Tonality

I think I remember that. Was that in Bill Z's results topic?

I think a lot of it has to do with the balance comparisons of specific sets.

Scrappers lose a lot of benefit from sets like Fire and Elec because of their 75% cap while brutes don't. That 15% drop in the hardcap really makes a big deal for sets like this, while other sets, such as WP, SR, and SD really don't suffer as much.

Yup, tankerminds with disposable pets would drive me crazy. Though, come to think of it, I don't recall exactly what role was intended of brutes originally.

For me, I could stomach a 5% drop in the hardcap, like khelds. But any further and I think it would really hurt those resist sets in the same way that they are for scrappers.

In any case I think I over-reacted and read into your post as a call for nerfs, which wasn't the case. My apologies.

Care to explain what I missed? Most of this topic isn't even discussing tank vs. scrapper but focusing on specific powersets.
Here's what I saw that was relevant:
(Emphasis mine)

From this post I can compare this with yours:

So, these numbers are arbitrary based on your sense of various sets, which upon further reading I see this:

Which you then completely ignored that you were also off on the scrapper's defensive values.

Furthermore, by comparing select sets, you're getting a very skewed impression. Especially since you picked SR and WP. SR with IO's is incredibly powerful. WP with IO's has a similar level of performance. You will likely find that comparing Fire Aura on tanks and scrappers might change your opinion.

The real reason you're seeing that is because of how much IO's change the balance of the game.

Then I see posts like this:

That leads me to think that maybe, you're not giving tanks enough credit on their damage either.

This is a better position to take. It's the DPE on tanks that is a concern. Rather than increasing the damage, reducing the endurance cost would make life better for a tank.

So what, exactly did I miss?

It isn't a bad set. It just doesn't quite fit the needs of a shield set. To increase your survivability, you want to aim for the soft-cap (45% defense to at least range and melee). If you can achieve that and still have room for a set like crushing, great.

My purpled build there could slot something like crushings if I slotted obliteration in Thunderstrike. However, I felt it better to have the rech proc and armageddon in that power for obvious reasons.

In the end, unless you spend a ton of money on that 3% PvP IO, you're not going to have room on for crushing impact because you're going to want your other powers to have various things.

Good. Patience pays off in the long run.

Yes. I bet a big part of that is blaze mastery.

As you are able, you may want to focus on more recharge. The build I first posted is what I'm running. It's expensive, albeit not quite the most expensive I've seen some use. I'm paying for the extreme amount of recharge, which lets me fire my heavy hitters a lot more often.

I wonder when people will stop trying to ask that brutes be nerfed without recognizing the role they play redside.

Moderate tanking skills needed? check
Good Damage output needed? check

Why?

1) Fury is only effective if you can survive the aggro.
2) How various archetypes blend redside is quite different than blueside. Damage output is typically shared with all AT's redside without a clear-cut role of a DPS blaster class. Stalkers maybe - but most sets aren't AoE focused.
3) Furthermore, the only reason a brute can tank at a level similar to a tanker is usually due to IOs. A lower base HP and base defenses really make a big difference in survival. Just ask stalkers.

Try exporting in PhPBB, Fruit Salad color scheme.

Now for the build:

1) Drop Barrage.
2) You can put off taking stamina for a while to help move up some other powers.
3) If you're going to go for a defense-oriented build, weave is nice. Otherwise, all it's really going to help you with is closing that elemental hole you have.
4) consider getting Elec-Fences. Those NPCs doing the drunk-walk are going to be wandering out of RTTC range, which is a bad thing. In fact, this is the one thing concern about this combo - the lack of AoE to hold aggro easily on a set that thrives on aggro, but has a weak taunt aura. You may need taunt. But hey, you're dropping barrage, right?
5) You took buildup fairly late. It's not terribly important but it's nice if you're wanting to get a nice burst of damage.

As for IO's, you're going to have to give me a budget, and the overall build goals.

+HP/Regen is going to be important, but you may want to add some defense onto your build. This means using kinetic combats, which can be expensive if you use the triple in that set.

What you'll do is use 4 of the kinetic combat for 3.75% Smashing/Lethal defense and use a 5th/6th slot for either a generic accuracy IO or something like Crushing Impact's Acc/Dam/Rech or Mako's Acc/End/Rech or Acc/Dam/End/Rech. You'll want better accuracy.

Leveling up, get a kismet +6% accuracy (to-hit) and slot that ASAP into combat jumping. You'll be glad you got it.

For your armors, grab Reactive Armor and 4-slot them. That gives you 1.25 Smashing/Lethal + Negative/Energy defense. You'll put those in Tough and Mind over Body.

They're expensive, but the LOTG set is ideal in your defensive toggles. Think of those as long-term investments.

The Numina set is nice in +HP and +Regen powers. It gives you +HP and +12% regen. Use generic health IO's until you can afford these.

4-slotting stamina/quick recovery with performance shifter (proc, end mod and 2 end mod/??) is the ideal.

3-slotting thunderstrike and 2-3 slotting devastation into Mu Lightning offers 2.5% nrg/neg defense and 12% regen/+HP. Plus the devastation hold proc is just amusing when it fires on anything below a boss.

Positron's Blast is the common choice in Ball Lightning. I'd probably use it in Elec Fences too (your immob will be perma with the recharge of Posi)

You aren't even using numbers. You're assigning some arbitrary scale based on subjective experience - and you even admit it.

Actually, Bill Z's results thread indicates that this would not be the case.

The results are in, take 2

Notice my choice of wording. I'm not suggesting it wasn't profitable. I'm suggesting that the profit they gained from free transfers wasn't significant enough for them to keep them from offering free-server transfers.

I would be very surprised if server transfers are even a decent portion of the income.

Atlas Medallion

Portal Jockey

Task Force Commander

Freedom Phalanx Reserve

Those links will let you know how to get them.

As for an affordable build, there are some routes to go:

6-slotted red-fortune over 4-slotted LOTG will give you a 2.5% range def bonus and 5% rech bonus. It's not as nice, but it's a LOT cheaper and gets you on the way toward your range defense.

I remember Touch of Death being fairly cheap on the market last I was on. It's been a while since I checked. Placing that in your single target attacks will help.

Grab the steadfast 3% def IO and slot it somewhere.

Those are the cheapest for the positionals. Skipping the zephyr KB protection will also help. You can fill in your AoE defense by 5-slotting Scirrocco in Lightning Rod and Shield Charge and using the 6th slot as a generic recharge IO.

The old standard, the SS/WP brute worked just fine with SOs. It's the high-powered Shield builds that need IO's.

Considering brutes and scrappers will outdamage a tank on average by 150%-200%, I'd say tankers are LOLdmg for farming. Dig around if you disagree with my numbers and you'll find that that range is accurate.

Off the bat, I'm thinking of suggesting DM/SD as a more synergistic pairing than NRG/SD. The -to-hit debuffs helping pre-softcap. The heal in siphon life is gravy. Plus, you can color your DM to have those pink pom-poms we all love.

Side by side, I have a lot of trouble even considering NRG when there's DM with siphon life, dark consumption and soul drain.

However, if you want to stand out, going nrg/sd is certainly going to get noticed.

If the OP isn't interested, I'm always interested in seeing builds.

Elec =/= Energy.
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Inv/NRG is Tyrant's powerset. There's in-game precedent for that combo.
I'll second Dark/NRG for stacking stuns, though TBH, brutes get a better mag fear effect on Cloak of Fear, so I might suggest a brute with that combo.
Fire/NRG is nice simply because you can pop the heal after using energy transfer.

For looks, I'm really not sure if any tanker set visually matches energy melee. Ice might if you color both sets right. Invuln also allows some coloring, which could be done to match Energy.

I think I'd go Inv/Nrg.

1) PvP event transfers. Suppose Shuriken_BladeX wants to have a PvP event on Infinity, and as most of the more PvP oriented players moved to freedom, having server transfers would let players return for events like this.

2) In a similar vein, special server events. If I find that a few devs or mods are on a particular server doing something crazy, I can go transfer over a character quickly and check out the fun!

3) The likely amount of income gained from server transfers wasn't that significant, given that they gave us free transfers for a month to begin with and then even extended it.

4) It allows people to flee [insert server name here].

Or Aion. Ugh.

I've considered it. But, in the end, I drop power surge and slot for defense. Popping a small luck easily soft caps my builds, and there's enough ablative there to usually survive defense debuffs (except rad blasts, but that's pure nrg, so I don't care).

I find the entire power underwhelming, considering outside of toxic damage, carrying Robusts around does the same thing without the crash. Hit the market, stock up when you need 'em and you're good to go.

If power surge stacked about 40% base defense, not more resists and didn't have the nasty crash at the end, I'd be more inclined to consider it.

I mean, you're an energy being. It's kinda hard to hit electricity.

<--- Owner of all things Brute.

(Well, not exactly, but I know my brutes)

You'll want to grab tough and possibly weave if you decide to layer on some defense with IO's on your build. Tough and Energize will change things for you.

I'm assuming you have the following attacks:
Swipe
Strike
Slash
Spin

That's up to and including spin.

I'm suggesting these powers instead:
Strike
Slash
Spin
Followup
Focus

Here's how I'd go 1-40 on the build using SO's. I'd frankenslot IO's at level 30 with whatever is cheapest on the market to get some better numbers in your attacks. For a final build, stack on melee or S/L defense to improve your survivability.

Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1.601
http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Level 40 Magic Brute
Primary Power Set: Claws
Secondary Power Set: Electric Armor
Power Pool: Fitness
Power Pool: Leaping
Power Pool: Fighting

Villain Profile:
Level 1: Strike -- Acc(A), Acc(3), EndRdx(5), Dmg(13), RechRdx(19), Dmg(37)
Level 1: Charged Armor -- ResDam(A), ResDam(17), ResDam(23), EndRdx(34)
Level 2: Slash -- Acc(A), Acc(3), EndRdx(5), Dmg(13), RechRdx(19), Dmg(37)
Level 4: Conductive Shield -- ResDam(A), ResDam(17), ResDam(23), EndRdx(34)
Level 6: Spin -- Acc(A), Acc(7), EndRdx(7), Dmg(11), RechRdx(15), Dmg(33)
Level 8: Follow Up -- Acc(A), Acc(9), EndRdx(9), Dmg(11), RechRdx(15), RechRdx(34)
Level 10: Hurdle -- Jump(A)
Level 12: Combat Jumping -- DefBuff(A)
Level 14: Super Jump -- Empty(A)
Level 16: Health -- Heal(A), Heal(37), Heal(40)
Level 18: Static Shield -- EndRdx(A), ResDam(40), ResDam(40)
Level 20: Stamina -- EndMod(A), EndMod(21), EndMod(21)
Level 22: Grounded -- S'fstPrt-ResKB(A)
Level 24: Focus -- Acc(A), Acc(25), EndRdx(25), Dmg(27), RechRdx(27)
Level 26: Lightning Reflexes -- Run(A)
Level 28: Energize -- Heal(A), Heal(29), RechRdx(29), RechRdx(33), RechRdx(33)
Level 30: Lightning Field -- EndRdx(A), EndRdx(31), Acc(31), Dmg(31)
Level 32: Boxing -- Empty(A)
Level 35: Power Sink -- EndMod(A), EndMod(36), RechRdx(36), RechRdx(36)
Level 38: Tough -- ResDam(A), ResDam(39), ResDam(39), EndRdx(39)
Level 41: [Empty]
Level 44: [Empty]
Level 47: [Empty]
Level 49: [Empty]
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Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Fury
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Set Bonus Totals:

• Knockback (Mag -4)
• Knockup (Mag -4)

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Set Bonuses:
Steadfast Protection
(Grounded)

• Knockback Protection (Mag -4)

Go AV or All-Around. Shield performs better at farming.

If you go AV, you want to softcap without using weave for better endurance efficiency. You also need lots of recovery/+end bonuses. You also need aid self.

If you go all-around, your build can cost a lot less. You can grab weave and save about 18% worth of defense bonuses in IO's (~6% defense x all 3 positions).

So, it depends on how much you really want to spend. Because, that AV soloer is also going to be a better-all around toon. But it will also cost you more. It also will farm decent.