Moonlighter

Dark Armor is a great secondary if used correctly, but using it has a heavy price and I don't feel the mitigation in high stress situations is really that much better than other secondaries to warrant the cost. This is my attempt to get Castle to make some tweaks to the set:

~ Change the endurance cost of Dark Regeneration to something more reasonable. Charging over a third of a bar of Endurance for a self heal in a set that uses resists and heals for mitigation is harsh. I would like to see the base endurance cost reduced to 20.

As comparison, Reconstruction is only base 10 endurance. While it has a longer recharge and cannot benefit from healing from multiple foes, it has the benefit of not needed a hit check and it can be used between battles to recover health safely.

~ Now that Cloak of Fear can only affect minions with Fear, fix the stats on it. Not only is the cost too much for what it does, but the damage aura the set uses actually interferes with its mitigation. The endurance cost for this power should be the same as Weave which would bring it down to 0.33. The power should also be changed back to base accuracy of 75%.

[ QUOTE ]

i try to not build my wp scrappers/brutes/tankers for smash/lethal defense. just the exotics. outside of arachnoids poison claw none of the exotic dmg types debuff defense that i'm aware of - not counting pain in the butt circle of thorn earth caster thingies.


[/ QUOTE ]

Another (admittedly uncommon) defense debuff comes from Radiation; like Anti-matter's robots.

Also, you can't entirely dismiss defense debuff from S/L because if they cascade in a mixed group then the F/C/E/N types with them will begin to really hurt. You see this sometimes against Vanguard.

[ QUOTE ]

But how soon can you do this? Almost near the end of the characters career, unlike WP where you get most of what you need for standard play by level 28. For extreme play you would have to wait for SoW. Even still if I took the same approach you did I would be just as unkillable with WP if not more unkillable (if this is even a word).


[/ QUOTE ]

You are writing this like I somehow disagree with you and didn't agree and comment with this sentiment several posts later. Invuln is rough without I/O unless you are fighting S/L where it isn't bad. I will point out that for me at least the run up with SR was just as bad.

If it bothers you do what I did for both my Invuln and SR; pick up Aid Self in the late 20s. At that time Aid Self is probably the biggest defensive boost you can get. Without it the Cimers were simply not possible at level 35, I'd have to rest after every spawn. With it they were no problem. They would do 3/4 of my bar every spawn but my AS would be up again and I could hum along.

[ QUOTE ]

The thing is why deal with piss poor performance for 40+ levels when WP is great from level 16 onward.


[/ QUOTE ]

Well, WP is one of the sets designed by the current team in the modern era of CoH. Not only do I believe Castle is most of the time simply a better designer than, say, Geko but to be fair to the previous team he has hindsight to learn from.

[ QUOTE ]

To me invul for scrappers just hasnt been good enough since the defensive nerfs in issue 5. That minor buff we got a few months back was just fluff that doesnt really help. I pretty much never die of end drain unless its LGTF and never had issues were recharge was an issue as I take hasten on all my toons. Defense debuff resistance again is worthless unless its really high levels like SR. Till invul gets a real buff I wont be touching it again.

[/ QUOTE ]

The difference isn't all those things, although that fluff stuff is nice to have.

The biggest buff was finally losing the defense penalty from Unyielding. A 5% penalty would drop end game builds from ~40% defense to ~35% defense with 5 minions be the difference in capping. This change was the biggest buff. The way the game currently works and the way builds flirt with the soft cap adding 5% effective defense is a huge buff.

If they buffed Invuln again defensively it would be too powerful at the high end with Tough and Weave and IOs.

[ QUOTE ]

But how soon can you do this?


[/ QUOTE ]

So, now that I have explained that I agree with you and I'd rather have Invuln level easier let me answer this question. Assuming you want to be efficient about it and get your IOs at maximum level?

You should be good to go against anything low level sporting S/L early. There is no reason you shouldn't be fine at 40-50% resistance to S/L in the late 20s and 30s. That leaves a lot of groups where you should be good to go; there's a lot of S/L in the Striga arcs and the Croatoa arc since the worst Croa stuff are Red Caps.

You'll get your butt whooping my the Striga Vampire pod mission but all my melee types do. The witches and ghosts might be a little rough.

At level 32 you can get your Kinetic Combat as they max out at 35. This will really bump your S/L defense; in this level range if the ene,ies do S/L you should be good to go.

At level 37 you can get those Reactive Armors. This will finish your S/L and really bump up your N/E. By now you should be well slotted (frankenslotted) and basically you are only waiting to finish up the Fighting pool and reaching 47 for Aegis and other miscellanous slotting.

[ QUOTE ]
Maybe I should have rephrased it. I'd rather die than wait for Devices to do its work.

The way I see /Dev used -and I know you use it differently- is generally like this:
Trip mine [4 seconds]
Caltrops [1 second]
Wait for Recharge [5 seconds; may include a second Caltrops]
Trip Mine [4 seconds]
Pull With Fireball [1 second]
Wait Around Corner For Badguys To Arrive [5 seconds? I dunno]

... 20 seconds for one spawn. I could be on the next spawn by then.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm a newbie blaster Fire/Dev so forgive me if my method sounds trite.

My typical attack sequence for Lt/Minion/Minion goes like this:

~ Run up to the spawn in stealth and taser the Lt.
~ Blaze/Fireball/finish to kill the first minion.
~ Nemesis Staff (not reliable without Targeting Drone) the second minion and finish.
~ Back up and open up the whooping on the Lt. with Blaze.

Sometimes I drop one Trip Mine someplace where I can pull three groups as a precaution more for the knock down than the damage and then eliminate the three groups without tripping the mine. Stealth really helps. Trip Mine ends up being my "run to here if in trouble" option; like Taser misses.

Recently I have taken to opening with Rain of Fire (haven't had it that long) and just killing the minions before they run out, then using Taser on the Lt. when it finally decides to attack me. I think the real advantage of /Dev isn't Trip Mine or Caltrops; it's Stealth + ToHit + Stun.

I also think /Dev *really* came into it's own when they changed controls to suppress rather than detoggle. Retoggling Cloak and TD was really getting old.

[ QUOTE ]
Invulnerability is a great set for Tankers, not so much so for Scrappers and Brutes. Both are fairly intuitive, set-and-forget defensive sets.

Invulnerability's advantage for tankers is that it's far, far easier to hold aggro with it, and the higher values of the tanker in both resistance and defense tend to multiply, especially since the marginal value of an additional point of resistance goes up sharply once you get resistance above 50%. Invulnerability is also clearly better for eating the alpha strike of a large team spawn: and if you're doing that often, you should be doing it on a tanker.

Willpower gives melee DPS that also take Stamina a huge pool of endurance, keeping them in the fight longer. The regeneration of Willpower is mostly indifferent to the type or position of incoming damage. You mostly don't need to worry about the strength of your taunt aura. You will be weaker to big alphas; but Tough and Weave help a lot, and you can sustain them far easier without costly IO bonuses than the Invulnerability tanker can.

I like my Invulnerability tanker a lot. But probably the only reason I keep my Invulnerability brute is that she is the leader and foundress of my villain group, and all of my Invulnerability scrappers are long time gone. Willpower is currently tougher than Regen, and far more worry free.

[/ QUOTE ]

Hmmm. I think I would like to see more clarification about which phase of the game you are talking about. I disagree with the implied worthlessness of Invulnerability scrappers, but if you are not talking end game I can see where leveling one might be at times frustrating.

[ QUOTE ]

Defense is the name of the game in regard to top level survivability. Once you softcap, everything else is gravy, and you measure the sets against each sets gravy level at that point. Once wp and inv are near or at softcap, they are pretty even imo. Leveling up and not soft-capped however, I would give the advantage to wp thanks in large part to quick recovery and better overall survivability, especially on teams.


[/ QUOTE ]

Agreed. Leveling up Willpower has several advantages.

Not only does Willpower have Quick Recovery, but it has *2* significant survival tools at low level that are passives which add no Endurance overhead. Having both a passive health boost and a passive regen boost adds synergy and survivability at no cost. This is really, really sweet.

Willpower provides up front defenses that are apparent and obvious before IO slotting. Invuln is end hungry and really only good against S/L until the end game when it can stack power pools, IO bonuses and fully slot its powers. Until then it is really kind of crappy and then jumps at the end. Willpower has a smooth survival curve all the way up and works very well end game with IOs and power pools.

Willpower alleviates the need for Endurance slotting with QR. This frees up set bonuses and, in the case of Conserve Power, power slots for other things.

Both depend on typed defense so both will unfortunately require slotting attack powers for defense IO bonuses to get near soft cap. This does cut into procs, purples, and other ways to tweak out DPS.

I am simply stating that I don't feel Invuln under performs in the end game. Maybe while leveling, but my suggestion is to level with Aid Self and then respec out of it into your end game build. Aid Self alleviated almost all of my leveling frustrations with Invuln.

[ QUOTE ]

All I can say is prove it. I simply dont make invuls anymore because they cant take the same kind of beating a WP can overtime. Outside of Unstoppable invulnerability for scrappers sucks. WP was the smoothest ride to level 50 I have ever had with any toon. Invul not much so. Basically if it isnt smashing lethal you pretty much die or get overwhelmed. With IOs that could be different but WP with IOs is godly so it still comes out a head.

[/ QUOTE ]

(This is from the perspective of an IO'd build that concentrates on defense.)

My Invuln at 48 already has a base 35% def in all except Psi. By the time I finish the build I expect to have, with one enemy in range, around 40% in F/C/E/N and around 35% in S/L. My S/L resist is ~70% and my exotics are ~23%. The only thing I lack is a self heal; I decided early that non-Inspiration play was not a goal for this particular character and went with Hasten instead. (I plan on popping greens.)

If I ever obtained a PvP IO I could jump to ~38/43/43 defense.

With that much base defense (one mob in range) it means I am capping my defense at 3 or 4 mobs. Against S/L I am virtually unkillable against anything short of an AV, and have no issue tanking AE Dual Blade Lt. ambush missions where spawns can get as high as 20-30 level 52 Lt custom mobs. I am not yet Stamina efficient enough to go after big game; I simply haven't obtained the Numina and Miracle Uniques for that particular character.

I also cap out Hit Points with Dull Pain. It has a 4 second downtime which I can probably shore up. That jacks my regen rate. In a whole map full of custom Lts. tanking 20 52s at a time I needed to pop a green inspiration only twice when they got lucky with combos, and I certainly could have simply jumped out of the mob and hit Shockwave instead.

If my primary was Dark and I could use Siphon Life the build would probably be as tough as my /Shield, significantly better against S/L, slightly better against F/C/E/N due to higher health leading to better regen and Siphon heal, and significantly worse against Psi. That does leave Shields with much better damage, but it has that advantage over every secondary.

Plus I'm not sure we want to start saying secondaries are insufficient because they aren't as good as /Shield.

That also leaves my Invuln significantly better most of the time than my SR, with the Psi hole being matched by "untyped" damage. The much higher hit point total means Invul gets more bang out of regen and heals and survives alpha strikes from most mobs better. Also, against custom EBs my SR tends to get taken out by Build Up cycles if I am slow. My Invul has the resistance and higher health to suck those up; against S/L I don't even think I'd have to interrupt my attacks.

I used to be very down on Invuln, but seeing my high performance Invuln operate I am a believer. My SG mate had the same crappy experience with Invuln and was going to reroll until he saw me on that mission; he simply didn't build towards typed defense. If I dropped Hasten and went with Aid Self I would be significantly more survivable most of the time over my SR. I might have to watch out during the Dull Pain down times against exotic damage types.

Invuln *does* require a bit of thought because you do have to herd a bit to cap defense. It means against AVs you will want to keep some minions around, but to anyone used to doing that for /Shields AAO it really isn't a hardship.

[ QUOTE ]
Sonic/ Psi/

/Em /Dev are probably your better picks as it stands.

[/ QUOTE ]

So I do some PvPing, but since when did /Dev rise from useless in PvP to mentioned with /EM? Is it the extra defense to help you cap and the Stealth?

QR

Also keep in mind that when a mez does land and affect you all your toggles suppress dropping your defense substantially.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

It's accurate. Flurry is one of the most damaging attacks in the game when you pvp...

[/ QUOTE ]

Umm...wut? Please explain.

[/ QUOTE ]

All attacks in PvP have been normalized based on animation length. Since Flurry takes so long to animate it does a proportionally large amount of damage. Technically all attacks do similar DPA but since PvP has so much jousting it is harder to take advantage of lots of shorter attacks. Long activation hard hitting attacks are good to deliver as you joust other players.

[ QUOTE ]
[QR]

I had a couple people tell me that the mission spawned too many "background" LTs which, due to them being sonic buffers, were too difficult to clear. I did some testing last night and it seems if you run the mission on an even level difficulty, you could get situations where there was so many of them, unless you had a way of scattering them it could get pretty ridiculous. It seems that at some point within the last few patches, the mission background group lost a minion: that caused all of the map spawns to spawn as LTs. At high densities that could get problematic.

I've fixed that and one other small error I detected in the arc that snuck in there. Anyone who tried this arc and were stymied by being mobbed by a map full of sonic LTs should retry it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not stymied. Just... utterly boring, at least for my Martial Artist. It's not that they were hard, it's that spending 7 minutes clearing each spawn because my Storm Kick was hitting for like 30 was not exactly the exciting game play I was expecting. Well, until I attacked the boss and then it's ZOMG.

But to be honest my first impression of them was with my Martial Artist mistakenly set to Unyielding where I was getting 5 cross buffed Lts. My DM on Invincible had no issues.

[ QUOTE ]
I've been looking at my BS/DA build and trying to achieve something comparable in regards to survivability for your Kat/DA build. I think you need to drop a power pool. I did mine with out any Epic pools, so things fit in more smoothly, IMHO.

Zet, given the choice which would you give up, hasten or Body Mastery?

[/ QUOTE ]

I *could* drop Focused Accuracy and put Gaussian's into Build Up. Another option is to put Gaussian's into Build Up and keep FA with one slot just to combat ToHit debuffs.

The problem with dropping Hasten, other than losing the gratuitously overpowered Recharge buff, is I also lose Superspeed and I need that BoZ bonus. I would have to pick up Teleport or something as a BoZ mule anyway.

I don't think the end usage would be management in long fights without Conserve Power. Obsidian Gloom adds very little to the build. Minions really aren't an issue. Cloak of Fear slotted for ToHit Debuff would be great, but I don't think the build could manage the endurance cost.

Here is the build:

Pertinent stats:

Defense:
Mel 20
Ran 39.3
AoE 35.6

(Not including the PvP IO for another +3%)

Resists:
S/L 46.5
F/C 41.5
E 23.5
N 53.2

Hasten downtime: 25 seconds

You'll might want to swap around slots to get a couple into Build Up, and tweak some other powers to your taste.

Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 1.401
http://www.cohplanner.com/

[u]Click this DataLink to open the build![u]

Level 50 Magic Scrapper
Primary Power Set: Katana
Secondary Power Set: Dark Armor
Power Pool: Fitness
Power Pool: Leaping
Power Pool: Speed
Power Pool: Fighting
Ancillary Pool: Body Mastery

Hero Profile:
Level 1: Gambler's Cut -- Hectmb-Dam%(A), Hectmb-Dmg/EndRdx(3), Hectmb-Dmg/Rchg(3), Hectmb-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(5), Hectmb-Acc/Rchg(5), Achilles-ResDeb%(7)
Level 1: Dark Embrace -- S'fstPrt-ResDam/Def+(A), S'fstPrt-ResDam/EndRdx(36), ImpArm-ResDam/EndRdx(36), ImpArm-ResDam(37)
Level 2: Death Shroud -- Sciroc-Acc/Dmg(A), Sciroc-Dmg/EndRdx(7), Sciroc-Dmg/Rchg(13), Sciroc-Acc/Rchg(15), Sciroc-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(15)
Level 4: Murky Cloud -- ImpArm-ResDam/EndRdx(A), ImpArm-ResDam(37), ImpArm-ResDam/Rchg(37), ImpArm-ResDam/EndRdx/Rchg(39)
Level 6: Swift -- Run-I(A)
Level 8: Divine Avalanche -- Mako-Acc/Dmg(A), Mako-Dmg/EndRdx(9), Mako-Dmg/Rchg(9), Mako-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(11), Mako-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(11), Mako-Dam%(13)
Level 10: Combat Jumping -- Zephyr-Travel(A), Zephyr-Travel/EndRdx(40), Zephyr-ResKB(40), LkGmblr-Def(43), LkGmblr-Rchg+(46)
Level 12: Obsidian Shield -- EndRdx-I(A)
Level 14: Super Jump -- Zephyr-Travel(A), Zephyr-Travel/EndRdx(43), Zephyr-ResKB(43)
Level 16: Health -- Mrcl-Rcvry+(A), Numna-Regen/Rcvry+(17), Numna-Heal(17)
Level 18: Dark Regeneration -- Theft-+End%(A), Theft-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(19), Theft-Heal/Rchg(19), Theft-Acc/EndRdx/Heal(25), Theft-Acc/Heal(25)
Level 20: Stamina -- P'Shift-End%(A), P'Shift-EndMod(21), P'Shift-EndMod/Acc(21), P'Shift-EndMod/Rchg(45)
Level 22: The Lotus Drops -- Sciroc-Acc/Dmg(A), Sciroc-Dmg/EndRdx(23), Sciroc-Dmg/Rchg(23), Sciroc-Acc/Rchg(31), Sciroc-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(34)
Level 24: Cloak of Darkness -- RedFtn-Def/EndRdx(A), RedFtn-Def/Rchg(34), RedFtn-EndRdx/Rchg(39), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(40), RedFtn-Def(46), RedFtn-EndRdx(46)
Level 26: Soaring Dragon -- Mako-Acc/Dmg(A), Mako-Dmg/EndRdx(27), Mako-Dmg/Rchg(27), Mako-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(31), Mako-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(31), Mako-Dam%(36)
Level 28: Hasten -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(29), RechRdx-I(29)
Level 30: Build Up -- Empty(A)
Level 32: Golden Dragonfly -- Armgdn-Dam%(A), Armgdn-Dmg/EndRdx(33), Armgdn-Dmg/Rchg(33), Armgdn-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(33), Armgdn-Acc/Rchg(34), Oblit-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(39)
Level 35: Boxing -- Empty(A)
Level 38: Tough -- EndRdx-I(A)
Level 41: Weave -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A), LkGmblr-Def(42), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(42), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx(42)
Level 44: Focused Accuracy -- GSFC-ToHit(A), GSFC-ToHit/Rchg(45), GSFC-ToHit/Rchg/EndRdx(45), GSFC-Rchg/EndRdx(48), GSFC-ToHit/EndRdx(48), GSFC-Build%(50)
Level 47: Conserve Power -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(48)
Level 49: Super Speed -- Zephyr-Travel(A), Zephyr-Travel/EndRdx(50), Zephyr-ResKB(50)
------------
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Critical Hit

There has always been a problem with highly specific pool power animations and concept. It's the reason so many people want to be able to choose animations for their powers. It's no different than magic based characters knowing they'd be more powerful taking Aid Self but not wanting the tri-corder animation.

[ QUOTE ]
I have been playing my Claws/Regen for 39 months. He's an AV soloer and has soloed 34 non-custom AV's without insp's.


[/ QUOTE ]

I know this is off topic, but I haven't had any luck with high end Regen builds that don't rely on DA or Parry. SR and Shields and Invul yes. DA look good. But Regen? I can't keep up with the big AV hits.

What is your defensive build strategy? Did you stack defense? Go with lots of recharge? Something else?

I am not sure where you are going with this build. My suggestion is to concentrate on Ranged and AoE defense and shoot for a 20% melee defense so one DA will put you at ~35% and two will cap you. With your resists you can probably let AoE slide a little. If you can get Ranged up to ~40% and AoE ~30% you will see a significant survivability jump and you can do some crazy stuff.

Assuming you want to keep Hasten I would definitely plan for Weave and lots of Blessing of Zephyr bonuses. BoZ also gives you multiple Knockdown protection IOs which is great for DA.

The build below makes some sacrifices, but Hasten recharges in about the same time as your build and it has high defense. Ranged is almost 40%, AoE is over 35%, and melee is 20@ before DA. Gambler's is boosted by the Resist Debuff and a damage proc since it assumes you'll be using it a lot.

(It's not meant to be a final build but a start with which you can tweak. I am not entirely happy with the slotting for your heal for example since it doesn't have enough End reduction.)

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[ QUOTE ]
What is this challenge? This sounds like something I would like to try. I need to read more of the boards I guess.

[/ QUOTE ]

It's an AE arc. Just search for Arcanaville; she has three arcs.

[ QUOTE ]
And that's why I'm shooting for 75% melee defense if I IO out my Broad Sword/Shield Defense. I want to be able to wade through Architect Entertainment content nearly as easily as regular content.

[/ QUOTE ]

My these scrappers don't have an issue with Architect content if I run on Unyielding so I don't hit AVs. Well occasionally an Elite Boss will two shot me with Build Up if I am being cocky which I often am.

My MA/SR scrapper has Aid Self which is the only reason I even got anywhere in the Arcanaville challenge. The problem is with the lower hit points (accolades plus bonuses) and no top end resists the damage spikes are too great. The passive hit points and resistances on the DM/Shields make all the difference.

If I make a /Shields with Aid Self and still remain capped it might be stronger than relying on Siphon Life for such this particular challenge. I don't know if I could do that and keep Hasten in a build though.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Is there any reason why I'm wrong and could someone provide more accurate stats or late game data?

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, there are many reasons. First off, you're ignoring the +dam contributions of other powers. */SD, DM/*, Claws/*, and DB/* are all capable of achieving significantly better +dam than Kat/regen is capable of putting out. Sure, it has decent DPA (though not the highest at all), but it's not going to be the top ST dps in the least. If you want some evidence, check this thread and this thread. Scrapper Katana is below Dark and Dual Blades on both lists.

[/ QUOTE ]

SD is by far the best secondary for raw damage because of AAO. For primaries DM is probably the best because of Soul Drain, but Katana and Broadsword can use multiple Resistance debuff IOs and Claws can also use one in Slash which can really increase DPS. The post he links doesn't take that IO into account.

I'm not familiar with DB though. I *think* the Defense Debuff is at the end of a combo? I am not sure if it can slot the Defense Debuff IO.

...And by "got through" I mean I cleared the mission and all the waves with lots of cheating, lots of dying, and a whole bunch of swearing at my monitor. I am still learning the encounter and once I know all the enemies I'll see if I can do better.

So, I have a few questions for anyone who has done it. Or written it.

~ Wave 1 was challenging, but I completed it on both scrappers with no deaths.

~ Has anyone completed it as intended? It seems to me that I had to break line of sight a lot to mitigate the mobs with Build Up which technically breaks the rules.

~ In Wave 2, how do all the MM minions (including the Gang War peeps) have a 30% plus chance to hit a capped character? There was no defense debuff that registered on my defense monitor. Did anyone notice any Empathy types buffing with a ToHit buff maybe? (I am working on kill order and things are too hectic for me to figure our all the secondaries.)

~ I personally found Wave 3 harder than Wave 2 but maybe it's just me.

Some comments:

~ It's easier on Invincible than Unyielding by a fair bit. I forgot I was on Unyielding when I first started it.

~ SR is fairly weak as scrapper secondaries go. Martial Arts is really bad for a scrapper primary. My DM/Shields did *so* much better than my MA/SR.

~ They really need to up the recycle time on all AE mob self rez powers. It's to the point where one boss rezzed twice because it took me too long to finish the other boss. No mob should be able to ever rez more than once.

~ The boss heavy hitting attacks hit too hard. Total Focus does most of my bar in one hit.

~ Boss ranged attacks hit way too hard. I got hit by a Shuriken for over 1200 damage before it started picking bleed damage.

~ Waiting on click type mez powers after dying really sucks.

Next will be finishing up my Claws/Invuln for this and trying it again with my DM/Shields. The lack of a self heal on the Claws/Invuln will mean I'll have to cheat with inspirations. We'll see how much Shockwave helps.

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Most of the time when I see claims of /Regen power its a Kat or BS. When your primary caps you in 1/3 of your positional defenses Regen synergizes very well because none of it's mitigation is defense based. Willpower/Unvul doesn't synergize well since it is typed defense and SR/SD can cap without Parry/DA.


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Parry/DA can help soft-cap lethal defenses, which is plentiful out there.

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Sure. But it doesn't synergize quite as well.

I was working on an experiemental Kat/WP build that didn't take Heightened Senses and instead capped Melee/Ranged/AoE with DA and set bonuses. I think my AoE feel short in the builds I was working on.

Though really what I meant is that I'd love to see some kick [censored] non-Parry/DA videos or read some stories of Regen feats like AV killing.

(While I'd love to see some Regen action in the RWZ challenge, it's my experience that Shockwave really makes a huge difference there so I suspect it would be a Claw/Regen scenario. Not that it isn't impressive to do with Claw/Regen.)

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Many people here keep saying regen is so much better over all but thats just 90 seconds of time provided you dont get 2 shotted anyways.


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Most of the time when I see claims of /Regen power its a Kat or BS. When your primary caps you in 1/3 of your positional defenses Regen synergizes very well because none of it's mitigation is defense based. Willpower/Unvul doesn't synergize well since it is typed defense and SR/SD can cap without Parry/DA.

(Yes Kat/Dark and Kat/Fire are also really good.)

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The lag is particularly bad in the Vanguard base in the RWZ. My Mac client ends up looking like a slide show where the Windows client under Boot Camp on the same machine has no lag in that area with higher settings. Losing performance under Boot Camp using the Windows client shouldn't be your concern.

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I guess your mileage may vary, but I believe the Mac client has performance that's good enough for me not to deal with the hassle of Boot Camp. Boot Camp was taking up a lot of maintenance time (as Windows tends to), plus the Windows CoH client wasn't really stable around the "bleeding edge" video drivers laptops (Macbook Pro, late 2008) usually get.

On my Vista based gaming PC, I have issues there too with occasional crashing, lots of lag, and "pauses" every 15 seconds. Vista has been such a pain, I've been threatening to use the Mac for CoH full time.

The difference, I believe, is that the Windows client problems are a mystery, while the Mac client's problems are well known and on the list to be fixed eventually. It might even be possible for them to be fixed before the PC issues.

BTW, you can reduce the RWZ/SG Base/Pocket D lag by turning on Advanced Settings and sliding World detail to 100% or less. I have mine set to 100%, and after a few seconds in a large SG base the lag subsides and it behaves almost normally.

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Yep, I did that. That isn't as bothersome as lowering character detail which really reduces my enjoyment of the game. I still am getting noticably worse performance Mac side. If it didn't also crash I could live with it.

I am not seeing issues with Vista which really pains me because otherwise I hate Vista. I hear Windows 7 is really good, though I am a Mac person at heart. Although I *am* having issues with Boot Camp and Vista -&gt; the Mac client isn't properly passing keystrokes to the system which prevents Ventrillo from working properly. Vent won't work with a key press activated output. I don't have an issue with Vent running on the Mac side.

I am anxious for a Mac fix, but I haven't read anywhere that the Mac client has been improved except this last patch fixed a rare memory leak. If that is supposed to fix some of these issues I will eagerly try the Mac client on test.

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I have one of the new MacBooks with the 9400M, and I'm extremely pleased with it in general--performance is overall slightly better in dense actions like ship raids than on my P4 PC equipped with an 8600GT/512.

I run at both 1200x800 on the built-in display and on an external monitor at 1650x1050. Lag in the Vanguard base has been noticeable, and in the SG base has been downright abhorrent to date.

I also set the Gamma slider to 131% in Graphics Options, as this matches hues better to the Windows version to my eye--the Mac is overbright elsewise.

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The issue seems to be the high resolutions/pixel count of the 24" monitor. Macbook screens are too small and the resolution too low to hit this problem.

If you are just looking to run Mid's, Parellels allows you to run a virtual Windows machine in a window on your Mac. It works fairly well. The performance hit is probably a bit low for running CoH but for working with Mid's it works fine.