mark.

Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 1.956
http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

With the Hami-Nerf, what's the best slotting for Divine Avalanche, +5's Allowed.

Here's the what I came up with today, but I'm sure there's room for improvement.

Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 1.956
http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Level 50 Technology Scrapper
Primary Power Set: Katana
Secondary Power Set: Fiery Aura

Level 8: Divine Avalanche -- Mako-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg:40(A), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg:50(23), GS-Acc/Dmg/End/Rech:50(23), C'ngImp-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg:50(25), LkGmblr-Def:50(25), LkGmblr-Rchg+:50(27)

I can't think of any of my builds right off that can't solo a +0 AV.

Depending on difficulty, you need anything from 100dps(+0 and it's gonna take an hour) to 475dps(54+3 in less than 5 minutes). More reasonable expectations would be 120 dps to 180dps. I am not currently aware of any melee builds capable of 475, but there are a multitude of builds in between. I'd expect the current top end with assault hybrid to be between 360 and 400.

See:
Current: http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=130754
Pre-lore* :http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showt...130754&page=72

See Also: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/...NmtRQUE#gid=13

*You could add 40 to 80 dps to any of the pre-lore older numbers to extrapolate approximate current non-lore performance.

My Katana is currently retired so I can't do head to head tests, but it "feels" like staff is ~40 dps behind Katana in single target damage. Obviously this could vary by builds. As well, ST damage is not at all an issue on staff stalkers with the added AS and ATOs, but they lose the utility of the forms as well as some AoE as I recall.

A melee fort will have about 90% of the damage of a similarly built night widow, but gains controls vs elude. I prefer the melee fort to the Night Widow and can solo harder content with the melee fort. Others prefer the Night Widow and optional Elude.

Ranged Fort gains range and psy damage, but has only 65% of the damage of the melee fort, that can leave the ranged Fort sub par for soloing AVs. However, Lore if used correctly can take care of the AV problem. Ranged Fort AoE, while not as strong also has a larger radius. The larger radius can help compensate for it's weakness. I didn't build mine for AoE damage, so I dont' recall the AoE comparison now. I'd guess that once you adjust for radius it should be close to even.

Yes, several iTrials favor Ranged over Melee.

Overall, I prefer the melee fort, but playstyles and perferences vary. There should be some older examples of each in my archives in my sig.

I have a couple of pre-hami-nerf builds in my archives that could be updated. The goal was to leverage Shadow Meld and high defense. I went vectored, ~ 45/28/28. Then added Shadow meld adding even more defense for alphas and longer fights. That character is retired and I ended up on a Staff/Fire brute without the shadow meld option 8-/. I should warn you /Fire on a scrapper without a taunt can be somewhat counter productive. A Tank or Brute would better serve in most cases.

Staff/Fire Cave, about an hour. SS/Fire Cave, about 40 minutes. Staff has more defense, more utility, levels easier, and is more easily adpated to non-farming. I'd say that's good enough. I would like to see more ST damage out of the set, but It's good enough as is, just not superb like the few outliers.

There is no difference in servers nor sides for the Market. Buy the built or converted +3, unless you insist on a lower level than 50 version. Send me a PM @linea, I'll send you a level 50 one for 250m if I have one handy, and I should. I may not be in-game again before friday or saturday. For that matter, I'll be happy to duo with if our schedules match.


Power Boost / Power Build Up

Hybrid is not perma, it's 120 on/120 off (currently bugged). Clarion Core is perma. Clarion Radial is 90 on/30 off but combined with PB/PBU pushes defense to ludicrous levels. That ludicrous defense is sometimes worth the trade off in status protection. It depends on what enemies you face.

With High defense the protection isn't as needed even exemping. Exemped I carry 4 to 6 BFs, but seldom if ever need them. Obviously playstyles vary.

I built my endurance for very long fights. I can almost fight indefinitely just by CP alone. I can fight indefinitely, non-stop, by alternating FoN and CP. Except for the FoN crash, depending on luck and inspirations. Mismanaging the FoN crash is my number one cause of death 8-/. Unless you want to do something crazy like solo a +4x8 ITF, then you may not need nor want that much endurance. I almost always build for that level of endurance.

All of the DP powers are useful, but you absolutely must leverage Hail of Bullets to get the most out of the set. The strength of DP is in it's AoE damage including Hail of Bullets, not in it's ST damage. Tier 4 Incarnate it's 50% or less of xp/hr of the average farmer in a cave with bosses. However, if you LT spawned caves, it's 80% of the average farmer. For a defender to a) Survive that, and b) be 80% of the speed, is nothing to sneeze at. Just realize you aren't a boss killer, you're an AoE Specialist. Another example would be everytime I team with scrappers, the scrapper will be surrounded by 10+ foes taking them out one by one. Then I walk up, nuke em all flat, leaving the scrapper a couple of seconds to finish the bosses. It's perfect a pairing of AoE and ST damage, but can annoy some melee types that dont' realize I need them just as much as they need me. Or I don't need them anymore than they need me. I think the latter annoys them most.

I built from the ground up knowing I had to leverage Hail of Bullets to make the build work. That meant leveraging Chrono, Hasten, sufficient global recharge, alphas, whatever it would take. It turned out to not be as difficult as I had thought, I got to use Musculature Core after all, which was one goal.

Which powers you keep and don't are really a playstyle choice. What works for me, may not work for you. In the spreadsheets I ran, for my build specifically, which can not be extrapolated to another build as each build is unique: Executioners and Piercing were as I recall damage neutral, but executioners made the chain simpler. I'd have to run the spreadsheets again to be sure of that, but that's how I recall it. When I say damage neutral I mean long term +4 Boss or above, where short term discreet differences don't matter. Aka: Pylon times, although I test in game with Bosses, EBs, AVs, and Pylons when I feel in-game testing is needed.

I have everything I need in the basic Time/DP, except damage. Hence the Muculature Core which is 45% instead of 33%. More hold could be useful, but I've never been one to rely on holds, I'm considerably more chaos in action, than the deliberate battlefield that reliance on controls would use. Intution radial, would be the better pick if you can make use of the additional facets.

I chose Assault as my primary hybrid, again because I am entirely tough enough as is, and the thing I lack most is damage. I will eventually get Assault, Both Melees, and maybe support double defense to pets. I expect as other incarnates come out, I will continue to pick those that increase my offense.

• Between PB/PBU, a PvP+3, and swapping an oblit into HIB you should be 45+ to all Vectors. I would personally rework the entire build, but those minimal changes would be a good start.
• PB/PBU would give you an additional 7.4 defense all perma, assuming you cast it as PB/PBU+Farsight.
• Chrono is nowhere near perma. It's generally advised to get Chrono as close to perma (90s) as possible.
• Acro is nice, but if you get your defenses to 45 all, then it's much less needed. Once you incarnate and get Clarion perma it's not needed at all.
• Clarion Radial can boost your defenses another 14 points or so, icapped, or almost icapped. However, that requires careful coordination as well as planning for the 30s gap in status protection. Depending on what you are fighting, sometimes defense is better, other
  times status protection.
• I would normally say get more recharge, with sufficient recharge you typically choose Execustioners or Peircing, not both.
• PvP +3 def are 200m to 300m these days, use one.
• I don't see a miracle unique. Chrono perma'd would help, but so would a miracle unique.
• Slowed Response likely needs more recharge.
• The entire build needs more recharge.
• DP is sub-par unless HIB is leveraged with very high recharge, /Time/ is one of the few sets that can do this fairly well. You goal should be Hasten less than 135s, Chrono less than 95s.
• With the right tweaking you can use Musculature Core with Time/DP or DP/Time. This also is a significant boost to damage. Slowed Response + Judgement*Musculature + HIB can (nearly) alpha wipe any spawn +2 or below with HIBs available to half alpha wipe the between spawns.
• ....

You can reverse engineer my build to corruptor if you want. It's icapped to all, transformed for a corruptor that should be close to 45 defense all. There are likely other builds in my archives that may be useful.

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=290765

The defender proc is a heal. I expect it's the (self) heal combined with fast recharging attack that's making Storm/Fire more desireable. I don't know what the Cor proc is.

I had not intended to include SBEs ATOs nor IOs in the question. I'm well aware of what can be done on a modern build, but it's been ages, issues, and many new sets since I last played SOs only. My personal pick would probably be Traps/Fire. Higher mods for defense and support, while still having strong offense. Traps/Sonic and Traps/Ice would also be contenders.

Let us know how the race goes. I'd love to see the numbers.