Mr_Body

Even scrappers, tanks, and brutes need to use inspires. It's not wrong to use them. Not every AT can run in the middle or jump in front of a spawn, say "boo" and walk away while the spawn goes to the Zig.

Search before you ask?

The best way? THE BEST WAY? It's not AE. Leveling in AE is the easy way. For experienced players, AE is a way to jump start to the level they want to start playing a new hero/ villain. The best way for new players is take the harder path to leveling. Do the content in the game the way it was meant to be played before Mission Architect. At your level, you should be joining teams in King's Row or the Hollows. Run contact or police band/newspaper missions. Learn how to play your toon as you also learn how teams and different ATs mesh and what tactics are good or bad.

Um, a brute question in the scrapper section? But besides that, I would concentrate on Smsahing/ Lethal and Energy/ negative over Fire/ cold defense. And my personal experience with WP is that 30% defense is a magic number for survival. Once I hit got to that level, I felt uber.

My ice/ice blaster bunny: Nibbles Flufferbunn.

Well at first I saw that you wanted Recall Friend and TP Self and was thinking this would gimp your defense, but then I remembered Blessing of the Z set. But really, why would Hover/ tp self aid you in tanking? Also Hover is detrimental to Lightning Rod as you must be on the ground to activate it. If movement is the problem, then go for Combat Jumping. Still if you are set on Hover, then you just have to turn it off.

Presence Pool. Taunt > Provoke and you need another power before you can take Invoke Panic as that is the tier 4 of the set.

PPP. Pick which is best suited for you BUT-- Electric Melee has no draw animations. Do you really want to have Mace mastery and then have redraw issues, especially if you want to mix and match attacks.

Electric Melee. I'd skip Lightning CLap. PBAoe non-damaging KB = bad for Shield's AAO. Really, LR + SC + Thunderstrike should be all the mitigation you need. In fact, a standard tactic I intend to use when my version of this combo gets high enough is: Run in the middle, gather up the spawn if necessary, Chain Induction + SC + LR + Thunderstrike = ownage.

IOs. Concentrate on sets that give +defense, +recovery, and +recharge.

Double XP did NOT stack with patrol xp. I had a few toons that I got some levels on that had sat for some time. Lots of patrol xp. Total patrol xp only got reduced by paying off debt and it just looked like it got smaller due to the amount of it was a smaller % of your newer level(s).

Chain induction--
Pros--better animation, fire off anywhere in a spawn
Cons-- do NOT slot any procs in it, if any target gets defeated-- chain ends there
Jacob's Ladder--
Pros-- can take some interesting procs
Cons-- animation sucks, it is a cone- have to move around a bit sometimes to max its targets

I'll be willing to give either a go--- Sweetness Embodified is ready for action.

Well you didn't say what you were fighting at the time so people went off on tangents. If you were not in MA, then I would guess you could have been fighting Nemesis, Circle of Thorns, or Devouring Earth. Of these groups, only CoT have direct defense debuff powers in Quicksand. Nems have their version of Vengeance that stacks unlike the player version. So, kill Lieuts last and if the next spawn has glowing red heads -- beware!
DE have their +buff pets which they will summon as soon as you are seen by them and are uninterruptible. Kill the quartz crystals as soon as they appear. These give massive +tohit to any DE affected.

I have 2 lvl 50 Ice armor tanks. My standard tactic: jump in the middle of a spawn and hit EA. EA + CE should neuter the spawn's ability to seriously injure you plus with the added benefit of instantly aggro'ing the entire spawn. Then open fire with those aoe attacks from /Fire and taunt any outliers that are going after your team.

I have a Sonic/ sonic. I have it slotted with enough +rec that I can continuously buff and attack w/o issues. Now, "team support" defender-- I could see Leadership and Medicine pools being good choices. Now, it could be that with that many toggles, you may have issues. For a PPP, I would suggest Dark Mastery.

[ QUOTE ]
It does, but does it work the way you think it should?
Keep in mind, your gauntlet effect and taunt auras are *NOT* auto-hit vs AV's and GM's while the power Taunt *IS* auto-hit.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just to nitpick, Shield's AAO is auto-hit even against AVs and GMs.

But a shield tank can do without taunt if your playstyle is complementary. Normally I run in the middle of a mob, let AAO get their attention, then Shield Charge laid right at my feet. And since I also have Footstomp, they are all looking at me. But I do have Taunt as well-- it is endurance free action-- good to use when Rage crashes or anytime you are low on end.

1st: When the bombs get to full health, they explode with massive AOE damage and a lot of KB though you most likely wont care about the KB cause you will be dead. I have also seen where a hero fighting a bomb gets hit by a Rikti ship flying overhead which also happens to hit the bomb, causing it to be destroyed.

2nd: Lots of flying heroes/ villains, but no reward at this time for killing a ship.

3rd: The Rikti will spawn anywhere a peep is standing outside without some cover overhead. That's why the warnings say take cover for those not wanting to be included. The more peeps in any given area, the more Rikti will spawn. We gather for mutual support, ie buffs and heals, and for the AOE potential of all attacks to be maximized. Let's face it: at higher lvls, its not about xp or inf as anyone and their team who damage a Rikti get credit for the kill and share the rewards- inf, xp, and vanguard merits. Salvage and recipe drops still go to a random person though. If a Rikti award Van Merits, everyone gets one I believe. You can begin to earn Vanguard merits once you reach lvl 35, go to RWZ and do the first contact there.

4th: There are 4 badges for the Rikti invasion- 3 defeats and 1 accolade. The accolade awards a special power which grants resist to psi damage while active, roughly 5%. Its either a flat 5% or varies by AT. Get all 3 defeats (Rikti invaders, Bombs, and the EBs- sorry I dont remember the exact #s) and you will get the accolade.

There did seem to be an unusually higher number of Magus as compared to other Rikti. The last scrapper standing in the bowl was fun though. But really, once we took down the monster, there was no point to keep beating on Rikti anymore. I'd be willing to do any all scrapper tf, on Test or Live.

PS: I was there as Sweetness Embodified-- BS/ Shield.

Only the Devs could tell you which server has the most active villains. They usually don't respond in the player question forums. And they probably wouldn't be willing to tell you even if you pm'ed one of them.

My suggestion: go visit the separate server forums and ask around. Some have lists of supergroups --see if one of these appeals to you. Alternately, you could go to the supergroup registar in Port Oakes or the one in Atlas Park and look at the top 100 sgs for a specific server. They list both hero and villain sgs, so some reading between the lines may be necessary. Also, just because a group is at the top of the list, doesnt mean it will suit your wants and needs.

[ QUOTE ]
Interesting replies. Thank you. Now i have a couple questions.

1) Why skip the 2 Resists? Is there not enough energy or fire damage to protect from at end game? (50) That's 10% resist and 20-20% effect resist. (what is effect anyway)

2) Tough, i usually get. Is weave really wanted? That's 5 toggles running, can the end. be maintained easily? (without getting alot of sets) I mainly just run common recipes on builds.

The main reason i wanted to try Inv. was the lack of end. usage it looked to consume in mids. I'd hate to have to get more toggles to run if not needed. Thanks for all the replies.

[/ QUOTE ]


1) Energy/ negative damage is more of a worry than fire/ cold. Fire/cold is the less common damage types. I usually get Resist Energies, I hate being drained. My response to fire/cold: Dull Pain-- I feel a lot better.

2) Yes endurance can be maintained even with 5 or more toggles running on any build. People were doing it before IOs came out. I would suggest you invest in a few sets anyways that give +recovery for 2 IOs. Bid ahead of time, bid low and eventually you'll get them.

Note on Unstoppable: I saw advice to just slot 1 resist in the base and you'll be good, I disagree. You want some recharge in there- 2 or 3 slots as you have them to spare. Resist is not necessary except for maybe scrappers and brutes.

[ QUOTE ]
while the server you just accessed is on the very bottom of that list. .

[/ QUOTE ]

The server you last accessed is on the TOP of the list.

To the OP: Welcome to the game!

After the server you were last on, the servers are then listed top to bottom by load. Least load on the top to the highest load on the bottom. Position on the list doesn't always mean that's where the least or most players are located at any given time but could have other factors namely on the server side we are not made aware of. The servers with the highest load will be where you may experience more lag than others.

Also: next weekend is double xp weekend. This is a MUCH anticipated event. As such, certain servers may seem unavailable at times, namely Freedom and Virtue. Now, the fact is if you keep switching between servers at the server selection screen, you will eventually be able to get onto those servers at some point.

This game is about the whole journey of level 1 to 50. Not like some other MMO's where you would want to rush to the max level. As such: make many alternate heroes/ villains and try out many powersets and frequent the different servers. This will add to your experience in-game and also, just in case some servers go down or are unavailable, means you won't be screaming here later on when/ if you cannot play your favorite toon.

LR will jump at you if you are gonna do the hover tank method. So, it will reduce the amount of melee attacks aimed at you but he does have some ranged attacks as well. But it might be possible.

[ QUOTE ]
We still on for sunday? I hope we get enough to this. After the STF run last sunday, I think 2 teams would be enough. How about lgtf as an alternate idea if lack of participation becomes an issue?

[/ QUOTE ]

I will be available for either the Raid or a LGTF.

Store Mark-up?

I bought a sidekick. I call it my second account. I get all the xp, inf, drops, and debt. That is, when I bother to run both accounts.