Synaesthetix

*paging Cybercel to this thread to dispense Son/Elec knowledgey-goodness*

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Altough I'm tempted to do a Gamma vs. Gonzo shot now that the subject came up

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That would be awesome.

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from a minmax PoV munitions is a waste of time, the res is to only S and L and is low enough to not really save yo'self . I would say all the other epics are better, although i'm not a fan of longass click powers.

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But you can get a giant freakin' AoE snipe, you fool. All that Elec/Elec must have shorted out your brain (or what was left of it).

Jesting aside, I'd really only recommend Munitions for AR/*, largely because of the way you can cash in on the lack of redraw on the animations. CFR is a pretty standard hold, much like the other epic holds. Sleep Grenade is decent for soloing, so-so in good teams, and dire in bad PuGs - such is life. Body Armour, as an auto-power, has saved my [censored] more than once - probably not worth slotting, but it's okay to take the sting out of attacks - good AR/* Blasters have usually discovered other ways to avoid taking damage, so they don't need the uber shields other Blasters do. LRM is a hilariously amusing power, and can be put to good effect in the course of normal gameplay.

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Mesmerize: WHY the hell people say its a great power? i've got it at lvl 1, and i still dont understand...

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To each their own - some people like having an extra mez in their back pocket, some don't. I know that I'm always thankful for having Mesmerize whenever I get unwanted attention I can't turn my full focus to deal with. It's cheap, low-cost, and easily broken - pay your money, take your choice.

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that means you can perm-hold a foe (in pvp too)

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No-one can perma-hold anyone else in PvP, due to mez-suppression.

I'd be happy to chime in for a villains team with my level 50 MM, Antithetix, if I can make the date (whenever it is).

Who, after enduring 5 lifetimes' worth of debt, and accidentally aggroing countless groups of mobs, finally managed to limp his way to 50 after being dragged most of the way there by his awesome SG as part of their successful "Help The Sucky Underpowered Doms Level" campaign.

I know Filth would like to thank all the Freaks who kept sustaining him in his bid to become the first Batcow ever to hit level 50 in CoH history, and for our thoughtful tips and advice, and general good humoured sufferance of his frequent rambling diatribes over the SG Global channel. A special thanks to Light Petting (AWOL shopping) for being Filth's Spiritual Mentor over the last few months - Godspeed, wherever you are. o7

Time to go back to TP-Foeing some "nubs" in PvP zones, old friend!

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Rad also has a very nice single target stun/hi-damage power.

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And Fire has a very nice very high damage power, with no stun.

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Both are AoE-biased. Choose whichever you want, they don't differ too much.

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If you're going for AoEs, Fire > Rad every time. Rad is much less endurance intensive though.

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The immobolise isnt the useful part of the web grenade its the -fly.

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It's pretty simple for a PvP empath (for example) to be completely unaffected by -Fly powers. If you're relying on that to get you by, then you're going to find yourself screwed when you go up against a team/player with a little nous. Yes, it's useful, but it's not the be-all and end-all. Ironically enough, I find that Web Grenade (and other related powers, as found in Mace Mastery) are much more useful in taking down melee characters, because of the -Jump component - a godsend for my MM.

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Also team pvp strikes me as gank the squishy (well for a scrapper anyway) if you cant get to them then you're going to be struggling.

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There's more than one way to skin a cat - the better PvP teams I've seen in action tend to exploit vulnerabilities in their opponents, whether they be squishy or "non"-squishy. That's partly why I prefer zonal to arena PvP - there's less emphasis on getting kills at the expense of everything else, meaning you can occasionally get some quite good battles going on between non-squishies - albeit with the obvious trade-offs of being in the zones.

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The ranged -fly of web grenade is vital for anything that isnt spines otherwise in an open map with flying squishies you are out the game.

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I wouldn't say that - if the squishies are staying that far away from the action, they're probably not a great concern anyway, and your attentions are better spent elsewhere. Furthermore, the majority of players who take Fly also don't take CJ > SJ > Acro, thus making Petrifying Gaze a useful tool to bring them back down to earth (Knockback/down should have the same effect, but good luck getting into Torrent/Energy Torrent range).

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Thanks for the help, I can really see myself enjoying Sonic/Cold, with the damage figures rising and rising every strike (and the annoying sound effects for maximum damage). Then again, I can see myself enjoying Ice/Dark, which complicated things.

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Play both, then! That's my solution (and is the reason I currently have toons I play on Zukunft and Vigilance ).

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If I take Siren's Song and not Howl, then I won't have a regular AoE attack, unless you count Sleet.

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I don't class Sleet as an AoE attack. Sonic just isn't an AoE attack set (Fire and AR both are). Howl is a token gesture towards an AoE attack, but it's not much of one. IMO, it's better off as a cone -Res debuff, stacking with Sleet - YMMV, that's just my take on the set.

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If I take Mu Mastery, then with the Power Sink and Heat Loss will I need Stamina?

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That depends on whether you're planning on doing any exemping, or PvP, really. Exemping below level 38 will reduce your +endurance/+recovery powers to a big fat 0 if you go Stamina-less. I'd also hate to have to get to level 38 before I had any blue in my endurance bar, so you'd probably have to respec into it. I do think it'd definitely be a feasible solution for a post-41 build.

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And how useful would a pet be? I'm thinking that it could be a nice help in a problematic situation.

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I'm split on the pets - some of them, I quite like, some of them I don't think so highly of. Again YMMV, but Adepts don't seem especially noteworthy, certainly not noteworthy enough for me to consider taking. My personal philosophy on PPP Pets is that they're only worth taking if you're prepared to slot them heavily, and if they're not worth slotting heavily, you probably shouldn't be taking them. You could feasibly use the Adept to help with end-draining foes, hypothetically speaking, stacking with Heat Loss and Power Sink.

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drawn by yours truly.

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Me next, me next!

No, seriously. If you do it, I might even let you kill Gonzo.

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weapon mastery is awesome, don't know why more non spines scrappers don't go weapon. Weapon mastery gives you more utility.

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And Darkness Mastery gives you a non-Lethal (and ranged) damage type, which is useful for everyone who isn't Dark Melee.

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So, how about Sonic/Cold? Could there be problems with it? It looks pretty cool to me, from the start I can lower a target's defense and resistance, making my attacks more powerful and accurate. The only problem with the combo is that I can't heal myself, but if I find that to be a problem I can take Aid Self (I'll probably take Aid Other anyway).

Now, I'm pretty sure that I won't take Siren's Song and Shockwave (don't want a sleep/knockback), but are there any Cold Domination powers that I might want to skip? They all seem good, yet if I take all the powers then I'll certainly won't be able to get Aid Self.

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It's not just lowering their Dam Res and Def, but also lowering their rate of attack. This in itself makes Sonic/Cold a great partner to any other AT, so I really wouldn't worry about picking up Aid Other (and to a lesser extent, Aid Self). Corruptors are definitely not heelors.

I think from the outset, or as early as possible, you have to figure out what kind of way you're going to play Sonic/Cold, as you can create a very potent self-sufficient offence-oriented toon or a great support character for both PvE and PvP, but there's not really room to do both. Personally, I've discarded Aid Self and the Medicine Pool from my build, and taken Siren's Song as my Get Out Of Debt Free card.

The most easily discarded powers from /Cold are probably the shields, especially Glacial Shield,0 which is something of a pity, as they are quite aesthetically pleasing shields. It's also worth noting that they're also more effective since the I7 changes. If you're going fully offensive, you can probably drop Frostwork as well - though you can expect to meet a lot of glum-looking Brutes on your way to 50. I wouldn't advise skipping any of the other powers, really - Snow Storm, Artic Fog, Benumb, Sleet, and Heat Loss are all excellent buffs and debuffs alike.

As far as Sonic/ goes, the best -Res you can achieve on a Single Target is from spamming Shriek, IIRC. Shriek, Scream and Shout make for a great attack chain on their own, and Screech is a good mez to have in your back pocket (especially when teaming with Energy/ Brutes). Amplify is a no-brainer, anything that increases your damage is a must-have, really (as much as you can have "must-haves" in CoX, anyway). The rest are largely optional - Howl is an okay cone, but nothing amazing; Shockwave is an okay "Get Away From Me!" power, but it does cause a chunk of aggro in the process and risks knocking foes out of some of your debuffs; Siren's Song is useful to have for solo and in teams who know how to act around Sleeps - but not so good for random PuGs, and the vast number of players who think the "Zzz" animation means "Attack Immediately"; Dreadful Wail is an awesome nuke - but only if you like nukes.

I'm happy that I've created a build that is good for support, whilst being able to provide a decent chunk of *CRUNCH* when it comes to inflicting the pain, even if it does lack a self-heal. I was also highly tempted by the [Siren's Song] + [Heat Loss] + [Dreadful Wail] combo, though I've yet to see how that works out in practice.

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we'll we are still in our go... people left so i'm keeping the mission from resetting until tommorow morning.

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What's your team composition, if you don't mind me asking?

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Thanks for the info from the guys from Union Server it helped alot.

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No problem at all, happy it helped - and congrats!

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I se 4 possible explanations.
a) Grav/Energy is overpowered around lvl 25.
b) Dominators in general are overpowered around lvl 25.
c) There is some bug that make the resist de-buff from the zone work as a buff instead.
d) The Exempting is not working properly.

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e) The heroes you were fighting weren't slotted with SOs/were at the lower end of the level cap for the zone.

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I still think its probably going to be too easy then. but at least, small servers like zukunft get the chance to get HOs

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Or to not get HOs. (I didn't get one at the end of the SF despite receiving all the other rewards, and petitioning didn't get me anywhere. I enjoyed the SF though, and that's more important. )

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Dratz! (no SHO? )

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Got a level 53 Endred instead, woop woop. \o/ I petitioned it.

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...but please don't tell me it took 12 hours...o_0 ?

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Nope, it took just shy of 10.

(We had to do a couple of nuke/Shivan runs in the last mission, we stormed through until that point, really.)

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Tactic suggestions anyone?

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Having just completed this, I'd advise taking the following action:

Buff Up with the Corrs you have;
Get half the team to spawn Shivans;
Chug Insps like candy: Reds, Purples, Oranges and Yellows;
Use 4 Bio nukes;
The other half of the team spawn Shivans under the FP to take Alpha;
Drop 4 Chem, then 4 Nukes on the FP;
Take Numina down, not only is she Psy and weak, she's their main buffer;
Take Psyche down, her Total Domination will wreck you if you let her go;
With luck, you might get to take out the third FPer, who should be Manticore. He has Leadership and does nasty things with his arrows.
>> At this point, you'll probably team-wipe. Don't sweat it. <<
Regroup, and get ready again.
Buff Up with the Corrs you have;
Get half the team to spawn Shivans;
Chug Insps like candy: Reds, Purples, Oranges and Yellows;
Use 4 Bio nukes;
The other half of the team spawn Shivans under the FP to take Alpha;
Drop 4 Chem, then 4 Nukes on the FP;
Take Citadel down, he's better off out of the picture whilst he's debuffed (he seems to lack AoE defence, from my observations, but I could be wrong);
Take BAB down, he should drop surprisingly swiftly;
Take Synapse down, as he does heavy, fast damage;
>> At this point, evaluate where you are - if most of the team is alive, keep going; if you're three men or more down, back off and regroup. <<
Take Statesman down, he throws you off your stride if you try to take Posi down first;
Take Posi out, he's surprisingly tough but will go down much more easily with all your focus on him.
Dance the Funky Monkey under Atlas.


The only way our team managed to make any inroads was with brute-force - trying to pull was a waste of time and effort. As far as general tips go, I'd advise not trying to rez people straight away if they drop - make the most of your buffs. Also, always stick to the original plan - don't split off to kill another hero unless you can take them out on your own, distracting people from their objective can and will lead to teamwipes.

No HO, a badge short... but victory has never tasted quite as sweet. Great work, everyone.

Give me a time, I'll try to show up and lend my support (and the ability to SK someone to level 49 if necessary). I should be around after about 2000 BST, possibly beforehand.

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all the squishies have knockback protection. And i think Vigiliant is fairly good claws/Sr and so is your friends synathethix claws scrapper. They just tickle.

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And I've taken out your Ice/EM Blapper one on one with my Claws/SR (pre-I7, without using Elude) - so I guess you could say I tickled you to death? It'll be even easier now, btw, with the toggle-drop changes - being able to use Follow Up without losing all your toggles in the process will massively increase the Claws damage output. Don't take my word for it though, X can give a good account of how much damage Claws can do in the right hands from a fight-night on Test.

It might not be the best duelling set, but Claws is assuredly a viable primary in PvP.

Raging_Speedhorn:
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2. Myself and Khorrighan are spokespersons on this forum.

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Anarky:
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We are sorting things so they will work for most ppl, so a bit of patience and we will post the info in the offial forums.

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I'm not wanting to pour cold water on someone trying to be helpful, but if you're going to go to the lengths of naming spokespersons... you might want to use them, or at least defer to them?

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AR/Ice has the ice patch+ignite combo, which is just beautiful. Other than that, it doesn't have too much going for it.

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Or Chilblain+Ignite, for a touch of variety. Shiver might conceivably be useful in keeping mobs together for your big cones (Flamethrower, Full Auto), but you'll probably just be better off firing them off on their own in most cases...

... hey, at least Build Up is nice. And the sword, that's quite pretty too.