Siolfir

First, I'm of the opinion that Scrappers should never get it - if you want to use the set, make a Stalker. Some sets simply don't need to be ported, and it's not like Stalkers get every armor set, either.

However, on the occasion that the class that already has more damage and more survivability whines their way into a defense set that was designed specifically with Stalkers in mind, I'd replace it with Mask Presence (40' PvE suppressing stealth and 1.875% defense to all with scrapper modifiers) so that it at least behaves similarly.

I could bring Clooless Noobie along... she's my Energy/Storm Corruptor.

Player Vengeance doesn't buff perception, and while I don't know for certain that it's doesn't buff perception for Nemesis mobs I would assume that to be the case. I suppose I could go check with my DP/MM/Munitions Blaster, since she has Surveillance, but that's too much like research and I'm lazy.

And yes, Placating things or debuffing their perception can allow you to bypass things even if they do see through stealth. The essential gist of my post was to explain that unless you PvP, there really is no need to stack Hide with other layers of stealth - if it sees through Hide, it'll see through whatever else you stack with it.

My KM Stalker never had any issues with pop-up turrets or proximity bombs... but then, I didn't have the option of skipping Repulsing Torrent on her.



As for the previous post and dealing with problematic mobs which don't have KB protection... sure, it can be used for that. But if you already had Energy Torrent, a Nemesis Staff, and Focused Burst you didn't need RT to do the same thing. Even without any of those, Air Superiority does the same thing with a shorter animation and recharge time, while dealing more damage (to the problem target, anyway) for less endurance and not scattering everything away from you. Energy Drain needs things close by to heal, after all.

A couple of nitpicks:

Dominators don't have the #1 base melee damage in the game - they have the #2 spot after Scrappers. But if you're going to recommend a non-epic villain AT to go with I'd second Dominators since in general, you can say that they will do more single target damage than a Corruptor, but it's very build and situation-specific.

I think it was Frosticus that either ran the numbers for or did a pylon test with a Fire/Fire/Mace (pre-APP) Dominator that broke 300dps, and then a Bane build that was slightly higher.

Not being affected by Power Siphon isn't the only bad part, but it does serve to make the power irredeemable for any KM character I make. Sure, it's another ranged damage power you can use, but the set-wide secondary effect was excluded and it's not even a good damage power... compare the recharge, endurance cost, and cone size to, say the non-epic versions of Energy Torrent - which have identical values for all of those, higher damage, and lower magnitude knockback.

The numbers don't include criticals at all. As a rule I don't include them because they vary from 10% up to 31%, not including the guaranteed criticals from hidden status. If you want to account for them - still ignoring the guaranteed crits - just multiply the DPA number by (1 + critical% chance).

I'm also not sure if it has a higher critical rate than the rest of the set for Stalkers... it used to be listed separately but is now covered under a general scaling percent, the same way that Storm Kick is (it should also have a higher critical rate per its description). If the formula just calculates a value and returns it for the power to use, then the extra chance may or may not be accounted for. I don't run anything to keep track of how often I critical, so I don't know - it's probably a safe assumption, though.

KM has shorter recharges - and thus lower damage per individual activation, although not necessarily damage per activation time, which is used for DPS chains - for most of the powers in the chain when compared to EM.

A comparison, using damage scales:
Energy Melee

• Barrage: 1.32
• Energy Punch: 1.00
• Bone Smasher: 1.64
• Energy Transfer: 4.56
• Total Focus: 3.56

Kinetic Melee

• Quick Strike: 0.84
• Body Blow: 1.16
• Smashing Blow: 1.48
• Burst: 1.25
• Focused Burst: 1.64
• Concentrated Strike: 3.56

So Quick Strike is less damage than Energy Punch, Body Blow is less than Barrage, and Smashing Blow is less than Bone Smasher, although Focused Burst does the same damage. Concentrated Strike does the same base as Total Focus but doesn't have critical damage - and the effect of insta-recharge on Build Up doesn't happen at the same rate as normal Stalker criticals - so can seem to do less damage. But EM also has no equivalent to Burst, which as you posted can be very nice.

AVs don't resist -Resist, either.

Or, more specifically, their resistance to both damage and resistance debuffs is the same as every other mob's: it's their resistance of that damage type.

Examples:
So an AV that has 90% resistance to Cold and 0% resistance to Fire will, when hit by Benumb (-50% damage), have -5% Cold damage and -50% Fire damage. Tag them with Sleet (-30% resistance) before the Benumb and now you're looking at 87% Cold and -30% Fire resistance, meaning -6.5% Cold and -65% Fire; add in Heat Loss after the Sleet, before the Benumb, and you're at 83.1% Cold and -69% Fire resistance giving Benumb -8.45% Cold damage and -84.5% Fire damage.

Or why my Dual Pistols Blaster who has Surveillance (-14% resistance) can get -7.98% -damage on an Immunes Surgeon (0% resistance to anything) from Dual Wield with Chemical Rounds active when it should be -7% after using Surveillance first. -7% * 1.14 = -7.98%.

See:



If course, if you just want to add lots of -damage, a Tanker will get you the most mileage: Bruising will increase the already-larger -damage numbers. If you're looking to get the best use of Power Siphon, a Scrapper is the way to go - you'll have it available more often, for a higher damage buff on a higher base damage than any other AT. Throw in Shield Defense for even more +/- damage.

I personally made a KM/EA Stalker because the default animation colors blend so well together and it looks like you're wrapping the EA fields around your hands to attack with them, Burst is still a 100% critical from Hidden status despite being confirmed as a bug during open beta (I'm hoping they decided that it really wasn't), and Concentrated Strike can recharge Build Up instantly at the same rate that it recharges Power Siphon for Scrappers.

Brutes, as has been mentioned, will see some mild improvement from Siphon Power but of the ATs that can get it they have the lowest damage modifier and Fury drowns out the damage buff aspect. Besides, if you really just want a long duration damage buff for Brutes you can take Super Strength.

If you want to maximize the knockback potential, you would want a Defender: they get a higher AT modifier for KB than Corruptors do.

If you want to maximize annoying your teammates, I'd go with a Grav/Storm Controller, using both Gale and Dimension Shift (which is a far more annoying power to me than any knockback) as often as you can while Wormholing mobs off of the melee ATs and into the squishies, placing Singularity and Tornado in spots to thoroughly scatter everything, and making sure that you have the star so you don't get kicked after the second Dimension Shift. Bonus points for a hideous neon color on Hurricane which never gets turned off.

Shhh... people thinking like the post you replied to are probably the only reason it hasn't been nerfed. While I haven't specifically done the math on it, for sheer number of things it can shut down and keep down permanently I can't think of a better control set. And let's not even go into the Mind Doms that have soloed the RSF...

It's a fairly close estimate - the numbers for Death Shroud are listed earlier at ~27 damage per tick with slotting at 65% Fury, but Quills does less damage per tick (scale 0.15 instead of scale 0.2, so it would do a base of 6.256), and Blazing Aura does a little more (scale 0.22 for a base of 9.18).

With slotting and 70% Fury, those base numbers are multiplied by 3.35 for the final values of 20.96 for Quills, and 30.75 for Blazing Aura - it works out to around 25.86 dps for a Spines/Fire, and just over 24 dps for Spines/Dark or Spines/Elec. If it were allowed, Spines/Stone would do just over 23 dps since Mud Pots does scale 0.18 damage.

To summarize and just use integer values...
Spines/ at 95% slotting and 70% Fury:

• /Fire: 25 dps
• /Dark, /Elec: 24 dps
• /Stone: 23 dps
• /Other: 10 dps

Then you aren't looking in the right place, or don't understand what you're seeing when you look.

First, there is the chain of combo information that enables/disables the varying combo states. For example, Tanker Typhoon's Edge lists the following under "Self":

• Disable Dual Blade Status Mode 1 mode [Ignores Enhancements & Buffs]
• Disable Dual Blade Status Mode 2 mode [Ignores Enhancements & Buffs]
• Disable Dual Blade Debuff Mode 1 mode [Ignores Enhancements & Buffs]
• Disable Dual Blade Debuff Mode 2 mode (after 0.25 second delay) [Ignores Enhancements & Buffs]
• Disable Dual Blade AoE Mode 1 mode [Ignores Enhancements & Buffs]
• Disable Dual Blade AoE Mode 2 mode (after 0.25 second delay) [Ignores Enhancements & Buffs]
• Disable Dual Blade DoT Mode 1 mode [Ignores Enhancements & Buffs]
• Disable Dual Blade DoT Mode 2 mode [Ignores Enhancements & Buffs]

Then there is the part later on where the specific effects are flagged:

• Defense -0.07 for 20s If Dual Blade Debuff Mode 2
• ToHit -7% for 20s If Dual Blade Debuff Mode 2
• 25.36 Lethal damage If Dual Blade AoE Mode 2
• +0.67 Knockback If Dual Blade AoE Mode 2

If it's not completely obvious by the effects, which are listed in the power description, "Dual Blade AoE Mode" is the Sweep combo, "Dual Blade Debuff Mode" is the Weaken combo, "Dual Blade Status Mode" is the Empower combo, and "Dual Blade DoT Mode" is the Attack Vitals combo.

The ending power - in the example above, Typhoon's Edge, which ends two combos - will have the stats for the combo listed with the flag for the appropriate mode. Sweeping Strike and Blinding Feint would have the damage for Attack Vitals and self-buffs from Empower, respectively.

As mentioned before, that's entirely due to the fury gained by the mobs attacking you.

As for the math for critical vs noncritical, if you're just looking for final damage numbers you need to figure out how the AT modifiers differ. Your "1000% vs 775%" example is meaningless for many reasons, not the least of which is because it disregards this entirely - a Brute at 100% damage doesn't deal the same damage as a Scrapper at 100% damage, and normalized it would actually be 1125% vs 581.25%. That's still only useful when using damage scalars to account for things, and assuming a guaranteed critical on a Scrapper.

For a specific example of how damage auras really do compare, using Death Shroud the base damage of each tick does the following:
Scrapper: 12.51 damage
Brute: 8.34 damage

Let's add some +damage to the equation, and say that both have it slotted at 95% for damage:
Scrapper: 12.51 * (1.0 + 0.95) = 24.395
Brute: 8.34 * (1.0 + 0.95) = 16.263

Because Death Shroud doesn't critical, that's about as far as the Scrapper is going to get without more damage buffs.

A Brute hasn't even started building Fury yet, though. Once we get up to around 40% Fury:
Scrapper: 24.395 (no change)
Brute: 8.34 * (1.0 + 0.95 + 0.80) = 22.935

And at 65% Fury:
Scrapper: 24.395 (no change)
Brute: 8.34 * (1.0 + 0.95 + 1.3) = 27.105

A Scrapper can certainly do more damage, though: see what happens when you keep the 65% Fury and apply identical +80% damage buffs:
Scrapper: 12.51 * (1.0 + 0.95 + 0.80) = 34.403
Brute: 8.34 * (1.0 + 0.95 + 0.80 + 1.3) = 33.777

As you can see, it's not as cut-and-dry as saying "Brutes do more damage with auras", although when considering only internal buffs that's most likely the case over time. But as you can see from the applied damage buff numbers just above, the Scrapper will do more damage during a Build Up cycle - even if they didn't have a higher +damage value.

I think you mean that it doesn't even generate Fury, since it most certainly does deal damage.


If you have a working taunt aura already, it's highly unlikely that it's going to increase your Fury even if Quills added another to it. What it would theoretically do is make it harder for things to pull aggro off of you by resetting the taunt duration and adding damage from you to the mobs that are hit, but it won't let you bypass the aggro cap and if you're already the center of attention it isn't going to give you any extra benefit.

KM's Build Up cast time was reduced after the set went live - it was the 1.93 seconds that Power Siphon has initially. But I still couldn't tell you why the variations in cast times exist on KM's Assassin's Strike, Assassin's Blade (it's NB, not DB, btw), and Assassin's Slash. It's not weapon draw since Spines and Claws also have a draw, albeit a shorter one.

Yeah, that's a relatively new things. Older versions didn't have it, and I made a habit of editing the database after every update. But Hide's defense value while suppressed is 1.875% (as is Stealth's).

Also, yes Hide will stack with Stealth, Invisibility, Grant Invisibility, Group Invisibility, Arctic Fog, Steamy Mist, Shadow Fall, stealth IOs, and every other source of grantable or personal stealth that I know of that a Stalker gets. Outside of PvP or specific custom mobs in AE missions, this is pretty much meaningless - any mob that can see you through Hide's 150' PvE stealth radius ignores stealth no matter what level it is.

Since when did Baby New Year resemble a child?

Electric Assault got reduced damage (and endurance and recharge) on the melee attacks; the one that had the fewest changes was Ice Assault iirc: the only change was a larger radius and recharge for Ice Sword Circle.

I never found it very hard to use; I just treated it as I do Hurricane: toggle it on when you need something either moved or less problematic, and turn it off when the target is either dead, you're running low on endurance, or they're where you wanted them to go. Any corner works well, and I've used it to push mobs who fled out of the Sleet + Blizzard patch right back in.

Of course, I've since deleted the character that had it, and my Mind/Energy can use her secondary to push mobs where she wants them. It's not an every-fight sort of power, but I wouldn't say it's really all that hard to use.