Siolfir

Tested with my DM/Nin just now in RV; with just set bonuses, Combat Jumping, Danger Sense, and Ninja Reflexes I needed to pop Retsu to break 45% (49.77% Ranged, 48.74% Melee, 46.11% AoE). Otherwise it's low-30s for everything.

So, perma-Retsu for the soft cap with Diminishing Returns; roughly 95-100% defense.

I'm going to assume that the same player would be playing either one, so skill is irrelevant.

To play? Brute - I like the Fury mechanic since it adds a minigame while you're charging from spawn to spawn.

To have on a team? First or second melee, Brute - they have a few more hit points and so end up a bit more survivable; the fact that the pseudo-gauntlet will gather mobs around them for AoE carnage is icing on the cake. Past that, Scrapper - yes a Brute can maintain Fury on a team with everything focused on something else, but it'll be a pain and at that point you're just adding damage. Note that I'd rather have a debuffer, Kinetic, or AoE-heavy Blaster over either.

[ QUOTE ]
Common IO res, Aegis res and res/end
Common IO def, LotG 7.5 rech, LotG def

If your budget doesn't stretch to the LotG special, try Gift of the ancients def and def/run speed instead.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is how I did it on my FM/SA; if you want a slightly cheaper route you can look at the lower-priced sets for frankenslotting but the set bonuses you get for that setup help address the Granite penalties and give a little extra regen.

Agreed on those points - but they could choose to arbitrarily make that decision.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The devs said (when power proliferation was first being talked about and around the time that they announced which sets) that heroes wouldn't get Poison and villains wouldn't get Empathy.

Traps, on the other hand, wasn't ever mentioned.

[/ QUOTE ]

Irrelevant anyway. Whatever arguments they used to deny Villains Empathy are now out the window as soon as Going Rogue arrives and each side effectively gets access to every powerset in the game whether it "seems" good or evil.

There is no longer any reason to deny any particular AT a powerset based on "good vs evil" because every AT will be both a hero and a villain AT.

[/ QUOTE ]
Yes and no - since it's going with a system to determine whether you're a hero or villain based on actions, they could simply have the Empathy powers move you along the path to being "heroic" (or inversely, the Poison powers moving you to "villainous"). It could be reinforced so that the reasoning behind the lack of proliferation is upheld, despite any logical reasons why it shouldn't. Note that in my mind there's no reason not to proliferate either one if you're going to do all the others, I was merely commenting on what the devs said about proliferation.

But Poison Trap is available in Traps, which they didn't say wouldn't be proliferated (aren't double negatives grand?), and of the two versions (Poison vs Traps) it's the superior power. So yes, eventually you should be able to put it on a Defender or Controller.

[ QUOTE ]
In general I agree with the above poster, but with a slight difference of opinion.

I think the 2nd hold in Ice/ is garbage because its animation is simply way too long. Its just not worth it IMHO.

I think Rad Infection is fantastic at every level of PvE and one of the real pillars of /Rad.

[/ QUOTE ]
To rebut this slightly, I don't particularly like Bitter Freeze Ray either - but I did take it when I respecced out of Fallout since it would use the same number of slots and I never got a chance to use Fallout because nobody was gracious enough to die without trying to run away from the mobs that killed them (greedy bastages ). The long animation is meaningless since it's mainly used at the very start of a fight, and followed up with Freeze Ray immediately so a spawn has 1 second to react before either the boss or 2 "problem mobs" are held as opposed to the recharge on Freeze Ray plus one second. I've also been known to use it to tag runners just because mine's slotted with 3 Mez/Dam HOs and unlike the rest of my single target chain, which may be recharging, it's almost always available because I use it so infrequently.

As for RI being wasted at high levels, it's largely due to the last "con" listed. By the time you've finished the over-3-second animation, if anyone else is attacking your target it's dead and you get to wait for it to recharge. If I put it up on hard targets that will live longer than 5 seconds, that's invariably the mob that everyone concentrates on. A lieutenant in the back of the spawn? It'll live slightly longer than a minion after the AoEs go off, but not much longer - and often times the lieutenants have annoying issues with anchors (see: Nightwolf Champion, Tsoo Sorcerer, Sky Raider Porter - all of which tend to disappear and draw in more spawns that aren't covered by the toggle. If you have to manually detoggle it due to running, that's just as bad as the anchor dying...).

So I just throw up EF so everything dies faster, and occasionally LR to keep things clumped together more. I save RI for soloing, when I'm the one deciding when the anchor dies, and it's great then. It's more of a team frustration issue than a problem with the power.

High Pain Tolerance is +20% hp.

High Pain Threshold is +10% hp.
Invader is +5% hp.
Born in Battle is +5% hp.

Kinetic Combat offers +1.5% for 3-slotting it, as do Mako's Bite and Touch of Death - all three sets are used frequently for attempting to boost defense.
Luck of the Gambler and Crushing Impact both offer +1.13% and are also fairly commonly used in many builds.
Devastation provides 2.25%, and Apocolypse is 3% if you really need that extra boost.

To cap the hp on a Stalker you need +33.3% hp; you certainly don't need all of (or any of) the accolades if you take HPT, slotted or no.

And if one slot is so hard to come by on your build (2 slotted with 50 common IOs HPT is +28.3%, add in Invader and you're capped) then I suggest that there might be some other powers overslotted. If anything I'd complain about the wasted power pick of HPT over the fact that you'd have to put an extra slot (or two, for the Res/+Def IO(s) but you also have MOB for that/those) in it.

[ QUOTE ]
With WP, it's very easy to self cap your HP with just HPT and the accolades. Both sets have a click heal, so Hasten is always recommended (plus it gets Lightning Rod available more often).

[/ QUOTE ]
IIRC if you slot HPT for heal, you're capped with just Invader, forget the other Accolades. My /Nin is capped on hit points with accolades and the set bonuses I ended up getting while trying to soft-cap her defense.

Stalkers in general are easy to self-cap hit points. If you're unable to cap WP you're not even trying.

The devs said (when power proliferation was first being talked about and around the time that they announced which sets) that heroes wouldn't get Poison and villains wouldn't get Empathy.

Traps, on the other hand, wasn't ever mentioned.

Late to the thread, but just trying to get everything straight. So basically what you're saying is that you looked at the Mako Patron Pool for Brutes and wanted to throw up?

>.>

<.<

What?

[ QUOTE ]
I left my mez protect toggle running with my sm/wp and rested in front of a red con freakshow stunner. They have more than one attack, but stay at range, and weren't able to smoke me with their chain (just come damned close, and barely able to get back to full to survive a second chain, which is where you want it really.)

[/ QUOTE ]
I took my level 24 DM/SR and rested right next to a +3 (red con) Freak Stunner - they have more than one attack but only ever use Charged Brawl if you're in melee with them. Roughly 1/4 mil damage per hour, but the regen cap for base Brute hp at that level is 293k/hr so not too far off the mark.

whatireallydon'tgetiswhatallthefussisaboutformatti ngimeanreallyitjustslowsyoudownandasakinyouneedtob easfastasyoucan

Pros:
- good single target damage
- all of the yummy rad debuffing goodness
- multiple holds for stacking or taking out multiple problem mobs
- everything in your secondary is an AoE except the rez, meaning less time spent using it
- best nuke in the game

Cons:
- endurance hungry, both primary and secondary
- lower sustained AoE than most other sets
- lolIceBlast in PvP
- in general teammates tend to see "anchor" and think "target!"


It's pretty straightforward and honestly you can get by solo on Relentless with just your single target blasts, Freeze Ray, and Accelerate Metabolism. At low levels Radiation Infection is great but at higher level/difficulty it's almost a waste of time unless you're toggle-herding.

I see an awful lot of SS Brutes, and as the "new shiny" there are still Shield characters all over the place.

If I had to pick one powerset that I see the most, though, it would be Fitness.

[ QUOTE ]
I can't wait to try out a blood-red WS... Woohoo!

"The One"

[/ QUOTE ]
I won't be recoloring anything beyond the Speed pool powers on my new WS (Amethyst Wraith). You can probably guess why.

Cherry Tart (Elec/Rad Corr) and Cinnamon Drop (EM/WP Stalker) are going to have their secondaries changed to red, though. Going Rouge, indeed.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Capt. Bikini. And that was a dude!

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, someone should get smacked for that.

[/ QUOTE ]
Yeah, how dare they know the origin of the word!

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Keep the scrub weapons and scrub enemies in the scrub levels.

[/ QUOTE ]
A sword doesn't have to be magical or a light saber to be dangerous. Who says Cimeroran Traitors are scrub enemies? By your reasoning I guess all Natural Origin broadsword scrappers are scrubs too, because all they're using are the same big pieces of sharpened steel the Cimerorans are.

[/ QUOTE ]
Actually he frequently makes arguments saying as much and the gist is basically that he has an Inv/SS Tanker and so he should never take damage because he's "invulnerable" and deal more damage than anything else "because he's super strong" in the game because that's his "concept".

He wants to play Superman, only without having to worry about Kryptonite.

This is where I say that bumping threads is against forum policies, thereby sabotaging the whole point by bumping the thread while posting about not doing so.

In a vain attempt to make it seem like a legitimate post, I'll say that I haven't even bothered coming up with a PvP build for ElM/WP and that if you don't get satisfactory answers here you can always try the PvP section.

[ QUOTE ]
Fire Blast (useless secondary effect)

Willpower (too balanced)

Broadsword (cone attack comes too early)

Dark Miasma (all the powers are weak except Black Hole, which I keep on auto-fire)

Illusion Control (not all the Phantom Army guys are the same size)

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
AE buildings out of Atlas, Galaxy and King's Row, yesterday.

[/ QUOTE ]

A better solution: make the level of the AE mission dependent on the level of the zone, the same way that radio missions are. That is, if you're in Atlas, you can only play AE missions that are up to level 10. If you're in KR, you can run AE missions up to level 15. In PI and GV you can get any level mission.

That means that newbies have to go to PI or GV to run those auto-SK-to-46 farming missions.

It'll hearken back to the "good old days" of PLing at Portal Corp, and reduce the double whammy of AE and costume contests in Atlas.

[/ QUOTE ]
Note: while there is an AE building in PI, there isn't one in GV. Villains would have to go to the RWZ, which is level gated at 35, for arcs higher than level 40.

Even discounting the parity issue, I think that simply removing the AE buildings from the lowbie zones is the better solution. Let them learn to travel between zones first, then they can PL to their heart's content.

[ QUOTE ]

<some valid points snipped>

4) Few Mezzers: But tons of mobs with AoE heals, and every lieutenant or above is immune to mez. Combine this with ...

5) Melee Centric: Did you know that Arachnos Soldiers are weak to melee? Cimerorans tear my Bane Spider character up, even on lowest difficulty settings. The stacking -def(all) from all those spammed Broadsword attacks makes Cimeroran Traitors just about the only enemies that threaten my bots/FF mastermind, too. Let me guess: you're a tank with a resistance-based primary?

6) Enemies that are "just right"? Are you including that one spawn of 8 overlapping elite bosses? Or the long path going up the hill that tends to drop three spawns on you at a time (regular spawn, patrol from in front, patrol from somehow behind) right at the moment that the team lags out? No other TF or SF has ever produced so many consecutive team wipes for me, not even mission 3 of the Positron TF.

<more snippage>

8) Painless Maps: Except, of course, for the one map that lags everybody out just as they're coming into the middle of a swarm of overlapping ambushes. Or that cave where every 3rd spawn is a team-wiping Nictus crystal.

<snip>

10) Ample Reward: And deserves it, because it's a pain-in-the-neck TF.

11) Time: About right when it goes well, but time to completion is wildly variable, since your estimate of one hour doesn't include any of the time to line up the right mix of levels, doesn't include waiting for people to come back from any possible team wipes due to massive simultaneous elite boss fights or overlapping ambushes, and doesn't include however long the team spends standing around arguing about how we want to take down Romulus this time. I've had ITFs wrap up in less than an hour. I've had two of them give up at above the 3 hour mark, counting from when recruiting started.

[/ QUOTE ]

So, because you can't adapt your playstyle and are incompetent enough to "continually teamwipe" while almost everyone else posting has said that it's relatively easy, fun, and quick, the TF is the problem?

And since I don't know you, I'm just going by what you wrote. Your VEAT dies because you're too lazy to maintain range while mobs are closing in. Your team wipes on the cysts, presumably because nobody bothers to buff anyone else, try to debuff the enemies, or apparently build a character competently enough to survive a spawn that a mostly-SO'd Dark/Cold Corruptor was able to take out solo. You cite the healers as a problem when anyone with two neurons to rub together would be able to think to kill the minion that's causing the issue, and not only is "they can't be mezzed" just flatout untrue but if you have to have something mezzed and unable to attack in order to fight it then you should stick to bubble farms.

Learn2Play.

Keeping in mind I'm far from an expert, I'd drop HPT for SoW and make up the hp difference in set bonuses and accolades. It's very easy for a Stalker with accolades to cap hit points, my DM/Nin did it purely unintentionally.

[ QUOTE ]
At least scanners mix up the NPCs too. AE stuff? the Boomtown map covered with 500 of the same scantily-clad female Dual Blader - the exact same one. Same costume. Same hair. Same everything. BORING! Scanners are a relief in comparison.

[/ QUOTE ]
Now, now... some of them use the Steel Canyon map and Freakshow Lieutenants, and then there are the bubble farms.

[ QUOTE ]
Scanner missions, to me, are just as boring as people attempting to run farms.

[/ QUOTE ]
I agree with this - so instead I just try to see how many story arcs I can speedrun for merits and pick up levels as they show up. Stalkers are really good for this, but I've been doing well with my Warshade also.

If I'm really in a hurry to level I'll just get a friend to PL me the old-fashioned way, since I still need purple drops and there's no way I'm paying what some people are willing to drive the prices to on the market.

My preferred levelling is through TF/SFs, but that's sortof gated by how many people I can get to join me.

I don't PvP with my ElM/Nin (build's focused more on AoE damage for PvE), but I'd imagine that having an uninterruptible Assassin's Strike (that also throws in -endurance, a chance for stun, chance for -recovery, and chance for knockdown) is kindof nice.