MrTPF

I'd be in favour of them combining, many people usually send messages to both in most cases anyway. Both are quite active, though I'd say Events is possibly more so.

Wow, that's a real shame.

I recently got back to the forums after a long break and this thread immediately got me excited. I decided to jump to the last post to see the most recent status update but really sorry to see you disbanded. I have a very fun-to-play FF/Sonic/Leadership Defender who wanted to join in.

What happened?

WOW - Moobix! I'm stunned I can't believe you actually signed up at the forum! Heh, I saw the name and chuckled to myself thinking of you ... then I realised it actually WAS you! I'm honoured

The pleasure was all mine Long live The Raven!

And, you're right Nine Claws - I really don't care how long it took me to get there, I don't entirely understand those that rush to 50 as fast as they can anyway. To be honest, a lot of that 714 hours wasn't even spent in mishes or grinding with street hunts, but instead exploring new zones as they unlocked, patrolling hazard areas to guide and assist lower level heros, hunting for badges, laughing at myself in pvp, exemping lots on my favourite TFs... I've tried to experience as much of the content as I could, and there's still more to enjoy. Reaching 50 is indeed a great milestone, but that isn't why I play

Gratz to Pinkette, the pinkiest superhero in Paragon City (pooflisseriserers beware!), on her first 50!!!

Pinkettte was the reason I came to this game, and it's been a pleasure and an honour to uphold justice the Paragon way for 50 levels together.

Well done Pinkette!

YAY!

Heh, nice one HH, gratz

de-grump!

Lots of gratz!

Did this happen? How did you get on?

If you're still trying to get it done, I've an Illusion troller with the right powers to help you out.

Yay Ave!!! Gratz my skimpily clad friend

Well done on another 50 and thanks for all the excellent teaming (not to mention all that progress on my healing badges ).

Nice one dude! Gief SB!

Woooo, gratz on your 5th!

"And that's kicking their butts, Sal A. Mander!!"

Been excellent superteaming with you Tommy, glad I finally kept up with one of your toons this time around

Will gladly share blag with you any time!

Gratz!

Hi all, and thanks very much for all the gratzes

I don't often get much time to be active here at the forums anymore but Pinkette pointed me to this thread, so it was a very nice suprise.

Was a really really fun night, as usual, carving through mobs with lots of friendly banter in team chat. I dinged on an AV mish, like I had wanted to, and with a team full of globals, like I had wanted to. I couldn't have asked for more really, although it was a shame two of my closest globals weren't around to join, but nevermind. There's so so much content I still want to do on Mr TPF, so it isn't over

Well, 0 to 50 in about 714 hours give or take a mish or two. Wow. That's kind of startling when you think about it, but I've never ever been in much of a rush to get to 50 and I've had so much fun, endless fun, throughout that entire time and most importantly made some really excellent friends.

Mr TPF wasn't my first alt, but he soon became my first serious character in which I started understanding the game and its mechanics, and was my "main" for quite a while. He spent a long while sitting idle in my login list, while I had fun exploring numerous alts, but I picked him up again a while ago and have really really enjoyed the last 15-20 levels.

This is rapidly becoming something between an oscar acceptance speech and 'memoirs of a super hero', but it's my first 50 and I've still got a massive grin across my face. *wipes tears* I wanna thank all my friends and globals in game, and everyone I've ever had fun teaming with for all the fantastic adventures and making this such an excellent journey...

And one worth doing all over again

Team Play First!!!

Nice one my man, Gratz

I hope you appreciate all that powerlevelling I did for you

What's the sound effect like for Screech?

Valid point, but my thinking at the time was both Scream and Screech are single target ranged attacks that do -20% resist. Screech is a disorient or stun (can't remember, but come to think of it, what's the difference?) whereas Scream is pretty OK damage and has a much faster recharge. I don't often find single target stuns that useful in my teams, so that's the main reason I took Scream.

I guess I was expecting it to be as good as slow resistance of Wet Ice from Ice Armor, though I can't find an exact figure for that.

Either way, I went with Quickness, so I'll be taking Dodge at 28 and Lucky at 30. Oh, I got Soaring Dragon last night... WOW... love the animation and what an awesome sound of steel slicing through the opponent!

Thanks for help everyone.

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Quickness would still be nice for the 40% resistance, which seems impressive at almost double that of 3-slotted Tough... though I'm not sure to what types (the builder says 'multi').


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Quickness gives you 40% resist against slow effects. "Multi" refers to run speed, fly speed and recharge speed. Tough gives you resist to smashing and lethal effects. You are mixing the food

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Yikes, gross misunderstanding on my part. I really can't think why I took that from the numbers in the builder. Thanks for setting me straight there.

So moving back to my choice. Hm. Quickness provides recharge boost, which I'm already getting from Hasten, and resist to slow, which I put to the test tonight, SK'd for the 'Defeat Chimera' praetorian mish, and it didn't seem to be so great. Either the KoA use especially nasty caltrops (I've not fought them before) or I couldn't get off them any faster than usual. Having said that perhaps I should just take the 3 passives Agile, Dodge and Lucky, to round off my Defense stats and skip Quickness altogether.

Thoughts?

Hmm, was a little disappointed with Quickness' performance on caltrops this evening. Isn't it supposed to give resistance to slow powers? Or is it recharge debuffs we're talking about (eg ice stuff) when we say slow?

Ah, good, a thread exists already. I've a similar query I'm currently facing on my Kat/SR. He's currently on lvl25, though I've yet to take the choice at 24. This is because, looking ahead at my build, I've probably taken too many attacks (I get scrapperlock) and consequently will only be able to take all but one power of the SR set.

My dilemma as of lvl24 is therefore which power to leave out of the three passives (Agile, Dodge and Lucky) or Quickness.

I already have Hasten in the build and with so many attacks recharge won't be an issue. So having said that, Quickness would still be nice for the 40% resistance, which seems impressive at almost double that of 3-slotted Tough... though I'm not sure to what types (the builder says 'multi').

I figure Lucky should also go in, agreeing with the comments in this thread.

Which leaves me with either Agile or Dodge. I'm thinking, well, I'm a scrapper and I hope to be in melee most of the time where I can use my AoEs etc. If I'm not on a team with a herding tank I'll do that myself. In this case, then Dodge trumps Agile since the latter is ranged.

Which makes my build something like this:

------------
Level 1: Sting of the Wasp
Level 1: Focused Fighting
Level 2: Flashing Steel
Level 4: Focused Senses
Level 6: Build Up
Level 8: Divine Avalanche
Level 10: Practiced Brawler
Level 12: Hasten
Level 14: Super Speed
Level 16: Hurdle
Level 18: Health
Level 20: Stamina
Level 22: The Lotus Drops
Level 24: Dodge <
Level 26: Soaring Dragon
Level 28: Quickness <
Level 30: Lucky <
Level 32: Golden Dragonfly
Level 35: Evasion
Level 38: Elude

Do you think I made the right choice of those powers discussed above?

Totally agree, Standoff. Many players don't realise how the buff helps. This change would make it more obvious as well as making things so much more fun. Don't need accurate ballistics, just flashy effects plix

I like Guacamole. But it's been a while since I've been able to eat avocados, about 7 months so far in fact. Anyway, I hope to have some soon.

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Does any1 else feel that the forcefield powerset could be made too look a bit more impressive?? i feel its very dull and boring looking.

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I've just tried all the powers from the FF set, with the noteable exception of Force Bubble (I wasn't high enough lvl). I think they all look excellent, some of the powers are addictive for the animation alone, with great sound effects too. Come on, which other set has such a visually loud/impressive presence?

Ok ok, perhaps there are a few others but FF is great!

It had been a while since I had last played my Defender. Until this weekend, I hadn't touched him for a couple of months, namely due to that cursed altitis. But I dusted him off on saturday and since then managed to gain 4-5 levels. For those interested, I thought I would post a followup on how my build above has worked out for me so far.

He is currently lvl26.

First off, he solos really well for a squishie. I don't often do it, but he has no trouble in that department. His attack chain is almost non-stop (especially as of lvl16), and I usually fight in melee range filling in with air superiority between attacks. The damage feels significant, possibly due to how loud the attacks are, possibly because I didn't expect it from a Defender, most probably because of the stacking -res but also because there's quite a bit of DoT and all those orange numbers make you feel powerful.

In teams, this means I can also contribute quite well to general damage dealing once I make sure everyone is buffed.

I'm really happy with how the defense buffs are working out. On saturday my PuG was surging through purple mobs on invincible mishes without a heal0r, and the (crazy) (ice) tank made me his global friend after thanking me. So it's nice to know the buffs are contributing well to team efforts.

It also gives me a satisfying retort when those annoying types on Union ask me "r u heal0r?".

Slotting the sonic blasts for endurance reduction was a must, since the attack chain is quite rapid it's easy to get carried away blasting yourself into no endurance. Stamina helps but once I started running Dispersion Bubble, Manuvers and Tactics all together, I really started to feel the drain. At the moment I'm running slotted Stamina, and endreds in Scream and Shriek. Longevity is fine if I run Dispersion Bubble and Manuvers, but once Tactics comes on, I drain fast. None of these toggles are yet slotted for endred, so that should hopefully help. Unthing's suggestions in this area have been proven in game. Thank you.

I love the sonic blasts, especially since they suit my concept so closely. Be warned, it's a noisey set. I'm not too hot on the sound fx for Shout though, it sounds like steam train CHOOO CHOOOOOO!!!

At 26 I took Shockwave instead of the intended Detention Field, mainly since I have a freespec to use prior to the one we're getting with I10. As it turns out, I really like Shockwave. In effect it's similar to Gale, though Gale looks much cooler and has over double the cone width and almost double the KB mag. Had a lot of fun with my stormy friend blowing Tommy One Eye's mobs back and forth through those narrow ship containers

So I might keep Shockwave in actually.

PFF is great for what it does, but I haven't used it much since those Igneous hunts in the early Hollows levels. It didn't work too well as a pseudo-tanking tool, and I don't generally like running off with PFF when my team is in trouble. I've considered dropping this in respec. Having said that, a less altrouistic player would definitely love this power and it would certainly come into better play during solo.

I also tried out all the other FF powers on Training Room, with exception of Force Bubble (not high enough lvl yet) because I was curious. Force Bolt is great, so I'm looking forward to that - especially since I love Power Push on my blaster. I really liked the animation and sound fx of Detention Field (much easier to notice than other phase powers) but I'm not sure how much use I'll get out of that. I might swap it with Shockwave tbh, which is a shame coz I want them both. Repulsion Field looks really cool too, though I would probably not use it, and I'll have Force Bubble for boxing mobs. Repulsion Bomb was another great animation, an overhead doublehanded lob of a force bubble into a mob, that knocked them all back (similar to Explosive Blast but not as loud) and stunned them. I wish I could fit that in too at some point. No wonder bubblers were supposed to have rocked in PvP.

I wonder if I would skip epics and take those. Does anyone think that's a terribly stupid idea?

Or perhaps I should just roll another FF Defender. Hmm, FF/Elec... I've always wanted to try sapping...

Oh and one finaly thing. Dispersion Bubble is great, but my worst enemy is sleep-type mezzers since that seems to get through. Having a break free handy is, well, handy, for those sleep attacks that chance to make it through my defense.

Anyway, I hope this was of interest to some of you.

Back on topic now. So, I tried out all the MA powers with a friend's lvl40 char against some Nemesis on the Training Room. Interestingly, I rather liked Cobra Strike, both animation and effect. Probably a good soloing power, possibly for pvp too. When it came to CAK I was a little disappointed. The damage is good enough, but the animation and sound effect just didn't do it for me. What I liked instantly about MA is that the attacks feel so fast and fluid, and have a huge KAPOW!!! factor when you hit something. In contrast, CAK took a while to hit and just felt like you were tapping your opponent. It felt slow and weak inspite of the damage. I'm torn now. I don't like it, but it does worthwhile damage. I tried an attack chain of SK, CAK, CK, DC, often filling in with DT. I didn't find myself waiting for attacks, this was on a /SR with Quickness. My MA will have Hasten so it should be fine.

Looking back at the build, I've decided to try the Resilience+Tough route and see how it goes:

------------
Level 1: Thunder Kick
Level 1: Fast Healing
Level 2: Storm Kick
Level 4: Reconstruction
Level 6: Focus Chi
Level 8: Crane kick
Level 10: Dull Pain
Level 12: Hasten
Level 14: Super Speed
Level 16: Quick Recovery
Level 18: Integration
Level 20: Resilience
Level 22: Boxing
Level 24: Tough
Level 26: Dragons Tail
Level 28: Instant Healing
Level 30: Crippling Axe Kick
Level 32: Eagles Claw
Level 35: Revive
Level 38: Moment of Glory
------------

As I said, I wasn't too enthused by CAK, so when I get to 30 I'll make my mind up whether to take that or perhaps Cobra Strike. I'll also know by that lvl how bad the endurance is and whether I'll need to respec Stamina in, which I will have room for if I drop TK, CAK and Revive.

Thanks for the feedback.

Np Rasma. That's what the forums are for. Graventite has already answered on my behalf but I will add a little. Just to put things into a little more context, there are about four different scenarios for which I ctrl-click powers into auto.

1. Fast-recharging attacks. Certain attacks in many power sets have such a fast recharge that you can often get them in once every other power in attack chains. They're usually early choices and do low burst damage so people sometimes overlook them, but over a length of time they give good damage per second due to the fast recharge, sometimes better than later attacks. Either way, their low recharge makes them great fillers, allowing you to keep a fluid attack chain and chiseling off that last bit of mob health after a larger attack. On my MA (early lvls), I usually go Thunder Kick - Storm Kick - Thunder Kick - Crane Kick - Thunder Kick and so on. Another example I can think of is Neutrino Bolt, a Radiation Blast that has a 3 second recharge. It's so fast you can basically chain cannon with it. In both cases above, CTRL-clicking the power on auto just makes your life so much easier.

2. Get-out-of-my-face attacks. This is most often handy on squishies, but can apply anywhere I guess. An example is a blaster that perhaps enjoys playing mostly ranged. You can CTRL-click a melee attack such as Air Superiority from Fly pool (an excellent knock-down), or perhaps something like POwer Thrust from Energy Melee (an excellent knock-back) so that as soon as a foe gets too close and within range, the attack powers and incapacitates him long enough for you to react.

3. Clicky powers that have a long duration but also long recharge, such as Hasten, Conserve Power, Practiced Brawler. Their effects is long lasting but they aren't toggles so you need to keep reactivating when ready. By CTRL-clicking these (with enough recharge enhancements) you can make them as close to toggles as you can get and not worry about forgetting to reactivate.

4. Spamming a power in emergencies, such as blanket healing. Empaths will often put Healing Aura on auto (with CTRL-click) when things get tough in an attempt to provide constant heals. Note this is often very inefficient and even more often frowned upon by others, especially when done outside of mission time.

Yay, more replies Thank you!

I took Thunder Kick to start with because it appears to have a higher dps than the other first few attacks and it filled out my attack chain nicely at early lvls. I basically keep it on auto and it fires off in between other attacks. TK - SK - TK - CK etc, makes a very fluid chain. I suppose at higher lvls when more attacks are available I can respec Thunder Kick out for an extra power. If I did that, I could fit in SK, CK, CAK, DT & EC along with Resilience, Tough (by lvl 24) and Stamina (at 41).

Why does nobody like CAK? It has better burst dmg than SK and very similar dps and activation time to CK, while less endurance cost than CK.

Ok, now for the whole Tough vs Health debate. Let's see if I can get this right. Please correct any misintepretations or mistakes:

Tough has 11.3% base Resistance to Smashing/Lethal types. If I get hit for 100 hp, running Tough would reduce that to 88.7 damage.

Health gives a 40% base increase to normal regen rate of 0.42%/sec which gives around 0.6%/sec at best. For scrappers, that equates to roughly 8 hp/sec regen.

So if I compare the numbers above, taking Tough is a far better option to taking Health if you ignore benefits of other powers in those pools. Am I getting this right?

As a player that hasn't really explored scrappers fully to the higher lvls (I team with them lots and buff them lots, so I'm always in awe but not made it there myself yet) I don't think I'll be able to resist (eww, poor pun) taking MoG on my MA/Regen when it's time. I mean, come on - don't scrappers spend most of their lives looking forward to their god mode? To me, it's sorta like a blaster going 32 lvls and then avoiding their nuke. Ok sure, perhaps Elude is better or perhaps none of these are as god-like as we expect, but I'm taking MoG for sure. Not experiencing it, at least for a few lvls before respecing out, would be such a shame!

To MoG!

(and see what you think).