City of Heroes: Live Forum Archive

Smoothjedi

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  1. Smoothjedi
    Here it is the 31st, and it still seems to be down.
  2. Smoothjedi
    There is really very little difference between the two. I don't really know why you only call crabs "pocket masterminds" when huntsmen only have one less potential pet.

    Huntsmen's attacks are mostly smashing and lethal, while many of the crab's base attacks (suppression, channelgun) are energy. Depending on their patron pools, they also could vary like toxic or energy again. Although huntsmen have the same power pools available, I am assuming the concept would prevent you from taking many. As these damage types are resisted far less than smashing and lethal, they are superior.

    As far as the rest of the class goes, it just depends on the variant. I think either way you go you will be far superior to many other ATs, but mainly given the fact that the main AoE crab attacks target less common enemy resistances is ultimately the tipping point in their favor.
  3. Smoothjedi
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Brakner View Post
    I prefer Electrifying Fences over School of Sharks , I couldn't handle the almost 3 second activation time, it drove me nuts. EF has just over a 1 second activation and allows me to move onto my other 3 AOE's. After 4 or 5 respec's this is what I use now...
    This is not a bad build by any means, and I will give some feedback on it since you posted it.

    First of all Bile Spray would be difficult for me to give up. The toxic attack synergizes too well with venom grenade. Therefore, I am pretty much stuck with School of Sharks. I can definitely understand your reasoning here though.

    I do like the chance for build up in your leadership. I think that is pretty well placed. I'll have to think about trying to fit that in somehow. Do you notice it go off pretty often?

    I do not like frag grenade because of the knockback effect. Do you find yourself having frag grenade up often when enemies are not under the effect of elec fences?

    I see you do not have your final pet. I find these are great for off cooldown damage, such as two aoe and two single target attacks. Number wise, they are comparable to your main character's powers. They also have some nice status effects too. Unfortunately another patron attack would be necessary, and I don't see how all that could fit in your build.

    I don't find it necessary to have all the enhancements in Health, to be honest. I only have numina's regen/recovery and our regen rates on both are pretty similar. I rarely have any problems with end recovery myself.

    Anyway a pretty good build, I'll have to put some thought into mu mastery and frag grenade.
  4. Smoothjedi
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Airhammer View Post
    Too many wives are illegal in the United States and Power Buttons are not emotional.

    And since you dont play my toon, you really cant tell me how I utilize my attack chain because I assure you i can push each and every button in the chain.
    Sigh, I wasn't trying to make social commentary. I was purely trying to relate the concept of having so many attacks that extras are wasted. Your comparison to an exceptionally beautiful wife in this context would translate into an exceptionally useful/effective power. I agree with this; a single extraordinary power would be essential to any build. If you have 10 of these extraordinary powers in your attack chain (or in the case of your original example, 10 incredible wives), some are wasted.

    Let me break it down for you further. I have no doubt that when you use your attack chain, you hit every button. The question is how many powers do you have to pick from at each time you push said button? Optimally, you would have 1. If you have 3 powers available each time the opportunity to use one comes up, then there are two powers you are wasting every cycle.

    This is the crux of my argument. Your attack chain sounds inefficient. Ideally to optimize your attack chain you pare it down so you only have one available each cycle. As your global recharge increases, you might be able to take another attack out of the chain and use the slot for something else, preferably a passive power or pet.

    I am not trying to say your build sucks, especially when I haven't seen it. I am certainly not trying to say it would not be fun to play, whatever it is. All I am arguing is that it is not as efficient as it could be.
  5. Smoothjedi
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Airhammer View Post

    There is NO kill that is quite as wonderful as OVERKILL !!!!!

    To me too many attacks is not even a concept. Its like saying I have TOO much money or my wife is TOO beautiful. No such thing.

    I can use every attack every fight all the time any time I want.. not an issue for me at all.
    It does become overkill when you can't use them all. You cannot possibly "use every attack every fight all the time any time" you want. The game has cooldowns to make sure you cannot. When you are cycling through those attacks, and you have 2-3 aoe powers sitting around not being used, that is overkill. An optimal set up to be the most effective is to have one attack power available every time you have a chance to use one.

    To counter your examples, the context of my overkill statement is you have too many powers, not that your powers are too effective. An accurate comparison would be you have too many wives to keep up with them physically or emotionally.
  6. Smoothjedi
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by dmcfarland907 View Post
    Um my Huntsman is hardly gimped
    I never said your guy was gimped, I just said it sounded like he was not as effective as he could be. As in my character, I do double stack assault, but I don't think the other leadership pool powers are worth it.

    I never made this sound like a pissing contest. However the title of the post is questioning whether a huntsman or a crab is more effective, and I felt I needed to put down some counterpoints to your arguments for picking one. The goal is to make your character more enjoyable by increasing his effectiveness, not to necessarily say he sucks compared to someone else.
  7. Smoothjedi
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Airhammer View Post
    However my current Crab Spider Major Havokk has SIX ranged AoE attacks ( seven if you count the Omega Maneuver )
    To me this is complete overkill. I have 4 (see my character above) and there is always one up. Why bother having way more attacks than you can even use?
  8. Smoothjedi
    Spiderlings are really easy to make perma though, so that's not a big deal.
  9. Smoothjedi
    I have to disagree with you dmcfarland. Crabs should be played for damage. Maybe part of your problem is web grenade? The benefits that its immobilize grants is not worth sacrificing the damage. Go Leviathan, get school of sharks and bile spray.

    Crabs get your "Heckle" and "Jeckle" pets as well. What exactly is the everything you're figuring in? From your post it just seems like you are sacrificing worthwhile abilities for less effective ones. Crabs are great out of the box, sure, but I spent a lot of time tweaking my build and enhancement setup. I think it paid off in spades. I don't think they are as straightforward as you think they are.

    Can you post your current build? I will post an approximate (powers and enh match my char, but not necessarily the order I took them) copy of my character. Could you post yours as well?

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  10. Smoothjedi
    I think you're putting too much value in soft capping your defenses. If you're doing +0/8 you need to just power them down before they have time to get to you. Here's an approximate copy of my current character. +0/8 is a complete joke.

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  11. Smoothjedi

    Huntsman Crab?

    POST-ACTION

    I'd hate to say it Gilia but that build does not look very effective to me. This is an approximate copy of my guy currently.

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  12. Smoothjedi
    I think the pets are some of the best investments you can make. It is good damage independent of your cooldowns. This is my current character. The enhancements are not completely optimized, but still pretty well built imo.

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  13. Smoothjedi
    I don't think Omega is worth it. You could be doing far more damage over time with other powers.
  14. Smoothjedi
    I have been playing my crab for quite some time. Personally I don't think the huntsman build stands up to the crab. I went crab at 24, and never looked back.

    First of all, build up is not all it is cracked up to be. It gives +20% to hit and 80% damage. Aim is on the same timer and gives +50% hit and +50% damage. It is less than build up for sure, but you still get over half of the bonus while being guaranteed a 95% chance to hit on +4s.

    You can summon 3x spiderlings that have ~49 damage each unenhanced on on a 3.8s cooldown. This is a significant boost to your single target damage that you may lose out otherwise. With an attack chain consisting of suppression, venom, bile spray, and school of sharks, one is always up. Since I can only fire my attacks so fast, having those pets doing damage off my cooldowns is very significant.

    Serum and fortification are very nice, and although it can be tough to tell at times how well your passive buffs are working, serum has consistently saved my butt many times.

    Web grenade seems kinda cool at first, but it does no damage. School of sharks does a significant amount of it, and is negative energy so tougher to resist. It does have the disadvantage of not hitting enemies in the air, but 95%+ of the time this is not an issue.

    Surveillance is nice, but it is single target. Great for AV's, but if you are playing an AoE character you shouldn't be worrying about single target dps anyway. Play to your strengths; let the scrapper/stalker deal with it while you take the pressure off them by killing everything else.
  15. Smoothjedi
    Hello,

    I am looking for some advice on my crab build. I have been playing with him for some time, and I have felt quite comfortable with my build up until recently.
    I never realized Arctic Breath had a -DR effect on it. As much as I would like to add this power, I can only feasibly replace my Coral Sentinel due to the level restriction of the power.
    I do really like the sentinel. My ST damage as a crab is fairly low, and he has some pretty heavy hitting attacks that are independent of my cooldowns. As far as single target damage goes, I chain channelgun and longfang repeatedly, paired with Aim occasionally. I really have to rely on the sentinel and my other pets to do this work for me.
    He also has two aoe attacks, which also do respective damage. These are also, of course, independent of my cooldowns. As I already have 4 AoE attacks where one is always up, I can't imagine finding time for another.
    On the other side of the argument, another -15% DR is mighty tempting, giving myself -55% DR against my big hitter Bile spray. The other effects such as the slow, etc are pretty appealing as well.
    Anyway those are my thoughts, what do you guys think? I am posting a chunk that copies my current loadout. I literally just copied my character directly, so don't pay attention to my level placement of slots, or powers for that matter. Although I tried to be accurate on the order of my power selection, I did make this export in a hurry.

    Thanks!

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