Silas

No more ridiculous than all the other server names.

Uh, what? PG is still kindof a turd but the Dark Servant is perma now. 240s recharge 240s duration. So I guess there's a couple seconds downtime for the cast if you have absolutely no global recharge or recharge in the power. Fluffy is very definitely perma and has been for a while.

Oh and Corruptors are still totally better at everything ever.

I knew the risks when I wrote it

To address your points:

- As others have said, the point of slotting Rec Aura properly is not to make my own build functional. Even if someones build is entirely endurance-solvent (so to speak) Rec Aura can let them spam all their high endurance powers at full bore. It also helps against the slew of mobs that sap endurance, as others have noted.

- Fair enough on the global recharge, at lower levels that should suffice to get your powers recharging pretty quickly.

- Yeah the second build looks a lot better to me. You've got much more powerful recharge on AB/Reg Aura as well as boatloads of global recharge.

- re:Webnade/Inferno, I can't hate on those set mules too much. After all I've got AAs in Screech and Fort Hyps in Sirens Song. That said, I personally feel Screech/SirS are more useful powers than Webnade/Inferno. Inferno would be a power I'd take for laughs, because crashing your endbar on a team is usually not a great idea. Taking a power for laughs is fine, but makes me reluctant to slot a purple set in it. It's like putting Hecatombs in Brawl or something. I guess if you don't have anywhere else you can put the purples okay, but I can't shake the feeling the slots and set (or set calibre) could be used much better elsewhere.

- I'm with Stray on this one. If taking Veng is asking people to die, what's the deal with taking the rez? I mean, this is something I covered in the guide. Yeah, ideally people won't ever die. But **** happens. When it does, you want the rez to get them back on their feet ASAP. When it does, Veng gives the team an incredibly powerful buff which helps prevent a domino effect leading to a wipe. That said, you've taken Veng in your second build Though contrary to what you've said, it would not be your only set mule.

I'm a little confused though, was the second build more for proof of concept? See how it'd work out? Because for what my 2 cents are worth, the second build is much better than the first.

Edit: This may sound strange coming from me, but I don't actually think not having RoF is a big deal for an Emp/Fire. Aside from Web Envelope (redraw, 2s cast time, 15' radius, noty) you've got nothing to keep them in the patch. For Corruptors this is less of an issue because when stuff gets to low health the double-Scourge will kill most before they can run out. This means you'd only really get use out of RoF when you're teamed with a Controller/Dominator.

RoF is fantastic if you can leverage it. For a build like Empathy which can't, I'd stick with Fireball/Breath over RoF.

Interesting. I wouldn't say it sucks because that would be boorish, but its certainly not how I'd build an Emp.

Some things I'd do differently:

• Recovery Aura is way underslotted. Anytime you exemplar below 45 it'll take ages to recharge. It's also taken way later than I would. Both auras are ASAP powers for me. Even if you never exemplar the slotting is poor.
• Panaceas in Regen Aura and AB, this set gives much less recharge enhancement than other sets. Only compensated for at 45+ with the Alpha. My preference is to slot them for max recharge and then have the Alpha on top of that. You'd get more bang for your buck enhancing the powers properly and then getting recharge rather than skipping straight to massive recharge.
• Lots of slots and purple sets invested in powers that are of minimal to no use. I refer to Boxing and Web Envelope, not sure where you'll get the 5th purple set for your Emp/Fire, but I certainly hope its not Armageddons in Inferno or something, haha. I did set mules myself for powers I'll almost never use, but its a smaller slot investment and for greater returns.
• No Leadership pool. As you say, a matter of personal preference. I wouldn't skip them on a Defender given their awesome buff mods and the fact that they buff you as well. Even if they didn't buff the team Assault and Maneuvers would be awesome, the fact that they do makes them a no-brainer for me.
• Singleslotted Hasten. Again, when exemplared it'll have really poor recharge enhancement.

You've got a fair chunk more recharge but its not helping you as much as it could due to how you've slotted your powers. The build loses a lot on the support side (IMO) but doesn't gain significant offensive or defensive benefit for it.

I would argue that the Empathy/team support side is not as effective as it could be. Key Empathy powers underslotted, taken later on, lack of Leadership. You've got a crapload of recharge, which is great, but it largely serves to compensate for poor slotting in your key powers. Which is a shame, given the investment in the build.

You've got about 25% more global recharge than me. High recharge gives diminished returns as you go. To compare the numbers I've swapped my build to t4 Spiritual Core.

For that extra 25% recharge, your AB recharges 2.1 seconds faster than mine (largely negligible since both are way past perma and impossible to realistically maintain on more than 1 person), Regen Aura recharges 3.5 seconds faster than mine, Fortitude recharges half a second faster and Recovery Aura recharges 5.3 seconds slower.

These differences are also only the case when the Alphas are selected. Without Alpha in the equation the powers are recharging in about the same amount of time. So that extra global recharge is serving almost entirely just to stay even.

I don't think such marginal benefits are worth underslotting core powers and dropping the Leadership pool entirely. To each their own.

Ah, fair enough. Yeah, Power Boost is definitely an incredible boost to any Emp build. As you say, its personal prefererence. I decided that the buffs were good enough that I could skip PB and go for softcap s/l.

Looks like a very solid build. It's the kind of build I'd recommend to someone looking for a midrange build.

Pros:

• Powerboost yumminess
• High recharge
• Well slotted powers

Cons:

• No AoE damage
• Very little personal survivability, just has Dark Embrace which isn't well slotted

Second build I have much the same feedback as the first. Very solid midrange build, just wouldn't suit my needs due to lacking in toughness and damage. Still very nice builds, thanks for sharing.

I will be going ahead with the SO builds for all my guides, as you say it'll be a good help for a lot of people.

Um, aside from not agreeing with how harsh you're being about Phillys builds, those adjectives you're using all mean pretty different standards of quality. Average and mediocre can be used more or less interchangeably, but fine is better than both and sub-par is worse than all of them.

Yep, you don't need an awesome build to be an awesome player. We've all seen lots of mediocre players with incredibly expensive builds and I'm sure we can all agree what an utter waste it is.

If you've got the time I'd be appreciative if you could also put together a build to show me how it could be done better. I've got my own issues with the build and my slotting, but it ticked the boxes I wanted. If its possible to get similar or better performance with less screwy slotting, I'd love to see it so I can improve my build.

Edit:

Phillygirl, it's not so much that I couldn't stay alive on a non-softcapped Emp so much as I wanted the additional toughness because it suits my aggressive playstyle and well, why not? I felt I was able to tick all the core Empathy boxes while getting the extra defense.

Your question was very reasonable, you've raised some very good points and I've appreciated your feedback. It seems we've just got fairly different playstyles (and thus build goals) but that's not a problem.

Thanks for your input

So you're reacting to something which not only wasn't present in my guide, but I explicitly argued against?

Well uh, okay. The expensive build thing is an interesting point though and its given me an idea. I think I'll be adding SO builds to all my guides, should help people looking for how the basics for a given set would work.

Okay, I'll have to wait for that build then. Maybe I'm misunderstanding something but I'm still not seeing what it is that my build is lacking which would make it, in your own words, much more team friendly.

As I said, I don't have a great deal of experience with Empathy so any helpful feedback is welcome.

It doesn't. Neither Destiny nor Spirituals recharge buff Judgement or Lore recharges. Musculature does buff their damage though, Interface also buffs them.

Spiritual buffing recharge on Judgement/Lore would be crazy. Well, more crazy than most Incarnate stuff already is.

It's Internet Money! Easy come, easy go

Well, why not? I knew the kind of performance I wanted from the build and I had the resources to get it. It's not like I had to strip other characters to make the build or anything. As I said in the guide, you don't need as much recharge as I've got, let alone softcapped s/l defenses. I just wanted them.

The softcapped smashing/lethal is also something I covered in the guide. It mitigates a huge amount of damage, being in melee or not. All gunfire from mobs, all energy blasts with a s/l component, its not just melee damage that s/l protects against. Ranged defense is definitely a very good alternative, I just prefer s/l because Scorpion Shield allows you to softcap it with relatively little power/slot investment, freeing up more of the build for other things like recharge.

If I could take Recall Friend I would have, it's a nice bonus. Flurry is there as a Kinetic Combat mule. The point about taking the rez earlier is a really good one, I should try and move that down in the build.

The problem with the Recall -> Rez combo is that it takes a lot of time. Run far away from the fight, spend almost 6 seconds porting them then rez them. I prefer to just rez them on the spot and hit them with Fortitude/CM as soon as they're up. Riskier, certainly, but a lot faster.

The Port/Recall combo works well right after a team wipe, but I've found its utility in normal teaming to be very limited.

How would you rebuild the character to be more team friendly? Other than Recall Friend, what is it I'm missing? I don't see how having overkill recharge means its not a team friendly build.