As I have played through the CoH universe, I have noticed everywhere I go there are Fire/Kinetics controllers. About a year ago, I asked my friend why there were so many, and he responded with "They are the best combination for farming missions for experience and money." After learning this, I decided to make a Earth/Kinetics controller in the hopes of one day being able to out-farm my fiery counterparts. This was a futile effort however because I soon learned that Earth control just didn't have the damage to compete. I despaired, and began to think that all hope was lost in finding another AT that could farm as well as Fire/Kin. Then I met a Archery/energy blaster who's name I wont mention, who showed me the wonders of the set, and how easily it can destroy large spawns in a matter of seconds. This prompted me to make my own Archery/energy blaster, and upon reaching level 32, and obtaining my Rain of Arrows, I realized that this was the answer I had been looking for. Now that my archer is at level 50, I can run the popular Demon and Council Empire farms at the same speed, if not faster than a Fire/Kin.
The secret is having RoA (Rain of Arrows), Aim, and buildup back every time you are ready to attack a mob. Now I'm sure some of you have archers, and are thinking, well RoA comes back pretty fast to start (1 minute recharge base) and I should be able to farm from the start. Here is where you have to ask yourself if you want to just be able to farm, or if you want to be able to show Fire/Kin's who's boss.
I am new to posting on this forum, (this is my first post
), so I dont know how to put my build in here for all to see and compare, BUT I can tell you that when I opened up Mids to make my farming build I focused on the three R's.
Recharge
Regeneration
Recovery
While ensuring that all my powers had the desired % in them, I looked for all the set bonuses that would make my powers come back faster.
As I am a casual player, I knew that including the high priced IO's in my build was not an option, so I made a Purple-less build that cost me just under 200 million influence. I encourage anyone who wants to farm with an archer to make their own builds rather than just copying mine (because I cant post it anyway
). The values that are actually important are posted below.
With hasten up:
RoA = 19.6 second recharge
Aim and Buildup = 29.5 second recharge
Hasten = 2 minutes and 43 second recharge
Since RoA will not kill everything in a group (especialy if they have high lethal resistance like Malta) follow up attacks such as Fist full of arrows and Explosive arrow are key to making this build work. After you hit with Aim+Buildup+RoA+FFoA+explosive arrow, there will most likely be some straggler lts that you can pick off easily with you single target attacks.
The only problem that I ever face when farming are runners, and as long as you pay attention, and act quickly, you can take out the cowards before they get too far away (boost range really helps here). Actually on the subject of boost range, many people don't consider it to be a worthwhile power. For farming, it is an amazing asset! It allows you to hit groups with RoA from further away, AND since it boosts the range of EVERYTHING, your cone Fist full of arrows, will hit more enemies without the need for you to run into almost melee range. Once I figure out how to post my build, I will.
This guide is basically just to inform you all that Archery/Energy is a viable farming build, and I'm sure once people start working out builds that are better than mine, Archery/energy will be the new Fire/Kin.
Oh wait.... what have I done!!!?!
