Pyromantic

Kind of. The bare minimum of endurance is as good as, or nearly as good as, full endurance for many critters, since their recovery often approximates or outstrips their endurance usage. You are likely to see some mitigation in the short term, but they should be up and running again long before your next EA unless you have a ridiculous amount of recharge.

This is my experience with Ice, which is significant but certainly not exhaustive. I'd be interested to hear what others have found.

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As I said in my post, what three powers (that you CAN'T fit into a normal fire/kin build) will help the duo more? My fire/kin (team build) has assault, tactics and vengeance as well as hasten and flight on top of fitness.

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To an extent that's an impossible question to answer, since each individual will prioritize powers (particularly those generally considered more "optional") differently. But since the comparison is being drawn between how much stamina will help relative to other powers, the first question I ask is "how much will stamina help?"

Of everyone who is saying that they have stamina and couldn't give it up, how much more recovery would you need before you would be satisfied? If you have slotted SB replacing slotted stamina, you're already adding nearly 50% recovery. That's a heck of a lot. Whenever I've run into endurance problems in the higher levels on fire/kin, it's generally because I've just used a bunch of high cost powers (flashfire, fire cages, fulcrum shift, fireball...) and missed with transference. Having two characters with transference, that's an extremely rare occurence. Assuming a reasonable amount of endurance slotting, I would expect the extra recovery from stamina to make a difference infrequently at best. This brings a far different perspective on its value relative to other powers than for a typical build.

(As an aside, someone may look at my comment regarding reasonable endred slotting and say that stamina should allow you to skip some of that. Totally true, but I've never claimed that taking stamina would be a mistake, just that other alternatives are just as viable.)

The rest of fitness is thus what remains. Swift or hurdle are both pretty insignificant when you have SB and fly. Health is certainly decent, but there are other options for regaining health and mitigating sleep.

Other power selections that I could see being effective:
<ul type="square">[*] ID (I mention this only because someone mentioned it as very skippable. While it is to an extent, I think its value is increased in this situation.)[*] All four APP powers, which many builds struggle to take otherwise.[*] Aid self on both characters, or aid self and aid other on one character, if you're looking for a heal when transfusion isn't practical.[*] Tough, particularly if stacked with a resistance armor from the APP.[*] Grant invis. Alternatively, smoke, which will actually generate a decent tohit debuff if slotted, double stacked and used alongside good defense numbers.[*] Anything else the OP considers useful.[/list]
Do I consider stamina a bad option? Not at all. But a perma-SBed fire/kin without stamina has a lot more recovery than fire/kins with stamina but without reliable outside buffs, and they manage just fine.

I don't have much experience with sapper builds, but I believe -recovery is at least as important as -end in making them work. As such I would guess that Elec Melee is far and away the best choice for the secondary.

To be honest, I'm genuinely surprised this many people are taking that stance. Without the planned duo I'd completely agree, but if you can count on SB 24/7, and have access to two transferences after 35, I don't see the need at all. With reasonable endred slotting a "typical" fire/kin shouldn't have any significant endurance problems, and SB is twice as effective as stamina.

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Yes and no. Someone with a lot of resist powers will have a steadfast slotted up, but say for example, a blaster/defender/mastermind/corruptor/etc that only get 1 shield (usually in the epic pool) you only have the chance to slot up one set of resistance enhancements. On my MM I went all glad armor because at the time people WERE using tp foe a lot more, but now I find I can sell it for around 600 million and invest in much better IOs for my blaster and dom that don't use it.

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Fair enough. I probably shouldn't speak in absolutes. However, I believe this is a rare case. You'd have to have only one power that could slot resist sets and feel that the 6 slot bonus for glad armor is worth more than the 3% defense, which is extremely unlikely unless it's primarily a PvP build. I expect a significant majority of these IOs in play are being used on PvE builds, and I'd be quite surprised to learn otherwise.

Stacked assault will be helpful up to a point, though it will be completely overshadowed once you get to fulcrum shift. Against any reasonably large group the FS from both characters will be enough to cap your damage. You may wish to switch it out for maneuvers at some point, either as an IO mule or to combine with other defense if you build in that direction.

Stacking tactics, OTOH, is gold IMO. Fire/kin needs to be able to hit consistently, and that's a huge tohit buff.

Going to have to disagree with others. If you can rely on having SB up all the time, then you absolutely do not need stamina. Slot SB for end mod if you find you need it, though even without that it's still providing more recovery than stamina will. Once you get to transference you'll have so few endurance problems anyway, and those extra power picks will be handy. You can stack leadership for example, or take stimulant for the broader mez protection than ID.

Air sup will provide you with some extra ST damage that is likely to help through the early levels, particularly for bosses or other tough targets. Once you get into the higher levels you are likely to find that running two fire/kins will require an insane amount of activity and you will likely forget about using the attack in favor of keeping all the buffs and controls going and letting hot feet and imps deal most of the damage.

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It is practically worthless, since you can get a Steadfast protection +3% def for 25 mill but sell the glad armor for 600mill. I love getting these and just making BANK.

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Of course, anyone that is seriously considering the glad armor should already have the steadfast slotted. The ability to add 3% def to all types in a single slot is huge, and considering the difficulty in acquiring this IO and the multiple billions of inf you can spend on a build these days it really isn't unreasonable.

It is worth noting that a little patience on this IO can save you 100 mill or two.

I have played plant/thermal to 40 and plant/rad to 50. Based on that, I would say the following:

Secondaries that are primarily focused on single target or long-recharge buffs (as much of empathy and thermal are) do not present any particularly good synergy with plant, since the pet is considered quite weak and doesn't contribute nearly as much to your offensive output as many other sets' pets do. This is of course a non-issue when teaming, as you'd generally use those buffs on teammates anyway, but you won't find it nearly as useful as forting three imps, for example.

In terms of synergy with plant, you will generally be looking for sets that use (de)buffs to enhance the strong damage of this primary, that provide additional recharge, and that diversify your control options. Not surprisingly, this makes storm, rad and kin all very good choices (which go well with most or all primaries).

I can't speak too much to trick arrow as I don't have much experience with the set, but I would expect the variety of debuffs and controls to also pair fairly well.

Force field, sonic, empathy and thermal, while all worthwhile sets in their own right, are not particularly synergistic with plant. While they all provide powers that you may find useful, such as thermal's debuffs at the top tiers or the mez protection of bubbles/rings, you are likely to find many of the powers useless when soloing. If you team exclusively you probably will not find it affects you that much.

Another consideration is the amount of attention you can spend on the powers in combat, which will depend on your style. Roots can be a very strong damage option, and I certainly found it worthwhile to develop a ST chain for my plant/rad, so I found a secondary that doesn't necessarily take up too much of your time to be ideal. You may also go through endurance quite quickly this way, so anything that provides recovery is also nice (cough cough rad or kin, though empathy does fit the bill here too).

In terms of slotting the primary, I would look to the following.

The most important powers are Strangler, Seeds of Confusion and Carrion Creepers. Strangler can be slotted purely as a hold, purely as a ranged damage power, or a mixture. Get 6 slots into it when you can. Seeds of confusion needs accuracy and recharge. I would get at least 4 slots into it quickly. Confuse duration is occasionally useful but is not a priority. Carrion Creepers should get 6 slots asap. It needs a little accuracy and then as much recharge and damage as you can get. The recent fixes to the power allow sets to properly enhance all aspects of the creepers, so frankenslotting is a good choice.

Following that I would look to roots and entangle (if you take it). I treat these both as damage powers and slot them as such. Note that roots does substantially more damage than similar powers in other sets. Don't bother slotting for immobilize duration.

The remaining powers are a little more optional and depend on your taste. If you take vines it benefits from heavy slotting (usually an even mix of acc, recharge and hold, with accuracy first thanks to the lower hit chance), but do not slot this much before the higher priority powers. Spore burst is, well, spore burst, and is usually skipped. A little accuracy, and maybe some recharge or end reduction if you really love this power. Spirit tree never interested me, but if I were to take it I'd prioritize heal slotting and recharge only if it was convenient and I found myself using the power a lot. Fly Trap is a take it or leave it kinda thing; I personally found it worthwhile but I wouldn't complain about anyone skipping it. Some accuracy with plenty of damage, like most pets. I thought about trying achilles heel in it, but I didn't find the use of fling thorns frequent enough to bother.

Most likely the server status page is acting up again. It was bouncing between showing the servers up and down every few minutes yesterday long before the servers actually went back up.

My build has perma-hasten and perma-AM, meaning that I only need minimal recharge in creepers to have it perma also. Otherwise I'd definitely be slotting creepers for considerably more recharge.

Ah. Yeah it's annoying when they take off. Slotting strangler was a definite priority for me, and I was usually able to hold the ghosts before they decide to do so.

May want to add more accuracy in roots. Like many AoE control powers it has a lower base accuracy than 1. Strangler and entangle, on the other hand, start with a higher accuracy. Interestingly enough, seeds actually has a base accuracy of 1, though I could see slotting it heavily for accuracy anyway given its importance.

It can be frustrating. There are times when an enemy definitely should not be considered off the ground but appears to be anyway. Other than applying a -fly power, my usual solution is to scan for another target that appears grounded and target it for roots. Truth be told, I use roots so early and so often in a fight that it hasn't been much of an issue for me.

Quick question...while ghosts can be difficult to immobilize, they generally aren't difficult to hold unless they've applied significant tohit debuffs on you. This suggests to me that you aren't using seeds of confusion to start the fight. Is that correct?

Good to know. Thanks. For a little while I was concerned that I may have to do some fairly major review of my planned 50 respec. Since I've already spent a lot of influence on it, that would be frustrating to say the least.

Ok, since it's been mentioned again and not contradicted, I need to check. To anyone's knowledge, is it possible to have 2 Creepers out at once? It's a little tricky to test, but it seems as though it isn't possible to me. I have tried summoning a second Creeper, and found that while the summoning took place the typical hiss/bubble sound of the first disappeared, suggesting to me that it despawned as a result of using the power. Any attempts to summon a second in combat have given no indication of a short-lived increase in the frequency of vine spawns.

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This title is misleading. Chimera received help from a lot of mobs on the map. He made no attempt to solo the scrapper.

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Given the life expectancy of a mob on the map, I'm pretty sure they count as temporary powers for Chimera. Does soloing with temps really count as soloing? Let the age-old debate begin again!

Thoroughly enjoyed that.

One will certainly make a substantial difference, and you may be satisfied with the result. However, you will still find yourself knocked on occasion when facing certain foes, especially if you are on a larger team and in the thick of things. A second will eliminate the vast majority of knock issues, reducing it to a few niche situations such as Katie TF, Fake Nemeses and a few AVs. A third will basically eliminate those as well.

Hoping for a little more clarification.

I've been playing my plant/rad very steadily since creating her and I should hit 50 soon. I've got a build planned and have picked up most of the pieces already. Due to Hasten, AM, and a substantial global recharge bonus, Creepers needs only a small amount of recharge slotted to be perma. My understanding is that Creepers won't really benefit much from reducing the recharge time below the duration (I'm assuming you can't have 2 out, so it would help for slows, zoning and the like). As such I'm planning to slot it with 5 pieces of Positron's Blast for the bonuses, including the proc.

This leaves me with a 6th slot in which I expect to place another proc. While the AoE damage sets carry down to all the subpowers, is that also true of the other sets? That is, would it matter whether I use the proc from slow, immobilize or knockback sets? If so, I'm assuming the knockback set would be the best choice. Would you consider this a worthwhile use of a slot in the amount of damage it will deal?

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shhhhhhhhh! The purple proc is broken (in a good way ) in caltrops. shhhhhhhhh! (unless they fixed it )

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I assume by this you mean the Ragnarok chance for knockdown. What about damage procs? Can they fire 4 times?

I'm levelling up a DM/Inv scrapper at the moment, and while it's still quite young I am already thinking ahead towards an AV soloing build for it. Looking through powers I had a thought that caltrops may actually function quite well in the build, though I have no first-hand experience with the power (and don't see it used often) so I'd like to clarify a few points.

The numbers listed for caltrops suggest it actually has a very strong DPA given that the extended time frame isn't very important on AVs and there is no hit check. I'd be using a high recharge build for an optimal attack chain so it should be up quite often (and stacked multiple times over).

Would running be an issue? My experience suggests that AVs typically ignore these kind of afraid effects, at least when PToDs are up, and I'm assuming that using MG with great frequency will keep the AV immoblized anyway. I don't expect this to be a problem but wanted some reassurance.

How will procs function in the power? Is it a rain type effect where they have a chance to fire every 10 seconds? If any procs used in the power have a chance to fire 4 times then the effective DPA of the power should be very high.

I don't recall seeing caltrops used in any AV soloing builds and I'm curious to know if there are significant problems with it. Thanks in advance for your feedback.

A quick note before your next build:

Remember that Fast Healing and Quick Recovery are stronger than Health and Stamina respectively. That means that you should take the former powers before the latter and ensure that they are enhanced at least as well. In addition, it's best to have the Numina (and RTissue, if you use it) unique(s) in a well-enhanced power as it does benefit.

These days it's more common to see /WP scrappers (particularly Kat/WP) slot for Fire/Cold/Nrg/Neg defense to layer on top of Heightened Senses rather than positional defenses.

It's an interesting approach, though I prefer a more old-school tactic of shoring up health and regen, with defense where convenient, along with enough recharge and solid damage slotting to keep my damage output strong.

Kat/WP is an extremely fun build. My own is without a doubt my favorite character, having seen considerably more play time than any other. It offers a great mixture of layered defenses and solid damage options.

While you can slot under the assumption you'll be working with DOs prior to a respec, I'd suggest building with SOs or (perhaps common) IOs in mind from the beginning. The odd DO here or there isn't going to make enough of a difference to be worth burning a respec later. One suggestion I have is to work with temporary travel powers through the early levels if you're willing. It's quite helpful to free up the power selection a little.

With that in mind, there are a few things I would recommend changing:

Firstly, Divine Avalanche should almost certainly be taken at 8. You'll want a third attack to round out your damage output early on, and it's quite serviceable as an attack power. It also has a huge impact on your survivability; you may well find it helps more than Mind Over Body, for example.

Gambler's Cut is often taken over Sting of the Wasp these days thanks to its extremely short animation and quick recharge. This gives it surprisingly good numbers overall. In higher end IO builds, it is often used every other attack in your standard chain, frequently slotted with Achilles' Heel or damage procs to get the most out of it. Whether working with SOs or an unlimited budget, I'd take it over SotW.

Keep in mind Hasten does essentially nothing for your secondary, so its only real value is for increasing your damage output. Personally, I think the slots you've devoted to it would be better used on the attack themselves.

As mentioned, Quick Recovery and Fast Healing should be slotted before Stamina and Health.

I wouldn't slot RttC (or practically any other toggle) for end reduction before getting attacks well-slotted, since they tend to burn far more endurance in typical situations.

HPT can be slotted for resistance but the returns are fairly low; it's an option in the later levels but probably should not be done at this point. The health bonus is more substantial.

Good luck with the build. Hope you enjoy the character.

There's no question that Katana provides a significant amount of mitigation in addition to a strong selection of ST and AoE damage, making it a very effective and well-rounded set. In some ways it is more noticeable at lower levels when stacked DA tends to overshadow your secondary altogether. You mention having experience with the other scrapper sets though, so I would have thought you would expect this if you've played BS.

My Kat/WP scrapper is my favorite character with around 1000 hours played (waaaay more than any other character I have). It works very well, but I don't think it pushes beyond the upper boundaries of several other scrapper combinations. Like other high level scrappers, typical solo situations will become boring due to a complete lack of challenge, but there are plenty of ways to push yourself and keep the experience enjoyable.